147 replies to this topic

[Appogee]

Seems a sensible idea. On the basis of prior experience, I'll reserve my excitement until it's actually implemented.

[Gorgo7]

I run a Wolverine with seven JJ.
I find the maneuverability it provides me with to be excellent! I do not always use all the fuel when jumping because so much thrust is provided. However, on Canyon for example there is nothing except a few cliff faces that lead off board that I cannot get up IN A HURRY.
I mention this because people who are upset with Pop tarting are missing the point of JJ's and their true power. Some have said that the heat penalty is worthless because it doesn't affect pop tarts enough.
The fact is that massive jump jets allow you to engage and disengage at will, flank, counter flank in difficult terrain, recover from poor judgement when maneuvering and assault like lightning when the opportunity presents itself.
I don't run non jumping mediums any more. They are simply not competitive. Not because of pop tarting. But because of the freedom that maneuvering provides a pilot with.
This new heat system may well help balance between jumpers and non-jumpers that has been lacking ever since the appearance of the "Big 55's" those of you who pilot the 55's know exactly what I am talking about.

Think on that.

[ATao]

Cimarb, on 08 June 2014 - 12:23 PM, said:

It's because they use different metrics to determine JJ class as weight class. Weight is four classes, while JJs have five classes. This causes mechs at the low end of the weight class to fall into the high end of the JJ class.

It doesn't matter in terms of "classes". Both light and medium mechs use 0.5 tonn JJs even 55 tonns shadowhawk uses them. All heavies starting from lightest like quickdraw utilize 1 tonn JJs. We have only 2 jumping assaults: HGN and VTR. And while HGN JJs weight 2 tonns, VTR ones weight 1 tonn. Seriously, what's the justification?

I'd say adding weight to VTR's JJs along with this heat thing is a good way to bring this mech in line with other assaults.

[Cimarb]

Alexander Malthus, on 08 June 2014 - 02:19 PM, said:

It doesn't matter in terms of "classes". Both light and medium mechs use 0.5 tonn JJs even 55 tonns shadowhawk uses them. All heavies starting from lightest like quickdraw utilize 1 tonn JJs. We have only 2 jumping assaults: HGN and VTR. And while HGN JJs weight 2 tonns, VTR ones weight 1 tonn. Seriously, what's the justification?

I'd say adding weight to VTR's JJs along with this heat thing is a good way to bring this mech in line with other assaults.

It looks like every 10-15 tons is a new JJ class in MWO, whereas weight classes are every 20 tons. That causes the issue you are talking about where the VTR and HGN are the same weight class, but have different JJ weights.

20-35 tons use Class V (0.5 tons) - light
40-55 use Class IV (0.5 tons) - medium
60-70 use Class III (1 ton) - heavy
75-85 use Class II (1 ton) - assault
90+ use Class I (2 tons) - assault

That weight breakdown is exactly the same as the TT rules (p 118), which goes as follows:
20-55 - 0.5 ton
60-85 - 1.0 ton
90+ - 2.0 tons

Those tonnages have to be in place to prevent stock builds from breaking.

[N0MAD]

Again complicated solutions (2 in this case JJ heat/Fall damage) to address symptoms (Jump sniping/Jump brawling).
All this to address what can be achieved by simply making JJs dependent on a fixed (exhaustible) fuel source.

[PhoenixFire55]

Heat on JJs is good, it will finally be as it should be.

However, in BT stock configs most lights do have at least 6-8 JJs on them. In MWO you hardly ever see lights with more than 1. Heavies and assaults were forced to use 3-4 JJs to retain their agility, mediums and lights not so much. It is clear that it was just another anti-poptart crutch, however disbalance is growing.

Make it necessary for ALL mechs to invest into multiple JJs to be manouverable, otherwise you'll have what you already have - non-JJ-capable mechs are pretty much not used unless it is some sort of specific build (like AC40 Jager etc.). How many ShadowHawks you saw during "official" tourney? Now how many Kintaros, Centurions and such?

[ATao]

Cimarb, on 08 June 2014 - 04:27 PM, said:

It looks like every 10-15 tons is a new JJ class in MWO, whereas weight classes are every 20 tons. That causes the issue you are talking about where the VTR and HGN are the same weight class, but have different JJ weights.

20-35 tons use Class V (0.5 tons) - light
40-55 use Class IV (0.5 tons) - medium
60-70 use Class III (1 ton) - heavy
75-85 use Class II (1 ton) - assault
90+ use Class I (2 tons) - assault

That weight breakdown is exactly the same as the TT rules (p 118), which goes as follows:
20-55 - 0.5 ton
60-85 - 1.0 ton
90+ - 2.0 tons

Those tonnages have to be in place to prevent stock builds from breaking.

PGI deviated from TT rules more than enough already. It's not BT anymore after you look at what they did to clan mechs and weapons. What's the difference here then ? It's not a problem to tweak stock builds to compensate for JJs tonnage. It's not a problem to tweak JJs classes and set them like lights&meds=0,5, heavies=1, assaults=2.

Right now VTR is one of the best assaults because of it's jumping capabilities and hardpoint layout. HGN was on par right before JJs agility was nerfed. After the nerf it barely jumps and you can't fit alot of JJs as they are 2 tonns each. Yet VTR is all the same. That's why I'm saying that in addition to jump heat VTR JJs should be balanced as well.

[PhoenixFire55]

Jonathan Paine, on 06 June 2014 - 09:21 PM, said:

One slight problem: Highlanders. Heaviest jump jets compared to mech weight, worst lift, worst heat and worst falling damage.
Oh well, I luv my atlas!

And even armed with 4 JJs the HGL is so often fails to climb even the slightest terrain obstacles. Totally don't see an issue here with breaking your legs and overheating from just movement. Like, totally.

Jakob Knight, on 06 June 2014 - 09:10 PM, said:

According to the table-top rules, the farther and higher a battlemech jumped, the more heat it generated. Why you think Light Mechs should not be penalized for having the longer and higher jump abilities over other battlemechs seems odd. Why should a light mech pilot -not- have to balance their jump jet use against the heat generated by heavy use of this system, when other units do?

Ever since I saw a stationary Jenner take two AC/20 hits from another stationary firing unit at close range directly to its rear torsos and only take yellow armor damage, I've long suspected a bias towards bending the rules for light mechs, and this smacks of the same. If a light mech is not engaging in combat while using their jump jets overmuch, then there wouldn't be a problem with heat, would there? Yet, apparently, the same issue that is attempting to make heavier units not use their jump jets in combat is something light mechs are intended to get a pass on?

Quit making special cases for light mechs, and just let every unit be treated fairly under the rules. Heavier units already have to pay more tonnage for their jump jets, -and- cannot jump as far. Why must they now also take -more- heat simply because they are not lighter units?

Light mechs already have the advantages of speed, damage reduction, and small size. They do not need, nor should have, any other 'special rules' simply because they are Light mechs. Let light mechs be -light- units.

QFT. Lights and mediums.

[Cimarb]

Alexander Malthus, on 08 June 2014 - 11:57 PM, said:

PGI deviated from TT rules more than enough already. It's not BT anymore after you look at what they did to clan mechs and weapons. What's the difference here then ? It's not a problem to tweak stock builds to compensate for JJs tonnage. It's not a problem to tweak JJs classes and set them like lights&meds=0,5, heavies=1, assaults=2.

Right now VTR is one of the best assaults because of it's jumping capabilities and hardpoint layout. HGN was on par right before JJs agility was nerfed. After the nerf it barely jumps and you can't fit alot of JJs as they are 2 tonns each. Yet VTR is all the same. That's why I'm saying that in addition to jump heat VTR JJs should be balanced as well.

PGI have not deviated from any rules that determine builds, such as tonnage or critical slot space. The only thing they have changed are balance-related, such as beam duration, projectile speed, etc.

I hope they balance Victors as well, but doing so through tonnage changes is less than optimal in many ways. Not only would it break stock builds, but it would not even solve the issue. There are much better ways, like compounding heat (like a flamer) and the number of jets compounding thrust (instead of getting most of the trust from the first one, like it is now).

[D1G17AL]

Deathlike, on 06 June 2014 - 05:31 PM, said:

I wasn't discussing fall damage. I was explicitly talking heat.

One of the things that people did not like prior to the Victor+Highlander JJ nerfs was that it only took ONE JJ, to fulfill the role, limiting the purpose of requiring more than 1 JJ for poptarting. So, if you "wanted more" out of JJs, you had to take more. That seemed reasonable.

If heat is scaled in a way to ACTUALLY penalize using multiple JJs, then it makes more sense to take just ONE JJ instead. The point of JJs is to get lift, so the normal proper way to commit to that is more tonnage+crits for JJs. If heat generated from multiple JJs makes something like the Victor-9K or Heavy Metal less suitable for putting in JJs, then you've defeated the purpose of "giving it more JJ power".

I get the feeling that "in order" to balance it, 1 JJ would unfortunately have a "high overhead" with more JJs progressively giving less additional heat. If the heat generated is in an exponential curve instead of a reasonable logarithmic curve, then there will be problems.

You are assuming that one jump jet is all you need... They did fix jump jets so that the thrust scaled with the number of jets you have. So go ahead and use just 1 or 2 jump jets, you aren't going to get the full potential thrust out of your mech.

[TygerLily]

Deathlike, on 06 June 2014 - 05:09 PM, said:

I'm starting to think this suggestion technically "reinforces" having 1 JJ instead of 3-4.

Why does this sound a tad backwards?

Jman5, on 06 June 2014 - 05:28 PM, said:

I like the idea of the jump jet mechs having that heat penalty for using their jj. It gives them some downside and can add an extra tax to people who are hitting that jump jet over and over. However I have some concerns.



I do not like the idea of more jump jets adding more heat per second. You already have a situation where people are skimping on JJ to save tons/slots. Why in the world would anyone invest all that extra weight/slot space to make their mech run even hotter (forcing them to invest even more tonnage in heatsinks potentially).

For most builds one, maybe 2 JJ is all you need.

What this change would do is make one Jumpjet, maybe 2, mandatory on all but the coolest builds because there isn't enough reason to bring more JJ. What do extra jump jets provide anyway? Longer burn time? You don't really need to be flying around 24/7. Just burst here and there. Jump snipers in particular have very little reason to bring more than 1 or 2 JJ. This is particularly true for non-highlander jump snipers that still have very quick initial thrust. Perhaps if initial thrust was toned down across the board this would be more meaningful.

Yea, it will be more reason NOT to bring more than 1 or 2...but to be honest, does that matter? Even now, without a heat ramp, generally no one brings more than 2. What I think needs to happen WITH the heat ramp is for Mechs to need 3 or 5 JJ to reach current levels of height. Same for Lights (loving Lights, myself, I know those are fightin' words...but it would make more sense).

While I agree this change will reinforces "take less JJ", it seems backwards to say MORE JJ's means less heat? It seems intuitive that more JJ equals more heat...so IMO the problem lies in the capability that so few JJ provide.

[Gas Guzzler]

If HGNs are going to create uber heat from their 2-ton jump jets when you really need 3 JJs (6 tons!) to get out of a bad situation, I think their thrust values should be given a SLIGHT buff. 2 Jump Jets on a Highlander weigh 4 tons and are MUCH less effective then 2 JJs on a Victor or Phract 3D. I'm not even talking about jump sniping, just basic maneuvering is laughably slow with 2 Jump Jets. Even 3 is meh (it is workable though, I will admit), you really need 4 to get a good boost, and only the 733C and Heavy Metal can bring that many.

My 2 cents, flame on.

[p4r4g0n]

TygerLily, on 09 June 2014 - 09:55 AM, said:

-snip-
While I agree this change will reinforces "take less JJ", it seems backwards to say MORE JJ's means less heat? It seems intuitive that more JJ equals more heat...so IMO the problem lies in the capability that so few JJ provide.

More JJ's produce less heat IF the multiple JJ's allows you attain the same height in much less time compared to a single JJ e.g. if the additional thrust produced was exponential for each additional JJ while the heat build was linear / sec of use.

[TygerLily]

p4r4g0n, on 09 June 2014 - 05:09 PM, said:

More JJ's produce less heat IF the multiple JJ's allows you attain the same height in much less time compared to a single JJ e.g. if the additional thrust produced was exponential for each additional JJ while the heat build was linear / sec of use.

Ah, yea...that makes sense. So long as a single JJ offers the same distance as max JJ's.

[p4r4g0n]

TygerLily, on 09 June 2014 - 08:21 PM, said:

Ah, yea...that makes sense. So long as a single JJ offers the same distance as max JJ's.

Giving a single JJ the same max height as multiple JJ's would render any attempt to encourage use of multiple JJ's moot unless the duration required for a single JJ to attain the same max height is sufficiently long that the heat generated becomes prohibitively high. Alternatively, the rate of climb will have to be prohibitively low thereby significantly increasing duration in the air. Without either or both of these disadvantages, there really is no reason to sacrifice slots and tonnage for multiple JJ's.

With the introduction of JJ heat, the balance that needs to be struck to make the use of multiple JJ's meaningful would only appear to be possible through the reduction of the impact of JJ heat with additional numbers of JJ's used (to attain the same height) since slot and tonnage cost of JJ's are unlikely to be significantly altered. This will require a somewhat complex calculation to derive the optimum numbers for thrust per JJ / number of JJ's / max height per JJ / heat per sec per JJ in order to achieve an optimum result.

Having said all that, the other possible simpler method of achieving the same end is to reduce the max height attainable by a single JJ to a very small amount and to exponentially increase the max height for each additional JJ so that at least 2-3 JJ's are required to attain any useful height.

Of the two, I prefer the former method as the latter basically means using a single JJ is not viable for anything.

Edited by p4r4g0n, 10 June 2014 - 01:02 AM.

[Karl Streiger]

Great system . really awesome -

so in other words - the 5 JJs on my Highlander will fail to climb a wall or hill or ramp or what ever in adequate time - so it will fall to the ground and get damage - and next to that i will overheat - that even if i made it some how to climb that wall and land for the perfect shot in the rear of my target - i will shut down - when i fire my ACs Laser and SRMs?

Great - simple perfect - you really have to add that a Mech that takes damage after a fall - has a increasing chance to fall to the ground for even more damage - the more weight the better the chance to eat dirt..... great oppositional balancing - I'm impressed

You can balance things by weight and heat - so if you have 2ton of equipment that produces much more heat it should be logical that it has to much worser as a 1ton equipment with fewer heat.

Edited by Karl Streiger, 10 June 2014 - 01:22 AM.

[TygerLily]

p4r4g0n, on 10 June 2014 - 12:58 AM, said:

Giving a single JJ the same max height as multiple JJ's would render any attempt to encourage use of multiple JJ's moot ...

p4r4g0n, on 09 June 2014 - 05:09 PM, said:

[It is logical if] More JJ's produce less heat IF the multiple JJ's allows you attain the same height in much less time compared to a single JJ...

I think maybe I am just confused by your stance. I think we're saying that: Less JJ's creating more heat makes sense if it's due to longer "burn time" to achieve your height therefore making more heat. That logic speaks only to burn time and not distance. If you add more distance to more JJ's, even at a faster rate, it will take more "burn-time" to get there...then the heat levels approach similar amounts and makes that sort of change generally pointless (as the point was to create a disparity between few and many JJs).

It seems counter intuitive that greater speed and height has LESS penalty (other than a tonnage "penalty"). It would seem logical, that less JJ's produce less heat. More JJ's produce more heat. But to curb the outcome of emphasizing the need for only 1 or 2 JJ's, you would need to have jump height be the same and the number of JJ's only determine how long and how hot (not how far).

Basically, if jump distance were flat and determined by the chassis, then taking a single JJ vs taking many would be situational:
Dedicating more tonnage to JJ's would produce more heat than fewer JJ's but get you up very fast (good for poptarting).
Less JJ's produce less heat but get you there eventually ("eventually" is the opposite of "pop"...this would be good for brawler traversing or wanting low-heat maneuverability in a brawl)

Honestly, I think we are saying the similar things:

p4r4g0n, on 10 June 2014 - 12:58 AM, said:

Having said all that, the other possible simpler method of achieving the same end is to reduce the max height attainable by a single JJ to a very small amount and to exponentially increase the max height for each additional JJ so that at least 2-3 JJ's are required to attain any useful height.

Of the two, I prefer the former method as the latter basically means using a single JJ is not viable for anything.

TygerLily, on 09 June 2014 - 09:55 AM, said:

What I think needs to happen WITH the heat ramp is for Mechs to need 3 or 5 JJ to reach current levels of height.

...

so IMO the problem lies in the capability that so few JJ provide.

I think the point in taking 1 or 2 JJ "in the latter" would be for brawlers who want to "roll" damage to the legs and jump-turn in CQC...while a poptart should have to have max or max-minus-one JJ's to reach current levels of height. I think the recent turning nerf on them was uneeded and the slow-burn and height restrictions weren't severe enough.

Edited by TygerLily, 10 June 2014 - 05:13 AM.

[Wildflame]

I do hope that in conjunction with this change and the fall damage change, they make jump jet thrust (and therefore max height) scale supralinearly - such that one JJ is a maneuvering aid, two gives some reasonable lift, and 3-4-5+ lets a 'Mech really fly! After all, with heat generation and more aggressive fall damage, why not allow someone willing to suffer the consequences (more tonnage in JJs, heat generation while jetting, need to feather for a soft landing / take leg damage on fall) to get more three dimensional?

[p4r4g0n]

TygerLily, on 10 June 2014 - 05:02 AM, said:

-snip-

Basically, we do agree on some points and any confusion may be due to my lack of clarity on the issue. Essentially, my preferred rationale behind JJ heat should be that it is a penalty for minimizing the number of JJ's used rather than one for usage of increased number of JJ's.

Some number crunching would be required to validate and determine the appropriate values but in principle it does appear to be possible to achieve my preferred rationale for JJ heat through manipulation of values for thrust, max height, thrust duration, etc.

Admittedly, I could be completely wrong but a different approach to this seems warranted.

[Solis Obscuri]

I like it - this seems sensible, and adds an additional tactical layer to jump jet maneuvering.