98 replies to this topic

[Jazzbandit1313]

After a three week hiatus whilst awaiting my new GTX760 (I fried my last one - don't ask) I patched and hopped on MWO. I played at least 5 rounds each of the trial clan mechs.

I have to say, after being a strong IS advocate and arguing that the clammers were OP so many times, that my mind has changed! Now, mind you, I only played in the two trial builds, so I didn't get to use many of the clan weapons, but I can clearly distinguish that the style of play is somewhat different that IS, but not harder or easier. I know many of you may think differently, but Clans and IS have two similar but different types of gameplay involving varying strategies and types of gameplay.

I won't get into the whole, pros and cons of each, because it reeeeeally comes down to personal opinion and how you play, but I truly believe now that the Clan mechs are *mostly balanced. I even feel bad for clan mech owners because of the upcoming nerfhammer about to be smashed upon their heads.

So, I digress, and apologize for any misgivings I have caused anyone by insulting the clans in the past, and I urge anyone who still believes that they're OP to take a clan mech out for a stroll.

*There are some issues with a few weapons here and there...Clan PPC's being too low heat, etc....but still beam durations are killer long and engine caps SUCK

[Bishop Steiner]

Jazzbandit1313, on 04 September 2014 - 05:46 AM, said:

After a three week hiatus whilst awaiting my new GTX760 (I fried my last one - don't ask) I patched and hopped on MWO. I played at least 5 rounds each of the trial clan mechs.

I have to say, after being a strong IS advocate and arguing that the clammers were OP so many times, that my mind has changed! Now, mind you, I only played in the two trial builds, so I didn't get to use many of the clan weapons, but I can clearly distinguish that the style of play is somewhat different that IS, but not harder or easier. I know many of you may think differently, but Clans and IS have two similar but different types of gameplay involving varying strategies and types of gameplay.

I won't get into the whole, pros and cons of each, because it reeeeeally comes down to personal opinion and how you play, but I truly believe now that the Clan mechs are *mostly balanced. I even feel bad for clan mech owners because of the upcoming nerfhammer about to be smashed upon their heads.

So, I digress, and apologize for any misgivings I have caused anyone by insulting the clans in the past, and I urge anyone who still believes that they're OP to take a clan mech out for a stroll.

*There are some issues with a few weapons here and there...Clan PPC's being too low heat, etc....but still beam durations are killer long and engine caps SUCK

seriously, even Clan PPCs cannot survive more nerfing. Might as well remove PPCs altogether before making them even weaker.

[Joseph Mallan]

the scary thing is the are some players out there that would support you suggestion Bishop!

Edited by Joseph Mallan, 04 September 2014 - 05:55 AM.

[AlmightyAeng]

After jumping into the Trial Nova, I managed to average 600 damage a match between 9 games. Without double heatsinks or the heat skills maxed out, I can only imagine how much more dangerous it could be. Granted, I've also been working on rocking Clan 'mechs in my favorite Firebrand build...so I'm not complaining...but I did seem to rack up damage much easier in the Nova.

I didn't try the trial Kitfox, as it doesn't have ECM. It'd be like basing my opinion of IS 'mechs off of a Raven-4X.

[Carrie Harder]

Bishop Steiner, on 04 September 2014 - 05:52 AM, said:

seriously, even Clan PPCs cannot survive more nerfing. Might as well remove PPCs altogether before making them even weaker.

I've heard rumors that hitscan lasers are the 'meta' now. Lol. Even one particular HoL Ember pilot mentioned that PPFLD isn't the "king" anymore, and that lazors have the advantage (see Victor Drake's thread). I don't fully believe it, but it is what it is I guess...

Edited by Carrie Harder, 04 September 2014 - 06:00 AM.

[Ultimax]

Ghost Badger, on 04 September 2014 - 05:56 AM, said:

After jumping into the Trial Nova, I managed to average 600 damage a match between 9 games. Without double heatsinks or the heat skills maxed out, I can only imagine how much more dangerous it could be. Granted, I've also been working on rocking Clan 'mechs in my favorite Firebrand build...so I'm not complaining...but I did seem to rack up damage much easier in the Nova.

I didn't try the trial Kitfox, as it doesn't have ECM. It'd be like basing my opinion of IS 'mechs off of a Raven-4X.

The trial nova does have dual heat sinks, all clan mechs have them standard.

[Joseph Mallan]

Carrie Harder, on 04 September 2014 - 05:58 AM, said:

I've heard rumors that hitscan lasers are the 'meta' now. Lol. Even one particular HoL Ember pilot mentioned that PPFLD isn't the "king" anymore, and that lazors have the advantage (see Victor Drake's thread). I don't fully believe it, but it is what it is I guess...

[AlmightyAeng]

Ultimatum X, on 04 September 2014 - 06:00 AM, said:

The trial nova does have dual heat sinks, all clan mechs have them standard.

Ah. Good point, hadn't thought about that...since I can't open it in the mechlab. Still...the skills make quite a difference, too.

[Bishop Steiner]

Ghost Badger, on 04 September 2014 - 05:56 AM, said:

After jumping into the Trial Nova, I managed to average 600 damage a match between 9 games. Without double heatsinks or the heat skills maxed out, I can only imagine how much more dangerous it could be. Granted, I've also been working on rocking Clan 'mechs in my favorite Firebrand build...so I'm not complaining...but I did seem to rack up damage much easier in the Nova.

I didn't try the trial Kitfox, as it doesn't have ECM. It'd be like basing my opinion of IS 'mechs off of a Raven-4X.

Trial Nova has Double Heatsinks.


Also, crappy hitboxes. Any focus fire amputates a limb pretty near instantly.

As for damage? Easy to do high damage in Clan Mechs. Not so easy to do focused damage and high kills. I find my damage to be slightly higher (9 matches you have not even remotely begun to equalize and stabilize your results, just wait til the Elo YoYo goes the other way), but my Kills are actually lower, for damage done.

With the Nova, I find matches I remember to twist, my damage goes up a lot...because I am splashing laser damage everywhere. But if you want focused, kill damage, you have to stare....a situation the Nova is not well advised for, usually.

Admittedly, better survivability also plays a factor in Clan Mech play, as any IS mech with a Novas hitboxes would be an XL Deathtrap.

Edited by Bishop Steiner, 04 September 2014 - 06:16 AM.

[Mott]

Joseph Mallan, on 04 September 2014 - 05:54 AM, said:

the scary thing is the are some players out there that would support you suggestion Bishop!

There is no need for assault class ppcs!

You should be able to do just fine with hunting ppcs.

[AlmightyAeng]

Bishop Steiner, on 04 September 2014 - 06:14 AM, said:

Trial Nova has Double Heatsinks.


Also, crappy hitboxes. Any focus fire amputates a limb pretty near instantly.

As for damage? Easy to do high damage in Clan Mechs. Not so easy to do focused damage and high kills. I find my damage to be slightly higher (9 matches you have not even remotely begun to equalize and stabilize your results, just wait til the Elo YoYo goes the other way), but my Kills are actually lower, for damage done.

With the Nova, I find matches I remember to twist, my damage goes up a lot...because I am splashing laser damage everywhere. But if you want focused, kill damage, you have to stare....a situation the Nova is not well advised for, usually.

Admittedly, better survivability also plays a factor in Clan Mech play, as any IS mech with a Novas hitboxes would be an XL Deathtrap.

*shrug* I don't plan on throwing down for Clan Mechs anytime soon...just tooled around a bit in a trial, and noted the differences between gameplay in IS mechs the same night. Nothing definitive, just anecdotal

[Octantis]

@Jazzbandit1313 I couldn't agree more. Once the clans came out I cracked open the wallet and bought a Timber Wolf to see what the big deal was. Initially I wasn't too impressed. Long laser burn times, burst ACs, and long cool downs go a long way to balancing out clan weapons. Toss in locked engines and some item locations and I found the Clans to be less customizable. For instance you can run dual Gauss on a Timber Wolf. Technically you can do it but only with 4 tons of ammo.

I found that running IS lights against clan mechs (especially after ppc nerf) to be almost comical; provided you don't do the circle of death and instead do strafing runs. The Front Loaded Damage of a clan mech is so low lights almost have free reign.

The one mech that made the clans so powerful was the Dire Whale or a UAC boat DW. If I walked around a corner and saw that guy I knew my time left in game is quickly coming to an end. Even if he didn't take a torso off it would be so damaged the remaining lrm spam would surely rip it off. The PPC nerf seemed to help this at least a medium to long range.

In my opinion I think that most people that complain about clans haven't yet run one of the mechs. Doing so you'll see their weaknesses and tactics can adjust to handle it. The PGI test with 90% clan winning can't be denied so some changes should occur but for an initial release of new weapons systems I think they got it pretty close.

[KingCobra]

Octantis

(In my opinion I think that most people that complain about clans haven't yet run one of the mechs. Doing so you'll see their weaknesses and tactics can adjust to handle it. The PGI test with 90% clan winning can't be denied so some changes should occur but for an initial release of new weapons systems I think they got it pretty close. )
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After running the clan mechs I can truly say there screwed now PGI should have left them alone no nerfs and fixed the InnerSphere mechs first but PGI is lazy and not very smart. Sure the Clan mechs took x2 the damage and have x4 the cooling that IS mechs have but I think PGI went the wrong direction once again.

Edited by KingCobra, 04 September 2014 - 06:44 AM.

[Moomtazz]

Ghost Badger, on 04 September 2014 - 05:56 AM, said:

After jumping into the Trial Nova, I managed to average 600 damage a match between 9 games.

Is there any way to prove this?

[DaZur]

Joseph Mallan, on 04 September 2014 - 05:54 AM, said:

the scary thing is the are some players out there that would support you suggestion Bishop!

We'e discussed this before 1000 times...

There is a segment of this player base that will not be happy until we all are piloting beige boxes with a single sLas (or CsLas) and 1000 hit-points.

Welcome to MW:O - Pillow Fight Edition.

[Mott]

Moomtazz, on 04 September 2014 - 06:52 AM, said:

Is there any way to prove this?

Yeah, pilot one yourself. lol

That was my immediate performance/reaction to both the Nova (600+dmg matches regularly) and the Stormcrow (750+ dmg matches regularly).

But as an earlier poster mentioned, jumps in damage =/= better matches, increased kills or more wins. Splashing tons of lasers all over the place leads to lots of damage. But I had to refine my game to translate that spike in damage to more kills.

Once i refined my builds to include more CERPPCs, CLB10Xs, etc, my damage dropped a bit, but my kills increased. Now my clan mech stats are about the same as my best IS mech stats.

[Viges]

Ghost Badger, on 04 September 2014 - 06:07 AM, said:

Ah. Good point, hadn't thought about that...since I can't open it in the mechlab. Still...the skills make quite a difference, too.

Mech details (blue button in the bottom right corner), then choose equipment tab.

UI2.0

Spoiler

[Sandpit]

I'm actually glad I saved my money regarding the clans. I got to toy around with them on the last PST and I was sincerely underwhelmed by them. They were definitely "cool" but nothing special. They're exactly what we had before their release, just different stats and colors.

I regularly eat Dires and timbers for lunch with my Misery. So I don't see them as "op", unfortunately Russ stated "the analytics scream OP" so that's where we're headed because that's PGI's latest audience

[Ultimax]

Carrie Harder, on 04 September 2014 - 05:58 AM, said:

I've heard rumors that hitscan lasers are the 'meta' now. Lol. Even one particular HoL Ember pilot mentioned that PPFLD isn't the "king" anymore, and that lazors have the advantage (see Victor Drake's thread). I don't fully believe it, but it is what it is I guess...

He's right.

[Mott]

Sandpit, on 04 September 2014 - 06:57 AM, said:

I regularly eat Dires and timbers for lunch with my Misery. So I don't see them as "op", unfortunately Russ stated "the analytics scream OP" so that's where we're headed because that's PGI's latest audience

QFT
I own a 6 clan mechs, including the DW... and it's just not that scary.

I've now gone back to IS mechs and leveling my Stalkers for exactly that reason - squashing DWs, WHKs & TBRs.

It's just too bad the whiners crying for nerfs can't open their eyes/mind to see that they already have the tools available to beat the boogeymen.

PS: A meta Victor will also still ruin a TBR's day.