247 replies to this topic

[Fut]

Joseph Mallan, on 20 February 2014 - 11:27 AM, said:

With double armor an AC20 is effectively an AC10. A TT Jenner with max armor loses its leg(and most side torso armor) to a single AC20, it takes an AC40 to do the same thing here. Hence feeling like an AC10.

Trauglodyte, on 20 February 2014 - 11:50 AM, said:

With doubled armor from table top, the AC20 is in fact doing AC10 damage.

Alright, I see the thought-process here. Thanks for clearing that up.

It is a bit of a skewed way to look at things though.
I mean, how much damage does an AC20 do in MWO? 20.
How much damage does an AC10 do in MWO? 10.

To say these weapons are hitting as their lower counterparts is a bit misleading, they're still doing the damage they're meant to. It's just that they have more armor to go through.

Sure, the AC20 may be "hitting like an AC10" from some perspective, but then again, every single weapon in the game is hitting for lower damage than it should be from that perspective... It's sort of a moot point to make.

Edited by Fut, 20 February 2014 - 12:35 PM.

[Dracol]

My 2 c-bills:

- Doubling armor across the board would be counter productive
....example: TTK for pin point damage initially 10 secs goes to 20 secs
........... TTK for weapons that spread initially 20 secs goes to 40 secs
..... The gap between pin point and none pin point would be even more noticeable, there by causing shift in meta towards them even more so then it is now
.....The gulf between lights and assualts would widen even more so then they are now. Mediums would most likely suffer the most from this

- If an increase in armor is called for, increase it a set amount across all weight classes
.....This would retain the usefulness of lighter chassis while increase TTK. still benefits pin point damage the most

- Pin point damage NOT the biggest cause of low TTK. Focused fire is.
..... 1v1 mech take a long time to kill, pin point or other wise. Its when the friends show up that causes the issue. The spreading of start points help at trying to encourage smaller engagements, but consolidating to a blob to focus fire is still a common tactic.

[Fut]

Dracol, on 20 February 2014 - 12:30 PM, said:

- Doubling armor across the board would be counter productive
....example: TTK for pin point damage initially 10 secs goes to 20 secs

I think the idea is that (using your numbers) with 20 seconds to work with, it'll be much easier for average players to remove themselves from dangerous situations before being destroyed.
When it only took 10 seconds of Pinpoint to destroy somebody, it usually wound up being one little mistake in placement/awareness and you were dead. With double the time, you'll be able to take an initial bombardment, and still recover from it.

[Dracol]

Fut, on 20 February 2014 - 12:38 PM, said:

I think the idea is that (using your numbers) with 20 seconds to work with, it'll be much easier for average players to remove themselves from dangerous situations before being destroyed.
When it only took 10 seconds of Pinpoint to destroy somebody, it usually wound up being one little mistake in placement/awareness and you were dead. With double the time, you'll be able to take an initial bombardment, and still recover from it.

Ah very good point.

[Trauglodyte]

Mcgral18, on 20 February 2014 - 12:13 PM, said:

Redo things with TT stats as a starting point? AC20 does 20 damage over 10 seconds, so 4 shots doing 5 damage, which gives you a cooldown of 2.5. Or, 5 shots for 4 damage each, 2 second cooldown. BAM, instant AC20, against stock armor, no need for doubled.

Gauss could get rid of the charge, and do 10-15 damage with 6-9 second cooldown, whatever isn't too powerful or weak. Testing would be required for balanced gameplay.

Downside is that the AC2 and other small damage might be rendered useless, but they could always be buffed.

As for ammo and heat, use the same TT ratio to new cooldown, so for the 2.5 second cooldown AC20 you would have 20 shots per ton, and it would have 2 heat. SHS wouldn't be useless! AMAZING! When they don't have 3 times their TT heat to dissipate, they might actually be able to compete at a pug level.

The damage that weapons do isn't the problem. Convergence isn't really a problem. Unrestricted mechlab creativity isn't the problem. Heat capacity and slow disipation isn't the problem. It is really a combination of all of the above. Each one of those issues listed is a lot like the UAC5. By itself, each is pretty lackluster but when you combine them, the power is beyond anything and things go sideways.

Right now, the AC20 is a fine weapon. And, in reality, all ACs are pretty ok (I still find the AC2 to be absolute garbage and feel that people that boat them are tools Hell bent on cheesing the game). People only have an issue with ACs when used enmasse or in combination with PPCs. And that issue is because of the impact of JJs on PPCs + ACs. That is further exasperated by the quick recharge time on JJs and how they sync up with PPCs and the lack of a heat issue in using JJs in combination with PPCs and ACs. In reality, we're looking at a much bigger issue than just "mechs fold up too quickly". We've got a system that encourages players to blow their wads early and often with no angel on the shoulder warning of impending doom from doing so. If you're running a Swayback or a 5 Lrg Laser Stalker, you can alpha if you want to and the only down side is possibly shutting down later (won't happen in one hit) and the small amount of damage that you MIGHT take when you shut down. There isn't any physical impact on the mech, no concerns of blowing armor, etc. So, all of the things that people are up in arms about are really because we don't have an in-game parent figure waving their fingers at us telling us to slow it down or else because there is "no else".

[Fut]

Dracol, on 20 February 2014 - 12:50 PM, said:

Ah very good point.

Who actually knows how it'll play out in game though.
It could very well have the reverse affect, and just perpetuate the high-damage pinpoint alpha warriors, which is what I believe you were getting at.

Would be great if the Devs did some testing on this to see how it'd work.

[Tombstoner]

Fut, on 20 February 2014 - 12:29 PM, said:

Alright, I see the thought-process here. Thanks for clearing that up.

It is a bit of a skewed way to look at things though.
I mean, how much damage does an AC20 do in MWO? 20.
How much damage does an AC10 do in MWO? 10.

To say these weapons are hitting as their lower counterparts is a bit misleading, they're still doing the damage they're meant to. It's just that they have more armor to go through.

Sure, the AC20 may be "hitting like an AC10" from some perspective, but then again, every single weapon in the game is hitting for lower damage than it should be from that perspective... It's sort of a moot point to make.

Not really. everything in mech design costs tonnage. Once fire rate was changed it devalued a ton of armor and heat sink effectiveness. it forced people to use low heat high tonnage weapons like auto cannons or adopt play styles that allow for period of heat dissipation..... styles like pop tarting.

Depending on the weapon PGI effectively increased heat output by 214 - 1923% and damage by 250 - 1923% give you one guess what weapon got the 1923% increase in damage.

A - The ac-2

That's what happens when you alter something simple like fire rates without rescaling for damage and heat.

Edited by Tombstoner, 21 February 2014 - 04:27 AM.

[wanderer]

SirLANsalot, on 20 February 2014 - 12:22 PM, said:

Still looks like some people are missing the true point here.


Pinpoint damage is NOT the issue, nor was it ever the issue. There are ways to balance around CORE game mechanics like that and still have a good game. This is one of them (Original Post) by adding more armor and hence more durability to every mech while still keeping damage the same. It extends game-play while still keeping true to things that you can keep true to without killing the game one way or the other.

Annnnnd the slower game without changes to pinpoint, frontloaded damage just mean that weapons that spread damage kill even more slowly, making everything but PPC's/AC's irresistable due to the even more significant boost in TTK they'd provide if you increased armor still further.

When everything else takes x+y damage to effectively deal X damage to a location thanks to damage spread, and AC/PPC mounts takes only X damage to inflict it for lack of same....people are gonna flock to the weapon that clearly kills better.

Welcome to the current meta.

[FactorlanP]

wanderer, on 20 February 2014 - 02:13 PM, said:

Annnnnd the slower game without changes to pinpoint, frontloaded damage just mean that weapons that spread damage kill even more slowly, making everything but PPC's/AC's irresistable due to the even more significant boost in TTK they'd provide if you increased armor still further.

When everything else takes x+y damage to effectively deal X damage to a location thanks to damage spread, and AC/PPC mounts takes only X damage to inflict it for lack of same....people are gonna flock to the weapon that clearly kills better.

Welcome to the current meta.

Exactly

[Varent]

SirLANsalot, on 18 February 2014 - 12:19 PM, said:

"But what about cannonicity? TT didn't do this."

No it didn't, but this game isn't TT, and isn't a 100% cannon game either and the sooner people get that through there heads, the better. Stop trying to make this game Table Top, or a game that follows the lore to the letter. If you want a TT game, go play MW:T which is far closer to TT rules and build rules then this game.

This made me smile. I wont comment much on the rest of the post since I disagre with some of it but I feel you really nailed this here. This game needs to stand alone as a good game before you can start worring about lore.

That said its been mentioned before and I feel a good start to helping balance time to kill would be to double the HP of internal structure.

Been mentioned before and would have alot of value and change the game up abit.

[Quick n Fast]

lol @ this thread

x4 TT armor lmao

no one person has even mentioned or taken into account that your xl eng. is the reason why you u die in 10sec..
everyone who runs a reg. eng. last the longer.

thus this whole topic is invalid.

[TimePeriod]

Who needs more armour when:

• Net Code is effin rubbish
  
• We lack EU server support
  
• Hit registration for SRM is pathetic
  
• Fall damage is a pathetic excuse for poptarting.

Please fix this before you make some kind of "armour fix"

Edited by TimePeriod, 20 February 2014 - 02:48 PM.

[TB Freelancer]

Bagheera, on 18 February 2014 - 01:36 PM, said:

I'm not convinced that doubling armor again will result in v a change in build distribution. People would still run the same weapon load outs, engagements would just be longer.

To borrow your AC40 example, I think most of those players would welcome more armor to protect their xl.

If anything this is just a blanket buff for everything that leaves the game fundamentally the same, just with longer matches.

You're more or less right. I can guarantee that some will use the increased durability to skimp on armor in some places, some people will just stand there and trade blows longer, and certain weapon imbalances will become more pronounced since the ability to keep delivering damage over time will become more important.

If PGI insists on keeping its completely fubared heat system, the best thing it could do without its traditional band aid fixes, is slow the ROF of all weapons down a notch as it would increase TTK and alleviate some imbalance issues caused by the borked heat system.

[SirLANsalot]

wanderer, on 20 February 2014 - 02:13 PM, said:

Annnnnd the slower game without changes to pinpoint, frontloaded damage just mean that weapons that spread damage kill even more slowly, making everything but PPC's/AC's irresistable due to the even more significant boost in TTK they'd provide if you increased armor still further.

When everything else takes x+y damage to effectively deal X damage to a location thanks to damage spread, and AC/PPC mounts takes only X damage to inflict it for lack of same....people are gonna flock to the weapon that clearly kills better.

Welcome to the current meta.

wrong.


the PPC/AC meta would literally vanish overnight. Reason being, HEAT! Those PPC's would need to be firing 2x longer and more often to accomplish the same effect. This means your mech is going to be running hotter, longer, which makes people start to look else where for high DPS guns rather then ALPHA guns (PPC's are ALPHA weapons). The natural progression would be to LPLs which are cooler, deal more damage, and have a shorter CD then a PPC. They do take more gunnery skill to apply that damage, but thats a good thing right?

AC's will also be in trouble as they (if the suggestion holds) will not be getting bonus ammo. So you will need to pack MORE ammo and thus sacrifice something somewhere else. Fewer Heat Sinks, or Lower Eng rating, ect to get more ammo on your mech.




So no. it would not encourage the PPC/AC meta that people are wanting to encourage (idiots) it would do the EXACT opposite.

[Craig Steele]

SirLANsalot, on 20 February 2014 - 04:39 PM, said:

wrong.


the PPC/AC meta would literally vanish overnight. Reason being, HEAT! Those PPC's would need to be firing 2x longer and more often to accomplish the same effect. This means your mech is going to be running hotter, longer, which makes people start to look else where for high DPS guns rather then ALPHA guns (PPC's are ALPHA weapons). The natural progression would be to LPLs which are cooler, deal more damage, and have a shorter CD then a PPC. They do take more gunnery skill to apply that damage, but thats a good thing right?

AC's will also be in trouble as they (if the suggestion holds) will not be getting bonus ammo. So you will need to pack MORE ammo and thus sacrifice something somewhere else. Fewer Heat Sinks, or Lower Eng rating, ect to get more ammo on your mech.




So no. it would not encourage the PPC/AC meta that people are wanting to encourage (idiots) it would do the EXACT opposite.

Not so sure.

If someone really wants to pop tart they're not going to be too fussed about engine, I can see many dropping engine to accommodate ammo / heat they require for that tactic.

Whether its right or wrong is irrelevent, it's just how they place their priorities on their build.

Having said that, I suspect many pop tarters are actually not that good and are enjoying their time in the sun rorting the mechanics. I mean if they were good they'd be targetting (and hitting) the head cause you know, that takes real skillz see.

If they cannot get their one shot one kill cause they cannot core a CT anymore, they will probably move on fairly quickly to another style of play.

[Roland]

Trauglodyte, on 20 February 2014 - 09:47 AM, said:

I wholey agree with that. The only thing that I would disagree with, and it isn't even so much a disagreement, is that, all too often, you're dealing with 8-11 people that have less an idea how to play the game than they walking and talking at the same time. So, while avoiding the water may be a poor idea in terms of tactics, it is often times necessary to avoid the genetic brain farts from getting decimated. Throw in some LRMs in even small numbers and they start running into each other like a bunch of bumper cars. Panic ensues, they go into the open and then you're down 3-4 people in an instant. I'll take cover every day if it ensures that I keep some puggers for a little while longer. Of course, 12 man play is an entirely different beast.

Well, a lot of the folks who are like, "Don't go in the water, you'll die!" are really just mindlessly repeating ideas that folks used to say way back in closed beta... because in earlier incarnations of Forest Colony, THERE WAS NO BOAT in the water. It was just a totally wide open death trap.

But they changed the map, such that now you basically have cover from missiles, so even if the enemy is missile heavy the water is still workable.

Really though, tons of folks just parrot stuff they have heard folks say before without any kind of actual understanding of what they are doing, why they are doing it, or how it could help them destroy the enemy forces.

Honestly, in tons of cases, many players seemingly will just walk straight ahead into the same location every time, die, and not have any idea why.. and never even CONSIDER that their actions directly led to their loss. Many times, they aren't even aware of what is happening when it happens.. or even after it happened.

For instance, I was playing a match recently on forest colony... Suggested taking up the position in H5, but some guy is like, "Don't go water, you'll die." So, sure enough folks follow him into some hole on land.. and they all get decimated with my light mech outscoring all of them... And the idiot says, "See, I told you not to go water." It was like he didn't even realize that the team DIDN'T go through the water, and got absolutely obliterated by a team that DID move through the water.

So it's kind of hopeless that the guy is really ever going to improve, because he isn't even aware of what happens in a game, and thus can't learn anything from his experiences. There were people who played Mechwarrior 4 for years who were the same way, and would make the same mistakes over and over again.

If you don't pay attention to why you lose, then you will never get better. In every loss there is a lesson, and in every lesson there is a way to win.

[Mr Ezzquizo]

lightwarrior online

new game

[Levi Porphyrogenitus]

Trauglodyte, on 20 February 2014 - 12:05 PM, said:

• Slowing the game down by way of increase recycle rates will cause people to fall asleep
  
• And the FPS crew will grab their torches and pitchforks if Cone of Fire is added

These are the clear winners. Slowing down the rates of fire (excepting Pulse Lasers and standard SRMs) will be super healthy for the game, addressing TtK, heat management, brawling, etc. Adding a situational reduction in precision (retain perfect accuracy at all times) will make the game far more interesting and more broadly skill-based than it currently is (now you mostly need 2 skills: pushing the spacebar and clicking). If you have to juggle throttle setting, heat level, and stability status (being off the ground, JJs firing, suffering from impulse, etc.), then suddenly the really good pilots will distinguish themselves.

[Jaeger Gonzo]

And the answer is... decrease rate of fire to duble value just in line as everything else and fix pin point demage.
Thats the real solution.

[Ordellus]

SirLANsalot, on 18 February 2014 - 12:19 PM, said:

...

How about we double the armor on everything but lights, so they stop being a viable combat mech and return to the scout mech they are supposed to be. Bonus to this is the mediums stop having their role filled by lights, and return to non-pointlessness.

Then add gravity drop to ballistics without adding anything to help them compensate for said drop, ta da no more problem there.

PPC shouldn't have an inch longer than their range, b/c it's a contained plasma bolt right? That shit doesn't just stick together... once it crossed it's threshold it would just fall apart, or cool to the point of uselessness.... ta da another problem fixed. Also saw an idea somewhere about limiting energy weapons based on engine size.... that should go double for something like the PPC. If my engine isn't strong enough to rotate my mechs body quickly, or walk up a hill, it sure as hell couldn't make enough power to form, contain, and then launch cubic meters of plasma for a mile.

Then get the jump jets off of the assaults all together... b/c that's just stupid, and the person that put them in should be fired.

Finally, with the targeting computer the dev was talking about things might actually turn into "the thinking mans shooter" it was advertised as..... or you can keep it the way it is and the game will fade into obscurity as everyone but the exploiters leave and then it'll go bankrupt.