Tarl Cabot, on 16 January 2015 - 09:29 AM, said:
Unfortunately MWO is not TT, it is more inline with Solaris boardgame where each turn is 2.5 seconds with cooldown timers, etc. Of course, you have to also remember that MWO started out with single heatsinks, and allowing the heatcap to exceed 30 allowed mechs to fire more often, etc.
Does it make sense to set the heatcap now at a specific level other than 30? For single HS /10engine that is 40 heatcap, double HS/10engine that is 50 heatcap. Maybe, but that should also entail altering or removing some of the other heat penalties and such to account for it.
On the other side of the coin, regardless of the heatcap, there are no negative effects until you actually hit max overheat. Mech do not slow down, nor become sluggish in movement/targeting. Ammo explosion is possibility but I would set it to happen only after approaching specific level before max heatcap.
There are other ways to approach it that would make sense to newcomers, especially if it directly affected them before hitting the max heatcap while piloting trial mechs. They could even add dialog to those mechs for teaching instructions, and or run them through practice sessions, each would come with a pop up window, run through a training course for this mech? y/n.
It should be noted that
unlike Solaris, Dissipation in MWO is
not quadrupled along with firing rates. AC10 and PPCs in MWO would be the equivalent of an AC40 and 4PPC in CBT; whereas Solaris is closer, quadrupling dissipation along with firing rate (for most weapons; some like the AC20 still needed a few "turns" of 2.5 seconds to charge).
I think that hard capping the maximum heat to 30 has merits. For one, it "flattens" the unmastered mech against the mastered mechs - 10-20% higher dissipation/capacity at 30 cap has much less of an effect than say, 10-20% higher dissipation/capacity at 70 cap. The pilot trees in MWO; whilst being rewarding as a form of progression, do play a role in segregating new players from veterans (which can even bypass the levelling experience by spending GXP) and it has ramifications in letting new players into the game.
30 heat capacity without ghost heat makes a lot more intuitive sense. Needing to refer to
this table each time when making a build does not an intuitive experience make; given that a reference like this is entirely outside of the game.
I think MWO's biggest mistake was in giving players baseline 30 heat cap; with additional capacity as per heatsinks. If zero convergence didn't encourage PPFLD before; the massive alpha striking that 60+ heat capacities permit sure do.
Lowering the "effective" heat capacity by introducing heat penalties such as slower arm slewing, torso twisting and mech speed at say, 80% heat would also do the job of further forcing players to chain their fire instead of blowing their load, taking cover to cool, then repeating. The 4-6 PPC Stalkers and 2PPC/AC10 Cataphract 3Ds would not have been half as effective had the heat caps simply had been lower (and jump jets generate appreciable heat). Who knows, with "hot" Jump Jets; perhaps we can finally move beyond hoverjets and actually have JJs that let you, you know, actually jump.
The super hot, but super high jump jets of MW:LL got the balance absolutely perfect.
Another consideration is that Ghost heat pretty much fails to account for certain weapons, like Dual Gauss; or overnerfs other weapons, like Inner Sphere Medium Lasers; or SRMS for both Clan and IS; or effectively takes AC2s out of the game (RIP Mauler, you will never see the light of day). The argument can be made to suggest tweaking those specific Ghost Heat values; but why have this monolithic, clunky system of individual tweaks when clearly the systematic failure is in enabling 60+ heatcaps?
As for loadouts like Dual Gauss, in CBT Gauss had a minimum range to reflect the difficulty of targeting someone that required capacitors to charge (the "lock time"; or time from trigger pull to gun firing). Now, this is by no means a push for Gauss to have minimum range; because MWO already has it in-game by requiring that no more than 2 Gauss Rifles can be charged, and they have to be charged before they fire. To nerf Gauss even harder, one could slow down arm slewing/torso twist whilst the capacitors charge; but I don't think that's necessary.
If anything, removing Ghost Heat and increasing dissipation with a lower heat capacity (hard 30, or dynamic with lower initial capacity of say, 10) would
bring more weapons closer to the sheer heat efficiency of the Gauss. Russ Bullock keeps mentioning his fears of truly "heat neutral" mechs; whilst "neutral" stock build mechs are ovens, and minmaxed boats can alpha 2-3 times in a row. In the case of Dual Gauss, you can "alpha" them forever; the only limitation being recharge time. I really don't understand the so called "heat neutrality" argument.
The grandest experiment MWO can conduct is for a week or so, hard cap Heat Capacity to 20-30, then quadruple dissipation for that quintessential Solaris Experience. I contend that contrary to what others may espouse as to autocannons dominating the day, Lasers and PPCs would still have a place; because whilst their alpha capacity has decreased; the DPS capacity over time has effectively quadrupled. It may well be that the new "suppressive fire" build is not Clan UACs; but chainfired Clan Pulse Lasers. The new PPFLD "cheese" would no longer be ultraquirked MPulse on T-Bolts; but IS AC20s; as it should be. And Gauss? Gauss would be indirectly nerfed, if anything, by virtue of everything else firing so much quicker and cooling down so much quicker.
Edited by Matthias Malthias, 19 January 2015 - 05:08 AM.
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