43 replies to this topic

[Alistair Winter]

Let me just start off by saying:

• I think the quirks in this game play a much larger role than they should. Quirks should be a minor factor, after all other variables have been adjusted to buff or nerf mechs as necessary. (Engine cap, torso twist, number of hardpoints, etc)
  
• The primary purpose of quirks, in my mind, is to promote variety, give a slight boost to underperformers and reward challenging builds. High risk, high reward.

Just as an intellectual exercise, I'm going to try to suggest a solution to fixing quirks. When you're unhappy about a feature in the game, it's sometimes a humbling experience to propose an alternative, as you may find that a lot of people think you're a moron and then you can consider whether the problem is more complex than you initially estimated. With that out of the way...

Quirks vs Mechs

Spoiler

MWO isn't like any other game, because it's based on the BT universe. PGI could create brand new mechs of their own design, but have mostly gone with canon mechs and canon variants. With that in mind, I think the goal of the devs should be to recreate mechs from the BT universe with a goal to stay true to the mechs' original role in BT. For example, the Atlas is renowned for its durability. It would be a pity of the Atlas in MWO was played like a glass cannon LRM boat with XL engine. Similarly, it would be a pity if iconic LRM boats like the Catapult turned out to be the ultimate PPC poptarts and everyone just stripped them of missiles all together. The goal should be to maintain the 'character' and core idea behind each mech, when possible. One clear exception to this rule would be if a mech, such as the Locust, was originally intended as an anti-infantry mech or a tank killer, since we have neither infantry nor tanks in MWO.

In conclusion... I think quirks should keep sniper mechs as sniper mechs, keep brawlers as brawlers, keep support mechs as support mechs, as a rule of thumb. Many mechs are iconic because of their unique armament, such as the HBK-4P with its laser hunch, the AWS-8Q with its PPCs and the Centurion with its large ballistic weapons. I don't think quirks should effectively force everyone to use stock weapons, but I do think it's very sad when it's a very bad idea to put a PPC on a CPLT-K2 or to put missile launchers on a Timber Wolf, because those weapons are very much a part of what makes those mechs so iconic.

TL;DR: Quirks should ideally not encourage people to completely change the role or armament of mechs, but should still give the players a lot of freedom to experiment and customize.

Quirks vs Boating

Spoiler

This is the main challenge with boating. I think the biggest mistake both PGI and players have made is to look at a mech like this:
1) The BNC-3S' stock armament is 2 PPCs, AC10, SRM6 and 4 medium and 2 small lasers.
2) The BNC-3S has 9 energy hardpoints, 1 ballistic hardpoint and 1 missile hardpoints
3) The BNC-3S is known for having medium lasers and would benefit most from medium laser quirks
4) Give the BNC-3S bonus medium laser range, bonus energy range, shorter medium laser duration, shorter duration for all lasers, extra PPC velocity and 10% ballistic cooldown. In other words, LOTS of quirks that buff medium lasers, and barely any quirks for PPCs, AC10 or SRMs.

If you give medium laser quirks to a mech with 9 energy hardpoints, who in their right mind is going to keep the single SRM6 on that mech?

Boating is a fundamental "problem" in any Mechwarrior game, because it makes sense to specialize. This is not like a space sim where you need different ammunition types (armour-piercing, explosive and energy shield buster) to deal with different targets. In those games, specialization is a huge risk. That's not the case in MWO or, as I understand it, even in TT.

Do I want to get rid of boating? NO! There are many missile boats in Battletech, many energy boats and many ballistic boats. My only concern is that people are turning every mech into a boat, and this leads to less variety. Variation is the spice of life. And the spice must flow.

Furthermore, near-universal boating places less emphasis on multi-tasking, which is what makes Mechwarrior-games different than most other FPS games. The challenge of keeping track of ammunition, heat, damage on different components, ECM jamming your radar and toggling different weapon groups at the same time is what makes Mechwarrior special. A player's ability to multi-task should be rewarded. Ideally, the best pilots should be encouraged to challenge their multi-tasking abilities with different weapon groups. Just like good Starcraft players should be encouraged to use the combined abilities of different unit types, instead of only spamming Siege Tanks.

TL;DR: MWO should not reward every one for boating with all mechs. Use quirks to make legendary boats such as the Nova Prime and CPLT-A1 viable, but encourage mechs with different hardpoint types to use all their hardpoint types.

How to quirk
This is the part where I offer my solution, based on the premise above. I'll do it with bullet points.

• Use quirks to save endangered hardpoints. E.g. if a mech has 4 energy hardpoints, 1 ballistic hardpoint and 1 missile hardpoint, PGI should give significant ballistic and missile quirks to encourage people to use all hardpoint types and make boating less attractive.
  
• Use general quirks as much as possible. Weapon-specific quirks (e.g. SPL quirks on FS9-A) tend to reduce variety. Type-specific quirks (e.g. laser range on FS9-A) promote experimentation with different weapons and builds. PGI has already started making this change, and that's good.
  
• Avoid hyper-quirked weapons such as the DRG-1N's AC5s. Same point as above, but I just wanted to give it extra emphasis.
  
• Use more quirks that are unrelated to weapons. Extra armour for the Atlas, for example. PGI has already started experimenting with this, which is good.

"But a heavily quirked single missile launcher isn't useful! That's not how you mechwarrior! Good builds do not rely on a single SRM6 and a single AC10!"

The metagame would change if you changed quirks to encourage the use of different weapon groups. For example, before the quirkening, the 3xSRM6 2xMedlas Centurion was a very common build, because there was hardly any point in bringing a single ballistic weapon, like an AC10 or LB10X. Better to just boat SRMs and ignore the single ballistic hardpoint.

After the quirkening, the SRM-boat Centurion is almost gone. Partially because we now have better SRM boats like the Griffin, sure. But if the single ballistic hardpoint on a Centurion is good enough, then you can't afford not to take it. If the single missile hardpoint on a RVN-4X is good enough, then you can't afford not to take it.

The goal is to reward players who can handle the multitasking of managing different weapon groups. Not reward people who just put 6 MPLs in a single weapon group and face tank their targets untill they fall down. You want to reward the Atlas pilots who can find that optimal range where all their lasers, ballistics and missiles work together in perfect harmony and create a symphony of destruction. You don't want Atlas pilots to just mount 4xLPL on the AS7-RS.

Some examples of mechs I would fix, and how:

BNC-3S

Spoiler

The BNC-3S has 8 energy hardpoints, 1 ballistic hardpoints, 1 missile hardpoint.
Stock armament is 2xPPC, AC10, 4xML, 2xSL, and SRM6.
Its quirks are PPC velocity, medium laser range, energy range, laser duration, medium laser duration, and a slight ballistic cooldown.

The problem is that it has 8 energy hardpoints and 4 of 6 quirks are great for boating medium lasers. There's no quirk for its missile hardpoint, which means there's no point in carrying missiles. Missiles generate a lot of heat, so without quirks, they make a bad combination with laser boating. The quirk for the ballistic hardpoint is not really that big, so there's not a lot of reason to bring a ballistic weapon. Most Banshee pilots who want ballistics tend to choose the 3xAC5 build for the BNC-3E, which actually has good ballistic quirks.

My solution is to give some solid cooldown and/or heat reduction quirks for the missile and ballistic hardpoint, as there is no risk of boating. Beyond that, it would be nice to give some generic energy hardpoints and let the players decide the combination of energy weapons they desire. With 8 energy hardpoints, a lot of players will want to bring medium lasers anyway, so I don't think that needs to be encouraged. But some PPC projectile speed quirks would encourage synergy between the ballistic weapon and the PPCs, and reduce the chance of people simply loading up 6-8 medium lasers.

TDR-5SS

Spoiler

The TDR-5SS has 7 energy hardpoints and 1 missile hardpoint.
Its stock armament is 1 PPC, 1 Flamer (lol), 3xML and 1 SRM6.
Its quirks are MPL range (25%!), energy range (25%!), energy cooldown, energy heat reduction and a silly little missile cooldown quirk.

I'll just use this as an example, since it's the most popular mech in CW right now. PGI has elected to give it MPL quirks, despite the fact that it doesn't come with MPLs as stock armament. Most people run it as a pure MPL boat, as far as I can tell. I guess PGI's idea was to give it an MPL quirk to promote more variation (instead of everyone running medium lasers), but instead they've killed variation by creating an army of MPL boats. My solution should come as no surprise:

First of all, give a bigger quirk to the missile hardpoint. I'm not talking Huginn-level SRM machine gun, but a good start would be an increase to missile range and cooldown. With only a single missile hardpoint, the chances of people exploiting this quirk is zero.

Second, replace MPL quirks with generic energy quirks, but get rid of the 15+15% heat reduction. Ideally, you want TDR pilots to use a combination of PPC + lasers, instead of just boating either PPCs or lasers. The way to do this, I think, is to give good PPC range / projectile speed / cooldown quirks, without reducing heat. Heat reduction counters ghost heat and leads to PPC boating. You could also give laser range + laser duration quirks which make medium lasers / MPLs a good choice to complement the PPCs.

It's a tricky thing to encourage people to use different energy weapons without hardpoint sizes, but I don't think it's impossible. I can't give specific numbers, but the idea would be:

• Make PPC an attractive choice, but too hot to boat them
  
• Make the missile hardpoint so good that most people would want to equip missiles, even though it's just a single launcher
  
• Give lasers extended range to work better with the PPC, but don't give any heat reduction quirks that result in people equipping 7 MPLs or 7 MLs.

CPLT-K2

Spoiler

The CPLT-K2 has 4 energy hardpoints and 2 ballistic hardpoints.
Its stock armament is 2xPPC, 2xML and 2xMG
Its quirks are PPC velocity, medium laser duration, laser duration, energy heat generation and ballistic range.
The challenge of the K2 is that it's such an iconic PPC carrier and you want to encourage players to use the PPC instead of dual gauss. But at the same time, you don't want to turn the CPLT-K2 into a supreme PPC boat like the TDR-9S used to be.

As a CPLT-K2 player, the biggest problem is the lack of hardpoints, which forces you to bring a lot of big and heavy weapons. The main challenge is having good enough DPS to survive in a brawl, and of course there's the minimum range on the PPCs to worry about. If you use a build like 2xPPC + 2xAC5, then you're probably going to be very slow and quite hot. If you use a build like 2xPPC + 2xLL, then you may go faster, but you'll still struggle with heat and DPS in a brawl. And when the enemy gets inside 90 meter range... forget about it.

The way to fix the CPLT-K2 is to encourage the use of PPCs by finding a solution to the DPS problem, without making PPCs so good that people just run 4xPPC. So you can't give PPC serious heat reduction, because that leads to boating. But if you give the CPLT-K2 some good cooldown quirks for PPCs combined with good PPC projectile speed, then you can hopefully get the same effect as the post-nerf TDR-9S. Few people still put 3xERPPC on the TDR-9S, because it's just too hot. But the cooldown quirks and ERPPC projectile speed on the TDR-9S make it useful to have a couple of ERPPCs and some lasers as backup weapons. Ideally, the same should be true for the CPLT-K2

What about Clan mechs?

Spoiler

Clan mechs are completely different due to omni-pods, obviously. My first thought is to nerf the Tier 1 Clan mechs. The Timber God, the Stormcrow, the Hellbringer and the Dire Wolf, to match Inner Sphere Tier 1 mechs being nerfed. This power creep has to end.

One way to nerf the Timber Wolf, for example, would be to decrease torso twist and arm speed, and decrease acceleration and deceleration. As a counter to the current laservomit trend, I would like to see some serious quirks that make LRMs a viable choice. I guess no competitive player will ever use MGs on a Timber Wolf unless PGI makes the MG a useful weapon, but that's a different story.

The worst clan mechs do still need to be buffed. The Adder, Summoner, Nova, Mist Lynx... they need some help. But generally, I think PGI is taking the right approach with the bad Clan mechs, the only problem is that they're being waaaay too careful. As if giving the Summoner 15% extra MG range would result in ragnarok and armageddon, and whole planets laid to waste by Summoners equipped with 2 torso-mounted MGs. Or that ridiculous 5% LB5X spread reduction for the Kit Fox. And why not give extra armour for mechs that struggle with insufficient firepower, like the Summoner?

My solution for the bad Clan mechs is simple. Do more of what is already being done. I don't think it's necessary to unlock Endo or anything like that. This thread is about quirks anyway, so I won't discuss other aspects of bad Clan mechs. It's not a bad idea to give the Summoner Prime an LBX buff, but the buff needs to be a LOT bigger for anyone to pick a ballistic arm over 2 energy hardpoints.

TL;DR - Nerf the good clan mechs to maintain balance as you nerf the Tier 1 Inner Sphere mechs. Keep buffing the bad Clan mechs. For the most part, PGI is giving them the right buffs, but the actual percentages are too low.

What does all this [hopefully] accomplish?
Basically, this is all about high risk, high reward. As an Atlas pilot with potentially 4 different weapon types (lasers, ballistics, SRMs and LRMs) you're taking a huge risk by having a whole array of weapons with different characteristics. At long range, your short range weapons have no effect, and vice versa. It takes skill to make all weapon types work together, and this skill should be rewarded. Conversely, it doesn't take a lot of skill to make 6 medium lasers work together. It's low risk, low reward. There are some boats that do require skill, of course. The CPLT-A1 missile boat and the Nova Prime laser boat are prime examples. These have their own innate risks, and should also be quirked to give high rewards.

In conclusion... I want quirks to promote variety, stop excessive boating and reward players who are able to make many different weapons work together, something which requires more skill.

Edited by Alistair Winter, 02 May 2015 - 08:00 PM.

[Matthew Ace]

Initial impression:

Fantastic post which I find myself largely, if not wholeheartedly in agreement to. It also gives me a new perspective to think from for generating ideas. Some stuff to add though...

For the Mad Cat's missile racks, however, it's more often due to hitboxes than anything else. Likewise for the Thor. Quirks won't fix this.

Edited by Matthew Ace, 02 May 2015 - 08:28 PM.

[Kiiyor]

I... don't know.

I think the 'Sphere needs to specialize heavily with quirks to be even remotely competitive.

Unless you make huge nerfs to the clan horseman of the apocalypse three (and i mean huge - 30% less acceleration etc) you likely won't see that drastic a change in the meta. Worse... if you slow them down enough, the current peek-and-trade meta might become even more commonplace.

As for nerfs... if you nerf the Clan mechs much harder, especially with general usability, no-one will play them because they just aren't fun. Burn times and general ease of use of Clan weapons is bordering on ridiculous as it is.

The trouble with the Clans is that those three (four with the HBR) mechs are just so versatile. They are survivable, fast, and heavily armed. There are no mechs in the 'Sphere that can compete in all three of those areas, so we have to specialize. Heavily.

Edit: Nice post though. Well thought out.

Edited by Kiiyor, 02 May 2015 - 08:18 PM.

[ROSS-128]

Well one thing I can say, unless you somehow super-quirk it a rocket machinegun/nuke launcher, I would absolutely never take a single SRM-6 on those mechs that only have one useless six-tube missile hardpoint.

It's just not worth it, a lone SRM hardpoint just isn't impressive on a 65 ton mech and it's even less so on a 95 ton mech. There are better uses for those tons and crit slots that the SRM and its ammo would occupy. Like sticking an AC/20 in that ballistic slot and getting ammo for that instead. Conveniently there's only a 2-ton difference between the AC/10 it comes with and the AC/20 it wants to have... taking the SRM out gets you the /20, plus a free ton of ammo, plus you can convert all your SRM ammo to AC ammo now. You'd need to buff that lonely SRM launcher quite a lot before that ceases to be a good deal.

Or just fitting a slightly larger engine with one more heat sink. Or, if there absolutely has to be a missile-type thing, a NARC. At least my target will be far more scared of every LRM on my team than they would be of a single SRM-6.

Speaking of the NARC though, I would totally run NARC in those oddball missile hardpoints if they had some range/velocity quirks for it.

Same thing for the Thunderbolt really... an extra 2 tons of engine and a heat sink is worth more than a single SRM launcher can give, short of apocalypse-level quirks. Though a quirked NARC would be tempting, since now you're secretly packing your entire team's LRM banks in that one missile hardpoint.

[Khobai]

Quote

It's just not worth it, a lone SRM hardpoint just isn't impressive on a 65 ton mec

Except its all comparative.

if every mech with 1 missile hardpoint was encouraged to take an SRM launcher then taking an SRM launcher would no longer unimpressive, it would simply the norm.

The problem is quirks reward boating rather than mixed loadouts.


For example, the Stalker-4N is supposed to use SRMs, LRMs, and Lasers... its a mixed weapons platform, not a Laser Boat. Yet the Large Laser quirks turn it into a laser boat.

The quirks for the Stalker-4N should be more like "If all of the following weapons (any SRM, any LRM, and any Laser) are equipped, then you get X, Y, and Z benefits"

That would still give you the flexibility of experimenting with all the different types of srms, lrms, and lasers... but would also encourage you to use a mixed loadout at the same time.

Edited by Khobai, 02 May 2015 - 08:53 PM.

[ROSS-128]

Khobai, on 02 May 2015 - 08:43 PM, said:

Except its all comparative.

if every mech with 1 missile hardpoint is forced to take an SRM launcher than taking an SRM launcher is no longer unimpressive, its simply the norm.

The problem is quirks reward boating rather than mixed loadouts.

For example, the Stalker-4N is supposed to use SRMs, LRMs, and Lasers... its a mixed weapons platform, not a Laser Boat. Yet the Large Laser quirks turn it into a laser boat.

The quirks for the Stalker-4N should be more like "If SRMs, LRMs, and Large Lasers are equipped, then you get X, Y, and Z benefits"

No, that would just make every mech that happens to have a "Forever Alone" missile hardpoint less viable compared to mechs who have hardpoint layouts that don't force them to carry dead weight. It'd be like the Adder's hardwired flamer: all it really does in its current state is turn the Adder from a 35 ton mech to a 34.5 ton mech.

In the TDR and BNC's case, forcing them to carry a lone SRM-6 wouldn't magically make a single SRM more viable. It would just turn those two particular variants into a 62 ton mech and 92 ton mech respectively (61/91 if you actually bring ammo for the poor thing). People would just play the BNC-3M and 3E who don't have that handicap, while ignoring the 3S. People would just play a Hunchback or Black Knight instead of a Thunderbolt.

[Khobai]

Quote

No, that would just make every mech that happens to have a "Forever Alone" missile hardpoint less viable compared to mechs who have hardpoint layouts that don't force them to carry dead weight

Why wouldnt it be viable? it would get quirks to make it viable. thats the whole point of giving quirks to the endangered hardpoints. SRMs wouldnt be dead weight if they were equal to other weapons.

Quote

In the TDR and BNC's case, forcing them to carry a lone SRM-6 wouldn't magically make a single SRM more viable

It all depends how good the quirks are. Grid Irons quirks make taking a single gauss more viable. Normally gauss on a hunchback is terrible.

Also mechs that are forced to take an SRM could get better quirks for their other weapons to make up for it. So the TDR and BNC could get better than average energy quirks to make up for the fact they have to take an SRM launcher. It could be like a synergy quirk "if you take an SRM launcher your energy weapons get an additional bonus"

The point is quirks should be rewarding you for using stock loadouts... or something approximating the stock loadout. quirks should not reward you for boating and meta builds.

Edited by Khobai, 02 May 2015 - 09:08 PM.

[Levi Porphyrogenitus]

I agree with most of what the OP has to say, giving a broader spectrum of generic quirks with emphasis on promoting limited-hardpoint weapon mounts and minor specific quirks to give a bit of an edge to stock loadouts, while tailoring the specific stats being modified to the needs of the variant.

As an example, the K2 should get PPC velocity, maybe range, and cooldown. The Awesome 8Q should retain PPC heat reduction. Why the difference? The K2 needs to use only one or two PPCs (stock or near stock), while the 8Q is a stock PPC boat and needs to be able to use its three-gun loadout without killing itself.

I also agree that more aggressive defensive quirks are called for, especially in the case of mechs that simply cannot compete on a firepower standpoint due to lack of hardpoints, or bad hardpoint placement, or whatever.

Really, if there's anything I disagree with, it's more a matter of ommission. I'd like to see PGI add maneuverability and agility quirks, and ramp up the spread quirks and other things that buff some weapon types without directly impacting damage output.

[Alistair Winter]

Matthew Ace, on 02 May 2015 - 08:15 PM, said:

For the Mad Cat's missile racks, however, it's more often due to hitboxes than anything else. Likewise for the Thor. Quirks won't fix this.

Ultimately, it's a trade-off between firepower and survivability. Ideally, you'd want LRMs to be so good that simple laservomit is a bad trade-off. Though I guess you'd have to adjust armour values to get that effect.

Kiiyor, on 02 May 2015 - 08:17 PM, said:

Unless you make huge nerfs to the clan horseman of the apocalypse three (and i mean huge - 30% less acceleration etc) you likely won't see that drastic a change in the meta. Worse... if you slow them down enough, the current peek-and-trade meta might become even more commonplace.

Peek-and-trade is harder to do when you decrease acceleration and deceleration, surely? I would think the consequence would be that brawling would be more commonplace.

Now, I don't think there's one easy solution to all of MWO's woes. There's a lot of issues I haven't touched at all, such as the fact that Clan ballistics are terrible, which makes laservomit more attractive. Not to mention the ECM vs LRM debate, or the Clan ER PPC debate.

Fixing quirks won't solve everything or drastically change the meta, I agree.

Kiiyor, on 02 May 2015 - 08:17 PM, said:

As for nerfs... if you nerf the Clan mechs much harder, especially with general usability, no-one will play them because they just aren't fun. Burn times and general ease of use of Clan weapons is bordering on ridiculous as it is.

Really? I haven't tried laserboating on the Timber Wolf, because it just makes me feel dirty. But I have tried laserboating on my Hellbringer, just to get a frame of reference and have some first hand experience. And boy, I have to say it feels like they could nerf clan lasers a whole lot before the laservomit Hellbringer stopped being easy to use.

CERLLs are a problem, I'll give you that. I like that they tried to make them different than IS LLs, but the heat is just ridiculous.

E Rommel, on 02 May 2015 - 08:33 PM, said:

It's just not worth it, a lone SRM hardpoint just isn't impressive on a 65 ton mech and it's even less so on a 95 ton mech. There are better uses for those tons and crit slots that the SRM and its ammo would occupy.

I think it depends entirely on the variables. What's the point of using SRMs as opposed to medium lasers, for example?
It's not firepower. An SRM6 does 12.9 damage spread all over the target, and you need 3 tons plus ammo. 3 medium lasers are 3 tons and do 15 damage. It's not range. The range is identical. So what would drive anyone to use the SRM6?

The heat.

SRM6 gives 4 heat, while the IS ML gives 4 heat per laser, which means 12 heat to do 15 damage. In a brawl, when you're in range, a single SRM is useful because you can keep pumping out damage at less heat than a medium laser.

A mech with 10 DHS and 2SRM6+2tons of ammo (6+2 equipment) has 100% heat efficiency. A mech with 10DHS mounting 4ML+4DHS (4+4 tons of equipment) has 68% heat efficiency. The SRM-build is more heat efficient and does more damage, but of course it spreads damage, relies on ammo, etc.

I don't think it's a given that a single SRM will always be useless compared to an extra medium laser or a bigger ballistic. It's just a matter of tipping the balance, I think. Give the players an offer they can't refuse.

[Alistair Winter]

Khobai, on 02 May 2015 - 08:43 PM, said:

Except its all comparative.
if every mech with 1 missile hardpoint was encouraged to take an SRM launcher then taking an SRM launcher would no longer unimpressive, it would simply the norm.
The problem is quirks reward boating rather than mixed loadouts.
For example, the Stalker-4N is supposed to use SRMs, LRMs, and Lasers... its a mixed weapons platform, not a Laser Boat. Yet the Large Laser quirks turn it into a laser boat.

The quirks for the Stalker-4N should be more like "If all of the following weapons (any SRM, any LRM, and any Laser) are equipped, then you get X, Y, and Z benefits"
That would still give you the flexibility of experimenting with all the different types of srms, lrms, and lasers... but would also encourage you to use a mixed loadout at the same time.

I feel like those options are a bit too heavy-handed. Like I wrote above, I want the single ballistics and single missile launchers to be an offer the player can't refuse. I think the game is at its best when it provides the player with the freedom to carry a PPC on a Raven, for example, while making this a bad choice just from the way the weapons are balanced.

Similarly, it feels a bit like RPG magic item sets if mounting a laser on your Stalker gives you a cooldown bonus to your LRMs and SRMs.

I kind of agree with what you're trying to do, but it feels a bit heavy handed.

[Khobai]

Quote

I kind of agree with what you're trying to do, but it feels a bit heavy handed.

it should be heavy handed

open-ended customization obviously doesnt work. its time to try something more rigid.

[ROSS-128]

Alistair Winter, on 02 May 2015 - 09:02 PM, said:

I think it depends entirely on the variables. What's the point of using SRMs as opposed to medium lasers, for example?
It's not firepower. An SRM6 does 12.9 damage spread all over the target, and you need 3 tons plus ammo. 3 medium lasers are 3 tons and do 15 damage. It's not range. The range is identical. So what would drive anyone to use the SRM6?

The heat.

SRM6 gives 4 heat, while the IS ML gives 4 heat per laser, which means 12 heat to do 15 damage. In a brawl, when you're in range, a single SRM is useful because you can keep pumping out damage at less heat than a medium laser.

A mech with 10 DHS and 2SRM6+2tons of ammo (6+2 equipment) has 100% heat efficiency. A mech with 10DHS mounting 4ML+4DHS (4+4 tons of equipment) has 68% heat efficiency. The SRM-build is more heat efficient and does more damage, but of course it spreads damage, relies on ammo, etc.

I don't think it's a given that a single SRM will always be useless compared to an extra medium laser or a bigger ballistic. It's just a matter of tipping the balance, I think. Give the players an offer they can't refuse.

The AC/20 though will give you an extra 10 pinpoint damage over the /10 (which as you mentioned is much better than 12 spread damage) for only 3 extra heat, making it more heat efficient than an AC10+SRM6 combo. The unified ammo storage also gives it more staying power. Plus the AC20 remains reliable out to 270m, where SRMs near their maximum range are often too spread out to deal their full damage, Then on top of that the AC/20 can be fired past 270 at slightly reduced damage, SRMs can't.

It'll cost you range to bump the /10 to a /20, sure, but then with the rest of your build also focused around the 270m-ish range, that's arguably a good thing. After all, at 500m, a lone AC/10 isn't much scarier than the lone SRM/6. If you have to get close anyway, might as well be packing a big punch when you get there.

Could a sufficiently large quirk overcome how much better an AC/20 is in PPFLD, DPS, heat efficiency, and weight efficiency? Eventually, but that would be crossing far into uberquirk territory for the sake of one weapon.

SRMs are best used in large tightly clustered splat groups, where their absurd total damage potential can overcome their problems with range and spreading.

Also the mechs being discussed can't mount the 2x6 SRM build, because they only have one missile hardpoint. Good for NARCing, not much else.

[Alistair Winter]

E Rommel, on 02 May 2015 - 09:14 PM, said:

The AC/20 though will give you an extra 10 pinpoint damage over the /10 (which as you mentioned is much better than 12 spread damage) for only 3 extra heat, making it more heat efficient than an AC10+SRM6 combo. The unified ammo storage also gives it more staying power. Plus the AC20 remains reliable out to 270m, where SRMs near their maximum range are often too spread out to deal their full damage, Then on top of that the AC/20 can be fired past 270 at slightly reduced damage, SRMs can't.
It'll cost you range to bump the /10 to a /20, sure, but then with the rest of your build also focused around the 270m-ish range, that's arguably a good thing. After all, at 500m, a lone AC/10 isn't much scarier than the lone SRM/6. If you have to get close anyway, might as well be packing a big punch when you get there.
Could a sufficiently large quirk overcome how much better an AC/20 is in PPFLD, DPS, heat efficiency, and weight efficiency? Eventually, but that would be crossing far into uberquirk territory for the sake of one weapon.

The AC20 is a poor example, in my mind, because pretty much every Inner Sphere mech with enough room for an AC20 will always equip an AC20, with few exceptions. Especially if you can get the arm-mounted AC20. The CN9-AH, the HGN-733C, the VTR-9B, the HBK-G, they always carry the AC20. The AC20 has always been in a special position in this game, just like the gauss rifle. You build those mechs around the AC20, you don't debate whether or not to bring the AC20. No person ever sacrifice the AC20 on their CN9-AH in order to boat SRMs more effectively. (Of course, sometimes you go with 2xUAC5 instead of AC20, if you have 2 hardpoints) People used to run AC5 or AC10 on the SHD during the poptart meta, and some people would equip 3xAC2 before AC2s were nerfed. But those days are gone. If you ever see a medium mech with an AC10 instead of an AC20 today, it's usually because it's boating SRMs.

On the other hand, there's a large number of mechs in the game that have many energy hardpoints and few missile hardpoints. Vindicator, Hunchback, Wolverine, Quickdraw, Thunderbolt, Grasshopper, Awesome, Battlemaster, Banshee and Atlas - they all have at least one variant with lots of energy hardpoints and 1 or 2 missile hardpoints. (The presence of ballistics varies, but it's not that relevant to my point here)

For a mech with lots of energy weapons, heat is always going to be a problem. And SRMs with significant heat reduction would be a useful way to maintain high DPS in a brawl, without overheating. It wouldn't really have to be super quirked, especially not on MPL-builds that have short range anyway.

[Mister Blastman]

Armor doesn't kill people, weapons do. The armor buffs wouldn't help the Summoner. It has bigger problems.

[ROSS-128]

Alistair Winter, on 02 May 2015 - 09:41 PM, said:

The AC20 is a poor example, in my mind, because pretty much every Inner Sphere mech with enough room for an AC20 will always equip an AC20, with few exceptions. Especially if you can get the arm-mounted AC20. The CN9-AH, the HGN-733C, the VTR-9B, the HBK-G, they always carry the AC20. The AC20 has always been in a special position in this game, just like the gauss rifle. You build those mechs around the AC20, you don't debate whether or not to bring the AC20. No person ever sacrifice the AC20 on their CN9-AH in order to boat SRMs more effectively. (Of course, sometimes you go with 2xUAC5 instead of AC20, if you have 2 hardpoints) People used to run AC5 or AC10 on the SHD during the poptart meta, and some people would equip 3xAC2 before AC2s were nerfed. But those days are gone. If you ever see a medium mech with an AC10 instead of an AC20 today, it's usually because it's boating SRMs.

On the other hand, there's a large number of mechs in the game that have many energy hardpoints and few missile hardpoints. Vindicator, Hunchback, Wolverine, Quickdraw, Thunderbolt, Grasshopper, Awesome, Battlemaster, Banshee and Atlas - they all have at least one variant with lots of energy hardpoints and 1 or 2 missile hardpoints. (The presence of ballistics varies, but it's not that relevant to my point here)

For a mech with lots of energy weapons, heat is always going to be a problem. And SRMs with significant heat reduction would be a useful way to maintain high DPS in a brawl, without overheating. It wouldn't really have to be super quirked, especially not on MPL-builds that have short range anyway.

It's a good example for the Banshee though, because that's exactly why people take the SRM-6 off it. It gets you the tonnage you need for the /20, and why would you ever sacrifice the /20 for an SRM-6?

The missile hunchbacks actually use their missiles. Partly because they're 50-ton mechs. One SRM-6 on a 95 ton mech is not impressive. Two on a speedy 50-tonner on the other hand, is a somewhat decent deal when backed up by 5 medium lasers. If it got reduced to one hardpoint though, I'd use it for NARCing. The other reason is that there are enough Hunchback variants that you basically have no reason to buy the missile versions unless you really have your heart set on using those missiles.

On the Thunderbolt though, people don't run the SRM-6 for the same reason people always find a way to replace the random small laser a lot of IS mechs have in their heads with a medium laser. Whatcha gonna do with that small laser, urbs?

Rather than doing 2 damage to six different components, that time is probably better spent cooling down to fire more lasers anyway. If hardpoint OCD is really such a problem, honestly a better solution would be to just strip out that lone missile hardpoint that can't find a purpose. There, now all the hardpoints are filled.

Or if you could stick an Arrow IV in there. After all the TOW tubes on the Bradley are useful... because each missile can OHK its target.

[Nothing Whatsoever]

I like the idea of exploring Signature Weapon(s) quirk(s) based on stock builds, while also looking at making adjustments to hardpoints and also making adjustments to base weapon stats.

Mechs known for making use of a Signature Weapon like the Enforcers, Hunchbacks and Centurions should each retain and expand on quirks to accentuate those stock builds, and several variants for these particular mechs already have that going for them. So the idea would be to extend this further to all mechs such as the example of the BNC-3S in the OP.

The second idea is to explore tweaking hardpoints to have more types, and explore assigning weapons a different style of weighting.

Spoiler

TAG and Flamers are two that could have their own Hardpoints, so that mechs like the CPLT-A1 could make use of TAG without giving it a general energy hardpoint. This could also allow TAG to have an On and Off feature that should then not interfere with energy weapons
Also, setting Flamers as their own hardpoint will affect the Firestarters, two Thunderbolts and the COM-3A, and allow adding that hardpoint to a select number of meches so that Flamers could be easier to re-balance, with them available on fewer variants and only boatable on Firestarters.
NARC could be a third system that could look into being given a unique Hardpoint.

So along with increasing Hardpoint types, also explore giving weapons different values for occupying Hardpoints.
For example, MGs and U/AC/2 would remain at occupying one hardpoint each. U/AC/5 and U/AC/10 occupies two each, Gauss and an U/AC/20 could occupy three each (the same should work for Clans). One example with the MDD-C is that it gets to increase its hardpoints in the arms from one each to three to be able to mount a mix of UAC2s and 5s or LBXs.
Then with energy, PPC, ERLL/LL and LPL could sit at two, with the rest at one.
LRM-20 and 15 could start at three, LRM-10, S/SRM-6 and 4 at two, and the rest of the missile systems staying at one.

So, some mechs would then get some additional hardpoint inflation and open up more customization options as a result of having more hardpoints available.

The last idea is to reduce some of the base stats on weapons and then allow quirks to pick up the slack on variants that have less hardpoints if they do not make use of a signature weapon.

Spoiler

The reduction is going to be minimal with the general idea being to increase cooldowns, beam durations, resetting damage and heat values. So for example the base DPS on an AC/20 goes from 5.00 base value to 4.00 base value. IS ER/PPC go from a DPS of 2.50 to 2.00, C-ERPPC goes from 3.75 to 3.00 and so on. Basically double of what their P&P values calculate out to, since quirks and weapon modules could still adjust them anyway.

This way mechs like the CPLT-K2, AWS-8Q and AWS-9M would be the premier mechs for ER/PPCs, and would still be able to make use of other builds that would then be available but also less effecient due to lacking quirks. For example, the K2 would have the arms increased to two hardpoints each where it would be able to carry 6xMPLs or 6xMLs, the AWS-8Q should see little change and the AWS-9M could be readjusted in its hardpoints to accommodate the change.

And with these sorts of changes, mechs remain open to customization, but also have to make a few more concessions when going away from stock builds.

(As an aside, I'd also like to move a missile hardpoint to each of the CPLT-A1 side torsos with a max tube count of 4 or 6; this way the ears remain like the CPLT-C4 and provides the ability to mount weapons in the torso.)

As for Clan mechs, I'd explore utlizing the set bonus idea for more quirks not just a small XP boost, so that players can still get reasonable quirks on variants that need it and help prevent quirks from getting out of hand with the ability to mix and match omnipods.

I hope I'm making some sense here!

[Ace Selin]

People will always boat because often its most effective. Changing quirks the way OP lists wont change that people boat.. it will make many mechs less effective & then they will not be played at all (large quirks will then need to be re-added to aid these mechs). People will find new mechs to boat and boat mechs without quirks.

Edited by Ace Selin, 03 May 2015 - 05:30 AM.

[Juodas Varnas]

[Duke Nedo]

While I agree with most of the OP in theory, I have my doubts in practice. The IS mechs unquirked are generally so far behind in available tonnage for weapons and heatsinks (because STD engine and heavier weapons) that the only thing that really saves them compared to clan mechs is energy heat gen quirks and in the odd case extreme dps buffs (because they free up Space in a way).

I would also welcome more general quirks and less weapon specific ones though. I dont think it would not change boating though... I doubt anything will. You only have so many mouse buttons suitable so if 3 weapon Groups wont cover it I generally wont build it. I even prefer 2 button builds, my aim is worse with mouse3...

I also must admit that I enjoy some of the "freaks". The Drg-1N and Huginn are good examples where quirks imo were successful in creating niche mechs that can perform without being OP. The 5SS, 9S and fs9-s quirks are a bit overdone though and feels a bit cheezy. But, that said, IS needs them as long as timber, crow and hillbilly remains unnerfed so...

Its probably too late to start nerfing the Trinity now though, so I think we're stuck with quirks. And, those quirks have to be useful, otherwise there's no point in having them.

Edited by Duke Nedo, 02 May 2015 - 11:39 PM.

[The Mechromancer]

I think clan quirks should only apply with an 8/8 omni set.

Edited by The Mechromancer, 02 May 2015 - 11:42 PM.