483 replies to this topic

[Victor Morson]

ENS Puskin, on 14 August 2013 - 02:56 PM, said:

I've played also some previous Mechwarrior games but have never seen duration on PPC. I do not like this idea, some things should stay as they are, classics should remain classics.

I would be OK if the PPC was an actual lightning bolt that fired semi-erratically around the target zone or something, because that would be way more consistent (and freaking cool looking) with how they're always described. i.e. actual lightning pouring out of a gun, arcing everywhere, and impacting where the crosshairs are.

That said I highly doubt they're building the PPC like this, so yeah, duration would be awful with the current model of PPC.

Edited by Victor Morson, 14 August 2013 - 04:32 PM.

[Monsoon]

Arrachtas, on 14 August 2013 - 01:49 AM, said:

It's statistics that in any MMO, the forums are indeed a vocal minority; the game has had over one million registered accounts. Even if only a fraction of those ever played the game, and a fraction of that fraction is still around... how many people are posting here? How many have truly good ideas? How many are just ranting and foaming at the mouth? These are not just rhetorical questions, they are fair ones.

This game is PGI's livelihood; for us, it's for fun. For them, it's about putting food on the table and paying a mortgage. The suggestion that they don't care about the game or what people think is therefore absolutely incredible. PGI not implementing what a certain forum demographic argues is the right idea (until they are blue in the face) does not mean that they are not reading and understanding what is being said; they are electing to do something else. Yes, we can disagree with what they do, have every right to do so, and should do so if we disagree, but is it not also, perhaps, just slightly arrogant for a niche of forum-goers to presume that they always know best? We don't have access to even 1/100th of the statistics and data that PGI does; all we have is play experience. They have play experience AND statistics. Who is therefore the more informed party?

We should be critical. We should seek to propose solutions, or critique ideas we don't like. The suggestions that PGI 'doesn't care' are rubbish, though. No game developer 'doesn't care'. At the end of our day, we can take our money elsewhere. At the end of their day, they either can pay their bills or they can't. Who do you think is more invested?

Watch out, you'll be called a 'White Knight' with that kind of reasoned post!

[DirePhoenix]

Lusankya, on 14 August 2013 - 01:22 PM, said:

Could they not just make the PPC a duration weapon like the lasers are?

ENS Puskin, on 14 August 2013 - 02:33 PM, said:

Duration on PPC? Come on.

Here is what you could do to de-synchronize PPCs from Gauss Rifles and/or other high-burst DPS weapons:

First yes, make it work like lasers (wait, let me explain):
- EXCEPT: Do Not split up the damage like lasers do, keep the damage in one shot, as PPCs should be.

How do you do that?

Make PPCs a "charge" weapon, where it has to build up a charge. The player squeezes the trigger, and a guiding laser activates. <lorefluff>This "guiding laser" or "pilot laser" super-heats a channel of air for the charged particles to follow</lorefluff> The guiding/pilot laser does no damage itself. Consider it like TAG except not tied into missile targeting. Just a laser pointer. Give the PPC say, a 1-second charge time (the duration of a Large Laser burn). On each "tick" the PPC barrel grows brighter until the final tick where the PPC discharges, and a bolt of lightning extends the length of the pilot laser.

No "projectile", just a beam of lightning on that last tick of the laser (a lightning bolt is not a "bullet"). On that last tick is where all the damage is done.

The pilot laser is visible (just like the TAG laser), so the target has some warning that a giant lightning bolt is about to strike (if they're not already looking at the PPC barrels getting brighter)

Viola! The PPC is now a unique weapon that still does all of its damage in one shot, but is de-synced from any other weapon type in the group because of the way it fires.

(Bonus Points if you can add in a Ghostbuster's Proton Pack charging sound before it discharges)

Edited by DirePhoenix, 14 August 2013 - 05:22 PM.

[Zuesacoatl]

I will give this community one thing, we have a very vocal minority. It is irrating to see all the whining going on over a game that is being developed and giving to you for free. They are not forcing your hand to pay to play, I know few people who have not dropped a dime on this game. As a founder, I am happy. I am not part of #whinnersareus better known as #savemwo because it does not represent the majority view of the community, just a minor part of it. 700 people from a minimum of 10000(just the numbers from Sarah who could afford to donate) is not really even a drop in the bucket. I play to have fun, not to be on world gaming circuit. I do not like 3pv, but if it brings in more people to fund this game, than I can live with it. Heat tweaks did not bother me much cause I could chain fire, hmm, not that hard, and the desyncing needs clarification, but lets just scream the sky is falling before more solid info is given.

"But Zues, they don't tell us what they are doing, information is not forth coming...." Tell that to EA or any other big box publisher and developer who make a game behind closed doors and give you the final product with no input from you. Get over your self entitlement. At least they give you some info, go play COD where you do not get squat and have to live with nerfs with no feedback avenues. Again, put on your big boy pants and understand that the world does not revolve around you. Just because you like to type, does not mean you represent the community. Go look at the polls around, most show the real majority does not mind "ghost" heat, most could care less what the minority elite or wannabe elites want. We just want a fun game to play, and so far they have given us just that. Sure a few short falls here and there, but I have yet to throw my hands up in exasperation and not play this game, I am over 12 after all.

The only thing I think that needs to be addressed is the 12v12 has put a strain on ballistic weapons and their ammo, is there something in the works to bring ballistics back in line with opfor additions?

Flame on vocal minority, flame on.

[Chronojam]

I like the part where you compare platinum AAA million-dollar franchise Call of Duty with yearly releases, to a free to play title by like a thirty-man development team. You're comparing a game with 40 million monthly players, to MechWarrior Online's tiny community, as if the public relations situations are the same. This is adorable.

[Deathz Jester]

IceSerpent, on 14 August 2013 - 07:06 AM, said:

Same reason why flamethrowers and acetylene torches get hot despite "venting what's basically heat"...

Jump jets arent acetylene torches, nor are they flamethrowers they're giant exhaust pipes with thrust vectoring.

[Zuesacoatl]

Arrachtas, on 14 August 2013 - 01:49 AM, said:

It's statistics that in any MMO, the forums are indeed a vocal minority; the game has had over one million registered accounts. Even if only a fraction of those ever played the game, and a fraction of that fraction is still around... how many people are posting here? How many have truly good ideas? How many are just ranting and foaming at the mouth? These are not just rhetorical questions, they are fair ones.

This game is PGI's livelihood; for us, it's for fun. For them, it's about putting food on the table and paying a mortgage. The suggestion that they don't care about the game or what people think is therefore absolutely incredible. PGI not implementing what a certain forum demographic argues is the right idea (until they are blue in the face) does not mean that they are not reading and understanding what is being said; they are electing to do something else. Yes, we can disagree with what they do, have every right to do so, and should do so if we disagree, but is it not also, perhaps, just slightly arrogant for a niche of forum-goers to presume that they always know best? We don't have access to even 1/100th of the statistics and data that PGI does; all we have is play experience. They have play experience AND statistics. Who is therefore the more informed party?

We should be critical. We should seek to propose solutions, or critique ideas we don't like. The suggestions that PGI 'doesn't care' are rubbish, though. No game developer 'doesn't care'. At the end of our day, we can take our money elsewhere. At the end of their day, they either can pay their bills or they can't. Who do you think is more invested?

THIS^^^^1000000000000000000000X THIS

[Rubidiy]

Highly disapointed with the fact of 8v8 regime exclusion. It's a common knowledge, that MWo lacks the scale and variability a Battletech game should provide. Until august patch we were at least able to entertain ourselves by synchrodropping 8v8 for a community warfare or duelling against each other. Now we're deprived of this ability with no reason at all.
Actually I cann't see what else I can do in MWo apart from taking part in random matches 12v12 which lost a half of tactical possibilities 8v8 had. Probably the best way to stay loyal to this game is to leave it for a good 6-12 months.

Edited by Rubidiy, 15 August 2013 - 04:23 AM.

[Monsoon]

Chronojam, on 14 August 2013 - 11:40 PM, said:

I like the part where you compare platinum AAA million-dollar franchise Call of Duty with yearly releases, to a free to play title by like a thirty-man development team. You're comparing a game with 40 million monthly players, to MechWarrior Online's tiny community, as if the public relations situations are the same. This is adorable.

Doesn't seem to stop all those people from complaining that everything is so slow in coming out for MWO, sure they may finally have 100 total staff, compared to the many hundreds of programmers alone working on all those AAA titles. So if he wants to make that comparison as well, I say turn-about is fair play.

Rubidiy, on 15 August 2013 - 02:29 AM, said:

Actually I cann't see what else I can do in MWo apart from taking part in random matches 12v12 which lost a half of tactical possibilities 8v8 had.

Ummmm what? Sorry but the tactical possibilities have certainly increased since 12v12.

Edited by Monsoon, 15 August 2013 - 05:16 AM.

[Lugh]

Gwaihir, on 12 August 2013 - 01:35 PM, said:

Ahahahaha, manually desynching the firing of Gauss rifles and PPCs, that is absolutely great.

Seriously, has no one considered that they're fine without all this artificial messing around, and that they just need their numbers changed to be balanced sniper weapons?

If it was absolutely fine and balanced to have them work without any ghost heat, crazy convergence, cone of fire, or "Manual desynchronization" in MW:LL, why won't it work for MW:O? I've yet to hear any good reasoning on this point.

e: For real, because this is getting in to serious and utter comedy time: Why would you waste precious, precious programming time on something that would be an utter non-issue with perhaps 5 number changes in one XML file, at most? Roll back the PPC projectile speed buff, to something other than the exact same speed as a Gauss slug. Drop PPC RoF to 5 seconds. Anything like that would be better than this. Literally anything.

They travel at different speeds now. Issue resolved. PPC RoF is 3.25 and Gauss cycle time is 4 seconds. Different enough already.

Most of the whine is coming from players that do dumb things like exposing themselves to fire REPEATEDLY to 'peek' at enemy positions, taking fire from 4-12 opposing mechs.

There is no programming fix for this level of stupidity.

[SVK Puskin]

DirePhoenix, on 14 August 2013 - 05:18 PM, said:

Here is what you could do to de-synchronize PPCs from Gauss Rifles and/or other high-burst DPS weapons:

First yes, make it work like lasers (wait, let me explain):
- EXCEPT: Do Not split up the damage like lasers do, keep the damage in one shot, as PPCs should be.

How do you do that?

Make PPCs a "charge" weapon, where it has to build up a charge. The player squeezes the trigger, and a guiding laser activates. <lorefluff>This "guiding laser" or "pilot laser" super-heats a channel of air for the charged particles to follow</lorefluff> The guiding/pilot laser does no damage itself. Consider it like TAG except not tied into missile targeting. Just a laser pointer. Give the PPC say, a 1-second charge time (the duration of a Large Laser burn). On each "tick" the PPC barrel grows brighter until the final tick where the PPC discharges, and a bolt of lightning extends the length of the pilot laser.

No "projectile", just a beam of lightning on that last tick of the laser (a lightning bolt is not a "bullet"). On that last tick is where all the damage is done.

The pilot laser is visible (just like the TAG laser), so the target has some warning that a giant lightning bolt is about to strike (if they're not already looking at the PPC barrels getting brighter)

Viola! The PPC is now a unique weapon that still does all of its damage in one shot, but is de-synced from any other weapon type in the group because of the way it fires.

(Bonus Points if you can add in a Ghostbuster's Proton Pack charging sound before it discharges)

Basicly PPC fire a stream of protons or ions so it is more beam than projectile. Why complicate things? De-synchronizing PPC and Gauss is easier way and according to what Paul said i think they will increase the recycling time of PPC but it is only my opinion.

[Kattspya]

CutterWolf, on 14 August 2013 - 09:23 AM, said:

LOL! Really? No Really?? Have you ever fired a rifle? Ever? I would have to say you have not or you would know that your statement is total BS. When your "zoomed in" on a target your not looking around to see what else is moving around you, your only concern at the time is hitting what your zoomed in on and hitting it where you want. Loosing FOV is what "zoomed in" is all about. Just wow......................

When I went through basic we were taught to keep both eyes open to have some situational awareness. Combat shooting and target practice are not the same. So... yeah

[Jakob Knight]

Zuesacoatl, on 14 August 2013 - 11:21 PM, said:

The only thing I think that needs to be addressed is the 12v12 has put a strain on ballistic weapons and their ammo, is there something in the works to bring ballistics back in line with opfor additions?

Considering that the obvious solutions to this are to either make sure you leave base with more ammo, control your firing, or select configurations that have backup energy weapons, I kind of like that players who don't take the long view when configuring their mechs end up paying for it.

After all, actual combat isn't limited to fifteen minutes, and having to take into account a longer combat endurance is part of designing viable armored units. If people insist on carrying huge numbers of ballistic or missile weapons but not enough ammo for the battle, it's not necessarily a bad thing they get into situations where the primary disadvantages of those weapons (ammunition) comes into play.

[Zuesacoatl]

Jakob Knight, on 15 August 2013 - 08:08 AM, said:

Considering that the obvious solutions to this are to either make sure you leave base with more ammo, control your firing, or select configurations that have backup energy weapons, I kind of like that players who don't take the long view when configuring their mechs end up paying for it.

After all, actual combat isn't limited to fifteen minutes, and having to take into account a longer combat endurance is part of designing viable armored units. If people insist on carrying huge numbers of ballistic or missile weapons but not enough ammo for the battle, it's not necessarily a bad thing they get into situations where the primary disadvantages of those weapons (ammunition) comes into play.

I can not disagre with you on that except to point out that with the original increase of armor values, the values of ammunition was never adjusted to correspond with or balance with these changes. We could compensate for it to a point in 8v8 matches, but with 4 additional opfor mechs with double armor values, it makes a normal dissadvantage into a major hindrance and reduces the viability of ballistics by a great deal. I know that we can not directly match a double increase in ammo, but a 15-25% increase would go a long way to bringing ballistics back inline with other weapons.

[Chronojam]

Lugh, on 15 August 2013 - 05:59 AM, said:

Most of the whine is coming from players that do dumb things like exposing themselves to fire REPEATEDLY to 'peek' at enemy positions, taking fire from 4-12 opposing mechs.

How have you convinced yourself of this? This has been a problem for seven months, identified among the top MWO teams, long before 12v12 was on the radar, anyhow. I'm just curious how you decided that everybody must be so wrong.

[Jakob Knight]

Zuesacoatl, on 15 August 2013 - 08:20 AM, said:

I can not disagre with you on that except to point out that with the original increase of armor values, the values of ammunition was never adjusted to correspond with or balance with these changes. We could compensate for it to a point in 8v8 matches, but with 4 additional opfor mechs with double armor values, it makes a normal dissadvantage into a major hindrance and reduces the viability of ballistics by a great deal. I know that we can not directly match a double increase in ammo, but a 15-25% increase would go a long way to bringing ballistics back inline with other weapons.

I'm afraid I don't see the issue, since, as has been pointed out when this rationale comes up, that to defeat those 4 additional OPFOR mechs, you gain 4 additional mechs of your own (yes, that means 4 more mechs' worth of ammo storage). The burden of firepower is thus the same on your ammo supply as it would be if you were in an 8 on 8, or a 4 on 4. You are still required to kill another mech on the other side to keep parity, and its only when someone on your team fails to do their part that you need more ammo...which is the same as in the other levels of play.

And let's be honest here...Ballistics are overall the most powerful weapons in the game, with minimal heat generation, high damage, high rate of fire, pinpoint damage location, and long range. They do far more damage in MWO than they were intended to do in the original material (AC/5s now do 2-4 times the damage of a PPC, for example). The sole disadvantages to these weapons are weight (they are the heaviest weapons to mount), size (largest systems to mount), and ammunition consumption. The previous two disadvantages are engineering issues that are dealt with by the Hardpoint system and just designing them out when configuring the mech. Ammunition remains the only disadvantage to using these weapons once they get into the field. This is why any mech in the field that can will mount autocannon and gauss rifles before any other weapons.

Edited by Jakob Knight, 15 August 2013 - 11:18 AM.

[Punk Oblivion]

I figured I would respectfully chime in my opinion as a heavy ballistic user.

Since 12V12 has started I have noticed that a higher % of people on my teams now die early, doing little or no damage before they do so. This means that if I survive the initial deaths, I have a larger % of enemies left to deal with, and that puts a strain on already tight ammo supplies.

Like you said, the main disadvantages to ballistics are weight and size, and having to take additional ammo adds more weight and slot usage. But you are incorrect in the AC5 to PPC comparison. An AC5 does 10 damage over 3 seconds, while a PPC does 10 damage over 4 seconds. So an AC5 does 25% more DPS over time, not 200-400% more, and double the shots means double that chance for damage to be spread out.

I think the ballistics in general need a little adjusting: AC2 heat bug fixed, AC5/LBX10 Fire rate increase, AC10 range increase, and actually maybe a slight AC20 nerf (make it a bit heavier)

BUT, most us ballistic users would be happy with a 25% increase to ammo/ton to all ballistics ammo, except maybe machine gun ammo.

[Chronojam]

One of my favourite proposals (naturally, one of mine) is to allow ballistic weapons to internalize some of their ammunition similar to how the engine can internalize several heatsinks. At the very least, come with a free/weightless/critless ton of ammunition built in. Even for Machine Guns~

[Desdain]

Gwaihir, on 12 August 2013 - 02:28 PM, said:

"Firing your gauss rifle causes the magnetic field to destabilize your PPC's focusing coils"
"Firing your PPC also drains your gauss rifle's charging capacitors"

Deep down you know it's going to be something dumb like that, and not smart like changing projectile speeds and recycle times.

Or even just doing nothing. Really, it's a 35 alpha.

[Gremlich Johns]

Zuesacoatl, on 14 August 2013 - 11:21 PM, said:

"But Zues, they don't tell us what they are doing, information is not forth coming...." Tell that to EA or any other big box publisher and developer who make a game behind closed doors and give you the final product with no input from you.

And we know what a quality game publisher/creator EA is......

I have always wanted PGI to make the game balanced and playable before putting out the shiny objects - it is difficult to do either well if you are doing them simultaneously. I bought the Founder's pack and two other mechs because I figured I could Beta the game well enough with those. Anybody with more than 8 mechs are just loons.

Edited by Gremlich Johns, 16 August 2013 - 02:02 PM.