57 replies to this topic

[Widowmaker1981]

While balance isnt perfect.. people seem to be missing the fact that since CW is a thing now, you directly pay for tonnage - lighter mechs should be flat out worse than heavier ones, or why take the heavier ones?

[Alistair Winter]

MauttyKoray, on 19 January 2015 - 03:16 AM, said:

A lot of people use lights to scout, TAG/Narc, and harass, not kill. People are taking the heavier mechs because this game's mechanic are broken as **** and heavier mechs can carry 60+ point alpha strike builds that can be used 2-3 times before needing to cool down (or if they even need to at all). It in no way has to do with whether or not the lights can get the kills or not (and believe me they can) but that people are taking advantage of the broken mechanics making heavier mechs more useful than lighter ones.

Well, we can agree on one thing. Gamebalance is in a very poor state and some mechs are capable of doing too much damage.

And yes, some people do use light mechs to scout, spot targets, harass, etc. But because role warfare has failed completely (or rather, never been implemented) there isnt really a big need for light mechs to do this. We have a matchmaker that always puts the equal amount of any weight class (ideally 3-3-3-3) on both teams, so the advantage of dropping in a light mech vs a medium mech is always irrelevant, as the enemy team will always have the same composition. In CW, I think it's fairly clear that TAG / NARC / scouting / harassing simply isn't as useful as sniping or zerg rushing.

I don't think we're ever getting role warfare. So the question of whether light mech pilots can get kills is actually crucial, because getting kills and doing damage is arguably the most effective way to ensure victory, it's the most fun thing to do for most players and it's the most profitable path both for C-bills, XP and LP. If role warfare ensured that light mechs as scouts had an important role, fun gameplay, good profits and an equal ability (compared to heavier mechs) to change the outcome of the fight, it would be different.

[Alistair Winter]

Widowmaker1981, on 19 January 2015 - 03:41 AM, said:

While balance isnt perfect.. people seem to be missing the fact that since CW is a thing now, you directly pay for tonnage - lighter mechs should be flat out worse than heavier ones, or why take the heavier ones?

Ideally? Because they have different abilities and a team should rely on a synergy effect between mechs with different abilities to win the battle. Furthermore, choice of mechs should ideally be more about your preferred playstyle rather than which mech is better. Unfortunately, some mechs in MWO are simply better, and that's why they dominate the meta. Which reduces variety. Which turns into CW a big orgy of Thunderbolts and Stormcrows.

[Mudhutwarrior]

I just bought my first locust. It does what its supposed to do and pretty well. Its 20 tons and dirt cheap.

Bring a .22 to a gun fight and you better be good.

That's what lights are all about.

If you want more spend more.

[Alistair Winter]

Mudhutwarrior, on 19 January 2015 - 03:56 AM, said:

If you want more spend more.

I do believe that's the official tagline for MWO.

[Latorque]

There's an additional; subjective problem on top: i won't field support-equipment on my light mechs; since i strictly despise playing into the hands of Lurmers. I love fast Brawler mechs the most, and yes; LRMs are a serious problem for those (losing LoS while in a brawl isn't that easy).

Since i played LRMs for mastering some chassis and rebought an AWS-8R missile boat yesterday (the challenge made for such horrible matches that i decided to go with the pack - it's mothballed until the next challenge): i hate this goddamn powerful autoaiming Hodorclub from personal experience on both ends, and even though i know i would probably improve my teams chances of victory i'll never support the use of it.

If the light's role would be reworked in a system where LRMs were very dangerous with a spotter - more than they are now - but far less useful without one; that would be a different story altogether. I'd consider this as the natural role of a light, and it should be substantially rewarded - as well as the LRM boat using its weapons to maximum efficiency in cooperation with the spotter; but LRMs are more than fine without any help.

The current mechanic of

• see something red that anyone spotted
  
• hit r
  
• fart missiles for great justice
  
• profit

just doesn't need the lights.

Edited by Latorque, 19 January 2015 - 04:13 AM.

[Mudhutwarrior]

Latorque, on 19 January 2015 - 04:08 AM, said:

There's an additional; subjective problem on top: i won't field support-equipment on my light mechs; since i strictly despise playing into the hands of Lurmers. I love fast Brawler mechs the most, and yes; LRMs are a serious problem for those (losing LoS while in a brawl isn't that easy).

Since i played LRMs for mastering some chassis and rebought an AWS-8R missile boat yesterday (the challenge made for such horrible matches that i decided to go with the pack - it's mothballed until the next challenge): i hate this goddamn powerful autoaiming Hodorclub from personal experience on both ends, and even though i know i would probably improve my teams chances of victory i'll never support the use of it.

If the light's role would be reworked in a system where LRMs were very dangerous with a spotter - more than they are now - but far less useful without one; that would be a different story altogether. I'd consider this as the natural role of a light, and it should be substantially rewarded - as well as the LRM boat using its weapons to maximum efficiency in cooperation with the spotter; but LRMs are more than fine without any help.

The current mechanic of

• see something red that anyone spotted
  
• hit r
  
• fart missiles for great justice
  
• profit

just doesn't need the lights.

That's crap. There are very few good LRM pilots. It's not really easy turning good damage if your up against a good team. Its only easy money against easy targets. An LRM pilot who brings tag, moves and finds his own targets can be deadly. A bad one may gain some but is a big target the rest of the time.

What I really enjoy is parking just behind the lone LRM boat with a gun boat. Sooner or later an lrm hating lance or a solo comes looking. End result is satisfaction.

[StraferX]

Widowmaker1981, on 19 January 2015 - 03:41 AM, said:

lighter mechs should be flat out worse than heavier ones, or why take the heavier ones?

Why should lights be worse than any other class? each class has it's own specific target group or role to play, a heavy can not scout as well as a light, a medium can not brawl as well as an assault. This is one of the big problems with the game, we do not have elevated rewards per chassis for your specific role. Given a challenge a light should not need to get a kill for the reward they are truly supposed to harass so the bigger guys can kill, or scout and relay info to the team unless its light vs light where damage should receive an 1.4x multiplier.

Someone mentioned adding a sliding mechanic for mechs over 150 kph! I love this as it would add the dimension of drifting, I would intentionally powerslide all the time. I can only imagine how much this would screw with HSR and hit registration.

[kesmai]

The last match with the locust e i had over 600 damage and 5 kills. While not the best match, the average until mastered was around 350 dmg and a k/d above 2. I do not think that high risk / high reward mechs should get more bonuses at all. Commandos spiders and lolcusts are very " niche ".
when a mediocre pilot like me can achieve those mumbers i see no need to buff them further.

[Latorque]

Mudhutwarrior, on 19 January 2015 - 04:25 AM, said:

That's crap. There are very few good LRM pilots. It's not really easy turning good damage if your up against a good team. Its only easy money against easy targets. An LRM pilot who brings tag, moves and finds his own targets can be deadly. A bad one may gain some but is a big target the rest of the time.

What I really enjoy is parking just behind the lone LRM boat with a gun boat. Sooner or later an lrm hating lance or a solo comes looking. End result is satisfaction.

Not really, sorry. No idea in which area of the vaunted ELO-bracket i'm in, but a purely LRM-equipped AWS-8R brought me through the challenge just fine. Yeah, i had a TAG in the head, and that's it. 4x15 LRMs w/o Artemis otherwise. Ghost heat isn't a real concern with this (it was elited en route btw, that means no 2x basic efficiencies for quite a while), ammo pretty much never runs out. In a victorious match it's 1-4 kills with no effort whatsoever, dmg around 500-800 unless you're on Terra Therma.

This build shouldn't have gotten me anywhere: http://mwo.smurfy-ne...202fc1b669b19c7

and it breezed me through the challenge without breaking a sweat after toiling away like mad in direct-fire builds. What i did in this was far from what i'd consider "good piloting"; it's a horrible troll build (okay, i "moved" toward the enemy).

If this would work with a spotting light to devastating effect, completely fine with me. If it works without one - what it did - it doesn't reflect that well on the current mechanics. I died every about every third match, when my team lost. Oh my.

And i didn't pilot LRM-boats for more than a year. The skill required is not exactly mindblowing.

[Widowmaker1981]

Latorque, on 19 January 2015 - 04:43 AM, said:

Not really, sorry. No idea in which area of the vaunted ELO-bracket i'm in, but a purely LRM-equipped AWS-8R brought me through the challenge just fine. Yeah, i had a TAG in the head, and that's it. 4x15 LRMs w/o Artemis otherwise. Ghost heat isn't a real concern with this (it was elited en route btw, that means no 2x basic efficiencies for quite a while), ammo pretty much never runs out. In a victorious match it's 1-4 kills with no effort whatsoever, dmg around 500-800 unless you're on Terra Therma.

This build shouldn't have gotten me anywhere: http://mwo.smurfy-ne...202fc1b669b19c7

and it breezed me through the challenge without breaking a sweat after toiling away like mad in direct-fire builds. What i did in this was far from what i'd consider "good piloting"; it's a horrible troll build (okay, i "moved" toward the enemy).

If this would work with a spotting light to devastating effect, completely fine with me. If it works without one - what it did - it doesn't reflect that well on the current mechanics. I died every about every third match, when my team lost. Oh my.

And i didn't pilot LRM-boats for more than a year. The skill required is not exactly mindblowing.

No, you see that is the exact same experience of LRMs i used to have - i played solo almost exclusively, with a bit of random group dropping on NGNG TS (about 5-10%, and not a much bigger W/L than solo) and id bring out my Warhawk LRM boat and had an average dmg of over 600 taken from stats - which is crazy freaking high. LRMs did indeed seem easy mode, which i never really understood because i found avoiding them pretty easy myself. my W/L on my account after ~2000 games like this was 1.15 - so not awful. (not all in LRMs by any means, maybe 30-40%)

Then i started grouping with my current unit mates (we formed the unit over time on NGNG) almost exclusively - now, after ~3000 drops my W/L is 1.6 (meaning for the last 1000 games its been around a W/L of 2:1 ish). This has inflated my Elo to the point where if i bring an assault/heavy LRM boat to a solo game (i almost exclusively play heavies and assaults in group so thats where my Elo is inflated) i can no longer get decent damage, ever. People just know how to dodge the missiles. Yet in a direct fire assault im still able to kill fine in my current Elo.

Tl:dr - I saw how easy mode LRMs were, then my Elo went up due to being in a good group, and now they no longer work. I didnt forget how to use them, my opponents now all know how to avoid them. LRMs are not OP, its target skill that determines their damage potential.

[Pjwned]

They already spread or avoid damage like crazy if you move properly and/or abuse bad hit registry, I would really rather not see already difficult targets even more difficult to hit.

If super fast light mechs need some help I think there are better ways of accomplishing that.

[Mercules]

Alistair Winter, on 18 January 2015 - 04:18 PM, said:

And it's not a matter of hit reg anyway, it's about stopping Locusts and Commandos from being legged 2 minutes into every game by anyone with a decent aim.

Alistair Winter, on 18 January 2015 - 06:23 PM, said:

I don't really care about the people who are able to do well in a Locust. Whenever you start a thread about the Locust, there's always some joker who says he regularly does 1500 damage with only flamers and an SRM2+Artemis. It doesn't really change the premise of the thread, which is the fact that the Locust, Commando and non-ECM Spiders are arguably the least popular and least dangerous (on average) mechs in the game. Getting a Commando on your team is like winning the lottery. Except the Commando will probably die after doing 81 dmg.

Part of this is because most people do not play Lights very well. If I end up spectating I'll watch a light pilot as they can help me gather the most info I can type in the fastest and usually can't slow down to type themselves. Far too many Light players do not use their speed for anything other than getting from point A to point B. They don't broken run and evade and they don't leave bad situations.

So Lights that can be "tankier" for whatever reasons(there are plenty of Firestarter threads already) are the go to mechs because people run in, circle or fast forward a face tanking, and blast away. You do this in a Commando/Locust and you die. That extra speed means you can snap shots into a mech by breaking cover, shooting, entering new cover, spinning in place(because you can literally brake while holding down the acceleration and turn very quickly) and running out of the cover at an unexpected place. Sometimes I'll run directly away from said mech with the cover between us, loop around and come back in from a different angle. They will stare at the corner I should be coming out of for a long time too.

Hit and Run is the way to play those mechs and should be how the other lights are played but there are other factors than just tonnage at play. Quirking them any further might be ridiculous but glancing blows are not a good balancing factor as they will simply anger pilots and if someone can drop an AC/20 on my Commando when I am evading they deserve the hit. I've tied up Boom Jaggers in my Commando multiple times just never giving them a clear shot while I pump the occasional laser and SRM into them to keep them after me. Usually I can keep them busy until my team can come deal with it or some LRM carrier notices my lock.

Edited by Mercules, 19 January 2015 - 06:01 AM.

[Latorque]

Widowmaker1981, on 19 January 2015 - 05:28 AM, said:

No, you see that is the exact same experience of LRMs i used to have - i played solo almost exclusively, with a bit of random group dropping on NGNG TS (about 5-10%, and not a much bigger W/L than solo) and id bring out my Warhawk LRM boat and had an average dmg of over 600 taken from stats - which is crazy freaking high. LRMs did indeed seem easy mode, which i never really understood because i found avoiding them pretty easy myself. my W/L on my account after ~2000 games like this was 1.15 - so not awful. (not all in LRMs by any means, maybe 30-40%)

Then i started grouping with my current unit mates (we formed the unit over time on NGNG) almost exclusively - now, after ~3000 drops my W/L is 1.6 (meaning for the last 1000 games its been around a W/L of 2:1 ish). This has inflated my Elo to the point where if i bring an assault/heavy LRM boat to a solo game (i almost exclusively play heavies and assaults in group so thats where my Elo is inflated) i can no longer get decent damage, ever. People just know how to dodge the missiles. Yet in a direct fire assault im still able to kill fine in my current Elo.

Tl:dr - I saw how easy mode LRMs were, then my Elo went up due to being in a good group, and now they no longer work. I didnt forget how to use them, my opponents now all know how to avoid them. LRMs are not OP, its target skill that determines their damage potential.

I concur, but target skill has a pretty heavy influence on any weapon's effects - but i see your point. Sure; as long as i'm not in a brawl avoiding LRMs with an RDM installed is not that hard, and effectivity starts to go up exponentially within a voicechat-coordinated team (i'm still looking for the right unit; and never quite sure if i want one at all). Simply taking a number of ECM equipped mechs and making sure they're moving with the team or something along those lines should do wonders.

I'm fully aware that i'm abusing my ELO bracket (i'll never unravel the mysteries of that thing); whatever it may be. 1.17 k/d, W/L by 1,49 (i'm kinda surprised by that ). But the point still stands: it's a highly effective weaponsystem requiring pretty much no effort when fielded against a pretty large group of players. If half of the enemy team packs LRMs - as they do now -, have fun avoiding those once the brawl is on. I dearly love playing my fast brawlers; but the experience piloting those was scarring in the last few days.

The thing i hate most about LRMs is their absurd ammo count per ton when boating. Using the build posted above; i ran out of ammo in the very last minute of the match; after sneezing out unending 30/30 salvoes in rapid succession. You don't have to hit often; but you can pretty much saturate the enemy with missiles - and that seems to be enough.

[mogs01gt]

The only light that needs fixing is the FS9! I dont mind the firepower since they run hot but I hate their hitboxes/hit reg. I was dead center on one with ac10 on a red CT and nothing registered.

[Widowmaker1981]

Latorque, on 19 January 2015 - 06:03 AM, said:

I'm fully aware that i'm abusing my ELO bracket (i'll never unravel the mysteries of that thing); whatever it may be. 1.17 k/d, W/L by 1,49 (i'm kinda surprised by that )

Your W/L is 1.49:1 from exclusively soloing? Holy cow.. you are a very lucky person. What kind of total number of matches is that?

[Latorque]

Not that many since the stat reset: 774. I took a long break after the LRM speed buff hit; due to neverending Lurmspam.

[Burktross]

Alistair Winter, on 18 January 2015 - 06:23 PM, said:

Well, this is why I'm suggesting a simple arithmetic rather than geometric calculations. For the sake of not complicating things.


I don't really care about the people who are able to do well in a Locust. Whenever you start a thread about the Locust, there's always some joker who says he regularly does 1500 damage with only flamers and an SRM2+Artemis. It doesn't really change the premise of the thread, which is the fact that the Locust, Commando and non-ECM Spiders are arguably the least popular and least dangerous (on average) mechs in the game. Getting a Commando on your team is like winning the lottery. Except the Commando will probably die after doing 81 dmg.

Yes, but this is a good solution. Broken hitreg helps as is, there simply needs to be convergence changes or quirkening v2.
I'm no expert in a lolcust, no, far from it. But I recognize that most of my deaths in it are my own shortcomings, not the mechs fault.