Greyhart, on 24 August 2016 - 04:11 AM, said:
I've not tested so can't comment but I think there is a fundamental question that needs to be addressed:
Should alpha striking have the same DPS as controlled fire (someone putting out constant damage over the same time period).
Say you are running 2 LL and lets say the heat is completely dissipated from those LL in the same time as the cooldown 3.25sec (I am not doing the math here its an example). If you alpha then damage is done and you can twist or get in cover. If you stagger the shots you have a lower heat spike but no real saving on heat, however you have more face time and bigger risk.
over the fixed period the damage and heat is the same but controlled fire is at a disadvantage. Logically therefore alpha striking is the only way to go.
If you want to encourage damage over time rather than one single packet of damage (alpha strike) then alpha strikes need to do less damage over the time than controlled fire.
alphas have other advantages than just damage. Gives time to hide. more reliably puts damage in the same place so less spread. massive burst of damage puts people off pressing forward and encourages the person using alpha strikes.
ah! I hear you say: Heat would build up with alphaing making it less damage over a long engagement. alphas dump the damage as quickly as possible leading to shorter engagements and is more reliable in dumping that damage into a single section again reducing the time of engagement.
As I consider it simply dumping more heat into a binary system of shutdown if you reach 100% doesn't really address that fundamental question. Should alpha strikes deal same damage as controlled fire over a set time.
No, and it does do not.
The fundamental difference is in burst damage (instantly or over ~one second) and damage dealt over time (times over 1.5, 2 seconds and upwards).
The situation you describe does not really exist in practice (but will, curiously, be more likely to happen with the ED system).
The idea is that you either build a mech for alpha damage or DPS or some compromise of the two. Weapons that allow stacking into large alpha strikes are heat inefficient and low-DPS ones. You can never get the same alpha with AC5s as you can with lasers, that's why AC5s have a huge DPS and sustained DPS advantage. SRMs give you both alpha and decent DPS, but have a low speed, spread damage and are usable only in short ranges.
Your comparison doesn't really tell you much. You have to imagine fighting a fight between let's say a 2xUAC5, 2xUAC10, 1xCERPPC Kodiak and a 2xCERPPC, 2xGauss Kodiak. Same mech. Same tonnage. If they trade shot for shot, the GaussPeep is gonna win with it's 50 alpha damage, but if the engagements are longer (for instance if the UACKodiak can double tap the enemy mech with it's ACs or even just fire twice) the UACKodiak is going to win.
There are obviously more considerations to each battle (range, peeking profile, the Gauss explosion, damage spread etc), but it's telling for our discussion.
Now if you tell the Kodiak player "you can't fire more than 40 alpha damage", he's obviously going to bin his GaussPPC build and go for the other one because if he has to fire his 50 alpha damage over 2 seconds instead of right away, he is definitely going to lose. Not only that, the other build gets even more advantageous if you can get an even longer engagement.
Obviously, if alpha damage goes to high, then DPS become less relevant as peeking around the wrong corner gets you crippled by enemy alpha damage, and you want to be able to return the favor so you build the same way. That's why alphas DO need to be controlled for fun gameplay.
On the other hand if you can't build an alpha strike big enough to trade with high DPS builds favorably in burst engagements (if for example all mechs have the same alpha cap, which is low), then there is no point in NOT building for DPS.
Finally, if you put armor into that equation, then you peeking in your medium mech to get quick shots and backing away is going to get you killed if that "quick shot" takes you 2 seconds to deliver, making it nearly impossible for you to outplay a heavier mech, unless you circle strafe them and they are potato and it's a 1v1.
I would love a MWO in which every mech heavier than a medium has like 3 different weapons like a PPC, an AC and some Small lasers or whatever. That would be great. But this type of change is not going to bring about such a meta. It's going to do the opposite and just kill a bunch of builds leaving us with the LPL disease.
Reno Blade, on 24 August 2016 - 04:31 AM, said:
Therein lies the whole point.
If everyone is ABLE TO then everyone NEEDS to build around biggest alphas because everyone is equally doing this (to reduce face time and increase killing power per shot).
If you are now receiving penalties if you alpha too much, then everyone will have to spread the damage.
This also means that everyone will take less risk with the increased face-time and this is getting closer to DPS fight than the Burst-fire fight of Alpha builds.
So the point is: Reduce alpha efficiencies (shared between all weapons) to make gameplay less one-shot style.
I think it will be a big improvement if all Alphas are equally affected and most people will build their mechs with multiple groups instead of one big alpha group.
Being able to trade more than 1-2 shots will increase the lifespan of all mechs.
=> Longer lifespan = more time to fight (compared to walking time and queue waiting) = more fun playing !
And that is my point.
If you make fights longer and favor DPS, you will lower build variety dramatically, you will also make build much simpler to min-max and design. And fights will be more face-tanky, boring and rushing will be even more prevalent.
Either that or bow down to the 3xLPL master race.
That's why, while alphas did need a nerf, this nerf is going too far. There needs to be a better balance.
Edited by Marmon Rzohr, 24 August 2016 - 04:55 AM.
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