632 replies to this topic

[Nicholas Carlyle]

With most of the good players already gone and the huge amount of mouthbreathers who die to LRMs constantly I can't even be bothered to try. I can't even log in anymore.

This is just to late and feels like another PGI scam/distraction.

I won't be wasting my time with this.

[Lootee]

Meh don't care any more. It's been broken for so long and so many other things broken to try to unbreak the broken Jesusbox.

Playing Elite instead and having lots more fun.

Although I do find it ironic that I'd rather spend more time playing a game in beta where all my progress will get wiped than a game that is supposedly 'released' and almost finished.

Edited by Lootee, 13 September 2014 - 03:52 PM.

[Túatha Dé Danann]

Cerlin, on 13 September 2014 - 03:36 PM, said:

ECm has been an OP part of the game

Again:
- It only works against LRMs and Streaks, all other weapons are not affected
- It can be countered in 7 ways
- It can only be mounted on certain mechs, making them priority targets
- ECM is totally ignored by mechs not mounting LRMs - If I sit in my Ilya, I give a ****** **** about ECM, I just let my ballistic scythe reap horror and death

Stating that ECM is OP by 24 pages of people saying that it is not means that you have to come up with at least some kind of argumentation for your claim. And I'm not afraid of LRM boats in my brawler - for the record. Or is cover now OP too?

[topgun505]

Then, why are you here?

Nicholas Carlyle, on 13 September 2014 - 03:43 PM, said:

With most of the good players already gone and the huge amount of mouthbreathers who die to LRMs constantly I can't even be bothered to try. I can't even log in anymore.

This is just to late and feels like another PGI scam/distraction.

I won't be wasting my time with this.

[Nicholas Carlyle]

I'm not really. I post like 3 times a day at most. And it's just to marvel at people like you.

[Russ Bullock]

People saying we want this to fail are absolutely incorrect. Remember we bought the publishing rights back from IGP and yes we had them since the first of August but were not allowed to say anything until we did on the 8th or 9th when we posted the information.

We want it to succeed and I will step in when asked to, at the moment I feel I have been asked to wait until at least Tuesday.

[Wolfways]

Tabu 73, on 13 September 2014 - 02:31 PM, said:

Excellent, excellent points! I could hug you right now.

lol irony.
A post by someone who complains about "LRM fairies" praising a post made by someone named after fairies (at least after Christians "altered" them)

[Nicholas Carlyle]

Russ Bullock, on 13 September 2014 - 03:54 PM, said:

People saying we want this to fail are absolutely incorrect. Remember we bought the publishing rights back from IGP and yes we had them since the first of August but were not allowed to say anything until we did on the 8th or 9th when we posted the information.

We want it to succeed and I will step in when asked to, at the moment I feel I have been asked to wait until at least Tuesday.

This is dumb. Youve driven off so many of the posters who could really do something like this justice. You should be able to see ECM is dumb. You had to release a special omnipod so the clans would have it and are scared to put it on more mechs. How many hero ECM mechs do we have? If it's balanced why can't every mech mount it? Exactly.

Edited by Nicholas Carlyle, 13 September 2014 - 04:00 PM.

[Wolfways]

Nicholas Carlyle, on 13 September 2014 - 03:43 PM, said:

With most of the good players already gone and the huge amount of mouthbreathers who die to LRMs constantly I can't even be bothered to try. I can't even log in anymore.

This is just to late and feels like another PGI scam/distraction.

I won't be wasting my time with this.

Almost there myself...

[Laserkid]

I suppose that ECM and its role on the battlefield relates most directly to targeting, information gathering and lock on missiles.
ECM should negate all electronic warfare boosters not a direct LOS lock or indirect fire from friendly lock or lock down a target from using lock-on missiles with in 180m. What it should do is reduce everything to “base” levels.

This needs but 3 status “ECM protected”, “ECM affected”, and “countered”

ECM protected have no enemy TAG bonuses applied to, NARC bonuses applied to, Artemis bonuses applied to, BAP bonuses applied to. They can be locked on to via indirect or direct LOS (UAV or Mechs)

ECM Affected targets should be able to fire lock on weapons at ECM protected mechs. However Artemis stops working (SRMs/LRMs), NARC info from NARCs inside of ECM stops working, TAG with in the area stops working, UAV based info stops working, indirect locks stop working, and personal locks are not shared.
Countered just means ECCM from an enemy ECM.

Now this effectively removes the current reason to take ECM, so indirect fire weapons need to change. LRM spread should be used to counter the renewed ability to maintain locks.

Lost or dumbfired, LRM should spread to a 10 meter diameter targeting the ground where dumb fired or last lock location.
Indirect locks a 6 meter spread.
Indirect + TAG 5 meter spread.
Direct LOS lock 4 meter spread. Most accurate a ECM protected mech.
Direct LOS lock with Artemis IV 3 meters.
Direct LOS w/ Artemis IV and TAG 2m.
NARC 2m spread.

BAP needs to change as well. Bonuses to range and target info gathering can remain the same but an additional HTAL display should be granted as an additional function to spot under armored sections and get an accurate damage read out. Once an enemy has been reconed the information should be available to any mech once targeted again save for exact remaining armor, but the max armor value remains.

Negative statuses should be hidden from friendly mechs that do not have BAP, including one’s own mech. TAG should be invisible to non-BAP equipped mechs.

[ramjb]

Nicholas Carlyle, on 13 September 2014 - 03:58 PM, said:

This is dumb. Youve driven off so many of the posters who could really do something like this justice. You should be able to see ECM is dumb. You had to release a special omnipod so the clans would have it and are scared to put it on more mechs. How many hero ECM mechs do we have? If it's balanced why can't every mech mount it? Exactly.

Yes please.Make ECM available for any mech. That way the sub-humans who boat LRMs will have to find something else to do in this game rather than hiding and point and clicking without even having to aim while raining 50 or 60 missiles on the enemy non-stop.

I won't argue wether ECM is OP or not. All I know is that is the only trustable, viable, solid, choice against lurmaggedon. You want ECM nerfed, first introduce a good list of changes that the system needs to fix the insoportable LRM abuse every PUG game is and that only ECM stops.

I don't care about lame excuses of how great you are at avoiding them. While you avoid them someone else is eating volleys of hundreds of LRMS. Not making things up here, I've been playing some games and in all of them as soon as the first contact.happened, 6-7 streaks of missiles were on the air a couple seconds later.

LRMS don't dominate gameplay right now in randoms. THey just smashblast it into oblivion as the second you're out of ECM cover and someone has a LOS on you, you're under a rainstorm of neverending doom.

ECM is the only and single reason why there's still a degree of proper fighting in this game instead of a lame, boring, long, neverending "gameplay" of hiding behind every available rock and not peeking out because if you do so, you'll be blasted into oblivion. ECM is the only and single way a NARC can be reliably countered. ECM is the only reason why MWO still can be enjoyed in PUGs. Nerf ECM, leave the LRMs as they are, you're guaranteeing noone will use anything but those blasted OP weapons.

Also, let's not forget. ECM is countered by another ECM mech. It's also strongly neutralized by well placed UAVs. And you don't need to target ANYTHING in this game to kill it...unless you run LRMs (or streaks, but it's also good to have some kind of measure that makes using SRM a risky proposition unless you load a BAP or a TAG). IF you lack the proper eyesight to see enemies without targetting them, go check an eyesight doctor. For anything else the only reason anyone would want to oppose ECM is because it counters LRMs. Being that the case and if that's your stuff, I suggest you go playing whack-a-mole and leaving this game alone.

Edited by ramjb, 13 September 2014 - 04:18 PM.

[Túatha Dé Danann]

Wolfways, on 13 September 2014 - 03:57 PM, said:

lol irony.
A post by someone who complains about "LRM fairies" praising a post made by someone named after fairies (at least after Christians "altered" them)

It does not change, that we have a healthy discussion right now. I do not feel that ECM is OP, I just feel that its effect is just too narrow in its use. I love more broadened mechanics to affect multiple aspects of the game, not having functions for a single purpose. So, if ECM becomes an asset to informational warfare, as well as other equipments can be used to counter LRMs beside ECM and AMS, the whole thing get a good level of sophistication while still being intuitive.

[BlakeAteIt]

Russ Bullock, on 13 September 2014 - 03:54 PM, said:

People saying we want this to fail are absolutely incorrect. Remember we bought the publishing rights back from IGP and yes we had them since the first of August but were not allowed to say anything until we did on the 8th or 9th when we posted the information.

We want it to succeed and I will step in when asked to, at the moment I feel I have been asked to wait until at least Tuesday.

Hi Russ! Thank you for saying active in this thread. I've seen and participated in several conversations about ECM modifications, on and off this site. I was wondering something. In your initial post, you stated that you wanted to focus on changes to the ECM part, but the more conversations I see, the more I become convinced that fixing the "targeting ecosystem" correctly might require tweaks to several components.

With the understanding that it would take longer, possibly considerably so, would it be reasonable to ask for wider-ranging changes? Not new components or anything crazy, but more along the lines of tweaks to the way that BAP, NARC, TAG, and the Command Console work as well?

To be clear, it is understood that these changes would take longer, and may have to be prioritized for after CW drops and is stable.

[Mcgral18]

Let's see what ECM does:

Quote

The Guardian ECM Suite was introduced in 2597 by the Terran Hegemony[1]. Designed to interfere with guided weaponry, targeting computers, and communication systems, the Guardian is typically used to shield allied units from such equipment by emitting a broad-band signal meant to confuse radar, infrared, ultraviolet, magscan and sonar sensors.[2]

Affected systems include Artemis IV, C3 and C3i Computer networks, and Narc Missile Beacons. A Guardian can jam a Beagle Active Probe (or its Clan equivalent), but the probe-equipped unit will be aware of the jamming.

The Capellan Confederation expanded the utility of the Guardian even more with the introduction of Stealth Armor.[3] Contemporary guided missiles such as standard LRM or Streak SRMs are not affected by the Guardian suite and will be able to achieve hard lock as normal.[4]

http://www.sarna.net/wiki/Guardian_ECM

I'll just highlight this part:

Quote

Contemporary guided missiles such as standard LRM or Streak SRMs are not affected by the Guardian suite and will be able to achieve hard lock as normal.

Angel ECM can indeed stop Streaks from firing guided missiles, at two tons and two crits.



Stealth armour:

Quote

The finest achievement in stealth systems developed by the original Star League, the Null Signature System was capable of shielding a BattleMech from electronic detection.

BattleMech Stealth Armor provides as much protection as standard armor. It takes up two critical slots in each arm, leg, and side torso. To work, it also requires the 'Mech to carry a Guardian ECM Suite.[1]

The system can be activated or deactivated in the End Phase of any turn. When active the system builds up 10 heat points, and is affected as if it is in range of an enemy ECM Suite. Any unit attacking a BattleMech with active Stealth Armor gets a +1 hit penalty at medium range and a +2 hit penalty at long range. The Stealth Armored BattleMech cannot be a secondary target while the system is active.[6]

http://www.sarna.net.../Stealth_Armour



Guess what Magic Jesus Box does...without any extra crits, tons, or heat? For the small package of 1.5 tons, it even blocks lvl1 LRMs, which it simply shouldn't.

A rework would be nice, though calling for changes to indirect fire is reasonable. Perhaps a larger spread and worse tracking, to simulate the to hit penalty of indirect fire.

Edited by Mcgral18, 13 September 2014 - 04:26 PM.

[Mystere]

BlakeAteIt, on 13 September 2014 - 04:18 PM, said:

Hi Russ! Thank you for saying active in this thread. I've seen and participated in several conversations about ECM modifications, on and off this site. I was wondering something. In your initial post, you stated that you wanted to focus on changes to the ECM part, but the more conversations I see, the more I become convinced that fixing the "targeting ecosystem" correctly might require tweaks to several components.

With the understanding that it would take longer, possibly considerably so, would it be reasonable to ask for wider-ranging changes? Not new components or anything crazy, but more along the lines of tweaks to the way that BAP, NARC, TAG, and the Command Console work as well?

To be clear, it is understood that these changes would take longer, and may have to be prioritized for after CW drops and is stable.

Frankly, I'd rather that ECM and other related systems take longer to deal with but done right -- or even not dealt with at all -- than just "fix" ECM in a vacuum.

[ramjb]

Russ Bullock, on 13 September 2014 - 03:54 PM, said:

People saying we want this to fail are absolutely incorrect. Remember we bought the publishing rights back from IGP and yes we had them since the first of August but were not allowed to say anything until we did on the 8th or 9th when we posted the information.

We want it to succeed and I will step in when asked to, at the moment I feel I have been asked to wait until at least Tuesday.

Hey Russ. I'll give you my personal view here. And if you allow me to do so, I'll make a comparison of MWO with one of the most succesful MMOs out there. Namely, World of Tanks.

World of Tanks for long, long, long months (actually, years) had a single part of the game that really infuriated people to extreme points. Namely, Artillery. It was just unsufferable, both because of their sheer power, and how many of them were in the queue at a given time.

It finally was fixed and since then the gameplay in that game has given such a quantum leap I can't describe in detail - anyone who's played that game knows what I mean. Now let me be straightforward here: in an online game you have to be EXTREMELY careful if you give a player the chance to use a standoff weapon. Essentially you're giving him the power to kill enemies with no retaliation which doesn't involve using the ame weapon.

If you make such a weapon not just easy to use, but on top of that too powerful, everyone will use it and the gameplay will suffer tremendously. Not to mention that if the weapon is easy to use aswell, you're just asking for every newcomer to get one and rumble, with the inevitable consequence: in the queue most of the players will be packing such weapons. In the gameplay with so many people using what should be a niche weapon (indirect fire) that renders anything else useless, as they can't strike back unless they're literally on top of the launcher (180m) and making the game unplayable.


Right now in MWO,in random games and single queues, the second anyone is targettable, a rainstorm of death immediatelly hammers him into submission. While I understand that both LRMS are part of the lore and a neccessary weapon (standoff indirect fire weapons are very valid tactically to unlock certain teams who'll just defend a hard to reach point and refuse to move), what is abnormal is that in every given game at least half the team packs some sort of LRM weaponry when, because of obvious gameplay reasons, it should be a very specialized weapon only usable in very particular conditions.

LRMS are too easy to use. They hit too hard. They are able to hit enemies behind cover because of their steep angles. They essentially require no skill other than keeping a pipper near a target box. And they're standoff. They reward too much for how easy they are to use. And as a result everyone use and abuse them. During the last challenges I've started to see Timberwolves with four LRM15+artemis...and nothing else. That wouldn't be a problem if those guys did poorly, but I spotted several of them scoring in the 1000+ damages...by doing nothing else than staying under cover, look towards the nearest target and clicking their mouse. I'm not opposed to easy to use weapons. I'm frontally against easy to use weapons that are able to create such havoc as far as making the game unplayable to others while giving mass rewards to people who just stay under cover clicking their mouse in regular periods of time.

I'm not talking without knowledge here. My T-wolf prime I've used all the time as a LRM50, it's by far my largest K/D ratio, largest EXP income, and largest credit maker of all my 26 mechs (including my heros, of course). And while I'm far from the best player of this game, ever, for me breaking 1000 points in a standard mech is not unknown and I think I do pretty well in most of them. But I'm twice the threat I am when I have LRMs than when I don't. The weapon is broken beyond redemption.


ECM thus far is the only thing that holds that kind of "gameplay" from ruling this game. The only thing that is able to hold lurmaggedon and give players a chance of fighting without being hammered to death from avobe. If you change ECM to limit it's abilities, be damned sure you do so after hammerblasting the LRMs with the strongest nerf ever seen in this game. Otherwise I don't know others, but I know myself, will leave it at once. I had no problems in leaving WoT behind until the artillery was finally brought into line, I had no problems leaving War Thunder as soon as I spotted their matchmaking system was a disaster, I won't either with MWO if I feel LRMs are given a free hand to reign supreme in random games.

Yours truly
RAMJB

Edited by ramjb, 13 September 2014 - 04:41 PM.

[Richard Warts]

Nicholas Carlyle, on 13 September 2014 - 03:58 PM, said:

This is dumb. Youve driven off so many of the posters who could really do something like this justice. You should be able to see ECM is dumb. You had to release a special omnipod so the clans would have it and are scared to put it on more mechs. How many hero ECM mechs do we have? If it's balanced why can't every mech mount it? Exactly.

Do you honestly think attacking Russ will help get your point across? Perhaps you'd like to trade places with him?

[zortesh]

Túatha Dé Danann, on 13 September 2014 - 02:42 PM, said:

So you assume, that the whole Blob is full of LRM-boats? Well, if yes, then they deserve to die.

I mean the enemy blob, if a ecm light ran into a blob of lrm mechs it'd die via directfire in seconds.

Ecm lights are only a problem when they hang with the enemy blob, and cover them when they camp, if they moved away from the blob, they would be easily narcable, as opposed to having to try and narc 2 enemy lightmechs while exposing yourself to 12mechs worth of firepower.

Túatha Dé Danann, on 13 September 2014 - 02:42 PM, said:

Aye, for more than one reason. LRMs are only on part - spotting itself is the other.

Ecm light mechs camping in a enemy blob make any spotting impossible, the lrm team is doomed to failure unless they narc and or snipe the ecm mechs to death incredibly soon, which is very much hard to do.

Túatha Dé Danann, on 13 September 2014 - 02:42 PM, said:

Thats why you have brawlers and snipers. Someone has to do the job of getting that ecm down, right? If there are no frontline-fighters in your squad, you cannot open the gap. If you cannot open the gap, all of your LRMs will be useless - which is well deserved then.

Again, suacide for a brawler to enter a enemy blob to chase a ecm raven, and a sniper is not going to stick around to pickup a shot on a specific mech, sniping all about shoot at first thing you see and leap behind cover.

Túatha Dé Danann, on 13 September 2014 - 02:42 PM, said:

You should be more worried about the frontline-fighters. You cannot hold off a push just with just LRMs. If you think you should be able to, then the trade-off between risk and reward is screwed up.

You actully can, it just requires you see the enemy coming, land a few narcs and rain hell on the push, hell you can even repeatably retreat while raining fire on a pushing oppoent, lrms do fighting retreats amazingly well.

tags allow people to rain hell on mechs charging under a ecm bubble, its snipers camping under multiple ecm lightmech bubbles that completely negate lrms.

Frankly the only mechs i fear reguardless of what im running is guass snipers.

Also a clanmech can have lrms and be a decent frontline fighter.

Túatha Dé Danann, on 13 September 2014 - 02:42 PM, said:

No, they suffer from the missing frontline element. Every LRM boat means one less frontline fighter. Just 2 or 3 of them missing is a whole lot enough for any halfway balanced unit to push you to the moon and back again. So if you still think that LRMs are or should be the primary force of attack, I advise you to reconsider their role. They are meant to support the main frontline unit from the third line, giving some additional damage to enemies or to take out enemies. As an allied Atlas has ECM ready to counter enemy ECM, in a balanced setup (implying both sides have the same amount of ECM) you will always get the chance to fire your LRMs, but with much less effect than a frontline-brawler.

I never said anything about brining 12 lrm mechs or anything insane, i wasn't so much complaing as just listing the weaknesses of lrms and when they cannot succed.

Personally I'd prefer my lrms be in the form of 3 stormcrows with there own narcs/lrms.

Túatha Dé Danann, on 13 September 2014 - 02:42 PM, said:

So again, if your team does not have a frontline, nor a second line but only third-line mechs, you deserve to be rolflstomped from the enemies first, second and third line within a minute.
ECM only works against 3rd line mechs. So the whole discussion, to be honest - is about negating all mech roles beside cheap camping and laying back, because nobody wants to lead the charge as they are too afraid to maybe die for the benefit of the whole team.

Agreed.

[MischiefSC]

Russ Bullock, on 13 September 2014 - 03:54 PM, said:

People saying we want this to fail are absolutely incorrect. Remember we bought the publishing rights back from IGP and yes we had them since the first of August but were not allowed to say anything until we did on the 8th or 9th when we posted the information.

We want it to succeed and I will step in when asked to, at the moment I feel I have been asked to wait until at least Tuesday.

One question -

How far should we go with this solution? Can we put forward a solution that involves tweaks to ECM, SSRMs/LRMs, BAP, TAG and radar if it's well done and functional or does this just need to be an ECM-specific fix that is as good as we can get with just that one component on its own?

[Russ Bullock]

Nicholas Carlyle, on 13 September 2014 - 03:58 PM, said:

This is dumb. Youve driven off so many of the posters who could really do something like this justice. You should be able to see ECM is dumb. You had to release a special omnipod so the clans would have it and are scared to put it on more mechs. How many hero ECM mechs do we have? If it's balanced why can't every mech mount it? Exactly.

I don't understand what this has to do withy statement. I was simply saying I can now do something like this, a week earlier I could not.