214 replies to this topic

[Trauglodyte]

Quote

I actually liked MW3's pulse laser behavior a lot (MW2 was kinda borked despite it being chaingun-like, and MW4 was underwhelming generally).

I'm ok with that too. It acts like a laser with ghost heat but, instead of heat, you get duration delay.

[YueFei]

Trauglodyte, on 19 February 2014 - 04:25 PM, said:

I get what you're saying. The concept, at least in my mind, is to have it be like a Machine Gun and like it is now. Think of it like this:

Large Pulse Laser (now) - fires 5 pulses over 0.6s; recharges every 3.25s

Large Pulse Laser (new) - fires 5 pulses over 0.6s; each pulse recharges every 0.65s

The way I'm looking at it, the weapon would act like a bank. You'd hold 5 charges and be able to unload all of them over 0.6s like now. But, you'd recharge a new pulse every 0.65s. That would give you the option of using it when needed or letting it bank all of the charges and unload them in a heavy alpha. It would also afford you the ability to pop a single pulse per weapon for when you need it to finish someone off without having to waste a lot of heat on more than is needed.

I love this idea a lot!

[Osric Lancaster]

Deathlike, on 19 February 2014 - 06:55 PM, said:

I actually liked MW3's pulse laser behavior a lot.

That's pretty similar to what Trauglodyte just suggested, except that you'd have the ability to refire your pulse lasers before your weapons were completely charged. Holding down the trigger on an empty charge could either fire a pulse every 0.62s or the weapon could simply stop recharging while the weapon is being fired. It might be hard to do fire control with a .6 second total fire time though. Maybe increase the total charge capacity and give it a slightly slower recharge rate?

MW3 did a lot of weapons really well, though I liked the LBXs of MW4.

Edited by Osric Lancaster, 19 February 2014 - 07:49 PM.

[80sGlamRockSensation David Bowie]

For still being a normal laser that costs extra tonnage, less range, and more heat all for a smaller burn time...

...they will forever suck. Why won't PGI make them a unique weapon instead of a crap version of regular lasers?

YueFei, on 19 February 2014 - 07:41 PM, said:

I love this idea a lot!

Shit, I have been saying to make it this way for years.... even made a video on it...

...a crappy video but a video nonetheless!

Edited by mwhighlander, 19 February 2014 - 07:51 PM.

[Osric Lancaster]

mwhighlander, on 19 February 2014 - 07:50 PM, said:

Shit, I have been saying to make it this way for years.... even made a video on it...

Your suggestion in the video is a bit different. You're mostly just saying 'congeal the damage into fewer component hit-scan beams'.

Asmudius Heng, on 19 February 2014 - 07:20 PM, said:

... my main worry is that this is it for another 6 months

That would be. . . one of my issues with PGI's approach towards weapons balance. The other being that they completely refuse to revisit core mechanics like heat, convergence, hard points or critical hits.

[Pjwned]

Osric Lancaster, on 19 February 2014 - 04:39 PM, said:

Please, no. The last thing we need is to give PGI a precedence for changing canonical weapon tonnages.
Changes to duration, heat, damage, recycle, or mode of fire are fine. If you want an energy weapon for filling that 2 to 5 ton gap, how about waiting / asking for light PPCs to be bumped up the timeline first?

They've already messed with weapon ranges & armor, drastically changed how the heat system works, and have stated that clan tech will not be grossly OP (rightly so) like it is in canon and I'm pretty sure there's other things as well.

I see no real reason to care about canon when said weapon values make a weapon system persistently bad in a game that's pretty much far and away as different as you can possibly get from tabletop and any other video game title. You don't even have an actual argument aside from "B-B-B-BUT I-IT'S CANON!!!!"

I understand wanting more weapon systems instead, but even if they put in a new energy weapon system that would essentially replace large pulse lasers, that would still mean leaving a lackluster weapon system in and that makes no real sense in a game where things are supposed to be more balanced and all the various technologies are supposed to be more or less viable.

[darkchylde]

Change Lasers to Direct Damage Beams. (lasers are not dots)

Make Pulses do damage for each Pulse that hits the target (crit seeker)

Now - you have two weapons with different characteristics

[Noesis]

WIP

I still feel the changes for PLas isn't enough to really help with real confidence for the short game. It was however more of a change even if subtle for larger platforms which only helps to maintain the idea of people using larger Mechs also. In fact these changes (with 20m to MPL) offered very little support to help with Medium/Lighter Mech use and the more shorter roles they can perform as a result.

Need more "aggressive" changes to these weapons to enable them to be used and also some appreciation to incentivising shorter game play roles. Especially more so for Medium/Lighter Mechs where the dependency on the ML, MPL as more of a primary/secondary weapon than a back up weapon is more significant.

Ideally less heat across the board for PLas, ML and making the value 3 for the Large Laser group before Ghost heat is applied to them. This will at least make them more sustainable for their all ready lack of effectiveness in comparison to ballistics with applied beam mechanics. This so they can then at least compete a little bit better with longevity as ballistics even if the range, DPS, FLD, pinpoint benefits of these weapons will sustain their use.

Edited by Noesis, 19 February 2014 - 11:32 PM.

[18 Inches of Hard Steel]

Range is useless to a brawling weapon, there are dozens of better ways to buff this. Have the people in charge ever played this game?

[MustrumRidcully]

LaserAngel, on 19 February 2014 - 03:25 PM, said:

I guess once more this is where "Laser Machine Gun" comes into play. I dread facing a ballistic Mech since I know they can keep me suppressed and have a better chance at dealing damage when I have to expose my Mech. A continuous Laser Machine Gun would definitely make them think twice about facing you and if you have the benefit of Lower Arm Actuators you can face your arms forward while attempting to shield your torso sections. I guess that I mean to say is that it needs to better replicate the Pulse Lasers from MechWarrior 3 or the X-Pulse Lasers from MechWarrior: Living Legends. Still, yesterday was a step forward.

Though wouldn't the balllistic mech still have the leg up here - the ballistic hits would shake your cockpit and cause smoke, in addition to damage, the LPL would just deal damage.

Of course, if you can deal x% more damage for the same weight investment, for certain values of x, things would probably be balanced. But I suspect the LPL needs a lot more help to get there.

Edited by MustrumRidcully, 20 February 2014 - 01:43 AM.

[ImperialKnight]

I'll still take MLas any time. MPLas is double the weight for a tiny little bit more damage and massively shortened range and more heat. It's too much for too little

MPLas needs to have the same range as MLas for me to even start considering taking it.

[MERC Mournblade]

Yeah, I just tried Pulse Lasers. They adequately represent the IQ of PGI employees.

[Matthew Ace]

Medium Pulse Lasers need, at the very bare minimum, a heat reduction. Going back to 4 would be ideal.

[627]

Why not up the damage for LPL? like 12 or even 14?

Right now the LPL is inferior to the PPC because of range and pinpoint - at the same weight. It is cooler but you'll do more focussed damage with the PPC over time.

It is inferior to the (ER-)LL because of weight - two tons less means two more heatsinks.

it is "on par" with 2 ML with damage, heat and range. but for 5 more tons... that's quite a high price for a missing E hardpoint.

So give it another purpose. Let it be superior to other lasers. It should be better than a large laser, it's 2 tons more! Downside is smaller range and not extra heat.
You could do the same for MPL, up the damage to 7 or 8 and see what happens.

[wanderer]

I'd still rather have seen them narrow the heat difference (I mean, do you REALLY need MPL's to be at 5 heat when they weigh twice as much as ML's?) and simply reduce the cooldown a bit vs. regular lasers. Beam duration and damage/shot is fine, and a higher ROF increases DPS anyway. Maybe 3/2.5/2 for LPL/MPL/SPL cooldowns. LPL's already pack more punch than a PPC, and with 3/4 the recharge time, they'd be able to drill a target repeatedly, easier.

[3rdworld]

mwhighlander, on 19 February 2014 - 07:50 PM, said:

For still being a normal laser that costs extra tonnage, less range, and more heat all for a smaller burn time...

...they will forever suck. Why won't PGI make them a unique weapon instead of a crap version of regular lasers?





Shit, I have been saying to make it this way for years.... even made a video on it...

...a crappy video but a video nonetheless!

Because meaningful balance changes are over their heads.

[Trauglodyte]

MustrumRidcully, on 20 February 2014 - 01:41 AM, said:

Though wouldn't the balllistic mech still have the leg up here - the ballistic hits would shake your cockpit and cause smoke, in addition to damage, the LPL would just deal damage.

Of course, if you can deal x% more damage for the same weight investment, for certain values of x, things would probably be balanced. But I suspect the LPL needs a lot more help to get there.

Well, you'd have the LPL doing 2.12 damage every 0.77s (0.67s w/ max efficiences) versus the AC2 (6 tons + 1 ton of ammo) doing 2 damage every 0.52s. So, 2.75 DPS (3.16 DPS w/ max efficiences) vs 3.85 DPS comparing single pulse to single shot. While the AC2 would have the benefit of shake and smoke, which is really annoying, the LPL would have the benefit of being able to unload 10.4 damage across 0.6s where as the AC2 is stuck spraying and praying. The LPL is a bit hotter at 1.6 heat per pulse vs. 1 heat per shot on the AC2. And, the AC has the range benefit but the LPL has always been a brawler weapon so we need to compare them firing within effective ranges. But, the LPL never runs out of ammo and, as such, isn't really burdened by additional weight and the base 10 DHS are enough to run both weapons.

[Gallowglas]

I tried a 2xLPL + 1 extra DHS build in place of a 3xLL build and, frankly, there's no comparison. The 3xLL build wins every single time. The weight, range, and heat differences are still too great to be made up for by marginal damage improvement and faster damage over time. If you're going to balance the weapon, you have to make the choice a compelling one for some builds and it's just not there. I applaud the buff, but it needs more to make them worth choosing. The biggest issue is that they're too heavy. Cut them to 6 tons and I'd probably use them on some builds.

[Felio]

The MPL range buff in particular seems like it was really needed. They still seem a bit hotter than they should be, however.

I like to think of weapons as competing against one another for the same hardpoint. If you are considering an MPL on a spot, it is probably competing against the ML and the SPL (which needs a range extension). And the ML is just a great all-around weapon. Excellent damage, range and heat efficiency for the tonnage and space required. That means the MPL and SPL need to be pretty good to compete for that hardpoint.

[FactorlanP]

Felio, on 20 February 2014 - 01:24 PM, said:

I like to think of weapons as competing against one another for the same hardpoint. If you are considering an MPL on a spot, it is probably competing against the ML and the SPL (which needs a range extension). And the ML is just a great all-around weapon. Excellent damage, range and heat efficiency for the tonnage and space required. That means the MPL and SPL need to be pretty good to compete for that hardpoint.

This is how I look at it as well. As it stands now... The extra heat, extra weight, and reduced range just aren't quite offset by the bump in damage yet.

I think Pulse Lasers would have been better off if they had shortened the pulse duration a bit and maybe reduced a little heat... And left the range where it was at.