62 replies to this topic

[SolCrusher]

I boat 6 of them on my CRAB, not worries plenty of power and can tear through mechs like a hot knife specially at range when people think oh that's just a plink.

Now my DWF outfitted with 6 UAC2's that's just s joke build because it's not quick and nimble so the DWF gets destroyed fast.

[Nothing Whatsoever]

FupDup, on 31 August 2015 - 07:17 PM, said:

I really don't like it when people name Autocannons by their DPS because it entirely ignores their alpha-strike damage, which is arguably more important in most situations.

After all, the "AC/2" technically has the best DPS per ton of any ballistic, and yet it's probably the worst ballistic in the game because of having a nearly nonexistant alpha strike value.

Well, that can get into how the weapons were described to function such as the Pontiac 100 on Victors compared to the AC/20s on Hunchbacks, versus their P&P simplified damage placement and translating turns to real-time.

And then MWO simply ported the simplified values also, but then jacked up DPS against original armor values, doubling Armor, not really implementing an accurate Heat System and so on.

Where the Pontiac 100 would fire a hail of projectiles versus four projectiles from the Hunchie.

Another big limiter is how hot AC/2s can get with their high HPS. I dunno if it has the Best DPS per Ton, I'd need to look into that.

[Gas Guzzler]

REDUCE HEAT NAO!

Perfect time to do it, as we are getting a mech that boats AC2s.

[Andi Nagasia]

the problem is AC2s have to be boated to be Effective, its kinda sad really,
if they just made the Cooldown 0.52 that would make them Infinity better than they are now,

QQer- B BUT the HEAT?!?!?!,... but nothing!!!
i threw 2UAC2 on my Elited NVA(Ballistic arms)(-25% Cooldown) AC2 cooldown = 0.54,
6tons of ammo, fired until i ran out of ammo on RiverCity, 2min6sec of firing, only 10%heat,
ya you'll have lots of heat problems boating them, but using them on Lights/Mediums, nope,
this will make using them 1-2 Viable without letting Boats benefit form their faster firing,
Edit-

Edited by Andi Nagasia, 31 August 2015 - 07:33 PM.

[EmeraldSongbird]

Andi Nagasia, on 31 August 2015 - 06:53 PM, said:

ACH will always use Lasers, it has enough Hardpoints and not enough tonnage,
However an 2UAC2 Adder/Shadow Cat would be Cool if it where Viable,

I run an Adder with 2 UAC2 and average 500-600 damage per game. If you don't think it is viable, you are definitely building it wrong. Shadow Cat... meh, we won't talk about that one, huh?

[FupDup]

Praetor Knight, on 31 August 2015 - 07:26 PM, said:

Well, that can get into how the weapons were described to function such as the Pontiac 100 on Victors compared to the AC/20s on Hunchbacks, versus their P&P simplified damage placement and translating turns to real-time.

And then MWO simply ported the simplified values also, but then jacked up DPS against original armor values, doubling Armor, not really implementing an accurate Heat System and so on.

Where the Pontiac 100 would fire a hail of projectiles versus four projectiles from the Hunchie.

Yes, I know the "fluff" explanations of ACs, but the fluff didn't dictate the balance of those weapons. If they really wanted ACs to be spread weapons in TT, they could easily have used a cluster-hits system like SRMs, LBX, HAGs, etc. already used...But they didn't.

In TT the different projectile counts mean nothing because it all just piled into a single hit location. In a real-time game, though, the weapon with more projectiles would always be directly inferior without any other changes like higher firing rate (for the multi-pellet model) or whatever. We already saw this with Clan UACs and their varying levels of buffs...

Praetor Knight, on 31 August 2015 - 07:26 PM, said:

Another big limiter is how hot AC/2s can get with their high HPS. I dunno if it has the Best DPS per Ton, I'd need to look into that.

AC/2: 2.78 DPS / 6 tons = 0.463 DPS/ton
AC/5: 3.0 DPS / 8 tons = 0.375 DPS/ton
AC/10: 4.0 DPS / 12 tons = 0.33 DPS/ton
AC/20: 5.0 DPS / 14 tons = 0.357 DPS/ton

So, the AC/2 does have the best DPS per ton of any Autocannon, and the most range, and the most velocity, while also being the lightest weight...and yet it's also arguably the worst AC of the bunch. That might be because of upfront alpha strike damage mattering more, perhaps?

[Nothing Whatsoever]

FupDup, on 31 August 2015 - 07:40 PM, said:

Yes, I know the "fluff" explanations of ACs, but the fluff didn't dictate the balance of those weapons. If they really wanted ACs to be spread weapons in TT, they could easily have used a cluster-hits system like SRMs, LBX, HAGs, etc. already used...But they didn't.

In TT the different projectile counts mean nothing because it all just piled into a single hit location. In a real-time game, though, the weapon with more projectiles would always be directly inferior without any other changes like higher firing rate (for the multi-pellet model) or whatever. We already saw this with Clan UACs and their varying levels of buffs...

I gotta get me the Solaris rules, since I've seen those brought up when talking about weapons, and maybe could provide some interesting ideas to consider. And I've seen some posted, but I need to google those posts again.

Yeah, projectile counts per turn means little in the P&P game, but such values would carry weight with real-time to bring more of the BT Universe to MWO, and provide different aspects to balance between mechs without needing to rely on large quirks and geometry, since I feel that FLD is still a bit problematic with various builds.

Quote

AC/2: 2.78 DPS / 6 tons = 0.463 DPS/ton
AC/5: 3.0 DPS / 8 tons = 0.375 DPS/ton
AC/10: 4.0 DPS / 12 tons = 0.33 DPS/ton
AC/20: 5.0 DPS / 14 tons = 0.357 DPS/ton

So, the AC/2 does have the best DPS per ton of any Autocannon, and the most range, and the most velocity, while also being the lightest weight...and yet it's also arguably the worst AC of the bunch. That might be because of upfront alpha strike damage mattering more, perhaps?

Sure, but we need to factor ammo, Heat Sinks, Fast Fire, quirks and the applicable cooldown modules also. And then there's the matter of fielding these builds across the different maps.

The mech mounting AC/2s can burst well if the teams are hiding, playing peek and poke, where even then the High DPS from the quick cooldown can be mitigated, and where quad AC/5s or Ultras would be the more optimal build than stacking AC/2s in many cases.

Any time I see a hot build, I have a bad tendency to want to press and flank, and when fellow teammates also push with me, that hot build is either scaling back damage output or over heats and then that mech would shortly go down if the rest of the enemy doesn't not try to engage the flankers.

That tends to be where I judge how useful a build is when being pressed like that. Catching enemies isolated on a flank like that can also provide a distraction for the rest of the team, if enough of the enemy turns to focus on the flankers, or it could push some of the enemy out to find new cover.

[FupDup]

Praetor Knight, on 31 August 2015 - 08:01 PM, said:

I gotta get me the Solaris rules, since I've seen those brought up when talking about weapons, and maybe could provide some interesting ideas to consider. And I've seen some posted, but I need to google those posts again.

Yeah, projectile counts per turn means little in the P&P game, but such values would carry weight with real-time to bring more of the BT Universe to MWO, and provide different aspects to balance between mechs without needing to rely on large quirks and geometry, since I feel that FLD is still a bit problematic with various builds.

I do recall that one of the rulebooks has a rule where ACs had the ability to "rake" their fire over multiple targets, which is a nod to their multi-pellet descriptions from fluff...but it's not a mandatory form of attack (you can still use the "default" single-target mode any time you want).

Praetor Knight, on 31 August 2015 - 08:01 PM, said:

Sure, but we need to factor ammo, Heat Sinks, Fast Fire, quirks and the applicable cooldown modules also. And then there's the matter of fielding these builds across the different maps.

The mech mounting AC/2s can burst well if the teams are hiding, playing peek and poke, where even then the High DPS from the quick cooldown can be mitigated, and where quad AC/5s or Ultras would be the more optimal build than stacking AC/2s in many cases.

Any time I see a hot build, I have a bad tendency to want to press and flank, and when fellow teammates also push with me, that hot build is either scaling back damage output or over heats and then that mech would shortly go down if the rest of the enemy doesn't not try to engage the flankers.

That tends to be where I judge how useful a build is when being pressed like that. Catching enemies isolated on a flank like that can also provide a distraction for the rest of the team, if enough of the enemy turns to focus on the flankers, or it could push some of the enemy out to find new cover.

The issue is basically that the DPS is almost completely cancelled out by the fact that it often spreads out across its target, and doesn't have an "upfront punch" to deliver that DPS. For example, the UAC/5 is a pretty good DPS gun while also having good upfront damage for its weight.

It's basically a "high risk, low reward" type of weapon. You pay more than what you get out of it. This can be fixed by lowering the opportunity costs (i.e. Light AC/2 and Protomech AC/2 require far less tonnage for the same low damage), or increasing the rewards (increase damage output).

[SolCrusher]

Zoom and leading are the AC2's friends. Once you establish hits you can keep on target. I don't use the AC2 to kill, I use it to cripple. You can use it to move people to other places on the battle field. It's a decent weapon at that and if you chain fire them most people can't tell if they are getting hit by 1, 2, 3, or more.

I'll chain 6 of them, but sometimes I'll run a 3 groups of 2 chain but I like 6 more than anything works with leading and zoom. I've gotten 1000+ dmg matches in my crab. I've had to cut back on ammo recently because of the Tier changes but whatever. I can still pull 600+ dmg in it.

If you gave me a .58 recycle on 6 AC2, it would be murderous. Been there done that on a under armored Jager. 6 AC2s worked on it well enough issues on it is ammo capacity so I would cut back to 5 AC2s. It was devastating when you had 3 or more of jagers doing this.

They did turn down the blinding, smoke, and rock for the AC2 so it's not too bad now but still annoying.

[Andi Nagasia]

FupDup, on 31 August 2015 - 08:06 PM, said:

The issue is basically that the DPS is almost completely cancelled out by the fact that it often spreads out across its target, and doesn't have an "upfront punch" to deliver that DPS. For example, the UAC/5 is a pretty good DPS gun while also having good upfront damage for its weight.

It's basically a "high risk, low reward" type of weapon. You pay more than what you get out of it. This can be fixed by lowering the opportunity costs (i.e. Light AC/2 and Protomech AC/2 require far less tonnage for the same low damage), or increasing the rewards (increase damage output).

i vote increase in DPS, at 0.52 the weapon can be amazing for lights and Mediums,
yes it would require full face time to do good damage but on the other hand look at how it can be used,
im AC2ing a DWF/KGC, they have to choose let me get my Damage, or focus on me,
if they stop targeting my team and start on me, my team can act,
using the weapon as Aggro/Suppression can really work,

[TyphonCh]

What about the phenomenally useless LBx2...?

Edited by Team Chevy86, 31 August 2015 - 08:16 PM.

[Andi Nagasia]

Team Chevy86, on 31 August 2015 - 08:15 PM, said:

What about the phenomonally useless LBx2...?

LBXs are a problem all in them selves, until we get swap-able ammo they will continue to be a problem,

[FupDup]

Team Chevy86, on 31 August 2015 - 08:15 PM, said:

What about the phenomenally useless LBx2...?

It still has 1300m/s velocity, the same as the LB 5-X...it's sad on an epic scale.

[SolCrusher]

Andi Nagasia, on 31 August 2015 - 08:12 PM, said:

i vote increase in DPS, at 0.52 the weapon can be amazing for lights and Mediums,
yes it would require full face time to do good damage but on the other hand look at how it can be used,
im AC2ing a DWF/KGC, they have to choose let me get my Damage, or focus on me,
if they stop targeting my team and start on me, my team can act,
using the weapon as Aggro/Suppression can really work,

Aggro/Suppression works great.

I use to run all my Cents with AC2s chain fired for light mech hunting, it worked well because you really could only hide from me. A cent with 2 AC2's and 2 or 3 SSRMs can rock lights. But that was way back in Closed Beta before the AH scandal.

[TyphonCh]

Andi Nagasia, on 31 August 2015 - 08:16 PM, said:

LBXs are a problem all in them selves, until we get swap-able ammo they will continue to be a problem,

For Clans... Even the IS LBx10 is a useless wad of 11 tons unless it has epic CN9-D quirks

Anyway back to topic... IMO, I want a heat decrease on AC2's before I see a cooldown buff/modules.

Edited by Team Chevy86, 31 August 2015 - 08:22 PM.

[SolCrusher]

Yep, LBX2 are crap, they were only good when ghost heat was really hammerings chaining AC2s. It was a decent Troll build with 6 LBX2 but that's all it was a troll build.

[SolCrusher]

I'd like to see the AC2 returned to it's original stats. I can't remember what it was but they were good then. They need a high rate of fire, lower heat, and longer range. There's a post somewhere about the original heat.

Heck they nerfed it because of the "machine gun" affect of chaining 5 or 6 of them on a Jager? Honestly one of the easiest mechs to take down. Too much crying.

[FupDup]

SolCrusher, on 31 August 2015 - 08:23 PM, said:

I'd like to see the AC2 returned to it's original stats. I can't remember what it was but they were good then. They need a high rate of fire, lower heat, and longer range. There's a post somewhere about the original heat.

Heck they nerfed it because of the "machine gun" affect of chaining 5 or 6 of them on a Jager? Honestly one of the easiest mechs to take down. Too much crying.

It was 0.5 second cooldown to be exact, but the same heat per shot...thus they had high heat per second, but they also had very good DPS to make up for it.

I don't think I would go all the way back down to 0.5, but it should be a bit faster than it is now (if PGI remains unwilling to increase the upfront damage but make it fire slower) along with a small nudge down in heat. Also, add cooldown modules for all Class 2 AC's that currently need them.

[Champion of Khorne Lord of Blood]

I had something typed up about the LBX ac2s saying they should also get the buffs that the other AC2s get while comparing them to the odd cousin that no one talks about that shows up every other thanksgiving... but my internet went down.

Edit: also suppression is a nice tool, holds back those pesky peekers who don't know if they have AC2 shells coming at them or AC20s.

Edited by Dakota1000, 31 August 2015 - 08:28 PM.

[TyphonCh]

SolCrusher, on 31 August 2015 - 08:23 PM, said:

I'd like to see the AC2 returned to it's original stats. I can't remember what it was but they were good then. They need a high rate of fire, lower heat, and longer range. There's a post somewhere about the original heat.

Heck they nerfed it because of the "machine gun" affect of chaining 5 or 6 of them on a Jager? Honestly one of the easiest mechs to take down. Too much crying.

At the time, (Not that I'd know) I heard that the 6 ac2 Jager was a 65 ton walking chainsaw. Nowadays with all clan UAC spam, it would be moderate at best.