35 replies to this topic

[MauttyKoray]

I think the convergence idea in this topic is a little...strange. What should happen imo is when moving, turning, etc, your aim (which is calculated by the battlemech's computer) should have an area of offset to it where the mech may not hit the direct center of the spot you're aiming. Say you're running 160kph, twisting and turning, swerving, etc, the area where your weapon might hit would be fairly large (offset by distance to the target obviously) because the computer is having to CONSTANTLY make adjustments to the firing solution and so it could be wrong fairly easily.

In books/lore a mech usually moved at walking speed while firing its weapons to stay accurate, while running or sprinting while shooting tended to lead to more inaccurate shots due to the computer having to compensate for a larger number of movement factors all at the same time.

That and no weapon should ever be completely accurate to a pinpoint, there should always be a chance to deviate 5-10% from the center of the reticule you're aiming with.

[Spleenslitta]

Modo44, on 06 August 2015 - 11:07 AM, said:

I think mechs should be able to put all damage in one spot, otherwise a big skill component would simply go away. I like the War Thunder system where weapons converge at a preset range. Given the different engagement ranges in MWO, there would have to be some toggle/adjustment during a match. That way sniping perfectly would require skill with range controls, and potentially laying in wait (to preset the range correctly) -- instead of the current "just snap aim" approach.

Oh, and a preset convergence range would fix one major problem with the current system: overshooting wildly when you happen to pull the trigger while the reticule travels slightly away from your target's silhouette.

I think removing convergence would demand far more skill for us to remain accurate.
Since we would have to adjust to new crosshairs like the ones i made in the OP - or - just know instinctivly how far away from the crosshairs the left torso laser will be at close range for example.

Removal or some change to convergence would make Time To Kill go up by a whole lot because of inaccuracy.
It would also give more.....character/individuality to our mechs and their variants for sure.
Besides it's canonical since in the Novels a mech can't hit do pinpoint damage with multiple weapons...as a matter of fact they are very inaccurate to the extreme.

[Modo44]

There is nothing instinctive about non-convergence. It means an automatic, forced damage spread, making any aiming skill much less relevant. MWO is very much a shooter, with good aim a core skill for any pilot. My vote is for making it more in-depth, not for dumbing the game down by removing convergence.

[Savage Wolf]

Removing convergence would increase the barrier to entry for new players and you do not want that if MWO wants any chance of getting more players. It would also just increase the difficulty without adding depth. It would simply be harder to do the same thing we already do.

Removing Ghostheat would only bring back the insane alpha builds we once saw and would totally ruin balance of the game. However, Ghostheat is also unintuitive and needlessly complex (which however kinda fits with the rest of mech building I guess) and so also scares new players.

So replacing Ghost heat with a better system (or an entirely new way to build mechs would be even better) like the system that has been suggested a few times with simply having a certain amount of power from the reactor limiting how many weapons can be fired at once. Does the same, but a lot simpler.

[Spleenslitta]

Modo44, on 07 August 2015 - 12:24 PM, said:

There is nothing instinctive about non-convergence. It means an automatic, forced damage spread, making any aiming skill much less relevant. MWO is very much a shooter, with good aim a core skill for any pilot. My vote is for making it more in-depth, not for dumbing the game down by removing convergence.

Seems there has been a slight missunderstanding here. When i say no convergence i don't mean the weapons go willy nilly in all directions.
I mean each torso mounted weapon aims straight forward from where you're pointing the torso,
So a 2 lasers mounted in different locations will never hit the exact same area....but neither will the spots they hit get any further away from each other.

They just go straight. This makes aiming skill extremely relevant because the player will have to keep in mind that the weapon will not hit in the center crosshairs.
That's why i made the new crosshairs so that you can see where each individual weapon will hit.
It even shows how much SRM, LBX AC and MG weapons will spread depending on range.

It's in the last spoilerbutton in the original post. But yes the game would demand more skill.

[Spleenslitta]

To say it in a more simplistic manner......You cannot cross an Awesome's nipplebeams no matter how hard you try,

[Savage Wolf]

Spleenslitta, on 09 August 2015 - 03:40 AM, said:

Seems there has been a slight missunderstanding here. When i say no convergence i don't mean the weapons go willy nilly in all directions.
I mean each torso mounted weapon aims straight forward from where you're pointing the torso,
So a 2 lasers mounted in different locations will never hit the exact same area....but neither will the spots they hit get any further away from each other.

They just go straight. This makes aiming skill extremely relevant because the player will have to keep in mind that the weapon will not hit in the center crosshairs.
That's why i made the new crosshairs so that you can see where each individual weapon will hit.
It even shows how much SRM, LBX AC and MG weapons will spread depending on range.

It's in the last spoilerbutton in the original post. But yes the game would demand more skill.

My question is this, BUT WHY?

Why intentionally make your warmachine bad at aiming? It's not rocket science to make torso weapons tilt a little to be able to hit the same spot and it requires so little movement that it might as well be instant.

And what would be the benefit of increasing the skill requirements for the game? It's not like it will enable you do more advanced stuff all of a sudden. No, you would just need to make a greater effort to do the same exact thing.

[Spleenslitta]

Savage Wolf, on 09 August 2015 - 07:12 AM, said:

My question is this, BUT WHY?

Why intentionally make your warmachine bad at aiming? It's not rocket science to make torso weapons tilt a little to be able to hit the same spot and it requires so little movement that it might as well be instant.

And what would be the benefit of increasing the skill requirements for the game? It's not like it will enable you do more advanced stuff all of a sudden. No, you would just need to make a greater effort to do the same exact thing.

I suppose here is where taste in games comes in. Not to mention that the dev's seems to want to stay as close to canon as possible as well as extend Time To Kill (TTK).

In the boardgame and the novel which is also called canon the mechs had huge accuracy problems.
The dev's have stated numerous times that they want to stick close to the canon.
If convergence was removed we would get a far longer TTK.

Your correct that we won't be able to more advanced stuff but will instead go a longer way around to complete the objective of killing off our enemy.
Let me give you an example of how removing convergence would give you better sense of accomplishment when winning a duel in MWO.

First imagine yourself playing a simple arcade helicopter simulator. You push the firing button while your crosshairs are right above the target and BOOM it's gone.
The sense of accomplishment is mediocre at best since it was an easy thing to do.

Then imagine yourself playing an advanced helicopter simulator like DCS Black Shark. Loads of videos on youtube.
In this game you have to make use of multiple switches, buttons, gauges and who knows what else to do things that would be done with a simple button push in an arcade game.
The sense accomplishment is much higher when you have do to many actions and concider information quickly in order to destroy your target before it destroys you.

You would still be able to fire weapons with a simple mouseclick in MWO, but you would have to aim more carefully to focus damage on a particular part of the enemy mech.
What kinda duel do you remember best of all the duels you've had in MWO? The fast ones where you destroyed your opponent within seconds or the long nailbiters where either side could win?

I remember the long duels from waaaaay back in founders beta quite clearly but the most recent fast duels are just........gone.

[Savage Wolf]

Spleenslitta, on 09 August 2015 - 08:23 AM, said:

I suppose here is where taste in games comes in. Not to mention that the dev's seems to want to stay as close to canon as possible as well as extend Time To Kill (TTK).

The devs both want to stay close to canon but also wants to make an online shooter. Those two things are constantly at odds and so we end up with a game that really does both things badly.
But I'd love to extend TTK, I just think that this wont actually help much on that front and is just terrible on so many other levels that if this is the goal, there must be better solutions.

Spleenslitta, on 09 August 2015 - 08:23 AM, said:

In the boardgame and the novel which is also called canon the mechs had huge accuracy problems.

Accuracy problems and convergence problems are not the same. Accuracy is if you are pointing correctly but the projectile doesn't go in a perfectly straight line. Convergence is actually aiming all weapons at the same spot correctly. Lets split these two things apart.
I can understand inaccuracy (maybe less so on laser, but oh well) but not convergence as you would have to intentionally design your warmachines ineffectively, even by modern standards.

Spleenslitta, on 09 August 2015 - 08:23 AM, said:

The dev's have stated numerous times that they want to stick close to the canon.
If convergence was removed we would get a far longer TTK.

Again longer TTK is great, but there are other options.

Spleenslitta, on 09 August 2015 - 08:23 AM, said:

Your correct that we won't be able to more advanced stuff but will instead go a longer way around to complete the objective of killing off our enemy.
Let me give you an example of how removing convergence would give you better sense of accomplishment when winning a duel in MWO.

First imagine yourself playing a simple arcade helicopter simulator. You push the firing button while your crosshairs are right above the target and BOOM it's gone.
The sense of accomplishment is mediocre at best since it was an easy thing to do.

Then imagine yourself playing an advanced helicopter simulator like DCS Black Shark. Loads of videos on youtube.
In this game you have to make use of multiple switches, buttons, gauges and who knows what else to do things that would be done with a simple button push in an arcade game.
The sense accomplishment is much higher when you have do to many actions and concider information quickly in order to destroy your target before it destroys you.

You would still be able to fire weapons with a simple mouseclick in MWO, but you would have to aim more carefully to focus damage on a particular part of the enemy mech.
What kinda duel do you remember best of all the duels you've had in MWO? The fast ones where you destroyed your opponent within seconds or the long nailbiters where either side could win?

I remember the long duels from waaaaay back in founders beta quite clearly but the most recent fast duels are just........gone.

I don't necessarily mind a harder game, but it must be meaningful. Dark Souls is hard but not because it was hard to swing a sword. A game with confusing controls is not a hard game, it's a frustrating game. If you don't gain anything from making controls more advanced then you have just made bad game design.

So lets find a better way of getting a longer TTK without making bad game design that will just make it harder to get new players.

But wait, you also suggest removing Ghost Heat, but that will surely reduce TTK!?

[Spleenslitta]

Savage Wolf, on 09 August 2015 - 08:54 AM, said:

The devs both want to stay close to canon but also wants to make an online shooter. Those two things are constantly at odds and so we end up with a game that really does both things badly.
But I'd love to extend TTK, I just think that this wont actually help much on that front and is just terrible on so many other levels that if this is the goal, there must be better solutions.

Now we're talking. Sure there are other ways to extend TTK.
I choose removing convergence to deal with the boating that's so prevalent in MWO. There would be mechs that would still boat really well such as the Hunckback 4P.
With the crosshairs i designed we could still fire weapons with accuracy but it would demand more skill.
The other alternative is a rather unpredictable thingy.....make weapons fire willy nilly according to range and percentage.
Roll a 10? Sorry but the shot goes off to the side and low...burns grass. That is something i don't want and i suspect you don't want that either.

But ultimatly if we combined no convergence with something else things would be even better.
There is harsher penalties for high heat for example. I'd love that to replace ghost heat. Ammo explosions would actually be something to worry about once more.

Savage Wolf, on 09 August 2015 - 08:54 AM, said:

Accuracy problems and convergence problems are not the same. Accuracy is if you are pointing correctly but the projectile doesn't go in a perfectly straight line. Convergence is actually aiming all weapons at the same spot correctly. Lets split these two things apart.
I can understand inaccuracy (maybe less so on laser, but oh well) but not convergence as you would have to intentionally design your warmachines ineffectively, even by modern standards.

Whether accuracy or convergence are the same....i just want higher TTK.
As for intentionally designing warmachines ineffectively...well the board game is from the 80's and the makers of that game went with their gutfeeling when they created it rather than actual knowlegde.
I'm not a hardcore canon kinda guy but if that's what helps extend TTK i'm all for it.

Savage Wolf, on 09 August 2015 - 08:54 AM, said:

I don't necessarily mind a harder game, but it must be meaningful. Dark Souls is hard but not because it was hard to swing a sword. A game with confusing controls is not a hard game, it's a frustrating game. If you don't gain anything from making controls more advanced then you have just made bad game design.

So lets find a better way of getting a longer TTK without making bad game design that will just make it harder to get new players.

But wait, you also suggest removing Ghost Heat, but that will surely reduce TTK!?

Less players being attracted to MWO because of higher complexity is a small worry of mine, but those crosshairs aren't confusing at all for me at least.
Just look at them and imagine yourself shooting a target 300 meters away in your favorite mech. After playing for awhile you will adjust easily.
But yeah.....new players might not.

Removing Ghost Heat would normaly lower TTK by a lot but there would be fewer AC40/Gauss Jagers/Catapults etc because each big gun would be further apart thus lowering pinpoint damage.
Because i was still concerned i put those other alternatives in the poll.
Voters could put forward their own ideas for what would replace Ghost Heat and convergence.

I guess we should both question ourselves what makes more sense.
- Similar weapons producing more heat once there are a certain number of them.

Or
- The more heat your weapons produce the more sluggish your mech gets. There are other dangers such as ammo explosions from high heat and heatsinks just bursting from going past their limits.

[Spleenslitta]

I knew it. I always get my brightest ideas and clearest mindset when i'm sitting on the toilet.
All scientists and doctors should hereafter sit on a toilet with their pants below their knees when finding solution to problems.

That's what i thought with this idea too but then i remembered that most players are more hotheaded (aggressive) than me in heavy combat.
(i tend to keep a cool head under combat pressure.)
Thus my idea has little merit. Too bad because it kinda proves a few things about how easily we could adapt to having no convergence.
Oh well.....the idea about scientists and doctors replacing their officechairs with porcelain still applies though. XD

[Savage Wolf]

Alright, lets focus on lowering TTK because that's where we agree. And yeah, TT was made in the 80s but we need to sell it to 2010 audience for it to survive. So a bit of modernisation is in order I think.

First, removing convergence (I presume from only the torso) would mean bad controls. And I mean both lore wise, immersion wise and game design wise. We simply made a state of the art warmachine that can't aim right. And to fix a game mechanics problem we intentionally made bad controls for our game.
But it would make it harder to snipe as it's harder to make more than one weapon hit a mech at range. But maybe even to the extend that we all just begin brawling instead where this is less of a problem.
And if arms still converge, we would just use mechs where we mount weapons there.

Non-instant convergence, maybe even convergence based on speed, would probably have the opposite effect. Snipers stand still and will not suffer much from waiting a little to converge and convergence is faster at range to begin with. Brawlers and harrasers would suffer greatly because they move fast and need to converge weapons more.

Inaccuracy would spread damage more and would reduce pinpoint accuracy, but similar to non-convergence would probably make snipers unviable. Maybe PPCs and Gauss would still have high accuracy, just not fully 100%.

However, there was once proposed a system where weapons were limited by the amount of power the reactor could provide at once. Similar to Ghost Heat it would simply prevent you from firing more than two PPCs at once (but also without being able to fire it together with AC/10's or other), but the power quickly recharges and enable you to fire again. It even removed the need for a seperate rule for Gauss as we simply define that it also needs considerable power to fire. The system would lengthen TTK, it would replace Ghost Heat, it would be more simple and it would possibly also help balance the weight classes.
So that's my proposed solution.

[Spleenslitta]

That limited power is a really good idea.

AC's taking little power to fire but Gauss requiring a fair amount sounds fair. MG's should use next to no energy.
Energy weapons would demand most power of all in comparison to how much damage they do of course.
I don't know about missiles though. Maybe LRM's and Streaks demand a some energy to go to the targeting sensors?

But there is one thing that concerns me
Dual PPC/gauss/lasersboats and such capable of oneshoting light mechs who have just received a single AC5 shell to the centertorso would still be dominant i think.
But i suppose they would have a longer cycling rate on their weapons since the battery/capacitator would have to be recharged.
So the next time the boat fires it's likely to be with half it's weaponry.

I do have one last thing to say about no convergence though. I put it in a spoilerbutton since i'm a bit embarassed by my poor drawing.

Spoiler

I don't think it will be harder to make a single weapon hit a target at long range if you look at crosshair 2 and 3.
See how the torso mounted weapons have their own marks for where they will hit and how much it will spread if it's an SRM for example?

Sniper mechs don't have to be limited to using dual gauss and such.

Actually all my mech configs are based on having weapons for all ranges very much like in the lore.
I can snipe perfectly well with only one long range weapon....i just move around a lot to live longer and thus do more damage over a longer period of time.

I play according these sayings
-"Shoot but don't get shot"
-"if you know what you're going to do in the next 5-10 seconds you're doing it wrong"
- "unpredictability is yet another layer of armor to a fast mech"
Here is a link to how i do it but be warned that it's a textwall monster of tremendous size that makes the meta tactics lean 70 degrees sideways.
Yup....lean 70 degrees sideways with no support and see what happens. You fall over.
Non Meta Light Mech Tactics Guide.

Edited by Spleenslitta, 09 August 2015 - 12:03 PM.

[Savage Wolf]

How much you are able to fire at once can of course be tweaked depending upon balance so if Dual Gauss is too much, we set the available power below that. But it's an easy way to balance the maximum amount of damage you can deal in an alpha strike or even over time, without having to change weapons or mechs.

It can even be used to tweak the balance between weight classes.

And if Assaults end up with more weapons than they can fire, they might consider using tonnage for a Command Console or BAP, TAG, AMS or any other equipment usually discarded for more damage. Or they can simple have more weapons as backup.

It would also give a sort of alternative chain fire based on how fast you recharge power to fire the next weapon.

But no, not having convergence in the torso would still enable sniping with one weapon, but you could still do dual sniping in the arms. So it would just limit the number of mechs able to do so.
So I still believe that non-convergence doesn't have the desired effect and when I consider the increased barrier to entry, I don't think it's worth it. And it ruins immersion for me.

[Spleenslitta]

Savage Wolf, on 09 August 2015 - 12:37 PM, said:

How much you are able to fire at once can of course be tweaked depending upon balance so if Dual Gauss is too much, we set the available power below that. But it's an easy way to balance the maximum amount of damage you can deal in an alpha strike or even over time, without having to change weapons or mechs.

It can even be used to tweak the balance between weight classes.

And if Assaults end up with more weapons than they can fire, they might consider using tonnage for a Command Console or BAP, TAG, AMS or any other equipment usually discarded for more damage. Or they can simple have more weapons as backup.

It would also give a sort of alternative chain fire based on how fast you recharge power to fire the next weapon.

But no, not having convergence in the torso would still enable sniping with one weapon, but you could still do dual sniping in the arms. So it would just limit the number of mechs able to do so.
So I still believe that non-convergence doesn't have the desired effect and when I consider the increased barrier to entry, I don't think it's worth it. And it ruins immersion for me.

Ok. Let's agree to disagree on the convergence issue then because i got nothing more. Moving on to the energy limitation idea.

Maybe if the faster you go the more power is reserved for movement rather than weapons.
That way dual big guns would still be available but not when moving over half speed.

Another thing that could be done is this. The hotter the mech is the slower it generates power or the smaller the power storage capacity is.
So a player would have to manage not only heat but power output or storage. Maybe even both output and storage goes down at high heat levels such as 80-99% full heat treshold.

I'm going to bed soon. Got a nightmare to deal with at work tomorrow.

[LDTorroc]

I not quite a fan of the idea of removing convergence because of this. The arms on the mech are ment to move like they are a humans own arm, We do not see it in MWO but mechs with the proper actuators are capable of the same full range of movement most humans have. SO a mech being able to tuck his arms in to fire at close is something that true in both mechanic's and lore.

Now on to the topic of Ghost heat, i have been playing since the start of MWO. But only really got in to posting in the forums as of late becouse i feel there are things with need to be addressed, with this being said in the days before ghost heat, we could see some mechs who could field four, or six heavy lasers at a time with no worries about the heat so long as they had the right amount of heat sinks. This caused an inbalance in mechs becouse mechs who could field loadouts like these could easily stop over players. Lore wise, table top wise, and even paper and pen wise this is all correct, But the problem is we are now playing something were everyone feels things need to be balanced for fairgame play.

I am not a fan of the idea of ghost heat, But unless something else is throught about it is something that might need to stay, some builds with can field say 4 RAC/5's with no ghost heat and perfect heating balance can wipe mechs off the map single handily. Let me go ahead and show you why ghost heat is needed to be applied to ALL weapons. there are common weapons we find on everyone's favorite ankle bitter the piranha, This is with our perks, or quarks i am baseing my math on. With perks and quarks, the numbers can be much greater.

1. clan micro laser
2.4 damage
1.14 heat
2.25 sec cooldown.
.75 sec duration.
20 shots in 60 sec
48 damage in 20 shots.

1. clan micro pulse laser
2.7 damage
1.2 heat
1.6 sec cooldown
.5 sec duration
28shots in 60 sec
75.6 famage in 28 shots.

1.small clan laser
5 damage
3.5 heat
3.5sec cool down
1.1sec duration
15 shots in 60 sec
75damage in 60 sec

1. clan machine gun.
1d/s
0heat
60damage/60sec

now the damage out put on each one of these dosnt look all that great now dose it? Well then lets see what happens when its ramped up to 12 shall we?

12. clan micro laser
2.4 damage
273.6 heat
2.25 sec cooldown.
.75 sec duration.
240 shots in 60 sec
576 damage in 20 shots.

12. clan micro pulse laser
2.7 damage
403 heat
1.6 sec cooldown
.5 sec duration
336shots in 60 sec
907.2 damage in 28 shots.

12.small clan laser
5 damage
630 heat
3.5sec cool down
1.1sec duration
180 shots in 60 sec
900damage in 60 sec

12. clan machineguns
1damage/s
0 heat
720damage/60s

as you can see here, the little ankle bitter is able to rip armor away off any mech its faceing in less then 60/secs. Now, with the proper build you can lower the heat out put on these mechs to make them easier to use But, if your runing an mg build what heat do you need to worrie about? I do miss the days when we could fire more then X amount of weapons at a time, But at the moment it dose serve a reason for exisiting.