47 replies to this topic

[Tolkien]

Vermaxx, on 19 June 2013 - 06:27 PM, said:

I must point out that right now both the small laser and the MG are 1dps weapons...sort of.

SL does 3 damage in .75 seconds, with a mandatory 2.25 second cooldown. 3 second full cycle, 3 damage.
MG does .10 damage per bullet, ten bullets per second. One full second for appreciable effect, no cycle time. 1 damage.

In 3 seconds of CLINICAL TRIAL USE, both weapons are similar, and do their 'book value' damage on a comparable track. Even THIS points out the flaws - a MG can EQUAL a small laser in clinical trials. It can pump out 1dps just like a SL, because it never cools down. A MG should always do 2 damage in the same period where a SL does 3, unless we're just going to completely rewrite the MG and admit light ballistic mechs are totally awesome and should boat MG.

HOWEVER, in 3 seconds of REAL WORLD USE, the small laser hits someone for around 3 damage because all they had to maintain was a .75 second steady hand. The MG most likely hits someone for less than 1 damage, because it needs a full second, has spread, and doesn't do anywhere near the same "pulse" damage as a laser. In real world combat, a MG is ineffective. Let's say you only keep the cursor on there for half a second, you still get 2 damage. The MG does half a point of damage in half a second.

This is the problem with using DPS to compare apples and oranges. Unless all weapons are cooldown, or autofire, they are fundamentally different and cannot be balanced against each other.

I cannot think of a way to "balance" the MG against a SL with this fundamental difference. My knee jerk is to set the bullets to .25 damage each, so it does 2.5 damage per second. This is about 2 damage every .75 seconds, like a small laser, except it has no cooldown and then ends up being roughly double the DPS of a small laser. I would say something like .17 damage per bullet, but even then it is clearly a better "dps" weapon.

Vermaxx, just to complicate your analysis testing by koniving and myself has shown that machine guns are not firing at 10 rounds per second, but between 7 and 13 with the average somewhere around 8. So I would say they are ~20%worse than a small laser right now on the damage per second clinical basis you described.

[Deathlike]

Tolkien, on 19 June 2013 - 11:00 PM, said:

Vermaxx, just to complicate your analysis testing by koniving and myself has shown that machine guns are not firing at 10 rounds per second, but between 7 and 13 with the average somewhere around 8. So I would say they are ~20%worse than a small laser right now on the damage per second clinical basis you described.

I wonder if that has anything to do with HSR... it probably does.

Remember that hit detection requires a consistent ping. Considering that MGs are the only weapons, next to TAG and Flamers that can fire indefinitely, I wonder if this affected by the massively fluxing ping which is part of the current netcode (which, hopefully would be resolved tomorrow). Remember that there are some networking optimizations going on.... so it may be a bit detrimental to that when you must keep the same status of firing MGs at about .1 second per bullet (similar to lasers, except without the duration limitation).

[Tolkien]

Deathlike, on 19 June 2013 - 11:25 PM, said:

I wonder if that has anything to do with HSR... it probably does.

Remember that hit detection requires a consistent ping. Considering that MGs are the only weapons, next to TAG and Flamers that can fire indefinitely, I wonder if this affected by the massively fluxing ping which is part of the current netcode (which, hopefully would be resolved tomorrow). Remember that there are some networking optimizations going on.... so it may be a bit detrimental to that when you must keep the same status of firing MGs at about .1 second per bullet (similar to lasers, except without the duration limitation).

It very well could, but I am currently more suspicious of fps having an influence. Last night I loaded up in minimum resolution and found that the machine guns were suddenly closer to 9.x bullets per second.

I recall reading back in beta that machine guns despite their graphics are actually an instant hit weapon like lasers. I am not sure if this is true or not but maybe the server prevents the client from reporting hits too quickly as a form of anti cheat which interacts with dodgy netcode to prevent them firing at their intended rate.

[St4LkeRxF]

MGs are fine as they are no need for more buff, unless you want to ask PGI to introduce MG ammo with depleted uranium.

[Tolkien]

I might be wrong but the damage number includes ammo explosions inflicted on the enemy and isn't a good indicator of any specific weapon's performance.

Testing on the training grounds takes ~56 seconds to take out the core of an atlas with 4 machine guns on a spider. This is about ~145 points of armor total, so your 610 damage implies ~4 minutes of 100% accurate sustained machine gun fire

If you pulled this off I congratulate you but also want to admonish your enemies for taking more than 4 minutes to deal with the spider that was within 120 metres of them the whole time, firing its noise makers.

Edited by Tolkien, 20 June 2013 - 12:40 AM.

[St4LkeRxF]

Followed Cicada to enemy base and there we cap and at same time we watch how our team does and they were not that good, so after like 2-3 minutes enemy send fresh Misery and Hunchback, and we kill stalker really fast and he only got energy weapons typical boating build just like hunchback so there was no ammo explosion to add to damage.

And instead to go back to cap enemy base we rush to fight enemy, and we ignored enemy capping our base but that is what happen when assault pilot try to use light mech.

[Tolkien]

Well then I have to congratulate you on getting 4 minutes worth of constant fire on to enemy mechs, this is something I don't think I will ever be able to do.

[Asmosis]

Its pretty easy, you just need to survive for the match. about 200 damage is due to er ppc's, most of it is machine guns. used ~5800 rounds in this match.

Edited by Asmosis, 20 June 2013 - 02:45 AM.

[Corvus Antaka]

MG is right where it needs to be. no heat weapon afterall. imho the range is now too high on the MG.

[xZaOx]

Yes we need more spray and pray...and rename MechWarrior to Modern Warfare...then add a dog.

[Seddrik]

Vermaxx, on 19 June 2013 - 06:16 PM, said:

The machine gun needs to apply 2 damage in .75 seconds. That is the same 'beam duration' as a small laser, and that is THE ONLY WAY IT WILL EVER BE COMPETITIVE. It doesn't even have its massive crit bonuses anymore.

2 damage in .75 seconds. Now, they can leave it autofire and figure that out (and it will probably be massively overpowered) or they can take out the stupid autofire and give it the same cooldown as a small laser.

And here we go... people saying the MGs have to be the same as small lasers.

Please people, understand that MGs are not meant to be small lasers. They are designed to be CRIT seekers. That role has been diminished and their effectiveness weakened. I formerly used MGs to regularly blow off exposed arms. But since the crit reduction and general dps buff... thats less common. And I'm not the only one seeing this. Learn to use the weapon in its role. Attack with it where armor is gone and thats where it shines... well, used to.

A build I used to use with MGs... I do notuse now because it is noticably less effective. Buff damage? Reduce crits? Remove autofire and add heat? Meh. Just copy past the stats of the small laser onto the ballistic MG and be done with it. Then we can all go to sleep from boredom. Variety is good, it makes you actually play different roles and with different strategies. Please do not kill the differences and variety of this game.

Edited by Seddrik, 20 June 2013 - 07:47 AM.

[Vermaxx]

Tolkien, on 19 June 2013 - 11:00 PM, said:

Vermaxx, just to complicate your analysis testing by koniving and myself has shown that machine guns are not firing at 10 rounds per second, but between 7 and 13 with the average somewhere around 8. So I would say they are ~20%worse than a small laser right now on the damage per second clinical basis you described.

Well great. I can't even count on the math to be right for default numbers. Then yeah, the MG is absolutely worthless.

Seddrik, on 20 June 2013 - 07:39 AM, said:

And here we go... people saying the MGs have to be the same as small lasers.

Please people, understand that MGs are not meant to be small lasers. They are designed to be CRIT seekers. That role has been diminished and their effectiveness weakened. I formerly used MGs to regularly blow off exposed arms. But since the crit reduction and general dps buff... thats less common. And I'm not the only one seeing this. Learn to use the weapon in its role. Attack with it where armor is gone and thats where it shines... well, used to.

A build I used to use with MGs... I do notuse now because it is noticably less effective. Buff damage? Reduce crits? Remove autofire and add heat? Meh. Just copy past the stats of the small laser onto the ballistic MG and be done with it. Then we can all go to sleep from boredom. Variety is good, it makes you actually play different roles and with different strategies. Please do not kill the differences and variety of this game.

Stop saying this. STOP SAYING THIS. Machine guns were implemented in a game where nothing/everything was a "crit seeker." They also did two damage to ONE location on MECH ARMOR/MECH INTERNALS. They were not for "killing people" or "vehicles" because neither flavor of non-mech was spelled out in original Battetech.

Yes, this is a video game and not a tabletop. It also lacks vehicles and people. They ALSO modified (HEAVILY) the crit bonus for machine guns. Crit multiplies damage by a factor of 1-3. .10 damage per bullet x3 (best crit possible) is .3 damage. Gonna take you a while to crit-kill a 10 hp item at 1./.2/.3 damage per bullet. Practically everything in the game has 10hp worth of crit-insurance. MG get a BONUS to crit CHANCE, not damage. They still have to shoot through ten hitpoints to kill an item, and every single bullet rolls to crit. Meaning (though unlikely) you could roll zero crits on every bullet and do nothing to items. What is more likely is you will roll a few crits per second to various items within that section, and kill none of them. You are also carrying around tonnage INTENDED TO DO ALMOST NOTHING TO HELP YOU BREACH ARMOR IN THE FIRST PLACE, so you're carrying around a derringer in the HOPES that someone else (or your other guns) will blow through the guy's SWAT armor so you can stuff your popgun in his belly.

The machine gun was EXPLICITLY, SPECIFCIALLY, INTENTIONALLY, an ammo based small laser competitor. Same range, similar damage (always 1 less), no heat. And for that, FOR THAT, one ton of MG ammo would LITERALLY kill just about any mech if it exploded. You had 200 "shots" in your mech, ie 400 damage. You could not shoot off enough MG ammo in any game to avoid mech death if it crit, even if you started with a half ton of ammo.

THAT is what a MG is. It is an anti-mech weapon that does 2 damage, no heat, and can kill YOU faster than it kills someone else. In MWO it can't kill anyone or anything. You should never survive a MG ammo explosion unless you're in a fresh assault mech with no XL engine. I've survived them in mediums.

Yes, they need to copy/paste the MG as a small laser. They need to run it like a small laser so apples can be apples and we can balanced the damned thing. That isn't going to kill the game, or kill variety, or flavor. It will make machine guns UNARGUABLY WORTH USING FOR EVERY PERSON CARRYING BALLISTIC SLOTS. You know what two machine guns are on a Catapult K2? Two heatsinks, period. There is no reason to keep the MG with their current low damage, lowered crit chance, and terrible damage potential.

A full ton of MG ammo, which takes "20 seconds" to shoot assuming the guns actually put out the correct rof, does a max of 200 damage. To me, a weapon that weighs 1.5 tons and can never do more than 200 damage under perfect circumstances and will probably do much less, is terrible. In contrast, a small laser ACTUALLY WEIGHS 0.5 tons and can do infinite damage. With DHS, a single SL is heat neutral without trying. They're both heat netural. They're both heat neutral when BOATED in practically any combo currently available. Heat is no longer a balancing factor for the small laser.

I'm tired of people telling me what MG were designed to do under the tint of PGI's vision like I'm some kind of moron. I know what PGI thinks they should do. I recognize some of you will agree. You are still the minority, the weapon is still one of the two least used items in game, and continues to get dev-time to try and solve that issue.

Stop wasting time. Make every gun in the game a cooldown weapon. You'd still have to aim it, still have to MAINTAIN aim, and still be balanced against a SL in a way that never lets it outshine its big brother.

They could even let a MG fire TWICE in that three second period of a SL (for one damage per spray), for say .5 duration. THEN not only does it have a SPECIFIC benefit over the SL, but it actually still feels almost like an always on weapon.

Edited by Vermaxx, 20 June 2013 - 09:51 AM.

[Deathlike]

Tolkien, on 19 June 2013 - 11:47 PM, said:

It very well could, but I am currently more suspicious of fps having an influence. Last night I loaded up in minimum resolution and found that the machine guns were suddenly closer to 9.x bullets per second.

Hmm.. I wonder if V-Sync affects this.

If performance truly affects this, they may need to rework the weapon to operate differently...

Quote

I recall reading back in beta that machine guns despite their graphics are actually an instant hit weapon like lasers. I am not sure if this is true or not but maybe the server prevents the client from reporting hits too quickly as a form of anti cheat which interacts with dodgy netcode to prevent them firing at their intended rate.

It's a fact. When laser HSR was initially implemented, it also affected Flamers AND MGs. MGs are hitscan.

[Drunk Canuck]

Zephyre, on 19 June 2013 - 08:09 AM, said:

Thank you for pointing out, Adridos.

Sadly people can't think like that. On top of the weight and and heat issue, I'm also looking at sustained dps/tonne vs range.

the MG produces 1dps per half tonne.

compare that to a ppc that does 2.5 dps for 7 tonnes. Yep that's right, less than 1 dps per tonne, also rof limited by how fast you can dump heat.

I suppose this is offset by the MGs lack of range.

NOW WITH ALL THAT SAID!

No where did I say they were OP or Broken. I kind of like where they are at. You can't just ignore them any longer. And a pack of spiders is cause for some concern.

What I did say is that I thought that any more buffs would make them stronger than they need to be.

The only change to MG's that I would suggest is lowering their crit damage some more. In the history of online gaming where something gets a damage increase, not adjusting it's crit value (if it exists in any given game), causes severe balancing issues. I have had teammates have all their weapons critted off by MG's in the last two days, so while the damage is fine, the crit rating is no longer acceptable.

[Vermaxx]

How long did it take to get "all their weapons critted off my MGs?" Because they don't get bonus damage to critting, they get bonus chance. Crits are per hit, and hits for MG are per bullet. As such, the best damage one bullet can do is .3.

It will take a while to shoot through 10hp of item (ONE item) at a third of a damage per bullet. That's roughly 3 crit damage per second, FULL SECOND, with EVERY BULLET max critting and hitting the same thing. What is much more likely is that the bullets will fail to crit, crit for x1 or x2, AND hit other items in the damaged mech.

What is ALSO more likely, is that while the guy with MG was hugging that mech, and maybe even getting the item destroyed credit, he wasn't doing any of the real lion's share damage. Someone else shooting the mech was doing all the work and the MG's superior rate of fire was getting the 'last hit' on the damaged items.

[Deathlike]

Vermaxx, on 20 June 2013 - 05:26 PM, said:

How long did it take to get "all their weapons critted off my MGs?" Because they don't get bonus damage to critting, they get bonus chance. Crits are per hit, and hits for MG are per bullet. As such, the best damage one bullet can do is .3.

It will take a while to shoot through 10hp of item (ONE item) at a third of a damage per bullet. That's roughly 3 crit damage per second, FULL SECOND, with EVERY BULLET max critting and hitting the same thing. What is much more likely is that the bullets will fail to crit, crit for x1 or x2, AND hit other items in the damaged mech.

What is ALSO more likely, is that while the guy with MG was hugging that mech, and maybe even getting the item destroyed credit, he wasn't doing any of the real lion's share damage. Someone else shooting the mech was doing all the work and the MG's superior rate of fire was getting the 'last hit' on the damaged items.

MGs are very efficient at getting crits...

MGs get an additional crit chance to deal damage to components.. which is approximately another 19%. So, on average, every 1 in 5 bullets will deal a crit (1.25 damage minimum PER BULLET, in the special crit case). If bullets actually hit with its listed rate of 10 bullets/sec, you are effectively dealing 2 crits per second. Components have 10 HP generally, so to be able to remove a weapon, you would need to spent 4 seconds with it... or 4 MGs to "blow one up every second" (which doesn't happen just like that, since it would be spread over many components). This is what the Spider-5K commonly uses.

For the common HBK-4P (referencing the Champion one here), if you are already breached the RT, it would "optimally" take 8 seconds to remove 6 meds and 2 DHS (80HP) worth of components. Of course, that assumes no MG spread (which is atrocious) and the bullets produced is actually 10 bullets/sec (instead of the fluctuating ~8 bullets per sec, depending on your FPS)

You would be better off to shoving 3 PPCs into that area twice, in 8 seconds.

Of course, this assumes that you've breached the internals...

Edited by Deathlike, 20 June 2013 - 06:02 PM.

[Vermaxx]

Where do they get the massive damage bonus? Crits only multiply the damage of the hit, unless something changed I don't know about. MG BULLETS are so low, how are the magnifying to about 12 times their base damage MINIMUM?

Edit, I see. They gave it massive potential to burn down internals. So it does OVERPOWERING damage to internals but can't breach armor. Yeah that's amazing balance.

Edited by Vermaxx, 20 June 2013 - 05:59 PM.

[Deathlike]

Vermaxx, on 20 June 2013 - 05:55 PM, said:

Edit, I see. They gave it massive potential to burn down internals. So it does OVERPOWERING damage to internals but can't breach armor. Yeah that's amazing balance.

That sums up weapon balance by PGI.

Edited by Deathlike, 20 June 2013 - 06:04 PM.

[Vermaxx]

It really gets me that PGI invented a system where the MG would be useful just because it wasn't.

It also gets me that it is easier to blow out a damaged component entirely rather than crit the items in it. Seriously, mechs have two bars of HP - armor and internal, and they USUALLY don't lose their weapons until the items physically fall off the mech. Look at the stats, everything in the game has 10 crit hp, except AC20 (which has 18 and is the most obscene alpha build out there), and ECM/Gauss which both have 3. Literally every other item in the game has 10 hp, which makes them generally easier to blow off than blow out.

[Vermaxx]

No, I'm not suggesting it auto hit. If I was suggesting that I'd suggest MW4 where everything fully hit if it hit at all - lasers would track the enemy as long as you hit it at the beginning.

I've run two matches now with a Hunch 4G carrying two ERPPC and three MG. Apart from being a light or a Jager, that is a damn good load of MG in a relatively decent mech. They are worthless. So far all breached armor I've seen has been torso, and if it's side the component dies before my MG have effect. CT is meaningless unless it's a chin-gun mech since engine crits aren't in.

I got two item destroyed this match, they were from the ERPPC, NOT the three machine guns hosing down mechs. MG are too situational to be useful, and therefore I really don't understand all the work PGI has put into them.