52 replies to this topic

[Exard3k]

recent buff for spread reduction helped. I like running LB10 on my Legend Killer but prefer dual AC5 or AC10 for other Mechs.

Edited by Exard3k, 28 April 2016 - 11:37 AM.

[Mystere]

Thorqemada, on 28 April 2016 - 12:09 AM, said:

Probably the best we can hope for is that PGI would make the LBX work like a Clan PPC that does damage to adjacent spots...it would still give the Weapon its uniqueness and improve the usefulness.

So I get a heavier but cooler CERPPC that requires ammo? No thanks.

How about something radical? Have the pellets act like super armor piercing slugs that ignore armor and instead do internal damage.

Khobai, on 28 April 2016 - 10:25 AM, said:

But its supposed to be a crit weapon that eats structure

thats the exact opposite of its intended role

again the only way to fix the LBX properly is to fix the whole critical hit system...

See above.

Edited by Mystere, 28 April 2016 - 11:44 AM.

[wanderer]

Quote

but peppering the entire mech is useless, it just makes the weapon bad. Even if zero pellets miss, spreading 10 damage over a whole mech is still unacceptably garbage.

Welcome to why TT LB-X's have a solid shot option- that is, solid shot to breach armor, and then cluster shot to wreck equipment in unarmored sections.

PGI instead made large single-damage hits the ideal equipment killers and rendered any weapon that cannot place most or all of it's damage into one pixel under the crosshair automatically second or third-rate, while being incapable of delivering a weapon with alternate fire modes.

[Wintersdark]

Mystere, on 28 April 2016 - 11:40 AM, said:

So I get a heavier but cooler CERPPC that requires ammo? No thanks.

Like the AC10 is a heavier, cooler, PPC that requires ammo? That's what Battletech ballistics are.

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How about something radical? Have the pellets act like super armor piercing slugs that ignore armor and instead do internal damage.

There's lots of better, more interesting ideas, no doubt.

But none of them have any chance of being implemented. The cERPPC splash code idea is good not because it's a brilliant perfect idea that makes the LBX awesome and unique, but because it keeps the spirit of the weapon (the cannister shot anyways) while being something that PGI could absolutely do with virtually zero effort.

Yeah, it won't happen either, but it has way better odds of happening than something really creative. And, knowing PGI, if they went the "really creative" route, it would either be utterly broken or just equally useless as now but different.

cERPPC splash code works, is known and understood, and would make it a useful weapon, which is wholly an improvement from it's current state.

---

All that said, I *still* think the best bet is just bumping per-pellet damage to 1.2 or 1.3. Then, up close, it spreads damage but does *more* total damage, making it a superior close range brawling weapon where effectiveness falls off with distance.

That's an even easier change, and makes the LBX work like a traditional FPS shotgun.

[Mystere]

Wintersdark, on 28 April 2016 - 02:30 PM, said:

Like the AC10 is a heavier, cooler, PPC that requires ammo? That's what Battletech ballistics are.

I was talking about emulating CERPPC splash damage. I never liked that part at all.

[totgeboren]

Mystere, on 28 April 2016 - 04:40 PM, said:

I was talking about emulating CERPPC splash damage. I never liked that part at all.

But it's perfect for a weapon that is supposed to fire a "cluster" round, almost like an old flak round.
It makes more sense than turning them into shotguns, that's for sure.

Edited by totgeboren, 29 April 2016 - 05:13 AM.

[Corrado]

Monkey Lover, on 27 April 2016 - 02:53 PM, said:

Still not worth using. They should have increased the dmg per shell.

or the rate of fire. is a brawling weapon after all.

[Raso]

I would love to see them become flack cannons but I feel like anything that requires too much of a change will only scare PGI away from doing it. Personally, I think that the best we can hope for is to support a fix that doesn't require PGI to use too much man power (because they don't seem to like doing things that don't involve making new mechs to sell) I think that's why upping the damage per pellet and tightening the grouping a little more is the best path to take. Heck, we might even want to cap the number of pellets at 8 or 10 so that when they do hit they hit a little harder.

That said, I think the hardest part about the LBX is that it's very easy for the weapon to become either a lighter AC10 or a heavier SRM6. Even going the easy route of upping the damage and tightening the spread on, say, a Mauler it would still make more sense to bring quad SRM6s since A ) beyond the SRM's max range the LBX is all but useless anyway and B ) SRM6s deal more damage and are lighter so you can fit in extra DHS and back up weapons. Maybe keep the damage and spread about where it is now but make it deal significantly extra damage verses exposed internal structure? Maybe reduce the number of pellets on the larger LBXs to 8, for LBX10s and 12, for LBX20s? Maybe give them straight up double damage at very close ranges with spread back to it's previous values? There are options that work with the current way the LBX is implemented and I strongly believe that we have to work withing those confines.

Edited by Raso, 29 April 2016 - 05:58 AM.

[The Smoking Man]

Khobai, on 27 April 2016 - 02:58 PM, said:

the more they tighten the spread the more they make it exactly like standard autocannons

LBX is supposed to be a crit weapon. they need to fix the crit system to fix LBX not make it more like a std AC.

I want to bump this point that Khobai made, it is right on the money. The pattern they made is better than it was, the crit chance is non existent. LBX offers a spread pattern with X amount of rounds hitting target at the same time, which makes me wonder what chance of crit we are getting as it hits the target.

The crit system shows as follows (from my understanding)
1st crit = X % damage
2nd crit 2/3X% damage
3rd crit even lower....
4th hit so on, so on...

But how is the LBX doing the hit order? Is it all at once using the highest crit % or is it putting the rounds hitting in sequence? With then an additional crit role in sequence of hits? Kinda sounds hard to program, but I don't know that sorta stuff.

So good job on the pattern spread decrease (at least I like it), but I wonder where we are with that crit system for them?

Even after the adjustment, I look at the LBX as the "finisher" not the "nut-cra-cker" like they used to be in previous MW titles. If you bring enough pewpew to crack that armor, the LBX will finish the job. But I don't think that's how it was intended for use, that really just makes it a glorified MG with bigger rounds and a slower cycle.


** Edited because the forum thinks Nut-cr--acker is a bad word?!?! it censored Cra-ck-er. Really? That's a bad word now? I like to put cheese on my crackers. ***

Edited by The Smoking Man, 29 April 2016 - 06:00 AM.

[Jun Watarase]

Lowering the spread is necessary or the LBX cant function at its optimal ranges. The LBX-20 has an optimal range of 360m...it should be effective at that range, but its not. Part of the problem is that in the tabletop version, the weapon doesnt have a range dependent spread (barring optional rules). Lets assume that PGI lowers the spread enough so that, for example, 2/3rds of the pellets hit one location at 360m. At 100m that would translate to 100% of the pellets hitting a location which potentially makes it really powerful at close range, compared to a normal AC. Making the spread range independent would allow you to tune the spread without worrying about it becoming too powerful at certain ranges.

But i cant imagine PGI being willing to do the work for that.

[Khobai]

Quote

Lowering the spread is necessary or the LBX cant function at its optimal ranges.

nah LBX should fire in a cylinder shape rather than a cone shape

that way its spread doesnt degrade over range

then LBX could have longer range than std ACs like its supposed too



they also need to adjust crit multipliers on all the weapons to make LBX the best crit weapon

Edited by Khobai, 29 April 2016 - 12:51 PM.

[Corrado]

i'd slowly increase the rate of fire till it starts to be competitive, while keeping the unique use.

[XxXAbsolutZeroXxX]

LBX (in this game) is a good lazy man's spray-and-pray weapon for those occasions when one can't be bother with silly things like aiming. Point. Shoot. Hope for the best. You have enough spread that you're almost guaranteed to hit something, eventually.