463 replies to this topic

[Rigiroth]

The more I try to play this game, the more boats I see. It is either SRM boats, LRM boats, or PPC boats and they are really ruining the game. Mechs are simply dying too fast; the game is feeling more and more like an arcade shooter than a strategy game. I'm getting to a point where I feel like the game needs further mech restrictions (Like engine restriction for the 3L) to make balanced builds more viable and get mechs playing the rolls they were intended (3L was never meant to be a brawler, Catapult not meant to be a brawler)

I have no idea what to do about assaults though. Lore assaults are designed to be able to attack at all ranges to achieve balance, but with any sort of customization, people are going to specialize in short or long range and dominate the hybrid assaults.

Any thoughts aside from me taking a break from the game?

[Mechwarrior Buddah]

it doesnt need to address boating, boating is canon to the game.
The whole Catapult line IS a design of boats

[RiceyFighter]

I don't particularly like the idea of A1 SRM boat makes any below average player to good player. Same with Stalker LRM boats. 2 Good hits = death for any medium mech.

Edited by RiceyFighter, 14 March 2013 - 04:27 PM.

[matux]

Agreed it needs to be addressed, I've seen soo much illegal mooring every day the past few months its getting bad.

[Team Leader]

I think they just need to address LRMs, reduce their damage a bit. It's currently way too high, especially with accuracy increase. They're supposed to be a support weapon to soften the enemies armor before they get close, not melt an atlas in 4 volleys lol

matux, on 14 March 2013 - 04:28 PM, said:

Agreed it needs to be addressed, I've seen soo much illegal mooring every day the past few months its getting bad.

Have you seen that botch job on forest colony? Disgusting. You can tell those buffoons didnt have the proper credentials, I don't understand how they got to the controls of such a large amount of cargo!

[Mechwarrior Buddah]

matux, on 14 March 2013 - 04:28 PM, said:

Agreed it needs to be addressed,

so we should remove the A1 from the game for one cause theres no way to make that mech not a boat
Prolly should remove the Catapult line entirely given that theyre all pretty much designed to be boats

Edited by Mechwarrior Buddah, 14 March 2013 - 04:30 PM.

[GrimDeath]

I would like to see an matchmaker option to be able to drop in stock mechs only. It would probably be a ghost town, but one I'd like to see anyway.

[Homeless Bill]

When is the last time you bitched about a CTF-4X being able to load up four ballistics?

This is the problem:

Paul Inouye, on 14 March 2013 - 12:53 PM, said:

Interesting and very thorough testing by the OP and many kudos for the in-depth write-up.
This problem has 2 levels.

First is that Testing Grounds has quite a few issues when reporting damage and the numbers you're seeing are inflated quite a bit (almost double). We will be addressing this bug and others as Testing Grounds matures over time.

Second, this does NOT eliminate the findings that S-SRMs AND SRMs are doing more damage than intended. This is not due to some top secret, behind your back weapon balancing. It has to do with splash damage, how it was first implemented and the new smaller Mechs coming out.



Here is one of the scenarios described and I've turned on the debug tools to let us see exactly what is going on in terms of hits and damage being done.

The Raven 3L has just fired 1 volley of 2 x S-SRM2 at the Commando 1B. As you can see, the amount of damage done to the Commando does not make sense. There is a total of 51.5 armor being stripped off the Commando. We've been able to reproduce this repeatedly and we're getting an average damage of 12.9 per missile. Quite a bit higher than the intended 2.5 damage per missile plus splash damage.

So what has happened to cause this? Smaller Mechs and more complex geometry than what was available when the splash damage system first went into the game. When SRM splash damage went into the game, there were a total of 4 Mechs available to the playerbase. The Jenner, Hunchback, Catapult and the Atlas. These 4 Mechs have very unique targeting silhouettes and were used to calculate the radius of splash damage per missile. Now what has happened is that the splash damage across smaller Mechs or Mechs with more complex/tighter component positioning are getting hit with more splash damage than intended.

In the image below, you can see how much overlap the damage done to the Commando has and how that it is taking significantly more splash damage than it should.



We are looking at the tuning for these hit locations/splash damage and will update as soon as possible.

Edited by Homeless Bill, 14 March 2013 - 04:40 PM.

[matux]

Mechwarrior Buddah, on 14 March 2013 - 04:29 PM, said:

so we should remove the A1 from the game for one cause theres no way to make that mech not a boat
Prolly should remove the Catapult line entirely given that theyre all pretty much designed to be boats

Should probably remove all hardpoints on all mechs in that case, boating problem solved. But maybe just make MG and Flamer only hardpoints...

[Monky]

Even in battletech there was a hero variant of the catapult with 6x SRM6, called the butterbee.

Boating isn't going to go away - what needs to happen is a proper mix of;

A: netcode and lag compensation fixes (we are currently getting there, still need missile and ballistic state rewind)
B: bug fixing (even today bugs are being uncovered in how damage is working - once they get fixed things should improve)
C: a proper balance of heat, damage, and overall efficiency per weapon that makes them useful individually without being overpowered in masses. This is tricky, but it is most certainly possible.

Keep in mind, simply due to the 'ease of use' factor of having all one type of weapon, you are always going to see boats, even if they are strictly speaking, made combat ineffective. A boat being defined as revolving around using 1 weapon type as primary damage source (2x AC20, 6x SRM, 6x PPC, what have you).

[Ohari]

I agree that they DO NOT need to address boating. HOWEVER, from what I have found in the forums is there does seem to be an overall issue with all missile damage. There is a great thread that illustrates the overwhelming issue of splash damage with missiles.

Still though, I've not had issues with dealing with any kind of boat. I press 'R' and analyze my target before engaging..that is when I can. It does suck to come around a corner and have a splat cat in front of me.

[Escef]

They have addressed it. We have the A1 Catapult, which traditionally boats LRMs, the 8Q Awesome boats PPCs, and the 4S Hunchback, which boats Medium Lasers. They're cool with boating.

[Lukoi Banacek]

Steemship, on 14 March 2013 - 04:18 PM, said:

The more I try to play this game, the more boats I see. It is either SRM boats, LRM boats, or PPC boats and they are really ruining the game. Mechs are simply dying too fast; the game is feeling more and more like an arcade shooter than a strategy game. I'm getting to a point where I feel like the game needs further mech restrictions (Like engine restriction for the 3L) to make balanced builds more viable and get mechs playing the rolls they were intended (3L was never meant to be a brawler, Catapult not meant to be a brawler)

I have no idea what to do about assaults though. Lore assaults are designed to be able to attack at all ranges to achieve balance, but with any sort of customization, people are going to specialize in short or long range and dominate the hybrid assaults.

Any thoughts aside from me taking a break from the game?

Sorry, disagree entirely with this entire train of thought.

Boating maximizes efficiencies in one area in exchange for another.
Boating doesn't violate canon.
Boating doesn't make any Mech ingame insurmountable by any means.

Just can't agree with this. If the game isn't enjoyable to you due to people boating, by all means, take a break. I personally think that short of the most hardcore boater types, you'll see the larger maps continue to influence people into taking more flexible builds (notice I didn't say "balanced").

[HRR Insanity]

Steemship, on 14 March 2013 - 04:18 PM, said:

The more I try to play this game, the more boats I see. It is either SRM boats, LRM boats, or PPC boats and they are really ruining the game. Mechs are simply dying too fast; the game is feeling more and more like an arcade shooter than a strategy game. I'm getting to a point where I feel like the game needs further mech restrictions (Like engine restriction for the 3L) to make balanced builds more viable and get mechs playing the rolls they were intended (3L was never meant to be a brawler, Catapult not meant to be a brawler)

I have no idea what to do about assaults though. Lore assaults are designed to be able to attack at all ranges to achieve balance, but with any sort of customization, people are going to specialize in short or long range and dominate the hybrid assaults.

The problem is not the number of weapons... it's all the weapons hitting the same spot. Pinpoint convergence breaks the damage model.

[KhanCipher]

Team Leader, on 14 March 2013 - 04:29 PM, said:

They're supposed to be a support weapon to soften the enemies armor before they get close, not melt an atlas in 4 volleys lol

the head of the Longbow, Naginata, Archer, and Catapult familys are sending their... "messangers" to tell you how wrong you are.

or that you didn't seem to play TT...

[BlackSquirrel]

Well get ready for more when coolant flushes come out... Honestly boating AKA alpha just needs a higher penalty after x amount of shots.

[Jerod Drekmor]

Mechwarrior Buddah, on 14 March 2013 - 04:22 PM, said:

it doesnt need to address boating, boating is canon to the game.
The whole Catapult line IS a design of boats

Sure mate, they designed Centurion to carry 2 ML and 3 packs of SRMs......only question is why the hell they bother with making arms on this mech??
Last time I have seen centurion with balistic in arm was Wang...3-4 days ago, since then, constant stream of zombie cents.

[Escef]

Jerod Drekmor, on 14 March 2013 - 04:45 PM, said:

Sure mate, they designed Centurion to carry 2 ML and 3 packs of SRMs......only question is why the hell they bother with making arms on this mech??
Last time I have seen centurion with balistic in arm was Wang...3-4 days ago, since then, constant stream of zombie cents.

My CN9-A runs a Gauss in the right arm, I was using it yesterday.

[Mechwarrior Buddah]

KhanCipher, on 14 March 2013 - 04:41 PM, said:

the head of the Longbow, Naginata, Archer, and Catapult familys are sending their... "messangers" to tell you how wrong you are.

or that you didn't seem to play TT...

Better yet:
http://www.sarna.net/wiki/Yeoman

[Psikez]

Mechwarrior Buddah, on 14 March 2013 - 04:50 PM, said:

Better yet:
http://www.sarna.net/wiki/Yeoman

This needs a deal with it sunglasses GIF