425 replies to this topic

[1453 R]

Bishop Steiner, on 15 June 2016 - 07:32 PM, said:

if it's anything like IW, then people will QQ til it's removed anyhow. Anything that adds immersion and depth and something beside click a pixel spamming is not wanted by this game community.

...
Yet people absolutely refuse to address the actual genesis of the problem and instead we slap on bandaids to make it stagger on to halfass sacrifice at the alter of Esports.

I surrender.

Bishop, man...what I cannot abide, what gets people ruffled over the interminable Convergence/CoF proposals that tend to crop up in flocks like locust plagues 'round here, is that pretty much all of them make it excessively difficult, if not outright impossible, to get any sort of accuracy back. So many folks...so many folks...hold up the never-to-be-sufficiently-damned "A BattleTech Game™" logo on the website and say "WHY CAN I HIT STUFF IN MY A BATTLETECH GAME™?!"

Well...because it's a shooter. And in shooters you need to hit stuff.

I get that most reasonable folks are basically hoping for enough deviation to split up a 70-point laser alpha between a couple of spots at long range. Personally, I don't see the point of exploding the system and inciting Balance Redux 2099 over a couple points of deviation, but even if you go with that...what happens if someone equips a TCVII, active probe, targeting modules, anything/everything she can do to improve her accuracy and eliminate deviation, even at the cost of firepower? They're trying for the surgeon's knife instead of the barbarian's axe - a couple of LPL, say, rather than five LPL, seventeen ML, eight SRM-6 and a rotary/2.

The Mystere answer, and this is why practically everything Mystere posts infuriates me, is that this person with the huge TC, the sensor/targeting-boosting equipment and modules, and the accuracy-focused, low-alpha loadout still can't hit s***, because being able to hit your target more than once in five shots just isn't A BattleTech Game™ enough.

In a CoF/Convergence game, that pilot up there should be her own special brand of scary (provided she herself is accurate enough to take advantage of the loadout). What she shoots at, she should hit. She can't hit very hard, but she can hit often because she runs cool, and you cannot count on RNGsus to protect you. That would be cool - a real marksman build, showcasing its pilot's talents and overcoming CoF inaccuracies with tech and trigger discipline instead of sheer, overwhelming volume of fire, using precision and raw awesome to do with half the shots what takes everyone else...well, double the shots.

Nobody, nobody, nobody seems to want that, though. All I ever see in these threads is the million and three things people want to tie into screwing with your aim, and yeah - it bothers me, a lot. All anyone ever wants to talk about is how many things should throw off your aim - moving should throw you off, shooting should throw you off, heating up should throw you off, taking fire should throw you off, steep enough inclines should throw you off.

When somebody asks "So what do you do to get your aim thrown back on? How do you drill through all that and hit stuff anyways; what systems are in place to let players compensate for the seething throngs of factors screwing with their aim? How can you get better at running MWO so that even though all of that stuff is messing with you, you can still end up awesome enough to hit what you shoot at?", the answer is a resounding...:

"...Uhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh...........?", followed in many cases by "...why do you want to? Didn't you play TT?!"

I'm going to be honest with you here, man, and say something that's going to get me thrown off the forums by force - the more time I spend here, the more I hate the tabletop game. I grew up on BattleTech - but I grew up on the older MechWarrior games and the novels, not the TT sourcebooks. BattleMechs are supposed to be enormously dangerous weapons of war piloted by elite warriors, not clattering rattletrap guncrates piloted by drunken morons that literally can't line up a straight shot to save their lives. Even the nameless mooks in the books are usually credible threats - if they miss it's because something happened to make them miss, or its a near miss that could easily have been a hit instead.

I'm not even talking about Kai god-moding through entire Trinaries with one gauss rifle and sheer author-induced stones, or Victor being more than a match for even the most elite of Clan warriors despite spending maybe a tenth of the time training. I'm talking regular guys, in regular 'Mechs, who can manage to be military professionals their commanders can (mostly) rely on instead of a bunch of stormtroopers fresh out of the Imperial Marksmanship Academy. Soldiers, not bad jokes.

There are certain artifacts of the tabletop game we really don't need back. There are certain realities of real-time, first-person games that Mystere some of the crustier old TT folks need to acknowledge. They never do. It pushes my buttons, and yeah - my buttons can be easy to push. Heh, you know how that goes. I'm sorry things have devolved as much as they have, but I'm not going to budge on the requirement that people be able to hit what they aim at, and that doing so does not require baroque or unreasonable concessions.

Having to deal with motion-induced reticle sway, a'la 3PV? Perhaps some reticle jitter when you receive a heavy impact, or a bit of jitter when running hot? More severe motion-induced sway when moving particularly quickly - and conversely, less severe motion-induced sway when moving at slower/more vulnerable speeds? Heatscale effects not involving randomly-rolled ammo lolbooms or Sudden Naptimes in the bottom yellow - things like 'swimming vision/pilot heat stress' filters, reduced twist range/speed, sluggish accel/decel/turning, non-UAC weapon jams/energy misfires due to severe overheating? Those all actually sound like perfectly workable ideas I'd actually really like to try.

All this Cone of Failure garbage can go right out the airlock, though. A system wherein accuracy is reduced by multiple external factors needs to be balanced by accuracy also being increased by multiple external factors, and the skill is in finding ways to minimize the one and maximize the other. The same system, minus the "increased" modifiers, just p!sses off players for no worthwhile reason.

[Mystere]

1453 R, on 16 June 2016 - 10:13 AM, said:

Bishop, man...what I cannot abide, what gets people ruffled over the interminable Convergence/CoF proposals that tend to crop up in flocks like locust plagues 'round here, is that pretty much all of them make it excessively difficult, if not outright impossible, to get any sort of accuracy back. So many folks...so many folks...hold up the never-to-be-sufficiently-damned "A BattleTech Game™" logo on the website and say "WHY CAN I HIT STUFF IN MY A BATTLETECH GAME™?!"

Ahem!

Based on these 14 pages so far, you're the only one who sounds like his feathers are being plucked.

1453 R, on 16 June 2016 - 10:13 AM, said:

The Mystere answer, and this is why practically everything Mystere posts infuriates me, is that this person with the huge TC, the sensor/targeting-boosting equipment and modules, and the accuracy-focused, low-alpha loadout still can't hit s***, because being able to hit your target more than once in five shots just isn't A BattleTech Game™ enough.

In any non-automatic convergence system, if you are unable to mentally calculate the position of your weapons relative to your reticle, that's on you and no one else!

Edited by Mystere, 16 June 2016 - 10:30 AM.

[1453 R]

Mystere, on 16 June 2016 - 10:18 AM, said:

In any non-automatic convergence system, if you are unable to mentally calculate the position of your weapons relative to your reticle, that's on you and no one else!

1453 R, on 16 June 2016 - 10:13 AM, said:

Having to deal with motion-induced reticle sway, a'la 3PV? Perhaps some reticle jitter when you receive a heavy impact, or a bit of jitter when running hot? More severe motion-induced sway when moving particularly quickly - and conversely, less severe motion-induced sway when moving at slower/more vulnerable speeds? Heatscale effects not involving randomly-rolled ammo lolbooms or Sudden Naptimes in the bottom yellow - things like 'swimming vision/pilot heat stress' filters, reduced twist range/speed, sluggish accel/decel/turning, non-UAC weapon jams/energy misfires due to severe overheating? Those all actually sound like perfectly workable ideas I'd actually really like to try.

All this Cone of Failure garbage can go right out the airlock, though. A system wherein accuracy is reduced by multiple external factors needs to be balanced by accuracy also being increased by multiple external factors, and the skill is in finding ways to minimize the one and maximize the other. The same system, minus the "increased" modifiers, just p!sses off players for no worthwhile reason.

[Mystere]

1453 R, on 16 June 2016 - 10:35 AM, said:

Your blind hatred is still making you miss the point.


In a related note, I might have missed this one ...

wanderer, on 14 June 2016 - 12:49 PM, said:

You don't need random.

You just need to make sure all the guns don't hit the same spot.

You can use imperfect (but stable) convergence- weapons converge at a point that isn't equal to the target's range (and you can adjust it if the firer has sensor lock if you want to make it matter for more than Streak/LRM fire).
You can use stable divergence- weapons diverge by a set amount from center-of-crosshairs by hardpoint location.

Neither causes random fire, but both defocus damage, because that's the big problem. All damage, one point, easy-peasy.

Precisely. You can still aim your shots and hit exactly where you want to. You just have to decide which is more important to you: accuracy, precision, both, or somewhere in-between. Quite shockingly, though, "Mr. Ruffled Feathers" here does not seem to see that very fine point.

Edited by Mystere, 16 June 2016 - 11:19 AM.

[Bobzilla]

PGI wants to increase TTK, and adding mechanics that do this passively, no matter how well/bad you play, is just boring and adds nothing to the game and completely not related to skill in any way.

I know if I am fighting a less skilled enemy, I don't want his mistakes to be mitigated by armor and structure quirks and my opportunity penalized by a GH system. If I make dumb mistake the enemy can capitalize on, I should be punished hard for it, instead of me having another chance cause 'lol, longer TTK, i must be gud now'.

Edited by Bobzilla, 16 June 2016 - 11:19 AM.

[Pjwned]

1453 R, on 16 June 2016 - 10:13 AM, said:

Nobody, nobody, nobody seems to want that, though. All I ever see in these threads is the million and three things people want to tie into screwing with your aim, and yeah - it bothers me, a lot. All anyone ever wants to talk about is how many things should throw off your aim - moving should throw you off, shooting should throw you off, heating up should throw you off, taking fire should throw you off, steep enough inclines should throw you off.

When somebody asks "So what do you do to get your aim thrown back on? How do you drill through all that and hit stuff anyways; what systems are in place to let players compensate for the seething throngs of factors screwing with their aim? How can you get better at running MWO so that even though all of that stuff is messing with you, you can still end up awesome enough to hit what you shoot at?", the answer is a resounding...:

"...Uhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh...........?", followed in many cases by "...why do you want to? Didn't you play TT?!"

This is why lock-based convergence is good, because in addition to other reasons it does let you be "awesome enough to hit what you shoot at."

-It doesn't have a drastic effect on convergence, which is fine because convergence doesn't need to be mangled into bits, it just needs to be toned down.

-It allows pilots to retain their perfect accuracy and convergence with a simple and (usually) easy condition.

-It makes info warfare really matter a lot, because having a proper target lock is now always desirable, and sets a good reason for mechs to be different from each other in some aspects of info warfare which is a good foundation to have.

-It makes plenty of sense to have your shots be more accurate with a target lock. This isn't much of an argument by itself but it does help that the goal of toning down convergence isn't accomplished by some ridiculous nonsense like ghost damage on lasers.

Quote

All this Cone of Failure garbage can go right out the airlock, though. A system wherein accuracy is reduced by multiple external factors needs to be balanced by accuracy also being increased by multiple external factors, and the skill is in finding ways to minimize the one and maximize the other. The same system, minus the "increased" modifiers, just p!sses off players for no worthwhile reason.

I don't like cone of fire either for 2 main reasons.

1. I just don't like the idea of a cone of fire in MWO period. It does work in some other games like Counter Strike, but those games also play so much differently where time to kill is drastically different and player movement is drastically different and you're not really dealing with weapons that have 3.0+ second cooldowns which means missed shots (especially due to cone of fire) matter a lot more, etc.

2. There aren't many suggestions on how somebody can mitigate cone of fire, and the ones that are given are for the most part bad or not that great.

I know some people like the idea of better aim when not moving, but I think it's a really terrible idea to reward people for sitting on their *** camping 1 spot (more than they already do) while punishing the people that actually move and try to do something, and then of course we have to acknowledge that such a system impacts fast mechs (i.e lights) more than it does slow(er) mechs (i.e heavies & assaults) and I don't think we need more biases against lights.

Some (other?) people have suggested mech heat levels affecting cone of fire which could be kind of decent I guess, but I'm not wild about it because I don't really think it makes a whole lot of sense and it also requires the whole heat system to be revised, which does need to happen at some point but it makes things a lot more complicated; there is a solid basis for heat levels affecting aim in the Battletech source material though so that makes it something to not just disregard completely.

I'm not really aware of any other ideas (good or bad) to mitigate cone of fire aside from some arbitrary BS like making it based on damage potential of a volley, so if somebody wants to throw something out for me then you can but I probably still won't like it very much because I don't really like cone of fire.

Anyways, I don't see much in favor of cone of fire because I don't think it's a very good system in the first place and I can't think of any particularly good ways to let players mitigate cone of fire (managing heat levels being the best I can think of, which I'm not wild about), but when it comes to (the idea of) a lock-based convergence system all I can really see is positives (even if it may not be all positives in practice) so I think that's what should happen.

[1453 R]

Well, the other thing with Cone of Failure and Dumvergence and such is that Russ has just about openly stated that all of the game's existing hitreg fix code, HSR, and everything else that tries to correct the problems inherent in server-authoritative fire control is dependent on a single, predictable, trackable point of aim for weaponry. That's one of the biggest reasons why the weird, wonky, buggy and problematical delayed convergence all the old closed beta folks pine for so desperately was removed, if I recall correctly.

That's another reason why I believe reticle sway would be a better idea than Cone of Failure or the four thousand and seventeen varieties of (de)Convergence people keep throwing out there - the singular point of fire that the game's hitreg and HSR code relies on is preserved. It simply ends up moving around more than it usually does, in a way pilots have to learn to compensate for.

[Thunder Child]

Levi Porphyrogenitus, on 15 June 2016 - 01:28 PM, said:

Consider the following:

The reticule consists of two elements: a cross for the torso weapons and a circle for the arm weapons. As variables stack up, the circle goes from what is essentially a point to more of a proper circle, while the area encompassed by the open center of the cross likewise expands. At rest, with no heat or other factors in play, firing the arm weapons will land all shots within the arbitrarily small arm reticule, while firing the torso weapons will land all shots within the arbitrarily small area enclosed by the arms of the cross. At high precision reduction, the arm weapons will impact at the outside edges of the arm reticule circle, dividing them into what are essentially two tight groups. Similarly, torso weapons will impact at the inner edges of the arms of the cross, leading to up to four tight impact groups (head for the upper arm, CT for the lower arm, and STs for the horizontal arms).

Your accuracy remains 100%, but your precision is predictably reduced in a way that is reflected graphically. Now, additional effects might apply based on how the heat scale ends up performing (say, fuzzing the reticule or other HUD elements, which is a common choice for MW devs when relfecting heat effects). The Academy would naturally be updated to reflect this mechanic, and it'd apply another layer of skill when managing weapons during intense combat.

Thunder Child, on 15 June 2016 - 03:46 PM, said:

This man gets it. 1453 R, your hatred for CoF is sinking your own argument, due to the amount of hyperbole you apply to it.

I don't think anyone is asking for actual TT inaccuracy. They are asking for all the important modifiers that made TT what it was, to affect gameplay in MWO.

Right now, you could do a 360 aerial no-scope with quad PPCs at 90% heat while taking fire from the entire enemy team and perfectly hit that Jenner running at 140kph. Admittedly, that would be one HELL of a shot, but provided the relative latency is low, and you have quality gaming peripherals, it is achievable. Hyperbole, yes, but achievable.

What we (the TT nuts) want, is for these factors to make a difference. Something that a SKILLED player needs to compensate for. We are not asking for your shots to go in random directions when you fire an Alpha while moving. We are not asking for you to completely miss a Barn.... sorry, I mean Awesome at 270m, because you happen to be running at 75% heat.
Now, I may be wrong in this assumption on behalf of the TT Nuts, but what I believe we are after is what Levi described. Predictable Crosshair divergence, based on factors that are affecting your mech. So, high heat? A few mm's of deviation, meaning at 600m, your ST weapons might hit their ST instead of their CT. Running full speed, with High Heat? Your ST are now likely to hit the STs, but may still hit the CT, at 600m. Taking fire, while Jumping, at 90% heat? Your ST and arm weapons are probably going to hit their STs, maybe their arms, but may still hit the CT.

And all of this is Predictable, and accurate, divergence. So, even with all these factors in the mix, if you swing right a little, and fire the left side, and then swing left a little, and fire the right side, all your shots will still hit CT. It will just be in two salvos, instead of a single LOLDERP Alpha.
At least, I believe this is what the TT crowd are after. Not a World of Tanks Random CoF (which I have less issue with than their Tier system). Just skill modifiers based on conditions applied to your mech.

1453R. I get where you're coming from. Especially with your post at the top of Pg 14.
And yes, having all the E-war Equipment, while sacrificing Firepower, SHOULD give you aiming advantages over someone that runs ALL TEH WEPOONS!
What we are disagreeing with is that someone should have perfect convergence ALL THE TIME, no matter what they are doing. According to TT (yes, we get it, you hate TT and CoF), Heat gives negative modifiers from around 30% and higher, if you loosely try to translate the heat effects table. Moving at a run induces a negative modifier to hitting your target. Jump jetting even more so. Range and enemy movement modifiers are pretty much already covered by trying to hit a small target at long range while it's dodging, so we can safely ignore those.
What most of us "crusty old TT players" are after, is just to have things like heat and movement and taking fire actually affect your mech in some way, other than "Lol, at 90%, I can still alpha after I poptart". And if you read what Levi and I proposed, it's not a random WoT CoF (which I mind much less than their Tier system), but a predictable divergence based on extreme circumstances.
Run at 60% or higher heat? A minor divergence, that is really only noticeable at +600m or so. 80% or more? Noticeable at maybe, 550, or 500m. Bear in mind, by noticeable, your shots are not "flailing wildly", but rather they may hit an adjacent component to what you are targeting, as well as the one you were centred on. Add in running at 75% or higher throttle? It's noticable, but still not terrible, at 450m. Jump Jetting while at 80% heat, with throttle at 100%, while taking fire? At 270m+, you'll start to notice divergence, and some of your weapons may actually miss at 800m+.

We're not asking for TT, "Lol, need a 13 to hit". We're asking for things that SHOULD require more skill to compensate for as a pilot. And because the divergence is predictable (read what Levi wrote), you CAN manually compensate, even at maximum extremes. Also, remove the damned reticle shake while jumping. With the proposed divergence mechanic, it would no longer be necessary.

That is what we are after. Not WoT Cone of WTF.

[Levi Porphyrogenitus]

1453 R, on 16 June 2016 - 10:13 AM, said:

I get that most reasonable folks are basically hoping for enough deviation to split up a 70-point laser alpha between a couple of spots at long range. Personally, I don't see the point of exploding the system and inciting Balance Redux 2099 over a couple points of deviation, but even if you go with that...what happens if someone equips a TCVII, active probe, targeting modules, anything/everything she can do to improve her accuracy and eliminate deviation, even at the cost of firepower? They're trying for the surgeon's knife instead of the barbarian's axe - a couple of LPL, say, rather than five LPL, seventeen ML, eight SRM-6 and a rotary/2.

For the sake of saving some space, I will only quote this paragraph.

In a system where there is fixed precision reduction based on known and controllable variables, it would be trivially easy for Command Consoles or, better, Targeting Computers to mitigate those penalties, either by reducing them or by speeding up their decay (or even both).

[Mystere]

1453 R, on 16 June 2016 - 12:06 PM, said:

Well, the other thing with Cone of Failure and Dumvergence and such is that Russ has just about openly stated that all of the game's existing hitreg fix code, HSR, and everything else that tries to correct the problems inherent in server-authoritative fire control is dependent on a single, predictable, trackable point of aim for weaponry. That's one of the biggest reasons why the weird, wonky, buggy and problematical delayed convergence all the old closed beta folks pine for so desperately was removed, if I recall correctly.

Guess what? At any point in time, a "convergence on lock" mechanic does have only a single predictable and trackable point of aim. Heck, any fixed convergence system, even one with multiple convergence points (selectable via a mouse scroll wheel, for example), has it too.

And heck once again, you can for example make the IS Command Console more useful by giving it N convergence points and Clan TCx targeting computer N_x convergence points!!!

So once again, your hatred just blinds you to it.

Edited by Mystere, 16 June 2016 - 01:07 PM.

[Bishop Steiner]

Levi Porphyrogenitus, on 16 June 2016 - 12:34 PM, said:

For the sake of saving some space, I will only quote this paragraph.

In a system where there is fixed precision reduction based on known and controllable variables, it would be trivially easy for Command Consoles or, better, Targeting Computers to mitigate those penalties, either by reducing them or by speeding up their decay (or even both).

Yeah...I had actually pre clan invasion pointed out TCs as a reason for CoFs, too as it would give them an actual immersive use, instead of the html adjusters we have now.

[1453 R]

Mystere?

I've never blocked/ignored anyone on this forum, as I find it a rather self-defeating practice to selectively deafen yourself to part of an ongoing conversation that will still happen whether you like it or not.

But you are coming really damn close to making me see how it works out after all.

Anyways.

Why are people so absolutely, positively, no-other-options-can-possibly-exist dead-set DETERMINED to do something with convergence instead of entertaining any other possible solution? Piranha tried it - it was awful. Actively un-fun. When folks aren't pining for the days when putting twenty points of damage on someone was an accomplishment worthy of a screenshot and a brag thread, I keep hearing stories about weapons converging in wildly awkward, completely unintended and utterly nonsensical ways because their crosshair brushed a tree or some such.

'Fixed' convergence of any sort means your weapons ignore the crosshair altogether, which is as bad for new players as Ghost Heat is - "why doesn't anything I fire ever go where I'm aiming at?!" Delayed convergence has been tried and it sucked. Any (de)convergence system breaks hitreg and HSR, and is a much more complex thing to code than simple single-point reticle sway or even Cone of Failure (which also breaks hitreg and HSR completely but has the singular, dubious benefit of being easy to code, at least). And most proposed version of the system make it impossible to reconverge weapons for any sort of accurate shot, which I've spent fourteen pages (and many other pages in many other previous threads) hopefully illustrating is BAD and NOT ACCEPTABLE in a first-person shooting game, regardless of its A BattleTech Game™ness or not.

What is wrong with a 3PV-style reticle sway system, rather than break-the-game-again convergence fixes everyone keeps going on and on and on and on about?

Edited by 1453 R, 16 June 2016 - 01:51 PM.

[wanderer]

HSR got broken because of dynamic convergence- that is, it couldn't keep up with constantly having to adjust things.

If your convergence point is set, it draws the hits just fine the entire way even if your shot hits something else that gets in the way, like another 'Mech. It also adjusts just fine to instant adjustments, like suddenly passing your crosshair over a building or another 'Mech. Having a preset convergence that isn't the target won't cause any trouble, likewise having a convergence equal to (range of locked target).

Nor would preset deviations, as these would neither be dynamic nor random- merely a different initial point to draw the shot line. HSR would be unaffected.

[Pjwned]

Mystere, on 16 June 2016 - 01:00 PM, said:

Guess what? At any point in time, a "convergence on lock" mechanic does have only a single predictable and trackable point of aim. Heck, any fixed convergence system, even one with multiple convergence points (selectable via a mouse scroll wheel, for example), has it too.

And heck once again, you can for example make the IS Command Console more useful by giving it N convergence points and Clan TCx targeting computer N_x convergence points!!!

So once again, your hatred just blinds you to it.

More or less exactly what I was going to say.

1453 R, on 16 June 2016 - 01:50 PM, said:

Anyways.

Why are people so absolutely, positively, no-other-options-can-possibly-exist dead-set DETERMINED to do something with convergence instead of entertaining any other possible solution? Piranha tried it - it was awful. Actively un-fun. When folks aren't pining for the days when putting twenty points of damage on someone was an accomplishment worthy of a screenshot and a brag thread, I keep hearing stories about weapons converging in wildly awkward, completely unintended and utterly nonsensical ways because their crosshair brushed a tree or some such.

Because there's a difference between trying something bad while halfassing it and trying something good without halfassing it.

It should go without saying that PGI are expected to do a good job rather than take a good idea, turn it into complete ****, and then not ever be expected to do it properly just because they can't come up with a good idea themselves to save their lives.

Quote

'Fixed' convergence of any sort means your weapons ignore the crosshair altogether, which is as bad for new players as Ghost Heat is - "why doesn't anything I fire ever go where I'm aiming at?!"

That's not what it means at all, shooting too wide or shooting too narrow (by a matter of only a few meters in most cases) due to improper convergence is not a case of the damn crosshair being ignored entirely; that's such ridiculous hyperbole.

Quote

Delayed convergence has been tried and it sucked.

It mostly sucked because it broke the game, not because it was an entirely bad idea.

Quote

Any (de)convergence system breaks hitreg and HSR, and is a much more complex thing to code than simple single-point reticle sway or even Cone of Failure (which also breaks hitreg and HSR completely but has the singular, dubious benefit of being easy to code, at least).

Wrong, delayed convergence breaking hitreg and HSR doesn't automatically mean any other (de)convergence system would do the same, and saying this means you don't understand why delayed convergence in particular was a problem.

Quote

And most proposed version of the system make it impossible to reconverge weapons for any sort of accurate shot, which I've spent fourteen pages (and many other pages in many other previous threads) hopefully illustrating is BAD and NOT ACCEPTABLE in a first-person shooting game, regardless of its A BattleTech Game™ness or not.

Yep, I agree that a system that doesn't allow weapons to reconverge on the target would be bad because again convergence doesn't need to be completely dismantled.

Quote

What is wrong with a 3PV-style reticle sway system, rather than break-the-game-again convergence fixes everyone keeps going on and on and on and on about?

Because reticle sway, assuming it's affected by movement, would just make the game stagnate into peek-a-boo laser vomit even more than it already is and still not actually address convergence itself; it's also hardly different from cone of fire unless I'm somehow completely missing something with the idea.

I'm also not convinced by fear mongering BS that a more balanced convergence system would break the game because my expectations are that PGI not be a bunch of incompetent hacks, and if that's the main problem then they need to get off their *** and work on it so the game doesn't remain an unbalanced mess.

Edited by Pjwned, 16 June 2016 - 02:37 PM.

[Johnny Z]

I don't know the convergence idea seems to make the entire thing more complicated. I would rather see 16 vrs 16 or 32 vrs 32 instead and have a simple cap on damage.

[Mystere]

Johnny Z, on 16 June 2016 - 02:35 PM, said:

I don't know the convergence idea seems to make the entire thing more complicated. I would rather see 16 vrs 16 or 32 vrs 32 instead and have a simple cap on damage.

The problem with artificially capping damage is that it's, well, artificial.

A more desirable solution is making your damage potential be limited only by your own (lack of) skill.

As for a convergence system being more complicated (at the software level, which I assume is what you mean), that depends on the mechanism chosen. A "fixed convergence" system, for example, is actually simpler. The convergence point is always at vector X relative to the Mech.

[Mystere]

1453 R, on 16 June 2016 - 01:50 PM, said:

Mystere?

I've never blocked/ignored anyone on this forum, as I find it a rather self-defeating practice to selectively deafen yourself to part of an ongoing conversation that will still happen whether you like it or not.

But you are coming really damn close to making me see how it works out after all.

The level and type of discourse I send your way is directly proportional to how many insults and hysterical hyperbole you keep on spouting. As such, the onus is on you. Tone/calm down and I will do the same.

Edited by Mystere, 16 June 2016 - 02:59 PM.

[wanderer]

There's logical ways to restrain damage, even.

You can spread damage, mitigating alpha strikes.

You can put in a full heat system (and corresponding tweaks to lower heat weapons such as rate of fire and ammo loads/ton) so there's actual drawbacks to heat spikes below 100%.

Or, you can put in something weird like "power draw" and just go full PGItarded.

[Thunder Child]

1453 R.
Please, take a breath and clam down.

If you read what Levi and I wrote, at no point was there a mention of NOT being able to reconverge. Drop below 70% heat, and have your throttle below 70% (as ball park figures), and you have your perfect convergence back in the idea that was proposed.
At no point were we ever advocating the complete IMPOSSIBILITY of hitting your target.

What we are asking for is penalties to people going balls to the wall, ALL THE DAMNED TIME.

Mechwarrior should not be a run'n gun shooter. Not if it wants to try and stay true to lore. We are not asking for you to stand dead still, with 0 heat, just so you can maybe, maybe, make a shot hit. We are asking that when mechs are under strain due to stressing the reactor, or running too hot, that penalties come into play.

Personally, I like Levis' Predictable Divergence mechanic. That said, I could live with Crosshair sway based on a mechs throttle and movement characteristics, if we also got debuffs to agility when running hot. Maybe a sliding scale starting at 1% agility and top speed debuff at 50% Heat, going up to a negative 50% debuff at 100% heat. Ballpark figures, a starting point.
These could be the equivalent of aiming penalties when running hot, because as the mech becomes sluggish, it is harder to track targets. Though I like this idea less than the Divergence, I still think it would be an acceptable compromise.

At the end of the day, I'd just like to see penalties for pushing your mech too hard. Right now, the "skill" in hitting targets is based on the quality of your gaming rig and relative latency.

Edited by Thunder Child, 16 June 2016 - 03:18 PM.

[MischiefSC]

Quicksilver Kalasa, on 16 June 2016 - 09:55 AM, said:

This will never be addressed without giving super quirks in such a way that bracket builds don't sacrifice so much firepower compared to specialized build.

I don't remember which thread I put it in, but if a bracket build has around 75-80% the firepower of a specialized build, then a bracket build might be viable against the specialized build, but until that is the case, specialized builds (or superweapon builds as you call them) will always be the goto. The risk of having weapons that behave and are used in different situations is just never worth the reward currently, and won't without large and very targeted balance changes.

Sincere question - like what?

Pretend for a moment someone got bone weary of the missed potential in MWO and picked up the license after it runs out with a great team and a reasonable budget and wanted to double down on making it work.

What would this look like?