133 replies to this topic

[Quicksilver Aberration]

Gas Guzzler, on 25 March 2016 - 08:21 AM, said:

Would be interesting to see how that played out now. Right off the bat I could see increasing IS LPL duration to 0.85-0.9 seconds.

Which would be a bit more appropriate given how Clan ERML/LPL have almost the exact same duration. I would say all IS wub should get duration increases and all the smaller IS lasers have their heat dropped, pulse included because Paul will normalize them to have the same heat as their standard counterparts anyway.

Edited by Quicksilver Kalasa, 25 March 2016 - 08:34 AM.

[Garfuncle]

I still don't understand the power drain thing. Does engine size effect it? A bigger engine means more power so laser builds on appropriate mechs aren't nerfed to oblivion?

[ReemusX]

I think if anything is going to be done with heat it should start with the heat sinks.

If they are trying to use heat as a penalty for firing more than X amount of weapons at one time...they should go more for a penalty in cool downs on more than X amount of weapons weapons fired in that group.

[GrimRiver]

I've never had an issue with IS laser vomit but there is 1 clan mech that bugs me
and that is the ebon laser meta builds(2x/3x ERLL, 3x/4x ERML and the pulse versions)

I seen an ebon fire 4 alphas of that laser meta back to back countless times without overheating.
That's some wrong there.

An alpha is meant to be used as a ambush tactic or a last ditch effort, not to be spammed every 20 seconds.

I'll be glad when that update nukes laser meta builds.

[Trauglodyte]

For the record, I don't want to destroy energy usage. Rather, I just want to bring them back in line. As someone pointed out, all lasers should probably get a duration increase of 10-20% (completely arbitrary numbers). Cool down would need to be dropped to maintain HPS and DPH but lasers are all about blow and go. It is extremely hard to do that with any other weapon in game. Really only the heavy ACs (nobody runs 10s, sadly) and the Gauss. With SRMs, you're in someone's face, LRMs/Streaks you need to keep you lock, MGs, and Light ACs are all about face time, etc. Yet, due to quirks and such, you can peak, pop, and pull back all while managing your heat. The alpha doesn't come into play and heat doesn't matter. This all makes sense, now, yes?

[Queen of England]

Garfuncle, on 25 March 2016 - 10:06 AM, said:

I still don't understand the power drain thing. Does engine size effect it? A bigger engine means more power so laser builds on appropriate mechs aren't nerfed to oblivion?

No one outside of PGI has any details.

[Vxheous]

GrimRiver, on 25 March 2016 - 11:49 AM, said:

I've never had an issue with IS laser vomit but there is 1 clan mech that bugs me
and that is the ebon laser meta builds(2x/3x ERLL, 3x/4x ERML and the pulse versions)

I seen an ebon fire 4 alphas of that laser meta back to back countless times without overheating.
That's some wrong there.

An alpha is meant to be used as a ambush tactic or a last ditch effort, not to be spammed every 20 seconds.

I'll be glad when that update nukes laser meta builds.

An Ebon Jaguar can fire a 2CLPL/3CERML alpha of 47 4 times on a heat neutral map before hitting heat cap. The 2CLPL/4CERML alpha of 54 can only fire 2.5 times (2 alphas + just pulse lasers) before hitting heat cap. Any further addition of CERML severely limits the amount of alphas before needing to skip a firing cycle to cool (-85*C Frozen City does not count). You can interchange Timber for Ebon with these builds and the number of alphas will be appox the same.

The Black Knight with 3LPL/4ML can do a 53 alpha 2.5 times as well, or 3LPL/5ML 58 alpha 2 times. (Shorter range though, but can do the full burn in almost 1/2 the duration of the Ebon's burn)

It's like players cannot handle being hit with a 45-50 alpha even in the age of structure quirks, and would rather play "hit each other with a limp noodle"

Edited by Vxheous Kerensky, 25 March 2016 - 04:30 PM.

[Gas Guzzler]

Trauglodyte, on 25 March 2016 - 02:45 PM, said:

For the record, I don't want to destroy energy usage. Rather, I just want to bring them back in line. As someone pointed out, all lasers should probably get a duration increase of 10-20% (completely arbitrary numbers). Cool down would need to be dropped to maintain HPS and DPH but lasers are all about blow and go. It is extremely hard to do that with any other weapon in game. Really only the heavy ACs (nobody runs 10s, sadly) and the Gauss. With SRMs, you're in someone's face, LRMs/Streaks you need to keep you lock, MGs, and Light ACs are all about face time, etc. Yet, due to quirks and such, you can peak, pop, and pull back all while managing your heat. The alpha doesn't come into play and heat doesn't matter. This all makes sense, now, yes?

But in competitive play, you have instances where SRMs and AC20s are taken over lasers unanimously for certain cituations, as are AC5s (Mauler MX90 is fantastic). I feel like people are only looking at their public queue experiences and not recognizing that lasers are not really that far out of line, if at all.

[Gyrok]

Trauglodyte, on 23 March 2016 - 03:50 PM, said:

I swear, I can't wait to get this. I'm probably going to be widely disappointed by it but, anything that comes into the game that shuts down the plethora of people that run 3+ Large Laser builds or the 3x3 Large Pulse/Medium Laser vomit is going to make me happy. Even if it is bad, as long as it semi-punishes people for doing this is a good thing. Don't get me wrong, I don't mind, hate, or despise energy builds. I've been playing Awesomes and Cicadas since Beta. What I mind and what is really bad for the game, in general, is the lack of a system that prevents people from taking the biggest weapon possible and just spewing it all over the place without any drawback. The lack of heat penalties, to-date, is why people do this. Here is to hoping we finally get some semblance of it.

Something tells me we are all going to wish we had ghost heat back when this comes out.

Just judging by the haphazardly thrown together new mode with terribly unbalanced spawns.

Here is to hoping they can easily roll it back.

[Wolfways]

I get the feeling that the 2xLPL's on my Mad Dog are going to be even more useless.
On the other hand my Jagermech will probably still be ridiculously OP...

[Trauglodyte]

It could be, Gyrok. I don't know what is going to come of this. I'm at a point where I'm both excited and terrified. Truth be told, Ghost Heat did what it was supposed to do in the beginning. But, it was a horrible fix that ended up forcing players to doing other things and then other things. Every time PGI tried to tweak it, the community went in a different direction. I don't know if this will do it or not. You've got to give PGI credit for trying while still giving the community the leeway to play as they want. At the end of the day, that is probably the error that they need to fix: stop letting players do what they want and punch them in the face when they get out of line. A lot of people have been asking for a 30 point heat cap with massive penalties. That is definitely too restrictive but there is a medium that could be reached if they just tried. But, I bet that they're too afraid of what might happen, given that they've allowed this to spiral into what it is 4+ years after release.

[Aleksandr Sergeyevich Kerensky]

Can we go back to gauss ppc days?

15+10 or 15+10+10 or 15+15!

Much lower alphas this way! Please pgi, dont change the heat scale, just rebuff ppc and gauss!

[Biclor Moban]

Garfuncle, on 25 March 2016 - 10:06 AM, said:

I still don't understand the power drain thing. Does engine size effect it? A bigger engine means more power so laser builds on appropriate mechs aren't nerfed to oblivion?

This Plan isn't out yet so no one really knows for sure. People like to surmise what it might be from what it was or what they think the "problem" really is.

Honestly I would just like the game to be balanced based on solutions based in reality not Ghost heat voodoo.

What you said about engine size would follow logical reasoning. You would have to build a Mech that was a balance. If you put a bigger engine in for powering more lasers it would be heavier and you wouldn't be able to put on as many lasers/Gauss if you ran a smaller engine to conserve weight for more lasers/Gauss you might not have the power to run them.

[Sjorpha]

Gas Guzzler, on 23 March 2016 - 09:14 PM, said:

LOL don't make me laugh.

Lasers and Gauss, PPCs and Gauss, AC20 and SRMs, Lasers and SRMs, there are meta builds EVERYWHERE that use more than just lasers. The fact that you (or the many other whiners on the forums) aren't aware of them isn't the game's fault.

So much this, people still thinking the meta is dominated by strict laser vomit are just wrong. Lasers are still strong but there has been lots of diversification in the meta these last few months. SRM brawling specifically has become very strong.

The game only has 3 basic categories of weapons, and withing those categories there aren't that many alternatives either. Lasers are the basic run of the mill weapon in battletech, and battletech is also full of laser boats as well as other types of weapon boating, so it should be no surprise to anyone that weapon boating is both common and strong in any multiplayer game based on that lore.

The idea that you can somehow stop "boating", is simply delusional. There are basic game theoretic principles that drive gaming strategies, in all games, towards specialization. Without focusing on a specific tactic, you will win less, simple as that.

Even if you can make combinations of weapons be the meta, it will only be the meta because those weapons happen to synergize together like small pulse/srms or gauss/PPC or whatever.

Making the classic idea of a mixed general purpose build with non-synergistic weapons into a competitive alternative is simply impossible, sorry about that. Let it go. It's not just games either, in the real world specialization is even more central to success in both warfare of professional success or what have you.

Reality favors specialization (boating) and there is absolutely nothing you can do to stop that.

Take magic the gathering for example which I just played a tournament in, there are maybe 20-30 comp viable deck archetypes in the modern format at this point, which is extremely diverse for any competitive scene I must say. But each and every one of those decks is totally specialized, just as in MWO you have to decide first how you are going to win with this deck and then you make the deck as good as possible at doing just that. In MWO we have our brawlers, laser midrange vomit, laser snipers, ballistic DPS fire liners and so on, in magic you have control decks, creature aggro, burn, feedback (I'm working on a madness/inspiration/discard based feedback deck, still not specialized enough to compete I'm afraid but very fun) and so on.

The point is that even in a game so much more complex than MWO you see the exact same logic at work, the meta is and will always be ruled by boats and other specialized builds.



My top of the head prediction for how a "alpha damage cap" type of system would change the meta:

Ballistic boating would be significantly buffed, because dakka by it's nature is low alpha/high DPS. There are already strong ballistic boats so unless PGI is careful with this new system we will se whining about "ballistic vomit" being the new standard complaint.

Midrange laser boat builds based around cycling such as the 6LL(3+3) stalker or battlemaster will also be stronger. (they already stay under 30 damage per burst). That should favor long range laser sniping even more than now. The 6LL stalker for example was already powerful back when it had to cycle 2+2+2, so as you see capping alphas don't actually discourage boating that much.

If SRMs and small pulses aren't excepted from the cap then brawling will be nerfed quite a bit I'm afraid.

For this reason I think it would be a good idea to have the cap scale with range, allowing higher no-penalty alphas the closer range weapons you are using. For example the extreme long range no-penalty max might be 20 damage (ERLL and ERPPC) and the extreme close cap might be 50 (SPLs and SRMs) and then a linear scaling between.

Edited by Sjorpha, 26 March 2016 - 01:35 AM.