183 replies to this topic

[Khobai]

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Have you heard about a thing called speed tweak? They say it helps to boost your standard 58 kph to 62 and thus the only reason you may be left alone is your own decision to not go with the team.

no one wastes points on speed tweak in an assault

what a waste of points

those are points that can go into firepower... which is the only way an assault can marginally stay ahead of a heavy that has all its points in firepower.

if youre putting points in mobility as an assault, youre definitely worse off than if you just took a heavy.

why do you think people have been asking for the mobility tree to be buffed for assaults? because right now its not worth it. because the bonuses are all percentage based and assaults get crappy mobility to begin with. adding an extra 10% or whatever to garbage base stats still gives you garbage stats.

if the mobility tree was massively buffed for assaults then it might be worth considering. and I hope PGI changes that.

Edited by Khobai, 24 November 2017 - 10:53 AM.

[Nema Nabojiv]

CFC Conky, on 24 November 2017 - 10:38 AM, said:

Yes, but with many IS assaults this means leaving behind a lot of firepower. I think 55km/h is a more reasonable goal for them, but what do I know...

Well sure, if that works for you then it works. But the people here seem to be convinced that assaults get left behind because they're slow.

While in the most cases they are left alone because they either:

- separate themselves by going to cap some point because they spawned relatively close to it

- they spawn on some far away location and can be intercepted by lights, which was a deliberate gameplay decision by the guy who makes maps, aiming to create a situation when light lance can contribute to fight in such a way

[Brain Cancer]

<- tweaked up to 61.8 in his Supernova

Yes, really. And Firepower is maxed out. And yes, I already have a max-size 325XL in it.

Every kph counts, especially when it means I'm not the hindmost getting light-tooled or positioning for a sweet-spot with a few dozen ATM tubes. Inefficient? Yes (although I get a marginal boost from the rest of the mobility tree too). Effective? Somehow, yes.

[R Valentine]

Nema Nabojiv, on 24 November 2017 - 10:43 AM, said:

Have you heard about a thing called speed tweak? They say it helps to boost your standard 58 kph to 62 and thus the only reason you may be left alone is your own decision to not go with the team.

Seriously, the only two assaults who have legit excuse for not going 60ish are the Anni and Dire.

Speed tweak is percentage based, so assaults benefit the least from it out of all weight classes. That's why most assault pilots never take it. It'll give you 4 KPH at best, and that isn't going to save you from the nascar death spiral.

[Nema Nabojiv]

Khobai, on 24 November 2017 - 10:48 AM, said:

no one wastes points on speed tweak in an assault

what a waste of points

those are points that can go into firepower... which is the only way an assault can marginally stay ahead of a heavy that has all its points in firepower.

So you have a problem of not being able to keep up with the team, but instead of solving this problem you prefer to invest in firepower and what, do additional alpha before you die because you been too slow?
Well ok, that's your toys and you play them how you like, but I dont understand why complaining about it.

[davoodoo]

Nema Nabojiv, on 24 November 2017 - 10:59 AM, said:

So you have a problem of not being able to keep up with the team, but instead of solving this problem you prefer to invest in firepower and what, do additional alpha before you die because you been too slow?
Well ok, that's your toys and you play them how you like, but I dont understand why complaining about it.

Better to risk your team sometime running needlessly ahead over constantly having heat problems, less range and cooldown, on top of ammo shortages.

[OrmsbyGore]

Nema Nabojiv, on 24 November 2017 - 10:55 AM, said:

Well sure, if that works for you then it works. But the people here seem to be convinced that assaults get left behind because they're slow.

While in the most cases they are left alone because they either:

- separate themselves by going to cap some point because they spawned relatively close to it

- they spawn on some far away location and can be intercepted by lights, which was a deliberate gameplay decision by the guy who makes maps, aiming to create a situation when light lance can contribute to fight in such a way

It seems like you're conflating getting left behind and wandering off. Assaults should never try to go lone wolf, but even an assault that goes 65kph cannot catch up to a team that is hell bent on nascaring at 81 kph+. Don't believe me? get into a car and try to keep up with another car by moving 16kph slower.

The spawning charlie lance far away isn't meant to encourage the enemy lights to nascar harder, it's meant to make your team go LEFT to group up with the assaults. Try to think outside of the counter-clockwise circle.

[Khobai]

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The spawning charlie lance far away isn't meant to encourage the enemy lights to nascar harder, it's meant to make your team go LEFT to group up with the assaults. Try to think outside of the counter-clockwise circle.

the slowest assaults should always spawn in the center where theyre the best protected

they should never spawn in the far away positions

thats another thing PGI should change

because on some maps its very easy for the slower assaults to get light rushed when they spawn in the far position

PGI didnt really take rushing into account when they designed their maps... which is why rush strategies are broken on a lot of maps

Edited by Khobai, 24 November 2017 - 11:50 AM.

[Nema Nabojiv]

OrmsbyGore, on 24 November 2017 - 11:29 AM, said:

It seems like you're conflating getting left behind and wandering off. Assaults should never try to go lone wolf, but even an assault that goes 65kph cannot catch up to a team that is hell bent on nascaring at 81 kph+.

The thing is, average speed of the majority of your team's heavies is 64. Thats being determined by the fact 280 and 300 engines provide the best weight to performance ratio for 70-75 tonners. Anything more than that and you get diminishing returns for much more weight.
Assault's 62 kph is enough to keep up, or not fall behind too much if you want precise terms, with heavies' 64 IF you look at the map and see where it goes.
The key is to determine when will nascar start before your teammates even realize they gonna start nascaring.

[Khobai]

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The thing is, average speed of the majority of your team's heavies is 64

but a clan heavy is way better than an IS heavy

and the average clan heavy goes 78

so if youre playing a heavy that only goes 64, youre playing a subpar mech

81 is what a good heavy moves at. or 97 if its a linebacker which is an amazing robot.

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Assault's 62 kph is enough to keep up, or not fall behind too much if you want precise terms, with heavies' 64 IF you look at the map and see where it goes.

so youre keeping up with a bunch of subpar heavies? while the rest of your lights, mediums, and clan heavies are racing ahead?

Youre better off just never playing something that goes less than 65-70kph. thats the sad reality of the current state of the game. you cant rely on your teammates to protect you if you go slower than that.

ive seen so many games lost because of assaults that were too damn slow. yeah teams probably should protect their assaults better, but lets face it, that rarely happens. and assault pilots should know better by now.

Edited by Khobai, 24 November 2017 - 12:04 PM.

[Nema Nabojiv]

Khobai, on 24 November 2017 - 11:55 AM, said:

so youre keeping up with a bunch of subpar heavies? while the rest of your lights, mediums, and clan heavies are racing ahead?

Youre better off just never playing something that goes less than 70kph. thats the sad reality of the current state of the game. you cant rely on your teammates to protect you if you go slower than that.

I'm not heavy-racist and I keep with what mechs I can. And you seem to have some personal grudge with clan heavies (out of which there is only three good mechs going 81, two being laserboats and the third is missileboat)

Anyway, to put it differently - your job as an assault is not to sit behind and wait when your team start nascaring. You got to be aggressive and start nascar yourself, in which case its called 'leading the charge'.

Edited by Nema Nabojiv, 24 November 2017 - 12:14 PM.

[Khobai]

assaults leading charges tend to die horribly while absorbing less damage than most heavies that can actually torso twist

things have changed. assaults cant lead charges well anymore without the ability to torso twist. they just cant distribute damage like they used to.

assaults are basically just slowass glass turrets now.

i want assaults to be better. thats the point of this thread. im fine with assaults not being as agile but they need to be able to absorb a lot more punishment.

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And you seem to have some personal grudge with clan heavies

of course I do. theyre as fast as mediums with better survivability than assaults. and equal or only slightly worse firepower than most assaults.

clan heavies are obnoxious in how overpowered they are compared other weight classes.

Edited by Khobai, 24 November 2017 - 12:26 PM.

[davoodoo]

What is this argumeny even about, team goes only as fast as slowest member.

Youll rush into enemy youll die outnumbered.
Youll leave slowest mechs behind theyll die and youll die outnumbered

Edited by davoodoo, 24 November 2017 - 12:28 PM.

[Nema Nabojiv]

Khobai, on 24 November 2017 - 12:21 PM, said:

of course I do. theyre as fast as mediums with better survivability than assaults. and equal or only slightly worse firepower than most assaults.

Yeah, you forgot to add they can do 256 alpha.

[Khobai]

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Yeah, you forgot to add they can do 256 alpha.

ghost heat means their alpha is the same as an assaults in a lot of cases

[davoodoo]

Warhammer, grasshopper, black knight, higher laser alpha than any is assault

[Big Whale]

As a Kodiak / Mad Cat 2 / Marauder-IIC pilot the call to lead the charge is delusional.

My Kodiak has 120 ct armor. My Panther 8Z has 60 ct armor. When you factor in the speed and agility, it seems like panther has 120, and Kodiak has 60.

Outside of a few niche builds like 4 x ballistic on KDK-3, majority of assaults are ROFL.

And btw in a shooter game being a slow and large target is just pointless. I don't bring anything extra on the table. There is no "tanking" in the game, and anyway assaults suck at tanking. You still die in 2-3 alphas. There are no XL weapons or point to have an assault in QP. And with DPS of a heavy being where they are, I don't bring anything worth the price tag.

Battletech gave assaults a certain place and aura. 100-tonner was something on the battlefield. In this game, its placeholder for someone who due to delusion or fluff reasons plays it.

Do you think I still play MWO? you bet lol.

[R Valentine]

People who think assaults "lead the charge" are asinine. Speed, hit boxes, and size make for a MUCH better tank than armor. Assaults end up having to play peek wars just like every other larger, slower mech. Only the assaults that can pack overwhelming alpha strike capability are worth taking. Death Strike, MADIIC, Mal-2P with dual heavy gauss, KDK-3, or the Annihilator. Slower, brawlier assaults with mixed hardpoints are complete garbage, like the KGC, Atlas, and Executioner. You need to be able to put out 70+ damage to 500m or more. And if the nascar toilet flush ensues, virtually all IS assaults die first. They're just way too slow. Mechs with 64+ base speeds like the Mad Cat Mk. II and the MADIIC, both of which can change engines, fair much better in the majority of play.

[davoodoo]

I would argue that neither here nor in tt assaults were particularly tanky, but ffs at least in tt assault carried enough firepower to destroy enemy before blowing up itself.

[Fleeb the Mad]

Nema Nabojiv, on 24 November 2017 - 11:51 AM, said:

Assault's 62 kph is enough to keep up, or not fall behind too much if you want precise terms, with heavies' 64 IF you look at the map and see where it goes.

This hasn't come up so far in this thread, but do people generally realize the tonnage tradeoff most assaults have to make in order to have comparable speed to the slowest heavies?

A Warhawk or a Mad IIC with a 340 XL to match the Night Gyr's base speed has a total payload of around 43.5 tons. A Night Gyr has a payload of 40 tons. Running an XL360 on a 90 ton machine to reach 64 kph is a 45 ton payload. You'll note serious diminishing returns even with the wonder machine that is the Clan XL and the benefits of Clan Endo. Both are required to achieve these numbers. The disparity becomes much greater on the IS side when you're no longer dealing with XL tonnage savings and Endo becomes a more troublesome proposition with 3-slot DHS.

A Battlemaster with a 340 Light and Endo Steel has a payload of 36.5 tons.

Does everyone understand the pattern here?

Those huge engines consume all the benefits of using a heavier chassis. You gain more armour in exchange for larger hit boxes and usually a drop in maneuverability. If your basement speed is the same as that for a slow heavy mech, you're quite simply better off choosing a heavy chassis with the right assortment of hardpoints and profile. If you want to go faster than 64 kph, then an assault chassis will suffer a net negative over a heavy every time due to the non-linear scaling of engine weight.

Building your assault mech to keep up with a lighter, faster team is a losing proposition. Clan assaults currently skirt the edges of it to maintain parity with their heavies due to the benefits of Clan XL and Endo. IS assault mechs are in a bad place, but it will be routinely glossed over because Mad IICs and Deathstrikes are still common on the field.