180 replies to this topic

[Chagatay]

Possible issue but then again I would rather have IS ACs any day. Maybe nerf the clan firing rate due to recoil concerns (weighs less more recoil naturally).

I know recoil would probably not even be a concern but give the spheroids something might as well.

Edited by Chagatay, 01 July 2015 - 01:59 PM.

[Johnny Z]

Well they have be thinking about meaningfull balance changes in this forcasted balance update. Clans are in the end still easy mode as much as some deny. Its alot closer but their "weak" lights arent carrying Inner Sphere XL's that blow so easily etc etc etc etc etc etc. It isnt a fair fight yet.

[Gas Guzzler]

Chagatay, on 01 July 2015 - 01:52 PM, said:

Possible issue but then again I would rather have IS ACs any day. Maybe nerf the clan firing rate due to recoil concerns (weighs less more recoil naturally).

Why nerf the Clan one vs just making the IS one more resilient? It would be such a minor change that would barely be noticeable in gameplay...

Cooldown reduction is more of a drag in my opinion..

[TyphonCh]

Hit the Deck, on 01 July 2015 - 12:59 PM, said:

I can agree with that although I proposed for more (removing IS charge mechanics but increasing its CD to >6s).

This is the direction I was leaning too. I'll quote myself from a different gauss thread, because there are several different ways you can go about it:

Team Chevy86, on 21 June 2015 - 07:11 AM, said:

It bothers me more, is that so far all clan weapons function slightly differently... Except gauss and SRMs. But SRMs firing in a stream like the current LRMs would be uber gay.
This idea just popped into my head now.. maybe it needs its own thread. But I read in a different thread that in TT gauss was supposed to have a minimum range of 2, which is something like 90m. While I think it's ridiculous that a weapon of its type should magically do 0 damage within 90m, something else may be in order?

I'm thinking that Clan gauss should just remain as is, right now, no changes.
An IS gauss should rifle should have it's charge removed. .....I've always back it up saying that charge should stay, but in saying that most weapons between IS and Clan are different, we could strike a balance

The reason I pick IS for this is because the current range perfectnessness of Clan ERmeds and their gauss rifles.

Remove the charge, but double the reload. It's currently 4sec? Bump it up to 8sec, and give it that minimum range. Maybe even bump that minimum range up to 120m, or even 200m. But instead of doing 0 damage, just give the gauss a %50 chance to not land where you're aiming. %80 for 2 gauss rifles. Since IS is supposed to be the underdog here for weapons, their gauss rifles should have some limitations. Just a thought... Wouldn't be a direct nerf, but it would definately make me think twice about doubling up on gauss rifles.

You could even force the minimum range on Clans as well, but requiring a TC to lower the % chance on a miss within that range?

[Greenjulius]

No more misinformation as to what mechs can or can't do 2xGauss well.

Mechs that can dual gauss with a backup weapon:
(usually 2-4xML or ERSL... don't gauss without a backup you turkey)

IS

CTF-IM - 2xGauss, 60 rounds and 3xML, XL280 or 295
CTF-3D - 2xGauss, same as above with option of JJ
CPLT-K2 - 2xGauss, 50 rounds, 2xML, XL280 (arms striped)
JM6 - All varients, 2xGauss, 50 rounds, 2xML, XL255
KGC - All varients, many builds possible

Clan

Ebon Jaguar - Strip and arm, shave armor on the legs a bit. You can comfortably run 2xGauss+50 rounds and 3xERSL for backup.
Timber Wolf - Barely. Strip the left arm, equip the "C" right arm and Prime right torso for 2xGauss, then add 50 rounds. The "A" left torso will allow you to put in 2xERSL. The Ebon Jag just does it better.
Warhawk - Actually a decent platform. 2xGauss, 60 rounds, or more. Only 2 energy hardpoints so option is either 2xERML or 2xMPL.
DireWolf - The easiest platform to load up in any imaginable way. 2xGauss, 2xLPL, 2xML. 70 point alpha crazy death dealer.

Edited by Greenjulius, 01 July 2015 - 01:58 PM.

[Deathlike]

Gas Guzzler, on 01 July 2015 - 01:49 PM, said:

Will do! as soon as I'm off work

Missed you last night. Kinda need more bodies.

Need to try to top the overall IS leaderboards...

[Ursh]

Person with stupid user name has problem with clan gauss being better than IS gauss.

I'm impressed with her arguments. Clan and IS gauss should be equal because ac20 is so equal with cuac20 in effectiveness, and uac5 rounds totally land on enemies.

[Chagatay]

Gas Guzzler, on 01 July 2015 - 01:56 PM, said:

Why nerf the Clan one vs just making the IS one more resilient? It would be such a minor change that would barely be noticeable in gameplay...

Cooldown reduction is more of a drag in my opinion..

Honestly they all fire way too fast for a sniper weapon....especially that one Hunchie which turns a normal gauss into a HAG. They should be as volatile as ever though as they need to have a down side seeing as they have virtually no heat, super long range (3x), and are ppfld.

[Hit the Deck]

Kristov Kerensky, on 01 July 2015 - 01:30 PM, said:

....
And the Clan Gauss IS a flat out upgrade of the IS Gauss, what's the problem there? ALL Clan Tech is an upgrade, did you guys miss that point of Clan vs IS Tech? Lighter, smaller, better, usually hotter though, but not always....

You forget that they tried to balance many of the Clan weapons to work differently from the IS version so they aren't flat out better in the name of Balance^TM. So just let's put Gauss into this list, especially that we now have Clan Battlemechs.

[Gas Guzzler]

Ursh, on 01 July 2015 - 02:01 PM, said:

Person with stupid user name has problem with clan gauss being better than IS gauss.

I'm impressed with her arguments. Clan and IS gauss should be equal because ac20 is so equal with cuac20 in effectiveness, and uac5 rounds totally land on enemies.

I don't really care that much, just proposed a method of balance that might help certain IS mechs. If you don't like it or can't present a valid argument, then you can leave.

[FupDup]

Some ideas of mine:

1. Both factions

• Explosion chance increased to 100%, from 90%

Logic: 90% is so often that it might as well be 100% anyways, plus it adds more predictability rather than having a small element of randomness.

• Cooldown increased to 5 seconds, from 4 seconds

Logic: Make the weapon less effective in close quarters situations, to somewhat specialize the weapon. Poking effectiveness at long and medium ranges is relatively unaffected.




2. Inner Sphere Only

• Increase health to 7.5, from 5

Logic: Gives the IS Gauss some sort of reason to exist compared to Clan Gauss, and help alleviate IS mech fragility at least a little bit.

• Reduce explosion damage to 15, from 20

Logic: See above.




I considered slightly reducing Clan Gauss health, but I think it already goes boom enough and I didn't want to make all Clan Gauss mechs die faster...the global changes of slower cooldown and slightly more frequent explosions might be enough for now.

Edited by FupDup, 01 July 2015 - 02:08 PM.

[FupDup]

Ultimatum X, on 01 July 2015 - 01:51 PM, said:

I'll go one further and say that all items should get a number of hitpoints based on how many critical slots they take up (and maybe even their weight).This way all of those bulky, crit slot guzzling IS items have at least some kind of a tiny offset to the pure superiority of Clan equipment.

In general that would make sense, however in the specific case of the Gauss Rifle I think that they should be a bit less durable than normal 6-7 slot weapons because their ammo doesn't explode in exchange (yes, ammo explosions are kinda rare, but that's besides the point) and it gives the Gauss a drawback to equipping.

Edited by FupDup, 01 July 2015 - 02:08 PM.

[Hit the Deck]

Team Chevy86, on 01 July 2015 - 01:57 PM, said:

This is the direction I was leaning too. I'll quote myself from a different gauss thread, because there are several different ways you can go about it:

Yeah and actually I made a thread about it to see people's opinion. I think many who replied didn't agree with the idea.

[Kristov Kerensky]

Team Chevy86, on 01 July 2015 - 01:57 PM, said:

This is the direction I was leaning too. I'll quote myself from a different gauss thread, because there are several different ways you can go about it:

That min range people talk about, it doesn't mean 0 damage usually, it means it's harder to HIT your target, you still do full damage, except for IS LRMs, the min range on those means 0 damage, unless you do what's called hot boxing your LRMs, which means they are armed in the tubes. Risky move as doing that means they can blow up if that section of your Mech takes damage, ie - you hit those armed missiles while still in the Mech and BAD things happen Clan LRMs arm the moment they leave the tubes, therefore no min range on them.

PPCs, not ERPPCs mind you, DO have a 90m no damage min range on them, but that is because there's an inhibitor that doesn't allow the weapon to FIRE on targets inside that range, and you CAN disable that inhibitor. Downside is that you take feedback damage based on range, but I don't recall ever not having that inhibitor disabled in TT. It was actually something you had to say you TURNED ON or we always considered it turned off

PGI has done away with min range on SOME weapons, like the Gauss, AC2 and AC5(yes, they have min ranges too in TT), and applied a 0 damage to PPCs within 90m, which is a bs deal, they should have simply put in the feedback damage based on range inside 90m. They kept the LRM min range but didn't offer us the hotbox option, and they put the Clan LRMs on a scaled damage inside min range, their balance for the Clan LRMs, which I can't really argue against.

I can go with Gas's recommendation on the IS Gauss, it does give it something the Clan version doesn't have, not that it needs that, but it is a nice gesture. And as someone who uses the IS Gauss a lot, I'd definitely benefit from it

[Roadkill]

FupDup, on 01 July 2015 - 02:07 PM, said:

In general that would make sense, however in the specific case of the Gauss Rifle I think that they should be a bit less durable than normal 6-7 slot weapons because their ammo doesn't explode in exchange (yes, ammo explosions are kinda rare, but that's besides the point) and it gives the Gauss a drawback to equipping.

Normal weapons:
ammo explodes 10% of the time if critted, weapon never explodes

Gauss:
ammo never explodes, weapon explodes 100% of the time if critted

The reality is that the Gauss is already overbalanced against other weapons in this regard.

[FupDup]

Gas Guzzler, on 01 July 2015 - 12:56 PM, said:

Really? Clan mechs that can use two:

Ebon Jaguar
Timber Wolf
Executioner
Warhawk
Dire Wolf
Hellbringer with intense armor stripping

IS mechs that can use two:
Jager
K2
King Crab
Cataphract
???

The Orion IIC-C will add to the Clan side of that list in some months.

The Hunchie IIC can do it as well...but you'd have to go relatively slow for it.

Roadkill, on 01 July 2015 - 02:22 PM, said:

Normal weapons:
ammo explodes 10% of the time if critted, weapon never explodes

Gauss:
ammo never explodes, weapon explodes 100% of the time if critted

The reality is that the Gauss is already overbalanced against other weapons in this regard.

I've pondered what it would be like if ammo explosions were 100% chance, but with drastically reduced damage...The reason for not full damage is that having 100+ damage explosions would basically be a death sentence, and seriously discourage the use of ammo-based weapons (in a meta where people complain about laser vomit being too common...).

Ammo boxes could probably have their health lowered a bit as well, having the full 10 for a single critslot item seems a bit much in this case.

[Night Thastus]

Gas Guzzler, on 01 July 2015 - 12:56 PM, said:

Really? Clan mechs that can use two:

Ebon Jaguar
Timber Wolf
Executioner
Warhawk
Dire Wolf
Hellbringer with intense armor stripping

IS mechs that can use two:
Jager
K2
King Crab
Cataphract
???

The Ebon can mount it, but has limited ammo or no backup weapons.
The Timberwolf can do it, but with even LESS ammo than the Ebon.
The Executioner certainly can't do it. Even if you strip the right arm and both legs completely, you can barely get 4 tons of ammo, not enough.
The Warhawk can do it, but is squish as f*ck. Dont expect much from it.
The Direwolf does it well.
Hellbringer is a joke. Can't honestly expect to pull that off. Dont even try.

Complain more. Your argument is still terrible.

Edited by Night Thastus, 01 July 2015 - 02:27 PM.

[Roadkill]

FupDup, on 01 July 2015 - 02:25 PM, said:

I've pondered what it would be like if ammo explosions were 100% chance, but with drastically reduced damage...

If you reduced it to "10 seconds worth" of damage then you could raise the chance. Count fractions and don't count quirks. Just the base fire rate of the weapon... so an AC/10 would be 10 damage * (10 seconds / 2.5 second cycle) = 40 damage explosion.

Or you could just reduce the chance of a Gauss explosion. It wouldn't even have to drop to 10%... 20% or 25% would probably do it.

[Gas Guzzler]

Night Thastus, on 01 July 2015 - 02:27 PM, said:

The Ebon can mount it, but has limited ammo or no backup weapons.
The Timberwolf can do it, but with even LESS ammo than the Ebon.
The Executioner certainly can't do it. Even if you strip the right arm and both legs completely, you can barely get 4 tons of ammo, not enough.
The Warhawk can do it, but is squish as f*ck. Dont expect much from it.
The Direwolf does it well.
Hellbringer is a joke. Can't honestly expect to pull that off. Dont even try.

Complain more. Your argument is still terrible.

You are the one complaining about not having dual gauss Clan mechs. I didn't even complain, I just proposed a balance suggestion.

Move along, I heard someone somewhere might care about what you have to say. Just a rumor though. If you can't dual gauss effectively in a Timber, then I guess you are pretty bad.

Edited by Gas Guzzler, 01 July 2015 - 02:32 PM.

[Greenjulius]

Night Thastus, on 01 July 2015 - 02:27 PM, said:

The Warhawk can do it, but is squish as f*ck. Dont expect much from it.

I kind of disagree on the warhawk. It can run dual gauss just like a Cataphract can, only with Clan XL survivability. It's just usually better to run energy on a warhawk because of the outrageous number of forced heatsinks.