110 replies to this topic

[Sereglach]

Glossary of Terms

Spoiler

DPS: Damage Per Second
HPS: Heat Per Second
HDPS: Heat Damage Per Second
TT: Table Top
CC: Crowd Control
crit: ciritical strikes that damage internal components. Crit hunting weapons have greater % chance to critical strike over other weapons

Introduction and Important Background Info

Spoiler

I’m currently writing this balancing concept because, although Flamers have received some buffs, they are still considered highly inadequate for use on the battlefield. In testing I have had it confirmed by unit members (in sync dropped 8v8 scrimmages), that two flamers are a hindrance, but are not dangerous unless my opponent is a hotter mech build. This is given that heat damage is supposed to stack exponentially.

I love using flamers, and have them on both my Death’s Knell and Blackjack-1X. Although I have used Flamers, myself, with a reasonable amount of success on the battlefield, I have had to develop the skill almost like an art form; and it is very niche work. I’m not looking for anything overpowered, but I am looking for a balanced weapon that I can utilize on the battlefield, effectively, on a normal basis. Thusly I have a proposed method of balancing. I may not be a weapon expert of any sort, but I did have over 5k of flamer damage BEFORE the damage buff, and I’ve only been playing since March. That equates to having flamers on target doing damage for almost 3.5 consecutive hours. (5000/.4DPS = 12500 seconds of damage / 60sec/min= 208.3min / 60min/hr = 3.47 hrs.). That being said, I think I know a thing or two about Flamers, at least.

This method of balancing heavily utilizes Dark Jaguar’s write-up on how to fix the game overall, for information referencing and solid number calculations. His write up can be found here: DarkJaguar's Open Letter to PGI However, I also include a possible rebalance to the flamer to make it more viable given the current state of the game.

The current flamer, as it stands, is only effective against med-high to high heat builds, and only if you have several flamers in use at once. True effectiveness of the flamer also relies upon the enemy continuing to fire its weapons while I keep a stream of fire upon them. IF I can get an enemy mech to shut down I have to hope that I have allies there able to attack him while he is crippled. Also, I should not be forced to use large quantities of flamers to do significant heat damage to an enemy mech. Since my HPS scales at what appears to be relatively close to enemy HDPS scaling, I would shut myself down just as fast as my opponent. That defeats the purpose and is the true death of the flamer as it currently stands on MWO.

Flamer Functionality and Purpose

Spoiler

Flamers in TT are used for CC purposes. There are many ways they do this. Flamers used on terrain light fires, which creates ambient heat on enemy mechs and damages infantry and light units passing through. Smoke screens from said fires hinder enemy sensors, vision, and mitigate enemy laser weaponry (lasers are beams of concentrated light, smoke breaks up the light beam). You cannot do this in MWO. What you can do, however, is raise your enemy’s heat and prohibit them from using their weaponry.

The current state of flamers only lets a pilot complete this task to a hindered extent. As stated above, testing shows that multiple flamers MUST be used in tandem to be effective against even non-heat-efficient builds. The best you can hope for, otherwise, is to mitigate enemy heat sink effectiveness as you pass by and harass your enemy.

In TT, you are capable of heating an enemy up to the point you force a reactor overload and destroy the engine. It takes a great deal of effort once the enemy mech shuts down, but it can be done. At the very least you are capable of keeping the enemy in a shutdown state. This is often referred to as stun-locking. PGI has stated that they do not want to allow for Flamers to stun-lock the enemy. My response to that is if a team is actually working together, then it should be nigh impossible for me to stun-lock and kill someone. If they’re the last mech on the battlefield, then they need to keep me at range, which is not hard to do since I have to close within 64m.

However, in the seeking of balance, at the very least make the Flamer heat damage cap out at whatever heat % a mech will restart. If that is 90%, then leave it at 90%. Give the enemy a chance to run away and open up a distance between the flamer wielder and themselves. I certainly understand that a mech pilot does not want to spend an entire match in a shut down state. I know I would not be happy about that. On the other hand, because of the flamer heat generation on the flamer wielder, it would also be extremely difficult to attempt to keep someone in a shutdown state, or even close to it. At some point the flamer wielder must allow himself to cool off, as well. Flamers are not exactly shy on their own heat generation.

Stat Comparison TT Canon vs. MWO and How it can be Rebalanced

Spoiler

The stat comparisons between a TT Flamer and an MWO flamer are rather stark. In TT one “round” of combat covers 10 seconds of real time. This gives us a basis for forming actual comparisons between the MWO and TT weapons. I thank Dark Jaguar for pre-calculating most of these comparisons in his previously cited thread.

Range:

MWO- 64m
TT- 90m
Range Difference- for being overall weaker than its TT counterpart, the Flamer in MWO also suffers greatly from having a significantly reduced range. Whether this is due to rendering issues of fire graphics or more attempts at balancing, it should be remedied, as it is the shortest ranged weapon in the game and doesn’t even have a max “effective” range like every other energy and ballistic weapon. The next closest weapon is the Small Pulse Laser, which still reaches out to 180m (albeit with reduced damage past 90)

Damage:

MWO Damge- .7
TT Damage- 2
MWO DPS- .7 (.35 Actual DPS given MWO has double armor numbers)
TT DPS- .2
DPS Difference- factor of 1.75 times higher than TT. . . this is nothing compared to AC2’s having a factor of 10, UAC5’s having a factor of 4.55, and small pulse lasers having a factor of 2.06 (see Dark Jaguar’s complete write-up for all damage comparisons) which leave the game in a damage control mess. Also, although Flamers in TT can only damage infantry, battle armor, and light vehicles, retaining slight damage to mechs in MWO should be kept in the attempt to balance ALL mech mounted weaponry for use in the game.

Heat:

MWO Heat- 1 (scales from there and grows exponentially over time)
TT Heat- 3
MWO HPS- 1 (scales from there and grows exponentially over time)
TT HPS- .3
HPS Difference- factor of 3.33 times higher heat generation on the user, however this also does not factor in the growing and scaling heat over time that builds up on the user, further mitigating effectiveness. Even in comparison to other MWO weaponry, the typical MWO weapon generates twice the HPS of a TT variant, so this is still another 1.33 times higher than that.

Heat Damage:

MWO Heat Damage- 0 (starts from 0 and grows over time, exponentially stacking across flamers)
TT Heat Damage- 6
MWO HDPS- 0 (starts from 0 and grows over time, exponentially stacking across flamers)
TT HDPS- .6
HDPS Difference- MWO requires users to keep flamers on target long periods of time to be effective, for heat stacking and scaling to kick in. TT gives consistent HDPS over time, while only a missed shot will detract from this (although it may not if you hit the terrain and raise ambient heat anyway).

As we can see, not only is TT heat damage consistent, but it inflicts heat damage at values TWICE that of heat generated on the user. MWO does not give us this feature; instead we must maintain contact to be effective. Missed shots in MWO causes you to lose HDPS significantly, and if the stream is broken too long you need to restart your HDPS scale while your HPS appears to be on hold for longer periods of time, and does not reset. Testing was very difficult to determine exact time HPS scale resets, however broken streams from the target seemed to reset HDPS almost immediately. This gives us extremely unreliable HDPS capabilities. Even just changing MWO values to be more flat values in a 1HPS:2HDPS ratio, regardless of numbers would make for more balanced flamers right off the bat.

Enemy Heat Dissipation and HDPS

Spoiler

Regardless of changes made to flamers, numbers on HDPS would still need to be balanced to actually be effective against enemy heat dissipation. If weapons and heat were rebalanced in accordance with Dark Jaguar’s post, then an actual .3HPS:.6HDPS Flamer would truly be effective in MWO. However, given the current state of the game, the actual numbers would need to be significantly higher to be effective. Since most MWO weapons generate two times (or higher) HPS and cool effectively on their own, and flamers need to have hindering/damaging levels of HDPS, I propose the testing of a 1.2HPS:2.5HDPS Flamer.

This tips the scale slightly past TT levels, but not too far beyond what MWO weapons currently generate on users. While keeping damage values low, the Flamer remains a utility weapon that is a hindrance even if only one is used, as it simulates the approximate constant firing of somewhere between an ER Large Laser (2.24HPS) and an ER PPC (2.75HPS). On the other hand, HPS for the user is equal to firing an AC10 (1.2HPS) nonstop as well . . . so it is still a reasonably heat generating weapon for the user. Having both the user’s and target’s heat sinks mitigated during this time ensures that controlled bursts of Flamer shots will be used.

Conclusion via Proposed Flamer Stats

Spoiler

Recommended Flamer stats if MWO is overhauled a la Dark Jaguar’s post (again found here: http://mwomercs.com/...ver-fix-balance )

Damage: .2 (remove crit hunting abilities . . . no longer needed)
DPS: .2
Heat: .3
HPS: .3 Flat (remove heat scaling, flamer heat stacks additively)
Heat Damage: .6 (calculated every .1 second of contact with enemy)
HDPS: .6 Flat (remove heat scaling, flamer heat stacks additively)
Heat Damage Cap: Whatever heat % a mech starts up at after shutdown/90%
Reasoning: If the game is rebalanced an all features are implemented in the way Dark Jaguar has proposed, most values would be able to return to TT numbers and be completely balanced. Using the TT HPS, DPS, and HDPS metrics to recalculate all values of MWO would make this a highly acceptable Flamer build granting good CC capacity. As a side note, for Clan Flamers (since the only difference in TT is that Clan Flamers weight .5 tons instead of 1) remove all damage and raise HDPS to .8, making them more effective at raising enemy heat while removing their ability to physically damage opponents unless you make their reactor overload.

Recommended Flamer stats if MWO remains in its current state of play:

Damage: .8 (retain crit hunting abilities to balance higher armor/internal values over TT)
DPS: .8
Heat: 1.2
HPS: 1.2 Flat (remove heat scaling, flamer heat stacks additively)
Heat Damage: 2.5 (calculated every .1 second of contact with enemy)
HDPS: 2.5 Flat (remove heat scaling, flamer heat damage stacks additively)
Range: 90m
Heat Damage Cap: Whatever heat % a mech starts up at after shutdown/90%
Reasoning: If the game remains in its current state of balancing and tuning, this allows flamers to do heat damage comparable to enemy mechs firing a single high heat weapon continuously, which will allow flamers to serve their intended purpose of CC. The higher HPS and the consistency of HPS and HDPS force flamers to be used in bursts, but ensure that bursts that land on target do valuable Heat Damage.

Future Concept . . . Clan Flamer Proposition, Given Current State of play:

Tons- .5
Damage: 2.5 (retain crit hunting abilities to balance higher armor/internal values over TT)
DPS: 2.5
Heat: 1.2
HPS: 1.2 Flat (remove heat scaling, flamer heat stacks additively)
Heat Damage: 1.3 (calculated every .1 second of contact with enemy)
HDPS: 1.3 Flat (remove heat scaling, flamer heat damage stacks additively)
Heat Damage Cap: Whatever heat % a mech starts up at after shutdown/90%
Range: 64m
Reasoning: These stats for the Clan Flamer would allow players to carry a "superior" version that mitigates most of the enemy heat generation capabilities and trades it for a stark difference in DPS. This choice, in turn, can create two different styles of play with Flamers . . . those who wish to support their team in CC and those who wish to do heavy amounts of close quarter damage. Heat damage equal to heat generation is in place to allow some mild CC capacity, however having the HPS and HDPS values nearly equal prevents heavy CC use. Range is cut short to the current value, instead of 90m, to create a high risk/high reward scenario for the damage dealt. Technologically speaking range needs to be shorter for the high grade armor melting plasma that is released to be effective.

As a final shameless plug the Firestarter was one of my favorite mechs of all time in TT, and I would love to see it implemented into MWO.

Spoiler

Sarna Firestarter Basic Reference

Viable 3050 Variants for use for this 35 ton chassis:
FS9-H: Jump Jets, STD 210 Engine, 4 Flamers, 2 Medium Lasers, 2 Machine Guns
FS9-S1: Jump Jets, STD 210 Engine, 4 Flamers, 2 Medium Lasers, 1 Small Laser, Endo Steel Internals, ECM, AMS
FS9-C: Jump Jets, STD 210 Engine, 4 Flamers, 2 Medium Lasers, 2 Small Lasers, 2 SRM2s, Endo Steel Internals, Double Heat Sinks

[DarkJaguar]

Great write-up Sereglach! The current disparity between TT #'s and MWO #'s is startling. It wouldn't be as bad if everything were overpowered to the same extent, but having some weapons at 10x TT levels, while some are right at TT levels creates a huge chasm. This is further complicated by the ability to put several weapons on the same pixel, creating a situation where you can deal not just 2x the DPS, but 8x the DPS to the same location again and again.

The only thing I would add is that if the flamer were to use a Cone of Fire as I had suggested in my thread, the entire cone be the weapons' effective area, and that the heat your mech suffered is proportional to the percentage of the cone it is engulfed by (I.E. If flamer optimal range were 90m and it's maximum range 180m, a hunchback at 180m would suffered only about 50% of the HDPS as only about 50% of the "cone" is in contact with their mech, the remaining blooming past them as waste heat.

[Blue Footed Booby]

They rebalanced flamers so they're actually semi useful, but then they totally broke them so they didn't do any damage or heat to your target--not too little, literally none. Have they fixed that? I haven't even tried flamers since the change.

[Sereglach]

Blue Footed Booby, on 08 July 2013 - 10:38 AM, said:

They rebalanced flamers so they're actually semi useful, but then they totally broke them so they didn't do any damage or heat to your target--not too little, literally none. Have they fixed that? I haven't even tried flamers since the change.

As I state in my write-up, flamers as they currently stand are only semi-useful, and that's if you put a great deal of time and effort into developing the skill. Unlike a weapon like a PPC or AC20, flamers are not a weapon someone can pick up and use effectively "right out of the box". Also, as they're currently set up flamers force a pilot to take more than one of them to even attempt to be effective because of their "exponential" scaling mechanic. Because of that mechanic alone, the stock mechs that have only one flamer (commando and spider variants, in particular) are exceptionally useless. My proposed mechanics would actually make those mechs more useful, even as stock variants.

DarkJaguar, on 08 July 2013 - 10:27 AM, said:

Great write-up Sereglach! The current disparity between TT #'s and MWO #'s is startling. It wouldn't be as bad if everything were overpowered to the same extent, but having some weapons at 10x TT levels, while some are right at TT levels creates a huge chasm. This is further complicated by the ability to put several weapons on the same pixel, creating a situation where you can deal not just 2x the DPS, but 8x the DPS to the same location again and again.

The only thing I would add is that if the flamer were to use a Cone of Fire as I had suggested in my thread, the entire cone be the weapons' effective area, and that the heat your mech suffered is proportional to the percentage of the cone it is engulfed by (I.E. If flamer optimal range were 90m and it's maximum range 180m, a hunchback at 180m would suffered only about 50% of the HDPS as only about 50% of the "cone" is in contact with their mech, the remaining blooming past them as waste heat.

Thank you, kindly, for the compliments on the article. It took quite a while to put together, and actually your write-up helped me get a few more of the concrete numbers that I needed to really flesh the thing out.

As far as cone of fire goes, one important thing for people to remember is that the flamer doesn't do damage in it's huge graphical blast of fire. A great way to get an idea of how flamers work is to take a mech with two energy hardpoints side by side and put a Flamer and TAG together (Death's Knell, Commando 3A, Jenners, Blackjacks, Quickdraws, and a few others work great for this). Head into the testing grounds and fire both together. Where that TAG is hitting is where your Flamer is hitting, and ONLY where your Flamer is hitting.

Now, since that is addressed, people will understand more of what you're saying. Yes, if CoF were given to all weapons, then it might be nice to allow the whole blast of fire to be doing DPS and HDPS to the target. I would love to see the whole cone of fire that comes out of the mech do splash damage, while HDPS would strictly revolve around % of stream contact with target. However, I thought that would also be a programming nightmare, so I worked with the Flamer functioning as is for it's core mechanic.

On the other hand, because of the very slight damage and extremely short range of Flamers, they could be in the extremely small exclusion of mech weaponry that would NOT have a CoF (Flamers, TAG, NARC, LBX autocannons since they're already scattershots, and SRMS for the same reason as LBX).

As another option, giving them a CoF that is constantly shifting it's stream (like MG fire), or just forcing the pilot to adjust their fire given the direction of the stream would also be acceptable methods of implementation. After all, that would promote pilot skill and adjusting to/learning your mech.

Thank you both for taking the time to comment. I hope more constructive criticism and discussion comes in, as well as votes.

[Bhael Fire]

I approve of anything that buffs these weapons:

Flamers
MGs
SRMs
Pulse Lasers
AC/2
AC/5
AC/10
LB 10-X
NARC

[Dirus Nigh]

Wow very organized and well thought out.

I like the ideas and would like PGI to try them out.

[Sereglach]

Dirus Nigh, on 08 July 2013 - 03:41 PM, said:

Wow very organized and well thought out.

I like the ideas and would like PGI to try them out.

That's what I'm hoping for. Thank you for the input.

[Shazarad]

Hey Sereglach, excellent write up. I've been thinking about flamer rebalance for a couple days when I daydream...the thought of a Firestarter with like 4-8 flamers on it just toasting people sounds like way too much fun.

I remember when I was scared out of my shorts in Mechwarrior 2 when I encountered a Flashman because flamers were crazy powerful back then. I hope they regain some of their power in the future and your ideas sound excellent.

[PoeDunk]

Flame on!

[Sereglach]

Thank you for the replies and votes. I wish those who voted no would give constructive criticism on why they voted so for the various questions, but we can't have it all. Keep it coming.

[DarkJaguar]

Bhael Fire, on 08 July 2013 - 01:48 PM, said:

I approve of anything that buffs these weapons:

Flamers
MGs
SRMs
Pulse Lasers
AC/2
AC/5
AC/10
LB 10-X
NARC

An interesting list, though I would note that the only weapon on that list that actually needs any buff at all is the SRM-4 as it currently does LESS DPS than the TT version. Everything else just requires normalization. If PGI selected a number and had everything at the same multiplier, balance would be much easier (preferably by setting everything to 1:1 canon DPS/HPS, canon heat scale, and resetting armor to 1:1 as well).

The reason that a lot of the weapons you list seem so underwhelming is based on a combination of a wildly varying multiplier and the silly arbitrary heat scale. Did you know that every single mech starts out with an automatic 30 to it's heat soak ability? In 3025 the vast majority of mechs had a heat pool of between 10-20 TOTAL, with the MWO system it's now at 40-50 total even with only SHS, that number is much higher if you include DHS. It's little wonder that support/crowd control weapons like the Flamer would be ineffective. They have to cope with that extra 30 heat soak points before they can really even touch anything else! PPCs benefit a HUGE amount from this, as a mech that could normally only fire 1 PPC without overheating is now able to fire 4 at a time, and every single one of those shots will hit the exact same pixel.

While I don't want to explicitly state that everything but the SRM-4 needs a nerf, it's normalization that is necessary. However, if the heat pool is not addressed, having the flamers do their HDPS in an inverse curve might be interesting as well. I.E. the flamer INITIALLY does say 10 HDPS, and this number decreases proportional to the target's current heat level (I.E. @ 90% max heat, the flamer only does 10% of it's origional HDPS.) The implications of doing it that way would be a QUICK rise through that initial 30 heat pool that levels out to just a sustainable level. While not capable of stun locking the target (as it will reach a certain threshold at which the Heat Sinks dissipate at an equal rate to the HDPS), it will force players to slow down their shooting and select targets carefully.

Edited by DarkJaguar, 09 July 2013 - 04:40 AM.

[Skoaljaw]

+1 this'll light a fire under some pants... lol

[Sereglach]

DarkJaguar, on 09 July 2013 - 04:30 AM, said:

An interesting list, though I would note that the only weapon on that list that actually needs any buff at all is the SRM-4 as it currently does LESS DPS than the TT version. Everything else just requires normalization. If PGI selected a number and had everything at the same multiplier, balance would be much easier (preferably by setting everything to 1:1 canon DPS/HPS, canon heat scale, and resetting armor to 1:1 as well).

The reason that a lot of the weapons you list seem so underwhelming is based on a combination of a wildly varying multiplier and the silly arbitrary heat scale. Did you know that every single mech starts out with an automatic 30 to it's heat soak ability? In 3025 the vast majority of mechs had a heat pool of between 10-20 TOTAL, with the MWO system it's now at 40-50 total even with only SHS, that number is much higher if you include DHS. It's little wonder that support/crowd control weapons like the Flamer would be ineffective. They have to cope with that extra 30 heat soak points before they can really even touch anything else! PPCs benefit a HUGE amount from this, as a mech that could normally only fire 1 PPC without overheating is now able to fire 4 at a time, and every single one of those shots will hit the exact same pixel.

While I don't want to explicitly state that everything but the SRM-4 needs a nerf, it's normalization that is necessary. However, if the heat pool is not addressed, having the flamers do their HDPS in an inverse curve might be interesting as well. I.E. the flamer INITIALLY does say 10 HDPS, and this number decreases proportional to the target's current heat level (I.E. @ 90% max heat, the flamer only does 10% of it's origional HDPS.) The implications of doing it that way would be a QUICK rise through that initial 30 heat pool that levels out to just a sustainable level. While not capable of stun locking the target (as it will reach a certain threshold at which the Heat Sinks dissipate at an equal rate to the HDPS), it will force players to slow down their shooting and select targets carefully.

The whole normalization aspect is why I have a proposed set of stats that work off of pure TT canon numbers. On the other hand, that's also why I have proposed sets of stats that work by scaling up to numbers comparable to what we currently have in MWO. One way or the other, the flamer then becomes normalized in comparison to everything else on the battlefield. However, as stated in the polling questions, the numbers are all merely suggestions for the same primary premise: balancing and normalizing the flamer as a stable crowd controlling support weapon.

The base heat pool of 30 is one of the most startling aspects of MWO as a whole and is probably the biggest contributor of the broken high-alpha meta. It is something that is in severe need of addressing. Regardless of that fact, however, a good scaling on weapons will promote everything being effective. I find it funny, however, that in order to scale the flamer up we need to increase it's HDPS to be more equal to something like a PPC when in TT the flamer does heat damage more in line with an LRM 20 or AC20, which is significantly less. However for MWO it would be necessary to have it at that level in order to actually achieve the desired goal of being an effective crowd control weapon.

As interesting as the inverse bell curve for the flamer mechanic would be, my personal opinion is that I'd like to see just a stable, consistent, reliable weapon to use. Simpler is typically better, as there is less to go wrong, rebalance, or tamper with. However, I wouldn't be averse to seeing how that type of flamer mechanic would apply into the game. I'm certainly open to the testing and experimenting with different mechanics and numbers to get the best and most enjoyable experience possible out of the game. There is always tuning and balancing that will need to be done.

[Firewuff]

if you need a glossary, the post is too long......

[Sereglach]

Firewuff, on 09 July 2013 - 03:56 PM, said:

if you need a glossary, the post is too long......

Or you're trying to help people understand what you're posting who may not be familiar with a great deal of gaming terms. At one point we all had to ask what DPS was. Please keep feedback constructive.

EDIT: And keep feedback on topic, please.

Edited by Sereglach, 09 July 2013 - 04:50 PM.

[CoreWatch]

Very well thought out post Sereglach... the number seem spot on. Hopefully PGI takes them into consideration.

/salute

[Sereglach]

Thanks for the feedback. I'm happy to see the number of votes it's gotten (and doubly happy to see that most are positive). Hopefully the votes keep coming in.

[Sereglach]

I was hoping there was going to be more constructive feedback and voting on this. Even if there is dissent I would love to know why.

[Bhael Fire]

Sereglach, on 11 July 2013 - 03:43 PM, said:

I was hoping there was going to be more constructive feedback and voting on this. Even if there is dissent I would love to know why.

The poll has majority vote in favor. I know 20-30 votes doesn't mean all that much, but it gives a fairly good read on where the most most frequent forumers stand.

That said, think pretty much everyone can agree that flamers need some love to make them a little more practical for crowd control (regardless if they like or even care about your proposed method for doing so).

As I mentioned, I know I'd love it if they gave flamers some attention...since I really like the general concept.

Edited by Bhael Fire, 11 July 2013 - 05:51 PM.

[Corvus Antaka]

given the upcoming boating penalties this is a bad time to mess with the flamer.