45 replies to this topic

[MadIrish]

Prosperity Park, on 31 December 2016 - 08:43 AM, said:

Using logic you have to quote lore in this context. The lore is the explanation for the short ranges.

In BattleTech the autocannon weapon systems all fire bursts of shells. The AC/20 weapon system fires a burst that is so large and Powerful that it is a very inaccurate. It is so inaccurate that you can only land your shots accurately up to 270 meters. AC/10 fires a burst with fewer shells and so has less recoil and is more accurate. AC/5 fires even fewer shells and the AC/2 has the longest range because it fires only a small handful of bullets (approximately 1 tenth as many as an AC/20).

You just lost a bit more credibility, "all" AC20s in lore do not shoot sub munitions some burst fire others shoot a single projectile. Are you like paid by PGI to troll the forums and argue with people or what?

[RestosIII]

MadIrish, on 31 December 2016 - 08:58 AM, said:

Are you like paid by PGI to troll the forums and argue with people or what?

Wait wait wait, what?



Are you saying I could get PAID to argue with people here? Then I should be getting thousands in back fees! Why didn't anyone tell me this sooner!?!?

[Felicitatem Parco]

MadIrish, on 31 December 2016 - 08:58 AM, said:

You just lost a bit more credibility, "all" AC20s in lore do not shoot sub munitions some burst fire others shoot a single projectile. Are you like paid by PGI to troll the forums and argue with people or what?

Welcome to the land of inconsistencies. BattleTech lore says that auto cannons fird burst s because single slug weapons are ineffective against BattleMech armor. There is a class of single slug weapons called mech rifles. They suffer significant damage penalties when used against battle mech armor. That means the single slug AC 20 rounds described in the lore are technically not AC/20s. They are rifles.

Any kind of AC/20 that fires a single slug would suffer a -3 damage penalty against Mechs.

Edited by Prosperity Park, 31 December 2016 - 09:10 AM.

[MadIrish]

Cathy, on 31 December 2016 - 08:49 AM, said:

Ranges in the TT were picked purely for balance purposes, quite a few have been changed or Min effective range ignored by P.G.I.

Balance can be achieved by staying true to the physics and simulating recoil, heat, weight, ballistic trajectory. The arbitrary range on ballistics and agree limited range on LRMs is not a good approach, keep the physics real but balance the weapons via means that don't penalize pilot ability with a specific weapon. i.e. longer range LRMs could be balanced with more effective AMS or putting more mechs in with ECMs.

[Felicitatem Parco]

MadIrish, on 31 December 2016 - 09:04 AM, said:

Balance can be achieved by staying true to the physics and simulating recoil, heat, weight, ballistic trajectory. The arbitrary range on ballistics and agree limited range on LRMs is not a good approach, keep the physics real but balance the weapons via means that don't penalize pilot ability with a specific weapon. i.e. longer range LRMs could be balanced with more effective AMS or putting more mechs in with ECMs.

You have to accept the fact that BattleTech is based on inconsistencies and not reality. If it were realistic than all the larger ones would always have a larger range and they would always be better in every way than smaller guns.

Edited by Prosperity Park, 31 December 2016 - 09:06 AM.

[Felicitatem Parco]

You guys really need to understand that the damage penalty assigned to single slug rifles is the primary balancing mechanism used for autocannons.

That single rule dictates the fact that large autocannons are burst fire weapons with short range ( that is limited by accuracy) and that smaller bursts that deal less damage can go further with greater accuracy.

The only examples of single slug AC/20s in the BattleTech stories are created by authors who were unfamiliar with the rules of the game.

Edited by Prosperity Park, 31 December 2016 - 09:16 AM.

[MadIrish]

Prosperity Park, on 31 December 2016 - 09:05 AM, said:

You have to accept the fact that BattleTech is based on inconsistencies and not reality. If it were realistic than all the larger ones would always have a larger range and they would always be better in every way than smaller guns.

Have you ever even tried to shoot someone with an AC20 from 1500m away...when they're moving...when your moving and they're moving. Yes smaller munitions ranges make no sense as well and should be able to reach out well beyond 270M, but at .87 damage you likely are not going to take anything down or be very accurate due to bullet spread unless you stand still in which case you set yourself up to be crushed by a 200mm round.

Edited by MadIrish, 31 December 2016 - 09:35 AM.

[MadIrish]

Prosperity Park, on 31 December 2016 - 09:14 AM, said:

You guys really need to understand that the damage penalty assigned to single slug rifles is the primary balancing mechanism used for autocannons.

That single rule dictates the fact that large autocannons are burst fire weapons with short range ( that is limited by accuracy) and that smaller bursts that deal less damage can go further with greater accuracy.

The only examples of single slug AC/20s in the BattleTech stories are created by authors who were unfamiliar with the rules of the game.

The balance approach of limiting range is over used in MWO and really hurts the fun factor of the game, just because it works for a turn-based board game doesn't mean the same limitations will translate to fun play in realtime FPS style gameplay with people piloting the mechs, who actually have to aim, judge trajectory, ignore incoming fire, while listening to B***hing Betty tell you something was just destroyed and more missiles are incoming so hurry up and take cover, all while trying to make a shot connect. Now if this was a turnbased, isometric PC version of Battletech ok lore should be king but its not it's supposed to put you in the seat of a mech in a physics based world.

Edited by MadIrish, 31 December 2016 - 09:36 AM.

[jss78]

IMO the "too small" ranges of MWO, while a holdover from a tabletop game, actually work really well for gameplay purposes also in an FPS.

Consider the gameplay implications if we had "realistic" ranges in this game -- yet our 'mechs supposedly still had the same movement speeds.

Would you like a game where this guy is sniping accurately at you from 5 km, and it'd take you minutes to close the distance to engage with your SRM's? On zero-atmosphere worlds ranges would presumably only be limited by LOS and the curvature of the planet's surface.

While our ranges are laughably short if you think about it (you shouldn't), the actual gameplay it produces is excellent.

While we fight within 1 km, there are still distinct and recognizable range brackets people specialize in. You can move between brackets in ~half a minute at most when needed. Because we fight so close, we can do flanking manoeuvres at our 'mechs movement speeds without having to spend the entire evening at it. It's unrealistic but fun and dynamic.

[C E Dwyer]

MadIrish, on 31 December 2016 - 09:04 AM, said:

Balance can be achieved by staying true to the physics and simulating recoil, heat, weight, ballistic trajectory. The arbitrary range on ballistics and agree limited range on LRMs is not a good approach, keep the physics real but balance the weapons via means that don't penalize pilot ability with a specific weapon. i.e. longer range LRMs could be balanced with more effective AMS or putting more mechs in with ECMs.

If you try and use real physics in games you end up with maps that are to big to make the game practical.

The worse case of this is, as I'm sure there are some masochists out there that perhaps still use it, and I had a photocopied version as a teenager, is a rules set made up by an ex U.s Naval Officer, for world war 2 battles.

It was the closest a table top game LOL, ever got to real time, I LOL because if you didn't have a surface area the size of a village hall forget it.

Torpedo's were tracked by marking out their tracks in chalk on the floor, you gauged by eye the fall of shot in feet and inches, and then declared a spread of shells, so not only was it impractical, it was also one of the most inaccurate rule sets, ignoring early Radar and gunnery range finders, in favour of Napoleonic style point the gun where you hope to hit.

This was all because he wanted 'realistic' ranges for his models

The principle law of making good combat rules is to never ever, bring real science into it

Edited by Cathy, 31 December 2016 - 09:53 AM.

[Davegt27]

when I first joined MWO in June 2014 the AC20 did have long range

I think that was the last month it had that range and man did I have fun with it

I was hitting people at range on alpine peaks lol

it got hit with nerf after nerf since

[Y E O N N E]

Cathy, on 31 December 2016 - 09:52 AM, said:

This was all because he wanted 'realistic' ranges for his models

The principle law of making good combat rules is to never ever, bring real science into it

Your friend seems to have executed poorly on the concept of "scaling."

Edited by Yeonne Greene, 31 December 2016 - 10:33 AM.

[NRP]

The AC20 range is weird. In real life, larger caliber weapons typically have longer ranges, don't they? At least that's what I gathered from a show about snipers on the Military channel.

[FupDup]

Tristan Winter, on 31 December 2016 - 12:42 AM, said:

Because in the year 3050, large caliber autocannons use Diet Coke and Mentos as propellant, apparently.

I miss 2013, when the AC20 felt like a real weapon, and not like I was launching a laden African swallow carrying a coconut bomb.

If you're referring to velocity, then many of the AC weapons feel like this:

[Lootee]

Newbies may not remember but PGI used to have it all screwed up by making the AC/20 do more damage at ranges it never should have been able to reach than the AC/10 could at its optimal range.

So the king of short range mugging weapons outperformed the dedicated medium range autocannon and also matched the performance of the long range PPC at its optimal range. It did all this at distances it was never intended to even be able to do damage at. Bad translaton of BattleTech is bad.

Don't even get me started on the Gauss Rifle that never exploded like the in-game desc says it should. This mindset is how you end up with stuff like GuardianAngelStealthArmorChameleonShieldNullSigAOE Jesus Box in the game.

As for why FASA made the max range so short, simple. They wanted the trade off for huge damage to a single location come at the cost of range. The Heavy Gauss Rifle only does massive damage up close. Clan Heavy Lasers have shorter ranges than their other laser types. LRMs can potentially do as much damage as an AC/20 but they don't do it to a single location plus have a minimum range. 3025 BattleTech is all about compromises. With Lost and New and Clan Tech it isn't quite as true any more, some pieces of equipment are just plain better with almost no drawbacks (fully operational LBX-ACs, Clan ERPPCs), but they still follow the same general rule. More damage to 1 spot = shorter range.

Edited by Lootee, 31 December 2016 - 01:23 PM.

[DrSaphron]

The AC20 is a smooth bore cannon, does amazing damage up close but once out of optimal range the abysmal ballistic charistics of a bus sized hunk of lead take over.

[XxXAbsolutZeroXxX]

AC20 is overnerfed imo.

It doesn't have any real advantages over a gauss at ranges under 270.

AC20 ammo is heavier per unit.

Gauss has more than 2x the effective range of an AC20 at near to the same weight.

AC20 doesn't explode like a gauss, but (last I checked) its just as easy to destroy via crits.

Gauss charge time arguably is the only disadvantage. Although there are a lot of people who use gauss enough to be skilled with it, or use macros, for that to not be much of an issue.

[GrimRiver]

Because when you have a round as large as an AC20 you would need rockets to push it further due to gravity and wind resistance.

Which is why you see shells "that large" IRL being used as howitzers and cannons, it's propellant is packaged separately due to it being soo large the shells would take up far too much room.

The AC20 would fit better as a howitzer than a crude broadside cannon.

For a round that large to overcome gravity and wind resistance and shoot further it would need either, even more powerful propellant or a smaller more dense warhead,

but if you want to have your cake and eat it too then you would need to put micro rockets on the end of that warhead.

[XxXAbsolutZeroXxX]

RestosIII, on 31 December 2016 - 09:02 AM, said:

Wait wait wait, what?



Are you saying I could get PAID to argue with people here? Then I should be getting thousands in back fees! Why didn't anyone tell me this sooner!?!?

If I remember right, Canada is known to pay people to visit chatrooms and message boards to spread pro state propaganda.

During the elections, Hillary paid off a lot of people to support her on twitter & elsewhere.

Other than that, I don't know of any paid opportunities for bloggers, etc.

Unless its being paid to give products positive reviews, etcc.

Edited by I Zeratul I, 01 January 2017 - 12:06 PM.

[RestosIII]

I Zeratul I, on 01 January 2017 - 12:05 PM, said:

Unless its being paid to give products positive reviews, etcc.

Ignoring all the political drivel there, I am 100% up for review whoring. Mechs don't buy themselves you know!