704 replies to this topic

[Tolkien]

Pater Mors, on 21 June 2013 - 02:26 PM, said:

At the moment, if you fire 3 of the same type of ballistic, the only feature you get is bullet drop. Other than that, they all hit the same pinpoint spot. Try that at a live firing range with any three of the same type of ballistic weapon (handgun, rifle whatever) and see if you can get all three bullets through the same hole.

Now try it at 5 different ranges in under 20 seconds.

Now try it at 5 different ranges in under 20 seconds while moving laterally to the target at 120kph.

See what I mean now? In MWO all that is possible. No ballistics behave that way. We essentially have Quake ballistics with added bullet drop at the moment.

Now I follow you, and agree that all guns are not identical identical identical as they are right now in the game.

scJazz, on 21 June 2013 - 02:26 PM, said:

But properly implemented Heat doesn't fix the pinpoint fire which has plagued every single MechWarrior version ever released. They gave us 11 hit locations, made one of them near impossible to hit, took away the randomness of hitting locations and then scratched their heads as to why people hate/boat high alpha mechs... just like EVERY Mechwarrior ever released. 20 years later the strangest damn thing imaginable is the fact that no one ever fixed this single fatal flaw

MPBT3025 tried to fix the flaw. When you fired guns 1 at a time it would work normally, but when you fired multiple guns at the same time it would lower your damage done AND randomly allocate the hits. This was critical to the game since mechs only had increased armor on the head, so a Jenner with 4x medium lasers could core other lights in a single pass before this tweak.

It worked pretty well but these days people seem absolutely allergic to any randomization of alphas.

[Pater Mors]

Tolkien, on 21 June 2013 - 02:33 PM, said:

It worked pretty well but these days people seem absolutely allergic to any randomization of alphas.

Skill™

[scJazz]

Tolkien, on 21 June 2013 - 02:33 PM, said:

Now I follow you, and agree that all guns are not identical identical identical as they are right now in the game.



MPBT3025 tried to fix the flaw. When you fired guns 1 at a time it would work normally, but when you fired multiple guns at the same time it would lower your damage done AND randomly allocate the hits. This was critical to the game since mechs only had increased armor on the head, so a Jenner with 4x medium lasers could core other lights in a single pass before this tweak.

It worked pretty well but these days people seem absolutely allergic to any randomization of alphas.

I said fix... fix this flaw... not strap on some epic stupid which makes no bloody sense whatsoever... fix

[TehSBGX]

Petroshka, on 10 June 2013 - 01:11 PM, said:

So the solution is to install Windows 98 on all mechs?

I would of gone with a Vista joke, but well played sir.

[Kageru Ikazuchi]

Win 98 is lostech ... most IS 'mechs are running Win 3.0 or Win Me, but can be upgraded to Vista ...

[CancR]

Kageru Ikazuchi, on 21 June 2013 - 07:48 PM, said:

Win 98 is lostech ... most IS 'mechs are running Win 3.0 or Win Me, but can be upgraded to Vista ...

that's getting PGi too much credit. Holding backspace to toggle delete is losttech.

[Tolkien]

scJazz, on 21 June 2013 - 04:07 PM, said:

I said fix... fix this flaw... not strap on some epic stupid which makes no bloody sense whatsoever... fix

I am not sure how much to appeal the 'makes no bloody sense' argument to battling seizure robots with giant energy blasters, so let's go a different route. In the battletech source material you couldn't actually choose where to hit your enemy with any shots unless they were shut down, or you had a clan targeting computer. In both cases it gave a +4 modifier on 2d6 so it was quite hard unless they were overheated.

So the roots of the game we are playing were borne of completely random hit locations on targets.

This type of randomization is much less confusing than trying to explain how ECM interacts with the other equipment and weapons in the game.

[Jack Starborn]

Read entire entry Homeless Bill. I'd like a medal for perseverance. :-)
And now seriously. A very elegant solution, adding tactical depth to the game.
Great unpaid work for PGI. They would be fools if they do not benefit from your idea.

It would give the second youth to medium class. I would like to again play my HBK-4 h, and be able to win rather than fall victim to team with 20 PPC.

[scJazz]

Tolkien, on 21 June 2013 - 11:59 PM, said:

I am not sure how much to appeal the 'makes no bloody sense' argument to battling seizure robots with giant energy blasters, so let's go a different route. In the battletech source material you couldn't actually choose where to hit your enemy with any shots unless they were shut down, or you had a clan targeting computer. In both cases it gave a +4 modifier on 2d6 so it was quite hard unless they were overheated.

So the roots of the game we are playing were borne of completely random hit locations on targets.

This type of randomization is much less confusing than trying to explain how ECM interacts with the other equipment and weapons in the game.

Whhhhaaaat? Ummm somehow you completely misread my intent. I was making fun of MPBT3025s "fix". I'm totally onboard with sane approaches to debuffing pinpoint Alpha.

[valrond]

I hope PGI pays attention to this thread. We've been discussing about convergence and dealing too much damage in an alpha strike since closed beta, like a year ago, and it hasn't been solved. I have barely played for the past two months because of it. Either you play a cheese boating build, or you die.

[Cracker Jack]

I think this is an excellent and well-reasoned solution - PGI should put some very serious thought into implementing this before launch.

[Baba Yogi]

this suggestion is not a healthy balance it rather forces people to spend more weight on things like larger engine/equipment since weapons are limited and mind you, a light mech has the same cap as an assault which is a direct nerf to them. They are supposed to be "oh **** run away" mechs which this kinda eliminates. They already lack speed. Main problem is average person can aim better than what average IS pilot could aim in TT. How to fix this? Just increase the speed of all mechs by same percentage, and those heavy hitting turrets will be scared to show themselves since everyone is going to aim for the guy who's standing still at that point. You might still be hit by those alpha's but at that point you should take into account the pilots skill and this question "do i deserve to live while running in the middle of half the enemy team?"

Also something must be done for max range of ac20 it should not deal damage farther than 540 meters. And gauss should get a range&projectile speed buff while having a big minimum range. I have no problem with very strong niche weapons but they should be "niche" so we could counter them without taking away what makes them fun.

[scJazz]

Lordhammer, on 23 June 2013 - 02:41 AM, said:

this suggestion is not a healthy balance it rather forces people to spend more weight on things like larger engine/equipment since weapons are limited and mind you, a light mech has the same cap as an assault which is a direct nerf to them. They are supposed to be "oh **** run away" mechs which this kinda eliminates. They already lack speed. Main problem is average person can aim better than what average IS pilot could aim in TT. How to fix this? Just increase the speed of all mechs by same percentage, and those heavy hitting turrets will be scared to show themselves since everyone is going to aim for the guy who's standing still at that point. You might still be hit by those alpha's but at that point you should take into account the pilots skill and this question "do i deserve to live while running in the middle of half the enemy team?"

Also something must be done for max range of ac20 it should not deal damage farther than 540 meters. And gauss should get a range&projectile speed buff while having a big minimum range. I have no problem with very strong niche weapons but they should be "niche" so we could counter them without taking away what makes them fun.

Wow you are just so wrong... go back and look at the numbers and point out the Light mech that actually gets nerfed please.

I was going to type more but then I realized that it would be a waste of time.

[theta123]

6 rounds in a row did i got wasted in seconds by boats

twice an AC40 lamer, one time a gausser and 3 times a gigantic PPC stalker build


I fully support this.

[MacKerris]

Bill,

Thank you for taking the time to think out a solution to the boating problem. I don't believe that heat is the solution to the issue at all. In the past I have seriously considered hard point limitations to be the best idea. However this idea works better and plays into the dev's meta. Consider that each mech could have its own modifier. The pilots could have a skill, and there could also be shop items or upgrades.

thanks for the read

Edited by MacKerris, 23 June 2013 - 06:47 AM.

[Quinton99]

An overly complex solution to a simple problem. If only 15 years of FPS development had already solved this problem... Oh wait! F*&$ing Half-Life solved this problem in the 1990s...

I will never understand why everyone seems to be in love with re-inventing the wheel...

[Homeless Bill]

Pater Mors, on 21 June 2013 - 01:09 PM, said:

The thing I can't quite understand about your attitude here, after following this thread since our original exchange of ideas is that all those things WILL disappear almost entirely under other systems. Sure, with heat, you can put 4PPC's on target on your first shot, but you're not doing it again for the rest of the match and you've effectively gimped yourself and your team badly too. I disagree with totally preventing tactics and builds from happening.

Ballistics are a different matter and should be treated differently but that being said, a hell of a lot of ballistic boats run hot anyways especially if they pack backup energy weapons. It's really only Gauss that's a serious issue with future releases.

If ballistics actually acted like ballistics in this game though, then the issue goes away. This idea certainly deals with that but as far as I am aware CryEngine supports realistic ballistics and I am unsure as to why we can't just use that, without needing a whole new system on top to fix the problem.

It does at anything except the lowest heat thresholds where I believe pinpoint is fine. They just need to be uncompromising and actual deterrents. As soon as you start running hot you're getting accuracy penalties. As soon as you pass 100% you're getting permanent accuracy penalties (plus, speed, twist, blown heat sinks etc etc).

How many people are really going to risk that to keep firing their super Alphas? You get one that's pinpoint and then you're crippled for the rest of the match. You're now a burden for your team and probably haven't even killed anyone unless you managed to one-shot a smaller guy. If you miss, it's even worse! Seems like a very fair trade off to me.

I completely disagree that cheese would disappear under heat penalties or the like. I think under other systems, most cheese will stay around. Look at PGI's projected numbers: 4xPPC builds are barely affected (9xML is apparently cheesier), my 732 is completely unscathed, and no heat penalty is going to prevent AC/20s from doing what they do.

You say you're against preventing tactics and builds, but then that whole paragraph was about how you'd never use an alpha strike because it's effects should be so detrimental. You basically either make the penalties so draconian that everyone is extremely paranoid about their heat or the penalties are ineffective. You might think that's a good thing, but I think that's just a pain in the *** that will cause cross-over gamers to shy away. The more hardcore you make the simulation, the more players you drive away. You're using a sledgehammer for surgery.

And as I've stated over and over, I think a harsh penalty will drastically alter gameplay in unknowable ways. It will basically mandate a weapon rebalancing because energy weapons will get the shaft far more than anything else. Any heat-based solution will have a ton of collateral damage, massive effects on gameplay, inconsistent impacts on different weapons, and have a lot of trouble finding the correct balance between effective and draconian.

You say we don't need a whole new system, but then you basically propose a whole new system for ballistics. The work involved in terms of programming and art would be about equal to what I'm proposing. Additionally, doing it that way causes a couple problems:
1. It makes weapon balancing inconsistent. You're solving the same problem two different ways for two different weapon types, and you're not really solving the problem at all for missiles (missiles aren't bad now, but the Clans will make them bad). It means balancing pinpoint damage will be that much harder because you have to make two or three systems solve the same problem with the same relative strength. I think it would just a nightmare for PGI's numbers team, particularly considering how bad they seem to be at balance in general.
2. Communication to the player would be difficult. Either you let them fire a huge ballistics alpha and then recoil happens (which doesn't solve the problem since the first shot was pinpoint) or you preemptively penalize them without any sort of explanation. You'd need most of the new HUD elements from my solution to do a less effective job of communicating what's going to happen.

Recoil / ballistics-specific penalties were something I played around with a lot, but no matter what I did, it was inconsistent, sloppy, and introduced a host of issues.

Jack Starborn, on 22 June 2013 - 04:04 AM, said:

Read entire entry Homeless Bill. I'd like a medal for perseverance. :-)

Does that mean you read the entire OP or the entire 17 pages of me defending it? You only get a medal for making it through the rebuttals =P

Lordhammer, on 23 June 2013 - 02:41 AM, said:

this suggestion is not a healthy balance it rather forces people to spend more weight on things like larger engine/equipment since weapons are limited and mind you, a light mech has the same cap as an assault which is a direct nerf to them. They are supposed to be "oh **** run away" mechs which this kinda eliminates. They already lack speed. Main problem is average person can aim better than what average IS pilot could aim in TT. How to fix this? Just increase the speed of all mechs by same percentage, and those heavy hitting turrets will be scared to show themselves since everyone is going to aim for the guy who's standing still at that point. You might still be hit by those alpha's but at that point you should take into account the pilots skill and this question "do i deserve to live while running in the middle of half the enemy team?"

Also something must be done for max range of ac20 it should not deal damage farther than 540 meters. And gauss should get a range&projectile speed buff while having a big minimum range. I have no problem with very strong niche weapons but they should be "niche" so we could counter them without taking away what makes them fun.

I don't understand why you think it will nerf assault 'mechs. Assaults and heavies are the ones that can fire off a massive alpha, so they are indeed affected more by the need for fire discipline; however, as stated many times, TCL dissipates so quickly that heat and weapon cooldown are the sole factors limiting damage over time. Lights will still be inferior in combat.

Increasing the speed is a bad solution for a few reasons: the current speed cap on lights basically means increasing the speed is impossible for them at the current time and it will have all sorts of unknowable consequences on gameplay. Altering something so fundamental to the pace of the game to fix what is essentially an unrelated problem with 'mech speed is extremely dangerous. Also, it doesn't actually fix anything. If extreme, pinpoint damage can still happen, it's not an effective solution. Period.

AC/20s aren't typically used for sniping. They end up being a lot like a Splatcat from a few months ago: when you see one under 300m, you know you're ******. Doesn't matter if you're driving a medium, heavy, or an Atlas - the Jagerboom is king in a way that it shouldn't be. I should be more scared of an Atlas than a Jager, and until that happens, this game is massively unbalanced as far as I'm concerned. Decreasing their falloff range doesn't fix the problem.

MacKerris, on 23 June 2013 - 06:42 AM, said:

Bill,

Thank you for taking the time to think out a solution to the boating problem. I don't believe that heat is the solution to the issue at all. In the past I have seriously considered hard point limitations to be the best idea. However this idea works better and plays into the dev's meta. Consider that each mech could have its own modifier. The pilots could have a skill, and there could also be shop items or upgrades.

thanks for the read

Thank you for reading it and providing your feedback =]

Quinton99, on 23 June 2013 - 07:47 AM, said:

An overly complex solution to a simple problem. If only 15 years of FPS development had already solved this problem... Oh wait! F*&$ing Half-Life solved this problem in the 1990s...

I will never understand why everyone seems to be in love with re-inventing the wheel...

I feel like you don't play this game, you don't understand the problem, or you're just trolling. What does Half Life have to do with this problem??? There were not multiple weapons to converge, it wasn't based off of a tabletop game, its combat was honestly not all that balanced... I just... I don't even.

[Baba Yogi]

Homeless Bill, on 23 June 2013 - 02:16 PM, said:

[color=#959595]I don't understand why you think it will nerf assault 'mechs. Assaults and heavies are the ones that can fire off a massive alpha, so they are indeed affected more by the need for fire discipline; however, as stated many times, TCL dissipates so quickly that heat and weapon cooldown are the sole factors limiting damage over time. Lights will still be inferior in combat.[/color]

[color=#959595]Increasing the speed is a bad solution for a few reasons: the current speed cap on lights basically means increasing the speed is impossible for them at the current time and it will have all sorts of unknowable consequences on gameplay. Altering something so fundamental to the pace of the game to fix what is essentially an unrelated problem with 'mech speed is extremely dangerous. Also, it doesn't actually fix anything. If extreme, pinpoint damage can still happen, it's not an effective solution. Period.[/color]

[color=#959595]AC/20s aren't typically used for sniping. They end up being a lot like a Splatcat from a few months ago: when you see one under 300m, you know you're ******. Doesn't matter if you're driving a medium, heavy, or an Atlas - the Jagerboom is king in a way that it shouldn't be. I should be more scared of an Atlas than a Jager, and until that happens, this game is massively unbalanced as far as I'm concerned. Decreasing their falloff range doesn't fix the problem.[/color]

by increasing speed i didnt mean numbers. Numbers stay the same but lets say new 100kph becomes as fast as 130 kph in game's current state. You only increase speed coefficient by a fixed number.(thus everything is faster by same percentage) By increasing the speed while keeping the object's volume you make it harder to hit. Yes, alpha's still going to be very powerful but it'll be harder for people to actually land them. And when moving targets are harder to hit people aim for those who standing still. Guess who those people are? alpha monsters.

For ac20s yea they are dangerous close, and i have no problem crapping on them all over from range with my 100kph 2erppc dragon. They cant chase me and i win at range but i think its a bit unfair for us snipers to get damaged by good deal by those ac20s. one ac20 still hits for 10 dmg at 540, considering current map design i think they are not "niche" enough.

[krolmir]

I will say this, damn good work. This thread is a handful to read. I like the idea HB, however, I feel it needs tweaking. I feel your system should affect ballistic weapons, missile weapons partially, and laser weapons not at all. One, pilot skill for soaking damage is a must. If your are standing still in front of a 6LL Stalker your already as ate up as a soup sandwich, regardless of your reason for being a perfect target. A one second duration increase on a LL (example) would have a drastic effect. The gunner will have to maintain pinpoint acquisition in order to focus damage in one area longer. The targeted mech can shake more, spreading the damage further. This puts the damage done and received in the hands of the players. This would not affect the firing rate, or overall damage per second of laser weapons. As far as ballistics go, your system is great. It is a great counter to boating that type of weapon. Now, PPC's are a special kind of monster, and I remember how fast I could get into trouble in closed beta on my 9M, I just alpha'd my 3 ERPPC's while sitting at 75% on my heat scale, and then I just blew myself the F*** up, back when heat management actually having to manage our heat, or else. I remember the first time I saw a 6 PPC Stalker, and it wasn't until after the nasty heat penalties disappeared from the game. I feel as a general whole that heat penalties need to be more severe. I also feel that PPC's are now too cool as a general whole, which makes them that much more desirable to boat in high quantity. Missiles, well that's the tough nut of the bunch. The latest missile fixes, have sorted most of their issues, but I feel that LRM's need a chance to miss even with a maintained lock. Think of them like a moving cloud they can only get so close together without hitting each other and falling out of the air. Artemis could make a tighter cloud, and that's it. SRM's are fine right now, they don't core at all, kinda weak if anything. I think your system is good for LRM's mostly, the higher the amount of missiles fired the more loosely packed the cloud gets. The problem I see with most of the ideas is they try to blanket very different weapons systems, with one fix. I feel that a different set of solutions is needed for every weapon type, and yes there will be some overlapping features between the solution sets.

[Quinton99]

Homeless Bill, on 23 June 2013 - 02:16 PM, said:

I feel like you don't play this game, you don't understand the problem, or you're just trolling. What does Half Life have to do with this problem??? There were not multiple weapons to converge, it wasn't based off of a tabletop game, its combat was honestly not all that balanced... I just... I don't even.

It's ok. Use your words. I'll wait.

You're getting too far off track. It doesn't matter that there are multiple weapons(One gun or six, you pull the trigger once and other players take a lot of damage) and a heat scale in this game, at least not for the purposes of this discussion. What matters is that Half-Life(just an example. Rainbow Six was another late 90s title that applies here as well) had a system for dealing with pinpoint damage that was instantly fatal, and they did it in a way that players didn't feel like they were being cheated.

Their solution worked so well that every shooter game worth a lick since then has used it(up to and including the much maligned around here CoD games): Accuracy penalties. If you move, the cone gets bigger. If you fire the cone gets bigger. Take your time to aim, and accept the penalty of not moving and you can get off one good shot. Even in this game the best you can do with that is 60 damage, which while potentially fatal is usually not. Plenty of games have one hit kills and actually pull off still being fun. Crybabies in this game whining about how "RNG hurts my skillz, man" need to go back to CoD... Oh wait, CoD actually has accuracy penalties!

So put that aside for a minute and let's look at what you're proposing. You propose adding an entirely new "resource" into the game, with its own balance issues, strengths, and weaknesses. Where's the incentive for PGI to try it? They could accept the word of some dude on the forum with his crazy new idea (which may or may not be brilliant, but will definitely take months to implement and could turn out to be total garbage) OR, and this is going to sound pretty crazy, they could go with the formula that has been making game developers silly rich since 1998 and go with what has been proven to work!

You don't have to make them wildly inaccurate or anything. Say just enough that your crosshairs would expand to an assault-sized target at 500m while you're at a flat out run, using jump jets at all, or constantly firing(or firing multiple weapons)? Just arbitrary and off the top of my head.

I really don't even feel the need to argue for this system. Forumwarriors can sit here and theorycraft all they want about how it will ruin the game, or it won't work, but the evidence that it will work is that it already has worked for 15 years.