20 replies to this topic

[Arkathan]

So I know since this is multiplayer group warfare only the devs don't want to make it too easy to be blown to pieces, but while it is easy to be shredded by a group of mechs, 1v1 combat is so slow that others will show up long before either person kills the other, one of my favorie things about MW4 is I could load up some heavy weaponry on a assault mech and blow smaller mechs apart with a single shot, unless I get a headshot here, even a ac20 the strongest weapon in the game takes 5-10 shots to bring down a medium and up. Anyone else wish certain weapons had a longer cooldown but more damage?

[CmdrPoopyPants]

From what I can see, there's a hit detection/damage problem going on right now. I've watched people dump 4 ERPPCs into someone standing 100m away, watched their reticule flash, and saw NO flashing on the enemy mech paper doll (and seemingly no damage apply). I also had a match where I was dumping into the CT of a Stalker (hard to miss that target, and the paper doll was flashing there like nuts the entire fight).. took forever to kill the guy. I barely got shots off on anything else, and my damage for the match was 625 damage.. near 500 just to the front of that Stalker. Sorry, but most of his armor was still on legs/arms, so there's no way just the 3 torso sections sucked up 500 damage and he was still standing.

Something just isn't quite right at present. .. Oh, and I've dropped a few lights in 1 or 2 alphas from my Assault mechs over the past few days, and been dropped in 3 to 4 seconds in my assault from running into an enemy pack.. so this "issue" isn't consistent. There are plenty of times I think "wtf! weapons are too damn strong!".. but, then, that's what I get for walking in front of 3 assaults from the enemy team

[Spheroid]

Maybe you need a high damage alpha or lesser armored target. What are you piloting?

[Arkathan]

I suspect you may be onto something, Ive piloted a dual AC20 firebrand, and Ive also equipped it with 4 PPCS at times, only dump it into a light and watch them walk away. People hate boating it seems but honestly it seems like certain small mechs can absorb way too much damage.

[Shalune]

Not that the previous replies are necessarily inaccurate, but I think the other folks here may be over-thinking things.

The simplest answer is "yes." Mechwarrior Online has a relatively slow time to kill compared to shooters and some older Mechwarrior games. This is likely what you're noticing in most situations.

However it does not appear to be an attempt by the developers to ease things into something different later on, given how long things have been like this. There are some downsides to this like having trouble positively impacting your team, alone. But it also encourages teamwork, piloting and positioning, and secures a role for medium skirmishers.

If you're unhappy with the current setup though I'd recommend looking into a 70+ ton PPC + Gauss boat. CTF-3D (2 PPC 1 gauss) or HGN-732 (3 PPC, 1 gauss) are probably the best mechs available for this. Stalkers are also an option if all you care about is raw firepower, many carry 4-6 PPCs.

[Dalziel Hasek Davion]

Time to kill a single target is a game balance issue.

To my mind it would be close to zero fun to be the light pilot in your scenario - spend minutes selecting the 'Mech, finding a game, loading it, set-up weapons, move to engagement range and then /bam/ instant death and spectatorville. One man's ceiling is another man's floor.

If that's what you have fun doing, then the closest you'll get today is one of the boating cheese builds as mentioned - or going back to MW4 and going single-player. I would not vote for measures to make duelling a one-hit matter.

[stjobe]

Dalziel Hasek Davion, on 11 June 2013 - 01:54 AM, said:

To my mind it would be close to zero fun to be the light pilot in your scenario - spend minutes selecting the 'Mech, finding a game, loading it, set-up weapons, move to engagement range and then /bam/ instant death and spectatorville.

That's a pretty accurate description of the current state of the game for light pilots.

Or, rather, inexperienced light pilots. The experienced ones have either moved on to heavies and assaults, or have learned to stay out of sight. On pain of death.

[Snowcrow]

As others have mentioned, there's a hit registration problem. It seem to have regressed as pgi has updated and changed the netcode in preparation for 12v12.
Hopefully they'll fix this soon.

[Koniving]

The battletech and mechwarrior series has never been about quick kills. It's not supposed to be. It's supposed to be the challenge of two or many behemoths battling each other in a battle of wits, skill, luck and cunning.

Yesterday me and another guy were piloting Miseries on voice comms. We've been brawling enemies in two on one battles when they are isolated. Finally it boils down to two enemies left. Both of them had 4 ER PPC rigs (one a stalker, one an Atlas RS with a Gauss Rifle on the side). They had just killed the 6th player, leaving only the two of us.

My teammate had been soaking most of the damage up to this point. When we charge them, he dies in the first volley of 8 ER PPCs. The enemy stalker shuts down. The Atlas is still moving. Since the enemy stalker was the weakest of the two in terms of armor, I went for him. With both of them pelting me from different angles at every opportunity that they could, I had my twin standard PPCs, 3 Medium Lasers, UAC/5, and Streak SRM-2 loaded up. I tore through the side of the stalker. He began to panic and move behind the Atlas.

I whirl around to give chase -- all of us repeatedly powering down because every single one of us are running hot on Tourmaline. With the Atlas between me and the other stalker while it cooled down, I began using only the streak and the UAC/5 to help facilitate my own cooldown while still doing damage but the damn thing keeps jamming! I cut to just the cannon as I push past the Atlas; I was going to disable that stalker altogether. When the stalker peeked to shoot at me from behind the Atlas, I let off an alpha strike. PPCs at 89 meters, 3 ML, streak and a UAC/5 into his surviving shoulder. Cherry red but I shut down. The Atlas just did another alpha strike into my side and powered down. I hear sparks. I've lost my side. It's now or never. I power up prematurely. "Override shutdown." Another alpha! Power down immediately. The stalker lost his other side torso. He's effectively weaponless.

The Atlas is panicking, powers up to give off another alpha just to shut right back down. Since I lost a laser, a PPC, and a streak, I now had better heat efficiency. Though I lost a few heatsinks as well. Still I was able to power right back up. My CT armor is gone thanks to that last strike. I whirl around counter-clockwise, not giving him any more chances to hit the weakened side. If he's gonna hit me he's gonna hit armor. I go for the gauss rifle. He's within 60 meters, so that PPC won't do jack here. Twin ML, UAC/5 barrage (when the thing doesn't jam), his armor shreds on the right torso. The Gauss Rifle explodes on him. His internals go to dark orange immediately. His last alpha with the gauss and 4 ER PPCs went into my arm and armored side torso; both went red in armor only. I'm still pumping UAC/5s into it and follow up with a PPC though I've been circling and not backing away (staying this close makes his ER PPCs imprecise and spreads the damage). His arm falls off, his shoulder is gone. My heat's doing so much better now. He's down to two ER PPCs.

But now I have a problem. His good arm is on the same side as my weak torso. There's no getting around this, he's got me pegged. By this time he'd been stripped of armor all along his back and on his center torso, but it's still bright yellow. My CT's become dark orange. We tussel a bit more. Ramming each other even though knockdowns are gone. Targeting each other's weak spots. We still occasionally get shut down but nowhere near as often now. The enemy stalker, now just a walking phallus on legs, attempts to interject by ramming me and getting between me and my enemy in seemingly coordinated attempts to soak up my fire and then hit me when my weapons are recycling.

Ultimately he becomes cherry red. A shot or two would kill him. I've lost my other side torso leaving me with only a medium laser in the center torso. I line up my shot. He lines up his. I fire and cutting into the beam is that damn stalker! The stalker dies. As he falls over I'm stuck waiting for the laser to recharge. The Atlas fires two ER PPCs into my center torso. From my perspective it may as well have been to my cockpit.

Defeat.

The enemy Stalker: "OMFG why won't you just die!?!?!?!?!?" came his response over the chat. "Holy ****!"
The Atlas: "You were one pain in the *** to put down."
Koniving: "Good fight."

-----------------------------

My partner said if I went with an AC/5 instead, I never would have jammed and I would have won that since I spent most of the fight with the thing jammed. I have to agree.

That's what mechwarrior is about. The "Thinking Person's Shooter." Challenging fights, battles of wit, and improving upon yourself, your teamwork, and finally your mech.

The franchise died with MW4, MechAssault tried to pick up the pieces by preventing those instant kill alphas, but then Microsoft tried to redesign it to entertain call of duty and halo players. Just went downhill and died from there.

(Edit: Forgot the U in the first UAC/5 reference.)

Edited by Koniving, 11 June 2013 - 05:50 AM.

[Mechteric]

Koniving, on 11 June 2013 - 05:30 AM, said:

That's what mechwarrior is about. The "Thinking Person's Shooter." Challenging fights, battles of wit, and improving upon yourself, your teamwork, and finally your mech.

The franchise died with MW4, MechAssault tried to pick up the pieces by preventing those instant kill alphas, but then Microsoft tried to redesign it to entertain call of duty and halo players. Just went downhill and died from there.

Well put, and exactly the reason I love mech combat! Its also good news to hear the devs think the damage output is too high (probably from the likes of those 5 PPC builds and whatnot). It can only get better from here!

[Buso Senshi Zelazny]

This is what I love about MWO, and what keeps me coming back even if I'm not always completely happy with the state of the game.

Yesterday, a couple friends and I ran a Medium wolf pack, fast Trebs and Cents with a mix of lasers and streaks. Got Tourmaline, and decided to flank the enemy and get behind them while our main group went straight at 'em. It worked for the most part, but by the end the fight, its just me in a CN9-AL 2 MPL, 2 ML, 2 SSRM2 and my buddy in a TBT-7M with 1 LL, 2 ML, 3 SSRM2s against a DDC with AC 20 and streaks, as well as a Ilya with 2 gauss and some medium lasers. We knock out the ECM on the DDC, and his center torso is yellow/orange, so I start to focus on him while my buddy dances around and keeps the Ilya distracted. Unfortunately, the Atlas still has an AC20, and the Ilya is still focusing me when BOOM!... leg gone, right torso gone, and I'm a sitting duck right in front of the Atlas. I decide I'm gonna take him with me if its the last thing I do, letting of two blasts of my medium lasers and streaks. Finally, his torso is dark red, I lose my missiles in the left shoulder, but one more blast of medium lasers... HE'S DOWN! I turn slowly to my right, and see my buddy has blown the left arm of the Ilya off, one gauss rifle down, the right arm is dark red. I need to take that other arm down, not even sure if the gauss rifle is in there but its my only hope. I fire the medium lasers, then my buddy fires his, and POP, there goes the arm, and chain reaction explosion into the side torso and bye bye XL engine.

Getting focus fired, or getting blasted by a 6 PPC Stalker really sucks. Its the long, drawn out battles, where any moment it could go either way that make this game fun. I'm glad PGI is at least attempting to push the gameplay away from the one hit KO. Boats have their place, but you shouldn't have to play against an entire flotilla in every match.

[Arkathan]

Buso Senshi Zelazny, on 11 June 2013 - 05:57 AM, said:

This is what I love about MWO, and what keeps me coming back even if I'm not always completely happy with the state of the game.

Yesterday, a couple friends and I ran a Medium wolf pack, fast Trebs and Cents with a mix of lasers and streaks. Got Tourmaline, and decided to flank the enemy and get behind them while our main group went straight at 'em. It worked for the most part, but by the end the fight, its just me in a CN9-AL 2 MPL, 2 ML, 2 SSRM2 and my buddy in a TBT-7M with 1 LL, 2 ML, 3 SSRM2s against a DDC with AC 20 and streaks, as well as a Ilya with 2 gauss and some medium lasers. We knock out the ECM on the DDC, and his center torso is yellow/orange, so I start to focus on him while my buddy dances around and keeps the Ilya distracted. Unfortunately, the Atlas still has an AC20, and the Ilya is still focusing me when BOOM!... leg gone, right torso gone, and I'm a sitting duck right in front of the Atlas. I decide I'm gonna take him with me if its the last thing I do, letting of two blasts of my medium lasers and streaks. Finally, his torso is dark red, I lose my missiles in the left shoulder, but one more blast of medium lasers... HE'S DOWN! I turn slowly to my right, and see my buddy has blown the left arm of the Ilya off, one gauss rifle down, the right arm is dark red. I need to take that other arm down, not even sure if the gauss rifle is in there but its my only hope. I fire the medium lasers, then my buddy fires his, and POP, there goes the arm, and chain reaction explosion into the side torso and bye bye XL engine.

Getting focus fired, or getting blasted by a 6 PPC Stalker really sucks. Its the long, drawn out battles, where any moment it could go either way that make this game fun. I'm glad PGI is at least attempting to push the gameplay away from the one hit KO. Boats have their place, but you shouldn't have to play against an entire flotilla in every match.

I agree here, nothing worse than playing a heavy and walking into a flotilla of assault PPCS, there should be weight classes or an option to play bigger or smaller levels.

Its not so much that I'm saying lets blow up the little mechs. But I have played a LOT of MechAssault, and that may be my problem, but in those games a PPC or gauss was a scary thing, here it is if you put friggin 6 of them on, but one or two will still result in a long drawnout battle, which I suppose is fine until a catapult and 4 atlases show up **** you from behind with LRM and heavy lasers while your team runs away. I enjoy longer mech duals, but the fact 3-4 of his buddies always show up makes me wish engagements were a bit shorter.

It just kinda seemed to me that perhaps PPC or gauss cannons could take up more space, heat and cooldown time, but generally have a bit more hit, but thats probably a mech assault thing.

Edited by Arkathan, 11 June 2013 - 06:42 AM.

[Ursus_Spiritus]

This game is NOT about the "instakill" and the child like mind set of instant gratification doesn't understand this cannot appreciate the complexity and the spirit of the game.

Edited by 8100d 5p4tt3r, 11 June 2013 - 07:31 AM.

[Darwins Dog]

Another thing that you will notice about this game versus other MW and BT games is that armor values have been doubled in MWO. It is supposed to take a long time to kill an opponent. Hit registration is less of an issue than it has been (still a problem), and my guess is that's not a big part of the difference that you're noticing.

[mailin]

Short answer to the OP's question; no.

[Corison]

Long answer... Their to strong... about 50% stronger than they should be to be exact... I would be happy if they doubled the armor values again. When they increased weapon rate of fire they really broke most of the offensive/defensive balance... Not to mention the game was never designed to be a FPS which makes armor balancing by location somewhat silly.. (Can you say Catapult head hit box every time? ).

[gjnii]

Not sure if its still up to date, but...
http://mwomercs.com/...n-one-shot-you/
Its really easy to die in this game if you don't know how to pilot, and they DO know how to shoot.

EDIT: because I just realized the threads so old its archived, I just want to say I hope that Icey takes the time to repost it verbatim, and remind people just how fragile their mechs are.

Edited by gjnii, 12 June 2013 - 05:02 PM.

[Kaio-Kerensky x10]

Koniving, on 11 June 2013 - 05:30 AM, said:

The battletech and mechwarrior series has never been about quick kills. It's not supposed to be. It's supposed to be the challenge of two or many behemoths battling each other in a battle of wits, skill, luck and cunning.

Yeah, man, I know ex-oops, gyro TAC, one second.

Anyway, you were saying ab-oops, crit result limb destroyed. Sorry, lemme try this again.

Yes, Battletech has always been ab-oh ****, gauss hit to HD. Man, this keeps happening!

Okay. One-shot kills have never been- oh the AC/5 ammo in my Marauder just exploded again.

Man, I keep getting interrupted!

[Vodrin Thales]

Shalune, on 10 June 2013 - 07:55 PM, said:

Not that the previous replies are necessarily inaccurate, but I think the other folks here may be over-thinking things.

The simplest answer is "yes." Mechwarrior Online has a relatively slow time to kill compared to shooters and some older Mechwarrior games. This is likely what you're noticing in most situations.

However it does not appear to be an attempt by the developers to ease things into something different later on, given how long things have been like this. There are some downsides to this like having trouble positively impacting your team, alone. But it also encourages teamwork, piloting and positioning, and secures a role for medium skirmishers.

If you're unhappy with the current setup though I'd recommend looking into a 70+ ton PPC + Gauss boat. CTF-3D (2 PPC 1 gauss) or HGN-732 (3 PPC, 1 gauss) are probably the best mechs available for this. Stalkers are also an option if all you care about is raw firepower, many carry 4-6 PPCs.

If he is scoring a direct hit on a light mech with a 40 alpha and seeing no effect weapon loadout is not the problem Shalune. Also there are some funky things going on with hit detection. It's actually better now than it has been, but the problem is not weapon power for sure because I can easily kill an assault in 3-4 salvos with my more powerful mechs.

[CmdrPoopyPants]

Vodrin Thales, on 12 June 2013 - 05:12 PM, said:

If he is scoring a direct hit on a light mech with a 40 alpha and seeing no effect weapon loadout is not the problem Shalune. Also there are some funky things going on with hit detection. It's actually better now than it has been, but the problem is not weapon power for sure because I can easily kill an assault in 3-4 salvos with my more powerful mechs.

Case in point, I've dropped lights that were silly enough to "stop" in front of my Jeager DD (2xGuass, 2xMLs) in 1 alpha.. and yet, I've "hit" some lights moving quick with 5 dual guass and not removed any armor (plenty of red armor, but still there). Clearly, the HSR isn't doing what it's supposed to... registered hits (via reticule flash and armor flash on enemy paper doll) aren't being fully applied from ballistics when fast movers are involved. I've read -nothing- to suggest "bullets don't hurt as much when you're fast".

something isn't right, there's no solid consistency.. yet, I still have fun blowing s.h.i..t up, even if once in a while it takes 5 times as much work