466 replies to this topic

[Lykaon]

Battlemaster56, on 03 December 2017 - 11:45 AM, said:

Sorry mate but lrms are only good at extreme niche situations and even in such situations it's better to use direct fire weapons, even ATM's are a better option as you can use them reliably more, and still keep direct fire advantage.

I mostly agree except that in the niche where the LRM is "good" is frequently when a direct fire weapon simply can't.


Like immediate second line offense. If there is only room for a few mechs to gain advantage of a fire lane an additional direct fire mech would be ineffective while an LRM carrier could still apply damage through the fire lane past the forward mechs in the lane by firing over the friendlies ahead of it.

360 assist range is another potential advantage. An LRM carrier can apply fire on any target in range regardless of LOS as long as something can see the potential target and the target is not in absolute cover. When a direct fire mech can clearly see a friendly engaged by an enemy on the mini-map yet be incapable of lending assistance the LRM carrier can.

other than these (and a couple others) niche situations I would say the LRM is largely inferior.

[PurplePuke]

Sure LRMs are great. As long as your opponents just stand in the open like in the OP's video.

But even then, no kills.

Edited by PurplePuke, 04 December 2017 - 06:38 AM.

[mogs01gt]

FupDup, on 03 December 2017 - 11:19 AM, said:

They're great...when the stars align.
When the stars don't align you're gonna have a bad time.
It's the reason why lock-on missiles in MWO (including Lurms) have needed to be redesigned for years. They're way too much of a feast or famine weapon.

This! Too many hard counters and pointing + clicking is way easier.

[poopenshire]

[mod]

Locking due to so many flame wars going back and forth here.

Please be kind to each other.

[/mod]

[JRcam4643]

So some said I should show how much damage I do compared to the team and I did that with this series of battles. Also some said that I didn't show a really good battle. These posts have nothing to do with trying to make my self look great. The point is to show I'm usually able to get more damage in a LRM mech than half, or more, of my team. And last note is some guys were saying 600/700 damage isn't that good. In most all battles at least half your team is doing less than 400 damage, many times not even close to that.

[Gristle Missile]

Trying to prove they CAN be good is not the same as saying they ARE good.

Sometimes you play against people who don't use cover, other times AMS/ECM/Radar derp can make LRMs irrelevant

600/700 damage is okay - but all that damage is spread to hell. Don't think you are doing better than your teammates who have 400 damage to torsos alone

Edited by Gristle Missile, 06 December 2017 - 09:37 AM.

[Exard3k]

spliit lrm damage in half to get actual value into the numbers. 700/2= 350 -> nothing special.

When I'm running high precision loadout with 400 dmg, I find myself with better performance killing enemy mechs than with a mad dog and 700dmg. But that relies on your aiming skills...when you're spreading your lasers and ACs/Gauss like crazy, this doesn't apply. Just means you have to practise and not making LRMs "good".

LRMs == good/above average performance == I can't aim with other weapons properly.

Same with C-SRM/ATM/MRM. Damage numbers trick you, you shouldn't rely on these stats to much.

Edited by Exard3k, 06 December 2017 - 09:45 AM.

[Khobai]

400 aimed damage from direct fire weapons is way better than 600-700 damage with lrms

If you arnt cracking at least 1000 damage with lrms I would say dont even bother

[Pariah Devalis]

Effective application of damage is far more important than damage alone. I can regularly get 1k damage games with, say, an ATM boat. However, the actual practical results of that damage can usually be duplicated with 500 damage games in a laser or gauss mech. And ATM tend to be more effective than LRM.

Across both arms and all three front torsos of a 50 ton mech, before quirks or skill tree, you can inflict ~220 damage and still not kill the mech. A smearing weapon system that takes 200 damage to kill a target looks impressive on the statboard, but is extremely inefficient when you consider that it only takes around 100 damage to actually kill the mech with direct fire weaponry. It is extremely inefficient damage placement, and thus "wastes" damage.

The only real use of LRMs are to either punish people who wander into the open away from cover, or to keep people's head down as a suppression system.

Edited by Pariah Devalis, 06 December 2017 - 09:53 AM.

[JRcam4643]

Gristle Missile, on 06 December 2017 - 09:36 AM, said:

Trying to prove they CAN be good is not the same as saying they ARE good.

Sometimes you play against people who don't use cover, other times AMS/ECM/Radar derp can make LRMs irrelevant

600/700 damage is okay - but all that damage is spread to hell. Don't think you are doing better than your teammates who have 400 damage to torsos alone

I would dare say if anyone is getting 400 torso damage they did at least 600+ damage overall. Not many people are that good a shots. And I'm saying and showing LRMs are good more then they are bad.

[JRcam4643]

Khobai, on 06 December 2017 - 09:38 AM, said:

400 aimed damage from direct fire weapons is way better than 600-700 damage with lrms

If you arnt cracking at least 1000 damage with lrms I would say dont even bother

That's a good theory, problem is most people don't aim that good and are spreading their damage about as much as my LRMs and also many people struggle to get 400 damage with direct fire weapons.

[Exard3k]

Pariah Devalis, on 06 December 2017 - 09:49 AM, said:

The only real use of LRMs are to either punish people who wander into the open away from cover, or to keep people's head down as a suppression system.

Oh...I'd like to add the point of having LRMs as a secondary to shoot while you dont have any LoS to targets. spread dmg is better than no dmg and keeps the pressure on the enemy. I like having 20-40% of podspace dedicated to this on several mechs. I hate it not to shoot at any given time

[MischiefSC]

I'm not going to look at your leaderboard stats but I can say that having had this discussion many times that nobody who's arguing that LRMs are good more than they're bad ever is winning much more the 50% of their matches, which is a 1.0.

It's not about stat shaming or you've got to be this 733t to talk about balance, it's about perception and accurate reporting. Confirmation bias is going to make you remember things that agree with your beliefs and forget those that don't. Backfire effect will make you immediately create excuses for why the actual recorded and demonstrated data beyond the occasional anecdote doesn't agree with your assumptions.

The brain lies. In fact your brain is less honest than most politicians. Even your memory lies - you never remember the actual event, you remember the last time you remembered it so your memory literally changes as you try to recall events.

LRMs are bad for a lot of reasons. They've been gone over repeatesly. Easily countered, slow, imprecise, teaches bad habits and prevents people from leading to be a useful team member. I promise you - It's not that everyone who's successful at the game "doesn't get it" or hates LRMs for their freedom or whatever. Its that the math has been done, the testing done exhaustively a billion times and the results confirmed ad nauseum.

If you enjoy them then play them. Its a game. However they are flat out inferior to direct fire. Even mediocre direct fire. LBX are better
Small Pulse is better. Play what you want but be honest about it.

[Khobai]

Quote

That's a good theory, problem is most people don't aim that good and are spreading their damage about as much as my LRMs and also many people struggle to get 400 damage with direct fire weapons.

and people that cant aim are also bad.

but people that can aim are doing better than you with your LRMs even when they only do 400 damage

and im not even saying LRMs are always bad (the problem with LRMs is more that theyre inconsistent), Im just saying 600-700 damage with LRMs is not at all impressive. 1000+ damage is the benchmark for good damage with LRMs.

Quote

If you enjoy them then play them. Its a game. However they are flat out inferior to direct fire. Even mediocre direct fire. LBX are better

Yep. My LB10X annihilator just did 1350 damage. Without any skill nodes.

Do you see me going around telling people LBX are good?

Edited by Khobai, 06 December 2017 - 10:22 AM.

[Bombast]

There's a lot of problem here. A misunderstanding about effective damage, the small sample size of the 'proof,' certain stats that need not be specified, a lack of any 'meta' argument (An explanation of why the math adds up to LRMs being good weapons), and several other things.

But what I want to know is what in the hell is wrong with your audio. Are you recording your game sound from speakers with a microphone?

[Armored Yokai]

Okay, can you 1v1 a mech at 1300m with 4 CERLL?

[JRcam4643]

Khobai, on 06 December 2017 - 10:08 AM, said:

and people that cant aim are also bad.

but people that can aim are doing better than you with your LRMs even when they only do 400 damage

and im not even saying LRMs are always bad (the problem with LRMs is more that theyre inconsistent), Im just saying 600-700 damage with LRMs is not at all impressive. 1000+ damage is the benchmark for good damage with LRMs.



Yep. My LB10X annihilator just did 1350 damage. Without any skill nodes.

Do you see me going around telling people LBX are good?

How many kills you get?

[Khobai]

6



HEY GUYZ LBX REAL GUD LOOK AT MY DAMAGES AND KILLZ!!!1111

Edited by Khobai, 06 December 2017 - 10:30 AM.

[Xavori]

I'm a big proponent of using LRM's to shape battles. I think used properly they can have significant impact on a match.

That said, no way does doing a lot of damage mean anything. I can easily put up 1k damage in any of the LRM boats I have (Tempest, Stalker 5M, Stormcrow cuz I'm insane like that). The damage numbers don't really mean anything except I get more c-bills and finish damage-based events quickly.

The thing that helps your team is killing the other guy as quickly as possible. LRM damage doesn't do that. LRM's help your teammates get quick efficient kills by pinning enemies in place, distracting them, opening components, and such, but the LRM's are just too random to be the key to team success.

So again, LRM's are great damage farmers. They can be a useful part of a team. But the total damage numbers they put up are fairly meaningless in the big picture.

[Y E O N N E]

FFS, part 2.