179 replies to this topic

[xXBagheeraXx]

*pats gauss rifle affectionatly*

This is actually a good idea. And in a way, what many have been screaming for a LONG time.

We don't want new mechs. We dont want more heros.

We want balance. Bug Fixes. New map and game-modes.

Then we will be more than happy to fork over our hard earned money for your hero mechs and clan packages. These guys could easily be as successful as Wargaming with the rabid fanbase this game has, but they keep slapping their old players in the face with the way this game is progressing, and screwing themselves out of untold amounts of money....Could you imagine if this game were as popular as Living Legends how fast those clan packages and gold mechs would have sold out? Man PGI, you must REALLY hate making money! xD

[Koniving]

Iqfish, on 09 May 2014 - 11:05 AM, said:

No. No, really No.

We have a lot of people (like 20-30) on hold, waiting for CW to come back and form an active company, another delay on CW would make this community even more toxic, would bring in lots and lots of negative press and would eventually kill this game, imo.

CW is what this game should be, an immersive simulation of a living galaxy, in which you fight for planets, fortify them and try to defend your property.

This (the whole post, but yeah.)
I mean read "Dear PGI" on the signature.

[xXBagheeraXx]

Koniving, on 09 May 2014 - 07:48 PM, said:

This (the whole post, but yeah.)
I mean read "Dear PGI" on the signature.

But think how much more awesome CW will be when the mechs, weapons, heat systems are all balanced, and we actually have some new (and more interesting) maps to play on.

[Koniving]

xXBagheeraXx, on 09 May 2014 - 07:52 PM, said:

But think how much more awesome CW will be when the mechs, weapons, heat systems are all balanced, and we actually have some new (and more interesting) maps to play on.

They've had 2 years to balance things.
Most of the Clan ideas of balancing to keep them from being overpowered came from the community itself in the many feature suggestions.
Do you honestly think we're going to see something actually balanced beforehand? And if so, what about after the return of R&R once CW is here?

[Kyle Lewis]

Iqfish, on 09 May 2014 - 11:05 AM, said:

No. No, really No.

Private Matches are good for making videos, for having some fun with your friends for a few evenings.
We had some awesome 1on1 duells or free for all matches in my unit, but we all went back to normal public matches.
The "vocal community", like ACES, SJR and the other "competetive" units are pumping the tournament stuff really much and making it look like the whole community is involved, but let me tell you that the majority of people in units are not taking part in them, not even being interested in them.

We have a lot of people (like 20-30) on hold, waiting for CW to come back and form an active company, another delay on CW would make this community even more toxic, would bring in lots and lots of negative press and would eventually kill this game, imo.

CW is what this game should be, an immersive simulation of a living galaxy, in which you fight for planets, fortify them and try to defend your property.

I agree with you when you are saying that they should fix things like HSR, Metagame and Clans (which will be OP/Too bad from day one, I bet on that).
ETA on CW is Fall this year and I don't think they dare to push it back again.

Actually The-BWC.com is excited by the match making and a lot of our members are coming back to MWO because we can now do training and inter-company activities.

I am curious since you are making the claim that the majority of the player base that is a member of units are not utilizing the new match making feature, do you have some information to support this or is it just your conjecture?

Edited by Kyle Lewis, 09 May 2014 - 08:01 PM.

[xXBagheeraXx]

Koniving, on 09 May 2014 - 07:56 PM, said:

They've had 2 years to balance things.
Most of the Clan ideas of balancing to keep them from being overpowered came from the community itself in the many feature suggestions.
Do you honestly think we're going to see something actually balanced beforehand? And if so, what about after the return of R&R once CW is here?

I dont see how changing the weight of the weapons came from anyone in the community with a brain.

Or adding Min-range to clan LRMS...But i wasnt even discussing the clan weapons. Everyone here knows those are going to get Nerfed to Oblivion....Enjoy the UAC20 the short duration it lasts, I'm sure thats the first one thats going to get Nerf-batted to oblivon.

They still haven't even balanced the IS weapons yet. Dont even get me started on the heat system, and this band-aid ghost heat shenanigans....Then the recent (and honestly uncalled for) Auto cannon ROF nerf that butchered my DPM builds?

If the core of the game is still jacked up, no amount of community warfare or anything is going to breathe life into this game. Painting a house up pretty is nice, but if you have termites and a crumbling foundation, your house is still going to collapse.

[Koniving]

xXBagheeraXx, on 09 May 2014 - 08:05 PM, said:

I dont see how changing the weight of the weapons came from anyone in the community with a brain.

They still haven't even balanced the IS weapons yet. Dont even get me started on the heat system, and this band-aid ghost heat shenanigans....Then the recent (and honestly uncalled for) Auto cannon ROF nerf that butchered my DPM builds?

There is no fixing the core game. It's too late to fix the thresholds, PGI has no interest in doing so. There's no fixing anything else without first fixing that.

They never said anything about changing the weight of the weapons. (Later on in Vblog 2 or 3) Quite specifically they expressed they cannot do that and in the Mech Devs and Beer 15 with Paul, it's decided that instead a minimum range of 75 meters will be implemented.

Min range is due to the 12 Clan LRM-5 paradox, which is 12 LRM 5s slapped onto a mech, performing (across more missiles) slightly superior damage to streaks, faster streaks, and being able to do it within brawling range. Why use streaks when you can do that with LRMs?

Basically instead of intelligently increasing the recycle time to make it difficult to do, they went that route.

But I was talking about multi-shot ACs.

Demonstrated here.

Spoken about here.


Laser ideas.


Various other things, including the Gauss minimum range, CHARGE UP PPCs (PGI got that one totally backwards), King Crab, switchable ammo for LBs, threshold fixes, etc.


Also, ALL of that was for Inner Sphere to fix it.
But it's been thrown on the Clans.

Edited by Koniving, 12 May 2014 - 11:41 AM.

[xXBagheeraXx]

^I had my own ideas as far as balance goes, just look at the first link in my signature, and if you can read past the Satire (you seem fairly intelligent, im sure you can) there are some great ideas there, with my reasoning behind them.

Multi shot (burst fire or whatever you want to call it) acs would be AWESOME, as it would break up the pinpoint damage QQing quite a bit. ive actually started reading some of the novels, and in the lore that was acutally a huge problem with them...yeah you have that big sexy 20 class Autocannon, but the damage gets spread all over the wazoo because you have TWELVE FREAKING ROUNDS PER SALVO xD

They could even go one step further and allow us to buy from different manufacturers, as in the lore many different manufacturers used different amount of shells in each shot their guns fired...some fired 12, some fired 2 or 3, some only fired one shell...each weapon cold have different quirks like muzzle velocity...different amounts of heat...you name it, it could be done. All kinds of diversity up in this {Dezgra}....

But all i can do at this point is dream.....

Btw Koniving do you have a public teamspeak you guys use? You seem like a pretty cool guy, id like to hangout/play with you boys when my clannies are all off eating applesauce/sleep

*ducks his clan masters immenent wrath*

Also about the clan lrms being used like SRms....with the low velocity the missiles will have, its going to be really hard to hit anything with a semblance of speed with these weapons in an SRM mode...The low speed with possibly a reduced turn rate would allow them to work without the minimum range


And the extra ac20 you were looking for was the Pontiac....I forget what number. Was used on the victor...LOL

Edited by xXBagheeraXx, 09 May 2014 - 08:37 PM.

[GalaxyBluestar]

1453 R, on 09 May 2014 - 07:09 PM, said:

And again, what happens when those expectations are met, those obligations are discharged and MWO doesn't turn into a shining jewel of polish and excellence, with a depth of story and persistence unmatched by even the mightiest of MMOs or most impressive of RPGs, overnight, like absolutely all of the CW NOW people swear it's going to?

the pgi made a **** game and it's pgi's responsibility to avoid that. are you trying to say it's the players fault for demanding what the company said they'd produce for over 2 years now!? i suppose you'd say it's our fault for the UI being what it is. it isn't it's what pgi made after ignoring tons of advice and it's their fault for the damage it's caused in exactly the same way a bad CW would be their fault. you proberbly wouldn't believe it but they were showing screenshot designs for ui ideas A YEAR AGO

UI.20 on the table

and guess how much the feedback changed the flaws? the answer NOTHING because all pgi can do is what they start with and that's it. if you want to hang your hopes on words and for eternity because you think as soon as CW is here it's over than you're going to be sorely dissapointed. how ever long it takes what you get is what you'll get like it or lump it. more importantly it's pgi who has to look out for themselves cause they really don't care about the community looking out for them and UI.20, in particular the mechlab, is the best example of this.

1453 R, on 09 May 2014 - 07:09 PM, said:

What're you going to do when you don't have anything else to look forward to, since the game as it stands is apparently so completely unplayable, eh?

i don't play which is something many people do, FPS bugs. we had some graphics cards screwing up map textures once the list for unplayabilty goes on. 3pv drove competative gamers away and they're not coming back to pay to turn it off and mechlab is a disgrace, smurfy was once a luxury now it's compulsory. if people still enjoy the game as it's very much still being built i doubt a buggy CW will really sway anything. they'll be people coming back saying at last something to do and others will leave saying there's no hope the game will always be appauling. buisness as usual for pgi. just please stop deluding yourself that this is and ever will be a complete game just needing tweaks. it will always be in beta.

1453 R, on 09 May 2014 - 07:09 PM, said:

I'll tell you - the player base screams louder than ever, PGI's sales drop even more, and thousands of man-hours of work ends up causing just as much negative momentum and bad press as U.I. 2.0 did.

If you want it because you paid for it and it's yours, great. Cool, that's your right. But if you want it because it's going to Save Mechwarrior Online™, then you are blind, and you're going to be crushingly disappointed when it turns out to be just as big a fiasco as every other major release Piranha's put out there so far.

it won't make MWO a brilliant game or a salvation but it will keep the company out of trouble moreso than fixing up sideliners like destructable terrain and knockdowns.

pgi made a bed, sold people on it and now have to lie in it. they have to do CW after clans or the stink and dieing playerbase will be just as bad as delivering a bad CW. they either get a good CW online or the game tanks, the end no more second chances cause 2013 blew it all away. they set themselves up for the fall not us {well we lose a few hundred for a gambit but that's what getting new games is like anyways} the playerbase will likely move on to other things with boredom {star citizen} if by 2015 CW is still a backburner effort when it was supposed to be a main jewel of the game's crown. by then i won't care if they ban my account for good i'll be asking for compensation for goods undelivered, mechs and medallions earning loyalty points.

Edited by GalaxyBluestar, 09 May 2014 - 08:57 PM.

[Dymlos2003]

GalaxyBluestar, on 09 May 2014 - 08:55 PM, said:

Blah blah blah, PGI is doomed, blah blah blah I don't play this game.

Sigh, you don't play so why are you here? And don't say because I come in to see how the game has developed. It's like checking up on an ex just to see if they have another gf.

[1453 R]

GalaxyBluestar, on 09 May 2014 - 08:55 PM, said:

Stuff

All right. Believe it or not, you have the correct reason for being pissed off over Community Warfare. I cannot and will not argue against someone who feels that Piranha's in breach of contract. I wish it hadn't come to that, but it's not something I can argue against.

But demanding that Piranha put out Community Warfare NOW - good or bad - strikes me as a dumb idea. They've rushed enough stuff out, to everyone's detriment. Expecting CW to single-handedly Save Mechwarrior Online isn't just dumb - it's outright asinine. If you want it because you paid for it and it's yours, all right. But notice that I've got an Overlord icon over there, too. I don't have my medallions, no - I don't even know how to redeem them, or which ones I'd pick if I did. Do I feel shorted? No, not really - I'm a lot more cheesed off over the VTR nerfs and other recent tomscrewery than I am over not having my LXP-boost medallions.

And realistically, I'm not going to argue your point about wanting what you bought because it's yours...but it's also not an argument that has much weight from anyone but a Founder, at least to me. And Founders have their own problems, in plenty.

if you don't like it, then seek redress for undelivered goods and move on. But demanding that Piranha put out a deliberately inferior product, over and above their usual inferior products...I just can't see the logic in that, man.

[GalaxyBluestar]

1453 R, on 09 May 2014 - 09:54 PM, said:

All right. Believe it or not, you have the correct reason for being pissed off over Community Warfare. I cannot and will not argue against someone who feels that Piranha's in breach of contract. I wish it hadn't come to that, but it's not something I can argue against.

But demanding that Piranha put out Community Warfare NOW - good or bad - strikes me as a dumb idea. They've rushed enough stuff out, to everyone's detriment. Expecting CW to single-handedly Save Mechwarrior Online isn't just dumb - it's outright asinine. If you want it because you paid for it and it's yours, all right. But notice that I've got an Overlord icon over there, too. I don't have my medallions, no - I don't even know how to redeem them, or which ones I'd pick if I did. Do I feel shorted? No, not really - I'm a lot more cheesed off over the VTR nerfs and other recent tomscrewery than I am over not having my LXP-boost medallions.

And realistically, I'm not going to argue your point about wanting what you bought because it's yours...but it's also not an argument that has much weight from anyone but a Founder, at least to me. And Founders have their own problems, in plenty.

if you don't like it, then seek redress for undelivered goods and move on. But demanding that Piranha put out a deliberately inferior product, over and above their usual inferior products...I just can't see the logic in that, man.

please get it out of your head it isn't about saving "the game" it's about saving the company from a customer lynchmob hell i will give up on this game if by 2015 there's no CW elements whatso ever. i've played just about all it has too offer and when i'm bored with achievements there's nothing left. no CW just means founders got shafted on vaperware cause if they can lie through 2013 and 14 what's to stop them doing this forever? and cut the pushing to put out deliberately inferior stuff nonsense, i've told you they put out what they got regardless of anything, like UI.20, we told em for months it was wrong and should have more work done once we saw what we were getting. if there's any demands it's for what actuall work and functionality will CW offer and if it sucks we'll tell'em to keep working on it but no doubt they'll ignore that and say "the players made us do it" and release crap. EVEN WHEN WE TELL THEM NOT TO. so they may as well get the CW disapointment over with and banish the vaperware crap so that any work on the game from now on can only be an improvement. that victor POV is a typical case of short term goal blindness, you really don't give a **** about quality retention, the long term, building a community that wants to stay for stuff, which is what F2P's need to prioritise or they won't hold playerbases for long and then start selling crazy packs for hundreds a dollars for yet another time around premeturely to just survive whilst letting people go {by garth by miSs}. if MWO is gonna die get CW out and at least don't go down in the history book as total fraudsters, if it's oh so bad get it over with so there's no more possible dissapointments!

but just don't think for a moment it's the playerbase putting preasure on them. Russ makes up his own dates time and time again, infact it's pgi that screwed the developement for it not the playerbase with all the times they said they were working on it and time and time again it was lies and making expectations worse as the years go by. frankly PGI should never have advertised community warfare back in 2011 if they knew it would takem years to even approve of a design. yeah that vid back at launch was info from the 2012 advert and still now the design is going through an approval satge, they're just making **** up and through whatever out anyways. it will be no different being released with the clans than it will be being released a year after clans it's always a throat with technical difficulties rush job. just like the concept art and price tag before any real designs clan packs. but no you can carry on saying it's the entittled crowd pushing PGI and that it has nothing to do with thier mismanagement, incompatence to do feedback properly or to communicate what pgi as a studio is actually capable of before selling goods.

oh and you'll love this thread.
disgruntled customers

Dymlos2003, on 09 May 2014 - 09:45 PM, said:

Sigh, you don't play so why are you here? And don't say because I come in to see how the game has developed. It's like checking up on an ex just to see if they have another gf.

it's strange isn't it... that someone might actually spend the odd hour on a game say each patch or once a week just for shits and giggles and stuff.

the GF argument is no comparison or if you treat women like a video game... i'm not even going to go there.

Edited by GalaxyBluestar, 09 May 2014 - 11:47 PM.

[GreyGriffin]

The premise of this thread is patently ridiculous. We've got 0.5 out of the promised 4 pillars of gameplay, and suddenly private lobbies enabling us to fabricate a faint facsimile of one of them makes it okay?

Let's review

• Mech Warfare – The embodiment of Mech to Mech combat.

We're about halfway there, but it's been two steps forwards and three steps back. TPV was a pretty hard hit here, but the game still needs to work on its overall feel. Mechanics like convergence have been thrown by the wayside, and Heat is all but a non-factor in real games.

• Role Warfare – The ability for player’s to customize their experience to suit their own style of gameplay.

Right now we have 2 roles - Jump Sniper and Scrap metal.

• Community Warfare – The ability to let the players take part in epic combat for territorial control.

This brings in the important immersive element of context. Without context, the huge gameplay flaws just gouge deeper into the psyche. Without context, there's little incentive to construct new maps or game modes to express the game's character, since we don't know how these modes and maps will play out in terms of Community Warfare because we don't have Community Warfare.

• Information Warfare – Bring a new element to the battlefield that incorporates information technology to help control the fight.

Remember ECM? I remember ECM. Information warface - complete?



*cough*

So yeah. We're mad. We founders shelled out 2 and a half years ago for a game we expected to at least be half-assed two years ago, and now we're going into year 3, and we don't even have a quarter of an ass. We're eighth-assed. That is frankly pathetic.

Edited by GreyGriffin, 10 May 2014 - 12:58 AM.

[Koniving]

xXBagheeraXx, on 09 May 2014 - 08:30 PM, said:

They could even go one step further and allow us to buy from different manufacturers, as in the lore many different manufacturers used different amount of shells in each shot their guns fired...some fired 12, some fired 2 or 3, some only fired one shell...each weapon cold have different quirks like muzzle velocity...different amounts of heat...you name it, it could be done. All kinds of diversity up in this {Dezgra}....

And the extra ac20 you were looking for was the Pontiac....I forget what number. Was used on the victor...LOL

Great read condensed to conserve space and reduce scroll.

Spoiler

Such was the idea. Between the laser variants and AC variants, Gauss Rifle variants, PPC variants, and even missile launcher variants could easily be possible to give the game a lot more flavor and it's all easy to balance, if PGI stuck with tabletop's "this much damage in this much time" easy one stop shop.

Spoiler

So, lets say we have single armor. And a typical Locust has 64 points of armor and 33 points of structure.

if an ML does 5 damage in 10 seconds, then maybe it shoots once every 2.5 seconds (including beam times) for 1.25 damage per shot. Keep in mind, many variations, some can fire very often for very little damage and some very rarely for a lot of damage. In the end it will always do 5 damage in 10 seconds, while generating 3 heat total in that time.

If an SRM does 2 damage per missile, what if it took 7 seconds to reload? Keep in mind that in lore SRMs are in fact guided. It'd still be one of the most devastating weapons there is.

If an LRM does 1 damage per missile, what if it took literally 10 seconds to be able to fire again?

Now, while autocannons have so many variations lets use the Hunchback's Tomodzuru 180mm 5 shot AC/20; each shot does 4 damage and it's one of the slowest burst fires in lore so it pumps out a shot each 0.75 seconds (0, 0.75, 1.5, 2.25, 3 seconds), with the next 7 seconds spent ejecting the magazine and loading in the next one. More examples below.

PPCs and Gauss Rifles are among the most dangerous weapons to exist. Variants are interesting concepts to work on. But for the most basic, if a PPC does 10 damage in 10 seconds, then it could simply be a single shot with a delayed fire 'build up' to charge it up. Say 0.5 seconds to 'charge up', the firing itself (WHOOSH! 10 damage; epic butchery considering a Centurion's arm would be 16 armor and 8 structure). And then after the 0.5 build up and the 0.3 seconds firing, 9.2 seconds are now spent letting the weapon cool. After all if you just fired two of them you're at 66.67% heat. If you fired 3 that's an instant shutdown. Now firing an ER PPCs would instantly bring you to 50% heat from 0, which with I proved with the Masakari is easy to handle and fire 4 within a 10 second period with 20 DHS without hitting the 30 threshold. Just fired one at a time with 2 to 3 seconds in between. No big deal considering they take forever to recharge anyway you wouldn't want to throw them all in one basket.

A 20 DHS mech with 3 PPCs, if it could fire twice in a 10 second period, could get out 6 shots and shutdown. However, they will only be firing once in a 10 second period for some versions, and others might have it split. The point is, unlike MWO where you could fire 12 and still not shut down with the same loadout, here it's under control.

Gauss Rifles have their violatile nature and the MWO charge up isn't so bad. Having true to size Gauss Rifles (i.e. 7 meter long barrels; in other words on the Jagermech, the Gauss Rifle could be used to scratch its knee) would also give them that additional weakness for the fact that these weapons do not generate heat. The Hollander's Gauss Rifle barrel is literally its size, and if I'm not mistaken crunched up like it normally is, the Hollander is a 35 ton mech that's between 8 and 9 meters, but with its legs extended is something like 12 meters. The barrel is longer than the mech's torso, and almost every mech with a Gauss rifle is depicted with a huge barrel.

After all of that, that Locust? He's gonna live a long, long time against one or two of any ot those weapons except the PPCs or Gauss Rifles. Missiles might be kinda devastating too. But lasers and ACs, except high caliber AC/20s, it's got a chance. And those others? Easy to dodge.

So variant examples: The AC/2. It was mentioned before but worth mentioning again: in lore Autocannons were not upfront damage but damage over time weapons whose immense tonnage was the cost of heat neutrality. It is only once you reach the 10 and 20 rated autocannons that you begin to push the boundaries of heat neutrality, but even the large laser at its 5 tons and 8 heat only does 8 damage. PPCs at 10 heat and 7 tons deal 10 but in a single blow. Pulse lasers are rapid firing lasers, and LPLs generate 10 heat (over a firing cycle of several shots) and dish out 9 damage (inner sphere) for 7 tons.
So PPCs = instant damage. Lasers, fast damage, slow recharge rate, very hot. Pulse lasers fire many times (for smaller increments of damage per shot), faster recharge, very hot. And finally autocannons, fire a lot more than just about anything else (except MGs), spread damage awfully, suffers recoil, heavier than heck, but manage to barely heat up your mech and up to 4 AC/2s or AC/5s could be fired eternally with 10 SHS in ideal environmental conditions. Limited ammunition and heavy weight keeps that in check.

Spoiler

AC/2s. In lore they range from 30 to 80mm.
Whirlwind/L 30mm AC/2, and a nameless (because I can't recall it) 40mm AC/2.
Now lets say Whirlwind/L is an auto-fire, belt-fed system that requires 10 shots down range to produce 2 damage.
Lets say the 40mm AC/2 (we'll call it The Bag) is a burst fire type that requires 8 shots down range to produce 2 damage.
And lets say that an 80mm AC/2 (we'll call it The Kon) is a 5 shot count to hit the 2 damage range, it is a much slower auto-fire system.

Now lets compare.
Whirlwind/L is a 10 shot AC/2 that deals 0.2 damage per shot. Its an auto-fire belt-fed, but it is still a cannon of sorts. It takes 1 second per shot to eject the previous shot and load the next round. Firing at 0, and restarting its cycle anew at 10, it fires 10 shots to get 2 damage. You can start and stop firing at any time. (Blinding Force). The recoil isn't much to speak of due to the spacings of the shots. Since the AC/2 generates 1 heat per firing cycle, it is generating 0.1 heat per shot (1 heat in 10 shots for 2 damage).
At 45 ratings per ton of ammunition, you had 450 bullets per ton.

Remember that in lore, a Jagermech, Blackjack -- and anything with only ACs -- could fire up to 4 AC/2s or AC/5s with 10 SHS and never overheat. You're not trading all that tonnage for firepower; that's what PPCs and their insane heat is for. You're trading it for heat neutrality; for weapons to fire when you're too hot to do anything else; and if you lingered at 60% heat That ammo was gonna go boom.

Now, The Bag is an actual AC/2 with actual stats and a made up name since I can't recall it. It fires 8 shots, at 0.25 damage per shot. It is a burst fire weapon. In this case, burst fire does not stop firing until the entire magazine is emptied. Once it begins lets say it pumps out a shot every 0.4 seconds. (Firing: 0, 0.4, 0.8, 1.2, 2.0, 2.8, 3.6, begin ejecting magazine and loading a new one. At 10 seconds since you pulled the trigger, a green light will appear letting you know it is ready to fire again). It is 45 ratings per ton of ammo for AC/2s, 1 magazine = 1 rating. 45 magazines of 8 shots each (360 individual bullets; but 45 trigger pulls). It generates heat at 1 / 8 = 0.125 heat per shot.

Now, clearly The Bag is a very hit-and-run friendly weapon system. But you can't stop firing once it starts. So if you mis-fire, you just blew an entire magazine and have to wait until it ejects and reloads, which takes (10 second period - 3.6 seconds to finish firing the burst = 6.4 seconds to reload). That's 6.4 seconds after you fired the AC/2 that you cannot use it. This is a very fast way to get the full 2 damage onto the target. But the burst, due to the firing rate, makes it incredibly inaccurate and hard to control. This, btw, is a 40mm. (Fun fact: 360 bullets, 4 pounds each, is 1,440 pounds: plus 45 magazines and a storage case that a loading mechanism can easily funnel it is pretty close to 1 short-ton).

The Kon is the made up name for our true to lore but can't recall the name at 3:25 AM 80mm slow auto fire AC/2. It's got the biggest shot, requiring only 4. That means 0.5 damage per shot; it's nasty compared to the two variants above. You can start and stop firing just like MWO's current AC/2. Its rate, however, is every 2.5 seconds. (Firing 0, 2.5, 5, 7.5, new cycle begins at 10). It's generating heat at 1/4 so 0.25 heat per shot, you might notice this one spiking a tiny bit. However AC/2s were never known for being that good against mechs. It has 45 ratings per ton of ammo like all AC/2s, and 4 shots per rating gives it 180 shots per ton.

Now, lets compare the same size AC/5s.

Spoiler

We skip the Whirlwind/L because the minimum size for an AC/5 is 40mm from what I've found.

A 40mm AC/5 and we're just using a quick example here: Does 0.25 damage per shot, fires 20 to reach 5 damage in a 10 second period, lets say its automatic for simplicity, it fires once every 0.5 seconds and heats up at 1/20 = 0.05 heat/sec. More tonnage lost for even better heat neutrality. all AC/5s have 20 ratings per ton of ammo, so this has 20 shots per rating * 20 ratings per ton = 400 shots per ton. And remember, we're automatic and so instead of 45 individual magazines of 8, it's one big belt/chain of ammo feeding from a very large drum. (If we use the 4 pound bullet from the video, it's 1,600 for all 400 bullets meaning the drum and chain together must weigh the remaining 400 pounds).

The increased shot count and speed of the shots create some nasty pull (recoil) which limits the effective range for a tight grouping at full fire to 540meters (TT's long). You could fire much farther but not at full rate of fire. Of course, the true optimum range is 180 meters (TT's Short) for perfect pinpoint at full fire.

So what about the 80mm? Here we have an automatic and a burst fire. Imperator-A (Price of Glory) or Armstrong J11 (Thunder Ridge). I can't recall which is which but I think the Imperator is the automatic.
Recall that our made-up-name AC/2 The Kon is 0.5 per bullet. It still is here. It takes (5 damage / 0.5 damage per shot) 10 shots to deal 5 damage. So the automatic fires 1 shot every second, generating 0.1 heat every second. It can start and stop at any time. Since all AC/5s have 20 ratings per ton of ammo, it has 200 shots in a ton.

Now, the burst fire version of the 80mm AC/5 fires a burst of 10 shots, and lets say it can pump out a shot every 0.5 seconds for 4.5 seconds. (Firing: 0, 0.5, 1.0, 1.5, 2.0, 2.5, 3.0, 3.5, 4.0, 4.5; begin ejecting the magazine and loading a new one). Takes (10 - 4.5 = ) 5.5 seconds to reload the new mag. It's still 0.1 heat but it's generated every half second for (5 seconds including 0) to reach 1 heat.

As it happens there's an AC/10 at 80mm, the Mydron Model B and the Federated AC/10, which fire 20 shots to reach their "10" damage rating in 10 seconds.

The list goes on, and is incredibly easy to make. Now mind you an AC/10 has 10 ratings per ton. Automatic at 20 shots per rating is 200 shots. The burst fire would have 20 trigger pulls, but still 200 rounds. AC/10s generate 3 heat in a 10 second period, so either way it's 0.15 heat per shot but how fast that piles up depends on the type.

Some comparisons at the highest AC/5 caliber across 5, 10, and 20

Spoiler

Now AC/5s and AC/10s both go up to 120mm. AC/20s in the Inner Sphere go from 30mm (the 100 shot Pontiac 100 where 100 shots at 0.2 damage = 20 damage) to 185mm (the 4 shot Chemjet Gun).

AC/5's 120mm General Motors Whirlwind/5 (Wolves on the Border) is a 3 shot burst weapon. Each shot does 1.666666666666667 damage and if you times that by 3 you get "5" perfectly. Now compare, the King Crab's Deathgiver AC/20 (Storms of Fate) which is also 120mm. Lets assume it does the same damage per shot. So 20 damage divided by 1.666666666666667 damage per shot = 12 shots. And what do you know, it fits.

The difference in accurate/optimum ranges is caused by the recoil of the weapon and the rate of fire. The actual range would be much longer if the shots are very carefully aligned and heavy fire control is used. But such control at long range ultimately is time consuming for very little return, ensuring that you will instead 'favor' firing within their optimum ranges.

The recoil could even give a true purpose to the 'crouching' mechanism, as crouching could allow you better recoil resistance even though it locks you as stationary.

Meanwhile, different types of autocannon can provide different strategies and methods to use. Some require more time 'facing' the target to be effective. Others require a rapid exit strategy and some cover due to the substantially long reload times.

Was quite a few variants out there.
----------
The books, while not perfect, did most of the balancing for us. I've only filled in the blanks. PGI blames Tabletop for translating badly to real time, but it had nothing to do with tabletop. It was everything PGI changed.

Russ didn't like the "bullet" depictions of past mechwarrior games which had some bad graphical and economic limits of game development at the time for what those games could do without disadvantaging the players. Without those limitations, Russ wanted big tank rounds. So ACs were turned into single shot weapons when RIFLES, aka 'single shot cannons' were abandoned due to being obsolete and inferior in every way since a single shot's impact was not enough to cause genuine damage against a Battlemech. The Heavy Rifle at 190mm would do 9 damage, but against modern armor is cut back to 6 and takes a long time to manually reload. The 185mm Chemjet Gun AC/20 does 5 damage per shot for 4 shots in the same amount of time and does not require the mech to hold it in its hands.

Fun fact, at 120mm remember the 3 shot AC/5, which is a 6 shot AC/10, which is a 12 shot AC/20? Complete with book examples demonstrating that the shot counts are consistent as is the math behind the damages? This is a 120mm gun. Very educational video where manually reloaded from a person's width away took 4 seconds, here the ACs are reloading much faster (despite their slow simulator friendly nature). So, Russ could have had his "Tank rounds" Autocannons without having to upfront all the damage in single shots. Oh the powers of research.

So lets get back to what else PGI changed:
Increasing threshold per heatsink on top of cooling -- NOT canon. Pilot skill tree -- canon yet not; this was something that couldn't translate from TT without literally being the player's skill set. Weapon hardpoints? Not canon but a good idea to avoid abuse. Unlimited armor across all variants within a tonnage (i.e. if I have 20 tons I can equip up to this much armor) is a canon 'build your own mech' rule that should have been thrown out but was not; the fact that this is in the game is preventing all possibility of actual Role Warfare. If you limit part of a mech's building you must do it for every aspect or you create exploits. These exploits are what we call the meta mechs.

SRMs with no guidance? Not canon (SRMs do not have a 'to hit' roll in TT which is for all NON-GUIDED projectiles. Without that roll, it is defintiely guided). Artemis cannot enhance non-guided weapons (regardless of what that Sarna entry says). The books describe a few tracking systems for SRMs to include but not limited to Thermal (heat-seeking) and 'target profile' (in other words it goes after something roughly shaped like the target, assuming it can find it again). SRMs did not need to be locked, but were more effective with a target. SRMs attack NARC'd targets, hence the reason the Kintaro, Stalker 5M, and Raven 3-L all carry NARC with SRM launchers (the 5M has both SRMs and LRMs but would never use its LRMs within the NARC-range).

Remember that while SRMs are direct-fire (which just means fire at, while LRMs are Ballistic Launch, aka fired upward into the air and not directly at the target), they are still guided. What PGI gave us were short range "MRMs." MRMs are defined as "Dead Fire" aka No guidance, Dumb as Rocks where it specifically says "unlike SRMs and LRMs."

ECM makes you invisible? PFft, no. ECM is used to deny information about your status and identity but it cannot deny the fact that you exist and are detectable. You show up as a targetable anomaly. Basically a redsquare that says "UNKNOWN." LRMs can still hit you. Though a lock may be delayed. You can create 'ghost' unknown targets, too, to confuse the enemy. However, ECM required the 12 slot-consuming Stealth Armor to allow you to become invisible to sensors. Note that it has not yet been created. Which means NO INVISIBLE MECHS. o.o; Bad PGI!

So many things. So very many things. Though the forum's topic is more on the graphical side where the high end side of the game has been cut back and sliced up and cut back again and again and again and again in favor of being easy to run on low-end computers. I've never known a game to need to sacrifice high end settings to optimize low end settings before to be honest. I'm still waiting for the high end, but please... PGI stop lowering texture quality or at least keep high res versions of textures handy for those of us on very high settings? Or allow us to mod in our own as WoT's high-quality texture mods help enhance their game and players would more than happily enhance your textures for you.

---

Far as the TS, we don't have a public one. But ask me tomorrow in a message and I'll share Zhizhu's teamspeak.
(This took me 4 hours to write and dig up some of the research. )
And goodnight, going to bed.

Edited by Koniving, 10 May 2014 - 11:51 AM.

[Zerberus]

Iqfish, on 09 May 2014 - 11:05 AM, said:

No. No, really No.

Private Matches are good for making videos, for having some fun with your friends for a few evenings.
We had some awesome 1on1 duells or free for all matches in my unit, but we all went back to normal public matches.
The "vocal community", like ACES, SJR and the other "competetive" units are pumping the tournament stuff really much and making it look like the whole community is involved, but let me tell you that the majority of people in units are not taking part in them, not even being interested in them.

We have a lot of people (like 20-30) on hold, waiting for CW to come back and form an active company, another delay on CW would make this community even more toxic, would bring in lots and lots of negative press and would eventually kill this game, imo.

CW is what this game should be, an immersive simulation of a living galaxy, in which you fight for planets, fortify them and try to defend your property.

I agree with you when you are saying that they should fix things like HSR, Metagame and Clans (which will be OP/Too bad from day one, I bet on that).
ETA on CW is Fall this year and I don't think they dare to push it back again.

This.

"Forcing" people to play in organized units in teh 12 man queue, in community created leagues, is NOT comunity warfare.

With all due respect, it`s basically just elitist "My toys work fine now, so **** yours" BS. This is practically the same as disallowing semi-organized football play in parks "because we already have the NFL."

Not everybody wants to formally align themselves with other players and be further constrained by THEIR rules in addition to those of the game just to be able to play what BT /MWO always were. Also, not everybody CAN, becasue some people actually work for a living, and would be expelled from many units for putting their RL before MWO.

And where does this leave the Lone Wolves or smaller Merc corps? Should they all disband /assimilate or be forced to continue to play a glorified MOBA in your perfect "Private matches and community leagues work fine" world?

This is like disallowing Clan Wars in Quake or CS to anyone that is not registered with teh ESL.. an absolutely ridiculous proposotion that will tank ANY game faster than a nuke killing the dev team and obliterating the server farm.

IMO pushing back (much less forgoeing) actual CW in lieu of (often halfassed) community created leagues that many players couldn`t give a rat`s ass about is the best way to make sure the game factually dies in 2014. I`d be willing to write a list in blood of at least 50 people that I know would immediately stop playing for good if CW were to be called off completely.

We`re here for Battletech and our respective Clans and Houses, not an open world pseudo-Solaris simulator, and that`s why none of us have aligned ourselves with units yet. No CW, no customer, and no community league that offers us zero in the way of actual rewards (C-bills, XP, eventually loyalty perks) has the potential to change that. If we can`t earn c-bills for accomplishing missions /contracts, it`S not BT, and by direct correlation not a game we need to be associated with. We would simply play MW tactics and LL exclusively, albeit in a much more leisurely fashion.

Edited by Zerberus, 10 May 2014 - 02:35 AM.

[Demuder]

Koniving, on 09 May 2014 - 08:20 PM, said:

Spoiler

There is no fixing the core game. It's too late to fix the thresholds, PGI has no interest in doing so. There's no fixing anything else without first fixing that.


They never said anything about changing the weight of the weapons. Quite specifically they expressed they cannot do that.

Min range is due to the 12 Clan LRM-5 paradox, which is 12 LRM 5s slapped onto a mech, performing (across more missiles) slightly superior damage to streaks, faster streaks, and being able to do it within brawling range. Why use streaks when you can do that with LRMs?

Basically instead of intelligently increasing the recycle time to make it difficult to do, they went that route.

But I was talking about multi-shot ACs.

Demonstrated here.

Spoken about here.


Laser ideas.


Various other things, including the Gauss minimum range, CHARGE UP PPCs (PGI got that one totally backwards), King Crab, switchable ammo for LBs, threshold fixes, etc.


Also, ALL of that was for Inner Sphere to fix it.
But it's been thrown on the Clans.

It is simply heartbreaking to see how easily the combat system (which the basis of everything in the game) could be tuned close to perfection. The fact that PGI won't even acknowledge the excellent suggestions made by players over the years and instead prefer having the player base rip each other apart on endless forum battles over mechanics and metagaming is dumbfounding.

The one and only problem with the game is that PGI's goals and visions for MWO change every now and then. They started with the Four Pillars, continued to creating a combat system with convoluted mechanics, proceeded with a 3/3/3/3 matchmaking system and are now focused on their new revelation, turning MWO into a e-sports game.

I don't know if all that was imposed on PGI by their corporate overlords, what I am sure of, is that a multiplayer online game, be it an MMO or just an online deathmatch matchmaker, needs a clear vision and goals. Development on these kinds of games take years (well, by PGI's glacial pace, decades). If the final goal keeps changing, from CW to New Mechs to Balancing (aka Ghost Heat) to New Mechs to UI.2 to New Mechs to Private Matches to .... Nothing gets done in time or to completion simply because nobody would even know what "done" means anymore.

[Joseph Mallan]

Dymlos2003, on 09 May 2014 - 10:59 AM, said:

I think PGI should hold off on CW for now. I know all of you are booing at that idea but hear me out.

We have private matches already, which is where the TRUE community warfare will be played. Since teams now have the ability to set up leagues, tournaments, and such; I feel the PGI should work on the things we have now I.E UI2.0, Immersion, balance, graphics, sounds, mechs, maps ect ect. They need to focus on MECHWARRIOR instead of the mainstream masses that keep screaming for MORE! CW can wait.

Get the game optimized and then roll out with the CW with some Solaris thrown in. That should be their priorities I feel.

[Mystere]

GreyGriffin, on 10 May 2014 - 12:54 AM, said:

The premise of this thread is patently ridiculous. We've got 0.5 out of the promised 4 pillars of gameplay, and suddenly private lobbies enabling us to fabricate a faint facsimile of one of them makes it okay?

Well, the most elite of the elite league players ( ) apparently already have their game so they don't care about anything, or anybody, else.

[Mystere]

Nikolai Lubkiewicz, on 09 May 2014 - 04:24 PM, said:

I see merit in both sides of the arguments, and certainly either side will make a host of players happy at the expense of another.

So, with that in mind, our approach has been to try to balance both sides, Dealing out optimizations while also building upon game features. Those who are keen might notice our patch deliveries tend to follow this very two-punch pattern.

Nick, with all due respect, I think an unequivocal (re)statement of PGI's vision for MWO is in order.

[Davers]

"Balance the game"? Haven't you guys been listening to the podcasts? PGI thinks the game IS balanced.