55 replies to this topic

[Dauphni]

It seems to me that the increased cooldown at high heat levels that exponential decay gives would actually stimulate high heat alpha strikes rather than dissuade them, which is the whole reasoning behind ghost heat. Since high heat is dissipated so rapidly, you can alpha again far earlier under your system. Just look at your own first graph: if I'm running 60% heat alphas with 22 SHS, I can fire them all again after only 5 seconds with exponential decay, which is barely longer than the cycle times of most weapons. With linear decay, that time is about 14 seconds. Taking that in mind, what you're proposing is actually going to do exactly the opposite if what you're intending.

Also, your system is completely disregarding the way this game is actually played. Exponential decay is nice when you're firing for extended periods of time, but that virtually never happens. Fighting from cover is key, if you expose yourself for too long slugging away at your opponents you're going to attract more attention than you can handle and you're dead. It's as simple as that.

So no, while ghost heat sucks and should never have been, this might actually be worse.

[Solis Obscuri]

Uite Dauphni, on 15 September 2014 - 05:03 PM, said:

It seems to me that the increased cooldown at high heat levels that exponential decay gives would actually stimulate high heat alpha strikes rather than dissuade them, which is the whole reasoning behind ghost heat. Since high heat is dissipated so rapidly, you can alpha again far earlier under your system.

This was my impression as well, though I'm having trouble getting some of the graphs to load on my work PC or my phone, so I'd need to review those later.

I would also note that due to heat sinks canonically working more like a form of heat pump, cooling rate is more a function of the efficiency of the heat sinks themselves than as treating the entire battlemech as though it were a superheated cooling fin made uniformly of a highly conductive isotropic material.



Lastly, I'd note that I find obviously biased polling options that insult dissenters are usually a reliable indicator of low quality suggestions.

Edited by Solis Obscuri, 15 September 2014 - 05:37 PM.

[Ancient Demise]

I honestly suggest downloading the excel file and trying the calculator your self. 22 SHS is about the middle for either situation.

Did you mean 60% of the current heat model or 60% of my proposed heat model. Both have very different max heats so the 60% means two very different heat values.

60% alpha of 22 would be 13.2 heat. In Table Top you would only need 14 heat sinks to remain heat neutral. In this case (and in TT) you are running a very heat efficient build. In Table Top you will never overheat unless you loose most of those heat sinks. With exponential you will max out around 16 heat, still hotter than table top but enough to stay cool with this model. The point is those extra 8 heat sinks are wasted pod space. To make an efficient build you could actually achieve a balance between the heat of weapons and the number of heat sinks.

As it is, once you get hot you have to drastically reduce your firing rate, but even if you fire once every 5 seconds you will still only be at 21 heat. Remember with the linear model the max heat would be about 52, meaning you could keep firing 13.2 heat every 5 seconds for about a minute before overheating!!!

If you meant 60% heat alpha in the linear model... max heat 52, 60% = 31.2 heat... This is over twice as much heat as 60% and is not an apt comparison to a 13.2 heat alpha.


If fighting from cover to cover is key (and you are waiting to cool down or to get out of fire), most times you will not notice a difference between linear and exponential. If you are firing a LOT you either have to use extra weight on heat sinks or carefully manage your heat - a trade off you can choose. As it is with the supposed 10 second simulated turn, you have no choice. Almost no builds can run truly heat neutral.

Solis Obscuri, on 15 September 2014 - 05:36 PM, said:

I would also note that due to heat sinks canonically working more like a form of heat pump, cooling rate is more a function of the efficiency of the heat sinks themselves than as treating the entire battlemech as though it were a superheated cooling fin made uniformly of a highly conductive isotropic material.


Lastly, I'd note that I find obviously biased polling options that insult dissenters are usually a reliable indicator of low quality suggestions.

Yes, you are absolutely right about mech heat sinks. However, I am considering the transfer of heat from the weapons to the heat pumps that run through the mech, which is still an issue of thermal conductivity. Assume that the heat sinks themselves are effectively thermal reservoirs at zero BT heat units. We are looking at how quickly the heat transfers to the heat pumps (quicker for more because more heat "sinks" means more volume can "hold" and dissipate heat) without having to deal with the coefficient of performance (exponentially less % the smaller the temperature difference) from the ideal Carnot cycle. We could add in the transfer of heat in such pumps but that is another level of complexity. It is simpler to look at the mech (minus the heat sinks) as a single control volume and approximate from there.

The external heat will still affect the cooling of the mech to some extent. It is essentially a constant heat level that the heat pumps are working against. In the case of a colder environment the mech will cool faster through convection.

Loganauer, on 10 September 2014 - 06:28 PM, said:

Well, this is embarrassing. There isn't a summary, so I have to skip through a lot of math and charts and it looks like you're suggesting changes to the actual weapon systems which is entirely unnecessary (for this problem)

Sorry, I will put up a summary. The intent was for people to read it and try it themselves to grasp just what this system can do for the game. The weapon changes, while peripheral to the core problem, are somewhat necessary to completely balance the system. Ideally I would see all values of the weapons modified as seen there. At the very least the heat per second should be examined.




As for that poll option... If you are going to vote no without saying why you are not helping anyone. It is rather abrasive of me, but if people who vote no can actually contribute to the discussion maybe we can get somewhere. And there are plenty of unbiased options - I cannot think of a condition I missed.

Edited by Ancient Demise, 15 September 2014 - 06:00 PM.

[Nothing Whatsoever]

I like the idea of exponential decay with heat dissipation (still tinkering with the excel file calculator you provided), but I'd make sure to set the heat cap to 30 max for automatic shutdown, and incorporate heat penalties.

Here is an example of what I'd like to see considered:


So, if we fire weapons that push heat above 18 (might be able to keep 14 as in the original, if I'm following how the math works, but 18 is safer to get this tested depending on what the cryengine can handle), the mech would shutdown, unless Shut Down was overridden before firing and face any appropriate heat penalties.

[Timuroslav]

I like exponential decay, but my fear is the heat threshold. If the heat threshold is too high; we go back to Alpha Assaults are us, and the giant arms race begins again. Then again an assault mech firing one weapon when it's at 80% with impunity does not make much sense either.

People expect double heat sinks to do double the work. I'm inclined to believe that, if it were not for the fact that 1 heat sink weighs the same as 1 double heatsink. That makes no sense either given the mass and the critical slot size. 1 Double heat sink should be double the weight and double the effectiveness. On the exponential scale of course. The Critical slot system was designed to reflect component size, even if it is a bit obscure.
ie: Why does the Hunchback 4G's AC20 smaller than an ACK 40 Barrel? How does a Blackjack have an AC 20 that looks like an AC2?

But, if we set the heat threshold into the game Much much lower?
Well then we might have viable light mechs and Medium mechs again.

Your Exponential heat decay is interesting because it has the potential to make medium and light mechs viable with heat threshold.

Edited by Timuroslav, 15 September 2014 - 08:13 PM.

[Kmieciu]

I would like the SHS to be viable. I would like the stock builds to be usable. But NOT-buying DHS isn't in PGI's best interest so this idea is doomed from the start. Better to concentrate how to balance mechs using DHS. DHS are default on clan mechs and they are the new meta.

There should be penalties for running hot. Right now, if you override and go over 100% you will die in a couple of seconds. But you can stay on 99% all day with no negative consequences.

I say let them group fire any number of lasers together. Let them fire 6xPPC! But introduce a gradual slowdown when you reach 60% and a chance of ammunition explosion when you reach 80%. Poptarting is dead right now, so any mech that fires that many energy weapons at a time will slow down to a crawl and will become the perfect target for the whole enemy team. He won't be able to escape from LRMs.

Right now Timberwolves and Stormcrows run around the battlefield at 90-110 kph non stop firing all their lasers with impunity. 25 DHS and a heat capacity of 78 that you can use with no downside. Why would you want to have cool running weapons, when you can run hot all the time?

Now imagine what would happen if the TimberWolf slowed down to 45 kph while at 90% heat?

Edited by Kmieciu, 16 September 2014 - 03:41 AM.

[Karl Streiger]

It's a really interesting read. And i have to say thanks for the work. I can see the benefit of exponential decay and i will play around with those ideas.

But the heat system in BattleTech is a simple mechanic and thus easy to understand. So the first question is - can you make you suggestion plain and simple?
No First Law of Thermodynamics, no thermal conductivity - well try to explain your system a 13year old pupil.

For example your proposal still has only one "penalty" for overheating -> shutdown.
Wouldn't be a "true" BT heat penalty work either?

The current MWO heat scale has a dissipation rating of BT Tabletop - 1 heat point per heat sink in 10seconds. And of course because of real time, it has the threshold value (that causes problems and is the reason for Ghost Heat) - wouldn't be the often suggested lower heat cap - higher dissipation + heat scale penalties have the same or better effect as an exponential decay?

What about the problems - of a lower dissipation at the lower end? I know its realistic - but from the "Gaming" point of view - for example the good old 3-2-3-2 PPC Awesome - wouldn't a reduced dissipation at the lower end automatically make this fire pattern impossible?
Exponential means also it will hardly reach zero right?

And there is another "problem" with this increased heat reduction at higher levels - its possible to create a Mech that heat up to a specific level - and at this level keeps heat neutral. Depending on weapons an heat sinks.
While a Jenner may work heatneutral at a level of 30% a Timber Wolf would be almost heatneutral at 80% - while firing tons of weapons.

I would be glad if you can answer - my questions (and yes its possible that i didn't get all the informations)

[Ancient Demise]

Okay... I will try to answer everyone's questions. Let me know if I missed anything.

Praetor Knight, on 15 September 2014 - 07:12 PM, said:

I like the idea of exponential decay with heat dissipation (still tinkering with the excel file calculator you provided), but I'd make sure to set the heat cap to 30 max for automatic shutdown, and incorporate heat penalties.

Here is an example of what I'd like to see considered:


So, if we fire weapons that push heat above 18 (might be able to keep 14 as in the original, if I'm following how the math works, but 18 is safer to get this tested depending on what the cryengine can handle), the mech would shutdown, unless Shut Down was overridden before firing and face any appropriate heat penalties.

The only thing I am worried about is with a max heat of 30 for every chassis, there is no real limit to what low effective-heat-sink builds can do. More SHS or DHS and you cool slightly faster but with 10 SHS you could do a lot. Making the max heat equal to the number of effective heat sinks restricts the alpha strike for anything less than 30 SHS or 15 DHS. Sure the alpha is a little higher the more heat sinks you cram on there, but you will still be running pretty hot overall.

What about spreading these penalties equally between 60 and 100% of the max heat as defined by effective heat sinks. That is to say



This is certainly interesting. Maybe we should reexamine this at 80%-100%? Or lessen the explosion chances? Or just try it and see what happens. What do you think?

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Timuroslav, on 15 September 2014 - 08:10 PM, said:

I like exponential decay, but my fear is the heat threshold. If the heat threshold is too high; we go back to Alpha Assaults are us, and the giant arms race begins again. Then again an assault mech firing one weapon when it's at 80% with impunity does not make much sense either.

People expect double heat sinks to do double the work. I'm inclined to believe that, if it were not for the fact that 1 heat sink weighs the same as 1 double heatsink. That makes no sense either given the mass and the critical slot size. 1 Double heat sink should be double the weight and double the effectiveness. On the exponential scale of course. The Critical slot system was designed to reflect component size, even if it is a bit obscure.
ie: Why does the Hunchback 4G's AC20 smaller than an ACK 40 Barrel? How does a Blackjack have an AC 20 that looks like an AC2?

But, if we set the heat threshold into the game Much much lower?
Well then we might have viable light mechs and Medium mechs again.

Your Exponential heat decay is interesting because it has the potential to make medium and light mechs viable with heat threshold.

A lower max heat would limit this and in most cases you would only see alpha strikes that were possible in Table Top without going into the heat penalty range. If, under normal circumstances, you can sink it in one turn in TT, you can alpha it in MWO. This is what makes those stock builds, lights, and mediums more viable.

In BT lore double heat sinks DO do double the work. The are twice as efficient with the trade off being more critical slots. All weapon and component critical slots directly reflect those of TT because of the inclusion of stock lore builds, hence why it seems obscure. Since PGI wants canon builds in the game and wants to do mech construction by the same TT rules, I would argue that they will not change any component size in the mechlab. The visual component size and scaling, however is handled by the art team at pgi, albeit rather poorly.

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Kmieciu, on 16 September 2014 - 03:30 AM, said:

I would like the SHS to be viable. I would like the stock builds to be usable. But NOT-buying DHS isn't in PGI's best interest so this idea is doomed from the start. Better to concentrate how to balance mechs using DHS. DHS are default on clan mechs and they are the new meta.

There should be penalties for running hot. Right now, if you override and go over 100% you will die in a couple of seconds. But you can stay on 99% all day with no negative consequences.

I say let them group fire any number of lasers together. Let them fire 6xPPC! But introduce a gradual slowdown when you reach 60% and a chance of ammunition explosion when you reach 80%. Poptarting is dead right now, so any mech that fires that many energy weapons at a time will slow down to a crawl and will become the perfect target for the whole enemy team. He won't be able to escape from LRMs.

Right now Timberwolves and Stormcrows run around the battlefield at 90-110 kph non stop firing all their lasers with impunity. 25 DHS and a heat capacity of 78 that you can use with no downside. Why would you want to have cool running weapons, when you can run hot all the time?

Now imagine what would happen if the TimberWolf slowed down to 45 kph while at 90% heat?

Well people would certainly still buy those Doubles. Having doubles in place of singles means you can save weight and add some more weapons while still retaining the same or better heat efficiency (as long as you have the pod space). There are a few instances where singles are still better than doubles - when you have the tonnage but not necessarily the pod space. I wager that just as many people would still buy DHS just to max out their heat and damage efficiencies. Since the gap between SHS and DHS would be smaller, stock SHS builds, most trial mechs, and those few that cannot yet afford DHS or do not have room for them would suddenly be able to hold their own against other maxed out builds.

Yes, I am all for penalties. What do you think of what I wrote up there?^^^

-----------------------------------------

Karl Streiger, on 16 September 2014 - 04:18 AM, said:

It's a really interesting read. And i have to say thanks for the work. I can see the benefit of exponential decay and i will play around with those ideas.

But the heat system in BattleTech is a simple mechanic and thus easy to understand. So the first question is - can you make you suggestion plain and simple?
No First Law of Thermodynamics, no thermal conductivity - well try to explain your system a 13year old pupil.

For example your proposal still has only one "penalty" for overheating -> shutdown.
Wouldn't be a "true" BT heat penalty work either?

The current MWO heat scale has a dissipation rating of BT Tabletop - 1 heat point per heat sink in 10seconds. And of course because of real time, it has the threshold value (that causes problems and is the reason for Ghost Heat) - wouldn't be the often suggested lower heat cap - higher dissipation + heat scale penalties have the same or better effect as an exponential decay?

What about the problems - of a lower dissipation at the lower end? I know its realistic - but from the "Gaming" point of view - for example the good old 3-2-3-2 PPC Awesome - wouldn't a reduced dissipation at the lower end automatically make this fire pattern impossible?
Exponential means also it will hardly reach zero right?

And there is another "problem" with this increased heat reduction at higher levels - its possible to create a Mech that heat up to a specific level - and at this level keeps heat neutral. Depending on weapons an heat sinks.
While a Jenner may work heatneutral at a level of 30% a Timber Wolf would be almost heatneutral at 80% - while firing tons of weapons.

I would be glad if you can answer - my questions (and yes its possible that i didn't get all the informations)

Happy to help!
Okay let's see if I can hit all those questions in one shot.


1. But the heat system in BattleTech is a simple mechanic and thus easy to understand. So the first question is - can you make you suggestion plain and simple? No First Law of Thermodynamics, no thermal conductivity - well try to explain your system a 13year old pupil.

A: I can sure try.

This proposal aims to balance gameplay, encourage more heat neutral builds, and simulate real physics better than the current heat system in MWO.

In real life physics a high heat source like a cutting torch will transfer heat across a solid object much quicker than a low heat source like a candle. At the same time a hotter object will cool faster than a warm object. In MWO a hotter object will cool at the same speed as a warm object.

In real life, to calculate how hot two heat sources will make an object you simply add their heat. In MWO, a third imaginary heat is applied to this calculation.

The heat you generate from firing your weapons will go away faster the hotter you are. As your heat level approaches zero, the mech cools slower and slower. This means that when you chain fire a lot of low heat weapons your heat will balance out at a certain temperature. It also means that if you alpha strike or are really hot your mech will cool down pretty quickly at first and then start to level out.

The max heat level should be equal to the number of heat sinks you have, each single heat sink counting as 1 and each double counting as 2. This will prevent anyone from firing too many weapons at the same time because you will overheat very quickly. However, because you also cool down quickly you can fire some more weapons without having to wait a long time.

Additionally, firing low heat weapons will make your heat rise to however hot those weapons are because of the math used to calculate your heat level. In MWO your heat will constantly decrease to zero at a certain rate, so if you fire something that gives you 1 heat it will never show up on your heat scale.




2. For example your proposal still has only one "penalty" for overheating -> shutdown.
Wouldn't be a "true" BT heat penalty work either?

A: A "true" BT heat penalty would be better, but I did not include it because we have not decided just how it should work (also because it is not in the game now) Also let me know what you think of that chart ^^^




3. The current MWO heat scale has a dissipation rating of BT Tabletop - 1 heat point per heat sink in 10seconds. And of course because of real time, it has the threshold value (that causes problems and is the reason for Ghost Heat) - wouldn't be the often suggested lower heat cap - higher dissipation + heat scale penalties have the same or better effect as an exponential decay?

A: In the higher register it would be very similar to exponential decay but it still differs on a couple key points.

1.) Double heat sinks are truly double (not 1.4) and the difference in effectiveness between 10 single heat sinks and 10 double heat sinks is much lower. Remember they said doubles would never be true doubles outside of the engine because that would make mechs cool down too fast.

2.) Firing low heat level weapons or firing a single high heat weapon with a lot of heat sinks barely makes a blip on MWO's heat scale simply because the linear equation is a function of heat sinks and time. The exponential equation also factors in current heat level making any heat generation weapon actually generate heat. Remember they made the CERLL hotter because it barely registered on most Dire Wolf builds with lot of heat sinks. (See also condition 23 in first post [shown below])

Dire Wolf: 4x cERLL (9 heat), 100 tons, 33 DHS (efficiency 0.51) (t interval = 0.25s)
Initial heat = 0. 9 heat every 5.5 seconds (6 times)

Quote

This comes out to about 9.5% heat for the exponential model and 0% heat for the linear model. It is an extreme case because anyone putting that many heat sinks for 4 large lasers is wasting a lot of pod space and will probably still die pretty quickly.

Additionally, Jump Jets would create heat instead of slowing the rate of decay, flamers could and would behave differently...

3.) Heat at low levels would take a fair (but reasonable) amount of time to dissipate. That means if you had an instant alpha strike heat value equal to your effective heat sinks, you would still not be able to fire safely until it dropped almost all the way down. With a higher linear sink rate you could fire a lot more often. (I say instant meaning PPC or AC20. Because lasers generate all their heat over the course of their exposure time the max alpha heat level would be a little less).




4. What about the problems - of a lower dissipation at the lower end? I know its realistic - but from the "Gaming" point of view - for example the good old 3-2-3-2 PPC Awesome - wouldn't a reduced dissipation at the lower end automatically make this fire pattern impossible?

A: It is not the reduced dissipation at the low end that makes this fire pattern impossible but the max heat itself. The awesome can fire PPCs in a 2-1-2-1 configuration. It can even fire 2-2-2-2 indefinitely. See condition 13 in original post [reposted below]. This is an Awesome firing full PPC alphas as soon as he can. A slight 1 or 2 second pause with the Mech Tree heat capacity bonus unlocked should be sufficient to allow full 3-2-3-2 or 3-pause-3 firing.

Quote

Condition 13:
Awesome 8Q: 3x PPC (10 heat), 1x SLas (2 heat), 80 tons, 28 SHS
Initial heat = 0. 30 heat every 4 seconds (8 times)


The pilot needs to exercise caution when firing. He will overheat at the second alpha strike. In other news the Awesome may be worth something again.

Remember that in MWO the max heat for 28 SHS is 58 which will make you overheat at the third alpha. In the exponential model you will overheat at the second alpha but you do not have to wait as long to fire again.




5. Exponential means also it will hardly reach zero right?

A: It depends on the exponential function. In my model I rounded to zero once the heat level reached 0.49, which does not take quite as long as you might think - it is usually only a little longer than it would take to bleed the heat linearly. Therin lies the price of firing alphas that put you at 100% heat.




6. And there is another "problem" with this increased heat reduction at higher levels - its possible to create a Mech that heat up to a specific level - and at this level keeps heat neutral. Depending on weapons an heat sinks.

While a Jenner may work heatneutral at a level of 30% a Timber Wolf would be almost heatneutral at 80% - while firing tons of weapons.

A: 1.) Yes, but that is because this system allows for relatively heat neutral builds. You will never bleed all your heat by the time you can fire again but you can sustain a higher (or hotter) rate of fire than in the linear model. Of course with the propose heat penalties

2). Which Jenner and which Timber Wolf? The stock Jenner-D has 4 medium lasers and 10 SHS (not counting the jump jets or srm4), meaning the max alpha for lasers puts the Jenner way over the max heat level. However, the Jenner can fire 2 medium lasers every 6 seconds (or 1 every 2 seconds) and ride the red line (levels out at about 100% heat). The champion Jenner is built to be heat efficient under the CURRENT MWO heat rules, meaning it will run very cool with exponential decay - maxing out at about 60% heat.

The Stock Timber Wolf is difficult for me to simulate due to the various weapons but I will try to match your example. 17 DHS means a max heat of 34. If we use the NEWEST weapon values of 10 heat for large lasers and 6 for mediums we get 32 heat about every 5 seconds with a 1.5 second beam duration. Under these conditions the heat level flattens out at about 30 heat which comes to about 88% heat.

Yes a Jenner running heat neutral has less firepower than a Timber Wolf running heat neutral, but the difference in firepower is to be expected. This difference, however, is not as big as you might think. The Timber Wolf is doing 34 damage every 5 seconds (7.83 DPS) and the champion Jenner can do 24 every 3-4 seconds (6.75 DPS). The bigger difference for the tonnage difference is the weapon ranges.





Summary:


Okay, if you like the MWO heat penalties that Praetor suggested (BT standard, modified) and that I injected to the heat proposal, let me know and I will update the first post with it.

If I answered your questions satisfactorily, let me know and I will update the Q & A with them.

[Nothing Whatsoever]

My interpretation of the Original Heat Penalties are certainly open to improvement.

For example, originally a mech can shut down at 14 heat. Before reading your thread, I though that this would be an issue for ERPPCs, which was why I set that as a heat warning and 18 as the first avoidable shutdown. Now it seems more likely to make use of that original table and your exponential heat decay to improve MWO.

And the percents I posted can easily be adjusted to what will work best for gameplay.

So, my main focus is have effectively heat neutral builds not be a bad thing, and to help reduce the size of alphas we can dish out, so that there is also a more level playing field between mechs; which also helps new players to get into and stay in the action while having more fun. And as a nice bonus, heat is made more realistic!

With the ammo explosions, they can be left on hold in regards to your idea, since it will require additional coding, and certainly can use further refinement as to how the idea should work and the probability of getting an explosion at the different heat levels.

I hope I'm making sense here!

Edited by Praetor Knight, 16 September 2014 - 03:20 PM.

[Ancient Demise]

I think I am following.

I just worry the ammo explosions might be a little too big lol. Maybe roll for an explosion once every 2 or 3 seconds?

Also, I was always under the impression that the overheat penalties were for every turn you remained at that heat. Firing and bleeding 30 heat caused no problems if you did not stay at or above those values. Am I correct?

[Nothing Whatsoever]

Ancient Demise, on 16 September 2014 - 03:32 PM, said:

I think I am following.

I just worry the ammo explosions might be a little too big lol. Maybe roll for an explosion once every 2 or 3 seconds?

Also, I was always under the impression that the overheat penalties were for every turn you remained at that heat. Firing and bleeding 30 heat caused no problems if you did not stay at or above those values. Am I correct?

Yeah, the Ammo Explosions from Heat need that sort of refinement, I'm open to better ideas to get that incorporated maybe over 10 seconds retaining that heat?

With BT turns, it was oversimplified to speed up games, where the structure was each turn roughly equaled 10 real-time seconds.

So each weapon was more or less fired separately against the Heat Cap, so three PPCs at the end of the turn was three separate shots over that 10 seconds turn, which was how there'd be that 2 heat retained into the next turn if all three were fired.

Here is one post that shows how the BT mechanics can be translated with a linear scale, he has a lot of good examples in regards to how to see those set into a real-time setting like MWO.

So that was what I was thinking about when I came up with the MWO effects from the Original heat effects in that table, and why I went with 18 over starting with 14, but considering dissipation happening in real-time things can change to have a very small capacity boost.

[Edit] I think the way to handle Heat Sinks is to have each add instead of 1.0 or 1.4 to Capacity as they currently do to set that at 0.1 for any heat sink.

So staying with an AWS-8Q with 28 SHS Capacity would be 2.8 and an AWS-9M with 20 DHS would be 2.0. That way when an ERPPC is fired it is able to use the Original Scale starting at 14 since the capacity is 16 against a single ERPPC at 15 heat.
[/Edit]

And another side note, with systems like Triple Strength Myomer that would need Heat Sinks to be deactivated and so on to retain heat for the benefit of using TSM, the capacity to retain some of that necessary heat as in your suggestion wouldn't need to have Heat Sinks adjusted.

Edited by Praetor Knight, 16 September 2014 - 04:39 PM.

[Ancient Demise]

Praetor Knight, on 16 September 2014 - 04:14 PM, said:

So that was what I was thinking about when I came up with the MWO effects from the Original heat effects in that table, and why I went with 18 over starting with 14, but considering dissipation happening in real-time things can change to have a very small capacity boost.

[Edit] I think the way to handle Heat Sinks is to have each add instead of 1.0 or 1.4 to Capacity as they currently do to set that at 0.1 for any heat sink.

So staying with an AWS-8Q with 28 SHS Capacity would be 2.8 and an AWS-9M with 20 DHS would be 2.0. That way when an ERPPC is fired it is able to use the Original Scale starting at 14 since the capacity is 16 against a single ERPPC at 15 heat.
[/Edit]

I think you kind of lost me there.

Are you saying that the max heat would be 30 + 0.1 for each effective heat sink? Or that it would be + 0.1 for each actual heat sink, regardless of heat efficiency?

I really think that a flat (or nearly flat) max heat would take almost all penalties away from low heat sink builds most light mechs, making them super effective without much fear of overheating while dulling out the heavier and hotter builds a little too much.

I understand that heat in TT is a constant rate but heat is also not dissipated until the end of the turn after all shots have been fired (initial and final conditions for each turn). While it is a gross approximation of reality taken at 10 second snap shots, this does not work well in a real time game. Consequently, the constant max heat does not work well with an exponential decay. *Okay actually I do not know that for a fact. I would love for the opportunity to test this in a real time simulator or test server before I can pass judgement on it.
Not convinced but would be open to trying both versions.

[Candid]

No, sorry. From a gameplay perspective I enjoy the high initial DPS possible with my 4 CMPL and 4 S-SRM, followed by the lower sustained DPS and brinkmanship-under-pressure once my heat is just shy of shutdown.

With your system, I wouldn't sequentially fire my streaks anymore or take particular care with my lasers because there'd be no need! In the time it takes for the former to reload I'd have lost way more heat than I do with linear cooling.

Basically, no matter the wild convolution of their methods, the place PGI have gotten us to is good in my opinion and I don't want to see it changed in this way. Far from impeding my enjoyment, the current situation is a big part of my enjoyment of the game.

Edited by Candid, 16 September 2014 - 05:56 PM.

[Kmieciu]

Candid, on 16 September 2014 - 05:54 PM, said:

the place PGI have gotten us to is good in my opinion

Everybody is entitled to their opinion, but PGI got us into a place where the the heat capacity is high and cooling is slow. This promotes alpha strikes: fire all you've got and duck behind cover to cool off.
This leads to a cowardly gameplay. Nobody wants to be the first to attack, because the first guy eats alpha strikes from all of the enemy team. And that is enough to destroy any mech.
They say Nova Prime is a bad mech. But is is capable of dealing 84 damage within 2 secods. When elited, it won't overheat and shut down. You are free to run away at 89kph and cool off.

A system that discourages alpha strikes would be better for the gameplay. Nobody wants to die in 3 seconds in a game without respawns. MWO should not play like Counter Strike.

Edited by Kmieciu, 16 September 2014 - 10:42 PM.

[Ancient Demise]

Candid, on 16 September 2014 - 05:54 PM, said:

No, sorry. From a gameplay perspective I enjoy the high initial DPS possible with my 4 CMPL and 4 S-SRM, followed by the lower sustained DPS and brinkmanship-under-pressure once my heat is just shy of shutdown.

With your system, I wouldn't sequentially fire my streaks anymore or take particular care with my lasers because there'd be no need! In the time it takes for the former to reload I'd have lost way more heat than I do with linear cooling.

Basically, no matter the wild convolution of their methods, the place PGI have gotten us to is good in my opinion and I don't want to see it changed in this way. Far from impeding my enjoyment, the current situation is a big part of my enjoyment of the game.

Alright let me try this out.

I will assume you are using a Timber Wolf with 4 cmpl and 4 cssrm6, 5.5 tons of ammo and 17 DHS.

With MY suggested weapon values (higher HPS) we get
t=1 fired lasers. h=18.6 (1 second burn time)
t=6 chain fired ssrms every second. h=11.6
t=7 fired lasers. h=26.9
t=12 h=13.5
t=13 h=28.3
t=18 h=13.8
t=19 h=28.6
t=24 h=13.9
t=25 h=28.7

Okay that is a pretty high heat that maxes out at about 85% Sustaining such a heat could incur some damage or ammo explosion penalties and definitely a speed reduction, as outlined by the above graphs (the actual chances of each are tbd).

What if, as you said, you took no care to chain fire missiles or watch your laser heat?

t=1 fired all lasers! h=8.6
t=3 fired all ssrms! h=27.8
t=6 fired all lasers! h=38.9
Ow ow ow that's almost a full second of being over 100% heat
t=8 fire ze missiles h=36.3
If you are not dead yet you soon will be.

Even if this were done usung the current heat and cycle time values for those weapons and even if you had a couple more DHS and less ammo you would still be overheating. If not right away it would still be inevitable.

Conclusion: Your statement is incorrect as firing those weapons carelessly would still lead to your death.

Heat management is still a very important factor to this system. Sure, most cases and under some conditions this will be different from MWO but the heat system is different and that is to be expected. This is not a magical "keep everything in game the same but still fix the heat system" fix. Those don't exist. It is a "make heat more realistic and closer to lore" fix. Builds designed for a different heat system will behave differently but hopefully not too much. At the very least this proposal should be considered and tested in the public test server.

Edited by Ancient Demise, 17 September 2014 - 04:22 AM.

[Cimarb]

Ancient Demise, on 17 September 2014 - 04:13 AM, said:

This is not a magical "keep everything in game the same but still fix the heat system" fix. Those don't exist. It is a "make heat more realistic and closer to lore" fix. Builds designed for a different heat system will behave differently but hopefully not too much. At the very least this proposal should be considered and tested in the public test server.

Yeah, the heat system definitely needs a revamp, not just a few tweaked numbers.

As far as following table top, it cannot be a straight import, and I think all of us are smart enough to know that. We can use it as a basis, though, for the heat scale penalties as well as the end result: X weapon heat - Y effective heat sinks = Z heat. (Or some other formula too advanced for my brain to think up...)

[Nothing Whatsoever]

Ancient Demise, on 16 September 2014 - 05:47 PM, said:

Are you saying that the max heat would be 30 + 0.1 for each effective heat sink? Or that it would be + 0.1 for each actual heat sink, regardless of heat efficiency?

Sorry for any confusion, I had to run when I was trying to expand on the idea.

So basically what I looked at was applying the Heat Effects Table to weapons fired in real-time. But, I noticed that starting at 0 on that scale could cause problems for ERPPCs in MWO.

Firing an ERPPC would see 15 heat apply evenly against the Scale 0 to 14, for each shot with the mech potentially needing to avoid shutdown before firing, (if moving, carrying residual heat from say jump jets or the map) then it would need to keep overriding, which is too much of a hassle I feel for the player.

So what I was looking next at, was that to add real-time Heat Effects into MWO, with the existing systems (so that we can use the original scale, that has the first avoidable shutdown at 14); we'd need to retain some small amount of additional capacity on Heat Sinks, and not reduce Heat Sinks additional Capacity to zero.

I figured that having a value of 0.1 for each Heat Sink could be enough. So that the base 10 SHS or DHS in the engine would only provide a combined max of 1 Capacity towards the Heat Effects Scale.

That way a mech with 10 DHS can fire it's ERPPC and hit 13 when stationary on a heat neutral or cooler map. This leaves a mech like the ERPPC SDR-5D needing some help, but that can be addressed through a Quirk, if deemed necessary, such as how the Awesomes got a boost.

Quote

I really think that a flat (or nearly flat) max heat would take almost all penalties away from low heat sink builds most light mechs, making them super effective without much fear of overheating while dulling out the heavier and hotter builds a little too much.

I understand that heat in TT is a constant rate but heat is also not dissipated until the end of the turn after all shots have been fired (initial and final conditions for each turn). While it is a gross approximation of reality taken at 10 second snap shots, this does not work well in a real time game. Consequently, the constant max heat does not work well with an exponential decay. *Okay actually I do not know that for a fact. I would love for the opportunity to test this in a real time simulator or test server before I can pass judgement on it.
Not convinced but would be open to trying both versions.

Well, we still have ways to give further tweaks to builds that are tested to be out of balance with the goals of the tweaks.

Such as applying more heat and dissipation quirks to mechs, and adjusting Weapon Heat and Heat Scale Penalties as necessary. For example, the HellSlinger introduced a new interesting quirk, that might have a more prominent place with a heat system that is much tighter on Capacity and utilizes exponential heat decay.

Another thing to look at is having faster dissipation, since Heat Sinks are Pumps, and using the original Battletech scale for Heat Effects does allow for reduced groups of big long range weapons. So the trade-off that I prefer is that, although we can't fire weapons in a big groups, we can still move and fire weapons individually for longer sustained periods of time.

That's what I like the most is being able to shift from alpha, alpha then cooldown to fire weapons, maneuver, fire, maneuver.

And with this change, I think we would need see Gauss exclusivity, where it can only be fired one at a time by itself, and the devs already have some code to handle that.

[Ancient Demise]

At this point are we deviating from an exponential decay system?

The Hellslinger quirks are built into my code...somewhere. Default is "1" so it does not do anything unless you modify that.

Quote

Another thing to look at is having faster dissipation, since Heat Sinks are Pumps, and using the original Battletech scale for Heat Effects does allow for reduced groups of big long range weapons. So the trade-off that I prefer is that, although we can't fire weapons in a big groups, we can still move and fire weapons individually for longer sustained periods of time.

That's what I like the most is being able to shift from alpha, alpha then cooldown to fire weapons, maneuver, fire, maneuver.

Even though the sinks are actually heat pumps (or heat engines) there is still the conductivity of the heat transferring from the 'mech TO the heat "pumps" themselves. The heat sinks can pump as much heat out as they can but it still has to transfer through the structure of the mech. More heat "pumps" will make the mech cool faster as there is less volume for the heat to travel to.

The trade-off you mention is kinda what the exponential part takes care of on its own (without the capped 30 heat). You can alpha (or almost alpha) then fire smaller weapons (or individual weapons) to get a sustained DPS but you have to cool down almost completely to alpha again unless you dedicated more tonnage to heat sinks. Unless you stay at a high heat by constantly firing those other weapons you will not have to worry too much about taking too many heat penalties.
This equation really seems to do it all...

Actually now I am thinking maybe the penalties should be 1, 2 and 3% chance of ammo explosions (because without case, OW) and each % roll once after every half second of being over the corresponding threshold.

[Nothing Whatsoever]

Ancient Demise, on 17 September 2014 - 05:00 PM, said:

At this point are we deviating from an exponential decay system?

I hope not, I'm just trying to explain my ideas to try to better fit them with exponential decay. I admit that I still need to tinker more with your calculator to get a better grasp of how it would work in a match, so I could still be missing or misunderstanding various details as to how it will be if we get to at least test it out in MWO.

Quote

Spoiler

The Hellslinger quirks are built into my code...somewhere. Default is "1" so it does not do anything unless you modify that.


Even though the sinks are actually heat pumps (or heat engines) there is still the conductivity of the heat transferring from the 'mech TO the heat "pumps" themselves. The heat sinks can pump as much heat out as they can but it still has to transfer through the structure of the mech. More heat "pumps" will make the mech cool faster as there is less volume for the heat to travel to.

The trade-off you mention is kinda what the exponential part takes care of on its own (without the capped 30 heat). You can alpha (or almost alpha) then fire smaller weapons (or individual weapons) to get a sustained DPS but you have to cool down almost completely to alpha again unless you dedicated more tonnage to heat sinks. Unless you stay at a high heat by constantly firing those other weapons you will not have to worry too much about taking too many heat penalties.
This equation really seems to do it all...

Actually now I am thinking maybe the penalties should be 1, 2 and 3% chance of ammo explosions (because without case, OW) and each % roll once after every half second of being over the corresponding threshold.

The idea I meant with mentioning the Hellslinger is applying that unique quirk to more mechs so that more mechs can be more independent of map heat, like maybe applying it to the SDR-5D for example, the same for dissipation such as how the Awesome has it's boost for Energy weapons; but that will be more on a case by case basis after getting to make use of the exponential heat decay system.

And with with the tradeoff, I meant more where currently I can take my GRF-3M and alpha my 4 SRM6 at a cost of ~17.20 each alpha at least two to three times within 15 to 25 seconds, since my Capacity is around ~57. So If I get lucky I can get about ~100 damage into a torso very quickly. That will take that mech out from either me getting a kill or severely crippling that mech.

Whereas, if we had a the Heat Effect Scale apply when I fired, would only get one alpha and then be forced to fire each weapon separately, one after another, I'd be able to sustain firing like that and would need to aim each time.

I like that better because its gives players a better chance to fight back and not get killed or crippled within first contact with the enemy. Granted this is happening within 100 M in the example, but the Griffin is not the only mech that can easily carry massive fire power like that, and other builds on other mechs can wreck at much longer ranges.

So to restate, my only concern really is that we need to best control where a build can be heat neutral in relation to how many weapons are able to be fired together with the number of heat sinks mounted.

[Leo Kraeas]

I'm on board with the idea of exponential heat decay. However I believe adding a baseline heat capacity would actually benefit both the system and the game. However, instead of adding a set amount to any mech we should instead add a baseline heat capacity based on tonnage. I suggest adding .5 points of capacity per 5 tons of chassis (an Atlas would get 10 points while a Jenner would get 3.5 points) This would symbolize a large mech's chassis ability to soak extra heat in it's prehiperal systems, exoskeleton, and armor. This also has the added benefit of allowing larger mechs who have tonnage and hardpoints to use more of them in tandem, such as in the case of the WHK-Prime.
The heat penalty would also be a good idea. The system could be used to add compelling gameplay elements such as lowering speed or gyro response time. Since the system would need to be understood by players he penalties would need to be simple and few. Maybe something along the lines of 15%-30% less gyro response time (arm movement, torso speed, and convergence time) at 50%+ heat and 25-30% lower speed at 80%+ heat. Although I believe that ammo explosions would help balance the oversaturation of auto-cannon and missile builds by the ballistics coming with the inherent risk of heavy internal damage, it would also be more confusing for many players as well as being a complex system to implement.