54 replies to this topic

[Shadowsword8]

I didn't want to use PPC every single time.

But PGi forced me to, when they add heat penalties for using even just 3 large lasers. Weapons that never were an issue.

So, instead of my standard 4 LL loadout, it's now 2 PPC + 2 LL.

[Erata]

Ok so the problem with nerfing PPCs into obscurity is that you're going to create what's called a vicious cycle where we look back and remember how PPCs were completely irrelevant to the game and the long range meta was only Gauss and create complaints where people want PPCs to be half decent weapons again. lol.

It also created the pre-emptive meta where people are taking a mixture of gauss and ppcs.

Again, the problem is that mechs are too easy to put into a critical state. Gauss and PPCs should not be great close range weapons, but the reason they are is because... again.. Robots are too easy to either disable or outright destroy. It has less to do with hitboxes, but who can save the BarnBot Awesome? Not even God... and more to do with how little overall health robots have.

Would ammo values have to be adjusts per ton? YES ABSOLUTELY. Would it do a better job of nerfing sniper meta than heatscale? Confidently yes.

Heck, put further increased health values on top of heatscale penalties. I'm not arguing for the outright removal of heatscale. Paul seems adamant that it was the right decision and the game needs aggressive changes if it's going to go anywhere from here.

Edited by Erata, 21 July 2013 - 12:39 PM.

[Tezcatli]

They said they would combine PPC and ERPPCs to the same heat penalty later in the month. As well as they said they "might" up the base heat on PPCs, but lower the heat penalty.

[Fulcrom Kerensky]

Tezcatli, on 21 July 2013 - 12:46 PM, said:

They said they would combine PPC and ERPPCs to the same heat penalty later in the month. As well as they said they "might" up the base heat on PPCs, but lower the heat penalty.

It should be the reverse of that in my opninion. Why should you penalize a player for using one ppc?

[Erata]

To anyone suggesting convergence nerfs.

Why it won't work.

JumpJet shake is already circumventable, poptarting still happens. That's fine because an element of skill is presented to the player because it has to be timed correctly, and the mech has to jump jet more than previously. That increases their exposure time to return fire.

That's why convergence 'fixes' won't work unless it's completely random, and a lot of players, myself included, are adamantly against a cone of fire/bloom effect in the game.
There are a few really good robots with weapons mount arrangements, Highlanders among them, that make it trivial to circumvent offset crosshairs because their weapons batteries are arranged so tightly.

Some mechs will have a harder time than others, but at higher skill levels, offsetting the crosshair just adds another fraction of a second to aiming time at sniper range, and is completely irrelevant at close range.

That's why some of us have been talking about boosting health vs all these wacky, but somewhat interesting systems.

edit: But what about that group-fire convergence thing that doesn't affect chain-fired or single-fired weapons?

That won't work because I have two buttons on my mouse and by grouping two gauss, or PPCs, or what have you to separate keys, I can still snapshot by drumming whatever buttons I'm about to press.

Most mech builds do not use ALL SIX WEAPONS GROUPS, so several of them can be bound to say:

LMB, R(ight)M(ouse)B(utton), MMB, Mouse Scroll Up, Mouse Scroll Down, or any key convenient to you. Whatever works for you. Whatever allows you to fire weapons, for all intents and purposes, in groups while slightly adjusting your aim.

At least it would introduce actual mech quirks in the game, but it does zilch to address the effectiveness of player accuracy short of adding dice roll RNG(random number generator) into the game.

Edited by Erata, 21 July 2013 - 01:29 PM.

[Blackadder]

Nerfing PPC's solves nothing beyond encouraging people to choose another weapon system that can be abused.

[Nryrony]

No, keep the weapons as they are, its fine, just make speed count more, increase turning rates and movement speed on lights and mediums. But at the same time slow Heavys and Assaults, make them really slow. So that they have trouble targeting again and are venerable even for an average player piloting a medium/light mech.

Edited by Nryrony, 21 July 2013 - 01:34 PM.

[Erata]

Nryrony, on 21 July 2013 - 01:33 PM, said:

No, keep the weapons as they are, its fine, just make speed count more, increase turning rates and movement speed on lights and mediums. But at the same time slow Heavys and Assaults, make them really slow. So that they have trouble targeting again and are venerable even for an average player piloting a medium/light mech.

This would go a long way to making combat even more interesting, but it doesn't solve the problem at a higher skill level, where better players will just take on a formation or allow one of their members to tank focus fire while the others retreat slightly to fire at the orbiting lights and mediums.

[Warge]

Blackadder, on 21 July 2013 - 01:26 PM, said:

Nerfing PPC's solves nothing beyond encouraging people to choose another weapon system that can be abused.

Agree. But they should produce more heat. Because LL or LPL - little harder to master.

Erata, on 21 July 2013 - 01:36 PM, said:

This would go a long way to making combat even more interesting, but it doesn't solve the problem at a higher skill level, where better players will just take on a formation or allow one of their members to tank focus fire while

...he TAGed and LRMed.

[jakucha]

Erata, on 21 July 2013 - 12:03 PM, said:

TLDR: Weapons aren't the root problem of the disease, they're a symptom. Increase the health of robots to alleviate the scourge of boring MW4 Sniper Meta.

It has been suggested by smarter men, such as Gwaihir(did I spell that right? is he even a man? .. or bird? Bird isn't a gender. Does that even matter? What are gender roles in mechmanperson online?), that the health values on armor and internals need to be increased.

"But this isn't TableTop"

But this isn't table top.

It's a real time action game using nearly 1:1 values instead of dice rolls to determine where shots land. As a result, the overall firepower a mech can dump into enemy megamans has increased.


In order to bring brawling back and tone down the effects of snipers, we need to plate more gundariam armor and replace the packing peanut internals with things like metal.


http://themittani.co...od-bad-and-ugly

This big old article shows why, in greater detail, and with visual learning tools that lesser writers like myself couldn't explain as clearly.

Increasing the health just means PPC will still be one of the only all around good weapons. The PPC is so good because it has lower heat at the moment, decent stats all around in terms of tonnage and crit slots, damage as well. Add to that how it's very fast, and delivers all its damage upfront, right away (that's the big one). It has almost no downsides. Individually as a weapon, it needs tweaking. Adding even more health to the mechs only makes the game less mechwarrior in my opinion.

The fact that they're probably increasing heat will help, but it could use another downside or two after that. Ballistics deliver their damage right away but they have so many downsides, unlike PPC.

Edited by jakucha, 21 July 2013 - 01:47 PM.

[Blackadder]

Warge, on 21 July 2013 - 01:42 PM, said:

Agree. But they should produce more heat. Because LL or LPL - little harder to master.

realistically LPL & LL should be superior weapons due to shorter range once the mechs reach that optimal range then PPC, most likely by a combo of DPS, heat, fire rates, as well as weight/hardpoints.

however, without changing the way range on weapons work, how armor & mech layouts are setup, along with many other factors its really a moot point. its been proven time and time again, that the current nerf/buff balance attempts that PGI uses do not work, the eventual outcome is always the same.

Edited by Blackadder, 21 July 2013 - 01:48 PM.

[Grand Ayatollah Kerensky]

If I were an executive at IGP, I'd be looking at Paul's decision making very closely. This boating penalty system represents a lot of money and manpower flushed down the toilet--that's really the message that needs to get out. The fact of the matter is that resources were spent on making a system that does not accomplish its stated goals.

[Unbound Inferno]

Erata, on 21 July 2013 - 12:26 PM, said:

Armor + Internals would:

Cause the time to kill a mech to increase. It takes longer to kill robots.

What happens to heat-inefficient boats like the AC 40 and PPC Stalker? They're unable to put brawling robots into a critical state before they enter SRM range. Within brawling range, those problem-mechs that have been the target of nerfs, would be unable to continuously fire. Due to being unable to fire due to cooling constraints, the cool-running brawling robot is able to fire more often, and thus, puts out more damage than the boating counterpart.

It forces snipers into a role of fire support vs the current meta of their overwhelming flexibility.

edit: It's less flawed than heat penalties that did not affect the overall damage output of PPC Stalkers in a meaningful way, and only harmed robots that didn't deserve it to begin with, like the HBK 4-P.

You are mistaken.

Because Weapons are not balanced, there is no other alternative other than PPC/Gauss/AC20s as the best means to deliver damage.

Brawlers can't work with the heat dissipation skewred like it is now - they can't keep it up to kill a mech.

The result is that the most damage as accurately as possible remains the best weapons.


Would mechs live longer? Yes.


We will still have to deal with mainly a PPC/Gauss/AC-20 based meta.

[Trauglodyte]

The one thing that people don't realize is that while the lack of heat is a big issue on the PPC, the biggest thing that makes the PPC so powerful is its range. Range is what is causing people to go balls out in the Sniper meta. If they'd reduce the extended range from 2x (energy) and 3x (ballistic) to 1.5 (energy) and 2.0 (ballistic), the ranges would be closer which would bring brawling into the fray and would balance out the PPC with LRMs. Heat is simply one small knob that needs to be turned.

[Angel of Annihilation]

theta123, on 21 July 2013 - 11:27 AM, said:

Return PPC to old beta status. It was powerfull but required very good heat management.

Today its the same thing....Gaus+PPC+PPC+ERPPC

Bam meta strike of 45...

Hmm I remember old beta status on PPCs and ER PPCs.....They sucked so bad that no one used them....EVER. That was when heat was 10 for PPC and 15 for ER PPCs.

Might be the reason why they aren't 10 Heat for PPC and 15 for ER PPCs now.

[Erata]

Unbound Inferno, on 21 July 2013 - 02:56 PM, said:

You are mistaken.

Because Weapons are not balanced, there is no other alternative other than PPC/Gauss/AC20s as the best means to deliver damage.

Brawlers can't work with the heat dissipation skewred like it is now - they can't keep it up to kill a mech.

The result is that the most damage as accurately as possible remains the best weapons.


Would mechs live longer? Yes.


We will still have to deal with mainly a PPC/Gauss/AC-20 based meta.

You are correct.

[Garruda]

Erata, on 21 July 2013 - 12:03 PM, said:

TLDR: Weapons aren't the root problem of the disease, they're a symptom. Increase the health of robots to alleviate the scourge of boring MW4 Sniper Meta.

It has been suggested by smarter men, such as Gwaihir(did I spell that right? is he even a man? .. or bird? Bird isn't a gender. Does that even matter? What are gender roles in mechmanperson online?), that the health values on armor and internals need to be increased.

"But this isn't TableTop"

But this isn't table top.

It's a real time action game using nearly 1:1 values instead of dice rolls to determine where shots land. As a result, the overall firepower a mech can dump into enemy megamans has increased.


In order to bring brawling back and tone down the effects of snipers, we need to plate more gundariam armor and replace the packing peanut internals with things like metal.


http://themittani.co...od-bad-and-ugly

This big old article shows why, in greater detail, and with visual learning tools that lesser writers like myself couldn't explain as clearly.

If extra armor could be "mounted" taking up slots just like weapons and heat sinks, that would give players choosing smaller/lighter brawling weapons a real incentive. For example, introduce a new item (Armor plating) 4 slots, 2 tons (= 2 tons more of armor to allocate to that body section). Would really introduce a tank/brawling spec into the game.

[Khobai]

nerfing heat wont fix ppcs. high heat on weapons is one of the main reasons for this whole alphastrike meta. people pop out, alphastrike, then go back in cover and cool down.

The only fix is a convergence fix.

barring that the best temporary fix is to slow down ppc projectile speed so theyre more difficult to hit with at long range.

Edited by Khobai, 21 July 2013 - 04:15 PM.

[Unbound Inferno]

Khobai, on 21 July 2013 - 04:13 PM, said:

nerfing heat wont fix ppcs. high heat on weapons is one of the main reasons for this whole alphastrike meta. people pop out, alphastrike, then go back in cover and cool down.

The only fix is a convergence fix.

barring that the best temporary fix is to slow down ppc projectile speed so theyre more difficult to hit with at long range.

Actually its the low dissipation with high heat that's the issue with high threshold allowing for multiple alphastrikes from high heat weapons.

Right now PPC is far from considered high heat. That needs to go up.

Heat threshold needs reworking to be lowered and add penalties that are noticeable and hinders enough that they are a bad idea - that limits what high heat boating can do, in other words PPC boats.

Increasing dissipation is one major stem that helps everyone, but most specifically brawlers by allowing them to continue to run.

With the lowered threshold and penalties limiting what mass alphastrikes can do the DPS brawlers will find that niche again where they can dominate the close range over the PPC.


That and weapons need balancing back to where they match that dissipation rate somehow. As it is now its horrible.

[Khobai]

Lower threshold is stupid though. It kills alphastriking completely. Alphastriking is meant to be part of the game. It would not be Battletech without alphastriking. The problem isnt that alphastrikes are in the game, its that alphastrikes are more effective than they should be, due to the heat system punishing builds that dont alphastrike, as well as convergence rewarding high alphastrike builds by putting all their shots in the same location.

Best fix is a convergence fix followed by a balance pass on all weapons.

Edited by Khobai, 21 July 2013 - 04:25 PM.