MWO is based on the Battletech TT rules. A single turn in TT is 10 seconds but MWO wants more than 1 shot per 10 seconds (on average 3) to happen for more action so they made Rate of Fire. On top of making Rate of Fire they decide to keep the Damages from TT. Now you are doing 3 times more damage per weapon. To balance this MWO doubles the amount of armor per ton that TT allows, but doesn't triple it for some reason.... Tripling the amount of armor per ton should balance Rate of Fire but they also have touched weapon heat values.
Heat values in TT balances the Rate of Fire of a single shot per 10 second turn. By decreasing the heat generated by larger energy weapons MWO is breaking from TT to allow players to fire their big guns more often than TT originally intended.
Heat Difference MWO has adjusted from TT per shot:
ER PPC -4
PPC -2
ER Large Laser -2.5
Large Laser -1
Large Pulse Laser -2.7
Medium Laser +1
Medium Pulse Laser +1
Small Laser +1
Small Pulse Laser +1
To balance weapons armor needs to be tripled to TT values to adjust for MWO rate of fire and heat values should be reset to TT values. MWO needs to use the balance that exists already in TT without reinventing the wheel.
4
Attention Forumites, The Problem With Ppcs Is Their Dps And Refire Rate.
Started by hashinshin, Apr 17 2013 01:52 PM
202 replies to this topic
#202
Posted 18 April 2013 - 09:43 PM
Once HSR comes in for missiles and we have a a much more polished game netcode wise all weapons need to be looked at. The values of weapons now were tweaked on stats that are not what they are now due to much greater accuracy.
My personal opinion on balancing means looking at each weapon in what ROLE it should perform then using whatever variables in your control to have the weapon mechanics behave this way.
No role should excel at all things also so that extreme builds come with extreme consequences and moderate builds do not excel but wil never be caught out. Right now I cannot see the downside in many extreme builds.
The high power direct fire weapons plus the pretty lenient and binary heat scale (shut down or perfectly fine) means that they are great sniping weapons that are now accurate, damaging, powerful, and also have a pretty good rate of to fire to boot. They are great at long range, very good mid range, and competent at close range. Close range weapons cant compete at long range, might do minimal damage at mid range, and are a little better than those other weapons close in.
Look at balance form the extremes first with roles in mind. That 6 ERLL/LL/PPC stalker - why should be survive if a brawling heavy gets in close? isnt he suppose to be at the back lending his punch and range - where is his massive disadvantage up close? Or ... where is the brawlers large advantage once he is talented enough to get in under the range of those long ranged mechs?
When you make extreme builds suffer form extreme consequences out of thier comfort zone people may start to emply more mixed range mechs. We cannot swing the other way too far either and make brawling the king of the day, they need to be scared of taking fire getting in too.
There are many ways to achieve this but lets look at the two weapons people seem to be having isued with - PPCs and Gauss.
PPC/ERPPC
pros - high power,good range, now accurate, fast refire rate, heat not overly punishing, can use at most ranges without feeling too pressed with DHS, stacked cause pinpoint damage to a location
Cons - heat is a litte high, close in the PPC has some small issues, stats are slightly worse in DPS compared to other more dedicated infighter weapons but not by much.
What is the PPCs role? It is a staple BT weapon, but the PPC had a minimum range that kind of dictated it was a mid to long range weapon. It's heat also meant that it was quite hot and the performance of your mech suffered greatly befoe you shut down also so continual fie of a PPC was of detriment.
The solution as i see it is to make it not a pure sniper weapon, but one where the heat it generates in groups at least is punishing in an extended fight. Howeer you also need to make it so a dedicated brawler in your face should scare the hell out of you. A longer refire rate would help with this for sure. It woudlnt stop pop tarts using them but at least it would be in thier remit as snipers. It is the lack of couterbalance to make them cry to thier mommies when outmanouvred because they can still brawl ok.
Gauss is similar but an even more snipercentric weapon. I do not believe that it blows up at the drop of a hat, usually if you are that damaged you probably only had a few extra shots left anyway and all its other benfits are pretty damned good.
Balance is an ecosystem, you cannot change one without effecting the other. Now that net code is fixed ALL weapons need to be adjusted. If i were PGI i would make sure to understand the role of each weapon and how it can be exploited to make sure that extreme builds have the consequences they deserve. They start changing the wepaon every single week for a month or two in a concentrated blitz on weapon balance until they hit a reasonable point.
ok i am buzzing with coffee and its about to crash thats my little rant ... or big ...
My personal opinion on balancing means looking at each weapon in what ROLE it should perform then using whatever variables in your control to have the weapon mechanics behave this way.
No role should excel at all things also so that extreme builds come with extreme consequences and moderate builds do not excel but wil never be caught out. Right now I cannot see the downside in many extreme builds.
The high power direct fire weapons plus the pretty lenient and binary heat scale (shut down or perfectly fine) means that they are great sniping weapons that are now accurate, damaging, powerful, and also have a pretty good rate of to fire to boot. They are great at long range, very good mid range, and competent at close range. Close range weapons cant compete at long range, might do minimal damage at mid range, and are a little better than those other weapons close in.
Look at balance form the extremes first with roles in mind. That 6 ERLL/LL/PPC stalker - why should be survive if a brawling heavy gets in close? isnt he suppose to be at the back lending his punch and range - where is his massive disadvantage up close? Or ... where is the brawlers large advantage once he is talented enough to get in under the range of those long ranged mechs?
When you make extreme builds suffer form extreme consequences out of thier comfort zone people may start to emply more mixed range mechs. We cannot swing the other way too far either and make brawling the king of the day, they need to be scared of taking fire getting in too.
There are many ways to achieve this but lets look at the two weapons people seem to be having isued with - PPCs and Gauss.
PPC/ERPPC
pros - high power,good range, now accurate, fast refire rate, heat not overly punishing, can use at most ranges without feeling too pressed with DHS, stacked cause pinpoint damage to a location
Cons - heat is a litte high, close in the PPC has some small issues, stats are slightly worse in DPS compared to other more dedicated infighter weapons but not by much.
What is the PPCs role? It is a staple BT weapon, but the PPC had a minimum range that kind of dictated it was a mid to long range weapon. It's heat also meant that it was quite hot and the performance of your mech suffered greatly befoe you shut down also so continual fie of a PPC was of detriment.
The solution as i see it is to make it not a pure sniper weapon, but one where the heat it generates in groups at least is punishing in an extended fight. Howeer you also need to make it so a dedicated brawler in your face should scare the hell out of you. A longer refire rate would help with this for sure. It woudlnt stop pop tarts using them but at least it would be in thier remit as snipers. It is the lack of couterbalance to make them cry to thier mommies when outmanouvred because they can still brawl ok.
Gauss is similar but an even more snipercentric weapon. I do not believe that it blows up at the drop of a hat, usually if you are that damaged you probably only had a few extra shots left anyway and all its other benfits are pretty damned good.
Balance is an ecosystem, you cannot change one without effecting the other. Now that net code is fixed ALL weapons need to be adjusted. If i were PGI i would make sure to understand the role of each weapon and how it can be exploited to make sure that extreme builds have the consequences they deserve. They start changing the wepaon every single week for a month or two in a concentrated blitz on weapon balance until they hit a reasonable point.
ok i am buzzing with coffee and its about to crash thats my little rant ... or big ...
#203
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Member
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Posted 19 April 2013 - 12:11 AM
I really tried to hold it 'till I can but all the crap I read is starting to make me wanna bash something...
"PPCs should be with longer CD" , "PPCs should generate more heat"... "PPCs this" "PPCs that"...
Well ok - let we accept the longer CD scenario - let we say it retain the same heat generation and it has it's cooldown increased to 4 sec recycle -
You know what? I'll be the hapiest person in the world, because that extra second will prevent me from any sort of overheating and will add atleast 1 alpha more without holding the button!
Bulls I tell you - who the hell is holding the alpha button while boating PPCs? Do you even think before you post?
And our common fella - Willie Saureland - which you all tend to flame actually have a good common sense despite what you think.
PPCs are perfect as they are and hell yea - I vouge for myself as a VERY descent player, as as one that's playing atleast the half time with the weapon.
It's not the weapon's problem, don't you get it?
It's the increased variety of poptarding-wanna-be mechs as the increased number of the large maps(and sort of the map-drop-chance precentage it seems) - as you'll do just more than fine if you drop on Alpine or the Desert and if not - you'll do quite good while having sniper weapons.
I'm playing this cursed game with PPCs(cause I love the weapon) basically since I started it, and I waited a long, LONG time for the PPC to get where they currently are.
I've played enough for them to have a good sense of knowing how and when they are ballanced, but you people really should start thinking before pointing something for a nerf bat target.
And that comparison with the AC10s is just way more beyound stupid, cause in the terms of slots the PPCs are taking way more crittical space than any AC available.
Yes. That's right. If you wanna shoot two times in a row with 3 PPCs you should have ~17-21 DOUBLE heat sinks - in the case with my AWS-9M build - 5 in the engine(well... good luck if you don't wanna use an XL) and 4(x3 == 12) as crittical space in the side torsos.
The price for having a PPC is high enough and the weapon is ballance enough for itself.
Even the PPC boating, which I completely dispise(yes, mr. STALKER, I mean you!) has some downsides - the mechs shutdown for quite a long time after firing two alphas(even with the coolshots - if we're talking about 5ppc STALKER made from heatsinks tho this is just stupid...).
The issue you're experiencing is based on the fact that a poptart can go in the air, unload an alpha on you, no matter how costly(in terms of heat) it is, then land behind the hill and wait for two weeks to cooldown without worrying of being endangered.
This is not an weapon issue.
It's the same sort of issue as all the other "ballance" problems the game had in the past which is:
PEOPLE ALWAYS TEND TO SEARCH FOR THE EASY MODE.
Since it's the highlander madness time now, the most logic thing for that seems to be going poptarding stuff.
Well I agree.
And I probably won't play for a week more, since everytime a new mech comes out there is something like this.
No?
Look few weeks back - you remember the Jager-BOOM-builds hit-of-the-season thingy right? 2xAC20s?
No?
I know that's a lie
Just... dare to touch my PPCs again...
And blame the weapon itself instead of the boating for that...
"PPCs should be with longer CD" , "PPCs should generate more heat"... "PPCs this" "PPCs that"...
Well ok - let we accept the longer CD scenario - let we say it retain the same heat generation and it has it's cooldown increased to 4 sec recycle -
You know what? I'll be the hapiest person in the world, because that extra second will prevent me from any sort of overheating and will add atleast 1 alpha more without holding the button!
Bulls I tell you - who the hell is holding the alpha button while boating PPCs? Do you even think before you post?
And our common fella - Willie Saureland - which you all tend to flame actually have a good common sense despite what you think.
PPCs are perfect as they are and hell yea - I vouge for myself as a VERY descent player, as as one that's playing atleast the half time with the weapon.
It's not the weapon's problem, don't you get it?
It's the increased variety of poptarding-wanna-be mechs as the increased number of the large maps(and sort of the map-drop-chance precentage it seems) - as you'll do just more than fine if you drop on Alpine or the Desert and if not - you'll do quite good while having sniper weapons.
I'm playing this cursed game with PPCs(cause I love the weapon) basically since I started it, and I waited a long, LONG time for the PPC to get where they currently are.
I've played enough for them to have a good sense of knowing how and when they are ballanced, but you people really should start thinking before pointing something for a nerf bat target.
And that comparison with the AC10s is just way more beyound stupid, cause in the terms of slots the PPCs are taking way more crittical space than any AC available.
Yes. That's right. If you wanna shoot two times in a row with 3 PPCs you should have ~17-21 DOUBLE heat sinks - in the case with my AWS-9M build - 5 in the engine(well... good luck if you don't wanna use an XL) and 4(x3 == 12) as crittical space in the side torsos.
The price for having a PPC is high enough and the weapon is ballance enough for itself.
Even the PPC boating, which I completely dispise(yes, mr. STALKER, I mean you!) has some downsides - the mechs shutdown for quite a long time after firing two alphas(even with the coolshots - if we're talking about 5ppc STALKER made from heatsinks tho this is just stupid...).
The issue you're experiencing is based on the fact that a poptart can go in the air, unload an alpha on you, no matter how costly(in terms of heat) it is, then land behind the hill and wait for two weeks to cooldown without worrying of being endangered.
This is not an weapon issue.
It's the same sort of issue as all the other "ballance" problems the game had in the past which is:
PEOPLE ALWAYS TEND TO SEARCH FOR THE EASY MODE.
Since it's the highlander madness time now, the most logic thing for that seems to be going poptarding stuff.
Well I agree.
And I probably won't play for a week more, since everytime a new mech comes out there is something like this.
No?
Look few weeks back - you remember the Jager-BOOM-builds hit-of-the-season thingy right? 2xAC20s?
No?
I know that's a lie
Just... dare to touch my PPCs again...
And blame the weapon itself instead of the boating for that...
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