171 replies to this topic

[MadRover]

Yeonne Greene, on 04 October 2017 - 08:03 PM, said:

Snapshots are what is needed if you are trying to poke a target down with burst. That's not what the Light Gauss does. What the Light Gauss is best geared for is a power-position type of maneuver, where you stay exposed and just hammer a target. For that, you don't need snap shots.

It's roughly analogous to ERLL power position, and you can see the concept at-play in MWOWC16 when EmP's Proton posted up on Tourmaline using a quad-Gauss KDK-3. He just sat there, exposed for the most part, and pounded any target that presented.

The Gauss family in general is more effective against larger targets than smaller, more agile ones. That's a fair trade, IMHO, for the power, range, velocity, and lack of heat.

Except the LGR doesn’t do that very well. It’s almost there though. 10 damage and it’ll be considered useable.

[Khobai]

The niche of light gauss should be extreme range sniping. It needs to be better at extreme ranges than gauss.

Which means increasing its damage to 10. Giving it at least 810/1620 max range. And giving it enough ammo per ton (20/ton) that it can afford to make risky extreme range shots without fear of running out of ammo.

And theyd probably also need to add at least one new map that promotes extreme range sniping so its niche isnt severely limited. A map like alpine/polarhighlands but really hot instead of cold would be ideal for light gauss.

Edited by Khobai, 06 October 2017 - 02:28 PM.

[MischiefSC]

Quicksilver Kalasa, on 04 October 2017 - 07:06 PM, said:

That doesn't sound appealing at all, sounds pretty horrible for the IS honestly since the Lt Gauss wouldn't even sync up with ERLL cooldowns. It just means you are more likely to combine it with itself rather than with any other weapon (so instead of 2 Lt Gauss 3 ERLL assaults you will more than likely see 4 Lt Gauss assaults).

Fair assessment. I've been playing around with them and they need something significant. As I'm playing them with 2 on the MAD R3 which has above cockpit mounts and peeks with them well, but they're just so weak for the tonnage. I'm better off taking a pair of uac5s. Still less tonnage.

16 damage for 24 tons +ammo is just a terrible proposition. 20 isn't much better.

Still tempted to say no chargeup. A 1 heat PPFLD weapon you can snapshot but doesn't boat well with other PPFLD may have value?

At this point I would be happy to try 10 damage and a bit of cooldown. Something, anything. PPCs still need help but that's another thing.

[Quicksilver Aberration]

MischiefSC, on 06 October 2017 - 02:31 PM, said:

At this point I would be happy to try 10 damage and a bit of cooldown. Something, anything. PPCs still need help but that's another thing.

There are a lot of IS weapons that need help.

[Y E O N N E]

MadRover, on 06 October 2017 - 02:12 PM, said:

Except the LGR doesn’t do that very well. It’s almost there though. 10 damage and it’ll be considered useable.

That's what I said in my OP, man. 10 damage with all else staying as-is, or 2.5 s cooldown.

[Shadowomega1]

Yeonne Greene, on 04 October 2017 - 08:03 PM, said:

Snapshots are what is needed if you are trying to poke a target down with burst. That's not what the Light Gauss does. What the Light Gauss is best geared for is a power-position type of maneuver, where you stay exposed and just hammer a target. For that, you don't need snap shots.

It's roughly analogous to ERLL power position, and you can see the concept at-play in MWOWC16 when EmP's Proton posted up on Tourmaline using a quad-Gauss KDK-3. He just sat there, exposed for the most part, and pounded any target that presented.

The Gauss family in general is more effective against larger targets than smaller, more agile ones. That's a fair trade, IMHO, for the power, range, velocity, and lack of heat.

Even with a Power position you need those snapshots if there is any decent cover on that map, and on maps with good power positions that shift due to team nascar (HPG) combined with cover then that is a massive factor.

As for ER LL while they can pull similar damage at lighter weight, they generate a lot of heat, have lengthy burn times, and give a perfect indication of your location to the whole enemy team. With the burn time they can spread that damage over more of the mech and where as with the LGR they start wondering what is pegging them. Now you are using the KDK-3 quad gauss as an example which is a little unfair as the clan gauss does have a bit more range than the IS gauss, and Tourmaline has many great funnel areas.

Khobai, on 06 October 2017 - 02:22 PM, said:

The niche of light gauss should be extreme range sniping. It needs to be better at extreme ranges than gauss.

Which means increasing its damage to 10. Giving it at least 810/1620 max range. And giving it enough ammo per ton (20/ton) that it can afford to make risky extreme range shots without fear of running out of ammo.

And theyd probably also need to add at least one new map that promotes extreme range sniping so its niche isnt severely limited. A map like alpine/polarhighlands but really hot instead of cold would be ideal for light gauss.

I have to double check but I do think it gets about 20 rounds per ton now, but it should be closer to 25 rounds per ton. As for range yea that could be pushed out as in MW4 its first appearance it had a max range of 1200m which is about its range in table top. As for fire rate in MW4 I think it was about 4 or 5 seconds as the Gauss Rifle was 8 seconds as well as the PPCs. Current fire rate I think is in a good spot due to many IS mechs with great cool down quirks stacked on top of the Skill tree, which is why I suggested just dropping the .5 second charge time as it wouldn't give quirked mechs even faster fire rate.

Edited by Shadowomega1, 06 October 2017 - 05:45 PM.

[Khobai]

Quote

I have to double check but I do think it gets about 20 rounds per ton now,

yes it gets 20 ammo per ton now but only at 8 damage

im saying it should stay at 20 ammo per ton but go upto 10 damage

thats a 25% increase in ammo damage per ton

that basically shaves an additional half ton off the weight of the light gauss for every two tons of ammo you take

Edited by Khobai, 06 October 2017 - 08:36 PM.

[MischiefSC]

Hmm. At 10 damage it's 2x the weight per weapon as CERPPC but 0 heat and faster plus changeup and no splash, plus it explodes

The more I think about it and the more I play with it the more I come to the conclusion that 10 damage and slightly faster cycle is a good solution. Whatever fixes PPCs get needs to cut out it's own space and any other solution for LGauss just pushes it more niche.

[Y E O N N E]

Shadowomega1, on 06 October 2017 - 05:44 PM, said:

Even with a Power position you need those snapshots if there is any decent cover on that map, and on maps with good power positions that shift due to team nascar (HPG) combined with cover then that is a massive factor.

You don't power position on maps with so much cover that you can't command any approaches. This is a non-issue.

NASCAR is not a balance concern, that's a player issue.

Quote

As for ER LL while they can pull similar damage at lighter weight, they generate a lot of heat, have lengthy burn times, and give a perfect indication of your location to the whole enemy team.

With the burn time they can spread that damage over more of the mech and where as with the LGR they start wondering what is pegging them.

I already showed you the math for ERLL on Page 1. Just three of them don't generate enough heat to ever be a concern for any reasonable engagement window.

The burn times aren't that lengthy. With the full skill tree values, the Inner Sphere ERLL has a burn-time of 0.935 seconds. The Clan one has a burn time of 1.215. Big 'Mechs will not spread the damage appreciably from a single set, and smaller 'Mechs won't weather the hit very well. 'Mechs have finite speeds at which they can twist, and shape/size can make spreading harder or easier. There's also pilot reaction time slowing things down. You would actually spread just as much damage with LGauss because the target can change orientation and position after you've let the round fly, causing the round to impact a different component or miss entirely. It works out. The ERLL are very strong.

Giving away your location is not a major concern if you are power positioning since the whole point is to maintain exposure. Nobody uses Gauss competitively for stealth reasons and, if you do, you'll be using the standard Gauss because higher burst damage helps you stay hidden.

Quote

Now you are using the KDK-3 quad gauss as an example which is a little unfair as the clan gauss does have a bit more range than the IS gauss, and Tourmaline has many great funnel areas.

Clan Gauss has identical range to IS Gauss (660 meters), but the LGauss out-ranges both (750 meters). Quad Gauss also wasn't just applicable to Tourmaline, it also worked on Caustic Valley, Alpine Peaks, Mining Collective, Canyon Network, and River City.

The example is the most valid example possible, not even a little bit unfair. Not everything is going to be useful everywhere, nor should it be. But right now, LGauss is not good enough at anything to be useful anywhere against any alternatives. That's the problem.

[Shifty McSwift]

Yeonne Greene, on 07 October 2017 - 03:18 PM, said:

You don't power position on maps with so much cover that you can't command any approaches. This is a non-issue.

NASCAR is not a balance concern, that's a player issue.




I already showed you the math for ERLL on Page 1. Just three of them don't generate enough heat to ever be a concern for any reasonable engagement window.

The burn times aren't that lengthy. With the full skill tree values, the Inner Sphere ERLL has a burn-time of 0.935 seconds. The Clan one has a burn time of 1.215. Big 'Mechs will not spread the damage appreciably from a single set, and smaller 'Mechs won't weather the hit very well. 'Mechs have finite speeds at which they can twist, and shape/size can make spreading harder or easier. There's also pilot reaction time slowing things down. You would actually spread just as much damage with LGauss because the target can change orientation and position after you've let the round fly, causing the round to impact a different component or miss entirely. It works out. The ERLL are very strong.

Giving away your location is not a major concern if you are power positioning since the whole point is to maintain exposure. Nobody uses Gauss competitively for stealth reasons and, if you do, you'll be using the standard Gauss because higher burst damage helps you stay hidden.



Clan Gauss has identical range to IS Gauss (660 meters), but the LGauss out-ranges both (750 meters). Quad Gauss also wasn't just applicable to Tourmaline, it also worked on Caustic Valley, Alpine Peaks, Mining Collective, Canyon Network, and River City.

The example is the most valid example possible, not even a little bit unfair. Not everything is going to be useful everywhere, nor should it be. But right now, LGauss is not good enough at anything to be useful anywhere against any alternatives. That's the problem.

I concur with all of that.

Except I don't really know about the specifics of light gauss, but given how spot on you were there, I will just assume that you are right there too lol.

Kind of depends what they/we want from it, as a weapon unique to IS they could go a bit whacky with it, make it more rapid fire in ways (quicker charge CD), or perhaps that is reason to not go too whacky with it, keep it in line with the overall theme and leave it as just really situational, more of an extra option, IDK. Gauss is a hard one for me, it is just so damn good in so many aspects as a weapon in this game comparatively, it is such an unforgiving gun in skilled hands, I fear buffing gauss in any way just by default.

[MischiefSC]

Yeonne Greene, on 07 October 2017 - 03:18 PM, said:

You don't power position on maps with so much cover that you can't command any approaches. This is a non-issue.

NASCAR is not a balance concern, that's a player issue.




I already showed you the math for ERLL on Page 1. Just three of them don't generate enough heat to ever be a concern for any reasonable engagement window.

The burn times aren't that lengthy. With the full skill tree values, the Inner Sphere ERLL has a burn-time of 0.935 seconds. The Clan one has a burn time of 1.215.

Human reaction time is, at best, 0.25 to visual stimuli. None of the audio in this is sharp enough to trigger audio stimuli speed which is as best 0.17 anyway.

Good players don't twist off damage relatively but reflexively. When they expect return fire not when they receive it. The difference in burn time is irrelevant save for the fraction of the population who has developed the reflex of twisting correctly when fire is expected, not received.

[adamts01]

MischiefSC, on 07 October 2017 - 04:48 PM, said:

Human reaction time is, at best, 0.25 to visual stimuli. None of the audio in this is sharp enough to trigger audio stimuli speed which is as best 0.17 anyway.

Good players don't twist off damage relatively but reflexively. When they expect return fire not when they receive it. The difference in burn time is irrelevant save for the fraction of the population who has developed the reflex of twisting correctly when fire is expected, not received.

Add lag to that equation as well.