Drunk Canuck, on 23 December 2013 - 09:28 PM, said:
First off, I'd like to state that this post is intended as feedback for the developers to look at before progressing too far with the notions of Clan technology. There is a rather large disdain for how PGI has gone about trying to balance weapons in this game and I feel that the point needs to be hammered home again.
High alpha builds are killing this game and the amount of cheese builds you see on a daily basis is pretty horrifying and I can see why this game fails to keep new players unless they are die hard fans of the franchise. There are a few things that need to be done that would quickly fix the high alpha builds and allow for more variety and versatility.
High Alpha builds rely heavily on having cover in front of you and teammates behind you, because removing either one makes them food for DPS builds, Lights and LRM builds because they're as effective at self defense as an LRM boat considering half their weapons dont work under 90 meters, they dont have the dps capability to survive a direct attack and their weapons are more difficult to use up close.
They're so 'effective' because most of their opponents think standing out at 700m with a couple of Large Lasers or AC2/5/10s exchanging hits without using cover properly is the way to fight them. Combined with people that dont how to spread damage, aim or actually pilot their Mech... Every weapon is devastating against an inexperienced opponent, and that's really all High Alpha builds are; A simple, generally effective design solution. Easy to make, easy to use and great against bad players.
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Heat threshold is first and foremost a problem, it needs to be slashed in half so that firing those two PPC's and an AC20 will cause you to shut down instantly. I have no issues with the heat generation but if you want to try and get this game back to being canon, the heat threshold needs to be dropped dramatically for starters.
Have you ever played a 2PPC, AC20 build? It's not very hot. Especially considering, depending on the range of your target, you arent firing both weapon groups at the same time, projectile travel times and all that. If you did, it's 26 heat then a 4 second wait for the next shot, during which for my Victor 13 of that heat is dissipated. Putting the next shot at 39 heat, the next one at 52 and the 4th at 65. Considering the threshold on my Victor is 70, that's 4 shots. Simple math tells us I'd still get a full alpha and have to wait 2 extra seconds for the 2nd shot - assuming I was firing everything at once. At the same time, you've nerfed not only High Alpha builds, but also the DPS ones, which most veteran players can already tell you are significantly more effective at dealing damage and killing than High Alpha builds... So what does halving the threshold essentially accomplish? People cant shoot as much in general, but will that suddenly embolden players to begin charging poptart locations and flanking entrenched Alpha Build lurkers? Cant say for certain, and it would definitely change the game around... But not because of any method of thinking you're currently using.
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Convergence is another massive problem. Want to see matches last longer and brawls actually happen? Get rid of convergence entirely and replace it with a useful pilot talent that doesn't instantly make your Mech OP.
The wonderful Instantaneous Convergence myth. PPCs and Energy weapons line up faster than Ballistics; If you've ever tried to alpha 2PPCs an and AC20 in a snapshot you'd know what i was talking about as the PPCs landed relatively right where you settled the arm reticle while the AC20 shot so wide it missed completely. Then there are the times you're pointing your crosshairs at the exact point you know a poptart is going to jump up, ready to unleash hell upon them and their blasphemous ways... only to watch both weapon groups miss wide to either side as the blasphemer lined up in your crosshairs...
Fact is weapons do not have instant or near-instant convergence - It's a Myth. You either 'prep the ret' by holding your crosshairs on a terrain feature that is a similar distance to, and near, your target, so your weapons are already converged when you need to pull the trigger or you anticipate the lack of convergence and compensate for it. Making the whole idea of 'get rid of convergence', combined with the fact most High Alpha mechs pack most of their weapons on the same relative side of a Mech (Reducing the effect of convergence substantially), an invalid solution that will increase the gap between skilled and unskilled pilots.
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Heat penalties pretty much ties into my first point, if you lower the heat threshold and set heat generation to original values, high alpha builds will go by the wayside for all but the best players who can snipe effetively and wouldn't worry about getting shredded if they overheated in front of an enemy as they could hide with jump sniping. As it is, heat penalties are worthless because you can still do a brutal amount of damage before you overheat due to the high threshold.
Ineffective change. There's only 3 or so High Alpha builds that even come close to invoking Ghost Heat - The AC40 Jager, 3PPC-Guass Highlanders and 4-5 ER Large Stalkers. Only the Jagers are relatively common and they are niche mechs while all of them operate entirely on an 'it's there if i need it' basis. None of them have proven more useful in any circumstance as other builds. People hate them because they dont know to fight them.
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PPC charge up time. Adding a wind up for the Gauss Rifle was silly, it's the PPC's that are the problem and despite their massive heat generation, a pair can strip a Mech easily thanks to convergence.
Right, give us back 30pt heatless alphas that would not be affected whatsoever by your 'halved threshold' insanity... That wouldnt cause a backlash of absurd proportions... At all.
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My question remains for PGI though, how do you balance Clan tech when you can't even get Inner Sphere tech right? And you want to make Clan Mech's rather terrible too and still claim that them being better justifies the price different despite the fact that at best we all know they won't be better and in many ways will be inferior due to lack of customization.
Your solution reduces firing rates by roughly 50%, retains all the short comings you have perceived the meta is wrought with and introduces a Gaussocolypse. I can certainly understand why PGI wouldnt bother justifying their designs to you.
The solution is really, really simple: Learn how to play.
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