90 replies to this topic

[Brain Cancer]

Shifty McSwift, on 17 June 2017 - 10:27 PM, said:

Didn't you know, apparently this place is swarming with game developers that have built and/or worked on projects similar to MWO, and who know all of the exact balance methods that would please 100% of people 100% of the time. Too bad PGI doesn't hire them right? Everything would be perfect if they just hired one of these genius voices of our generation. /s

Nope, but I'd warrant that hiring from a competent enough level of players would actually end up being a significant improvement in customer satisfaction.

[Shifty McSwift]

Brain Cancer, on 17 June 2017 - 10:58 PM, said:

Nope, but I'd warrant that hiring from a competent enough level of players would actually end up being a significant improvement in customer satisfaction.

[El Bandito]

l33tworks, on 17 June 2017 - 07:12 PM, said:

So what changes are exactly so horrific to warrant the uproar?

Not uproar worthy but it is very disappointing to see seldom used IS SPL getting the nerf.

[Dee Eight]

Play battletech... values set in stone for decades...come to MWO and wonder what crack pipe they were smoking to arrive at the damage/heat values for these lasers... then laugh at all the butthurt players crying when they finally try and re-balance the values closer to the original battletech source material.

[Birthright]

Im just mad about small laser nerf and potentially mad about the AMS change.

If AMS really becomes a counter to SRMs, then this will kill a lot of the fun for me in this game.

SRMs are alrdy not easy to use since they are relatively slow unguided missiles (they are slower than ballistics),
considering the ping difference between EU and US, they are not easy to use well unless you rly get into the enemies face.

If there now is a counter to SRMs, then GG...

I dont know what PGI is doin with the balance to be honest, I feel like they really wanny kill brawling.

they nerf all small lasers, increase heat on every clan weapon basically, SRMs may become totally useless, and IS will get a lot of long ranged weapon with the upcoming tech patch.

So game becomes one big sniper fest?

Edited by NebeIparder, 18 June 2017 - 12:17 AM.

[Dee Eight]

Given the # of players who still whine as is about devoting 1.5 tons to an AMS installation.... even though on your average game... around just LRMS...they can easily kill 320+ missiles with just one AMS... and that's the equivalent of TEN TONS of standard armor protection...to yourself and the rest of your team.... and folks still won't carry them?! No amount of buffing can correct stupid player behavior.

[Snazzy Dragon]

I have no idea why the iS SPL damage is being nerfed other than "**** lights"

[kapusta11]

Make sense?

What's the reason to take LL over ERLL now that they have the same duration?

What's the reason to take cSPL over cERSL or cMPL or SRMs? The weapon is dead now.

What's the reason to take IS SL or SPL AT ALL?

[Kalleballe]

Dee Eight, on 18 June 2017 - 12:21 AM, said:

Given the # of players who still whine as is about devoting 1.5 tons to an AMS installation.... even though on your average game... around just LRMS...they can easily kill 320+ missiles with just one AMS... and that's the equivalent of TEN TONS of standard armor protection...to yourself and the rest of your team.... and folks still won't carry them?! No amount of buffing can correct stupid player behavior.

Dealing with lrm boats and punish stupid player behaviour used to be my favourite activity as a light pilot before mini map and agility nerf.

What was the role of lights in battletech source material?

Edited by Kalleballe, 18 June 2017 - 01:17 AM.

[LordNothing]

what i like:

sl gets better by comparison
clan ersl and spl gets the nerf they needs.
is medium laser returns to its workhorse role again
is medpulse gets some love
ll stays more or less the same
lpls get the nerf they needed
erlls get the buff they needed

dont like:

is spl needlessly nerfed.
is sl could have had more buff
clan medpulse gets a buff when it should be nerfed.
ppc description too vague, balanced like a dps weapon when it clearly is not.

what could be done better:

dont much like the vague definition what is a std laser, what is a pulse laser, what is an er laser. i see a lot of normalization to the point where i dont think any of the laser types are distinct anymore and doesnt designate new roles for the new lasers we will be getting in july. if i were to balance lasers id do something like this:

parameter - type priority best to worst
duration - pulse, std, er, heavy
cooldown - std, er, heavy, pulse
damage - heavy, pulse, er, std
range - er, heavy, std, pulse
heat - pulse, std, er, heave

if i were to assign the worst values a 1 and the best values a 4 and sum the results you get:
std - 13
er - 13
pulse - 13
heavy - 11 (reson below eventually)

then redefine sizes, clan have 4 sizes while the is have 3, so its easy to put the is values smack dab between the two adjacent clan values, for example is small is better than clan micro but worse than clan small. you also have the problem with heavy lasers, which i think to be heavy really needs a whole different size classification. a small heavy laser sounds counterintuitive as a small class laser, but what if it lines up to be roughly equivalent to an is medium, the medium heavy as equivalent to an is large and the large heavy laser is actually a half a level above the best clan ll. its going to be a more brute force weapon. like:

clan micro
is small
clan small
is medium, small heavy
clan medium
is large, medium heavy
clan large
clan heavy (clan owning the large end of the laser specrum would be offset by is ppc options)

at least thats the way i see it. but we will see if the new values make sense when they go live.

Edited by LordNothing, 18 June 2017 - 01:42 AM.

[El Bandito]

Snazzy Dragon, on 18 June 2017 - 12:43 AM, said:

I have no idea why the iS SPL damage is being nerfed other than "**** lights"

"**** the Locust-1E in particular". Paul must have been rear-shotted by one.

Edited by El Bandito, 18 June 2017 - 01:47 AM.

[l33tworks]

kapusta11, on 18 June 2017 - 12:47 AM, said:

Make sense?

What's the reason to take LL over ERLL now that they have the same duration?

What's the reason to take cSPL over cERSL or cMPL or SRMs? The weapon is dead now.

What's the reason to take IS SL or SPL AT ALL?

LL has better DPS so will be better than ER LL once you get within LL optmal range. I dont like this change I hink a longer duration is more fun but hey, its not illogical.

I guess they want cspl to be just for really close range. It has lower duration and better DPS. Of you like that sort of thing I guess you would take it over ERSL.

IS SL has just had its heat reduced significantly so its a flat out buff. Not sure wjy you are asking why would you still take this. Agree the IS SPl didnt need that much of a nerf but it got less of a nerf than clan one. Not sure why PGI felt the need to nerf this one but they felt it was overperforming. It was a pretty good weapon up close now it will be meh. Reason to take one? If you like ankle bitting it will still be ok...

Edited by l33tworks, 18 June 2017 - 01:56 AM.

[El Bandito]

NebeIparder, on 18 June 2017 - 12:17 AM, said:

Im just mad about small laser nerf and potentially mad about the AMS change.

If AMS really becomes a counter to SRMs, then this will kill a lot of the fun for me in this game.

SRMs are alrdy not easy to use since they are relatively slow unguided missiles (they are slower than ballistics),
considering the ping difference between EU and US, they are not easy to use well unless you rly get into the enemies face.

If there now is a counter to SRMs, then GG...

Even with the AMS buff, it will only be able to destroy 3-4 SRMs at most, out of 24 or more. So there is no worry.

[AssaultPig]

my general criticism is that it seems like the upshot of these changes will just be more long-range hideypokey and general timid gameplay

I like that they're generally reducing DPS but I'm not sure what the point of moving balance even further in favor of longer-range weapons is (like why would you take an IS LL over an ERLL now?)

[Blackhound]

Won't anyone think about the Mist Lynx?

[Scyther]

I'm willing to give the changes a couple months to see how they all settle out.

However I agree with AssaultPig (2 posts above) that the changes, in general, have a 'better to poke at long range, knife fights and backstab runs are now a bad idea' flavor. Unless you are using largely SRMs or ballistics, I guess, which may be their goal.

Regardless, new tech coming, let's toss that into the mix and see what we're left with.

[Appogee]

Davegt27, on 17 June 2017 - 08:03 PM, said:

if you go into a meeting and the boss asks you what are you doing about balance of the game

it wont take you to long to figure out the deal and you will soon come up with all kinds of crazy stuff

Except in this instance the boss doesn't give a cr4p about MWO. He is focused on the next money-spinner, MW5.

They delegated balance to a more junior employee. And his only mission is to keep MWO eking out some income until the MW5 pre-purchase goes live.

[Robinson Crusher]

Kalleballe, on 17 June 2017 - 10:44 PM, said:

Nerf SPL, buff lrm and ams. Sounds like Lights are no longer wanted and yet another play style disappears.

LRM5s got a nerf... and buffing AMS isn't anti-light; it's anti-missile. This is really going to hurt when the laser AMS comes in and people never run out of ammo.

[Kalleballe]

Skill tree was lrm buff with free tonnage "missile rack", less radar dep and ecm nerf. Harassing enemy lrm boats used to be the job of lights. Now that there is only 0-2 light/match we get ams buff instead.

[LordNothing]

it occured to me that the ppc is now going to be the king of the battlefield. as it should be imho. i dont see the half second nerf to the cerppc as being very bad. its actually forcing a degree of free heat management on you by limiting how often you can shoot it. you run into the heat wall before dps really starts to mean anything anyway. its really dependent on how many heat sinks you are boating, i dont see any multi cerppc varient being affected at all by this nerf. it could be up to a couple seconds more before people start to care. is ppc options will also dominate.

Edited by LordNothing, 18 June 2017 - 03:42 AM.