16 replies to this topic

[Gentleman Reaper]

It shocked me when I found out that LL, ERLL and LPL damages have been upped from tabletop values. It certainly makes sense early in game development if they thought that people would choose multiple medium lasers over them, but the large laser family has been the meta of the game for years now, it makes no sense why they haven't toned down the damage on them to help reduce how ridiculous 4 or 5 laser alpha strikes are.

It's especially shocking as to why clan lasers received such a massive damage increase over tabletop numbers (11 vs 10 dmg for CERLL and 13 vs 10 dmg for the CLPL), people have been complaining since the omnimechs released that the clan large lasers were broken overpowered, and PGI has chosen to increase the burn duration rather than sticking with actual lore values. Change this now so that we can have actual variety in our battles instead of point and alpha fights.

Edited by Elit3 Nick, 19 January 2016 - 12:23 PM.

[FupDup]

Because many of the Large-class lasers were junk in TT, and not to mention the mechanical differences between a real-time game and TT (e.g. TT had no such thing as beam duration, every laser weapon was basically PPFLD like Mechwarrior 3 and Mechwarrior 4).

All IS Large Lasers (LL, ERLL, LPL) were inferior to the PPC in TT in most circumstances.

On the Clan side, the CERLL was okay because of its extreme range and the fact that it dealt its damage to a single hit location, making it a 4-ton PPC. The CLPL was beastmode because it had a -2 to-hit modifier that made it hit targets much more consistently than other non-pulse weaponry, in addition to also dealing its 10 damage to a single hitbox every time.

None of the IS Larges need nerfs. A small damage nerf could be argued for the Clan side, but only if a counter-buff was given to the CERLL such as a beam duration reduction.

----------------------------------------

Side-note: The IS ML and SL still have more heat than their original values, which is something more worthy of changing than just nerfing Larges.

Also, on the Clan side, the ERML is actually even more dominant than the C-Larges because of being only 1 ton, in spite of having more heat and less range than TT.

Edited by FupDup, 19 January 2016 - 12:40 PM.

[Lorian Sunrider]

FupDup, on 19 January 2016 - 12:34 PM, said:

All IS Large Lasers (LL, ERLL, LPL) were inferior to the PPC in TT in most circumstances.

Oh how the tables have turned on my poor lightning guns

[Chuck Jager]

Because this is based on Battletech, they did not say a BT tabletop simulator.
Bt is very different from many games in that the Story Lore also comes with a game lore. With story lore folks are a "bit" more understanding that it is fiction or if historical that the battles may have to have a different model for a game. Right now I am only worried about how weapons of either tech or ranges are balanced amongst mechs in this game only.

The biggest balance issue is the chunk of change that BT (both TT and story) bring to this game versus all of the mechs technologies and book thumpin literalist rules that are hard to balance in a fps shooter with a medium sized player base.

I love history and sci-fi, but I have to learn to dump the back end when I play the games that may have been created from these (SWORTOR, WarThunder) and play the meta for that game while enjoying the pretty pictures and moderate translation I may get.

I do think it may be more valid of a statement if someone says , "this issue existed in TT and also exists in MWO and do you think it may be valid to address it the same way". I do give the OP kudos for partially doing this in the opening, but you are still assuming that the alpha number is too great. So is it really about long range alpha, which was a problem that occurred when PGI introduced the clan in game. As a non-lore person, this decision seemed more of a problem created by the lore driven request regardless of how it was translated.

From a mathematical problem solving perspective, it seems that the more variables that must be balanced across the equation the more issues that will arise.

So in short, enjoy the background, but learn to embrace/live with the current META in game. I do not think it will be eliminated in most games.

[Prof RJ Gumby]

FupDup, on 19 January 2016 - 12:34 PM, said:

(...) None of the IS Larges need nerfs. (...)

I may be biased by "quirks everywhere" approach, but IMHO LPLs are a bit too good. If you can fit 3LPLs, fitting anything else would be a bad choice.

[Escef]

I would point out that the OP has not made any convincing argument to institute the changes he wants. The "this makes no sense to me" argument is not a relevant argument. The universe is not obligated to make sense to anyone, yet we live in it.

[Gentleman Reaper]

Escef, on 19 January 2016 - 01:52 PM, said:

I would point out that the OP has not made any convincing argument to institute the changes he wants. The "this makes no sense to me" argument is not a relevant argument. The universe is not obligated to make sense to anyone, yet we live in it.

Ironic how you say I'm not providing a convincing argument when you don't even provide your own >.>

[Xythius]

Elit3 Nick, on 19 January 2016 - 02:17 PM, said:

Ironic how you say I'm not providing a convincing argument when you don't even provide your own >.>

He doesn't have to - he's not asking for anything to be changed.

[Gentleman Reaper]

Chuck YeaGurr, on 19 January 2016 - 12:54 PM, said:

Because this is based on Battletech, they did not say a BT tabletop simulator.
Bt is very different from many games in that the Story Lore also comes with a game lore. With story lore folks are a "bit" more understanding that it is fiction or if historical that the battles may have to have a different model for a game. Right now I am only worried about how weapons of either tech or ranges are balanced amongst mechs in this game only.

The biggest balance issue is the chunk of change that BT (both TT and story) bring to this game versus all of the mechs technologies and book thumpin literalist rules that are hard to balance in a fps shooter with a medium sized player base.

I love history and sci-fi, but I have to learn to dump the back end when I play the games that may have been created from these (SWORTOR, WarThunder) and play the meta for that game while enjoying the pretty pictures and moderate translation I may get.

I do think it may be more valid of a statement if someone says , "this issue existed in TT and also exists in MWO and do you think it may be valid to address it the same way". I do give the OP kudos for partially doing this in the opening, but you are still assuming that the alpha number is too great. So is it really about long range alpha, which was a problem that occurred when PGI introduced the clan in game. As a non-lore person, this decision seemed more of a problem created by the lore driven request regardless of how it was translated.

From a mathematical problem solving perspective, it seems that the more variables that must be balanced across the equation the more issues that will arise.

So in short, enjoy the background, but learn to embrace/live with the current META in game. I do not think it will be eliminated in most games.

I agree with everything you're saying, I'm not one of those lore loyalists that throw a tantrum whenever something isn't lore accurate (I.E. clan dominance), I'm just explaining my observations that damage is something they can touch on to help balance the meta LLs (they didn't adjust the dmg of any other weapon other than them) This can be just one element of a rebalance, with either a range nerf like in the PTS and/or greater ghost heat penalties for alphas (which is the only thing IS LPL needs)

Prof RJ Gumby, on 19 January 2016 - 01:38 PM, said:

I may be biased by "quirks everywhere" approach, but IMHO LPLs are a bit too good. If you can fit 3LPLs, fitting anything else would be a bad choice.

Ghost heat changes are probably the only way to balance this, if they lower the damage here it might not make it attractive to mount a single one on a lighter mech.

[Gentleman Reaper]

Elit3 Nick, on 19 January 2016 - 02:17 PM, said:

Ironic how you say I'm not providing a convincing argument when you don't even provide your own >.>

Apologies if I got a bit hot headed here, I'm not saying their damage should be lowered to TT, but that because they did change it from TT it can be used as a balancing point, unlike most other weapons in the game, which PGI is reluctant to change since they're lore accurate.

[Escef]

Elit3 Nick, on 19 January 2016 - 02:17 PM, said:

Ironic how you say I'm not providing a convincing argument when you don't even provide your own >.>

That's because I'm not making an argument. I'm pointing out that the closest thing to an argument you have is "change this to make me happy". I mean, nothing personal, but why should we care if you are happy or not? There's thousands of people playing this game, and you think something should be changed to accommodate you?

Elit3 Nick, on 19 January 2016 - 02:37 PM, said:

Apologies if I got a bit hot headed here, I'm not saying their damage should be lowered to TT, but that because they did change it from TT it can be used as a balancing point, unlike most other weapons in the game, which PGI is reluctant to change since they're lore accurate.

Lot's of weapons have been changed from table top. Because after testing the conclusion was that the new values made for better game balance. The idea that we should revert to older values that were found to be unbalanced because it would please you is not a good argument.

Edited by Escef, 19 January 2016 - 02:39 PM.

[xXBagheeraXx]

Large lasers have NOT been meta for years...only recently has laserbarf been the thing.

[wanderer]

This one's easy.

Because Paul will constantly nerf and buff weapons as we complain, allowing him to neatly ignore that the end result is still "stack as many direct-fire weapons as you can point at one pixel and fire with reasonable safety".

When PPC/AC was the meta, people complained about laser inferiority. Thus the buff. Now it's lasers that get the best bang for coring people, so the meta is laservomit. When it gets changed, the meta will move to the next best converging instant combo-blast, and so on, and so forth.

The real problem isn't the weapons. It's being able to flick your crosshairs over a pixel and put every iota of damage into that precise spot regardless of range. Dynamic convergence is a lost cause, but they aren't even trying binary convergence or anything other than leaving convergence, much like collisions and jump jets....broken as intended.

[Mawai]

How about "because this is a first person real time aimed shooting video game and not a 10s turn based random target location damage assignment board game"?

It is fine to question the damage values given to every weapon in the game. They SHOULD be questioned and discussed.

However, the numbers we have today are the result of the basic game design by PGI and three years of game and playtest development to reach something that is in better balance that it was when it started.

Initally, PGI increased weapon refire rates over the board game and at different values for different weapons which immediately means that the table top balance is out the window assuming that it was ever really useful in a game where weapons are aimed and not decided on a random roll of the dice. The weapons also initially did the amount of damage from TT ... why? Maybe they thought it was a good place to start ... though it was quickly found that it required doubling of the armor values. Since then, all the values have evolved towards some sort of improved balance based on PGIs current approach of small infrequent changes whenever possible.

So ... suggesting that the laser damage values be set to table top values is unfortunately ludicrous since it takes us back 3 years in terms of balance progress. If they wanted to do something like this then they would need to rescale the damage output from every weapon in the game ... which might not be a bad idea ... but leave the TT numbers out of it since they really are so far out of context for MWO that they mean nothing.

[Metaccini Alfredo]

Do you have any specific, concrete examples of Large lasers being an issue? I'm pretty new, but so far they haven't seemed to be a big issue if you know how to move your mouse back and forth to spread damage. Someone in teamspeak called it "rolling" the damage.

Edited by Metaccini Alfredo, 19 January 2016 - 04:26 PM.

[Y E O N N E]

xXBagheeraXx, on 19 January 2016 - 02:45 PM, said:

Large lasers have NOT been meta for years...only recently has laserbarf been the thing.

If by "recently" you mean most of 2015 and continuing on to today...

[Gentleman Reaper]

Metaccini Alfredo, on 19 January 2016 - 04:26 PM, said:

Do you have any specific, concrete examples of Large lasers being an issue? I'm pretty new, but so far they haven't seemed to be a big issue if you know how to move your mouse back and forth to spread damage. Someone in teamspeak called it "rolling" the damage.

The issue mostly stems from how grouped lasers allow for pinpoint alphas on a single point without incurring a significant heat penalty. Some builds, like 4 or 5 LL stalkers, 3 LPL Blackjack and Quickdraws give you high dmg alphas that they can fire at least twice before heat becomes an issue. Since they're hitscan weapons, and can reach quite a distance (especially so for clan LLs) there's little reason to use anything else, since ACs have limited velocity, and SRMs have spread damage and limited range.

wanderer, on 19 January 2016 - 04:02 PM, said:

This one's easy.

Because Paul will constantly nerf and buff weapons as we complain, allowing him to neatly ignore that the end result is still "stack as many direct-fire weapons as you can point at one pixel and fire with reasonable safety".

When PPC/AC was the meta, people complained about laser inferiority. Thus the buff. Now it's lasers that get the best bang for coring people, so the meta is laservomit. When it gets changed, the meta will move to the next best converging instant combo-blast, and so on, and so forth.

The real problem isn't the weapons. It's being able to flick your crosshairs over a pixel and put every iota of damage into that precise spot regardless of range. Dynamic convergence is a lost cause, but they aren't even trying binary convergence or anything other than leaving convergence, much like collisions and jump jets....broken as intended.

The thing about metas is that they become less and less powerful with every balance pass:

Jump jets: Nerfed their thrust and added screen shake so that heavier mechs can no longer pop-tart

Gauss/PPC: Gauss had the charge mechanic added and PPCs had their velocity drastically reduced (I think it's a bit too slow now)

AC5/PPC: Velocities changed so that they won't hit the same place

UAC5: Had the jam rate significantly increased

Yes it's true that the meta always shifts, but aside from the AC5/PPC every overpowered combo has existed since the beginning, they only get knocked down once it becomes popular after the previous meta is destroyed, after a while the meta becomes little more than a slight advantage. Feedback is essential to helping the devs balance the game, and I still see plenty of people that think that the game is balanced from the start and that the devs are pandering to the people calling for nerfs.

Edited by Elit3 Nick, 19 January 2016 - 07:59 PM.