54 replies to this topic

[The6thMessenger]

Ah rocket launcher, one use like a consumable, and shoots dead-fired missiles like SRM at a longer range. It's a filler you put on a missile, maybe buff a hardpoint or your have just some few tonnage or slots you could spare.

The Rocket Launchers are single use, not reloadable while deployed, that means you shoot one and you're done, and hope that you didn't miss and you dealt considerable damage.

But how would that translate to an FPS game? PGI had made several steps to compensate for an FPS game that has pin-point accuracy like 2x armor value. The impact is kind of reduced, whereas before a KGC has 40 ct stock armor, a single RL20 would have taken 50% of hp assuming all missiles hit, but now at 80 CT armor it would have left 75%.

What if we buff a rocket launcher damage? Wouldn't simple 2x damage would put it on it's former glory before?

I'm kind of worried with buffing it's damage, cause it could easily pad alphas and go into 1-hit-kill territory. Maybe 1.5x damage would be the magic number? I guess so.

But consider the one-use splat nature of the Rocket Launcher, at 40 alpha per RL20, what if we get so much Leeroy Jenkins builds? Basically cancerous suicide bomber lights or mediums. What if we get an archer with 8 RL20s? That is basically a 160 alpha.

As with the words of FupDup:

FupDup, on 17 March 2017 - 09:38 PM, said:

No. A 1.5 ton weapon dealing 40+ damage with one shot is absolutely insane.

Rocket Launchers in general should have been left out of MWO. They promote a very frustrating if not toxic playstyle where people load up on them, instakill one enemy mech, and then have no weapons for the rest of the match. It's basically like the 11 ERPPC Dire Star mech, but with massively lower tonnage requirements.

Weapons built around being used only one single time in a match are not worth the hassle of trying to balance. Too strong and they make the game horribly unfun (because random instakills and suicide-bomber teammates), too weak and nobody uses them.

The other option would be for PGI to do what MekTek did in MW4 and make RL's not be one-shot launchers anymore. The civil war page description already tells us that this will never happen, though.

My solution is to not make it a one-use, but just limited use. It's still disposable in a sense that you don't put 1-crit-slot ammo to extend your use, you put another rocket launcher. As opposed of the RL10 shooting all 10 missiles at once, RL15 shooting all 15 missiles at once, and RL20 the same, all of them shoots only one missile per trigger/pull and is accurate, goes at a straight line like a narc, and each missile does a lot more damage but the entire damage is just spread out over a long duration. The launcher size only dictates how much ammo you can have.

Basically, think of it as an Autocannon instead, but it flies slower, deals more damage, and you can't add more ammo via 1-ton ammo items.

Quote

Damage/Missile: 5
DPS: 6.944444444444444
Heat/shot: 0.8
Range: 450m
Missile Velocity: 650
Cooldown/Fire Interval: 0.72s
Ammo/weapon: 10/15/20

As the stats shown, the "alpha" effect is instead handled by the short-lived DPS, this gives a chance to spread the damage, while still do a lot over a long duration. AC-esque as it fires one accurate shot that deals damage.

Doing this effectively removes the potentially-cancerous light-weight cheap-shot dire-star-esque high-damage alpha. But at the same time adds a bit of sustainability.

That's just my idea about it.

What about you, how do you think the RLs should turn out?

POLL: https://mwomercs.com...ocket-launcher/

Edited by The6thMessenger, 22 June 2017 - 07:08 PM.

[Scout Derek]

They should be like MW4; High Fire Rate, low damage, around a SRM2-4's damage, but with AOE damage ( meaning that if the target is not hit directly, it still takes splash damage), 20 shots per ton, and high heat per shot.

[Aggravated Assault Mech]

I think the easiest change would be to make them two shot per launcher but with a 5-6s cooldown.

[Levi Porphyrogenitus]

I'd be happy with any of the following:

1 - Pure TT, all alpha all the time
2 - Volley based, say flinging 1/4 of their payload per trigger pull
3 - Katyusha style, extremely rapid fire of single rockets at a time

Each option has its pros and cons, and in each case I'd be inclined to say that they should get a 1.2 to 1.5x multiplier for their damage per missile over TT values. Either that, or increase the number of missiles each launcher gets, though PGI hasn't been willing to deviate from TT in similar areas elsewhere.

[slide]

I like the idea of 1 rocket per trigger pull.

This game doesn't need any more huge alphas, nor does it need suicide bombers either. I can see those 4 missile point locusts being a real pain, especially in FP, if they have a 160 point alpha.

[Ripper X]

They could keep it mostly as is, just make it fire one or two shots at a time. Hold the button down for rapid fire.

[WrathOfDeadguy]

I want them to be single-shot weapons. One reason is because they do still fill a role, albeit a niche one- a panic button, break-glass-in-case-of-fail, sackpunch alpha-boosting, emergency filler weapon that provides a great value in damage-per-ton without being a terribly-conceived zero-tonnage, whale-oil fueled cbill-sink cancer like strikes are. I am fully on board with the one-shot SRM model for these. You can't add ammo to them, and you can't spam them, so they have to have a strong point to avoid being worthless.

RLs are what consumables should be: equipment that you actually mount on your bloody 'Mech, that requires tonnage, slots, and hardpoints just like any other weapon.

Rocket lolphas are not going to be problematic no matter how they're modeled. They're one shot wonders. All PGI needs to do to keep them from metastasizing is to set strict GH limits on them so that running a RL175 ARC is just as suicidal as a Direstar. A one-shot RL troll build would thus be at most a one-for-one trade, and a fairly short ranged one at that. That's never going to be meta.

It might wreck your match once in a great while, but... I can't see any justification for limiting Rocket alphas when MRMs are going to be in the game and offer the ability to deliver Macross Missile Massacre over and over and over again. Being lightweight does not in any way offset the one-and-done limitation of RLs. You still have to sacrifice hardpoints for the things, which means you're limiting your follow-up shots if you take too many Rocket pods.

[stealthraccoon]

As much as I want my RL120 Javelin and RL80 LOLcust, I think RL's are best treated as disposable MG's or stream-fired like Clams LRMs.

Also damage should be doubled.

Edited by stealthraccoon, 22 June 2017 - 08:25 PM.

[Tier5 Kerensky]

Well with 2 damage per missile there would be just few mechs that might make it bad.

Those mechs could be handled with quirks for example.

[El Bandito]

Scout Derek, on 22 June 2017 - 07:10 PM, said:

They should be like MW4; High Fire Rate, low damage, around a SRM2-4's damage, but with AOE damage ( meaning that if the target is not hit directly, it still takes splash damage), 20 shots per ton, and high heat per shot.

No splash pls. PGI removed splash from missiles in 2013 for a good reason. Its damage multiplier was too great.

[The6thMessenger]

WrathOfDeadguy, on 22 June 2017 - 08:03 PM, said:

Rocket lolphas are not going to be problematic no matter how they're modeled. They're one shot wonders. All PGI needs to do to keep them from metastasizing is to set strict GH limits on them so that running a RL175 ARC is just as suicidal as a Direstar. A one-shot RL troll build would thus be at most a one-for-one trade, and a fairly short ranged one at that. That's never going to be meta.

I don't think being a meta or not is the concern, rather being cancerous and just disruptive to good play.

The thing with lolphas is that they are easy to do. Direstar is hard to do, mainly because it's a 100-tonner. That's the restraint of the PPC, cause each of it requires 6 - 7 tons, the RL20 is just 1.5t a piece. Put a lolpha in something small, light and fast, say an RL80 locust - LCT-3S RL80 - replace SRM6s with 2 RL20s.

Edited by The6thMessenger, 23 June 2017 - 02:50 AM.

[Requiemking]

The6thMessenger, on 22 June 2017 - 11:32 PM, said:

I don't think being a meta or not is the concern, rather being cancerous and just disruptive to good play.

The thing with lolphas is that they are easy to do. Direstar is hard to do, mainly because it's a 100-tonner. That's the restraint of the PPC, cause each of it requires 6 - 7 tons, the RL20 is just 1.5t a piece. Put a lolpha in something small, light and fast, say an RL80 locust - LCT-3S RL80 - replace SRM6s with 2 RL20s.

So, let me get this straight. You're complaining about a one-shot wonder weapon who's only use is as a filler for unused hardpoints(Grasshopper head missile) and for kamikaze builds on one of the least used variants in game? Especially when, in most scenarios, MRM10s are going to be wholly superior? I don't know what to say. I mean, with ST being a thing, an 80 damage burst isn't exactly going to kill a skilled up Assault, even from behind. Besides, with how little Lights have to work with, can't we have one wonder weapon?

[cazidin]

In all likelihood, despite the description, Rocket Launchers will very probably be ammo based like SRMS. There is no reason to take a single shot missile unless it's a miniature tactical nuke, and then only if you're an Urbie.

[The6thMessenger]

Requiemking, on 23 June 2017 - 06:39 AM, said:

So, let me get this straight. You're complaining about a one-shot wonder weapon who's only use is as a filler for unused hardpoints(Grasshopper head missile) and for kamikaze builds on one of the least used variants in game? Especially when, in most scenarios, MRM10s are going to be wholly superior? I don't know what to say. I mean, with ST being a thing, an 80 damage burst isn't exactly going to kill a skilled up Assault, even from behind.

"Complain" is a strong word, do you something against what I analyzed, and you just need to exaggerate?

It's not the RL as a weapon, or the idea as a filler weapon, the idea is the one-shot wonder kamikaze **** that would follow. And the really cheap way to pad an alpha by that much, considering that an RL20 weighs 1.5 ton only and with only 4 heat, likewise it makes it possible to be boated and make one-shot wonders easily, it is a big deal.

And then whose to say that the proposed RL wouldn't be worth for the 4M locust? It just makes it so that we can get out more of the weapon than just some one-shot wonder. The locust with 4 RL20s could still have a total of 400 damage, assuming he didn't missed.

I have to say that the MRM thing is a red-herring in this instance, it's quite irrelevant. We are discussing about the implication of a lightweight weapon that can pad alphas, and most likely result on cancerous one-shot wonder builds that are just plain annoying and disruptive. So what if an MRM is that powerful? Don't you think the tonnage it requires justify that?

Requiemking, on 23 June 2017 - 06:39 AM, said:

Besides, with how little Lights have to work with, can't we have one wonder weapon?

I don't mind a light wonder weapon, I mind it being potentially cancerous.

cazidin, on 23 June 2017 - 06:57 AM, said:

In all likelihood, despite the description, Rocket Launchers will very probably be ammo based like SRMS. There is no reason to take a single shot missile unless it's a miniature tactical nuke, and then only if you're an Urbie.

That's the thing, if it's a tactical nuke that weighs 0.5 to 1.5 tons, that can easily pad an alpha, or just to promote cancerous disruptive kamikaze builds, bordering on extreme trolling.

[cazidin]

The6thMessenger, on 23 June 2017 - 07:02 AM, said:

That's the thing, if it's a tactical nuke that weighs 0.5 to 1.5 tons, that can easily pad an alpha, or just to promote cancerous disruptive kamikaze builds, bordering on extreme trolling.

Right but would PGI implement a tactical nuke's worth of damage into a half to one and a half ton weapon, or make it a micro-SRM?

[ScrapIron Prime]

Rocket launchers will deliver a single MRM like shot and be done. If you want more, get an actual MRM.

The new archer splat will likely be twin MRM 30's, backed by 6 RP20's and 1 RP15. Total alpha 195 missiles, and after that 60.

For my part, I'm looking forward to a triple large laser Centurion AL with 3 rocket pods as finishing weapons.

[Nightbird]

Because of MWO's inflated armor values, I would prefer a 2 shot disposable weapon with at least a 4s cooldown for the second shot. It'll still be a terrible dmg capacity/ton weapon with great alpha/ton, with a minor possibility of helping you win a fight.

[DivineTomatoes]

How about this instead.

How about we just remove all weapons and replace them with squirt guns.

Or in other words NO, they can either stay as close to lore as possible or not be in the game at all.

They should be a 1 shot, high damage weapon. If you screw up then that's it. If you have zero situational awareness, are a stupid assault that doesn't check his 180 or doesn't bother investing in seismic.Then you get what you deserve.Rocket Launchers are going to do one thing, punish stupid people. And that works both ways.

[The6thMessenger]

cazidin, on 23 June 2017 - 07:05 AM, said:

Right but would PGI implement a tactical nuke's worth of damage into a half to one and a half ton weapon, or make it a micro-SRM?

Too strong, it's cancerous. Too weak, it won't be used. Considering PGI's track record, i don't think they can find the right one.

That's why they should just not make it a nuke.

Reaver2145, on 23 June 2017 - 07:30 AM, said:

How about this instead.

How about we just remove all weapons and replace them with squirt guns.

Or in other words NO, they can either stay as close to lore as possible or not be in the game at all.

They should be a 1 shot, high damage weapon. If you screw up then that's it. If you have zero situational awareness, are a stupid assault that doesn't check his 180 or doesn't bother investing in seismic.Then you get what you deserve.Rocket Launchers are going to do one thing, punish stupid people. And that works both ways.

Or hows about actually modify it to be not potentially cancerous. Far far less ludicrous than squirt guns.

PGI's already ditching the 3-ammo on the ATM, and made it so that they change damage based on distance automatically.

No, it should work like a tactical nuke that destroys the entire enemy team in one salvo. And why? For the same reason you gave for your assertion - because i said so.

If you want to be battletech purist, go play Battletech by HBS, or the Table-top game.

Edited by The6thMessenger, 23 June 2017 - 02:15 PM.

[cazidin]

The6thMessenger, on 23 June 2017 - 02:09 PM, said:

Too strong, it's cancerous. Too weak, it won't be used. Considering PGI's track record, i don't think they can find the right one.

That's why they should just not make it a nuke.

...Actually, are we certain that PGI won't simply make Rocket Launchers a consumable?