227 replies to this topic

[Almond Brown]

Nicholas Carlyle, on 24 April 2014 - 10:17 AM, said:

So you think damage that is spread out over multiple shots is better than FLD?

Not sure. Given the Lighter and more space saving nature of the Clan weapons, perhaps that spread will arrive on target at greater distances and in greater number than their I.S. cousins.

Besides, given that the cry for this exact thing is ongoing for the current I.S. FLD based weapons would make is seem a "wanted, if perhaps painful, change".

Perhaps the I.S. versions will follow suit.

Edited by Almond Brown, 24 April 2014 - 10:34 AM.

[Nicholas Carlyle]

Almond Brown, on 24 April 2014 - 10:31 AM, said:

Not sure. Given that the cry for this exact thing is ongoing for the current I.S. FLD weapons would make is seem a wanted, if painful, change. Perhaps the I.S. versions will follow suit.

I guess you aren't understanding our problem. It's not that they added burst. It's that A] we've been clamoring for this for like a year now, and B] I get that we are "trying" to make Clan and Inner Sphere mechs equal (which is dumb), but so far it just looks like they are going to make the Clan mechs worse all around.

Edited by Nicholas Carlyle, 24 April 2014 - 10:36 AM.

[Almond Brown]

As noted before. Without stats, it is all supposition. Some prefer that as that allows them to shit on the Dev without actually having facts. So be it. I will wait and see the final outcome and then decide. You, and whoever "our" is, may carry on as usual.

Edited by Almond Brown, 24 April 2014 - 10:37 AM.

[Nicholas Carlyle]

Almond Brown, on 24 April 2014 - 10:37 AM, said:

As noted before. Without stats, it is all supposition. Some prefer that as that allows them to shit on the Dev without actually having facts. So be it. I will wait and see the final outcome and then decide. You may carry on as usual.

What stats do you want? We have a general idea for all weapons.

And it's the mechanics of the weapons which are causing the issues.

Do you think the UAC20 is going to do more than 20 damage per burst?

Are you expecting the CLRM20 to do a lot more damage per missile than the IS LRM20?

What stat are you looking for?

Also, this would be a TOTAL non-issue if they hadn't released a money grab for these mechs already. But they once again have people paying a rather large amount of money for this crap.

How about those loyalty points for the Phoenix Badges? How are those working for people?

[Gas Guzzler]

Rasc4l, on 24 April 2014 - 12:42 AM, said:

Yes, it is entirely possible to not understand what I'm saying if one tries very hard.

For simplicity, imagine a situation where a meta highlander is 'dueling' a brawler atlas. If contact is made at longer ranges than ~300 m, the atlas doesn't stand a chance. If MWO maps were the size of 600 m x 600 m boxes, we could argue that the current long range vs. short range weapon balance is ok, because in roughly ~50 % cases the fight happens also in brawler ranges. But maps are much larger than that. If contact is made at ranges 300-1000 m it will cost the atlas an arm and a leg (well most probably both side torsos) to get close and by the time his weapons would start to have an effect, the atlas has been severely beaten.

So it doesn't matter that the metamech can make "only" 10 points of damage at extreme range, because SRM-based brawlers make exactly 0 damage until they can see the eyeballs. Sure, I've managed the leg the occasional jenner at 500 m with AC/20 even with the slowed down projectile speed but effectively we are talking about the highlander having 3x-4x the range of the atlas. This is of course fine, because mechs have different roles but when the brawler atlas is FINALLY in range, it should be devastating to anyone. The first instinct of a metahighlander upon seeing an atlas close by should be to flee, not go "well, I'm pretty much on even ground, let's see if I can take him out".

Breakdown is roughly something like this:

close range (0-270 m) damage potential, Atlas: 66 alpha
close range (0-270 m) damage potential, Highlander: 40 points pinpoint (0-90 m less of course)

medium range (270-600 m) damage potential, Atlas: 0 (sometimes u hit with AC/20 but it's nothing significant)
medium range (270-600 m) damage potential, Highlander: 30-40 points pinpoint

long range (600-1000 m) damage potential, Atlas: 0
long range (600-1000 m) damage potential, Highlander: 10-20 points

Please don't get hung up on my numbers, which I'm sure are not completely accurate but I think you should be able to get the point. So maybe you think that "well, as a brawler you're not supposed cross the vast glaciers of alpine but sneak into their backs and hit them hard". Well that's what I basically always do. But to engage the 2 highlanders I just surprised alone from behind at 200 m leaves me usually quite broken and many times dead, because it is so easy for them to maneuver with JJs and keep me at 90+ meters so that their PPCs work. If they now nerf the SRMs, I don't think brawlers will have a chance.

If I drop in a brawler and land in alpine, I just accept my disadvantage. Obviously you would never bring a slow brawler to alpine by choice. I'm not arguing for a nerf to SRMs, but the HGN in question has weapons optimized for 540m/620m. Your Atlas is optimized for 270m engagement. I don't get why we are comparing the two. You can also only fire the PPCs a few times before reaching heat limits... there is a lot of factors in this comparison, but you say yourself, within 270m the Atlas has more firepower. Did you say your atlas has no lasers? Most of the time you can fit 2 LLs, AC20 and SRMs on an atlas, or more SRMs and medium lasers. In either case you can do damage past 270m, so saying beyond 270m is 0 damage is an exaggeration.

By the same token you say a Highlander should flee (at 64 kph max? not really effective at fleeing as most Atlases are setup to do about 60 kph after speed tweak (mine are)), because its 10 tons less? Then you must have a huge problem with light mechs. I've confidently taken on an Atlas 1v1 in a light (and I'm not light mech master) so maybe we should focus there first, with such a huge tonnage disparity lights should have no chance.

The simple solution though, is if you are in a brawler, don't move in open cover, as you stated before. When you get close, you DO have the advantage, especially when SRMs are fixed.

[Nicholas Carlyle]

Gas Guzzler, on 24 April 2014 - 10:43 AM, said:

You can also only fire the PPCs a few times before reaching heat limits..

Sorry what?

Seems like I can shoot PPC's a lot before I reach the rediculously high heat cap.

[Joseph Mallan]

Nicholas Carlyle, on 24 April 2014 - 10:39 AM, said:

What stats do you want? We have a general idea for all weapons.

And it's the mechanics of the weapons which are causing the issues.

Do you think the UAC20 is going to do more than 20 damage per burst?

Are you expecting the CLRM20 to do a lot more damage per missile than the IS LRM20?

What stat are you looking for?

Also, this would be a TOTAL non-issue if they hadn't released a money grab for these mechs already. But they once again have people paying a rather large amount of money for this crap.

How about those loyalty points for the Phoenix Badges? How are those working for people?

I would expect it's damage to Increase over a Standard AC20 as much as a Ultra5 increases over a standard AC5. PGI does seem to have a problem with the meaning of double sometimes.

[Nicholas Carlyle]

Joseph Mallan, on 24 April 2014 - 10:49 AM, said:

I would expect it's damage to Increase over a Standard AC20 as much as a Ultra5 increases over a standard AC5. PGI does seem to have a problem with the meaning of double sometimes.

I understand that, wasn't quite what I meant. What I meant was.."Per shot, how much damage are you expecting?".

So the UAC5 currently does 5 per shot, yes it can double tap, but it's still technically 5 per shot.

The Clan UAC20, is going to do 20 damage per shot...and from the sound of it, it will be 5 damage per shell, with 4 shells total.

It means that you have to spend more time facing your target to do the damage. Which in a game of focus fire FLD (which is the IS), can be a pretty large disadvantage.

[Fut]

Nicholas Carlyle, on 23 April 2014 - 12:12 PM, said:

Honestly, If I'm in a Meta style mech, I doubt your Atlas ever gets to use his SRMs on me, because Atlases are by far one of the easiest mechs to kill in the game at this point.

How ******* sad, eh?

[Nicholas Carlyle]

Fut, on 24 April 2014 - 10:54 AM, said:

How ******* sad, eh?

This game has some major underlying problems.

Atlases are slow, have huge hitboxes and has low slung weapons. So it basically HAS to put it's center torso in play to fire. And if you have two guys with 30 point FLD mechs, they can core him really damn quick.

Edited by Nicholas Carlyle, 24 April 2014 - 10:56 AM.

[Fut]

Nicholas Carlyle, on 24 April 2014 - 10:56 AM, said:

This game has some major underlying problems.

Atlases are slow, have huge hitboxes and has low slung weapons. So it basically HAS to put it's center torso in play to fire. And if you have two guys with 30 point FLD mechs, they can core him really damn quick.

That's the part that I find so sad. That the issues/problems with this game are flipping some aspects of MW onto it's head.

[Gas Guzzler]

Nicholas Carlyle, on 24 April 2014 - 10:48 AM, said:

Sorry what?

Seems like I can shoot PPC's a lot before I reach the rediculously high heat cap.

2 at a time continuously with AC5 fire? Usually 4 times. Sorry this was mainly in response to Rasc4l.

By the way Rasc4l, you say I'm trying to misunderstand you, but you said 30-pt alpha at 1000m and that is straight up false. It is impossible for 2 PPCs and 2AC5s to alpha at 30 points from that far away.

[Rasc4l]

Gas Guzzler, on 24 April 2014 - 10:43 AM, said:

If I drop in a brawler and land in alpine, I just accept my disadvantage. Obviously you would never bring a slow brawler to alpine by choice. I'm not arguing for a nerf to SRMs, but the HGN in question has weapons optimized for 540m/620m. Your

...

The simple solution though, is if you are in a brawler, don't move in open cover, as you stated before. When you get close, you DO have the advantage, especially when SRMs are fixed.

I somehow took your message as if you were arguing for the damage drop of SRMs like Bilbo and wrote a wall of text argument for brawlers. You were not and our opinion is rather similar than dissimilar on the subject. Cheers.

[Joseph Mallan]

Nicholas Carlyle, on 24 April 2014 - 10:52 AM, said:

I understand that, wasn't quite what I meant. What I meant was.."Per shot, how much damage are you expecting?".

So the UAC5 currently does 5 per shot, yes it can double tap, but it's still technically 5 per shot.

The Clan UAC20, is going to do 20 damage per shot...and from the sound of it, it will be 5 damage per shell, with 4 shells total.

It means that you have to spend more time facing your target to do the damage. Which in a game of focus fire FLD (which is the IS), can be a pretty large disadvantage.

See I want my enemy's UAC20 to fire 2 20 point shells every 4-5 Seconds Not 4-8 shells doing 5 a piece. And why do I want that ? Cause that is how they shot me for over 25 years.

[Rasc4l]

Gas Guzzler, on 24 April 2014 - 11:06 AM, said:

By the way Rasc4l, you say I'm trying to misunderstand you, but you said 30-pt alpha at 1000m and that is straight up false. It is impossible for 2 PPCs and 2AC5s to alpha at 30 points from that far away.

You are right, of course the damage isn't that high all the way to that distance but with that inaccurate comment I was illustrating the range at which the metamech remains functional, which is 3x-4x to the range of atlas. This went with the thought that I misunderstood you arguing for SRM nerf, which you didn't.

[Trauglodyte]

Fut, on 24 April 2014 - 10:54 AM, said:

How ******* sad, eh?

Well, the big Al is slow and easy to target. I'm getting to the point where I often walk into the fray already twisting away until I feel more comfortable with how the fight is going to proceed. The crap part is that I often get left alone in my Atlas, either because I made a piloting mistake (sometimes) or because my idiot PUG teammates can't read a map (all the time) or got shot at and backed up as I pushed (all of the time). I swear, the Atlas is a horrible mech only because the people around which it is surrounded are so terrible that you're set up for complete and total failure.

Joseph Mallan, on 24 April 2014 - 11:10 AM, said:

See I want my enemy's UAC20 to fire 2 20 point shells every 4-5 Seconds Not 4-8 shells doing 5 a piece. And why do I want that ? Cause that is how they shot me for over 25 years.

I can appreciate that, Joe. But, for 25 years, you've got had people rolling dice to see if they hit you along with penalties which reduced their chances to hit you and another set of dice rolls to see where they hit you. The UAC20 in TT was a scary mofo, especially given that we were using half of the armor we're using now. BUT, the chances of you getting hit were mitigated by environmental factors and the impact of piloting, distance, etc. We're suffering right now with 2x the armor because it doesn't take any real effort to shoot someone (unless you're trying to shoot a Light mech with slow speed ACs - not easy). When you've got people that are able to put 30 points of damage in the same location time after time, we get into trouble. Being able to do that with a UAC20 that weighs half of what it costs to field 2x PPCs and 2x AC5s/UAC5s is an issue. Hell, I can't tell you how many times that I end up losing both of my ACs in my Atlas (I made the switch from the AC20 cause it died ALL of the time) within the first few minutes of the fight and that is in the mech with the largest allocation of armor in game. Too much damage is getting slung around in too many of the same spots with nothing to limit it from happening.

Edited by Trauglodyte, 24 April 2014 - 11:21 AM.

[Nicholas Carlyle]

Trauglodyte, on 24 April 2014 - 11:12 AM, said:

Well, the big Al is slow and easy to target. I'm getting to the point where I often walk into the fray already twisting away until I feel more comfortable with how the fight is going to proceed. The crap part is that I often get left alone in my Atlas, either because I made a piloting mistake (sometimes) or because my idiot PUG teammates can't read a map (all the time) or got shot at and backed up as I pushed (all of the time). I swear, the Atlas is a horrible mech only because the people around which it is surrounded are so terrible that you're set up for complete and total failure.

One of those ignored skills in this game.

When I play my Shadow Hawk, until my lance has connected with the rest of my team, i'm normally watching the rears of my slower compatriots.

It's no good if they never make it to the fight.

[AlmightyAeng]

Nicholas Carlyle, on 24 April 2014 - 11:16 AM, said:

One of those ignored skills in this game.

When I play my Shadow Hawk, until my lance has connected with the rest of my team, i'm normally watching the rears of my slower compatriots.

It's no good if they never make it to the fight.

I find that it's useful to pop up in chat and say "Your 57.3 KPH ECM Mountain is going to X on the grid. Please don't leave him to die."

[Nicholas Carlyle]

Ghost Badger, on 24 April 2014 - 11:17 AM, said:

I find that it's useful to pop up in chat and say "Your 57.3 KPH ECM Mountain is going to X on the grid. Please don't leave him to die."

Yeah I'll normally mention it too.

[Trauglodyte]

I pull a lot of rear security (no jokes ) for my team. If we get into an area and the PUGs move somewhere else, I'll walk backwards facing the unknown area while my slower teammates move through. The 85+ Assault mechs don't necessarily turn really swift like to the point of being able to turn and re-engage should someone come up from behind.

As for typing where I'm going, I was in a match last night in Canyon network. As usual, the PUGs went straight to the junk pile elbow from the bridge starting point. I was in my Atlas and got stuck on the other side which made my 57kph speed even more of a hinderance. As I moved on through, I typed out that when I got to the elbow that I was going to push around. I had 2-3 mechs in tow with me (none were premade groups as I made the mistake of pulling a few late night solo drops - ugh!) and I rounded the corner, made it a good 20-30m, and the 3 of us got schwacked with our other 9 teammates hudding behind the rocks not wanting to get shot.

Played another game in CN (had a lot of those games last night, unfortunately) and we pushed around theta and smashed half of the team at the elbow (WHY do people keep going there?). Of course, the idiot PUGs decided to chase a Light mech around and 4-5 of them got demolished which left us tied 9-9. The opposing team did the smart thing and retreated to base wiht the rest of my team wanting to go after them. I went down the middle, typed out what I was doing, and told them to push with me as my ECM would cover them from the turrets. I roll on, my team takes their time, and I get hosed as the rest of their team bum rushes me with my forces shooting me in the back trying to kill them. They tried to fall back only to get overwhelmed.

Basically, it doesn't matter what you do because PUGs are terrible ALL of the time and will be the undoing of this game.