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Weapon Ranges


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#1 Agent1190

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Posted 13 January 2018 - 11:15 AM

What if the weapon ranges were set in stone rather than "Optimal range + extra at reduced damage?"

i.e. IS Medium lasers hit at 270m and under, not up to 540m?

#2 K O Z A K

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Posted 13 January 2018 - 11:24 AM

why? it makes sense that laser beams dissipate over distance

#3 Y E O N N E

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Posted 13 January 2018 - 11:32 AM

Then you get shot in the face with just ERLL + Gauss instead of ERLL + ERML + Gauss.

#4 Khobai

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Posted 13 January 2018 - 12:15 PM

the change they need to make is to require you to have a sensor lock to do any respectable damage beyond optimum range with direct fire weapons.

then reduce the sensor range on most heavies and assaults (certain assaults like the cyclops would keep their better sensors though).

that would make sensors actually important and it would strengthen the role of lights and mediums. and it would help reduce the effectiveness of the long range poking meta which everyone hates.


youd have three different sensor suites:

Basic Sensors - 400m range (most heavies/assaults)
Intermediate Sensors - 600m range (most lights/mediums, heavies/assaults like the cyclops)
Advanced Sensors - 800m range (lights/mediums like the raven)
BAP, Sensor Skills, etc... all still work the same and give you a % increase to your base sensor range

And if you dont have a sensor lock, you suffer a considerable damage penalty when firing beyond optimum range.

Edited by Khobai, 13 January 2018 - 12:23 PM.


#5 FupDup

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Posted 13 January 2018 - 12:16 PM

View PostKhobai, on 13 January 2018 - 12:15 PM, said:

the change PP needs to make is to require you to have a sensor lock to do any respectable damage with direct fire weapons past optimum range.

then reduce the sensor range on most heavies and assaults (certain assaults like the cyclops would keep their better sensors though).

that would make sensors actually important and it would strengthen the role of lights and mediums.

Pls noe

#6 Khobai

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Posted 13 January 2018 - 12:24 PM

Quote

Pls noe


why?

in battletech those weapons would do 0 damage beyond optimum range.

there should be no max ranges on weapons anyway. my idea still allows for max ranges but balances it in a way that makes sensors matter and makes lights/mediums better.

the long range poking meta exists because weapons have way too much range. x2 max range has never been balanced in this game. The max ranges need to be significantly reeled in.

unless for some reason you support the garbage long range poking meta thats largely ruined the game theres no reason to oppose my idea.

Edited by Khobai, 13 January 2018 - 12:32 PM.


#7 FupDup

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Posted 13 January 2018 - 12:51 PM

View PostKhobai, on 13 January 2018 - 12:24 PM, said:

why?

in battletech those weapons would do 0 damage beyond optimum range.

there should be no max ranges on weapons anyway. my idea still allows for max ranges but balances it in a way that makes sensors matter and makes lights/mediums better.

the long range poking meta exists because weapons have way too much range. x2 max range has never been balanced in this game. The max ranges need to be significantly reeled in.

unless for some reason you support the garbage long range poking meta thats largely ruined the game theres no reason to oppose my idea.

The TL;DR is that for most mid to long range weapons you're rendering them unable to deal sufficient damage to splat brawlers before they close in, thus giving people the choice of either guns with 700-800+ optimal (no sensor dependence) OR pure brawling with nothing at all in-between. Stuff like 300-500m optimal range guns (with no extended range due to your sensor requirements) just wouldn't have enough of a gap to make a difference against a bunch of angry splatbros trying to get in your face.

You're also not really fleshing out sensors as some kind of unique "fourth pillar" of mech combat capability (three current main pillars being firepower/durability/mobility), you're just making sensors into glorified weapon quirks. Still a firepower race, you're just making firepower a bit more obfuscated.

Edited by FupDup, 13 January 2018 - 01:40 PM.


#8 Agent1190

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Posted 13 January 2018 - 01:13 PM

View PostKhobai, on 13 January 2018 - 12:15 PM, said:

the change they need to make is to require you to have a sensor lock to do any respectable damage beyond optimum range with direct fire weapons.

then reduce the sensor range on most heavies and assaults (certain assaults like the cyclops would keep their better sensors though).

that would make sensors actually important and it would strengthen the role of lights and mediums. and it would help reduce the effectiveness of the long range poking meta which everyone hates.


They tried something like this with a failed "info-war" PTS. It wasn't implemented very well and didn't go over very well.


View PostFupDup, on 13 January 2018 - 12:51 PM, said:

Stuff like 300-500m optimal range guns just don't have enough of a gap to make a difference against a bunch of angry splatbros trying to get in your face.


This makes sense to keep weapons as they are - the game's hardpoint inflation, armor/health inflation and build freedom allows "splatbros" to exist, and in a 270m fight SRMs and Streaks would be king.

Edited by Agent1190, 13 January 2018 - 01:23 PM.


#9 Khobai

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Posted 13 January 2018 - 01:55 PM

Quote

The TL;DR is that for most mid to long range weapons you're rendering them unable to deal sufficient damage to splat brawlers before they close in,


no you arnt, they still do full damage upto their optimum range.

And they would still do full damage upto maximum range with a sensor lock. Youd just have to get a sensor lock.

Quote

Stuff like 300-500m optimal range guns just don't have enough of a gap to make a difference against a bunch of angry splatbros trying to get in your face.


Except at those ranges its very easy to get sensor lock. All you have to do is push R.

Your whole objection to my idea makes no sense whatsoever.

My idea would only punish weapons at ranges where getting sensor locks is more difficult (600+ meters).

Quote

You're also not really fleshing out sensors as some kind of unique "fourth pillar" of mech combat capability (three current main pillars being firepower/durability/mobility), you're just making sensors into glorified weapon quirks. Still a firepower race, you're just making firepower a bit more obfuscated.


Wrong. Because lights and mediums would have better sensors than heavies and assaults. It helps create role warfare and creates dependency between weight classes.

It also makes sensor warfare legit. Because not letting the enemy get sensor locks on you in order to reduce their long range damage becomes a viable strategy.

There is nothing obfuscated about needing a sensor lock to do full damage past max range. Its very simple.

Sensor Lock = Full Damage beyond optimum range
No Sensor Lock = Not Full Damage beyond optimum range

There is nothing confusing, hidden, or obfuscated about that.

Quote

They tried something like this with a failed "info-war" PTS. It wasn't implemented very well and didn't go over very well.


They never tried my exact idea though. My idea avoids all of the problems of the infowar PTS. Because its DIFFERENT.

Edited by Khobai, 13 January 2018 - 02:08 PM.


#10 FupDup

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Posted 13 January 2018 - 02:05 PM

View PostKhobai, on 13 January 2018 - 01:55 PM, said:

no you arnt, they still do full damage upto their optimum range.

And they would still do full damage upto maximum range with a sensor lock. Youd just have to get a sensor lock.



Except at those ranges its very easy to get sensor locks

Your whole objection to my idea makes no sense whatsoever

My idea would only punish weapons at ranges where getting sensor locks is more difficult.

You deliberately missed my argument dingus.

Let's look at the ER Medium Laser as a specific example. Up above you said that most big robots should only get 400m sensor range, and in general you want all weapons to do 0% damage past their optimal ranges. With that 400m sensor restriction, you couldn't deal any damage whatsoever past 400 meters whatsoever unless you had a teammate sitting in the line of fire holding a lock for you. Ergo, those weapons become borderline useless instantly. If you can't do anything past 400 meters, you might as well just walk a few steps closer to proper brawling range with more powerful weapons.

The HBS Battletech game had this same problem where their horrifically short sensor ranges meant that you couldn't even use the full range of a mother ******* AC/10 without a spotter. 270m range guns pretty much covered your entire vision area, ergo why the heck bother with anything that can reach further than that.

View PostKhobai, on 13 January 2018 - 01:55 PM, said:

Wrong. Because lights and mediums would have better sensors than heavies and assaults. It helps create role warfare and creates dependency between weight classes.

It also makes sensor warfare legit. Because not letting the enemy get sensor locks on you in order to reduce their long range damage becomes a viable strategy.

People aren't going to want to rely on light mechs so that they can properly use PPCs and Gauss Rifles, get real. Look how that works out for LRMs and potatoes who act like literal parasites to their team by being useless if nobody can get a red dorito for them.

People are going to heavily flock towards weapons that operate at maximum levels without allied input required.

Edited by FupDup, 13 January 2018 - 02:07 PM.


#11 Khobai

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Posted 13 January 2018 - 02:09 PM

Quote

Let's look at the ER Medium Laser as a specific example. Up above you said that most big robots should only get 400m sensor range, and in general you want all weapons to do 0% damage past their optimal ranges.


I didnt say 0 damage. I said a penalty. You would suffer a 30%-50% damage penalty without a sensor lock when firing weapons beyond optimum range.

Quote

400m sensor range


You can extend that with BAP and sensor skills though.

BAP = +25%
Sensor Skills = +35%

So you could bring it upto 640m

If you want to rely less on lights/mediums you would need to put points in the sensor tree. The sensor tree becomes useful where its currently useless.

Basically youre wrong. As usual.

Quote

The HBS Battletech game had this same problem where their horrifically short sensor ranges meant that you couldn't even use the full range of a mother ******* AC/10 without a spotter.


Yeah thats not the same problem. You would still be able to use an AC10 without a spotter. You would just suffer a 30%-50% damage penalty if you fired it beyond optimum range without a sensor lock.

And its only a problem if your piloting an assault, your lights/mediums arnt spotting, youve taken no BAP or sensor skills, and youre trying to shoot something beyond optimum range. All those things would have to be true. So its not really even a big problem.

Edited by Khobai, 13 January 2018 - 02:15 PM.


#12 FupDup

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Posted 13 January 2018 - 02:10 PM

View PostKhobai, on 13 January 2018 - 02:09 PM, said:


I didnt say 0 damage. I said a penalty. You would suffer a damage penalty without a sensor lock when firing weapons beyond optimum range.

Okay fine, you didn't say literally zero, but you did say:

View PostKhobai, on 13 January 2018 - 12:15 PM, said:

...to do any respectable damage beyond optimum range...


If the damage isn't respectable, there isn't much point in bothering considering that this game has such a long TTK for the most part (i.e. you want to try to minimize your opponent's TTK as much as you can).

#13 Khobai

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Posted 13 January 2018 - 02:16 PM

Quote

If the damage isn't respectable, there isn't much point in bothering considering that this game has such a long TTK for the most part (i.e. you want to try to minimize your opponent's TTK as much as you can).


The point is to encourage sensor usage, make the sensor tree useful, make BAP more useful, give a stronger role to lights/mediums, and to curb the long range poking meta.

It achieves all of those goals.

And it doesnt punish 300m-500m weapons because getting sensor locks at those ranges is super easy (worst case scenario you have to press R). It only punishes extreme range weapons like ERLL/Gauss which shouldnt have ranges that long in the first place. But it still allows those weapons to do full damage at extreme range if you can get a sensor lock.

Having to target what youre shooting at to do full damage (especially at long and extreme ranges) is a concept that makes perfect sense to me. How else are you going to make sensor locks actually matter? Sensor locks are meaningless unless theres some kindve penalty for not locking on.

If we did things the way you wanted, sensors would never matter and sensor skills would always be useless. And scouting would never be a role in the game.

Quote

People aren't going to want to rely on light mechs so that they can properly use PPCs and Gauss Rifles, get real.


Like I said, they can take BAP and sensor skills if they dont want to rely on lights.

Is it so bad for the sensor skill tree to actually have a purpose and reason to put points into it? that sounds like a good thing to me.

Nobody will be forced to rely on lights. But if they dont want to rely on lights they will have to rearrange their skill tree to allow them to be more independent. And figure out a way to fit a BAP.

How else are you gonna make sensors and sensor skills actually matter? Tying sensors into damage is the only way.

Edited by Khobai, 13 January 2018 - 02:38 PM.


#14 Jaybles-The-PegLeg-PotatoCaptain

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Posted 13 January 2018 - 03:36 PM

View PostAgent1190, on 13 January 2018 - 01:13 PM, said:

They tried something like this with a failed "info-war" PTS. It wasn't implemented very well and didn't go over very well.




This makes sense to keep weapons as they are - the game's hardpoint inflation, armor/health inflation and build freedom allows "splatbros" to exist, and in a 270m fight SRMs and Streaks would be king.



The info war PTS required you to get a target lock for lasers to do full damage, no lock was half damage or something. This was at the height of the laser vomit meta and what people didn't like is that: A, you needed a lock to do full damage, and B, it would have shifted everything to PPCs and ballistics, cause why use half damage weapons? There was also a ECM change where you could R target ECM mechs at normal sensor ranges, but you couldn't Missile lock them. And each weight class had different base sensor ranges, like assaults were 500M heavies 700, mediums 850, lights 1000 etc.

The PTS was actually a lot of fun. But instead of fine tuning and taking suggestions from the player base, PGI scrapped the whole thing and pursued energy draw.

I wish PGI would make more use of the PTS, even offering MC and cbill rewards for participation but alas Solaris is on the way and I doubt we will see any gameplay changes before it's release and inevitable patching and tweaking.

Edited by Jaybles-The-PegLeg-PotatoCaptain, 13 January 2018 - 03:37 PM.


#15 Y E O N N E

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Posted 13 January 2018 - 03:38 PM

No, PTS was half-range until you got a lock, then it was full-range.

#16 FupDup

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Posted 13 January 2018 - 03:39 PM

View PostYeonne Greene, on 13 January 2018 - 03:38 PM, said:

No, PTS was half-range until you got a lock, then it was full-range.

Well, reduced range did reduce your damage unless you were pretty close to the target already.

#17 Y E O N N E

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Posted 13 January 2018 - 03:46 PM

View PostFupDup, on 13 January 2018 - 03:39 PM, said:

Well, reduced range did reduce your damage unless you were pretty close to the target already.


The details matter.

Half damage is 2.5 damage at 270 meters and 0 damage at 540 from a MedLas. Half range is 5 damage at 135 meters and 0 at 270.

#18 El Bandito

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Posted 13 January 2018 - 07:04 PM

View PostAgent1190, on 13 January 2018 - 11:15 AM, said:

What if the weapon ranges were set in stone rather than "Optimal range + extra at reduced damage?"

i.e. IS Medium lasers hit at 270m and under, not up to 540m?


No reason why it couldn't work like that. Previous MW games all had hard capped weapon ranges and people still had fun in multiplayer.

#19 Khobai

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Posted 13 January 2018 - 11:09 PM

Quote

No reason why it couldn't work like that. Previous MW games all had hard capped weapon ranges and people still had fun in multiplayer.


The problem with hard range caps is that it still doesnt encourage people to use sensors or make sensor skills worth taking.

Weapons should suffer a 30%-50% damage penalty when fired beyond optimum range, unless you have a sensor lock. And heavy and assault mechs should have lower sensor range than lights and mediums.

Then sensor locks and sensor skills would have an actual purpose. BAP becomes much better. And scouting becomes an actual role.

If it was tabletop youd be suffering +8 accuracy penalty to hit at extreme range with weapons. So a 30%-50% damage penalty without a sensor lock is getting off easy. Weapons should not have as much range as they do in MWO without any kindve penalty.

Quote

No, PTS was half-range until you got a lock, then it was full-range.


PTS3 made it so your optimal range was reduced by 40% without sensor lock.

My idea wouldnt reduce optimum or max range. It would only reduce damage by 30%-50% when firing past optimum range without a sensor lock.

Under PTS-3 an ERML would suffer -40% range without a sensor lock.

With my idea the ERML does full damage upto 400m with or without sensor lock. And suffers 30%-50% damage loss between 400m-800m if you dont have a sensor lock. But the range is never reduced only the damage.

So its not really the same thing at all. My idea is mostly geared towards curbing the extreme range meta by making it more difficult to do damage at extreme range by requiring sensor locks for full damage. It makes it more like battletech which heavily penalizes weapons at long/extreme range.

Edited by Khobai, 13 January 2018 - 11:32 PM.


#20 El Bandito

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Posted 14 January 2018 - 01:37 AM

View PostKhobai, on 13 January 2018 - 11:09 PM, said:


The problem with hard range caps is that it still doesnt encourage people to use sensors or make sensor skills worth taking.

Weapons should suffer a 30%-50% damage penalty when fired beyond optimum range, unless you have a sensor lock. And heavy and assault mechs should have lower sensor range than lights and mediums.

Then sensor locks and sensor skills would have an actual purpose. BAP becomes much better. And scouting becomes an actual role.


Just reduce the base sensor range and lock time, while increase the bonuses of sensor related skill nodes. Simple.





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