72 replies to this topic

[Dino Banino]

All we need is the TT Heat Limit of 30. That's it.

[Moonlight Grimoire]

xXBagheeraXx, on 21 August 2016 - 12:58 PM, said:

That is basically what I'm suggesting. Lower heat capacity, higher disspiation. Lower potential alpha damage since your mech cannot fire as many weapon systems all at once while rewarding people who make balanced builds that mix low heat and high heat weapons. More diversity, more potential builds less gimmics.

Gauss only needed its rate of fire nerfed, which it got some patches ago. The "lack of accuracy" was partially represented with the precharge mechanic, which while I dont LIKE I'm ok with rather than more nerfs to the weapon.

Agreed, sorry that I took something else from what you typed, wasn't the most coherent last night when I read it, heatwave here has done a number on my comprehension of information. But, Yeah I agree with you wholey, the charge up helped decrease the accuracy of gauss, though maybe not as long as it was. Another point I am uncertain if it has been brought up is the point that power draw of 30 is meant to be like the heat scale on TT (with the heat penalties still being tied to heat, hence the thresholds now established with icons that could be tied to true penalties). This pretty well shows PGI wants to drop heat cap effectively to pre DHS era MWO where everyone had cap of 30 (I believe).

It would be so much simpler (and cheaper though PGI already has burnt assets making new UI) to just dump heat to a fixed cap of 30 like we both are saying. Small Pre-charge on gauss is good (too short though and it will be too hard too use, too long and it will be the same issue).

Archangel Dino, on 21 August 2016 - 06:53 PM, said:

All we need is the TT Heat Limit of 30. That's it.

Honestly, agreed, it would do 90% of the work powerdraw is attempting to do and what ghost heat was put in to do. Throw us all to a hard cap of 30 heat, give us all .2 heat/s per DHS and .1heat/s for SHS and we are golden. If you have pod space but not tonnage you take DHS, if you have tonnage but not space you take SHS. Gauss and PPC's with long cooldown, IS LPL's having a longer burn time since they are far more powerful than any other pulse laser atm. But, mostly, set heat cap to a hard 30, give true DHS and SHS, then tweak from there.

Edited by Moonlight Grimoire, 21 August 2016 - 07:23 PM.

[Moonlight Grimoire]

double post, ignore.

Edited by Moonlight Grimoire, 21 August 2016 - 07:23 PM.

[Countess]

I was expecting some sort of whining in this post, but it's truly very well done and explained. Thumbs up. Your system made me feel like a true mechwarrior just by reading and trying to place myself into those situations mentally.

[Andi Nagasia]

still this system encourages Ballistic Boating more so than Energy Draw,
it would be a nerf to lights, and many small mediums and Energy only Builds and mechs,

[MechaBattler]

Technically it's replacing a long standing band aide that many in the community wanted gone or replaced. I personally think it's too early to write it off as bad. Things like energy cap and energy recharge can still be used to tweak things. As well as other penalties.

Everyone has an idea how to fix the heat system. But it's up to them to decide. It's their livelihood on the line. Even if they do what a handful of people say, everyone else will get pissed regardless.

[Hit the Deck]

Andi Nagasia, on 21 August 2016 - 07:57 PM, said:

still this system encourages Ballistic Boating more so than Energy Draw,
it would be a nerf to lights, and many small mediums and Energy only Builds and mechs,

They could make it so, that for the same amount of DPS, you need to take much more space for ballistic weapons, effectively making your 'Mech a one trick pony. If you take some energy weapons to match that DPS, you can take other weapons (say. missiles) because you still have some space. The latter effectively makes you ready for more situations - in the spirit of mixed builds. Lighter 'Mechs are by their nature disadvantaged in the firepower department by having less option because of less space. What we need to do is reward Lighter 'Mechs for other things they could potentially do, like scouting *gasp*

Still, the potential problem with this is the 1 heat Gauss which again rears its ugly head. Fortunately everything can still be balanced by just make the Gauss have a very long cooldown, for example. What we/they need to do is make the Gauss still fun to play, and that's the hard part. BTW in TT we have Battle Value which in theory can balance anything so you can have your imba weapon (but you won't have anything else because it's so costly to field).

[Simbacca]

Mystere, on 21 August 2016 - 12:06 PM, said:

FTFY.

Well both heat and pin-point convergence is the problem - especially with certain mechs able to mount 14 (or more - but they cannot be controlled) weapons. And these issues; convergence specifically, is where the power creep is most widely felt.

[Khobai]

energy draw is ********

we already had a draw system: heat

but instead of fixing the draw system we had they just added another draw system on top of it

talk about sidestepping the issue.. its such a retar ded and completely unnecessary bandaid

Quote

Technically it's replacing a long standing band aide that many in the community wanted gone or replaced.

wait what?

ripping off one bandaid and putting another bandaid on doesnt fix anything. thats not at all what the community wants because it MAKES NO SENSE.

If you already have a draw system, you fix that one, you dont add more draw systems and turn the game into a convoluted mess.

just fix the current heatscale by adjusting ghost heat, add heat penalties, and find an intuitive way (chargeup was not intuitive) to balance certain low heat weapons like gauss so they dont dominate the meta.

yes keeping ghost heat isnt ideal but its a hell of a lot better than having two draw systems. at least mixed loadouts work with ghost heat while energy draw solely encourages boating.

Edited by Khobai, 21 August 2016 - 10:00 PM.

[Hit the Deck]

Khobai, on 21 August 2016 - 09:52 PM, said:

...
ripping off one bandaid and putting another bandaid on doesnt fix anything. thats not at all what the community wants because it MAKES NO SENSE.

If you already have a draw system, you fix that one, you dont add more draw systems and turn the game into a convoluted mess.

just fix the current heatscale by adjusting ghost heat, add heat penalties, and find an intuitive way (chargeup was not intuitive) to balance certain low heat weapons like gauss so they dont dominate the meta.

yes keeping ghost heat isnt ideal but its a hell of a lot better than having two draw systems. at least mixed loadouts work with ghost heat while energy draw solely encourages boating.

Why does your location (under your banner) say otherwise?

[xXBagheeraXx]

Hit the Deck, on 21 August 2016 - 09:05 PM, said:

They could make it so, that for the same amount of DPS, you need to take much more space for ballistic weapons, effectively making your 'Mech a one trick pony. If you take some energy weapons to match that DPS, you can take other weapons (say. missiles) because you still have some space. The latter effectively makes you ready for more situations - in the spirit of mixed builds. Lighter 'Mechs are by their nature disadvantaged in the firepower department by having less option because of less space. What we need to do is reward Lighter 'Mechs for other things they could potentially do, like scouting *gasp*

Still, the potential problem with this is the 1 heat Gauss which again rears its ugly head. Fortunately everything can still be balanced by just make the Gauss have a very long cooldown, for example. What we/they need to do is make the Gauss still fun to play, and that's the hard part. BTW in TT we have Battle Value which in theory can balance anything so you can have your imba weapon (but you won't have anything else because it's so costly to field).

I actually have a bit of an idea about that, but instead of making a wall of text I wanted to try recording a video, but I'm completly inexperienced when it comes to videos. It would adress possibly the role of scout mechs AND the convergence issue.

Khobai, on 21 August 2016 - 09:52 PM, said:

energy draw is ********

we already had a draw system: heat

but instead of fixing the draw system we had they just added another draw system on top of it

talk about sidestepping the issue.. its such a retar ded and completely unnecessary bandaid



wait what?

ripping off one bandaid and putting another bandaid on doesnt fix anything. thats not at all what the community wants because it MAKES NO SENSE.

If you already have a draw system, you fix that one, you dont add more draw systems and turn the game into a convoluted mess.

just fix the current heatscale by adjusting ghost heat, add heat penalties, and find an intuitive way (chargeup was not intuitive) to balance certain low heat weapons like gauss so they dont dominate the meta.

yes keeping ghost heat isnt ideal but its a hell of a lot better than having two draw systems. at least mixed loadouts work with ghost heat while energy draw solely encourages boating.

Except this isnt a band-aid. This is a complete remodel of the heat system that should have happened way back in closed. beta.

Andi Nagasia, on 21 August 2016 - 07:57 PM, said:

still this system encourages Ballistic Boating more so than Energy Draw,
it would be a nerf to lights, and many small mediums and Energy only Builds and mechs,

NO. IT. WOULD. NOT. those mechs do not carry very large numbers of energy weapons. OR sinks. they dont generate much heat as it is and will get MORE use out of thier limited number of heatsinks than they currently do.

[Lostdragon]

I agree with the spirit of the OP and would also assert that Gauss Rifles need to have heat added to them in order to make heat truly the limiting factor for damage output.

[xXBagheeraXx]

Lostdragon, on 22 August 2016 - 09:31 AM, said:

I agree with the spirit of the OP and would also assert that Gauss Rifles need to have heat added to them in order to make heat truly the limiting factor for damage output.

Not really. The gauss rifle is good at what it does. It is a high damage fast moving ballistic weapon. it is THE best ballistic weapon just like PPCS and LPLS are some of THE best respective energy weapons. It is rather annoying that people have a penchant for punishing weapons for being good at what they do. Its balancing factors are its slow firing and tricky to use in close quarters unless you are a skilled pilot and have mastered the precharge mechanic. it also has a bloody 90% chance to explode, taking half your mech with it.

Edited by xXBagheeraXx, 22 August 2016 - 09:43 AM.

[Wing 0]

Coolant, on 21 August 2016 - 12:27 PM, said:

I don't know, i like ghost heat, and i like the new heat scale coming soon even better. It will stop ridiculous 50+ point energy alpha strikes. I can't wait to see how pilots who think they are something reduced to nothing.

There was no ghost heat or limiter in MW4:Mercs. Whatever the heat of the weapons the sum of them would be your total heat when fired. And, the alphas in MW4 were much higher (up to 120+).

So, MWO has improved that aspect (although I didn't mind the way MW4:Mercs was at all).

Don't forget that We had Leagues that been around for a long time. Mechwarriorleagues was one of those leagues that made a great concept on balance for over 10 years before MWO was announced. With the Ladder Leagues like NHUA Team Attrition, TB 3v3, TD 3v3, Brawler, Team Destruction, Team battle Restricted, All in 1 specific mech ladder. That league made things happen and got mektek making those "Free Mechs back during those times. Then you got the dedicated servers back then, it made things easy to setup good stuff. Then there was that scrub league called NBT. Puretech only league. Players there were wee bit too big of scrubs and it died years early before the Free Release of MW4 Mercs and before MWL finally died.

[Lostdragon]

xXBagheeraXx, on 22 August 2016 - 09:42 AM, said:

Not really. The gauss rifle is good at what it does. It is a high damage fast moving ballistic weapon. it is THE best ballistic weapon just like PPCS and LPLS are some of THE best respective energy weapons. It is rather annoying that people have a penchant for punishing weapons for being good at what they do. Its balancing factors are its slow firing and tricky to use in close quarters unless you are a skilled pilot and have mastered the precharge mechanic. it also has a bloody 90% chance to explode, taking half your mech with it.

If you care about addressing big alphas from PPC+GR combos (I do) then the only realistic solution is to add heat to the GR. The effort to prevent this is what made PPCs almost unusable except on mechs with PPC velocity quirks for a long time. Power draw is simply an overly complicated way to add heat to the GR. PPC+GR is uber on the PTS because while you do suffer power overdraw from 3 PPC + GR it is not a big deal because the GR itself has 1 heat. There has got to be something to curb that level of PPFLD and the only reasonable thing is GR heat.

[xXBagheeraXx]

Lostdragon, on 22 August 2016 - 10:13 AM, said:

If you care about addressing big alphas from PPC+GR combos (I do) then the only realistic solution is to add heat to the GR. The effort to prevent this is what made PPCs almost unusable except on mechs with PPC velocity quirks for a long time. Power draw is simply an overly complicated way to add heat to the GR. PPC+GR is uber on the PTS because while you do suffer power overdraw from 3 PPC + GR it is not a big deal because the GR itself has 1 heat. There has got to be something to curb that level of PPFLD and the only reasonable thing is GR heat.

Good point. I don't consider 2 ppcs 1 gauss to be overpowering, but the paired 2 ppcs 2 gauss does need to be addressed. But it needs to be done in a way that doesn't necessarily "add heat" to the Gauss rifle. If you are firing 1 or 2 gauss by themselves you should still retain the bonuses of low heat from ballistic weapons....Perhaps a firing delay if you have a pair of ppcs and gauss?

Honestly most of the mechs that can carry this config dont do too well vs fast moving targets since ppc and gauss velocity is so de-synced now. I used to be quite guilty of running this config on my dire wolf prime when the clans first dropped and i haven't used it again in ages. Laser+gauss is simply more reliable damage

[Lostdragon]

xXBagheeraXx, on 22 August 2016 - 10:41 AM, said:

Good point. I don't consider 2 ppcs 1 gauss to be overpowering, but the paired 2 ppcs 2 gauss does need to be addressed. But it needs to be done in a way that doesn't necessarily "add heat" to the Gauss rifle. If you are firing 1 or 2 gauss by themselves you should still retain the bonuses of low heat from ballistic weapons....Perhaps a firing delay if you have a pair of ppcs and gauss?

Honestly most of the mechs that can carry this config dont do too well vs fast moving targets since ppc and gauss velocity is so de-synced now. I used to be quite guilty of running this config on my dire wolf prime when the clans first dropped and i haven't used it again in ages. Laser+gauss is simply more reliable damage

Why does it need to be done without adding heat to the GR? It is long past time that sacred cow got killed in the name of balance, not all canon mechanics translate from tapletop to realtime shooter ajd no heat GRs is the most egregious example.

If you add a firing delay that is just another mechanic layered on that doesn't really make sense. Adding heat to the Gauss Rifle actually makes sense not only from a game balance perspective but also from a "this is actually how it would work" viewpoint instead of having to write off systems like ghost heat and energy draw to hand waving and space magic.

In order for one or the other (PPC or Gauss) not to be gimped in some fashion the way PPC velocity is right now for many mechs there has to be some kind of mechanism to curb firing 3x PPC and Gauss or 2x of each. The answer is already in the game and it is heat.

Edited by Lostdragon, 22 August 2016 - 10:54 AM.

[Chagatay]

I think it is a good start to addressing alphas and is far more transparent than Ghost Heat. I would recommend that PGI adjust the penalties of going over to make them far more severe.

Improvements:
Energy bar is allowed to go negative and has a negative section. If your bar is negative, ALL weapons are knocked offline and the pilot must wait for the bar to go back to positive. Negative scale stops at -14.99. Mech refuses to fire weapons if gauge would drop below -14.99 (impossible to fire 3 Gauss/PPCs or any combination of them).

Sample values:
PPC(ER) - Long range PP - 15 energy
Gauss - 15 energy
ERLL - 12 energy (slightly worse than base of 10 but ensures you can't use 4 because that would be 48 energy)
ML - 5 energy (6 is limit we have now you can put 2 more at a ridiculous increase to heat)
AC20 - 20 energy (2 carries a high penalty just like now)
SRMs - 1.25 energy per missile (4 SRM6s ok, 5 is very hot, 6 of them it will refuse to fire)
LRMs - 0.75 energy per missile (40 LRMs in a volley is ok, over that you run very hot and refuses to fire at 60 LRMs)

Edited by Chagatay, 22 August 2016 - 11:12 AM.

[BLOOD WOLF]

I don't want to write a long post; However after reading your proposed plans, this wouldnt seem to fix much of anything. Sure setting tighter restrictions in theory sounds like it will work, but just by reading your plans i see various holes, and you also didnt address key items.

It sounds less like a solution to the whole problem, than it is a plan that is curtailed more to your play style.

I figured I wont make a summary, after reading your post, you are rehashing some old ideas, but putting polish on them.

Lower heat capacity, increase cooling. Hard cap with increase numbers to prevent alpha strikes, but it wouldnt stop boating.

You also do not account for the other players, rather I believe you are basing this purely on your experience alone.

Edited by BLOOD WOLF, 22 August 2016 - 11:17 AM.

[Khobai]

Quote

Why does your location (under your banner) say otherwise?

because no ghost heat and no energy draw is ideal.

but if we have to have one bandaid, given the choice between ghost heat or energy draw, ghost heat is still better