96 replies to this topic

[Mcchuggernaut]

After the air and artillery strikes got a buff, I'm seeing a lot of them. I watched an unwary Spider get owned just a few matches ago by one, and almost died laughing as he cursed on the chat and his body rolled awkwardly down off the ridge he had been hiding on whilst sniping at my teammates. All my considerable mirth aside, I have some questions I want to find answers to about the mechanics of air and arty strikes:

It says each shell does 40 damage, and there are six of them. 240 damage would core any mech in the game, so how is that damage applied? Is it spread evenly over all parts of a mech?

How wide is the radius of an air/arty strike, and is the damage more severe the closer to the center of that radius that you are, or does anywhere inside that radius deal the same damage? Does facing in the direction of the epicenter of the strike protect your back?

How come everyone seems to be using arty strikes over air strikes?

Finally, I have heard some complaining that it is extremely easy to blow out the cockpit and rear armor of a mech, because I THINK the damage is spread evenly over the mech, and anything over 20 damage is potentially lethal with a max cockpit armor of only 20 and back armor usually set about the same or slightly more. Is any of that true, and if so will it be changed?

I know there might not be answers to all these questions, but since the strikes are starting to show up a competent player should know how they work and how to deal with them. Also, any tips from those already in the know on how best to use them?

Thanks in advance for any help!

[Khobai]

not sure why pgi thought it was a good idea to go from 10 damage to 40 damage in one patch.

When most other devs balance their games they do incremental buffs. they dont just jack up damage 4 times in one patch.

[Thorqemada]

The Dev Command Chair Post about the Consumables (Coolant + Strikes):
http://mwomercs.com/...ost__p__2019322

The Hits of the Strikes are randomly distributed into the target area and do splash damage to whatever is inside the splash damage range...now with quadruppled damage values.

Edited by Thorqemada, 01 December 2013 - 02:52 PM.

[unFearing]

damage is applied based on proximity and direction your mech is facing. if a shell hits right behind you, you can kiss your rear armor goodbye. if it lands on your or probably right in front of you, typically there goes your head if you don't have enough armor, or it might go even if you have max armor sometimes. if you're a light mech, typically you'll lose and arm or leg; possibly your head.

240 dmg is not applied evenly at all. it's just a bunch of random shots around that general vicinity of red smoke. the difference between arty and air strike is that air strike is a line of shells fired in the direction you are facing (uncertain as to whether it is upper or lower torso), so if there is a conga line of mechs, air strike is more ideal for hitting all of them. however, firing a straight line of shells is also more prone to missing the enemy mechs if they manuever away, and less likely to surround a particular mech or small force in momentary hell. as the enemy, you can't know if it's an arty or air strike unless you see the smoke and then see the planes, but it's the unpredictability of the arty strike that allows the offchance of damaging rear torsos. i would say both have an equally small-but-evident chance of headshotting mechs.

the blast radius was stated in some ATD or CC post i'm sure.

how to use? don't use mc. put right behind lrm boats. light mechs find the most opportunities for these, but all pilots wouldn't mind having one when seeing a conglomeration of mechs charging or sitting still. assign the arty/air strike hotkey to a button you can easily hit without taking your hand off the keyboard or mouse or game controller. JJs allow for more lucky strikes, i would say.

[aniviron]

Each shell does 40 damage, and when upgraded, you get 10 of them, which is why they're so popular right now. If three of your teammates can land arty strikes and the other team doesn't have them, well, they're boned.

The damage is applied the same way that SRM splash works right now. Each shell has a radius (10m I think? Forget the exact number.) and every component in that radius takes damage, decreasing with distance from the centerpoint. When a shell would do more than 40 damage (i.e. it hits very close to a mech and would deal say 30 damage to center and left torso each) the damage is instead capped at 40 and the damage is divided up amongst all sections hit; not sure if it is divided evenly or if the ratio of how much damage each section would have taken is kept the same.

The reason people take arty over airstrikes is that arty concentrates all the damage roughly where you are aiming, whereas an airstrike generates a line that does damage over a couple hundred meters. Since the arty goes more or less where you aim and most teams ball up instead of lining up, airstrike is pretty worthless and arty is pretty great

Khobai, on 01 December 2013 - 02:44 PM, said:

not sure why pgi thought it was a good idea to go from 10 damage to 40 damage in one patch.

When most other devs balance their games they do incremental buffs. they dont just jack up damage 4 times in one patch.

Yeah, I was pretty stunned when I read the patch notes on this; sure enough, everyone is using arty now. Just goes to show that they learned nothing from the various Lurmageddons that have happened over the last year. It's depressingly common for a weapon to get 3-4 buffs or nerfs in a patch; the last one was the PPC. And we wonder why weapon balance see-saws back and forth so drastically.

[xMEPHISTOx]

Mcchuggernaut, on 01 December 2013 - 02:41 PM, said:

It says each shell does 40 damage, and there are six of them. 240 damage would core any mech in the game, so how is that damage applied? Is it spread evenly over all parts of a mech?

I am sure the idea is to spread damage, but I do not think it works. On several occasions have had legs/arms get severely cored w/just one air strike. And not it lights either im talking about assaults and not with inadequate leg armor.
For the most ezmode weapon in the game it does create an immense amount of damage.

Khobai, on 01 December 2013 - 02:44 PM, said:

not sure why pgi thought it was a good idea to go from 10 damage to 40 damage in one patch.

When most other devs balance their games they do incremental buffs. they dont just jack up damage 4 times in one patch.

Or at the very least they test it on a test server either public or private.

[Mcchuggernaut]

Thorqemada, on 01 December 2013 - 02:49 PM, said:

The Dev Command Chair Post about the Consumables (Coolant + Strikes):
http://mwomercs.com/...ost__p__2019322

The Hits of the Strikes are randomly distributed into the target area and do splash damage to whatever is inside the splash damage range...now with quadruppled damage values.

Thanks for drawing my attention to this, but since the damages shown are all different than the re-worked strikes we are using now, it is quite clear that it was written before the current changes and their information is less than accurate. Also, just HOW MUCH splash damage is done and at what distance from the epicenter is not stated at all. That's pretty important with the Priority version of an arty strike doing 400 damage...

unFearing, on 01 December 2013 - 02:51 PM, said:

damage is applied based on proximity and direction your mech is facing. if a shell hits right behind you, you can kiss your rear armor goodbye. if it lands on your or probably right in front of you, typically there goes your head if you don't have enough armor, or it might go even if you have max armor sometimes. if you're a light mech, typically you'll lose and arm or leg; possibly your head.

240 dmg is not applied evenly at all. it's just a bunch of random shots around that general vicinity of red smoke. the difference between arty and air strike is that air strike is a line of shells fired in the direction you are facing (uncertain as to whether it is upper or lower torso), so if there is a conga line of mechs, air strike is more ideal for hitting all of them. however, firing a straight line of shells is also more prone to missing the enemy mechs if they manuever away, and less likely to surround a particular mech or small force in momentary hell. as the enemy, you can't know if it's an arty or air strike unless you see the smoke and then see the planes, but it's the unpredictability of the arty strike that allows the offchance of damaging rear torsos. i would say both have an equally small-but-evident chance of headshotting mechs.

the blast radius was stated in some ATD or CC post i'm sure.

how to use? don't use mc. put right behind lrm boats. light mechs find the most opportunities for these, but all pilots wouldn't mind having one when seeing a conglomeration of mechs charging or sitting still. assign the arty/air strike hotkey to a button you can easily hit without taking your hand off the keyboard or mouse or game controller. JJs allow for more lucky strikes, i would say.

Thank you, that was very informative.

[Khobai]

Quote

Yeah, I was pretty stunned when I read the patch notes on this; sure enough, everyone is using arty now. Just goes to show that they learned nothing from the various Lurmageddons that have happened over the last year. It's depressingly common for a weapon to get 3-4 buffs or nerfs in a patch; the last one was the PPC. And we wonder why weapon balance see-saws back and forth so drastically.

Most players dont even do 400 damage at the end of most matches.

But a single module item can potentially do upto 400 damage by itself? PGI did not think this out.

[80sGlamRockSensation David Bowie]

Arty FOTM?

Thats a cute name. I see you've never played in any leauge matches or competitive 12's before.

[Deathlike]

It doesn't matter when you can apply both modules AT THE SAME TIME.

Thanks PGI.

[Mcchuggernaut]

mwhighlander, on 01 December 2013 - 03:09 PM, said:

Arty FOTM?

Thats a cute name. I see you've never played in any leauge matches or competitive 12's before.

Well, no I haven't obviously. Otherwise I would be getting my information somewhere else besides the forums...haha. I take it you mean they were commonly used before the buff in competitive play?

[Deathlike]

Mcchuggernaut, on 01 December 2013 - 03:12 PM, said:

Well, no I haven't obviously. Otherwise I would be getting my information somewhere else besides the forums...haha. I take it you mean they were commonly used before the buff in competitive play?

No, they were used EXCLUSIVELY after the buff in competitive play.

Edited by Deathlike, 01 December 2013 - 03:17 PM.

[Thorqemada]

Imho the strikes do all damage as splash damage (but who knows, maybe the coring comes from direct hits that have a hard coded minimum value and the direct hit value is to high) and you get splash damage equivalent to the volume of your mech inside the explosion area compared to the splash volume (also distance is a factor) which means you should never get the full 40 dmg.

But who am i - i could tell total ******** here...

Edited by Thorqemada, 01 December 2013 - 03:22 PM.

[NRP]

I've run into a few people who could use Artillery strikes effectively, but more often than not, Artillery strikes are a waste of 40k C-Bills. They're easy to avoid if you're paying attention, and they hardly do any significant damage when they do hit (even after the buff). They're most effective at the end of matches when enemy mechs are already significantly damaged.

Total non-issue imo. But hey, we need something to cry about, right?

[Khobai]

Quote

you should never get the full 40 dmg.

its 40 damage per SHELL. its upto 400 damage. Its a module item that potentially does more damage than the average player. That is insane when you think about it.

[Thorqemada]

It is like PGI

PS: I loved Scorched Earth - was a great "Artillery Duel" inspired game with destructible maps...
That would have been a great implementation of an Arty Strike, count in Wind, Gravity, a whole bunch of Special Guns n Ammo.....yeah!



Its a better game the more Players play...

Edited by Thorqemada, 01 December 2013 - 03:34 PM.

[xMEPHISTOx]

NRP, on 01 December 2013 - 03:22 PM, said:

Artillery strikes are a waste of 40k C-Bills.

I would agree with this...I can produce damage perfectly fine w/my weapons, no need to decrease my cbill earnings per match. This applies more so for 4 mans grouping and solo pugging, not so much for 12 man drops.

[Tekadept]

Arty strikes are waaaay better at 40 pts, pretty much balanced damage wise, they are still MAJORLY nerfed with the red smoke, In no way shape or form, should the enemy know where you have requested artillery to drop unless they are haxing your radionet, and even then you wouldnt have a nice plume of red smoke to highlight it.

[Mcchuggernaut]

On a side note, I just shot through a wall with an AC20 shell. It blew up on the terrain right in front of me. I was backing up trying to get a shot at a nearly cored Atlas that was standing there facing me like a tool. Despite CLEARLY hitting the rock outcropping in front of me I got a red hit marker, my opponent promptly died, and the game informed me that I had killed him. I hadn't hit this guy for several seconds with anything else so unless ammo explosions can happen 4 seconds after a hit, this is another example of the game doing wonky things sometimes. Like when you core someone through their back armor shooting them in the front...(rolls eyes)

Ended up with six kills that game, but when you have magical bullets that teleport through objects to your enemy's faces that isn't such a feat.

Edited by Mcchuggernaut, 01 December 2013 - 03:37 PM.

[xMEPHISTOx]

Tekadept, on 01 December 2013 - 03:30 PM, said:

Arty strikes are waaaay better at 40 pts, pretty much balanced damage wise, they are still MAJORLY nerfed with the red smoke, In no way shape or form, should the enemy know where you have requested artillery to drop unless they are haxing your radionet, and even then you wouldnt have a nice plume of red smoke to highlight it.

There ya go, nice...promote the most ezmode weapon in the game to be buffed up.