108 replies to this topic

[Wintersdark]

The Atlas Overlord, on 10 October 2015 - 06:20 PM, said:

Everything after this is moot.

The class of mech is flat out designed to kill any assault in the game.

It's not even close in comparison.

The fact that assault mechs literally MUST have their team protect them is testimony to how badly this game has turned out.

Best light vs best assault.... assault only wins if the lights get stuck on terrain or some other game glitch.

Sorry, but no.

What they are designed for is irrelevant; what they actually do is what matters.

6375 drops for me now since they started keeping stats. Of those, easily half are in Assault mechs.

Two lights are extremely dangerous. One light and one <anything else> in fact are extremely dangerous, because the light can stay behind the assault lest he risk letting the mech with more firepower get behind. But then, that's 2v1, and that's pretty much always horribly one-sided. One light, however, cannot remain behind an assault, not any of them. Even a Direwolf can readily maneuver to bring a light across his field of view frequently. I'll happily demonstrate this if you want, feel free to friend me and we'll have a private match.

This is not because I'm an outstanding pilot, it's just math. Piloted correctly (not just continuously turning in the same direction "chasing" the light) anything from mastered Direwolf and up in mobility(That is, anything short of ridiculous builds with hideously undersized engines) can draw a bead on a locust with ease. When you've got a mech that can push 120 point alpha strikes, you don't need a lot of luck to swat a light.

And again: The light needs to hit repeatedly, over and over, in the same location to grind through the Assaults' armor. Even in the case of the very powerful lights (FS9, ACH) it still takes numerous hits. The Assault? Unless it's woefully underarmed, one. Maybe two.

The only Assaults that are vulnerable to lights one on one in a open battle are very, very poor assault pilots. Or, to be fair, if the light pilot is taking his time over a very long duration staying at extreme range with ERLL's against a short ranged assault, or if the assault for whatever reason cannot turn and engage the light (say, NASCAR fun times)

InRev, on 10 October 2015 - 06:25 PM, said:

Forget lights, my own damn teammates tear my back armor up all the time. I run back armor just because pugs have the trigger discipline of a squirrel on amphetamines.

I used to run 1 ST 4 CT rear armor, until the recent swaft of events. I lost a LOT of side torsos in my Direwolves to teammates in a hurry to shoot through me. Now I'm up to 8/10, a huge amount for me.

I still tend to lose it to teammates with disturbing regularity.

Edited by Wintersdark, 10 October 2015 - 06:41 PM.

[Tsar Bomba]

Wintersdark, on 10 October 2015 - 06:39 PM, said:

Even a Direwolf can readily maneuver to bring a light across his field of view frequently. I'll happily demonstrate this if you want,

It's doable but not certain in an elite+ but a basic (like a new player starting out or someone starting to try to master the model) and absolutely not.

[Wintersdark]

Tsar Bomba, on 10 October 2015 - 06:43 PM, said:

It's doable but not certain in an elite+ but a basic (like a new player starting out or someone starting to try to master the model) and absolutely not.

It's certain, in a doubled-basics DWF. Absolutely. I've never, in roughly 600 Direwolf drops, ever encountered a light pilot that could stay out of my field of fire. Not even the very best ones.

Not to say I don't fear the very good light pilots, but I fear them because they are very good pilots, not because they are in lights.

A Direwolf or 300std KGC/AS7 without doubled basics, maybe. Probably. But I don't much care about that, as one can get those doubled basics fast and, to be honest, an Assault mech without it's pilot skills is at a horrible disadvantage anyways, and is a much lesser threat.

[Metus regem]

If we had melee, an Atlas would be scary.... Hell in TT I had one use an enemy Locust as a club to kill a Phoenix Hawk....

[Tsar Bomba]

Wintersdark, on 10 October 2015 - 06:48 PM, said:

A Direwolf or 300std KGC/AS7 without doubled basics, maybe. Probably. But I don't much care about that, as one can get those doubled basics fast and, to be honest, an Assault mech without it's pilot skills is at a horrible disadvantage anyways, and is a much lesser threat.

Well, we're going off topic this is about the Atlas, but a brand new DW can be back cored in seconds by a decent light without having any chance to return fire.

There is nowhere else in the game where this level of surety (auto-win to use the parlance) exists. There is nowhere else in the game where one mech can kill another mech and expect any kind of complete immunity to damage like the light vs a stock build assault without any XP yet.

[Ex Atlas Overlord]

Tsar Bomba, on 10 October 2015 - 07:03 PM, said:

Well, we're going off topic this is about the Atlas, but a brand new DW can be back cored in seconds by a decent light without having any chance to return fire.

There is nowhere else in the game where this level of surety (auto-win to use the parlance) exists. There is nowhere else in the game where one mech can kill another mech and expect any kind of complete immunity to damage like the light vs a stock build assault without any XP yet.

Exactly this.

Put a good pilot into a light and assaults b/c completely pointless.

It's laughable how easily they go down.

[Illya Ghost Bear]

Davers, on 10 October 2015 - 04:43 PM, said:

The Atlas was only feared until someone put 2 gauss rifles on a K2. Then DHS killed it, and newer heavy/assault mechs with better hardpoints buried it.

To be fair though, even in TT it was only scary within 90m.

and only until 3050.... and only because the few operational Assaults were usually in better operating condition than everything else because they were too precious to waste on any but super vital missions.

[Illya Ghost Bear]

GrimRiver, on 10 October 2015 - 05:35 PM, said:

I know that feeling, I wrecked one too with my WVR-6R(AC5+maxxed cooldown mod, 3 SRM4's, 1 med laser) both of us was 100% and I came out on top with 36% left, I did have a video but Nvidia's savefile became corrupt and lost 15 video's.

The Atlas was never really about scary firepower. Even in TT, the Stalker, Banshee S and such outgunned it, in part because of it's "do a little bit of everything" armament.

What it was supposed to do was be tougher than everything else out there, lobbing huge 20 pt damage shells around, and generally out-tanking everything.

Thanks to two plus years of stupendously bad balance choices, that is not the case with MWO's Atlas. One good bit of news out of the last Test Server Fiasco though, is that they are indeed playing with giving the Atlas MASSIVE armor/Structure buffs (I've only been after them to do this since quirks were debuted), which should at least make it pretty tanky again.

Though with 12v12 focus fire, and it's geometry that will only go so far.

GrimRiver, on 10 October 2015 - 05:35 PM, said:

I know that feeling, I wrecked one too with my WVR-6R(AC5+maxxed cooldown mod, 3 SRM4's, 1 med laser) both of us was 100% and I came out on top with 36% left, I did have a video but Nvidia's savefile became corrupt and lost 15 video's.

The Atlas was never really about scary firepower. Even in TT, the Stalker, Banshee S and such outgunned it, in part because of it's "do a little bit of everything" armament.

What it was supposed to do was be tougher than everything else out there, lobbing huge 20 pt damage shells around, and generally out-tanking everything.

Thanks to two plus years of stupendously bad balance choices, that is not the case with MWO's Atlas. One good bit of news out of the last Test Server Fiasco though, is that they are indeed playing with giving the Atlas MASSIVE armor/Structure buffs (I've only been after them to do this since quirks were debuted), which should at least make it pretty tanky again.

Though with 12v12 focus fire, and it's geometry that will only go so far.

[Khobai]

theres nothing wrong with lights countering atlases. light mechs countered assaults in tabletop too. assaults have to have some weakness afterall. and fast mechs are their weakness.

the problem is more heavies countering atlases. the atlas should have virtually every advantage vs a heavy in a straight up fight and it doesnt. even a timberwolf should be afraid of an atlas. and its not.

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The Atlas was never really about scary firepower. Even in TT, the Stalker, Banshee S and such outgunned it, in part because of it's "do a little bit of everything" armament.

But the atlas had max armor. remember a lot of stock mechs didnt have max armor. so when mwo allowed mechs to increase their armor to the max for their tonnage it kindve took that advantage away from the atlas.

its true that the atlas never really had a good weapons loadout because of its mixed weapons. but was absurdly tough to kill and thats what made it scary. it lost that durability advantage in mwo.

The LFE was also a big deal for the atlas when it came out. It let the Atlas pack on a lot more weapons without hardly losing any survivability. They should probably add the LFE to the game to balance out CXL being so good. Or make the ISXL as good as CXL and buff STD engines somehow.

Edited by Khobai, 10 October 2015 - 07:33 PM.

[Wintersdark]

Illya Arkhipova, on 10 October 2015 - 07:19 PM, said:

Thanks to two plus years of stupendously bad balance choices, that is not the case with MWO's Atlas. One good bit of news out of the last Test Server Fiasco though, is that they are indeed playing with giving the Atlas MASSIVE armor/Structure buffs (I've only been after them to do this since quirks were debuted), which should at least make it pretty tanky again.

Though with 12v12 focus fire, and it's geometry that will only go so far.

Yup. I've been begging for this as well - something to make the AS7 a mech with a purpose, something that makes it unique. Sure, one can argue that extreme tankiness is not as valuable as face-melting firepower and this may keep it largely out of comp circles, but at least it gives the mech a real role, instead of just being a poor way to spend 100 tons.

[Ex Atlas Overlord]

Khobai, on 10 October 2015 - 07:23 PM, said:

assaults have to have some weakness afterall.

They already do...

They're so big it's impossible to miss and so slow it's impossible to run away.

If those aren't "weaknesses" I don't know what the F is.

But apparently that's not good enough, so instead it's just "shoot here with any mech in the world to insta kill and completely bypass the fact that it's supposed to take a lot of fire to kill it"

Edited by The Atlas Overlord, 10 October 2015 - 07:35 PM.

[Illya Ghost Bear]

Khobai, on 10 October 2015 - 07:23 PM, said:

theres nothing wrong with lights countering atlases. light mechs countered assaults in tabletop too. assaults have to have some weakness afterall. and fast mechs are their weakness.

the problem is more heavies countering atlases. the atlas should have virtually every advantage vs a heavy in a straight up fight and it doesnt. even a timberwolf should be afraid of an atlas. and its not.



but the atlas had max armor. remember a lot of stock mechs didnt have max armor. so when mwo allowed mechs to increase their armor to the max for their tonnage it kindve took that advantage away from the atlas.

its true that the atlas never really had a good weapons loadout because of its mixed weapons. but was absurdly tough to kill and thats what made it scary. it lost that durability advantage in mwo.

Illya Arkhipova, on 10 October 2015 - 07:19 PM, said:

What it was supposed to do was be tougher than everything else out there, lobbing huge 20 pt damage shells around, and generally out-tanking everything.

something that I mentioned in the very same comment you quoted from. fancy that.

[Khobai]

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something that I mentioned in the very same comment you quoted from. fancy that.

hence why i liked your post

I was simply reiterating what you said.

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They're so big it's impossible to miss and so slow it's impossible to run away.

right and part of being slow and having poor agility is that lights can get into your back arc. the problem isnt so much that lights are in your back arc but more the sheer amount of damage those lights are doing with broken weapons like CSPL. The CSPL is a really broken weapon that needs to be majorly nerfed.

another problem is the 1.4 DHS. Its hard for assaults to get a heat dissipation advantage by stacking heatsinks because the external heatsinks are so crappy. They really should make all DHS 1.7-1.8 instead of having internal be 2.0 and external be 1.4. That makes no sense.

Edited by Khobai, 10 October 2015 - 07:43 PM.

[Tsar Bomba]

Khobai, on 10 October 2015 - 07:23 PM, said:

theres nothing wrong with lights countering atlases. light mechs countered assaults in tabletop too. assaults have to have some weakness afterall. and fast mechs are their weakness.

Never said they shouldn't. It's Rock-Paper-Scissors.

But the problem is, as I mentioned already, that the Light v Assault (Paper beats Rock) is much easier than Assault v Heavy (Rock beats Scissors). In my above example the beginning assault with no XP in an open area is easy pickings vs a Light. Now take what an assault should be good at; killing Heavies and it's hardly as cut and dried. in fact, if you took a stock heavy with no XP yet, he could still make the assault pay for taking him on. The same can't be said for making the light pay in a stock assault with no XP getting jumped by a light.

All I am saying (and again this is off topic in this thread but I've said it in the Grandpa Mech thread) is that there needs to be parity between how easy it is for paper to beat rock and how difficult it is for rock to beat scissors.

Edited by Tsar Bomba, 10 October 2015 - 07:40 PM.

[Vxheous]

Mycrus, on 10 October 2015 - 04:57 PM, said:

run 1 pt of rear armor... on all your mechs except lights... for lights I run 3 pts...

1 pt of rear armor is asking to get arty strike/air striked to red internals...8 is usually good for assaults since you cannot protect your back as easily as others. Usually 4-6 back armor on all other classes.

[Davers]

The Atlas Overlord, on 10 October 2015 - 07:25 PM, said:

They already do...

They're so big it's impossible to miss and so slow it's impossible to run away.

If those aren't "weaknesses" I don't know what the F is.

But apparently that's not good enough, so instead it's just "shoot here with any mech in the world to insta kill and completely bypass the fact that it's supposed to take a lot of fire to kill it"

That's all relative though. If you try to solo an Atlas in a 50 ton IS mech you would totally think it's pretty tanky.

No mech in the game can insta-kill an Atlas (12 PPC mechs aside). The question is "How long should the largest mech with the most armor be able to stand against x number of opponents?" And unless you want all weapons to be shooting pillows, the answer is "Not very long".

[Khobai]

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But the problem is, as I mentioned already, that the Light v Assault (Paper beats Rock) is much easier than Assault v Heavy (Rock beats Scissors).

I agree with that. But a lot of that is just a weapon balance problem. Lights are doing these massive alphas with imbalanced weapons like CSPL.

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That's all relative though. If you try to solo an Atlas in a 50 ton IS mech you would totally think it's pretty tanky.

Yeah but a 55 ton clan mech will wreck an atlas with laser vomit. It basically kills the atlas in 3 alphas. maybe 4 if theyre not dead accurate.

Likewise a 65 ton IS jagermech has no problem at all wrecking an Atlas. Even though it has a 35 ton disadvantage the fact it can carry multiple high mounted ballistics makes it more than a match for the Atlas.

Edited by Khobai, 10 October 2015 - 07:52 PM.

[DjPush]

GrimRiver, on 10 October 2015 - 04:37 PM, said:

I mean really? Every atlas I've seen over the past month or two has did under 200dmg because all it's hardpoints are at it's center, not enough hardpoints vs dire-wolfs, crappy quirks, very slow and a massive very easy to hit target.

Why waste the money on it when every other assault is better in every possible way, the only reason why anybody buys it is for nostalgia and that alone will not make it any better.

The main menu has an Atlas on it and yet it's one of the most underperforming mechs in the game, it should be a dire on that menu because when I see a dire in game im like "oh crap here comes the hurt" but when I see a atlas I think "Im gonna blast him in the butt plate and move on" and out of all the mechs in the game the jenner would've done more dmg to me even though I was fighting the atlas waaay longer.

I want the Atlas's old glory back, make people fear it again.

http://www.sarna.net...28BattleMech%29

Their low damage isn't because of hardpoint locations. It's because people aren't piloting them properly.

[Khobai]

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Their low damage isn't because of hardpoint locations. It's because people aren't piloting them properly.

even when theyre piloted properly they do half the damage of direwolves.

And remember the direwolf and atlas are supposed to be EQUAL. Because IS and Clan is supposed to be balanced 12v12 which means 1:1 balance. So a 100 ton IS mech should equal a 100 ton clan mech.

[James Montana]

OMG! I'm glad I found this thread. I've been trying to like the Atlas and have been playing it again for the past few days. I have to say, I'm so frustrated with this mech. I love the Atlas in concept and TT, but in MWO... well, it freaking is just is so damn frustrating to play. I drop in the damn thing with a mind set of having a lumbering tank that can soak up some serious damage and dish it out, too. Instead I have an experience like a fat man running a gauntlet, watching his blubber being shot off after every step. I'm still going to drop in this mech, but I really don't know why.