422 replies to this topic

[Roughneck45]

I_AM_ZUUL, on 01 June 2017 - 07:46 AM, said:

You keep on knowing that

Fix'd that for you.

I_AM_ZUUL, on 01 June 2017 - 07:46 AM, said:

either you are pinned in place and can not effectively fight my teammates (meaning I am doing my job as Support by just desultory keeping a single flight of missiles in the air at all times, I put a single 5 on some mechs to do that purpose alone) or you get melted when exposed (meaning I am doing my job.) MWO has skewed peoples understanding of what Direct-Fire is supposed to mean with its pixel perfect convergence application, and somehow people can not grasp such a simple concept as Role Warfare but PGI really seems to hate the entire concept of that and has done everything possible to remove it from the game. I still have over a 40% Accuracy with the most inaccurate weapon in the game & a large percentage of that +55% was NEVER intended hit the target anyways.

You can romanticize role warfare all you want, I just observe the game for what it is. Direct fire weapons can pin down targets too, if you have the aim. The missile warning can make people panic, for sure, but I never said you can't PUG with LRMs, I said LRMs don't have the potential that direct fire has.

FuhNuGi, on 01 June 2017 - 07:54 AM, said:

*Anecdotal condescending response*

Thats all well and good, but I didn't say or complain about any of that.

I don't rage at people who bring LRMs. They are fun to use and there are a lot of nostalgic builds that are fun to play, and they can work when you know how to play to their strengths.

All I'm saying is that LRMs don't have the potential, or skill ceiling if you prefer, that direct fire does. The best LRM player will always be defeated by the best direct fire player. That is a fact. The design of the weapon makes it so.

Edited by Roughneck45, 01 June 2017 - 11:45 AM.

[Ultimax]

Lorcryst NySell, on 01 June 2017 - 10:55 AM, said:

This is too good to ignore ...

I've played chess a grand total of two times in my 43 years of life.
I never understood the rules.
So of course I'll reject a game of chess to prove my skills/points, since I have NO skill whatsoever in chess.
I don't fear that I might lose, I *KNOW* I *WILL* lose.

So I'm a coward by refusing to give myself up like a sacrificial lamb ?

No, you're not a coward for refusing.

You would be a fool however to be blathering on incessantly spouting ridiculousness like Sun Tzu for a video game, when when it's clear you are a novice or a low caliber player.


Low skill or new players should always voice their opinion of what they like/don't like, but without game knowledge debating points of balance mechanics is foolish and ridiculous.

[Lightfoot]

Radar Dep is buried at the bottom of the Sensor Tree, but if you hate LRMs you may have to trade another tree for Sensors.

And actually the Missile buffs do very little for LRMs. I tested them on non moving mechs in Testing Grounds with and without the buffs, and using three A-LRM-15, all the buffs killed mechs 15-20 missiles faster, so 4.5 salvos instead of 5 with nothing. But if you are a missile mech you have a good portion of the Sensor tree for lock duration. Now that Lock duration is applied to mechs with no Radar Dep. Delicious.

[cyb3rj4ck]

Roughneck45, on 01 June 2017 - 06:12 AM, said:

LRMs, by their design alone, cannot reach the potential that direct fire can. Its that simple.

LRMs punish mistakes. They decimate players that don't use cover properly, don't look for UAVs, and don't have a firm grasp of the radar mechanics of this game. The better your opponent gets the more dead weight LRMs become.

You could be the most skilled Lurmer in all of MWO and a player that knows how to use cover is going to avoid 90% of the damage you are putting out.

This, exactly. I've shot at Assaults that obviously have mobility skills. They'll peak-and-shoot and by the time I can get a lock and fire, my missile hit the cover they're behind.

When the missiles start flying, find a good rock (or assault) to hide behind!

[Strength Damage Cliff Racer]

Funny thing is, it's very easy to get both levels of AMS overload just on your way to adding extra survivability. With this one in place, you get rather sick protection from LRMs even with ONE AMS, which is easily installed if you got a ton to spare (0.5 tons AMS, 0.5 tons of ammo).
Recently I had a game with 8 guys packing 1-2 AMS on them. NOt only they fully negated our LRM boats, I couldn't kill lights with SSRM30 shots.

[VanillaG]

Viktor Drake, on 01 June 2017 - 11:00 AM, said:

This is why LRMs need to be dialed back or at least there needs to be some mechanic that allows a player to feel they are in control or have some sort of counter to being picked apart by an enemy out of sight on the other side of the map. Radar Dep modules provided this call it "Feeling" that you had such a counter, i.e. you felt that as long as you could break LOS, you could protect your mech, even if you didn't have hard cover available. Without easy access to Radar Dep, players have lost this counter or feeling or whatever and now feel that they are pretty helpless a being able counter against LRMs, therefore frustration and rage builds up when it happens, player become vocal about LRMs being OP or needing a huge re-work, etc.

You can install AMS and have it be buffed with 5 SP skill tree that can shoot down missiles aimed at you and nearby friendlies. You can get 60% Radar Dep with 9 SP in the skill tree to break locks when you break LoS. If you have ECM you can buff it via the skill tree to make your friends invisible to locks. What more do you need so the you can "feel in control"?

If you CHOOSE to do none of those things, along with staying out in the open, you have nobody to blame but yourself. You made a value judgement that those things were not necessary and are now reaping what you sow. Let's not delude ourselves into thinking that there is nothing you can do to counter LRMs. There are plenty of tools to counter LRMs but people are not using them because for years LRMs were not a big problem because of mandatory Radar Dep and overpowered ECM. Now people have to make the value judgement on spending those SP for those items and/or change builds to free up 1-2 tons for AMS.

[I_AM_ZUUL]

Daggett, on 01 June 2017 - 08:54 AM, said:

My guess is the main problem with LRMs is that they are simply very vulnerable to hate by design.

• They require no aim and LOS, which make their users skilless. -You need to be able to keep the arc equation running in your head to be truly effective with them, making them the most thought required out of any weapon system (which is one of the reasons I like it since it gives my brain a constant stream of information to process and allows me to focus without 3 other trains of thought trying to take primary)
  
• They have many counters which make them unreliable and therefore weak. -There are counters to the counters as well as just dumbfiring (which I see a complete lack of utilization caused by low skill level users) that works great against Hide-Poke that just eat 60 damage to the face as they are trying to peek.
  
• They encourage less-experienced pilots to sit back way too far which make those pilots armor-denying cowards. -This is a 100% true and a result of the Range being too large, but cERPPC/cGuass & ERLL/cERLL cancer mechs are just as guilty of doing.
  
• They can easily annihilate a careless enemy when boated which makes them OP. -Almost every weapon system in the game is "boated" making this a non sequiter
  
• They spread their damage which devalues their damage-potential. -This is true and not true... it devalues there ability to focus down a kill but that is NOT a LRMers Role, so it can not be used a negative that it is not done. cLRMs will actually get more Kills on average than LRMs because of the nature of how they are fired but that is what works out to be what makes them inferior weapon systems, getting Kills is a nice bonus since they are almost always Solo Kills if you are doing your job correctly but a Secondary concern to the Primary Role which is one of Force Multipler.

Since you took the time to address your issues point by point, I addressed them point by point.

Edited by I_AM_ZUUL, 01 June 2017 - 04:49 PM.

[I_AM_ZUUL]

cyb3rj4ck, on 01 June 2017 - 12:01 PM, said:

This, exactly. I've shot at Assaults that obviously have mobility skills. They'll peak-and-shoot and by the time I can get a lock and fire, my missile hit the cover they're behind.

When the missiles start flying, find a good rock (or assault) to hide behind!

I addressed how what you are describing is a result of poor LRM skill level in the post above... Dumbfire them!!! You do not need Lock just LOS to where you want them to go, so aim where the Target is peeking of cover from, Alpha Strike your missile payload there then torso twist and get into your own cover. They eat 40-60 damage right when they are trying to fire and you have retreated into cover yourself. Do it twice more & then you will generally be charged at which point you just melt their mech for bothering you... then they can come on the forums screaming about "LRMZ IZ OP.. PGI NERF NOWZ!!!11!!!1" thread and you can laugh to yourself when you see 3 of threads started by people you personally killed with LRMs in the past day or two. I can tell you, I find it hysterical myself.

[Ted Wayz]

Racism is the wrong term.

Prejudice is the correct term.

Direct fire weapons I hit in the high 80's %.

LRM's high 39-45%. That is why I carry many. So many counters. Keep in mind I try to fire at 300-400m and with LOS.

[I_AM_ZUUL]

Roughneck45, on 01 June 2017 - 11:39 AM, said:

You can romanticize role warfare all you want, I just observe the game for what it is. Direct fire weapons can pin down targets too, if you have the aim. The missile warning can make people panic, for sure, but I never said you can't PUG with LRMs, I said LRMs don't have the potential ability to be exploited through coordinated effort of the the badly implemented ruleset PGI has given us to use cause they are incapable of opening and reading two books Total Warfare & Tactical Operations that direct fire has.

Fixed that for you*

Sure, LRMs have no real place in "comp" play because they can not be exploited into what is a gross caricature of the game I want to be playing. There are way better games I could choose to play if that was what interested me, but it is not in the slightest since I want to play Stompy Robits in Battletech. "Comp" play bares absolutely ZERO resemblance to Battletech because it is not Battletech in the slightest... everything that makes a mech Meta is total irrelevance in a Battletech game, it is a LUCKY AF dice roll that you might hit once or twice if you spent the entire time doing on your way to being crushingly defeated.

I am not talking about Comp or even Group play really... I got disgusted with that over a year ago, as I said that holds actual negative interest to me since it is the practical expression of everything that PGI has done wrong all rolled into one giant exploited caricature of what it should be. I would rather the most Terribad Potato LRMer be on my team than anyone who runs exclusively the "meta mechs" cause I can at least teach the Terribad how to not be terrible, the Meta Mech pilots are conciously choosing to play Individually great but Group Detrimental mechs in a Team based game. That kind of selfish of behavior can not be rectified since it is done knowing that is exactly what they are doing... they are walking examplars of why Solo Queue is a Low Trust environment where people playing have absolutely no confidence that their teammates even want to play a Team Based game.

Since +90% of the player population is NEVER going to play Group or Comp.... why do you guys think you are important or have anything of relevance to add to a conversation besides the most basic concepts??? What is "Meta" is usually Not Good in Solo Queue and requires being carried to Victory or is directly responsible to pulling the Team down to Defeat. Stop talking about stuff that people copy even though it utterly ill suited for what they are going to be using it for and do not generally even have the skill to be a Good Cancer Pilot like the top level guys can.

Edited by I_AM_ZUUL, 01 June 2017 - 06:23 PM.

[Wil McCullough]

Lorcryst NySell, on 01 June 2017 - 10:55 AM, said:

This is too good to ignore ...

I've played chess a grand total of two times in my 43 years of life.
I never understood the rules.
So of course I'll reject a game of chess to prove my skills/points, since I have NO skill whatsoever in chess.
I don't fear that I might lose, I *KNOW* I *WILL* lose.

So I'm a coward by refusing to give myself up like a sacrificial lamb ?

if you start off by trying to tell a chess grandmaster that his chess knowledge is terrible, your strategies work better and have gotten you a 90% win rate in your games, THEN refuse his challenge of a game to prove it, just like james did...

... yes. absolutely yes, you'll be a coward.

[Wil McCullough]

I_AM_ZUUL, on 01 June 2017 - 06:15 PM, said:

What is "Meta" is usually Not Good in Solo Queue and requires being carried to Victory or is directly responsible to pulling the Team down to Defeat. Stop talking about stuff that people copy even though it utterly ill suited for what they are going to be using it for and do not generally even have the skill to be a Good Cancer Pilot like the top level guys can.

can you identify one "meta" build that is "usually not good in solo queue and requires being carried to victory"?

[Lorcryst NySell]

Wil McCullough, on 01 June 2017 - 10:43 PM, said:

if you start off by trying to tell a chess grandmaster that his chess knowledge is terrible, your strategies work better and have gotten you a 90% win rate in your games, THEN refuse his challenge of a game to prove it, just like james did...

... yes. absolutely yes, you'll be a coward.

That's not what I did though

[Wil McCullough]

Lorcryst NySell, on 01 June 2017 - 11:02 PM, said:

That's not what I did though

yup james did. he was the one being called a coward, not you. (unless i went blind and read that entirely wrong)

[Vellron2005]

I have to say, when I opened this topic, I specifically said it was meant for statistical data and not the love/hate LRM bile.. yet, again, this thread has devolved into love/hate LRM bile..

I read the first and last pages (sorry, didn't have time to real all 133 comments since I opened the topic, it kinda exploded), but the jist of it, once again, the bile and bitterness being spat at one-another about LRMs..

So please, would someone tell me if anybody posted ANY actual statistical data, as requested in my OP?

Did PGI react in any way? (wishful thinking, I know, but still.. a boy can dream)

Also, let me just quickly comment on the fact that top-level comp teams don't use LRMs..

Personally, I don't understand why they don't use LRMs, cose' I've seen very successful drops using JUST LRM boats, but hey, I'm not a comp player, so I'll give them that.

The fact that competitive play is devoid or LRMs does not mean that LRMs are an inherently bad system. It may mean that they are not suited to that particular play style. Just like you won't see high-end speakers in a formula 1 race car.. Comp play is simply different, with its own rules and and ways to play.. But then again, comp play is not an official game mode either, is it? I don't see QP, FP and CP, now do I?

This means that Comp play is something almost "3'rd party" and cannot be taken into account when discussing the average MWO experience that most of the community enjoys.

And this topic is about exactly that.

The AVERAGE player's experience, and the statistical data involving using LRMs.

Again I IMPLORE all of you to cut the bile and hate down to a minimum and provide some hard evidence that LRMs are this way or that way.

Saying "there's no LRMs in comp play", or "LRMs are the worst" or "LRMs are amazing" is not hard data pertinent to the average player's MWO experience .. its an opinion.

[Lorcryst NySell]

I'm afraid that no one provided hard data and that PGI hasn't seen this thread ...

And I'm guilty of that too, since I don't have hard data apart from my own abysmal stats.

[Wil McCullough]

Save paul coming in and giving us the numbers, no one will be able to provide "hard evidence".

Comp play is the apex of mwo competitiveness. And in any versus game that takes balance seriously, things are balanced from the top, aka comp play.

As it stands, lurms are very very seldom used in comp play. And that says something.

If we're going to balance by potato, lurms allow a player unable to move and aim at the same time (like we were all like when we first started) to double or even triple his score.

Does that mean lurms should be nerfed to AT LEAST half their current effectiveness?

[Daggett]

I_AM_ZUUL, on 01 June 2017 - 04:47 PM, said:

Since you took the time to address your issues point by point, I addressed them point by point.

Thanks for addressing those myths. I thought doing that too, but that would have made my post tldr.

Edited by Daggett, 02 June 2017 - 12:50 AM.

[Vellron2005]

Lorcryst NySell, on 01 June 2017 - 11:42 PM, said:

I'm afraid that no one provided hard data and that PGI hasn't seen this thread ...

And I'm guilty of that too, since I don't have hard data apart from my own abysmal stats.

Yeah, I figured it was so..

Can anyone please poke Russ or Paul on Twitter about this issue?

Maybe, if we poke hard enough, we can stop all the pointless bickering and get some hard data..

[PhoenixFire55]

Vellron2005, on 01 June 2017 - 05:50 AM, said:

I would really like to see PGI intervene and step in, because we LRM users are seriously starting to feel bullied, both in-game and on the forums.

Good. Time to gitgud.