1026 replies to this topic

[Felbombling]

I cannot think of a single Mech design that has less than two jump jets, but we see Mechs mounting a single jump jet all the time around here. Here are a few ideas, Paul...

1. The first jump jet can provide enough thrust to get you airborne off the ground, second jump jet gets you to 12m, and each extra jump jet adds 6m as per normal rules.
2. Each jump jet gets you up to 30m distance in any direction, controlled by your movement keys.
3. The moment your Mech leaves the ground, all your weapon groups turn red and are inoperable.

Radical, yes, but the fun factor of being able to fire while jumping has turned every version of MechWarrior into a Mexican Jumping Bean Stand Off. Jump Jets in the original canon were meant for tactical maneuvering, period. Let the coolness of being able to travel 240m and land behind your opponent be the allure to Jump Jets... not the ability to take one jump jet and play peek-a-boo-I-shoot-you all game long.

[Xyroc]

... whatever you do to the JJs please leave the lights out of it!!!!!! I beg you!

[N0V0CAIN]

Ryan Steel, on 05 February 2014 - 05:35 PM, said:

lol. You terribads have been saying stuff like that since the beginning of closed beta. "I can't wait till they nerf ________ and for all the meta (wrong use of the word "meta") abusers to start crying!!11111" We're going to dominate you no matter what gets nerfed in this game. We've used brawlers, lasers, direct fire, and every single mech and weapon system in it. The irony is that the nerf puts a huge stick in the spokes of the terribads that use FOTM mechs as a crutch and not to their full potential.

To put my ac20 round where your cockpit is, I'll even throw this in. I, as are all the members of the House of Lords, am openly endorsing the abolition of poptarting from this game, as well as direct fire if the community sees fit. We are guaranteeing that you will either not see us in game because you're absolutely terrible at this game and have low Elo, or you will get steamrolled as hard as you always have.

LORD STEEL
ggclose

Don't worry HOL really talk more than they play, you see them out there they are probably dead anyway. HOL are fine solo pilots but suck at team play.

Oh, Ryan can you list any competitive match HOL actually won? Dont worry Ill wait....

Edited by N0V0CAIN, 06 February 2014 - 08:14 AM.

[Nicholas Carlyle]

StaggerCheck, on 06 February 2014 - 08:03 AM, said:

I cannot think of a single Mech design that has less than two jump jets, but we see Mechs mounting a single jump jet all the time around here. Here are a few ideas, Paul... 1. The first jump jet can provide enough thrust to get you airborne off the ground, second jump jet gets you to 12m, and each extra jump jet adds 6m as per normal rules. 2. Each jump jet gets you up to 30m distance in any direction, controlled by your movement keys. 3. The moment your Mech leaves the ground, all your weapon groups turn red and are inoperable. Radical, yes, but the fun factor of being able to fire while jumping has turned every version of MechWarrior into a Mexican Jumping Bean Stand Off. Jump Jets in the original canon were meant for tactical maneuvering, period. Let the coolness of being able to travel 240m and land behind your opponent be the allure to Jump Jets... not the ability to take one jump jet and play peek-a-boo-I-shoot-you all game long.

I'm getting to the point where this is making the most sense too me.

I don't pop-tart...but jump jets brawling are still really good. And it really makes a huge difference between a mech that can jump and one that can't.

For instance, lets look at Centurion's vs. Shadow Hawk's. Ignoring the tonnage difference of course and the amazing hardpoint's and hitboxes of the Shadow Hawk.

When I fight with my SH, I am bouncing around like crazy, making me obscenely hard to track, while spreading damage all over my mech. While i'm still able to shoot at my opponent.

Whereas with my Centurion, I'm limited to the normal moving and agility on the ground, and hopefully torso twisting the damage away.

Jump Jets are really crazy good right now.

[CeeKay Boques]

General Taskeen, on 06 February 2014 - 08:00 AM, said:

lol this is funny... this is what happens when Jump Jets in their current functionality are lame, unfun, and the most undynamic JJ's in a Mech Warrior game ever. They aren't even close to the functionality of Battle Tech. I could care less if people are drifting up in the air and firing shots, is that what the Devs and players are really complaining about? Its the fact that what they currently can do is all they can do, because the functionality is boring and not well thought out in the first place. They can be nerfed or buffed in their current format, it still doesn't change what they do.

Yes, gawd please don't restrict movement... Or make mechs more clumsy, more stiff, more immobile as a fix.

Edited by Technoviking, 06 February 2014 - 08:14 AM.

[Andross Deverow]

IMHO They will not mess with the jumpjets too much if at all on other mechs. They will however look at them on the meta builds, IE Highlander, Victor, Cataphract. These are the main culprits that are being used for the meta crutch. Most other chassis cant wield the massive alpha firepower to support a jump snipe threat.
As others have mentioned in previous posts my thoughts would be to change the jump jet functionality so that big heavy mechs need to have the maximum allowable jump jets equipped in order to gain the height that a jump sniper needs to be effective. This will change loadouts and balance the mechs.

Just my opinion.

Regards

[3rdworld]

N0V0CAIN, on 06 February 2014 - 08:08 AM, said:

Don't worry HOL really talk more than they play, you see them out there they are probably dead anyway. HOL are fine solo pilots but suck at team play.

Oh, Ryan can you list any competitive match HOL actually won? Dont worry Ill wait....

They are in RHoD season 3, they beat the remnant last week 3-0.

[Thunderchickenz]

It's been said before, but the Highlander isn't OP, poptarting+alpha is OP. The same problems apply to any mixed Energy/Ballistic JJ capable mech with enough weight to carry big guns (Highlander, Victor and CTF-3D at the moment)

[Drunk Canuck]

3rdworld, on 06 February 2014 - 08:15 AM, said:

They are in RHoD season 3, they beat the remnant last week 3-0.

That's not saying a lot since most of the good players from that team left a few weeks back. Put them against any top tier team and watch them get crushed.

[Deathlike]

3rdworld, on 06 February 2014 - 08:15 AM, said:

They are in RHoD season 3, they beat the remnant last week 3-0.

Sounds like it was gg close.

The thing about the meta is that I'm sure people do try to copy/emulate it, but ultimately there's usually more people that have a clue to move onto the next thing (instead of outright whining+ragequit), thus I tend to think the fair portion people that complain about the meta... simply don't get it (aka run completely bad builds and/or use bad tactics). It's hard to lump them all into the same boat because I'm sure a bunch of them don't enjoy (I don't either, but I do the meta because I need the C-bills) but so much of the whining ("the noise") tends to come from the ill-informed so if you had to actually question them, they couldn't give you a reasonable/logical response other that "it sucks" or "I don't/can't replicate it myself, so it must be hax".

Ultimately, I think the PGI dart board of balance™ is in play here.

Edited by Deathlike, 06 February 2014 - 08:33 AM.

[DocBach]

Rebas Kradd, on 05 February 2014 - 07:32 PM, said:

You cannot remove pinpoint convergence without also removing the ability to target specific components on a mech.

Yes you can, as long as you allow a 'Mech to gain pinpoint convergence at some point rather than instantly. In very early beta convergence had to be obtained. The big problem was you didn't know if you had gotten convergence yet, there was no indicator, so some of your shots would go wide in funky ways.

[Drunk Canuck]

Ryan Steel, on 05 February 2014 - 05:35 PM, said:

lol. You terribads have been saying stuff like that since the beginning of closed beta. "I can't wait till they nerf ________ and for all the meta (wrong use of the word "meta") abusers to start crying!!11111" We're going to dominate you no matter what gets nerfed in this game. We've used brawlers, lasers, direct fire, and every single mech and weapon system in it. The irony is that the nerf puts a huge stick in the spokes of the terribads that use FOTM mechs as a crutch and not to their full potential.

To put my ac20 round where your cockpit is, I'll even throw this in. I, as are all the members of the House of Lords, am openly endorsing the abolition of poptarting from this game, as well as direct fire if the community sees fit. We are guaranteeing that you will either not see us in game because you're absolutely terrible at this game and have low Elo, or you will get steamrolled as hard as you always have.

LORD STEEL
ggclose

It's amusing, the scrub who gets 12-0'd in high ELO drops when doing 4 mans with some of the best players in the game calls other people terribad. I will enjoy watching the ego's of every single scrub on your team implode when you get 3-0'd in an RHOD match soon enough. Keep trolling though, maybe some day PGI will do the right thing and rid us of the cancerous plague that is you and Villz permanently.

[Amsro]

StaggerCheck, on 06 February 2014 - 08:03 AM, said:

I cannot think of a single Mech design that has less than two jump jets, but we see Mechs mounting a single jump jet all the time around here. Here are a few ideas, Paul...

1. The first jump jet can provide enough thrust to get you airborne off the ground, second jump jet gets you to 12m, and each extra jump jet adds 6m as per normal rules.
2. Each jump jet gets you up to 30m distance in any direction, controlled by your movement keys.
3. The moment your Mech leaves the ground, all your weapon groups turn red and are inoperable.

Radical, yes, but the fun factor of being able to fire while jumping has turned every version of MechWarrior into a Mexican Jumping Bean Stand Off. Jump Jets in the original canon were meant for tactical maneuvering, period. Let the coolness of being able to travel 240m and land behind your opponent be the allure to Jump Jets... not the ability to take one jump jet and play peek-a-boo-I-shoot-you all game long.

Let them play "peek-a-boo", instead make more JJ actually DO SOMETHING, the lack of JJ in this game is astounding! The ranges and heights have been NERFED TO OBLIVION.

This idea that JJ need NERFING is OBSCENE !

Nicholas Carlyle, on 06 February 2014 - 08:10 AM, said:

I'm getting to the point where this is making the most sense too me.

I don't pop-tart...but jump jets brawling are still really good. And it really makes a huge difference between a mech that can jump and one that can't.

For instance, lets look at Centurion's vs. Shadow Hawk's. Ignoring the tonnage difference of course and the amazing hardpoint's and hitboxes of the Shadow Hawk.

When I fight with my SH, I am bouncing around like crazy, making me obscenely hard to track, while spreading damage all over my mech. While i'm still able to shoot at my opponent.

Whereas with my Centurion, I'm limited to the normal moving and agility on the ground, and hopefully torso twisting the damage away.

Jump Jets are really crazy good right now.

Jump Jets are terribad, the fact the only thing they are truly used for is to Pop Tart, if they actually had a true mobility side to them you might see someone drop 8 tons to fly, thereby removing some firepower or engine speed.

That would essentially fix the issue.. hear that.. BUFFING JJ to actually do something will increase the amount of JJ used also decreasing the FIREPOWER you are trying to nerf!

/end CAPS RAGE.

Edit; The Highlander with 3 JJ should have a range of 90 Meters, currently in MWO 3 JJ nets you a whopping 16.7 Meters.

Wooooo ..... LAME.

Edited by Amsro, 06 February 2014 - 08:47 AM.

[Viges]

[Villz]

Andross Deverow, on 06 February 2014 - 07:41 AM, said:

There is nothing Terribad about anyone stating the obvious. The meta at this time is jumpy snipey. Personally I think the whole meta issue is a big crutch for those whom cant brawl well or simply refuse to try anything other than the "easy button" I hold jump snipers in the same regard as LRM boaters.

Regards

unfortunately for you, Your regard has little impact to the outcome of the match ;-).

[Master Q]

StaggerCheck, on 06 February 2014 - 08:03 AM, said:

I cannot think of a single Mech design that has less than two jump jets, but we see Mechs mounting a single jump jet all the time around here. Here are a few ideas, Paul...

1. The first jump jet can provide enough thrust to get you airborne off the ground, second jump jet gets you to 12m, and each extra jump jet adds 6m as per normal rules.
2. Each jump jet gets you up to 30m distance in any direction, controlled by your movement keys.
3. The moment your Mech leaves the ground, all your weapon groups turn red and are inoperable.

Radical, yes, but the fun factor of being able to fire while jumping has turned every version of MechWarrior into a Mexican Jumping Bean Stand Off. Jump Jets in the original canon were meant for tactical maneuvering, period. Let the coolness of being able to travel 240m and land behind your opponent be the allure to Jump Jets... not the ability to take one jump jet and play peek-a-boo-I-shoot-you all game long.

This, repeatedly.

Going back to TT, movement happened first, and was calculated on ending position. If you jumped from cover to cover, you had no shot. At all. Weapons fire in the air "didn't happen."

In MW2, Jump Jets were used for precisely two things: poptarting, and skateboarding Daishis loaded down with 12 SPL's or MG's going for crit overload.

In MW3, Jump Jets were for the crazy laser poptarters.

In MW4, same thing - poptarts were the meta.

Allowing for "I fire at the high point of my jump, then fall behind cover" is a bad game design decision. I'm not going to call it "OP", I'm just going to call it what it is, really bad game design. It breaks the fundamental mechanics that otherwise exist in the game - exposing yourself to enemy fire in exchange for being able to fire yourself - by rendering any poptarting 'Mech fundamentally immune to all but a few of the game's weapon types.

[Padde]

PGI please do me a favour and just NERF the JJs. IMO, JJs should be something special. Something that might give the edge in some situations like movement or maneuverability. For now, there is so much bunny hopping in MWO - and there is almost NO RISK in jumping like crazy.

If there would be the risk to fall and take severe damage to the legs / the mech or even the chance to lose a leg or tweak an actuator, people would start considering when to jump.

For instance, just reduce the reload time for JJs and give them more heat. That way the JJs are still usefull for movement, but much less an option for an attack/offensive move!

[Mister Blastman]

After playing in the Marik league for a little bit (it just started), we've been playing with rules such as...

a. No Jump Jets
b. No PPCs
c. No ECM

No Jump Jets makes a marked difference on the game, but so did no PPCs. Without PPCs you lose a lot of that direct damage cohesion and you start seeing more large lasers being used which changes the game quite a bit. Until Paul does something with PPCs and convergence, he's partially wasting his time.

I will admit, however, Jump Jets need a drastic overhaul. They provide far too many advantages as it is. If anything, he should consider removing movement penalties from mechs that can't mount jump-jets--i.e. give them terrain advantages over other mechs.

Remember, several things happened that killed brawling:

Terrain movement penalties
PPC buffs
HSR
SRM nerfing
Jump jet boost

The movement penalties really hurt the non-jj brawlers. I can't imagine it'd be a hard thing for them to implement, either, as they already have a movement "class" system. They'd just need to snap in a few extra lines of code: Instead of having four movement classes, you have eight. Four more that are for non-jj mechs and perhaps remove the penalties altogether for them.

That alone wouldn't solve the problem but it'd go a long way towards helping.

Making jump jets more like they were in closed beta (i.e. longer burn time) would help light mechs... TREMENDOUSLY. At the same time, don't keep the 1 jj requirement that we had then, but instead, model them after the mechlab and make it a linear increase based on how many jets you have rather than this goofy... oh, slap one on and get half your jump height right away. The reduction in burn time perplexes me to no end. Light mechs could seriously use the increased burn time again to get those wonderful distances they did in the past.

Then we get into PPCs and convergence but I've said plenty there, on that subject already. PPCs with splash would be excellent. ACs with multiple shots would be divine. Torso weapons that don't converge at all would be spectacular (as well as non-actuated arms).

But nerfing a single mech (like they did with the K2) is bad game design.

[Drunk Canuck]

DocBach, on 06 February 2014 - 08:36 AM, said:

Yes you can, as long as you allow a 'Mech to gain pinpoint convergence at some point rather than instantly. In very early beta convergence had to be obtained. The big problem was you didn't know if you had gotten convergence yet, there was no indicator, so some of your shots would go wide in funky ways.

Which is the way it should be. Arm mounted weapons should fire at the same area since they can be actuated from side to side in most cases, however arm mounted weapons that only have a vertical movement and no horizontal motion would have to fire in a straight line since they can't be as finely tuned as an actuated arm for accuracy. Sure, you might be able to put 2 PPC's in the CT of a Mech because they are mounted on elbow and shoulder actuators but that torso mounted AC20 is going to land elsewhere if triggered at the same time.

[Fais]

Paul Inouye, on 05 February 2014 - 05:09 PM, said:

Sitting across from the studio from me is a board with all the 'Mechs on it. In my crosshairs... the Highlander. More info to follow along with intended implementation date. Just giving you all a heads up.

Just try it without being able to fire while jumping, and not allowing them to turn any faster while jumping then they would normally. Although I think some people will be bothered by it, and loosing their Meta. I think the majority of your player base will like the increased amount of depth it will add to the "alpha" mech line up. It will probably start to resemble traditional battletech a lot more also. .