19 replies to this topic

[Asmudius Heng]

So I was looking at the most recent changes to the PPC and CERLL and was kind of frustrated, but decided to take some time out and come back to the issue with some clarity after a few tweets from PGI about what they envision for long range combat.

I think i have a big disconnect from my years of playing MW4 in competition which colours my view and i am sure does many others. Sometimes this is a good thing as there was some aspects of MW4 that were very good and we desperately miss in this game (Passive/Active sensors for instance), others we needed to jettison (unlimited heat sinks for all!), and others that simply come down to a different type of play.

In MW4 the balance of all weapons was terrible. Medium lasers were horrific, SRMs sucked, IS LRMs were garbage, machine guns? lol. There was a subset of useful weapons that defined the high end gameplay which included C-ERLL, C-LRMs, Light Gauss, LBX both clan and IS. The game shifted at that level to one of very low time to kill BUT there was this odd balance.

Light gauss had the best range and could be used to out-snipe the C-ERLL
The C-ERLL had amazing range, hit instantly and since you could stack them they became the default high power weapon, 800m range was the cut off.
Then you had LBX which were extremely efficient infighters doing 1.4 the damage of an AC if i recall and had the power and reload time to punish people once in range.

You had a game where people jockeyed for position to use their best effective ranges. You could harass the ERLL guys with LtG and LRMs, ERLL rules 400-800 range, but then the LBX became the formidable infighter. There was this odd balance of extreme range, long range, then short range and the game revolved around using terrain to gain you the most advantage to your setup.

You could WIN at long range, snipers were common.
You could WIN in close range, Brawlers were effective if you could close.

Both play styles were viable - but the punishment if you got your positioning wrong was horrendous. You rarely got to make multiple mistakes.

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Now we look at MWO and the direction it is taking. PGI do not want super effective long range weapons, they want the mid range and close range to rule, they understand that people like brawling also (people also like to snipe PGI ... and many other roles). What seems to be happening is a game where long range is all about plinking the enemy, minor damage and spread forcing people to get in close to do real damage and making it hard for a longer range team to win at range exclusively.

The more of these changes, the more the long range game changes to one of support, suppression and positioning.

Conversely I have been amazed that close range weapons have not seen a buff before, but not it makes some sort of sense. they do not want to nerf range and then make brawling so efficient as to push everyone to brawl to get maximum damage efficiency. in MW4 the brawler was a high risk high reward setup in fact - with powerful long ranged weapons though in the current state you get high risk and very little reward (better with the SRM fixes though)

So the more they nerf range the better brawling looks in regards to risk, but the reward is not nearly as high still.

The net effect is a deliberate attempt to lower the time to kill and push engagements closer which fits their map theory was well ... small maps. It also makes manoeuvring less important because you can make more mistakes at range before the final confrontation.

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So what is my point? I kind of see what PGI are trying to do (still needs a lot of work) - it is a major shift from risk/reward on the part of your build to something that pushes less risk and less high powered reward on most builds. Your rate of return the more you boat is supposed to be less which is not a bad thing in many ways.

I do not know if this really works in practice but it is actually closer to Battletech where long range engagements happened by rarely were won there due to random hit locations and being much more difficult to hit.

I am reluctantly trying to move off some of my MW4 ideals to fit into this reality, but feels that PGI still need to put a lot of work into weapons balancing if they really want this sort of gameplay. They also still need long range to play a significant part in the game without the silly LRMs vs ECM garbage to define it.

I will put down my pitchfork for now, but warn PGI that they are riding a fine line going down this path because many long range weapons are still efficient brawling weapons so they may still need to buff close range weapons to be more effective for the risk of such short ranges - plinking or hammer blow they still suffer.

Anyway - just my thoughts. Neither style is wrong or right but they fit a very different paradigm and both are difficult to balance well. One becomes all or nothing, the other can become bland damage splatter and dull attrition.

[Saint Scarlett Johan]

The biggest issue lies in the poor map pool to choose from. MWO maps are bar none, the worst in any title I have ever played.

That rock, paper, scissors of MW4 was alive because the maps allowed it to thrive.

In MWO, we have duck, duck, goose. Where the maps cater to goose.

[Asmudius Heng]

The MWO maps are extremely busy and too small, though the change in how ranges work cater to the size a little more.

The clutter though on MWO maps is not great ... though I blame the game modes more than the maps.

EDIT: This I not a ***** post about the game BTW I was simply looking at the game from a different angle so please do not let this dissolve into PGI bashing, plenty of other avenues for that ....

Edited by Asmudius Heng, 11 August 2014 - 08:33 PM.

[Wolfways]

I've never understood why people want short ranged weapons buffed. If you want more damage take more powerful weapons.

[El Bandito]

I personally prefer longer TTK, but that's just me.

[Asmudius Heng]

It is about risk vs reward.

Being short range means you need to be close to enemy to do damage. This means you often take damage trying get into range.

If your weapons do not then deal enough damage for their payload to offset the range disadvantage then the risk is far higher than the reward.

Bigger does not always mean better, weapon fit into roles - or they should.

El Bandito - Longer TTK is certainly interesting, but too long makes the game a slog of attrition that does not reward manoeuvring and marksmanship.

There is a careful balance to be found and I do enjoy many aspects of a longer TTK than MW4 - though the intensity of a MW4 league game was an incredible rush because your mistakes were punished so badly.

[waterfowl]

Lord Scarlett Johan of Yazoo, on 11 August 2014 - 08:27 PM, said:

The biggest issue lies in the poor map pool to choose from. MWO maps are bar none, the worst in any title I have ever played.

That rock, paper, scissors of MW4 was alive because the maps allowed it to thrive.

In MWO, we have duck, duck, goose. Where the maps cater to goose.

Yep, it's the maps that are the heart of most problems described here. The current maps aren't bad to say ... but they really need some variety. We need terrains of all extremes, instead of just generic FPS map with bits of cover and sniper zones

[Wolfways]

Asmudius Heng, on 11 August 2014 - 08:51 PM, said:

It is about risk vs reward.

Being short range means you need to be close to enemy to do damage. This means you often take damage trying get into range.

If your weapons do not then deal enough damage for their payload to offset the range disadvantage then the risk is far higher than the reward.

Bigger does not always mean better, weapon fit into roles - or they should.

What i'm saying is that instead of trying to change the game design use better weapons. Longer ranged weapon do better at short range too? Use them then!

[Asmudius Heng]

WolfWays - if what you are advocating is to simply make weapons obsolete then perhaps you miss the point.

I use what works in the current game ... I am talking about game design decisions on a theoretical basis for a discussion.

It is bad game design to simply make a very small subset of weapons good for all situations.

[Wolfways]

Asmudius Heng, on 11 August 2014 - 09:00 PM, said:

WolfWays - if what you are advocating is to simply make weapons obsolete then perhaps you miss the point.

I use what works in the current game ... I am talking about game design decisions on a theoretical basis for a discussion.

It is bad game design to simply make a very small subset of weapons good for all situations.

I don't see any weapons as obsolete (except maybe flamers).

My point is that BT weapons are not based on "short ranged better at short range, long ranged better at long range". They are designed as take whatever you want as your main weapons and take other weapons as backup.
Choosing short ranged weapons as your main weapons and expecting to do well against players who fit the heavier, more heat intensive weapons is just...ridiculous (and very rarely worked out well in history).

Energy weapons get more powerful and longer ranged the "heavier" the cost (heat, crit slots and weight). Ballistics get more powerful in the opposite direction but exchange damage for range, with the AC20 being short ranged but also the biggest damage dealer in the game.

In MWO we all have complete freedom to choose whatever weapons we like thanks to customization. If someone chooses only short ranged weapons and complains that they have trouble doing well in matches i have no sympathy for them.

[Aresye]

For the previous MW games you had checks and balances. They may have had horrendous balance, but in general everything just sort of worked, and the end result felt more balanced than what we have in MWO.

MWO seems to try and achieve "actual balance," in which all weapons are compared to each other and all of them must somehow have the ability to be equally viable, which IMO is completely boring and completely eliminates role warfare entirely.

[Kiiyor]

I think the backend and technical issues have a lot to do with this, as well as map and general weapon balance. While hard-coded weapon values like damage, range etc. have a large influence on balance, things like HSR and hit registration do too. With balance for weapon systems on a knife edge, even the tiniest changes can have drastic results.

SRM's have gone through numerous iterations. At one stage they were great, and did enough damage that some very wonky hitreg issues didn't really matter, for most people. High ping players though were at a huge disadvantage when compared to those closer to the great white land of the moose. One day, HSR and hitreg for SRM's was improved, and suddenly they became the equivalent of a tactical mech nuke. Remember the Catapault SRM boats? Hilarious to pilot, terrifying to face in any other mech.

Overall, my point is that it's difficult to balance weapons when there are so many contributing factors... as evidenced by our ongoing balance sagas.

It's the wax and wane that gets me. One minute, PPC's are garbage. They get sped up, they get a bit better. Hitreg is improved, and they suddenly become capable of making holes in mechs that Jenners can run through. Aeons ago, LRM's were considered crap. They get their damage buffed by 0.2 and suddenly you wish you had a giant bronze shield to cower under while enemy missiles blot out the sun.

What's my point? Honestly, I don't even know. I think I had a point initially, but degenerated into an old man style rant. Maybe it's that trying to balance so many weapon systems must really suck?

[Sephlock]

Wolfways, on 11 August 2014 - 09:16 PM, said:

In MWO we all have complete freedom to choose whatever weapons we like thanks to customization. If someone chooses only short ranged weapons and complains that they have trouble doing well in matches i have no sympathy for them.

OTOH trench warfare is boring.

[Wolfways]

Sephlock, on 11 August 2014 - 09:44 PM, said:

OTOH trench warfare is boring.

I never sit around, i'm always on the move. But if someone has better short ranged weapons than me i'm certainly not going to close the distance by choice

[Asmudius Heng]

Wolfways - The ACs became more powerful as the range got shorter.

Main weapons were about weight mainly because that much payload kin of defined the mech. If you took an AC20 your AC20 usually defined your mech's role at lower weights anyway.

You also had mechs with no 'backup' weapon ... look at the swayback - all medium lasers. That however defined its role in BT. With rand hit locations it was like a laser shotgun.

Range is simply one parameter that I offset by a number of factors, heat, range, damage etc - it is an equation of power of that weapon. The application of that power determines it viability in situations creating roles.

There is an opportunity in MW to take this further and apply more variables to offset power o enhance roles which is done well with some equipment and badly with others.

The point of post was simply that the way the game is done now from previous iterations is the risk/reward factor is less polarised which is not good, nor bad unless it is taken to extremes.

[Davers]

I think 'long range', according to PGI, is gauss. LRMs and ERLasers can help out, but their damage gets spread a lot. In fact I wouldn't even really put LRMs in the 'long range' category, as they are much more efficient in the 300-600m range bracket, especially with Artemis.

[Wolfways]

Asmudius Heng, on 11 August 2014 - 10:09 PM, said:

Wolfways - The ACs became more powerful as the range got shorter.

That's what i said.

[Asmudius Heng]

The fact it can reach long range means it is long range ... they are just trying to limit the effectiveness of that extreme long range.

LRMs have lots of chances to lose locks at those ranges and they spread damage.
ERLL have burn time making damage spread
ERPPCs have a much slower projectile making accurate shots harder so more spread and misses
AC2s spread a lot due to bullet drop, travel time and lots of little pellets

The only outlier is Gauss which is why it is my ranged weapon of choice. No drawbacks apart from the charge time which is manageable but occasionally stops snap shooting.

EDIT: Sorry wolfways I did not read your post clearly. My apologies, you did state that and I did not take it in properly.

Open customisation does make it harder but balanced builds still all out of favour compared to specialist builds very often.

Brawlers who complain fall into two categories though. The rambos who charge across open ground then get tore up and complain because they have no idea how to approach under cover. Then there are those who can get into close combat without a scratch through extremely good situational awareness an skill ... but then find they on about even footing with a ranged build in knife fighting range an have very little close range advantage.

Not all brawling weapons are like that mind you - SRMs feel decent now, theAC20 still packs a punch, but medlas are still too hot, pulse lasers are pretty terrible, and the LBX should be better for the horrific spread it does for most of its range beyond 100m.

Edited by Asmudius Heng, 11 August 2014 - 10:37 PM.

[Voidcrafter]

Asmudius Heng, on 11 August 2014 - 10:29 PM, said:

~Some good stuff that don't concern me~

Brawlers who complain fall into two categories though. The rambos who charge across open ground then get tore up and complain because they have no idea how to approach under cover. Then there are those who can get into close combat without a scratch through extremely good situational awareness an skill ... but then find they on about even footing with a ranged build in knife fighting range an have very little close range advantage.

Not all brawling weapons are like that mind you - SRMs feel decent now, theAC20 still packs a punch, but medlas are still too hot, pulse lasers are pretty terrible, and the LBX should be better for the horrific spread it does for most of its range beyond 100m.

I think the main issue people are having with the game while using their idea of "brawling" is kinda subjective.
"Brawling build" seems to be a quite relative term - most of the weapons don't work the same way under the same circumstances and some of them are way more optional than the other.
Example:
AC20 - good direct hit damage.
Optionality: you actually need to HIT stuff with it( DOOH! ) and not only that - you NEED to hit stuff with it EXACTLY where you want to do it - which takes some skill. Long CD - which means you really have to be quite skilled with the weapon to be able to squeeze the most of it.
Same goes for SRM.
SSRM - you just need to lock stuff(meaning - a BEagle probe is really a good thing to have, even a bit situational)
Optionality: Hits random location, wasting way more shots than you would've wasted if you were with the ordinary SRMs and a good aim.
LBXes - good damage - if you've cored your oponent he's already half past dead 9/10. In my opinion - in the case of the CLBX20 - that's the best weapon a brawler can get(on clan side anyways).
Optionality: the spread you named. Though I personally shoot at targets in the 300<-->500m gap(that with the CLBX20) and still manage to get good results.
My point - brawling has a skill gap - even if you mount the perfect weapon for that really optional situational moment, when you'll have the chance to shine(after, presumably, you've waited about 4 mins for it), if you don't have the skillZ to do what you do not just good, but excellent - it could lead to really dissapointing experience.
Add to that the perfect situational awarness you gotto posses - since when you start engaging someone that someone will have a lock on you almost 100% of the time, and that makes you really comfortable target for all the LRMs in the universe.
Not to mention you have to be aware of where most of your enemies are - to not waste precious seconds when "INCOMING MISSILES" alert pops up.
You gotto have a perfect knowledge not only of how your weapons behave, but how much heat they produce, cause 1 overheat will kill you/render you useless more than half of the times.
You have to be excellent at torso twisting - if you really wish to engage at least two foes during the match(providing we're talking about people with decent skill) - even the defensive weapons the enemy carry will scratch you(to say the least) and you have no option to evade this while fighting.
Some modules seems like a must - like Radar Derp. and Seismic.
A plus is to know where the more dangerous weapons arsenal of your enemy is located - you gotto have common(at the very least) knowledge of the overall mechs - clan's omni sheets aint making it any easier and there're lots of mechs already that don't serve the "RT-->ballistics!" rule.

Well okay... all that is not a "must" but you know - if you wish to actually be a valulable part of the team instead of someone that just sees something, fires twice and dies, the ends up at topic that whines about how stupid brawling is - that's the right direction

[Asmudius Heng]

You do not need to tell me how to brawl or the disadvantaged/advantages of it.

I was merely stating that the game direction is moving to a very different model.

Rather than increasing the reward (power) of infighting builds to offset their risk (very power long range enemies), they are choosing to make the risk of the brawler much less by making the reward (power) of long range much less.

The balance can eventually level out if this is done well, but the danger is the less risk and reward across the board can lead to less interesting fights.

It is like a balance slider where TTK is shortened the more you approach reward.

RISK |------------------------------------| REWARD

MW4 was like:

RISK |--------------------------------*---| REWARD

MWO is like:

RISK |-----------------*----------------| REWARD

but moving further down the risk scale which could lead to a game where skill and positioning become increasingly less important.

That is all I am saying not going into individual weapons and tactics, more you nerf weapons the more you increase TTK but push too far and you reduce the individual and group skill involved in combat as people just spam each other over and over until someone falls over!