229 replies to this topic

[Atlai]

Victor Morson, on 04 December 2013 - 11:31 PM, said:

Why do people keep posting subpar runs in pug games as something to be proud of?

You wanna know why im proud of it? because even after a year and a half of playing this game, im one hell of a sh#tty *** pilot, its nothing anyone can teach me, im just bad.
I barely top 400 damage a game, even in Atlai or Cataphracts or any other "Good" mech, so when i get 650 damage in a game as the last man standing winning the game for my team(In supposedly the one of the worst mechs), i feel pretty damn good.

Victor Morson, on 04 December 2013 - 11:25 PM, said:

For anyone, in particular beginners.

The only people who should be considering Dragons are people who have a ton of nostalgia for them on Table Top and want to own one because of it. Everyone else should look elsewhere.

I disagree completely, a game is about having fun right? and i have a lot of fun in my Dragon, and thats a good enough reason for me to pilot them.

[Itsalrightwithme]

giganova, on 05 December 2013 - 09:25 AM, said:

Oh yeah, I'm with you. It was more of a redundant question that I was posing, I've been here since closed beta. I was just pointing out some of the cognitive biases involved with a lot of these rankings. Call of Duty still gets a '9 out of 10' for being the same iterative game it was the year prior. I've never trusted review scores, top 10 lists, tier rankings, or any critique that assigns arbitrary and superfluous numbers or scoring. They're just lists based off personal experience and taste, even if the author's claim there's a consensus.

Ah, I got you. It's hard to convey or detect the redundance / rhetoric in your previous post.

Like you, I also believe in quantitative analysis first, but in this game there is no good way to make direct and unbiased comparisons unless they are specifically instantiated, such as "should I bring 1 AC10 or 2 AC5s?" Also ELO, MM, skills, the fact that the population is vastly different at various times of the day and days of the week, make it difficult.

Speaking of which, I've quit playing pugs/4-mans between 1200 and 2100 GMT, there population variance is waaaay too large, and I'm tired of getting stuck with teammates who have a hard time breaking 200 damage in an assault or heavy. Or, getting a 4-man premade running all assault mechs where I didn/t have to contribute anything to win. It's exhilarating being the last guy alive and managing to take out 2 of the 5 enemy mechs still standing, but it gets tiring after a while.

Anyway, if there is one thing that I can put a lot of faith on, it is that builds that top league teams and top players run are almost surely at least "very good" in general. Top players (again, not me) spend a lot of time tweaking and testing, challenging themselves, etc. If they find something good, they'll find it and they'll use it. There are times that I feel that, "damn this build, are these guys really the top players they seem to be?" but every time I stick with their builds, the process of learning that build points out weak points in my own personal piloting skills.

As I said earlier, most casual players dumped their ER/PPC when heat was bumped up, but the best shooters still really like the pinpoint damage and versatility. By sticking to using PPCs I found my own weak points as a pilot, and I'd like to think that I suck less at it than I was just 4 months ago.

Some players just like to pugstomp, so they bring whatever enabled them to do so given the current meta (Streakapults in CB, Streak Ravens about 9 months ago, DDC LRM boats about 12 months ago, HGN poptarts 6 months ago), but running those builds at the peak of their popularity / OP-ness doesn't build real skill. Plenty of players I knew quit just because their favorite toy was nerfed, and they didn't want to learn anything else.

Edited by Itsalrightwithme, 06 December 2013 - 04:58 PM.

[King Arthur IV]

Awesome are AWESOME
CHECK SPOILER!!

so i said something about playing right now and getting screen shots as i go.

and you said something about proving it

so here they are my "awesome" games from just now, most with my so called "op" variants. 15 games 11 screen shots.

the reason i didnt screen cap the four:
--one game we got pick apart i made 3-4 bad positional moves, could of won the game if i wasn't so hung up on killing a ddc so my fault. i could of owned the other mechs then come back the to the ddc.
--Second, I capped won a game so no worth a screen pic, did zero damage and funny thing is we weren't even losing the fight i just blanked out from so many wins.
--third & fourth only did like 200-350 damage, won one and lost one. map was too big or maybe i took too long killing my target to move on.


All the games you see, im aiming for left/right torsos or other vital areas like "red" leg.
I generally leave a mech alone in a crowd if they are a stick, hence low kills.
Aiming for side torso have also granted the team alot of xl kills and my damage doesn't need to go off the roof.

Spoiler

When i say "OP" variants in my clan forum, i mean better/ easier to play/ suits my play style/ advantages can be utilized.
I dont mean end all and be all. if i thought they were broken in some way i would say so here right now.

made so many highlanders useless this run. all the weapons on the right side is a HUGE Achilles heel screaming in your face to shoot it.

Edited by King Arthur IV, 05 December 2013 - 10:35 AM.

[Alaskan Nobody]

King Arthur IV, on 05 December 2013 - 10:35 AM, said:

made so many highlanders useless this run. all the weapons on the right side is a HUGE Achilles heel screaming in your face to shoot it.

And yet, the Highlander is one of the 'best' you can have, while the upcoming Griffin, is supposedly DOA for having the same trait?

I laugh every time people bring up one or the other in either of those senses.

[Victor Morson]

King Arthur IV, on 05 December 2013 - 10:35 AM, said:

Awesome are AWESOME
CHECK SPOILER!!

A bunch of shots where you, once again in a 4 man, did less damage than my Shadow Hawk does typically in an 80 tonner is not impressive.

Mason West, on 05 December 2013 - 09:25 AM, said:

I disagree completely, a game is about having fun right? and i have a lot of fun in my Dragon, and thats a good enough reason for me to pilot them.

I've definitely said repeatedly that if you know a build isn't great but enjoy it, pick it up.

But don't come on here and tell new people to do the same because you happen to like it. It's very confusing.

King Arthur IV, on 05 December 2013 - 10:35 AM, said:

made so many highlanders useless this run.

A very neat trick given across all your screenshots, there were a total of 4 them. Out of what, a half dozen games?

Which also explains your damage.

Itsalrightwithme, on 05 December 2013 - 09:58 AM, said:

Anyway, if there is one thing that I can put a lot of faith on, it is that builds that top league teams and top players run are almost surely at least "very good" in general. Top players (again, not me)

You can hold up there with the best of them man. heh

Mycrus, on 05 December 2013 - 08:08 AM, said:

[/size]

yep, like this one..

Yes indeed, outdated.

This was during the period before the Awesome got engine restricted and lasers/SRMs were king. It was a brief glorious month or two months in which the Awesome was the best thing since sliced bread.

Believe me I take no pleasure in smack talking the Awesome. It's my favorite 'mech in the franchise. I own one against better judgement.

But I'm still going to give it one star.

Edited by Victor Morson, 05 December 2013 - 02:59 PM.

[Victor Morson]

Broken Doll, on 05 December 2013 - 07:03 AM, said:

I don't get how you can expect anyone to take your opinions seriously when you dedicate the entire thread to mocking and berating anyone who questions them in the slightest way. I think I'll look for advice elsewhere.

Your call.

The reason I'm being so adamant, exclusively, is that otherwise every single 'mech recommendation thread turns into this:

OP: These mechs are good, check them out.

Players: Ignore that list buy stuff that's half as effective or worse, or you are a noob!
AKA we don't want to face more people in good builds / wish this game were TT

.. 5 pages later: Let's talk Commando loadouts while I give you stories about how I can use so many tactics to not just be an inferior Jenner
You can't.

It just gets worse from there. Huge groups of people constantly spouting misinformation without justifying it. I fully encourage you to make up your own mind. I'm trying to back arguments with logic and experience, and if you look at the best players in the game, they are running pretty similar setups in most instances.

What I am not doing is going "Nu-uh it's great" and just posting screenshot after screenshot in which I took a 4 man into a PUG game (most of which with equally bad mechs/configs) and scored a moderate amount of damage that a well designed medium could do for a third the tonnage.

Edited by Victor Morson, 05 December 2013 - 03:08 PM.

[Victor Morson]

giganova, on 05 December 2013 - 06:39 AM, said:

MavRCK's topic also started out in the "New Players" section. Kind of odd when you think about it, why would competitive players give advice to new casual players? Casual and competitive are two completely different ball games. There's no room for error in competitive play, which has an amplification effect on the quirks of any given mech, exaggerating its competitive usefulness. This just isn't the case in casual play, where presumably 99% of new players spend their career.

Because buying and mastering a 'mech is a huge commitment.

Often, new players come to us, and they have spent weeks grinding a bad 'mech, or a niche 'mech that isn't used very much, and it's a shame.

You hit new guys with mastered Hunchbacks and Commandos all the time, and the minute they get thrown into the fire, it works out very badly until they can upgrade to serious 'mechs.

So why allow a newbie to waste time on a chassis that will inevitably fail them and handicaps them right from day 1? I think they should have access knowledge of what the best options are, so they can get something that they'll both enjoy but will also not handicap them in the slightest, and will last them for a considerable amount of time.

While the meta has shifted, most of the top meta 'mechs remain on top. Unless the Clan tech screws everything up, which is possible, they're not going anywhere anytime soon.

Again I'm not saying "Never buy a sub-5 'mech." I own sub-5 'mechs. I'm saying don't tell newbies that they should be anything close to the first 'mech they buy.

giganova, on 05 December 2013 - 08:29 AM, said:

Not only that, but the fact that there is no scientific reproducibility involved with these lists just adds to their dubious nature.

Go youtube Run Hot Or Die. Watch what the teams are running.

Every time a good team hits a bad team and you see the 'mech lists steer from the top 'mechs in the OP you'll also see a very, very dead team.

Edited by Victor Morson, 05 December 2013 - 03:13 PM.

[Atlai]

Victor Morson, on 05 December 2013 - 03:03 PM, said:

But don't come on here and tell new people to do the same because you happen to like it. It's very confusing.

Just for the record, i dont actually think i ever recommended the Dragon in one of my posts, i just said i like it personally.

[MrMedallion]

Man, I wish I had that list when I first started! Agree or not, there's definitly a lot to think about there. It would have saved me from buying the overlord package, I would have just been happy with the shadow hawk.

[DONTOR]

Victor Morson, on 03 December 2013 - 01:53 PM, said:

That is the exact reverse of the problems with the Wang - it's way too easy to cripple. It'll be down to 2 ML or 1 LL in almost no time.

Compared to the 9A, which is like a Terminator, well.. there is no comparison.

Maybe a Dark Angels Terminator. Not a bad list all in all. Though I think you rated some mechs lower than what you would have liked, to due to it being a list for newer players.

[Victor Morson]

giganova, on 05 December 2013 - 09:25 AM, said:

Oh yeah, I'm with you. It was more of a redundant question that I was posing, I've been here since closed beta. I was just pointing out some of the cognitive biases involved with a lot of these rankings. Call of Duty still gets a '9 out of 10' for being the same iterative game it was the year prior. I've never trusted review scores, top 10 lists, tier rankings, or any critique that assigns arbitrary and superfluous numbers or scoring. They're just lists based off personal experience and taste, even if the author's claim there's a consensus.

That's reasonable. That's why I've tried to briefly explain the strengths/weaknesses that made up the list.

The Shadow Hawk isn't a 5 because I like Shadow Hawks or am biased for them. It's a 5 because it has great high mounted guns for ridging, a really good hit box layout, good hardpoint setups that offer a lot of options. They are also universally jump capable, and the variants a ton of options to players, including to keep up with meta.

[luxebo]

Wow, a lot of talk between Victor's group and the F8L... Would like to see this battle soon.

Maybe have a few matches using Awesomes, Dragons, and Locusts both sides.

@King Artur 4: Come back with a post if you ever get to over 1000 damage. Or maybe 6 kills or something. A lot of the matches I see that you posted pics of are not really supporting your ideas or any of the F8L ideas on this topic. If you can break a record of the height of maybe a Victor's/Cataphract's/Highlander's damage, then maybe Victor might see a bit of your point.

Edited by luxebo, 05 December 2013 - 05:08 PM.

[Alaskan Nobody]

luxebo, on 05 December 2013 - 04:15 PM, said:

If you can break a record of the height of maybe a Victor's damage, then maybe Victor might see a bit of your point.

Koniving did, Victor mocked.

[luxebo]

Shar Wolf, on 05 December 2013 - 04:20 PM, said:

Koniving did, Victor mocked.

I meant the mech Victor. A Victor. But I'm saying that all the F8L guys posting pics attempting to support their point of view is really working against them. 400 damage games with an Awesome isn't totally impressive.

How much Koniving achieved? I know he is a solid mech pilot, but I'm not sure if you were talking about Victor or the mech Victor. I was attempting to base it on something via tonnage (Victor 80 tons, Awesome 80 tons.) I'll fix it.

Edit: Found a few shots that are pretty high in damage numbers.

Edited by luxebo, 05 December 2013 - 05:11 PM.

[Victor Morson]

luxebo, on 05 December 2013 - 04:15 PM, said:

@King Artur 4: Come back with a post if you ever get to over 1000 damage. Or maybe 6 kills or something. A lot of the matches I see that you posted pics of are not really supporting your ideas or any of the F8L ideas on this topic. If you can break a record of the height of maybe a Victor's damage, then maybe Victor might see a bit of your point.

To be fair, he did post one over 1,000, but just one. The enemy team only had one Highlander and almost nothing to speak of, and it was in a 4-man against low ELO players (including some trials) so I can't be too enthusiastic about it.

I'm looking forward to the match up too, I hope they follow through. My PM box is open.

Shar Wolf, on 05 December 2013 - 04:20 PM, said:

Koniving did, Victor mocked.

Mostly because screenshots really don't mean anything in pug games. If I dug around long enough on the forums I could find you a shot of an MG Raven doing like 1k damage, too.

Edited by Victor Morson, 05 December 2013 - 05:08 PM.

[Heavenly Angel]

High scores don't really mean anything apart from that you were lucky enough to not be shot at much. I love my awesomes but there aren't many mechs in the game I'd feel confident about dueling with one.

Edited by Heavenly Angel, 05 December 2013 - 06:52 PM.

[King Arthur IV]

luxebo, on 05 December 2013 - 04:15 PM, said:

Wow, a lot of talk between Victor's group and the F8L... Would like to see this battle soon.

Maybe have a few matches using Awesomes, Dragons, and Locusts both sides.

@King Artur 4: Come back with a post if you ever get to over 1000 damage. Or maybe 6 kills or something. A lot of the matches I see that you posted pics of are not really supporting your ideas or any of the F8L ideas on this topic. If you can break a record of the height of maybe a Victor's/Cataphract's/Highlander's damage, then maybe Victor might see a bit of your point.

Victor Morson, on 05 December 2013 - 03:03 PM, said:

A bunch of shots where you, once again in a 4 man, did less damage than my Shadow Hawk does typically in an 80 tonner is not impressive.

i did those 15 games last night in a 3-4 hour our span. you guys talk alot about high damage and certain mechs. please show me. i give you 12 hours from when you choose to play and i want to see what you claim.

vic.M. shadow hawk +700 damage average

and for you lux +1000 damage average any mechssss your choice.

these are the perimeters you have set yourself to. do what you need to do but show me these consistent scores.

i have never claimed that the awesome will miraculously constantly out put 1k damage but im saying the awesome can be played, if played right.
there is no need to do high amounts of damage if you hit vital areas, look at my match scores and assist in those last 15 games. im in the top 5 all the time. (i think, might have to double check) im also consistently doing well, winning, doing damage, beating mechs that weigh more then mine etc.

you say doing damage means i didnt take any in return...... im not a passive player and my stats death toll would reflect that.

i dont care that you gave the awesome a 1 star but saying its not playable is another. maybe you dont know how to play a awesome, but you know what? im hear for all noobs alike, new new ones and old new ones.

tip one: keep moving. work on that one for now. once you get that one down, wow! the avenues it opens up for you! AMAZING! or should i say AWESOME!

reason why im helping? iv been playing a while and even i can admit when i suck at a mech. for instance i tell everyone the catapult sucks but truth is i suck at it..... but it does really suck.........


anyway show me the money!

ps. i did 800 damage in a ssrm hawk (have the pic to prove it too) i took off 6 arms and killed 3 mechs. sad thing is if the 800 didnt just all go to the arms i could of killed more mechs or downed them faster.
do i think its a good mech, yeh!
do i think its better then a awesome? cant say
do i think it makes a awesome useless? no

show me the money!

Edited by King Arthur IV, 05 December 2013 - 11:25 PM.

[Victor Morson]

Have you entirely missed the point of what I've been saying?

That numbers don't matter in screenshots like that, because you are against random PUGs that are often in as bad, if not worse, equipment than you are. It his literally no relevance when discussing why you should always, always, always a hundred times over buy a Victor before an Awesome.

[Heavenly Angel]

But why are you complaining about pubs in a thread that was made for new players who most likely play them exclusively?

[Victor Morson]

Heavenly Angel, on 06 December 2013 - 03:39 AM, said:

But why are you complaining about pubs in a thread that was made for new players who most likely play them exclusively?

I think you're misunderstanding what I'm saying about the pug matches. While newbies are only pugging, this is to help them get setup in a good chassis; however, trying to use screenshots of X points in a pug game as "proof" of a chassis usefulness is a big joke for everyone.