99 replies to this topic

[Ransack]

Davers, on 01 May 2013 - 11:54 AM, said:

If you are using weapons that can target your opponent's AMS, then the AMS was never a concern for you to begin with.

Point is, I don't think it's going to stick up like a Jagermech's head antenna. It will be small, it will be hard to see at range it will be in an odd spot. It's not going have a big HIT ME sign on it.

I guess using AMS was a bad comparison in hindsight.

Boo on me

[IceSerpent]

Critical Fumble, on 01 May 2013 - 09:37 AM, said:

Is it supposed to fiddle with your awareness? All it does in TT is cancel some electronic support items (BAP, TAG, Narc, Artemis) and in later rules it apparently gave a small amount of protection against guided and semi-guided rounds.

It also affects targeting (interferes with C3 network).

[Zerberus]

Keifomofutu, on 01 May 2013 - 06:05 AM, said:

It's funny, the best ideas for ecm balance I generally read on the forums. The current laughable 4 sec ecm disruption from getting hit by ppc does nothing to actually counter ecm. It's not even long enough to get a single lrm strike in.

Funny, I can keep a single mechs ecm screen down for days on end with just 2 ppcs.

A 4 second loss refreshed every 1.5 seconds until the target movey out of MY firing arc = more than enough time to lock, fire and land even from 1000m.

Considering every 1337Stalk0r and his scottish pogo-stick wingman is boating at least 2 or more, maybe the problem is alphastriking instead of using your weapons intelligently?

Don`t get me wrong, I am not a fan of ecm and only use it on 2 mechs because it is IMO OP, but 1 intelligent pilot that can aim with 2 ppcs can disable the benefit of 1 enemy ecm for the duration of the match if he can keep his target.

Edited by Zerberus, 01 May 2013 - 02:22 PM.

[Keifomofutu]

Zerberus, on 01 May 2013 - 02:19 PM, said:

Funny, I can keep a single mechs ecm screen down for days on end with just 2 ppcs.

A 4 second loss refreshed every 1.5 seconds until the target movey out of MY firing arc = more than enough time to lock, fire and land even from 1000m.

Considering every 1337Stalk0r and his scottish pogo-stick wingman is boating at least 2 or more, maybe the problem is alphastriking instead of using your weapons intelligently?

Don`t get me wrong, I am not a fan of ecm and only use it on 2 mechs because it is IMO OP, but 1 intelligent pilot that can aim with 2 ppcs can disable the benefit of 1 enemy ecm for the duration of the match if he can keep his target.

If you are such a God with PPCs then you wouldn't need to "counter" a light ecm boat anyway. You'd simply kill him in one or two alphas. Aka my whole point. The simplest way to counter ecm is just to not bother and instakill him with PPC alphas like everything else. Hence the counter doesn't really work as advertised. Any weapon can kill a light mech PPCs should be a little different.

Not that I believe your little story of landing every hit on a light mech with ppcs in chain fire ALL the time. Seen enough light mechs skitter through eight guys with barely a scratch to believe any random player's boasting.

Edited by Keifomofutu, 01 May 2013 - 06:07 PM.

[DocBach]

The idea that being able to damage something makes it balanced is kind of funny. You can say anything is balanced with that excuse.

"what do you mean our ultra AC/60 that doesn't make heat is overpowered? we put plenty of counters in the game, like other weapons! If a player shoots it enough times, it dies. Hence, balance achieved!"

[MrZakalwe]

I'm running a streakboat and I get attacked by an ECM Raven- I am alone, he is alone.

How do I fight back?

[Livewyr]

MrZakalwe, on 02 May 2013 - 01:06 AM, said:

I'm running a streakboat and I get attacked by an ECM Raven- I am alone, he is alone.

How do I fight back?

Well duh! Don't run a streak boat you noob!


Everyone knows that Streaks are only for the ECM mechs...

Edited by Livewyr, 02 May 2013 - 03:07 AM.

[El Bandito]

The whole concept of an equipment totally shutting down LRMs/SSRMs without any use of skill is pretty dumb. None of the previous MW titles had this crap. I'm gonna blindly blame Garth for this debacle.

Edited by El Bandito, 02 May 2013 - 03:26 AM.

[MustrumRidcully]

Fate 6, on 01 May 2013 - 07:23 AM, said:

That literally does nothing. Even making a hardpoint does not help the actual issue. LRM and Streak-using mechs cannot target the hardpoint, even if they can somehow get a lock on the ECM mech.

The devs really trust their crit system to do miracles, like turning Machine Guns into useful weapons, and now balancing ECM.

As long as the don't accept some fundamental aspects of their game's gameplay (like that critical hits are really not such a big deal), what hope can we have?

[Rushin Roulette]

MrZakalwe, on 02 May 2013 - 01:06 AM, said:

I'm running a streakboat and I get attacked by an ECM Raven- I am alone, he is alone.

How do I fight back?

I have highlughted the 2 main problems why you are being killed by an ECM mech.

As for your question on how to fight back... You have Jumpjets. go for the DFA and perform Riverdance on his cockpit .

Even though knockdowns have not been re-implemented, you still deal (minimal) damage if you can manage to land on his head.... now go out and practice with your Jumpjets :

[Kitane]

I am currently grinding Catapult A1 and it's pretty rough. The mech can equip three types of weapons, two are completely turned off by some magic "ECM" that does not originate from BT, and the third one is somewhat effective, but fragile, restricted and cheesy as hell. I hated playing against them and I hate using them.

Not a brightest idea to grind this mech variant right now, I know.

[MrZakalwe]

Rushin Roulette, on 02 May 2013 - 03:46 AM, said:

I have highlughted the 2 main problems why you are being killed by an ECM mech.

As for your question on how to fight back... You have Jumpjets. go for the DFA and perform Riverdance on his cockpit .

Even though knockdowns have not been re-implemented, you still deal (minimal) damage if you can manage to land on his head.... now go out and practice with your Jumpjets :

For the record I don't own a streakboat but that's not the point- that somebody can use a 1.5 ton bit of equipment that makes another player completely helpless just by being near them.

Worst Game Design of the Year award.

[El Bandito]

MrZakalwe, on 02 May 2013 - 04:31 AM, said:

For the record I don't own a streakboat but that's not the point- that somebody can use a 1.5 ton bit of equipment that makes another player completely helpless just by being near them. Worst Game Design of the Year award.

Word.

[Cyke]

A big issue is that LRMs are too damn easy to use.

I'm not talking about their effectiveness, which has fluctuated massively from the old head-blasting top-attack missiles, to the middle-damage version, to the Jager patch LRMpocalypse version.

What I mean is that regardless of their actual damage, they've always been too easy to use. You just hold the reticle anywhere near the target box, wait for it to turn red, and fire. Then you hold it anywhere near the target and hole that a brave teammate maintains line of sight to the target until impact.
With such easy LRMs, it only followed that they needed to put in a hard counter mechanic that completely nullifies the LRMs.

If LRMs (for example) required the player to hold the reticle directly on the enemy 'Mech until a lock is attained, and moving the reticle off-target causes loss of a lock, then it would become possible to actually accidentally fire unlocked. Then after the missile flight is already in the air, the strictness can be loosened to where it is now (reticle just needs to be near the target).
I don't like to bandy about the elitist term, but basically it would need "skill" to use. A better way to say it is that there's a risk of causing a failed attack.. a miss.. just like with any other weapon.

Right now, self-TAGging an ECM-protected enemy in order to LRM them is actually more like the level of skill that LRMs should need all the time.

If LRM locks weren't so easy to achieve, then maybe ECM can stop affecting LRMs.

At least, I think this is PGI's logic, and instead of tackling LRM mechanics, they decided to totally hard-counter it with ECM, which actually makes the entire game design and balancing less satisfying for everyone.

Edited by Cyke, 02 May 2013 - 05:14 AM.

[Cyke]

That was sort of off the topic, so here's a post regarding ECM itself.
If LRMs needed more player attention and concentration to achieve tracking, then here's a suggestion on what ECM can do instead.

Right now, either we detect the target and get a solid red box around it and gather target information, or it's super-stealthed and our sensors act like it doesn't exist.

How about a middle ground?
Say, if a 'Mech is protected by ECM, the box flickers and floats around randomly (even if the target stands still), making it rather useless for aiming in low visibility conditions. That'll also make it near impossible to attain an indirect LRM lock, because you'd normally need the red box to tell you where to point the reticle, but now the red box is in the wrong place.
And, you gather no information beyond the first info level (no name, no 'Mech model, no damage display, no weapon list, etc).
Lastly, as it currently is, if your teammate is in the 180m Low Signal bubble, his computer shouldn't be able to share data on enemies either.

But at least with all this, if you can see the target, even under ECM protection, you can still target the enemy, ignore the inaccurate flickering red box, hold your reticle directly on the 'Mech, and launch your LRMs.

[El Bandito]

Cyke, on 02 May 2013 - 05:11 AM, said:

A big issue is that LRMs are too damn easy to use. I'm not talking about their effectiveness, which has fluctuated massively from the old head-blasting top-attack missiles, to the middle-damage version, to the Jager patch LRMpocalypse version. What I mean is that regardless of their actual damage, they've always been too easy to use. You just hold the reticle anywhere near the target box, wait for it to turn red, and fire. Then you hold it anywhere near the target and hole that a brave teammate maintains line of sight to the target until impact. With such easy LRMs, it only followed that they needed to put in a hard counter mechanic that completely nullifies the LRMs. If LRMs (for example) required the player to hold the reticle directly on the enemy 'Mech until a lock is attained, and moving the reticle off-target causes loss of a lock, then it would become possible to actually accidentally fire unlocked. Then after the missile flight is already in the air, the strictness can be loosened to where it is now (reticle just needs to be near the target). I don't like to bandy about the elitist term, but basically it would need "skill" to use. A better way to say it is that there's a risk of causing a failed attack.. a miss.. just like with any other weapon. Right now, self-TAGging an ECM-protected enemy in order to LRM them is actually more like the level of skill that LRMs should need all the time. If LRM locks weren't so easy to achieve, then maybe ECM can stop affecting LRMs. At least, I think this is PGI's logic, and instead of tackling LRM mechanics, they decided to totally hard-counter it with ECM, which actually makes the entire game design and balancing less satisfying for everyone.

LRM misses--a lot. It is very easy to disrupt the homing function by going behind cover. LRMs have the lowest hit rate of all main weapons. For example, Large Lasers have around 85% hit rate, PPC/Gauss have 50% hit rate, but LRMs have 25% hit rate. LRM locks are very hard to achieve in many of the small maps cluttered with buildings, unless you got a flanking light scouting for you. Not to mention it is useless within 180 meters.

If you remove target decay then LRM will be a real pathetic weapon compared with PPCs. Why expose yourself for the full duration of the missile flight by keeping the target in your cross hair at all times, when you can just shoot 3-4 PPCs and duck behind cover? Or just poptart?

I do agree that LRM locks should be harder to achieve. For example, the function where teammates spot for you can be removed. Like all other MW titles you should spot and target and lock by yourself. Target decay should stay IMO.

Edited by El Bandito, 02 May 2013 - 05:39 AM.

[Cycleboy]

Cyke... that is what ECM was design for in table-top. In MWO we all get free C3 computers to share targetting info. ECM is supposed to stop that. So, no "easy mode" LRMs. Fine. But when your 'mech is sitting on a hill ridge, direct LOS to the enemy, holding it for 10, 20, 50 seconds... and still can't lock on to fire???? That is NOT what ECM was designed for.

[Xenosphobatic]

Cycleboy, on 02 May 2013 - 05:34 AM, said:

But when your 'mech is sitting on a hill ridge, direct LOS to the enemy, holding it for 10, 20, 50 seconds... and still can't lock on to fire???? That is NOT what ECM was designed for.

That's only the case if you have an ECM enemy nearby. There is a delay in locking if outside the bubble, but you can still grab a lock at that distance. It IS hard to maintain, but don't pretend it cannot be done.

Edited by Xenosphobatic, 02 May 2013 - 05:43 AM.

[Skyfaller]

Livewyr, on 01 May 2013 - 04:48 AM, said:

People don't care about ECM much anymore because people don't want to carry missiles at all anymore. (For obvious reasons among the missiles themselves...)

Thus PGI has made a very smart move regarding protecting their stance on ECM- whether it was intentional or not.


ECM is obviously overpowered and effectively crippled missile usage.
(Like breaking a finger at a knuckle)
Missiles have been nerf to uselessness regardless of ECM.
(Like cutting the whole finger off..)

Thus, no one worries about ECM (the broken finger) because missiles have been effectively removed(the finger has been cut off.)

ECM isn't the problem. Its the damage reduction of the LRM without compensation (2x ammo per ton, removal of warning message, etc). I still use LRMs and I can get them to hit reliably. Problem is they hit for poor damage compared to before and I cannot carry enough ammo to inflict the damage I previously did.

[Cycleboy]

Xenosphobatic, on 02 May 2013 - 05:43 AM, said:

That's only the case if you have an ECM enemy nearby. There is a delay in locking if outside the bubble, but you can still grab a lock at that distance. It IS hard to maintain, but don't pretend it cannot be done.

You can do that IF and ONLY IF you are using a TAG and holding it on target... even to the mechs that don't have ECM but are huddled around the mech that does. If you are LRMing at 500m to an enemy mech within 180m of an enemy ECM and you do NOT have TAG, you are worthless.

***EDIT - Now, don't go off on "if you have LRM and don't have TAG then 'u r dum! lolz'" because that just adds to ECM not functioning properly. You need a second support system to even attempt to use your primary. And that secondary uses up a slot that could hold a direct fire weapon instead.

Edited by Cycleboy, 02 May 2013 - 06:06 AM.