18 replies to this topic

[Admiral_Korean_Jesus]

Hey PGI, you guys did a good job making light mechs all but useless with fall damage. This is from a long time light mech pilot by the way. No amount of careful jump jet slow down can keep light mech legs from falling off now.

Im not the only one who sees this...

Sincerely,

The legless Jenner.

[A banana in the tailpipe]

Medium pilots support you comrade!

[Monkey Lover]

I can control the fall dmg its the jj being so slow and under powered i dont like. There is no more run jump attacks, no more jumping up hills to escape.

[Yokaiko]

Monkey Lover, on 19 July 2014 - 06:35 PM, said:

I can control the fall dmg its the jj being so slow and under powered i dont like. There is no more run jump attacks, no more jumping up hills to escape.

....and god help you run off a ledge without the JJs full throttle.

[A banana in the tailpipe]

What I would like to see are different kinds of JJs.

Say you take a pair of JJs for thrust, then a third JJ that passively cushions your landings.

[Skyfaller]

this has been a issue for many years.

Bigger mechs that dont have jumpjets .. think Atlas and Stalker.. can walk off cliffs several times their height and take no damage. None. Yet a spider or jenner falls from half its own height and gets hit with leg damage.

The solution is simple:

In the Endo Steel / Standard internal structure section, add a new upgrade option: Leg Impact Absorbtion & Recovery (LIAR).

This upgrade can be used in ADDITION to either Standard or Endo steel options.

Benefits:
-Makes mech immune to fall damage regardless of height.
-Available only for light and medium chassis
-Does not add tonnage cost.

Cons:
- Reduces noticeably the mech's ability to decelerate. Think a return to no-skill point bonuses deceleration status. Your mech will take a couple of steps more than it does now when stopping. This effectively hampers the maneuverability of the mech.
- Reduces leg rate of swivel. Effectively it makes your mech's legs turn slower..again, think no skill point bonus.
- When airborne, legs cannot swivel. This is hard-set as the legs need to be facing the same vector the mech jumped in to absorb the impact.
- Takes up 1 slot in each leg.

[A banana in the tailpipe]

Skyfaller, on 19 July 2014 - 06:41 PM, said:

this has been a issue for many years.

Bigger mechs that dont have jumpjets .. think Atlas and Stalker.. can walk off cliffs several times their height and take no damage. None. Yet a spider or jenner falls from half its own height and gets hit with leg damage.

Even now in a Timberwolf on Mordor, I'll just walk off the middle and fall straight into the lava if it means a good flanking position or to chase a crippled mech. A fall from that distance doesn't even turn fresh legs orange, yet on some maps every step you take adds yellow damage. It's the poor/sloppy map design that is to blame really. Too many maps have spots where mechs get stuck, hurt on pebbles, fall through the world, invisible crap causes premature impacts, etc.....

PGI slapped that **** together with haste and need to go back over it for quality control now that they have the time and staff.

Edited by lockwoodx, 19 July 2014 - 06:46 PM.

[Kiiyor]

JJ capable mechs are fine. I've trained myself to hit the jets whenever the comforting sound of my footfalls disappears.

Non-JJ mechs though, they need to slow down and do proper 3 point turns with their hands comfortably at 10 and 2 prior to any elevation change, whilst indicating, and crawling through corners at an acceptable pace. Being instagibbed is a small price to pay in the name of safety!

[MonkeyCheese]

Monkey Lover, on 19 July 2014 - 06:35 PM, said:

I can control the fall dmg its the jj being so slow and under powered i dont like. There is no more run jump attacks, no more jumping up hills to escape.

because that small percentage of light mechs in use in this community especially the smaller percentage that use airborne attacks were such a threat to the game (aside from the lagshield spiders and ravens that got fixed) T__T

[A banana in the tailpipe]

Kiiyor, on 19 July 2014 - 06:52 PM, said:

JJ capable mechs are fine. I've trained myself to hit the jets whenever the comforting sound of my footfalls disappears.

I do that too but because of all the anomalies on maps such as invisible things you make contact with before you THINK you need to buffer your fall, damage happens anyways.

If PGI fixes the maps, then JJ tapping for a cushy landing will become a reality.

[Tezcatli]

It took me 32 falls at about 38ft/s to blow out both legs. And falling from my max jump jet height at a maximum of 57ft/s it took 11 falls. Piloting the Ember.

Edited by Tezcatli, 19 July 2014 - 07:46 PM.

[Kiiyor]

Tezcatli, on 19 July 2014 - 07:38 PM, said:

It took me 32 falls at about 38ft/s to blow out both legs. And falling from my max jump jet height at a maximum of 57ft/s it took 11 falls. Piloting the Ember.

I'm ok with the concept of fall damage, and I appreciate that it can indeed take a whole mess of falls before you destroy your legs, but the point is that light mechs live and die by their legs. Even losing 3% in a reasonable fall can be crippling when there are mechs out there with the potential to amber or red your leg armour in one volley.

Heavies and Assaults can throw themselves off mountains with wild abandon. Lights and some Mediums now need to pay a whole mess of attention to their speed and piloting, in addition to worrying about all the MetaMechs that can core them in one volley if they make even the tiniest errors.

I'd be interested in seeing the ratios lowered for lights especially, and maybe mediums.

[Jacobei]

It is way worse but its still 1% overall damage..

They have a mod for it now which you should use then.... Don't cry about the game upgrade you need this new mod. They are limiting poptarts - Which I have never really encountered but what ever I am sure its working.

Perhaps you a poptart and your tactics are all messed up now? You cant fly straight up to max shooting and just fall to the ground over and over without losing your legs?

[Impyrium]

We must be playing different games, because my lights have been perfectly fine. If you're seriously hitting the ground hard enough and often enough to disable or seriously damage your legs, then YOU. ARE. PLAYING. IT. WRONG.

If you don't have jumpjets and you're scoring high damage, then you need to stop jumping off ledges. The damage ISN'T that high, even when it's triggered unfairly.

I really don't get this whole 'JJ change ruined my lights' argument. What are you guys trying to do, pilot them like AeroSpace fighters? If it was a bug, I'd understand. But it's not, it works fine 95% of the time, and my lights are doing just as well as they were before.

[Kiiyor]

AUSwarrior24, on 19 July 2014 - 08:46 PM, said:

We must be playing different games, because my lights have been perfectly fine. If you're seriously hitting the ground hard enough and often enough to disable or seriously damage your legs, then YOU. ARE. PLAYING. IT. WRONG.

If you don't have jumpjets and you're scoring high damage, then you need to stop jumping off ledges. The damage ISN'T that high, even when it's triggered unfairly.

I really don't get this whole 'JJ change ruined my lights' argument. What are you guys trying to do, pilot them like AeroSpace fighters? If it was a bug, I'd understand. But it's not, it works fine 95% of the time, and my lights are doing just as well as they were before.

It's not just about JJ's - the changes to jets are fine. Even one jet is enough to control a rapid descent in a light.

It's mostly about the poor lights without JJ's.

Lights are already borderline as far as battlefield effectiveness is concerned. Anything over 60 tonnes has the capacity to effectively one shot you. Light pilots have to pay attention to piloting and battlefield positioning more than any other class - now they have to pay attention to lowering their speed and moving in predicable paths to navigate terrain.

They can either ignore a drop, and accept the damage to already weak armour that everyone shoots at - or they can choose to move somewhere their enemy may have already anticipated.

[Tezcatli]

Kiiyor, on 19 July 2014 - 08:40 PM, said:

I'm ok with the concept of fall damage, and I appreciate that it can indeed take a whole mess of falls before you destroy your legs, but the point is that light mechs live and die by their legs. Even losing 3% in a reasonable fall can be crippling when there are mechs out there with the potential to amber or red your leg armour in one volley.

Heavies and Assaults can throw themselves off mountains with wild abandon. Lights and some Mediums now need to pay a whole mess of attention to their speed and piloting, in addition to worrying about all the MetaMechs that can core them in one volley if they make even the tiniest errors.

I'd be interested in seeing the ratios lowered for lights especially, and maybe mediums.

Well I tested the Atlas off the same place I tested the Ember. It took only 20 falls to destroy it's legs. So if anything an assault takes more damage from a fall. But since the Atlas has no jump jets. It is far less likely to die from it.

But I do agree with you. Especially with the Clans raising the amount of DPS going out. Light legs feel even more fragile. They should increase the buff to the structure considerably. Hell they should do it for the hull mech imo.

[Impyrium]

Kiiyor, on 19 July 2014 - 09:10 PM, said:

It's not just about JJ's - the changes to jets are fine. Even one jet is enough to control a rapid descent in a light.

It's mostly about the poor lights without JJ's.

Lights are already borderline as far as battlefield effectiveness is concerned. Anything over 60 tonnes has the capacity to effectively one shot you. Light pilots have to pay attention to piloting and battlefield positioning more than any other class - now they have to pay attention to lowering their speed and moving in predicable paths to navigate terrain.

They can either ignore a drop, and accept the damage to already weak armour that everyone shoots at - or they can choose to move somewhere their enemy may have already anticipated.

OK, I see your point there. But still, I personally believe that this means that those lights will need to adjust the way they play. Admittedly I only have a single light without JJs that I use often, but with that 'mech I tend to play away from close range brawling. When I do get up close, sure, you have to put more effort in to stop your 'Mech flying away. But I don't think that extra effort really is that much, and it's entirely reasonable.

A decent player can pilot a JJ-less light 'mech fine. Just because it's not 'easy' doesn't mean it's not 'fair', so to speak.

[Kiiyor]

AUSwarrior24, on 19 July 2014 - 09:49 PM, said:

OK, I see your point there. But still, I personally believe that this means that those lights will need to adjust the way they play. Admittedly I only have a single light without JJs that I use often, but with that 'mech I tend to play away from close range brawling. When I do get up close, sure, you have to put more effort in to stop your 'Mech flying away. But I don't think that extra effort really is that much, and it's entirely reasonable.

A decent player can pilot a JJ-less light 'mech fine. Just because it's not 'easy' doesn't mean it's not 'fair', so to speak.

I agree, with some caveats though. I've seen some awesome light pilots, and there are many among them who (from what i've seen) have adapted to the new mechanics just fine. The issue appears to be that there is less margin for error than ever before.

• HSR - lowered high speed light survivability (and rightly so).
  
• High pinpoint meta - being one shot is now far more common.

These things combined made Speed - one of the light mech's greatest assets - largely irrelevant when faced with someone with decent aim. And that was fine, really - tactics were adjusted, and instead of mindless invincible circling, lights had to adjust to striking and hit and run tactics, exposing themselves for the merest instant, striking hard, then vanishing.

• Fall damage - made lights far more cautious.

Now, most of the lights I see are hanging at the rear of formations, with long range weapons, begging for scraps from the Heavy and Assault's tables. Those that decide to mix it up have to be right on their game, or they are likely doomed.


I have had a fair amount of success in my Jenners, all have JJs. If you have JJ's on a light, it means that you don't have to pay nearly as much attention to the throttle. How many Atlases or MadCats are brawling and think "oops, better halve my throttle near this bump!"

To test the JJ-less theory however, i've been striking out in a JJ deprived Firestarter. Maybe it's my tiny single-task brain at fault, but I can't keep track of everything when I don't have JJ's to rely on for piloting mishaps - and by mishap, I mean running off any type of drop/bump/hillock at top speed. I find myself lowering my speed, but I usually go to far, providing an easy shot to my enemies, or lower it and bounce anyways.

The biggest issue here is brawling. If i'm shooting at an enemy, it's hard to keep track of where my legs are going to end up. And it's here that the little bounces add up. The 1 and 2% hops. Everyone shoos at your legs anyways, and if you lose 10% of your legs to dirt, then you're usually doing 10% less damage before you're cut off at the knees, and summarily executed.

Sigh. I guess the crux of my argument is this:



.

Edited by Kiiyor, 19 July 2014 - 11:04 PM.

[Skyfaller]

Light mechs with JJ's rely on their ability to use terrain to advantage. Ergo, buildings, cliffs, other mechs, etc.

As the JJ's currently are, you burn off half your fuel just barely getting airborne enough to jump onto a small building. This is with max # of JJ's on the 5D and V versions of the spider for example.

Perhaps they should change how jets work to:

- Not consume jet capacitor power/fuel (whatever you call it) until 2 seconds after the jets have been activated when at ground level.
- Those first 2 seconds thrust provide twice the thrust.
- Those first 2 seconds sees the jets increase weapon heat.
- Number of jump jets installed would determine the amount of heat generated in those 2 seconds as well as thrust power on initial jump and when airborne. ***

*** this is total amount of jets. If one light mech can carry 12 jets and the other only 4 then both will have the same performance if both equip only 4 jets. The one with 12 jets will have 3x the thrust and fuel/heat cost.

oh and... remove the idiocy of the forward movement for the jet. it should only thrust the mech straight up and it should only use the mech's ground speed momentum to carry it when airborne.