93 replies to this topic

[New Day]

Whatzituyah, on 23 November 2013 - 07:16 PM, said:

Getting technical here? Ok Mr. Technical does this mean if you powerdown your heat generation is gone because you off? I like to see you try to prove that one.

Here, I'll help you

Quote

MOVEMENT HEAT

Your engine generates heat the higher your throttle is.

At 66% throttle the engine generates heat up to the equivalent of 1 single heatsink.
At 100% throttle the engine generates heat up to the equivalent of 2 single heatsinks.

[Joseph Mallan]

xMEPHISTOx, on 23 November 2013 - 06:36 PM, said:

Do you...do you really...? Or is this just an easy way for you to up your post count.

What's a High Post count get us? I have the highest on the forum an All I got was this fancy title. And I didn't even get to chose it!!!

Edited by Joseph Mallan, 25 November 2013 - 05:26 AM.

[NextGame]

energy weapons are almost bottom of the barrel, just above srms

[Randalf Yorgen]

I have a Hunchback, P I think, the all laser one. 5 med lasers, 2 MPL, great mech to support the heavies and assaults with. set to chain fire I can fire nonstop for about 20-30 seconds before betty starts crying to me about the dangers of heat. It also goes about 90 and carries full armour and has a Standard Engine. Lights don't like me much at all but neither do the hvys and assaults when I come over the hill and fire a stream of lasers at them while moving behind another hill for cover. If I stay with my brawlers I can add my lasers to their fire power and I can keep the enemy lights off their backs. it's not unusual for have 500+ damage in a match that I survive in. If I die in the match it can be quite a bit less.

The way I see it, Lasers are the DOTs of MWO, Balistics are the burst damage and lrm, gauss, erppc are the ranged weapons doing scatter damage. if you use lasers properly (kill the enemy with 1000 paper cuts) then they are quite effective. If you expect lasers to be as effective in burst damage as an AC10-20, then you are sadly mistaken.

[Sandpit]

Randalf Yorgen, on 25 November 2013 - 06:19 AM, said:

If I stay with my brawlers I can add my lasers to their fire power

I just wanted to highlight this part. I'd like those on the "I hate energy bandwagon" to take note. He's in a Hunchy (usually considered the best general all-around medium in the game and a heck of a work horse). It's got tons of armor, moves quick, but does NOT consider himself a brawler.

That means he realizes the limitations of his mech. Energy weapons are NOT going to let you go head on toe to toe with ballistic brawlers. That's not what they are designed to do. You cannot brawl like that in an energy build. You WILL get your tail handed to you most of the time if the other guy knows what they're doing.

Skirmisher

Learn it, live it, love it.

That should be more your role in a build like this. Please take note, I'm not trying to dictate to anybody how to play this game. I am just trying to give some of those pilots out there some tips on how to get better with these kinds of builds. They take a little more finesse than ballistic brawlers usually.

[Almond Brown]

Sandpit, on 23 November 2013 - 06:47 PM, said:

STK-5M

Firing discipline is more important than anything else. Chain fire is your friend and learning WHEN to risk an overheat on an alpha.

I don't agree with the whole "standing still" thing but I do think you have to be very aware situationally. You have to be very aware of your location and enemy positions. It's always a good idea to have a plan to be able to pull out of the conflict for a few seconds to cool off when needed. You're not going to out brawl anything. You can do just as much if not more damage but you can't fire off all your weapons as often as those brawl builds can especially when dealing with a dakka dakka.

Nice Energy Mech, Drive one myself but with a small tweak. Remove 1 LL, as you can never Alpha all 5 when at even 25%, and upgrade your Engine to a 300 rating, it upgrades the speed to 63kph, when Elited, and adds another Engine DHS(2), moves the Cooling threshold up to 58% and leaves room for a BAP.

Still burns holes in stuff too.

[Almond Brown]

Sandpit, on 24 November 2013 - 01:30 PM, said:

Did you stop to consider the MLs were outside of optimal range.........?

I was curious as to why the Energy Mech just stood in front of the obvious Ballistic Mech. Moving is OP in this meta too I guess.

Edited by Almond Brown, 25 November 2013 - 08:49 AM.

[Sandpit]

Almond Brown, on 25 November 2013 - 08:27 AM, said:

Nice Energy Mech, Drive one myself but with a small tweak. Remove 1 LL, as you can never Alpha all 5 when at even 25%, and upgrade your Engine to a 300 rating, it upgrades the speed to 63kph, when Elited, and adds another Engine DHS(2), moves the Cooling threshold up to 58% and leaves room for a BAP.

Still burns holes in stuff too.

I may try that. I've toyed with the idea of dropping 1 LL, switching 2 LLs out for ER LL, then adding in a larger engine and AMS to see how that works. 5 can't alpha, but having that 5th LL allows me to chain fire and I can literally have one continuous stream of LL goodness going for about 30-40 seconds before I have to worry about heat on most maps (little longer on cold maps, little shorter on hot maps). I love finding those stationary LRM boats and lighting them up. They'll start to pull back and then they start cussing because they realize they haven't stopped taking damage since I first opened fire lol

So much for not being able to sustain damage in an energy boat

[Satan n stuff]

Greyboots, on 23 November 2013 - 06:24 PM, said:

No, I didn't because this isn;t anything that's not been covered quite a lot. The simple fact is that AC mechs are far better at sustained firepower than Laser mechs. Why? Well, it costs you 12 tons for an AC 10 giving you 4 DPS.

It costs you 10 tons for 2 Large Lasers giving you a DPS of 4.24.

Both have an optimal range of 450m.

Medium lasers are still dealing damage at 450m so you can add a little more damage if you like. OR you can just add 2 medium lasers for them to be there. Then you trade out one large laser for an ER Large laser.

You now have one weapon firing at long range and fired solo so it's no heat issue allowing you to at least throw something back at the AC 10. You then get into the midrange and now fire the ER Large and the Large laser to get a DPS advantage.
Then you get into short range and you fire the Large LAser and the 2 Medium Lasers.

Long range: You potentially lose to the AC in DPS but a miss isn't a miss, you can drag the laser onto the target for partial damage.

Optimal range: You now have a higher DPS than the AC 10.

Short range: Medium Lasers have a DPS of 1.25 (x2 = 2.5). You fire 1 large laser and 2 medium lasers for 4.62 DPS (again you win) which the same heat as the ER Large BUT offers a higher DPS. You ALSO have the option of burst firing at 6.74 DPS.

The AC 10 is just 4 DPS no matter what.

The problem? The AC10 takes ONE hardpoint where the Laser setup takes 4.

This is why lasers are USUALLY backed by either missile or ballistic weapons except on rare mechs. These rare all-energy mechs are actually the only real issue.

The game simply doesn't allow all-energy wepaon mechs to be competitive above Mediums outside of a very narrow range of gameplay. You CANNOT build an all-energy weapon mech that will go toe to toe with a ballistic-heavy mech of the same size. The space and hardpoints required simply force you into inadequate or under-cooled setups that only work in the most narrowest of circumstances.

You mean setups that can deal 43 damage in one second with room to spare for an SRM6 like I have on one of my thunderbolts? I'm sure all those phracts and jagers thought it was a really bad build when I killed them in 2 shots, never mind all those assaults who I outgunned and killed despite already running hot halfway through the fight.

2 Large lasers and 5 medium lasers = 43 damage for 15 tons of weapons, using 9 crits. That's a lot more burst damage than an equivalent amount of ballistics could do, and who cares if I only get 2 shots with it if the target dies on the second one anyway.
The most efficient way to use energy weapons in this game has always been guerrilla warfare. Pop out, kill something, run, repeat. Hell even simply providing the setup for a kill works wonders. Have you ever been in one of those matches where every player on a team gets cored early and the team collapses like a house of cards when the enemy actually attacks? Builds like this make things like that possible.
Edit: DPS is meaningless for most energy weapons by the way.

Edited by Satan n stuff, 25 November 2013 - 11:58 AM.

[Lupus Aurelius]

Whatzituyah, on 23 November 2013 - 12:11 PM, said:

I have been using energy weapons for a long time and as long as you have double heatsinks and stand still in a safe place to not get shot to cooldown aswell as take some fireing dissipline you will be fine. Turns out standing still actually makes the heat dissapate faster you know why? Its a rule of battletech and they implemented it in this game! True ballistics and LRMS maybe a little more op but its not to big of a deal for energy boats unless you just alpha a hot weapon with another then it is a problem. ER PPCS and PPCS are the ones needing a buff in reality of balance everything elses seems fine with some fireing dissipline.

I understand that its not ok too standstill its just that sometimes you have too just to get another shot. Speaking of shots bring CoolShots for emergency only.

Ignore my grammer and spelling errors I am sorry cannot understand.

I hope you learned something from me.

Someone has not been paying attention, there is plenty wrong with energy weapons, and the heat system in general atm. PGI has really borked the weapon relationships and functionality, from beam duration, having ballistics, other than the LB, be single shot instead of multiple quick fired rounds, heat levels and dissipation ported from BT, but increasing firing speeds 19x to 2.5 times faster, nerfing DHS external to the engine, etc.

And the forum is full of threads supporting that energy weapons currently are less than optimal:
http://mwomercs.com/...t-fire-weapons/
http://mwomercs.com/...ey-are-too-hot/
http://mwomercs.com/...77#entry27742778
http://mwomercs.com/...35#entry2771535
http://mwomercs.com/...__fromsearch__1
http://mwomercs.com/...__fromsearch__1
http://mwomercs.com/...__fromsearch__1
http://mwomercs.com/...__fromsearch__1
http://mwomercs.com/...4-pulse-lasers/
http://mwomercs.com/...es-and-oranges/
http://mwomercs.com/...rts-2013-11-10/
http://mwomercs.com/...hassis-tonnage/
http://mwomercs.com/...d-for-the-game/
http://mwomercs.com/...ge-laser-limit/
http://mwomercs.com/...cing-all-wrong/
http://mwomercs.com/...-viable-or-not/
http://mwomercs.com/...n-pulse-lasers/
http://mwomercs.com/...on-rebalancing/

[Sandpit]

Lupus Aurelius, on 25 November 2013 - 11:57 AM, said:

Someone has not been paying attention, there is plenty wrong with energy weapons, and the heat system in general atm. PGI has really borked the weapon relationships and functionality, from beam duration, having ballistics, other than the LB, be single shot instead of multiple quick fired rounds, heat levels and dissipation ported from BT, but increasing firing speeds 19x to 2.5 times faster, nerfing DHS external to the engine, etc.

And the forum is full of threads supporting that energy weapons currently are less than optimal:
http://mwomercs.com/...t-fire-weapons/
http://mwomercs.com/...ey-are-too-hot/
http://mwomercs.com/...77#entry27742778
http://mwomercs.com/...35#entry2771535
http://mwomercs.com/...__fromsearch__1
http://mwomercs.com/...__fromsearch__1
http://mwomercs.com/...__fromsearch__1
http://mwomercs.com/...__fromsearch__1
http://mwomercs.com/...4-pulse-lasers/
http://mwomercs.com/...es-and-oranges/
http://mwomercs.com/...rts-2013-11-10/
http://mwomercs.com/...hassis-tonnage/
http://mwomercs.com/...d-for-the-game/
http://mwomercs.com/...ge-laser-limit/
http://mwomercs.com/...cing-all-wrong/
http://mwomercs.com/...-viable-or-not/
http://mwomercs.com/...n-pulse-lasers/
http://mwomercs.com/...on-rebalancing/

The only person not paying attention is you.........

As in paying attention to the players that actually using them contradicting everything you just supported

You can show me all the threads you want (which just proves that everyone loves posting duplicate threads btw) and that means no more than "I have an opinion on energy weapons and it is they suck" just like you have several players telling you their opinion is they don't suck, but in your mine those saying energy weapons are somehow "wrong"

And the reason you see so many thread "proving" energy weapons are "broken" is because those that use them, like them, and are successful with them don't normally feel the need to jump on the forums with 50 threads of "Energy weapons are great!" That's not because we don't like them, that's because we have no reason to jump up and down and talk about how great they are.

You DO, however, find players in every single one of those threads contradicting the "energy is bad" fact opinion. But that must not be what you meant by not paying attention

[Lupus Aurelius]

Sandpit, on 25 November 2013 - 12:09 PM, said:

The only person not paying attention is you.........

As in paying attention to the players that actually using them contradicting everything you just supported

You can show me all the threads you want (which just proves that everyone loves posting duplicate threads btw) and that means no more than "I have an opinion on energy weapons and it is they suck" just like you have several players telling you their opinion is they don't suck, but in your mine those saying energy weapons are somehow "wrong"

And the reason you see so many thread "proving" energy weapons are "broken" is because those that use them, like them, and are successful with them don't normally feel the need to jump on the forums with 50 threads of "Energy weapons are great!" That's not because we don't like them, that's because we have no reason to jump up and down and talk about how great they are.

You DO, however, find players in every single one of those threads contradicting the "energy is bad" fact opinion. But that must not be what you meant by not paying attention

Actually, I do use them, and I use ballistics, and I use LRMs. And I consistently perform almost 2 times better in ballistic heavy builds than energy only builds. I prefer energy weapons, but actually use them less than I use to ( I use to use them exclusively when possible) because experience and data have shown they are not competitive against ballistics atm. But instead of giving personal opinion only, or anecdotal, like you do, I support my observations with actual data and math, as do some others here.

You are too quick to constantly downplay any negative comments about energy weapons, without any supportive analysis to your opinion. To me, and any other person with some level of intelligence, this would indicate a bias. Instead of constantly repeating the same message all the time, try actually supporting that with some data other than "I don't have a problem with them".

Edited by Lupus Aurelius, 25 November 2013 - 12:20 PM.

[Whatzituyah]

VIPER2207, on 25 November 2013 - 03:37 AM, said:

[xMEPHISTOx]

Joseph Mallan, on 25 November 2013 - 04:11 AM, said:

What's a High Post count get us? I have the highest on the forum an All I got was this fancy title. And I didn't even get to chose it!!!

lol...fair enough.

[Sandpit]

Lupus Aurelius, on 25 November 2013 - 12:15 PM, said:

Actually, I do use them, and I use ballistics, and I use LRMs. And I consistently perform almost 2 times better in ballistic heavy builds than energy only builds. I prefer energy weapons, but actually use them less than I use to ( I use to use them exclusively when possible) because experience and data have shown they are not competitive against ballistics atm. But instead of giving personal opinion only, or anecdotal, like you do, I support my observations with actual data and math, as do some others here.

You are too quick to constantly downplay any negative comments about energy weapons, without any supportive analysis to your opinion. To me, and any other person with some level of intelligence, this would indicate a bias. Instead of constantly repeating the same message all the time, try actually supporting that with some data other than "I don't have a problem with them".

No I'm quick to point out your opinion isn't factual. You do better in ballistics? Great. I'm happy for you. use them. Love them.

I don't. I do better in my laser boats. Just because you're better in a specific build doesn't make other builds "bad". It also doesn't mean that those weapon systems you can't use as effectively as others are "broken"

You're the only one not providing data. I've provided tons of data. It's called my statistics. I need no other data to prove your opinion wrong for me. Neither does anyone else claiming they're "fine". I support my findings with math as well. It's called my kdr and w/l and damage at the end of a match.

2+2 = 4 This is a fact
2+2 = 4 is a better equation than 2x2 = 4 This is an opinion

Ghost heat causes xx amount of heat per weapon. This increases boating heat if you fire xx amount of weapons in a specific amount of time. This is above the normal heat caused by those weapons if they were fired individual and consecutively.

Ghost heat = more heat when you boat weapons and fire them en masse. This is a fact
Ghost heat = A bad device and ruins energy builds. This is an opinion

do you see the difference?

[GalaxyBluestar]

Sandpit, on 25 November 2013 - 09:00 AM, said:

I may try that. I've toyed with the idea of dropping 1 LL, switching 2 LLs out for ER LL, then adding in a larger engine and AMS to see how that works. 5 can't alpha, but having that 5th LL allows me to chain fire and I can literally have one continuous stream of LL goodness going for about 30-40 seconds before I have to worry about heat on most maps (little longer on cold maps, little shorter on hot maps). I love finding those stationary LRM boats and lighting them up. They'll start to pull back and then they start cussing because they realize they haven't stopped taking damage since I first opened fire lol

So much for not being able to sustain damage in an energy boat

at lurms

taking the fifth laser out

but but... zombie assault! you can actually get kills with that final center LL!



EDIT: pic added, yep made a mistake and got thrashed bu made up for it. first time {and hopefully last} that i screw up enough to get that much armour ripped. i admit this match had "kill steals"

BTW wanna go with four? go 3F 5m is strictly a must use CT energy hardpoint.

Edited by GalaxyBluestar, 25 November 2013 - 09:11 PM.

[Sandpit]

GalaxyBluestar, on 25 November 2013 - 05:40 PM, said:

at lurms

taking the fifth laser out

but but... zombie assault! you can actually get kills with that final center LL! {will post picture when out of the office }

lol I know, it's my favorite mech right now. LRMs just get pesky at times with no AMS and I can't always rely on the kindness of strangers lol

[YueFei]

Lykaon, on 24 November 2013 - 12:59 PM, said:

Situation is as follows.

A Jagermech breaks cover from around a corner and comes rushing straight towards you uleashing a hail of AC ammo at you.Your Battlemaster (with it's 20 ton weight advantage) fires off a PPC and 6 medium lasers.The PPC registers a good hit but somehow the medium lasers under perform for damage and hit reg. The Jager now has some moderate damage you have some significant damage from the Jager and you also have high heat.The Jager is cool and continuing a constant hail of fire.

You were outplayed the moment that Jager broke from cover and you didn't have anything nearby to dive behind, and he forced you into a sustained gunfight where you'd overheat. It's really that simple. It happens. Change that scenario a bit to one where you have cover to dive behind for a few seconds to cool off, and it changes. Assuming that you're packing a monster engine (since you only seem to carry 13 tons of weapons?? 6 ML + 1 PPC?), you should be fast enough to book it outta there.

[Khobai]

Quote

PPC and 6 medium lasers

And thats your problem right there... medium lasers as your main weapons is fail. Even my Battlemaster uses two AC/5s and two PPCs as its main weapons. Its basically a ghetto highlander, but its still better than any laser build.

Which brings us back to my original question, why does the battlemaster have 7 energy slots, when there isnt a single effective build which can use all of them? Energy builds are outright inferior to mixed ballistic/energy builds.

Edited by Khobai, 26 November 2013 - 01:00 AM.

[Tahribator]

Khobai, on 26 November 2013 - 12:55 AM, said:

And thats your problem right there... medium lasers as your main weapons is fail. Even my Battlemaster uses two AC/5s and two PPCs as its main weapons. Its basically a ghetto highlander, but its still better than any laser build.

Which brings us back to my original question, why does the battlemaster have 7 energy slots, when there isnt a single effective build which can use all of them? Energy builds are outright inferior to mixed ballistic/energy builds.

Even 6 medium lasers in an Assault with 22-23 heatsinks cooling them should be absolutely scary. At the moment you can only fire an extra alpha or maybe two compared to a Jenner, even with the massive heatsink difference. Everybody has a good chuckle when engaging an energy boat Awesome or Battlemaster.