16 replies to this topic

[stkxie]

Hello, I could use some help to understand how the game works. I currently like to play 4 Mechs, Jester, BH, Firebrand, and Jenner F. While trying to learn how to play I have noticed several things:

1. BH with XL400 & 6 large lasers is going to overheat when I am alpha striking. Total of 21 double heat sinks. Is there something I am doing wrong? How come I can alpha strike 6 medium lasers on a jenner several times in a row and I can't alpha strike even once with 6 large lasers on BH? Like on my jenner the best I did was 987 dmg in a map and on my BH I never go over high 700ish...

2. When outfitting any mech with ER PPC and shooting only one ER PPC at a time it generates 20 heat not 15 as advertised in mech bay. Is it broken or working as intended?

3. How to counter ac builds like 2x ac2 & 2xac5 or 4x ac5 on heavy mech like Jester. it seems every time I get stuck on something I die in a couple seconds. Also by the time I even cycle through my lasers on jester jager will just rip me to shreds.


Thank you.

[Greyboots]

stkxie, on 17 November 2013 - 01:46 AM, said:

Hello, I could use some help to understand how the game works. I currently like to play 4 Mechs, Jester, BH, Firebrand, and Jenner F. While trying to learn how to play I have noticed several things:

1. BH with XL400 & 6 large lasers is going to overheat when I am alpha striking. Total of 21 double heat sinks. Is there something I am doing wrong? How come I can alpha strike 6 medium lasers on a jenner several times in a row and I can't alpha strike even once with 6 large lasers on BH? Like on my jenner the best I did was 987 dmg in a map and on my BH I never go over high 700ish...

No, you aren't doing anything wrong! This is due to "Ghost Heat". Many weapons suffer a heat penalty if you fire more than a certain number at a time.

For ER Large Lasers this is only 2 before you incur a penalty and you are firing 4.

Medium lasers however can fire 6 at a time without incurring a heat penalty.

A look at this site will give you some more in-depth answers: http://mwo.smurfy-net.de/ (scroll down to "heat penalties per weapon")

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2. When outfitting any mech with ER PPC and shooting only one ER PPC at a time it generates 20 heat not 15 as advertised in mech bay. Is it broken or working as intended?

You can't actually tell how much heat you are generating by your heat meter. Heatsinks not only dissipate heat more quickly, they also increase the amount of heat you can have before you overheat. Your meter jumping by 20% doesn't mean you've generated 20 heat.

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3. How to counter ac builds like 2x ac2 & 2xac5 or 4x ac5 on heavy mech like Jester. it seems every time I get stuck on something I die in a couple seconds. Also by the time I even cycle through my lasers on jester jager will just rip me to shreds.

Energy weapon mechs are just not made to go toe to toe with AC mechs. This, however, is a VERY big discussion and I suggest reading some of the posts in the "gameplay balance" section of the forums to see what's going on.

As a quick pointer: Laser weapon mechs do NOT reach their full potential until they have trained all Elite skills and get the 2x bonus for all basic skills. This is because you need the 2x heat reduction bonus and 2x heat capacity bonus where AC mechs usually don't.

This means you'll have to train up some other catapults to get your Jester (and other mechs) to unlock the Elite skills. Spending real money on mechs isn't really "pay to win" by design (and I'm not saying that as a putdown, it's just the easiest way to explain what's going on ), it just accelerates your progression. Hero mechs are simply unique variants that give you extra cBills per match. Champion mechs are simply a standard variant with an XP bonus attached. Otherwise they follow all of the same rules as every other mech.

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Thank you.

If this has been helpful, you're welcome!

[Arnold J Rimmer]

This link will take you straight to the heat penalty section: http://mwo.smurfy-ne...eapon_heatscale

As above, fire large lasers and extended-range large lasers in pairs to avoid triggering the penalty - 6 LL or ERLL is an insane heat load.

With regards to lasers vs AC, the cannon have the further advantage that they don't need to be held on target to do their full damage. An AC/5 will do 5 damage to a target struck within its effective range with one shell. A Medium Laser will only do the full 5 damage (at a shorter range, I might add) after the full one-second beam duration stays on the target - and the likelihood is that damage will be spread over the enemy. Combine this with the fact that it is easy to put a lot of lead onto a target in a short time and the advantage goes squarely to the autocannon, despite being ammunition dependent.

[Jon Gotham]

I think this is some kind of very subtle trolling attempt-if it is+1 for it. It was actually rather clever.....
Re -read and look at the comparisons he makes-esp about the AC.....

[Redshift2k5]

stkxie, on 17 November 2013 - 01:46 AM, said:

Hello, I could use some help to understand how the game works. I currently like to play 4 Mechs, Jester, BH, Firebrand, and Jenner F. While trying to learn how to play I have noticed several things:

1. BH with XL400 & 6 large lasers is going to overheat when I am alpha striking. Total of 21 double heat sinks. Is there something I am doing wrong? How come I can alpha strike 6 medium lasers on a jenner several times in a row and I can't alpha strike even once with 6 large lasers on BH? Like on my jenner the best I did was 987 dmg in a map and on my BH I never go over high 700ish...

2. When outfitting any mech with ER PPC and shooting only one ER PPC at a time it generates 20 heat not 15 as advertised in mech bay. Is it broken or working as intended?

3. How to counter ac builds like 2x ac2 & 2xac5 or 4x ac5 on heavy mech like Jester. it seems every time I get stuck on something I die in a couple seconds. Also by the time I even cycle through my lasers on jester jager will just rip me to shreds.


Thank you.

Large lasers begin to have heat penalties after 2. Medium lasers don't get penalties until you fire 7 or more (the Hunchback 4P can bring 9 medium lasers but suffers significant heat penalties if you try to alpha strike with them). Try a pair of large lasers and four medium lasers (and significantly more heatsinks) instead.

When your mech heat scale bar says "20", that's 20 percent of your heat limit, not 20 heat.

Ballistic mechs have some significant advantages if you allow them to catch you out in the open; They have low heat, fast recycle time,s and significant range. The best defense is to not get caught in the open and not to let them single you out- stick to cover, work with your team, and approach carefully. Shoot for a Jagermech's side torsos many ballistic Jagers will have an XL engine and relatively fragile side torsos.

If you can't beat 'em, join em- you have a Firebrand, bring a pair of AC5s or ultra/5s of your own.

[Koniving]

stkxie, on 17 November 2013 - 01:46 AM, said:

Hello, I could use some help to understand how the game works. I currently like to play 4 Mechs, Jester, BH, Firebrand, and Jenner F. While trying to learn how to play I have noticed several things:

1. BH with XL400 & 6 large lasers is going to overheat when I am alpha striking. Total of 21 double heat sinks. Is there something I am doing wrong? How come I can alpha strike 6 medium lasers on a jenner several times in a row and I can't alpha strike even once with 6 large lasers on BH? Like on my jenner the best I did was 987 dmg in a map and on my BH I never go over high 700ish...

2. When outfitting any mech with ER PPC and shooting only one ER PPC at a time it generates 20 heat not 15 as advertised in mech bay. Is it broken or working as intended?

3. How to counter ac builds like 2x ac2 & 2xac5 or 4x ac5 on heavy mech like Jester. it seems every time I get stuck on something I die in a couple seconds. Also by the time I even cycle through my lasers on jester jager will just rip me to shreds.


Thank you.

Refer to Redshift's post. But additional feedback for you.

1. Read this link. Heat Scale. It will tell you what's punished when firing too many at once. You can get around this by chain firing them (tap backspace to set up chainfire on a group you selected. Tap again to switch back to group fire.)

Also see this, Heat Simulator it has been recently updated and is accurate. Note that different maps add or subtract 10 to 20% from the totals given here on both Cooling Rate and Threshold. Notice as you add heatsinks, your threshold raises.

As much as I dislike this system, explanation...

Spoiler

(MWO would be far more tactical and less shoot 'em up with the classic locked 30 threshold) 4 LLs without Heat Scale penalties (made up for PGI) or any heatsinks at all (or straight up 0 second timeslice on TableTop) will get you 28 out of 30 heat (93.33% out of 100% heat) with MWO's LL heat.

Thus you wouldn't even be able to be moving at all without shutting down and chances are on TT you'd shut down anyway if you failed the roll for it and the pilot would lose consciousness. The mech would fall over and chances are the pilot himself would get a concussion, as well significant damage to the mech. Of course, with 1 second of cooling with 20 SHS or 10 DHS, you'd be fine to move in those systems. Then again LLs are supposed to generate even more heat than they do, and mediums are supposed to generate less.

With MWO as it is given to us, at least you can spam ultra powerful weapons like it ain't no thang, so long as you don't do them all at once as opposed to old systems where even without ghost heat 4 LLs would be very hard to use in an alpha strike.

2. Refer to heat simulator. Tinker with engine size, skill unlocks, etc. Your threshold rises with every heatsink so that percentage changes. It's 15 points of heat (out of any number from 40 to 88.56+).

3. Jester cannot use ballistics. But that said there are a few ways. The main thing is you do not want to fight them out in the open. LRMs trump ballistics at range, so if you can get your team's LRM users to attack the ballistic boat, enjoy watching them die. Alternatively you can opt for destroying a side torso (they always have XL engines and even if they don't die right away, they lost half of their guns), or going for the legs. A prime example is a Cataphract 4x. Most Cataphracts will die instantly from losing one leg, as there's an unusually high likelihood of them exploding in a chain reaction of ammo explosions. This is amplified if you use AC/10, AC/20, (triple likely if you use LB-10), and MG (about 5 to 10 times more likely) on the leg before it blows up.

Edited by Koniving, 17 November 2013 - 06:46 AM.

[Konril]

Sounds like heat has been discussed already, so let me talk a bit about #3 on that list.

Since you mentioned that you had the Firebrand, you might just want to take a good look at the Jagermechs yourself. You'll eventually be piloting two of them if you want to get through the elite and master efficiencies.

The JM6-S and JM6-D comes with two AC/2s and two standard or ultra AC/5s by default. They also come with less armor than many light mechs and far too little ammo to use those guns for very long. XL and Endo Steel technology can shave some weight. But shoehorning something like four AC/5s into a Jagermech with good armor will probably leave you moving like an assault mech. In fact, in my attempt, I dropped the engine to an XL 200, and I'm still not sure that I have adequate ammo in there. If I ever try this again, I'll probably be using just three Ultra AC/5s so I can have even more ammo. On the plus side, while the ammo lasts, the DPS is pretty much as high as it gets.

To compete with your Firebrand, I would recommend 2 Ultra AC/5s, a single ER Large Laser, and extra double heat sinks. Sustained DPS isn't going to be as good, but you'll be able to burst DPS better than the 4 AC/5 monster, and that can give you the edge. Don't be afraid to jam those guns as long as you have a bead on the target.

Competing with the Jester is probably going to take some skill and practice. What you need to do is to learn a tactic usually referred to as "sniping." The one weakness of the "cannon boat" is that it's DPS is almost too literally damage per second. Since AC/2s and AC/5s don't do a lot of damage per shot, but shoot very quickly instead, the best counter is to be aware of where your cover is and stay behind it as much as possible when you're not ready to shoot. If your mech is not exposed for more than a second when you're shooting your large lasers and PPCs, then the enemy Jagermech is not going to be able to do a lot of damage to you in return, and you can eventually win. In theory at least.

[Koniving]

Working with long range weapons like Konril's third build, I recommend a bit of an overhaul from Smurfy's default armor placement. This is his twin UAC/5 + ER LL build with an armor overhaul for long range engagements. Only armor was changed.

[Pictish]

Aha, I take it this is a new thing I had just taken a few weeks off and I could not figure out why my mechs kept shutting down not coming back online and then exploding when over ride was used.

[Not A Real RAbbi]

OP: You asked if you're doing something wrong.

Not REALLY, but sorta. To avoid the ghost heat penalty, or at least mitigate it, CHAIN FIRE YOUR LAZORZ!

Not as satisfying as pressing one button and watching that enemy mech's center torso armor disintegrate, I know. (Actually, I don't know, because I pilot lights and am therefore unfamiliar with what real firepower looks like from the firer's end.) But you'll live longer. I promise.

Also, few players I know are actually using ERPPCs right now. Most have gone to ERLLs or vanilla PPCs. The heat (even without ghost penalty) is just too ridiculous. Like you saw, a 20%-of-max increase in your mech's current temperature is a LOT for a single weapon doing only 10 points of damage. That's just unreasonable for all but the most dedicated snipers.

[stkxie]

Guys, Ladies, thank you very much for your help, much obliged!

On another note, could you please post link to the "laser math" & "armor math" to show how laser dmg is related to the range and how much dmg armor values can soak up. Also are there any tricks on how to shoot pair of UAC5's in order to avoid jamming?

[Alaskan Nobody]

stkxie, on 18 November 2013 - 05:06 PM, said:

how much dmg armor values can soak up.

Simple enough
1 point of armor is worth 1 point of damage, regardless of the damage type
Ferro-fibrous is just lighter than Standard, 1 point of either is 1 point of armor.

stkxie, on 18 November 2013 - 05:06 PM, said:

how laser dmg is related to the range

They do their listed damage out to their listed effective range - and drop by percentile out to their maximum range
IE a med laser does:
5 damage within 270 meters (effective range)
2.5 damage at 405 meters (50% damage at 50% past maximum)
0 damage at 540 meters (100% drop at 100% past maximum)

...that make sense?

Edit: formatting.

Edited by Shar Wolf, 18 November 2013 - 06:47 PM.

[Koniving]

^
This.

Some additional things.
Flamers are an exception for the double range rule. They go to stated range, period. Nothing more.
PPCs are like lasers in that it follows the double range rule.

Autocannons go out to 3 times the range. Example, if a random non-specific autocannon has a stated range of 500 meters, then at 500 meters it does 100% damage. At 1,000 meters (2x stated range) it does 50% damage. At 1,500 meters (3x stated range) it does 0% damage.
(For comparison if a random laser did the same... it'd be 100% damage at 500 meters, 50% damage at 750 meters, and 0% damage at 1,000 meters).

Like flamers, Machine guns do not follow the ballistic rules. They follow the laser rules... for everything. Quite literally MGs are lasers in terms of script code. The particle effect means nothing. There is no leading.

Missiles do 100% damage up to their stated range. But generally do not go beyond that range (except a few meters; this is usually more of a communication/lag delay rather than intended) and self-destruct.

-------

To summarize. 1 damage = 1 point of armor. There is no resistance (except missile bay doors). Ferro is not better than standard.

(Lore-wise Ferro is older and 'standard armor' is an upgrade. Ferro is simply lighter, allowing more points per ton. But since maximum armor cannot be exceeded, ferro is largely pointless. Ferro is stated in books to be laser resistant while standard is more resistant to ballistics; but as this is not in the Battletech board game rules it will never show up in MWO. I find this unfortunate).

[Victor Morson]

stkxie, on 17 November 2013 - 01:46 AM, said:

Hello, I could use some help to understand how the game works. I currently like to play 4 Mechs, Jester, BH, Firebrand, and Jenner F. While trying to learn how to play I have noticed several things:

The Firebrand is solid for a Jagger for sure. The Jester is lackluster; if you pick up another hero, I'd HIGHLY recommend an Ilya Muromets (Cataphract) since it seems like you enjoy ballistic oriented heavies.

stkxie, on 17 November 2013 - 01:46 AM, said:

1. BH with XL400 & 6 large lasers is going to overheat when I am alpha striking. Total of 21 double heat sinks. Is there something I am doing wrong? How come I can alpha strike 6 medium lasers on a jenner several times in a row and I can't alpha strike even once with 6 large lasers on BH? Like on my jenner the best I did was 987 dmg in a map and on my BH I never go over high 700ish...

Welcome to the nightmare that is Ghost Heat. If you search those words, you will find thousands of posts. Basically if you run too many of specific guns, it causes huge heat spikes and does not relay this information to the player. You can find a complete table of heat interactions at: http://mwo.smurfy-net.de/

Basically you can only fire specific combos of weapons every half second. It's really annoying, dumb and doesn't accomplish what it set out to do, but for whatever reason, PGI really dug in on having it.

stkxie, on 17 November 2013 - 01:46 AM, said:

2. When outfitting any mech with ER PPC and shooting only one ER PPC at a time it generates 20 heat not 15 as advertised in mech bay. Is it broken or working as intended?

The # listed for heat is towards your maximum threshold; not your heat %.

stkxie, on 17 November 2013 - 01:46 AM, said:

3. How to counter ac builds like 2x ac2 & 2xac5 or 4x ac5 on heavy mech like Jester. it seems every time I get stuck on something I die in a couple seconds. Also by the time I even cycle through my lasers on jester jager will just rip me to shreds.

AC/2s are pretty bad, but AC/5s are a top dog gun right now. I highly recommend you try using them on your Firebrand, they work well in a 2 AC5, 2 PPC config. That said, if you are driving the Jester, your best bet is to load PPCs into the arms and then "hill hump" - peek BARELY out, fire an elevated shot at an enemy, and then duck back. The Jester is a very limited hero because of the Ghost Heat mechanic from point 1. Your Firebrand, by contrast, will be able to deal with it just fine.

[Konril]

stkxie, on 18 November 2013 - 05:06 PM, said:

Also are there any tricks on how to shoot pair of UAC5's in order to avoid jamming?

Sorry about that. Unfortunately, the best way to stop those UACs from jamming is to pull them out of the mech and replace them with standard AC/5s. Both of the "5" guns share the same performance, 5 damage, 1 heat per shot, 1.5 cooldown, similar range, 1,300 shot speed, and even the same 30 ammo per ton. The Ultra is 1 ton heavier and 25% bulkier just to get you the option to fire a second shot during the cooldown with the 20% jam rate. However, at least the jams only last 6 seconds.

Personally, I love the Ultra cannons. If the battle turns into a sniper fight with everyone popping in an out of cover, the ultra cannon can hit almost twice as often during the limited times the enemy is exposed. So they "snipe" pretty well. Unjamming when behind cover is little different than cooling off behind cover. So I can sometimes forget that some people really don't like the randomness.

You can probably get away with dropping a few extra things from my suggested build to downgrade the cannons to standard AC/5s and add an extra large laser. (If you follow the link, note the lack of AMS, one less heat sink, and slightly reduced leg armor.) Actually, I think it might be a little more bursty than the single laser build like this. You would only be able to fire both lasers for 30 seconds before needing to cool down. More or less depending on the map and unlocked efficiencies. But at least it won't actually jam.

Victor Morson, on 18 November 2013 - 09:44 PM, said:

AC/2s are pretty bad, but AC/5s are a top dog gun right now. I highly recommend you try using them on your Firebrand, they work well in a 2 AC5, 2 PPC config. That said, if you are driving the Jester, your best bet is to load PPCs into the arms and then "hill hump" - peek BARELY out, fire an elevated shot at an enemy, and then duck back. The Jester is a very limited hero because of the Ghost Heat mechanic from point 1. Your Firebrand, by contrast, will be able to deal with it just fine.

Speaking of which, I don't think I actually talked about how to load a Jester. Typically, what I see on the battlefield is usually 2 PPCs and 2 Large Lasers. (Sometimes ER versions.) The beauty of this beast is that the two PPCs do an instant 20 points of pinpoint damage while the large lasers do another 18 points over 1 second. So a single pull of the trigger can deliver 38 points of damage to a single component. Two accurate shots to the side torso of one of those "cannon boat" Jaggermechs is probably all you need to kill it. It shouldn't take more than three shots. But on the flip side, if you don't get time to cool down before that third shot then you'll be either overriding or shutting down to get that third shot off. So you really need to know where your team and cover is, so you can retreat to safety.

[stkxie]

Ladies, Gentleman, once again I am in your debt. All the information you have provided made a huge impact on my game, and I got to experiment with my mechs.

One suggestion, when you tell a newbie to put more armor on the torso mention that it is shared with the back, took me a while to figure that out, longer then I care to admit.

So now I find myself hating the slow mechs and stick to close range battles with range of about 300ish meters. For example my firebrand from now on called "the .50" is using xl280 2xlb10 & 6x medium lasers. You guys taught me how to mix the low heat ballistics and energy weapons for the maximum burst at the preferred range and how to use terrain and friendlies for cover.


And now I require some more help with targeting. How do exactly lasers do damage, is there and initial damage and then a dmg tick during lasers 1 second duration? how much do you lead the target with lasers? Also when you go one on one with another mech no damage to both of you, and you know that the mech is using std engine which components do you aim for? Do you go for the center torso or do you try to disarm the mech? Is there a point to shooting the guy in the back when you know he is gonna turn around and face you or is it better to cool off and continue to pound the most damaged component?


Thank you!

[Alaskan Nobody]

stkxie, on 20 November 2013 - 07:59 PM, said:

And now I require some more help with targeting. How do exactly lasers do damage, is there and initial damage and then a dmg tick during lasers 1 second duration?

WOOOT! something I can help with! Yay!

Lasers:
Do a portion of their damage aprox. every .1 second (currently working on testing the exact timing though)
Same amount of damage for every tick, how much damage depends on the specific laser.
IE the Large Pulse does more damage per tick than the Medium STD laser.

I did the math on it a while ago, but I am currently in the process of double/triple/quadruple checking it, so forgive me if I don't get specific on that.
(somebody offered to help with that... was it ScJazz? I forget )

stkxie, on 20 November 2013 - 07:59 PM, said:

How much do you lead the target with lasers?

Lasers have no travel time: point, fire, and if they are in your crosshairs they take the damage.

stkxie, on 20 November 2013 - 07:59 PM, said:

Also when you go one on one with another mech no damage to both of you, and you know that the mech is using std engine which components do you aim for? Do you go for the center torso or do you try to disarm the mech? Is there a point to shooting the guy in the back when you know he is gonna turn around and face you or is it better to cool off and continue to pound the most damaged component?

This one gets a little trickier - as it really depends on who/what you are fighting
IE: you see a completely undamaged YenLoWang - you shoot his gun arm off.
Getting more specific on that would involve learning the vulnerable spots for the various chassis.

I would highly suggest testing their leg armor - as a lot of people leave them drastically unarmored
(as in you can blow all the armor off some Atlas legs with a single small laser)
If their legs appear to be decently armored, I tend to aim for either the side that has more weapons, or their CT.

As for shooting them from behind - like legging you can try it - a lot of mechs go similarly unarmored to the rear.
(IE - in my Commmando/Locust I can usually burn through an Atlas from behind, before the rest of my team can kill him from in front.)
But keep in mind whoever you are fighting is probably going to be trying to keep you in front of him, so you probably will not get more than the one shot at his rear.
(exception: if you are in a fast mech like a light or Cicada, and you find yourself chasing another similar speed mech, and occasionally a slower mech can be 'shadowed')