1084 replies to this topic

[MountainCopper]

DeathofSelf, on 11 July 2013 - 10:47 AM, said:

What about the stalkers that mount 2 PPCs and 2 ERPPCs? Can they still fire all 4 without penalty?

I think, that PPCs and ERPPCs are counted as the same weapon for this purpose. Also Large Lasers and ER Large Lasers probably...
Come to think about it, since ER LLs already produce more heat to fire, I think only the normal LL is affected with this change. LLs don't have that much of the "high alpha" problem...

Edited by GoldenFleece, 11 July 2013 - 11:22 PM.

[Zyllos]

Bad change for heat for a bad meta game choice...

I 100% disapprove of this change...

Increasing heat for firing multiple weapons, is not going to work. It doesn't even matter if they are the same or not, right now, the system is easy to circumvent because it only looks for the same, but once that change happens, it will still not provide the outcome you are wanting, PGI.

Players are just going to find that sweet spot and still place pin point damage onto a location of their choosing. Everything else will lag behind because either you can't fire all your weapons and hit a single location then torso twist away, or you will fire once and shutdown.

Players who want to win, which is technically everybody, only want's their damage to hit where they aim. Any system that forces players to have to aim for a long time (by forcing to chain fire or fire several small groups) will fall to the wayside because they can't control where enemy players can hit them.

The whole metagame is based on the fact that if your not placing damage onto a location that will either kill or maim a target, it's pointless damage. And the reasoning behind this is two fold:

• You can torso twist away without hurting your own DPS and aiming
  
• Pin point accuracy allows alpha strikes to aim all their damage onto a single point

As long as you have pin point accuracy, players will gravitate to loadouts that allows for alpha strikes to hit a single locations instantly and allow you to torso twist/dodge away waiting on cooldowns.

MechWarrior is built around the idea that you face off against your enemy. You lay down constant barrages on your target, not really attempting to have them land on specific areas unless you can take the time to aim to hit on those specific areas.

But MWO's mechanics are setup to force players to only want to hit specific areas because there is no penalty for doing so. Alpha striking weapons doesn't change this fact.

I hope you see that this system is extremely flawed and understand that weapon's fire has to spread it's damage out more to bring balance to entire weapon systems. As long as pin point accuracy exists, MWO will be continuouly plagued by this problem.

It has happened in all previous MW games, why would it not happen in MWO?

[arghmace]

Ras187, on 11 July 2013 - 11:45 AM, said:

JUST AS LONG AS IT TAKES CARE OF THE 6 PPC STALKER NOOBS

Who cares about noobs? The good sniper players with Gauss, PPC and ER PPC -combos are the problem.

[3rdworld]

Shumabot, on 11 July 2013 - 11:31 AM, said:

I love the fact that the SRM buff, something 100% of the playerbase wants, and wants visibly, is put to a vote while max alpha heat scaling, something the majority of the player base thinks is a terrible idea is getting pushed in without asking.

It's as if this poll is a farce.

Kinda reminds me of the poll where the community said pretty clearly they didn't want 3pv.

[SovietArmada]

I like the fact that mechs will take damage after overheating at 100% now instead of 120%, SRM buff is nice while they work on detection.

But as people have pointed out, standard sniper build will be 2x PPC and Gauss, unless PGI decides to put Gauss in the PPC family as well . Still I'd rather deal with a 2xPPC/Gauss than a X6 PPC Stalker. In all honest i actually never had an issue with the 2x PPC/Gauss. I never use those builds but when im against that build i dont have an issue with it.

[Caviel]

My feedback, likely echoing others in the thread:

-SRM damage increase to 2.0: Something is better than nothing at this point, I'm willing to take more SRM damage as an assault pilot if it means there's more alternatives to PPC+Gauss that are actually viable again. Killing/Dying to something other than PPC fire would be a welcome change at this point.

-Heat damage change to 100% max: Does nothing to solve the meta problem, and a non-issue for any skilled pilot. An elite unlocked Stalker (4 ER PPC or 6 reg PPC) would have to stupidly alpha three consecutive times for this to be an issue.

-Alpha limits: As pointed out weeks ago when this was mentioned, it does nothing to solve the underlying problem. The currently proposed idea:

• impacts stock 3 PPC builds like the Awesome (Even though in cannon it is mentioned as a hot running mech that typically fired them in pairs to counter this).
  
• PPC Stalkers will just shift to use 2 ER PPCs and 2 PPCs instead of 4 ER PPCs, Assault Highlander/Misery builds can simply switch to 2 ER PPC + 1 PPC + Gauss, Heavy mechs already use 2 ER PPC + Gauss builds so this has no impact there at all. Actually less heat as a result meaning it is easier to alpha this way.
  
• We are lacking details at this point, although if you simply use weapon grouping (With macros if a delay is required), you can avoid the penalty all together.

My much easier to implement suggestion that requires no additional new features over today's current release:

• Return weapon heat values to TT values as a "reset" point
  
• Remove heat cap bonus for additional heat sinks making a heat cap of 30 (33 Basic, 36 Elite)
  
• Increase non-engine mounted DHS to a 2.0 dissipation rate.
  
• Set overheat damage threshold to 110%

It does not solve everything relating to ballistic and missile boating, although it will slow the pace of alphas, and even a single alpha will cap out a mech's heat, and a 3 or 4 PPC build will take some damage as a result with a single alpha. Alphas then become more of a desperation move and less a primary mode of fire. PPCs would also have to be paced out to not slag your own mech's internals.

[armyof1]

Let's not neglect the possibility to combine 3xSRM6 with 3xSRM4 on an A1 that can alpha with 30 missiles without penalty. That should also be included in heat penalties so combining SRM4 and SRM6 can't go above a certain amount of total missiles. I think max 20 missiles, which would mean 2xSRM6 + 2xSRM4 would make sense.

[Thoummim]

Balancing because of hit detection is what brought the ppc meta. DONT DO IT !

Srm are fine if you use them against heavy assault, dont overpower them.

And if you decide to do it anyway despite comon sense dont put them at 2damage its way too much.

Edited by Thoummim, 11 July 2013 - 11:49 AM.

[Megasa Ward]

I like most of these ideas. Voted yes for the obvious reasons, and I thank you guys (Paul in particular) for the poll, this is a cool thing you're trying to do. 12v12 was fun also--maybe the test server will be put to good use on our side of things.

I'm not sure if this Max Alpha idea is going to do much for distinct weapon combinations however. I'm thinking specifically of the 3PPC+Gauss HGN, the 732. How is this going to work with mixed PPC types? I don't know anybody that pilots that thing using all three standard PPC or all three ERPPC, it's always a mixed bag. It also means my AS7-RS is a little broken now. Can only group the smaller lasers on the arms without incurring penalty. I feel sorry for you AWS owners.

Don't get me wrong. I'm not saying the sky is falling, just that this doesn't make a whole lot of sense with the amount of context us players have. I guess we will find out soon enough how it works (hopefully it works).

[Tezcatli]

I think I'd actually have to try it first. But the heat penalty seems like a nice step. But only a step. Other tweaks are probably needed to get desired result of corralling out the alpha meta.

Was that too positive?

"THE END IS NIGH!!!!!! It's all PGI's fault! THEY SHOULD DO WHAT WE SAY!"

[Joe Mallad]

So what about the other AC weapons? Or the other LRMs and all the pulse lasers?

[SQUIRRELLL]

I like the changes for the most part. SRM need to be at 2 at the minimum. Also LL need to be at 4. Two is kinda weird, they arent ppc's.

[MountainCopper]

Hmm, don't like the fact that a potential SRM buff will destroy larger mechs more quickly. Heavies and Assaults are going to severely suffer from that change, as stated by the author.
I also don't like it, when I can't destroy a Centurion with my SRM6 and some Medium Lasers over a period of 2 minutes, but I'm voting for no buffs to SRMs... Just let them fix the hit detection as soon as they can.

[Zerikin]

Heat scaling will not fix the alpha strike meta. The core of the problem is the ability to have all the damage hit a single point.

[Stoicblitzer]

recap:

1) hit detection is known to be broken.....let's announce a launch date.
2) sell HBK-4P Champion with 9mlas......set maximum medium lasers allowed to 6.
3) SRMs need to be buffed for 4 months.....let's wait one more month to do it.

hold on. gonna buy a phoenix package now.

Edited by Stoicblitzer, 11 July 2013 - 11:56 AM.

[Shumabot]

3rdworld, on 11 July 2013 - 11:47 AM, said:

Kinda reminds me of the poll where the community said pretty clearly they didn't want 3pv.

But 3pv wasn't for this community, is was for the community they were hoping to attract. The only community that wants max alpha heat scaling is the community of repo men who will take back PGIs servers after they go bankrupt.

[PEEFsmash]

Firing 6 MLs DOES incurr extra heat penalty on Test Server. I might have been wrong about it happening at 4. Here is proof that shooting 6MLs, (not OVER 6, but exactly 6) incurs extra heat.

Test Server Cold Map: 39% http://www.twitch.tv...smash/c/2560918

Normal Server Neutral Heat Map same build: 31% http://www.twitch.tv...smash/c/2560957

Edited by PEEFsmash, 11 July 2013 - 11:56 AM.

[Wales Grey]

Yoseful Mallad, on 11 July 2013 - 11:51 AM, said:

So what about the other AC weapons? Or the other LRMs and all the pulse lasers?

LPLs are bad enough right now without extra issues.

[Lucian Nostra]

Iason, on 11 July 2013 - 11:10 AM, said:

Garth was streaming with Phil till a few minutes ago and said that, at the beginning, PPC and ERPPC will be seperated, but will later count as the same. So the 2 PPC+ 2ERPPC build will has the same problem as the 4 PPC or 4 ERPPC build.

What's the mentality behind that? Why not just do it RIGHT the first time? Why do something that isn't worth commenting on because it's going to change anyway? just.. bleeh a waste of time

[Braggart]

considering you may never find the cause, You absolutely have to do something to make them worthwhile in the mean time.

I used to run 3 SRM 6 on my QD, but all that did was lower my total damage and cause me to lose any brawl I got into.



I really want to point something out. Srms they claim they cant move back to 2.5 damage, because it allows 2-3 volleys to kill assaults. Well, that is exactly what happens with PPCS, and your idea to fix it is the heat scaling feature, wouldnt that also work for SRMS? If a splatcat fires all 6 srm 6 at once. Shouldnt that shutdown his mech??????????????

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