51 replies to this topic

[Quicksilver Aberration]

davoodoo, on 21 August 2016 - 11:45 AM, said:

It is too low along with heat dissipation.

http://mwo.smurfy-ne...51428e0ef4d2eee
This thing wouldnt be able to ever overheat without taking assault lance worth of inferno ammo in tt.
38 heat generated by weapons(82 dmg alpha with double tap btw), 2 by movement, 50 dissipated

Here it can fire for 12 seconds... 3 alphas...

I don't think you get the point of heat in the mechwarrior series, heat management wouldn't really be a thing if builds like that were allowed to be heat neutral, regardless of how it was in TT, this isn't TT.

[Vincent Quatermain]

An easier fix to the OP's issue would be to simply put on your Imagination Caps and consider that the new system is merely what was being abstracted in the TT Heat Scale. This solution is free, and can be implemented instantly.

Why have PGI spend dev time on an equally complex mechanic that serves the same purpose as Energy Draw, just so that grognards can be happy with the name ascribed to the mechanic?

[Draconeran]

Quicksilver Kalasa, on 21 August 2016 - 12:06 AM, said:

So question I keep coming to is why do we need energy draw on top of heat?

First, ideally heat should be taking into account different ranges and damage outputs, something that is missing from energy draw, even the way it groups things isn't granular enough.

Second, energy draw still relies on heat to dole out punishment to any mech that abuses power draw.

So here is the idea, get rid of energy draw, and separate heat into three 'stages':

• Safe zone: Heat incurred in this zone is unpunished, could be set to 30, or maybe a bit higher.
  
• Penalty zone: Heat incurred here is punished with a penalty ramp up the higher up the heat you go, ideally you would see the penalty in the UI by some kinda of special color as some have suggested in other threads. This would also be where you add flavor "penalties" like HUD flickering or maybe some extra cockpit stuff going to or maybe even a slight slowdown. Maybe this could be at double the safe zone?
  
• Shutdown zone: Once you reach a certain amount of heat you shutdown. This would have a special max though, that when hit (like if you alpha'd right before the instant shutdown) you would instantly suicide kinda like how it is with the 120 energy draw instant suicide. This zone doesn't necessarily need to be displayed through the HUD (but could be displayed in the cockpit) since you are shutdown at this point. I would imagine something like being triple the safe zone would suffice for the capacity.

Some caveats:

• This means that heat sinks would no longer affect capacity (which is probably for the best) except in the choice between SHS and DHS, installing one or the other may increase capacity, but adding heat sinks beyond the default 10 engine heat sinks will not increase this further which is really one of the keys to this.
  
• Quirks should be used to control mechs to potentially force them into a specific role of DPS or burst, or give mechs stuck with unfortunate hardpoint type spreads with more capacity/dissipation to allow better DPS in spite of their unfortunate hardpoints.
  
• Gauss seriously needs heat, can we stop ignoring this and stop creating stupid artificial rules for it like gauss charge limits or putting a hard limit on how many gauss a mech can mount?
  
• Some weapons may still need their heat values adjusted (like SRMs).

Things to keep in mind:

• For DPS builds, capacity controls how long a DPS build can keep up holding down the trigger for all weapons while dissipation controls the DPS of the build once it has reached capacity.
  
• For alpha builds, capacity should control what is a reasonable alpha, while dissipation should control how long before it can be repeated.

I am still unsure on this idea just like I am unsure of energy draw itself, but this tries to combine the concepts into one to make reduce the necessity of managing two resources at once and simplifies the balance between the two given they have the same reasons for existence.

I like this idea. Our current heat scale is not to the right % if you actually count it out. I would like to see a system like the one mentioned above with a few changes to the UI.

1. Set 100% mark to the heat sink cap of mech.

2. Set a percent marker where shutdown occurs. I.E. either +15% over max or 15 cooling points over max (TT ref is 14)

3. So mention safe (green) zone would be mechs heat capacity, penalty zone (yellow to orange) would be from 100% capacity to Shutdown level mentioned above, Shutdown zone (red) would be the end of the bar.

4. Change the heat bar to be color coded instead on a little icon below. We need to have a HUD the provides all information is a clean simple way, have to look at an icon to see what stage of heat your in does not work. Also add a line indicator showing your 100% mark on suggested bar. I created an example bar an loaded to google drive.

https://drive.google...iew?usp=sharing

5. I haven't notice a big change yet with the heat bar on my builds. I affected my four LL stalker a little but not significant the I wouldn't bring it or alpha with it. BTW this build shouldn't be able to work 18 DHS x 2 (I know MWO doesn't give DHS 2) =36, IS LL is 7 heat x 6 = 42 heat. so standing still I make more heat that I can prevent! Yet you see builds like this all the time. Energy bar does not prevent this build it just add a small quirk to it. All it did was move ghost heat to a bar!.... enough said!

Edited by Draconeran, 21 August 2016 - 01:15 PM.

[Malcolm Vordermark]

Not sure I agree with the particular solution you have suggested, but I do agree with the general idea PGI should rework heat. They're basically adding a system to help another system do its job. I'd rather they fixed the broken system.

The current system doesn't really do anything to reduce damage output, it just splits it up a bit. Meanwhile, this one-two punch style (or continuous stream of dakka) leads to a lot more staring contests, which detracts from one of the more, in my opinion, interesting aspects of game play: torso twisting.

[davoodoo]

Quicksilver Kalasa, on 21 August 2016 - 12:04 PM, said:

I don't think you get the point of heat in the mechwarrior series, heat management wouldn't really be a thing if builds like that were allowed to be heat neutral, regardless of how it was in TT, this isn't TT.

Why not??

If you use tonnage for dhs then you dont use that tonnage for weaponry.
Very few stock loadouts in tt are heat neutral and would rather have some extra oomph when needed at the price of heat buildup.

Heat neutral build will always be underarmed compared to build which sacrifices heat efficiency for more dmg.

Edited by davoodoo, 21 August 2016 - 03:21 PM.

[Quicksilver Aberration]

davoodoo, on 21 August 2016 - 03:21 PM, said:

If you use tonnage for dhs then you dont use that tonnage for weaponry.

Which means boats can use it to abuse alphas more frequent. It also means ballistics have less of an advantage over energy weapons.

[davoodoo]

Quicksilver Kalasa, on 21 August 2016 - 03:55 PM, said:

Which means boats can use it to abuse alphas more frequent. It also means ballistics have less of an advantage over energy weapons.

Smaller alphas more frequent...

I can make heat neutral mech which will kill assault in 4 alphas or i can make mech which will overheat after 3 alphas which kills assault in 2 alphas...
Guess which one is more beneficial

And no they really wont have, especially uacs which got superb dmg per ton ratio. Dhs also take plenty of slots for low tonnage

Edited by davoodoo, 21 August 2016 - 04:13 PM.

[Quicksilver Aberration]

davoodoo, on 21 August 2016 - 04:03 PM, said:

especially uacs which got superb dmg per ton ratio.

UACs have nothing on energy weapons, they have the best dmg per ton ratio, that is their selling point, their whole drawback is supposed to be heat, if you boost dissipation too far, they will be all you see. Sorry, but for this game, energy weapons should not be heat neutral, even those that are supposed to in TT.

[Moonlight Grimoire]

I think i missed exactly how you would have DHS influence heat cap vs SHS, I know you said it only mattered for the first 10 heat sinks as those are the ones required to run the engine. Would DHS put the cap at 60 instead of 30? Or would it put it at something more like 40?

Outside of that, I like this idea, hell just the first step of setting heat capacity at 30 for everything alone is enough if DHS were twice as powerful as SHS. Become a huge fan of this idea since I saw it earlier today and saw how combat was back when there were no DHS so heat cap was far lower. Was also mentioned after DHS showed up GH came too to try to balance the huge heat capacity that now existed.

[Quicksilver Aberration]

Moonlight Grimoire, on 21 August 2016 - 08:11 PM, said:

Would DHS put the cap at 60 instead of 30? Or would it put it at something more like 40?

To balance SHS vs DHS, SHS would have the higher cap to make up for the lack of dissipation, how much so I have no clue on, maybe 50% more?

[davoodoo]

Quicksilver Kalasa, on 21 August 2016 - 07:33 PM, said:

UACs have nothing on energy weapons, they have the best dmg per ton ratio, that is their selling point, their whole drawback is supposed to be heat, if you boost dissipation too far, they will be all you see. Sorry, but for this game, energy weapons should not be heat neutral, even those that are supposed to in TT.

Their drawback was lower accuracy and lack of specialised ammo. Heat per shot stays the same as with normal ac, higher range and ability to fire 2 shells per cycle and its not like you already have uac20 capable of producing 40 dmg for 14 heat, less than single erppc with 10/2.5/2.5 dmg or uac10 with 20 dmg for 6 heat or uac5 10 dmg for 2 heat.

Also
http://mwo.smurfy-ne...b#i=349&l=stock
4 uac5, capable of over 5 minutes of sustained fire assuming no jam, if any jams then you they are heat neutral...

You havent given any argument why energy shouldnt be heat neutral, it boils down to just because this game.
You could get stupid amounts of energy and enough heat sinks to cool them in any previous mechwarrior game so it being fps is flawed argument and previous games proves it can work...
And if you want to say because huge alphas then i would like to point to tt where 100 dmg alpha when mechs had half of mwo armor wasnt something unheard of. Kdk-1 in its stock configuration carries 118 alpha

Edited by davoodoo, 21 August 2016 - 10:23 PM.

[Greyhart]

I had a quick go with the new system, which is likely an improvement over the old but needs work. The problem with anything tied to heat in MWO is why should I care.

Other than the competitive crowd heat from 0% to 99% is irrelevant for the most part. competitive crowd might be more interested in heat efficiency.

If I could only get one alpha off without shutting down I would probably do that then change to chain fire riding the 99% mark. Being able to place the most damage in one section is the important bit. If I then need to go hide for a couple of seconds then I go hide. During a match I am not generally calculating heat or energy draw I am looking at how high the heat is and asking can I fire or not?

If extra heat is added through GH or ED doesn't really make a difference. ED is better because it is clearer and more adjustable.

in order to make heat matter it needs to have additional effects before the shutdown and likely needs have a lower cap. this would make the decision to fire more interesting rather than a binary will this shut me down yes/no.

And lets face it with long range weapon people sit behind buildings and poke so heat cooling is not an issue because they'll just wait a second or 2 more.

If you want to really promote mixed build then there should be a minimum range on weapons too. We all know that IS LRMs/ PPCs have a minimum range and therefore usually people bring something for close encounters. We also know that if we see someone with LRMs only we get in close as they can't hurt us. That mechanic creates diversity in builds and discourages boating.

[Steve Pryde]

We need no ghost heat if we would have a proper heat scale. Let the guys do high heat alphas but then your mech should extremly slow down, your cockpit begins to flicker or something like that, it worked in previously Mechwarrior titles. And if your heat scale gets into the red zone your ammo could explode because of the high heat.

Pls no garbage energy draw system that's like ghost heat 2.0, that helps nothing.

Edited by Steve Pryde, 22 August 2016 - 04:43 AM.

[ScarecrowES]

Playing the PTS with ED, I keep coming back to what Quicksilver is basically saying... at the point we adjust ED to do everything we want it to do, all we'll have done is created a second heat scale with a somewhat lower cap.

Why not just cut out ED and make that change directly?

I'm not sure exactly how that would be best tuned... maybe a combination of various ideas would be best... but the basics of the OP proposal seem to be where we're headed anyway, and doesn't require a whole separate system on top of it to work.

Maybe it's time to stop applying band aids and address the system directly?

[Quicksilver Aberration]

davoodoo, on 21 August 2016 - 10:12 PM, said:

Their drawback was lower accuracy and lack of specialised ammo.

Specialized ammo isn't a huge selling point since it only meant you were missing out on 2 things, LBX cluster ammo and precision AC ammo. Precision is nice but with pulse not really necessary (though is nicer for IS since the range difference between pulse and ACs is a little more stark). Lower accuracy though? What are you talking about? Wub had -2 to-hit modifier and VSPLs could get -3 at short range. Sure energy weapons didn't have something that hit as hard as Heavy Gauss or AC20s but they were close enough with PPCs and LPLs.

davoodoo, on 21 August 2016 - 10:12 PM, said:

http://mwo.smurfy-ne...b#i=349&l=stock
4 uac5, capable of over 5 minutes of sustained fire assuming no jam, if any jams then you they are heat neutral...

Why are you using an example from MWO? Lasers can't be heat neutral so of course 4 UAC5 has incredible DPS compared to lasers, that's to make up for how you can't stack them like you can lasers, that's the trade-off.......

davoodoo, on 21 August 2016 - 10:12 PM, said:

You havent given any argument why energy shouldnt be heat neutral, it boils down to just because this game.

I have, you just ignore it every time with bogus reasons.

Edited by Quicksilver Kalasa, 22 August 2016 - 07:03 AM.

[Quicksilver Aberration]

Greyhart, on 22 August 2016 - 04:20 AM, said:

in order to make heat matter it needs to have additional effects before the shutdown and likely needs have a lower cap.

Most additional effects are just as binary as shutdown, they are either inconsequential or allow for catastrophic events, so this isn't really necessary. Heat is just meant to limit damage whether it is burst or sustained.

Greyhart, on 22 August 2016 - 04:20 AM, said:

And lets face it with long range weapon people sit behind buildings and poke so heat cooling is not an issue because they'll just wait a second or 2 more.

That 2 seconds between shots matters a lot for a team that is getting pushed. That means that is 2 seconds you aren't sharing armor or doing damage.

Greyhart, on 22 August 2016 - 04:20 AM, said:

If you want to really promote mixed build then there should be a minimum range on weapons too.

No one brought up mixed builds in this discussion, it is irrelevant.

[Draconeran]

The new system feel like a bad explanation of ghost heat. I tested it on several runs yesterday and it didn't seem to affect very many of my builds. It helped my opponent's Blackjack build and hinder a few of his clan boats. I don't see any benefit to the current concept or function of it.

[davoodoo]

Quicksilver Kalasa, on 22 August 2016 - 07:02 AM, said:

Specialized ammo isn't a huge selling point since it only meant you were missing out on 2 things, LBX cluster ammo and precision AC ammo. Precision is nice but with pulse not really necessary (though is nicer for IS since the range difference between pulse and ACs is a little more stark). Lower accuracy though? What are you talking about? Wub had -2 to-hit modifier and VSPLs could get -3 at short range. Sure energy weapons didn't have something that hit as hard as Heavy Gauss or AC20s but they were close enough with PPCs and LPLs.


Why are you using an example from MWO? Lasers can't be heat neutral so of course 4 UAC5 has incredible DPS compared to lasers, that's to make up for how you can't stack them like you can lasers, that's the trade-off.......


I have, you just ignore it every time with bogus reasons.

You forgot ap ammo and through armor crits it allowed.
As for uac you had the rule saying no called shots unless fired in single shot mode.
"Total Warfare updated the rules to specify that Pulse Lasers (including Variable Speed Pulse Lasers and X-Pulse Lasers) as well as multi-shot firing autocannon cannot aim their fire, unless the affected autocannon are fired in single shot mode. In addition, an LB-X autocannon only receives the benefits if it is firing solid rounds instead of cluster ammunition."

Lasers can be heat neutral and tbh boating mediums yields good results in general, at low heat too.
http://mwo.smurfy-ne...eb50c07bb14c323
Fill tonnage with mlas, 42 heat generated, 42 heat dissipated 3025 tech lvl 70 dmg heat neutral alpha...
http://mwo.smurfy-ne...ab#i=16&l=stock
this does 62 dmg and generates 3 heat per alpha.

Quicksilver Kalasa, on 21 August 2016 - 07:33 PM, said:

Sorry, but for this game, energy weapons should not be heat neutral, even those that are supposed to in TT.

This is not argument, this is saying "because this game".

[Lostdragon]

Ghost heat and power draw are bandaids. Power draw tries to fix what ghost heat cannot by indirectly adding heat to the Gauss Rifle. If the Gauss Rifle generated an appropriate amount of heat for its damage/range then it would not be necessary to come up with silly secondary sources of heat like ghost heat and power draw.

It is long past time to add heat to the GR because the low heat mechanic simply does not work for such a powerful weapon in a game like this. Not all TT rules can be carried over into a shooter style game and for the sake of balance it is time for the GR to generate some more heat than it does now.

Look at all the tremendous failures that have been attempted to stop GR and PPC synergy. They work great together because they do PPFLD and have low and high heat profiles respectively. Both weapons have been nerfed significantly to try to adrress this but the nerfs are in the wrong stats (such as PPC velocity). The heat synergy has to be broken, and not by penalizing PPCs as PGI has already tried, but by adding heat to the GR. If you do this then both weapons can still be usable on their own or in combination of 1-2 PPCs and a GR or 2 GR and a PPC but if you don't directly add heat to the GR you wind up with silly mechanics like ghost heat andnpower draw to try to limit the PPFLD these weapons can do.

There is an easier solution that does not involve new mechanics. Set the heat cap to a hard cap (maybe this needs to be done per chassis or weight class, maybe not). Make heatsinks good at removing heat, but don't let them add heat capacity. Set the heat of weapons based on damage, range, spread, burn time, CD, etc. Adjust those variables as necessary, then you can easily limit how much PPFLD can reasonably he done without punishing brawlers that need to be able to fire and twist or builds that rely on weapons with inherent damage spread.

Some weapons might have to have relatively low heat values for this to work but that can he balanced with CD or other variables. I would much prefer to see something like this being tested instead of power draw because what will wind up happening is weapons will have to have an additional power draw stat. The current implementation is untenable because everything takes a relatively low penalty for excess power draw. Some weapons will wind up having higher or lower draw to compensate for their strengths and weaknesses and then you wind up having to do more and more complicated math to figure out if a build works or not when it should be as simple as knowing "at x heat I shut down and it takes y seconds to dissipate 100% heat so therefore I can/can't fire all these weapons at once". Then it is easy to figure out weapon groupings and stagger interval of groups. Power draw will make this much more complicated and less intuitive because, just like ghost heat, there is no simple way to show how it works in the mechlab when weapons start getting penalized very differently for over drawing.

[davoodoo]

Lostdragon, on 23 August 2016 - 05:41 AM, said:

Ghost heat and power draw are bandaids. Power draw tries to fix what ghost heat cannot by indirectly adding heat to the Gauss Rifle. If the Gauss Rifle generated an appropriate amount of heat for its damage/range then it would not be necessary to come up with silly secondary sources of heat like ghost heat and power draw.

7s cd, 15 dmg, 15 tons, 90% explosion chance, 5 hp oh and 7 slots.

Yea sure gauss could cause more heat, but then knock down a ton off it for every extra heat its supposed to generate and 1 slot for every 2 heat.

Low heat and projectile speed are only upsides on this weapon...

Edited by davoodoo, 23 August 2016 - 06:42 AM.