23 replies to this topic

[Jape]

UAC jamming has always annoyed me to no end. Therefore I suggest the following:

Instead of jamming, UACs would have a kind of "quick shot cassette" which holds a few rounds and is replenished at a fixed rate. E.g. the cassette could hold 5 rounds and would replenish at a fixed rate of one round per two seconds. The gun would have a fixed fire rate of 0.7s/round (or whatever). No double shots. This would have the following pros:
- No jamming! Less annoyance!
- Removes the lag induced unpredictability in double shots
- Fixed, predictable fire rate and overall behavior of gun which is good for competitive play.
- Probably easier to tweak the parameters for balance

This would make UACs more of a burst fire -type weapons. What do you people think?

Edited by Jape, 26 March 2013 - 02:08 AM.

[Roadbuster]

Not a bad idea but jamming is a part of UACs.

How about increasing the chance of a jam the more rounds you fire?
At the moment UACs often jam after the first shot, which can bring you in big trouble.
Let's say your UAC has a 1% chance to jam after the first shot and this value goes up with every round fired till it jams.
If you stop firing it takes a few seconds for the value to go down to the base 1% and if it jams we have the current unjam mechanism.

Example:
round 1 - 0% chance to jam
round 2 - 1% chance to jam
round 3 - 2% chance to jam
round 4 - 4% chance to jam -> fire stop -> 2 seconds cooldown till chance to jam is 0% again
next attack after only 1 second cooldown
round 1 - 2% chance to jam
round 2 - 4% chance to jam
round 3 - 8% chance to jam
round 4 - 16% chance to jam
round 5 - 32% chance to jam-> weapon jams -> standard unjam

I have no problem with UACs jamming. But it happens too often that they jam after 1 shot.
I actually prefer normal AC5 lately because it's reliable damage.

[Jape]

IMO dealing with probabilities is always a bit problematic when trying to make a balanced competitive game. Still, I like your suggestion better than the current implementation.

[Torquemada]

UAC are not supposed to be reliable weapons. They're incredible for burst damage if shot accurately. If the jam mechanics were predictable rather than random, they would quite easily become over powered. For example if I could guarentee a burst of e.g. 6 shots per UAC before they 'run low' with this system then I could quickly burst targets down, much more easily than now when they may jam after just a single shot.

[Nexus Omega]

This is an interesting idea, I find the Jam mechanic frustrating to, not a fan of random,
It makes the UAC a "burst" damage type gun instead of straight DPS, which is neat.

[Karl Streiger]

Hm I got used to them in TT terms simple because of their better range profile...never used them with double tap.
That should be implemented ingame. While you don't have any benefits that trade of the increased weight and less ammo. A slightly increased RoF without double shot is ok.
When using double shot ... than this gun should have a good chance to jam - or give it less chance to jam - but increase the time until it is unjammed.

[Jape]

Torquemada, on 26 March 2013 - 04:09 AM, said:

If the jam mechanics were predictable rather than random, they would quite easily become over powered. For example if I could guarentee a burst of e.g. 6 shots per UAC before they 'run low' with this system then I could quickly burst targets down

The numbers I presented were just some random numbers. Obviously I would leave the actual balancing to the developers. One of my points actually was that with no randomness, the balancing would be much easier.

[General Taskeen]

I will make a video of the new UAC's in MW:LL 0.7.1, because this is exactly what the OP is suggesting. Its over all better.

All Autocannon's also can jam by overheating the barrel in MW:LL, there is no rolling the dice on every shot. Its all skill based.

Its either this or removing the double shot in favor of a 2x better cool down, with a skill based jam (barrel overheating), and that's it.

[blinkin]

Jape, on 26 March 2013 - 03:22 AM, said:

IMO dealing with probabilities is always a bit problematic when trying to make a balanced competitive game. Still, I like your suggestion better than the current implementation.

make this a good game first and then if people like to play it competitively then great. i have seen far too many games ruined by the competitive mindset. *cough*starcraft 2*cough*

[Jape]

This already is a competitive game. You play against other players.

[Kell Commander]

The UAC needs to jam, however I do feel something needs to be adjusted because I have had too many games where the damn thing jams every shot.

It needs to be random also because a predictable pattern will be exploited and then the UAC will be overpowered like Torquemada said.

[sC4r]

Roadbuster, on 26 March 2013 - 03:07 AM, said:

Not a bad idea but jamming is a part of UACs.

How about increasing the chance of a jam the more rounds you fire?
At the moment UACs often jam after the first shot, which can bring you in big trouble.
Let's say your UAC has a 1% chance to jam after the first shot and this value goes up with every round fired till it jams.
If you stop firing it takes a few seconds for the value to go down to the base 1% and if it jams we have the current unjam mechanism.

Example:
round 1 - 0% chance to jam
round 2 - 1% chance to jam
round 3 - 2% chance to jam
round 4 - 4% chance to jam -> fire stop -> 2 seconds cooldown till chance to jam is 0% again
next attack after only 1 second cooldown
round 1 - 2% chance to jam
round 2 - 4% chance to jam
round 3 - 8% chance to jam
round 4 - 16% chance to jam
round 5 - 32% chance to jam-> weapon jams -> standard unjam

I have no problem with UACs jamming. But it happens too often that they jam after 1 shot.
I actually prefer normal AC5 lately because it's reliable damage.

would love if uac worked like this..
currently its way too random

[Space Odin]

Roadbuster, on 26 March 2013 - 03:07 AM, said:

Not a bad idea but jamming is a part of UACs.

How about increasing the chance of a jam the more rounds you fire?
At the moment UACs often jam after the first shot, which can bring you in big trouble.
Let's say your UAC has a 1% chance to jam after the first shot and this value goes up with every round fired till it jams.
If you stop firing it takes a few seconds for the value to go down to the base 1% and if it jams we have the current unjam mechanism.

Example:
round 1 - 0% chance to jam
round 2 - 1% chance to jam
round 3 - 2% chance to jam
round 4 - 4% chance to jam -> fire stop -> 2 seconds cooldown till chance to jam is 0% again
next attack after only 1 second cooldown
round 1 - 2% chance to jam
round 2 - 4% chance to jam
round 3 - 8% chance to jam
round 4 - 16% chance to jam
round 5 - 32% chance to jam-> weapon jams -> standard unjam

I have no problem with UACs jamming. But it happens too often that they jam after 1 shot.
I actually prefer normal AC5 lately because it's reliable damage.

This. Jamming after a single shot is just ******* stupid. The chance to jam should go up slightly the more you fire it successively. This way you could actually apply some skill to how you use your UACs. It would naturally make it a burst fire weapon like its supposed to be. It might be better if after like 5 or 6 shots the chance to jam goes from 0% to like 50% so you still wont jam after just one or two shots. The way it is now there no good reason not to just let it rip and fire constantly, no skill is involved.

[focuspark]

Make that a magazine of three shots, and make the overall firing rate over 10 second equal to a AC5 and you've sold me on the idea - I'd even call it brilliant. Why 3? Because it fits the role between the AC10 and AC20 then. Why keep it on par over a fixed amount of time with the AC5? Because no weapon should be plainly superior to any other weapon - this is after all, a FPS PVP MMO and not a TT game.

[blinkin]

Jape, on 26 March 2013 - 01:26 PM, said:

This already is a competitive game. You play against other players.

i am aware of this, but your competitive mindset is directly counter to my desires to push this game back towards being a simulator. real life has random failures. guns jam, shots vere off course, things sometimes explode violently from critical failures.

[Jape]

As a flight/car simulator enthusiast, I'm all for realism, but IMO military grade weapons that have a high chance of jamming are not very realistic. I would actually welcome small randomness to ballistic weapon bullet trajectories, provided they buff the guns to offset this.

My suggestion is actually not very far away from real modern autocannons. Some of them have a kind of cassette system that lets it fire a few (don't really know the exact number) rounds very quickly and then change the cassette. That's where I got the inspiration to suggest this in the first place.

[Roadbuster]

Karl Streiger, on 26 March 2013 - 04:13 AM, said:

Hm I got used to them in TT terms simple because of their better range profile...never used them with double tap.
That should be implemented ingame. While you don't have any benefits that trade of the increased weight and less ammo. A slightly increased RoF without double shot is ok.
When using double shot ... than this gun should have a good chance to jam - or give it less chance to jam - but increase the time until it is unjammed.

That's the problem. They jam even if you want to only fire 1 round.

[blinkin]

Jape, on 26 March 2013 - 11:10 PM, said:

As a flight/car simulator enthusiast, I'm all for realism, but IMO military grade weapons that have a high chance of jamming are not very realistic. I would actually welcome small randomness to ballistic weapon bullet trajectories, provided they buff the guns to offset this.

My suggestion is actually not very far away from real modern autocannons. Some of them have a kind of cassette system that lets it fire a few (don't really know the exact number) rounds very quickly and then change the cassette. That's where I got the inspiration to suggest this in the first place.

jamming is rampant with any sort of new system design just ask the first guys that used the M16 assault rifle in combat. from what i understand in 3050 the UAC is a fairly new design and they have not worked out the bugs yet.


^^notice the hopper used to feed this early machine gun design. now tell me that this thing didn't jam after every couple of shots.

during the dark ages in the battletech universe a lot of knowledge was lost. in many respects they are far beyond our current technology, but there are also plenty of places where they are more on par with technology and ideas from the 1600s to WW2 era. there is a great deal that is being relearned. even the construction of a new mech is only possible because automated factories are already capable. there are very few who understand any of the technology being utilized.

[Jape]

Yes, from a lore point of view jamming makes sense. Can't argue about that. What I can (and do) argue is that from a gameplay point of view, jamming is not a good mechanism (IMO).

[Side Step]

It's ok to have a jam mechanic, but not as the default behavior when you hold the trigger.

UAC/5 should fire at the normal rate, and only double fire when pressed again during the recycle. This way, the risk/reward of jam/double fire will truly be optional.