53 replies to this topic

[focuspark]

are we really attempting to bring real world physics into a game about giant stompy robots? If we are, then the big walking tanks are the first things to go...

In the real world more damaging projectiles travel faster because e = m * V^2 and "e" does the damage. AC/2 should travel the slowest and shortest distances while AC/20 should travel the fastest and do the most damage. This is real physics but it would make for an unbalanced and ****** game.

Gauss (which is not rail, it's coil) is what it is as an attempt to create a balanced and fun to play game. Not because this is a real world combat emulator. If it was, see previous comment about not having mechs in it.

[CallMeGunny]

Guass is already one of the easiest weapons to aim. So my response:

No.

[Steel Talon]

Skadi, on 18 March 2013 - 02:09 PM, said:

none of the sense is being had.
well this post now looks like **** because i cant use the enter key on this site anymore for some bizarre reason, but rail gun=/=gauss rifle.

Its actually coilgun technology, which has even higer velocities ~5000 m/s.
Just from physical perspective it should be faster than any chemicaly propelled weapons, adding charge-up time is possible & realistic.
In MW:LL gauss look more like hitscan how it is fast.
Slug wont penetrate today tanks at 1200 m/s, barely WWII heavy tanks

[Skadi]

Steel Talon, on 19 March 2013 - 01:26 PM, said:

Its actually coilgun technology, which has even higer velocities ~5000 m/s.
Just from physical perspective it should be faster than any chemicaly propelled weapons, adding charge-up time is possible & realistic.
In MW:LL gauss look more like hitscan how it is fast.
Slug wont penetrate today tanks at 1200 m/s, barely WWII heavy tanks

We also have a 5 UAC5 dire wolf in MWLL, and we used to have a 2 AC10 and AC20 atlas, alias Bubble Boy.

[focuspark]

Steel Talon, on 19 March 2013 - 01:26 PM, said:

Its actually coilgun technology, which has even higer velocities ~5000 m/s.
Just from physical perspective it should be faster than any chemicaly propelled weapons, adding charge-up time is possible & realistic.
In MW:LL gauss look more like hitscan how it is fast.
Slug wont penetrate today tanks at 1200 m/s, barely WWII heavy tanks

Again... projectile velocities were chosen based on gameplay needs and fun factor, not realistic values.

[Steel Talon]

focuspark, on 19 March 2013 - 02:41 PM, said:

Again... projectile velocities were chosen based on gameplay needs and fun factor, not realistic values.

High projectile speed is iconic ability of gauss rifles, when it's lower than most ACs, it breaks the fun factor u stated.
There are more "invisible " ways to balance it out!

[DeadlyNerd]

LOL

As I see it, this is a pop tart OP who wants his gauss to match the speed of his PPCs and is trying to get that by comparing other ballistics, namely autocannons.

Fail is fail and all who voted yes on this also seem to be pop tarts, so they're fail too.

Gauss speed is fine.

EDIT:

focuspark, on 19 March 2013 - 10:50 AM, said:

In the real world more damaging projectiles travel faster because e = m * V^2 and "e" does the damage. AC/2 should travel the slowest and shortest distances while AC/20 should travel the fastest and do the most damage. This is real physics but it would make for an unbalanced and ****** game.

The physics behind current ACs is in a way plausible but is completely irrelevant since real BT autocannons don't fire single shots of giant projectiles, but bursts of smaller projectiles.

The shorter range of large autocannons was justified by the recoil and spread of the burst.
If it was done like that, every AC would have the same projectile speed, only different bursts, WHICH is actually a VERY plausible logic.

Edited by DeadlyNerd, 20 March 2013 - 01:53 AM.

[Gryphorim]

Slanski, on 14 March 2013 - 03:27 AM, said:

Make its projectile speed 3000M/second, but add a delay while the capacitors go to full charge and the weapon discharges. Net result: highly accurate at long ranges, but difficult to aim close up. It doesn't matter if the target is at 600m or 1500m, but the weapon is much harder to aim at 100m, bringing it into line. I resent the ease with which Gauss takes out lights at 50m.

This sounds damn good, balance wise

[Steel Talon]

DeadlyNerd, on 20 March 2013 - 01:41 AM, said:

LOL

As I see it, this is a pop tart OP who wants his gauss to match the speed of his PPCs and is trying to get that by comparing other ballistics, namely autocannons.

Fail is fail and all who voted yes on this also seem to be pop tarts, so they're fail too.

Gauss speed is fine.

1200 m/s is not fine, no need to compare anything, even fastest chemicaly propelled gun cant compete with electromagnetic based weapons.

[Slanski]

@Gryphorium: Incidentally this was how it worked in MW2. Annoying, but balanced.

[Steel Talon]

Look at MWLL, nothing to say about gauss here, they work perfect!

[focuspark]

Steel Talon, on 20 March 2013 - 03:31 AM, said:

1200 m/s is not fine, no need to compare anything, even fastest chemicaly propelled gun cant compete with electromagnetic based weapons.

Yeah, don't be so sure about that. Checkout the Enhanced Hypervelocity Launcher for a chemically propelled gun that fires slugs faster than rail and/or coil.

Rail and coil guns are massive, so this is a completely viable comparison. Additionally, there's no reason hydrogen burst technology couldn't be miniaturized and be the tech powering BT AC weapons. If it was, then we could reasonably say that the devs have artificially reduced the speed to make the game more fun. Having basically instant hit weapons means lasers see no advantage at ranges within the games limited draw distance.

[Deathlike]

Gauss seems a tad slow, relative to the existing ACs (the AC2 is insane, but whatever). Boosting it up to 1500 sounds about right, since that is 3/4 the speed of a PPC, which AFAIK is the fastest projectile on the field (on par with the AC2).

Edit:

I would like to add that the AC5/UAC5/AC2 serves a completely different purpose than than the Gauss rifle, and are required to be reasonably fast to consistently hit exposed targets. Gauss has to be faster than the AC10/LBX10 for sure, so yes, it does need a speed boost over the AC5 as it currently stands.

It only takes 3 UAC5 shots (2 UAC5s with 1 of the UAC5s jamming) in successful succession to do the same damage as Gauss.

Edited by Deathlike, 20 March 2013 - 08:20 AM.

[Slanski]

Chavette, on 18 March 2013 - 02:38 PM, said:

Its already like that, if you're playing from the other side if the world. I can almost count to 2 from when I click the button and it explodes 500m from me. Not sure what you're aiming for.

For someone playing at ping 20-60, it's not like that. He points and shoots, hitting close up targets absolutely accurately. Latency and ping are another matter, but my balance doctrine says if we give it very high projectile speed (3-4k m/s), we need to ensure that it's not a jack of all trades equally good at close range (traditionally it had a minimum range). A short delay, while you hear the deep humming sound of the capacitors going to full, with a following discharge would give you the rail/coilgun feel, mostly obey real world physics and plausibility and be balanced gameplay wise as well.

PPC: No delay, high projectile speed.
AC: No delay, inversely proportional projectile speed to shell calibre (AC2 fastest).
Gauss: Charge delay, very high projectile speed.

Then the artificial vulnerability of the weapon system with its 3hp, which takes it out of commission on any direct hit can be rolled back and we're as close to canon as possible, while maintaining balance and plausibility. Afterall we're all nerds here.

Edited by Slanski, 21 March 2013 - 04:32 AM.

[Steel Talon]

Railgun shot:
http://youtu.be/i1q_rRicAwI
Actually slower than potential of coilgun technology

[Strongpaw]

Info taken from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Railgun

As weapons




Drawings of electric gun projectiles
Railguns are being researched as weapons with projectiles that do not contain explosives, but are given extremely high velocities: 3,500 m/s (11,500 ft/s, approximately Mach 10 at sea level) or more (for comparison, the M16 rifle has a muzzle speed of 930 m/s, or 3,050 ft/s), which would make their kinetic energy equal or far superior to the energy yield of an explosive-filled shell of greater mass. This would decrease ammunition size and weight, allowing more ammunition to be carried and eliminating the hazards of carrying explosives in a tank or naval weapons platform. Also, by firing at greater velocities, railguns have greater range, less bullet drop, faster time on target and less wind drift, bypassing the physical limitations of conventional firearms,

[Dorynn]

Slanski, on 21 March 2013 - 04:29 AM, said:

PPC: No delay, high projectile speed.
AC: No delay, inversely proportional projectile speed to shell calibre (AC2 fastest).
Gauss: Charge delay, very high projectile speed.

I like this. It would reduce the effectiveness of those ridiculous 'poptart' builds, and it'd be in line with canon, since the gauss has a massive capacitor it uses to power the coils (that's the thing that blows up when you shoot the rifle).

[0X2A]

Just a random idea:
->Make gauss projectile speed variable by "charging" capacitors while holding fire (Maximum of 1,500m/s Minimum of 750m/s)
->Increase gauss range to that of ERPPC
->Shots fired at 750m/s do 10 damage
->2 second cooldown for 750m/s shots
->2 second charge for 1,500m/s shots
->Capacitor charge is lost when diverting power stabilize in flight shots, resulting in a 750m/s shot.
->Gauss rifles squishy-ness keeps it from becoming a AC/10 substitute.

[blinkin]

MasterErrant, on 18 March 2013 - 03:11 PM, said:

I think if you look at it PPCs and lasers have a visible flight time. and thety are light speed weapons

despite what you may be seeing lasers are hitscan weapons. this means you pull the trigger and the computer immediately finds the first object that intersects that line. it is as instantaneous as a computer can get. and as far as human reflexes are concerned (and for that matter computer input), even at the most extreme ranges of the ERlarge laser (actually the range does not matter at all for hit scan everything gets hit at the same time regardless of distance) there is no dodging of lasers.

in computer terms time stops (literally) whenever a laser is fired. the server goes into the laser subroutine and completes the hitscan operation THEN it goes back to the other operations. this is not unique. all current computer programs run operations one at a time. even multithreading is done this way. the difference is a multithread based program is split up into several programs. each processor in a multicore system does EXACTLY one calculation at a time. but back to the original point. programs run through processors single file, but they do so at an extremely rapid speed so we percieve the MWO reality in a timely rate.

tldr: when running the laser hit detection function the game stops completely until that operation is finished, but this pause is far too brief for any human to percieve with standard senses.

and for the PPC we shall ask sarna:
http://www.sarna.net/wiki/PPC
The Particle Projector Cannon (or PPC) is a unique energy weapon. PPCs fire a concentrated stream of protons or ions at a target, causing damage through both thermal and kinetic energy.^[3] As such, despite being an energy weapon, it produces recoil.

^^if these particles were pushed out anywhere close to the speed of light the PPC would be ripped out of the mech and thrown backwards at very high maybe even relativistic speeds as a tear dropped chunk of raw metals that in no way resemble their original structure.

[blinkin]

focuspark, on 19 March 2013 - 10:50 AM, said:

are we really attempting to bring real world physics into a game about giant stompy robots? If we are, then the big walking tanks are the first things to go...

welcome to the world of scifi. where physics are invoked to explain everything up until science says that canon is wrong in some way (then we quietly stop looking at things).

in following with tradition:
giant mechs are a horrible way to fight battles like this, but for that matter so was standing troops in nice neat rows in an open field and roshamboing until one side is more dead than the other. <-we still did it for many running wars over several hundred years.

Edited by blinkin, 22 March 2013 - 08:57 PM.