22 replies to this topic

[Champion of Khorne Lord of Blood]

I hear a lot that assaults are meant to be the big target taking damage for the team on the front lines to improve the team's health pool.

But I was thinking that's a little counter productive.

I mean assaults are slow and they carry a bunch of firepower, sorta like a battering ram or a big cannon, something you'd want to defend and keep from taking lots of damage even if it can take a few good hits. I'd rather have my assaults keep all their weapons throughout the match and put them to very good use.

I've found light mechs and faster mechs to be better at "tanking" damage. Rather than taking hits though they dodge them so that the damage is entirely wasted on the ground rather than the team's health pool. I know something like 4 ERLL is much more effective against an assault mech than a light mech, the light just spreads it and runs so fast that most of the shot misses while the assault usually takes the beam mostly to the torso.

Other mechs that can trade well also tend to tank better because they just shoot and hit and the enemy returns fire right into the dirt or off into the air.


Its a bit different in full team matches I'd assume, but at least in a pug match where you don't know just what your allies will do I'd rather save my Atlas's armor and kill off half the enemy team stealth-fully rather than charging with the group and trying to get a kill while the enemy focuses the obvious giant scary mech.

In one situation I help the team by taking damage so they don't have to and leave the killing up to them, in the other situation I let the team take damage while I kill off enemies from a side route or etc. Though in the second situation I also take damage of course, I just didn't get focus fired down like what happens to the assaults in any team push against a competent firing line.


TLDR: Maybe assault mechs shouldn't be the main damage tankers because they get focus fired and are easy to hit compared to other mechs. I also feel assaults could be better used as either heavy fire support for the team (Maulers and KDK-3s for example) or as ambush brawlers (Atlases for example). Rather than taking damage, dodge damage by using terrain and speed and baiting to conserve team health pool.


What are your thoughts on this philosophy?

[Voidcrafter]

See - assaults ARE supose to and ARE tanking the damage.
The problem is more like psychological with those things - for example - people know that they're guaranteed 4 assaults for the enemy team and bunch of heavies.
People know that the mechs named WILL carry sheetload of firepower and that most likely most (if not all) the assaults will be Kodiaks with heavy ballistics/lazorz accent.
People know that this is a problem - people look for a way to solve it.
So people do something that they are less likely to do in different conditions --> when they see the greatest threat they just focus fire it, rain LRMs on it, snipe it from safe distance, from behind - in other words they cheap-kill it as best as they could.

Hell - I'll do that too.
Nothing is supose to survive in that kind of environment.
That's one of the reasons large and open maps are really often picked in Quickplay in my opinion(though currently seems like all the maps are "large") - people know there'll be problem and people want to solve it taking the easiest shortcut to that.

Now - I've seen handful of games that the battles were fought over the assaults conditions and man... lemme tell you - that's the things I am still playing this game for
But I got the brawling in my blood...
I am also a heavy pilot.
And I am also doing what people do(cheapshotting any danger and picking the means for that --> LRMs :| ).

The saddest part is that that way I feel most helpful toward the overall team result but in the current game state - the (overall)huge maps, the (overall)large open spaces, the craBload of heavies/assaults(and their huge numbers in variety, variants, etc.) that can bring sheetload of close-range firepower(even as support weapons)... don't know - doing something aside from that really seems like almost suicide...

Seems a bit irelevant to your topic but in my eyes - all this is the reason for the big-bad-slow mechs to go that fast.

Cheers.

[Aetes Nakatomi]

I'm sure you have some great matches against disorganised pug groups. I'm sure you had fun. I'm sure you thought your plan was part of the reason your team won.

It wasn't.

In MWO the team that sticks together and stays aggressive generally wins (especially true in PUG play).

If team A splits into little groups and some go sniping, while team B stays together then team B will have both a firepower and armour advantage over any group/lone mech they meet and will crush them very quickly.

At the end of matches I see the useless sniper mech that starts boasting about its 600 damage and how awesome they did with their 0 kills. 600 averaged across 12 mechs is 50 damage... Congrats on scratching a bunch of mechs across most of their hardpoints with your LL/LRMS, remind me to give you a medal...

[Scandinavian Jawbreaker]

There are three assets in this game that are important; speed, firepower and armour. The outcome of the match however is often determined by firepower and armour (as in ability to tank damage). In a good team these two are spread out evenly for all.

I'm not sure if I got you correctly but seems like you are only talking about push situations. I agree with you, pushing to a well formed firing line is very stupid indeed and it doesn't matter how much armour you sacrifice for your team most of the times. These pushes can be done but only when focus fire is perfect.

However we often talk about trades. In pug matches it's more about the trade game than organized pushes because of the chaotic nature of putting 24 random solos in a same match - drop decks are not unified, everyone has their own opinion about proper tactics and so on. A proper trade is when you deal more damage than you take, meaning that you must sacrifice some armour as well. However I often see that there is no trading at all taking place and many assaults just sit and wait for something.

In high tier group queue matches you see alot of aggressive trading that as a side product make the 'nascar effect'. Aggressive poking and getting an upper hand of the enemy team makes the team or a lance very mobile in counter clockwise movement. Counter clockwise is mainly because most of the weapons are in the right side of the mech. In pugs however the nascar is a wide circle that has no aggressive nature in it. Just a wide circle (that I call a fail train) that often fails leaving the assaults behind and losing the match. So it's no wonder that some assault players play it safe when it comes to giving that precious armour to the team - they on get killed without gaining the support from the team.

On the subject that lights should be tanking... While in pugs someone can run thru a team without taking much damage, believe me there are player that can leg a light as soon as it comes across. While a tanky light mech can take alot of damage to the torsos the weak point is legs. Legs don't have much armour and once you leg the light it is an easy kill. So while they might seem tanky they actually are not when you face a player that knows what he/she is doing.

Team has a total value of armour to spend and when it is spread evenly the team will most likely win. The bigger the mech the more armour it has and it has to spend it more in order to assist the team absorbing enemy damage and putting their heat up thus reducing the overall damage potential enemy has.

[Voidcrafter]

Aetes Nakatomi, on 27 May 2016 - 12:03 AM, said:

I'm sure you have some great matches against disorganised pug groups. I'm sure you had fun. I'm sure you thought your plan was part of the reason your team won.

It wasn't.

In MWO the team that sticks together and stays aggressive generally wins (especially true in PUG play).

If team A splits into little groups and some go sniping, while team B stays together then team B will have both a firepower and armour advantage over any group/lone mech they meet and will crush them very quickly.

At the end of matches I see the useless sniper mech that starts boasting about its 600 damage and how awesome they did with their 0 kills. 600 averaged across 12 mechs is 50 damage... Congrats on scratching a bunch of mechs across most of their hardpoints with your LL/LRMS, remind me to give you a medal...

Meh - it's not like that.
Also you're one unfriendly arrogant fella
I do feel more rewarded for successful brawling and aggressive play - true that. I also admit that this wins the games in most of the cases - but there's a psychological wall too --> people are afraid to push.
It's not dependent on whether or not they have a good leader/example/whatever in most of the cases - majority of the PUG people, when seing one/some guy(s) charging are like "Ohh... you'll be missed... for a split second or two - then I'll just keep on doing the same boolsheet I am doing atm, nps".
Truth to be told - I always loved balistics - I always thought them to be most versatile, skill dependent weapon - if you are careful you'll always be able to make others play your game, not the other way around.

BUT.
My practice with the current PUG games shows that snipping/laser boating/LRM-ing turns out to be way more successful(on average basis).
Don't get me wrong - this saddens me a great deal...
I disliked poptarting when it was a thing.
When the victor had the insane twist rate(especially in air), when the JJs were really something else, when there were loads of CTF-3D with 2xPPC, 1xUAC5, etc.
I disliked LRMs during their several hells and even before and after that.
Still --> don't know - the game just doesn't intuitively push you toward being more aggressive and charge people - not for the average person.
I am ok either way, but then again I've spent my share of milions and milions creds and I need mo-neh(as I presume the average player too).

What do you think I(he) will do?
Arm up with some seems-to-be-suicidal combo, wait for the right moment, hope for the best for my 15 seconds to shy?
And I am not talking about Assaults here - we take it there're 3/4 per team and I chose to be from the other 75% of my team.
This actually setups a deadly environment for every self-initiative anyone decides to seize - in the common sense.
So yea - I get why assaults can't "tank" it, as everything else, and why people chose that road.

Dont you?

[Champion of Khorne Lord of Blood]

Aetes Nakatomi, on 27 May 2016 - 12:03 AM, said:

I'm sure you have some great matches against disorganised pug groups. I'm sure you had fun. I'm sure you thought your plan was part of the reason your team won.

It wasn't.

In MWO the team that sticks together and stays aggressive generally wins (especially true in PUG play).

If team A splits into little groups and some go sniping, while team B stays together then team B will have both a firepower and armour advantage over any group/lone mech they meet and will crush them very quickly.

At the end of matches I see the useless sniper mech that starts boasting about its 600 damage and how awesome they did with their 0 kills. 600 averaged across 12 mechs is 50 damage... Congrats on scratching a bunch of mechs across most of their hardpoints with your LL/LRMS, remind me to give you a medal...

My how condescending.

I'm not even talking about being a bad sniper here, I'm saying that it would be smarter to try to negate the enemy damage rather than tank it directly, and try to not get focus fired heavily by putting all your assaults in one spot.

Take for example having the team split into two groups, main lance of 8 mechs and a secondary is 4 mechs. They stick close together but aren't one full group. When the enemy attacks they come in from two angles rather than one. This way the enemy is always open to an attack from two powerful forces. If they rush either then the other takes them from behind. Rather than just rushing in and attacking their full team and putting it solely up to which team can kill the other faster in a direct fight, you weaken the enemy by using favorable trades and good firesupport. At this point they either die from inaction and withering fire or try to make a move. If they rush one group though they'll be open to heavy direct fire from ballistic boats, and brawling mechs could take them out with a shot to the rear.

Now if you don't want a theoretical situation I'll just use one example of when I was piloting my Atlas-S.

We were on Tourmaline and the enemy deathball was moving in on us at a section of the map resembling a Y due to a crystal formation. The majority of my team tried to defend one way while I went into the other as the enemy team pushed. It was group queue and I knew the team I was with wasn't a great one so I knew I'd have to make any damage I take count for something other than just damage not done to them. I moved in from the side peeking out at about 200m from the enemy able to take shots on the rears of their mechs with my 70+ alpha strikes. Torsos fell off, enemy mechs went down quick, if anything I saved my allies from taking damage just by killing off enemies before they could do much. After that fight my Atlas was only mildly damaged but I had killed off an enemy Atlas, Timber Wolf, Centurion, and another I can't remember along with throwing damage onto ones that my team finished off. I went and hunted down the last two enemy mechs which happened to be Arctic Cheetahs with an ambush around the corner and killed them both before they got out of range.

I find that situation more favorable than standing with a team I know won't make up for my loss and dying there without putting out heavy damage and without killing off enemies so that we don't have to tank their damage at all.

Edited by Dakota1000, 27 May 2016 - 12:28 AM.

[Paigan]

Aetes Nakatomi, on 27 May 2016 - 12:03 AM, said:

I'm sure you have some great matches against disorganised pug groups. I'm sure you had fun. I'm sure you thought your plan was part of the reason your team won.

It wasn't.

In MWO the team that sticks together and stays aggressive generally wins (especially true in PUG play).

If team A splits into little groups and some go sniping, while team B stays together then team B will have both a firepower and armour advantage over any group/lone mech they meet and will crush them very quickly.

At the end of matches I see the useless sniper mech that starts boasting about its 600 damage and how awesome they did with their 0 kills. 600 averaged across 12 mechs is 50 damage... Congrats on scratching a bunch of mechs across most of their hardpoints with your LL/LRMS, remind me to give you a medal...

You did not reply at all to his point.
I get the strong feeling you did not understand it at all.

He did NOT say "let me fall back with my assault to snipe". He said the team should defend the assaults.
He basically proposed what you were saying: stay together instead of waste the assaults.

Before you go all arrogant "I'm sure you thought your plan was part of the reason your team won. - It wasn't.", I suggest to understand the point, first.

---

I, for my part, agree with the OP.



edit:
I started replying before Dakota's post and actually posted it afterwards.

Edited by Paigan, 27 May 2016 - 12:26 AM.

[Tarogato]

I agree with the OP. There is something to be said for how much you can "speed tank" in this game. I would not be at all surprised to find out that a Spider or Arctic Cheetah can shrug off more damage than the almighty uberquirked Atlases, due to the simple fact that nobody will never *miss* an Atlas - you simply can't. In fact, I've been wanting to test this for a while now - set up two or three mechs in a firing line, and let loose a few 30-ton mechs in front of the firing line and see how long the 30-tonners survive. And then do the same with 40-tonners, 50-tonner, 60-, etc.

Edited by Tarogato, 27 May 2016 - 12:44 AM.

[mogs01gt]

Nothing can "tank" damage in MWO. Assaults are primary targets because the amount of damage they put down range and need to be in the front lines because they have the highest damage and most effective hp.

[Karl Streiger]

I still ask myself how do anybody can think that assaults have the most firepower.
Granted there are a couple of Mechs like the KDK3 can run some serious damage, but anything else?
Even before the Clans some Heavys like JaegerMech and Catapult had more firepower than an Atlas.

I can have almost the same loadout of a Spirit Bear on a StormCrow - when reducing the size and numbers of the missies and running 6 ER-S-Laser i have the same alpha potential....but running at 104kph.
OK heat is a problem - but with speed you can alpha and fade.

So, tanking Assaults only on designs that are supposed to be tanky. (Atlas and Zeus)

[Kangarad]

Karl Streiger, on 27 May 2016 - 04:31 AM, said:

I still ask myself how do anybody can think that assaults have the most firepower.
Granted there are a couple of Mechs like the KDK3 can run some serious damage, but anything else?
Even before the Clans some Heavys like JaegerMech and Catapult had more firepower than an Atlas.

I can have almost the same loadout of a Spirit Bear on a StormCrow - when reducing the size and numbers of the missies and running 6 ER-S-Laser i have the same alpha potential....but running at 104kph.
OK heat is a problem - but with speed you can alpha and fade.

So, tanking Assaults only on designs that are supposed to be tanky. (Atlas and Zeus)

Well you can alpha and fade however your alpha is nowhere near what the assault mechs can reach

while yes the Assault mechs are way slower they can withstand HIGH damage alphas.
The KDK 3 4x10 CUAC has a 40 points alpha sure doubletab is 80. your 6 csml ? 30 +3x6 srm is still only 71
My KGC 0000 has a 101,3 Alpha (normal is 40 to 90), how much armour did you have again?
The Atlas usualy has arround 58 to 80+ dmg alphas
The atlas is supposed to facetank, which is why it has structure quirks ulike the KGC.

The jaegermech has between 20 and 40 damage alphas and in most cases tends to run out of ammo, fast unless you strip armour or carry an XL.

Catapults unless it is a splatcat just do not have the damage nor dps, and you do not want to tank in em at all.

Foremost assaults just have the tonnage to carry more weapons and armour than any other mech even if theyr slow.

your Stormcrow must be running way hotter than the Spirit bear (or just have way less range) to achieve the same alpha of 80 damage ive tried to rebuild it but havent found a way to achieve good dps or something that wont die as soon as it starts poking, mind building it in smurfy and linking it here?

Edited by Kangarad, 27 May 2016 - 05:01 AM.

[Aetes Nakatomi]

I read the sniping in tier 1 thread first saw the OPs reply in there before seeing this thread, hence my assumption on super sniper Rambo assault plan. I admit my reply is somewhat more aggressive than I would normally write, but I am getting tired of damage farmers who think their individual stats are more important than a team win.

As for re-reading just this thread.

There are some assaults and heavies that are designed as push monsters, heavy armour good hit boxes and decent structure quirks while some are more damage orientated and keeping them as second line absolutely makes sense in most situations. As for using lights as tanks, that only works well against targets with poor aim/hit scan weapons.

Apologies again for conflating the two posts in separate threads (the trouble of reading forums on a phone during a 10 minute tea break).

[zephoidb]

Nothing in the game can tank damage. When a 4x UAC10 kodiak puts out 80 damage in <1s, you aren't going to be able to take fire from more than 1 mech for any quantity of time. Force multiplication is the name of the game. You want as many of your mechs to be able to put fire on targets as possible, since even a few light mechs can have enough burst firepower to knock out assaults or heavies in a very short quantity of time.

The only way you can make assaults into tanks is if you bring 4+ of them, bunch up, and get them all moving. They have so much firepower than people duck back after single volleys or die. That way they can share damage and break up the opponent's force multiplication.

[EekaBlitzer]

Far too many non-assault players want other people to play a close range assault mech to absorb most of the enemy team's damage ( and often die quickly), whilst they kick out the damage to the enemy. They get a big score, whilst the assault player gets a GG, that's worth nothing in C-bills.
The main reason behind the constant complaints about LRM carrying assault mechs.

[mogs01gt]

Karl Streiger, on 27 May 2016 - 04:31 AM, said:

I still ask myself how do anybody can think that assaults have the most firepower.
Granted there are a couple of Mechs like the KDK3 can run some serious damage, but anything else?
Even before the Clans some Heavys like JaegerMech and Catapult had more firepower than an Atlas.

I can have almost the same loadout of a Spirit Bear on a StormCrow - when reducing the size and numbers of the missies and running 6 ER-S-Laser i have the same alpha potential....but running at 104kph.
OK heat is a problem - but with speed you can alpha and fade.

WTF are you smoking cause I want some!!!

Jaeger's typically are maxed at 40pt alphas, Atlas are usually 50+ and arent glass cannons. Catapult,,,seriously?
How can 6 ERSL be your reasoning when comparing alpha potential? So lets ignore the hundreds of meters difference of effective range...

Edited by mogs01gt, 27 May 2016 - 06:49 AM.

[davoodoo]

Let me take a look at metamechs because im too lazy to make my own builds in builder

http://mwo.smurfy-ne...8a7c87dbc9cdf0c
69dmg alpha, 592 armor
http://mwo.smurfy-ne...e39ba32bc86288b
58 dmg alpha on shorter cooldown, 448 armor.

Kodiak isnt that much more armed than black knight, but its bigger, slower and in the end if enemy team knows what they are doing mech can only take as much as his legs or ct can take because every weapon is pinpoint accurate and you can put it all into single component ignoring all that armor on arms torsos or in most cases legs.

Edited by davoodoo, 27 May 2016 - 06:55 AM.

[Corrado]

a pug winnin general tactic, is a moderately fast deathball with focus fire. after the lights done some scouting job, should report back and draw some attention while brawlers kicks in followed by medium range dps. focus fire and done. enemy team can either group up and fight, while in most cases will just start backpedaling in fear losing tonnage after tonnage.

profit.

a uav here and there launched from brawlers close to the heat zone generally helps.

Edited by Corrado, 27 May 2016 - 06:58 AM.

[Tralik]

I think the combat dynamic in this game is interesting. There really isn't any "tanking" in the traditional gaming sense of the word. Assaults and Heavies will still wither quickly if they are focused by more than two enemy mechs at the same time. This generally takes less than 15 seconds.

The stick together and be aggressive play style works in this game so well because there is no real penalty for dying other than lost time. That's my opinion.

I think you would see more strategic game-play evolve if dying actually meant something like it does in some other games. For instance if you had to spend c-bills to repair your mech, or if there were item decay from dying, I believe a much more reserved and strategic combat would emerge rapidly. I'm not suggesting that this kind of change actually happen, just that this is a large part of why the steamrolling tactic is so prevalent.

[Corrado]

Tralik33, on 27 May 2016 - 07:14 AM, said:

I think the combat dynamic in this game is interesting. There really isn't any "tanking" in the traditional gaming sense of the word. Assaults and Heavies will still wither quickly if they are focused by more than two enemy mechs at the same time. This generally takes less than 15 seconds.

The stick together and be aggressive play style works in this game so well because there is no real penalty for dying other than lost time. That's my opinion.

I think you would see more strategic game-play evolve if dying actually meant something like it does in some other games. For instance if you had to spend c-bills to repair your mech, or if there were item decay from dying, I believe a much more reserved and strategic combat would emerge rapidly. I'm not suggesting that this kind of change actually happen, just that this is a large part of why the steamrolling tactic is so prevalent.

well was like that in CB. you had repair and rearm cost. meant cbills for repairs and cbills for ammo. also running a big and fragile XL, would raise repair costs and lower survivability. thats why back there, the gameplay was a lot more static, tight really tights ambushes, lights werent dancing close to the enemies due to tackling/trampling techniques (mechs would fall if they did crash on each other... i had a really fast dragon for that)

luckily those days are gone. matches could have gone sitting for 10 minutes with some mechs peek shooting and waiting the clock to count down to achieve the score win.

[Airwind]

There is no tanking as long there is pinpoint alpha damage. waiting for battletech game to bring back the fantasy.