stjobe, on 03 July 2013 - 03:13 AM, said:
If you think golf, ice hockey, or soccer (or any other professional sport for that matter) isn't affected by randomness to a certain degree, I seriously doubt you've ever watched any games, much less tried playing yourself. As I said, what makes the pro players pro is that they have the ability to perform despite these random events.
Like I said. These events you're referring to are only 'random' up to the point where they are perceived by the player. At this point, the player predicts (probably reflexively) the effects of the event and acts accordingly. An experienced player knows better than a new player how best to respond, but the response is always based upon an expectation of these events proceeding a certain way.
The point here is that the events all lead to an expected result. Actual randomness, where one event has no connection with the one that came before or the one that will come after, like I would expect to see here(based on the JJ shake), does not, and therefore can't be adjusted for. I suppose what I'm worried about here is that they'll take "random" literally, which does nothing to improve the quality of the game.
stjobe, on 03 July 2013 - 03:13 AM, said:
Again, nobody is arguing total randomness; most suggestions I've seen are talking about a small amount of randomness that grows bigger with e.g. movement, and smaller by standing still; grows with rising heat, and shrinks with lower heat levels. The player will at all times be in control over how much randomness he experiences. A stationary, cool 'mech would be as perfect a firing platform as one could ask for, but one running at max speed over uneven terrain, perhaps also jump-jetting, would not be the perfect firing platform it is today.
I realise at this point that I'm arguing semantics, but as soon as you have an something that you can evaluate and predict an outcome, it aint' random no more. In the description you gave there, how accurate is the stationary, cool mech? Is it able to hit a pebble at 1000m with a single Gauss round?
stjobe, on 03 July 2013 - 03:13 AM, said:
It's not an uncommon feature of modern FPS games to have a cone of fire (at the very least for full-auto fire) and a "breath shake" for sniping weapons. I don't understand why some people think it such anathema to introduce a similar feature into MWO. It doesn't take your skill away, it makes it more pronounced.
The same thing happens in all of those games where they use a cone of fire. People who want to win just pick the weapon that is least affected by it, meanwhile everyone else complains that they're a cheesy scrub.
stjobe, on 03 July 2013 - 03:13 AM, said:
Since alpha is king and DPS is worthless today, I'm not at all opposed to at least trying a DPS game instead of the current one-shot circus.
I'm not opposed to trying it either. I'd love to be able to pull out my C1 again. I was just pointing out that giving everything a spread is just going to shift the focus on to the high DPS weapons, which people will complain about just as much as what we've got now. That's why I'd like to have them both be viable.
stjobe, on 03 July 2013 - 03:13 AM, said:
The problem actually is that you can put ALL your shots exactly where you want them, down to the pixel.
Right, and I agree to the point where you shouldn't be able to put them all right where you want them
at the same time. I do think that you should be able to put an individual shot exactly where you want it, and that's where people seem to disagree.
stjobe, on 03 July 2013 - 03:13 AM, said:
That is not how the BattleTech universe is supposed to work, and all other values (damage, heat, armour, you name it - basically any TT values still in MWO) were balanced from the understanding that hit allocation was random. A 6-weapon alpha would have to be exceedingly lucky to put more than two shots in the same location - if even all weapons hit the target (as each weapon had a separate to-hit roll). In the current MWO, all weapons in that six-weapon alpha automatically hits the same location without any effort on the player's part. Aim, pull trigger, all weapons hit the same pixel.
And this is exactly why we should scrap the TT numbers and make something specially constructed for this game. Get the BattleTech Universe feel without being hamstrung with some numbers that were specifically designed and balanced for a completely different game type.
stjobe, on 03 July 2013 - 03:13 AM, said:
And as a final kind of sidenote: It's the ballistic weapons that are the main culprit, since they do all their damage in one hit. If you make them burst-fire instead (including the PPC), a lot of the pin-point problems go away.
Agreed, however making all of the ballistic weapons burst fire does homogenize them to an extent.