20 replies to this topic

[Glaive-]

(Sorry if this subject has been brought up in the past. The search didn't show up with much, so I figured I'd go ahead and make this topic)

Does anyone know how PGI intends to handle Anti-Personnel Pods?

I ask because certain mechs like the Hellbringer and Huntsman come stock with AP pods, and I would really hate to see those mechs left out just because they carry a minor piece of equipment.

I suppose implementing AP pods could be a large about of work for PGI, since technically infantry would also have to be implemented for AP pods to have a use.

Personally I wouldn't mind having inert AP pods like how the command console once was. At least we could get Hellbringers (and eventually the glorious Huntsman ).

[Joseph Mallan]

No personnel... no pods I would assume. OR it could be a one shot doing 1-2 damage to a leg humping Mech.

[MAXrobo]

The A-pods could very easily be replaced with an extra double heat sinks in the legs as they almost always come in pars on stock mechs. There are no infantry in the game and I don't think there is much reason to try and make up a use for a weapon system that doesn't apply to this game. I doubt many people would complain about changing one or two tons from the stock designs in this case.

[Carrie Harder]

Maybe a single-use item that deals out critical hits (including enough crit damage to actually destroy items) but does little or no damage to armor?

[Strum Wealh]

Apparently, Bryan Ekman did mention in NGNG #117 (starting around the 55:06 mark, according to the related Reddit thread) that combined-arms consumables (such as a squad of Elementals) were being considered, so it's possible that we may see A-pods (available to the Clans since 2810, but not available to the Inner Sphere until being successfully reverse-engineered by ComStar in 3055) actually serve their intended purpose if normal infantry are also implemented in a similar manner (since A-pods canonically have no effect on Battle Armor; this is reserved for B-Pods, which are invented by Clan Wolf-in-Exile in 3068).

[Carrie Harder]

Strum Wealh, on 23 August 2014 - 02:38 PM, said:

Apparently, Bryan Ekman did mention in NGNG #117 (starting around the 55:06 mark, according to the related Reddit thread) that combined-arms consumables (such as a squad of Elementals) were being considered, so it's possible that we may see A-pods (available to the Clans since 2810, but not available to the Inner Sphere until being successfully reverse-engineered by ComStar in 3055) actually serve their intended purpose if normal infantry are also implemented in a similar manner (since A-pods canonically have no effect on Battle Armor; this is reserved for B-Pods, which are invented by Clan Wolf-in-Exile in 3068).

Except you could just aim any laser of your choice at the ground and kill infantry just as quickly, because MWO doesn't have artificial damage inflation/deflation against certain targets like TT did (i.e. a Flamer did 2 damage normally, or 4d6 [4-24 damage] against unarmored infantry).

Specialized anti-infantry-only equipment is utterly pointless if you can manually just aim and them and kill them with a sweeping laser beam.

[Davers]

armyunit, on 23 August 2014 - 12:39 PM, said:

(Sorry if this subject has been brought up in the past. The search didn't show up with much, so I figured I'd go ahead and make this topic)

Does anyone know how PGI intends to handle Anti-Personnel Pods?

I ask because certain mechs like the Hellbringer and Huntsman come stock with AP pods, and I would really hate to see those mechs left out just because they carry a minor piece of equipment.

I suppose implementing AP pods could be a large about of work for PGI, since technically infantry would also have to be implemented for AP pods to have a use.

Personally I wouldn't mind having inert AP pods like how the command console once was. At least we could get Hellbringers (and eventually the glorious Huntsman ).

PGI has never had a problem including placeholder equipment in the past, so I don't see why they couldn't include those mechs.

[Bartholomew bartholomew]

I would be very happy to see AI personnel That I could go 'anti' on ingame!

[Mcgral18]

Half ton of ammo, heatsink, more armour, something to fill the tonnage.

Same thing was done with the Yen Lo Wang, they upgraded the engine and amour since there aren't any hatchets (4 tons) in MWO. You can't increase the engine on Clan mechs, so anything else that fits can be swapped in.

Edited by Mcgral18, 23 August 2014 - 02:57 PM.

[Malcolm Vordermark]

Well, the Hellbringer Prime has 4 A-pods, each one weighing 0.5 tons and taking up a critical. So they could be replaced with DHS very easily. Another alternative is to release an item with no function similar to the the command console (until recently). Also, depending on how the hard points worked out they could just skip the prime all together.

[Strum Wealh]

Carrie Harder, on 23 August 2014 - 02:41 PM, said:

Except you could just aim any laser of your choice at the ground and kill infantry just as quickly, because MWO doesn't have artificial damage inflation/deflation against certain targets like TT did (i.e. a Flamer did 2 damage normally, or 4d6 [4-24 damage] against unarmored infantry).

Specialized anti-infantry-only equipment is utterly pointless if you can manually just aim and them and kill them with a sweeping laser beam.

There are a number of 'Mechs that don't have the actuators or twist/pitch ranges to do that - Locusts, Ravens, Cicadas, Blackjacks, JagerMechs, Catapults, Stalkers, and any Clan Omni with a combination of ER-PPCs, GRs, or ACs in both arms come to mind.

[Carrie Harder]

Strum Wealh, on 23 August 2014 - 03:50 PM, said:

There are a number of 'Mechs that don't have the actuators or twist/pitch ranges to do that - Locusts, Ravens, Cicadas, Blackjacks, JagerMechs, Catapults, Stalkers, and any Clan Omni with a combination of ER-PPCs, GRs, or ACs in both arms come to mind.

So none of those listed mechs possess the ability to aim their weaponry at the ground? I'm pretty sure that they have the ability to aim their guns at the ground.

[Kassatsu]

Strum Wealh, on 23 August 2014 - 02:38 PM, said:

Apparently, Bryan Ekman did mention in NGNG #117 (starting around the 55:06 mark, according to the related Reddit thread) that combined-arms consumables (such as a squad of Elementals) were being considered, so it's possible that we may see A-pods (available to the Clans since 2810, but not available to the Inner Sphere until being successfully reverse-engineered by ComStar in 3055) actually serve their intended purpose if normal infantry are also implemented in a similar manner (since A-pods canonically have no effect on Battle Armor; this is reserved for B-Pods, which are invented by Clan Wolf-in-Exile in 3068).

Is the lag not bad enough already? How can we possibly continue living without 24 packs of (presumably 2-5) elementals running around spamming small lasers in every match?

Also... Infantry would be what... A paratrooper consumable? So they can deal 0.1 damage to mechs with their machine guns and I don't know, 3 damage with RPGs (don't remember the TT damages off the top of my head)? Good way to lag the servers up though, just get your whole team to drop infantry at the start and then you've got a ton of NPCs eating server resources for the rest of the match.

On the other hand... I would not mind seeing tanks, proper aerospace fighters and infantry/battle armor in the game if we ever see game types that aren't team last man standing, team last man standing with a square you can stand in and turrets to blow up, and team last man standing with five squares. Shut up. I can dream, right?

[Strum Wealh]

Carrie Harder, on 23 August 2014 - 04:00 PM, said:

So none of those listed mechs possess the ability to aim their weaponry at the ground? I'm pretty sure that they have the ability to aim their guns at the ground.

Being able to "aim at the ground" is not the same thing as being able to "aim at one's own feet" - and even those 'Mechs with full actuator sets in both arms cannot do the latter.



In fact, now that I've double-checked against the above image (from Smurfy), the LCTs are the only 'Mech that can pitch their arms downward (or upward) by more than 50 degrees, with most 'Mechs being unable to pitch their arms downward (or upward) by more than 40 degrees.



For most 'Mechs, θ (the complementary angle to the sum of torso pitch & arm pitch angle) is going to be on the order of 40 degrees (since most 'Mechs can pitch their torso down by 20 degrees & can pitch their arms down by an additional 30 degrees; 90 - 20 - 30 = 40), and h (the height of the 'Mech's weapons from the ground) is usually going to be on the order of 6-9 meters if the 'Mech has elbows, so the distance r (the closest distance at which it can hit the ground) would be on the order of 5.04 meters - so there should be a roughly 10-meter-wide circle around most 'Mechs where they would be incapable of hitting the ground.
(The Locust, with its 60-degree arm pitch angle on top of its 20-degree torso pitch angle & an assumed height of approximately 8-9 meters, could reduce the diameter of the circle to approximately 3 meters - it couldn't shoot its own feet, but it comes close.)

The A-Pods (and, eventually, B-Pods?) could then provide a 'Mech with protection against any infantry (or Battle Armor) consumable that is dropped within the circle where it just can't aim low enough with its normal weapons and begins attacking the legs (the equivalent of a TT "leg attack").

[Carrie Harder]

Strum Wealh, on 23 August 2014 - 04:51 PM, said:

Being able to "aim at the ground" is not the same thing as being able to "aim at one's own feet" - and even those 'Mechs with full actuator sets in both arms cannot do the latter.

-pic-

In fact, now that I've double-checked against the above image (from Smurfy), the LCTs are the only 'Mech that can pitch their arms downward (or upward) by more than 50 degrees, with most 'Mechs being unable to pitch their arms downward (or upward) by more than 40 degrees.

-pic-

For most 'Mechs, θ (the complementary angle to the sum of torso pitch & arm pitch angle) is going to be on the order of 40 degrees (since most 'Mechs can pitch their torso down by 20 degrees & can pitch their arms down by an additional 30 degrees; 90 - 20 - 30 = 40), and h (the height of the 'Mech's weapons from the ground) is usually going to be on the order of 6-9 meters if the 'Mech has elbows, so the distance r (the closest distance at which it can hit the ground) would be on the order of 5.04 meters - so there should be a roughly 10-meter-wide circle around most 'Mechs where they would be incapable of hitting the ground.
(The Locust, with its 60-degree arm pitch angle on top of its 20-degree torso pitch angle & an assumed height of approximately 8-9 meters, could reduce the diameter of the circle to approximately 3 meters - it couldn't shoot its own feet, but it comes close.)

The A-Pods (and, eventually, B-Pods?) could then provide a 'Mech with protection against any infantry (or Battle Armor) consumable that is dropped within the circle where it just can't aim low enough with its normal weapons and begins attacking the legs (the equivalent of a TT "leg attack").

You don't need to literally aim at your own feet to deal with troopers running around. The pitch angles down are more than enough most of the time, unless maybe you're on fairly elevated ground above the target. Go to testing grounds with any of the mechs you talked about above at you'll see that something has to get VERY close in order to escape your vertical firing arc.

In the rare situations where you failed to tap them with a hitscan DoT laser pointer before they get that close, you have several options:

A. Run them over
B. Use reverse throttle to outrun them, because IIRC infantry can only move 1 hex per turn (which means even a non-elited Dire Whale can outrun them by a huge margin)
C. Maybe even turn the whole mech into a different direction to outrun them, for faster speed than going backwards
D. Jump jet over them (if applicable)


Dedicating tonnage and critical slots to items that only help in fairly rare circumstances is a waste, especially if there are other ways to prevent/deal with those circumstances which aren't specialized for only one job and can be used more than once per match. Equipping items that kill everything with equal effectiveness (and get to fire more than one time) is generally a better choice.

Edited by Carrie Harder, 23 August 2014 - 05:03 PM.

[mithril coyote]

Carrie Harder, on 23 August 2014 - 02:41 PM, said:

Except you could just aim any laser of your choice at the ground and kill infantry just as quickly, because MWO doesn't have artificial damage inflation/deflation against certain targets like TT did (i.e. a Flamer did 2 damage normally, or 4d6 [4-24 damage] against unarmored infantry).

Specialized anti-infantry-only equipment is utterly pointless if you can manually just aim and them and kill them with a sweeping laser beam.

actually, the game does has damage reduction programmed in.. turrets. when closed they take like 1% of normal damage. this is why it takes so long to kill them when they are closed, but they die quick once they pop up.

and it seems likely that instead of 28 tiny individual sprites, they'll treat infantry units as basically one unit that just looks like 28 seperate targets. at which point a similar damage reduction would need to come into play. certainly controlling each platoon as a single sprite would make the server load lighter.

Edited by mithril coyote, 23 August 2014 - 05:03 PM.

[Carrie Harder]

mithril coyote, on 23 August 2014 - 05:02 PM, said:

actually, the game does has damage reduction programmed in.. turrets. when closed they take like 1% of normal damage. this is why it takes so long to kill them when they are closed, but they die quick once they pop up.

and it seems likely that instead of 28 tiny individual sprites, they'll treat them as basically one unit that just looks like 28 seperate targets. at which point a similar damage reduction would need to come into play. certainly controlling each platoon as a single sprite would make the server load lighter.

Having the troopers count as a single, combined health pool would be awkward. It would be kinda weird to see the sprites getting directly hit by massive mech-mounted weapons without the sprite being aimed at dying. Even a Small Laser would immolate any human it touched (unless wearing battle armor or something of that sort) because it has the power to burn off a small amount of mech armor...human flesh is much less durable than giant robot armor.

The turrets are more of a damage resistance against all damage types kind of deal rather than something like "magic" type weapons doing triple damage to "psionic" type units or something like that.

Edited by Carrie Harder, 23 August 2014 - 05:10 PM.

[Fiona Marshe]

A one-shot 360 degree LBX with a 30m effective range could work as an analogue.

Not perfect but since the camera is locked, the only way to aim it.

[Strum Wealh]

Carrie Harder, on 23 August 2014 - 05:00 PM, said:

You don't need to literally aim at your own feet to deal with troopers running around. The pitch angles down are more than enough most of the time, unless maybe you're on fairly elevated ground above the target. Go to testing grounds with any of the mechs you talked about above at you'll see that something has to get VERY close in order to escape your vertical firing arc.

In the rare situations where you failed to tap them with a hitscan DoT laser pointer before they get that close, you have several options:

A. Run them over
B. Use reverse throttle to outrun them, because IIRC infantry can only move 1 hex per turn (which means even a non-elited Dire Whale can outrun them by a huge margin)
C. Maybe even turn the whole mech into a different direction to outrun them, for faster speed than going backwards
D. Jump jet over them (if applicable)


Dedicating tonnage and critical slots to items that only help in fairly rare circumstances is a waste, especially if there are other ways to prevent/deal with those circumstances which aren't specialized for only one job and can be used more than once per match. Equipping items that kill everything with equal effectiveness (and get to fire more than one time) is generally a better choice.

Much of that assumes that one sees them coming before one's legs start taking damage (which is unlikely to be the case for constant-zoom snipers & most missile boats, among others).

It also depends on how it'd be implemented - the actual implementation could be something along the lines of "a bunch of guys pop out of the ground (as though emerging from spider holes), plant satchel charges on your 'Mech's legs, and run before the charges blow" - kind of like a weaker arty strike that comes up from the ground instead of dropping from above.
They might even make the spawn/de-rez cycle fast enough that one mightn't be able to target them, or might just make them invulnerable to enemy fire (or do both, with the former serving to largely disguise the latter.)

Then, the A-Pods could be automatic defensive measures that would go off on their own, one at a time, in the event that an infantry consumable was activated within so-many-meters of a 'Mech, much like how AMS goes off whenever an enemy missile comes within a certain distance.

[Bishop Steiner]

Joseph Mallan, on 23 August 2014 - 12:40 PM, said:

No personnel... no pods I would assume. OR it could be a one shot doing 1-2 damage to a leg humping Mech.

I actually like that idea, though for their weight, it should act like a 1 shot LB-10x or LB-20x, triggering when an enemy mech is detected within 100 meters of your rear. Might have to give them a "global cooldown" like arty strike tho.


Of course, it might also do some FF splash damage, but that's half the fun!

Could you imagine the rage howling when a cherry legged spider thought they were sneaking up on you, then "pow" and dead?

Edited by Bishop Steiner, 23 August 2014 - 06:26 PM.