23 replies to this topic

[RLBell]

Most people try to avoid inflicting friendly fire, but some mechs have more trouble with friendly fire than others.

I would like to offer up the worst offenders (in my opinion) for unintentional friendly fire: The Jester, the Catapult K2, and all Jagermechs.

It is not that their pilots are goofballs that press the fire button without looking at what is under their crosshairs, but that their arms are so far apart, that you can be in front of the weapon without being in front of the mech. If the pilot has zoomed in on a distant target, not only can you be in front of the weapon without being in front of the mech, you can be in front of the weapon AND at least partially outside the pilot's field of view.

If you crowd the these mechs, they may accidentally shoot you.

[Wrathful-Khan]

Or don't facehug enemies who are being focused down?

Personally, I get ***** by friendly fire when lights make a run through our team. Everyone just goes crazy shooting everywhere. Swear theres been times i've taken more damage from my own team than the enemy in these situations.

[RLBell]

Indiandream, on 10 June 2014 - 08:54 PM, said:

Personally, I get ***** by friendly fire when lights make a run through our team. Everyone just goes crazy shooting everywhere. Swear theres been times i've taken more damage from my own team than the enemy in these situations.

That is a different topic, but when I am confident that my bug squashing advice is useful, I will post it and it will give better options than sweeping lasers everywhere.

[Alaskan Nobody]

Atlas are also an offender at time - due to the difference between the view of the cockpit and the angle of the weapons.

And no - facehugging is not always the problem

[Phlinger]

Situational awareness is very important. Not just to the firer, but to those around him. We all know what it's like when you have someone lined up in your sights only to have a Centurion run right in front of you. Don't be that guy. Know where you are running to. If you run in front of another mech, know full well that there is a chance, he's going to accidentally sweep his lasers across your juicy and tender vittles.

You can't get mad at him for doing it, he's just trying to shoot the guy behind you. You became the problem in the equation, not out of choice most times, usually out of the need to get out of dodge before you got cored.

Know where you are standing at all times, know where those around you are standing. Listen for big stompy footsteps moving in close. And always, I mean always, have a safe plan of escape that doesn't involve running through your friendly Atlas' field of fire.

[xMintaka]

Sometimes in a light or medium you need to run across a fire lane, just to escape enemies. I do this a lot and if I ever get tk'd I apologise for taking 10k of that persons winnings.

The difference is when someone just waltzes in front of you and stops to shoot your target. Blocking you from firing. This happens frequently enough that I'm considering not holding fire. Stop in front of a mech that is firing and you're asking to get cored.

The solution is easy. Leave a mech-width between yourself and your allies.
Not only will you have less FF issues, you will have better firing angles and less risk from arty/air strikes.

But nope. The idea in most games seems to be "How many mechs can we fit into the approximate area of a Mini Cooper".

[SnagaDance]

Shar Wolf, on 10 June 2014 - 09:37 PM, said:

Atlas are also an offender at time - due to the difference between the view of the cockpit and the angle of the weapons.

Quite so. Just yesterday I fired a PPC in the rear of a friendly Cataphract while I thought I had ample room to shoot. Luckily he was ok (but minus 10 rear armour) and we both helped secure the win.

[Lily from animove]

Well the main Issue is, when you are zommed in and have arm laoded guns, you often do not even see when a teammate suddenly steps in the line of fire. Especially with lasers its an Issue. You fire on clean Line of Fore, 0,1secs later a wild teammate appears in your vision eating the 0,9s of laserfire.

And when hes moving in the worng direction you hardly can pull off the laser fast enough.

[Papapeshu]

Sooo many times in my triple UAC/5 cheese-Jager I've been hosing the other team from my turret on chain fire only for some delightful teammate to wander into my continuous stream of shells as if they're totally oblivious!

I'm seriously considering deploying signs around my mech for those times I turret

...in with the love, out with the jive... just breathe and release the trigger.... do not respond to the abuse...

[SilentScreamer]

RLBell, on 10 June 2014 - 08:50 PM, said:

Most people try to avoid inflicting friendly fire, but some mechs have more trouble with friendly fire than others.

I would like to offer up the worst offenders (in my opinion) for unintentional friendly fire: The Jester, the Catapult K2, and all Jagermechs.

As a Jagermech pilot I will add my two cents and say when I have taken a firing position and I am actively firing, an ally mechs will frequently cut 10 meters in front of me and block my line of fire. The worst offenders are light mechs with 2 LL. I have yet to core one out, but it will happen eventually. I will not shed any tears over them.

[Cord78]

This happened to me a few times last night. The difference being it is not a laser I am firing but dual guass. It takes time to charge and quite often I am timing the charge with the enemy peeking out from cover. Quite a few med mechs have eaten a guass round in the back or arm because they have the genius idea of jumping in front of allies for whatever reason. Is it eagerness? need to kill steal? who knows; but in the end if you feel you need to jump in front of any mech that is doing high damage (guass jaeger, KS or Assault mechs) and expect not to get shot in the back by your own team mate then to paraphrase a fellow crow... You went full ****** and then some.

[Macksheen]

Most of the friendly fire I see is people stepping in front of someone.

Or, someone mouse-clicking back into the game at launch.

[Zelumbras]

Sometimes it can't be helped that you scratch a fellow mech with friendly fire but in most situations it is or rather would be avoidable.

Avoid getting shot by friendly fire:
- don't get too close
- don't run right in front of them, especially while they are shooting
- don't try to steal a kill by blocking a fellow mechs killshot (most common and most despicable!)

Main reasons for friendly fire:
- being unaware of a mechs hardpoint locations (low arms on Cataphract, wide arms on Atlas/ Jaeger etc.)
- bad timed jump shot (often related to point 1)
- PPPCE [Premature PPC Ejacul., often right at the start of a match] (go see a doctor! also, i think you are leaking a bit coolant there -.-)
- lacking in situational awareness / always in max zoom / heat vision
- overestimating your fellow mechs situational awareness (see upper list)

In short: friendly fire isn't very friendly and often avoidable but if someone just runs in your obvious line of fire, its their own fault.

[Fiona Marshe]

When collisions are turned back on, that will mitigate some of these issues, as the spacing between mechs will be larger.

[Nothing Whatsoever]

There could also be elements outside of player control, such has having a desync between the clients and server that causes jumps/rubberbanding/teleports (or whatever is the proper phrasing for such happenings) that can cause incidental FF and so on.

[KamikazeRat]

This just happened to me, so ill throw it in here, TK'd a guy with 4 Streak SRM 2s in his back. Had a lock on a Jenner, circling it with a friendly Blackjack, Jenner ran right, Blackjack ran left, crossed paths after SSRMs were out of my control, blam. downed teammate. so....be careful with SSRMs in tight quarters, especially with the clans coming with larger packs of them flying.

[Macksheen]

Something is up recently. Maybe it's new payers, maybe it's just a growing meta-desire to jump in and get the kill.

I went months without a TK, and this week I had three. Several of my buddies also accidentally TK'd in PUGs too - people stepping in front of their sustained chain fire.

C'est la vie.

[JC Daxion]

I have killed a few people in my time with FF... two times i recall.. Once i blasted a Mech with SRM's from a distance.. was totally my fault.. it was when i first started before i realized you could do FF.. whoops..

another i was lining up a shot with my AC-20..and i clicked fire right as a spider came JJ'n in from behind me, landing directly in front of me. I popped him in one shot right in the direct center of his back from like 3m away. He had a good sense of humor about it and just laughed..

that said.. I have had my armor trashed by more people than i can count. People really do need to take more care about where they shoot over all i would say. But it is also on the other pilots to try not to get in the way of said fire. It does happen from time to time, it can't be avoided completely.


the one thing that bugs me most is when i have my target lined up right in front of me, and some faster mech decided to run right by me, then get in my way.. instead of taking a slightly longer route. this would let both of you fire at said enemy, and greatly decrease the chance of FF..

[JC Daxion]

Macksheen, on 11 June 2014 - 04:28 PM, said:

Or, someone mouse-clicking back into the game at launch.

I am guilty of this one a few times.. thankfully it has been only a couple times.. and now that they moved spawn points i have not had it happen in a long time..Clicking on the game Tab, verse the screen is a way to avoid it.. but sometimes you just simply forget out of habit.

[Skiddlywibble]

Yeah, I've blasted people accidentally with arm weapons before. The biggest potential for FF is when a pilot used to 'mechs with lots of stuff mounted on the torso or high arms switches to a 'mech with wide arms and lots of firepower on them. Lots of shots you could have got in one 'mech hit your own guy in the other.

It's not always the shooter causing the problem, though. When I pilot lights getting cored from behind is almost always my fault. I once played on a CS server where you had the option to punish or forgive friendly fire, letting people punish TKers but let people off for genuine mistakes. It would be nice to have a similar thing in MWO.