242 replies to this topic

[BoPop]

Victor Morson, on 26 July 2013 - 12:10 PM, said:

opinion is not a good way to base what is good and what is not,

you said it. not me. and that's why i disagree with your opinion on point 1 and probably would nevar, evar, nevar, evar refer anyone to this post (it's not a 'guide' really) i would NEVER do it, ever, never. ever, never.

and never.

[Void Angel]

Royalewithcheese, on 26 July 2013 - 04:27 PM, said:

In a brawl, alpha still matters. You can't rely on the ability to constantly point your guns at the opponent - if they know what they're doing, they'll be torso twisting and using terrain, and if you know what you're doing, you'll be torso twisting as well. I'd rather take an AC/20 over both of those, but Gauss is decent close-range. One thing you'll never see in the right torso of my fatlas is two AC/5, though. UAC/5, maybe, because at that point the DPS starts getting high enough to override the inherent problems with DPS in this game.

Of COURSE it matters, as I have repeatedly emphasized! But it's not the ONLY thing that matters: as I've pointed out already in the post you are quoting, you can't stop a smart user from smashing your legs - and the AC/5s brawling power is such that the superior alpha damage of the Gauss isn't enough to compete.

As I also pointed out in that same post, you cannot evaluate weapons outside of their intended use - and that includes the other weapons in your loadout. Of course the Gauss or AC/20 will be more attractive in an Atlas; it has too few hardpoints and too much tonnage for you to screw around with smaller weapons, for one thing. But ask yourself this: which one is more attractive? Doesn't it depend on your remaining weapon loadout? Another consideration is, again, the locations of your hardpoints. If you've only got hardpoints for one or two ballistic weapons, it's probably best to go with one big weapon in that slot, and fill out your other hardpoints with supporting arms. If, on the other hand, you are the Cataphract 4X, and have four hardpoints on the arms, the AC/5 recommends itself well - particularly in conjunction with the UAC/5.

Weapon selection is always situational - in some cases (including, as I mentioned, the Flamer, and the AC/10) the weapon underperforms to the degree that using it is nearly always a Bad Idea. Other weapons are situationally powerful, but their drawbacks discourage their use as the sole armament on a 'Mech. The UAC/5 comes to mind here - great in conjunction with other weapons (and you should really try two UAC/5s, two LLasers, and SRMS on your Atlas) but too prone to jam if you maximize their DPS.

Edited by Void Angel, 26 July 2013 - 05:29 PM.

[Void Angel]

BoPop, on 26 July 2013 - 05:16 PM, said:

you said it. not me. and that's why i disagree with your opinion on point 1 and probably would nevar, evar, nevar, evar refer anyone to this post (it's not a 'guide' really) i would NEVER do it, ever, never. ever, never.

and never.

"Everyone is entitled to their own opinion. They are not entitled to their own facts."

[Royalewithcheese]

Void Angel, on 26 July 2013 - 05:24 PM, said:

Of course the Gauss or AC/20 will be more attractive in an Atlas; it has too few hardpoints and too much tonnage for you to screw around with smaller weapons, for one thing.\

Hold up a sec - let's examine this. Why don't I have 2 AC/5 in my ballistic slots?

• Instead of them being too small, they're actually too heavy relative to what I get out of them. 16 tons + whatever I'm spending on ammo for a pair of fast-firing weapons is actually a serious build investment. I'm using 20%+ of my robot to run two AC/5.
  
• DPS is weak in a brawl. On paper, two of those things gives me 6-7 DPS. In practice, it's a lot more feasible to get a clean shot every 4 seconds than it is to get one every 1.5 seconds in a brawl.

Void Angel, on 26 July 2013 - 05:24 PM, said:

If, on the other hand, you are the Cataphract 4X,

Same issue for the Cataphract. 32 tons (plus ammo, over 50% of the robot!) is just not worth it for a weak DPS weapon. Of course, the 4X is a weak variant in general, but even on the Ilya or a Jager you've got better stuff to do with your tons and/or ballistic slots.

Void Angel, on 26 July 2013 - 05:24 PM, said:

(and you should really try two UAC/5s, two LLasers, and SRMS on your Atlas)

This is not far off from what I'm running on my Atlas right now. The UAC/5 and the SRM6 have something in common - spread and DPS are both weak weapon types, but the particular weapons in question are so damaging that they justify their tonnage.

[Bloodweaver]

zraven7, on 26 July 2013 - 12:15 PM, said:

That said, the 10X geting some kind of a buff, like a cooldown reduction, would make a lot of sense.

The best thing they could for the LB 10-X is to re-design it as a flak cannon instead of a shotgun. I.e., the shell's spread doesn't change much regardless of the distance it travels, since it doesn't fragment until within the vicinity of the target. Pretty sure this is the way it was meant to operate in table-top, and it's the only thing that makes sense considering it's supposed to have a better range than the standard AC/10.

[Erata]

Good general advice. It's a shame that it takes so long to explain why the weapons listed in the Original Post are bad.

The most basic way to explain why they are could be that
1: They're not the most flexible choices... Pulse weapons reduced range makes them bad weapons for a new player to use because it forces them into closer-range confrontations and presents them to higher risk situations that they may not be able to read or retreat from.
2: The weapon is just bad in the terms of the current state of game. Patches may changes this in the future of course... The current state of play favors weaponry that can land their entire stated damage on a single component. LBX-10s are not good because their damage is too low due to spreading each pellet across a different component. Their actual optimal range is much lower, similarly to SRMs.
3: The weapon is currently bugged: SRMs are still somewhat risky to take because hit detection sometimes causes missiles to do lower damage than they should be doing. The recent buff to SRMs makes them more viable, but due to bugginess, can go either way for you.

4: There are always build exceptions that cause favorable weapons to be chosen due to restrictions.
The CTF-4X is a great example of a robot restricted to less than favorable options. If it could run dual gauss, I'd run dual gauss over 4x AC5/s.

--Why burst/accurate damage is important: It enables the pilot to rotate their torso after firing, causing their opponent to be at risk of spreading return-fire damage across multiple components. The game continues to favor builds that can strike the CT and cut the engine out to kill quickly.

That's it really. There's no need to be snide in response to a list that is honestly just trying to save players the pain of spending big bucks on the LBX 10 when, in the current state of the game, is not worth its tonnage or its excessive Cbill price.
The tone of the OP is taken constantly out of context when all he is trying to do is present a case for newer players and set general guidelines.

Annnnd finally remember: If you play in a group with voice comms, you can make a lot of fun builds work and be called trolls for running flamer-centric builds with your friends, but don't forget that a coordinated team of optimized robots are more likely to win.
Winning is fun, too, and by optimizing your robots, you enable your team to begin getting more money, and be able to buy new robots in future updates as you pad your Cbill coffers.

Edited by Erata, 27 July 2013 - 12:02 AM.

[Void Angel]

The AC/5 has a higher dps/ton than either the AC/20 or the Gauss Rifle - they don't have the same alpha/ton, as you've noted, but that's really not the reason I wouldn't put them into my Atlas (nor are they going to be over 20% of your tonnage; more like 18% - the lower fire rate doesn't eat ammo like the UAC or AC/2.) I do have to apologize at this point for being unclear to the point of innaccuracy on that point, so let me take a page from your format and elucidate myself more clearly. =)

The reason I don't have a brace of AC/5s in my Atlas is:

• My Atlas is a dedicated, direct-combat tower of awesomeness - I don't need sustained, heat-and-ammo efficient damage, I need raw smashing power. The likelyhood that I'm going to be fighting just one guy is minimal, so I need to stomp some poor heavy flat and survive to either back off and let a teammate take the heat, or hopefully cripple another couple-seven goombahs before they drag me down. The AC/5 can beat a Gauss Rifle in a brawl, but it's too "small" for its DPS to offset the armor penetration of the AC/20 (this is more what I was trying to say above,) and doesn't creat the kind of gaping armor wounds that will be most beneficial to my team in the sad event that they have to carry on without me.
  
• Similarly, AC/5s are all-around weapons, and sadly, that kind of generalist equipment doesn't (perhaps ironically) benefit you as much if you have several weapon types available to make up for weaknesses - consider the ERPPC-sniping Stalker who can also slap you in the face with a cloud of SRMs.
  
• As long as I'm not crippled when it jams, an UAC/5 does the whole "smashing power" thing I mentioned much better than an AC/5. Thus, the UAC/5 is a better supporting weapon than the AC/5, since I have other significant armaments available during jams.

Remember, I wasn't arguing with the OP about how AC/5s are the bestest weapon since sliced bread - in point of fact I rarely use them. I was disputing a factually innacurate objection he raised to another poster, saying that using AC/5s instead of a Gauss Rifle was always foolish - in part because he claimed the AC/5 was a high heat weapon. This claim was wrong mathematically and tactically - you're responding to my response to that.


There are a few builds where the AC/5 is a solid choice - I keep on bringing up the Cataphract because it is the poster child for such a case. A dual-gauss build may satisfy the SniparWarriors, but it's an inferior direct-combat build. The Gauss will indeed put 30 points of damage on the same point every 4 seconds, but the UAC will pick up the slack and more (plus the opening salvo of double-fired UAC rounds can easily hit the same location as the rest of the volley.)

Edited by Void Angel, 27 July 2013 - 12:25 AM.

[MustrumRidcully]

To figure out the value of DPS vs alpha, consider this:

An Atlas can have up to 124 CT armour and has 62 internal armour on the CT. Total Damage needed to kill: 186, more likely 166 since the CT armor must be split between front and rear and I figure 20 points is a typical investment.
A Catapult has 84 CT armour and 42 internal, total damage needed to kill: 126 or maybe 111 (similar armour split as Atlas).

This gives us two damage figures we need to reach.

How long would it take your build to deal that amount of damage? COnsider that you're using a suite of weapons, not a single weapon.
Let's say you want to compare a Dual Gauss Cataphract 4X vs a Quad AC/5 Cataphract 4X.
The Gauss version needs to fire about 4 salvos to kill the Catapult and 6 to kill the Atlas. It can have done this after 12 respectively 20 seconds. (Firing at 0, 4, 8, 12, 16 and 20 seconds).
The AC/5 version needs to fire about 5 salvos to deliver the damage to kill the Catapult and 9 salvos for the Atlas.
That's 6 seconds respectively 12 seconds.

Now, this doesn't sound bad for the Quad AC/5 mech. He's done 6 to 8 seconds faster. But there are some more things to consider.
The Gauss Version of the mech needs more time, but it also has 4 second pauses between each shot. That is time that can be spend for maneuvering and torso twisting.
The AC/5 version needs to face the enemy every 1.5 seconds. That doesn't leave much time for twisting. And he has to land more shots in a shorter time - which introduces more error. So if these two Cataphracts face a Catapult or an Atlas, the AC/5 Cataphract might take a lot more damage to the face then the other one.

If both variants use excessive sniper tactics, and don't just spend their cycle time but extended periods in cover, then the cycle time difference might vanish entirely, and it's really only alpha damage.

The challenge is figuring out this error. I leave this as an exercise to the reader. Try it out, run statistical analysis on your results, and then come back. I know that I did extremely well in my AC/40 Jagermech (at least before the heat nerf and the SRM buff - the buff to SRMs prompted me to run my Atlas again) thanks to all the time I could spend torso-twisting between alphas. ANd I am not even a good shot, I manage to miss an enemy at 200m range twice in row, each time shooting over their head. *sigh*

Fire and Salt, on 26 July 2013 - 02:45 PM, said:

Mr. Morson, can you please refute my arguments, I am feeling left out...

I believe he is currently... unable to reply.

[Void Angel]

Is that like "the master is indisposed at the present, sah. If sah would call again, perhaps in three to five years?"

[Void Angel]

On the subject of error, the AC/5 setup (and recall, this is just an example for comparison with the Gauss) is actually more forgiving, because each individual error represents a much smaller loss in actual DPS. Two pilots of hypothetically equal skill can be expected to miss the same percentage of their shots. But when statistical clumping happens, and you miss two in a row - well, that hurts the slower weapon a lot more.

Even considering the torso twisting advantage, the AC/5 'mech has an advantage, because he is doing almost double the dps for nearly the same tonnage. That's a big advantage - and you can completely negate the twisting question by simply blasting apart a leg so the Gauss user can't maneuver. Certainly, you can put more on a leg than a torso - but who does? Under nearly all circumstances, it's far more efficient to destroy a torso than a leg, and their armor priority reflects this. Even if the enemy has maxxed leg armor, the dps advantage is still enough to cripple a leg before the enemy achieves armor strikethrough - and then you have the advantage of mobility. Running the numbers, time to kill for a Cataphract with 70 CT armor on the front (total with structure is 92 points) would be 12 seconds; smashing both legs would take 10.5. It's close; if anyone misses a significant amount (see first paragraph) they're gonna lose - but the advantage is still to the AC/5s.

To reiterate, I don't think that quad AC/5s are a good build - you'd want to use a pair of UAC/5s if you went that route with the 4X. Further, the AC/5 isn't really a brawling weapon - it excels at sustained, midrange combat. Brawler support, if you will. My sole point in comparing the Gauss Rifle to its rough tonnage equivalency in AC/5s is to point out that a Gauss Rifle is not always superior to the AC/5 under normal circumstances.

Edited by Void Angel, 27 July 2013 - 10:35 AM.

[1453 R]

Yes, Victor is coming across as something of a colossal douchenozzle here. I don't know if he is a colossal douchenozzle (personally, I don't doubt it), but that's kind of immaterial to the discussion at hand. There are weapons in the game that need help, there are chassis in the game that need help. The heatscale system was, and is, highly questionable, I didn't even bother to read the Maths post after a certain point - and I'm a damned electronics technician, numbers don't normally turn into pasta in front of me - and as much as I just flat adore the LBX/10, as much as I feel the spread adjustments have helped it, it's just not in a good place right now. Neither are Streaks, neither is the AC/10 (which stinks hard because the AC/10 is a classic general-purpose weapon we're sorely missing), neither is the Flamer. Machine guns are better but not good, and won't be good until/unless we get arrays given the hardpoint limitations currently in place. Since they're, y'know, meant as antivehicle/antipersonnel weapons in a game with neither vehicles nor personnel in it.

Large lasers can still do the job for most of us, but don't act like the heatscale thing didn't hurt them.. ER large lasers have always been a choice made solely because one has a surfeit of heat efficiency, which is a thing that happens on Spiders and basically not much else. Pulse lasers need to have halved beam duration, not three-quarters beam duration, and have a shorter cycle time over standard lasers to boot, as a start, if PGI wants them to be good without stripping them entirely and starting over.

I actually agree with Void where the AC/5 is concerned - I do not want to see them on friendly Atlases or Highlanders, but I've been doing surprisingly well with them on lighter chassis that aren't generally meant to stand in the brawl anyways. The AC/20 in my VTR-9B is a lot better than a pair of AC/5s would be for that 'Mech, but I've found that a pair of AC/5s in my Dragon Slayer isn't so much worse than its normal Gauss Rifle as just different. Different role, different fighting style, but not a worse one in my experience. Certainly I'm a scrub player in a scrub 'Mech and doubtlessly will be told to go play in my corner like a good little kiddie, but if the good Mr. Morson can express an opinion based on his experiences, then I can opt to do so as well.

That said...

Victor, buddy, guy...you need to be a lot less aggressive and fatalistic over this if you want people to pay attention instead of knee-jerk. Telling people "These four guns, out of all the dozens of weapons in the game, are the ONLY things that are good, and if you use anything but these EVER you're a bad person in a bad robot and you should feel bad" is a great way to get them to call you out on it. Demanding that ever new player in the game do nothing at all but pilot HGN-732s with ALL the alpha weapons(!!) doesn't actually make you look like you're looking out for the new guy. It sorta makes you look like a colossal douchenozzle.

You can argue that you'd love a more balanced gamescape all you want, but the fact of the matter is that actions speak louder than words, and the actions of the high-Elo players who all pilot the same HGN-732 say that they're perfectly fine with the way the game currently stands. PGI doesn't actually have to balance things for you guys, since you'll never stoop so low as to use something that isn't balanced against the top anyways. You'll use whatever wins, whatever that is, play games against other people doing the same thing, and generally only care when and where it isn't important. You have your good 'Mechs, Victor, your 'Mechs that win you games...but when was the last time you piloted your favorite 'Mech? When was the last time you took out a 'Mech with an LBX autocannon on it, just because you love the LBX and you want to use it and to hell with the numbers, eh?

You just.

Don't.

Care.

That's the impression a lot of us dumb lowbies you don't really talk to or care about have of much of the higher-level playerbase. It's one of the reasons the Community Town Hall was as alarming to me as it was exciting - your proposed solutions for a lot of the game's problems are actively harmful for a lot of us regular Joes and Janes. We're out there struggling with our subpar equipment in our subpar 'Mechs because we like that equipment, we like those 'Mechs, and we refuse to let the game beat us before our opponents even get a chance to. Call us idealistic. Call us naive. Call us !diots, or even worse. But don't you ever forget that we pay for this game just as much as you do, we fill out a whole lot more games than you do, and we deserve our fun every bit as much as the top-tier Leagueians do.

And you threaten to take it away from us only at your own peril.

[Royalewithcheese]

1435 R, you know those non-optimal weapons and mechs you like? Your average upper-tier player *wants to make them more powerful.* Threads like this are not about making folks feel bad for having a sub-optimal robot, they're for steering new players towards optimal robots until they know what they're getting into when they make a pulse laser Dragon or an AC/2 Jagermech. Game is hard enough to be a beginner in to begin with, the least folks who are experienced can do is steer new players towards strong builds.

[1453 R]

I dunno, man. Victor's OP did a pretty good job of making his opinion of people who use that stuff pretty clear.

Like I said, Royale. The upper-crust Elites can say they want buffs all they like. They can come up with intricate fixes for them all they want, and often do. Some of them will even go so far as to conduct serious testing with existing numbers, which is damn cool of them and deserves all the kudos it gets. But when it comes down to crunch time, those players will simply accept that Awesomes are terrible and that nobody loves the LBX. They will accept it, they will move on, and they will yell at us for not doing the same as they did and giving up our favorites for their winners.

Actions and words, Royale. Their actions send a whole different message than their words, man. I agree with their words a hundred percent. I hate their actions, especially the casual indifference, and even sometimes brutality, they exhibit towards newer or less-skilled players. The fact that, often as not, they don't even realize they're being destructive makes it worse, not better.

Prime example: one of the more popular solutions for the problem of the New Player Experience in the Community Town Hall with the presenters who actually got to have opinions was to put up some sort of official mechanism for funneling new players into established units and clans, for the purposes of letting those clans worry about training their own raw recruits. A great step and a wonderful idea, right?

No.

Neither of those.

In fact, I hate the idea with a ferocious passion.

So...you upper-crusters are saying that Piranha's off the hook for tutorials and training? That they don't need to revise their legendarily junky approach to telling players how this game works, because the ideal solution is to force new players into clans? Where they can, in fact...learn to be somebody's b****? Are we saying that if a new player doesn't join a clan, then proceed to play when and how that clan tells them, buying what they're told to buy, playing what they're told to play, and to hell with their own preferences, their own schedules, their own anything, they can get tossed out of said clan and just left high and dry, with no instruction or assistance at all?

Yeah. You can take that idea, smear it all over your lips, and kiss every last millimeter of my keister with it, guys.

Telling new players "This is how things are. Cope or Gee Tee Eff Oh" is not helpful. The only time it is, is when the new player in question wishes to be a competitive E-sportsman more than he wishes to have fun playing MWO. In which case, he should go and learn to play Starcraft or League of Legends instead.

Edit: Piranha. For Bob's sake, relax your cuss filters a little bit...@_@

Edited by 1453 R, 28 July 2013 - 10:27 AM.

[Roland]

Why do you expect people to use terrible weapons, rather than demand those weapons be made non terrible?

[1453 R]

See, there you go again.

I want these bad weapons to be good. In the case of the LBX, I want it badly enough that it aches sometimes to remember how much raw fun I had with my Flame back in the day when I ran the LBX/SRM variant instead of the Gauss. I am just as much in favor of proper weapon balancing as any top two percent Elite Leagueian. Honestly, probably more so since I'm also an old MechWarrior hand and a huge old-timey (I.e. pre-Jihad. **** that ****) lore buff who wants this game to play like a fight out of the old books with dozens of different weapons on the field and no place to shore up and be safe.

The difference, Roland, is not that I want weapon balancing any less than sync-dropping, pub-hating Leagueians do. The difference is that I am unwilling to compromise my own fun while waiting/clamoring for that balancing. I know for a fact that I am a terrible Highlander pilot. The Victor is almost too slow and ponderous for me*, and it's a 'Mech noted for its speed and agility for its class. I'm not the sort of pilot who could tolerate being a giant, immobile gun battery of a Stalker, or a slightly-less-Fatlas with more PPCs than common sense. I am a strike pilot - I hate being shot, I value mobility and positioning more than raw endurance, and I prefer to come to grips with my foe in the medium to short range basket rather than poking at him from 800+ meters for half an hour. I am a bad Highlander pilot. I'm a worse Stalker pilot, I would be an equally bad Cataphract pilot. I like Dragons, Cicadas, Quickdraws, Victors - strikery 'Mechs with strikery armaments. I'll dip down into Ravens and Jenners when I'm feeling twitchery than usual, but I can't tolerate the sorts of 'Mechs which, according to Victor and the OP, are the only ones which people who don't need to feel terrible about themselves pilot.

And, of course, I'm a solo dropper who occasionally plays with a couple of buddies, rather than some unnoticed, largely unwanted cog in some Leagueian's pet noob corral. I'm not here to make some puffed-up e-sportsman jackass feel better about himself for the fifteen minutes a week he spends pretending to 'Educate the Newbs(!)", I'm here to play MechWarrior and enjoy doing it. If that means I'm relegated to a lower Elo tier because the stuff I like and the way I fight isn't very good, then so be it. I will accept that as the price of doing what I want in MWO - namely, having fun - until the day Piranha gets their **** together.

Just as you guys accept playing junk you openly admit you hate playing as the price of doing what you want in MWO - namely, winning - until the day Piranha gets their **** together.

The only real issue is that one of us would prefer the other didn't exist, and that's the sort of thing I feel needs to stop, and the sort of message Victor's pushing here.

*Technically, my Victors are too slow and ponderous for me right now. With a 350XL and no elite efficiencies, the things feel clumsy in close fights and move about ten klicks slower than is really tolerable on most maps. Oh well - they'll get there in time, and I'll appreciate it all the more for having suffered with 71 kph on the way.

Edited by 1453 R, 28 July 2013 - 12:15 PM.

[Royalewithcheese]

1453 R, on 28 July 2013 - 12:11 PM, said:

Just as you guys accept playing junk you openly admit you hate playing as the price of doing what you want in MWO - namely, winning - until the day Piranha gets their **** together.

The only real issue is that one of us would prefer the other didn't exist, and that's the sort of thing I feel needs to stop, and the sort of message Victor's pushing here.

You are free to make pulse laser Pretty Babies all day. Someone apparently even won the Assault v. World tournament with one. But you know what you're getting into when you make sub-optimal robots, and new players don't. This game already has a brutal learning curve, and it's great that the community is transparent about what works and what doesn't.

[1453 R]

Come on, Royale!

You're honestly telling me that you don't see a difference between informing new players of the current state of affairs with "Heya! How ya doing? I have to say that this gun you're using isn't generally very good, for these reasons." and Victor's little "THESE GUNS ARE BAD. IF YOU USE THEM YOUR ROBOT IS BAD. IF YOUR ROBOT IS BAD, YOU ARE BAD. IF YOU ARE BAD, YOU SHOULD FEEL BAD, AND ALSO GET THE HELL OFF MY TEAM." tirade in the opening post here?

I'm not arguing the information. I'm arguing the presentation and mindset of these Elites who insist on being brutal, unforgiving ******** in a game which is already brutal and unforgiving enough as it is. We've all been there, we all remember how hard this game is to pick up on. Why do folks like you have to make it even harder?

[Varrin Coursca]

NRP, on 25 July 2013 - 09:05 PM, said:

Congrats whiners! Keep it up! Before long, every weapon will suck. Then you can run around in your MG + Flamer frankenmech pretty much unmolested.

If every weapon were to equally suck in some give-or-take way, the game would actually be balanced at that point.

[Royalewithcheese]

1453 R, on 28 July 2013 - 12:32 PM, said:

I'm not arguing the information. I'm arguing the presentation and mindset of these Elites who insist on being brutal, unforgiving ******** in a game which is already brutal and unforgiving enough as it is. We've all been there, we all remember how hard this game is to pick up on. Why do folks like you have to make it even harder?

I dunno, I found this sort of guide very helpful starting out. I try not to be too thin-skinned over what sort of laser I put on my robot in a video game.

Edited by Royalewithcheese, 28 July 2013 - 12:49 PM.

[Roland]

Quote

The only real issue is that one of us would prefer the other didn't exist, and that's the sort of thing I feel needs to stop, and the sort of message Victor's pushing here.

I don't think Victor said anything to suggest that he thought new players shouldn't exist, or that bad weapons shouldn't exist. Rather, he's pointing out the bad weapons to new players, so that they don't pick them up and then, when they get crushed, blame it on something other than poor weapons balance.

1453 R, on 28 July 2013 - 12:32 PM, said:

Come on, Royale!

You're honestly telling me that you don't see a difference between informing new players of the current state of affairs with "Heya! How ya doing? I have to say that this gun you're using isn't generally very good, for these reasons." and Victor's little "THESE GUNS ARE BAD. IF YOU USE THEM YOUR ROBOT IS BAD. IF YOUR ROBOT IS BAD, YOU ARE BAD. IF YOU ARE BAD, YOU SHOULD FEEL BAD, AND ALSO GET THE HELL OFF MY TEAM." tirade in the opening post here?

Dude, you are imagining things here. There is nothing in Vic's original post which suggests any of that. He points out bad weapons. He didn't make moral judgements regarding the players who don't know any better than to bring those weapons. He doesn't actually make any comments regarding players at all in that post.