311 replies to this topic

[Khobai]

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Unfortunately, it's simply not on par with the AC10 in overall effectiveness

You cant have two AC10s on an Atlas. You can have two LB10Xs on an Atlas. So I would say the LB10X is outright better on the Atlas.

[Deathlike]

Levi Porphyrogenitus, on 26 January 2014 - 11:01 PM, said:

Since the UAC5 has been coming up in discussion, I wanted to point out that, assuming my understanding of the math is correct, you always want to double-tap your UAC5. Even with jams the net dps is significantly higher than a standard AC5 or a macro-fired UAC5.

Correct.

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I don't take an LBX-AC10 as my only offensive punch. I always bring something with it, whether an extensive suite of MLs, some ERLL/LPL, or another AC variety. I have had great success recently with LPL/LBX combos. The range and weight of the LPL should make it a poor choice, but I've been finding the damage-per-shot and overall dps to be hugely powerful. It's an amazing weapon for stripping armor. Two of them out-damage an AC20, and they out-dps it too (relevant due to the short burn time making twist protection still viable). They're excellent for punching holes in armor, which the LBX can exploit.

I'm fully aware, but I'm a lot more productive with medium lasers or even the LL/ERL than the LPL just on sheer heat mechanics. LPL since the last change (slight damage increase with the unfortunately "heat normalization" increase). It used to be a fun niche weapon, but for me, it's not even a real option.

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That said, both the LBX and LPL require careful use of terrain to close with the enemy. I find sniper builds to be distasteful and I don't tend to do well with them, while my brawler setups seem to do quite good work (though there are exceptions to both trends), and the LPL/LBX combo has been very friendly to me.

The thing is, a lot of the current mechanics simply don't favor brawling. I'm a brawler at heart, but when my decision tree on building mechs excludes LPL, LBX, and SRMs due to various issues... I simply have to conform to the PPC brawls (with LL or ERL in some cases) with the UAC5 and Streaks... because it's unfortunately more effective than the alternative.

Khobai, on 26 January 2014 - 11:04 PM, said:

You cant have two AC10s on an Atlas. You can have two LB10Xs on an Atlas. So I would say the LB10X is outright better on the Atlas.

I'd go for the 2 UAC5s... as stated before. Frankly, that was probably the most successful build I had on a D-DC... I should've copied that for the D.

Edited by Deathlike, 26 January 2014 - 11:16 PM.

[Reitrix]

I still don't understand why people play MWO like CoD or BF. Everyone thinks only of scoring personal kills to the exclusion of all else.
The LBX excels at stripping armor. Its not unusual for me to run 700+ damage on my LBX build Muro, Kills are few and far between, but I'm rarely less than 8 assists.

Being able to strip armor from 3 torso locations at once allows my team to focus down the weaker parts, or even to score a kill myself If the armor has been stripped already. Its also handy for scaring away Lights. Nothing startles the little ******** like taking damage on every location at once.
Its my favourite AC in the game for its support playstyle.

[Khobai]

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I'd go for the 2 UAC5s... as stated before. That is Atlas-D and Atlas-D-DC compatible last I checked.

Except you said the LB10X was not on par with the AC10 for overall effectiveness. But since the Atlas cant have two AC10s that means theres at least one situation where the LB10X is better than the AC10. In other words your blanket statement about AC10s always being better was wrong.

So if theres at least one situation where the LB10X is better than the AC10, it also stands to reason that there might conceivably be at least one situation where dual LB10Xs are better than dual UAC5s. And in fact I would guarantee it since LB10Xs dont jam.

[Deathlike]

Khobai, on 26 January 2014 - 11:25 PM, said:

Except you said the LB10X was not on par with the AC10 for overall effectiveness. But since the Atlas cant have two AC10s that means theres at least one situation where the LB10X is better than the AC10. In other words your blanket statement about AC10s always being better was wrong.

If you're hinging on that to be better, congrats? I should primarily clarify my statements with "wheneven possible the situation comes".

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So if theres at least one situation where the LB10X is better than the AC10, it also stands to reason that there might conceivably be at least one situation where dual LB10Xs are better than dual UAC5s. And in fact I would guarantee it since LB10Xs dont jam.

Here's the only situations:

1) The target's armor is exposed. The 2 LBX10 will be faster in one shot at doing the job. Congrats. It would've taken a little more time with the UAC5, but not that much more.

2) When I see an Atlas with 2 LBX10s, it means I can ignore it since it is genuinely less of a threat than one with 2 UAC5s. Congrats, you draw less attention to yourself... and once you are the last few targets on the field, the LBX will go pretty quickly soon enough.

The thing is, I actually remember why I ran 2LBX10... it's literally because I drew less attention from the field. 2 UAC5s is better on the D-DC due to ECM, but on the D, "you're asking for it".

Still, those are not really compelling reasons otherwise.

Edited by Deathlike, 26 January 2014 - 11:32 PM.

[Serpieri]

LB-X autocannons are supposed to spread damage which is it's strength. The weapon improves your chances of striking a critical location. Does it work well against a fresh mech....yes and no. It does well for stripping the mechs armor but the meta in this game is all about pin point damage. However, against a mech that has had its armor damaged/stripped from your lancemates or your other weapons will leave the mech vulnerable to those crit seeking pellets. I've seen mechs torso twist trying to use their armor to shield the incoming damage implode from LB-X's because it got past the arm and hit the area it needed too.

And to this date the scariest Atlas I've seen was a DDC that used 2 LBX10's and 3 srm 6's. The score was 6-2 in favor of the other team, sadly i was dead but I watched this Atlas sneak in and obliterate 5 mechs before they were able to take him down. The mech was a walking can opener of death, would he have lasted that long if he charged fresh mechs? Doubtful, but he definitely knew how to utilize those weapons.

[Khobai]

My point is your view of weapons is very black and white. You dont see the grey at all. I am trying to get you to expand your limited way of thinking by admitting that the LB10X has possibilities you havent considered.

The LB10X is far from the best weapon, but it is not always worse than other weapons either.

[Jaguar Prime]

Reitrix, on 26 January 2014 - 11:25 PM, said:

I still don't understand why people play MWO like CoD or BF. Everyone thinks only of scoring personal kills to the exclusion of all else.
The LBX excels at stripping armor. Its not unusual for me to run 700+ damage on my LBX build Muro, Kills are few and far between, but I'm rarely less than 8 assists.

Being able to strip armor from 3 torso locations at once allows my team to focus down the weaker parts, or even to score a kill myself If the armor has been stripped already. Its also handy for scaring away Lights. Nothing startles the little ******** like taking damage on every location at once.
Its my favourite AC in the game for its support playstyle.

This is a no respawn team based game. You win by killing the opposing team or at least in skirmish you do. Scoring 700 points of damage means nothing if you don't put the enemy down and win. Killing mechs efficiently means I have a better chance at winning. Wasting damage by putting it all over a mech means he stays alive and has a chance at killing me. I like winning and the AC10 is more efficient at killing mechs than the LBX10 is. So it will always be a better choice in my eyes.

[Deathlike]

Khobai, on 26 January 2014 - 11:41 PM, said:

My point is your view of weapons is very black and white. You dont see the grey at all. I am trying to get you to expand your limited way of thinking by admitting that the LB10X has possibilities you havent considered.

It's not black and white. It's just that there's not a lot of grey. Every weapon has been defined by its stats, and success is defined by actual effectiveness in combat.

The only thing that would be "grey" to me is whether or not I should deploy a UAV or whether I should launch the airstrike. If and only when the situation arises, then it makes sense to use them. LBX does not fall into that category. If I can replicate its effectiveness through other weapons, then unfortunately, the weapon is not that useful to me. This even goes with my definition of niche. The LBX does not even at all fit into what the LPL used to be for me.

I don't mind expanding my knowledge, but my knowledge has told me and reinforced by the output of said weapon is that it's not good enough where it's at to deserve too much consideration. It doesn't mean you can't be good in it, but there are better options available (unless, you genuinely feel it is undesirable personally, which is fine). LBX is where it is at for a reason, and I've TRIED using LBX (if I didn't say it enough times, I guess I'm not saying it at all) and it doesn't work well enough. It's not even a playstyle issue... it's always been a performance/effectiveness issue.

Edited by Deathlike, 26 January 2014 - 11:58 PM.

[Khobai]

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Scoring 700 points of damage means nothing if you don't put the enemy down and win.

Getting kills with LB10Xs isnt a problem. I already proved I can break 1000 damage and 4+ kills with my LB10X Atlas.

Would I do better with dual AC5s/UAC5s? Definitely. But I'd also be completely bored out of my mind playing the same meta build as everyone else.

The reality is im good enough I dont need to rely on meta builds as a crutch. I can use LB10Xs and pulverize the enemy team. Theyre really not as bad as everyone says they are.

[MustrumRidcully]

Clydewinder, on 26 January 2014 - 08:03 PM, said:

Isn't the main advantage of an LB-X the fact that it has 10 chances to crit an unarmored location rather than one chance?

With one press of the fire trigger, the LBX-10 has 10 chances to crit random components for 1 damage. An AC/10 has 1 chance to crit one component for 10 damage. Most locations have more than one component, most components have 10 hit points. That means the LBX spreads the damage across multiple components, likely destroying none of them ,while the AC/10, when it cirts, destroys one.

In the table top game, the crit system worked simply different. 10 crit chances meant you could actually theoretically destroy up to 10 items with a single shot. That's devestating. But that's because only a single crit is needed to destroy an item, regardless of what the damage value of the crit is. If items have hit points, it becomes very important how much damage your crit actually deals, and having a lot of crit chances has to be weighted against the actual damage you inflict.

Also, not to forget - you mighjt generate 10 crit chances in theory, but how many locations will your LBX actually hit? If the RT has lost its armor, but the CT and he RA don't, but your LBX spreads its projectiles across all 3 locations, then only those that hit the RT actually can crit.

Reitrix, on 26 January 2014 - 11:25 PM, said:

I still don't understand why people play MWO like CoD or BF. Everyone thinks only of scoring personal kills to the exclusion of all else.
The LBX excels at stripping armor. Its not unusual for me to run 700+ damage on my LBX build Muro, Kills are few and far between, but I'm rarely less than 8 assists.

And what do you play MW:O like? Isn't talking abouts kills or assists also a COD/BF thnig, or is it more an MMO thing?

The end goal is to win a match. Dealing lots of damage can help that, but if you were to find an isolated, single, heavily armored battlemech in the field with a terible shot as pilot and shoot it up by systematically destroying limb by limb, you could inflate your damage score, but not help the team win the match. If you had done a quick CT (or head!) kill, you would have been able to return to the team, dealt less damage.
This is an obvious extreme example, but you are doing something similar when you use LBX - you're spreading your damage instead of focusing it. Your only defense could be "I am such a bad shot that I wouldn't hit anything at all if I'd use a weapon that allows precise shot"... But I doubt anyone is that bad.

That said - spreading damage isn't always inherently bad either. If the weapon spreads damage but deals enough extra DPS compared to a weapon with similar requirements in weight, the weapon might be fine, too. But the LBX is too close to the AC/10 that does the same damage output for just a ton and a crit more - without the drawback of damage spreading.

Removing the LBX spread is of course not the answer - we don'tneed two AC/10s. Removing it further isn't either. What could be done would be making the LBX simily deal a bit more damage - raise either rate of fire or just the damage per pellet.

Edited by MustrumRidcully, 27 January 2014 - 01:18 AM.

[XX Sulla XX]

From my use it seems the LBX work ok if some one already had their armor stripped. And you do save a little weight etc with it. So some times on the right mech witht he right build it makes sense. But most of the time an AC10 does better. And for me I only use an AC10 if there is no way for me to fit an AC20

[Alex Warden]

AC10 mainweapon

LB10 sidearm

that´s all, see you around

Edited by Alex Warden, 27 January 2014 - 01:43 AM.

[Reitrix]

MustrumRidcully, on 27 January 2014 - 12:56 AM, said:

With one press of the fire trigger, the LBX-10 has 10 chances to crit random components for 1 damage. An AC/10 has 1 chance to crit one component for 10 damage. Most locations have more than one component, most components have 10 hit points. That means the LBX spreads the damage across multiple components, likely destroying none of them ,while the AC/10, when it cirts, destroys one.

In the table top game, the crit system worked simply different. 10 crit chances meant you could actually theoretically destroy up to 10 items with a single shot. That's devestating. But that's because only a single crit is needed to destroy an item, regardless of what the damage value of the crit is. If items have hit points, it becomes very important how much damage your crit actually deals, and having a lot of crit chances has to be weighted against the actual damage you inflict.

Also, not to forget - you mighjt generate 10 crit chances in theory, but how many locations will your LBX actually hit? If the RT has lost its armor, but the CT and he RA don't, but your LBX spreads its projectiles across all 3 locations, then only those that hit the RT actually can crit.


And what do you play MW:O like? Isn't talking abouts kills or assists also a COD/BF thnig, or is it more an MMO thing?

The end goal is to win a match. Dealing lots of damage can help that, but if you were to find an isolated, single, heavily armored battlemech in the field with a terible shot as pilot and shoot it up by systematically destroying limb by limb, you could inflate your damage score, but not help the team win the match. If you had done a quick CT (or head!) kill, you would have been able to return to the team, dealt less damage.
This is an obvious extreme example, but you are doing something similar when you use LBX - you're spreading your damage instead of focusing it. Your only defense could be "I am such a bad shot that I wouldn't hit anything at all if I'd use a weapon that allows precise shot"... But I doubt anyone is that bad.

That said - spreading damage isn't always inherently bad either. If the weapon spreads damage but deals enough extra DPS compared to a weapon with similar requirements in weight, the weapon might be fine, too. But the LBX is too close to the AC/10 that does the same damage output for just a ton and a crit more - without the drawback of damage spreading.

Removing the LBX spread is of course not the answer - we don'tneed two AC/10s. Removing it further isn't either. What could be done would be making the LBX simily deal a bit more damage - raise either rate of fire or just the damage per pellet.

When i say that people play the game like CoD or BF, i mean they aren't interested in supporting the 'Mech standing next to them, they want the kill and whoever is nearby is just fodder.
You need only spectate a few games to see the selfish destructiveness of many players. They will blow entire alphas into a dead 'Mech just to try and get the kill shot, everyone else on their team is a kill stealer to them, all they want is a high KDR, team mates be damned.
The most dangerous aspect of brawling in the game right now is not the enemy, its your own damn team mates.

An example is a match i played tonight, in my triple LB Muro on Terra Therma. My lance engaged a single enemy Lance comprised of a Cicada, Awesome, Dragon and Misery. I personally destroyed the Awesome, removed the Arm and most of the Dragons armor, before turning to the Misery and blowing off both side torsos before being TEAM KILLED by the Highlander. Only 3 'Mechs in the field, myself, the Misery and the Highlander, he purposely shot me in rear RT specifically so he could clean up the Misery, whom i had stripped of both STs and all of its CT armor.

You call the spread of the LBX a drawback, i call it a benefit, but then you're probably the type who avoids brawl range combat. The LB is far more effective a weapon in close range than the AC10. It is and always will be, a Brawler weapon.

my LB setup is far more effective at dealing with skill targets than a pinpoint build. Every shot from me is removing armor across the entirety if the target, whereas every shot from the pinpoint build will take from a single location.
Except when you drop 30 damage on my Right Arm, then my Left Torso, then my CT then my Left Arm, then my CT again because I'm twisting and strafing you, while I'm dumping steady streams of shells across your entire 'Mech all at once, from any angle, I'll kill you faster through a Side Torso loss, or by virtue of disarming your main gun. If you're large enough, like an Atlas or Highlander, ill be dumping the majority of my damage into single locations just as you are anyway.

The only advantage the AC10 has over the LBX is a longer effective range. Which is as it should be. They are two different guns with different battlefield purpose.

If you raised the firing rate of the LB, I'd be dumping 30 damage in your face at 1 - 1.5 second intervals instead of 2 second intervals, and i hardly see how thats a good thing.

[wanderer]

Khobai, on 26 January 2014 - 11:41 PM, said:

My point is your view of weapons is very black and white. You dont see the grey at all. I am trying to get you to expand your limited way of thinking by admitting that the LB10X has possibilities you havent considered.

The LB10X is far from the best weapon, but it is not always worse than other weapons either.

The LB-10X is a "better" weapon right now because it's real competitor, the SRM is borked.

2x SRM6 -would- wreck internals better for less tonnage....but hit detection is hosed. As it is, a weapon that's designed to chew up internals shouldn't take up 12 tons of space, when similar tonnage weapons do the same job adequately and -also- punch through armor well, while the LB-X has to wait.

There's a reason it's designed to be a dual-munitions weapon. If it was working as it should, it'd be one of the best ballistics, one that'd need a ROF slowdown to avoid rendering other guns useless. As it stands, it's an opportunity weapon that needs a hole-puncher to do the the heavy lifting, and that gimps it badly.

[Joseph Mallan]

L-BX is supposed to be like a shot gun. Last time I loaded a shot gun I loaded one Buck, one slug, one Buck, one Slug. Our Shot Gun is missing some ammo.

[Mudhutwarrior]

Joseph Mallan, on 27 January 2014 - 04:36 AM, said:

L-BX is supposed to be like a shot gun. Last time I loaded a shot gun I loaded one Buck, one slug, one Buck, one Slug. Our Shot Gun is missing some ammo.

Agreed Joe, I run my 500 with combo rounds. Just one ounce slugs and buckshot. Idea is when opponent is wearing body armor one shot slug center of mass for knockdown and one buck for the headshot. Couple of rolls of chicken wire Some 2x4 and a screw gun and they will have to pull a dormer to get you out. Better to find a building with sprinklers. Helps keep down the tear gas and knock down fire.

And the LBX is awesome with lights. Reason you use shot for quick moving birds.

[Nightcrept]

i Understand the math behind the reasoning that the lbx is worse then the other alternatives but for some reason in game the results I have are different when I use them for brawling.
And i am a good shot and have and do use all other weapons.
I run dual lbx and only on my atlai.

I.e.

In many many games I will run into the exact same ecm altas builds using ac-20 as the main weapon vs my dual ac-20 builds. And most of the atlai pilots upon seeing my lbx build will rush me thinking my build to be easy food. Unfortunately for them if we are at even health my build generally wins.

So i don't know the math but from under 180 meters or so the lbx seems to me to be more effective.

Someone told me once that it was the shake effect like from the ac-2 but I haven't been on the receiving end to know.

[General Taskeen]

remove the crit on lb 10-x

Give LB 10-X bonus damage per pellet (1.2 or 1.4 per pellet), I.E. 12 to 14 damage.

Increase cool down slightly.

AC/10 fires slightly faster for "pin point".

Boom fixed the game with a few XML tweaks.

[N a p e s]

General Taskeen, on 27 January 2014 - 07:47 AM, said:

remove the crit on lb 10-x

Give LB 10-X bonus damage per pellet (1.2 or 1.4 per pellet), I.E. 12 to 14 damage.

Increase cool down slightly.

AC/10 fires slightly faster for "pin point".

Boom fixed the game with a few XML tweaks.

This man speaks truth! 2.75-3 second cooldown with increased raw damage. I'd even go higher than the recommened 1.4 damage/pellet which is warranted considering this is one of the most expensive guns in the game and also spreads its damage to multiple components.