13 replies to this topic

[Foxfire kadrpg]

Short version: It may be possible to design maps where pop-tarting opportunity is infrequent at best, allowing for jumpjets to freely become powerful.

Having found a little time, I decided to update my laptop and putter with the latest update: I put three jumpjets into my Heavy Metal and loaded up the new River City to stomp on some trees. While I was greatly impressed with the new map, the jumpjets, albiet stronger now, still were not "worth it" in my opinion. As I admired the taller, LRM unfriendly buildings, an idea struck me.

Now I have never objected to pop-tarting, but I understand how some players would hate it. The pop-tarter has one distinct advantage over someone merely firing from cover, in that the pop-tarter uses gravity to propel himself back into cover much faster. Even MASC is probably never going to compare to falling in terms of speed. I DO however, very much LOVE jump jet mobility, often longing for the days when I played Armored Core with friends.

So far, the way we have curbed pop-tarting has been to drastically increase start up time (requiring a larger commitment to a single jump) as well as lowering velocity, making flight slower and altitude lower. This has meant much fewer places where a large mech can pop up, as well as more infrequent jumps. Mission accomplished, pop-tarting now belongs exclusively to small mechs who possess such small alphas that players don't mind it. Jump jets, particularly Class I, are still not worth it.

Now, suppose jumpjets were instant thrust, significant thrust, PGI was determined never to diminish them in any way and yet, PGI still wanted to prevent pop tarting. I suggest future maps should be planned with two key features in mind:

ONE: All cover (buildings, giant rocks, ect) have such a tall stature that mechs would consume all of their jumpjet burst to reach their top. Sufficient height would make fall damage discouraging for pop-tarting as well as make the "I don't know how LRMs work, but they keep killing me" crowd happy.

TWO: similar to Canyon Network, 'regular terrain' could have steep fall offs, which would deny non jump jet mechs travel routes. If the plateau of each regular terrain was large enough, it couldn't be used as cover terrain for pop-tarting. Being able to reach a place faster because you have jumpjets is one of the most alluring reasons to equip them.

I know that maps take time. I have great faith in the map makers now, and know that they could design future maps with anti-pop-tarting in mind if they were directed to. It's just a matter of addressing how to deal with pop-tarting. For me, killing jumpjets has not been a good trade off.

[Wintersdark]

Or, the much better route: have JJ's be awesome AND terrain designed freely, but have the JJ's designed in such a way as to curtail poptarting. Make them fast, without a long hang time, and make them have a sharper vector (a lot of forward or backward movement while jumping, even from stationary). Thus, there's no real hang time, it's fast and furious. Make them feel powerful, like rockets strapped to your mech. In all the stories, they're presented as crushing the pilot back into his seat with the acceleration after all.

[GonaDie]

Wintersdark, on 11 July 2015 - 09:28 AM, said:

Or, the much better route: have JJ's be awesome AND terrain designed freely, but have the JJ's designed in such a way as to curtail poptarting. Make them fast, without a long hang time, and make them have a sharper vector (a lot of forward or backward movement while jumping, even from stationary). Thus, there's no real hang time, it's fast and furious. Make them feel powerful, like rockets strapped to your mech. In all the stories, they're presented as crushing the pilot back into his seat with the acceleration after all.

Yeah, i wish JUMP Jets could actually JUMP.

[Sjorpha]

There's no need.

Poptarting is only a problem if it dominates the metagame, it's not a problem in itself that it works well. It's like any other strategy, it becomes a problem if it's the only one used. Jumpsniping should be a thing, just not the only thing, and now it isn't because lasers are dominant and ballistics are very good.

I've tried out the old poptarts now with the JJ and PPC buffs, it works like a charm. Almost like before actually, but it doesn't dominate because clan tech and quirks have created a new meta where poptarting can only hope to become one of several options.

[Saint Scarlett Johan]

Poptarting is viable, but it's too slow and too squishy to be dominant again.

[Choppah]

Looking at the slow rate of map development, it is unlikey the devs are going to make maps fit into JJ mechanics. While they should be more proactive in preventing exploitive/unintentional spots that JJ allow mechs to get on (like big hill on crimson), I still don't see it happening. The easier, and therefore more likely, change will be to JJ themselves. Go here to to see recent thread on different ideas about JJ.

Edited by Choppah, 11 July 2015 - 11:10 AM.

[Hit the Deck]

Foxfire kadrpg, on 11 July 2015 - 09:17 AM, said:

...
So far, the way we have curbed pop-tarting has been to drastically increase start up time (requiring a larger commitment to a single jump) as well as lowering velocity, making flight slower and altitude lower. This has meant much fewer places where a large mech can pop up, as well as more infrequent jumps. Mission accomplished, pop-tarting now belongs exclusively to small mechs who possess such small alphas that players don't mind it. Jump jets, particularly Class I, are still not worth it.
It's just a matter of addressing how to deal with pop-tarting. For me, killing jumpjets has not been a good trade off.
...

You know I'll keep spamming EXE pics if people still say this (the bolded italicized part).



But I agree with you that JJs should work more forcefully.

[Foxfire kadrpg]

Sjorpha, on 11 July 2015 - 10:58 AM, said:

There's no need.

Poptarting is only a problem if it dominates the metagame, it's not a problem in itself that it works well. It's like any other strategy, it becomes a problem if it's the only one used. Jumpsniping should be a thing, just not the only thing, and now it isn't because lasers are dominant and ballistics are very good.

The problem in this post is that Jumpjets still suck. The conclusion is that they still suck because PGI is convinced Pop-tarting should never return. The Post is the suggestion that we can have our jumpjets back to full glory, maintain the lackluster Pop-tarting at present, if we instead design maps that make it rare for poptarting to be useful.

Again, I don't care about poptarting, but from what I've read the ONLY reason six tons of jump jets doesn't always get a highlander out of the ravine in Canyon Network is because some vocal players are convinced poptarting is a horrible Satin-inspired-fun-killer and because PGI's only answer is to make jump jets unserviceable for larger mechs.

[Trev Firestorm]

Poptarting is not and was never a problem.

Edited by Trev Firestorm, 11 July 2015 - 12:02 PM.

[ShadowWolf Kell]

What jump jets could be!

[Kiiyor]

Trev Firestorm, on 11 July 2015 - 12:01 PM, said:

Poptarting is not and was never a problem.

Were you around then? Ah, you're a founder, so you were.

Poptarting was an almost no risk, high reward tactic that promoted extreme levels of camping. Your exposure time was negligable, and your firepower with PPFLD meta was huge. Battles were filled with poptarts because it was the #1 tactic, all other tactics #2 or lower. People were frustrated with it, because the only way to beat it was to join it. Heck, I joined it, even though I despised it, and my KDR quite literally soared.

The biggest issue with poptarting though, was that you were always in control of the battlefield, because it was a superior offensive tactic that was available everywhere. Now, if you're playing defensively, you have an advantage over an enemy that is peeking at you, because that enemy has to waste time accelerating and decelerating to get back into cover. Not so when poptarts ruled the skies; their tactic was available everywhere, they could negate most cover by soaring above it, and the only maneuvering they had to do was straight up. Map positioning was irrelevant, as long as they had cover to land behind. Heck, most people never bothered to move as a poptart, and could 'tart from the exact same place for the majority of a match, because even if the enemy knew where they were, and were expecting them, they STILL lost on trades to poptarts.

I hated it mostly because it removed maneuvering from the game. You didn't need to jockey for position, at least in most pug games, because any position with cover was acceptable for poptarting. Even the daytona map meta we have now is better than that.

[Kristov Kerensky]

Oddly enough, JJ's actually work almost identical to TT now, go figure.

You get the distance you should get and the height you should get, per TT, so it's actually where it should be. Players just want something MORE than what JJs were actually supposed to be in TT, because all other MW titles gave that, including MWLL, not a single one of them got JJs working per the TT rules...

Now that PGI has them working that way, I think they're fine. I can get my Heavys up high enough to do a DFA or get on a roof, and that's really all they need to do, because that's all they can do in TT.

[Hit the Deck]

Kristov Kerensky, on 11 July 2015 - 04:02 PM, said:

Oddly enough, JJ's actually work almost identical to TT now, go figure.

You get the distance you should get and the height you should get, per TT, so it's actually where it should be. Players just want something MORE than what JJs were actually supposed to be in TT, because all other MW titles gave that, including MWLL, not a single one of them got JJs working per the TT rules...

Now that PGI has them working that way, I think they're fine. I can get my Heavys up high enough to do a DFA or get on a roof, and that's really all they need to do, because that's all they can do in TT.

It's my impression that forum warriors want JJs that give big thrust (which I can agree with), although those who complained almost never explicitly said that (often heard phrases are "HoverJets" and "Class I JJs are useless"). I think the sluggishness of Heavy JJs gives people the illusion that they can't reach high places or leap far, which is in reality not true. People also need to now that running start helps and when to jump to reach the spot they want.

[Mystere]

It seems some folks are still suffering from psychological trauma induced by those big bad poptarts.

May I suggest a possible therapeutic activity? How about taking up shooting clay pigeons?

Wintersdark, on 11 July 2015 - 09:28 AM, said:

Or, the much better route: have JJ's be awesome AND terrain designed freely, but have the JJ's designed in such a way as to curtail poptarting. Make them fast, without a long hang time, and make them have a sharper vector (a lot of forward or backward movement while jumping, even from stationary). Thus, there's no real hang time, it's fast and furious. Make them feel powerful, like rockets strapped to your mech. In all the stories, they're presented as crushing the pilot back into his seat with the acceleration after all.

This I can go with, as long as poptarting was still viable for those skilled enough to do so.

Edited by Mystere, 11 July 2015 - 08:57 PM.