37 replies to this topic

[Eglar]

Mcgral18, on 10 October 2014 - 02:02 PM, said:

No...that's frontloaded, dealing all damage in one instance
Pinpoint is dealing damage to a single location, lasers fit into that.
They aren't mutually exclusive. isACs, Gauss and PPCs are PP FLD. All lasers are pinpoint, you know, deathstars. Missiles are FLD, but not pinpoint because of their CoF.
I take it there are different definitions for different people.

oh no i am not talking about the weapon mechanics but rather the player ability to keep the damage on one point, which matches your definition of:

Mcgral18, on 10 October 2014 - 02:02 PM, said:

Pinpoint is dealing damage to a single location, lasers fit into that.

laser and clan ballistic damage is fairly easy to spread. Even in a direwolf, if you start twisting after getting hit, you can still distribute about 35% of the damage on other parts of your mech. On faster mechs you can of course spread the damage a lot more. At the same time it's virtually impossible to keep the damage onto one single component to enemy lights or mediums. That's what I mean by pin-point. In a sense, SRM ARTEMIS's might even perform better since they are front loaded and on 200 meters their spread is neglectable.

Edited by Eglar, 10 October 2014 - 02:17 PM.

[w0rm]

Xarian, on 10 October 2014 - 02:05 PM, said:

All lasers are pinpoint. Lasers are not front-loaded.

lol no.

PPCs / Gauss / IS ACs are pinpoint. Lasers are DOT weapons.

[Mcgral18]

w0rm, on 10 October 2014 - 02:15 PM, said:

lol no.

PPCs / Gauss / IS ACs are pinpoint. Lasers are DOT weapons.

You don't seem to understand what Frontloaded damage is.

Lasers ARE pinpoint; they hit the pixel you have the crosshair over. They are also DoT.

Edited by Mcgral18, 10 October 2014 - 02:20 PM.

[KraftySOT]

But isnt torso twisting to spread damage a way to deal with the symptoms and not actually a cure?

Is that how you think mechs in the lore/TT are behaving in a firefight?

[Eglar]

Koniving, on 10 October 2014 - 02:10 PM, said:

Battletech (the board game) tries to simulate accuracy based on mech movement with modifiers. 0 for stationary, +1 for walking, +2 for running, +3 for jumping/sprinting. Each number makes it that much harder to hit something accurately.

While I can understand your issues with Gauss/PPC weapons systems. Using Lasers are exactly what Tabletop tries to emulate with its modifiers. Of course it's much harder to keep the crosshair on one single location compensating your own movement (horizontal) or when you jump (horizontal + vertical) in addition to enemy movement.
far
In fact the vectorial approach of MWO is by far more realistic than what Tabletop could ever have been. E.g. if an atlas moves towards you, not twisting, in a straight line, looking at you.. that's like if you were standing still and I am going to core your CT out with 2 alphas in a Stormcrow. But that's his own fault, right?

Edited by Eglar, 10 October 2014 - 02:38 PM.

[Mcgral18]

Eglar, on 10 October 2014 - 02:31 PM, said:

While I can understand your issues with Gauss/PPC weapons systems. Using Lasers are exactly what Tabletop tries to emulate with its modifiers. Of course it's much harder to keep the crosshair on one single location compensating your own movement (horizontal) or when you jump (horizontal + vertical) in addition to enemy movement.

In fact the vectorial approach of MWO is by more realistic than Tabletop could ever have been. E.g. if an atlas moves towards you, not twisting, in a straight line, looking at you.. that's like if you were standing still and I am going to core your CT out with 2 alphas in a Stormcrow. But that's his own fault, right?

I'm not sure the deathstar is what TT intended.

It's effective, but a tad exploitative of the armour system, and the completely magical convergence.


And I've been using these since before the SRM fix with the WubShee, which is comparable to the Clam laser spam, at significantly less range, but half beam time as well.

[StringyQuark]

Put convergence on a player controlled input. Such as the 1-9 for 100M - 900M, 0 for infinity, and/or the mouse scroll wheel. Would add skill to pinpoint shots. Could also land more shots on fast moving high angle (moving 90 degrees to you) mechs where you must lead your target but convergence is on the cross hair usually much further out then the mech you are trying to hit.

[Koniving]

Eglar, on 10 October 2014 - 02:31 PM, said:

While I can understand your issues with Gauss/PPC weapons systems. Using Lasers are exactly what Tabletop tries to emulate with its modifiers. Of course it's much harder to keep the crosshair on one single location compensating your own movement (horizontal) or when you jump (horizontal + vertical) in addition to enemy movement.
far
In fact the vectorial approach of MWO is by far more realistic than what Tabletop could ever have been. E.g. if an atlas moves towards you, not twisting, in a straight line, looking at you.. that's like if you were standing still and I am going to core your CT out with 2 alphas in a Stormcrow. But that's his own fault, right?

I think you missed something in what I was trying to say.

You are moving. The target is moving. The two of you are moving at each other at an angle.

Your arms are bobbing. Your mech is hobbling. Every thrust rear-ward of your leg sends your entire body up into the air and like a horse galloping there's a fraction of a second when your feet are not touching the ground (light mechs). Now, with every step, there's an impact of your 30 tons landing into the ground. First it surges through your foot, into the knee, into the hip, through the body. As your torso is recoiling from the sudden impact of your stride, the arms are still 'falling' until they, too, feel the surge and begin to go skyward again.

Every step, every movement, every motion, every impact received from enemy fire, etc., should have an impact on whether or not your shot hits where you aim.

Watch that (mute if you want). Notice how the body moves?
Or this..
Notice how the mech sways with each step?
Watch the first person here.

Notice how the sway matches the third person in the video before?

That AC/20 sways a full 15 to 35 degrees left and right with every step depending on your speed, with favorable sways at stock speeds and lower. A bit extreme but you get my point.

That is what I am referring to.
Also tabletop fails to depict a lot of things in relation to the lore. You may laugh at this, but Tabletop suffers horrifically from a pinpoint & front-loaded damage issue. For example, the Atlas D's AC/20 is described as a chain firing constant rate of fire DPS weapon that deals 20 damage in a unit of time (not per shot). The one sample that gives the exact shotcount states 16 shots for its Deathgiver, a 100mm weapon. That's 1.25 damage per shot (20 total for a rating). 0.4375 heat per shot (7 total for a rating). And with one ton of ammunition being 5 ratings per ton, that is 80 shots per ton.

The Shadowhawk's Armstrong J11 is an 80mm 10 shot weapon, dealing 0.5 damage per shot at 0.1 heat per shot, for a grand total of 5 damage. Unlike the AC/20 Deathgiver that the Atlas D uses, this Armstrong J11 is not fully automatic chain/belt/drum-fed weapon but a magazine fed weapon. Each magazine (properly called a cassette) holds one rating of ammunition (10 shots in this case), and a ton of ammo holds 20 ratings (200 rounds). Now different weapon variants that use burst fire work differently. Some like the Victor's Pontiac 100 (a 100 shot AC/20) spends the entire magazine in a single trigger pull. Others, like the Armstrong J11 might do a 2 round burst considering it's recon and fire support setup.

Even the lasers go this far. The Rassal Blue Beam has 3 pages of fluff that describe it specifically as a front loaded weapon in the sense that it is a standard medium laser that has multiple capacitors, requires a charge up, deals its damage in "2 blinks of an eye" for the full 5 damage... generates extra heat due to a poor cooling jacket. Causes EM interference, disrupting the user's radar, seismic, ECM, etc. Gives visual and audio warnings before it is fired (arm-vibration, heat iminantions/distortions, a "wailing cry that causes ears to bleed"), and an 8 second cooldown before it can be used again.

Yet there are medium lasers that can be fired 8 times in 10 seconds, a single one of those fired 8 times only dealing 5 units damage.

So... I wasn't referring to any deathstar mentalities.

Just accuracy, and mechs that bounce. Your beam could get glancing blows across two bodyparts instead of entirely focused on one. If you're moving too fast you might hit 3 different body parts spreading your laser's damage + wasted some on the air or the ground, too. But if you slowed down you'd get more accuracy. Just like tabletop. Just like third person.... but completely lost in first person where pinpoint aiming is causing some serious issues.

[elitewolverine]

PGI Has managed to somehow mess with the TT idea. And managed to make excuses despite games like WoWP have area of fire.

The reason why targeting computers were golden in TT is because it allowed aim. Here in the game we have that.

But lets ask a question, were the pilots also not able to aim in TT?

Roll of dice stopped pinpoint damage. It also allowed for things like one-shot-head kills which this game destroys, because they doubled the fire rate, introduced 'ghost' heat making some builds worthless, example Stock Awesome, and then they allow to core a CT with little trouble.

TT excuse was that this walking behemoths could not possibly have pinpoint accuracy with non guided systems, I mean run with a gun and fire,see how pin point it becomes.

The game could learn lots from these ideals:

1: weapon fire rate, 10 seconds was TT, getting very close to that would be perfect and make movement a much higher game mechanic.
2: Ghost heat, dumb, just remove it. Heat sinks should dissipate constantly at x amount of HS/sec, so when you fire there is no complicated math and no nerfing of HS with 'ghost heat' (Yes I want my awesome to be awesome, not a jenner magnet).
3: Convergence or system so that you hit, but not 100% crosshair pixel accuracy.
4: Armor. Make it like the TT, 7points normal 14 points FF, not that hard and would create for more 'safer' game play than running 3 lightsup a daishi knowing that a ac20 will not kill them, When it should.

[Eglar]

Koniving, on 10 October 2014 - 03:12 PM, said:

Your arms are bobbing. Your mech is hobbling. Every thrust rear-ward of your leg sends your entire body up into the air and like a horse galloping there's a fraction of a second when your feet are not touching the ground (light mechs). Now, with every step, there's an impact of your 30 tons landing into the ground. First it surges through your foot, into the knee, into the hip, through the body. As your torso is recoiling from the sudden impact of your stride, the arms are still 'falling' until they, too, feel the surge and begin to go skyward again.

lol that's what you mean.

I'll just assume that there's a software. which compensates your movements when you take aim both shakes and recoils. BT-Lorewise(TRO, Novels. In fact the novels suggest that pilots do not have to bother with compensating recoil or movement bobbinh) I can't really recapture any precise description of such a system or whether the pilot has to compensate this himself. I am fairly sure that TT ruleset left it out aswell.

as for arm-convergence some official illustrations suggest that arms can be moved very freely while torso mounted weapons are basically static. As a FPS gamer I would want to hit where I aim at. which means that PGI would have to implement multiple cross-hairs *one for each torso mounted weapon and 1 for arms, which would be the most realistic one and I probably could live with. But what's the other solution?

Cone of fire, virtually Adding an LB-X mechanic to every weapon system? pfft.

Edited by Eglar, 10 October 2014 - 03:46 PM.

[Koniving]

elitewolverine, on 10 October 2014 - 03:14 PM, said:

(TT is 16 points of armor normally per ton. MWO is 32 points of armor per ton.)
Ferro varied with whether Clan or IS. IS was simply 18 per ton (9 per half ton). Clan was 9.?? per half ton, but only gave full point increments. So 0.5 tons of Clan Ferro is 9 points, but 1 ton is 19 points, 1.5 tons is 28, but 2 tons is 38...
(For comparison IS ferro is 9 for 0.5 tons. 18 for 1 ton. 27 for 1.5 tons. 36 for 2 tons. Etc.)

But agree with most of what you said.

[DocBach]

KraftySOT, on 10 October 2014 - 02:22 PM, said:

But isnt torso twisting to spread damage a way to deal with the symptoms and not actually a cure?

Is that how you think mechs in the lore/TT are behaving in a firefight?

It'd explain how I somehow hit the right arm when shooting from the left side arc.

[Xanquil]

Hitting where you aim is perfectly fine if we were only allowed to use only one weapon at one time. Even with frontloaded damage, it is when every weapon fired at the same time hits, and hits the exact same location that things become a problem.
To make matters worse the more weapons lumped together into one "shot" reduces the amount of skill needed in order to defeat your enemies, completely removing the "don't nerf my skill" argument. By removing the alpha strike from being instant convergent it will make those that are truly skilled shine.
The current Alpha strike system in MWO is just bad for the game. I don't care if they add a COF to alphas(and only alphas) or remove alpha strikes completely, the ability to always hit the same location with every weapon fired at once needs to be removed.

[Koniving]

Eglar, on 10 October 2014 - 03:44 PM, said:

As a FPS gamer I would want to hit where I aim at. which means that PGI would have to implement multiple cross-hairs *one for each torso mounted weapon and 1 for arms, which would be the most realistic one and I probably could live with. But what's the other solution?

The torsos didn't converge. The arms did.
On a side note... there's a reason they didn't have to compensate much. They didn't fight at full speed.



Most fighting is done at half speed or even stationary. A mech that goes 64.8 kph will spend most of its time fighting at 32.4 kph. Especially in urban environments with streets, as any faster it could risk tripping. Not to mention be half as accurate.

Also, you mentioned exactly what I was looking at for an idea. A system with a crosshair for each weapon (as you go through the list to select them or all at once if you grouped them). This way it doesn't clutter the screen. Meanwhile arm weapons and Turrets (such as Locust) and missile targeting (think Catapult LRMs) will track its own united crosshair. (Meaning Catapult will not be limited to its no lower arm actuator situation, it can freely lock anywhere the pilot can see).

Mech arms could also track. Cockpits (on some mechs) could rotate. I've been covering this too.
For example you could hit Q to rotate the head left. It swings your entire cockpit that way. Now your arm raises up shoulder-level and allows you to fire up over a wall. The right arm will try to follow as best as it can, with some range that it cannot follow leaving you using only one arm.


And if your arm doesn't have a lower arm actuator, it'll remain in position and ignore the head movements of the battlemech.



This, from PGI, was the most accurate thing they ever did to Battletech.

And somehow the two+ years between then and 2011... they managed to start straying... and now it is completely unrecognizable from a Battletech perspective.

Edited by Koniving, 10 October 2014 - 04:16 PM.

[DocBach]

Koniving, on 10 October 2014 - 04:00 PM, said:

Heh, at about 2:45 we see the Kodiak twisting to spread damage.

[Eglar]

Koniving, on 10 October 2014 - 04:00 PM, said:

And somehow the two+ years between then and 2011... they managed to start straying... and now it is completely unrecognizable from a Battletech perspective.

Well I am sorry that you think this way. Even though I haven't always been d'accord with PGIs decisions, I wouldn't say that the game has strayed from the Battletech gerne in comparison with previous BT pc games. Just as a Side-note: You do realize that PGI will not invest the resources in order to change the current convergence system in order to keep it simple. While I am sure that hardcore BT geeks would be happy about such a change, it will enormously raise the entry level for new players who are not directly familiar with battletech and only want to play a stompy robot game.

[Psydotek]

Eddrick, on 10 October 2014 - 11:52 AM, said:

If weapon convergence were removed. It would spread damage naturally. The only way all shots would hit the same spot is if each weapon were fired one at a time and with aim adjustments made for each shot fired. Which, encourages chain fire. If you add recoil into the max after that. It makes all shot hitting the same spot still possible. But, even more difficult.

I'd love to try something like this. Especially if every weapon is given a separate targeting reticule.

[Koniving]

Eglar, on 10 October 2014 - 04:32 PM, said:

Well I am sorry that you think this way. Even though I haven't always been d'accord with PGIs decisions, I wouldn't say that the game has strayed from the Battletech gerne in comparison with previous BT pc games. Just as a Side-note: You do realize that PGI will not invest the resources in order to change the current convergence system in order to keep it simple. While I am sure that hardcore BT geeks would be happy about such a change, it will enormously raise the entry level for new players who are not directly familiar with battletech and only want to play a stompy robot game.

I agree. And through BT, there are a number of ideal mechs with simplified mechanics.

For example did you know that the following mechs do not twist in any way shape or form in canon?
Locust.
Jenner
Cicada
Catapult
Mercury
King Crab
Owens
Nova (Black Hawk)
Kit Fox (Uller)
Adder (Puma)

The list is actually quite extensive.

Some of these are noted to have lots of flexibility with their arms.

The King Crab in particular could extend and target an enemy on either side of itself (90 degrees left and 90 degrees right) and accurately hit them. Then again its AC/20s are burst fire rather than DPS-style auto fire. Its claws are known for shutting during the cassette-exchange sequence.

Some of these mechs have turrets to make up for their lack of flexibility.
The Locust has a turret that tracks the pilot's head movements, and contrary to PGI's implementation, the lack of lower arms doesn't actually mean that the mech can't aim left and right with its arms. (It does for some but not all, much like the Atlas K has 10 tubes on the LT and RT but they are fed from an LRM-20 in the left torso). The turret is capable of shooting 145 degrees left or right from the front, though more rear-ward fire requires slowing down.

The Catapult can fire its LRMs on angles and such; all good. But wait, what about the torso lasers? No twist leaves it vulnerable (as it should be), right? Right. However it's not unreasonable to make an adjustment.
A free-lancer style side turret could easily be done on either side torso, so it can fire off to the sides up to 45 degree angles. Not together mind you, but one side torso beam weapon; enough to do something in a 1x armor environment when accompanied by LRMs that have no minimum range. LRMs have a minimum accuracy range.

Despite minimum range, 4 LRM-5s were fired here from the tank. 3 of the 4 hit to absolutely crippling effect against these 50 ton ComGuard Enforcers. The one that didn't hit was the steep angle that once the LRMs were fired, required a curved 90+ degree arc that the missiles obviously should fail to accomplish. (Btw tanks are goddamn incredible.)

Then there are those like the Jenner. "Oh it can't aim left or right or torso twist, it must be worthless." Really now? I recall being able to shoot forward and backward. Make your hit and run charge, shoot the enemy, veer off and around or jump over it and flip the lasers in reverse to fire during your retreat!

Of course, to me an ideal scenario would have a combination of players and AI in the field akin to War Thunder. AI infantry, ground vehicles and aircraft. Plenty to keep any player busy and feeling very accomplished; also giving a sheer sense of scale. Command Console users able to give orders to the AI units to help support the efforts (otherwise they act on their own). One where the real value of a Dual Cockpit mech shines when the primary pilot is unconscious or killed, allowing the other to take over and keep you in the fight even after that headshot that would have killed you.

Spoiler

Weapon Attack Phase
-------------------
Weapons fire for Locust LCT-1V (Koniving)
Machine Gun at Atlas AS8-D (PTC); needs 3, rolls 6 : - Direct Blow - hits (using Left Side table) HD (hit aimed location)
Atlas AS8-D (PTC) takes 3 damage to HD.
6 Armor remaining.

Pilot of Atlas AS8-D (PTC) "Lily Davenport" takes 1 damage.*** Atlas AS8-D (PTC) DESTROYED by pilot death! ***


Machine Gun at Atlas AS8-D (PTC); needs 2, rolls 9 : - Direct Blow - hits (using Left Side table) LA
Atlas AS8-D (PTC) takes 4 damage to LA.
2 Armor remaining.


Medium Laser at Atlas AS8-D (PTC); needs 2, rolls 9 : - Direct Blow - hits (using Left Side table) LL
Atlas AS8-D (PTC) takes 8 damage to LL.
12 Armor remaining.


Weapons fire for Locust LCT-1V #2 (Koniving)
Machine Gun at Atlas AS8-D (PTC); needs 5, rolls 9 : - Direct Blow - hits (using Right Side table) CT
Atlas AS8-D (PTC) takes 3 damage to CT.
29 Armor remaining.


Medium Laser at Atlas AS8-D (PTC); needs 5, rolls 11 : - Direct Blow - hits (using Right Side table) HD (hit aimed location)
Atlas AS8-D (PTC) takes 8 damage to HD.
Armor destroyed, 1 Internal Structure remaining
Critical hit on HD. Roll is (8+3) = 11; 2 locations.
CRITICAL HIT on Standard Cockpit.
CRITICAL HIT on Sensors.

Pilot of Atlas AS8-D (PTC) "Lily Davenport" is already dead, so no damage is dealt!

The Atlas in that spoiler would still be functional even after that had it been a D-DC. Instead of shooting the centered cockpit of the nose, the Locust would have to choose an eye and fire and in doing so, the Locust pair would only take out one pilot rather than both. But what I find greatest of all is that not once did either Locust ever go beyond 86 kph up against Snub Nose shotgun PPC, Light PPC, RAC/5 (an RAC/5 in MWO will do in excess of 200 damage in 10 seconds at 6 times the rate of fire of the IS AC/5 in MWO) and other nasty weapons.

Every weapon and piece of equipment would have many variants but ultimately these variants would have similar stats in a unit of time. And akin to the lore, the Gauss and PPCs would not only be the deadliest weapons but also the rarest to fire again. So while that Awesome might align its arm PPC with one of the torso PPCs for a 20 damage pinpoint shot against an Atlas with 304 armor, that Awesome won't be able to fire those two PPCs for what might feel like years. Meanwhile the Atlas D's DPS style auto-fire AC/20 is pelting away, 1.25 at a time, while LRMs are flying, and the poor Awesome trying to use its body parts to shield itself or align its third PPC to fire the last thing it has until the others are ready to fire again.

Compared to the ultra powerful Awesome, a tanking beast of lots of armor with firepower heavy enough to be a "siege mech," the Victor would pale in comparison. In relation, however, the Victor would appeal to more 'get in your face and fight' style players. The Victor would be able to do things that the Awesome cannot even if the Victor can't match the Awesome's front-loaded firepower.

The ultimate goal of a developer is to have 'everything' be useful. Not just a select few mechs.

But yeah. Fantasies. I know it's far too late for MWO to do these things. That crosshair behavior from several posts back for the third person camera genuinely following every motion the real model's cockpit does instead of the 'gliding head' crosshair of first person? It would do wonders for this game.

Edited by Koniving, 10 October 2014 - 06:11 PM.