52 replies to this topic

[Xandergod]

Firstly, this thread is to foster civil conversation about where we would like to see balance in MWO. Not to complain about things as they are now or have been in the past.

The forums have been flush with missile discussion for as long as I've been reading them. As an LRM user, my opinion is bias towards my own effectiveness rather than quote end quote balance within the game itself.


I've noticed that some people feel the weapon system is too easy to use.
Some feel the weight to effectiveness ratio is too high.
Some feel missile tracking is too effective.
Etc.


My question basically is, how do people want to see missiles function in the game? Keeping in mind LRMs and SRM/streaks are functionally different, but share characteristics, thus should share similar end effects.

[Commander Kobold]

I would like them to be effective without being mini nukes, they should be a threat not the mosquito bites they are now.

Edited by Omni 13, 22 March 2013 - 09:24 AM.

[Kahoumono]

I happen to have purchased a Trebuchet-3C just after the last patch and got about 20-25 matches in before the hot fix. After 2-3 matches with the hotfix I decided to keep track of my mech stats to see materially how the fix affected my performance. I like the balanced loadout of the Treb and have a pretty balanced build. Here are the average results after 25 matches in each.

Treb-3C: 2 Med Laser, ER PPC, LRM15+artemis and TAG.
Pre-hotfix:
Average damage per match: 489, Kills: 27; Deaths: 8; Win/Loss: 1.5
Post-hotfix:
Average damage per match: 232, Kills: 14, Deaths: 10; Win/Loss: 1.8

The damage was too much for the last patch and they screwed up the splash damage. To fix it, lower the damage(higher than the current levels), fix the splash damage and stop the missles from making 90 degree turns..
I am currently doing the same for my Raven-2X. I bet I can easily top 232 damage per match...will post results later. I hear the boats are still doing fine with their 10x LRMs but thats a whole other issue.

Added Raven-2X results,
17 pre-hotfix:
Average damage per match: 342, Kills: 18, Deaths: 10; W/L: 1.13
7 post-hotfix:
Average damage per match: 397, Kills: 7, Deaths: 5; W/L: 1.0

Probably not enough matches but I don't like my 2X, just wanted to prove that LRMs as they are are out of kilter.

Edited by Kahoumono, 22 March 2013 - 10:32 AM.

[Vasces Diablo]

Drives me crazy when people say LRMs are a "low skill" weapon.

Do they require "twitch skill"? No.

They do require that you:

1. Calculate the flight time before shooting.
2. Know what your target is doing (can they reach cover during flight time)
3. Determine if being exposed to fire while holding the target is worth it
4. Communicate with your spotter to know if they can hold the target (for indirect fire)

They are a "mental math" weapon, not a twitch one. But they are certainly not "low skill", at least not if you are going to be effective with them.

People who prefer a more run and gun style (which is fine too, I'm not saying that's bad) tend to see them as long range streaks, which i disagree with. But different styles of preferred play will mean that the community will never come to a consensus on if they are "balanced" or not.

[Xandergod]

Omni 13, on 22 March 2013 - 09:23 AM, said:

I would like them to be effective without being mini nukes, they should be a threat not the mosquito bites they are now.

It begs to be asked, how much of a threat. The way missiles work, it's entirely possible to catch 100 in seconds with a little over exposure from cover.
What should the effect of 100 LRMs coming your way? How many should actually hit? How f'ed should you be when you see that trail of missiles coming your way.

[sgt scout]

I cant help but think that most of the people complaining about this and that are just not very good. LRM damage before patch seemed almost ballanced to me. I felt a slight damage reduction on both LRM's and SRM's would have been enough.
As it stands, SRM'S are still usable but LRM's are trash.
I don't use LRM's much but the lack of damage they do to me whils i just stand there and line up my 40 dmg 4xppc alpha must be insulting to every one who enjoyed being an LRM boat.
I don't understand why the damage had to be taken down so drasticly ( 1.8 per missile to 0.7 i think). Seems like way to much of a dive to me, why not drop it to a nice number like 1.0 ???

[Xandergod]

Vasces Diablo, on 22 March 2013 - 09:29 AM, said:

Drives me crazy when people say LRMs are a "low skill" weapon.

I wholeheartedly agree with you. It's very easy to have little to no effectiveness with poor LRM use.

sgt scout, on 22 March 2013 - 09:34 AM, said:

I cant help but think that most of the people complaining about this and that are just not very good. LRM damage before patch seemed almost ballanced to me. I felt a slight damage reduction on both LRM's and SRM's would have been enough.
As it stands, SRM'S are still usable but LRM's are trash.
I don't use LRM's much but the lack of damage they do to me whils i just stand there and line up my 40 dmg 4xppc alpha must be insulting to every one who enjoyed being an LRM boat.
I don't understand why the damage had to be taken down so drasticly ( 1.8 per missile to 0.7 i think). Seems like way to much of a dive to me, why not drop it to a nice number like 1.0 ???

I may be mistaken, but 1 damage per missile is canon, is it not?

[Vasces Diablo]

LexLuther, on 22 March 2013 - 09:36 AM, said:

I may be mistaken, but 1 damage per missile is canon, is it not?

It is, but the doubling of armor values essentially mean that 1 damage in MWO I would equal .5 damage in TT canon/rules. So really, all direct fir weapons had their damage halved when converted to MWO while LRMs (at 1.8 dmg) took a smaller hit.

Considering the convergence of MWO/removal of random missing from TT, this actually makes quite a bit of sense. If damage on LRMs was truly reduced to .7, than that is to far of a pendulum swing.

[Dimitry Matveyev]

I think it's not the LRM's or SRM's, that should be balanced first. Its a hardpoint system that realy needs balancing. As you can see changing missile damage doesn't affects LRM 60+ boats, that affects light's and med's, who are using light launchers (like one LRM 5/LRM10 or SRM2/SRM4). Make the hardpoint system similar to MW4, don't allow to put LRM20 to 6-tube hardpoint and there you go - no more LRM 60+ boats, missile problem solved.

Edited by Dimitry Matveyev, 22 March 2013 - 10:00 AM.

[Esplodin]

Vasces Diablo, on 22 March 2013 - 09:52 AM, said:

It is, but the doubling of armor values essentially mean that 1 damage in MWO I would equal .5 damage in TT canon/rules. So really, all direct fir weapons had their damage halved when converted to MWO while LRMs (at 1.8 dmg) took a smaller hit.

Welcome to the same hell as the machine gun. Coffee is over there -->

Not so funny when its your preferred weapon, is it?

[Tennex]

they will look at missile bunching. and address that before buffing the LRMs again.

[MaddMaxx]

Given the Dev explanation of the change, the current .7 is then added to by a 1.8m radius splash effect at 40% from the center hit. Any component, or section, splashed adds .7 x 1.40 thus a Missile (most in fact due to tight clustering) do inflict a full 1(.98) point in over-all damage.

So if you ever wanted LRM's at 1 pt/per, you got em.

Rejoicing was heard (Ok, low mumblings were heard)

Edited by MaddMaxx, 22 March 2013 - 10:17 AM.

[darkfall13]

Vasces Diablo, on 22 March 2013 - 09:29 AM, said:

Drives me crazy when people say LRMs are a "low skill" weapon.

Do they require "twitch skill"? No.

They do require that you:

1. Calculate the flight time before shooting.
2. Know what your target is doing (can they reach cover during flight time)
3. Determine if being exposed to fire while holding the target is worth it
4. Communicate with your spotter to know if they can hold the target (for indirect fire)

They are a "mental math" weapon, not a twitch one. But they are certainly not "low skill", at least not if you are going to be effective with them.

People who prefer a more run and gun style (which is fine too, I'm not saying that's bad) tend to see them as long range streaks, which i disagree with. But different styles of preferred play will mean that the community will never come to a consensus on if they are "balanced" or not.

QFT and I'll just paste something I just wrote elsewhere on the same exact subject:

darkfall13, on 22 March 2013 - 10:33 AM, said:

No I'm seriously wondering why does the community think this? You move your fat arm and click a mouse with a single finger for both direct fire weapons and missiles. But on a serious note:

• You have to keep your crosshairs on target for missiles and direct fire weapons, so same "skill," yes in the LRM world you have the advantage of distance so the enemy's angular velocity is lower, same with long range direct fire weapons, so again same "skill"
  
• In shorter range direct fire weapons scenarios you're near your target, in the environment with them, so target dodging via building or outcropping isn't really relevant, so your direct fire weapons take less "skill"
  
• With LRMs you have to take into account a pretty long arrival time, and the scene of battle can change drastically before your payload arrives, so you need pretty good foresight and calculating "skill"
  
• You pretty much have to have a target and have it locked to be of any use for missiles, unlike direct fire weapons, pew pew to your heart's content so less to monitor with direct fire so less "skill"
  
• There are loads of ways to defeat missiles, ECM, physical obstacles, AMS, etc so you need more "skill" for missiles to overcome those enemies, for direct fire weapons you only need to worry about physical obstacles so less "skill"
  
• Once your payload leaves the launchers it's up to the server gods, with direct fire weapons you can readjust or in duration weapons like lasers, can still hit even with a crap initial click

So what takes more "skill" again?

Edited by darkfall13, 22 March 2013 - 10:46 AM.

[Xyroc]

All this hotfix is just ...... it puts fix for the boaters but us that use 1 or 2 launchers get completely screwed out of a good weapon ... guess my 4sp will be sitting in the mech bay until this gets fixed .... big big

[Commander Kobold]

LexLuther, on 22 March 2013 - 09:30 AM, said:

It begs to be asked, how much of a threat. The way missiles work, it's entirely possible to catch 100 in seconds with a little over exposure from cover.
What should the effect of 100 LRMs coming your way? How many should actually hit? How f'ed should you be when you see that trail of missiles coming your way.

well first if your watching the missiles flying through the air towards you you're doing something wrong XD, and I'd be happy with 1 damage per LRM with the following modifier/fix the more LRMs launched at a target the more the missiles would spread(i.e an LRM 5 mostly hit the CT while an LRM 20+ would scatter their damage all over the place) this would nerf/balance missiles boats with their 60+ missiles but keep smaller launcher valiable (as for the logic behind it, could say that the targeting computer is less accuracte the more missiles it has to keep track of) Edit: sorry about the giant paragraph, for some reason my enter key won't let me skip lines on the forums.

Esplodin, on 22 March 2013 - 10:05 AM, said:

Welcome to the same hell as the machine gun. Coffee is over there -->

Not so funny when its your preferred weapon, is it?

hey I've been all for an MG buff from the start

Edited by Omni 13, 22 March 2013 - 10:55 AM.

[Vasces Diablo]

MaddMaxx, on 22 March 2013 - 10:16 AM, said:

Given the Dev explanation of the change, the current .7 is then added to by a 1.8m radius splash effect at 40% from the center hit. Any component, or section, splashed adds .7 x 1.40 thus a Missile (most in fact due to tight clustering) do inflict a full 1(.98) point in over-all damage.

So if you ever wanted LRM's at 1 pt/per, you got em.

Rejoicing was heard (Ok, low mumblings were heard)

Cool, thanks for laying that out. I must have missed that announcement.

[Commander Kobold]

MaddMaxx, on 22 March 2013 - 10:16 AM, said:

Given the Dev explanation of the change, the current .7 is then added to by a 1.8m radius splash effect at 40% from the center hit. Any component, or section, splashed adds .7 x 1.40 thus a Missile (most in fact due to tight clustering) do inflict a full 1(.98) point in over-all damage.

So if you ever wanted LRM's at 1 pt/per, you got em.

Rejoicing was heard (Ok, low mumblings were heard)

you can't count on the splash damage for effectiveness. I'd mark it up as the wquivilent of the MG crit seeker buff

[MagicHamsta]

1) Make LRMs laser targetted instead of auto lock. (I.E: player has to manually control the missiles by aiming a laser.)
2) Tighten the spread to compensate. (but not too much, it should still rake 2+ components instead of lasering one part)
3) Remove splash. (No spam corner bombing.)

That way, it be player skill (& planning) which will determine how effective the weapons are.
Also players won't be able to just spam missiles: 1) They'll run out of missiles 2) It'll leave them open to counter fire as the targeting laser will require LoS.

Edited by MagicHamsta, 22 March 2013 - 10:58 AM.

[Dark Baron]

Omni 13, on 22 March 2013 - 10:56 AM, said:

well first if your watching the missiles flying through the air towards you you're doing something wrong XD, and I'd be happy with 1 damage per LRM with the following modifier/fix the more LRMs launched at a target the more the missiles would spread(i.e an LRM 5 mostly hit the CT while an LRM 20+ would scatter their damage all over the place) this would nerf/balance missiles boats with their 60+ missiles but keep smaller launcher valiable (as for the logic behind it, could say that the targeting computer is less accuracte the more missiles it has to keep track of) Edit: sorry about the giant paragraph, for some reason my enter key won't let me skip lines on the forums.



hey I've been all for an MG buff from the start

Which would then make LRM 15s and 20's worthless, and LRM 5s aren't worth the weight as is, but then we all know this is what you're pushing for. So in that same vein, what do you suggest we do to nerf boating lasers and PPCs? I think convergence should work less accurately for each extra laser or PPC you fire beyond the first 2. How's that sound?

[NKAc Street]

They are fine as they are now. You still will not last long if you run out in the open. But they are not so overwhelming that premades would use lrms as a focal point to their entire team. This was the best move to overall game balance yet. You could still run lrms wit a boating stategy as before but you would know now that a team trying to mainly use lrms as their winning stategy is now risky. It is as it should be.