At the risk of becoming the target of all your combined wroth, let me say this: you're ALL trolling each other

Let me just say that if we calm down and logically present our point of view with priority placed on clarity, it will be easier to see where the other person is coming from. Likewise, carefully read the other person's point of view to see where they're coming from.
Over-simplifying the other person's opinion in a manner intended to degrade its validity isn't going to help us here.
As for me, my personal opinion on this is that while increased complexity that raises the difficulty of accurately targeting specific components is a good thing, I believe randomized inaccuracy (resulting in a cone of randomized probable shot trajectories) is not the way to go.
I'm not sure if there's some sort of stigma against quoting oneself, but here's something I once stated on a previous thread:
Cyke, on 12 March 2013 - 08:18 AM, said:
No matter how you try to compensate for an RNG, it can betray a player.. or benefit his enemy. In a worst-case scenario, it can do both of those things in the same engagement, turning the outcome of the engagement from a win to a loss.
Recall that in a game with non-regenerating durability (armor points), any such luck-based outcome will further cascade and can decide the outcome of an entire game. With community warfare, that could further cascade into even further-reaching effects.
I'm getting ahead of myself here, though.
The point is, even if we want to make pinpoint accuracy more difficult (or rather, concentrated pinpoint accuracy with multiple weapons fired simultaneously), it's best if we use a mechanic that raises difficulty, but has a consistent, predictable outcome, and therefore one that can be compensated for.
The consistent, predictable increase in aim difficulty (raising the skill bar, one might say) can be accomplished through several means, all of which carefully avoid involving any randomness whatsoever.
Here are a few:
- Altering the behavior of convergence, itself having a few possibilities:
- Remove convergence from torso weapons, so they consistently fire straight ahead. Probably keep convergence for arm weapons.
- Require a player to manually set his convergence on-the-fly. This likely requires -too much- player effort. I'm not for it.
- Go back to slow converging weapons. However, weapons converge based on R-locked target range, not reticle range.
- Increasing the difficulty of a shot based on a 'Mech's throttle.
Reticle bobs up and down when a 'Mech goes above 60% throttle. In BattleTech, going over 60% throttle is "running" as opposed to walking. The reticle should bob slightly, but in a rhythmic manner that allows a player to either time his fire, or pull the reticle back on target.
Note that the walking/running distinction coincides with the movement heat generation in MWO ('Mech generates 0.1 heat/sec when walking from below 60%, 0.2 heat/sec when running).
- Reticle "wavers" around when 'Mech goes above ~50% or ~75% heat.
The reticle starts drifting around when the 'Mech gets hot, but the important thing is that the shots still all fire with proper relation to the reticle. It drifts more when you get very hot. Therefore, the player is able to simply put the reticle back on target before firing, if he can.
- Introduce mechanics that encourage (or mandate) chain-firing.
This reduces the overbearing effectiveness of massive Alphas of large weapons that many players have pointed out. Using multiple large weapons (e.g. PPCs and Gauss Rifles) to hit home tremendous damage into a single component is the way to go, which actually requires the least amount of player coordination and effort.
I'm not sure what specific mechanic could accomplish this without detracting from the feel of the game, though.
In conclusion, I feel that randomized shot deviation ("RNG") fudges the importance of player input making player "skill" less relevant. However, these ideas increase the requirement of attentiveness and focus on the player. They'll tax the player's hand-eye coordination, and familiarity with his 'Mech chassis and build.
Basically instead of decreasing the gap between good, average and poor players, these ideas increase the gap in shooting quality, consistency,and accuracy between players.
Btw, I'm glad to see no one has dared suggest that removing auto-convergence equates to randomness. That's the epitome of a complete lack of understanding of the game we ourselves play.
Edited by Cyke, 28 May 2013 - 08:05 AM.