413 replies to this topic

[Snowbluff]

El Bandito, on 03 August 2016 - 08:44 PM, said:

3xSSRM6 = 9 tons. CLB10X = 10 tons. 3xSSRM6s can not only deals much higher damage to armor, it can completely screw over Lights. LB10X in the version you are advocating pales in comparison. 0.5 damage to armor is a stupid stupid idea.

Yeah, I think we have like 7 parts the SSRM will. So if about 3 missiles hit each part seperately it's like 6ish damage each. If I am reading it right, he means only half damage to armor from LBX10, so if a full blast hits one section it will do less (5 damage) than a complete spread from Streaks, right? o.0

Please don't adjust the damage directly.

[Strum Wealh]

Koniving, on 02 August 2016 - 03:00 PM, said:

Though this leaves me wondering about the path of destruction that is 'left out' of this explanation when we go this route. We should have small explosions going in a cone, affecting potentially multiple targets especially as we go further out. And with this fluff explanation, we're left with something that doesn't quite fit.

To a point, that consideration is at least partially addressed by the Multiple Targets rule for LB-X cluster rounds (Tactical Operations, pg. 100).

"For an LB-X autocannon firing a cluster shot, make a single to-hit roll against the highest to-hit number plus 1. If all damage is applied to the first target after a roll on the Cluster Hit Table, then no additional damage is applied to the second target. However, if some of the damage missed the target, use that 'missed' Damage Value as the new number to roll on the Cluster Hit Table to determine what damage struck the second target. For example, a controlling player rolls a 7 on the Cluster Hit Table roll for an LB 10-X, resulting in six 1-point Damage Value groupings hitting the first target. That leaves 4 damage and so the controlling player would then roll on the 4 column of the Cluster Hit Table to see what damage is applied to the second target."

As "both targets must be in adjacent hexes and within range of the weapon", this would indicate that a single LB-X cluster round could be spread/"walked" across two targets that are as much as 30 meters apart (e.g. center-to-center distance of laterally adjacent (relative to the viewpoint of the attacker) hexes).
However, it is obvious that spreading the damage between two targets 30 meters apart at a range of 100 meters requires a very different (and much larger) spread angle than spreading the damage between two targets 30 meters apart at a range of 500 meters (on the order of ~8.62 degrees at the weapon's muzzle for 100 meters versus ~1.72 degrees at the weapon's muzzle for 500 meters).

Shrapnel-style proximity-detonated or timer-detonated shells, by their very nature, cannot achieve that level of flexibility/variability in their spread, as they tend (by design) to focus their submunition release in a relatively narrow area in front of the shell's path-of-travel (see the Wikipedia graphic, below) - which, incidentally, is one of the main reasons why some MWO players have advocated for that style of implementation (see Bishop's graphic here).

"The explosive charge in the shell was to be just enough to break the casing rather than scatter the shot in all directions. As such his invention increased the effective range of canister shot from 300 to about 1100 m."
"In addition to a denser pattern of musket balls, the retained velocity could be higher as well, since the shrapnel shell as a whole would likely have a higher ballistic coefficient than the individual musket balls."

That exact problem can - and, since approximately 1950, has in reality - been addressed in real-world shotguns by the idea of an adjustable choke mechanism.
Imagine: a servo-driven variable/adjustable choke system slaved to the "Mercury-VII targeting system" (cast as essentially a dedicated gun data computer for the LB-X ACs which is, in turn, slaved to the 'Mech's Targeting-Tracking System (which serves as a director/predictor)) with the choke being set to "fully open" when firing LB-X slugs or when firing LB-X cluster rounds at extremely close range (to allow for relatively wide spread), being set to "full choke" when firing LB-X cluster rounds at long-range targets (to allow for narrow spread, to concentrate damage against distant targets), and having intermediate settings for targets at intermediate ranges (where the Mercury-VII unit automatically adjusts the gun's choke setting based on the range-to-target).
The presence of such a system would help to explain the high price difference of the LB-X weapon itself (400k c-bills for a LB 10-X, vs 200k c-bills for a standard AC/10), as well as the lack of ammo interchangeability (e.g. why a LB-X AC of a given bore size cannot simply fire standard AC rounds of the same bore size, instead requiring specialized "standard-esque" rounds that cost twice as much (12k c-bills/ton for LB 10-X "slug" rounds, vs 6k c-bills/ton for AC/10 standard rounds), which would be designed to account for the presence of a choke mechanism on the LB-X weapon).

Edited by Strum Wealh, 03 August 2016 - 08:56 PM.

[Snowbluff]

I would like the shells detonate/spread based on rangefinder distance. It would help the ranged performance, and would look cool if they added a little animation for when it detonated (with a little poof and the canister bouncing).

The concept reminds me of the contemporary M25.

Edited by Snowbluff, 03 August 2016 - 09:01 PM.

[davoodoo]

El Bandito, on 03 August 2016 - 04:39 AM, said:

Light mechs might get disproportionately shafted though. Not only many of them have mere 10-20 armor per section, their internals are also of low value and get busted by your 100% crit real fast.

Um what??

Criticals dont do any extra dmg to structure and any piece of equipment on light mech is as durable as on any other mech.
Maybe if you had a light which rolls gauss with xl, but are there any?? Even then youre looking at 1-3 pellets hitting this specific part and critting exactly this one gauss and not anything else.

Edited by davoodoo, 03 August 2016 - 11:09 PM.

[El Bandito]

davoodoo, on 03 August 2016 - 10:52 PM, said:

Um what??

Criticals dont do any extra dmg to structure and any piece of equipment on light mech is as durable as on any other mech.
Maybe if you had a light which rolls gauss with xl, but are there any??

Pretty sure LBX as well as MG criticals do extra damage to structures.

[davoodoo]

El Bandito, on 03 August 2016 - 11:07 PM, said:

Pretty sure LBX as well as MG criticals do extra damage to structures.

Nope.

If you hit with 1 pellet of lbx you currently do 1 dmg to structure(ofc if you could crit armor it would be 1 armor dmg) and a chance to do 2/4/6 dmg to equipment within that part.

http://mwo.gamepedia.com/Critical_Hit
"A critical hit is defined as damage to equipment that takes up critical space."

Edited by davoodoo, 03 August 2016 - 11:25 PM.

[El Bandito]

davoodoo, on 03 August 2016 - 11:22 PM, said:

Nope.

If you hit with 1 pellet of lbx you currently do 1 dmg to structure(ofc if you could crit armor it would be 1 armor dmg) and a chance to do 2/4/6 dmg to equipment within that part.

http://mwo.gamepedia.com/Critical_Hit
"A critical hit is defined as damage to equipment that takes up critical space."

Even if you are right, the comment I was replying to focused on crit mechanism to the internals.

Edited by El Bandito, 03 August 2016 - 11:41 PM.

[davoodoo]

El Bandito, on 03 August 2016 - 11:37 PM, said:

Even if you are right, the comment I was replying to focused on crit mechanism to the internals.

Everything but ecm, gauss ac20(probably forgot some) got 10 hp theres also engine with 15hp which cant be destroyed...

Lets take some champion mech, for example locust 1e.
http://mwo.smurfy-ne...b#i=396&l=stock

First you break 2 points of armor on arm by staring at it intesively...
Now 12 slots, 4 rerolls, 2 mlas, 6 dhs. So 1/2 chance to crit 1 dhs, 1/6 chance to crit mlas.
6 structure hp, 10 armor left, 16 pellets worth of hp total
So 0-1 6 dmg, 3-4 4 dmg, 5-7 2 dmg, 5-6 0 dmg.
Lets take best scenario.
You managed to crit mlas on right arm, 6 dmg 4dmg, mlas dead, 2nd mlas 4 4 4 destroyed, dhs 2 2 2 2 2 dead, mind you now it got no armor. rest of the pellets non crits.

And now lets be honest, how much pellets do you hope will crit arm of running locust?? 0?? 1?? 2 at best.
You just wasted 3 to 5 shots(assuming you hit arm every time) to destroy weapons in single arm of locust, while ac10 or ppc would blow whole arm off in 2 hits and 3 mpl or 2 lpl would do it in single alpha.
Hell 3 to 5 shots with lbx will be 7.5-12.5 seconds. 4mgs would blow the arm within 4 seconds and probably crit more(12.5 shots per second each having a 67% total of criting dealing 1/2/3 dmg, it will take 2.5seconds to burn through armor, and in 1.5s theyll spit 75 bullets out of which 50 will crit 29 for 1 dmg,16-17 for 2dmg, 4-5 for 3 dmg, so 74-75 crit dmg)

Edited by davoodoo, 04 August 2016 - 12:44 AM.

[El Bandito]

davoodoo, on 04 August 2016 - 12:30 AM, said:

Everything but ecm, gauss ac20(probably forgot some) got 10 hp theres also engine with 15hp which cant be destroyed...

Lets take some champion mech, for example locust 1e.
http://mwo.smurfy-ne...b#i=396&l=stock

First you break 2 points of armor on arm by staring at it intesively...
Now 12 slots, 4 rerolls, 2 mlas, 6 dhs. So 1/2 chance to crit 1 dhs, 1/6 chance to crit mlas.
6 structure hp, 10 armor left, 16 pellets worth of hp total
So 0-1 6 dmg, 3-4 4 dmg, 5-7 2 dmg, 5-6 0 dmg.
Lets take best scenario.
You managed to crit mlas on right arm, 6 dmg 4dmg, mlas dead, 2nd mlas 4 4 4 destroyed, dhs 2 2 2 2 2 dead, mind you now it got no armor. rest of the pellets non crits.

And now lets be honest, how much pellets do you hope will crit arm of running locust?? 0?? 1?? 2 at best.
You just wasted 3 to 5 shots(assuming you hit arm every time) to destroy weapons in single arm of locust, while ac10 or ppc would blow whole arm off in 2 hits and 3 mpl or 2 lpl would do it in single alpha.
Hell 3 to 5 shots with lbx will be 7.5-12.5 seconds. 4mgs would blow the arm within 2 seconds and probably crit more.

All this only serves to my argument on just why current LBX sucks and why buffs such as increased pellet damage is necessary for it.

[Xetelian]

I think the LBX debate is silly. It is a bad weapon, end of discussion. The idea that one less slot and one less ton make the IS LBX10 usable is untrue, if you can't fit 2 AC10s then you need to drop down to UAC5s or AC5s, there is no gain from taking an LBX weapon instead of 2 UAC5s or 2 AC5s.

I think LBX needs to do more damage and have its spread lessened even more. The only time you're doing full damage to one component is when you're 5m away from the nose on a Stalker.


You PRO-LBX users need to learn how to use a REAL weapon. I can put up 1400+ damage with 4 LBX10s on a DWF but that doesn't mean I did anything meaningful. You may be seeing damage done as a sign of greatness but it isn't all about how much damage you did when you could have killed 7+ mechs with that damage and didn't.


The guy who takes 2 LBX10s on a MAD is handicapping his mech but since he probably did 500 damage once he thinks its awesome.


3 AC5s on that STD 300 is only 2 more tons and WAAAY better .5 more DPS and its all in one place
2 UAC5s and a solid laser option is just as good as 3 AC5s if not better

Don't put 2 LBX cannons on anything, and certainly don't take 22 tons of ballistics on a mech when you can't also take an XL engine. You are seriously bad at building MADs if you do.

[davoodoo]

El Bandito, on 04 August 2016 - 12:37 AM, said:

All this only serves to my argument on just why current LBX sucks and why buffs such as increased pellet damage is necessary for it.

At this point lbx is more useless than single ac2.
2 dmg per pellet would give it more firepower than ac5 at 400m, still weight difference and cooldown.
Ac10 and uac5 are both still more powerful.

So how much dmg?? 3 dmg would probably make it on par with uac5 and completely outclass ac10.

Edited by davoodoo, 04 August 2016 - 01:01 AM.

[El Bandito]

davoodoo, on 04 August 2016 - 12:59 AM, said:

At this point lbx is more useless than single ac2.
2 dmg per pellet would give it more firepower than ac5 at 400m, still weight difference and cooldown.
Ac10 and uac5 are both still more powerful.

So how much dmg?? 3 dmg would probably make it on par with uac5 and completely outclass ac10.

I already stated in my first post that LBX needs 1.4 or 1.5 damage per pellet to be useful without quirks.

[davoodoo]

El Bandito, on 04 August 2016 - 01:37 AM, said:

I already stated in my first post that LBX needs 1.4 or 1.5 damage per pellet to be useful without quirks.

We are looking 1/2/4/2/1 spread at 400m and 2/6/2 at 200m

1.5 dmg is nowhere near enough to make it better than ac5 at 400m or better than srm or ac10 at 200m.

Edited by davoodoo, 04 August 2016 - 02:00 AM.

[MW Waldorf Statler]

Oh No...Weapons make Damage ...wtf , thats not AI Warrior Online ,and Wepaons have Damage Effects live with this or play Ken&Barbie ,all the Whining about Weapons bring unbalance an stupid Ideas by trying to balanced the Whining...the Maingun of a Abrams M1 make more Damage as the MG of a Humvee ...Battlefield is unbalanced..all will a free Mechlab, and not the Problems with to many Weapons/ammo and boating of this

Edited by Old MW4 Ranger, 04 August 2016 - 02:07 AM.

[El Bandito]

davoodoo, on 04 August 2016 - 01:58 AM, said:

We are looking 1/2/4/2/1 spread at 400m and 2/6/2 at 200m

1.5 dmg is nowhere near enough to make it better than ac5 at 400m or better than srm or ac10 at 200m.

I believe 1.5 is a great place to start. If you think it needs to be higher then that's where we differ.

[davoodoo]

El Bandito, on 04 August 2016 - 02:10 AM, said:

I believe 1.5 is a great place to start. If you think it needs to be higher then that's where we differ.

Im against dmg increase.

I would rather see lbx firing slugs and ac10 being buffed cause it isnt in good spot either.


Thats a sure way to make both useful and for both of those fluff had answer. Namely lbx mechanics and specialty ammo and specialty ammo also creates precedent to buff ac5 which is meh at best and ac2 which sux badly.

Edited by davoodoo, 04 August 2016 - 02:19 AM.

[El Bandito]

davoodoo, on 04 August 2016 - 02:13 AM, said:

Im against dmg increase.

I would rather see lbx firing slugs and ac10 being buffed cause it isnt in good spot either.

Thats a sure way to make both useful and for both of those fluff had answer. Namely lbx mechanics and specialty ammo.

Clearly you haven't been around in the forums long enough. We already tried pestering PGI about giving LBX switchable ammo between slug and cluster, since 2012. PGI already admitted that they are incapable of coding alternate ammo selection of LBX. So there is no way LBX in MWO can fire both slug and cluster, per lore.

Therefore I am trying to come up with a much simpler balance alternative--simple enough for the dunderheads in PGI to implement. Understood?

Edited by El Bandito, 04 August 2016 - 02:23 AM.

[davoodoo]

El Bandito, on 04 August 2016 - 02:21 AM, said:

Clearly you haven't been around in the forums long enough. We already tried pestering PGI about giving LBX switchable ammo between slug and cluster, since 2012. PGI already admitted that they are incapable of coding alternate ammo selection of LBX. So there is no way LBX in MWO can fire both slug and cluster, per lore.

Therefore I am trying to come up with a much simpler alternative. Understood?

Ive been here and i dont ask for switchable ammo.

I ask for prebuilt lb10x which can fire slugs and another prebuilt lb10x which can fire clusters...

Nothing more than xml editing required.

Edited by davoodoo, 04 August 2016 - 02:23 AM.

[El Bandito]

davoodoo, on 04 August 2016 - 02:22 AM, said:

Ive been here and i dont ask for switchable ammo.

I ask for prebuilt lb10x which can fire slugs and another prebuilt lb10x which can fire clusters...

Nothing more than xml editing required.

That's just silly. Why should PGI create a standalone slug firing LBX, while AC10 exists? It would be redundant.

Edited by El Bandito, 04 August 2016 - 02:25 AM.

[davoodoo]

El Bandito, on 04 August 2016 - 02:24 AM, said:

That's just silly. Why should PGI create a slug firing LBX, while AC10 exists?

To make lbx worth anything.

If you couple it with armor piercing ac10 or precision ac10 or hell even incendiary ac10(imo worth extra ton)
There would be place for both and maybe ppl would actually pick ac10 over uac5 99% of time.

Edited by davoodoo, 04 August 2016 - 02:28 AM.