Quicksilver Kalasa, on 14 September 2016 - 12:17 PM, said:
So what do you do to balance the Gauss/PPC Kodiak which is arguably the strongest Kodiak variant on Live right now?
You want my honest assessment?
The gauss rifle is the problem. It's always the problem. If you know TT, you know the gauss was a risky weapon to mount. We pay lip service to the whole "explode when you crit it" thing here in MWO... it's an occasional annoyance that in no way actually deters mounting the weapon and trying to brawl with it.
But in TT, you protected that gauss like your life depended on it... because, well, it did. With a single ER-PPC having enough damage to strip a full ton of armor (32 points in MWO) off a mech, you were going to see components shed armor in short order, leaving all those juicy crit slots exposed. A gauss explosion often meant full-on death. It was dangerous to mount a gauss, hence why the thing has no heat.
But double armor and internals in MWO kinda removes most of that fear, right? Like with UACs, we got rid of nearly all of the risk of the weapon, and didn't put anything else in to replace it.
This is why UACs and gauss throw off basic ballistic balance... they perform WAY better than they're supposed to.
So of course, my honest assessment is make some common sense deviations from how TT sets those weapons up. We shouldn't be slavish to the rewards when we weren't slavish to the risk. Adding even a LITTLE heat to the gauss won't do much to hurt these weapons when paired with mixed builds or even in doubles alone... but put them with PPCs and it all just runs too hot to be practical for most builds that use them.
I also, personally, wouldn't mind seeing a more defined roll for the gauss. I once recommended a 90m min range like in TT, though most don't seem to want that. And then, with the snap-shot back in play, I recommended limiting snap-shots to 270m, and require charging to increase the range. Kinda the best of both worlds there, and harder to syncronize with PPCs.
But ultimately, I don't blame the PPCs for the PPC/gauss meta. I blame the fact that the gauss doesn't have its risk.
Mcgral18, on 14 September 2016 - 01:14 PM, said:
Optional rule for UACs, but true for RACs
This is what I thought. I remember you couldn't unjam playing basic rules, but I wasn't sure. I also remembered an unjam sequence - Turn 1, jam. Turn 2, declare intent to unjam. Turn 3, roll for unjam. Something like that. Been awhile since I scratched a PnP game out. Never cared for ultras myself... risky.