1386 replies to this topic

[Hayashi]

Bryan Ekman, on 08 April 2013 - 11:36 AM, said:

CCQ 3: Why is Machine Gun damage so low? A: Partly due to the nature of how MGs work in the TT rules, partially due to how we chose to make it useful. When equipping a MG, keep in mind that it is not meant to burn through armor but is very useful for tearing up internals (crits). Bumping MG damage will turn it into a laser that can be kept on with no heat penalty until it runs out of ammo. Now imagine the devastating effect that a 6 MG spider could do to the back of an Atlas! We are still investigating balance of the MG but don’t expect any significant increase in damage.

We're seeing a massive increase in the number of Machine Gun threads in multiple forums which is starting to block out nearly every other discussion out there. While this is clearly an issue of contention with so much activity, the current state whereby we can't see any other threads because of the number of Machine Gun threads is not desirable either.

So, please continue all Machine Gun discussions here. A 200-page reply train would probably invoke more than a bit of attention. Currently the forum merge system would make all the thread links from your notification centre fail (and make it seem like the threads were deleted), so to make sure all the links are still valid, we're using the lock-and-link method. Please refrain from creating any new threads on the issue.

All other MG discussion threads will be locked and linked to this one, and this thread will be linked back to all the other MG discussion threads so none of the discussion will be lost.

http://mwomercs.com/...-reality-check/ - 119
http://mwomercs.com/...makes-no-sense/ - 54
http://mwomercs.com/...o-heres-a-poll/ - 9
http://mwomercs.com/...anmech-says-so/ - 26
http://mwomercs.com/...achine-guns-is/ - 11
http://mwomercs.com/...the-front-page/ - 32
http://mwomercs.com/...ew-on-mg-issue/ - 13
http://mwomercs.com/...dwagon-as-well/ - 11
http://mwomercs.com/...and-a-proposal/ - 19
http://mwomercs.com/...d-to-be-better/ - 39
http://mwomercs.com/...because-we-can/ - 10
http://mwomercs.com/...ake-37-from-me/ - 20
http://mwomercs.com/...s-wrong-on-mgs/ - 6
http://mwomercs.com/...ry-small-laser/ - 22
http://mwomercs.com/...e-machine-guns/ - 2
http://mwomercs.com/...-face-infantry/ - 51
http://mwomercs.com/...point-like-ams/ - 13
http://mwomercs.com/...ctually-bugged/ - 53
http://mwomercs.com/...mgs-ballistics/ - 14
http://mwomercs.com/...s-are-not-fine/ - 56
http://mwomercs.com/...stic-mechs-use/ - 63
http://mwomercs.com/...g-ammo-with-mg/ - 8
http://mwomercs.com/...ive-range-buff/ - 124
http://mwomercs.com/...ity-cost-of-mg/ - 5
http://mwomercs.com/...hoot-lrms-down/ - 48
http://mwomercs.com/...se-machineguns/ - 341
http://mwomercs.com/...-a-damage-buff/ - 551
http://mwomercs.com/...f-machine-guns/ - 157
http://mwomercs.com/...t-boost-in-dps/ - 298
http://mwomercs.com/...t-be-increased/ - 93
http://mwomercs.com/...al-use-in-game/ - 53
http://mwomercs.com/...achine-gun-why/ - 96
http://mwomercs.com/...2-machine-guns/ - 116
http://mwomercs.com/...-gun-buffssigh/ - 253
http://mwomercs.com/...cs-stream-fire/ - 34
http://mwomercs.com/...do-it-properly/ - 343
http://mwomercs.com/...-makes-no-sense - 269
http://mwomercs.com/...c-bt-fairy-land - 444
http://mwomercs.com/...-with-mgflamers - 132
http://mwomercs.com/...ametralladoras/ - 26
http://mwomercs.com/...ng-as-intended/ - 74
http://mwomercs.com/...to-buff-the-mg/ - 27
http://mwomercs.com/forums/topic/112357-additional-generic-mg-thread/ - 30
http://mwomercs.com/...nother-mg-idea/ - 29
http://mwomercs.com/...eekend-results/ - 2

That little number to the right is the total number of posts each thread had. And you can see for yourself how many threads there are.

Viterbi, on 09 April 2013 - 07:42 AM, said:

Rest assured that your Community Representatives will be monitoring this thread and forwarding your feedback to the developers accordingly. Recall that Bryan has noted that Machine Guns are working as intended, but as with all feedback threads we will continue to review your concerns. If you could please come back to the discussion regarding Machine Guns itself, we would greatly appreciate a minimal meta-discussion. Posting off-topic, creating duplicate threads, and making nonconstructive remarks, greatly increases our workload and prevents us from time that would normally be spent reviewing your feedback and generating reports of your concerns for our developers. Sanctions will be placed on accounts that violate our Code of Conduct. Critical feedback can be valuable, but it must be posted in a way that does not undermine other users or our efforts. Now... back to the discussion on Machine Guns...

Edited by Egomane, 14 April 2013 - 06:44 AM.
More links

[Sifright]

I thought you only care about trends?

Doing this hides the trend...

[Xelah]

So basically you're locking this topic so that we can't start a "trend" that the devs are looking for and this will never be fixed?

[zztophat]

Sifright, on 09 April 2013 - 02:22 AM, said:

I thought you only care about trends?

Doing this hides the trend...

...And that's the point.

[Michael Costanza]

Sifright, on 09 April 2013 - 02:22 AM, said:

I thought you only care about trends?

Doing this hides the trend...

If they went through the effort to consolidate threads, they noticed the trend. That's more feedback than not consolidating and just letting people rant and rave.

[MadPanda]

Sifright, on 09 April 2013 - 02:22 AM, said:

I thought you only care about trends?

Doing this hides the trend...

Why do you think there are no changes? They only care about the issue if there a lot of threads, but at the same time the mods mop up the many threads into a single thread. PGI checks the forums and sees one topic and thinks everything is fine. That's why there have been no changes to anything the community complains about.

[Dremster]

Repost from the "Post your MG stats thread"
Machine guns are in dire need of a buff. I don't see why we just can't buff the damage for one patch. Thats 2 weeks to TEST, at least we can see for ourselves if machine guns should be allowed more damage.

MACHINE GUN 2 2,688 1,868 69.49% 00:10:07 69
2 matches with the 5K Spider. 34.5 damage per match, or 8.625 per gun.

Also:
The Machine Gun is the quintessential anti-infantry weapon, issuing a stream of bullets at a high rate of fire to cut down opposing soldiers, while still being effective at damaging BattleMechs. It should be noted that despite their enhanced effectiveness against infantry, BattleMech machine guns are perfectly capable of STRIPPING THE ARMOR off any BattleMech.

/facepalm

Edited by Dremster, 09 April 2013 - 02:28 AM.

[Michael Costanza]

Oh come on everyone! They've noticed concerns about streaks, ECM, missile splash, matchmaking issues, crashes, etc and you're all accusing them of sweeping MG under the rug? Give them a frigging ounce of credit.

[xenoglyph]

Well, I can now say I've finally visited the Support & Feedback / Game Balance section of the forums. I didn't expect so many cobwebs...

[Brilig]

There is a happy middle ground between useless and OP. Right now MGs are pretty useless.

If 6 SRM6 Catapults were not OP. Then I don't know why were afraid a damage buff to machine guns will make a 6 MG Jager OP.

As Jeffsw6 suggested in another thread, QA dept should do some more testing to ensure weapons are all viable, and not OP. I'm fine with something beyond just damage too. Wicked crit seeking would be a cool MG feature. However they don't seem to do that either.

Edit: Credit to Jeffsw6's suggestion.

Edited by Brilig, 09 April 2013 - 02:34 AM.

[xenoglyph]

Snicker snack

[Sifright]

Michael Costanza, on 09 April 2013 - 02:25 AM, said:

If they went through the effort to consolidate threads, they noticed the trend. That's more feedback than not consolidating and just letting people rant and rave.

no because it was done by a volunteer mod unless he brings it to the attention of the main pgi team they wont notice or care. it's a thread hidden out of the way.

by the by,

Mgs need a 200% buff.

Given they don't read posts for specific suggestions though I guess we should all just scream BUFF MGS with no other information given.

They don't want detailed feedback just rage.

[jeffsw6]

A guy who is a "volunteer moderator" and doesn't have sufficient permission to sticky a thread has noticed.

That's some progress, I suppose. Why does it take a "200 page reply thread" to figure something out that could be determined by 1 dev making a mech with 4 MGs and spending 10 minutes in the Testing Grounds?

The feedback process is broken. Obviously the suggestion forum is ignored. That is not a good way to collect input from players.

Here's an idea, PGI: create your own polls that are linked from the in-game advertisement / sale graphic, or the useless news feed, and ask players if they think Machine Guns are OP. Or flamers. Or UAC5s. Or Command Consoles!

Or, I dunno, search the database that stores player stats and realize that no one is doing any real amount of damage or kills with the SDR and CDA mechs that do not have viable builds because there are no suitable armaments for them.

Just a thought.

[Michael Costanza]

Sifright, on 09 April 2013 - 02:29 AM, said:

no because it was done by a volunteer mod unless he brings it to the attention of the main pgi team they wont notice or care. it's a thread hidden out of the way.

by the by,

Mgs need a 200% buff.

Given they don't read posts for specific suggestions though I guess we should all just scream BUFF MGS with no other information given.

They don't want detailed feedback just rage.

They have an Ask The Devs thread, Command Chair posts, Bug Reports threads, developers have responded _directly_ to posts in the past. You've been here awhile, you would know this. Look at that whole uproar over coolants and consumables that no one really even cares about anymore? And again, we're talking about MG. Of all the things the Devs could be working on, would you rather the Devs be focusing on MG balancing or something else like 12v12 or new content or Community Warfare?

[Chavette]

jeffsw6, on 09 April 2013 - 02:31 AM, said:

Here's an idea, PGI: create your own polls that are linked from the in-game advertisement / sale graphic, or the useless news feed, and ask players if they think Machine Guns are OP. Or flamers. Or UAC5s. Or Command Consoles!

Fully support this, its been said only a fraction of players frequent the forums, and they have opinions too.

Just have a "Poll of the day" on the start screen, or launcher. It would be a great and painless way to touch around issues without making a huge post here or committing to do anything.

[jeffsw6]

Sifright, on 09 April 2013 - 02:29 AM, said:

Mgs need a 200% buff.

I'm not sure 200% is enough. I am certain that, if they become over-powered, there are a wide variety of mechs that will be capable of equipping them, and it should become self-evident pretty quickly. If they get buffed too much and become OP, they can simply be adjusted again. It is very reasonable to ask them for a HUGE buff so they WILL BE OP and then expect them to be further adjusted over a few days. This can be done with trivial patching / hot-fixing.

Alternatively, they could just gradually buff the MG every couple weeks until it feels right.

I have little confidence in my own ability to pick a number and say "this is what it should be." I don't think PGI can do that, either, since they didn't even think it was broke in the first place.

Let's keep the discussion about the process they should use to improve it. Huge buff and then nerf if needed? Baby steps? Whatever it is, BETA is the best time to make radical game-balance modifications. Mistakes are acceptable as long as they are addressed in the next patch.

Brilig, on 09 April 2013 - 02:27 AM, said:

As someone suggested in one of those linked threads, QA dept should do some more testing to ensure weapons are all viable, and not OP. I'm fine with something beyond just damage too. Wicked crit seeking would be a cool MG feature. However they don't seem to do that either.

I think all MECHs should be viable. The reason MGs matter is the various low-ton mechs that can't equip enough armaments to be useful at all.

That's why there aren't 30 Flamer threads. Small Lasers exist. There is no Small Auto Cannon, there is only Machine Gun.

[Sifright]

Michael Costanza, on 09 April 2013 - 02:32 AM, said:

They have an Ask The Devs thread, Command Chair posts, Bug Reports threads, developers have responded _directly_ to posts in the past. You've been here awhile, you would know this. Look at that whole uproar over coolants and consumables that no one really even cares about anymore? And again, we're talking about MG. Of all the things the Devs could be working on, would you rather the Devs be focusing on MG balancing or something else like 12v12 or new content or Community Warfare?

except the latest ask the dev threads explicitly states they don't look at specific suggestions. They might reply to them but they aren't taken onboard as part of their feedback process. only trends are of concern.

[Rippthrough]

0.15dps baby, oh yeah!

Seriously, is there some sort of anti-balancing gnome in the PGI offices that keeps smacking the guys on the back of the head every time they look at weapon numbers?

[Sifright]

Rippthrough, on 09 April 2013 - 02:38 AM, said:

0.15dps baby, oh yeah!

Seriously, is there some sort of anti-balancing gnome in the PGI offices that keeps smacking the guys on the back of the head every time they look at weapon numbers?

yes his name is paul inouye

[Xelah]

Rippthrough, on 09 April 2013 - 02:38 AM, said:

Seriously, is there some sort of anti-balancing gnome in the PGI offices that keeps smacking the guys on the back of the head every time they look at weapon numbers?

Yes. His name is Steve.