104 replies to this topic

[terrycloth]

Chain fire when:
(a) You're chasing a stupid spider and the risk of missing with your entire alpha is too high.
( Heat is near max. So, after your second alpha. Generally this is when I'm in the process of fading to cool but haven't got entirely out of line of sight yet for one reason or another. One medium laser at a time still gains heat on my Jenner. :/
(c) SRMs pretty much always. It seems to calculate the spread based on the total number you fire at once.
(d) LRMs when you want to annoy people with constant screen-shake and they don't have AMS.

I usually have a separate 'chain fire' group. For a while I tried just madly clicking to simulate an alpha but it didn't work that well. I also tried right arm / left arm lasers but it was often still too hot.

[Bishop Steiner]

Kmieciu, on 12 September 2014 - 09:01 AM, said:

https://www.youtube....dOwHzCHfgA#t=18

Lucy was talking about medium lasers. There is never a good reason to chain fire them.

Wow, must be neat to be ....oh, wrong, with such certainty? Maybe try thinking outside your owned rigid fixed preconceptions and read the actual posts, mine, Jmans, etc.

You might actually learn something and not look foolish in the future.

AssaultPig, on 12 September 2014 - 10:36 AM, said:

up to 6 MLas, your heat per damage is the same whether you alpha MLas or chain fire them. You are not creating any additional cooling by chain firing. If you are near your heat cap you are much better off to simply cool a bit longer, then link fire again than you are to chain fire.

It is useful to have specific fire groups for arms/torso, or for your right/left side, and you can use those to manage heat in situations where you are near shutdown or just need that little bit of additional damage to destroy a red component. Chain firing is basically never a good choice.

Not the point. By having those on chain fire you have the more heat and damage efficient option of NOT firing all 6, when you don't need to, to do the job. Often all you need is one or two hits more. Chain firing that 1-2 shots not only saves you the heat from the other 4, but leaves you 4 more ready to fire at another enemy, if needed.

[Augustus Martelus II]

Good luck to alpha with all the heat penalties

[Adiuvo]

You people are completely ignoring the spirit of both Lucy's and Roland's posts.

It is always bad to chainfire lasers/ballistics on someone when they are not near death. Always. You are spreading damage more than necessary. Against anyone decent there is no psychological edge. You are not magically more heat efficient. You are just increasing your exposure time while dealing pointless amounts of damage to someone and letting them deal damage efficiently all the meanwhile. If you're near overheat then it's better to wait until you are no longer at risk and then fire your full burst.

In the rare instances where someone has a cherry CT? Then yeah sure use one laser. Those situations are rare enough in normal play that they really don't deserve to be brought up in this discussion, and taking on some holier than thou tone basing off of a flawed premise is stupid.

As for why I care, when you're on my team and I'm relying on you to deal damage effectively, then it certainly is my business. You are not playing this game by yourself. There are other people playing with you that expect you to do your job and behave accordingly.

[RussianWolf]

Adiuvo, on 12 September 2014 - 11:50 AM, said:

As for why I care, when you're on my team and I'm relying on you to deal damage effectively, then it certainly is my business. You are not playing this game by yourself. There are other people playing with you that expect you to do your job and behave accordingly.

As for why I could care less. I'm here to have fun. I play to have fun. I don't worry about the other 23 people in the match. If I have fun in the match, I win. Regardless of the scoreboard, win/loss, the ratios or anything else. If you or anyone else needs me to play a particular way in order for you to have fun, sucks to be you/them.

[Piney II]

" By having those on chain fire you have the more heat and damage efficient option of NOT firing all 6, when you don't need to, to do the job. Often all you need is one or two hits more. Chain firing that 1-2 shots not only saves you the heat from the other 4, but leaves you 4 more ready to fire at another enemy, if needed"

^^^^^This.

[Mercules]

Adiuvo, on 12 September 2014 - 11:50 AM, said:

You people are completely ignoring the spirit of both Lucy's and Roland's posts.

Sorry, I can't really discus "the spirit" of someone's comments. I can guess at it, but given that over 70% of our communication skills are not what words we are using I miss a lot of the message and a lot of "the spirit". When someone types in "always" I tend to think that they literally are trying to communicate "always" not, "Well, most of the time if you ignore situations where it would be better to do something else."

If they didn't mean "always" or "never" or make statements that leave no room for interpretation (aka, "The Spirit") then yeah, I am going to discuss what they actually said instead of what they might have maybe, supposedly, on a Thursday with a full moon, have meant. It's a text based medium. If you want people to know what you mean write down all those extra words that actually explain your position. We can't guess what expression was on your face or tone of voice from your text.

[Lefty Lucy]

Mercules, on 12 September 2014 - 12:46 PM, said:

Sorry, I can't really discus "the spirit" of someone's comments. I can guess at it, but given that over 70% of our communication skills are not what words we are using I miss a lot of the message and a lot of "the spirit". When someone types in "always" I tend to think that they literally are trying to communicate "always" not, "Well, most of the time if you ignore situations where it would be better to do something else."

If they didn't mean "always" or "never" or make statements that leave no room for interpretation (aka, "The Spirit") then yeah, I am going to discuss what they actually said instead of what they might have maybe, supposedly, on a Thursday with a full moon, have meant. It's a text based medium. If you want people to know what you mean write down all those extra words that actually explain your position. We can't guess what expression was on your face or tone of voice from your text.

I never said, "always" or "never."

I was specifically talking about people who use chainfired lasers as their default weapon group, not in the few situations where it's actually useful.

[Griggio]

I run 6 C-ERML's on chain fire on my DW. This works out well for me since chainfire is not just holding down a button, each individual button tap will fire off the next laser.

I want to only fire 3, 3 quick taps.....all 6, 6 quick taps.

It took some practice to not spam the button in an intense fight. But the more I use it the easier it gets.

[Mercules]

Lefty Lucy, on 12 September 2014 - 12:50 PM, said:

I never said, "always" or "never."

I was specifically talking about people who use chainfired lasers as their default weapon group, not in the few situations where it's actually useful.

Roland did and you were lumped in with his comments. You did, however, say:

Lefty Lucy, on 11 September 2014 - 04:59 PM, said:

When you fire your lasers like this, all you're doing is spreading damage ineffectually, instead of targeting the specific opponents that get you a kill or disable on an enemy mech.

Which is a bit of an emphatic statement and doesn't include the possibility of anything else. "all you are doing". Nope, I am also not overheating, not firing a weapon that will be on recycle and unavailable if I need it, not wasting damage if I know 2 laser shots will finish that mech and can add in a third just in case...

If you had said, "Most of the time all you are doing is..." but you didn't. You basically said "always" without actually using the word. I can't read into it and go, "Oh they mean usually." because you didn't leave room for usually or say usually.

Edited by Mercules, 12 September 2014 - 01:43 PM.

[Bishop Steiner]

Adiuvo, on 12 September 2014 - 11:50 AM, said:

You people are completely ignoring the spirit of both Lucy's and Roland's posts.

It is always bad to chainfire lasers/ballistics on someone when they are not near death. Always. You are spreading damage more than necessary. Against anyone decent there is no psychological edge. You are not magically more heat efficient. You are just increasing your exposure time while dealing pointless amounts of damage to someone and letting them deal damage efficiently all the meanwhile. If you're near overheat then it's better to wait until you are no longer at risk and then fire your full burst.

In the rare instances where someone has a cherry CT? Then yeah sure use one laser. Those situations are rare enough in normal play that they really don't deserve to be brought up in this discussion, and taking on some holier than thou tone basing off of a flawed premise is stupid.

As for why I care, when you're on my team and I'm relying on you to deal damage effectively, then it certainly is my business. You are not playing this game by yourself. There are other people playing with you that expect you to do your job and behave accordingly.

then perhaps Lefty and Roland need to expound their position more thoroughly, and cover such caveats, instead of posting black and white "This is the way and all others are BAD" posts.

Using terms like "never a good reason to use chainfire" do not leave a lot of room for interpretation.

[AssaultPig]

Bishop Steiner, on 12 September 2014 - 11:31 AM, said:

Wow, must be neat to be ....oh, wrong, with such certainty? Maybe try thinking outside your owned rigid fixed preconceptions and read the actual posts, mine, Jmans, etc.

You might actually learn something and not look foolish in the future.


Not the point. By having those on chain fire you have the more heat and damage efficient option of NOT firing all 6, when you don't need to, to do the job. Often all you need is one or two hits more. Chain firing that 1-2 shots not only saves you the heat from the other 4, but leaves you 4 more ready to fire at another enemy, if needed.

that is my point; firing fewer lasers isn't any more or less heat efficient. You get the same damage per heat whether you chain fire or alpha strike (absent ghost heat.)

The only time it would be 'efficient' to chain fire would be if you knew the component you were targeting was almost gone and it would only take 1-2 more individual shots to destroy it. But that's very rarely the case, and even when it is you can't necessarily rely on holding your beams on target for the full duration. Better to fire six and only need to hold them on target a fraction of the time to do the necessary damage. Better to generate a bit of extra heat and have a better chance of killing the target than have to wait for your next firing cycle.

You can construct a scenario in which it's ideal to maintain less than a maximum rate of fire, but it's a scenario that will occur vanishingly rarely in actual gameplay.

[terrycloth]

Shutting down makes you extremely vulnerable for a long time. Usually, long enough to kill you. So you chainfire when otherwise you'd be in danger of shutting down. If you tend to alpha and shut down a lot, then maybe you should enable chainfire by default.

This is an extremely common scenario that happens in every game for laser-focused mechs. You can't even build heat-neutral laser mechs without going to ridiculous extremes (for example, a stalker with two ER large lasers and no other weapons can be heat neutral with something like 20 double heat sinks). Since you're always riding the edge of the heat curve, you're often in a position where your options are 'do nothing until I can alpha' or 'fire 1 laser right now'. The first is better if you can take cover and your enemy will be wasting time chasing you, the second makes more sense if multiple mechs are focusing on the target or if the enemy is shooting someone else.

[AssaultPig]

rate of fire is dictated by your heat; you can fire X number of lasers within a certain amount of time. It is 99% of the time going to be more effective to group those shots into the largest possible bursts than to distribute them evenly.

There are lots of reasons for this: it minimizes enemies' ability to twist away, lets you locate damage better, gives you more time to twist and/or evade damage, removes individual components more easily, etc.

Laser mechs should not be spending most of the match riding right at their heat cap; that limits your flexibility and prevents you from taking advantage of circumstances. You should be hitting as hard as possible in a short time, then backing off to cool and limit your exposure.

[Mercules]

AssaultPig, on 12 September 2014 - 01:50 PM, said:

that is my point; firing fewer lasers isn't any more or less heat efficient. You get the same damage per heat whether you chain fire or alpha strike (absent ghost heat.)

The only time it would be 'efficient' to chain fire would be if you knew the component you were targeting was almost gone and it would only take 1-2 more individual shots to destroy it. But that's very rarely the case...

So rare it happens nearly 12 times every match. Rarely do mechs go from "My torso armor is almost gone." to "I'm dead." without some sort of middle stage where the structure just needs a tiny bit more damage. The times when it doesn't is when you are dealing with AC/20s, PPCs, Gauss. Laser based mechs OFTEN leave a mech at that, "Almost dead" state so when we are talking 6 mediums were are also talking about this, "rare" thing happening much more often.

AssaultPig, on 12 September 2014 - 02:05 PM, said:

Laser mechs should not be spending most of the match riding right at their heat cap;

I agree with you, but the enemy doesn't seem to be willing to stop trying to make me ride the edge.

Edited by Mercules, 12 September 2014 - 02:10 PM.

[DAYLEET]

I appreciate that after being proven wrong they have changed their song to "sometimes its right and sometimes its not" but have kept the same result, chainfire is no good.

[Mercules]

DAYLEET, on 12 September 2014 - 02:11 PM, said:

I appreciate that after being proven wrong they have changed their song to "sometimes its right and sometimes its not" but have kept the same result, chainfire is no good.

Yeah, I have to agree that the majority of the time it is better to hit with everything at once. To say it is always the right way to go is to view the world far to black and white when the world works in shades of grey.

[Bishop Steiner]

AssaultPig, on 12 September 2014 - 01:50 PM, said:

that is my point; firing fewer lasers isn't any more or less heat efficient. You get the same damage per heat whether you chain fire or alpha strike (absent ghost heat.)

The only time it would be 'efficient' to chain fire would be if you knew the component you were targeting was almost gone and it would only take 1-2 more individual shots to destroy it. But that's very rarely the case, and even when it is you can't necessarily rely on holding your beams on target for the full duration. Better to fire six and only need to hold them on target a fraction of the time to do the necessary damage. Better to generate a bit of extra heat and have a better chance of killing the target than have to wait for your next firing cycle.

You can construct a scenario in which it's ideal to maintain less than a maximum rate of fire, but it's a scenario that will occur vanishingly rarely in actual gameplay.

I have over 15000 matches. I am relatively certain I have some idea how rare scenarios are, and I find myself in the one described with some regularity, unless i have a nice cool running ballistic to use instead. But then I also regularly multitask, firing LRMs at one target while fighting the one in front of me with lasers. And after 15k matches, I also know pretty well what component is about to pop on a mech looking at the wireframe. Though the IS buff on the HBK has thrown me off my game in regards their AC. Blasted thing used to pop the moment you hit IS, now it usually lasts until the torso is gone. Heh, got reminded of that last night.

[Ultimax]

Bishop Steiner, on 12 September 2014 - 05:23 AM, said:

ah Roland, you tact is delightful as ever.

I forgot that you are indeed the authority on al things MW/Battletech.

So by all means, next time you have an opponent with a cherry red internal CT, alpha strike him and shut down, so his teammate can kill you while defenseless. Or wait that extra 5-10 seconds for your heat to drop enough NOT to overheat and hope your opponent doesn't kill YOU in the meantime.

Or, you can have a second fire group with lasers on chain, which a GOOD player can then tapout near instantly 1-2-3 beams as needed to finish the job, NOW, without overheating.

Anyone who clings to either chainfire or alphas as the answer to everything, is the BAD.

Your black and white world is so cute.

To be honest, I never use chainfire.

If I have massed lasers, like on a Nova, I'll always split the lasers into groups and have one group that is "low heat" - and when necessary I'll use that. But I'm still firing at least 2 to 3 at once (depending on that builds heat cap).

But I don't use chainfire otherwise, it's exceptionally rare I can realistically stand that long out in the open on a target.

Edited by Ultimatum X, 12 September 2014 - 05:09 PM.

[Bishop Steiner]

Ultimatum X, on 12 September 2014 - 05:08 PM, said:

To be honest, I never use chainfire.

If I have massed lasers, like on a Nova, I'll always split the lasers into groups and have one group that is "low heat" - and when necessary I'll use that. But I'm still firing at least 2 to 3 at once (depending on that builds heat cap).

But I don't use chainfire otherwise, it's exceptionally rare I can realistically stand that long out in the open on a target.

you do realize chainfire does not mean "stand in the open wait for one laser to fire, then let the other begin"?

When I do use my chainfire trigger, it's tap tap, or tap tap tap.... firing 1, 2 or 3 lasers essentially simultaneously, but with total control.