26 replies to this topic

[Ilithi Dragon]

As everyone is well aware by now, long-range direct fire mechs, the PPC and Gauss snipers and poptarts, are dominating the metagame right now, with few other builds being viable, and with a whole weight class, the Medium mech, seeing limited implementation.

Many have suggested solutions to this problem, including the nerfing of PPCs and Gauss in a number of ways, or Jump Jets, but speaking as a long-time poptart sniper, the suggested nerfs, increasing heat generation, increasing cycle times, reducing the accuracy of weapons, changing the lift profiles of jump jets, etc., will not solve the problem.

Poptarts and direct-fire snipers are not as easily affected by nerfs to heat and weapon cycle time as other builds, because they don't just stand there and spray fire. Sometimes they do, but that only happens when the sniper and/or the target is being extremely stupid. Poptarts especially won't be greatly impacted by these nerfs, because a poptart that is making even half-decent use of cover has had their weapons cycled long before they jump up again the vast majority of the time, and the heat generated from their weapons is given plenty of time to cool down between jumps. In order to significantly nerf the abilities of snipers, and poptarts in particular, you would have to nerf the PPCs and Gauss so much as to make them all but completely ineffective and useless to carry on any other build.

The problem is much the same with the UAC/5, which has a chance to jam high enough that it makes it awkward to use as a single weapon.

The solution is not to nerf the PPC and Gauss weapons. They are balanced fine. The problem that we are seeing is not over-powered weapons, it is a lack of sufficiently strong counter-balancing weapons.

As a sniper, as a poptart, the greatest threat to me is not the big, slow, heavy mech. The greatest threat to me is the small, fast, agile mech that can get in close and run circles around me with a lot of close-range firepower. Snipers are absolutely TERRIBLE against lights and fast mediums, because they are terrible brawlers.

The greatest counter to a sniper/poptart-heavy metagame are fast Mediums and brawling Lights, but we don't see many of these builds, particularly the Medium mechs, because the weapons that they can mount are under-powered. The SRMs in particular are lacking in firepower ever since the hotfix for the Missiles of Doom. Missiles in general have had issues, particularly with their splash damage and clustering, and I would much rather have under-powered missiles than the Missiles of Doom, but under-strengthed SRMs are directly contributing to the sniper/poptart-heavy metagame.

SRMs are the bread-and-butter of the Medium weight class. They are relatively light, take up relatively little space, and SHOULD give Mediums the ability to pack a (relatively) lot of short-range firepower into a modest frame. A fast Medium packing a lot of SRM firepower is one of the WORST nightmares of any sniper or poptart, because with just a little use of cover, they can get in close quickly and run circles around them, forcing them to divert their attention away from the main battle, and fight the exact kind of in-your-face, fast-turning battle that they are the worst at. Mediums also have enough armor and can pack enough firepower that they are also effective at supporting the main fight, or at least, they SHOULD.

But with under-powered SRMs, these kinds of builds just aren't viable. They are not as effective in the main brawl, and they're not able to dish enough firepower fast enough on the snipers and poptarts, so people just don't run them very much. And with people not running as many fast mediums and brawling lights, there isn't as much of a need to run mechs to counter them, so THOSE mechs and weapon configurations get left out.

If you want to counter snipers and poptarts, you need to increase the effectiveness of Medium mechs. Particularly, increase the firepower of SRMs. Reducing the weight of the AC/10 and LBX AC/10 to make them more worthwhile weapons, and easier to mount on Mediums, would help as well, but boosting SRM firepower is the most critical thing, because it is the SRM (and the Medium Laser, but those are balanced fine) that makes the Medium mech a truly viable platform. If you make Medium mechs more viable, people will take more of them, they will be used to counter snipers and poptarts more often, and players will take more diversified mech loadouts to deal with Mediums and the mechs that counter Mediums.

There are other things that can be done to make other mech builds more viable, like boosting LRM firepower and changing ECM so that it does nothing to block friendly communication, so that when a mech under enemy ECM is targeting an enemy mech under enemy ECM, that enemy mech can be targeted by other mechs outside of the ECM bubble. Adding a delay between LRMs being fired and the Incoming Missile warning being received would also help make LRMs more effective, and make LRM builds (and builds to counter LRM builds) more attractive.

Decreasing the weight of the AC/10 and LBX AC/10, tightening the spread on the LBX, and maybe giving them boosts to RoF and DPS to make them more worthwhile for the tonnage spent would help increase weapon variety.

Reducing the UAC/5 jam chance to 20% from 25% would make them a more viable weapon, particularly with single UAC/5 builds, or better yet set the base chance to jam much lower, like 5% or 10%, and have the chance to jam increase rapidly with each double shot (you could also add a modifier for multiple UAC/5s that gives an increased chance to jam due to the ammo feeding too rapidly, to prevent the multi-UAC/5 builds from becoming too powerful).

These and other tweaks to make Medium mechs and brawling Lights more viable mech choices are the best way to counter snipers and poptarts, because fast Mediums and brawling Lights are THE counter to snipers and poptarts, and more viable Mediums and brawling Lights would require players to take more builds suited to countering those mechs. Nerfing PPCs and Gauss and/or Jump Jets will not solve the problem, because you would have to nerf the weapons so much to significantly impact snipers and poptarts that they would become nonviable on any build outside of a sniper or poptart. The problem is not that snipers and poptarts are over-powered, it is that the mechs that best counter them are UNDERpowered.

Edited by Ilithi Dragon, 11 May 2013 - 09:50 AM.

[Kitane]

SRM buffs?

*insert a broken holo-record of Godzilla wrestling with Splatcat and losing*

edit: I would rather tone down lethality of long range fire. The game is better when mechs don't instantly blow up each other in brawling range.

Edited by Kitane, 11 May 2013 - 09:56 AM.

[Ilithi Dragon]

Yes, SRM buffs. I am telling you, as a sniper/poptart, that the absolute worst thing that can happen to me, the thing I fear the most, is having a brawling Light or a fast Medium get in my face with a bunch of SRMs and run circles around me, but right now I am NOT sufficiently afraid of that happening, because SRMs don't do enough damage, they are not effective enough, so people don't run those kinds of builds very often, and when they DO, and when I DO get caught by them, I'm not nearly afraid of them, in the current balance of the game, as I should be.

SRMs should be weapons that deal VERY high damage for their tonnage and space investment, with the limitation that that damage is very short-ranged, and spread over a large area by wide missile clustering (which can be improved by Artemis, at the cost of additional weight and space). Right now, they are a mediocre investment at best for their weight and space requirements, given their range and damage spread limitations. Make SRMs more viable, a more powerful weapon, and I can guarantee you that you will see snipers and poptarts countered, and a much wider diversity of mechs.

[Kitane]

Ilithi Dragon, on 11 May 2013 - 10:00 AM, said:

Yes, SRM buffs. I am telling you, as a sniper/poptart, that the absolute worst thing that can happen to me, the thing I fear the most, is having a brawling Light or a fast Medium get in my face with a bunch of SRMs and run circles around me, but right now I am NOT sufficiently afraid of that happening, because SRMs don't do enough damage, they are not effective enough, so people don't run those kinds of builds very often, and when they DO, and when I DO get caught by them, I'm not nearly afraid of them, in the current balance of the game, as I should be.

SRMs should be weapons that deal VERY high damage for their tonnage and space investment, with the limitation that that damage is very short-ranged, and spread over a large area by wide missile clustering (which can be improved by Artemis, at the cost of additional weight and space). Right now, they are a mediocre investment at best for their weight and space requirements, given their range and damage spread limitations. Make SRMs more viable, a more powerful weapon, and I can guarantee you that you will see snipers and poptarts countered, and a much wider diversity of mechs.

I understand your point. However any SRM buff has to be considered with Splatcat and other SRM boats in mind.

One-two hit short range kills are not going to improve this game.

[FunkyFritter]

For the most part I agree. PPCs are far from unanswerable, they're just clearly superior to the other options. I'd rather see every weapon be more comparable with PPCs than current SRMs. That would require a lot more tweaking though, so it's unlikely given the timetable PGI is working with.

Edited by FunkyFritter, 11 May 2013 - 10:15 AM.

[Ilithi Dragon]

Kitane, on 11 May 2013 - 10:12 AM, said:

I understand your point. However any SRM buff has to be considered with Splatcat and other SRM boats in mind.

One-two hit short range kills are not going to improve this game.

And I understand that concern. Care would definitely have to be taken to not over-balance SRMs and make them OP, but they definitely do need to be boosted in damage. I'm also less concerned about OP SRM boats than I am about UP SRMs in general, because you're not going to get ungodly SRM damage salvos on anything less than a Heavy, which limits the potential two-shot-kill SRM boats to bigger, slower mechs, and they will have to get very close to be able to deal that kind of damage. High-damage SRMs can also be further balanced by making the missile clusters rapidly balloon out into a wide pattern, so that that damage will be spread over a very large area, with a large number of missiles missing entirely at the upper end of the SRM range.

So, yes, you need to be careful not to make SRMs OP when boosting them, but there are a number of ways to prevent that.

[Vassago Rain]

Kitane, on 11 May 2013 - 10:12 AM, said:

I understand your point. However any SRM buff has to be considered with Splatcat and other SRM boats in mind.

One-two hit short range kills are not going to improve this game.

So because one mech can boat them, that means all others should suffer? Why don't we consider energy based around the stalker?

Just give it up. SRMs are terrible right now, and need to become deadly again.

[Ilithi Dragon]

Kitane does have a valid point. I remember the days of Closed Beta when the Splatapult was a common mech, and everyone feared it. Even today, when the splatapult is not the fearsome hitter it used to be, people STILL prime any they see down very hard. Any time you boost a weapon's power, you have to be careful that you don't make it, or some builds that make significant use of it, OP.

Still, as I said, there are ways to prevent that from happening, and SRMs and LRMs both are in desperate need of a damage boost.

[Kitane]

Vassago Rain, on 11 May 2013 - 10:33 AM, said:

So because one mech can boat them, that means all others should suffer? Why don't we consider energy based around the stalker?

Just give it up. SRMs are terrible right now, and need to become deadly again.

Is increasing short range weapons to OP level just to counterbalance OP long range weapons a smart solution?

I don't think so.

[Ilithi Dragon]

Making one weapon OP to balance another OP weapon is not a great idea, no, but I don't think PPC/Gauss builds are OP. They just don't have any viable direct counters, because the main weapons of those direct counters are under-powered. That, and LRMs are still not a very viable weapon, and will remain such until a mech close enough to target an enemy mech under ECM can share that target data with other mechs outside of the ECM bubble.

[Vassago Rain]

Kitane, on 11 May 2013 - 10:49 AM, said:

Is increasing short range weapons to OP level just to counterbalance OP long range weapons a smart solution?

I don't think so.

The nature of sniper weapons makes them always OP in straight battles. That's how it is. You need P90s to balance AWPs - not useless shotguns.

SRMs were our P90s. Now we're stuck with shotguns.

[Adridos]

The problem with PPC and gauss is teh same problem as was there with splattcat.

They are so over the roof damage wise, that they kill a mech in one hit... one shot kills are really bad for a game which doesn't allow you to respawn and take revenge and even worse when it is supposed to make you feel awesome in a huge machine and not another iny pawn on the battlefield which gets killed if a single bullet hits him.

[Ilithi Dragon]

Umm... I have almost never been one-shot-killed by a sniper mech. If you can cockpit a mech, sure, you can get a one-shot-kill, but do you know how hard that is? Since I started playing back in July, I think I have been cockpitted by a sniper at range maybe three times.

The few times that I have been one-shotted by any mech, sniper or no, have either been the rare cockpit shot, or a solid hit to my weaker rear armor, and you don't need a 6-PPC stalker to do that.

Yes, a heavy sniper or poptart will rip apart a big, slow, heavy mech unless that mech manages to walk around a corner on them, but that's because long-range fire support mechs are THE counter to the big, slow, heavy mechs. A mech build doing well against the type of mech it is supposed to be countering does not make it OP.

The problem is that the mechs that are supposed to be countering the long-range fire support mechs are underpowered. How often do you see Medium mechs being fielded in matches? How often do you see brawling Lights? These mechs are seen very infrequently, because the main weapon that gives them serious punch in a brawl, the SRM, is underpowered. If you increase the power of SRMs (while taking care to not make them OP), you will see many more fast Medium brawlers running in close to the snipers and ruining their day, and that will result in fewer snipers and more builds to counter the fast Medium brawlers, and thus more mech diversity.

Snipers are not OP, the counter to snipers (fast Mediums with lots of SRM firepower) are underpowered.

[Vassago Rain]

Adridos, on 11 May 2013 - 11:15 AM, said:

The problem with PPC and gauss is teh same problem as was there with splattcat.

They are so over the roof damage wise, that they kill a mech in one hit... one shot kills are really bad for a game which doesn't allow you to respawn and take revenge and even worse when it is supposed to make you feel awesome in a huge machine and not another iny pawn on the battlefield which gets killed if a single bullet hits him.

Splatcats are far preferable to what we have now. Cats at least had to risk themselves getting to you to shoot you. Saying that, the A1 works almost as well now as before they ruined SRMs. You have the punch to take people out in 2 or 3 shots still.

Just won't overkill them 100 points.

[ExAstris]

Ilithi Dragon is right that missiles need a buff. He's also right that doing so will reduce the number of pop-tarts.

Its also worth mentioning that his recommended change will reduce the number of snipers in general as well.

The basic reason for this is because currently the sniper weapons in the game are 90% as good at brawling as the brawling weapons are at brawling. There is no reason to take a brawling (i.e. SRM) loadout for such a paltry advantage, meeting even a single enemy at medium range puts you at a severe disadvantage as you'll be doing nothing to him until you close that gap. This is especially true of medium mechs like the Centurion and Trebuchet which are not small enough or fast enough to dodge sniper fire, yet cannot mount enough close range brawling punch to be a threat to well-piloted heavy and assault snipers. They will still get outgunned and destroyed, even when they do everything right.

While I've only recently hopped back in the game (thanks to the news about BAP countering ECM finally, as of the 21st), I can tell you that missiles are laughably underpowered right now. While I did own a splatcat, I rarely used it, instead prefering a C4 and CN9-A as my SRM brawling platforms. And all my LRM/SRM mechs have been dustbinned. Its SSRMs or no-missiles at all right now. Given that ACs are too heavy to 'boat' on a medium, and lasers are great secondary weapons but not brawl worthy as a primary (unless you're using that hunchback with 9 hardpoints of course), and missiles are useless unless you're carrying SSRMs to deal with lights, its no wonder that medium mechs rarely show up on the field anymore.


Fortunately, Ilithi Dragon's primary suggestion, buffing missiles, is coming to fruition in the patch for the 21st in which missile numbers are all getting rebalanced (hopefully to about where they were pre-splash damage). As it stands currently, LRMs are only doing about 4/5 the damage they need to, and SRMs only about 3/5s the damage they need to in order to restore the metagame balance.


As to the finer points of the other weapon's balance, whether PPCs are too powerful or not, or exactly what should be done to the AC10/UAC5, I'm not sure, I haven't been in the loop long enough to diagnose them properly. Though the AC10 has needed a buff for a long time, if it is unchanged from 3 months ago, then it surely still does need a little oomph.

[Chavette]

They arent buffing but weakening for a reason. They want mechs to last longer, esp against the future clan weapons. So no, it wont be buffed.

[Corvus Antaka]

SRMS are just fine. a splatcat with 4 srm 6 remains a terror.

LRMS need love to keep those popsnipers running around, once LRMS come back popsniping wont be nearly so useful, even just LRM supression with dumbfire will help.

[LegoPirate]

As someone with a 4+ KDR with 4ppc stalkers, jump sniper highlanders and cataphracts, I enjoy nothing more then a light mech trying to brawl with me and getting 1-2 shotted. The only time they don't blow up is if they aren't being shot at, which means I'm too busy killing that atlas or countersniping to bother. Cent bombs are pretty much the only mech that I do fear(seems like the hit registration is especially awful on them), and they are slow enough that they're dead by the time they're in range.

[Ilithi Dragon]

Chavette, on 11 May 2013 - 01:37 PM, said:

They arent buffing but weakening for a reason. They want mechs to last longer, esp against the future clan weapons. So no, it wont be buffed.

Um... I'm pretty sure that missiles actually are getting buffed in the next patch. Last I heard, they were, anyway.

Colonel Pada Vinson, on 11 May 2013 - 01:40 PM, said:

SRMS are just fine. a splatcat with 4 srm 6 remains a terror.

LRMS need love to keep those popsnipers running around, once LRMS come back popsniping wont be nearly so useful, even just LRM supression with dumbfire will help.

As a long-time poptart, in MWO and in MW4 Mercs. I can say that LRMs are NOT a real counter to poptarts. Any half-decent poptart will be in cover far too much for a LRM mech to get any kind of reliable lock, and dumb-fire LRMs won't be much of a deterrent against poptarts most of the time.

LRMs will be an effective counter to non-popping snipers, who can't jump in and out of cover, but not poptarts.

[IceSerpent]

Ilithi Dragon, on 11 May 2013 - 02:34 PM, said:

LRMs will be an effective counter to non-popping snipers, who can't jump in and out of cover, but not poptarts.

Non-popping snipers tend to hump hills, so they care about LRMs even less.