24 replies to this topic

[Daekar]

Was shooting clay pigeons this weekend and thinking about LBX mechanics. Sure, a shotgun spread in real life is shaped like a cone, widening with range... but does an LBX have to work so that it's totally useless at its maximum normal range? No. All that would be necessary to make the LBX more useful is to make the pellet spread stop at a certain size and let it continue to max range at the same size pattern. Make it so that all the pellets can fit into the upper 25% of an Atlas regardless of range and you'd be good.

EDIT: The forum censor is completely ridiculous. The word that begins with S that is used to refer to clay pigeons is banned.

Edited by Daekar, 10 April 2014 - 12:53 PM.

[Jack Avery]

1. I like your idea.

2. I know which word you refer to. It has a rather...different meaning as well. That is the one that put it on the filter.

[Lyoto Machida]

Jack Avery, on 10 April 2014 - 02:43 PM, said:

1. I like your idea.

2. I know which word you refer to. It has a rather...different meaning as well. That is the one that put it on the filter.

Thank Lil' Jon for that...

[Dracol]

From a game play angle, pretty good idea. From an aesthetics point of view... that would just look weird.

[Lukoi Banacek]

Lyoto Machida, on 10 April 2014 - 04:27 PM, said:

Thank Lil' Jon for that...

beeya beeyaaaaa!!

[El Bandito]

1.3 damage per pellet. You can remove crit seeking.

All I ask.

Edited by El Bandito, 10 April 2014 - 07:05 PM.

[Sephlock]

Lyoto Machida, on 10 April 2014 - 04:27 PM, said:

Thank Lil' Jon for that...

To the window! To the wall!

[Ultimax]

I'd like the AC 10 and LB 10X to be combined into one weapon:

7 slots
11 tons
2 fire modes.

[Daekar]

Dracol, on 10 April 2014 - 06:20 PM, said:

From a game play angle, pretty good idea. From an aesthetics point of view... that would just look weird.

I agree. The aesthetic would hinge on either making the angle of initial spread very small so that the bend in each pellet's path once the pattern reached max size would be small, or simply having them blast out extremely sharply from the muzzle and hiding the sudden change in direction with muzzle flash. I'm partial to the first, but I would love to hear alternative ideas.

The reason I bring this up is that I see LBXs fielded very rarely because they're so ineffective despite their long nominal range.

I also believe that without a mechanic like this, LBX-2 and LBX-5 units will be totally useless.

Another idea I tossed around was to turn the LBX into a very fast burst-fire weapon with no spread, firing very very rapid bursts of 2, 5, 10, or 20 pellets. That would make it a spread-damage ballistic that could still make use of its max range. I don't really like the idea though, it's not canon and I like the shotgun model.

[Dracol]

As for LBx-2 and 5s, I don't think they'll be hampered as much as the LBX 10 is. As it stands, the LBX 10 can still be useful out to its max range, just not as effective as one would hope.

[Mister Blastman]

Dracol, on 10 April 2014 - 07:42 PM, said:

As for LBx-2 and 5s, I don't think they'll be hampered as much as the LBX 10 is. As it stands, the LBX 10 can still be useful out to its max range, just not as effective as one would hope.

It depends on what you consider useful. If you are swatting flies, maybe...

[Straylight]

I know this is tied to weapon convergence and that has its own (apparently insurmountable) issues, but since LB-X autocannons are fairly explicitly firing giant shotshells, not the canister rounds you'd expect from a gun that size, the solution I'd prefer to see is a self-adjusting choke, so that the spread at the point the shot reaches the target (or at least the target distance) is always the same size.

I realize that's more complicated to code than to say, but it would solve the problem of the gun's effectiveness increasing the closer the target, and keeps it notably distinct from the AC/10. In practice, the LB-X would spread damage more like an SRM launcher, which is in-keeping with TT functions anyway.

[East Indy]

If you want to deal more damage per location, you're really going for the wrong weapon.

Lower the cooldown. Make LB-X about DPS, and quickly scraping armor off a target with little regard for precise aim.

[Trauglodyte]

Daekar, on 10 April 2014 - 12:50 PM, said:

Was shooting clay pigeons this weekend and thinking about LBX mechanics. Sure, a shotgun spread in real life is shaped like a cone, widening with range... but does an LBX have to work so that it's totally useless at its maximum normal range? No. All that would be necessary to make the LBX more useful is to make the pellet spread stop at a certain size and let it continue to max range at the same size pattern. Make it so that all the pellets can fit into the upper 25% of an Atlas regardless of range and you'd be good.

EDIT: The forum censor is completely ridiculous. The word that begins with S that is used to refer to clay pigeons is banned.

• Bump up the damage to 2.0 per pellet at range 0 and have it scale down like normal when beyond its base 450m range (improves it in brawling ranges)
  
• Apply the SRM spread mechanic to it

Quite honestly, I think the better way of handling the spread would be to treat it like artillery. You fire a slug and whatever it hits it causes 10 1 point attacks within X meter radius. It keeps the weapon as it should be and not some lack luster POS that it is.


Oh, and sk33t sk33t sk33t ya'll!

Edited by Trauglodyte, 11 April 2014 - 07:57 AM.

[cSand]

East Indy, on 11 April 2014 - 07:48 AM, said:

Lower the cooldown. Make LB-X about DPS, and quickly scraping armor off a target with little regard for precise aim.

Well TBH the LBX isn't really for scraping off armor...
It works best after the armor is gone. Instant limb removal

People want it to act like all the other weapons but it's more like the MG in that it's not as effective against armor. Once that armor is opened up though...

I like the idea of tightening up the spread though. Even though it has a 540m range, the spread is so big at that range that you may as well just not bother

Edited by cSand, 11 April 2014 - 08:02 AM.

[Percimes]

Straylight, on 10 April 2014 - 09:04 PM, said:

I know this is tied to weapon convergence and that has its own (apparently insurmountable) issues, but since LB-X autocannons are fairly explicitly firing giant shotshells, not the canister rounds you'd expect from a gun that size, the solution I'd prefer to see is a self-adjusting choke, so that the spread at the point the shot reaches the target (or at least the target distance) is always the same size.

I realize that's more complicated to code than to say, but it would solve the problem of the gun's effectiveness increasing the closer the target, and keeps it notably distinct from the AC/10. In practice, the LB-X would spread damage more like an SRM launcher, which is in-keeping with TT functions anyway.

Instead of making it automatic, the choke could be an alternated mode, just like ECM disrupt/conter. Default is like it is now, alterned mode the choke is on and the spread reduced. We would have something closer to the TT.

[Daekar]

Trauglodyte, on 11 April 2014 - 07:56 AM, said:

• Bump up the damage to 2.0 per pellet at range 0 and have it scale down like normal when beyond its base 450m range (improves it in brawling ranges)
  
• Apply the SRM spread mechanic to it

Quite honestly, I think the better way of handling the spread would be to treat it like artillery. You fire a slug and whatever it hits it causes 10 1 point attacks within X meter radius. It keeps the weapon as it should be and not some lack luster POS that it is.



Oh, and sk33t sk33t sk33t ya'll!

The canister shot thing could work too. I hope PGI is paying attention, because in TT you could hit all 10 pellets on your enemy all the way out to max range regardless of whether or not that enemy was a light or an assault.

[Shlkt]

Allow LBX to crit through armor! Bwuahaha!
Crit % could be scaled by amount of armor remaining on target... full armor = 0%, half armor = 20%, zero armor = 40%

[Khobai]

1) The entire point of cluster munitions is to hit every location on a mech, find holes in the armor, and roll up critical hits. So tightening the spread of the LB10X makes absolutely no sense. What PGI needs to do is widen the spread, increase the damage per pellet, and increase the critical damage multiplier.

2) The LB10X should fire in a cylinder pattern rather than a cone pattern. Simply because a cylinder retains the same circumference regardless of distance traveled. The spread would be exactly the same at 500m as it is at 100m.

3) The LB10X should be able to switch between cluster and slug ammo. We should have two distinctly specialized ammo types that are both good at one thing (critseeking and punching armor respectively) instead of a single ammo type which tries to do both things and fails miserably at both. In order to prevent the LB10X from completely replacing the AC10, the LB10X should have a worse profile than the AC10 when firing slugs, specifically it should fire slower and have less range.

4) Critical hits in general need to matter more. Right now the internal structure of a component gets destroyed faster than the items inside the component. The obvious solution to this is to increase the internal structure of mechs. This would not only make critseeking weapons better, but it would also increase the TTK which many players feel is currently too low.

The result would be the LB10X becoming a versatile weapon thats good at both critseeking and punching armor, but still not as good at punching armor as the more specialized AC10. Critseeking would also become a more viable tactic and give you the option to disarm a mech before outright destroying it.

Edited by Khobai, 11 April 2014 - 10:37 AM.

[Daekar]

Khobai, on 11 April 2014 - 10:14 AM, said:

1) The entire point of cluster munitions is to hit every location on a mech, find holes in the armor, and roll up critical hits. So tightening the spread of the LB10X makes absolutely no sense. What PGI needs to do is widen the spread, increase the damage per pellet, and increase the critical damage multiplier.

2) The LB10X should fire in a cylinder pattern rather than a cone pattern. Simply because a cylinder retains the same circumference regardless of distance traveled. The spread would be exactly the same at 500m as it is at 100m.

3) The LB10X should be able to switch between cluster and slug ammo. We should have two distinctly specialized ammo types that are both good at one thing (critseeking and punching armor respectively) instead of a single ammo type which tries to do both things and fails miserably at both. In order to prevent the LB10X from completely replacing the AC10, the LB10X should have a worse profile than the AC10 when firing slugs, specifically it should fire slower and have less range.

4) Critical hits in general need to matter more. Right now the internal structure of a component gets destroyed faster than the items inside the component. The obvious solution to this is to increase the internal structure of mechs. This would not only make critseeking weapons better, but it would also increase the TTK which many players feel is currently too low.

The result would be the LB10X becoming a versatile weapon thats good at both critseeking and punching armor, but still not as good at punching armor as the more specialized AC10. Critseeking would also become a more viable tactic and give you the option to disarm a mech before outright destroying it.

I see we agree on a great deal. Cylindrical pattern that is not so wide as to be useless at nominal max range would be the best, certainly, and I agree about increasing the relevance of crits.

I also still like the canister shot idea.

There needs to be more than one way to skin a cat, and right now there isn't.