38 replies to this topic

[Bishop Steiner]

What are your findings?

I have 4 Quad MG mechs, the Ember, Huginn, my Jager-DD "Crit-Bomb" and my Nova-S.

I first noticed on the Test Server....that while the Clan MG sounded sexy as heck.... I was really getting no crits, no destroyed components. Figured lower damage or crits were a trade off for half weight, so didn't think too much about it.

Then we get the patch notes, telling us that they were not doing their full damage, and because that is fixed now, their damage is reduced. OK, fair enough, accurate damage registry, supposed to come out a wash, No problem.

Except that I have not found them to be a wash. I actually find them staggeringly less effective.
They are still great sounding, low heat Dakka, and a lot of people twist and panic still, because they are conditioned to panic about getting critted...... but the actual amount of damage, number of crits and component destructions are waaaaaaay down for me.

Mind you, by far not the biggest balance issue by any means (unless you are an Ember or Huginn, maybe?), but curious what other people are experiencing?

[FupDup]

I can't tell for sure, but I *might* also be seeing something similar. I've been using 2 backup MGs on my Kit Faux and so far not very many cherry red body parts have been destroyed by them. It's far more often my lazors that end up ripping off parts.


One theory I've heard is that the "missed" MGs hits from pre-patch still dealt critical damage, which added to the weapons crit-seeking potential. But, after the nerf, those "missed crits" are no longer applying, despite higher base damage "on paper." Something like that.

Edited by FupDup, 21 June 2014 - 06:59 AM.

[stjobe]

Actuators can be critted now, that's the difference.

Edit: Here's the link:

Omid Kiarostami said:

I can confirm that internals (actuators, gyros, sensors, etc) are supposed to be accounted for in the critical hit distributions. They are great crit-buffers!

Prior to clans, the default health value of internals was a constant in the code base. When we moved internals to the xml game data, we didn't need that anymore and started specifying hit points on them like every other item. This doesn't represent a change in functionality, though - everything should still be the same as it was before.

In lieu of a formal post going over crits, here's an image of a CN9-YLW with the debug crit table showing:http://imgur.com/G6EmMky

The percentage next to each item in the image above is the likelihood the game uses when determining what item is hit by a crit. Internals factor into the crit distribution (at least until they are destroyed), so having internals in a component definitely improves the survivability of items you slot there.

Edited by stjobe, 21 June 2014 - 07:17 AM.

[Foxfire]

More parts to absorb Crits and the flat 20% reduction in damage is multiplied on a crit... So less damage and more to chew through.

[Bishop Steiner]

stjobe, on 21 June 2014 - 07:00 AM, said:

Actuators can be critted now, that's the difference.

Edit: Here's the link:

Would make some sense, but don't those register as components?

I was averaging 10 component destruction a match with my Crit-Bomb ....now I am averaging 5 CompDes a match. Pretty significant drop off.

[stjobe]

Bishop Steiner, on 21 June 2014 - 07:21 AM, said:

Would make some sense, but don't those register as components?

I was averaging 10 component destruction a match with my Crit-Bomb ....now I am averaging 5 CompDes a match. Pretty significant drop off.

I can't swear what's going on, but it's possible they don't count against component destruction.

If they don't, that's your answer; you destroy just as much as previously, but won't get credit for more than about half.

Edited by stjobe, 21 June 2014 - 07:26 AM.

[Jack Avery]

stjobe, on 21 June 2014 - 07:26 AM, said:

I can't swear what's going on, but it's possible they don't count against component destruction.

They don't. Component destruction is for the main body parts, like arms, legs, torsos, not the items within them.

[Bishop Steiner]

stjobe, on 21 June 2014 - 07:26 AM, said:

I can't swear what's going on, but it's possible they don't count against component destruction.

If they don't, that's your answer; you destroy just as much as previously, but won't get credit for more than about half.

My Ember is disappoint.

[stjobe]

Jack Avery, on 21 June 2014 - 07:27 AM, said:

They don't. Component destruction is for the main body parts, like arms, legs, torsos, not the items within them.

Yes of course, that's not what I meant. The question is whether damage done to e.g. an upper arm actuator transfer 15% of its damage to the internal structure just as damage to a weapon does?

Something is making MGs have less component destruction, and just sticking more things in there to crit shouldn't do that.

[Reitrix]

Bishop Steiner, on 21 June 2014 - 06:51 AM, said:

What are your findings?

I have 4 Quad MG mechs, the Ember, Huginn, my Jager-DD "Crit-Bomb" and my Nova-S.

I first noticed on the Test Server....that while the Clan MG sounded sexy as heck.... I was really getting no crits, no destroyed components. Figured lower damage or crits were a trade off for half weight, so didn't think too much about it.

Then we get the patch notes, telling us that they were not doing their full damage, and because that is fixed now, their damage is reduced. OK, fair enough, accurate damage registry, supposed to come out a wash, No problem.

Except that I have not found them to be a wash. I actually find them staggeringly less effective.
They are still great sounding, low heat Dakka, and a lot of people twist and panic still, because they are conditioned to panic about getting critted...... but the actual amount of damage, number of crits and component destructions are waaaaaaay down for me.

Mind you, by far not the biggest balance issue by any means (unless you are an Ember or Huginn, maybe?), but curious what other people are experiencing?

I run my Nova Prime with 4 MGs as backup to cool off, and i was messing people up something shocking with them. Once a component goes unarmored, the MGs ripped it off.

However, if there were a problem, i would put it down to a possibility that the old MGs were only *sometimes* not dealing full damage (like SRMs) and they beefed that damage a bit so when it DID do full damage, it stung.
I'm willing to bet that the MGs in their current state is how they were originally intended to be.
It really was kinda silly to just spray a component for a fraction of a second to destroy whats in it.

[Jack Avery]

stjobe, on 21 June 2014 - 07:35 AM, said:

Yes of course, that's not what I meant. The question is whether damage done to e.g. an upper arm actuator transfer 15% of its damage to the internal structure just as damage to a weapon does?

Something is making MGs have less component destruction, and just sticking more things in there to crit shouldn't do that.

Ah, okay, I see where you are going with that. It seems, though, that actuators actually were crittable before, though, reading through Omid Kiarostami's and Karl Berg's posts. They just explicitly set the health, rather than use a default for everything. Or maybe I'm misreading some of that, too.

That doesn't explain what people think they are seeing, though. I haven't used MGs enough (or even played enough lately) to compare

[Bishop Steiner]

Reitrix, on 21 June 2014 - 07:41 AM, said:

I run my Nova Prime with 4 MGs as backup to cool off, and i was messing people up something shocking with them. Once a component goes unarmored, the MGs ripped it off.

However, if there were a problem, i would put it down to a possibility that the old MGs were only *sometimes* not dealing full damage (like SRMs) and they beefed that damage a bit so when it DID do full damage, it stung.
I'm willing to bet that the MGs in their current state is how they were originally intended to be.
It really was kinda silly to just spray a component for a fraction of a second to destroy whats in it.

Eh, considering you needed 4 even before to make them reliably do anything, IDK. But it is what it is. Just curious what the in game results were showing.

[MonkeyDCecil]

So now my Huggins, which I love. Is now less lovable. That sucks.

Also when you crit, does it noy multiple the damage of said weapon. So a lower damage means less crit damage. So you mite not be doing enough damage to destroy component. I just what my mgs back to what they were.

[MountainCopper]

stjobe, on 21 June 2014 - 07:00 AM, said:

Actuators can be critted now, that's the difference.

When did that change happen? That's a pretty big change in terms of damage buffering for critical hits...

Omid Kiarostami, on 18 June 2014 - 05:46 PM, said:

This [modification] doesn't represent a change in functionality, though - everything should still be the same as it was before.

So in this sentence, internals do not count when rolling for a critical hit.

Omid Kiarostami, on 18 June 2014 - 05:46 PM, said:

Internals factor into the crit distribution (at least until they are destroyed), so having internals in a component definitely improves the survivability of items you slot there.

But in this part of the same statement, they do count as a buffer?

Omid Kiarostami, on 18 June 2014 - 05:46 PM, said:

Hope that clarifies!

Not really...

Edited by GoldenFleece, 21 June 2014 - 09:16 AM.

[Foxfire]

MonkeyDCecil, on 21 June 2014 - 08:55 AM, said:

So now my Huggins, which I love. Is now less lovable. That sucks.

Also when you crit, does it noy multiple the damage of said weapon. So a lower damage means less crit damage. So you mite not be doing enough damage to destroy component. I just what my mgs back to what they were.

Yeah, you will damage on the crit. If the crit increase is 1250%(The only number I could find on the matter, from early last year) then you'll lose .25 damage per crit(up to .75 damage if you have a triple crit).

Not counting any double or triple crits and doing a straight 33% chance for a single crit, you lose ~191 potential damage over a ton of ammo(in the most ideal of ideal situations, where you are shooting only exposed internals with nothing hitting armored parts).

[Deathlike]

I think you guys are missing the critical component in this discussion.... and the answer is "blame Paul".

By design, a PERCENTAGE of the BASE weapon damage is applied to the crit bonus. On smurfy's, I suggest you look at how much CRIT DAMAGE was generated compared to the current patch.

So what is actually happening is while the crits are still being generated at the same rate (regardless of whether or not the damage is applied to other corresponding crits), the DAMAGE DEALT TO INTERNAL COMPONENTS IS LOWER (in addition to the amount of damage converted to INTERNAL ARMOR).

While you "might be more efficient" since Paul claims a bug was "fixed", the other part of the change was actually more significant (the damage value adjustment).

I suggest people that have that spreadsheet ready to do the math. You'll see that the "hidden nerf as compensation for more hits" is actually hurting the MG overall.

Edit:
The bonus crit damage is 90% of the weapon's base damage (you can verify through smurfy and/or the appropriate xml file in the game's data).

The base damage of the old IS MG is 1 damage (10 bullets with .1 damage each) generates a base .9 damage crit bonus when successful.

The base damage of the new IS/Clan MG is .8 damage (10 bullets of .08 damage each) generates a base .72 damage crit bonus when successful.

So... you can figure out the math from that.

Edited by Deathlike, 21 June 2014 - 02:47 PM.

[FupDup]

Deathlike, on 21 June 2014 - 02:43 PM, said:

I think you guys are missing the critical component in this discussion.... and the answer is "blame Paul".

By design, a PERCENTAGE of the BASE weapon damage is applied to the crit bonus. On smurfy's, I suggest you look at how much CRIT DAMAGE was generated compared to the current patch.

So what is actually happening is while the crits are still being generated at the same rate (regardless of whether or not the damage is applied to other corresponding crits), the DAMAGE DEALT TO INTERNAL COMPONENTS IS LOWER (in addition to the amount of damage converted to INTERNAL ARMOR).

While you "might be more efficient" since Paul claims a bug was "fixed", the other part of the change was actually more significant (the damage value adjustment).

I suggest people that have that spreadsheet ready to do the math. You'll see that the "hidden nerf as compensation for more hits" is actually hurting the MG overall.

Unintended Consequences™.

[Deathlike]

FupDup, on 21 June 2014 - 02:44 PM, said:

Unintended Consequences™.

The Nerfhammer said:

Working as intended™.

Edit:
He should have NOT changed a thing unless it was magically more powerful than before... not a freaking preemptive nerf.

Edited by Deathlike, 21 June 2014 - 02:49 PM.

[FupDup]

Deathlike, on 21 June 2014 - 02:47 PM, said:

I think I need to make a photoshop image of a poster for the Terminator movie, renamed to "The Nerfinator" with Paul Inouye's face pasted over Arnold's face.

[Deathlike]

FupDup, on 21 June 2014 - 02:49 PM, said:

I think I need to make a photoshop image of a poster for the Terminator movie, renamed to "The Nerfinator" with Paul Inouye's face pasted over Arnold's face.

Would see. Moar popcorn readied.