68 replies to this topic

[Lord Ikka]

I would like Ghost Heat gone. PPCs are balanced back to what they should be, hot but still useful, and GH is a complex system that doesn't translate well.

[Royalewithcheese]

Taemien, on 10 September 2013 - 06:11 PM, said:

How many of you are new to the franchise? You figured it out, why can't your peers?

We're all part of the "vocal minority" that posts on forums and reads patch notes. But I'm pretty sure we've all had silent majority experiences. Here's one of mine:

Back when I played TF2, it was quite a while before I learned that rocket jumping had a special mechanic that made it more optimal than you would think if you didn't know that mechanic existed. However, in TF2, rocket jumping isn't a core mechanic if (like me) you main Heavy and Engie, so you can do just fine with the basic knowledge that sometimes Soldiers and Demos use explosives to jump and you need to be ready for that.

In MWO, ghost heat is a core mechanic. It completely changes what mechs you buy, what you put on your mechs, and how you pilot your mechs. If we're going to compare (for instance) playing a Stalker in MWO vs. playing a Soldier in TF2, I would even go so far to say that for casual players, knowing how ghost heat works is significantly more important than knowing how rocket jumps work.

[keith]

i would love it dead. i fear its here to stay. they will do a heat tutroial with some form of trying to explain ghost heat in it. bam horrible thign in forever. bad mechinc keep alive by bad devs.

Edited by keith, 10 September 2013 - 07:05 PM.

[scJazz]

Victor Morson, on 10 September 2013 - 03:42 PM, said:

Another good way is weapon edits and hardpoint restrictions. You know, a way everyone's in favor of?

Royalewithcheese, on 10 September 2013 - 03:51 PM, said:

If you can't explain it without a table, it's complex. If the table's third-party, it's complex and poorly documented.

ObsidianSpectre, on 10 September 2013 - 04:44 PM, said:

Getting rid of ghost heat is probably the easiest thing PGI could do to restore my faith in them as a company. They've already gone a long ways towards fixing things the right way, and getting rid of the convoluted system which seems designed to merely sweep balance problems under the rug would help demonstrate a commitment towards getting the right fixes in, as well as a willingness to back away from their mistakes (and mistakes happen frequently in game design, I am totally capable of forgiving them for mistakes).

@Victor... Hardpoint restrictions just plain suck! Totally, not in favor of that plan at all!
@Royalewithcheese... Obvious great point is obvious!
@ObsidianSpectre... Probably the greatest reply so far! +1 Interwebz

The various changes done recently from Streaks to PPCs have moved Weapon Balancing from "Train Wreck with Fire and Explosions" to "Bicycle Accident" levels of bad. I voted "DIE" because Ghost Heat is just a horrifically stupid, undocumented, needlessly complex, piece of junk.

I'm not entirely convinced that turning Ghost Heat off right now would be a great plan. I think a better phrasing would be Ghost Heat must be removed at some point in the near future.

[Unusual Suspect]

The specifics of Ghost Heat require a graph. The generalities of Ghost Heat require a quick popup in game to explain ("If you fire more than the Ghost Heat Number of a weapon in half second period, you'll generate extra heat! For specific heat numbers, see this graph. [link]"), with a clear marker on the maximum number on each weapon, preferrably right underneath the Heat characteristic.

At its most complex, you might give each weapon a tier (weak, medium, strong, OMGWTFBBQ) for how much additional heat is caused. SRMs might be weak, medium lasers at medium, PPCs would be strong, and the AC20 would be OMGWTFBBQ.

Because, frankly, for mech-building, you really don't need to know that the PPCs generate an additional 7.1215 +e^pi heat per extra PPC in order to build a workable mech with understandable alpha-ing limits. You need to know (a) that more than X of a weapon carries alpha-ing penalties, and ( roughly how much each additional weapon affects heat.

For uber-serious mechbuilders that need to know the hypothetical exact number of heatsinks they'd need installed in order to alpha exactly twice given Elited basic unlocks in a 36 degree Calvin environment, the graph is there, ready and linked and waiting to be mathemagickicized. A new player shouldn't (and with minimal effort on the new UI's part, wouldn't) need to see the graph at all in order to know that alpha-ing 6xPPCs or 6 SRM 6s or 2 AC20s is gunna run hotter than lava.

Edited by Unusual Suspect, 10 September 2013 - 07:14 PM.

[Xanquil]

I agree ghost heat needs to go away. The problem is it will not be going anywhere until a better "fix" for pinpoint alpha strikes is developed. It also is being used as PGI's version of "heat penalties".

[Colby Boucher]

Yeah... I'm not gonna scream and cry like everyone else, but I agree that PGI should understand that the underlying reason for GS has bee fixed and it can happily disappear.

[Cybermech]

I'm sure calling it ghost heat would confuse more then calling it staking penalties.
While it solves many issues and not just the 6xPPC stalker.
If you can't add more to the list it just convinces me that you don't know what your talking about.
There are some issues with it, gameplay is far better with it then with out.
As you seem to think the weapons are fine now (which they ain't) the staking penalties forces people to stagger their shots over alpha which they still can do but it will cost them.

Cone of fire, 30 max alpha and other solutions are just as problematic.
There needs to be a better solution first.

[Benden]

"Ghost heat must die!" ? This is not the right claim. I'm a Battletech/MW veteran and don't want to see the game becoming some variant of mech assault online.
Asking for something to balance High damaging weapon Boating with oneshooting Alpha ability would be more legitimate.
Also PGI must document and explain the feature ingame. Right now I can't imagine how lost newbies can be.
PPCs had their heat increased, so now they can lower a bit the "ghost" heat penalty maybe but something must be done to balance PPC boating for instance.
So it must stay in the game until another way to way to balance weapons boating/heat is found.

[John MatriX82]

Victor Morson, on 10 September 2013 - 03:42 PM, said:

Another good way is weapon edits and hardpoint restrictions. You know, a way everyone's in favor of?

^This. Think about limiting LRMs to the available tubes (not like it is now that the tubes are modular) take a stalker 3H it has 2x20 tubes in the arms and 2x6 tubes in the side torsoes.

Total: 50 LRMs. NO multiple firing salvoes. Simply, if you have 20 tubes, you can mount 20, 15, 10, 5, if you have 5 (or six tubes like it is now in the side torsoes) there you can place a single LRM5.

Beside tubes modularity that affects all the newer chassis (and without considering the sillyness that affected the Victors that had that possibility totally wasted especially when you want to use SRMs in there), few mechs could reach more than 50 LRMs. Think about balancing lrms knowing that the maximum you can bring is 50.. 50 could be fearsome, but also 10 or 15 could be useful much more than they are now. Bam! A weapon system that could be easily balanced restricting the hardpoints, while now devs have to rebalance things because of those boating 70-80-90 lrms!

The same could be done for dual gauss, dual AC 20's multiple PPCs, 2PPC & Gauss, without considering the hardpoint variability that you could give by rendering each variant within the same chassis to be UNIQUE (think about the stalkers).

90% of the weapons balance problems we have now is a direct consequence of "free hardpoints". But Garth says "no dice" about hardpoint restrictions everytime I meet him in game..

[Lightfoot]

Ghost heat/ Heat Scaling is too harsh and too mysterious. Your average MWO player doesn't even know it exists so they lose when they should or could win.

I know in Battletech weapons fired in singlefire generate a bit less heat and an Alpha-Strike (I mean a real Alpha-Strike where you press \ ) can generate alot of heat, make your HUD jumbled, etc., but everyone with any previous knowledge of MechWarrior or Battletech knows you are supposed to fire your weapon arrays in groups so this should not be massively penalized with a mystery heat nerf. MWO even prompts players to set-up logical firing groups the instant the game launches with the firing groups on the HUD.

Also there is no reason not to have full DHS 2.0 for all heatsinks if you also have Ghost Heat.

MWO can't run basic stock Energy based mechs like the AWS-9M and it never could. So MWO has never had a working heat model. Working to allow Battletech stock mechs anyway.

Oh yes, the mechs are too weak for 2xRecharge, make them tougher in their vital areas and in general and you would not need to curtail weapon firing times with Ghost Heat.

.

Edited by Lightfoot, 11 September 2013 - 04:46 AM.

[MustrumRidcully]

Ghost heat is a terrible idea and needs to go.

I don't think tweaking weapon stats alone would fix all balance issues, but ghost heat just adds more problems then it solves.

I suspect we really need a revamp of the heat system as a whole, to be more... "constrained" in how much waste heat you can produce before you overheat. Only that way can you ensure that each weapon's impact on a mech's heat load is predictable and can be balanced.

[Khobai]

The truth is alphastrikes were completely out of hand. The game needed a mechanic like ghost heat that artificially limited the effectiveness of alphastrikes. Ghost heat just happens to be a horrible mechanic though.

Personally I wouldve gone a different route, and approached the problem from the armor/internal structure side instead of the weapon side. Because increasing armor/structure or adding damage threshold/reduction/transfer, etc... doesnt change the customization aspect of the game by limiting what loadouts players can use.

I still think some type of threshold system couldve worked, where if a torso location got hit for over 20 damage within X seconds, then a portion of that damage would be transferred outward to adjacent locations instead. Like if your center torso was a bucket that could only collect 20 damage and any damage in excess of that would overflow to your side torsos. In a way it would simulate the damage spread of battletech, without removing the aiming component from MWO.

Edited by Khobai, 11 September 2013 - 05:12 AM.

[sarkun]

Ghost heat as it is right now is one of the more ridiculous mechanics I've ever seen. Anyone who thought that having a system that takes an excel spreadsheet to explain is a good game mechanic... is just.. I don't even... whyyy?

Take SRMs. You can fire 3xSRM6 or 4xSRM4 or 4xSRM2 without GH, which is somewhat straightforward, albeit stupid - cause the number of missiles differs massively.

BUT! You don't take the same amount of GH for using an extra SRM6 or SRM4, or SRM2. Another complication.

Oh - and SRM6 and SRM4 are linked - they count as SRM6s if you use them together - but only for GH, the normal heat stays unchanged.

But not the SRM2s. Or SSRMs.

And this is just one weapon system. This is madness.

If GH is to stay... then it needs to get massively simplified.

Edited by sarkun, 11 September 2013 - 05:03 AM.

[Joseph Mallan]

I voted for the death of Ghost Heat. Seriously it was a dumb idea. And implemented in a ham handed manner. +24 on 2 weapons that run fairly cool!!!! That is just stupid.

[Tom Sawyer]

Ghost heat HAS to go and GO NOW. The rules for defining heat is so out of wack that I have had friends new to BT but like online games get pissed about how they would shut down for no reason. Trying to explain ghost heat they would get glassy eyed and then just go play something else.

Edited by Tom Sawyer, 11 September 2013 - 05:13 AM.

[Sybreed]

I voted other.

I think Ghost heat should live... for now. It made it possible to use my mediums again, and those are the mechs I like piloting the most. If ghost heat goes, even with the new heat values, you can expect to see heavy alphas coming back again. Unless PGI changes their heat threshold/dissipation mechanic, I want ghost heat to stay. Eating 4 ppcs in the face without having the time to react is not my definition of fun in this game.

edit: In favor of removing ghost heat also if they include hardpoint restrictions, which we know won't happen.

Edited by Sybreed, 11 September 2013 - 06:00 AM.

[ArmandTulsen]

Wait a minute, where's the part about the weapon fixes?

[JohnnyWayne]

Heatpenaltys are a good thing and should stay. They are neither complicated nor obsolete. Everyone who says different is just not smart enough to get a thought to its end.

Heatpenaltys did exactly what they were inteded for: limit weaponboating and pinpoint alphastrikes with energy weapons.

But I agree, they should be documented ingame in a understandable manner and embedded in a upcoming tutorial.

[The Boz]

"Everyone that disagrees with me is stupid."
What an excellent way to participate in a discussion.