Hello mates ,
I am non-pay player whom i excluively using a Cicada 3M the past 4 months at least and only in solo que/PUGland , and its the only mech i have in my mechbay atm . Thus , i would like to throw on the discussion table some thoughts from my experience for you to take under consideration.
A) For first , altho many players consider ecm as OP , i can tell you for a fact that in every single game , i am targeted by LRm'S . 4 out of 10 times i even die from em . So imho , its an "OK" equipment , rather than "OP" . Why is that?...well for first lets consider which mechs can carry an ecm . A version of commando , a version of a spider , a raven , a cicada and an Atlas . So , the crashing majority of the mechs that can actualy utilize ecm are below 40 tons with the exeption of the atlas . That practicaly means , that for those mechs , a hit of a full salvo of lrms form a boat , its death sentence....simple as that . And there are so many ways to counter the ecm (eccm , narc , uav , distance itself , etc), that those mech , rarely make it out of a fight alive . I know i dont .
B ) player stated many times that mounting an ecm requires no sacrifice . Thats incorrect . The ecm weights 1.5 tons , which its considerable for a mech of such a low tonage .
C) ecm blocks only the weapons which they require a lock on .Thats lrms and streaks . For any other weapon , if the mech can see me , can hit me just fine . Under that perspective , even the advanced zoom module , its a great passive mean of detection and my ecm cant do jack against it .
D) ecm's range its rather limited . No matter how hard i try , i usualy manage to put only 1/3rd of my team under my umbrela most of the times. Even if the whole team concentrates in a single spot , the space that 12 mechs occupy , push some of em out of ecms range , even if i am standing in the middle of the formation .
E) distance is a crucial factor on countering the ecm . Even if you are an lrm boat , if you stay close to your team in the front lines (which many good players do) , you dont even need to have a tag installed . Cuz when the brawling dance begins , everyone is close enough to detect anyone so lock ons are rather easy to get . On the other hand , if you only want to stay like 1-2 blocks away from your base and just shoot missiles , then sorry but you ll have to suffer the conciquences of your choice.
F) while tag and narc can negate a single ecm , a uav can cancel all of em.
G) other option to counter the lrm boating , are not existant atm. The ams is totaly inaquate as we all know and deprivation module needs 15k exp and 6mil cbils to install , which practicaly means that without a premium , a players needs 3-4 weeks of hard playing in order to get it.
H) an ecm installed on an atlas is of little use . The mech itself is so big that can be detected visualy from across the map , and its speed too low to effectively keep up with rest of the team in order to provide stealth cover .
Like i said above , i am PUG cicada player . My mech is nothing but a compact table with 2 legs . This means that anything that hits me from above , hits one of the 3 parts of the xl engine . Now having that in mind , and take into consideration that PGI recently made IS lrms to hit in pinpoint manner instead of doing splashing dmg , you can understand that a single voley of lrms20's , with its curved trajectory , is enough to take me out . Clan lrms on the other hand , have no distance limitations , thus combined with a tag , can double as srms . I already lost duels with kitfoxes and stormcrows on that manner .
Also , i would like to mention here that many players cant understand that the mech is a complete vessel and not a mobile lrm turret . That means that one needs to invest not only on weapons , armor and engine only , but in electronics aswell . One also needs to understand the concept of "primary and secondary" weapons . You cant put 4 lrms20 on your mech and nothing else , or lrms 20 and large lasers and expect to be effective with that . If you do that , then yes , i ll sneak behind your teams front lines with my ecm , solo you out and kill you and you wont be able to do anything . That doesnt mean that my ecm is overpowered , it means , you havent installed anything to detect me , and no proper weapon to fight me off . Like i said before , most mechs that can carry an ecm are below 40 tons , which means that they cannot withstand fire from MPL's , PL's , srms , SL's , SPL ,s for too long , and for sure , if you fight back it wont insist on going toe to toe with something far bigger than itself . My point is....ok add the lrms you need , but also add some dps weapons for yourself defence , they are not useless you know.
As for last but not least , the light class mechs participation in metches at the moment , is somewhere between 8-12% . The crashing majority of them are ecm versions cuz practicaly they are the only playable lights that one can get . Nerfing the ecm , will effectively kick the last of these lights out of the que .Cuz , lets face it....who would buy a mech that has no true perpose , can die from a single avarage alpha , while on the other hand it needs 30-40 secs of continues firing to get a kill due to its low firepower , unless it has at least an edge on something?
@PGI
At the end , ppl complain about my ecm , i complain about their lrms , the other guy complains about IS balistics , and the guy next to him complains about ppc's , clan mech etc . We all consider the others "OP" . Whos right and whos wrong ?....have you ever considered the possibility that we are all both right and both wrong?...
My opinion is that the problems lays not on ecm , lrms , autocannos , ppc's , etc. It lays on the game itself . If i drop in a game that the other team has 3 ecms and 6 lrms boats , while my team has 1 ecm and mostly brawling weapons and lose badly , then i ll come to forums infurated screaming "nerf lrms" . On the other hand , if i am an lrm boat on a team full of lrms against a team full of ecms and speedy mech , i ll lose badly and start screaming "nerf ecm"...and so on and so on...
Can you fix the matchmaker to chose better than only tonnage and mech class?...imho...no you cant .Thats why WOT and WOA are dieing already . There are too many variables and when you balance something towards one direction , something else get unbalanced on another direction . Its like the sleeves on a sort shirt . You pull the left sleeve down , the right sleeve goes up .
What can you do about it ? . There is only one thing that can be done . Let the game balance itselfs . Drop the 12vs12 arena fps philosophy , and open the maps to as many players as possible . Seperate the community in 4 major nations (innersphere , clans , mercenaries , periphery) and let em balance themselfs through fighting and experience . Remove any limitations in weaponry , mechs , maps , strategies , numbers , anything....and let the nations balance each other . Create a system which can allow ppl just jump into a map and either defend of attack when a nation leader makes a call into arms , no matter if they are solo player , battalion members , clan members , etc .Unleash this games potentials...completely!...no restrictions at all .
And if after that , something needs to be changed (which i doubt) , well i am pretty sure it will be focused , certain and obvious , to you and to everyone else , so there will be no arguments.
Thats all i had to say , plz excuse my english , are not my native language
Thnx for your attention
Edited by Ed Trend, 14 September 2014 - 03:00 AM.