85 replies to this topic

[Luminis]

Can we please keep LRMs out of this? I guess we all know that they're a potato favourite because they can crutch you out of Tier 5 nicely, even though using them doesn't automatically make you a potato, just like using PPFLD doesn't automatically make you MRBC Div. A material.

Can we move on now?

[PhoenixFire55]

Since Gauss and PPCs share the same ghost heat group, where is my no-charge 4s cooldown Gauss?

[Kin3ticX]

Pjwned, on 15 July 2017 - 02:17 AM, said:

Because that impacts gauss rifle builds that don't abuse the unbalanced state of convergence to deliver huge amounts of pinpoint, frontloaded damage to 1 spot with ease at all times.

The 1 heat is a big part of what makes the gauss rifle the usual problem weapon. PGI has changed everything about the Gauss Rifle but the heat and damage.

Velocity
Range
Cooldown
Health
Internal Damage
Crit chance
Charge up
Charge limit

Never heat because 1 heat is some holy numerical value decreed in lore books of old.

Edited by Kin3ticX, 15 July 2017 - 02:55 AM.

[Gryphorim]

Alternate idea for gauss-ppc.
Both have charge time, PPC fires immediately after charge, gauss can be held for up to .5 seconds. PPCs require .5 seconds longer to charge. Gauss has small screen-shake and reticle-shake on firing. Finally, if you begin chargeing any combo of weapons, no other charging event can be started during that charge cycle. It's all as a group, or nothing else in that window.

So now if you want to PPC-gauss, all must begin charging together, the gauss must fire up to .5s before PPC, and PPC will be slightly off-target.

As far as ideas go, it's a start. Balance gurus would have to adjust the numbers, and it doesn't take light and heavy models into account, but it's a start.

[Bud Crue]

Screw Gauss/PPC.

Look what they did to clan ER medium. Look what they did to CERSL.

My nova, my poor nova.
My linebacker...I...I think I'm gonna cry.

PGI..you...you...monsters.

[Kin3ticX]

Gryphorim, on 15 July 2017 - 03:05 AM, said:

Alternate idea for gauss-ppc.
Both have charge time, PPC fires immediately after charge, gauss can be held for up to .5 seconds. PPCs require .5 seconds longer to charge. Gauss has small screen-shake and reticle-shake on firing. Finally, if you begin chargeing any combo of weapons, no other charging event can be started during that charge cycle. It's all as a group, or nothing else in that window.

So now if you want to PPC-gauss, all must begin charging together, the gauss must fire up to .5s before PPC, and PPC will be slightly off-target.

As far as ideas go, it's a start. Balance gurus would have to adjust the numbers, and it doesn't take light and heavy models into account, but it's a start.

The charge up is a monumental wall to new players but with practice its like its not even there (almost). Its really flawed, it should go.

[kapusta11]

More heat just means worse sustained dps. Gauss already has poor dps. What's the point?

[H I A S]

Vonbach, on 15 July 2017 - 01:09 AM, said:

The amusing thing is the gauss ppc players seem to think they are better tier of player than a LRM boater. They are not.

sure they are.

Kin3ticX, on 15 July 2017 - 02:54 AM, said:

gauss rifle the usual problem weapon.

why they are a problem? gauss and peps are the only thing why i still start the game once every two weeks.
ppfld and dakka is the playstyle with the highest skill cap. why allways nerf such things only because spuds are crying like little girls? the best time in MWO was the HGN/CTF/VTR meta. i miss that time

Edited by H I A S, 15 July 2017 - 03:39 AM.

[Pjwned]

PhoenixFire55, on 15 July 2017 - 02:51 AM, said:

Since Gauss and PPCs share the same ghost heat group, where is my no-charge 4s cooldown Gauss?

Nowhere, because gauss + PPC was never the sole reason for adding gauss charge.

I do think the cooldown should be reverted back to 4s, partly because the minimum cooldown would still be 4.75s when considering the gauss charge (assuming the shot is fired instantly without holding it at all, which otherwise increases the effective cooldown even more), which would still be the lowest DPS per ton weapon in the game, but the gauss charge isn't going anywhere and for good reason.

Kin3ticX, on 15 July 2017 - 02:54 AM, said:

The 1 heat is a big part of what makes the gauss rifle the usual problem weapon. PGI has changed everything about the Gauss Rifle but the heat and damage.

Velocity
Range
Cooldown
Health
Internal Damage
Crit chance
Charge up
Charge limit

Never heat because 1 heat is some holy numerical value decreed in lore books of old.

That tells me very little about why it's a good idea to mess with the heat, and absolutely nothing about why it needs to be adjusted outside of the gauss + PPC combo.

If you want more heat on the gauss rifle then what you're saying is that even a build like this needs a nerf by making the gauss rifle (presumably quite a bit) hotter.

Edited by Pjwned, 15 July 2017 - 03:45 AM.

[Luminis]

The Gauss being basically heat-free sets it apart from the ACs, though, and the charge-up (even though I don't quite like it) makes it feel different in usage to the ACs as well. Change both and what we've got is an AC15 that trades weight for range and explosing when crit for velocity. Yay, I guess?

[Sjorpha]

The 1 heat and the charge mechanic is what makes the gauss rifles a unique and interesting weapon group to me, I'm against changing either of those.

Hopefully this GH linkage thing allows PGI to buff the gauss rifles a bit, especially the IS gauss since it needs to be worth 3 more tons than cGauss (and light gauss needs to be buffed enough to be worth the same tonnage as cGauss too)

My preferred changes would be decreased cool down and increased range on regular gauss, and very small charge+very long range on light gauss. Heavy gauss probably needs a buff too but I haven't tested that.

The argument that "it needs practice to use, therefore it's flawed" argument I read above seems very strange, why would weapons being difficult to use or needing practice be a bad thing?

[Khobai]

Quote

Since Gauss and PPCs share the same ghost heat group, where is my no-charge 4s cooldown Gauss?

Well to be fair, even if they get rid of the chargeup, the charge time should still be added into the cooldown.

So it should be a no-charge 5.75s cooldown Gauss.

Quote

Nowhere, because gauss + PPC was never the sole reason for adding gauss charge.

Actually it was. And PGI is on record as saying thats the exact reason they added gauss chargeup. To help desync it from PPCs. I can go back and find the exact patch notes if you want, but its very clear that was the sole reason for adding chargeup.

Quote

The 1 heat and the charge mechanic is what makes the gauss rifles a unique and interesting weapon group to me, I'm against changing either of those.

the charge mechanic currently makes 2/3rds of the Gauss weapons useless. It needs to go.

And the reality is such that the Heavy Gauss will never compete with ISUACs as long as it has chargeup. Because heavy gauss is a brawling weapon and chargeup is a mechanic that hurts brawling weapons. It is entirely counterintuitive.

Quote

The Gauss being basically heat-free sets it apart from the ACs, though, and the charge-up (even though I don't quite like it) makes it feel different in usage to the ACs as well. Change both and what we've got is an AC15 that trades weight for range and explosing when crit for velocity. Yay, I guess?

Like I said, if you give Gauss a min range with a linear damage dropoff, then it wont be able to compete with ACs at brawling range. It allows the removal of chargeup on gauss while still maintaining the integrity of autocannons as brawling weapons.

And if Std Gauss has a min range with linear dropoff and Light Gauss and Heavy Gauss dont, then theyre less overshadowed by standard Gauss. Which is a good thing. Because right now Std Gauss completely overshadows them both.

I mean you could argue Light Gauss should have a min range too. But I dont think Light Gauss with no min range is in danger of putting Autocannons out of business. So I think its fine with no min range, and it actually gives it an advantage over Std Gauss, if Std Gauss has a min range and Light Gauss doesnt.

Edited by Khobai, 15 July 2017 - 05:06 AM.

[Luminis]

Khobai, on 15 July 2017 - 04:49 AM, said:

Like I said, if you give Gauss a min range with a linear damage dropoff, then it wont be able to compete with ACs at brawling range. It allows the removal of chargeup on gauss while still maintaining the integrity of autocannons as brawling weapons.

I'll support that. Much better representation of the long range nature of the Gauss, in my opinion, mostly because the charge-up also affects its performance at mid to long range.

[MustrumRidcully]

I hate ghost heat. I really think it's one of the clumsiest and inelegant mechanics they could come up with.

But in practical play, the Gauss Charge mechanic is much more annoying. If we could get rid of that, I am totally okay with the Ghost Heat link.

[Luminis]

MustrumRidcully, on 15 July 2017 - 05:03 AM, said:

I hate ghost heat. I really think it's one of the clumsiest and inelegant mechanics they could come up with.

But in practical play, the Gauss Charge mechanic is much more annoying. If we could get rid of that, I am totally okay with the Ghost Heat link.

To be fair, PGI has to try and make a somewhat balanced game out of inherently unbalanced source material. Yes, stuff like Ghost Heat isn't elegant, but... Well, they'll never get the game to a remotely balanced state without implementing stuff like Ghost Heat or Energy Draw or whatever.

[Skanderborg]

Kin3ticX, on 15 July 2017 - 12:21 AM, said:

Not sure why they are going after Gauss Peep so hard suddenly. The deeps are meh and to rack up a lot of work in solo queue you have to have a pretty long match.

Laser vomit is putting out way better numbers than double gawse peep or double peep gawse, especially double peep gawse

Laser vomit has better numbers on paper but sometimes its hard to get a reliable full damage burn. I can almost ALWAYS get full damage on a single component with PPFLD. So lasers have more raw power , but are not as consistent.

[PhoenixFire55]

Pjwned, on 15 July 2017 - 03:44 AM, said:

Nowhere, because gauss + PPC was never the sole reason for adding gauss charge.

LOL ... suuuure.

[Spr1ggan]

Vonbach, on 15 July 2017 - 01:04 AM, said:

Lrms are nowhere near as effective as Gauss ppc and everyone knows it. Gauss PPC does a ton of damage to one location at extreme range. Lrms have so many counters its hard to count them all. Including travel time and AMS not to mention the damage is spread all over the mech.
Not to mention you cant fire poptart fire lrms.

Not as effective but far and away used more than gauss/ppc builds in quickplay. Gauss/ppcs don't spam people with "incoming missile" all ******* match either. And as such i've found that it's much easier to get people to push poptarts in quickplay than lurmboats.

People running gauss/ppc have to actually aim at targets and lead shots to get hits. And you'd be surprised at the amount of people that struggle to do that. They can't just wait for other people to press r then hold m1 and start hitting people without having to aim or expose themselves.

The implementation of LRMs in this game is almost as bad as the smart pistol in titanfall.

Edited by Spr1ggan, 15 July 2017 - 07:34 AM.

[Mister Blastman]

The second problem with gauss rifles is the lack of visual trail back to the shooter's position. If we added a trail, we could get rid of charge.

[MustrumRidcully]

Luminis, on 15 July 2017 - 05:10 AM, said:

To be fair, PGI has to try and make a somewhat balanced game out of inherently unbalanced source material. Yes, stuff like Ghost Heat isn't elegant, but... Well, they'll never get the game to a remotely balanced state without implementing stuff like Ghost Heat or Energy Draw or whatever.

The main problem Ghost Heat and Energy Draw are trying to deal with is pinpoint damage. The only way to get pinpoint damage in the table top (before clan elite pilots and targeting computers at least) is to equip a big damage gun, basically. Everything else is RNG working with or against you.

What enables pinpoint precision?
- Mouse Aim
- Group Fire.

I think removing Mouse Aim is not really an option. (I suppose we could add a random component to the targeting, but do we really want that?)
So eliminate Group Fire. Every gun must be fired separately, with a set minimum amount of time between shots. We can make exceptions for weapons with ridiculously low cooldowns that don't have pinpoint damage in the first place, provided we cannot find a way to balance them with a longer cooldown and higher damage per shot.