259 replies to this topic

[Nightbird]

Yeonne Greene, on 08 July 2018 - 12:00 AM, said:

As for whether or not people will take 6x AC/5 instead of 4x AC/5 and 2x LPL, what do you see now? Not the latter, and that's not because it can't deal damage well; it's because the two weapons have little synergy.

With the proposed changes however, 4AC/5s + 2LPL has more DPS and uses heat better than 6AC/5s. LPL=5.25DPS and AC/5=2.59DPS. The reason the stats are like this is because AC/5s are given their extremely high lore heat efficiency and are heat neutral essentially, so 6AC/5s leaves a lot of heat on the table. This option does not exist today.

For the same reason, an IS large laser boat will feel terrible even with buffed DHS installed because of a 20-30% reduction in damage per heat to lore levels and your cooldown will be so fast that you'll feel "heat ammo starved" all the time. It's better to add some heat efficient options (Gauss or AC/5s) as long as you can aim.

In MWO, dakka is too hot to add lasers, and lasers too cool to add dakka, so there's no reason to mix.

Lastly, I misused 'bracket builds' thanks for pointing that out.

Edited by Nightbird, 08 July 2018 - 11:12 AM.

[MischiefSC]

You want the distinct performance but they need to be in scope of each other. 5 vs 7 damage for the same 1 ton is going to require disadvantages in the CERML to keep it balanced that isn't going to be as fun to play. 6 v 5 is significant enough to feel different but still play a similar role.

[Nightbird]

MischiefSC, on 08 July 2018 - 11:16 AM, said:

You want the distinct performance but they need to be in scope of each other. 5 vs 7 damage for the same 1 ton is going to require disadvantages in the CERML to keep it balanced that isn't going to be as fun to play. 6 v 5 is significant enough to feel different but still play a similar role.

I think Yeonne Greene had the same point, I respect your view but I feel weapons that require relearning because they are so different = fun, rather than unfun as long as they are balanced.

You can see the proposed changes in the spreadsheet, please point out a comparison you don't like.
+pro -con

C-ERML
+alpha +heat efficient +range -cooldown -duration
C-HML
++alpha +heat efficient --cooldown
C-MPL
+alpha +heat efficient +DPS -tons
ERML
+DPS +Range -heat efficient
ML
+heat efficient
MPL
+heat efficient +DPS +duration -tons

MischiefSC, on 08 July 2018 - 09:47 AM, said:

Dear God what if they were all viable... just in different but as useful ways? What sort of game would that be like? Oh, just like other good PvP games with good weapon/role balance.

Just like that.

If you throw lore out, you may say 6 for C-ERML is fine but others will ask, why? They have the same role, same tonnage, 5 damage is fine for both.

Edited by Nightbird, 08 July 2018 - 11:41 AM.

[MischiefSC]

I don't think the cooldown and burn duration is sufficient to offset it. If it was, it would be crap to use like the old lightsaber erlls for the same reason.

**** lore. It was always bad. Make it fun to play. 5 vs 6 is 20% different. Enough to feel/play different but still fit the same role.

[Nightbird]

In that case, 5 vs 5.25 is 5% different. Enough to feel/play different but still fit the same role.

[MischiefSC]

Nightbird, on 08 July 2018 - 12:21 PM, said:

In that case, 5 vs 5.25 is 5% different. Enough to feel/play different but still fit the same role.

You're being obtuse.

Even HLLs are a bit on the long side. The Erlls were almost unplayable and they were about 30% over IS erlls.

Clan mechs already have a ton of hardpoints. You can use GH to limit boating - which makes the hardpoints useless. Better to scale the weapons to the mech options.

[Nightbird]

MischiefSC, on 08 July 2018 - 01:25 PM, said:

You're being obtuse.

Even HLLs are a bit on the long side. The Erlls were almost unplayable and they were about 30% over IS erlls.

Clan mechs already have a ton of hardpoints. You can use GH to limit boating - which makes the hardpoints useless. Better to scale the weapons to the mech options.

I'm presenting PGI's way of thinking, which agrees with you much more than it agrees with me.

[MischiefSC]

Nightbird, on 08 July 2018 - 01:46 PM, said:

I'm presenting PGI's way of thinking, which agrees with you much more than it agrees with me.

Don't make me report you for personal insults.

And it doesn't - I'm saying **** lore, focus on fun first.

[Nightbird]

MischiefSC, on 08 July 2018 - 03:43 PM, said:

Don't make me report you for personal insults.

And it doesn't - I'm saying **** lore, focus on fun first.

Are you ok?

[MischiefSC]

Nightbird, on 08 July 2018 - 03:56 PM, said:

Are you ok?

I'm teasing. You compared my opinion to how PGI looks at balance, I said that was like breaking CoC for personal insults.

I'm also not I agreement with PGI because I don't want to try and cling to all the lore stuff they are.

[MTier Slayed Up]

Can you two just hug it out?

[MischiefSC]

DrtyDshSoap, on 08 July 2018 - 04:12 PM, said:

Can you two just hug it out?

We agree a lot more than we disagree. We both want a pretty much complete revamp of weapon balance. He's just in favor of going all the way back to lore values and I'm saying lore values were never good - even the original developers from FASA have said so. I would rather go with stuff a bit more balanced as a baseline.

There's this idea that lore was balanced or better - or even good. It wasn't, 3050 Clan/IS balance was a horrible mistake and the people who made it said so. We've been struggling under that set of errors for decades. Why not just admit it was bad, fix it and move forward?

[Nightbird]

MischiefSC, on 08 July 2018 - 04:12 PM, said:

I'm teasing. You compared my opinion to how PGI looks at balance, I said that was like breaking CoC for personal insults.

I'm also not I agreement with PGI because I don't want to try and cling to all the lore stuff they are.

LOL ok

I want fun too of course, but fun is subjective. For you, slightly different values for weapons with the same role is more fun, for me, lore values when the necessary changes for balance is more fun.

We'll see if PGI will pick up some of the community balance update, because that is the direction they are going rather than making the necessary changes in other parameters to preserve lore values.

[MischiefSC]

Nightbird, on 08 July 2018 - 04:18 PM, said:

LOL ok

I want fun too of course, but fun is subjective. For you, slightly different values for weapons with the same role is more fun, for me, lore values when the necessary changes for balance is more fun.

We'll see if PGI will pick up some of the community balance update, because that is the direction they are going rather than making the necessary changes in other parameters to preserve lore values.

I'm willing to try whatever - but we had a go at what you're talking about once and the lightsaber Clan lasers were not that fun.

[AncientRaig]

Biggest thing I dislike about this is the charge time on PPCs. Really, that's my only complaint. PPCs shouldn't have a charge time. The system is already hard enough to use, and the MWO charge up isn't exactly well designed. Other than that, everything looks pretty good.

[Nightbird]

AncientRaig, on 08 July 2018 - 04:36 PM, said:

Biggest thing I dislike about this is the charge time on PPCs. Really, that's my only complaint. PPCs shouldn't have a charge time. The system is already hard enough to use, and the MWO charge up isn't exactly well designed. Other than that, everything looks pretty good.

PPCs are stream beam weapons. MWO changed them to PPFLD like ACs but half weight PPFLD with no drop was hard to balance so PGI had to add all sorts of penalties.

The charge up time as proposed is compensation for a very short burn. If we keep PPFLD it can still work with velocity and cooldown tweaks.

[AncientRaig]

Nightbird, on 08 July 2018 - 06:59 PM, said:

PPCs are stream beam weapons. MWO changed them to PPFLD like ACs but half weight PPFLD with no drop was hard to balance so PGI had to add all sorts of penalties.

The charge up time as proposed is compensation for a very short burn. If we keep PPFLD it can still work with velocity and cooldown tweaks.

PPCs, at least in the games, have always been presented as PPFLD weapons that fire a bolt of charged particles. From as far back as MW2 they've been shown like this. While the sarna page describes them as a "stream", I've always heard them described elsewhere as basically firing something visually similar to ball lightning.

My main concern with charge up is that PPCs are already fairly hard to aim weapons with unstable hitreg. The actual "projectile" fired by the PPC is a lot smaller than the visual effect. Adding a charge up time just makes them harder to use than they already can be.

Edited by AncientRaig, 09 July 2018 - 12:25 AM.

[Tetatae Squawkins]

You keep conflating TT rules with wildly inconsistent universe lore.

In the late/post Dark Age era everyone has access to pretty much everything. Including a long list of new weapons. That's how they "fixed" things.

I understand most people are asking for balance to be done through asymmetric attributes where one side has advantages in some stats and the other side as advantages in other stats. And to make those changes consistent throughout each factions equipment lineup. That makes sense.

But you can't have clans just be better like they are in the lore during this time period. Use the lore as a thematic starting point and then kick all of the TT/Lore numbers to the curb. Limiting yourself to tweaking only a few variables in a modern video game because of a 1980s pen and paper dice game is insane.

[Nightbird]

AncientRaig, on 09 July 2018 - 12:19 AM, said:

PPCs, at least in the games, have always been presented as PPFLD weapons that fire a bolt of charged particles. From as far back as MW2 they've been shown like this. While the sarna page describes them as a "stream", I've always heard them described elsewhere as basically firing something visually similar to ball lightning.

My main concern with charge up is that PPCs are already fairly hard to aim weapons with unstable hitreg. The actual "projectile" fired by the PPC is a lot smaller than the visual effect. Adding a charge up time just makes them harder to use than they already can be.

With charge up it becomes a beam weapon. Hitscan, just like lasers. Speed of lightning after all.

[Nightbird]

Quote

But you can't have clans just be better like they are in the lore during this time period. Use the lore as a thematic starting point and then kick all of the TT/Lore numbers to the curb. Limiting yourself to tweaking only a few variables in a modern video game because of a 1980s pen and paper dice game is insane.

First of all point to one weapon where the clan version is 'superior' in the proposed numbers. Just using TT numbers doesn't make clans superior or balance impossible. Second of all, new numbers seem to simply make the two equivalent. Erasing differences between the two. How is that preferable?