14 replies to this topic

[Sepulchritude]

Pulse Lasers just aren't working. PGI is applying minor tweaks, but the weapons remain fundamentally broken.

Why? Let's look at their pros and cons.
+Slightly more damage than a laser
+Reduced beam duration
-Massive weight increase
-Substantial heat increase
-Terrible Range (which reduces the damage by a lot in effect)

Basically, you don't get any advantages. Reduced Beam duration is actually really cool, but the terrible range means they usually don't do any more damage than just normal lasers, which are more flexible anyway. And lighter, since the extra tonnage can go to heat sinks.

My Solution:
Change Pulse Lasers entirely to a new kind of weapon.

Instead of being a 'modded' Laser that fires a little different, make it behave like a UAC/5. A burst weapon that can potentially shoot a lot of shots, then needs to be ramped down.

A Medium Pulse Laser could be a weapon that shoots every 1s, with the 0.6s beam. But it has to cycle for 10 seconds after putting out 4 or 5 beams. A sort of 'clip' mechanic.

Alternatively, just like a UAC/5. Have it have a pulse overload mechanic that's identical to jamming, making it a substantially better burst damage weapon, without ruining the 'holy TT stats'.

[Daekar]

No. Heavy burst damage is not what we need for balanced gameplay, and we definitely don't need another problematic random-jam weapon class. The devs have stated that when they figure out a better way to do it, the UAC/5 will not be random.

The new stats on the pulse lasers are a step in the right direction. In my opinion they need a smidgen more tweaking (less heat, I think), but they don't need much to be pretty useful. I had a great time earlier today in a Commando running 3x MedPLas, and I did good damage - more useful damage than usual, because I found myself being able to concentrate damage on the rear CT of mechs better.

We don't need to totally revamp Pulses, we need additional iteration in small doses. There are other things that could use an overhaul more than pulses by far.

[DEN_Ninja]

Pulse lasers are suppose to be great brawl weapon systems.

I'd take away the range buff and put in a damage buff instead.

==================

SL is 3 Damage@90m for 2 Heat

SPL is 4 damage@90m for 2.5 Heat

==================

ML is 5 Damage@270m for 4 Heat

MPL is 7 Damage@180m for 5.5 Heat

==================

LL is 9 Damage@450m for 7 Heat

LPL is 11 Damage@300m for 8.5 Heat

Makes more sense to me.

[Sandpit]

I've always thought they got it "wrong" when it comes to pulse. If they had just reduced their recycle time and reduced heat to be similar to regular lasers and reducing their range slightly it would have worked better as opposed to the MG style implementation. I would also have reduced beam duration making them put more damage on target faster. That would give them an increased fire rate which would result in increased heat but a reduction to the heat output would keep them from being insanely hot.

You'd get a faster firing laser that produces a bit more heat and loses range in exchange for being able to fire faster with a reduced beam duration. It would still produce more heat as an offset as well as have that reduced range but fire much faster and put more damage on target faster. That would also give more use to the weapon modules taht increase range in my opinion.

That's just how I would have worked them

[Roland]

Sepulchritude, on 24 February 2014 - 01:56 PM, said:

Basically, you don't get any advantages. Reduced Beam duration is actually really cool, but the terrible range means they usually don't do any more damage than just normal lasers, which are more flexible anyway. And lighter, since the extra tonnage can go to heat sinks.

Folks have pointed this out for over a year.

Sepulchritude, on 24 February 2014 - 01:56 PM, said:

A Medium Pulse Laser could be a weapon that shoots every 1s, with the 0.6s beam. But it has to cycle for 10 seconds after putting out 4 or 5 beams. A sort of 'clip' mechanic.

Not a bad idea.

[War Beast]

Quote

Folks have pointed this out for over a year.

Which says everything about this game. Very obvious issues, well documented, well known. YET NOTHING GETS DONE FOR A YEAR OR MORE AT A TIME.

I mean WTF ??? Thats just sad. No wonder so many people are horribly bummed out by the game.

[PropagandaWar]

What I want to see with pulse is rapid fire pew pew lasers like machine guns, only they heat up quick and do more damage.

[Lukoi Banacek]

Sepulchritude, on 24 February 2014 - 01:56 PM, said:

+ 17% more damage than a laser
+ 40% reduced beam duration

- 40% weight increase
- 14.2% heat increase
- 18.5% range reduction (for the max effective ranges)

For me personally, as much as I enjoy pulse lasers, I still only justify using them on one build, given the 3-distinct cons vice 2-distinct advantages. Maybe half the duration of the pulse ("near"-front loaded damage OR if we are still leery of more weapons that do that.....well, idk)? Increasing the range just kills the distinctiveness between the two imo, leaving only beam duration, heat and damage as tweakables.

I think this latest minor refinement was a good first step....now hopefully PGI quickly assesses it and then adds just a smidge more damage, reduces just a smidge more heat/beam duration but leaves it a short range weapon for the most part. I think by tweaking those three items in small doses, PL can be brought up incrementally without pendulum-swinging breaking of the game meta.

[80sGlamRockSensation David Bowie]

I entirely support this notion. Many players have been saying for over a year now that pulse lasers need a unique weapon mechanic in order to be different enough from normal lasers to not suck.

[Levi Porphyrogenitus]

Pulse lasers are in decent shape right now. Introducing radical new mechanics is not only unnecessary but counterproductive.

What PLs really need (and what the game in general needs, among several other things) is for general fire rates to be reduced by a second or two. If PLs had a significant RoF edge in addition to their burn-time and damage advantages, suddenly they become fearsome brawling weapons.

SRMs could use a similar treatment (retain high RoF as other weapons get theirs reduced).

[Zordicron]

Mech Warrior 3 Pulse lasers. WIN. They could keep the short range, heck make it shorter. They would be the premier brawl weapon and function like nothing else in the game currently.

[Lyoto Machida]

War Beast, on 24 February 2014 - 03:48 PM, said:

Which says everything about this game. Very obvious issues, well documented, well known. YET NOTHING GETS DONE FOR A YEAR OR MORE AT A TIME.

I mean WTF ??? Thats just sad. No wonder so many people are horribly bummed out by the game.

It only took them around 9 months to fix PPC heat if I recall correctly lol.

[Sandpit]

War Beast, on 24 February 2014 - 03:48 PM, said:

Which says everything about this game. Very obvious issues, well documented, well known. YET NOTHING GETS DONE FOR A YEAR OR MORE AT A TIME.

I mean WTF ??? Thats just sad. No wonder so many people are horribly bummed out by the game.

uhm ok

no, it means they've focused on other things as a priority.

[Davers]

Sandpit, on 24 February 2014 - 05:27 PM, said:

uhm ok

no, it means they've focused on other things as a priority.

But they have guys whose job description is 'the weapons guy'. If that is his job, what has he been doing? Not Clan weapons until recently. 9 months designing turrets?

[Sandpit]

Davers, on 24 February 2014 - 06:38 PM, said:

But they have guys whose job description is 'the weapons guy'. If that is his job, what has he been doing? Not Clan weapons until recently. 9 months designing turrets?

I don't think they have an actual "weapons" guy based on what we've seen thus far. I think they have a guy or two that works on code in general which means they're the macguyvers' of the team. That's all conjecture though. If they had a dedicated person or team for every aspect of the game I think we'd see MUCH faster dev times.