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Weapon Ranges
I've been looking at allot of battletech rules lately, and for a good many things, PGI has them matched up relatively well. However, one thing here is that weapon ranges are quite a bit too long to make sense. (Seriously, none of us like trying to shoot at an assault mech when its a tiny speck 1800m away, and in all reality, there isnt a direct fire weapon that is ACTUALLY supposed to hit farther than an lrm.
Now. Lets take a look at this table for an lrm 20 (IS)
Min range short range medium range long range extreme range
6 7 8-14 15-21 22-28
Now. Lets take a look at that minimum range value. Which is 6. In mwo, minimum range is 200m, thats fair. If you work it out that equals out to 1 for this table, equaling out to 33.3 meters. (makes sense right? 199.8 meters, if they are inside that well...your missiles wont arm.)
This would mean that the short range, where missiles might fly over your target is 233
Medium range is 266m-466m (chance the missiles might miss given flight speed, but optimal)
long range (optimal lrm range) 499m-699m. (This is the range that, even in mwo, your lrms are DEFINITELY going to smash something) and lastly extreme range (the end of extreme being the point where your missiles may loose tracking) being 732m-932m. Seems to line up very well to the stats for an lrm in mwo, correct?
Now!....heres the stats for an ER large laser (clan)
Short range medium range long range extreme range
1-8 9-15 16-25 26-30
Following the same mathematical concept.....
Short range (laser will still obviously hit, but due to long burn time of a large laser, you may not get damage in) 33m-266m
Medium range (semi optimal, again, target able to strafe in that range, not effective for heat vs damage vs time) 299m-499m
long range (optimal range for a large laser) 532m-832m
Extreme (the range in which a lasers damage starts to dissipate...ppcs lose concentration, autocannons and gauss rifles start to lose velocity) 865m-999m
999m....thats the farthest an er large laser should be able to hit, and still do some damage. After that, the er large lasers damage should be minuscule at best.
For point of reference ppcs max range should be 932m.
Gauss rifles should be the same range as an er large laser
Ac2's should have a max range of 1,198m
and LBX ac2's (remembering that, historically these were weapons used against aircraft....not mechs...) have a max range of 1,332m
These changes, are a nerf to maximum range. However, largely, would be a buff to the damage drop off distance, for instance. Right now your gauss rifles damage is dropping at about 650-700m (without range modules) still dealing damage up to about 1250m
In the above instance, your damage should be dropping between 832-999m reaching close to null above 999 meters.
So, with the above change, you would still do full damage (or close to it) up to 832m, however, getting a massive drop from 832-999. (No more hitting people from 1k+m away...shooting at specs isnt fun.
Allong with that, LRMS should be losing tracking strength, between 832-999m. (nobody likes getting lrmd across the map, or sniped across the map).
The above changes would bring us allot close to how battlemech fighting SHOULD feel, large, in your face, action. Not a sniping ***********. Aside from that. Gauss rifles have a minimum range...so do regular ppcs (being more complicated) Gauss rifles have a minimum range of 67m (honestly your not going to hit someone at 66m with a gauss rifle by rights anyway) and PPCs (not er) light ppcs and heavy ppcs (when they add them) all have a minimum range of 100m due to their capacitors, it is however explained, that they can be used inside this minimum, however it will damage your mech as well.
The lbx2 and lbx 5 both have minimum ranges as well. Again, these weapons are meant as flak guns against aircraft, or long range pellet sniping, not shotguns. lbx2 being 133m lbx5 being 100m. 10's and 20's have no minimum range.
I know mwo does not have aircraft, battle armor or tanks, but ill get to that in a moment.
General Balance and gameplay
Aside from this, omnimechs have some limitations. Such as not being able to equip lower arm actuators, on an arm that has large bore weapons, such as an ac-20, or gauss rifle. As well as not being able to remove weapons and equipment that are hardwired to their frame. (pgi has done this, one notable mech being the adder) However, omnimechs are, COMPLETELY. Modular, meaning, for example, you SHOULD be able to equip a couple of ac'5s in the place your warhawk has PPCS, you SHOULD be able to have a srm launcher in each side torso, omnimechs dont have to be asymmetrical monsters guys. You SHOULD be able to slap a few missile racks on your direwolfs arms. Which brings me to another point, there SHOULD, be hard points such as....Direct fire (ballistic or energy) Ammo consuming (missile or balistic) and Omni (any weapon type). Yea, i know, "But if we dont include 6 variants and heroes of every mech, we wont make money!" Actually, id be more entitled to have 6 varients of the same mech, if i could actually deck it out the way i should be able to. However, the general removal of variant restriction (for the most part, a k2 is still a k2...but wouldnt it be nice to have gauss rifles on those arms?) would lead to people just having one mech, and switching the weapons out.before a match. This change would require the facilitation of an engineering fee when adjusting your mechs. Why? because in battletech, re configuring a battlemech or omnimech, generally costs money...more so with a battlemech, since they are not modular like omnimechs are. In terms of PGI making money, hero mechs are still valuable for their c-bill boost an custom aesthetic, and. honestly id have like 5 kodiaks if i could actually deck out their hard points with all possibilities the chassis can hold.
Now, again, on a weapons note. Massive weapons like Ac-20;s, gauss rifles, HAG-20-40's, artillery weapons like the thumper, are SUPPOSED to be capable of being split between the arm, and the adjacent torso. or vice versa. Freeing up slots in either section. There are many mechs that split the firing mechanisms of these weapons into adjacent torso or arm sections.
Along with this, you should not be able to put your ammo in your legs....as far as i've read (and thats allot) there isnt a mech that houses its ammo in its legs. Aside from this, the farther you move your ammunition from the weapon it is loaded into, the longer it should take to reload it. (This would be relatively minuscule but, make a slight difference in combat and in building your mech)
No more having your ac20 ammo in your big toe.
Along with this, targeting is done quite wrong. You should not be able to share targetting data the way we do now, the way targeting data is shared now is assuming we are all equipped with c3i computers. While i dont think their should be a multitude of varients in c3 computers, you should have to mount one on your mech if you want to be able to share targeting data with teammates. (obviously tag, and narc will still mark a target and enable it to be targeted by friendly's) This would solidify the importance of scout mechs, as well as communication. Greatly amplifying the strategic importance of flanking, ect.
Sticking with balance, quick play, in all reality, does more damage to the game than good. Fights should not be mixups of IS and Clans, they should either be clan vs IS, IS vs IS or clan vs clan. Quick play, (once the timeline gets bumped to 3060) should be replaced with sollaris style matches, requiring a c-bill contribution to enter, with the potential for massive winnings and losses. Would people abuse this and team up? Yes...yes they would, thats a sollaris death match. Its allowed. Would they have to make teaming up and switching winners back and forth not really worth it? yes, yes they would. Thats a relatively easy balance of price to enter, cost of loss, and winnings. Sollaris rewards are distributed to first, second, and third places.
These types of matches would provide the opportunity to create actual mechwarrior legends within the community, that "black knight" type person your terrified to joust with.
The current quick play takes away from the ISvsClan balance, and is really more frustrating from a balance point if view, Clans dont fight inner spehere 12v12....IS forces would get DESTROYED utterly up untill the late 3060's or more, and even then after that.
If you read into the lore....the clans didnt lose the war due to being outmatched, they blew through IS forces on atleast 90 worlds, before succumbing to infighting between themselves.
In terms of technology, the inner sphere dont make many advances in technology before 3060, and are borrowing from clan tech LONG after that. Now....after 3060, inner sphere and clan technology gets quite co-mingled and miss-matched, the inner sphere field a large number of clan mechs, and on occasion the clans use IS tech to cut costs. In many cases custom mechs end up with a mix of clan and IS tech, especially so with merc units.
Moving on from that, mechwarrior NEEDS, mellee combat, grappling, knock downs, and damage from being landed on.
Potential function for mellee would be....Button such as....left alt, initiates hands, when in this mode, left click will swing with left hand actuator, right click will swing with right hand actuator, and cntrl plus left or right click will initiate a grapple with either, or both hands, allowing you to fire at the target with your free arm using whatever weapons are present in said arm, or knock the target to the ground, provided you are A. heavier, and B. grappling with both hand actuators.
This would open up the way for....
Mechs with melee weapons.
an actual function to equipping hand actuators on omnimechs
and an advantage for mechs that DO have hand actuators, hand actuators arent there for show, they enable climbing, grabbing, picking things up, and melee combat.
Yes, an atlas could pick up a car, and throw it at you.
Ramming an enemy mech at full speed (60+kph) SHOULD have some impact, to you and them. (them more so if they dont decide to full on charge you, obviously)
Mellee is a longshot, since it would require a large amount of work from PGI on their physics and game controls....but hey we can hope.
Now, on to the flamer.....
In no mechwarrior game, ever, has the flamer been a disgusting flashlight.
The flamer, and the heavy flamer (the heavy flamer carries ammo for 10 SHOTS per ton....its exactly like the flamer, but uses ammo....) fires a burst stream of plasma from its engine (in the heavy flamers case from ammo cartridges) the "white hot plasma-flame blast" aesthetic is cool and accurate...however in its current design in mwo, it really.....really....sucks. Its a blast, with a cycle, like every other weapon. Firing a stream from your fusion engine core for an extended period of time would....probably blow up your mech. Fix it, please. Aside from that, a constant ramp up of heat from a flamer equipped mech is not how it should function.
Now....moving on, it needs to set things on fire. Thats the main tactical advantage of it, aside from killing infantry and heating up enemy battlemechs. Setting fires, which create smoke....which blind removes vision.
Autocannons
Make a tab, on the side, with a select-able caliber. Ac-20 does not mean, BIG SHELL, or (in the clans case) LOTS OF BIG SHELLS. It is the amount of damage that autocannon can do. . Autocannons are not cannons, they are, and im quoting here, "basically, a giant "machine gun" "autocannons range in caliber from 30mm up to 203mm and are loosely grouped according to their damage versus armor. The exact same caliber of shell fired in a 100 shot burst to do 20 damage will have a shorter effective range than when fired in a 10 shot burst to do 2" Yea....theres a model of your ac-20 that fires 100 rounds in one burst, having extremely small shells. Let us select the number of shells fired. (obviously not up to 100, since that would be ridiculous, but you get my point here) On a side note, selecting the number of tubes (up to the total number of missiles...(no, you dont need 20 tubes for an lrm-5) for your missile launchers, would also be a nice feature. Personally, i loved mounting an srm-6 on my 2 tubed cicada.
Select-able ammunition
Now, this has been something people have been going on about for awhile, but ammunition ranges in a variety of types. With the below mentioned game mode and subsequently game focus change, ammunition variations would be much more feasible, as well as required.
Model changes for weapons
Now, medium lasers and small lasers, generally are fine. However, large lasers are MUCH bulkier, and should have a size variation in the tubing. There should be a difference in laser size if i mount a large laser on my mechs arm, as opposed to a small. Lense color variations would be nice as well.
Ultra-autocannons..]Rotary Autocannons are multiple-barrel arrangements. Some standard, and autocannons also use a multiple-barrel arrangement, but not as frequently. Selectable barrel variations for ultra, and standard acs...please.Or at the very...VERY least. Get rid of that UGLY.....SOOOO UGLY, model for the clan uac-10 and uac-20. The way it looks on a kodiak, is great. Try and make them more like that when put into other mechs arm or torso slots, maybe with a little of a barrel protrusion. Or triple/quad barrel....double barrel is just, so ugly.
Faction Play suggestion
In its current state, faction play in all reality offers not much of a reward over quick play in terms of time played vs c-bills gained, unless you factor in loyalty points and....even then its a waste of time if you lose.
My suggestion, would be a full on redesign of faction play from the floor up. With game balance being focused ALLOT more around faction play. It SHOULD be the main focus of the game, not quick play.
This one may take a bit to explain.
The theory for this, would be to have opposite teams, in an almost moba style map, however much more open field.
Each side would have a walled up base, with 3 gates, and an assortment of turrets on the walls, (both direct fire laser and lrm turrets) The gates would have generators, much like they do now, however gates would open when friendly forces get close to them.
Each base would house...
6 dropship pads. these dropship pads would be positioned around the center of the base (2 per gate) and carry with them vehicles and infantry.
Each dropship would carry 20 standard's (IS) 5 LRM carriers (IS,60ton)
8 axel's (IS 65ton)
and 15 elementals (clan) 4 Hachimans (clan 50ton) 8 Oros (clan, 60ton)
Vehicles and infantry would split themselves betwen the gates and move toward the enemy base, arriving in intervals of 1 dropship per pad every 5 minutes
Inside the base would also be an airfield, which would periodically launch
17 mantis VTOL(IS,15ton) 10 defender strike craft(IS, 25ton)
10 Donar VTOL (clan,21ton) 8 Avar strike craft (clan, 35 ton)
Fighters would launch from the airbase toward the center gate and then spreading out, launching a group of vtols every 6 minutes, and a group of fighters every 4 minutes.
Inside the base would also be 4 mechwarrior drop pads, respawning mechwarriors (players) every 30 seconds in intervals.
As well as 2 mech repair and resupply bays, and 1 radar dish, which offers map data to players. (enemy targets as pings on the map, infantry obviously would not show up)
and an HQ, losing your HQ means losing the match, awarding the winning teams faction with control points towards owning a planet.
In base structures are destroyable by the opposing team, with a "reconstruction time" of 6 minutes. Destroying an in base structure disables it until it can be repaired. Mechwarrior drop pads are not destroyable.
Out in between the two bases would be...
3 Anti aircraft batteries, which would periodically shoot down enemy drop ships (not mechwarrior dropships)
1 mech repair and resupply bay.
2 HPG relays, which would speed up the rate at which your reinforcements come by 30 seconds each.
and 1 turret control tower, which would enable turrets around any other battlefield bases your team owns as long as you hold the tower.
For this version of faction play, players would be able to select any mech from their mech bay associated with their said faction. Players would be allotted drop weight at the start of the match, (up to 65 tons) and awarded more drop weight as they participate in the match. (no one wants a cluster of assault mechs running around) Once you spend your drop weight, it will revert back to 65 tons. So, if you save up your drop weight for an atlas, your next drop would revert back to 65 tons. This would ensure a large variety of mech weights on the field at a time. Should your mech be destroyed, it will enter a "being repaired period" for 4-8 minutes depending on mech weight class. Trial mechs would not incur this penalty.
Matches would be extensively drawn out, therefore, players would be awarded not for match victory, but for participation. Capturing objectives, infantry kills, vehicle/aircraft kills, base destruction, and the normal rewards you get in a quick play match. (although extensively increased, as to balance with no win/salvage rewards) The number of groups in a ,match would be 5 stars (25 players, clan) and 7 lances (28 players, IS). So, if its....IS VS IS, 28v 28
clan v clan, 25v25, is v clan 28v25. This would enable pgi to better resemble the balance of clan technology.
This mode of gameplay, along with all changes listed, would ensure a more diverse role for mechs, as well as discouragement for those people who like to pump 5 ppcs on their mechs. (Your not going to fair very well vs a bunch of tanks or aircraft with those weapons) Requiring players to set up specific builds on their mechs to full-fill certain roles(more so like they are intended to, for example, the jaggermech is an anti-aircraft platform, so is the rifleman) as well as allow things like artillery mechs, anti-infantry/vehicle mechs to thrive. (As well as the inclusion of the weapons that go allong with these types of mechs, like thumpers, arrow IV's, light machineguns, heavy flamers). No longer forcing mechs that, werent designed to take on other mechs to do so, and allowing scouts to full-fill their role of harassment and scouting much more fully.
Quad battlemechs
They exist....tough ***** if your lead developer doesnt like them. In functionality, they are much more stable, (cant be knocked over) and generally faster than regular mechs, many of them also equip turrets.
Rear mounted weapon hardpoints
Lots of mechs have them...specifically to discourage people from trying to attack you from behind. Like the huntsman, it has a rear mounted weapons pod, and A-pods in its feat.
That finishes my suggested changes. I hope this post will see some support, cheers
Edited by XkrX Dragoon, 04 March 2017 - 03:37 PM.
