67 replies to this topic

[Kiiyor]

Is it just me, or do LRMs seem... fine at the moment?

I've been hesitant to air my thoughts before this, as mentioning anything LRM around here is akin to waving a premium beef medium rare Scotch Fillet steak about at the annual Pitt Bull and Fat People ball, bit it seems to me that the venerable LURM launcher may actually be worth its weight as a weapon system... and not excessively so.

It took me a while to put my finger on it, but after testing them in battle recently and coming away without disappointment or even the excessive murderous glee that fills me whenever I roll in something overpowered (BOOM YAGER! MUAH HA HA HAA!), I became suspicious. A subsequent cursory glance in the balance sections of the forums showed an alarming decrease in vitriol laced posting about missiles. It's like the forums are holding their breath.

If there has been any one weapon system that is wildly unstable as far as tweaking goes, it is this. Even tiny damage adjustments have had wildly unpredictable results. Could it be that we are finally close to having LRM's viable, without being overpowered?

Has anyone else noticed this? Could HSR have had anything to do with it?

Some personal observations:

• As far as raw damage goes, they aren't anything special. The spash nerf seems to have worked its magic. If you don't have Tag and Artemis, the spread also seems to be fairly wild, which is good.

• ARTEMIS and TAG are devastating together, which is also good - to be dangerous, you at least need to stare into your opponent's eyes as you riddle them with cheese. The majority of missiles seem to strike the CT with this combo, which is great for making enemies seek cover, and it's like Kryptonite for any damaged mech. Maybe the spread could be increased a small amount here.

• Indirect fire seems to be less than effective, which is good.

• The flightpath seems awesome. You need to be reasonably clear of obstacles in front of you to fire, meaning that you need to lurk outside of cover to be effective, and missiles no longer seem to plunge from orbit to hit you behind cover when you're on the receiving end, making cowering a lot more intuitive.

• AMS is very, very viable protection now. I watched swarms of missiles swatted out of the air by 4 mechs with AMS last night. AMS on your own mech has a noticeable effect, and dual AMS is very noticeable.

• NARC is... BAAH HA HA, has anyone else actually tested Narc recently? I added it to my mech last night, but the gods of battletech took possession of my body and removed it.

If I were to tweak the system at all, it would be to increase the spread with Artemis and Tag ever so slightly, and increase the damage by .1 or so to compensate.

TL:DR? I think LRMs are closer to being balanced than they have ever been - you probably think i'm wrong though.

COMMENTS?

[The Cheese]

When your team has multiple boats, yeah, they're good. Otherwise, they're still wasted tonnage.

The main problem with LRMs is the same as the LBX. When you've got a choice between putting your damage exactly where you want it or spraying it all over the place, it would be stupid to choose the latter unless there's some kind of trade off. Right now, the indirect damage tradeoff is just as attractive as the LBX's crit potential.

The problem with balancing them comes down to this randomised spread. If every rocket hit, it would be OK to bring the damage down. However, since they don't all hit, they need to make each missile do more damage to make up for the lost damage, otherwise our damage output per ton is too low to make the weapon worthwhile.

Then we throw in art/TAG/narc, and all of a sudden all of our powerful rockets are hitting, and now they're OP.

So we nerf the damage of each rocket so that when people use the accuracy boosters, they're not OP anymore. But now they're useless without the boosters because too many of them miss the target. Round and round we go.

Then we consider the missile trajectory, which adds a whole new level of complexity. I really can understand how the devs are having such a hard time with this weapon...

On top of that, no one wants to play a spotter because there's no benefit in it. Without spotters, LRMs are too unreliable because most people know exactly how to evade them. Spotters are forced to be exposed in order to maintain locks, and in the current high-alpha meta, being exposed for too long is a great way to get knocked out of the game without doing anything meaningful. On top of THAT, the spotter bonuses are laughable compared to raw damage rewards. Even if the spotter does well, they get nothing out of it.

TL;DR
If LRMs could reliably do their advertised damage, they would be worthwhile.

Edited by The Cheese, 11 June 2013 - 10:49 PM.

[Theodor Kling]

I actually agree: There nearly there. My dual LRM20 Jäger is having a good time without dominating the battlefield. And becomes real good when a light with tag scouts and spares you the need to expose yourself in that slow walking slow turning tower of a Jägermech Because that is the reason to choose LRMs despite the dmg spread: indirect fire.

And for the record: It's just 2xLRM20.. no real boating. If I would rip out the secondary weapons for knife fighting I could fit more

[aniviron]

Yeah, LRMs are in a very good place right now. I play mostly close range and rage and hate getting hit by them, and then remember that I am getting hit by like 20 tons of launchers and it seems fair that I am getting wrecked.

Your point about indirect fire is off though. Right now artemis is being applied regardless of LOS due to a bug, so any difference between direct and indirect fire is in your head, with the exception of the fact that indirect fire gets a better vertical descent trajectory.

[Tennex]

The Cheese, on 11 June 2013 - 10:25 PM, said:

When your team has multiple boats, yeah, they're good. Otherwise, they're still wasted tonnage.

people like this are the ones causing the lurmpocalypses

[The Cheese]

Tennex, on 11 June 2013 - 10:58 PM, said:

people like this are the ones causing the lurmpocalypses

You misunderstand. I am not suggesting that they should be more powerful than they are. I actually think their base stats are in a good place right now. My point is that they almost never do their advertised damage when they do hit, which is unreliable in itself.

Edited by The Cheese, 11 June 2013 - 11:09 PM.

[Tennex]

The Cheese, on 11 June 2013 - 11:00 PM, said:

You misunderstand. I am not suggesting that they should be more powerful than they are. I actually think their base stats are in a good place right now.

ah alright my b

[Kiiyor]

aniviron, on 11 June 2013 - 10:53 PM, said:

Your point about indirect fire is off though. Right now artemis is being applied regardless of LOS due to a bug, so any difference between direct and indirect fire is in your head, with the exception of the fact that indirect fire gets a better vertical descent trajectory.

Ah, I thought they had fixed that. My own observations were anecdotal. Cheers.

[Karenai]

No they are not. And people fearing the apocalypse just plainly lie, mostly to themselfs. Tonnage for tonnage, including the ammo you need, every other weapon system is better, by far. So yeah, you can put LRMs on mechs, they do something now, after two months of beeing dead weight. But if you could use that weight and heat for anything else, you are better of doing that.
Your ONE hit from a PPC does more then three salvos from a LRM 20 do, unless the target stands still, has no cover and no AMS around. But even then I would opt for the PPC, because if he ist standing still I can target specific parts of his mech.
Those times you are getting rained on by LRM? Well if your enemy had other weapons on his mech, you would not live that long to be in that position anyway.

[Dalinor Frostreaver]

Almost, they are at least playable now, minor tweaks and they should be dead on. I actually consider taking ams now.

[Ningyo]

I find myself rather conflicted on this issue let me give you a rundown of why.

First overall they are about as dangerous as they should be. If you do not use AMS and/or use ECM/cover, and other techniques like torso twisting and proper movement they can be deadly. If you use some combination of these they can be rendered near or fully useless however.

Problem: Center torso takes hits from above too readily, maybe adjust some rear torso hitboxes to cover a bit more of the top of the mech?

Problem: (Probable BUG) CT seems to take more damage per missile hit than it should 1.1 to 1.5
Problem: (Probable BUG) non-CT seem to take reduced damage per missile hit; 0.6 to 1.0

Problem: (Probable BUG, might be HSR related) Sometimes many volleys in a row on a mech that are perfect hits end up doing little or no damage (as in 500 missiles at 300-400m range on a assault that is not moving with TAG and Artemis and visually all missiles hitting, but NO armor reduced beyond yellow.) seems to happen 3-10% of the time but hard to tell for certain.

Problem: Seismic almost completely removes ability to effectively use spotters on most maps (believe devs are tweaking this, might fix this)

Problem: Almost no one uses AMS so it is very hard to say just how useless they might be if even 25% of players had it. It might still be fine, but just really hard to tell. (and 1 AMS will wreck most mixed LRM builds so they would go extinct, but need 3-4 to stop a boat, so would this just force boats only for LRMs? if so maybe somethings need tweaked somehow.)


So yes I think right now LRMs seem about right, and I really think mostly just a couple bugs and some minor tweaking needs done. but right now they have some oddities, and many people not knowing how to play against them which make it hard to say they are where they should be.

[Nauht]

Karenai, on 11 June 2013 - 11:14 PM, said:

No they are not. And people fearing the apocalypse just plainly lie, mostly to themselfs. Tonnage for tonnage, including the ammo you need, every other weapon system is better, by far. So yeah, you can put LRMs on mechs, they do something now, after two months of beeing dead weight. But if you could use that weight and heat for anything else, you are better of doing that.
Your ONE hit from a PPC does more then three salvos from a LRM 20 do, unless the target stands still, has no cover and no AMS around. But even then I would opt for the PPC, because if he ist standing still I can target specific parts of his mech.
Those times you are getting rained on by LRM? Well if your enemy had other weapons on his mech, you would not live that long to be in that position anyway.

Can't rmember the last time my ppc or gauss round went through the dropship in the middle of frozen city to hit the guy that was fighting with my light mech team mate while I was standing behind where epsilon is.

All this without aiming too.

[One Medic Army]

Overall your experiences mirror mine, I wouldn't mind a bit shallower on the indirect firing, a little higher dmg, and a bit less of a love affair with the CT, but overall I'm pleased.

Kiiyor, on 11 June 2013 - 10:13 PM, said:

NARC is... BAAH HA HA, has anyone else actually tested Narc recently? I added it to my mech last night, but the gods of battletech took possession of my body and removed it.

I actually have something approaching a stock 3L (NARC (2t), TAG, ECM, xl280, 2ML, SRM4) and I can say that NARC is quite effective actually.
However for best usage you really need to bring your own LRM boat.

It's quite fun to just run up to someone, NARC them, and run while the cloud of missiles comes in at them. As an added bonus it makes them show up on radar and helps your team be aware of their position.

It just has one gigantic downside: it's the size and weight of an SRM6 launcher, at least each ton of ammo is now 12 shots.

Edited by One Medic Army, 11 June 2013 - 11:48 PM.

[Theodor Kling]

Playing pugs only LRM use is sometimes problematic, but like already said: with a good scout LRMs can become pretty dangerous. A ulti-PPC build can do mor dps, and concentrated at that, but indirect LRM fire prevents getting return fire Without a fast light with tag scoutign for you this is of course worhtless... I like it

[CHWarpath]

If it were up to me I would ban any lock on weapons because they require zero skill but yes LRMS have been nerfed and rightfully so.

[Kiiyor]

One Medic Army, on 11 June 2013 - 11:47 PM, said:

Overall your experiences mirror mine, I wouldn't mind a bit shallower on the indirect firing, a little higher dmg, and a bit less of a love affair with the CT, but overall I'm pleased.

I actually have something approaching a stock 3L (NARC (2t), TAG, ECM, xl280, 2ML, SRM4) and I can say that NARC is quite effective actually.
However for best usage you really need to bring your own LRM boat.

It's quite fun to just run up to someone, NARC them, and run while the cloud of missiles comes in at them. As an added bonus it makes them show up on radar and helps your team be aware of their position.

It just has one gigantic downside: it's the size and weight of an SRM6 launcher, at least each ton of ammo is now 12 shots.

Still only marginally effective then. Artemis and tag seem to be where it's at. You can add Artemis and tag to two launchers for three tonnes, which seems a far better deal. Also, seeing that Artemis and narc don't stack... Well, it just doesn't seem worth it to me.

Maybe i just need to test and decide for myself.

[One Medic Army]

Kiiyor, on 12 June 2013 - 12:15 AM, said:

Still only marginally effective then. Artemis and tag seem to be where it's at. You can add Artemis and tag to two launchers for three tonnes, which seems a far better deal. Also, seeing that Artemis and narc don't stack... Well, it just doesn't seem worth it to me.

Maybe i just need to test and decide for myself.

NARC is for if you're running a dedicated LRM spotter. Being able to fire it on someone, and then not have to stick around holding lock is what it's all about. NARC also doesn't stack with Artemis, but Artemis doesn't affect indirect fire anyway.
If you're the LRM boat there's absolutely no reason to carry a NARC.

Edited by One Medic Army, 12 June 2013 - 12:28 AM.

[FERAL TIGER]

I personally dislike LRMs, but feel ECM and AMS take care of the problem. I think my play style just makes me vulnerable.

[El Bandito]

LRMs are fine at the moment. I don't want PGI to meddle with it any time soon.

[Kitane]

The only thing that's bad is the final part of the flight path, missiles need to use a lead pursuit curve during final 1-2s of the flight, not a pure pursuit curve.