55 replies to this topic

[Tango Schroder]

In answer to you question about percentage of hits, they seem to me to be roughly the same. I posted my Laser and Pulse Laser stats below.

I like the solution they came up with and it makes sense to me so you can actually increase your accuracy with total damage dealt.

Been a while since I have read any of the TROs or novels but I think that even if not exactly cannon for BT it fits well with the intended purpose of the pulse lasers.

I have found that since the shortened duration my actual damage to light and medium fast movers has gone up, which would seem to be the purpose of the -2 to hit in BT.

LRG PULSE LASER 78.71%
MED PULSE LASER 82.03%
SML PULSE LASER 70.07%
SMALL LASER 82.59%
MEDIUM LASER 81.92%
LARGE LASER 78.55%

Edited by Tango Schroder, 26 August 2013 - 11:49 PM.

[Alistair Winter]

I agree with the premise, but only to stay faithful to Battletech and the old MW games.

Unfortunately, that isn't a very good reason, because we have to protect the delicate, fragile minds of modern gamers, who need 3PV and arm lock to understand what the hell's happening. I suppose they would just collapse into fetal position if one did something as drastic as swapping the way two weapons work.

Get off my lawn.

[Cycleboy]

The more threads I read about pulse lasers, the more I'm coming around to making them laser machine guns. I'd say divide the current damage and heat by the pulse+cooldown time and give them ALL at 0.5sec cycle time. Ok... so more like laser AC2s. Large laser now is 2.25dam and 2.125heat per pulse... just keep firing! This is balanced by the face time you need staying on target. Regular lasers are now the fire and evade weapon. Pulse are constant train on enemy until hot brawler.

They could even (if code allows easily) put heat dynamic on it for length of firing. First pulse is 0.9xheat, second is 1.0xheat, third is 1.1xheat, fourth is 1.2xheat, ad infinium... So... if you have some heat cap to spare and are in someone's face with pulses, you should be feared! This would compensate for the short range too, but not let a Raven or Cic just run straight up with 1 LPL and drop someone... the heat would fry them after a few sec.

[SiriusBeef]

Compared to the LL the LPL offers almost no advantage. More heat, more mass, less range. Sure there is slightly better damage distribution but at the trade off of shorter range which can be pretty tricky. That being said the LL is still outclassed by the PPC. Is it really that hard to balance them out? Could we try giving them the same range as the LL to justify the extra two tons and see if that helps?

[LeShadow]

Cycleboy, on 27 August 2013 - 05:10 AM, said:

They could even (if code allows easily) put heat dynamic on it for length of firing. First pulse is 0.9xheat, second is 1.0xheat, third is 1.1xheat, fourth is 1.2xheat, ad infinium... So... if you have some heat cap to spare and are in someone's face with pulses, you should be feared! This would compensate for the short range too, but not let a Raven or Cic just run straight up with 1 LPL and drop someone... the heat would fry them after a few sec.

Isn't that exactly what they did with the flamers? Last time I checked, those worked just like that (except for doing next to no damage )

[Cycleboy]

LeShadow, on 27 August 2013 - 08:08 AM, said:

Isn't that exactly what they did with the flamers? Last time I checked, those worked just like that (except for doing next to no damage )

I don't know. I saw something in a post about heat additives for firing flamers... but... heck... who keeps track of flamers??? They've sucked from the begining. So until I die from one, they aren't in my stable.

So... you are saying it's do-able? I'd say that's a way to go with the pulse dynamic. Constant cycle time firing for massive heat gain until you stop for... hell... make it the old recharge timer... 4sec stop for LPL to reset the heat dynamic (call it capacitor cooling or some such).

[LeShadow]

I like that. Makes sense and sounds like a lot of fun.

[Zyllos]

Pulse lasers need to act differently from normal lasers. There needs to be a functional difference between the two.

I think the best suggestions is to make pulse lasers act like machine guns or give pulse lasers very low cooldowns.

[Avalios]

Pulse lasers simply need less heat and they would become the brawler mechs weapon of choice.

[Corpsecandle]

Shadey99, on 26 August 2013 - 04:54 PM, said:

I think the animation is fairly correct for Pulses, however I'm still of the opinion we should control the length of the duration these weapons have with max duration for each weapon. So hold down button and a medium laser fires a beam until it's 'charge' runs dry and the cooldown starts to recharge it. A Pulse weapon would fire pulses in the same fashion. The mechanics themselves would stay the same, but the player would have much more control and they would play a bit more like 'machineguns' becoming good at suppressive fire over a period of time.

The times may need reworked, but the way they are controlled feels off to me first...

I like this. At the very least I'd would be able to avoid hitting the doofus who ran across my LOF without having to take my reticle off target. Right now the general solution is to jerk the stream up so you don't accidentally core your teammate...who while not proving to be best pilot is still taking hits for me.

[Cycleboy]

Thought of another reason while "pulse machine guns" would be good... those stafing lights! If you are being harassed by a light that ducks in and out of cover, say the buildings on Frozen City, when he pops out you unload continuous streams of fire at them until they cross the open spot and get back to cover. And for the light I just messed up, your chance to dodge and weave, making the hard firing pulse user heat up to the point of shutdown, then get behind to core with your own pulses.

Beams will be for fighting big targets at longer ranges. Pulses for fighting lights, and for lights that hit and run from close range.

[Shufflemuffin5]

xengk, on 26 August 2013 - 10:41 PM, said:

I think the normal and pulse laser mechanics should stay as it is.
However, give pulse laser shorter fire duration and faster cooldown, but retain their heat, range and damage.
This way pulse get to fire more often in a brawl at the risking of frying the user.

meanwhile, on accuracy.
LPL 85% (1,390 fired, 7,157 dmg) average 5.1 dmg ~51% actual accuracy
LL 83% (12,319 fired, 52,284 dmg) average 4.2 dmg ~46% actual accuracy
MPL 83% (3,412 fired, 10,085 dmg) average 2.9 dmg ~48% actual accuracy
ML 83% (34,902 fired, 79,000 dmg) average 2.2 dmg ~44% actual accuracy
SPL 84% (209 fired, 386 dmg) average 1.8 dmg ~60% actual accuracy
SL 74% (4,171 fired, 4,862 dmg) average 1.1 dmg ~55% actual accuracy

^ I agree with this 100%. My accuracy is:

LPL - 92.31% (22,818 fired, 154,411 dmg) average 6.7 dmg ~ 63% actual accuracy
LL - 92.53 % (30,839 fired, 170,123 dmg) average 5.5 amg ~ 61% actual accuracy
MPL - 93.29% (10,866 fired, 40,041 dmg) average 3.7 dmg ~ 61% actual accuracy
ML - 92.35% (49,916 fired, 143962 dmg) average 2.9 dmg ~ 57% actual accuracy
SPL - 92.82% (3,619 fired, 7481 dmg) average 2.1 dmg ~ 61% actual accuracy
SL - N/A (have only done 2 matches with Small Lasers apparently! lol)

Edited by Shufflemuffin5, 28 August 2013 - 11:15 AM.

[Odins Fist]

Snow Drift, on 26 August 2013 - 04:38 PM, said:

"Lasers Vs Pulse Lasers"

They are different...

[Bront]

As is, it's pretty easy to hit with the first shot of a laser, and as pulse lasers are now, that first little hit does more damage. I think they're fine.

On the other hand, I think the beam durration should be .75 for standard, and .5 for pulse. That would fix some of the issues that lasers have in general of being easy to hit, but hard to stick the damage on. I'd also drop the heat of lasers just a bit (MLs in particular are hotter than they should be).

[Raso]

I've often been a proponent of 2 different methods of changing them.

The first is making pulse lasers act like burst firing, laser ACs which deal instant damage for each wub. This delivers more pinpoint damage to each location by spreading it less while allowing smaller, faster targets the chance to dance between the beams.

The second is to lower their damage per shot, heat per shot, cool down time and beam duration while giving them a heat per second that is higher than that of a beam lasers. Make it so that if you hold on the target it will deal more damage per second than a beam laser at the cost of more heat per second than a beam laser. Turn beam lasers into burst damage weapons and pulse lasers into high DPS, laser machine guns.

[Bront]

Raso, on 28 August 2013 - 01:25 PM, said:

The first is making pulse lasers act like burst firing, laser ACs which deal instant damage for each wub. This delivers more pinpoint damage to each location by spreading it less while allowing smaller, faster targets the chance to dance between the beams.

Um, that;s how they do work right now...

[Deathsani]

I like the idea of the laser-machine gun myself. It is rather disappointing that not all of the weapons seem to see use, and I hope they change that.

[XANi]

To be honest just removing weight penalty would be enougth to make them pretty effective. Then it would be basically tradeff, bit more alpha/focus fire for bit less range/heat efficiency.

As it is now, SPL is just ****** ML, MPL is not worth tonnage (better get heatsink for that ton) and LPL is worse PPC

Making pulses cycle faster would also be interesting, brawlers could get in. quickly "dump" their heat into target, and get out and repeat after cooling. PL should have best DPS per ton, while PPC have best Alpha and normal lasers best damage per heat

[Pac Man]

Hit% | Damage | Hits | Damage per Shot

ML | 89.34% | 88,692 | 36,405 = 2.43

MPL | 87.27% | 29,271 | 7,841 = 3.73

Nothing wrong with them. They are superior, but have shorter range.

Edited by Pac Man, 28 August 2013 - 02:35 PM.

[Raso]

Bront, on 28 August 2013 - 02:16 PM, said:

Um, that;s how they do work right now...

It's totally not. They split their damage evenly the same way as a beam laser does across 10-12 ticks (depending on who's you listen to). Each visual pulse is simply that: a visual effect. The underlying mechanics are identical to beam lasers but with a shorter range and beam duration and with more heat.

By delivering the larger portions of damage over fewer ticks damage could be spread across fewer armor sections but at the risk of losing more damage with poor tracking. It ups the skill required to use them while rewarding said skill. Personally this is my least favorite of my 2 proposed ideas but it's also likely the most feasible.