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Sized Hardpoints Instead Of Negative Quirks

Balance Weapons Loadout

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#1 Pjwned

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Posted 07 June 2015 - 01:36 AM

Instead of just blanket nerfing certain clan mechs for even thinking about equipping a single energy weapon, the laser vomit problem should be addressed at the hardpoint level instead of the omnipod level. Want to equip that SCR-B right arm and stream vomit your enemy to death? Fine, but if you're not careful there will be consequences.

It's important to note that by sized hardpoints I do not mean limiting where equipment can be placed, because that's stupid. What I mean by sized hardpoints is that, very similar to how missile tube sizes already work, weapons should be less effective if they're too big for the hardpoint they're placed in, and this would be accomplished by spreading out their damage more than usual.

We already have this system in place for missiles like I said, so aside from some missile hardpoint tube sizes that should be adjusted (*cough* VTR-9S *cough*) it's pretty much fine and that only really leaves energy weapons and ballistics. For lasers, it's pretty simple because the only needed adjustment would be longer beam duration, so if you fit a large laser into a hardpoint meant for medium lasers or smaller then the large laser would have a duration penalty. As for ballistics, autocannons would be the only real consideration for sized hardpoints and all it would take is increasing the number of projectiles, so if you fit an AC20 in a hardpoint meant for AC10 or smaller then you get 2 projectiles; clan autocannons and especially (clan) LB-X cannon(s) are a bit more complex to deal with so I'm not going to dwell on that much right now.

In the somewhat unique case of the gauss rifle, it would just need to be considered a small weapon to retain its pinpoint nature, which it should not really lose ever except perhaps in the case of a gauss spider or something equally ridiculous. For PPCs which are also somewhat unique, I've read suggestions to spread its damage out by having a stream following behind the main projectile, so for example (numbers are purely hypothetical) the projectile would do 8 damage on impact and the stream following behind it would do the remaining 2 damage over 0.3 seconds; I think something like this would be a pretty good adjustment if PPCs were crammed into a hardpoint that was too small.

I'm still not entirely sure how much (if at all) clan laser vomit should be nerfed (though I have and still will take the piss out of people for throwing a huge shitfit about it) but what I can say is it seems really inappropriate to instantly blanket nerf a mech for having an omnipod equipped regardless of how the pilot intends to use it. With the current method, it hurts builds that make perfectly legitimate use (i.e not cheesy excessive laser vomit) of an omnipod with even a single energy hardpoint, and that is really dumb even if the penalty is fairly small in that particular case with of course more energy omnipods making the situation even worse.

So how does this all apply to addressing clan laser vomit? Well, simply giving problematic omnipods small enough hardpoints would work, so for example only 2-3 C-ER medium lasers would be fully effective on the SCR-B right arm or only 1 C-ER LL would be fully effective on the TBR-A left torso. You could still stick more of the same lasers in the rest of those hardpoints of course, and that's intentional, but you would be seeing decreased performance and have to downsize your additional lasers to something smaller if you want optimal performance.

Also, I don't mean to suggest that only a select few mechs should deal with sized hardpoints, but the recent controversy with clan laser vomit nerfs really highlights the issue again. I know that I'm asking a lot (more than likely too much) and it will probably fall on deaf ears because PGI has consistently shown they are incompetent, but I suppose there's a small chance something might change if I bring up the idea again and it sure as hell seems like a better idea than what we have now.

P.S: The idea of sized hardpoints as suggested is not originally mine, somebody else posted it a while ago and I liked the idea quite a bit.

Edited by Pjwned, 07 June 2015 - 01:41 AM.


#2 EvilCow

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Posted 07 June 2015 - 01:38 AM

PGI lost this train years ago.

#3 El Bandito

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Posted 07 June 2015 - 01:43 AM

I support sized hardpoints. For what its worth.

#4 keith

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Posted 07 June 2015 - 03:32 AM

View PostEvilCow, on 07 June 2015 - 01:38 AM, said:

PGI lost this train years ago.


lost this battle back in closed beta

#5 Quicksilver Aberration

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Posted 07 June 2015 - 04:04 AM

As much as I support sized hardpoints, it is never going to happen. We'd be lucky if we even see hardpoint changes to existing mechs, much less a redesign of 200+ mechs with regards to hardpoints on top of extra coding.

It still wouldn't solve the ghost heat problem completely, but it would definitely help the redundancy that exists between variants as well as allow for the removal of some of the weapon quirks.

#6 Ghogiel

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Posted 07 June 2015 - 04:06 AM

Proposal is just negative quirks under a different name really.

#7 EvilCow

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Posted 07 June 2015 - 04:08 AM

View PostGhogiel, on 07 June 2015 - 04:06 AM, said:

Proposal is just negative quirks under a different name really.


It is also ponies under a different name.

#8 bad arcade kitty

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Posted 07 June 2015 - 04:15 AM

doesn't fit the tt rules

#9 Ultimax

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Posted 07 June 2015 - 04:17 AM

The backbone of every laser vomit build is massed CERMLAS, which are 1 ton / 1 crit slot weapons that come loaded stock onto most of the best omni-pods.

The SCR Laser Vomit builds for example, often only have 1 CLPL + 4 or 5 CERMLAS.


This sized hardpoint idea would fail to solve this.

Edited by Ultimatum X, 07 June 2015 - 04:52 AM.


#10 bad arcade kitty

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Posted 07 June 2015 - 04:18 AM

sized hardpoints are usually proposed to nerf lights, like those shouldn't be able to carry big guns etc

imo it's silly

#11 Quicksilver Aberration

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Posted 07 June 2015 - 05:05 AM

View Postbad arcade kitty, on 07 June 2015 - 04:18 AM, said:

sized hardpoints are usually proposed to nerf lights, like those shouldn't be able to carry big guns etc

imo it's silly

Lolwut, no they are not.

Not that it matters since lights carrying anything larger than a Large Laser are generally lackluster.

Edited by WM Quicksilver, 07 June 2015 - 05:27 AM.


#12 Fate 6

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Posted 07 June 2015 - 05:46 AM

Negative quirks are effectively sized hardpoints because they give us incentive to take certain weapons.

#13 TELEFORCE

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Posted 07 June 2015 - 05:52 AM

I'd rather see negative weapon quirks than sized hard points. I enjoy having the freedom of outfitting any weapons I like within the current structural slot restrictions, like working around arm and hand actuators on IS 'mechs.

#14 Andi Nagasia

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Posted 07 June 2015 - 05:53 AM

i dont like this idea as i dont feel it will help much more than what we have,
boating ML would still be a thing, and a full rework is a problem

a real Heat-Scale and/or equipment Draw System would help more, :)

#15 Navid A1

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Posted 07 June 2015 - 05:59 AM

well... sized hardpoints only work with large weapons. med lasers are one of the smallest and can be boated anywhere... so its not a matter of size. AC20 on a raven is.


decreased performance by having more weapons of the same type is not called sized hardpoints. its called "ghost laser duration" , "ghost cool down" and "ghost range reduction". And it can solve the problem of laser vomit.

example: ghost laser duration:
firing 2 ER meds is fine
3 gives 4% more duration
4 gives 8%
5 gives 12%
6 gives 16%
etc...

and for penalties to trigger you'll have to fire the said number of lasers at the same time (pretty much like ghost heat)
and it logically makes sense.... significantly more sense than ghost heat.

And those have been suggested countless times and everytime landed on deaf ears.

Edited by Navid A1, 07 June 2015 - 06:21 AM.


#16 El Bandito

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Posted 07 June 2015 - 06:13 AM

View PostUltimatum X, on 07 June 2015 - 04:17 AM, said:

The backbone of every laser vomit build is massed CERMLAS, which are 1 ton / 1 crit slot weapons that come loaded stock onto most of the best omni-pods.

The SCR Laser Vomit builds for example, often only have 1 CLPL + 4 or 5 CERMLAS.

This sized hardpoint idea would fail to solve this.


Just balance the CERML then. Developers of TT were stupid enough to make a weapon that has almost the same damage and range as IS LL with only 1 ton 1 slot, in the first place.

TT LLaser--8 damage, 8 heat, 15 max range (costs 5 tons and 2 slots)

TT CERML--7 damage, 5 heat, 15 max range (costs 1 ton and 1 slot, lol)

Broken from inception, I say. Sized hardpoints can work, but it requires certain weapons such as Clan and IS medium lasers to be rebalanced.

Edited by El Bandito, 07 June 2015 - 06:21 AM.


#17 Andi Nagasia

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Posted 07 June 2015 - 06:29 AM

View PostEl Bandito, on 07 June 2015 - 06:13 AM, said:

Just balance the CERML then. Developers of TT were stupid enough to make a weapon that has almost the same damage and range as IS LL with only 1 ton 1 slot, in the first place.

TT LLaser--8 damage, 8 heat, 15 max range

TT CERML--7 damage, 5 heat, 15 max range

Broken from inception, I say.

but remember that in MWO they are
Weapon.....Damage,..Heat,..Burn,..recharge,..Range,..Max Range,..Tons,..Crit*,
IS LL................9............7.....1.00.......3.25..........450...........900.............5.......2.
Clan ER-ML.....7............6.....1.15.......3.00..........405...........810.............1.......1.

IS ML...............5............4.....0.90.......3.00..........270...........540.............1.......1.
IS ER-LL,.........9............8.....1.25.......3.25..........675..........1350............5.......2.

but IS has yet to get their "ER"-MLs,(based off TT Stats with MWO inflation),
IS ER-ML.........5............5.....1.05.......3.00..........370...........740.............1.......1.
so ya we should stop Comparing C-ER-ML to IS-ML, =BUT RANGE!!!= :)

#18 Mystere

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Posted 07 June 2015 - 06:34 AM

SIzed hardpoints?

Posted Image

Bringing it up is just and exercise in futililty.

Edited by Mystere, 07 June 2015 - 06:35 AM.


#19 Kh0rn

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Posted 07 June 2015 - 06:43 AM

Something I too said time and time again it would of helped a lot with the role warfare.

Example and this could be use too add a little fun lore.

AS7-D : Has small energy points due too the size of the energy capacitor in the arms thus SL,SMPL,ML,MPL fits just fine , Large bore AC tho so it can fit pretty much any size AC in there. 1 Large LRM weapons point. 1 Large SRM point. So you can customize stuff but it keeps it in the general roll of that variant. Now the D variant for fills its role as a brawler with a LRM too throw out as it closes the distance.

AS7-K : has larger energy points on its arms, larger energy capacitors. thus LL,LP,ERLL can be fitted too it, Guass rifle means any thing up too that can fit in its port. 1 large LRM size point so any size LRM can be fitted and no srms. Now you have a Atlas adapted too long range battles as the K was build for.

AS7-RS: 4 large energy points on its arms but balanced by the fact it can only mount smaller AC and missile points.

D-DC: Well it has ECM no need too worry about it.

AS7-S this is the only problem Atlas as it has every thing the AS7-D but more so I guess in this regard you could give the D a extra ballistic point too balance it out.

Some values could be adjusted too something like the BNC-3E model by saying alright you can only fit small AC5's but you can fit 3 for example. So no AC 20 or dual LBX for BNC.

#20 Ultimax

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Posted 07 June 2015 - 07:02 AM

View PostEl Bandito, on 07 June 2015 - 06:13 AM, said:

Just balance the CERML then. Developers of TT were stupid enough to make a weapon that has almost the same damage and range as IS LL with only 1 ton 1 slot, in the first place.



No, they were simply developing for a very different game.



You can have one weapon or troop unit be completely superior to an enemies unit - if the elite unit costs more resources to field and grants you less units overall.



Translating that to a 12v12 game where no one ever wants to be cannon fodder "cheap" units because they personally represent a single unit on the field is a recipe for poor balance though.

Edited by Ultimatum X, 07 June 2015 - 07:03 AM.






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