Colby Boucher, on 24 February 2014 - 02:46 PM, said:
Also, I don't think the way a gauss rifle fires has anything to do with cannon. I'm only 17, so I'm in no way qualified to say that, but I've heard many people say that it's not even certain whether autocannons fire one shell or a burst of shells. So it seems that we have a whole lot of room to play around with, despite some people thinking that their "headcannon" is fact. (that last bit really wasn't directed at you, please don't hurt me)
Gauss Rifle technology is a form of Energy Kinetic weaponry. The term Gauss Rifle is applied to both Rail Guns and Coil Guns. These use similar methods of accellerating a projectile made impart or fully of a magnetic material up to super sonic speeds before leaving the "barrel" of the weapon. This is done through magnetic field expansion (
Rail Gun) or linear pull (
Coil Gun) exclusively.
In terms of battletech the design seems to be more akin to a Coil Gun, than a Rail gun.
To answer the solution provided, That doesn't make sense for the function of the weaponry itself. Typically these are power off large capacitors that would discharge their stored energy when using. Some use direct power like small home made functioning versions of this weapon design (seriously search Youtube. You'll find home made Coilguns and Railguns) the Navy in its testing a larger naval grade Rail Guns uses large capacitors and superconductors to power the rails and have had the projectile reach speeds 2.4 kilometers per second (5,400 mph).
While they can generate substantial heat along the rails and magnetic coils from just the power throughput but most of this can be regulated and rapidly diminished through heatsinks attached to the coils/rails.
I also think the current charge up system works fine and relates to power being pushed into the capacitors to discharge into the coils and fire the projectile.
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Second: Laser weapons.
Now I havent played MWO religiously, I dont remember what they were like before. But I hear alot of people say that they feel they are almost useless now compared alongside ballistic guns now. So I say that they should get a rebalancing pass to bring them back up to par. Simple as that.
As it stands for the other solutions. Lasers are fine and perform at the level I believe they should. I haven't found an instance where I felt lasers were underpowered if used as they should be. Everything has a time and a place to be used properly. The damage associated with lasers for precision combat is there for a skilled hand, or for dragging damage across multiple areas of a mech.
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Third: The coming Clan LRM's.
I just have to shake my head at this. In order to "balance" them for the game while keeping some aspect of the superior clan tech, it was said they mah have it were the missiles can fire at point blank but will do less damage the closer they are? Im sorry, when did missiles start having a degrading damage factor? Its a self contained warhead, it does its max potential damage regardless of the range it impacts within its boosters fuel limit. Rather, I suggest simply incuring a massive heat penalty the closer the missiles hit a target INSIDE the origonal LRM max firing range. This fits much better than some Hokey damage loss mechanic. Its a missile, not a cannon shell.
This idea for the design sounds like they're trying to award superiority through utlity. Have a level edge fire weapon capable of doing damage in the event your missile mech gets rushed is an advantage without them needing to add the superior damage. This solution is inline with them also making them behave sorta like MRMs.
If you want a mechanical excuse for this. The damage reduction is based on the explosive warheads not arming, so you're using the physical projectile and it's fuel as the means of striking the object while the ordnance contained within does not function. Personally its a rubbish excuse to pass on, but I can see the mechanical relevance within the reasoning like that.
I also don't think it's a junky excuse. You also seem to relate everything to a Cannon, are you refering to Canon as in the fiction or universe, or a Cannon as in a weapon?
Cause if it's a Cannon as a weapon, they don't tend to do less damage up close unless its a super high velocity in which case it passes straight through an object, but that'll deal all sorts of other damage. So the relation there doesn't make sense.
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Fourth: Ballistics
These seem to be pretty OK in my mind. However I do note hearing people talk that its hard to lead fast light mechs with it alot of the time. A simple fix to this would be to increase shell velocity, making the shells hit their intended target potentially faster, thus making leading the target much easier. I dont suggest a MASSIVE increase in velocity, but just enough to make a difference
I'm of no real opinion on this. I think they're perfectly functional and accounting for the travel time takes a degree of skill. Increasing the projectile velocity will only make them easier to use and thus would need some sort of other balancing factor.
As for this as a means of shooting light mechs, thats sorta what lasers are for. Though piloting lights I've been hit with ballistic weapons when I behave in a stupid fashion or slow down too much, the idea is not to have any weapons platform be the end all be all, so leaving them as is and having Missiles with lock on, and Lasers be the counters to all things small and speedy makes sense.
Edited by Mirkk Defwode, 24 February 2014 - 03:51 PM.
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