44 replies to this topic

[Alistair Winter]

Disclaimer: The premise for this thread is that lights are the least popular class in MWO, and there's also a huuuge power gap between the best and the worst light mechs. As a result, everyone is playing ACHs, Firestarters and Jenners, and very few people are playing Commandos, Kit Foxes and Wolfhounds. I'm not trying to make the best light mechs better, I'm just trying to even the playing field.

After weeks of mostly playing Ravens as my primary light mechs, I've gone back to my LCT-1E just for the sake of farming. And since I haven't played my ACH in forever, or any SPL light mech, for that matter, I was blown away by how much better the LCT-1E is than any of my Ravens. It was like switching to the Timber Wolf after playing Mad Dog for months.

The reason isn't very complicated, of course. It's just a matter of hardpoints and speed. So my simple fix should come as no surprise.

• Inflate the number of hardpoints for inferior light mechs
  
• Increase engine cap for inferior light mechs, if possible

Locust

Spoiler

LCT-1E: Perfect. 6E
LCT-1V: 4B 1E upgrade to 6B 1E
LCT-1M: 2E 2M upgrade to 2E 4M
LCT-3M: Perfect. 5E 2AMS. With some AMS range and ammo quirks, this would be an ok mech.
LCT-3S: 1E 4M upgrade to 1E 6M. May need ammo quirks too.
LCT-PB: Meh, I dunno about this one. Maybe upgrade 2B 4E to 2B 5E. It's not exactly a top tier mech right now.

Commando

Spoiler

Death's Smell: 4E upgrade to 6E
COM-1B: 3E 1M upgrade to 4E 2M
COM-1D: 2M 2E upgrade to 4E 2M (I've no idea how to fix this one, really)
COM-2D 1E 3M upgrade to 3E 3M
COM-3A: 2E 2M upgrade to 2E 4M

Spider

Spoiler

SDR-5D: 3E upgrade to 4E
SDR-5K: 1E 4B upgrade to 2E 4B, or even 2E 6B
SDR-5V: Not even Jesus can save this one. Increase jump jet cap to 28 and let it fly home to Jesus.
Anansi: 2B 2E 1M upgrade to 4B 2E 2M

Urbanmech... you could always inflate hardpoints, but I think quirks should make this a viable ballistic platform rather than a 360 laservomit squirrel.

Firestarter

Spoiler

Ember: Increase engine cap to 315
FS9-A: Perfect
FS9-H: Increase engine cap to 315
FS9-K: Perfect
FS9-S: Perfect

Jenner

Spoiler

Oxide: Perfect (maybe fix quirks tho)
JR7-F: Increase engine cap to 315? Not sure.
JR7-D: Increase engine cap to 315
JR7-K: Upgrade 4E 1M to 6E 1M. (Leave engine cap at 300)

Panther
I don't think this mech needs both a low engine cap and low hardpoint numbers. Remove at least one, and I don't much care which. Give it more hardpoints or bigger engine cap. More jump jets would be nice too.

Raven

Spoiler

Huginn: Upgrade 2M 4B to 2M 6B. Give us a reason to put MGs on this thing.
RVN-2X: Upgrade 4E 1M to 4E 2M
RVN-3L: Upgrade 3E 2M to 4E 2M or 3E 3M
RVN-4X: Upgrade 2E 1M 2B to 2E 2M 3B

Wolfhound (aka Firestarter with no jump jets and lower hardpoint number)

Spoiler

WLF-1: Upgrade 5E to 7E
WLF-1A: Upgrade 6E to 8E
WLF-1B: Upgrade 5E to 6E, increase engine cap to 315
WLF-2: Increase engine cap to 320 or 325.

Clan omnimechs are a different story, because PGI would never add hardpoints to existing variants. They just need to add new PGI-variants with needed hardpoints. E.g. Mist Lynx P-variant with energy hardpoints in the torso. MLX-P.

FAQ:
Q: Won't this just lead to less variation and more SPL / ML / SRM boating?
A: Yes and no. You will see more light mechs boating SPL / ML / SRM, but you will also see different kind of mechs, instead of 80% Firestarters, Jenner IICs and Arctic Cheetos. How often do you see a Commando on the battlefield, really? Would it be so bad to see one boating lasers and/or missiles?

Q: Can't you just accept that some light mechs should be worse than others?
A: No.

Q: What about quirks? They should give Panthers better quirks for PPCs and LLs, for example.
A: I like quirks for special cases, such as Panthers, Urbanmechs or CERPPC Adders. But the mechs with most hardpoints are consistently the most popular ones, except for CW LL sniping. And PGI has learned that quirk balancing can be tricky.

[John1352]

I agree with buffing the 20-25 ones with hardpoint inflation. The 35 tonners really don't need more hardpoints though. Less energy points means you use LLs and take advantage of the range quirks.

I totally disagree that the locust 1E is better than the ravens though, unless you insist on red lasers on everything. Locust gets annihilated if the enemies aim for CT, however the legs are the toughest part of the whole mech.

[Y E O N N E]

Alistair Winter, on 16 February 2016 - 07:55 AM, said:

Locust

LCT-1E: Perfect. 6E
LCT-1V: 4B 1E upgrade to 6B 1E
LCT-1M: 2E 2M upgrade to 2E 4M
LCT-3M: Perfect. 5E 2AMS. With some AMS range and ammo quirks, this would be an ok mech.
LCT-3S: 1E 4M upgrade to 1E 6M. May need ammo quirks too.
LCT-PB: Meh, I dunno about this one. Maybe upgrade 2B 4E to 2B 5E. It's not exactly a top tier mech right now.[/spoiler]

LCT-1E: Only perfect as long as it has some range and heat-gen quirks. Becomes garbage at full heat, even with SPL. The 3M was better at SPL before quirks became a thing due to heat; that extra E hardpoint was virtually useless. And it needs the duration because...it's a Locust. It can't face-stare very well even for 0.9s.

LCT-1V: Yes. All of this. We've got Jenners running around with quad or hex-SRM4. Six MG on a squishy Light is nothing.

LCT-1M: What's your plan, here? XL180+4xSRM2+2xSL? What do you do for ammo? 200 rounds? Not enough for a quad of 2s. Will need an ammo quirk. I actually greatly enjoy the variant exactly as it is, though. With the imminent loss of range, I would say it needs a stronger energy heat-gen buff and a light cool-down increase to compensate. Possibly faster, longer-reaching missiles.

LCT-3M: Not quite perfect. To run the twin AMS you gimp your weapons. Badly. If it had some non-trivial SL-specific quirks for cool-down and/or duration, then it could have a role as a fast AMS-support 'Mech that isn't excessively under-gunned. I actually enjoy playing it like this quite a bit, I just loathe my individual match performance trends while doing so.

LCT-3S: 6xSRM2? Ludicrous. That would require an ridiculously huge ammo quirk to overcome, and you might instead find people bringing a quad of SRM2s and a Medium Pulse which renders those extra two launchers extraneous. Even if they did use them, they would be really hot because only 7 TruDubs. A better solution would be a modest ammo quirk (though, if SRM ammo were increased to 120-per-ton we'd be okay, too), slightly faster energy cool-down, and some extra durability in the arms (which get blown away with alarming regularity on this variant). Also, a geometry change so 4xSRM2 look like 2xSRM4 currently do and so we don't have all that wasted space per pod. Plus it would look cooler.

LCT-PB: Also unsure what to do with this one. I really despise its hard-point placement, but apart from ECM that's also what makes it unique. It's the best variant to run quad MedPulse on, since the arms are unnecessary and are a good place to strip out armor to make the required max of 89. I know, bad build, but also a very fun build. How about 4B+3E? Two MGs in each arm, a Small Las in each arm and a MedLas in the CT with an XL180 and ECM? SmallLas-enhancing quirks? I actually rather like the look of that...

LCT-3V: You left this one out. Upgrade to 4B+2E, give it a 10% energy cool-down buff, and call it a day.

Edit: said quad of SRM4s for LCT-3S, meant SRM2.

Edited by Yeonne Greene, 16 February 2016 - 09:24 AM.

[Quicksilver Aberration]

There are only 3 IS lights that really suffer from low number of hardpoints, and that is the Commando, Spider, and Raven (with a special exception for the ballistic Locusts). The Wolfhounds could use an increase to numbers by 1 maybe so all of them can run 6 MPLs, but that isn't a big issue.

Increasing the engine cap on a bunch of these mechs won't really do much either since most of them are starting to go a bit slower for better JJs/firepower/heat efficiency. Something to keep in mind, both the Cheetah and Oxide run the same speed (8/12) and are considered the best lights.

Edited by Quicksilver Kalasa, 16 February 2016 - 08:55 AM.

[man du]

Locusts are my favorite 'Mechs and they were the first chassis I mastered. I would love it if they could go faster. Maybe if they added a couple more energy hard points to the PB, I could run it with 6 smpl, like my 1E. And I know it would probably break the game, the internet and start WWIII if machine guns were a little more accurate, but I think that would make playing my 1V more pleasant.

I bought 4 Commandos on a dare to try to play them well and it is certainly very challenging. Lucky for me, I reside in the Underhive, so hitting softballs down here for leveling purposes is definitely nice, but aside from tying a big bag of Cbills to my rear and try to get OpFor to come after me, I'm having a difficult time being successful in higher tiered group queues. Guess I probably ought to get gud-der.

As far as Urbies go, what a wonderful chassis! I have all 3 of mine mastered and never once was thinking,"Oh man, what a drag!"

I am all for PGI making a minuscule buff pass on some of the lightest of Lights, not to make them OP but to increase the number of viable Light chassis to encourage diversity in this shallow game depth, lobby shooter.

[BFHKitteh]

If PGI simply made MGs useful, you'd fine about a dozen and a half light mech variants coincidentally also become useful over night.

[Oderint dum Metuant]

Whenever I see a Wolfhound I think that looks to tall, it's lack of JJs is what will hamper it, but I also think it should be given ECM to fulfill a striker role, so let being a laser boat having neither ECM or JJ is going to keep it down

[Darian DelFord]

Alistair Winter, on 16 February 2016 - 07:55 AM, said:

Disclaimer: The premise for this thread is that lights are the least popular class in MWO, and there's also a huuuge power gap between the best and the worst light mechs. As a result, everyone is playing ACHs, Firestarters and Jenners, and very few people are playing Commandos, Kit Foxes and Wolfhounds. I'm not trying to make the best light mechs better, I'm just trying to even the playing field.

After weeks of mostly playing Ravens as my primary light mechs, I've gone back to my LCT-1E just for the sake of farming. And since I haven't played my ACH in forever, or any SPL light mech, for that matter, I was blown away by how much better the LCT-1E is than any of my Ravens. It was like switching to the Timber Wolf after playing Mad Dog for months.

The reason isn't very complicated, of course. It's just a matter of hardpoints and speed. So my simple fix should come as no surprise.

• Inflate the number of hardpoints for inferior light mechs
  
• Increase engine cap for inferior light mechs, if possible

Jenner
Oxide: Perfect (maybe fix quirks tho)
JR7-F: Increase engine cap to 315? Not sure.
JR7-D: Increase engine cap to 315
JR7-K: Upgrade 4E 1M to 6E 1M. (Leave engine cap at 300)[/spoiler]

Strictly from the Jenner PoV

We will see where the Oxide lands today, yes it is the king of the Jenners, but its NOT P2W or OP.

The Jenners engine cap is fine, being able to increase the cap will not do anything for their survive ability. It simply will not.

All the Jenner D F and K need, are the structure quirks and they will be fine and competitive. They are arguably the easiest mech to kill in the game due to their hit boxes. The K might need more love than the other two. But that is all the changes they really need.

[AmazingOnionMan]

What exactly does this "fix" accomplish? The Jenner, the Panther and the Wolfhound (to take three examples) are 3 different mechs, with different capabilities, and with different roles - what is gained by removing what little diversity the game has? And, saying this as a primarily light/medium pilot, by making light mechs even more dangerous adversaries than what they already are?
Let's say PGI gets drunk enough to do this - we'll have 4 different light mechs in the game, with each one being slightly more potent than the last one due to more available tonnage. And a bunch of heavier practice targets.

[Felicitatem Parco]

I have been asking why the Commando has 4 hardpoints and no jumpjets for years. It has to compete with Light Mechs that have up to 8 weapons + JJs.

Alistair, you are too ambitious... Your solution is too correct, therefore I would not suggest holding your breath.

Edited by Prosperity Park, 16 February 2016 - 09:39 AM.

[TELEFORCE]

I can't see why PGI couldn't inflate hardpoints for some omnipods. Sure, there's no precedent, but that doesn't mean it shouldn't be considered.

[Quicksilver Aberration]

I wouldn't mind seeing the Firestarter getting more energy hardpoints so it can actually boat enough Small Lasers to be useful.

[FupDup]

Quicksilver Kalasa, on 16 February 2016 - 09:38 AM, said:

I wouldn't mind seeing the Firestarter getting more energy hardpoints so it can actually boat enough Small Lasers to be useful.

I wouldn't mind seeing Small Lasers being buffed so that you don't need 12 of them to be useful.

Edited by FupDup, 16 February 2016 - 09:39 AM.

[Y E O N N E]

Quicksilver Kalasa, on 16 February 2016 - 09:38 AM, said:

I wouldn't mind seeing the Firestarter getting more energy hardpoints so it can actually boat enough Small Lasers to be useful.

Lol, 5-6 tons in Small Lasers on an FS9-A with 10 or 12 hard-points could be vicious.

[Quicksilver Aberration]

FupDup, on 16 February 2016 - 09:39 AM, said:

I wouldn't mind seeing Small Lasers being buffed so that you don't need 12 of them to be useful.

Well that would be nice, but in general it takes more standard lasers to compete with their pulse counterparts, for obvious reasons so it could stand for both .

Yeonne Greene, on 16 February 2016 - 09:43 AM, said:

Lol, 5-6 tons in Small Lasers on an FS9-A with 10 or 12 hard-points could be vicious.

It would certainly be nice to see Small Lasers be effective again.

Edited by Quicksilver Kalasa, 16 February 2016 - 09:45 AM.

[Cyborne Elemental]

I always thought that the simple fix for the Spider-5V would be to simply move the hardpoints to the torso's if inflation was out of the question.

RT -1E
LT -1E
Then at least it could do 2LL, or a PPC and medlas or w/e.

[Felicitatem Parco]

Mister D, on 16 February 2016 - 09:44 AM, said:

I always thought that the simple fix for the Spider-5V would be to simply move the hardpoints to the torso's if inflation was out of the question.

RT -1E
LT -1E
Then at least it could do 2LL, or a PPC and medlas or w/e.

Once again, too simple and too effective.

Off the table.

[Kaeb Odellas]

I'd be happy if they dropped the 10 HS requirement. It would be a great help to low-engine ballistic mechs like the Urbie and ballistic Locusts.

[Mcgral18]

Mister D, on 16 February 2016 - 09:44 AM, said:

I always thought that the simple fix for the Spider-5V would be to simply move the hardpoints to the torso's if inflation was out of the question.

RT -1E
LT -1E
Then at least it could do 2LL, or a PPC and medlas or w/e.

For zero effort, LegoMech™ the 5D and anansi hardpoints to the 5V
Suddenly, best Spider with 5E hardpoints.

[Y E O N N E]

Kaeb Odellas, on 16 February 2016 - 12:37 PM, said:

I'd be happy if they dropped the 10 HS requirement. It would be a great help to low-engine ballistic mechs like the Urbie and ballistic Locusts.

Why do people think this is a good idea? What else are you going to put onto that ballistic Locust? A large laser will be too hot with less than 10 and the minimum 10 right now are only barely adequate at keeping that super quick MPL in check.