29 replies to this topic

[Mothykins]

Ok, seriously. Just bear with me here, I know It's been talked about a billion times, but here's the thing.

It still a load of garbage.

There is no legitimate reason for the AC 2's heat management issues, when the AC 5 can still be stuck in groups of four and fired until you empty your ammo reserves. Hell, It can be chain fired like crazy. They have similar DPS Curves, but the heat curve from the ghost heat on the AC 2 just makes little sense. I understand that the reason the AC 2 has such high heat output in general is because of its Damage to weight ratio compared to the AC 5, but the inability to chainfire it is pointless and hinders creative game play.

All this has done is kill suppressing fire and inter-player intimidation tactics that make for better game play.

As an aside, the dang6x C-UAC5 combo.

UAC-5 fire rate (single shot) = 1.66 s

1660 / 3 = 553.3 ms

Firing 2xUAC5 every 550ms would avoid any ghost heat at all.

This would result in ~12 1.67dmg projectiles per second, an 83ms dakka doing 18 DPS for 3.6 HPS (Heat Per Second ).
Let's put that in context:
It does as much DPS as 7.2 ER PPCs, but with the heat of less than one ER PPC (3.7 HPS)


Just fix the dang AC 2.

Edited by Cavale, 20 August 2014 - 10:01 PM.

[Carrie Harder]

The heat limit for all weaponry should be set to 20. I believe this would be the most fair and balanced way to handle it.

[Hans Von Lohman]

The AC-2 nerf we got a little while ago that upped the rate of fire from every 0.52 seconds to what it is now at 0.72 seconds is probably a bit much.

Game balance 101 was described to me as doing things in halves. You think something is too weak, then you double it. If that seems to still be too weak, you double it again, if that is too strong, you go halfway between the last two changes, ect.

So, split the difference and set it to 0.62 seconds and we can go from there.

[Macster16]

I thought the AC2s got smacked with GH because of the screen shake? I think PGI stated that people were causing "griefing" by chaining 4 odd AC2s for massive screen shake? Someone might want to correct me on this though.

Edited by Macster16, 20 August 2014 - 10:22 PM.

[Sephlock]

PGI's solution: Nerf all other autocannons.

[John1352]

AC2s are terrible. They're 2.5x hotter than AC5s per damage, they spread damage terribly, require constant line of sight and suffer ghost heat when chainfired. If they had no heat at all, they still would only be useful for having fun with dakka. Constant exposure is a death sentence.

[Mcgral18]

Ghost heat did very little to bump the AC2s heat up, if you are alpha-ing them at any rate.

Ghost heat for 6 AC2s was .81 extra heat, or less than 2 heat per second. They are simply very hot weapons, doing 1 heat for every shot fired. That's what happens when you make a weapon fire 14 times it's rated RoF. And even at 14x damage...it's still very mediocre.

[Monkey Lover]

Ac2 dps is even lower due to server lag too. Its a weapon not worth using unless youre bored.

[Davegt27]

I ran five AC2's for awhile it was pretty fun. a great suppression weapon not much damage but any mech would pull back when I opened up

people would say the ghost heat was to high but I stripped my Jager added 2 double heat sinks got it into master so I could put a smaller xl in the thing and that setup worked pretty good until we started the Clan VS IS
then the Clan Mechs would just ignore me

since the primary weapon for the Jager is the AC I am constantly chasing the AC Setup
but every time someone brings up the term AC my guns get nerfed


Davegt27

[Y E O N N E]

Macster16, on 20 August 2014 - 10:22 PM, said:

I thought the AC2s got smacked with GH because of the screen shake? I think PGI stated that people were causing "griefing" by chaining 4 odd AC2s for massive screen shake? Someone might want to correct me on this though.

If that were the case, simply lowering the impulse would have sufficed. Even then, they ran hot enough that it was not possible to sustain a stream of stagger-fired AC/2 if you had more than two.

So regardless of official word, I don't buy the griefing story because it's inconsistent with the current state of the game, where LRMs give far worse shake and blur and when there are so many complaints about it.

[Mazzyplz]

the thing about AC2s and why they got so hammered with ghost heat is because they could outrange ANYTHING

(kinda like clan ER large lasers do now)


when they killed the range on them, it was the proper move to reduce the ghost heat... but they didn't.

people's problem was getting shot by rapid fire at 2 kilometers but now the clan mechs do it and pgi doesn't wanna fix their cash cow mechs - these clan mechs outrange any IS weapons in maps like alpine and tourmaline, which is what was the big problem with AC2 long ago and why it got nerfed. you can expect pgi to fix the ac2 heat and nerf the clan weapons range "soon" (in about 12 months)

originally, the range on autocannons was double or triple what it was in TT ( cant remember off the top of my head)

why, you ask?

my best guess is paul inouye rolled some dice and came up with that in a totally random way - until the community demanded that the range on autocannon not be so ridiculous, but it took him about a year to do it, and now finally the autocannon is not the main weapon of the game with it's ludicrous range and usually low heat

Edited by Mazzyplz, 21 August 2014 - 01:47 AM.

[MeiSooHaityu]

The Multi A/C2 loadout isn't quite as good as it used to be. About the only real advantage is range.

I still run 3 A/C2s in my Shadow Hawk, but it was much better before. I would like to see a slight A/C2 Buff.

[El Bandito]

Can't say this enough.

BRING BACK THE DAKKA JAGER!!!

[Flapdrol]

Quad ac2 jager is still pretty good, second line mech of course, but it does over 10 dps for 20 seconds, and that's a lot of damage even if it's spread out a bit.

[Andross Deverow]

Cavale, on 20 August 2014 - 10:01 PM, said:

Ok, seriously. Just bear with me here, I know It's been talked about a billion times, but here's the thing.

It still a load of garbage.

There is no legitimate reason for the AC 2's heat management issues, when the AC 5 can still be stuck in groups of four and fired until you empty your ammo reserves. Hell, It can be chain fired like crazy. They have similar DPS Curves, but the heat curve from the ghost heat on the AC 2 just makes little sense. I understand that the reason the AC 2 has such high heat output in general is because of its Damage to weight ratio compared to the AC 5, but the inability to chainfire it is pointless and hinders creative game play.

All this has done is kill suppressing fire and inter-player intimidation tactics that make for better game play.

As an aside, the dang6x C-UAC5 combo.

UAC-5 fire rate (single shot) = 1.66 s

1660 / 3 = 553.3 ms

Firing 2xUAC5 every 550ms would avoid any ghost heat at all.

This would result in ~12 1.67dmg projectiles per second, an 83ms dakka doing 18 DPS for 3.6 HPS (Heat Per Second ).
Let's put that in context:
It does as much DPS as 7.2 ER PPCs, but with the heat of less than one ER PPC (3.7 HPS)


Just fix the dang AC 2.

Ghost heat is not my main issue with AC2, my problem is the horsesh1t nerfs they did. Reducing the firing rate and reducing the effective range was just.... stupid.

Regards

[MauttyKoray]

6xC-UAC5 set in 2 group of 3 and on chain fire causes them to be fire in a CONSTANT state of rotation. This set up is SEVERELY more effective at perma-screen rocking than a chain of AC/2s.

Also, if screen shake is what the problem is, setting it lower (since they're small bullets anyway) should alleviate that issue without removing their function.

Edited by MauttyKoray, 21 August 2014 - 05:30 AM.

[DONTOR]

John1352, on 20 August 2014 - 10:37 PM, said:

AC2s are terrible. They're 2.5x hotter than AC5s per damage, they spread damage terribly, require constant line of sight and suffer ghost heat when chainfired. If they had no heat at all, they still would only be useful for having fun with dakka. Constant exposure is a death sentence.

It didnt used to be that way. They had massive range over every weapon, actually it was nearly the same as a gauss rifle. So long exposure outside of everyones range was fine and still did alot of damage. Range nerf was really what killed the AC2.

[occusoj]

Unnerf the AC2. It needs some love.
I run 4xAC2 on a Banshee for fun and giggles but 3xAC5 is plain better if not going for the longest of ranges. AC2 is too hot for what it delivers, either it needs to fly faster, further, reload quicker or get a bit cooler.

And for chainfiring, how about a real chainfire? Currently 4xAC2 on chainfire is much slower than it could be, theres constantly 2 guns loaded, ready but not fired. Who came up with that crap?

[MeiSooHaityu]

DONTOR, on 21 August 2014 - 07:19 AM, said:

It didnt used to be that way. They had massive range over every weapon, actually it was nearly the same as a gauss rifle. So long exposure outside of everyones range was fine and still did alot of damage. Range nerf was really what killed the AC2.

Although the A/C2 couldn't have done much at the really long ranges it was capable of before (a tripple A/C2 was doing maybe 3 damage over 1000m), it still registered damage to the enemy and had ballistic shake. It was a good fire suppression tool because of that. Not huge damage at extreme ranges, but the range and fire-rate kept the enemy's head down.

Now it has lost both it's range and RoF. Kind of makes me sad. It isn't useless, but it isn't that useful either.

[Turist0AT]

ghost heat has many victims and its a bad idea