517 replies to this topic

[Cimarb]

Ultimatum X, on 11 April 2014 - 01:37 PM, said:

However, part of the reason the ACC is so high is because it is a hitscan weapon.

This means you are always extremely likely to hit with some part of the attack.

From my own data, the duration of the attack appears to be not as much of a factor as my ACC with pulse lasers is actually very close to my ACC with Lasers - even though the duration of the beam is 40% shorter.

From Wiki:

Quote

Hitscan is a term that is used mainly in computer games, most commonly in first person shooters. A hitscan is a calculation performed by a game to find the point at which a given line intersects a game object, and is commonly used to determine whether a bullet or projectile hit a target after being fired from a weapon.

Hitscan is a very simple calculation that basically ignores flight time, projectile drop, etc. A very fast projectile, though, with little drop, such as the AC2 or PPC, are not hitscan, but darn near. Even at maximum range, an AC2 is VERY easy to hit with.

Duration of the beam doesn't matter much for laser accuracy, because if you are anywhere near the target when you fire, it is very easy to adjust and get at least a single tick of damage. That is why your pulse and standard lasers accuracy is very similar - you are either close when you pull the trigger, or fired into a pile of snow to draw a smilie face...

Ballistics, if made burst-fire, will either have much worse accuracy (if each projectile is considered a "hit" or "miss") or much higher accuracy (if each full burst is considered a single "hit" or "miss" like lasers are).

Ultimatum X, on 11 April 2014 - 01:37 PM, said:

Remove FLD from ACs.

Suddenly they are weapons that become a pulse weapon, just like pulse lasers - but without hitscan benefits.

The only manually aimed, projectile based spread damage weapons we have are: SRMS & LB 10X.

Neither of those are in a great place imo.

EDIT: I forgot machine guns!

Both of those spread by area, though, which is quite a bit different than duration spread. SRMs are also very close range and have serious hit registration issues.

For instance, if you shoot a "single" shot of LBX, you are actually shooting 10 individual pellets, similar to how missiles are individual once launched. If you are at long range, you are much more likely to get a hit, but the damage potential (efficient damage) of that "hit" is significantly worse than the same "hit" at close range.

(NOTE: I actually think the LBX is in a good spot. When used correctly, they are devastating on internals, and when used like I do, they are great at suppression and "assist farming".)

Ultimatum X, on 11 April 2014 - 01:37 PM, said:

How can you guarantee that they would have very short flight times?

I don't see that included in any proposals, outside of you recognizing it.

I think my use of them projectile is appropriate.

I can't guarantee anything. I doubt PGI has even considered a system like I am proposing, since it involves more than two lines of code change...

All I can say is that flight times can be tweaked to balance, just like damage and many other factors. Even switch ACs to burst-fire is a very simple change, and StJobe even detailed how easy it would be a few weeks ago (I really need to write down the link to that post... so hard to find anything on this forum).

Ultimatum X, on 11 April 2014 - 01:37 PM, said:

I wanted to respond to your other points, but I need to head out - sorry!

Not a problem, take your time!

[Cimarb]

stjobe, on 11 April 2014 - 03:19 PM, said:

Even though I hit 30% more often with the LL, I do so little damage with each hit I need to hit more than twice for every time I hit with the AC/10 to do the same damage - and those two LL hits will likely never hit the same location, being 4.25 seconds apart. But the AC/10 puts 10 damage in one location, guaranteed. At range, on a moving target, from a moving 'mech. Every time it hits.

On top of this, every "hit" with your LL, even if it damages something, is going to spread that damage across the target, further compounding the effectiveness of the damage.

For instance, if you hit the target with an AC10, 10 points of damage (or more if you get a crit) is applied "on target" to that one single location. An equivalent hit with a LL could spread the damage to 2, 3, 4+ locations, making the "on target" damage a mere fraction of what it could have been. It is skill based, but not just your own, as the skill of the target actually subtracts from your own skill to determine how much that damage is spread.

[General Taskeen]

a blast from the past



How'd they solve it? By doing away with TT damage completely, and simply making it 'feel' like an equivalent to the Battle Tech weapon.

[kapusta11]

Cimarb, on 11 April 2014 - 03:42 PM, said:

On top of this, every "hit" with your LL, even if it damages something, is going to spread that damage across the target, further compounding the effectiveness of the damage.

For instance, if you hit the target with an AC10, 10 points of damage (or more if you get a crit) is applied "on target" to that one single location. An equivalent hit with a LL could spread the damage to 2, 3, 4+ locations, making the "on target" damage a mere fraction of what it could have been. It is skill based, but not just your own, as the skill of the target actually subtracts from your own skill to determine how much that damage is spread.

I like how you overlooked the fact that with 64% accuracy with ballistics not all hits are put at the CT or wherever you were aiming for. I like how the others say laser accuracy is unimportant "because even 1 tick is enough to register a hit" (72% damage done with 85% accuracy in my case = 61% effectiveness). I like how most of you say that with laser weapons you need to expose yourself while you can shoot AC5 then torso twist for 1.5 sec then turn back and immediately shoot again, just like that, because who needs tracking right?

We have no equivalent laser based builds because you get punished the more energy weapons you put. Awesome is FLD, pinpoint, whatever based mech, is it OP?

Edited by kapusta11, 12 April 2014 - 03:30 AM.

[Cimarb]

kapusta11, on 11 April 2014 - 10:39 PM, said:

I like how you overlooked the fact that with 64% accuracy with ballistics not all hits are put at the CT or wherever you were aiming for. I like how the others say laser accuracy is unimportant "because even 1 tick is enough to register a hit" (72% damage done with 85% accuracy in my case = 61% effectiveness). I like how most of you say that with laser weapons you need to expose yourself while you can shoot AC5 then torso twist for 1.5 sec then turn back and immediately shoot again, just like that, because who needs tracking right?

We have no equivalent laser based builds because you get punished the more energy weapons you put. Awesome is FLD, pinpoint, whatever based mech, is it OP?

A huge issue with comparing them is determining "on target", I agree. Even though we can't see this "on target" amount, though, you would be lying if you said that ballistics and lasers have anywhere near equivalent "on target" damage. Ballistics/PPCs require you to lead the target, slightly, but at anywhere near optimum range, you simply pull the trigger and it hits where you want, with 100% damage. No matter how accurate you are with lasers, unless both you and the target are stationary, there WILL be spread damage over that full second duration.

The PPC-full Awesome is pinpoint FLD, yes, but because of that FLD from PPCs (and autocannons), PGI had to implement Ghost Heat, which pretty much completely ruined that mech as well as many others. Change PPCs to be beam/splash damage instead, and you can remove Ghost Heat.

[kapusta11]

Cimarb, on 12 April 2014 - 07:40 AM, said:

A huge issue with comparing them is determining "on target", I agree. Even though we can't see this "on target" amount, though, you would be lying if you said that ballistics and lasers have anywhere near equivalent "on target" damage. Ballistics/PPCs require you to lead the target, slightly, but at anywhere near optimum range, you simply pull the trigger and it hits where you want, with 100% damage. No matter how accurate you are with lasers, unless both you and the target are stationary, there WILL be spread damage over that full second duration.

The PPC-full Awesome is pinpoint FLD, yes, but because of that FLD from PPCs (and autocannons), PGI had to implement Ghost Heat, which pretty much completely ruined that mech as well as many others. Change PPCs to be beam/splash damage instead, and you can remove Ghost Heat.

Don't want to brag but think again before accusing someone in lying.

So yeah, the point stands.

And ghost heat was introduced to address people that were exploiting broken heat system, I've talked about it countless times. 6xLL Stalker was quite good btw.

Edited by kapusta11, 12 April 2014 - 10:23 AM.

[Cimarb]

kapusta11, on 12 April 2014 - 10:14 AM, said:

Don't want to brag but think again before accusing someone in lying.

So yeah, the point stands.

And ghost heat was introduced to address people that were exploiting broken heat system, I've talked about it countless times. 6xLL Stalker was quite good btw.

What precisely are you bragging about, or proving? Nothing in that image says anything about your efficient, "on target" damage. In fact, it is currently unprovable, as there is no way to show what portion of your damage hit the section you targeted.

[Ultimax]

Cimarb, on 12 April 2014 - 12:42 PM, said:

What precisely are you bragging about, or proving? Nothing in that image says anything about your efficient, "on target" damage. In fact, it is currently unprovable, as there is no way to show what portion of your damage hit the section you targeted.

He's just proved how high his accuracy is with a hitscan weapon.

His Large Pulse Laser ACC is 83.33%
His AC 5 ACC is 55.45%

That's a difference of 27.88%. That's significant.



stjobe's proposal would remove the FLD, which would lower the efficiency of the "on target" damage, but it would also retain the much lower accuracy of a projectile weapon.


Take a look at his Gauss Rifle's ACC, it's a bit better, at 64%, ACC with AC 2s is 68.58% - both are still lower than the hitscan weapon with their generous projectile speeds of 2000m/s.


2000m per second.

Just how fast do you think the devs would be willing to push Autocannon projectile speeds to "balance" this loss of FLD?



Do you think 2000m/s AC 5, AC 10 & AC 20 rounds are likely?

I'm going with "extremely unlikely", as my answer.

Edited by Ultimatum X, 12 April 2014 - 05:39 PM.

[Mavairo]

A high rate of fire, lower damage pershot AC WOULD be balanced against lasers.
That's how its' worked in past mechwarriors, that's how it worked out in table tops.
Seriously, do you really think people never ever took ballistic weapons in other games, because of their lack of pin pointed damage?

Hell no. Ballistics balance out, because they generate very very little heat, while possessing greater range.
The decision to make ACs just one big cannon slug was probably among the worst decisions PGI could have done for this game.

Gauss and PPCs were supposed to be FLD in mechwarrior. PPCs Currently are about where they should be.

[stjobe]

Ultimatum X, on 12 April 2014 - 05:38 PM, said:

His Large Pulse Laser ACC is 83.33%
His AC 5 ACC is 55.45%

That's a difference of 27.88%. That's significant.

It's also a bit of cherry-picking, taking the laser with the highest accuracy number and the AC with the lowest.

But even so, when you compensate for partial damage, the numbers look like this:
LPL: 83.33% accuracy, 88% damage done = 73.33% efficiency
AC/5: 56.45% accuracy, 101% damage done = 57% efficiency

And if you look at the ERLL or LL instead of the single-match LPL, the margin of efficiency all but disappears:
ERLL: 87.93% accuracy, 72,1% damage = 63.41% efficiency
LL: 80.95% accuracy, 72.2% damage = 58.45% efficiency

Less than 2% is not significant.

Ultimatum X, on 12 April 2014 - 05:38 PM, said:

stjobe's proposal would remove the FLD, which would lower the efficiency of the "on target" damage, but it would also retain the much lower accuracy of a projectile weapon.

Projectile weapons do not have "much lower accuracy" when accuracy is viewed as "ability to put damage on target".

And you again fail to acknowledge that the AC will put 100% of its damage in a single location every time it hits, whereas every other weapon at least have the possibility of spreading its damage across multiple locations, or do partial damage.

Ultimatum X, on 12 April 2014 - 05:38 PM, said:

Take a look at his Gauss Rifle's ACC, it's a bit better, at 64%, ACC with AC 2s is 68.58% - both are still lower than the hitscan weapon

Until you compensate for partial damage that is.

AC/2: 68.58% accuracy, 104.5% damage, 71.68% efficiency
GR: 64.60% accuracy, 104% damage, 67.18% efficiency

LPL: 83.33% accuracy, 88% damage done = 73.33% efficiency
ERLL: 87.93% accuracy, 72,1% damage = 63.41% efficiency
LL: 80.95% accuracy, 72.2% damage done = 58.45% efficiency

The only outlier is the single-match, fired 18 times and hit 15, for all we know fired on an AFK 'mech Large Pulse Laser.

[kapusta11]

Cimarb, on 12 April 2014 - 07:40 AM, said:

you would be lying if you said that ballistics and lasers have anywhere near equivalent "on target" damage.

Cimarb, on 12 April 2014 - 07:40 AM, said:

What precisely are you bragging about, or proving? Nothing in that image says anything about your efficient, "on target" damage. In fact, it is currently unprovable, as there is no way to show what portion of your damage hit the section you targeted.

You know what. Now you're talking about “effectiveness” of "on target" damage, whatever, suit yourself, but it works both ways and you can't say that ACs are superior here, you can aim for CT and hit an arms or side torso. The point is not how high stats are but how close laser's "on tharget" damage and ballistic's are. 58%-63% for LL, ERLL and 64% for ballistics is far from “nowhere near”

(AC5 is outlier because I was leveling quad AC5 Cataphract 4X and anyone who’ve piloted them knows about low and wide arm placement resulting in shots fired at walls and hills. LPL have too low amount of shots fired so I wouldn’t take it into consideration no matter of the result)

Let’s take a look at AC20 and AC2:
2xAC2 weight the same as 1xAC20, the former have 7,7 dps, latter - 5, that's 54% more damage for the same weight. Let's go in the game, now what weapon is more "OP"? (rhetorical question) In case of AC2's spread was addressed by increasing its damage output by a lot and still it's more useful for suppressing rather than damage dealing, Lasers don't even have that. You can't even mount more than 2 because of ghost heat, you’ll just get penalized. Even if you could you'll be penalized by how current heat system works.

AC’s are indeed better than energy weapons but it’s because of more obvious stuff – higher damage, faster rate of fire (no heat disipation issues) and all the nerfs made to energy weapons.

Edited by kapusta11, 13 April 2014 - 03:04 AM.

[Ultimax]

stjobe, on 12 April 2014 - 11:13 PM, said:

It's also a bit of cherry-picking, taking the laser with the highest accuracy number and the AC with the lowest.

But even so, when you compensate for partial damage, the numbers look like this:
LPL: 83.33% accuracy, 88% damage done = 73.33% efficiency
AC/5: 56.45% accuracy, 101% damage done = 57% efficiency

To be clear, my goal wasn't cherry picking.

I choose the LPL specifically because as 3 pulse firing weapon, I think it would be the closest to your concept of burst fire for ACs.

It fires 3 pulses, 1 pulse every 0.2s.

I believe you proposed ACs would fire 3 "pulses", 1 pulse every 0.1s.

Do you disagree that the pulse lasers firing method would be closer to what you propose than a standard laser?

stjobe, on 12 April 2014 - 11:13 PM, said:

Projectile weapons do not have "much lower accuracy" when accuracy is viewed as "ability to put damage on target".

1) They have lower accuracy. No way that you slice it can change this. You get Lasers and Pulse lasers onto a target easier, because of their delivery method. Hitscan.



2) Efficiency per damage dealt is a nebulous concept. Yes, the ACs are more efficient when they actually do hit - but that is only 50% of the time.

Sometimes getting "some" damage onto a target is valuable, like when you are trying to leg a light.

Sometimes its not, and you wanted to place it all on the CT and FLD would have been better.



If you change them to pulses.

ACC will remain the same.

Efficiency will go down.

stjobe, on 12 April 2014 - 11:13 PM, said:

AC/2: 68.58% accuracy, 104.5% damage, 71.68% efficiency
GR: 64.60% accuracy, 104% damage, 67.18% efficiency

LPL: 83.33% accuracy, 88% damage done = 73.33% efficiency
ERLL: 87.93% accuracy, 72,1% damage = 63.41% efficiency
LL: 80.95% accuracy, 72.2% damage done = 58.45% efficiency

Two questions:
1) What happens when the AC 2's accuracy remains consistent, but the damage done drops to 70% ~ 80%?

As a burst/pulse weapon (your proposal) it's likely to have lower damage done than it does now.


2) Do you think it's realistic to assume the devs would also push AC 5, AC 10, AC 20 projectile speeds to 2000m per second - to match weapons like the GR and AC 2?



Also, as I mentioned to Cim, I just wanted to take the time to thank you for remaining civil. I do appreciate that we can both agree and not resort to insults. You have my respect for that.

[stjobe]

Ultimatum X, on 13 April 2014 - 06:48 AM, said:

I choose the LPL specifically because as 3 pulse firing weapon, I think it would be the closest to your concept of burst fire for ACs.

It fires 3 pulses, 1 pulse every 0.2s.

If you have a source for that claim, I'd love to read it. Normal lasers are commonly understood to be 10 ticks per beam, but from where do you get that pulse lasers are 3 ticks per beam?

Ultimatum X, on 13 April 2014 - 06:48 AM, said:

1) They have lower accuracy. No way that you slice it can change this. You get Lasers and Pulse lasers onto a target easier, because of their delivery method. Hitscan.

The accuracy is more likely than not just about the same, the accuracy number gets higher because a miss can be converted into a partial hit that counts as a hit (and conversely a hit can "slip off" the target, not doing its full damage).

The AC does full damage every time it hits.

Ultimatum X, on 13 April 2014 - 06:48 AM, said:

2) Efficiency per damage dealt is a nebulous concept. Yes, the ACs are more efficient when they actually do hit - but that is only 50% of the time.

And that makes up for the "accuracy" difference and more - in my case, about 10% more.

Ultimatum X, on 13 April 2014 - 06:48 AM, said:

1) What happens when the AC 2's accuracy remains consistent, but the damage done drops to 70% ~ 80%?

We'll see on Tuesday - they're being adjusted to 3 DPS by increasing the cooldown.

Ultimatum X, on 13 April 2014 - 06:48 AM, said:

2) Do you think it's realistic to assume the devs would also push AC 5, AC 10, AC 20 projectile speeds to 2000m per second - to match weapons like the GR and AC 2?

That was Cimarb's suggestion I believe, I think they'd do just fine with minor changes if any.

Ultimatum X, on 13 April 2014 - 06:48 AM, said:

Also, as I mentioned to Cim, I just wanted to take the time to thank you for remaining civil. I do appreciate that we can both agree and not resort to insults. You have my respect for that.

Likewise. I see no reason not to be civil; we are discussing hypothetical changes to a game, after all, not politics or religion

Also it seems that the "nerf" they're bringing to the autocannons isn't burst-fire, but a DPS reduction to the AC/2 and AC/5 by increasing their cooldowns.

Someone needs to go to PGI's office and hit them with a clue-by-four; that change won't do much of anything - and is eerily reminiscent of how they "normalized" (read: nerfed) the pulse lasers "in anticipation of a balancing pass" which of course hasn't happened yet, almost a year later.

[Cimarb]

Ultimatum X, on 12 April 2014 - 05:38 PM, said:

He's just proved how high his accuracy is with a hitscan weapon.

His Large Pulse Laser ACC is 83.33%
His AC 5 ACC is 55.45%

That's a difference of 27.88%. That's significant.

stjobe's proposal would remove the FLD, which would lower the efficiency of the "on target" damage, but it would also retain the much lower accuracy of a projectile weapon.

Take a look at his Gauss Rifle's ACC, it's a bit better, at 64%, ACC with AC 2s is 68.58% - both are still lower than the hitscan weapon with their generous projectile speeds of 2000m/s.

2000m per second.

Just how fast do you think the devs would be willing to push Autocannon projectile speeds to "balance" this loss of FLD?

Do you think 2000m/s AC 5, AC 10 & AC 20 rounds are likely?

I'm going with "extremely unlikely", as my answer.

If autocannons were made to be burst-fire, 2000 m/s would not be an issue. Burst-fire opens up TONS of options to balance them by.

StJobe answered everything else quite eloquently, as always, so thanks - you may want to check out http://mwomercs.com/...ost__p__3291001, as Karl actually addressed the burst-fire idea!

Edited by Cimarb, 13 April 2014 - 04:51 PM.

[stjobe]

Cimarb, on 13 April 2014 - 04:47 PM, said:

you may want to check out http://mwomercs.com/...ost__p__3291001, as Karl actually addressed the burst-fire idea!

What the ever-loving hell is that thread doing in "off-topic discussions"? It might just be the single most informative thread I've ever seen on these forums, and it's tucked away in off-topic?

These mods are on drugs. They must be on drugs.

[Cimarb]

stjobe, on 13 April 2014 - 09:14 PM, said:

What the ever-loving hell is that thread doing in "off-topic discussions"? It might just be the single most informative thread I've ever seen on these forums, and it's tucked away in off-topic?

These mods are on drugs. They must be on drugs.

That is addressed somewhere in the thread - that just happens to be where Rebas posted it originally - but it shows that even those forums are monitored, which is encouraging to me!

I reported the post to try to get it "promoted", but it would probably help if others did so as well.

[kapusta11]

I'm yet to see some numbers concerning burst fire, that's what you and your proposals lack, as well as any ability to foresee the consequences.

You want to turn ACs into a laser with different visuals and kill that little weapon diversity that we have now, that's ok but what will you do with Gauss, changing it is against the lore and common sense? What will you do with ECM Ravens with 2xERLL that can easily avoid burst fire, lrms, streaks, have range advantage and if not can easily acquire it? What will you do with burst fire AC2, lets assume it fires a volley of projectile with infinite speed that deals 2 damage over 0.5 sec meaning that it can shoot non stop for 4 spreaded damage per second, for 8 (with ammo) tons. You do realise it sounds like garbage even compared to laser weapons?

Edited by kapusta11, 13 April 2014 - 10:55 PM.

[Joseph Mallan]

stjobe, on 13 April 2014 - 09:14 PM, said:

What the ever-loving hell is that thread doing in "off-topic discussions"? It might just be the single most informative thread I've ever seen on these forums, and it's tucked away in off-topic?

These mods are on drugs. They must be on drugs.

I agree, that should be in Balance not Off Topic. Would there be an issue with drop off and other issues Karl Mentioned? It sounds kinda dambing to rapid fire ACs?

[Ultimax]

stjobe, on 13 April 2014 - 07:08 AM, said:

If you have a source for that claim, I'd love to read it. Normal lasers are commonly understood to be 10 ticks per beam, but from where do you get that pulse lasers are 3 ticks per beam?

You know, you're right. I made an assumption based on the visual.

I'm not sure if I can realistically test it, as my reflexes simply aren't that good.

My assumption was that as you need to keep the Laser on target for the full second, with each 0.1 tick applying 1/10th portion of the weapon's overall damage per shot that consequently a Pulse Laser would work similarly in that the damage would be divided into 3.

So that would be 1/3rd damage for each pulse of the weapon resulting in 0.2s per pulse due to 3x pulses. (0.6s firing duration).

stjobe, on 13 April 2014 - 07:08 AM, said:

The accuracy is more likely than not just about the same, the accuracy number gets higher because a miss can be converted into a partial hit that counts as a hit (and conversely a hit can "slip off" the target, not doing its full damage).

The AC does full damage every time it hits.

My concern is really, what happens when they are burst and therefore no longer do full damage every time they hit.

I do not think we will see the same Accuracy jump that we see with lasers/pulse lasers.

I believe that while part of that is due to the DoT nature, a very large portion of that is due to hitscan being a superior delivery mechanism (especially against faster/smaller targets).

stjobe, on 13 April 2014 - 07:08 AM, said:

Likewise. I see no reason not to be civil; we are discussing hypothetical changes to a game, after all, not politics or religion

Cimarb, on 13 April 2014 - 04:47 PM, said:

If autocannons were made to be burst-fire, 2000 m/s would not be an issue. Burst-fire opens up TONS of options to balance them by.

I wasn't really saying it was an issue, my opinion is that it would be exceptionally unlikely.

The developers have spent quite a bit of time constantly adjusting projectile speeds to meet their concept of balance and differentiation.

I simply do not see them suddenly changing AC 20s, to fire as fast as a Gauss Rifle - or even crazier into a hitscan weapon.***

That's an opinion and a guess though, I have nothing to base that on outside of ... quite some time playing MMOs and trying to analyze the robot-brains of developers.



***While I like the "big boom" of ACs, if I get a hitscan AC 20 that fires like a super machine gun so I can turn pesky lights into paste when they facehug me - I promise, I will not complain.

Cimarb, on 13 April 2014 - 04:47 PM, said:

StJobe answered everything else quite eloquently, as always, so thanks - you may want to check out http://mwomercs.com/...ost__p__3291001, as Karl actually addressed the burst-fire idea!

Thanks for the link!


To be honest, I feel like what he is saying supports my opinion more than anything.

Karl Berg, on 13 April 2014 - 09:20 AM, said:

I'm not an expert on the weapons systems, but I think this might be a bit troublesome. Alex is also hugely supportive of this model for AC's, as it's actually much closer to lore.

Here's the gotchas: The highly rapid-fire weapons, like machine guns, act as trace-fire weapons similar to lasers. The AC's all simulate with somewhat more physical accuracy, they spawn an actual projectile which has velocity, simulates over time, is affected by gravity, etc..

So while we could shoot off a pile of rapid-fire projectiles, that would have knock-ons that would require additional investigation at the very least. Increases in network traffic, increases in processing time and collision detection costs. Or, we might consider turning AC's into trace-fire at the cost of simulation fidelity. The shells would then fire with effective infinite velocity, no longer have gravity falloff, etc.. That's not necessarily a tradeoff we would like to make.

1) Increased projectiles = increased network traffic, processing time, collision detection load.
2) Trace fire would lose simulation fidelity, a tradeoff they would not really like to make.


I also feel that his statement on ACs:

"The AC's all simulate with somewhat more physical accuracy, they spawn an actual projectile which has velocity, simulates over time, is affected by gravity, etc.."

...Supports what I've been stating here, that reducing them to burst fire would create a negative impact due to their delivery vs. trace fire/hitscan.

Edited by Ultimatum X, 14 April 2014 - 06:32 AM.

[stjobe]

Ultimatum X, on 14 April 2014 - 06:18 AM, said:

You know, you're right. I made an assumption based on the visual.

No worries, we've all been there.

Ultimatum X, on 14 April 2014 - 06:18 AM, said:

My assumption was that as you need to keep the Laser on target for the full second, with each 0.1 tick applying 1/10th portion of the weapon's overall damage per shot that consequently a Pulse Laser would work similarly in that the damage would be divided into 3.

So that would be 1/3rd damage for each pulse of the weapon resulting in 0.2s per pulse due to 3x pulses. (0.6s firing duration).

I don't think that's how it works.

If I've understood things correctly, the lasers put out a tick of damage every 0.x seconds - whether x is beam duration / 10, or a constant 0.1 I do not know. I.e. if all lasers, regardless of duration, deal their damage in 10 ticks, or whether all lasers, regardless of damage, do ticks every 0.1 seconds is not known.

It does seems likely (to me) that it's 10 ticks regardless of duration since the SL has a duration of 0.75 and would need 7.5 ticks if it was a steady 0.1 seconds between ticks.

How many ticks a pulse laser does I do not know. Same 10 ticks as regular lasers? Three? Six? I don't know, and I have no idea how to test it since the visuals (and damage decals) aren't necessarily representative of actual damage ticks.

As for the rest of your post: You may well be right, I may be wrong, but I'm giving up on this now; this was probably the last chance we had of having proper BattleTech burst-fire autocannons and we got some lame-ass cooldown increases in lieu of balance.

Always the easy way out with PGI, and screw BattleTech lore.

Thank you for the interesting discussions though, you made me take a hard look at my reasoning and that's always useful. While I do believe my reasoning stands up to scrutiny still, the point is now moot and PGI has doomed us to pin-point perfect convergence alpha hell forever.

More's the pity.