143 replies to this topic

[Solaxxas]

Maleki, on 21 May 2013 - 12:34 PM, said:

LRM didn't exist before this patch as more then a pest. I've ignored them over the past months over hundreds of rounds. I didn't care because they really did suck that much.

Maybe you just didn't know how to use them? I utilized them quite effectively with my trusty CPLT-C4, was pretty consistently on top of the scoreboard. Using them now feels like cheating more than anything.

[Maleki]

Been using them since closed man. Maybe you just do it better. They were sorta my thing but it just got frustrating. Broke out the PPC's and lasers and just enjoyed.

[Chavette]

PGI did it again.... stupidest buff ever... oh wait they already messed em up once... guess thats how they roll, never bother to learn.

[Corvus Antaka]

LRMS seem fine so far. how about you play for a week before bitching?

[Katsuie Shibata]

it is quit nice how sombody starts flaming . agreed that the LRM buff went to far. So Please PGI put the damage back to 0.7, i gues this would be nice for the game play (LRM are strong, but this is to much!!)

Edited by Katsuie Shibata, 21 May 2013 - 01:00 PM.

[Thorqemada]

Atm LRM seem to work though the Flightpath is obviously somewhat angular.
I got damaged on Alpine from a big number of LRM Mechs in the semi open bcs the Team did not care for the base defense and left me alone but i had games with many LRM Super-Boats that got easily defeated.

Edited by Thorqemada, 21 May 2013 - 01:03 PM.

[Assaultfox]

The LRM balance seems much better now. Having tried my builds with them I must say I am pleased. I have not done any amazing damage with them, but with the speed tweak more are hitting (even on those pesky lights). The trajectory is more in line with what I think a missile volley should be, though I believe their angle down on target is a bit too severe. My thought for that is leave the launch angle the same, and soften the reentry angle by 10 degrees or so. Doing so should make cover still viable, and would spread out the damage a bit more with a direct hit.

[Funkadelic Mayhem]

way.... WAY to far with the LRM's . Its break time again.

[Tommi_Gunmetal]

LRM's are fine. Boating is the problem. Also, LRM's are a lot easier to deal with than the PPC/Gauss poptarts. If nothing else, within 180m they are literally useless.

[Eraos]

The problem -- in my opinion, at least -- is that PGI changed far too many things with this LRM change:

- the ECM nerf is obviously pertinent
- speed increase
- damage increase
- flight path change
- artemis/tag stacking changes

Fundamentally, a lot of buffs were applied to LRMs, and they have ended up in a state where I would agree that they are too powerful. Personally, I think that the key problem is actually the flight path change. Now that the flight path is so vertical, it is much harder to find cover from them. For example, in River City (lower city), most of the buildings are not high enough to provide cover from LRMs that follow the new flight path. With the old flight path you could advance through the buildings in relative safety as most -- if not all -- of the missiles would slam into the cover that you were keeping in front of you.

With the new flight path this has drastically changed -- things that are roughly the same height as your mech provide next to no cover, because the LRMs come in at such a steep angle that few of them hit the cover. This is in itself a huge buff, and actually bothers me quite a lot because it removes much of the skill from LRM use.

With the old flight-paths (so long as the target wasn't sitting out in an open field like an *****), it took a fair amount of skill to land really good volleys of LRMs. Positioning and flanking was keenly important, since any LOS cover (even fairly low LOS cover) blocked LRMs almost as effectively as it blocked lasers and ballistics. With the new flight paths, most of that skill has been frittered away -- now low cover provides almost no protection, and LRMs are thus significantly easier to land solid volleys with.

IMO this is the major problem with the new LRMs -- I would like everything to stay the same except to have the missile flight path changes reverted to the old pathing. I think that would balance them approximately correctly, and would restore a fairly significant skill barrier between "using LRMs" and "being really effective with LRMs".

As things sit now, I agree that LRMs are too powerful and that the power problems could be addressed in a variety of ways, but I really think that the flight path changes are the true underlying problem; and it would be worth rolling just the flight path changes back and seeing where the balance lay at that point.

As a final word directly to PGI: flatly put; you guys are changing far too many variables at once, balance wise. As you keep dropping 50 ton weights on each end of the teeter-totter, it is not surprising that a lot of weapons systems oscillate regularly between "very weak" and "too strong". Monthly monolithic releases where you change 5-10 things about the way a weapon works (LRMs, in this case) are never going to work very well. IMO you should respond more quickly (weekly or even every few days) and with much smaller changesets (change one variable, not X variables). I'm guessing you already know this; and I'm just wasting your time by stating it -- but I'm quite unclear as to why you clearly aren't doing it. The LRM changes should have been phased out over a month's time, bit by bit -- both to cut down on "flavour of the month" and to allow the changes some time to exhibit themselves so that you know what needs to be changed next.

While I think that LRMs are a little powerful at the moment; they are only so powerful/so irritating because everyone and their dog are using them: they are the flavour of the month, because you buffed a whole bunch of things about them rather than making small, incremental changes. In such a situation, any possible weapon balance issues are made all the worse because it is compounded so many times.

[arghmace]

In one battle the enemy had a disconnected Jagermech going full speed in circles. Two boats in our team bombarded him with LRM's for a minute until he died. The LRM's still do not hit moving targets very well and the damage is still lowish. The arc seems too steep but they're not OP from what I've seen this far.

The main issue is that everyone is using them after the patch so it can be a bit boring. I think it will cool down, since they're not that good still. Everyone is just trying them out.

Edited by arghmace, 21 May 2013 - 02:08 PM.

[Seelenlos]

Eraos, on 21 May 2013 - 01:46 PM, said:

The problem -- in my opinion, at least -- is that PGI changed far too many things with this LRM change:

- the ECM nerf is obviously pertinent
- speed increase
- damage increase
- flight path change
- artemis/tag stacking changes

Fundamentally, a lot of buffs were applied to LRMs, and they have ended up in a state where I would agree that they are too powerful. Personally, I think that the key problem is actually the flight path change. Now that the flight path is so vertical, it is much harder to find cover from them. For example, in River City (lower city), most of the buildings are not high enough to provide cover from LRMs that follow the new flight path. With the old flight path you could advance through the buildings in relative safety as most -- if not all -- of the missiles would slam into the cover that you were keeping in front of you.
...
As a final word directly to PGI: flatly put; you guys are changing far too many variables at once, balance wise. As you keep dropping 50 ton weights on each end of the teeter-totter, it is not surprising that a lot of weapons systems oscillate regularly between "very weak" and "too strong". Monthly monolithic releases where you change 5-10 things about the way a weapon works (LRMs, in this case) are never going to work very well. IMO you should respond more quickly (weekly or even every few days) and with much smaller changesets (change one variable, not X variables). I'm guessing you already know this; and I'm just wasting your time by stating it -- but I'm quite unclear as to why you clearly aren't doing it. The LRM changes should have been phased out over a month's time, bit by bit -- both to cut down on "flavour of the month" and to allow the changes some time to exhibit themselves so that you know what needs to be changed next.

While I think that LRMs are a little powerful at the moment; they are only so powerful/so irritating because everyone and their dog are using them: they are the flavour of the month, because you buffed a whole bunch of things about them rather than making small, incremental changes. In such a situation, any possible weapon balance issues are made all the worse because it is compounded so many times.

Hi,

Not much to add to this comment:

Exactly declared all PROBLEMS and also INCLUDES the SOLUTION.
Needs only to be reprogrammed back again....

- ECM is now useless (neighter can it save my Atlas, nor my team.
- My Atlas is reaped apart only on CT by Missiles
- All Missiles hit! In Battle-Tech (if i remember it right) it mean dicing one 6 then another 6 then 20 .... now we have it all the time.

The only thing is good is the flight path as in Battle-Tech you could also blind fire and hit an area (the only thing good about that patch)...

The next patch-fix is for Friday PGI?

[IdolElite]

LRMs are actually worth their weight again. It must be so strange for people who have never played MWO while LRMs were viable. Welcome to real mechwarrior, a tactical thinking man's shooter. Adapt or die.

[Herr Vorragend]

That buff was a little too much. The speedtweak of the rockets combined with the new flightpath would easily have been enough. Now I don´t wanna look out for the enemy team anymore. You could be splattered apart within seconds. I´d recommend a hotfix reducing the dmg to the previous settings. But keep the flightpath and speed to collect data.

[Innocent]

It is not adapt or die. the game is now sit behind big cover and hope the other team gets bored and closes with you. the current implementation of LRMs means any break in cover will cause death within a few seconds.

All i really want is an statement from PGI that they understand the issue and a timeline for a hotfix.

[Corvus Antaka]

Innocent, on 21 May 2013 - 02:20 PM, said:

It is not adapt or die. the game is now sit behind big cover and hope the other team gets bored and closes with you. the current implementation of LRMs means any break in cover will cause death within a few seconds.

All i really want is an statement from PGI that they understand the issue and a timeline for a hotfix.

a big part of this is everyone still running all those big fat slow mechs with tons of pinpoint firepower. More mobile mechs and mediums have little trouble dealing with LRMS if they move from cover to cover.

running 20 matches through so far in everything from lights to assaults I so far see no evidence that LRMS are OP yet. Lots of laziness, people with boat only LRM builds get jumped and are useless, one thing i have seen is a lot more variety on the field.

An AMS or 3 does wonders too.

Edited by Colonel Pada Vinson, 21 May 2013 - 02:26 PM.

[Sunaiac]

Did 5 games tonight.
Died 5 times cored by 4-5 LRM volleys.
Leaving the game again, until next patch.
Thanks for breaking it. Again. Same way.

Colonel Pada Vinson, on 21 May 2013 - 02:25 PM, said:

a big part of this is everyone still running all those big fat slow mechs with tons of pinpoint firepower. More mobile mechs and mediums have little trouble dealing with LRMS if they move from cover to cover.

running 20 matches through so far in everything from lights to assaults I so far see no evidence that LRMS are OP yet. Lots of laziness, people with boat only LRM builds get jumped and are useless, one thing i have seen is a lot more variety on the field.

An AMS or 3 does wonders too.

I do like light and fast medium mechs.
But I like others too. I'd like to have the option of playing them.

[Oy of MidWorld]

LRM's literally define every match. Saying so is acceptable and necessary. Telling people to learn this or that is just not viable (and rude), constructive criticism however is.

[Thorqemada]

ECM still works against LRM until you close in and disable it.
Cover still works, stay close to it and most Missiles wont hit - some maps offer more cover than others.
The flightpath could get a smoothing pass but damage and launching angle be good.
It seems that the CT gets more damage than the other parts but the CT allways gets more damage than any other part bcs People usually go for it as it is the most secure hit so this is no difference to other weapons.
Boating is as much a Problem as with any other weapon.
LRM still be slow!

People mostly got used to harmless LRM that never scratched the paint on their Mech - so not break locks, not use Cover, ECM and AMS.

Edited by Thorqemada, 21 May 2013 - 02:33 PM.

[John MatriX82]

Lrm path is near the first Artemis screwpatch. There's virtually NO cover to stay behind to avoid them. I hope they'll realize they screwed them up again..