42 replies to this topic

[Sephlock]

Chemie, on 18 May 2013 - 09:33 AM, said:

I do not get the whole ECM thing. They were never OP. It was lack of HSR that made lights un-hitable but everyone said it was ECM. They put in HSR, and super-nerfed 3L legs and honestly ECM has not been an issue since. Yes, they are a pain for LRM but LRM are useless right now regardless of ECM.

How they are doing BAP will not solve the issue if there is one. That just gives other lights an option if they want to run streaks but it will not help LRMs at all. Just TAG for your self.

They made SSRMs and LRMs useless for a long stretch even before the current missile nerf.

[Livewyr]

80Bit, on 18 May 2013 - 09:10 AM, said:

I did read the OP.

You are trying to pick apart an official, and also old, statement about ECM.

You try to point out logical flaws, using statements like "but bringing and using ECM requires no skill and no teamwork", when teamwork is absolutely required (the kind of teamwork where they team stays together, the most rare and precious kind of MWO).


What I see here is one part masked rant at the current PPC meta, and one part desecration of the dead horse that is the ECM "issue". The last bastion of ECM dominance was in light on light fighting, and with the coming BAP change it will not longer be required there either.

Teamwork: I do not think it means what you seem to think it means.
Everyone staying under the missile umbrella is not teamwork, that is mooching the guy who brought the Jesus Box. The dude with the Jesus Box could forget he had it, and still benefit fully from it.

Teamwork is an active coordination between 2 or more units.
Example 1:
A light using LoS (or even TAG) to focus/maintain a lock on a specific mech (active) in order that another unit with missiles and no LoS could engage it.. with missiles (Active)

Example 2:
Two mechs positioning on opposite sides of a stronger opponent in order to divide his attention while they pick it apart.
One Mech shoots(active) while the other has its/their attention, and vice versa. (Active)

Syllogy, on 18 May 2013 - 05:04 AM, said:

It's current implementation is being used (incorrectly) as a brawling mechanism.

Coolant, on 18 May 2013 - 10:08 AM, said:

^This...

Is it incorrectly? I'd say it's pretty darn correct given what ECM does.
ECM is incorrect.

Syllogy, on 18 May 2013 - 05:04 AM, said:

Remember, if you have LoS for PPCs, you have LoS for TAG.

Massive difference:
PPC = Point>Click>Profit>Hide
TAG = Point>Click-Maintain LoS for 3-10 seconds>Profit>Hide

(That's 3-10 seconds of being shot... or no profit.)

Chemie, on 18 May 2013 - 09:33 AM, said:

I do not get the whole ECM thing. They were never OP.
<snip>
How they are doing BAP will not solve the issue if there is one. That just gives other lights an option if they want to run streaks but it will not help LRMs at all.

Answered your own rhetorical question.

[Levi Porphyrogenitus]

Wispsy, on 18 May 2013 - 05:10 AM, said:

Have you not taken a full LRM team (with spotters) into 8mans this patch! 100% winrate with it so far for me! You can still core mechs surprisingly quickly with enough of them and whilst getting them to hit some targets can require spreading out and co-ordination when they increase the speed it should be totally fine and easy again.

I'm sure that's due to the CT bug that Streaks benefit from as well. Unless a mech is a fast medium or a light, LRMs will damage the CT preferentially (a problem with guidance combined with the still-wonky splash mechanics). A full team of LRMs with a good spotter who knows what he's doing should slaughter anything moving under 80 kph, and with more than one LRM boat they can mutually cover each other to prevent the 180m minimum from being an issue.

If 8-mans are primarily assaults nowadays, then well-coordinated LRM boating is an amazing way to take advantage, even in their hot-fixed and buggy current state.

[OneEyed Jack]

Chemie, on 18 May 2013 - 09:33 AM, said:

How they are doing BAP will not solve the issue if there is one. That just gives other lights an option if they want to run streaks but it will not help LRMs at all. Just TAG for your self.

Not true. BAP will keep the ECM Lights from being able to lock down a LRM boat by just standing near it. It won't do anything for distant targeting through an ECM umbrella, but TAG can do that. What TAG can't do is overcome being inside the umbrella.

[Livewyr]

OneEyed Jack, on 18 May 2013 - 01:57 PM, said:

Not true. BAP will keep the ECM Lights from being able to lock down a LRM boat by just standing near it. It won't do anything for distant targeting through an ECM umbrella, but TAG can do that. What TAG can't do is overcome being inside the umbrella.

TAG can no longer do that anymore either, given the ranged alpha strike meta.

[Miekael]

What really sucks is if I want to carry LRMs on a mech I have to equip both TAG and BAP to be functional against ECM. Maybe not too much of an issue to LRM boaters, but it renders the weapon system virtually useless in any mixed/hybrid build. You shouldn't need to pay a 2.5 ton, 3 hard point tax just to use a weapon system.

[jeffsw6]

Miekael, on 18 May 2013 - 02:50 PM, said:

What really sucks is if I want to carry LRMs on a mech I have to equip both TAG and BAP to be functional against ECM. Maybe not too much of an issue to LRM boaters, but it renders the weapon system virtually useless in any mixed/hybrid build. You shouldn't need to pay a 2.5 ton, 3 hard point tax just to use a weapon system.

I don't have the BAP on my LRM boats but I will be installing it once the BAP improvement goes on. I don't mind carrying these things. On anything other than a boat, though, it's a choice. Do you really want an LRM launcher as a side-weapon if it is ineffective against many opponents? I have one LRM15 on my main STK-3F (brawler) and it's sometimes useful (don't have TAG or BAP on that mech) but usually just for harassing enemies.

Either way, it does not really matter. If you play an LRM boat against an enemy team that has several PPC boats, you are likely to have a very tough match. When I see a bunch of enemy highlanders on my missile boat, I spend the whole game running like mad. Sometimes I do okay, sometimes not; but it's very tough.

[warner2]

I suppose it really is a dead-horse.

In the upcoming patch BAP is being made to act like ECM in counter mode at a range of 180m. So it's kind of amusing that one of the ways of balancing ECM that PGI has come up with is to make another piece of equipment behave like ECM.

This quote about ECM is this quote from Paul...

"It brought the need to be aware of your surroundings and assist team mates in a way that previous MechWarrior titles didn't have. Teams will now have to work together to counter the effects of ECM and as of February 15th, the new counters allow for multiple attack vectors against the system."

The first part is true (in that ECM turns radar off so you have to use your eyes) however this was absolutely not absent from previous MechWarrior titles. MW4 had passive radar which did the same thing; you would go passive if you wanted to be stealthy and not appear on the other teams radar until you were close. However it was better in MW4 because if you went passive there was a downside; you had no radar yourself. ECM is basically easy mode because you get to be stealthy at no cost whatsoever to yourself, and not only that, you can make your teammates stealthy too, also at no cost. I don't see how that's raising the bar as a MechWarrior title, at all. It's patently worse.

The second half is amusing since half the game is now balanced around ECM, which to me is just odd. How has one piece of equipment become so central to balancing the whole game?

As a caveat I would add that in organised 8 v 8 it looks like ECM is not mandatory, nor that big of a deal whether you have it or not, or whether they've got it, or whatever. That's partly because most good teams don't use LRMs, so couldn't care less about that issue (which is a shame, since when LRMs become viable again, they should have a role, albeit a niche one). They are OK with using their eyes and not relying on radar (see MW4 comment above, we are used to it), and now that the SSRM2 splash damage has been reduced they are OK taking on SSRM2 carrying light mechs with their own laser based light mechs.

None of that means ECM is a well-designed piece of equipment.

It's still FUBAR. It just means good teams have learned to work-around it. Those teams aren't using "ECM counters" other than their own eyes, direct fire weapons at range, and lasers at short range. They aren't using the game mechanic that is ECM and the counters to ECM, they are ignoring them and using basic gunnery to make ECM irrelevant. That's how FUBAR it all is. ECM and all of the various weapons and counters that revolve around it are being ignored by the good teams, which in effect means that there is a part of the game that has simply become irrelevant. Which is a same, see LRMs, and the pillar of "information warfare".

[Carrion Hound]

While I awknowlege what the OP said in his posting, and yes it is worth talking and thinking about.

I see no point in raised blood pressures over this. If your unit has thier stuff together, then ecms should not be an issue.


Besides, patience and brain-sports, that's what wins you a battle. Not some shiny bauble or whatever on your 'mech

[Syllogy]

General Taskeen, on 18 May 2013 - 10:24 AM, said:

ECM - BAP - TAG - NARC - C3 already had a perfectly fine 'paper-rock-scissor' implementation in Battle Tech.

I believe you mean "Rock-Paper-Scissors-Lizard-Spock"

Sorry, I couldn't help it.

[Trauglodyte]

ECM-BAP-TAG-NARC-C3 worked in TT based on how they implemented it in that game. ECM-BAP-TAG-NARC work in MW:O based on their game design. That they didn't rubber stamp those components in game doesn't make it wrong. In fact, the current implementation, while crippling to weapons that require "tone", works and works well. The only hinderance in this entire information warfare scenario has been the extremely slow roll out of counters. ECM came out, what, 6 months ago? And we're just now getting BAP and NARC to a point where they work appropriately. I could use the whole "its beta" excuse but that is getting really disingenuous.

[Stonefalcon]

80Bit, on 18 May 2013 - 05:40 AM, said:

This pictures applies correctly to everything about MWO.

[General Taskeen]

Trauglodyte, on 18 May 2013 - 04:34 PM, said:

ECM-BAP-TAG-NARC-C3 worked in TT based on how they implemented it in that game. ECM-BAP-TAG-NARC work in MW:O based on their game design.

Please think of the larger issues. Information Warfare does not mean weapon denial or Brawler Enabling. The way ECM and equipment have been given additional "functions" are completely backwards to this logic and is detrimental to a F2P game and the spirit of Battle Tech.

Practically every Mech Warrior game had a closer interpretation of said equipment from TT. Keeping the spirit of Battle Tech.

Lets look at an example, shall we:

Team A: Typical balanced 2 Lance formation

• Composition: Short-Long-range weaponry, with LRM Support and/or Streaks (imagine an Atlas-S is on this team, it comes with streaks stock)
  
• What they do not have: BAP, PPC, ECM, or TAG

Team B: Typical balanced 2 Lance Formation

• Composition: Short-Medium-range weaponry, ECM Heavy, with LRM Coverage
  
• What they have: 4-6 ECM for coverage

What does this mean in MWO? Well, that's fairly obvious. Team A brought along some STOCK missile boats, for the sake of imagination, let's make them Yeoman's, A1's, or Stalkers, or even an Atlas stock config with an LRM. Their long-range support is rendered useless due to weapon lock-out from enemy team's ECM coverage. They have several tons of useless weaponry. Team A has no hard-counters, and half of their weapons will be un-useable. Meanwhile, Team B can use their LRM's and Streaks against the enemy with impunity.




Since they do not use hardpoints and/or tonnage/crit space for "hard counters" they are SOL.

What does this mean in TT?

• Since Team B has heavy ECM coverage, Team A has little information on what the enemy is carrying or their armor levels. They didn't bring BAP to counter "Information Denial."
  
• In higher rules, ECM Team B might create "false" radar targets so the enemy moves to the wrong location thinking there is enemy at that location in order to flank. I.E., Information Warfare.
  
• Battle Example: Light Mechs on Team A have LOS of targets (but are unaware of variant types, weapon loadouts, or armor levels), share their targeting data, thus allowing in-direct fire support of LRM's. Since the ECM Team is not yet close, Team B has not removed removed Team A's ability for target sharing. Since Team A are not using Artemis, they do not require LOS and Artemis accuracy is cancelled anyways in an ECM Cloud. They are able to score some LRM hits, but Team A's Scouts are still not able to determine how damaged the enemy might be. Their weapons were not rendered useless tonnage or crit space.

Going a bit further, if the composition were different. Team A with NARC, LRM Artemis, and BAP on one team. TEAM B with ECM on the other. ECM Team is able to remove accuracy bonus of Artemis missiles and were able to save their Lance Mechs that were NARC'ed and receiving in-direct auto-seeking LRM missile fire from enemies. The BAP Mechs from Team A were finally able to get close enough to Team B's ECM coverage, and rolled to cancel their "Information Denial." Team A is now aware of partial composition of enemy Team B.

Edited by General Taskeen, 18 May 2013 - 05:43 PM.

[Livewyr]

General Taskeen, on 18 May 2013 - 05:31 PM, said:

Please think of the larger issues. Information Warfare does not mean weapon denial or Brawler Enabling. The way ECM and equipment have been given additional "functions" are completely backwards to this logic and is detrimental to a F2P game and the spirit of Battle Tech.

Practically every Mech Warrior game had a closer interpretation of said equipment from TT. Keeping the spirit of Battle Tech.

Lets look at an example, shall we:

Team A: Typical balanced 2 Lance formation

• Composition: Short-Long-range weaponry, with LRM Support and/or Streaks (imagine an Atlas-S is on this team, it comes with streaks stock)
  
• What they do not have: BAP, PPC, ECM, or TAG

Team B: Typical balanced 2 Lance Formation

• Composition: Short-Medium-range weaponry, ECM Heavy, with LRM Coverage
  
• What they have: 4-6 ECM for coverage

What does this mean in MWO? Well, that's fairly obvious. Team A brought along some STOCK missile boats, for the sake of imagination, let's make them Yeoman's, A1's, or Stalkers, or even an Atlas stock config with an LRM. Their long-range support is rendered useless due to weapon lock-out from enemy team's ECM coverage. They have several tons of useless weaponry. Team A has no hard-counters, and half of their weapons will be un-useable. Meanwhile, Team B can use their LRM's and Streaks against the enemy with impunity.





Since they do not use hardpoints and/or tonnage/crit space for "hard counters" they are SOL.

What does this mean in TT?

• Since Team B has heavy ECM coverage, Team A has little information on what the enemy is carrying or their armor levels. They didn't bring BAP to counter "Information Denial."
  
• In higher rules, ECM Team B might create "false" radar targets so the enemy moves to the wrong location thinking there is enemy at that location in order to flank. I.E., Information Warfare.
  
• Battle Example: Light Mechs on Team A have LOS of targets (but are unaware of variant types, weapon loadouts, or armor levels), share their targeting data, thus allowing in-direct fire support of LRM's. Since the ECM Team is not yet close, Team B has not removed removed Team A's ability for target sharing. Since Team A are not using Artemis, they do not require LOS and Artemis accuracy is cancelled anyways in an ECM Cloud. They are able to score some LRM hits, but Team A's Scouts are still not able to determine how damaged the enemy might be. Their weapons were not rendered useless tonnage or crit space.

Going a bit further, if the composition were different. Team A with NARC, LRM Artemis, and BAP on one team. TEAM B with ECM on the other. ECM Team is able to remove accuracy bonus of Artemis missiles and were able to save their Lance Mechs that were NARC'ed and receiving in-direct auto-seeking LRM missile fire from enemies. The BAP Mechs from Team A were finally able to get close enough to Team B's ECM coverage, and rolled to cancel their "Information Denial." Team A is now aware of partial composition of enemy Team B.

Agreed.

Edited by Livewyr, 18 May 2013 - 05:48 PM.

[General Taskeen]

Livewyr, on 18 May 2013 - 05:40 PM, said:

Wordy and complicated, but; agreed.

Edited a little, hopefully more readable.

Edited by General Taskeen, 18 May 2013 - 05:44 PM.

[Livewyr]

On another note.. maybe I should've lured Paul in with some sort of non-insult or a misquote. He went back through the other thread he was tagged in, and when he found a dialogue of ideas going on, he left.

[MasterBLB]

Maybe you'll find these post interesting guys:
fairly long about root causes of ECM being wrong and ways to fix it
Mine explanation why the devs chose BAP as hard counter for ECM.Though it needs to be confirmed by some of these,yet after much of wondering I made these conclusions.

[Livewyr]

MasterBLB, on 18 May 2013 - 05:46 PM, said:

Maybe you'll find these post interesting guys:
fairly long about root causes of ECM being wrong and ways to fix it
Mine explanation why the devs chose BAP as hard counter for ECM.Though it needs to be confirmed by some of these,yet after much of wondering I made these conclusions.

I posted a positive, level-headed, solution based long-winded thread about ECM a long time ago.

It was even regarded by some as "the most beautiful post to ever come on these forums" when placed in the Official thread (page 30-ish of the Official ECM discussion)

The concept started with:
http://mwomercs.com/...ter-better-one/

And through that thread, was refined, melted, cast, and tempered into:
http://mwomercs.com/...onics-overhaul/

Which was utterly ignored due any number of reasons. (Most likely being that it was longer than most essays students write in high school now..)

Edited by Livewyr, 18 May 2013 - 06:04 PM.

[LockeJaw]

I doubt this will work. It is entirely too easy to read, lacks any manufactured rage, or forum spittle dribbling.

Good luck.

Edited by LockeJaw, 18 May 2013 - 09:18 PM.

[Shadowsword8]

PGI will never answer this, because there is no sound logic behind the way they implemented ECM.

Just like a child would rather deny he has committed a fault than man up and admit it.