6 replies to this topic

[Invictus XVII]

Hello Mwo community.

I wish to speculate about the new battletech (MRM's) and bring forth some of my own thoughts and suggestions.

So far as everyone knows, the current missile systems in the game act differently.
LRM - Lock-on longrange missiles which can dumbfire
SSRM - Lock-on short range missiles which cant dumbfire
SRM - Short Range dumbfire missiles.

And as of right now the tools like tag and narc are currently out of favour because they simply dont have a real function anymore.

Therefore i hereby put forth the following suggestion about the MRM's

That if a tag is equipped with MRM's - the tag line will make the MRM's laserguided and not dumbfire.

I think this could lead to some pretty interesting gameplay and techniques when a skilled player learns to lead MRM missiles around corners by shooting far to the right and then tag the corner to the left and the missiles will arch towards that direction being able to negate shallow cover to some degree. (Not very responsive guide mind you, you shouldnt be able to make it do a hard 90* or anything)

I would imagine this would work if the missile cluster sees the tag point, but simply continue as dumb if the tag can no longer be seen by the missile.


What do you guys think?

Edited by Fishbaws, 07 April 2017 - 06:50 AM.

[Ch_R0me]

I don't think that's gonna work for a MRM's... Using TAG for guidance is actually used in Semi-Guided LRM's & Arrow IV Homing Missile.
Since PGI probably will never implement artillery weaponry (such as Arrow IV for example), the only thing your theory would support while being compatible with BT is only Semi-Guided LRM's, which was introduced in 3057.

For MRM's however, there is a dedicated Fire Control System, named "Apollo", which gives MRM's limited guidance, but it shows up in 3071, unfortunately.

Edited by ManganMan, 07 April 2017 - 09:09 AM.

[Vlad Striker]

SRM by lore are guided missiles but with a limited homing capabilities. MRMs are a pure dumb-fire missiles.
"Apollo" is not guidance system it's just targeting helper who predicts crossing point of missile and target.

[Tesunie]

Vlad Striker, on 07 April 2017 - 11:35 AM, said:

SRM by lore are guided missiles but with a limited homing capabilities. MRMs are a pure dumb-fire missiles.
"Apollo" is not guidance system it's just targeting helper who predicts crossing point of missile and target.

Technically (with exception to Arrows and Semi-guided LRMs), no missile is actually guided at all in BT lore. SRMs certainly are not guided, and even SSRMs are not guided (but wont let you shoot unless the targeting computer predicts that all missiles will hit, saving ammo).

In this game though, SSRMs use the same locking system* as LRMs, and all LRMs are guided missiles (as well as SSRMs).

* As in, get locks, missiles will home. Not necessarily homing behavior.

[Invictus XVII]

What i mean was. If you got a tag, the MRM's could try to aim in the direction where you fire the tag (if the missile see the tag dot (not locked target)) It could be an excpetionally interesting game mechanic to help curve trajectories around obstacles on the battlefield, like team mates, corners or hitting the enemy from a certain angle (like an atlast who dont want to expose his chest or back so hes shouldertanking you and you shoot at an angle and guide the missile in to the side)

Im not really well versed in the canon or lore. Frankly i dont really care about it much- I want to bring a useless item back which you normally have to sacrefice 1 ton and an energypoint to have onboard while it does virtually nothing but giving you a tagging money bonus. And dont say it has anti ecm, cause a probe does the job a lot better and doesnt take an energy slot.

while at the same time give the game an interesting game mechanic that would actually be fun and USEFUL at the same time.

Edited by Fishbaws, 10 April 2017 - 07:05 AM.

[Tesunie]

Fishbaws, on 10 April 2017 - 07:03 AM, said:

I want to bring a useless item back which you normally have to sacrefice 1 ton and an energypoint to have onboard while it does virtually nothing but giving you a tagging money bonus. And dont say it has anti ecm, cause a probe does the job a lot better and doesnt take an energy slot.

while at the same time give the game an interesting game mechanic that would actually be fun and USEFUL at the same time.

For LRM use, TAG can be very helpful. For SSRM use, it also can be helpful.

TAG decreases lock on times, meaning you can get locks faster. This can help SSRMs as well as LRMs.

It tightens spread of LRMs, making it so more missiles hit center mass (CT).

It cuts though the "no-target shield" ECM provides, and at much farther ranges (750m) compared to BAP. However, it doesn't shut down ECM, so ECM's increasing to lock on times will still be an issue, but TAG does help counter that effect as well.

TAG also extends target decay a little, as in the lock after you've lost line of sight. In this case, you'd have to be hitting the target with TAG just before you lost line of sight for it to work.


TAG does already have it's uses, depending upon what you are using it with.

[ScrapIron Prime]

One thing PGI has been great at is incorporating the tech directly from lore. Thats going to be the case here. MRMs do not benefit from guidance tech at all and have an inherent -1 to hit in tabletop. Given that, TAG, Artemis, and NARC are definately out.

So how can they simulate a system that fires a bajillion mildly inaccurate rockets? I'd suggest making them faster than SRMs, make them fly straigh like SRMs with similar grouping, but in a stream. Make an MRM 10 fire 1 rocket per 0.1 seconds for 1 second. Likewise an MRM 30 fires 3 rockets perr 0.1 second for 1 second. This would make the system harder to score devastating hits with without making it laughably inaccurate.

Anyone who remembers when the Raven first came out will remember the NARC missile hardpoint could only fire 1 missile at a time, so if you put an LRM 10 on it, you got a fire hose of missiles. =)