13 replies to this topic

[Cementi]

I know I know people hate ED or really anything that does not allow them to press one button and have their opponent become vapor. However take a step back and realize that there are people who want to slug it out not just press a button and move on to the next target. A happy medium has to found for the good of the entire community. ED with the right tweaks is half of what we need. The other half is a heat scale with actual penalties. I have had thoughts on heat scale before and will admit in retrospect a number of my ideas would have either simply not worked, been to hard to code, and frankly confusing as hell to most people. It also would have caused massive rage as it would have stepped on the alpha warriors toes a bit too hard. I may despise one button builds and the playstyles that come with them but the fact is ....... some people like them and taking an entire playstyle away from someone is not right. What we need to do is find away to make dps and mixed builds more viable. Nerfing alpha strikes won't solve the problem.

First off I suggest a threshold of 35 and a soft cap of 60. (I know 35 is a weird number just keep reading please). This needs to be totally unmodified by anything in game, no heat sinks adding capacity, no skill tree (we have no idea what the skill tree changes will entail but I do not expect to see them for at least 3 months after mechcon if not more). Every single mech regardless of class or engine size would have the same. Heat sinks would function as they do now on test as far as dissapation (true dubs if I am not mistaken).

Zero to thirty five would be your operational threshold. Anything in that area and you are fine. However if you go over then you start to run into penalties somewhat similar to table top. I know people are not fond of RNG so I would change some of the random elements. The penalties would be as follows and would stack with lower penalties unless the mech is suffering the same type of penalty or taking damage ie at 40 heat you suffer a -20% to torso and arm speed and a -20% speed and accelerat not -30%. If you spike to 52 heat you do however take the damage from 44, 48 and 52.

35 heat = -10% movement speed and acceleration
38 heat = -20% torso and arm speed
40 heat = -20% movement speed and acceleration
43 heat = -40% torso and arm speed
44 heat = Shutdown or if overide engaged 2 points of damage to CT structure, 1 point to each ST structure
45 heat = -30% movement speed and acceleration
47 heat = -60% torso and arm speed
48 heat = Shutdown or if overide engaged 4 points of damage to CT structure, 2 points to each ST structure
49 heat = 10% of ammo is lost however no damage is taken
50 heat = -40% movement speed and acceleration
52 heat = Shutdown or if overide engaged 6 points of damage to CT structure, 3 points to each ST structure
53 heat = 20% of ammo is lost however no damage is taken
54 heat = -80% torso and arm speed
55 heat = -50% movement speed and acceleration
56 heat = Shutdown or if overide engaged 8 points of damage to CT structure, 4 points to each ST structure
58 heat = 30% of ammo is lost however no damage is taken
60 heat = Mandatory shutdown untill heat is below 60 again, 10 points of damage to the CT structure, 5 points to each ST structure.

I considered reticle shake however I feel that it should be used for movement. For example I think that there should be a slight recticle shake for any speed under 75% of your mechs speed and moderate (less than current masc shake) for 76% and up. Masc should not add any additional shake.

Jump jets or Hover Jets as people call them need to be fixed. They were meant as a mobility tool and that has been forgotten. This is where I would go back to TT directly. Mechs shoot from their last point in a turn and I suggest we do that for JJ's. No firing in the air at all and in turn we get jump jets that are usefull. Jump jets that can allow an assault mech to spin around faster than it could otherwise. Jump jets that actually impart proper forward thrust. For example in TT 1 hex of movement works out to 10.8 kph I think. If you have 5 jump jets then when you hit them you should accelerate to 54 kph from a stand still. Not slowly float upwards and forwards slightly. Sure mech momentum can still have an effect, I am fine with that. To avoid hopping exploits to break hit boxes put a minimum burn time. If you engage your jets they have to burn for at least one second before cutting out. To balance the extra mobility, especially assault mechs being able to turn around on a time when you land your recticle shakes as much as it does now when you have upwards thrust. For maybe a duration of 2 or 3 seconds. Obviously alot of testing would have to go into this. Yes we would no longer have pop tarting.......but I think that was pretty well universally hated and instead we would get ACTUAL jump jets that work. Having jump jets hard locked onto a chassis would no longer be a problem as they would be worth it. Oh and it would be nice that if you turned in the air.....your mech actually started to go in that direction.

Also note that for structure damage and ammo loss these penalties are only triggered when a mech's heat increases past them and does not trigger again on the way back down. For example a mech on overide spikes to 52 heat and takes cumulative damage from 44, 48 and 52 and then dissipates down to 46. No additional damage is incured unless they fire another weapon. If they do that and surpass 48 they would take that damage again but not the damage from 44 as they have not "passed" it again. Override cannot be engaged or disengaged untill the mech has cooled below 44 heat.

If something like this was implemented the only thing I can see ED being usefull for is keeping gauss in line as it's super low heat really throws a wrench into things. Might be usefull for some of the silly UAC builds too as they probally will not generate enough heat to really hit the ammo loss triggers. I kind of like the idea that once the gauss is charged you have to let the shot go. However the longer you hold the charge the more heat it generates. But really either that or ED would work for me. ED by itself might work but I feel the bar fills to fast so that it becomes a non issue for almost every mech so long as they stagger fire just slightly.

So thats my thoughts.There are some things I might do differently but trying to keep it to things that i think they allready have the code for for the most part. The ammo loss could also be ammo bin crits without chance to explode. I personally wouldnt mind the chance for it to go pop but I know people hate RNG so better to just lose ammo I think. I know it is not strictly ED feedback however I look at the ED discussions more as a way to address issues that the playerbase percieves in either the heat or PPF. I imagine more than a few people will hate this but I think it would add some choices as well as penalties both to high heat laser vomit and some risk with ammo builds. Also getting rid of the random internal structure damage I think would be a good thing. It would allow a pilot to better weigh the risks instead of hitting override and hopeing for the best.

No one thing is going to fix the issues this game has. As is its a good game. It could be great though. None of the things I suggested could be rolled out all at once. While there is probally enough testing done with ED to do some of the proposed heat scale with ED the penalties would likely have to be tweaked. Jump Jets themselves would need their own series of tests though I think you could combine those tests with the movement reticle shake changes.

There we go, flame away. After all we are talking changes to the heat system.

[Gattsus]

Yes, but less spaced and with lower thresshold:

20 heat = -25% movement speed and acceleration
25 heat = -50% movement speed and acceleration 25% torso and arm speed
30 heat = Mandatory shutdown or if overide engaged 3 points of damage to CT structure, 2 point to each ST structure, per second
40 heat = point of damage to cockpit per second until goes below 40

60 heat is a lot!!! Current threshold to shut down is 30, if I'm not wrong.

Ammo explosions, could be left for later.

Edited by Gattsus, 16 October 2016 - 10:31 PM.

[Gattsus]

I was a fan of ED until saw how convoluted it is.

[Cementi]

I personally do not feel it is that convoluted. I just think that by itself it is not enough. ED is really nothing more than a more clear way to display an updated version of ghost heat.

You are also incorrect the shutdown threshold is not 30. The problem is alot of people do not realize that heat sinks not only affect dissapation but they also increase heat capacity. I personally think that most of the problems people have with the heat scale comes from this factor.

I forget the exact amount (I am sure someone will be along eventually to post it) for both live or test but currently on live if you have a mech with 10 internal double heat sinks on live and fire two IS ERPPC's on say canyon network you only spike to 49% with efficiencies. Since two IS ERPPC's put out 28 heat (14 each ) that means that currently on live you can, without even having extra heat sinks hit somewhere around the 56 heat mark give or take without suffering any ill effects at all. The system I suggest would have you start suffering penalties around what would be currently about 58% heat on live. Also currently you would have to go beyond that 56 or so heat to worry about damage and/or shut down. My suggestion would make shutdowns appear at about 77% unless you had override on. Having override on would damage you at those heat levels though you would be able to weigh the risk better as you would know exactly how much it was going to hurt you instead of the random system that is in place now.

Next time you die watch people and you will see virtually everyone runs their heat above that currently. Heat penalties that there would certainly have an effect.

Heat sinks, or double heat sinks should do nothing other than dissapate heat to shorten the amount of time you have to endure those penalties if you go into the red.

Keep in mind that currently heat dissapation is also not at true dub levels on live.

Edited by Cementi, 16 October 2016 - 11:37 PM.

[feeWAIVER]

This idea is horrible. You want to play a fps game that punishes out for shooting to the point that everyone will be slogging around knee deep in mud, staring at each other, each afraid to fire in fear of the consequences.

So after a couple volleys a hunchback is going to move at ~60kph? No thanks.

[Tibbnak]

This really is a situation where half the playerbase wants mecha-powercreep cod edition and the other half wants mech simulator, and PGI wants both's pocketbooks..

[Cementi]

feeWAIVER, on 17 October 2016 - 11:39 AM, said:

This idea is horrible. You want to play a fps game that punishes out for shooting to the point that everyone will be slogging around knee deep in mud, staring at each other, each afraid to fire in fear of the consequences.

So after a couple volleys a hunchback is going to move at ~60kph? No thanks.

You are entitled to your opinion though constructive discussions would be more effective. Ironicly the changes I suggested would actually allow you to fire more often as the heat dissapation would be higher than it currently is on live. However if you pushed it to far you would have to pay actual consequences.

The point of these changes would be to reduce massive pinpoint aphas or at least make them high risk so that people would consider doing something other than boating a ton of something and then mashing one button over and over. They can still do it occasionally but if they over use the alpha strike then yes there would and should be consequences to not being able to manage heat.

Currently most people ignore the heat bar unless it is at or near the % that they know they can alpha safely at. ie knowing that if you are at 75% on canyon you can fire all of your weapons and not shut down. The rest of the heat bar is meaningless in that situation.

Tibbnak, on 17 October 2016 - 12:33 PM, said:

This really is a situation where half the playerbase wants mecha-powercreep cod edition and the other half wants mech simulator, and PGI wants both's pocketbooks..

Sadly you are correct however until they do something about it my pocketbook is closed however it is more than just the wonky heat scale though fixing that alone would get me spending money again. Heck all I had to do was upgrade a pack from standard to collectors to get an ECM stalker, not even that was able to tempt me because the state the game is in.

[Gattsus]

Cementi, on 16 October 2016 - 11:36 PM, said:

I personally do not feel it is that convoluted. I just think that by itself it is not enough. ED is really nothing more than a more clear way to display an updated version of ghost heat.

You are also incorrect the shutdown threshold is not 30. The problem is alot of people do not realize that heat sinks not only affect dissapation but they also increase heat capacity. I personally think that most of the problems people have with the heat scale comes from this factor.

I forget the exact amount (I am sure someone will be along eventually to post it) for both live or test but currently on live if you have a mech with 10 internal double heat sinks on live and fire two IS ERPPC's on say canyon network you only spike to 49% with efficiencies. Since two IS ERPPC's put out 28 heat (14 each ) that means that currently on live you can, without even having extra heat sinks hit somewhere around the 56 heat mark give or take without suffering any ill effects at all. The system I suggest would have you start suffering penalties around what would be currently about 58% heat on live. Also currently you would have to go beyond that 56 or so heat to worry about damage and/or shut down. My suggestion would make shutdowns appear at about 77% unless you had override on. Having override on would damage you at those heat levels though you would be able to weigh the risk better as you would know exactly how much it was going to hurt you instead of the random system that is in place now.

Next time you die watch people and you will see virtually everyone runs their heat above that currently. Heat penalties that there would certainly have an effect.

Heat sinks, or double heat sinks should do nothing other than dissapate heat to shorten the amount of time you have to endure those penalties if you go into the red.

Keep in mind that currently heat dissapation is also not at true dub levels on live.

I mean, it's not THAT convoluted, BUT it's not as easy to make accurate the calculations on the fly compared to having a fixed scale with fixed penalties due reaching a certain heat threshold.

Edited by Gattsus, 18 October 2016 - 10:06 AM.

[Brandarr Gunnarson]

I had a very similar idea; so yeah, I'd tweak this, but I like it.

I think Gattsus is right about lower thresholds and smaller incremental spacing.

One thing I especially and strongly support is the removal of heat capacity from heatsink. They should be dissipation only.

[Cementi]

Every system is up for tweaking.

I would not be opposed to a lower threshold but as I feel those who want big alphas have to be realistic I think those of us wanting changes have to be as well.

[ShaneoftheDead]

Energy Draw is a band-aid on the real problem, Mech imbalance, that does not cover it fully.

Mech A weighs 50 Tons and has 6 weapon mount points while Mech B weighs 50 Tons and has 12 weapon mount points. Energy Draw is forcing Mech A and B to only fire 6 weapons at a time, or face a severe heat penalty. Mech B still has the upper-hand.

There should be a formula for Mech creation. At the same weight, Mechs should be equal for weapon mount points. If you want to add more mount points, then that Mech must take some negative quirks like less armor, less speed, or slower turning. If you want to remove weapon mount points, you get to add positive quirks like more armor, more speed, jump jets, or ECM.

Apply that to the prior example and Mech B is a slow, glass cannon.... while Mech A is a more well rounded Mech. You know, trade-offs.

[Cementi]

Mech imbalance is IMO a separate issue. However the problem is mechs were not created to be equal. BV was used to balance teams and it took into condsideration equipment and pilot skill.

Mechs and equipment should have a BV value as they do in table top and that value should be checked with the pilots tier (though the tier system is not great) to modify the BV and use that to build matches. Modifiers could even be tied somewhat to hard point location ie a hardpoint that is higher up on a mech would get a larger modifier where as a mech with really low weapons could even have a reduction.

Quirking mechs to achieve balance has more often than not opened up a can of worms or simply done nothing to actually help a mech. I feel that quirks should remain for structure and armor only to deal with chassis that have geometry that makes them vulnerable. I personally feel that armor should be used over structure as once they punch through that spot that is so easy to hit keeps getting pounded on and components get crit out of it. So really it does not help that much other than making a pilot a punching bag.

And now we have gone way of topic but hey why not. Not like that many are even talking about ED these days anyway.

[Deathlike]

A lot of these penalties look too heavy and actually penalizes brawlers a lot more than they do snipers.

Brawlers tend to hit the heatcap faster... especially with traditional brawling weapons (SRMs, MPL/CSPL, etc.) and if you can't really punish your opponents fast enough (because you do need speed and mobility to get close), then snipers practically win as they have free reign to get back into cover, relocate, and cool off.

Edited by Deathlike, 23 October 2016 - 02:38 AM.

[davoodoo]

What my problem with this is, that you dont take heat sinks into account... whats with arbitrary 60 heat?? why not heat sinks capacity +5 to 30??

Then shutdown at just 14 heat?? in tt it was at least easy to pass diceroll, i would understand chance to deal x dmg if on override and ammo lost... just give it 10% chance for each ammo slot you have and 90% for gausses with all regular dmg on 28/30

But finally for all this to happen you need to buff dissipation to actual tt values or you kill whole idea of assault actually having firepower and mechs without ballistics being viable.
And what i mean by tt values?? 0.2s per dhs with 10s cooldown on weapon, 7s ppc?? 7.25 llas duration + cd?? 0.3s, 5s cd on ppc?? 0.4s and so on.

Edited by davoodoo, 23 October 2016 - 11:07 AM.