1107 replies to this topic

[SteelShrike]

GalaxyBluestar, on 24 March 2013 - 11:20 PM, said:

http://mwo.smurfy-ne...89974696212ddfc

It's not finished. You need a minimum of 10 heat sinks. That only has 9.

[idle crow]

MuKen, on 24 March 2013 - 11:07 PM, said:

That's not true 100% of the time. Fact is, if you want to build a streakmando with ECM, 3 streaks, 2 tons of ammo, and a small las,(not an unreasonable loadout) you're going to need to go single heatsinks, or sacrifice a lot of armor (not smart on a commando). This is because the commando CAN'T equip a larger engine.

Try finishing this build, and you'll see what I mean. Remember that you have to put in at least 2 more external heatsinks somewhere.

http://mwo.smurfy-ne...0f8144d55e76fac

He needs the ferro more than the DHS.

Don't forget to mention your lower battle value that totally calculated into drops to...

[p00k]

MuKen, on 24 March 2013 - 11:07 PM, said:

Try finishing this build, and you'll see what I mean. Remember that you have to put in at least 2 more external heatsinks somewhere.

http://mwo.smurfy-ne...0f8144d55e76fac

He needs the ferro more than the DHS.

with that build, what the DHS alternative buys you is a speed trade for armor

yes, ferro lets you run the 210, largely because the 210 is a non x25 engine choice. going to the 200 however, is certainly slower; however, that extra ton going to the 200 will let you run the doubles plus increase your armor. a bit slower for more armor and MUCH cooler. you can argue that you'll never have to fight duel for an extended period in the caldera so the extra cooling is unnecessary, but honestly i'd rather have the cooling for a fairly minor speed sacrifice

that said, admittedly this is more of a choice than a pure upgrade, so point taken

[MuKen]

You're right, and admittedly my own streakmando has DHS. But yes, my point was just that for the commando at least, a person could take SHS and it wouldn't be a ridiculous decision.

Edited by MuKen, 24 March 2013 - 11:32 PM.

[GalaxyBluestar]

SteelShrike, on 24 March 2013 - 11:22 PM, said:

It's not finished. You need a minimum of 10 heat sinks. That only has 9.

well spotted that's a serious cop out of me and my blindness. 1+ to you

we'll try this one

http://mwo.smurfy-ne...ed211ac9c5d2649

i think the bonuses or full armour and better heat easily outway the one less ammo. i'm still convinced that singles are saddly inferrior and need more love and attention.

Edited by GalaxyBluestar, 24 March 2013 - 11:34 PM.

[GalaxyBluestar]

MuKen, on 24 March 2013 - 11:31 PM, said:

You're right, and admittedly my own streakmando has DHS. But yes, my point was just that for the commando at least, a person could take SHS and it wouldn't be a ridiculous decision.

it's not rediculous but it's just that you're making your life more difficult for many more builds, really there should be a build effectiveness of 50/50 but really it's 30/50 cause only a few weapons that generate little heat can be boated and many mechs need high heat weapons for a support which makes singles the less optimal choice far more often. poor trial mechs

[Captain Wolfsburg]

If you do nothing but munchkin your builds then yes, singles are kind of useless. But for those of us who still experiment and know how to balance heat well, singles have their place. The real issue here isn't dhs vs shs, it's the usefullness of stock builds, the answer being "none what-so-ever".

[p00k]

and on a side note, you DO need that cooling. 40% cooling eff by smurfy's is awful. the popular raven build is >50% by smurfy's, depending on a few ammo/armor/ams options, and in an extended skirmish you can easily run at near-overheat levels long enough that you have to start pulling your shots

i wouldn't drop the ton of ammo, but increased armor and the ability to keep your weapons firing long enough to outshoot an enemy light mech is easily worth the minor speed loss

[GalaxyBluestar]

A5mod3us, on 24 March 2013 - 11:36 PM, said:

If you do nothing but munchkin your builds then yes, singles are kind of useless. But for those of us who still experiment and know how to balance heat well, singles have their place. The real issue here isn't dhs vs shs, it's the usefullness of stock builds, the answer being "none what-so-ever".

you're right the issue is greater than just the heatsinks but the internal external application which involves the engines and then theres the weapons and their assigned stats to be balanced with heat output and so forth. stock mechs would appear in general to not carry enough heatsinks where as customised mechs always have enough {unless they're badly built }

so i don't want singles removed and idon't think dhs needs a nerf or anything it's just that all the factors regarding stocks and thier heat dispession has to be tied up closer with the custom mechs. how you do that without restricting customisation i don't know but it's a shame to make a game based on battle tech and have many battletech pieces that simply don't work against alted equipement.

p00k, on 24 March 2013 - 11:41 PM, said:

and on a side note, you DO need that cooling. 40% cooling eff by smurfy's is awful. the popular raven build is >50% by smurfy's, depending on a few ammo/armor/ams options, and in an extended skirmish you can easily run at near-overheat levels long enough that you have to start pulling your shots

i wouldn't drop the ton of ammo, but increased armor and the ability to keep your weapons firing long enough to outshoot an enemy light mech is easily worth the minor speed loss

yeah i was wondering which way it would go, outrunning and dodging ability {speed} vs longer lived punches for quicker destruction {more ammo} depends on your tactics and playstyle but yeah i'd go for the speed loss as well

Edited by GalaxyBluestar, 24 March 2013 - 11:44 PM.

[SteelShrike]

Still sounds to me like a nerf to DHS engine heatsinks and an overall buff to heat dissipation in general would alleviate a lot of the frustration. Maybe in the next round of Ask the Devs, we can present the idea and get a response.

[MuKen]

p00k, on 24 March 2013 - 11:41 PM, said:

and on a side note, you DO need that cooling. 40% cooling eff by smurfy's is awful. the popular raven build is >50% by smurfy's, depending on a few ammo/armor/ams options, and in an extended skirmish you can easily run at near-overheat levels long enough that you have to start pulling your shots

i wouldn't drop the ton of ammo, but increased armor and the ability to keep your weapons firing long enough to outshoot an enemy light mech is easily worth the minor speed loss

Cooling efficiency alone does not tell the whole story. If you are just firing the streaks, and saving the slas as a backup weapon, you will use almost half your total ammo firing non-stop before you have to start regulating your fire. The commando has other reasons to regulate his shots.

Again, it's a matter of choice for this build. Some people want to be able to fire everything non-stop until they are bone dry, some people don't plan to do that in one single fight.

Like I said, I'm running mine the way you said. But I would not fault someone for running the build I put up. For a commando, speed is life, almost everybody can ruin your life in one alpha.

Edited by MuKen, 24 March 2013 - 11:50 PM.

[Peter von Danzig]

Maybe SHS will have some use when they implement cooling bonus - for example if you stand in water and have SMS in your legs. Until then DHS are your only option.

[p00k]

GalaxyBluestar, on 24 March 2013 - 11:42 PM, said:

yeah i was wondering which way it would go, outrunning and dodging ability {speed} vs longer lived punches for quicker destruction {more ammo} depends on your tactics and playstyle but yeah i'd go for the speed loss as well

no question

i run my raven with, by smurfy's, a 58% cooling eff. on frozen night, sure i can go all day, but on caustic or tourmaline after a few volleys i have to start slowing my shots.

i have other mechs that run in the mid-40's per smurfy and they run quite hot

so yeah, if you've got a 3L raven chasing you, and you enter the circle of death, believe me you'll last longer with the dramatically superior cooling as opposed to the slight speed increase. the mechs you could effectively outrun with a 210 you can still outrun with a 200. yes you can slowly pull away from mechs going 140kph when you're going 150, but that 10kph faster speed isn't really escape speed

[GalaxyBluestar]

MuKen, on 24 March 2013 - 11:49 PM, said:

Cooling efficiency alone does not tell the whole story. If you are just firing the streaks, and saving the slas as a backup weapon, you will use almost half your total ammo firing non-stop before you have to start regulating your fire. The commando has other reasons to regulate his shots.

Again, it's a matter of choice for this build. Some people want to be able to fire everything non-stop until they are bone dry, some people don't plan to do that in one single fight.

very true i group my weapons accordingly to balance out the heat output, you don't alpha strike long and short range weapons unless they damage at the targets spot right? so all your heatsink capability is for the most part covering only half your heat fireing output at a time. learning this is what everyone dubs as heat management. however i have had an experience when a trial catta had so few singles that firing just the four lasers disregarding the autocannon and ppc i still had heat shoot up that would take a minute or so to cool down. it was caustic but even still it was just so unbalanced that it would struggle to retaliate against any custom build. perhaps if the heat sink boost worked the otherway round bonuses for more externals and just standard for engines. something like that.... i need to think more but i can't someone take over!

Peter von Danzig, on 24 March 2013 - 11:52 PM, said:

Maybe SHS will have some use when they implement cooling bonus - for example if you stand in water and have SMS in your legs. Until then DHS are your only option.

that's the problem though patching wounds doesn't fix core problems, how much water is there on given maps? to use singles you sacrifice putting other equipment in the legs? still sounds like a raw deal for singles.

Edited by GalaxyBluestar, 24 March 2013 - 11:55 PM.

[p00k]

MuKen, on 24 March 2013 - 11:49 PM, said:

Cooling efficiency alone does not tell the whole story. If you are just firing the streaks, and saving the slas as a backup weapon, you will use almost half your total ammo firing non-stop before you have to start regulating your fire. The commando has other reasons to regulate his shots.

Again, it's a matter of choice for this build. Some people want to be able to fire everything non-stop until they are bone dry, some people don't plan to do that in one single fight.

Like I said, I'm running mine the way you said. But I would not fault someone for running the build I put up. For a commando, speed is life, almost everybody can ruin your life in one alpha.

presumably you'd be firing the streaks together, in which case, pretending you didn't have the small las, you'd have a cooling eff of 56. not bad, enough to keep going for several volleys, perhaps more than enough on cool maps. but 56% on caustic and tourmaline will catch up to you quickly.

and as a light, your two biggest threats are the big front-loaded pinpoint hit from big mechs (double gauss/ac20s/ppcs/etc), and other lights. for the former, the difference between 140 and 150 quite honestly is pretty negligible, the people that could hit you at 140 can still hit you at 150. for the latter, well, given the latest missile nerf a streak-mando is even less of a challenge to a raven, but at least if he's already somewhat hurt the extra cooling can keep you going long enough to make him turn away. going 150 instead of 140 will NOT let you escape from him. 10kph simply isn't a big enough difference to be meaningful when you're eating shots in the back and he can take the inside route whenever you turn

[Dakkaface]

Protection, on 22 March 2013 - 01:40 PM, said:

After watching another poor PUG die in the heat-death-traps (often called Trial mechs) while playing today, it occurred to me -- why are single heatsinks even in the game at all?

Chris Morris, on 22 March 2013 - 01:47 PM, said:

Was there a purpose for them in tabletop Battletech?

Single heat sinks are largely all that's available at the tech level we are at. More importantly, double heatsinks cannot take advantage of water. In the tabletop at least, leg mounted heatsinks got double the heat dissipation when standing in water - and at three critical spaces you can't put double heatsinks on your legs. Granted, that means that doubles are overall better when not all of the maps feature standing water, but it IS an upside that doubles don't have.

[MustrumRidcully]

SteelShrike, on 24 March 2013 - 11:00 PM, said:

You're probably right, but I haven't seen a whole lot of civil discussion on a proper solution, either. I'd love to find one, because it is something I've noticed, too. It's been a problem ever since DHS was introduced in the table-top game even. There's literally no reason except cost to upgrade, especially if engine heatsinks are all you have. And in a lot of cases, that's all you really need.

The problem with DHS is not neccessarily that they are more powerful than SHS. It is a problem if you want all items to be balanced and do not want a clear progression of technology, but that isn't the only problem.

The other problem is that the heat system in MW:O is very different from the table top heat system. The consequence of the specific implementation is that stock mechs from the table top game (and in fact, it doesn't matter whether they use Single or Double Heat Sinks, what matters is that they are stock) are poorly designed for the heat system in MW:O.

Look at any build you are using now, regardless of whether you have standard or double heat sinks. DO you think you could improve that build by removing a bunch of heat sinks and adding additional weaons, or replace some weapons with heavier, more powerful versions of the weapon?
Probaly not. If that was an improvement, you'd already done it. But the stock mechs are basically designed like that, because in the table top heat system, this worked reasonably well. No, these mechs weren#t perfect - they were neither boats nor specialists, many of them had a weird mix of weapons, and often they were not able to support all the weapons installed heat-wise, with the intention of using some weapons only withni certain range brackets. But they were able to fire most of their weapons iwthin a range bracket continously. ANd the "boats" (4-Laser Jenner, 8 Laser Hunchback, 3 PPC Awesome) were definitely designed to fire all their weapons continously with only the occassional turn where they'd fire not all of them to cool off a bit. But they don't work like that in MW:O, because weapons generate twice the damage and twice the heat (fighting doubled armour) or more.

Unfortunately, doubling the heat load of a mech is not the same as halving its time to overheat. The Jagermech is the perfect exampe - it would normally never overheat, in MW:O it roughly in 6-7 seconds. Going from "infinity" to "less than 10 seconds" is not halving the time to overheat.

[MustrumRidcully]

Peter von Danzig, on 24 March 2013 - 11:52 PM, said:

Maybe SHS will have some use when they implement cooling bonus - for example if you stand in water and have SMS in your legs. Until then DHS are your only option.

Really think about it. How many maps do we currently have where you can stand around in water for a majority of the match?
Do you really think this alone would make it worth it?

If you do, good luck to you. This bonus is already in. Heat Sinks do provide more cooling the deeper you are inside water. There is even additional steam for it.

Edited by MustrumRidcully, 25 March 2013 - 01:08 AM.

[SteelShrike]

I went ahead and made a poll in the Suggestions forum over this, and what I'd like to see. If you want, go ahead and chime in on your thoughts.

http://mwomercs.com/...ce-suggestions/

EDIT: Don't want to seem like I'm forcing opinions or trying to take credit for anything. I gave Protection proper thanks for bringing up the topic. But I figured we can sit here endlessly debating the facts till the cows come home, or we can actually try to do something about it.

Edited by SteelShrike, 25 March 2013 - 01:39 AM.

[AndyHill]

GalaxyBluestar, on 24 March 2013 - 11:31 PM, said:

i think the bonuses or full armour and better heat easily outway the one less ammo. i'm still convinced that singles are saddly inferrior and need more love and attention.

No contest about the singles' inferiority, but dropping 50% of that build's ammo is a total no-go. I've played that build and in any decent game the 2 tons of streak ammo becomes a limiting factor for effectiveness (and I have a medium laser in it as well, since even 3 tons of ammo left me defenceless at times). Mine is based on doubles, but the builds shown in this thread have made me consider singles as an option. The 2D commando is a good build and possibly the only one where singles are an option.