15 replies to this topic

[Unbound Inferno]

Just a thought, maybe it has some merit.

We have Double Recharge (Double Damage & Double Heat) which led to us getting Double Armor.

So why not go with Half Damage and Half Heat? With Double Ammo or so...


The Heat Dissipation is set around 10 seconds, most recharges run under 5. If we just about Half Heat levels we'd be able to see a return of many DPS builds that just can't work now.

But that fear of Damage, right? Why not solve that with Half Damage.


If we cut the Damage down, we'd essentially double armor again. Mechs live longer, opening the paths of DPS Heat Neutral builds to come into play as a viable alternative to make it through a fight. High-Alpha Pinpoint Damage would be crushed as its effects of tearing off an arm easily is no longer doable. Would need to do a bit more than Double Ammo, but I think that's a small price to pay.

Right now Ammo's at 150%
Armor is 200%
Recharge is 200% (leading to double Damage outputs and Heat costs)

If we drop Damage to 50%, the Double Recharge means its just at normal damage for the cycle.
Double Armor if it stays would mean we need about 200% to 300% ammo from what we have now.
And Half Heat would let those DPS builds work again.


Key point: I don't mean for EVERYTHING. Some weapons need an adjusted cost in this screwy setup, so something like PPC heat should be high, but with Half Damage maybe that might become more manageable.

Edited by Unbound Inferno, 30 July 2013 - 08:06 AM.

[Nothing Whatsoever]

Well, its worth exploring.

And we can still dish out good damage even with a 50% reduction across the board as suggested. Ammo might need a slight buff, which is also fine with me.

[JokerVictor]

Unbound Inferno, on 30 July 2013 - 08:02 AM, said:

Just a thought, maybe it has some merit.

We have Double Recharge (Double Damage & Double Heat) which led to us getting Double Armor.

So why not go with Half Damage and Half Heat? With Double Ammo or so...


The Heat Dissipation is set around 10 seconds, most recharges run under 5. If we just about Half Heat levels we'd be able to see a return of many DPS builds that just can't work now.

But that fear of Damage, right? Why not solve that with Half Damage.


If we cut the Damage down, we'd essentially double armor again. Mechs live longer, opening the paths of DPS Heat Neutral builds to come into play as a viable alternative to make it through a fight. High-Alpha Pinpoint Damage would be crushed as its effects of tearing off an arm easily is no longer doable. Would need to do a bit more than Double Ammo, but I think that's a small price to pay.

Right now Ammo's at 150%
Armor is 200%
Recharge is 200% (leading to double Damage outputs and Heat costs)

If we drop Damage to 50%, the Double Recharge means its just at normal damage for the cycle.
Double Armor if it stays would mean we need about 200% to 300% ammo from what we have now.
And Half Heat would let those DPS builds work again.


Key point: I don't mean for EVERYTHING. Some weapons need an adjusted cost in this screwy setup, so something like PPC heat should be high, but with Half Damage maybe that might become more manageable.

A simple, viable solution.

It'll never happen.

[Unbound Inferno]

JokerVictor, on 30 July 2013 - 08:45 AM, said:

A simple, viable solution.

It'll never happen.

I can only wish for the day that isn't true.

[jakucha]

The game needs to find a balance between living longer than a few seconds and not living too long, so I don't think this solution falls in a good zone.

[Unbound Inferno]

jakucha, on 30 July 2013 - 08:56 AM, said:

The game needs to find a balance between living longer than a few seconds and not living too long, so I don't think this solution falls in a good zone.

Doesn't have to be absolutes.

It could be just "Reduced Damage" and "Less Heat Costs" to achieve the results that place it where its living longer, but not too long...

[Poisonblack]

It's kind of what I hoped the elo rating stuff would involve for new players coming into the game, so at the noob end of the scale things were lower dmg/more forgiving and people couldn't insta-pop regardless of fotm monster loadout they were thrown up against.

By the time your rating improved the damage would've scaled up to make everything hurt more but you'd have a clue about how to defend against it.

[Team Leader]

Id rather just have Bills convergence fix implemented along with some of the Lowtax DPS builds+Higher internals health ideology. That would be the best solution for this game IMO even if it wouldnt be the easiest. Sometimes its worth doing things the hard way to get it right rather than the current PGI way of band aid after band aid

[Unbound Inferno]

Poisonblack, on 30 July 2013 - 01:13 PM, said:

It's kind of what I hoped the elo rating stuff would involve for new players coming into the game, so at the noob end of the scale things were lower dmg/more forgiving and people couldn't insta-pop regardless of fotm monster loadout they were thrown up against.

By the time your rating improved the damage would've scaled up to make everything hurt more but you'd have a clue about how to defend against it.

There's a similar idea that floated around in other MMOs through their levels.

As you "level up" you become more powerful, and the levels help determine who belongs in what bracket. Different skills, abilities and powers are available making the game more complex, or more skill oriented as they say.

Really the higher you go the faster the game is decided, making it into the usual rushed pace.


What we have in MW:O is everyone stepping in at maxed levels and rushing to PvP with most of them not having a clue how to move.

Team Leader, on 30 July 2013 - 01:48 PM, said:

Id rather just have Bills convergence fix implemented along with some of the Lowtax DPS builds+Higher internals health ideology. That would be the best solution for this game IMO even if it wouldnt be the easiest. Sometimes its worth doing things the hard way to get it right rather than the current PGI way of band aid after band aid

While I think Homless Bill's idea has merit, I think its complexity is... a bit beyond PGI's ability to do well.

Until they own up and actually try and fix obvious errant issues (such as the double heat double recharge caused and how ti killed DPS builds) we'll likely never see them make an honest fix that's really that good over these perpetual band-****.

Edited by Unbound Inferno, 30 July 2013 - 01:54 PM.

[zorak ramone]

Unbound Inferno, on 30 July 2013 - 08:02 AM, said:

Just a thought, maybe it has some merit.

We have Double Recharge (Double Damage & Double Heat) which led to us getting Double Armor.

So why not go with Half Damage and Half Heat? With Double Ammo or so...


The Heat Dissipation is set around 10 seconds, most recharges run under 5. If we just about Half Heat levels we'd be able to see a return of many DPS builds that just can't work now.

You're observation is correct. I made the same observation back in closed beta (last July, IIRC!). I made the same suggestion: double HS draining rate (equivalent to halving heat) and double ammo, and was laughed down.

However, you don't need to half damage. As you note, double recycle = double damage. The doubling or armor essentially halves damage again.

Preemptive rebuttal: "bbbubububu HEAT NEUTRALITY!?!" So what? 2xGR builds are already heat neutral, and they're not dominating the far from heat neutral 2xERPPC/GR or (before today's patch) 2xERPPC/2xPPC builds. The problem with the alpha-sniper meta is lack of regulation of the amount of accurate damage you can place into a single panel in a single trigger pull.

This has nothing to do with heat neutrality, but for DPS builds, many of which, as you point out, are nerfed, this is a big deal.

Edited by zorak ramone, 30 July 2013 - 02:00 PM.

[Unbound Inferno]

Very true.

I suppose we could go with another double armor for those wanting to keep MWO damage numbers (I mean think of the ppl that won't run an AC-20 that deals 10 damage)

But I think its a better alternative. The Mechbay is crap, and needing to click a few dozen more points cause we lack a "max armor" option could get really annoying.

[zorak ramone]

Unbound Inferno, on 30 July 2013 - 02:05 PM, said:

Very true.

I suppose we could go with another double armor for those wanting to keep MWO damage numbers (I mean think of the ppl that won't run an AC-20 that deals 10 damage)

Halving damage across the board would probably shift the meta even more toward assaults. The more damage it takes to kill something, the move valuable big damage/DPS mechs become. This is probably generalizable any FPS or FPS-like game. Imagine TF2 if all weapon damage was halved. I doubt anyone would use anything other than the Heavy, Soldier and Demo.

Quote

But I think its a better alternative. The Mechbay is crap, and needing to click a few dozen more points cause we lack a "max armor" option could get really annoying.

There is no way PGI's programers are so bad that they can't add a "max armor" and "strip armor" button. I mean this is basic stuff here.

[Nothing Whatsoever]

zorak ramone, on 31 July 2013 - 06:31 AM, said:

Halving damage across the board would probably shift the meta even more toward assaults. The more damage it takes to kill something, the move valuable big damage/DPS mechs become. This is probably generalizable any FPS or FPS-like game. Imagine TF2 if all weapon damage was halved. I doubt anyone would use anything other than the Heavy, Soldier and Demo.

I disagree, if anything, it would extend fights out slightly (and likely require more ammo, but maybe not too much). I mean we can deal a lot of accurate damage right now in a very, very short period of time as it is; and within 20 seconds there are builds that can still pump out a lot of damage even at a 50% reduction.

For example, a single mech, only using a Gauss Rifle and two PPCs can still do 70 damage in 16 seconds with the 50% reduction in place; compared to the current 140 damage in 16 seconds that that weapon combo currently can output, (granted if all shots hit the enemy).

Now have at least two mechs with that loadout working together and you can see how damage can go through the proverbial roof in certain matches.

I've been in matches that barely lasted a total of 3 to 4 minutes from how fast mechs can be taken down (on a bigger map, like Tourmaline, for example, a match seems to take longer but that is due to the time it takes to meet the enemy in the first place).

With a 50% damage reduction, I guess that change could add a few minutes to the average match?

[zorak ramone]

Praetor Shepard, on 31 July 2013 - 07:00 AM, said:

I've been in matches that barely lasted a total of 3 to 4 minutes from how fast mechs can be taken down (on a bigger map, like Tourmaline, for example, a match seems to take longer but that is due to the time it takes to meet the enemy in the first place).

With a 50% damage reduction, I guess that change could add a few minutes to the average match?

Well, I guess it all comes down to how long you think a match should run. I don't think there's necessarily a right answer to this (aside from obvious extremes like 1 minute, every mech dies in one shot instagib mode, and 3 hour, it takes 10 minutes to kill a mech marathons). Personally, I'm ok with match length as it is right now: 5-10 minutes is a reasonable block of time to devote to a game that you can't really pause or take a break from.

Tweaking the heat scale so that heat-neutral mechs were more feasible would probably shorten matches because it would make infighters more viable, but I don't think it would be too big of a change. It probably wouldn't affect the sniping game much (as evidenced by the 2xGR vs 2xERPPC/GR example), which is currently where most of the kills/damage comes from.

If you want to look at CBT as an example, and if you count a CBT "game" as the point in a MWO match where the mechs make contact, then MWO games are already much longer than CBT games. In CBT, a 4v4 to 8v8 game usually takes about 15 turns (IIRC). 15 turns represents 150 seconds, which is 2.5 minutes.

[Nothing Whatsoever]

zorak ramone, on 31 July 2013 - 07:46 AM, said:

Well, I guess it all comes down to how long you think a match should run. I don't think there's necessarily a right answer to this (aside from obvious extremes like 1 minute, every mech dies in one shot instagib mode, and 3 hour, it takes 10 minutes to kill a mech marathons). Personally, I'm ok with match length as it is right now: 5-10 minutes is a reasonable block of time to devote to a game that you can't really pause or take a break from.

Tweaking the heat scale so that heat-neutral mechs were more feasible would probably shorten matches because it would make infighters more viable, but I don't think it would be too big of a change. It probably wouldn't affect the sniping game much (as evidenced by the 2xGR vs 2xERPPC/GR example), which is currently where most of the kills/damage comes from.

If you want to look at CBT as an example, and if you count a CBT "game" as the point in a MWO match where the mechs make contact, then MWO games are already much longer than CBT games. In CBT, a 4v4 to 8v8 game usually takes about 15 turns (IIRC). 15 turns represents 150 seconds, which is 2.5 minutes.

If matches stay near an average of 5 to 10 min, that should be fine; the key for me is that matches are fun, challenging and as fair as possible for any playstyle and mech class.

Coordination and focus fire should remain important factors, but right now mediums tend to be at a disadvantage on average and DPS builds can struggle against sniper teams. And being in a light one would have to play a perfect game to compete, since one lucky shot will either kill you or send something to red on your mech.

So aiming skill should not be penalized, but being able to apply 30+ damage at a time can also be overwhelming at the same time.

I didn't know that that was the average length in CBT, certainly much I don't know first hand about the TT game.

[Sable]

I support the OP. Although i like the nice round damage numbers they use now for my own calculations... they would either need to raise armor and internal structure or lower dps. And they already raised armor values once so why not lower dps?