4831 replies to this topic

[Maugged]

There's no point using a locust for the event. You get less points for wrecking a DW by sneaking in his team's back to backstab him in three or four alpha shots than a DW gets from milking another DW before being able to kill him and it's too hard to reach 400 points consistently with this mech chassis unless opposite teams have no brain.

[Nightshade24]

Throet, on 17 September 2015 - 09:26 AM, said:

Initial thoughts: The underrated LCT-1V doesn't do anything that the SDR-5K doesn't do better.

faster acceleration, turn rate, twist rate, higher max speed, smaller profile, more compact profile, all weapons up high....

[Takashi Uchida]

Yea I realized that pretty quickly for this event. the problem is that you gotta do damage. I don't really know how the match score works, but even if you get a couple clean kills, might not even break 300 if you don't have a substantial amount of damage

[DarthHias]

Right, i had a game where i backstabbed two Banshees and then did some spare damage ~400 and match score was abyssmal.
PGI wants us to barf loads of dmg all over the place.

[Takashi Uchida]

For contrast: Just had a game with my Nova. I damage-spread my way to 700 damage, lots of assists, but no kills (!). Got way over 500 match score.

It's weird, pretty much all my 400+ score games were at least 700 damage, but no kills! But then I've had games that I had 3-4 efficient kills but couldn't or barely got 300.

Now I think I am a ok Locust pilot but games over 600 damage are very rare for me. The problem with using the Locust for this is that most of the kills come from backstabs, where you don't have to chew through hundreds of front-loaded armor

[Takashi Uchida]

Well, it can be done! Unlikely, but possible. Match score: 406, Locust 1E. 499 damage, 1 kill, 10 assists.

Check this out though:

1. Friendly Awesome did a lot more damage (589), also only got one kill, had 6 assists. He only got a match score of 365.

2. Friendly Stormcrow did more damage (532), got two more kills (3), and had only 3 less assists (7). Yet his match score is only 17 points greater than mine at 423.

You'd think kills would be big but I guess not! As mentioned I had a 3-kill game that didn't even get me to 300 points. Looks like 500 damage might be the sweet spot for the 1E. The reason why I got a higher score than the Awesome (probably an LRM boat) was that I was getting all the little scouting and ambush bonuses that come with playing the 1E. Still, it looks like damage is really important, and even with the little bonuses there's not much incentive dropping in stuff other than a power vomit build or a damage spreader.

Spoiler

Edited by Takashi Uchida, 20 September 2015 - 04:05 AM.

[ShinVector]

I decided to give myself a personal challenge and get Tier 2 in a Locust.
After much much searching I finally got that elusive good match in Crimson after my 6th shot at it.

Edited by ShinVector, 20 September 2015 - 07:27 AM.

[IraqiWalker]

Takashi Uchida, on 20 September 2015 - 01:40 AM, said:

Yea I realized that pretty quickly for this event. the problem is that you gotta do damage. I don't really know how the match score works, but even if you get a couple clean kills, might not even break 300 if you don't have a substantial amount of damage

DarthHias, on 20 September 2015 - 01:53 AM, said:

Right, i had a game where i backstabbed two Banshees and then did some spare damage ~400 and match score was abyssmal.
PGI wants us to barf loads of dmg all over the place.

Takashi Uchida, on 20 September 2015 - 02:04 AM, said:

For contrast: Just had a game with my Nova. I damage-spread my way to 700 damage, lots of assists, but no kills (!). Got way over 500 match score.

It's weird, pretty much all my 400+ score games were at least 700 damage, but no kills! But then I've had games that I had 3-4 efficient kills but couldn't or barely got 300.

Now I think I am a ok Locust pilot but games over 600 damage are very rare for me. The problem with using the Locust for this is that most of the kills come from backstabs, where you don't have to chew through hundreds of front-loaded armor

Spotting, flanking, and assists bump up the match score.

[stealthraccoon]

Yeah, I racked up 3 kills and over 500 damage, and didn't break 300 points.

Still enjoying my 3V and 3M to tears this weekend, also running my 1V with a STD engine just for some giggles (zombie large laser goodness).

[Takashi Uchida]

logged in today with the intent to crank out 3 more maps. it seems like they lowered each tier by 100, which means I am done!

[mad kat]

Crikey im rusty in my locusts.

[DarthHias]

*cracks fingers*

Challenge is over and I´m sick of meta builds and laser vomit and Timbers and EBJ´s BACK TO LOCUSTS!

I hereby declare my next 10 matches to be Locust matches!

[Takashi Uchida]

Locust deserves its own tier!

Edited by Takashi Uchida, 22 September 2015 - 07:25 PM.

[IraqiWalker]

Takashi Uchida, on 22 September 2015 - 07:25 PM, said:

Locust deserves its own tier!

Hard mode tier.

[Takashi Uchida]

I did pick up hill climb. Maybe I am nuts but I am underwhelmed. I thought I would be doing flips off the wall like in the matrix lol. maybe it hasn't saved my a** enough yet for me to appreciate it

[IraqiWalker]

Takashi Uchida, on 22 September 2015 - 11:54 PM, said:

I did pick up hill climb. Maybe I am nuts but I am underwhelmed. I thought I would be doing flips off the wall like in the matrix lol. maybe it hasn't saved my a** enough yet for me to appreciate it

Have you had any drops with it on Canyon Network? When you do, you'll really appreciate it.

[Tim East]

I have no idea what the requirements are for "individual performance" to determine whether one experiences a decrease in psr or not, but they may well be very difficult to meet in a Locust. I just played a match where I single-handedly drove off a pair of raven snipers, UAV'd the better part of the enemy formation, got 2 kills, an assist, and 350+ damage (my mark for satisfaction in a match having been traditionally 300) and still somehow experienced a red down arrow there.

The funny thing about it all is, I thought it was a pretty good game, despite the fact that a bunch of my guys just wandered off and got wasted. I got to make a pair of Raven pilots wet themselves, even back-coring one to death in the middle of the ensuing delightful 2v1, and nearly got to backstab a shiny new Mauler to death. I'm looking forward to killing one of those, just to have another type of silhouette on my imaginary mech kill paintjob.

It's a brave new world I'm looking at out here. A brave new world where I may inevitably have my "tier" status lowered on every losing match... thus pitting me against hypothetically worse players over the course of time... Something about that seems vaguely unsporting. A part of me is like, "Oh, that sucks, I'm going to get dropped with newbies," and a part of me is all like, "Well, not if other semi-experienced players also experience a similar phenomenon," to which a third aspect of myself replies, "Who cares? Easy kills when they come, and good challenges when you can find them."

It'll be interesting to see how it all pans out. I kind of wonder if we'll see people deliberately sandbag to lower their stats.

[Takashi Uchida]

Did you lose or win that match? From my anaecdotal experience, it seems whether you gain or lose PSR weighs heaviest on match result, then damage, then kills. There's a new match score system now, and it does not favor the high-efficiency damage of the locust backstabber (as many of us found out during the last tournament event).

I have managed to get the green arrow in a loss, but I have to do like 700+ damage to get it. A traditional " pretty decent loss" in a Locust (320 damage, 1 kill 9 assist, something like that) is usually not enough to get an increase in PSR, though you might get the equal sign (no change) if you're lucky. Though, a mediocre win might still get you the increase. That's been my experience anyway. None of the players really know how it works.

I don't have a problem hanging in there on the scoreboard while in the 1E, 3M, or even PB, but for some of the less firepower oriented variants it will be difficult to break even in losses because you probably won't be doing that much damage. You'd better be prioritizing the crap out of your targets and making every little thing you do help your team win. Can't get away with "just be clean-up."

(I am T2 if that matters, who knows it might affect the score threshold. But people who primarily pilot Locust don't give a crap about tier haha)

Edited by Takashi Uchida, 23 September 2015 - 10:02 PM.

[mad kat]

Two great matches last night in my 1e first match plenty of brawling and a couple of kills including taking down a jager while legged in the tunnel on crimson straight. He turned around to see me limp around the corner of the side exit and boom alpha'd him before he could retaliate. Then next match on hpg both teams appeared to get straight into a brawl so i legged it to their base to hold cap long enough to get a trebuchet and arti cheetah running back to stop me freeing up a better balance in the brawl. Actually managed to keep those two mechs busy for several minutes giving the artic cheetah an especially hard time. Alas i was outgunned but by the time they returned to the fight after i sucummed my team were just mopping up.

Incidentally i discovered that asigning my lasers to one big chain fire group on mouse button 3/4 if i press it rapidly theres enough overlap to get a drawn out alpha but without the heat spike.

Edited by mad kat, 23 September 2015 - 10:39 PM.

[DarthHias]

I held my promise of doing 10 Locust matches and had something I had missed over the event... FUN

Right in the first one i caught a gigaspike whale alone. Nomnom that rear armor

Hey mad kat, the best kills are when you are legged ^^
Just curious what Locust Build do you use that can cause ghost heat?