28 replies to this topic

[Quicksilver Aberration]

After looking through the quirks, while you did make the Vindicator better, you buffed the BJ to the point that Vindicator is now ever further behind the Blackjack. Whatever total level of quirks you give the BJ, you probably should give as much to the Vindicator in order to make it as competitive, because right now I still have no real reason to run a Vindi over a Blackjack.

Edited by Quicksilver Kalasa, 14 November 2015 - 12:44 PM.

[Tarogato]

You do realise you're posting in the PTS3 forums right? Your feedback should now go into the PTS4 forums, which don't exist yet, so hold off for now.

[Quicksilver Aberration]

Tarogato, on 14 November 2015 - 02:28 PM, said:

You do realise you're posting in the PTS3 forums right? Your feedback should now go into the PTS4 forums, which don't exist yet, so hold off for now.

They also just renamed this forum when they "released" PTS3, so technically this is the PTS2 forums...so yes, I do realize this.

Edited by Quicksilver Kalasa, 14 November 2015 - 02:59 PM.

[Sickening Spying Scheming Eunuch]

I also want to criticize lack of real buffs for vindicators, letting this mech to be on a same level as other 45 ton mechs, however I'll wait till PGI release PTS4 forums, so stay tuned and prepare your jimmies, because we are going to need a lot of voices if we want PGI to do anything about poor Vindi.

Edited by KruczekIIV, 14 November 2015 - 05:50 PM.

[Max Liao]

As someone who plays the Vindicator more than any other Mech (by far), I am really scared my 2x PPC Vindy AA -- which I have become quite good with -- will get nerfed realigned.

No, I have seen nothing to directly indicate this (nor have I searched very hard), but I'm concerned (paranoid?) about how the updates to the quirks and skills systems may influence the Vindicator -- considered by many to already be a shoddy Medium 'Mech.

I'm not so concerned about the SIB, at this point, but the AA is my baby.

[Tahribator]

The ridiculous structure quirks the Blackjack received was not needed at all. With its laser quirks and high mounts, the Blackjack relied on not being hit after all. It's also nicely scaled so it's already tanky for its size.

But the poor Vindy? It's oversized as hell, has low mounts and a small engine . . . it's a pocket brawler that can't afford to brawl. Its main problem is that it's way too squishy. It desperately needs the Atlas treatment with a lot of extra structure. Basically take away the structure quirks from the BJ and give them to the Vindicator.

It's been a year and the Vindicators are still absolutely horrible. Basically extinct on the battlefield. I swear someone at PGI still thinks they're good.

Edited by Tahribator, 17 November 2015 - 03:03 AM.

[Sickening Spying Scheming Eunuch]

Yep, Blackjacks are little Jaggers, if you use one you can shoot at your enemy showing only your head and guns from behind the cover. Vindicators doesn't have such luxury, have ridiculously low hardpoints, yet this mech haven't got anything out of PTS4, while Blackjacks got buffed. The gap between the two is even greater than ever.

Tahribator, on 17 November 2015 - 03:01 AM, said:

But the poor Vindy? It's oversized as hell, has low mounts and a small engine . . . it's a pocket brawler that can't afford to
It's been a year and the Vindicators are still absolutely horrible. Basically extinct on the battlefield. I swear someone at PGI still thinks they're good.

+1

[Jive Korsan]

Tahribator, on 17 November 2015 - 03:01 AM, said:

The ridiculous structure quirks the Blackjack received was not needed at all. With its laser quirks and high mounts, the Blackjack relied on not being hit after all. It's also nicely scaled so it's already tanky for its size.

But the poor Vindy? It's oversized as hell, has low mounts and a small engine . . . it's a pocket brawler that can't afford to brawl. Its main problem is that it's way too squishy. It desperately needs the Atlas treatment with a lot of extra structure. Basically take away the structure quirks from the BJ and give them to the Vindicator.

It's been a year and the Vindicators are still absolutely horrible. Basically extinct on the battlefield. I swear someone at PGI still thinks they're good.

This is the truth of the matter unfortunately. I want to like them cause I love the look, but I'm basically a detriment to my team when running mine as I could have brought a BlackJack instead.

[Acheron Blade]

Agree with everything said here. I cannot understand how the vindicator is not receiving huge structure/arm for buffs. It is a huge mech for its weight, low mounted and limited number of hard points and a ct hitbox that is really big because of its huge head which can be shot from any angle. 90%+ of my deaths are due to ct cored. I would argue that the vindicator should get more buffs than the blackjack, which is already not a horrible mech like the vindicator.

If we take a look at the 45 ton mechs, the cicada has great speed, the blackjack has great poking ability and small size, the vindicator has...a cool mech model? There is a reason on live today that you will still see blackjacks and cicadas but hardly any vindicators.

Edited by Acheron Blade, 29 November 2015 - 10:28 AM.

[GLaDOSauR]

Personally I think the vindicator should get jump jet buffs. Making it a viable skirmisher and pop-tarter.

[Wildstreak]

I gave a once over to the PDF, the BJ does not need all the Structure buffing, I find them tanky little buggers already when I try to shoot them with any Mech.
Vindicators seem to be getting changes to allow more flexible builds (good) except the 1AA (bad) that still seems too focused on PPCs. I have thought about getting a SIB recently and trying this chassis, just 2 things put me off.
1 - The 1AA's PPC focus even after changes.
2 - The weaker health compared to other 45 tonners including the BJ but also including the Ice Ferret, it looks tougher than the Vindicator and the Ferret is getting no changes.

[Bluttrunken]

The reason why the Blackjack, with much more hardpoints and better hardpoint placement, gets decent quirks on it's weapons PLUS massive structure quirks whereas the VND only gets some additional armor on arms and legs and, on some variants, lackluster quirks is BEYOND ME.

If we take the Blackjack as a measure, the VND should get better quirks on it's weapons than the Blackjack(as most VND lack a decent number of hardpoints) PLUS at least the same amount of structure and mobility quirks.

Let's sum it up: the Blackjack gets superior mobility(accel/decel+turn rate), structure(on all components) AND weapon quirks even though the chassis is superior from the get-go.

Hands down the Blackjack is overdone and hopefully changed soon but the VND is so far left behind by it, it's not even funny.

Edited by k05h3lk1n, 02 January 2016 - 03:35 PM.

[Wildstreak]

I believe is it due to psychology of the players. We have a community where Mechs are ranked in Tiers and we are told to play certain Mechs to 'get gud.' This results in what is called 'stuck behavior' where people who play the **** out of top tier Mechs go into the PTS and play those a lot ignoring Mechs like the Vindicator, Mist Lynx and others thus you get what you saw in the last PTS runs. PGI has these data collection tools and they collect all this data on top tier Mechs with little on others so changes never happen to make some Mechs worth anything. Then the people who encourage this bad testing behavior blame PGI for something the players did. You cannot get fixes if you are not going to play the bad ones giving data to the company.

Vindicator is not better, I have been working with all 4 variants now and they all do not do well. Way too hot if running Lasers and some other builds with decent firepower where the rating is better than some Blackjacks or Hunchbacks, 1X is only semi-good and heat manageable if you use a Gauss or AC10 but there was no reason to add a third Ballistic point, run a large Energy weapon means you run 3 MGs. 1AA can dual LL but still hot, 1R could have a decent Brawler but still hot, only one I would ever try to LRM boat with but it just winds up being a 45 ton Hunchback-4J in loadout, I don't need two of the same build in two different IS Mechs, If I want clone builds, I run Clan, St. Ives could run a pair of LL/LPL but still hot. Only build left for any of them is one big gun (PPC/LPL/LL) with backup yet still hot. I never ran this hot in Enforcers, Hunchbacks or some other Mediums. Most builds use XL where you die easier to STs than an Enforcer, a few can run STD. Within a certain range, the location of the weapons does not converge as well as some other Mechs, if someone gets close to a Vindicator he does not need to torso twist, the damage is already spread due to where the weapons are.

I still have fond TT memories of this Mech but not here. I think once so far I made it to 500 damage. It leaves me with an empty feeling I get when I try to use Jenner IICs and I gave up on those.

[Solis Obscuri]

Wildstreak, on 02 January 2016 - 07:52 PM, said:

I believe is it due to psychology of the players. We have a community where Mechs are ranked in Tiers and we are told to play certain Mechs to 'get gud.' This results in what is called 'stuck behavior' where people who play the **** out of top tier Mechs go into the PTS and play those a lot ignoring Mechs like the Vindicator, Mist Lynx and others thus you get what you saw in the last PTS runs. PGI has these data collection tools and they collect all this data on top tier Mechs with little on others so changes never happen to make some Mechs worth anything. Then the people who encourage this bad testing behavior blame PGI for something the players did. You cannot get fixes if you are not going to play the bad ones giving data to the company.

Vindicator is not better, I have been working with all 4 variants now and they all do not do well. Way too hot if running Lasers and some other builds with decent firepower where the rating is better than some Blackjacks or Hunchbacks, 1X is only semi-good and heat manageable if you use a Gauss or AC10 but there was no reason to add a third Ballistic point, run a large Energy weapon means you run 3 MGs. 1AA can dual LL but still hot, 1R could have a decent Brawler but still hot, only one I would ever try to LRM boat with but it just winds up being a 45 ton Hunchback-4J in loadout, I don't need two of the same build in two different IS Mechs, If I want clone builds, I run Clan, St. Ives could run a pair of LL/LPL but still hot. Only build left for any of them is one big gun (PPC/LPL/LL) with backup yet still hot. I never ran this hot in Enforcers, Hunchbacks or some other Mediums. Most builds use XL where you die easier to STs than an Enforcer, a few can run STD. Within a certain range, the location of the weapons does not converge as well as some other Mechs, if someone gets close to a Vindicator he does not need to torso twist, the damage is already spread due to where the weapons are.

I still have fond TT memories of this Mech but not here. I think once so far I made it to 500 damage. It leaves me with an empty feeling I get when I try to use Jenner IICs and I gave up on those.

Christ, I'm lucky if I can wring 500dmg out of a Vindicator over three matches, let alone one. Agree that the knuckledragger arms and mediocre accel/decel hurt it as a platform... TBH, I'd love to see some overall solution for the knuckledragger problem across the board - like if we could raise arms to shoot over cover, like in all the BT art.

Doesn't help that the theoretical advantage of most 'mechs with arm joints, wider firing arcs, is usually negated by letting turretmechs have wider torso twist ranges, higher twist speed, and greater arms elevation/declination ranges. Lower arm actuators are just lost crit slots in most cases.

[Wildstreak]

Interesting, I am almost done Basicing the 4 Vinds and finding a few Brawly/Striker builds that works, even got over 600 dmg once. Still there is the limitation in builds to 2 types per chassis.

[Inflatable Fish]

Wildstreak, on 12 January 2016 - 09:58 PM, said:

Interesting, I am almost done Basicing the 4 Vinds and finding a few Brawly/Striker builds that works, even got over 600 dmg once. Still there is the limitation in builds to 2 types per chassis.

there's also the limitation in that if someone looks funny your way, you die. the VND has less survivability than lights, even with a standard engine.

[Wildstreak]

Inflatable Fish, on 13 January 2016 - 04:41 AM, said:

there's also the limitation in that if someone looks funny your way, you die. the VND has less survivability than lights, even with a standard engine.

That's because of all this buff craziness being applied only to meta Mechs.
For me, I find living with a STD is possible, I am used to the MWO before quirks and using the Hunchback IIC.
It just had and probably still has some problems dishing out damage due to heat even though it can get better alphas than Blackjacks, then it is limited to 2 builds only per chassis, 3 for the 1R if someone wants an LRM Boat.

[Solis Obscuri]

Inflatable Fish, on 13 January 2016 - 04:41 AM, said:

there's also the limitation in that if someone looks funny your way, you die. the VND has less survivability than lights, even with a standard engine.

Yep, it would have been a strong candidate for resizing.

[Koniving]

Are the PTS4 servers still operational?

[Quicksilver Aberration]

Wildstreak, on 13 January 2016 - 06:21 AM, said:

even though it can get better alphas than Blackjacks

Lolwut, no, unless you cheat by counting missiles on the 1SIB.

Solis Obscuri, on 14 January 2016 - 02:42 PM, said:

Yep, it would have been a strong candidate for resizing.

No it wouldn't, it really isn't as big as you think. It's tall, sure, but it really isn't that big. It really is just missing the BJ level quirks. The 1AA didn't get any manueverability quirks while the BJ-1X did, on top of its structure buffs which just doesn't make a whole lot of sense. The 1SIB is the missile variant of the group but only got 10% cooldown and velocity and considering the limited energy capability hurt its overall usefulness. The 1X is a step in the right direction still needs more appropriate quirks. Missile quirks are silly on it, ballistics need less cooldown and more velocity, while PPCs need less velocity and more cooldown so that you can use an AC10/PPC combo and let them sync in velocity.

Edited by Quicksilver Kalasa, 14 January 2016 - 09:04 PM.