1386 replies to this topic

[Deathlike]

ICEFANG13, on 15 May 2013 - 06:07 PM, said:

3 kills 6 assists? Are you playing 12v12s already?

I'm sure a TK counts as a kill.

[Utilyan]

The MG as a crit-seeker weapon would be nice if there was something to crit. From my experience testing it out for all the shooting that you do it might take out a weapon just as good as any other weapon. You could go to testing grounds for example shoot up the RT and LT of a atlas or catapult and it never sets the ammo off. Its until the actual piece is destroyed that MAYBE the ammo might blow up. There are things that should have been crit that weren't. Like if your shooting legs without armor then maybe the hips start to degrade, the actuators start being damaged and destroyed, or like center torso engine speed out put starts to degrade, the gyro gets screwed up, the head, the pilot gets shot, loss of sensors, ect.

Every empty crit space should have been like a weapon that can go out. and if every space on the internal was out before hps are gone that whole part should have just blown up and died. That always sorta bugged me that here I am with a MG shooting at an UNARMORED target......and its the very worst weapon to use vs unarmored target even in close anti-ARMOR target ranges.....and its still horrible.

I could understand the whole idea of plink plink doesn't do anything to armor, my thing is it doesn't do anything better vs unarmored. Its still THE WORST vs unarmored.

[ICEFANG13]

I really think that if ammo and Gauss blew up 100% of the time, which I think would be good, at this power level that will be at May 21st, it might be ok. The 10% stuff is silly.

[TemplarGFX]

Deathlike, on 15 May 2013 - 06:42 PM, said:

I'm sure a TK counts as a kill.

Yeah apparenlty I got a kill assist for the shots at friendlies who keep freaking walking infront of me. I mean when you see a Jager ripping into a mech at close range with MG's do you think to yourself "hey, lets get in front of the jager"

The number of times I have alpha'd the back of a friendly mech who has run into my field of fire just as I let loose is rediculous

I dont think I should get xp and cbills for helping the enemy team take out a friendly mech. thats just stupid

Edited by TemplarGFX, 15 May 2013 - 08:54 PM.

[FupDup]

TemplarGFX, on 15 May 2013 - 03:25 PM, said:

Machine Guns definately do not need a buff in my opinion. I bought a Jager last week, and Ive been struggling to find a setup on that mech that works for my play style and ping. Well that was until early last night when I put 6 Machine Guns in it, and 1 Large Laser.

This Jager is my most effective mech when it comes to kills/assists (infact I got 3 kills and 6 assists in one game!) and thats got nothing to do with the Large Laser, its the 6 MG's.

Considering the LL is the only "power" weapon, doing 317damage tells me the Machine Guns are doing there job.

Only a single Large Laser? What the hell do you spend all of your tonnage on? I'm toying around with that build in Smurfys and I shoved in the largest possible standard engine, AMS + 2 tons of ammo, 4 tons of MG ammo, and I still have 15.5 tons left to find something to do with. I'm avoiding shoving in more ammo because of ammo explosion liabilities. You are seriously under-utilizing that second energy hardpoint.

[Deathlike]

Anyone with thoughts on this post?
http://mwomercs.com/...ost__p__2343483

Summary:
MG would be revamped as such -
.5 damage/per bullet (could be revamped to deal less damage, but with more bullets)
4 bullets/per sec maximum before cooldown (could be increased)
3 second cooldown maximum (.75 sec cooldown per bullet fired, can be tweaked as needed)
200 bullets/per ton (could be changed as necessary)

Alternatively...
.25 damage/per bullet
4 bullets/per sec, 8 bullets over 2 secs maximum before cooldown
2.6 second cooldown maximum (.325 sec cooldown per bullet fired)
400 bullets/per ton

Edited by Deathlike, 16 May 2013 - 04:49 AM.

[Redbow]

In essence, i feel the machinegun should be inbetween 1.4 to 1.7 as effective as a GAU-8, which is half the weight.
Mounting 6 mg's on for instance the Jagermech DD should be a fun CLOSE combat experience. Intimidating and ripping enough for you to contemplating in finding cover, but not emediately lethal as a lone weaponsollution. The range could be set to 0-350 as the force needed to push such a projectile is substantional enough to cut allready scarce ammo-space. 1000rounds pr ton should be enough if the damage is boosted.

Futher more, in the spirit of this post, i suggest implementing a 1 or 2.ton GAU-type machinegun to lessen the HUGE gap inbetween ballistic weaponary. 400 or 600rounds PR ton, 2second-bursts, 100rounds pr.s. making one ton go out in 2 or 3 shots. TAXING but effective as a plating-stripper, if you can keep your victim in line for that duration. Range 0-2000m being 50% effective at 1000m 25-10% effective at max range.
Since the momentum of such a big projectile is lost substantionally after 600-1000m, It won't do much harm after the 1000m mark. But the psychological effect will still be terrorizing, making mechpilots second guess.

Oh... And don't forget the sound-effect of the gun...
"WhrrrrrooooooomPFH!!!"

;-)


/Redbow

Edited by Redbow, 16 May 2013 - 06:11 AM.

[Bishop Steiner]

Screw Crit Seeking and all the fancy chrome trim.


Simply buff MG Damage so it's DPS is 2/3 that of a small laser, with the same range drop off in damage you get with Ballistics. It won't be OP due to lack of heat because:

- 1) It is fired in a Cone of Fire, so pinpoint damage is not possible,
- 2) it is fired as a continuous stream of damage, which means you have to maintain that targeting nonstop for a longer period than Small or Small Pulse Lasers to apply the that 2/3 damage over 10 seconds (no "cooldown" period)
- 3) Due to need for Ammo, is still heavier than a Small Laser. OH, and of you feel that the Ammo weight is not penalty enough, cut the ammo payload per ton in half. If it actually DID damage, we wouldn't need as much.


AKA.. stop trying to over-think it, stop trying to get cute with peripherals, and just make the things effective FOR THEIR WEIGHT.

[Utilyan]

Bishop Steiner, on 16 May 2013 - 06:29 AM, said:

Screw Crit Seeking and all the fancy chrome trim.


Simply buff MG Damage so it's DPS is 2/3 that of a small laser, with the same range drop off in damage you get with Ballistics. It won't be OP due to lack of heat because:

- 1) It is fired in a Cone of Fire, so pinpoint damage is not possible,
- 2) it is fired as a continuous stream of damage, which means you have to maintain that targeting nonstop for a longer period than Small or Small Pulse Lasers to apply the that 2/3 damage over 10 seconds (no "cooldown" period)
- 3) Due to need for Ammo, is still heavier than a Small Laser. OH, and of you feel that the Ammo weight is not penalty enough, cut the ammo payload per ton in half. If it actually DID damage, we wouldn't need as much.


AKA.. stop trying to over-think it, stop trying to get cute with peripherals, and just make the things effective FOR THEIR WEIGHT.

Well it has a dps .4 right now.......and small laser is a 1. So since they are talking about double damage its going to be a .8 thats roughly little more then the 2/3rds of a small laser right?


MGs are getting their damage doubled to 0.08/shell.
MG range is going to be 120m and they will fall off to 0 damage at 240m.
MG Spread will remain unchanged for the moment.

In 10 seconds small laser does 10 damage. in 10 seconds mg does 8 damage? A AC/2 cannon does 40damage in 10 secs

[Bishop Steiner]

Utilyan, on 16 May 2013 - 10:24 AM, said:

Well it has a dps .4 right now.......and small laser is a 1. So since they are talking about double damage its going to be a .8 thats roughly little more then the 2/3rds of a small laser right?


MGs are getting their damage doubled to 0.08/shell.
MG range is going to be 120m and they will fall off to 0 damage at 240m.
MG Spread will remain unchanged for the moment.

In 10 seconds small laser does 10 damage. in 10 seconds mg does 8 damage? A AC/2 cannon does 40damage in 10 secs

IMO that is probably going to be pretty close to how it should be, although the DPS between a MG and S.Laser are somewhat deceiving as you have to keep the MG trained on that one spot for the full 10 seconds to deliver that 8 damage, whereas you are hitting it for like 1 second 3 separate times with the S. Laser, so you are really only firing 3-4 out of the 10 seconds.

And I am TOTALLY fine with the AC/2 doing a much higher order of damage (although go around with a single AC/2 and see how much hurt you lay out..... which is what 5 of the buffed MG would lay out....... so I still don't see the dreaded 6 MG spider coring out any Atlas booty in 4 seconds.

[FupDup]

Utilyan, on 16 May 2013 - 10:24 AM, said:

Well it has a dps .4 right now.......and small laser is a 1. So since they are talking about double damage its going to be a .8 thats roughly little more then the 2/3rds of a small laser right?


MGs are getting their damage doubled to 0.08/shell.
MG range is going to be 120m and they will fall off to 0 damage at 240m.
MG Spread will remain unchanged for the moment.

In 10 seconds small laser does 10 damage. in 10 seconds mg does 8 damage? A AC/2 cannon does 40damage in 10 secs

Something to remember about using the Small Laser as a baseline weapon is that the SL is pretty crappy right now due to DHS alleviating the higher heat of a Medium Laser. The SL (and SPL while we're at it) could use a buff of its own, really (i.e. heat reduction, range increase, duration reduction, etc.). This would also give us a stronger baseline to compare MGs to...

[Lord of All]

FupDup, on 16 May 2013 - 06:10 PM, said:

Something to remember about using the Small Laser as a baseline weapon is that the SL is pretty crappy right now due to DHS alleviating the higher heat of a Medium Laser. The SL (and SPL while we're at it) could use a buff of its own, really (i.e. heat reduction, range increase, duration reduction, etc.). This would also give us a stronger baseline to compare MGs to...

Really? the Mg isn't even buffed yet and your trying to now say the SML is't buffed enough to compare with when you were touting that before. Your agenda is so evident.

Told myself I was done with this unreal agenda laden thread but this is so obvious it's pathetic.

[FupDup]

Lord of All, on 16 May 2013 - 06:14 PM, said:

Really? the Mg isn't even buffed yet and your trying to now say the SML is't buffed enough to compare with when you were touting that before. Your agenda is so evident.

Told myself I was done with this unreal agenda laden thread but this is so obvious it's pathetic.

Small Lasers currently only have the use of being a tonnage filler on a few oddball mechs like the Jenner JR7-F (although I could and should probably swap out my 2 SL for a fifth ML now that I think about it). I haven't even touted the Small Laser comparison before other than maybe once prior to the post you quoted, I've just been touting for a general damage increase with reference to Tabletop MG damage. Where, exactly, did you get that information from?

Even without the MG factored in, I want all other obsolete weapons to see some lovin' as well. Since this is an MG thread, though, that's where the majority of my attention is directed to right now.

Lord of All, on 16 May 2013 - 06:14 PM, said:

Told myself I was done with this unreal agenda laden thread but this is so obvious it's pathetic.

Two things:
1. Every single poster in this thread has an agenda. Myself and some others (stjobe, Bishop Steiner, Esplodin, etc.) have the agenda of making the MG competitively viable. You and a few others (Merchant, some guys I forgot about, etc.) have the agenda of keeping them terribad. Just because you're on the opposite side that I'm on doesn't make you change you having an agenda as well. This is pretty much politics in a nutshell: the action of saying that the other guy is doing something for political reasons is an action that has political motivations of its own behind it by definition.

2. If it's so obvious, why did you feel compelled to point it out? Redundancy for the win.

Edited by FupDup, 16 May 2013 - 06:33 PM.

[Lord of All]

FupDup, on 16 May 2013 - 06:27 PM, said:

...

2. If it's so obvious, why did you feel compelled to point it out?

Unfortunately there are not many those that can discern these things so easily. It's taken me a lifetime to realize they have to be pointed out.

My only agenda is to keep this game true to BT. All else pales. I use what works in whatever situation is current. Unfortunately the global scale is so severely lacking ATM we will probably never see a truly global Strategic BT universe from this game.

And that is the main problem. Cherry picking a portion of a balanced game is impossible.

Edited by Lord of All, 16 May 2013 - 06:35 PM.

[FupDup]

Lord of All, on 16 May 2013 - 06:34 PM, said:

Unfortunately there are not those that can discern these things so easily. It's taken me a lifetime to realize they have to be pointed out.

My only agenda is to keep this game true to BT. All else pales. I use what works in whatever situation is curent. Unfortunately the global scale is so severely lacking ATM we will probably never see a truly global Strategic BT universe from this game.

And that is the main problem. Cherry picking a portion of a balanced game is impossible.

If we were really being true to BT here, there wouldn't be any issues with MGs (or a couple of other weapons). In classical BT, MGs had the weaknesses of pitiful range and extremely lethal ammo explosions at the upside of doing pretty good damage for their weight against armored targets and doing even more to infantry. In MWO, MGs have the same downsides with no upsides to counteract them other than sounding cool (which isn't good enough for a lot of people).

Another thing: if you're using what works in current situations, why bring up the "global scale" thing? I'm guessing that is referring to stuff like combined arms, i.e. aircraft, tanks, infantry, and battle armor alongside mechs in battle. We already know that such features are very unlikely due to AI coding being required, so that doesn't really count as a "current situation." It might not even count as a future situation. We can't rely on it until we're told otherwise by the devs.




And, lastly, I'm going to assume that PGi defied all odds and added combined arms warfare, including infantry, just to hammer the point as hard as possible. In TT, many weapons were pretty bad against infantry. A PPC, for instance, could only kill one infantry soldier in a squad if it hit successfully. A Machine Gun, on the other hand, could kill between 2 and 12 dudes per bullet. I don't feel like hunting down to-hit modifier tables, but I *think* that non-anti-infantry weapons have lower accuracy against infantry.

In MWO, there aren't any to-hit modifiers. If you aim at a trooper, he's gonna get hit. So, if we compare MGs to other ballistics and missiles, then I guess it would still be wasteful to use them (other ballistics and missiles) instead of MGs when shooting men. The heat output of energy weapons is pretty easy to deal with, though, so PPCs would be still fairly slow at killing platoons but people would still try it.

Our current lasers and pulse lasers, however, have this nifty mechanic called a beam duration. You can write your name with them and draw funny symbols. If there were infantry, you could also drag the one-second beam over an entire platoon and slaughter all of the poor fools instantly just like aliens invading the Earth in a sci-fi movie, because each moment of laser exposure would do more damage than an MG bullet. Meanwhile, an MG would need to fire a new bullet for every soldier, resulting in taking a much longer time to kill them. MGs also have spread, meaning that you might need more than one bullet per soldier. The ML doesn't have ammo explosions to deal with and also gets waaay more range. In conclusion, an MWO Medium Laser would vastly outclass an MG or even a Flamer in the anti-infantry role, AND to put a cherry on top they have the bonus of killing armor. Hell, I'd even rather take a single Large Laser against infantry than a quad-MG Spider. So, you get to be dedicated anti-infantry or dedicated anti-everything. Not a very hard choice for power-gamers to make.

On a side-note, pulse lasers are supposed to do a lot more anti-infantry damage than standard lasers by +2 dudes killed for large and medium classes. Small and Micro Pulse Lasers did 2D6 against infantry, also known as identical to the Machine Gun. However, in MWO, pulse lasers have a shorter beam duration. This actually makes them worse against infantry because you can't drag the beam over as many troopers.


The only way to avoid such is to make non-MGs and non-Flamers literally bounce harmlessly off of infantry soldiers, which would be both unrealistic and just plain stupid looking. MWO's current mechanics simply do not allow for anti-infantry weapons to perform well against infantry at all. This game would have to rebuilt from the ground up to allow for specialized anti-infantry roles to actually matter at all. Mechs would also have to be an extremely rare sight and not something that every boy and his dog could stomp around in. That is also very unlikely to occur, as this game's main design pillar is stompy robots.

Edited by FupDup, 16 May 2013 - 07:13 PM.

[Lord of All]

FupDup, on 16 May 2013 - 06:55 PM, said:

...

Another thing: if you're using what works in current situations, why bring up the "global scale" thing? I'm guessing that is referring to stuff like combined arms, i.e. aircraft, tanks, infantry, and battle armor alongside mechs in battle. We already know that such features are very unlikely due to AI coding being required, so that doesn't really count as a "current situation." It might not even count as a future situation. We can't rely on it until we're told otherwise by the devs.

Correct

FupDup, on 16 May 2013 - 06:55 PM, said:

...On a side-note, pulse lasers are supposed to do a lot more anti-infantry damage than standard lasers by +2 dudes killed for large and medium classes. Small and Micro Pulse Lasers did 2D6 against infantry, also known as identical to the Machine Gun. However, in MWO, pulse lasers have a shorter beam duration. This actually makes them worse against infantry because you can't drag the beam over as many troopers.

Actually I think pulse lasers are better vs anything that dies immediately is because the initial "Pulse" kills then the next does and so forth as a straight laser kills but has no duration in TT.

Many issues with real time from Board ports. But trying to overcome them without taking the global balance (IE all unit types) into account is a futile effort, No matter how noble.

It's like trying to play rock/paper/scissors without one.

[FupDup]

Lord of All, on 16 May 2013 - 08:04 PM, said:

Actually I think pulse lasers are better vs anything that dies immediately is because the initial "Pulse" kills then the next does and so forth as a straight laser kills but has no duration in TT. Many issues with real time from Board ports. But trying to overcome them without taking the global balance (IE all unit types) into account is a futile effort, No matter how noble. It's like trying to play rock/paper/scissors without one.

I already pointed out that adding all unit types wouldn't fix MGs (or Flamers for that matter) with the Medium Laser comparisons. A single ML Spider in MWO's current environment would be vastly superior against infantry--and everything else--than an quad-MG Spider.


Every weapon mechanic would have to be rebuilt from the ground up. Lasers couldn't have durations, convergence could not exist at all against infantry unless using specific weapons, non-specific weapons would have to deal less (if any) damage to infantry than an MG bullet, mechs would have to be as rare as unicorns, and so on and so forth. It is simply too unlikely to happen. The essence of the problem is trying to put the cart before the horse when we already know that the horse is incredibly unlikely to ever arrive, thus ensuring that the cart never gets pulled unless we use a different horse that already exists.

Edited by FupDup, 16 May 2013 - 08:41 PM.

[stjobe]

Lord of All, on 16 May 2013 - 06:14 PM, said:

Really? the Mg isn't even buffed yet and your trying to now say the SML is't buffed enough to compare with when you were touting that before. Your agenda is so evident.

Told myself I was done with this unreal agenda laden thread but this is so obvious it's pathetic.

All rhetoric aside, there's one big difference between MGs and SLs:
There's no alternative to the MG until the 6-ton AC/2.

The energy line has six weapons under 6 tons, including both the ML and the LL.

Therefore, it doesn't really matter that the SL is pretty bad; you can always use another weapon instead. With the ballistics line, there is no such luxury - if you cannot for some reason afford the tonnage of an AC/2, you're forced to either use the MG or simply not mount a weapon at all.

That's one of the main reasons why it's important that the MG is made viable, and the reason that I'm personally not too keen on keeping it chained under the yoke of 2/3rds of the SLs damage. I'd much prefer it to be closer to the AC/2 than the SL, at 2.0 DPS with spread and 1.0-1.2 DPS if spread should be removed. Range can be kept at BT values; it's supposed to be a knife-range AC/2, after all.

If MWO could increase the AC/2's damage output by a factor of 20, I'm sure even us BT purists can look the other way if the MG surpasses the SL in damage.

[Blood Rose]

As it stands the MG`s range is cannonically correct, that of the small laser. As for the TT damage-that represents a sustained burst from the MG`s. However i do agree that they are quite useless ATMO. Infact, unless we start seeing infantry and Battlearmour they will never be valid at their current stats.

I run a modified K2 i named Nightwraith. Some of you may have encountered me. Now look at my mech. The basic build comes with 2 PPC`s, 2 Medium Laser`s and 2 MG`s. If you have ever actually encountered me in-game then the first thing you will have noticed is that i only ever use my PPC`s and MLaser`s. Why? Because the first thing i did was rip out my MG`s and sell them. Even against lights they are completely useless, a waste of tonnage and space. I may hate lights but i would rather blast them with my mediums than waste time throwing peas at them which IMHO is what the MG does. The Range is fine, they are for inclose point defence against infantry, but the damage and accuracy are terrible. I would far rather have that extra armour, AMS and Heatsink`s than pack 2 useless items that are more of a threat to me than the enemy, due to the chances of an MG ammo explosion. Im good thanks. My little brother (Bebster) owns a spider and even he agrees that the MG`s in it are utter crap.

Oh and BTW the TT MG ammo represents how many "bursts" of gunfire you can get, not the individual rounds.

[stjobe]

Blood Rose, on 17 May 2013 - 02:57 AM, said:

The Range is fine, they are for inclose point defence against infantry

Fixed that for you. A weapon that does (or at least should do) as much damage as an AC/2 is not meant to be only used against infantry.

I mean, a lot of people cite that the MG shouldn't do more than 2/3rds of the damage of the SL if we're to keep in line with BT, but the MG also does as much damage as an AC/2 in BT. The problem is that the SL and the AC/2 doesn't do the same damage in MWO - the SL has a DPS of 1.0 and the AC/2 has a DPS of 4.0.

In BT, these weapons did the same damage:
MG.
AC/2.
A single SRM.

In MWO, they do not do the same damage any more. So why get stuck on the "MGs should do 2/3rds of the damage a SL does", when it's equally true that "MGs should do as much damage as an AC/2" or "MGs should do the same damage as a single SRM"?

My take is that it's because keeping the MG stuck at 2/3rds of the SL's damage keeps the MG useless, and that's what some people want, for various reasons.

Me, I want the MG to be a weapon worthy of being mounted in my 'mechs; a knife-range armour-shredder, much like the AC/2 is a long-range armour-shredder. The MG has so many drawbacks that I think it's only fair that if I manage to overcome those, the weapon actually *does* something.

So yeah. Drop the crit malarkey, buff the DPS to 2.0 (or 1.0-1.2 if spread is also removed) and adjust ammo per ton to 750 (or 1500 if spread is removed). Keep the effective range at 90m and make it drop to 0 at 270m, just like all other ballistics progress.