71 replies to this topic

[Rhent]

In my bracket, I see a LRM mech about as often as I see a good M Night Shamylan movie. Why?

-ECM is extremely prevalent now acting as a hard counter
-LRM missile speeds is exceedingly slow
-Missile warning makes dodging LRM's a trivial task
-Radar Deprivation is an immediate counter to Adv. Target Decay

I like to run Narc but frankly, I hardly ever see a LRM carrier, and its typically for those four reasons above. So what would bring TAG/Narc back into play (and don't give me the 90M ECM nerf it will do nothing)

NARC: Mechs under those effects have the following:
-Missile speed is double of what it normally
-Torso seeking double the chance to hit the torsos from what it currently is
-If a NARC'd mech gets to ECM, the target lock still applies however the two previous benefits are removed (no double speed, no increased torso hit). In essence, you now have ECM working as it was design to (remove the targeting benefits not preventing hits completely)

TAG: Mechs under those effects have the following:
-Missile speed is double of what it normally
-Torso seeking double the chance to hit the torsos from what it currently is

What effects would you see? LRM's would stand to come back into play. It would make sense for a LRM mech to expose themselves in the open for 3 seconds to get a lock, fire and hit compared to the 6 seconds it takes now on average.

Edited by Rhent, 01 August 2015 - 01:59 PM.

[TercieI]

Back?

[Monkey Lover]

You would still need to double the damage for me to take them to a game I cared about.

[Rhent]

Monkey Lover, on 01 August 2015 - 02:02 PM, said:

You would still need to double the damage for me to take them to a game I cared about.

Well putting in a warning indicator is what did the whammy on LRM's. You don't do that for a slow moving spread damage weapon. Imagine what would happen if you got a warning when you had a weapon lock on you and had a 2 second warning before any weapon could hit you? How often would you get hit?

[Aiden Skye]

Or just fix ECM and information warfare in MWO?

[Soldier91]

There is definitely something weird happening with the tag module. Sometimes it won't register I was encountering this myself and a guy in one of my PUG's was having the same problem.
Been a few times that the tag won't counter ECM like I can expose them on the map and target them with R but no missile lock with streaks &or LRM is possible.

Maybe it's just me but I haven't been noticing bitching betty with the missile lock that much anymore, before it was a pretty constant but I still get the red flashy thing.

[One Medic Army]

NARC and TAG both have fundamental problems that no amount of tweaking will help with.

TAG requires the user to have 100% FaceTime with the target, prevents the user from twisting, and must be held on target until the missiles hit for there to be any effect. TAG makes the user an easy target, and is easy to break locks from.

NARC is a short-ranged weapon that uses a missile hard point and requires a relatively high amount of tonnage and crits given that the NARC user and the LRM user are not the same. It's a weapons system which requires one mech to sacrifice a large amount of tonnage and a valuable missile hard point solely for the purpose of assisting another mech entirely, one which might not even be present in a given match. To make things worse, the best NARC carriers are the mechs least able to make the tonnage sacrifice, light mechs.

[Tristan Winter]

I want the incoming missiles warning. Heck, I wish this game has a 'target lock' warning too, any time someone had a lock on you. Modern fighter jets have it, so why not? Missile travel time needs to be decreased regardless, whether you do that by changing the trajectory or the missile speed or both.

As for NARC and TAG, I think it makes more sense to change trajectory and homing ability rather than missile speed.

And make target locks harder to get, please. Don't keep aiming skills out of the equation.

[Rhent]

Tristan Winter, on 01 August 2015 - 02:15 PM, said:

I want the incoming missiles warning. Heck, I wish this game has a 'target lock' warning too, any time someone had a lock on you. Modern fighter jets have it, so why not? Missile travel time needs to be decreased regardless, whether you do that by changing the trajectory or the missile speed or both.

As for NARC and TAG, I think it makes more sense to change trajectory and homing ability rather than missile speed.

And make target locks harder to get, please. Don't keep aiming skills out of the equation.

I've run all mechs and LRM's are the hardest weapon in the game to damage by any ways and means. Why? You go out to get your lock and you fire, the enemy gets the warning, looks up, sees you and you have to stay exposed for 3 to 6 seconds while your weapons go to hit him. He can get at least 2 alphas in you at range, and hide and take 1 of your volleys spread, assuming that he has idiot ECM's who don't immediately run to cover him.

I play ECM mechs, as soon as I see LRM's on my team's heavies/assaults I'll run to cover them. I play sniper builds and LRM mechs can't damage me. I pop up, hit them, pop back and let radar deprivation work. I play narc carriers, and the speed of the missile is so slow that making a hit on a moving target is one of the hardest things to pull in the game now.

The system I outlied means that w/o TAG/NARC the LRM's work as they currently do, IOW's they don't work and they are a joke to avoid. As soon as you are Tagged/Narcd now LRM's can hit and hurt you. It would give Narc carriers an actual reason to run Narc and it would bring more LRM's back into play.

[Deathlike]

I don't ever remember when LRMs were pro-comp weapons.

Seriously, the only "time" would be those Lurmaggeddons.

[Adiuvo]

Until you introduce some method to actually aim LRMs they will never be used in high level play. However, allowing you to aim them would be too strong under the current LRM mechanics.

[Rhent]

Adiuvo, on 01 August 2015 - 02:41 PM, said:

Until you introduce some method to actually aim LRMs they will never be used in high level play. However, allowing you to aim them would be too strong under the current LRM mechanics.

The people doing the aiming are the Narcers and Taggers. Narcing is inherently dangerous due to the extremely slow speed of the missile and the fact you need to get well withing all short range weapon systems to get a hit and then you have to evade them and not lose a leg or get blown up. There is little to no benefit to narcing now and that needs to change.

[Naduk]

Soldier91, on 01 August 2015 - 02:12 PM, said:

There is definitely something weird happening with the tag module. Sometimes it won't register I was encountering this myself and a guy in one of my PUG's was having the same problem.
Been a few times that the tag won't counter ECM like I can expose them on the map and target them with R but no missile lock with streaks &or LRM is possible.

Maybe it's just me but I haven't been noticing bitching betty with the missile lock that much anymore, before it was a pretty constant but I still get the red flashy thing.

nothing is wrong with tag, or narc
if you are countering someone with ecm and they stand near another ecm user it counters your counter
thus with the sheer amount of ecm in play at the moment its very common to see a narc or tag hit and have zero effect on a target

[Kaeb Odellas]

Give TAG infinite range!

[Monkey Lover]

Kaeb Odellas, on 01 August 2015 - 02:53 PM, said:

Give TAG infinite range!

This would make a cool quirk for a few light mechs.

[wanderer]

Or simply kill the "no-lock" effect of ECM and simply have it cause a lock-on/spread penalty instead, which TAG/ECM would negate entirely if on the target.

It's funny how one of the lightest pieces of gear in the game can utterly negate some of the biggest tonnage-hog weapons (since they're ammo gluttons as well) in turn.

[Rhent]

Monkey Lover, on 01 August 2015 - 02:55 PM, said:

This would make a cool quirk for a few light mechs.

Sounds good, but due to range it would be useless trying to keep TAG on any target going 89.1 KPH or faster past 1K.

[Gas Guzzler]

Rhent, on 01 August 2015 - 02:49 PM, said:

The people doing the aiming are the Narcers and Taggers. Narcing is inherently dangerous due to the extremely slow speed of the missile and the fact you need to get well withing all short range weapon systems to get a hit and then you have to evade them and not lose a leg or get blown up. There is little to no benefit to narcing now and that needs to change.

No, tag or narc just has to hit the mech "somewhere". The aiming he is talking about is actual aiming, like shooting specific components.

Edited by Gas Guzzler, 01 August 2015 - 02:57 PM.

[One Medic Army]

One of the better suggestion I've seen is to make LRMS steer towards the TAG impact point, meaning you could use TAG to actually aim LRMs at individual sections.

Implementing that, with the caveat that it works for any LRMs currently in flight towards the TAG'd mech, or LRMs in the area with no target, would certainly make both TAG and LRMs more useful.

edit: Example usage

LRM user fires a big spread of missiles at an enemy, indirectly (or even in the direction of the enemy without a target), and then he (or a spotter mech) pops up a half-second before impact to direct the LRMs accurately.

This both buffs TAG to remove the 100% facetime thing, and it boosts LRMs by allowing them to find targets with similarly low exposure period to other weapons (though at the expense of wasted ammo). Also makes LRMs more of an "everyone take cover" suppression weapon.

Edited by One Medic Army, 01 August 2015 - 03:01 PM.

[Havyek]

Biggest issue I have with TAG and NARC are they work in conjunction with LRMs.

No one in competitive play brings LRMs because:
DoT weapon
Damage spread
Flight time
Lock time
Probably something I'm not thinking of

IMO TAG and NARC should both be hard counters for ECM. Broadcast target's location to the rest of the team, and allow targeting information to be gathered faster (like TIG).