212 replies to this topic

[Scout Derek]

Mister Blastman, on 16 June 2017 - 08:16 PM, said:

[Mystere]

UnofficialOperator, on 16 June 2017 - 08:37 PM, said:

Won't be any need for lights after the patch then considering light queue is already low. No point flanking or backstabbing. It'd all be deathball with medium and heavy.

The heavy queue now is pretty much the most popular one.

I was in a drop where we had only one light and one medium. The rest were heavies and assaults.

[Deathlike]

So... new balance overlord... same as the old balance overlord?

Thy spreadsheet doth protest too much?

Chances are no real comp player was consulted... instead it was super potato. I don't even remember the last time IS SL was a thing (IS SPL was a brief thing when Firestarters weren't huge and 8 SPL FS9-A was kind of the only good option w/o quirks for IS SPL).

Edited by Deathlike, 16 June 2017 - 08:42 PM.

[Requiemking]

El Bandito, on 16 June 2017 - 08:28 PM, said:

That would buff Lights too much. They have no issue getting close.

Erm, maybe if that Light's name happens to be Locust, Commando, or Arctic Cheetah. Other Lights are hilariously large, sluggish, and fragile. Trying to get close to knife fight or even hit-and-run in anything other than the three I listed earlier is tantamount to suicide.

[UnofficialOperator]

Mystere, on 16 June 2017 - 08:39 PM, said:

I was in a drop where we had only one light and one medium. The rest were heavies and assaults.

Yeah I was in a similar drop. 2 lights per side. Rest was heavies and assault. I guess they just want to sell heavies and assault mechs.

Edited by UnofficialOperator, 16 June 2017 - 08:49 PM.

[VitriolicViolet]

im guessing part of the SL/SPL nerfs are due to trying to pre-emptively balance them against the new Micro lasers and MGs. also if anything the black knights needed all round buffs, instead the best one got nerfed even further, sensor range is not a acceptable replacement for losing range, cooldown and heat quirks even if it is lore friendly.

[Revis Volek]

FupDup, on 16 June 2017 - 08:20 PM, said:

As we've seen with the IS SL, the gap needs to be pretty substantial or else it ultimately doesn't help much.

yea a small margin is basically none...

[poltergoost]

Well, byebye to my 6-SPL Jenner IIC. Which is the only mech I really enjoy playing.

I wonder what the Light mech queue will look like after this...

[Deathlike]

poltergoost, on 16 June 2017 - 08:56 PM, said:

Well, byebye to my 6-SPL Jenner IIC. Which is the only mech I really enjoy playing.

I wonder what the Light mech queue will look like after this...

It only shrinks, except Light mechs only get larger nominally. That's all.

[Mister Blastman]

El Bandito, on 16 June 2017 - 08:28 PM, said:

That would buff Lights too much. They have no issue getting close.

You can't balance a class of weapons based on a 'mech class. This nerf hurts larger robots far more than lights, especially already mediocre ones such as the Gargoyle and Executioner.

Lights were bad enough. Now they'll be even worse.

Nonsense changes.

Edited by Mister Blastman, 16 June 2017 - 09:13 PM.

[MischiefSC]

FupDup, on 16 June 2017 - 07:43 PM, said:

The issue with the cooldown changes is for pulse lasers, mostly. The small cooldown buffs they got doesn't offset their upfront damage reductions.

PGI should have gone whole hog and changed both damage and cooldown by very large margins for pulses. Let pulses act like laser versions of the AC/5 or AC/2. THAT would create the sustained DPS role that PGI is looking for. The current changes keep their current role (mostly upfront damage) with less effectiveness.

Sustained staring DPS only works for brawling and has to *significantly* out DPS a alpha build to make it worthwhile because you're spreading your damage and he's focusing his.

A mid-long range sustained staring DPS build is something of a lolwut for energy. You can sorta do it with enough AC2s but nobody is ever going to say that's going to compete with a long range poke build. The concept of sustained staring DPS LPLs at 400-700m vs an alpha build is an idea that only works if you're playing on a map with no cover. If the map has cover then the guy with the alpha build has a distinct advantage.

Hence why alpha builds are the go-to. Even for brawling, cuz boom twist boom wins vs stare plinkplinkplink stare.

I'm struggling to see where these changes are any sort of positive to gameplay. It's not even scaling back laservomit vs ballistics, just reducing the number of viable lasers and pushing people toward long range ERLL poking.

Just a bit... confused.

[JadePanther]

map changes to HPG are not gonna solve the nascar **** of the left flank unless they move that spawn.. the center spawn could always just go thru the right exit

[Mister Blastman]

MischiefSC, on 16 June 2017 - 09:03 PM, said:

I'm struggling to see where these changes are any sort of positive to gameplay. It's not even scaling back laservomit vs ballistics, just reducing the number of viable lasers and pushing people toward long range ERLL poking.

Just a bit... confused.

Precisely. That is exactly what this balance update does.

I have zero interest in going back to that, so I'll just find something else to play from now on, I guess.

[Sereglach]

MischiefSC, on 16 June 2017 - 09:03 PM, said:

Sustained staring DPS only works for brawling and has to *significantly* out DPS a alpha build to make it worthwhile because you're spreading your damage and he's focusing his.

A mid-long range sustained staring DPS build is something of a lolwut for energy. You can sorta do it with enough AC2s but nobody is ever going to say that's going to compete with a long range poke build. The concept of sustained staring DPS LPLs at 400-700m vs an alpha build is an idea that only works if you're playing on a map with no cover. If the map has cover then the guy with the alpha build has a distinct advantage.

Hence why alpha builds are the go-to. Even for brawling, cuz boom twist boom wins vs stare plinkplinkplink stare.

I'm struggling to see where these changes are any sort of positive to gameplay. It's not even scaling back laservomit vs ballistics, just reducing the number of viable lasers and pushing people toward long range ERLL poking.

Just a bit... confused.

Take this as an example of what PGI SHOULD have done to make a DPS Pulse Laser viable; and what some of us have talked about in the past and/or have mentioned in this thread. We'll use the Clan LPL vs. ERLL as the example (again, numbers for example purposes only):

C-ERLL - Dam 10, Heat 10, Cooldown 3.75, Duration 1.25 = DPS 2, HPS 2, and DPH 1
C-LPL - Dam 6, Heat 4, Cooldown 1.25, Duration .75 = DPS 3, HPS 2, DPH 1.5

Then we'd end up with a C-LPL that'd do 50% more DPS and DPH over an ERLL while maintaining the same overall HPS . . . which means you could do a LOT more damage over time with the LPL in comparison to the ERLL. The difference in cycle and duration times also means that when going head to head in a brawl the LPL will drastically outperform the ERLL. That also makes them worth the extra tonnage investment.

If they followed that kind of pattern on the Pulse Lasers they'd be in a much better place. Instead they're still not much different than before outside of overall nerfing and they still don't truly fit the role of a DPS laser type.

[Cy Mitchell]

You have to look at all the energy weapon changes in the context of making the new Civil War weapons have a place to slot into.

IS gets erSL and erML, Light and Heavy PPC and Snub Nose PPC.

Clan gets erMicro Lasers and Micro pulse lasers plus Heavy small, medium and large lasers.

They have to slot those in somewhere. I will wait and see how this all plays out.

[Razorfish]

RestosIII, on 16 June 2017 - 06:31 PM, said:

They nerfed Clan Small Lasers. W-why? And they dropped Clan SMPLas damage by 2? Whyyyyyyyyy

Cuz they needed it. Or because it makes me happy

[UnofficialOperator]

[TravelingMaster]

Bud Crue, on 16 June 2017 - 07:55 PM, said:

I agree...Most of them are. I just don't think the D is all that. Now if ya want to talk about the A or the Scorch, then sure they are pretty nasty, but the D? 2B and 2M in the arms and 1E in the RT and 1E in the head. The meta build has some snipe potential and that has little to do with innate agility. All nerfing agility does on that mech is encourage/force people to play the damn snippy 2Gauss 2ERLL build. Take away any motivation to run that mech any other way. Certainly you aren't going to brawl with such an unresponsive pig, that can now lose its arms so easily, because being so unresponsive, they are just hanging there? This is exactly the opposite of what PGI said they want to encourage with the skill tree...avoiding changes that tend to force players into specific builds. To give them choice to do other things. All making this particular mech this unresponsive will do, is encourage the long range snipe build. Yippie.

Agreed. The D variant is the only variant I have (bought it as a noob, should've gotten a different variant), and this mobility nerf irritates me. It's already slower than the other variants due to lower max engine, and its hardpoint setup basically makes you field big-*** ballistics (Gauss Rifle or 20's). I just got finished setting up a dual-LB20 build on my MAD-IIC-D, and now I'm probably gonna have to figure something else out because the thing's gonna handle like a Kodiak or something. Can't even gauss-snipe properly with the thing, because of the low-slung arms.

[TravelingMaster]

Brain Cancer, on 16 June 2017 - 08:17 PM, said:

I'll also note that the AMS change has a disproportionate effect on Clan LRMs, since a larger envelope of engagement means their missiles get hit for more on the way in. I mean, if they'd increased velocity I'd understand (or added AMS damage), but this basically is saying "LRMs must be good, so we'll have to make them worse & make one of their numerous counters notably better.".

As one of the lurmer fanatics, I cannot even comprehend it. LRMs seem to be only effective at making bad players salty you killed them with the most inefficient damage delivery in the game, yet changes seem to be devoted to making them even less efficient and more counterable, while moving AMS towards being a "harder" countermeasure.



MWO is Too Big To Flush. You'd end up with a clog!

Yeah, I generally run LRM-hybrid builds (two LRM10's or two LRM15's, with an assortment of other weapons), because I'm trying to use LRMs without boating them. This kind of thing just makes me less likely to use LRMs now, because the only way you're really gonna get through is with boat builds. Gonna have to figure out what to use on my Timby and Mad Dog instead. . .probably an autocannon or something. Sure as hell not gonna use the 3-laser left torso, since they didn't deign to remove the unfair mobility nerfs on that.

[Y E O N N E]

TravelingMaster, on 16 June 2017 - 09:56 PM, said:

Agreed. The D variant is the only variant I have (bought it as a noob, should've gotten a different variant), and this mobility nerf irritates me. It's already slower than the other variants due to lower max engine, and its hardpoint setup basically makes you field big-*** ballistics (Gauss Rifle or 20's). I just got finished setting up a dual-LB20 build on my MAD-IIC-D, and now I'm probably gonna have to figure something else out because the thing's gonna handle like a Kodiak or something. Can't even gauss-snipe properly with the thing, because of the low-slung arms.

The MAD-IIC-B has the firepower if a middle-of-the-road heavy. As such, I built it with a big engines and jump jets to use mobility as an augment for its middling firepower. They are taking that away. I am not pleased.