176 replies to this topic

[Prezimonto]

From the most recent Breakdown found here:
http://mwomercs.com/...10#entry3109510

Quote

Advanced Anti-Missile System : Chaff
-A sphere of metallic particles is launched around the mech, expanding to its full diameter of [30m] in 0.5s.
-For 5s sec the stationary sphere will intercept a lower amount of missiles over time. 100% first 2s, 80% next sec, etc.
-Due to timeline infringements this system is up in the air at this time but could be ready for deployment at any time. That is up to the space-time continuum to figure out.

ESTIMATED RELEASE: June 3051 – January 3060

Advanced Missile Warning System Module
-When equipped this module will allow a pilot to know the distance and possibly vector to the nearest missile threat.
-We are still slinging around ideas on how to best show this to a pilot but have narrowed it down to a few possibilities.

ESTIMATED RELEASE: June 3051

We get notice that NARC is getting a buff... so lets counter that by added in more soft counters to LRMs... oh yeah also a bug fix to PPC's... so there's less opportunity to counter the hard counter of ECM.

The problem with LRM's is that they scale poorly(downward), not that they're OP... just like with AC's... with hard support and many, many LRM's (50+ and more than 1 mech with them) they're highly effective. But individual weapons are in a terrible place at the moment due to all the needed support, hard and soft counters, and the silly slow flight speed.

Unlike single AC weapons it's not very useful to take just 1 LRM 10. You'll likely get very poor return on the tonnage investment.

These counters are going to make that issue worse.

Suggestion: Make LRM's bone target. We know the code is there (exists on SSRMs). It will let the individual missile damage be ramped back up and the flight speed (or better acceleration) go back up, without giving 50+ missile boats a huge gain in effectiveness.

Other thoughts, suggestions are highly welcome.

[joedawg39s]

chaff seems like its going to be a consumable to me, and since they are overhauling the module system I don't think we know enough yet to call it one way or the other. If that's something you can do once or twice a match I don't see it having such a big effect. especially if you are dropping coolant flush or arty strike to carry it.

[Green Mamba]

Hopefully they Will Nerf LRMS

[NRP]

Oh thank god! Finally a Module I'd want to use. I hate LRM noobs.

[MadcatX]

Yes, lets take a weapon that already sucks and make it worse.

LRM boats are annoying, but easily countered and even more easily killed.

[Latorque]

Now this sounds like a module/consumable going into all my mechs.

LRMs can be nerfed to hell and back for all i care.

[R Razor]

I hate getting LRM spammed to death as much as the next guy, but honestly I'd rather see them nerf the JJ/PPC/AC {Scrap} that rules the game before beating up on the easy mode LRM folks.

[Screech]

I am not sure if it really would be an LRM nerf because I am not sure why anyone would use any of these items. They seem like a waste of module space to me.

[o0cipher0o]

Latorque, on 29 January 2014 - 03:09 PM, said:

Now this sounds like a module/consumable going into all my mechs.

LRMs can be nerfed to hell and back for all i care.

NRP, on 29 January 2014 - 02:53 PM, said:

Oh thank god! Finally a Module I'd want to use. I hate LRM noobs.

Yeah' you guys are right, let's eliminate everything but PPC/ACs, that's the way to go.
So you are really saying that a barely average performing weapon needs more and more nerfing? The real easy mode is that stupid poptarting that goes on in every match. You know, before firing an lrm salvo, competent players think two, tree, sometimes even four times, because the enemy can get into cover by the time the missles reach him.
Lrms are way more difficult to use than the ppc+ac combo that dominates the matches, at least if you want to make the differnce in the match, and i say this by experience, because i've played both the role of the lrm mech and the poptart mech.

P.S.: if you guys don't like to be "LRM spammed" all day long, Just don't stand in the open


EDIT: by the way, this chaff module doesn't seem to me a realli big nerf, at least, like someone has already said, it comes in the form of a consumable. Otherwise, it could seriously weaken the LRMs.

Edited by o0cipher0o, 29 January 2014 - 04:00 PM.

[Solis Obscuri]

Screech, on 29 January 2014 - 03:38 PM, said:

I am not sure if it really would be an LRM nerf because I am not sure why anyone would use any of these items. They seem like a waste of module space to me.

Yeah, I'm inclined to agree. The chaff thing sounds interesting if you're getting seriously inundated, but it would require some prior knowledge that you're going against a really LRM-heavy team. The improved proximity alert also sound like an interesting idea, but if you can't look up and see a slow-moving cloud of fire drifting through the sky, you have bigger problems than enemy fire-support.

What really disappoints me is that they're nerfing the close-range EMP effects of PPCs against ECM. That's a system that doesn't need any buffs, ninja or otherwise.

It's also kind of farcical that you'd need much better of a system than AMS, which is crazy effective since it was buffed.

[Khobai]

Pgis mentality seems to be get the stuff in the game first then fix it later.

[Sephlock]

joedawg39s, on 29 January 2014 - 02:38 PM, said:

chaff seems like its going to be a consumable to me, and since they are overhauling the module system I don't think we know enough yet to call it one way or the other. If that's something you can do once or twice a match I don't see it having such a big effect. especially if you are dropping coolant flush or arty strike to carry it.

The thing is, the LRM firer won't necessarily know that chaff has been deployed, and will thus end up wasting volley after volley (although astute players will notice their first volley doesn't hit, whereas the second one, which may have been fired before the first one landed, will partially hit and make the crosshair turn red... the firer cannot be sure that obstacles weren't responsible for that happening, and won't know how many of his missiles are being wasted...)

Also, won't mechs in giant furballs be able to hide in or behind their teammates' chaff clouds?

Aside from the effect on pugs, are they just hell bent on guaranteeing that LRMs never make it into competitive 12 man play?

[Asmudius Heng]

LRMs are pretty terrible right now this does not sound like it helps them much.

However if these are consumables then I don't really care that much because it will only be taken by people who have no idea how to use terrain to negate missiles reducing thier options for good modules such as artillery and other decent non consumables.

If they buff LRMs a bit on the back of this then we have a system, those who cannot handle LRMs have an option to negate them breifly and will still die

What LRMs really need is a way that you can use a single launcher effectivly but stacking them does not give huge scaling benefits. Ghost heat does not stop this and there is very little reason to take an LRM 10 or 15 on its own unless you are playing against newbies and even then it's really secondary.

Edited by Asmudius Heng, 29 January 2014 - 06:44 PM.

[dario03]

Sephlock, on 29 January 2014 - 04:00 PM, said:

The thing is, the LRM firer won't necessarily know that chaff has been deployed, and will thus end up wasting volley after volley (although astute players will notice their first volley doesn't hit, whereas the second one, which may have been fired before the first one landed, will partially hit and make the crosshair turn red... the firer cannot be sure that obstacles weren't responsible for that happening, and won't know how many of his missiles are being wasted...)

Also, won't mechs in giant furballs be able to hide in or behind their teammates' chaff clouds?

Aside from the effect on pugs, are they just hell bent on guaranteeing that LRMs never make it into competitive 12 man play?

It only lasts 5 seconds and only covers 30m. So even assuming it stops all missles and not just ones launched at the user's mech I don't think it will do much. Maybe if it was a multi use module or covered a larger area, or if we had attack/defend maps that required you to storm across a open field, but as is, probably wouldn't do much.

[Lightfoot]

No bones targeting for LRMs. You could never carry enough ammo to destroy a mech. The bones thing was just to protect Light mechs from their one true bane in Battletech, SSRMs. I would rather have the chaffe and ECM buffs and LRMs that actually worked like real missiles than the fuzzy dice targeting of SSRMs. That's horrible to put that in a Sim.

Also, I got destroyed by LRMs for the first time in weeks or months yesterday when my mech got stuck on a tiny rock it should have just stepped over, but for some reason it couldn't move in any direction, so I don't see LRMs as being much of a threat. I just duck into cover and the LRMs go away almost 100%. If you are getting killed by LRMs you are doing something wrong. I wish I could turn off the AC bum-rush by ducking behind a building, but they just rush in and fire at point-blank range. Let's make all AC's target the mech's bones by random chance too. No?

Edited by Lightfoot, 29 January 2014 - 04:28 PM.

[Solis Obscuri]

Asmudius Heng, on 29 January 2014 - 04:04 PM, said:

What LRMs really need is a way that you can use a single launcher effectivly but acting them does not give huge scaling benefits. Ghost heat does not stop this and there is very little reason to take an LRM 10 or 15 on its own unless you are playing against newbies and even then it's really secondary.

I actually do very well with a single launcher on some builds, but it's either supplemented with other mid/long range direct fire weapons or just a single supplemental long range weapon on a brawler.

[TehSBGX]

Maybe just maybe instead of nerfing LRMs, brawling weapons could get better? If fighting up close gets better, lrm spam could be less prevalent.

[joedawg39s]

Also if chaff works the way I think it does the cloud either shouldnt move at all or move the direction you are traveling when you fire just slower.

Edited by joedawg39s, 30 January 2014 - 02:39 PM.

[wanderer]

5 seconds of LRM shielding. For a module slot. And you have to be immobile to benefit. And it's a consumable.

Ooh, my LRM carriers are shakin' in their boots on this one. Might be useful if it blocks vision as a "smoke round" of sorts.

[ExAstris]

Asmudius Heng, on 29 January 2014 - 04:04 PM, said:

What LRMs really need is a way that you can use a single launcher effectivly but acting them does not give huge scaling benefits. Ghost heat does not stop this and there is very little reason to take an LRM 10 or 15 on its own unless you are playing against newbies and even then it's really secondary.

This.

My preferred solution would be to hardcap the number of missiles a mech can fire by the number of tubes on the physical model. Then, once any mounted missiles have used all the tubes, those tubes are unavailable to every launcher until the appropriate cycle time has been enacted. That way no mech could ever launch more than 52 LRMs in a salvo (the Stalker 3H), and the vast majority would be limited to 30-40, even for LRM heavy designs.

Then you could make LRMs far more dangerous per missile, with no worries about balance, especially since lower numbers of higher value missiles makes AMS even more powerful.

As it currently stands, LRMs are a joke. Yes, you can occasionally have a good match with them and rack up 700 damage to a team full of (bad) assault pilots. But most of the time you'll be lucky to nab 200 damage that spreads over your enemies entire mech and will barely just bite at the ankles of lights. And that's assuming you aren't on Terra Therma, Crimson Straight, or HPG Manifold as the central main fighting areas on all of those maps provide mindlessly easy ways to completely negate LRMs.

Far better off to take a direct fire mech and average 300-400 damage per match, putting more of it on the torso than LRMs ever did, give you a fighting chance against lights, not get entirely neutered by map selection, not get entirely neutered by a single piece of enemy equipment, and still be able to pull 700+ damage against that same team of slow bad assaults.



TL;DR. LRMs are getting nerfed even more because... ?
They need tons of buffs to be competitive, or be reworked to have their effectiveness depend on pilot aim so that they scale better (so low elo brackets don't get dominated by them and higher level players can still actually use them).