87 replies to this topic

[FerrolupisXIII]

LRM's are certainly hitting CT a lot. however, this may be because everyone who actually likes LRM's uses Artemis FCS, which is what causes such focused volleys. the actual damage, however is just pathetic.

even if every missile hits my LRM-20 volley only does 14 damage, spread around the mech. at that rate, to blow through 100hp (armor/structure whatever) you need 7.14 volleys. thats 142 missiles, keeping in mind we're assuming every missile hits. which, as anyone competent knows, never EVER happens.

most reasonable pilots i know run either 2x LRM-15 or 2x LRM 20. any more, you're a waste in close or if the enemy are competent enough to, you know, duck. or shoot you while you stand there ogling their mechs for a target lock. or get under ECM. any less and you're doing laughable amounts of damage.

As much as i love my Catapults, and they can still be effective, its been a very hard couple of months. im very much looking forward to the BAP improvements.

I wouldn't go so far as to say i see all PPC all the time, but it is rare to go a match without seeing the ubiquitous 4x PPC Stalker. or Jump Sniping PPC/Gauss Highlanders/Cataphracts. or even smaller mechs like the Centurion, Dragon, or Trebuchet with at least 1 PPC/ Gauss to pot shot with from a flank. They're now the go to weapon, and certainly need some re tweaking.

[jeffsw6]

My LRM boats have back-up lasers plus LRMx70 and LRMx60. I go back and forth between the two configurations; one obviously has more laser punch than the other. Neither one is as devastating as the 6 MG Spider, but they can be made to work in PUG matches. Put a decent 4-man on the opposing team, though, and I am doing nothing but suppressing fire or fighting off lights and mediums using my lasers, or maybe killing a noob or two and trying to soften enemies up for my teammates.

[I am]

Tell me all about how pro you are at WoT. Are LRMs still OP, nah. Are they the gimped useless weapon so many cry about through posting? Absolutely not. I would like to see my ELO rating.

Let me tell you how to use LRMs effectively within the upper ELO. First, dont run just LRMs. I pair them with an ac20, and 2 MLs. Next, dont sit back spamming them, act as though you dont have them, and just stay with the team. You want to wait until the enemy has committed to leaving cover, till he is engaging your mates, to really light him up. Also, bring alot of them. I use around 1000. As long as you have enough, it makes up for their reduced damage. Finally, its just part of your arsenal. Keep aiming them down as you mix in LRM volleys.

They're not the end all they were last month, but they sure are not broke either. What is this a little swath of X LRM boaters trying to discount the truth? Missing your last month meta I guess. They can go back to it for all I care, just makes that build stronger. Have a mech configured with each class of weapon, a splat, an LRM boat, dual ac20 k2, light w ecm, and some ERPPC bpat and you cant lose.

Point is the current meta is pretty balanced, save the fact that PPCs are still effective at close range, I wouldn't change a thing.

[Roland]

Quote

You want to wait until the enemy has committed to leaving cover, till he is engaging your mates, to really light him up. Also, bring alot of them. I use around 1000. As long as you have enough, it makes up for their reduced damage. Finally, its just part of your arsenal. Keep aiming them down as you mix in LRM volleys.

Unless one of the mechs in that area has ECM.

Then your LRM's are just a waste of tonnage.

[Atheus]

I am, on 14 May 2013 - 03:18 PM, said:

2. PPC minimum range? How did I one shot a jagermech today that was hardly hurt from about 20 meters, when all I was carrying was 4 PPC's. Not ERPPC's, just PPC's.

Your quad PPC's did just under 2 damage if you were actually 20m away. In an upcoming patch the close range bug will be fixed and quad PPC's will do just under 9 damage at 20m. Chances are someone else blew the hell out of that mech, and you just got the killing scrape.

[Devil Fox]

Roland, on 15 May 2013 - 05:13 PM, said:

Unless one of the mechs in that area has ECM.

Then your LRM's are just a waste of tonnage.

One reason my Highlander has a Guass, 3ML to back up the 2 ALRM15's it runs. The pinpoint damage form a 30 point alpha, which is low on heat, is still very detrimental on an enemy CT, so you can disable or kill the enemy ECM, or laugh at those that stand in the open for LRM's (that's right dumbfire) and pinpoint alpha's!

[I am]

Roland, on 15 May 2013 - 05:13 PM, said:

Unless one of the mechs in that area has ECM.

Then your LRM's are just a waste of tonnage.

For all teh restrictions required to use them, those conditions seem to be met all the time. I think its that there are alot more stalkers and jagermechs, and alot less DDCs. Plus, the PPC disabling effect, seems to help the LRM usage alot. I did say, if you guys read the entire thread, Im LRM'd out, and was just using it as more of a break from the mech im preferring at the moment. 5 ERPPCs on my phract. It overheats all the time, and can fail epicly. But if I hit it right, I can do a quick double aplha tap, and kill just about anything. First mech I ever named, I call it "the tiger uppercut!"

Another good break mech at the moment is the commando, and it is much much better than the forums would have one believe. Plus I don't get that dirty, I'm a Raven 3L, feeling.

Atheus, on 15 May 2013 - 05:30 PM, said:

Your quad PPC's did just under 2 damage if you were actually 20m away. In an upcoming patch the close range bug will be fixed and quad PPC's will do just under 9 damage at 20m. Chances are someone else blew the hell out of that mech, and you just got the killing scrape.

You gents just love to hate. Maybe I was a little further away that 20 meters, a little bit, but he was mostly intact I think sitting at about 97% 98%, and closing fast using ballistics. I did aim for his little cockpit eyehole and perhaps luck struck and I actually caught it. But yes it was jsut 4 PPCs, and no one was around to help or hinder us. I figured I was dead. I mean after all, all you read about on the forums from pro stalker PPC spammers is how ineffective they are under 80 90 meters. To that I say, hogwash.

Edited by I am, 15 May 2013 - 06:47 PM.

[Roland]

Quote

For all teh restrictions required to use them, those conditions seem to be met all the time.

But you are missing the key element that makes them inferior weapons... the fact that you are relying on specific conditions to be met, in order for them to be useful.

That makes them inherently inferior to all of the other weapons that don't require special conditions to be met.

This doesn't mean that LRM's can't be effective, in certain situations, against certain opponents. But it means that they are inferior in many situations.. and in the situations where they aren't being flat out neutralized, they aren't strong enough to merit their usage.

In the BEST case scenarios with LRM's, you will do "OK" damage.

Why not just take other weapons which can do damage that is just as good, but can do it always?

Quote

You gents just love to hate. Maybe I was a little further away that 20 meters, a little bit, but he was mostly intact I think sitting at about 97% 98%, and closing fast using ballistics. I did aim for his little cockpit eyehole and perhaps luck struck and I actually caught it. But yes it was jsut 4 PPCs, and no one was around to help or hinder us. I figured I was dead. I mean after all, all you read about on the forums from pro stalker PPC spammers is how ineffective they are under 80 90 meters. To that I say, hogwash.

People are simply informing you of how the weapons work in the game.

If you were at 20m, then 4 PPC's does around 8 damage (not counting the current bugs that are resulting in some reduction of that number). You didn't one-shot a mech with 8 damage, even with a headshot, unless his head was already critted out.

Again, no one is hating on you here. They are just explaining the game mechanics.

[I am]

No Roland your missing the point, those conditions are met constantly, probably 80% of the time at least. Im not seeing pub teams with pure ecm loadouts. No one is. And ok damage, is ok. Since im coupling it with my other weapons, it is jsut part of the puzzle. Most weapons do ok damage, so it sounds like they are on par with most weapons. The ones that are exceptional at the moment, PC/ERPPC and Gauss, both have drawbacks. Gauss is a explosion waiting to happen, ask the Misery pilots. ERPPC spam, even PPC spam mostly, is a nightmare to deal with in terms of heat.

So either he had 8 armor on his cockpit, or I was slightly further away. Either way, in the 20-30 range, my 4 PPCs took down a heavy in one volley. Maybe what would be best would be have them do 0 under 80 meters, period. I pay more in terms of heat for my ERPPCs, Id like that tradeoff to be meaningful. As it stands, the PPCs hardly render the boater "defenseless".

[Corbon Zackery]

These are exploiters who now whine to the developers so they can exploit the game.

A few month ago they got LRM's Pushed up to double dmg. with extra splash damage and extra dmg. when you have TAG and a Airtimes computer.

That resulted in a community ban as the game was unplayable until they balanced the weapon systems.

So now the exploiters whine and write stuff trying to change the game back. We also call them Hawken lovers because in the end there going to play that game, and whine how its so much better on the forums board.

I'm amazed that MechWarrior Online team still listens to them you think after messing up LRM 3 times they would think twice.

This happens with every free to play game. I spent a hour in the new Neverwinter free to play ignoring people selling and trading crap in a zone chat.

[I am]

Corbon Zackery, on 15 May 2013 - 07:40 PM, said:

These are exploiters who now whine to the developers so they can exploit the game.

A few month ago they got LRM's Pushed up to double dmg. with extra splash damage and extra dmg. when you have TAG and a Airtimes computer.

That resulted in a community ban as the game was unplayable until they balanced the weapon systems.

So now the exploiters whine and write stuff trying to change the game back. We also call them Hawken lovers because in the end there going to play that game, and whine how its so much better on the forums board.

I'm amazed that MechWarrior Online team still listens to them you think after messing up LRM 3 times they would think twice.

This happens with every free to play game. I spent a hour in the new Neverwinter free to play ignoring people selling and trading crap in a zone chat.

True story. They are the reason this game has a smaller community that it could have. Well, they're part of the problem at least.

[Atheus]

I am, on 15 May 2013 - 06:41 PM, said:

You gents just love to hate. Maybe I was a little further away that 20 meters, a little bit, but he was mostly intact I think sitting at about 97% 98%, and closing fast using ballistics. I did aim for his little cockpit eyehole and perhaps luck struck and I actually caught it. But yes it was jsut 4 PPCs, and no one was around to help or hinder us. I figured I was dead. I mean after all, all you read about on the forums from pro stalker PPC spammers is how ineffective they are under 80 90 meters. To that I say, hogwash.

I have done extensive, controlled testing of the PPC's close range behavior, and discussed its deviation from the intended behavior with Thomas Dziegielewski (the guy who wrote Breakdown). The code indicates that the intended rate of attenuation is linear from 90m to 0m, but a bug is causing that reduction to be squared. So at 20m, you do 20/90*10 damage per ppc without the bug, but with the bug (20/90)^2*10 dmg per ppc. I checked again this morning, and the bug is still live.

This yields about 1.98 damage at 20m, or 4.4 damage at 30m from 4 PPC's. Either way, your observations are either inaccurate, or you have uncovered a rare bug which I did not encounter in the process of hurling hundreds of PPC's at immobile targets both in testing grounds and in live matches. To one shot a cockpit, you need to deal 33 damage, which I can assure you, you did not do from any less than 85m or so. This has nothing to do with hate, but you can't reasonably expect people to throw out the results from dedicated PPC testing, plus analyzing the actual code, and go with your highly suspicious anecdote.

[I am]

You are splitting hairs, I even admitted its possible he was about 10 meters further away that I had assumed, that being 30 meters. 4,4 x 4 = 16+. 20 meters, 30 meters, either way well winthin the 80 meter supposed ineffective range. 16+ dmg, that's enough to headshot that jager. Actually, you pretty much proved my point. Thank you.

[Kmieciu]

We had some new players join our corp lately. I formed a lance and dropped with them to test their skill.

To my amazement we went against Dragons with LBXs, Spider-Ks, Awesome LRM boats and XL Centurions. Did I mention Ravens with SRMs? I got 5 kills and 800 damage using HGN-732. I felt like a demigod.

Then we played 8mans and we got our butts kicked by russian jade falcons that used nothing but Gauss and PPCs, even on their cicadas.

The moral of this story is that the game looks different depending on the ELO level you play.

Edited by Kmieciu, 16 May 2013 - 04:51 AM.

[Roland]

I am, on 16 May 2013 - 04:00 AM, said:

You are splitting hairs, I even admitted its possible he was about 10 meters further away that I had assumed, that being 30 meters. 4,4 x 4 = 16+. 20 meters, 30 meters, either way well winthin the 80 meter supposed ineffective range. 16+ dmg, that's enough to headshot that jager. Actually, you pretty much proved my point. Thank you.

Inside the min range, the damage starts to go linearly towards zero,

Also, 16+ damage isn't enough to headshot a mech, unless the mech's head is already critted out. You need to generate 33 points of damage to kill a fresh mech through its head.

[Kommisar]

When reading these here forums, always keep in mind that your user experience can be vastly different from those of the other posters. Kmieciu nailed it. I've seen that effect myself. I picked up my first light mech a few weeks ago, and when I first started in my Spider, with a default ELO, it was a strange place for me. I'm not saying that I had max ELO in my assaults (though I do run into some of the high end guys from time to time when the match search runs a long time and gets tired), but it was a very noticeable difference for me.

It was a bunch of little things, but it all added up. How a lot of the players moved. Where they moved to. Target prioritizing. Seeing guys ripping away with weapons outside of effective range. Poor heat management (see previous sentence). Worse over-all situational awareness.

Heck, I had a few matches where I took my ECM Spider and walked directly into the enemy's formation (blob). I just walked right along with them. No one seemed to notice that they were being jammed and that I didn't have a friendly blue carrot above my head.

I've since moved up the brackets in my lights (though, the Raven 4X is dragging me back down!! ) and seen the progression. Now, I have PPC Stalkers that can take my legs off if I am not paying attention.

So, not everyone will see the things you see. Oh, and everyone has their emotional elements as well. I HATED StreakCats when they first exploded into the FOTM. Hated. Especially back then when they rocked your whole mech and threw up black smoke to blind you. That was my irrational hatred.

Oh. Almost forgot. If Chewbacca lives on Endor, you must acquit!

Why can't the Devs understand that!

[Lupus Aurelius]

Kommisar, on 16 May 2013 - 06:18 AM, said:

...

Oh. Almost forgot. If Chewbacca lives on Endor, you must acquit!

Why can't the Devs understand that!

This guy gets it, he used the Obligatory Chewbacca Defense comment...

[Kommisar]

Someone had to. We were almost to page 4 on this thread. No one knows for certain what would happen if we get past page 4 without someone typing that. Might be nothing some say; but they're only guessing. They don't know either, and someone has to think of the children.

Oh, just in case this goes into page 5:

StreakCats are the mechs ****** would have made!!!


(the ***** above refers to a certain national leader from the 20th Centurty)

Edited by Kommisar, 16 May 2013 - 06:42 AM.

[MaddMaxx]

jaakkomm, on 15 May 2013 - 11:06 AM, said:

Yes, they do...

You sir, make a very strong case. Your ability to dissect the problem is almost indisputable. Carry on.

Edited by MaddMaxx, 16 May 2013 - 06:55 AM.

[MaddMaxx]

IceSerpent, on 15 May 2013 - 01:53 PM, said:

Did you ever consider that your definition of "doing well" might be vastly different from the one the rest of us use?

Please do not do that. You have grouped him by himself, or perhaps with "others", then grouped everyone else on the other side.

If you would be more specific about who your "rest of us" actually was, that would really help. Thanks.