1094 replies to this topic

[DoctorDetroit]

This is seriously like 5 guys that are for this idea and they and they clearly do not care that the vast majority of players would be against it. The only reason a few of us need to keep posting is because PGI isn't always discerning enough about bad ideas. cough* (game mode voting).

[Champion of Khorne Lord of Blood]

tortuousGoddess, on 09 February 2016 - 05:36 AM, said:

Not even close, ghost heat is far easier to understand and adapt to than invisible RNGs and complex heat effects. You even get a nice warning when your build is putting you at risk to trigger it, that defines the rules of the effect clearly. Random factors that depend on other factors which could also depend on other factors themselves? No where even close to being that easy to comprehend. Alienating the casual playerbase isn't going to do anything except cause the game serious financial damage.

I really don't see how the opponents to you keep saying you are delusional, you seem to be the one making the most sense in this arguement. I haven't had to make any posts for myself other than my first because you have it covered.

Its already hard enough for new players to understand ghost heat, or even just range, and those are both things told to you directly. Adding in heat effects as described here would just lead to a bunch of players asking "why aren't my shots going where I aim" as they overheat trying to fire their shots. I feel bad enough for them with ghost heat, we really really don't need any more "mechanics" like these.

[Brandarr Gunnarson]

Lockon StratosII, on 09 February 2016 - 05:18 AM, said:

Every new reticle point means that there will be a weapon attached to it and that server will need to calculate new flight path for said weapon(s), increasing the server load which is a commodity as it is right now

This exactly what happens no matter how many points you have; 1, 2, 5, every weapon is still attached to a point and must calculate that anyway.

[Livewyr]

I'm just going to answer in the quote to make it a bit easier to pick at.

tortuousGoddess, on 08 February 2016 - 09:48 PM, said:

People only thought 3PV was going to be the doom of the game before PGI released all the details. [They still thought it was doom. The Threadnaught lasted far longer...] Once people saw that it put you at more of a disadvantage than anything, [Which was tested thoroughly once the feature was released and also found a bug with a spider providing intel while being invulnerable] and PGI explained how it was important to helping new players understand the separation of legs and torso(something us MechWarrior fans tend to take for granted), the only people left shouting doom were the typical forum doomsayers. [What exactly is happening right here?]

Many competitive gamers, including myself and many others here, dislike the games you listed for exactly this reason, among others. [Can you point to examples of FPS games with perfect accuracy?] It's not fun dealing with an RNG when you should be using skill, [There is more to skill than "Candy Crush" clicking.] especially in a game where location damage is so critical. [Which is a double edged sword, since locations can either spread damage, or result in death with little effort.] Contrary to what some of the slander people in here are slinging says, competitive players compete for personal enjoyment, and tend to care above all else for the health, balance, and competitive integrity of the games they play, as they are key to how they enjoy playing the game. [Then why are the comp players cool with so many mechs being entirely useless? Insufficient energy hardpoints, bad weapon locations- bad weapon locations is a problem extending from the perfect accuracy we have. Being able to "hull down" and use shoulder mounted weapons is much more important when exposing to someone who can destroy your mech with a single, perfectly clicked synchronized alpha strike...from 500 meters. Every mech has to max out armor over vital locations because a reduction in any armor means you die.]

Making these elements dependent on player action only causes additional problems. [I think you meant: "requires additional skills.] If you think the number of hiding puggies is bad now, how do you think they'll respond when they learn that moving randomizes their aim, and stopping can take 2 full seconds or so? [I think they'll learn that there is more to positioning than just ensuring to click first.] How are competitive teams going to respond when they learn that pushing gives their whole team an accuracy debuff against dug in enemies who get to keep their pinpoint? [They are going to learn to flank, they are going to learn to use cover. Like literally every other game of in the genre. They might even learn to use missiles for suppression...] How are you going to keep light mechs from going under 5% of the queue in that environment? [They benefit the most, they stop the quickest, start the quickest, and they can get behind cover before the Jumpjetting Timberwolf full speed Stalker can turn and remove most of the armor from their legs. They trade the silly lag-fest brawling furball for tactical use.] How are you going to counteract the horrible pinpoint camping meta that results, [Like the one we have now?] where shoulder mounted long range pinpoint is the only thing that makes sense, [Like the one we have now?] while short range and small arms are completely useless? [Similar to light mechs, short range benefits heavily. Not being shot on sight by someone 800 meters away while they are maneuvering or positioning allows the shorter ranged mech to position easier, and once short range weapons are that close, they would have to have overheated themselves and running at 100kph to have their aim thrown off that badly.]

Every way I look at this, it only makes the problems it's trying to fix worse, while dampening the skill cap for no reason. [It changes the type of skill, not reducing the skill cap. As a matter of fact, one could argue that it increases the skill cap because we will no longer be playing Mecha-HALO Candy Crush. Forethought will be more required, rather than just a quick and accurate mouse hand.] It's a dangerous acceptance of mechanics from other shooters based on the fact that they were monetarily successful, without bothering to consider just how different it functions in an environment where you're a foot soldier who can stop and turn on a dime, as opposed to a lumbering war machine. [Again, point to me the competitive FPS game with perfect accuracy. Or hell, any game where accuracy is a factor, that is competitive with perfect accuracy.] I've probably read a hundred different ideas on it by now, and all I can conclude is that MWO is not a game that plays nice with CoF, period. [And I'm fairly certain you are incorrect.]

What we have now is Candy Crush, with positioning considerations. That is it.

You pick the Heavy/assault mech with the most energy hardpoints (or that can carry a couple of gauss) and you set yourself up to click on the enemy mech first. That is it.

Bringing a Shadowcat, or any non-quirked medium is crippling yourself compared to what you could do with the meta heavy or assault. I don't see how anyone can think it's fun to hop into their favorite mech, peek over a hill and lose a torso, or all of the armor on the CT in a single shot from someone 600 meters away, while they are falling from a jump at 80% heat...

It's so dumb, it's unreal. PGI's own game mechanics are why they can never balance the game even remotely. They just change WHICH mechs fit the pinpoint alpha meta.

Edited by Livewyr, 09 February 2016 - 06:09 AM.

[Champion of Khorne Lord of Blood]

Brandarr Gunnarson, on 09 February 2016 - 05:58 AM, said:

This exactly what happens no matter how many points you have; 1, 2, 5, every weapon is still attached to a point and must calculate that anyway.

Its harder to calculate 5 points than it is to calculate 2. Leading a target with 2 guns is hard enough, leading a target with 5 guns is reserved for targeting computers.

[Wolfways]

tortuousGoddess, on 09 February 2016 - 05:50 AM, said:

Just so you know, chilling in the back refusing to help your team make trades isn't "better piloting". Piloting skill is also not a trump card that negates the need for aim, like you seem to think.

I'm never "in the back". I'm either at the front or flanking (occasionally I'll be just behind the front line if using LRM's).
I also never said piloting negates the need to aim. I said that good piloting negates getting shot at.
But hey, if you think letting the enemy shoot you is a good thing...

Quote

Keep practicing, you'll get a grasp of what you should be doing soon enough.

lol didn't take long to resort to petty insults.

[DoctorDetroit]

Livewyr, on 09 February 2016 - 06:06 AM, said:

I'm just going to answer in the quote to make it a bit easier to pick at.



What we have now is Candy Crush, with positioning considerations. That is it.

You pick the Heavy/assault mech with the most energy hardpoints (or that can carry a couple of gauss) and you set yourself up to click on the enemy mech first. That is it.

Bringing a Shadowcat, or any non-quirked medium is crippling yourself compared to what you could do with the meta heavy or assault. I don't see how anyone can think it's fun to hop into their favorite mech, peek over a hill and lose a torso, or all of the armor on the CT in a single shot from someone 600 meters away, while they are falling from a jump at 80% heat...

It's so dumb, it's unreal. PGI's own game mechanics are why they can never balance the game even remotely. They just change WHICH mechs fit the pinpoint alpha meta.

This doesn't happen to me and I pilot all sorts of light and medium mechs. Granted the shadow cat needs some love in the buff department, but it is definitely not as easy to take down as you describe.

You are exaggerating to the level of a bold face lie. Is your argument so weak, that you cannot conjure up any real supporting points?

Wolfways, on 09 February 2016 - 06:09 AM, said:

I'm never "in the back". I'm either at the front or flanking (occasionally I'll be just behind the front line if using LRM's).
I also never said piloting negates the need to aim. I said that good piloting negates getting shot at.
But hey, if you think letting the enemy shoot you is a good thing...

lol didn't take long to resort to petty insults.

You are over simplifying game play. Against a competent team, the best tactic is to control where your team takes damage. This does not just mean spreading damage on your own mech, which is a very important part of pilot skill, but also across your team, so that you can keep more mechs firing. If you take no damage at all, then all that damage is being focused on your teammates.
This is a difficult concept for many players. But the moral of the story is that good piloting does not mean not getting shot, but controlling when and where you take hits, so that the exchange favors your team.

Edited by DoctorDetroit, 09 February 2016 - 06:23 AM.

[Dino Might]

tortuousGoddess, on 09 February 2016 - 05:41 AM, said:

It is not. It is an ELIMINATION of those factors in favor of a full randomizer, which is the key difference that makes it unacceptable. CoF still fails to model real target shooting by your own definition, as it does not attempt to make any calculations outside of RNG.

I don't even know what you mean by "full randomizer," and I suspect you don't either. You are obviously not understanding the concept.

As a real world target shooter, I can tell you that your assumptions are dead wrong. Despite your lack of experience and knowledge, you continue to claim that I am wrong. CoF is not one random die roll with an arbitrary (large in your assumption) standard deviation. There is not one version of CoF.

The idea proposed is a fixed CoF for each weapon with modifiers that are deterministic based on mech movement and heat. This is by far a much better model of what shooting is than either your misconception of CoF or perfect accuracy and precision at all times.

As an aside, go study statistics for more than 5 seconds on wikipedia, and maybe you'll stop misrepresenting what is being said. Also, it would help if you took a gander at probabilistic modeling and simulation techniques to understand why this sort of application works not just here but in many other places where we are attempting to predict natural, deterministic phenomena.

Edited by Dino Might, 09 February 2016 - 06:19 AM.

[Brandarr Gunnarson]

Dakota1000, on 09 February 2016 - 06:07 AM, said:

Its harder to calculate 5 points than it is to calculate 2. Leading a target with 2 guns is hard enough, leading a target with 5 guns is reserved for targeting computers.

As far as the pixels and the game/server is concerned, 1 or 5 points are all the same. It has to calculate based on each weapon hitting a particular set of coordinates no mater what.

Also, leading with 5 points is why no one can complain it doesn't need skill! So the "skillz" pinpoint crowd should be satisfied; unless they actually don't have skillz...

It breaks up the super-alpha, so the "pinpoint alpha isn't BT" crowd should be satisfied because there could never be a single point alpha, ever. Even if you alpha, you'd hit according to multiple locations, so that's all good.

TTK should go up, considerably without sacrificing pinpoint accuracy and skilled shooting!

Additionally, still funny how many people are arguing over CoF and ignoring the multi-point reticle suggestion!!!

[Lockon StratosII]

Brandarr Gunnarson, on 09 February 2016 - 05:58 AM, said:

This exactly what happens no matter how many points you have; 1, 2, 5, every weapon is still attached to a point and must calculate that anyway.

yes it does, but they all have only one variable (ie coordinates for point of impact, maybe more depending how they implemented targeting). If you add new reticle you will have to track coordinates for those those separately, then you will have to add markers for which weapons correspond to which reticle (we currently have 48 of those in each game, adding one just one more brings that number to 72, and 5 total, which some ideas propose will give you 120). Not to mention adding a code that will close them together when mech is more stable (ie standing) which further increases server load etc. It's a simple idea on first glance, but it has a lot of stuff that you have to add in the back to make it work and while number of calculations stays the same, number of variables that you have to track grows

[Champion of Khorne Lord of Blood]

Brandarr Gunnarson, on 09 February 2016 - 06:21 AM, said:

As far as the pixels and the game/server is concerned, 1 or 5 points are all the same. It has to calculate based on each weapon hitting a particular set of coordinates no mater what.

Also, leading with 5 points is why no one can complain it doesn't need skill! So the "skillz" pinpoint crowd should be satisfied; unless they actually don't have skillz...

It breaks up the super-alpha, so the "pinpoint alpha isn't BT" crowd should be satisfied because there could never be a single point alpha, ever. Even if you alpha, you'd hit according to multiple locations, so that's all good.

TTK should go up, considerably without sacrificing pinpoint accuracy and skilled shooting!

Additionally, still funny how many people are arguing over CoF and ignoring the multi-point reticle suggestion!!!

I meant it would be harder for people's brains to calculate. The issue with a suggestion such as having 5 crosshairs is that it is added complexity which does nothing more than put off many players, especially newer ones that aren't familiar with battletech.

Besides, its a mechwarrior game, and all of them so far have had pinpoint convergence, I don't understand why people instead go with saying its a battletech game and should be different when all other cases have been pinpoint.

[Dino Might]

Firing range designers use CoF models to determine what range safety characteristics they need. They take real world shooting and model it with CoF:

The dimensions and shape of the danger area(s) are produced using test data. Danger area design is dependent on a number of factors including the external ballistic characteristics of the ammunition; bullet design; range construction (site and design); the planned shooting activities (shooting discipline) and the cone of fire for that shooting activity. It is also dependent on the management of these activities (Range Standing Orders and range supervision). The development of a cone of fire (as opposed to acceptance of an existing cone of fire that may be considerably larger than necessary) provides much greater flexibility to the design, construction and use of ranges. Cone of Fire (taken from: Ordnance Board Proceeding P125(1) - Small Arms Range Safety Hazard Levels and Principles for Determining Small Arms Weapon and Range Danger Areas - Pillar Proceeding, dated 7 Jul 98) The cone of fire is intended to contain, in the vertical and horizontal planes, fired projectiles that are to be allowed for in range design. It includes an allowance for acceptable firearm deviation, which is represented by 5 Standard Deviations and an additional margin for firearm deviation that is considered unacceptable. The allowance made within the cone of fire for unacceptable firearm deviation is not a scientific prediction but reflects a desire by the user to mitigate as much of the unacceptable deviation as is practicable.

source: https://www.police.g...ange-manual.pdf


Some other resources to get an introduction to some of the ideas:

https://en.wikibooks...ki/Marksmanship


Heck - it's in the dang army field manual:
[color=#000000]
"When several rounds are fired in a burst from any machine gun, each round takes a slightly different trajectory. The pattern these rounds form on the way to the target is called a cone of fire (Figure 5-2). This pattern is caused primarily by vibration of the machine gun and variations in ammunition and atmospheric conditions."[/color]

http://www.globalsec...3-22-68/c05.htm

^ yes, the variance is due to deterministic effects, but to model it, we use a normally distributed random variable to create our CoF.

Edited by Dino Might, 09 February 2016 - 06:29 AM.

[Hotthedd]

tortuousGoddess, on 08 February 2016 - 07:49 PM, said:

Yes, the competitive players will still stomp you(until they quit from the boredom of CoF), but you're wrong. If the CoF radomization goes in favor of one player hitting what they want more than the other, the field has been skewed and the other player has been disadvantaged regardless of skill level. That's what CoF systems often do in effect, and why they are awful.

You haven't yet gotten bored of coring 'mechs with a single mouse click, then ducking back into cover to cool off, rinse and repeat? To me that is stale and extremely boring gameplay.
A player-managed dynamic Cone of Fire, ADDS to the skill level. If you are such a leet pilot, you should welcome the challenge. The more skilled pilot will still win.

[Hit the Deck]

Brandarr Gunnarson, on 09 February 2016 - 06:21 AM, said:

...
Additionally, still funny how many people are arguing over CoF and ignoring the multi-point reticle suggestion!!!

I didn't and my reply is on the last page:

Hit the Deck, on 09 February 2016 - 05:35 AM, said:

Mister Blastman is also a proponent of this idea but your proposal still lacks an important detail - that the crosshairs offset from the center have to be constantly adjusted/redrawn according to the range you are aiming at. If you think that this could look bad in game when your point of aim change quickly from place to place (this is not World of Warships where you could hold a point of aim at certain range for a long time), consider how much mental calculation you have to do when you want to lead a shot at a moving Mech!

Edited by Hit the Deck, 09 February 2016 - 06:33 AM.

[Brandarr Gunnarson]

Dakota1000, on 09 February 2016 - 06:26 AM, said:

I meant it would be harder for people's brains to calculate. The issue with a suggestion such as having 5 crosshairs is that it is added complexity which does nothing more than put off many players, especially newer ones that aren't familiar with battletech.

Besides, its a mechwarrior game, and all of them so far have had pinpoint convergence, I don't understand why people instead go with saying its a battletech game and should be different when all other cases have been pinpoint.

This is actually quite true and reasonable.

I, personally, am quite ok with the reticle system we have.

I just suggested this as an alternative to the twin ridiculousness of CoF and dynamic convergence.

[Ratpoison]

Dino Might, on 09 February 2016 - 06:18 AM, said:

I don't even know what you mean by "full randomizer," and I suspect you don't either. You are obviously not understanding the concept.

As a real world target shooter, I can tell you that your assumptions are dead wrong. Despite your lack of experience and knowledge, you continue to claim that I am wrong. CoF is not one random die roll with an arbitrary (large in your assumption) standard deviation. There is not one version of CoF.

The idea proposed is a fixed CoF for each weapon with modifiers that are deterministic based on mech movement and heat. This is by far a much better model of what shooting is than either your misconception of CoF or perfect accuracy and precision at all times.

As an aside, go study statistics for more than 5 seconds on wikipedia, and maybe you'll stop misrepresenting what is being said. Also, it would help if you took a gander at probabilistic modeling and simulation techniques to understand why this sort of application works not just here but in many other places where we are attempting to predict natural, deterministic phenomena.

I don't have any misconception about this. The proposal still ends with an RNG at the end of movement and heat effects, both of which are idiotic for their own reasons aside from the RNG itself, and the rest of it is all still left up to random. That's what I meant when I used the words "full randomizer", is that it's a randomization within the CoF that is not based on any in game data other than the two defined factors that determine its size. It's not like any of the environmental or damage effects will alter it, so real world CoF simulation is irrelevant to this discussion.

You need to stop with the real world comparisons that don't connect. Making a good game comes before heedlessly adding "realism".

[Brandarr Gunnarson]

Hit the Deck, on 09 February 2016 - 05:35 AM, said:

Mister Blastman is also a proponent of this idea but your proposal still lacks an important detail - that the crosshairs offset from the center have to be constantly adjusted/redrawn according to the range you are aiming at. If you think that this could look bad in game when your point of aim change quickly from place to place (this is not World of Warships where you could hold a point of aim at certain range for a long time), consider how much mental calculation you have to do when you want to lead a shot at a moving Mech!

I had imagined my suggestion to be almost exactly as we have in-game now (arms move independently and torso catches up), so I'm not sure why it would make much difference, other than making it hard to aim for players.

[TexAce]

DoctorDetroit, on 09 February 2016 - 05:52 AM, said:

This is seriously like 5 guys that are for this idea and they and they clearly do not care that the vast majority of players would be against it. The only reason a few of us need to keep posting is because PGI isn't always discerning enough about bad ideas. cough* (game mode voting).

Please count the likes on my OP. Thanks.

[Hotthedd]

As long as single weapon chain fire gives perfect precision, even while moving, none of the leet comp players should have a problem with this proposal, right?

Unless of course they use the lolpha as a crutch.

[wanderer]

tortuousGoddess, on 08 February 2016 - 05:39 PM, said:

Nice strawman but gameplay balance is obviously a different issue entirely. CoF is a lowering of the skill cap, where the randomness of your shots determines who wins a duel rather than piloting and aiming skill. I'm speaking for a significant number of players when I say that I'll uninstall the moment any CoF is added to the game.

If I had a dime for every time I heard this since closed beta, I could buy PGI.

The majority of the weapons in the game already spread damage. The majority of the weapons on the game will be laughed at when put on a meta-complimentary chassis. You call it a balance issue, I call it a fundamental flaw in the way damage is allocated by weapons fire. The capacity to deliver maximum damage to one spot, untrammeled by range or anything else is a flaw in the way we shoot things in MWO.

You either move the other weapon systems up to the point where their spread doesn't matter (in other words, they kill nearly as efficiently as point-targetable weapons- waiting for the screams of another lurmageddon?) or the mechanic of direct-fire weapons breaks the game except for a narrow band of weapons, quirks, and chassis choices.

Or, y'know, you could have that CoF. Which is it? Overstatting spread weapons so they're effective, or spreading out lasers,AC's, etc? I'd like to see my missile hardpoints used for something besides SRM 4/SRM 6's on Metamechs.