41 replies to this topic

[M0rpHeu5]

I'll speak with an example that happened too me. I armed my K2 with 2 UAC5 and went to fight. 1 encounter was an atlas, i hold the button down and he died in like 10sec. Next encounter i press the button and they jamm after shooting once.
Point is why having a gun that is 90% luck except if there is something more to it that i do not know.

I suggest to make it like a deferent ac5 like
AC5 --7tones --damage5 --reload time 1.4s --rest as it is
UAC5 --9tones --damage5 --reload time 1.1s --rest as it is (no jamm)
Makes more sence imo

[Stingz]

The reduced cool-down is already there, but holding it leads to almost 100% jam rate. Use AC/5 or AC/10 if you don't like the risks.

[Targetloc]

It is interesting that a certain group screams up and down until blue in the face that any programmed deviation in aiming what-so-ever would be a greater atrocity than Jar Jar Binks, Duke Numkem Forever and the Twilight Saga combined.... but they're perfectly fine with some builds being able to sustain over 27 DPS for 10 seconds based entirely on luck.

[DocBach]

Targetloc, on 19 March 2013 - 01:31 PM, said:

It is interesting that a certain group screams up and down until blue in the face that any programmed deviation in aiming what-so-ever would be a greater atrocity than Jar Jar Binks, Duke Numkem Forever and the Twilight Saga combined.... but they're perfectly fine with some builds being able to sustain over 27 DPS for 10 seconds based entirely on luck.

Yeah, pretty much the Ultra AC should have been handled like an assault rifle's burst function in an FPS - one pull of the trigger shoots two rounds, with one of them deviating a bit from the point of aim. We see it in the ruleset for the board game in which Ultra AC shots rarely hit the same location, sometimes one of the shots misses entirely (which can easily be translated by having the second round have a cone effect).

This will solve the problem later on down the line of Clan Ultra AC/20's able to shoot incredibly fast, all in the same location.

Even better would be the cone dependent on caliber size; small Ultra AC/2s have little deviation from point of aim/point of impact, Ultra AC/20s have large deviation.

[Targetloc]

The servers would be crushed by the sheer magnitude of tears if Ultra AC20 was implemented with the mechanics they've established with the UAC5.

[TheRulesLawyer]

DocBach, on 19 March 2013 - 02:06 PM, said:

Yeah, pretty much the Ultra AC should have been handled like an assault rifle's burst function in an FPS - one pull of the trigger shoots two rounds, with one of them deviating a bit from the point of aim. We see it in the ruleset for the board game in which Ultra AC shots rarely hit the same location, sometimes one of the shots misses entirely (which can easily be translated by having the second round have a cone effect).

This. ultras should fire in burst mode with a toggle to go back and forth between it a mode exactly the same as an ac5.

[M4rtyr]

Targetloc, on 19 March 2013 - 02:20 PM, said:

The servers would be crushed by the sheer magnitude of tears if Ultra AC20 was implemented with the mechanics they've established with the UAC5.

And Streak 6's

[Agent 0 Fortune]

I had a few ideas to make the AC5 more completive and to tone down the huge risk v. reward of the UAC5.

These definitely need an adjustment. Since they are within 1 ton of each other I think the DSP needs to be leveled out. The UAC/5 is an odd weapon it has a base DPS of 9.09 (it fires 2 shots every 1.1 seconds for 5 damage each) but it only has that DPS 75% of the time, which 25% of the time it jams for 3 seconds dropping its rate of fire to 1 shot in 3 seconds. Therefore its overall DPS is about (75% x 9.09) + (25% x 1.67) = 7.24 DPS which is completely out of line with other autocannons (and if you exercised a little fire discipline you could easily get 5 damager per 1.1 seconds for 4.5 DPS). While the AC/5 is 5 damage ever 1.7 for a 2.94 DPS, the lowest of all autocannons.

First the AC/5 I think it needs a slight DPS boost, but you don’t want to set it to 4.0 or no one would take the AC/2, therefore I think lowering the cooldown from 1.7s to 1.5 is reasonable, it sets the DPS to 3.33, the same as PPCs.

The UAC/5 is a tougher nut to crack; it needs to be better than the AC/5 but not as overwhelming as it was. We can look at the 3 barrel art model as a starting point, and say the UAC/5 can fire 3 shots in the time it takes an AC/5 to fire 2 shots, a rate of fire of 1 second, which gives us a 5 DPS (5 damage per 1 second); or 15 damage per 3 seconds since each shot is going to function like a separate weapon with a 25% chance to jam for 2 seconds. Two seconds basically meaning that barrel skips a shot before continuing. Using the example below we can calculate of 12 seconds (4 fire rotation) that we see 3 jams on average (25%) for a total of 45 damage with a DPS of 3.75 (45 damage / 12 seconds). With no jams maximum DPS is 5.0 (60 dam/12s) and the lower boundary is 2.5 (30 dam/12s). And at this point any changes to weapon damage can be made at the jam percentage (for instance changing the jam to 20% makes average DPS 4.0). The beauty is this weapon will never completely stall for several critical seconds, and on average you are doing more damage than an AC/5.
Example.
Second 1: Fire A - (5)
Second 2: Fire B - (10)
Second 3: Fire C – Jam (15)
Second 4: Fire A – Jam (20)
Second 5: Fire B - (25)
Second 6: Skip C – Unjam (25)
Second 7: Skip A – Unjam (25)
Second 8: Fire B - (30)
Second 9 : Fire C – Jam (35)
Second 10: Fire A - (40)
Second 11: Fire B – (45)
Second 12: Skip C – Unjam (45)

[Roland]

Almost all of the folks who complain about UAC5's don't understand how to use them correctly.

If you want to use UAC's, you need to NOT hold the trigger down unless you are willing to potentially jam the guns.

If you use a light touch, and press the trigger quickly (such that it never registers an attempt to fire on cooldown), then the guns will NEVER jam, and they crank out a massive amount of damage.

[DeadlyNerd]

Roland, on 20 March 2013 - 05:19 AM, said:

Almost all of the folks who complain about UAC5's don't understand how to use them correctly.

If you want to use UAC's, you need to NOT hold the trigger down unless you are willing to potentially jam the guns.

If you use a light touch, and press the trigger quickly (such that it never registers an attempt to fire on cooldown), then the guns will NEVER jam, and they crank out a massive amount of damage.

By using UACs correctly you mean putting 3 on CTF-IM and using chain fire?

What you're talking about is a myth showing that you have absolutely no idea about using UACs and have probably ditched using them when they first jammed on you.

[rgreat]

AC5 and UAC5 must have same fire rate.

Only difference is that UAC5 is capable of double shots.

I wonder why PGI try to make RAC5 out of UAC5...

[Roland]

DeadlyNerd, on 20 March 2013 - 05:23 AM, said:

By using UACs correctly you mean putting 3 on CTF-IM and using chain fire?

What you're talking about is a myth showing that you have absolutely no idea about using UACs and have probably ditched using them when they first jammed on you.

I actually use UAC's all the time, and do not have them jam at all unless I choose to fire in ultra mode.

And no, I don't run them in chainfire mode. I fire 3 of them from a Muromets. I just choose to fire them on cooldown most of the time, and thus am able to fire them every 1.1 seconds, without them EVER jamming.

Folks who see them jam "on the first shot" are holding the trigger down for a fraction of a second, and the system is attempting to fire them immediately after the first shot. This has a chance of jamming the gun, and due to the firing delay mechanism, can sometimes cause it to jam up and actually prevent the first shot from firing as well.

But if you press the firing key quickly, they NEVER JAM on the first shot. I've tested this as recently as two days ago, when folks were complaining about it again, and I wanted to confirm that they hadn't changed something about UAC's.. and no, they have not. Unless I just happened to get really lucky, to the extent that I fired a hundred shots without it ever jamming... but that seems unlikely.

[General Taskeen]

Stingz, on 19 March 2013 - 12:50 PM, said:

The reduced cool-down is already there, but holding it leads to almost 100% jam rate. Use AC/5 or AC/10 if you don't like the risks.

No. Please stop defending this terrible Ultra implementation. We don't need rolling dice mechanics in this game.

First of all, the jam is in place due to Ultra's initial, poor implementation -> AKA, the 'double shot,' two shells at once + better cool down (essentially, double double). It should have been simply 2x better fire rate and nothing more. Second, jams that are random rolling dice have no place in a skill based game.



(Go to 6:20)

Skill-based jamming is controlling how long an AC can fire before it jams. MW:LL did this by making the Autocannon itself 'soak' in the heat that each shot causes. If the barrel gets too hot, the gun jams, no randomness.

[DocBach]

Roland, on 20 March 2013 - 05:19 AM, said:

Almost all of the folks who complain about UAC5's don't understand how to use them correctly.

If you want to use UAC's, you need to NOT hold the trigger down unless you are willing to potentially jam the guns.

If you use a light touch, and press the trigger quickly (such that it never registers an attempt to fire on cooldown), then the guns will NEVER jam, and they crank out a massive amount of damage.

My complaint is actually the fact that the ultra autocannons shoot much faster than the regular autocannons and all hit the same place.

This is going to be very, very bad when the Clan large bore UAC's come out, and I guarantee we'll see much outrage, crying and threats to quit when people boat UAC/10's and 20's that are able to put four rounds in the same place instantly.

The super high rate of failure is a bad balancing mechanic, like most of the attempts at balancing PGI makes, with little foresight.

[M0rpHeu5]

M0rpHeu5, on 19 March 2013 - 12:42 PM, said:

I suggest to make it like a deferent ac5 like
AC5 --7tones --damage5 --reload time 1.4s --rest as it is
UAC5 --9tones --damage5 --reload time 1.1s --rest as it is (no jamm)
Makes more sence imo

Don't you like this idea? it will give us more variety of autocannons for every ocasion like in all the other gun types, imagine making ac2 into Uac2 and make ac2 weaker and lightr so light mechs can use something otrher thaan machine guns as balistics and think the Uac20 duble shot

I saw someone saying that they can be used without jamming, doen't double shot without jam make them op?

[Tragos]

So all you suggest is that you buff the AC5 slightly?
AC5: 5dmg/reload 1.7 -> 5dmg/1.4

UAC5:5dmg/reload 1.1-> 5/1.1 - or did you mean with no jamm = no double shot?

[Skadi]

General Taskeen, on 20 March 2013 - 06:24 AM, said:

No. Please stop defending this terrible Ultra implementation. We don't need rolling dice mechanics in this game.

First of all, the jam is in place due to Ultra's initial, poor implementation -> AKA, the 'double shot,' two shells at once + better cool down (essentially, double double). It should have been simply 2x better fire rate and nothing more. Second, jams that are random rolling dice have no place in a skill based game.



(Go to 6:20)

Skill-based jamming is controlling how long an AC can fire before it jams. MW:LL did this by making the Autocannon itself 'soak' in the heat that each shot causes. If the barrel gets too hot, the gun jams, no randomness.

He posted it for me....

[M4rtyr]

When have weapons jamming ever had anything to do with skill.

It's dumb luck if a weapon will jam, the only thing that makes any difference is having a clean weapon and even then they will still jam at random.

The jam mechanic was the same thing used in TT and its perfectly acceptable here. Although I've heard the randomization might be flawed but I ave no experience with this.

So I won't say that they don't need to be changed at all but the jam mechanic seems fine to me.

[DocBach]

M4rtyr, on 20 March 2013 - 05:41 PM, said:

When have weapons jamming ever had anything to do with skill.

It's dumb luck if a weapon will jam, the only thing that makes any difference is having a clean weapon and even then they will still jam at random.

The jam mechanic was the same thing used in TT and its perfectly acceptable here. Although I've heard the randomization might be flawed but I ave no experience with this.

So I won't say that they don't need to be changed at all but the jam mechanic seems fine to me.

The jam mechanic was pretty rare in TT, but under standard rule sets it was a deadline of the weapon for the rest of the game. Unjamming it use to be pretty complex in MWO, then they just made it unjam automatically, but increased the rate of jam to balance it out.

However, the board game also balanced the weapons (especially the huge Ultra AC/20's) by giving it simulated recoil; it was very rare for both rounds to hit the same place as each shot had to have its hit location rolled separately with a high chance the second shot would miss entirely. Easily implemented in real time with a cone of fire; first shot goes where you aim, second shot goes somewhere in the cone. Small caliber AC's like the 2's and 5's will have smaller deviation, 10's and 20's have more, so we aren't instacored.

[M4rtyr]

DocBach, on 20 March 2013 - 05:46 PM, said:

The jam mechanic was pretty rare in TT, but under standard rule sets it was a deadline of the weapon for the rest of the game. Unjamming it use to be pretty complex in MWO, then they just made it unjam automatically, but increased the rate of jam to balance it out.

However, the board game also balanced the weapons (especially the huge Ultra AC/20's) by giving it simulated recoil; it was very rare for both rounds to hit the same place as each shot had to have its hit location rolled separately with a high chance the second shot would miss entirely. Easily implemented in real time with a cone of fire; first shot goes where you aim, second shot goes somewhere in the cone. Small caliber AC's like the 2's and 5's will have smaller deviation, 10's and 20's have more, so we aren't instacored.

Fair enough, but then convergence is a problem in its own right. I have no problem with Ultra rounds hitting different locations but they need to change the convergence first which wont be as easy as you think I'm afraid.

I just setup an Atlas with a pair of UAC5's (didn't have the cash for all the bits to take it into real battle yet) but trying them out on the Tg it seemed ok witht he jam rate and rate of fire. Convergence is much worse on mechs that don't move though so I took that into account.

But yeah Convergence is a problem with alot more then Ultras, so why don't we fix that and then see where the Ultras stand. Problem is I don't think Devs haven't had enough pressure to really consider an alternative but its needed. At least I've not seen them acknowledge this.

Edited by M4rtyr, 20 March 2013 - 06:10 PM.