cERPPCs
As a Warhawk Prime lover i must say the changes to the clan ERPPC had me interested and thats where i started my testing. After the mini update that happened to the PTS i feel like it's in a very good spot. with the higher damage i feel like it's got it's bite back while the longer cooldown is a fair tradeoff in my opinion. The added benefit is that since you aren't firing as quickly you have more time to cool off in between shots. And the nature of longer cooldowns moves the cERPPC into more of a long range support weapon rather than a full on main weapon. It helps solitify the Warhawk into it's intended role i think. It's not like you could get into brawling range and be able to go toe to toe and still be as effective. I also don't think cERPPCs will become a huge problem because there aren't that many mechs that can boat them effectively. Except for the warhawk, dire, and kodiak nothing can mount enough heat sinks to use Four of them well.
IS ERPPCs
i actually think these are also in a great spot now since the changelog patch for PTS. They aren't as hot as clan ERPPCs and have a slightly better cooldown. The reduced heat from the latest change puts them in a very appealing place compared to before.
IS PPCs
With the other PPCs getting a buff i do feel like these could use a little more love since they still have shorter range and the minimum range handicap. I think regular PPCs should maintain their current live cooldown as to give them some appeal over ERPPCs.
Autocannons
I felt like these all performed right where they ought to be nothing significant struck me while testing them.
Ultra Autocannons
The energy consumption decrease i felt was a nice plus and for cUACs. As for the jam time i think UAC10s and higher the 8 second jam is fair. It punishes those who solely rely on them and encourages a mixed loadout to have backup weapons in the occurrence of a jam. But i do agree with other's who have mentioned an 8 second jam for the lower caliber UACs seems like a bit too much especially on the UAC2s which too my knowledge are rarely used anyway.
Large Laser types
I have to say some of these changes confused me as I find in some cases it removes the discouragement of boating certain weapons.
IS Large Laser
although the damage was reduced from 9 to 8, the energy consumption was reduced to 7.2 from 9. I find this out of place with the whole idea of reducing alphas. at 3 you would be at 27 energy for 27 damage, so firing 4 at a time would give you a heat penalty of 8 additional heat. But at 7.2 you can fire 4 large lasers and only be at 28.8 energy used for 32 damage and get no penalty. Doesn't this kinda ruin the point of limiting alphas? The ER large laser has the same numbers for damage and energy used.
IS Large Pulse Laser
The same problem happens here with the new energy draw numbers. Old numbers of 10 damage for 10 draw you could fire 3 large pulse for 30 damage with no penalty. But with the new damage at 9 with a draw of 8.1 you could fire 4 large pulse lasers for 36 damage at 32.8 draw. The penalty is low enough that i'm sure people would consider it an acceptable amount of penalty to alpha all the time.
Clan ER Large Laser
Same issue here, old damage 11, old draw 11 = 2 er large firing without penalties, 22 damage
New damage 10, draw 9 = 3 ER large firing without penalty, 30 damage
Clan Large pulse
Although i do feel like the nerfs to Clan large pulse laser damage from 13 to 11 was necessary at 9.9 draw it means you can now fire 3 of them at a time. Which means instead of 26 damage for 2 large pulse now you'll have 29.7 damage going out from 3 large pulse.
All the large laser groups are basically buffed in a way i do not think will accomplish limiting higher alpha strikes. If this is the case i think more people would just adopt into a large laser meta game.
And although these didn't get any changes this round i do feel it's important to say something about SRMs. I don't get why being able to fire 4 SRM6s was tweaked to begin with. Even if they are short range and that is their drawback i don't think they should get special treatment. That's still a lot of damage to alpha at someone.
Lastly the Gauss change although every little bit helps this didn't seem to have a big impact on anything i observed.
Also still waiting for JJ improvements to be encorporated into the energy draw system
As i said at the start of this post i get the feeling some of these changes were just to see what would happen or what it would be like to try it out for funnzies. But the ideal place for ED will be somewhere between ED2 and ED3
Edited by Sable, 03 September 2016 - 04:35 PM.