51 replies to this topic

[Trogusaur]

I am so glad to see that the majority wants to end the boating epidemic. However, what I am more worried about is the lesser known artemis Tbolt/LRM 20 spammers. I've played a few too many MW4 Mercs matches where people sit on a distant hill with their Archers/Longbows and either Tbolt from 1200M or get a lock and fire their LRMs from behind the hill, firing one at a time so that the receiver can't even return fire (If even possible at that range) due to knockback. Two volleys is enough to kill any 70 tonner, or at least destroy an entire torso with one. Tbolts are immune to LAMS, and artemis only helps reduce lockon for this superweapon. Hate to troll, but the thunderbolt is exploited by stat rackers far too often.

[dal10]

but what about the black knight... it is amazing...

[Tannhauser Gate]

Volume, on 23 December 2011 - 11:47 AM, said:

Anyway the point isn't "nerf boats by making them do less damage when multiple lasers are fired" or "nerf boats by not allowing customization," but "make TRO builds viable by enforcing rules about heat, ammo explosions, core breaches, shutdowns, and other such things on boaters. Things that have allowed boats to be "better" in the past because of their minimal impact (override shutdown, coolant flush, etc) can still be in the game, but please make the game unforgiving and punishing to people who do not want to actually THINK about their equipment.

Boating and balancing weapons toward TRO are inexplicably linked in the same issue imo so you cant talk about one with out implying the other.

But yeah, I totally agree that MWO should be about the epic TRO weapons and not necessitate the need to boat.. and the mechlab shouldnt allow boating anyway.

[EDMW CSN]

Lord Trogus, on 23 December 2011 - 12:04 PM, said:

I am so glad to see that the majority wants to end the boating epidemic. However, what I am more worried about is the lesser known artemis Tbolt/LRM 20 spammers. I've played a few too many MW4 Mercs matches where people sit on a distant hill with their Archers/Longbows and either Tbolt from 1200M or get a lock and fire their LRMs from behind the hill, firing one at a time so that the receiver can't even return fire (If even possible at that range) due to knockback. Two volleys is enough to kill any 70 tonner, or at least destroy an entire torso with one. Tbolts are immune to LAMS, and artemis only helps reduce lockon for this superweapon. Hate to troll, but the thunderbolt is exploited by stat rackers far too often.

Thunderbolt 20s are only massed produce during 3072 as per Sarna. No worries for a game taking place in 3050. Also if going by the almighty fluff, it has the range of a PPC and a min range of 5 and it is extremely vulnerable to AMS.

Plus they don't work with NARC or Artemis so they will be inaccurate.

http://www.sarna.net.../Thunderbolt_20


As for LRM boaters, well they deal with their damage being scattered all over your mech, so they aren't as deadly as direct fire boats that rule most of the time in the MW series.

Edited by [EDMW]CSN, 23 December 2011 - 12:13 PM.

[Skwisgaar Skwigelf]

They could also make missiles less accurate, maybe 14 of your 20 hit one time and 17 out of 20 another time. Make the damage spread more random.

[Trogusaur]

[EDMW]CSN, on 23 December 2011 - 12:11 PM, said:

Thunderbolt 20s are only massed produce on 3072 as per Sarna. No worries for a game taking place in 3050. Also if going by the almighty fluff, it has the range of a PPC and a min range of 5 and it is extremely vulnerable to AMS.

http://www.sarna.net.../Thunderbolt_20


As for LRM boaters, well they deal with their damage being scattered all over your mech, so they aren't as deadly as direct fire boats that rule most of the time in the MW series.

Unfortunately, it seems mektek has upgraded the functionality of the Artemis system then. I don't see any other way my Thor could lose a weapon system in it's left torso and have every other part of it's center torso and L arm still green and yellow from one burst of fire.
But thank you for clarifying. My biggest pet peeve in this game is hearing the short ring of the missle alarm and suddenly getting knocked over, losing half my weapons from one attack.

Edited by Lord Trogus, 23 December 2011 - 12:16 PM.

[Felicitatem Parco]

Lord Trogus, on 23 December 2011 - 12:04 PM, said:

... I've played a few too many MW4 Mercs matches where people sit on a distant hill with their Archers/Longbows and either Tbolt from 1200M or get a lock and fire their LRMs from behind the hill... [etc.]

But that's how fire support works! If you're not familiar with warfare, modern Mobile Artillery units use a method called "Shoot-and-Scoot" where you sit either behind or on top of a hill, fire your long-range artillery, and then boogy out before your opponent can fire back. That's what fire-support is meant to be like - you fire and then don't allow yourself to get shot back.

Edited by Prosperity Park, 23 December 2011 - 12:18 PM.

[dal10]

remember the vulture that stands next to you in the steiner championship match on solaris? those thunderbolts HURT

[EDMW CSN]

Skwisgaar Skwigelf, on 23 December 2011 - 12:13 PM, said:

They could also make missiles less accurate, maybe 14 of your 20 hit one time and 17 out of 20 another time. Make the damage spread more random.

If again going by TT game experience... LRMS usually do 60% of their rated payload.

The LRM-20 does a mere 12 damage regularly. Split in 5/5/2 damage groupings.
Artemis adds another 20% accuracy on average so it would put the LRM20 into 16 damage regularly.
Again split to 5/5/5/1.

As long TT damage scaling is used for LRMS (not more than 5 damage dealt to each location per launcher), it would take A LOT of LRMS to actually bring down a heavy, yet alone an assault mech.

Edited by [EDMW]CSN, 23 December 2011 - 12:29 PM.

[Trogusaur]

Prosperity Park, on 23 December 2011 - 12:17 PM, said:

But that's how fire support works! If you're not familiar with warfare, modern Mobile Artillery units use a method called "Shoot-and-Scoot" where you sit either behind or on top of a hill, fire your long-range artillery, and then boogy out before your opponent can fire back. That's what fire-support is meant to be like - you fire and then don't allow yourself to get shot back.

I completely agree. However, I don't find it reasonable that you have a superweapon that is not only light enough to spam with a relatively light mech, but you're able to hit anywhere from a map with absolutely NO means of counter, except with your own Tbolt. My problem isn't necessarily with the ALRM, or even the idea with fire support in general. It is the way it is presented, simply another means of boating. This method is even worse than laser boating because it doesn't generate half as much heat, and extra ammo only costs a ton.

Edited by Lord Trogus, 23 December 2011 - 12:26 PM.

[Barantor]

Lord Trogus, on 23 December 2011 - 12:14 PM, said:

Unfortunately, it seems mektek has upgraded the functionality of the Artemis system then. I don't see any other way my Thor could lose a weapon system in it's left torso and have every other part of it's center torso and L arm still green and yellow from one burst of fire.
But thank you for clarifying. My biggest pet peeve in this game is hearing the short ring of the missle alarm and suddenly getting knocked over, losing half my weapons from one attack.

Honestly I want you to lose half your weapons, but only if some light mech with the electronic warfare role was spotting for indirect LRM fire and you never saw him. If it takes skill to sneak around you and call in the catapults, then you should be more cautious.

Now if it is jut some catapult jumping up from behind a building with instant lock and no support, I would cry foul as loud as the rest of you. Missiles should be good, but they should not be like a shotgun to the face.

Mektek should be taken with a grain of salt as they have to code around an existing game and mod things in that weren't ever envisioned with that old engine.

[EDMW CSN]

Lord Trogus, on 23 December 2011 - 12:23 PM, said:

I completely agree. However, I don't find it reasonable that you have a superweapon that is not only light enough to spam with a relatively light mech, but you're able to hit anywhere from a map with absolutely NO means of counter, except with your own Tbolt. My problem isn't necessarily with the ALRM, or even the idea with fire support in general. It is the way it is presented, simply another means of boating. This method is even worse than laser boating because it doesn't generate half as much heat, and extra ammo only costs a ton.

No worries. If they do the TT way of doing things.

1) There are only 120 missiles per ton.
2) Missile ammo explodes.
3) Ammo takes up critical space.
4) LRMs cannot do more than 5 damage per location.

[Karn Evil]

As long as all of the weapons are realistic - lasers that require time to hit, missiles with something less than pin-point accuracy, etc. - I'll be fine with it. I don't know that lasers have ever been "king" in my experience, with the possible exception of ridiculous boats throwing the MekTek Continuous-Beam Laser all over the place. Usually when I got nailed in the MW4 multiplayer matches, it was by somebody carting around a large bucket full of autocannons, or, on one memorable occasion, an Annihilator stuffed with machine guns.

[Trogusaur]

Barantor, on 23 December 2011 - 12:24 PM, said:

Honestly I want you to lose half your weapons, but only if some light mech with the electronic warfare role was spotting for indirect LRM fire and you never saw him. If it takes skill to sneak around you and call in the catapults, then you should be more cautious.

Now if it is jut some catapult jumping up from behind a building with instant lock and no support, I would cry foul as loud as the rest of you. Missiles should be good, but they should not be like a shotgun to the face.

Mektek should be taken with a grain of salt as they have to code around an existing game and mod things in that weren't ever envisioned with that old engine.

I would be 100% alright with that. You present a reasonable, skilled way in which to use a brutal amount of fire support. I just don't want to see any solo Longbows doing the same thing a Black Knight/ Warlord/ Gladiator would do with direct fire weapons. Granted, Longbows don't have jj's, they have extreme range instead.

Edited by Lord Trogus, 23 December 2011 - 12:32 PM.

[Barantor]

Lord Trogus, on 23 December 2011 - 12:30 PM, said:

I would be 100% alright with that. You present a reasonable, skilled way in which to use a brutal amount of fire support. I just don't want to see any solo Longbows doing the same thing a Black Knight/ Warlord/ Gladiator would do with direct fire weapons.

Exactly. It may also come down to making missile weapons have a longer cycle time than we are used to with previous mechwarriors. I always thought it was odd that the machine could reload all those tubes and arm the warheads that quickly, especially when some of the magazines for those missile racks aren't right behind the racks.

SRMs should be the more spammy ones, but should coincide with their lack of damage when compared to LRMs. If we see minimum distances and longer reloads on LRMs but with the same damage and difficulty to get on target then it might be better.

[Trogusaur]

Barantor, on 23 December 2011 - 12:34 PM, said:

Exactly. It may also come down to making missile weapons have a longer cycle time than we are used to with previous mechwarriors. I always thought it was odd that the machine could reload all those tubes and arm the warheads that quickly, especially when some of the magazines for those missile racks aren't right behind the racks.

SRMs should be the more spammy ones, but should coincide with their lack of damage when compared to LRMs. If we see minimum distances and longer reloads on LRMs but with the same damage and difficulty to get on target then it might be better.

I will leave it to the Devs to work out balancing weapons relatively fairly, the whole point is to have fun. Just putting my two C-bills in so it's there at least. Thanks for input!

Edited by Lord Trogus, 23 December 2011 - 01:02 PM.

[Volume]

Lord Trogus, on 23 December 2011 - 12:04 PM, said:

I am so glad to see that the majority wants to end the boating epidemic. However, what I am more worried about is the lesser known artemis Tbolt/LRM 20 spammers. I've played a few too many MW4 Mercs matches where people sit on a distant hill with their Archers/Longbows and either Tbolt from 1200M or get a lock and fire their LRMs from behind the hill, firing one at a time so that the receiver can't even return fire (If even possible at that range) due to knockback. Two volleys is enough to kill any 70 tonner, or at least destroy an entire torso with one. Tbolts are immune to LAMS, and artemis only helps reduce lockon for this superweapon. Hate to troll, but the thunderbolt is exploited by stat rackers far too often.

ECM
Stealth Armor
BAP
Passive Radar
Show up behind the Missile Boat before he even knows what hits him. Or maybe dodge in and out of his reticle so he can't get a lock on you. Too slow? Battles are 12v12 or 8v8. Have your lights take the LRM boat out. LRMs are SUPPOSED TO HAVE a pretty annoying minimum range and I hope that's reflected here.

Again, environments where missiles don't fly as far, or perhaps electrically charged particles in the air cause them to take longer to lock, or for the warhead to arm, or a map with lots of hills like a desert, or structures blocking LoS - cityscape, or trees in a jungle, or even ducking between craters on a moon/space/ice map.

[DKTuesday]

Well the Devs did say that they were sticking very closely to the TT rules. Hopefully, shouldn't be so much of an issue.

Edited by DKTuesday, 23 December 2011 - 01:06 PM.

[Draelren]

DKTuesday, on 23 December 2011 - 01:06 PM, said:

Well the Devs did say that they were sticking very closely to the TT rules. Hopefully, shouldn't be so much of an issue.

Thank god. I despise MW4 half of the time because hardly anyone brawls, they just snipe with 5 assaults. There is no place for a medium pilot such as myself most of the time.

[ManDaisy]

Tbolt--Argh... the most mis translated table top weapon in all of mechwarrior. Thunderbolts are suppost to be used to deliver land mines across map tiles where they detonate and not as a cheap arrow IV missle.

Also hated they fact that those flying turds were practically invincible. Laser, machine guns, AMS, ppc, once it was in air anything you could shoot at it, passed thru like nothing.

SHOOT DOWN ALL THE MISSILES!!!

Edited by ManDaisy, 23 December 2011 - 01:27 PM.