147 replies to this topic

[Kyle Polulak]

Salutations!

Please let us know your thoughts on the latest news from Paul on Jump Jets!
http://mwomercs.com/...-jet-heat-ramp/

Paul Inouye, on 06 June 2014 - 10:24 AM, said:

Jump Jet Heat

Jump Jet heat is currently not being applied properly to the jumping 'Mech. We are re-implementing the system to make each individual Jump Jet generate linear heat the longer it is used.

Each Jump Jet class will have its own heat rating which will be used to determine how much heat is generated. Class V (smallest) Jump Jets will generate the least heat over time while Class I (largest) will generate the most. The graph below shows an example of how this would be ramped.



If we set the heat rating to a Class V Jump Jet (the kind put on a Spider for example) to 0.1, each Jump Jet mounted on the Spider would generate 0.1 heat per second while it is being used. If there are 8 Jump Jets on the Spider, then Jump Jets would be adding 0.8 heat per second to the 'Mech while Jump Jets are burning. Again, the heat gains will be linear for each of the Jump Jet classes.

While we appreciate that table-top rules are somewhat different, implementing them as according to turn-based system would severely affect smaller 'Mechs in our real-time game environment.

NOTE: All numbers above are for example purposes only. Actual production numbers will be shared in the patch notes when the fix has been implemented.

[StillRadioactive]

More good news. You guys are 3-for-3 so far.

[Jin Ma]

Brilliant!

JJ heat will impact firing mechs more than mechs traveling over terrain.

Retaining its mobility function, while slightly reducing the effectiveness of jump sniping/offensive use of jump jets.

Edited by Jin Ma, 06 June 2014 - 05:09 PM.

[MonkeyCheese]

Perfectly happy with this idea. Now to just wait and see the real numbers.

[Deathlike]

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

Why does this sound a tad backwards?

[p8ragon]

I like this full on warfare against poptarting!

[FETTY WAP]

Yesss. Saw this suggested a few weeks ago (I think.) Thank you.

[StillRadioactive]

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?

Because it's not aimed at people who use JJs for maneuvering, you dolt. The fall damage ensures that they have to bring more jumpjets to avoid wrenching their own legs off. The heat penalty for that increased number of jets ensures that they have to reduce their fire rate.

Seriously though, is there anything you WON'T complain about?

[Cimarb]

I still think they should work like a flamer, generating heat incrementally based upon length of time held, with the number of jump jets affecting acceleration/height, not heat.

[Glaive-]

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?

Agreed. I hope they do another pass on jumpjet thrust values.
It should be a trade off between less heat and greater jump height when deciding how many JJs to mount.

[Cimarb]

Jin Ma, on 06 June 2014 - 05:08 PM, said:

JJ heat will impact firing mechs more than mechs traveling over terrain.

Retaining its mobility function, while slightly reducing the effectiveness of jump sniping/offensive use of jump jets.

What do you mean it will impact firing mechs more than non-firing? It has nothing to do with whether they are firing or not.

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?

It does, which is disappointing.

StillRadioactive, on 06 June 2014 - 05:15 PM, said:

Because it's not aimed at people who use JJs for maneuvering, you dolt. The fall damage ensures that they have to bring more jumpjets to avoid wrenching their own legs off. The heat penalty for that increased number of jets ensures that they have to reduce their fire rate.

Seriously though, is there anything you WON'T complain about?

Name calling is unneeded.

He brings up a valid point, which you fail to see because you are too busy trying to insult him.

Penalizing players for bringing MORE jump jets, which this system does, 'reinforces' the habit of using less jump jets, exactly as Deathlike stated. The jump jet post says nothing about a change to the current issue of a single jump jet giving just as much boost as a full set, though I do hope you are right on that point.

[Jman5]

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.

Quote

f we set the heat rating to a Class V Jump Jet (the kind put on a Spider for example) to 0.1, each Jump Jet mounted on the Spider would generate 0.1 heat per second while it is being used. If there are 8 Jump Jets on the Spider, then Jump Jets would be adding 0.8 heat per second to the 'Mech while Jump Jets are burning.

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.

[Jin Ma]

Cimarb, on 06 June 2014 - 05:26 PM, said:

What do you mean it will impact firing mechs more than non-firing? It has nothing to do with whether they are firing or not.

Because if they are firing, they are generating heat. And if they are Firing(heat) + Jump Jetting(heat) they create more heat than with our current system. Firing(heat) + Jump Jetting(no heat). The added heat to an already hot Jump Jetting mech near max heat usage, will increase likelyhood of overheating the jump jetting + firing mech.

While mechs using JJ to travel don't care about the added heat, because it will never be enough to cause them to overheat. Jump jetting alone will never cause near overheating levels if the mech is only traveling.

Like how ambient heat only affects your mech when you are firing the weapons, if you are juts walking around it doesn't really matter, because simply walking will never cause you to overheat.

I don't know how else to explain this

Edited by Jin Ma, 06 June 2014 - 05:34 PM.

[Deathlike]

StillRadioactive, on 06 June 2014 - 05:15 PM, said:

Because it's not aimed at people who use JJs for maneuvering, you dolt. The fall damage ensures that they have to bring more jumpjets to avoid wrenching their own legs off. The heat penalty for that increased number of jets ensures that they have to reduce their fire rate.

Seriously though, is there anything you WON'T complain about?

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.

[Tezcatli]

I am very curious to see how much of a difference this will make. Especially for lights. Chasing JJ equipped lights in a Commando on Canyon map is pretty much a futile. If I chase them into a canyon. They just fly right back out. And I have to find a path I can take back up. The small amount of tonnage I get out of not having JJs isn't much consolation.

[East Indy]

Guys, the problem all along is that players get most of the benefits from jets with minimum weight investment.

Penalizing multiple jets doesn't help this. In fact, it works against the recent thrust change. Works against. Works against.

This is one change away from being good or bad design. Remove the jet number multiplier. Make it good design.

[Deathlike]

Cimarb, on 06 June 2014 - 05:18 PM, said:

I still think they should work like a flamer, generating heat incrementally based upon length of time held, with the number of jump jets affecting acceleration/height, not heat.

That doesn't sound unreasonable.

armyunit, on 06 June 2014 - 05:21 PM, said:

Agreed. I hope they do another pass on jumpjet thrust values.
It should be a trade off between less heat and greater jump height when deciding how many JJs to mount.

IIRC, JJs currently use "scalar values" (aka it's linear).

What they should be is exponential.

Ever wonder why 1 JJ gives essentially "fixed" height increases in the mechlab? That's not good.

Instead of +5m for each JJ, it would be like 3 for JJ #1, then 9 or 10 for JJ #2, and 18-19 for JJ #3, etc.
You can change the lift based on weight or whatever that makes sense.

It would work better really.

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.

2 JJs is enough for most, but I already run 4 JJs on a Victor as it is, so I dunno what to tell you. JJ lift should be exponentially better with more JJs, not linearlly better which is what it happens to be right now.

[ManDaisy]

Jump Jet heat should honestly be exponential like flamer heat. Long burst = Great Heat, Big Air. Short Burst = Small heat, not great air.

You have a light spider with 8 jump jets who likes to skit around fine (think moon lander), not that much heat penalty. You have a spider who wants to go to infinity and beyond, expect ( space shuttle launch rocket) type launch heat.

Edited by ManDaisy, 06 June 2014 - 05:54 PM.

[MuonNeutrino]

The thing people are missing about the 'more jets = more heat' thing is that more jets ALSO means more thrust. A mech with more jets will not have to burn them as long to get to a given height, which will somewhat mitigate the extra heat. For a hypothetical example, imagine 4 jets generates 2 heat per second and one generates 0.5 heat per second, but 4 jets only has to burn for 3 seconds to get to a certain ledge while 1 jet has to burn for 6. In that case, even though 4 jets are generating 4 times as much heat per second, the total heat generated by the 4 jets is only twice that generated by the 1 jet since they only have to burn for half the time. It doesn't completely mitigate the stacking heat, but it reduces it some.

Also, remember, with the fall damage changes poptarts are really going to be wanting to equip more than one jet. One jet might minimize the heat gained, but that victor with only one jet is going to be pretty sad when his legs start falling off after a few hops because he never has any fuel left to cushion the landing.

I do think, though, that the first jet ought to generate more heat than the subsequent ones, simply because the first jet also generates more thrust than the subsequent ones. More jets would still equal more heat, but not by as huge of an amount, which would somewhat soften this penalty.

Edited by MuonNeutrino, 06 June 2014 - 06:02 PM.

[Kageru Ikazuchi]

The only concern I have is this ... please make sure the scales hit the targets (CTF and VTR) the hardest ... with the earlier mobility and JJ adjustments, the HGN got hit the hardest with the nerf bat.

While I know some pilots who can still do amazing things with a HGN, they're not nearly as scary as they used to be (and should be).


Edit: Oh, and I'm loving the short and sweet CC posts ... what else are you guys working on?

Edited by Kageru Ikazuchi, 06 June 2014 - 06:02 PM.