1386 replies to this topic

[Blood Rose]

stjobe, on 17 May 2013 - 03:36 AM, said:

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.

I have to say after reading your post and thinking it over that i agree with you. The MG`s are a close range fusilade weapon and whilst i do still stand by my point of them beinp an anti infantry weapon i do have to say that you have a very definitive point. When coupled with the uneven weapon DPS values, the lack of infantry means that an MG is most definetly worse than useless.

[Lord of All]

stjobe, on 17 May 2013 - 02:02 AM, said:

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.

So basically we need to buff weapons for any chassis that sux in your opinion?

[FupDup]

Lord of All, on 17 May 2013 - 07:26 AM, said:

So basically we need to buff weapons for any chassis that sux in your opinion?

To be fair, it also helps chassis that don't sux (but not by nearly as large of a margin). Maybe, for instance, somebody might shove a few buffed MGs on their Jagermech or heaven forbid Catapult K2 for some low-tonnage close defense.

Edited by FupDup, 17 May 2013 - 07:47 AM.

[Team Leader]

Lord of All, on 17 May 2013 - 07:26 AM, said:

So basically we need to buff weapons for any chassis that sux in your opinion?

So basically we need to buff the weapons that are absolutely useless (which is the MG and Flamer) which many mechs mount stock and there is no alternative for.

Why the heck isnt this in gameplay balance? Mechs and loadout, REALLY? Its like theyre trying to hide it. STICKY IT EVERYWHERE!

[FupDup]

Team Leader, on 17 May 2013 - 08:34 AM, said:

So basically we need to buff the weapons that are absolutely useless (which is the MG and Flamer) which many mechs mount stock and there is no alternative for.

Why the heck isnt this in gameplay balance? Mechs and loadout, REALLY? Its like theyre trying to hide it. STICKY IT EVERYWHERE!

To be fair, the Flamer does have the alternative of the Medium Laser for the same tonnage (but yes, I do still want a Flamer buff).

[Deathlike]

FupDup, on 17 May 2013 - 08:36 AM, said:

To be fair, the Flamer does have the alternative of the Medium Laser for the same tonnage (but yes, I do still want a Flamer buff).

The flamer buff is coming... I still wonder if it'll be good enough.

[Lord of All]

Deathlike, on 17 May 2013 - 10:04 AM, said:

The flamer buff is coming... I still wonder if it'll be good enough.

Well if nothing else it should make it more fun to use. I throw one on every now and then for ***** and grins.

[TemplarGFX]

Firstly let me say, I am no TT master, infact I really have no idea what is TT and what isnt.

But I like to say my piece anyway (lol) so here it is :


Idea 1 )
Make MG's take up 2 slots, and do double damage. Imagine it as additional space required for ammo feeds or ancillary systems. It makes MG's a little more viable, but lowers the chance of boating without using up ALL of your space.

Idea 2 )
Make MG's deal double or even tripple damage to unamored areas. Leave them as the crappy armor shredders they are, but make them truly viable once the armor has been removed

Idea 3 )
Double the firing rate of the MG

Idea 4 )
Simulate richocet by giving MG bullets a chance to deal splash damage. (fairly high chance so it happens alot)

Idea 5 )
Add the Heavy Machine Gun (http://www.sarna.net...avy_Machine_Gun) into the game, give it double the damage of the standard MG, half the max range and double the weight.

[FupDup]

TemplarGFX, on 19 May 2013 - 02:52 PM, said:

Firstly let me say, I am no TT master, infact I really have no idea what is TT and what isnt.

But I like to say my piece anyway (lol) so here it is :


Idea 1 )
Make MG's take up 2 slots, and do double damage. Imagine it as additional space required for ammo feeds or ancillary systems. It makes MG's a little more viable, but lowers the chance of boating without using up ALL of your space.

Idea 2 )
Make MG's deal double or even tripple damage to unamored areas. Leave them as the crappy armor shredders they are, but make them truly viable once the armor has been removed

Idea 3 )
Double the firing rate of the MG

Idea 4 )
Simulate richocet by giving MG bullets a chance to deal splash damage. (fairly high chance so it happens alot)

Idea 5 )
Add the Heavy Machine Gun (http://www.sarna.net...avy_Machine_Gun) into the game, give it double the damage of the standard MG, half the max range and double the weight.

Idea 1: So it's like the upcoming change PGI is going to make, but it takes up more slots? Also, the double damage won't be nearly enough.

Idea 2: It would be a lot better than crit-seeking, but still underwhelming. Keep in mind that internals only make up 1/3 of a location's health (and armor is 2/3). By the time internals are open, they can just be destroyed by anything pretty quickly.

Idea 3: That won't be nearly enough, and MGs currently don't even fire as many shots per second as they're supposed to.

Idea 4: Interesting. I personally find it kind of weird, but seeing how splash damage has made missiles OP before the Jagermech update this might have some merit to it if combined with a damage boost of no less than double.

Idea 5: That would still be terrible. Even a Clan HMG, which weighs just as much as a standard IS MG, would suck horribly in MWO.



Ultimately, here are my own ideas:
1. Buff damage per bullet to no less than 0.12
2. Fix the RoF bug so they actually shoot 10 bullets per second
3. Remove spread completely (keep bullet drop when firing at greater than 90 meters)
4. Reduce ammo per ton so that the damage per ton is ~150
5. Remove crit-seeking attribute

[TemplarGFX]

Like I said, not much of a TT person! I did not know it fired slower than it should!

I have very up and down luck with the MG. some games I get a rediculous amount of damage done, others I barely pass 50.

using 6 mg's in a single game I managed to deal out 163dmg. Now that in my opinion is pretty good damage for a machine gun, however thats a crazy good run!


Perhaps your suggestions of the damage increase + the ammo weight changes is the way to go?

I personally thing the MG only needs the tiniest of damage increases, if its role is to remain a crit seeker. If they insist on keeping the MG as the light ballistic weapon, the ONLY light ballistic weapon then the damage needs to be SERIOUSLY increased. However if they plan on adding the Light AC/2 or the Light Rifle into the mix to flesh out Ballistics, then again, I think only the tiniest of damage increase is needed.

[stjobe]

TemplarGFX, on 19 May 2013 - 08:58 PM, said:

using 6 mg's in a single game I managed to deal out 163dmg. Now that in my opinion is pretty good damage for a machine gun, however thats a crazy good run!

"Pretty good damage", huh? Have you done the math?

Your 163 damage from 6 MGs is 27.16 damage per MG, meaning you fired 679.16 bullets from each MG, which in turn means you fired your MGs for 67.92 seconds, going through more than two tons of ammo (total bullets fired is 4074, which means you had at least three tons of ammo for those MGs).

Now 6 MGs + 3 tons of ammo is 4.5 tons.

Had you instead gone with three Small Lasers, you would not only have saved three tons, you'd have done 25% more damage; 201 instead of 163.

And that's with half of the guns that you mounted.

TemplarGFX, on 19 May 2013 - 08:58 PM, said:

I personally thing the MG only needs the tiniest of damage increases, if its role is to remain a crit seeker. If they insist on keeping the MG as the light ballistic weapon, the ONLY light ballistic weapon then the damage needs to be SERIOUSLY increased. However if they plan on adding the Light AC/2 or the Light Rifle into the mix to flesh out Ballistics, then again, I think only the tiniest of damage increase is needed.

First off, the Light Rifle is unable to damage 'mechs. It does 3 damage to non-'mechs, but has a -3 damage modifier against 'mechs.

Secondly, they won't implement weapons that are out of the timeline or non-canon, like the Light AC/2, they've stated so on numerous occasions. So the MG is what we've got.

Finally, you're absolutely correct in that the "crit weapon" malarkey needs to go, since the MG is and will be the only light ballistic weapon for a number of years in the timeline. I just wish the devs would open their eyes and see that too.

[Lord of All]

nvmnd, how do i unsub a thread?

Edited by Lord of All, 20 May 2013 - 09:15 AM.

[Terror Teddy]

TemplarGFX, on 19 May 2013 - 02:52 PM, said:

Idea 1 )
Make MG's take up 2 slots, and do double damage. Imagine it as additional space required for ammo feeds or ancillary systems. It makes MG's a little more viable, but lowers the chance of boating without using up ALL of your space.

So suddenly the MG would take up TWICE the critical space of a weapon 12 times heavier that also STILL would do 20 times the DPS instead of 40...

Gotta be a lot of padding in that gun.

[stjobe]

A couple of matches into the new patch, did a couple of drops in my 5K.

Results: Effective DPS (damage done / rounds fired * 10) is up to 0.5 per MG, or 2 DPS for the four I use on the 5K.

Verdict: It's kind of sad, really; the 6xMG JM6-DD pilot I dropped with in one match said before the match "I'm gonna shoot ALL the MGs", and sounded pretty stoked about the buff. After the match though, it was "2x nothing is still nothing". And that's my verdict as well; the buff was too small. The MGs are still not worth mounting, and the light ballistic 'mechs will continue to be needlessly sub-par.

0.2 per round if you're going to keep the spread, 0.1-0.12 if you lose the spread and let us hit what we aim at is what you should try next. Preferably next patch. And remove the silly crit buff already, just up the damage and be done with this travesty of weapon balancing.

Edited by stjobe, 21 May 2013 - 11:41 AM.

[Deathlike]

One person has said it's been better for them. I expect more MG users to be happy with it, but not necessarily totally satisfied.

[Lord of All]

REALLY!!!!! A MG Boat isn't viable?????

Who would a guessed?

[FupDup]

Lord of All, on 21 May 2013 - 04:00 PM, said:

REALLY!!!!! A MG Boat isn't viable?????

Who would a guessed?

Pretty much anyone who sees a pattern in PGI's patching process.

[shintakie]

Tried a couple matches with buffed MG's.

As predicted was a complete waste of time.

Yay for the 3C still bein a useless Cicada!

[Deathlike]

Hey, at least the MG is not a Flamer.. which was accidentally nerfed (no weapon in this game deals heat damage at the moment).

Another incremental buff to 1.2 DPS would be nice...

[Curccu]

Can I just start shooting mechs with my AMS its way more powerful than MG, with same tonnage.