70 replies to this topic

[Zarlaren]

I actually try to get out and help my team in my Atlas but sometimes when a 100ton Atlas exposes himself is is like a big target board saying hit me and soon enough your taking 1000 lrms to the face. It's no wonder they want to hide.

[Bishop Steiner]

Zarla, on 15 August 2013 - 05:22 PM, said:

I actually try to get out and help my team in my Atlas but sometimes when a 100ton Atlas exposes himself is is like a big target board saying hit me and soon enough your taking 1000 lrms to the face. It's no wonder they want to hide.

it is sad when I would rather hunt Atlases in my Hunchback then fight Lights, because an Atlas is far easier prey than a bloody Commando.

[Zarlaren]

I think they should increase the reloading time on lrms by alot it is rediculous that you want to fight fair with lasers,ppcs,ACs only to get blasted down by lrms in enormous numbers like it is raining lrms. I got blasting down by 20+15 lrms in multiple successions. In my opinion lrms is a coward weapon. As I do try to help my team the best I can in my Atlas.

[Balls McManly]

I don't know... it depends on the group, and since we're talking mostly about pugs, sometimes you just have to lead the charge.

Standoffs and LRM trading is a really boring way to play, so it helps if you show some leadership, jam your throttle forward, and push on, lasers blazing. A lot of the time, when other assaults see you charge, they'll generally push with you and give support.

It also helps if your name is Balls Mcmanly.

Edited by Balls McManly, 15 August 2013 - 08:49 PM.

[Roror]

I'm that guy.

Even though I don't want to be.

And here's why:

1- Survivability. I run a DDC brawler build and it takes about three alphas to bring my CT to yellow-red (less depending on what's coming down range) (I'm 94 or 96 to CT armor depending on build).

That means that -any- mech can finish me off with just a few hits. My most common cause of death is being cored. Torso twisting doesn't work since most smart folks target my AC20 anyhow.

2) Exposure size: I don't know about the other mechs. The Atlas' ballistics location is too low. That means that any other mech can get into a hull-down position behind a hill and I must expose 70% or more of my mech in order to get a clear AC20 shot at him (65% or more for my 2xLLs). Forget about SSRMs, the exposure time is way too high in a poptart maneuver if I'm leading a charge.

In fact on most maps, Hunchbacks, Jagers, and Awesomes can effectively shoot at me without me being able to shoot at them behind a hill. They'll bring me to yellow or less without me being able to do much to them, even though the markers clearly show I have a shot at them.

3- Zero support. Rarely if ever do I get support from other team members. Usually on weekends I get support, that's when I do the best. During the week and especially at night it's pretty much every man for himself.

4- Since I'm so easy to core, most smart teams will take me out first, or critical me by the time I find cover.

So what do I do? I stand back.

Yup, I wait until the mid game usually (or early mid game) when people are knife fighting, are at 65% or less and have used up most of their ammo or are missing limbs.

I then go in and clean house. Don't get me wrong, I'll defend a waypoint or hold a spot and will always help a team member.

But I'm simply not going to bother against fresh mechs. I'm finding more and more that my hits don't register on fresh mechs (even when I hit them in the rear).

So I don't bother anymore. I wait until the enemy is already beat up to go in. Besides a single atlas isn't going to be enough to turn the tide if the entire team blows and we're already losing.

[Prezimonto]

GODzillaGSPB, on 15 August 2013 - 04:58 AM, said:

Very cool idea!!!

PS: You should go ahead and post this over in the feature suggestions.

DONE!
http://mwomercs.com/...ch-classquirks/

[GODzillaGSPB]

Viktor Drake, on 15 August 2013 - 01:50 PM, said:

Basically be sure of your understanding of what those Assaults are trying to do before you jump to a conclusion.

I understand what they're doing. It's more about their role and my role and what I have to do. I guess next time I will simply NOT do the frontline thing in my medium because it is not meant to do that, it isn't fast and / or enough armored for this. I will hang back and will protect the assaults (because that's usually my role as a flank-guard) but obviously hurt will come to them and they'll be unable to defend themselves.

Actually that's a good idea and not too mean. Learning by hurting.

[Wolfways]

Prezimonto, on 15 August 2013 - 04:31 AM, said:

I would love to see mech quirks and game rewards do the following:
bonus XP and cbills for damage taken by assaults
bonus XP and cbills for damage given by heavies
bonus XP and cbills for capping/spotting by lights
bonus XP and cbills (and a slightly lower level but higher overall) for everything by mediums

I like this idea except for the assault mech bit. The point is to avoid damage as much as possible (while killing the enemy obviously).
Plus not all assaults are frontline mechs. Some are support mechs with long-range weapons.

[Lightfoot]

Assaults are just the center of the lance because they are slow. You should stay with them. Then Assaults stay in the vanguard.

[Anjian]

Assaults are meat shields. The highest chance of survival for a medium mech is to fight close to one. The friendly assault will draw the fire while you sneak in behind and slam the back of the opposing team.

If a brawl is already occuring involving friendly lights, mediums and heavies, an assault entering the frey can cause friendly fire on the lighter friendly mechs, as the lighter mechs go around crossing the assault's cone of fire. This is not optimal for both the assault and hazardous to the lighter mechs, unless lighter mechs are in the flank and don't try to criss cross the assault's line of fire. This is exactly where LRMs are handy.

Quite often if you see a friendly assault hang back, chances are it may already be working in concert with another mech tagging targets for LRMs.

[GalaxyBluestar]

I support this thread.

Too many twiddle thumb cowards in pugs these days who grab a kill and damage points... because they stayed behind watching their lancemates being slaughted whilst they take a random popshots and they'll have the gall to tell you to lrn2play. they are not team players they are a waste of space not supporting front liners and blame them for not surviving better when they themselves left them to be overwhelmed. the amount of highlanders and atlas mech cowering behind other mechs is embarressing.

few pugs understand push together and you overwhelm the enemy into submission, stay back and you watch your friends being cut down 1 by 1 until you face 5-10 of them and get slaughtered.

yeah claim skillz for pop shotting dregs when real warriors have done the grunt work for you.

Edited by GalaxyBluestar, 17 August 2013 - 02:06 AM.

[Archon Adam Steiner]

Assault 'mechs cowering in the back in PuG matches is nothing new; fundamentally, nobody really wants to die, and in a PuG match, where you can't rely on anybody (as many players are flat-out terrible at worst, or uncoordinated at best) what else is one to do?

Unfortunately, it devolves many PuG games to some sort of pseudo cover-based shooter, like a Mass Effect game without any of the hot babes. My little attempt at humour, there.

It's similar in 12-mans; there are many teams that my guys go up against who think that if they do anything other than pop-tart or hide as far away as possible with as many long range weapons as possible that they may, actually... have some fun. Sarcasm aside, no one wants to be reckless or stupid, but being aggressive can be the right thing to do in many places; many teams that cower and hide get picked off one by one, as they are too afraid to either support each other or risk getting shot.

The irony, of course, is that the 'mechs best suited to taking damage are the ones that often seem to be the most afraid of receiving any. This isn't an issue for the more intelligent 12-man teams, but it's probably a permanent reality for 12-mans, barring a fundamental change in game mechanics... or some people simply growing a pair!

[Khobai]

Honestly if an assault does 500+ damage. I dont care if was in a support role or not.

[Fyrerock]

True double heat sinks, placed in a very large XL engine gives you great heat control, something that you want to have with the nerfs to PPC. And the nerfs to streaks, mean you need speed to give you a chance to kill the lights that love to run circles around you. By staying in the back and waiting for the right time, allows you to put out some serious dps, and keep it up for a long time.

[Prezimonto]

Wolfways, on 16 August 2013 - 04:42 PM, said:

I like this idea except for the assault mech bit. The point is to avoid damage as much as possible (while killing the enemy obviously).
Plus not all assaults are frontline mechs. Some are support mechs with long-range weapons.

Actually, I decidedly think you're wrong, at least some mechs are designed specifically to take damage and be the focus of attention. Assault mechs are supposed to push into an enemy line and break it open... that means they're going to take damage. A good system will heavily reward too piloting for spreading that damage across as many mech sections as possible.

Check out the fleshed out idea I posted, I also include the point that individual mechs should get different set of bonuses so this certainly isn't set in stone.
http://mwomercs.com/...ch-classquirks/

[Wolfways]

Prezimonto, on 17 August 2013 - 04:39 AM, said:

Actually, I decidedly think you're wrong, at least some mechs are designed specifically to take damage and be the focus of attention. Assault mechs are supposed to push into an enemy line and break it open... that means they're going to take damage. A good system will heavily reward too piloting for spreading that damage across as many mech sections as possible.

Check out the fleshed out idea I posted, I also include the point that individual mechs should get different set of bonuses so this certainly isn't set in stone.
http://mwomercs.com/...ch-classquirks/

I really like your idea. The only problem i have with it is that in my experience assault mechs in MWO can't really take much damage because their slow speed and torso twist means that the enemy can concentrate most of their damage on one area, usually ct, while the smaller classes of mechs can spread the damage around better.
I mostly pilot heavy mechs and would rather go up against an Atlas than just about any other mech.

I feel that mechs need another armour buff. Maybe double the ct armour again and another 50% to side torso's. Then assaults will be able to soak up some damage without being cored straight away.
If that were the case then i'd agree with your idea 100%

[Prezimonto]

I play with a guy who pilots a DDC with a 350 standard. He's light on weapons and we win most matchs if I or another takes a heavy mech with a big weapon load. He's a huge, fast, durable target with great brawling weapons... perfect distraction if you work in a lance and pick your fights.

[Bishop Steiner]

Wolfways, on 17 August 2013 - 09:23 AM, said:

I really like your idea. The only problem i have with it is that in my experience assault mechs in MWO can't really take much damage because their slow speed and torso twist means that the enemy can concentrate most of their damage on one area, usually ct, while the smaller classes of mechs can spread the damage around better.
I mostly pilot heavy mechs and would rather go up against an Atlas than just about any other mech.

I feel that mechs need another armour buff. Maybe double the ct armour again and another 50% to side torso's. Then assaults will be able to soak up some damage without being cored straight away.
If that were the case then i'd agree with your idea 100%

Naw, because once HSR finally works, I think we will find them hammer of god-ing the Lights anyhow. What I could see is a 50% increase on Internal Structure for Assaults. So, they are still more durable, but might lose weapons, heatsinks and stuff. The mix of greater toughness with some vulnerability should keep it from making them OP. Flip side is I think Lights (at least ATM) should have 50% LESS Internal Structure. No commando should be nailed rear CT with a 66 pt alpha, and he able to restart from overheat and run away. Period.

[Fyrerock]

Prezimonto, on 17 August 2013 - 10:14 AM, said:

I play with a guy who pilots a DDC with a 350 standard. He's light on weapons and we win most matchs if I or another takes a heavy mech with a big weapon load. He's a huge, fast, durable target with great brawling weapons... perfect distraction if you work in a lance and pick your fights.

Sure that works in a pregroup of people working together, because you are the tank and your teammates are the dps, but things like that do not work in most pugs, in fact that build can hurt many pugs because you really lack the dps to defend yourself and if the group either does not follow or they are all bad shots the fight is over very fast with a wipe.

Many times I have seen an atlas run over a hill and engage 4 other mechs and be killed in less then 15 seconds, now how does that help a group, it is not like that atlas set up to brawl had the dps to really hurt the other team in 15 seconds.

[Bishop Steiner]

Fyrerock, on 17 August 2013 - 12:06 PM, said:

Sure that works in a pregroup of people working together, because you are the tank and your teammates are the dps, but things like that do not work in most pugs, in fact that build can hurt many pugs because you really lack the dps to defend yourself and if the group either does not follow or they are all bad shots the fight is over very fast with a wipe.

Many times I have seen an atlas run over a hill and engage 4 other mechs and be killed in less then 15 seconds, now how does that help a group, it is not like that atlas set up to brawl had the dps to really hurt the other team in 15 seconds.

tis the point most miss on here.

What works for 12 man, is not always ideal for 4 man, and what works in pairs or lances, doesn't always work well for true Pugging. The smaller your base unit, the more self-reliant the build needs to be because the less help you can count on to watch your back and cover our deficiencies.

Shame the serial 12 man "Pros" are the ones who least comprehend this concept while they troll the forums telling everyone else how "bad" they are. And not able to realize that winning and dominating in 12 man vs in PuG are two TOTALLY separate scenarios, as one is highly controlled, whilst the other is total chaos. The overall skill level may arguably be higher in 12 man (though often I find it's just who metarapes hardest, and then when the Meta changes, they have to scramble to find the next set of exploits) but it's also a much less diverse set of scenarios one faces, and therefore easier to account for and adapt. PuG matches, you may be king of the hill one match and have to save your teams bacon, and the next get totally steamrolled.

It's the difference between being a soldier, and being a warrior. 100 Romans would kill 100 Teutonic or Celtic Barbarians, every time. In a duel, 1v1 the lone Celt would almost always beat the Centurion. The Warrior dies to group tactics, but is usually far superior when he needs to rely on himself.