31 replies to this topic

[Victor Morson]

MG + Flamer buffed, still trash. News at 11.

[MasterErrant]

General Taskeen, on 18 June 2013 - 12:08 PM, said:

Like I've said countless times, the MG needs to be changed to an actual mini-ballistic that actually SHOOTS shells and not hit-scan magic affects.

the MG (Yet again) is not a major weapon. and it does what the devs want ti to do. it tears is to **** fast without heat or more valuable main weapon ammo. and when NPS armour/infantry/elementals come in it'll be very usefull as will the flamer.

[stjobe]

MasterErrant, on 19 June 2013 - 02:15 PM, said:

the MG (Yet again) is not a major weapon. and it does what the devs want ti to do. it tears is to **** fast without heat or more valuable main weapon ammo. and when NPS armour/infantry/elementals come in it'll be very usefull as will the flamer.

First off, it doesn't tear internal structure any faster than it tears armour. What it does tear is internal components; but not all that much faster than any other weapon.

Secondly, I guess you haven't heard, but the devs have said that PBI's and vehicles are not coming. At all. Ever.

Edited by stjobe, 19 June 2013 - 02:23 PM.

[General Taskeen]

MasterErrant, on 19 June 2013 - 02:15 PM, said:

the MG (Yet again) is not a major weapon. and it does what the devs want ti to do. it tears is to **** fast without heat or more valuable main weapon ammo. and when NPS armour/infantry/elementals come in it'll be very usefull as will the flamer.

Hey look an MG that is useful as a 'major' weapon in a Mech Warrior game. Stunning.

[Pater Mors]

A big problem is that they're making all the weapons too similar. Why should the flamer do any damage to armour at all!? Is it as hot as plasma? Because a simple flamethrower is never going to get to the heat required to melt armour. Why does it's DPS even matter? How about making it into something unique? Like having it cause energy weapons heat to spike massively if fired while being flamed? Or having it seriously increase the chance to cook off ammo? Having it make the pilot pass out from heat stress? I don't know, but I don't like the idea of another weapon who's only important stat is DPS.

MG's I am undecided on. I like the idea that they function best as a crit seeker, but I don't think there is enough stuff to actually crit. As far as I know they do nothing at all to engines and any body section that doesn't contain a component.

[MrPenguin]

Livewyr, on 19 June 2013 - 05:45 AM, said:

MGs weigh half a ton and have like no cooldown or heat.. what exactly do you guys want?

Ultra AC/20's they can fit on a spider.

[stjobe]

Pater Mors, on 19 June 2013 - 02:37 PM, said:

A big problem is that they're making all the weapons too similar. Why should the flamer do any damage to armour at all!? Is it as hot as plasma?

Yes. From sarna.net: "Introduced in 2025, the standard Flamer taps into a BattleMech's reactor to produce heat in the form of a plasma release."

Pater Mors, on 19 June 2013 - 02:37 PM, said:

Why does it's DPS even matter? How about making it into something unique? Like having it cause energy weapons heat to spike massively if fired while being flamed? Or having it seriously increase the chance to cook off ammo? Having it make the pilot pass out from heat stress? I don't know, but I don't like the idea of another weapon who's only important stat is DPS.

What else is there? It's a game of 'mech to 'mech combat, the objective is to kill the other team. If you don't do damage you're a waste of space, and a liability to your team.

I'd love for it to be differently, but that's the harsh reality of the current MWO. Crit weapons are a waste of time (both ours and the devs'). Flamers are a waste of time.

Pater Mors, on 19 June 2013 - 02:37 PM, said:

MG's I am undecided on. I like the idea that they function best as a crit seeker, but I don't think there is enough stuff to actually crit. As far as I know they do nothing at all to engines and any body section that doesn't contain a component.

And ammo only explodes 10% of the time. 90% of the time it just gets destroyed.

[Pater Mors]

stjobe, on 19 June 2013 - 03:03 PM, said:

Yes. From sarna.net: "Introduced in 2025, the standard Flamer taps into a BattleMech's reactor to produce heat in the form of a plasma release."

Well that's fine then.

Quote

What else is there? It's a game of 'mech to 'mech combat, the objective is to kill the other team. If you don't do damage you're a waste of space, and a liability to your team.

I just posted you at least three examples of how a flamer could work differently. Did you not read them?

Quote

I'd love for it to be differently, but that's the harsh reality of the current MWO. Crit weapons are a waste of time (both ours and the devs'). Flamers are a waste of time.

They neither should or have to be a waste of time.

Quote

And ammo only explodes 10% of the time. 90% of the time it just gets destroyed.

Yeah, and that's a big problem that leads to stale gameplay where people just shove all their ammo in their legs and CASE is rarely ever used. Ammo should explode far more often. Then people might actually have to think about where to place it and CASE becomes far more useful again.

[stjobe]

Pater Mors, on 19 June 2013 - 03:07 PM, said:

I just posted you at least three examples of how a flamer could work differently. Did you not read them?

I did, and then I asked my question and made a statement. Did you read them?

All three of your examples, while interesting, do not contribute to killing the 'mech. Only damage does. Furthermore, two of the examples are dangerously close to being stunlocks, which is not a good thing.

Pater Mors, on 19 June 2013 - 03:07 PM, said:

They neither should or have to be a waste of time.

I couldn't agree more, but that's what they currently are.

Pater Mors, on 19 June 2013 - 03:07 PM, said:

Yeah, and that's a big problem that leads to stale gameplay where people just shove all their ammo in their legs and CASE is rarely ever used. Ammo should explode far more often. Then people might actually have to think about where to place it and CASE becomes far more useful again.

The whole current crit system is borked and needs to be redone. For what it's worth, I do agree with you.

[Pater Mors]

stjobe, on 19 June 2013 - 03:13 PM, said:

I did, and then I asked my question and made a statement. Did you read them?

All three of your examples, while interesting, do not contribute to killing the 'mech. Only damage does. Furthermore, two of the examples are dangerously close to being stunlocks, which is not a good thing.

Okay the last one is a bit stunlockish, but it was just off the top of my head. The first two are reasonable. Spiking heat on energy weapons just means you have to either use missiles or ballistics or get away from the Mech flaming you, it's only a stunlock if you insist on continuing to fire all your energy weapons every second. Getting within 64m of a Mech is a gigantic risk in itself, so I don't think that's an OP reward for the flamer.

All weapons do not need to be doing straight up damage to be having an effect on game play. Cooking off ammo certainly contributes to killing the mech, in fact it could kill it outright if the ammo was in a bad location and not protected by CASE.

My point is that we have Small, Medium and Large lasers at the moment and pulses are pretty much just worse standards until they get some serious love. Why does the flamer, which has the potential to be unique and interesting, have to just basically be a weaker small laser that causes some heat (which does sfa anyway)?

[FupDup]

To throw an idea out there, maybe to avoid the whole "stunlocking" problem with Flamers we could just make them "deactivate" (not destroy, mind you) heat sinks instead of directing adding heat. That way, the target still has some serious heat issues but has full control over whether or not they shut down.

The heat sink "deactivation" rate would be based on how many Flamers are used at a time and how long they're held on target. The effect would last for a few moments after the Flamers stop hitting the target (after that, the heat sinks start coming back online one at a time). I'd imagine that an enemy mech could never be reduced to fewer than 1 heat sink active so that they at least have some sort of minor heat dissipation.

Edited by FupDup, 19 June 2013 - 05:22 PM.

[Bishop Steiner]

Livewyr, on 19 June 2013 - 05:45 AM, said:

MGs weigh half a ton and have like no cooldown or heat.. what exactly do you guys want?

an actual reason to mount them?

Also they weigh .5 a ton, but require that pesky ton of ammo....... and spread damage (what little they afflict) all over the place.

The least powerful and useful weapons in this game are the only ones stick with cones of damage. Genius way to encourage their use, or allow lights who can only feasibly use MGs in ballistics to make use of those hard points.