35 replies to this topic

[Kitane]

The issue:
Assault LRM boats can launch massive amount of missiles in the air, twice as many as lighter mechs like Catapult. Attempting to balance LRMs without making lighter LRM boats non-viable is difficult.

The proposed suggestion:
Every mech has a limited amount of tubes on its chasis, by design. Attempting to fire more missiles than the mech can support should increase the recycle time of LRM launcher mounted in that respective mech part. Trying to squeeze multiple LRM launchers through shared tubes would result in similar effect.

Example:
An arm has a 6 tube launcher:
LRM5 - no changes
LRM10 - two staggered volleys of 6 and 4 and then the cooldown would start. The cooldown would be increased by 1.66 (10 / 6)
LRM20 - four staggered volleys of 6-6-6-2 and the 3.33 x default cooldown (20/6)

A torso mounted launcher has 10 tubes:
1x LRM5 - no change
1x LRM10 - no change
1x LRM20 - two staggered volleys and 2.0x cooldown.

2 x LRM5 in torso - no change
2 x LRM10 in torso - both would have increased cooldown by 2, even when fired separately.

1x LRM20 in NARC tube - 20 separately fired missiles and then cooldown x 20, a fitting punishment for something so daft.

The increased cooldown would be calculated, displayed and finalized in mechlab before launching the game.

=========

This would make it rewarding to either stick to the default number of tubes, or go slightly above (up to 50%) in order to get more missiles in air at once for a small nerf in sustained dps. A heavy LRM boating on an assault mech would be discouraged. Trying to mount twice as many missiles as the tubes can support (yes, I am talking about Stalker) would result in a massive volley and significant dps reduction.

Also, it would preserve the role of Catapults as specialized LRM heavies as all missile Catapults come with either 30 or 40 tubes, comparable with LRM oriented assault mechs.

It would also require that no dynamic models for launchers with variable number of tubes reflecting equipped launchers would be introduced. That would be unwise anyway, because it would invalidate Catapult C4 in an instant. Its only selling point is the number of tubes and it sacrifices a lot for it.

LRMs could be then buffed to more appropriate values without threat of LRM Assault boats blotting out the sun with 60-70 missile salvos. They could try to do it, but they would cripple themselves in the long run.

yes, I am a Catapult pilot and I hate LRM assaults boats as a source of endless nerfs, why do you ask?

Edited by Kitane, 27 May 2013 - 06:14 AM.

[Svalfangr]

No.

This is a bad idea that hurts varied builds.

[HiplyRustic]

Svalfangr, on 27 May 2013 - 06:20 AM, said:

No.

This is a bad idea that hurts stacked LRM cheeseboats.

FTFY

Edited by HiplyRustic, 27 May 2013 - 06:22 AM.

[Kitane]

There is only one real issue with LRM damage as I see it.

The 60-70 missiles that can be launched by 80t+ missile boats with massive amount of ammunition to support such weight of fire. Assault mechs are supposed to field massive amount of firepower, but here they can field twice as much firepower as similar heavies. Other weapon systems do not have this gap, Highlander certainly isn't packing twice as much firepower as Cataphract or even K2 Catapult, but it can fire twice as many missiles as Catapult.

If LRMS are buffed to make medium/heavy LRM mechs viable, LRM assaults will be walking death reapers, blowing up everything with few button presses.

If LRMS are balanced around LRM assault mechs "softening" typical targets, no medium/heavy LRM boat will be able to throw enough missiles at the target to be viable.

Therefore we can't solve this issue with simple LRM missile damage tunning. There needs to be something preventing 60-70 LRM Assaults from being twice as effective as 30-40 LRM medium/heavies. Because unlike 6 PPC Stalker (or similar monstrosity), assaults can handle massive LRM heat production just fine.

Edited by Kitane, 27 May 2013 - 06:53 AM.

[Satan n stuff]

the problem i see with this is that assaults aren't exactly short on missile tubes. The Awesome 8T and 8R both have 30, the 8V has 15, the 9M has 4 and the Pretty Baby has 19. All Stalkers aside from the Misery (1) and the 4N which nobody likes (22) have 32-42. Highlanders have 16-26. Atlai have 9 (RS), 10 (K) and 16 ( D and D-DC ) .
So it would not significantly affect Stalkers, especially the 3H, the typical missile boat. It would significantly nerf the Atlai and overnerf two out of four, one of which is already the least popular variant.

[Kitane]

***** n stuff, on 27 May 2013 - 07:50 AM, said:

the problem i see with this is that assaults aren't exactly short on missile tubes. The Awesome 8T and 8R both have 30, the 8V has 15, the 9M has 4 and the Pretty Baby has 19. All Stalkers aside from the Misery (1) and the 4N which nobody likes (22) have 32-42. Highlanders have 16-26. Atlai have 9 (RS), 10 (K) and 16 ( D and D-DC ) .
So it would not significantly affect Stalkers, especially the 3H, the typical missile boat. It would significantly nerf the Atlai and overnerf two out of four, one of which is already the least popular variant.

That's exactly what I had in mind, 20-40 tubes as a preferred missile volley size for the LRM specialists. 20 for medium mechs and for secondary weapon systems on hybrid heavies/assaults, 30-40 for heavy/assault LRM specialists. It's easier to increase LRM damage per missile if there is a system in place to prevent insane stacking.

And LRM as a guided system already generates a lot of heat on the forums, people are more likely to accept stacking restrictions on auto-hit weapons than on direct-fire "skill" weapons.

A mech capable of launching 60 or 70 missiles is always going to be a pain to balance without some significant downside. A 6 PPC Stalker hits like a truck but its heat management is hopelessly bad. A LRM60-70 assault can shoot and shoot and still have some basic alternate firepower to defend itself at close range.

A LRM60 Highlander/Awesome or LRM70 Stalker would be able to throw a large number of missiles in the air like now, but because they would try to fire twice as many missiles as their tubes allowed them to, they would suffer extra long cooldown. They would have to make a tradeoff between size of missile clouds and the ability to sustain missile fire.

A LRM40 Stalker or LRM30 Highlander/Awesome (as it is close to the original design) is not going to throw a wrench in LRM balancing.

[Zerberus]

NO. For the simple reason stated after the quote.

Kitane, on 27 May 2013 - 06:13 AM, said:

The issue:
Assault LRM boats can launch massive amount of missiles in the air, twice as many as lighter mechs like Catapult. Attempting to balance LRMs without making lighter LRM boats non-viable is difficult.

the blanket statement behind this basic premise is FALSE. Ironically, SPECIFICALLY the Catapults you reference as a contrary example do not back it up.

A catapult A1 can launch clouds of 90 missiles (Don´t believe it? put in a 200 xl, 6xLRM15, and skimp on armor.)
A catapult C4 can launch clouds of 80 (or 2x 40, cant remember becasue it`s been a while since I had more than 2x20 on mine, shich also come out as a single cloud of 40)

Contrarily, an Atlas D has 20 tubes and can launch 40 LRMs in 2 waves of 20.

Anything DESIGNED as a Missile boat can launch huge clouds. Anything not designed as such takes a bit longer. One could almost think that the mechs were specifically designed that way....

The only assault mech designed with missile boating in mind is a stalker (can`t remember the variant), and it is the only one that can put out more than 20 in a single cloud.

Edited by Zerberus, 27 May 2013 - 08:48 AM.

[Kitane]

Zerberus, on 27 May 2013 - 08:44 AM, said:

NO. For the simple reason stated after the quote.



the blanket statement behind this basic premise is FALSE. Ironically, SPECIFICALLY the Catapults you reference as a contrary example do not back it up.

A catapult A1 can launch clouds of 90 missiles (Don´t believe it? put in a 200 xl, 6xLRM15, and skimp on armor.)
A catapult C4 can launch clouds of 80 (or 2x 40, cant remember becasue it`s been a while since I had more than 2x20 on mine, shich also come out as a single cloud of 40)

Contrarily, an Atlas D has 20 tubes and can launch 40 LRMs in waves of 20.
Anything DESIGNED as a Missile boat can launch huge clouds. Anything not designed as such takes a bit longer. One could almost think that the mechs were specifically designed that way....

Oh great, one can never underestimate the insanity of people. Point taken.

Typical assault LRM boats haven't left the realm of sanity yet, unlike 60-90 LRM Catapults. Have you met AC40 Cicada yet? Or her 4 PPC sister?

60 LRM Catapult C4 would be slow, defenseless and suffer 50% extra cooldown on fire rate on top of already staggered volley fire. 80-90 Catapult... *shrug*

It wouldn't prevent A1 from loading 90 missiles. It would fire once every 12 seconds and crawl at iceberg speed. Fun? Maybe. But a 30 LRM Cat would deliver same amount of missiles over 12 seconds, slightly faster and without looking like a tool.

Edited by Kitane, 27 May 2013 - 08:57 AM.

[Satan n stuff]

Zerberus, on 27 May 2013 - 08:44 AM, said:

The only assault mech designed with missile boating in mind is a stalker (can`t remember the variant), and it is the only one that can put out more than 20 in a single cloud.

Actually the Awesome 8R can launch 60 at once and the 8T can launch 30 at the same time.

[Kitane]

***** n stuff, on 27 May 2013 - 08:57 AM, said:

Actually the Awesome 8R can launch 60 at once and the 8T can launch 30 at the same time.

Yep, that's essentially a bug. It has 30 tubes, 15 in each torso. But when you mount two LRM15 in each torso, all four will be checked separately for 15 missile tube limit in their mech body part, and all four will fire at once.

If you loaded 4x LRM20, you would fire 15+15+15+15 in first volley and 5+5+5+5 in second volley.

[Strum Wealh]

Also, it should be noted that the number of launch tupes will vary by loadout.

It already does this on the Highlanders (and, presumably, any 'Mechs to be released after them), and IIRC is planned to be back-ported to all 'Mechs.

As an example:

(originally from the post here by Daumantas Galland)

So, counting on the number of tubes being static, and building a balancing system on a system that we already know is on its way out, is not a safe proposition...

[Nightcrept]

The simplest way to look at this issue is that you cannot balance lrms for all applications because they become exponentially more powerful as you boat more of them.

So players who scream that lrms are op are generally if you as them referring to the stalker ultra boat.

But if we balance lrms for the boats then we make the weapon up for smaller uses.

SO if you don't like the posters suggestion how about making one yourselves? How do we fix this?

[Zerberus]

Kitane, on 27 May 2013 - 08:55 AM, said:

Oh great, one can never underestimate the insanity of people. Point taken.

Mine cannot be OVERestimated, it is as endless as the universe itself

Quote

Typical assault LRM boats haven't left the realm of sanity yet, unlike 60-90 LRM Catapults. Have you met AC40 Cicada yet? Or her 4 PPC sister?

I also own a 9 flamer hunchback that has a side job as a stunt double for the DeathStar

Quote

60 LRM Catapult C4 would be slow, defenseless and.... .... 80-90 Catapult... *shrug*

My atlas is significantly faster, I think the Roflpult goers 45 or something, lol... but the irony is that it doesn`t need to be fast... pump oit single shots of 15 and as soon as somebody tries to close on open ground you blot out the sun.... was a helluva lot of fun while LRMS were nerfed to see cents and trabs that thought they would find easy prey over the ridge get plastered over half the star system right when they crested it and were ybout to take theoir first shot.

***** n stuff, on 27 May 2013 - 08:57 AM, said:

Actually the Awesome 8R can launch 60 at once and the 8T can launch 30 at the same time.

Seriously?? I always avoided awesomes becasue I felt they were very ineffective with LRMs (and have a torso the size of Asia, lol), limiting my versatility in loadout.. I stand corrected, thanks.

Nightcrept, on 27 May 2013 - 09:19 AM, said:

SO if you don't like the posters suggestion how about making one yourselves? How do we fix this?

This implies that everybody feels that they need fixing, whether they agree with the OP or not. I think my post is quite clear that I do not feel that way, and therefore expecting a suggetion to that extent is an exercise in futility. And I believe the same holds true for numerous others.

Kitane, on 27 May 2013 - 09:06 AM, said:

Yep, that's essentially a bug. It has 30 tubes, 15 in each torso. But when you mount two LRM15 in each torso, all four will be checked separately for 15 missile tube limit in their mech body part, and all four will fire at once.

Interestingly enough, the Atlas D has the same bug "in reverse". It has 20 tubes, but a single LRM20 somes out in 2 waves of 10 instead of a cloud of 20. So it really only makes proper use of it`s tubes when groupfiring 2x20 for 2 clouds of 20.

Edited by Zerberus, 27 May 2013 - 09:44 AM.

[Scandinavian Jawbreaker]

Svalfangr, on 27 May 2013 - 06:20 AM, said:

No.

This is a bad idea that hurts varied builds.

Your statement hurts my Centurions feeling who wants to drop in with an LRM launcher for a change.

Let's face it; right now the medium and some heavy mech LRM builds are useless. They continue to be useless as long as there are no tubes restrictions. With those restrictions or penalties we could raise the LRM damage way up and actually use the weapon as intended.

[Neolisk]

Kitane, on 27 May 2013 - 06:13 AM, said:

Assault LRM boats can launch massive amount of missiles in the air, twice as many as lighter mechs like Catapult. Attempting to balance LRMs without making lighter LRM boats non-viable is difficult.

Bump the value of AMS, letting it shoot down 40xLRM missiles at best. Right now it's what - 20?

Bump the value of MG, letting them shoot LRMs down with directed shots.

Nerfing LRMs when they were just bumped is not a good solution, IMHO.

[Scandinavian Jawbreaker]

Neolisk, on 27 May 2013 - 10:48 AM, said:

Bump the value of AMS, letting it shoot down 40xLRM missiles at best. Right now it's what - 20?

Bump the value of MG, letting them shoot LRMs down with directed shots.

Nerfing LRMs when they were just bumped is not a good solution, IMHO.

So how excactly is this going to help my Cent running with LRM launcher? Your suggestion is nerfing that build even worse.

[blinkin]

Strum Wealh, on 27 May 2013 - 09:18 AM, said:

Also, it should be noted that the number of launch tupes will vary by loadout.

It already does this on the Highlanders (and, presumably, any 'Mechs to be released after them), and IIRC is planned to be back-ported to all 'Mechs.

As an example:

(originally from the post here by Daumantas Galland)

So, counting on the number of tubes being static, and building a balancing system on a system that we already know is on its way out, is not a safe proposition...

well that is disappointing. i chose my hunchback 4SP specifically for the way that it streams missiles out of it's dual LRM20. when i have them set to chainfire, i can fire one wait the few seconds for it to unload it's 4 volleys and then fire the second one. the resulting steady stream of missiles makes it great for suppression fire. instead of firing 40 missiles, i get to fire 6, 6, 6, 2, 6, 6, 6, 2. not as effective against AMS, but it is far better at driving opponents back and disrupting their ability to aim.

[Zerberus]

Neolisk, on 27 May 2013 - 10:48 AM, said:

Bump the value of AMS, letting it shoot down 40xLRM missiles at best. Right now it's what - 20?

Bump the value of MG, letting them shoot LRMs down with directed shots.

Nerfing LRMs when they were just bumped is not a good solution, IMHO.

But ironically, this heavy-handed change would be the ultimate nerf bar none.

AMS would become an absolute must have on every mech, and LRMs would die out becasue even the heaviest most insane boats like an lrm 90 catapult could not get past a 2x AMS stalker /AS7-K or 2 ams mechs near each other.... meaning that even if the enitire enemy team is boating, it`s not going to matter to anyone that `s not running off alone.

a 1.5 ton system making an entire class of weapon (thes change yould also shoot down 90% + of ssrms and streaks) useless is the whole reason people screamed about ECM.. and with ECM there was at least the chance to dumbfire or find someone out of the bubble.. this would effectively patch LRMs out of the game forever, because no normal person carries more than 60 and those would all be shot down, ESPECIALLY on systems taht cannont loose all 60 simultaneously burt send "waves".

Add onto that for example the reactive armor from another thread, and the ONLY weapons that make any sense to mount at all are ams, and ballistics. Welcome to Mech of Duty with pistols, shotguns, and short range "sniper" weapons

Edited by Zerberus, 27 May 2013 - 11:14 AM.

[Satan n stuff]

Kitane, on 27 May 2013 - 09:06 AM, said:

Yep, that's essentially a bug. It has 30 tubes, 15 in each torso. But when you mount two LRM15 in each torso, all four will be checked separately for 15 missile tube limit in their mech body part, and all four will fire at once.

If you loaded 4x LRM20, you would fire 15+15+15+15 in first volley and 5+5+5+5 in second volley.

Bug or not, it is Awesome. And extremely fun. I first figured this one out right after TAG and before upgrades. When the upgrades were added it made quad LRM15s practically unstoppable, as long as you had the sense to go for guaranteed hits. Now that you can add a BAP to shield it from ECM it actually works again, though the 114 damage alpha strike is a thing of the past.
Target alpha! WHOOOSH! Alpha down.
Go golf! WHOOOSH! Gamma down.
Foxtrot! WHOOOSH! Foxtrot down.
DAMMIT ***** STOP STEALING MY KILLS!
True story.

Edited by Satan n stuff, 27 May 2013 - 11:21 AM.

[Aslena]

why not just make it where if you have 15 tubes and you put in a 20 it still just fires 15, that would make it a lot easier to balance in the long run, they might would have to adjust some of the mech tubes here and there but it would be easier.