76 replies to this topic

[Phoenix 72]

This is an honest question. I started playing in late open beta, stopped playing, came back early this year and have been playing since. And the first thing I had to learn was to curb my impatience, because people do not seem to like actually doing something ingame.

I went through some different roles to find out what suited me. Brawler often didn't end well, on wide open maps. Tried sniping, but felt it was utterly ineffective. Tried scouting, but I was really bad at it. So in the end, I decided to mostly play short to mid range fire support. I go where other people go and shoot what other people shoot. I try to rotate into the front line when my armour is fresh and rotate out of the front line if I was shot up but not killed.

Back in Tier 5 and 4, "sniping" with lurms was the gameplay of choice. In Tier 3 this dropped down to almost nothing and people started really sniping. Hiding behind a rock, popping up, shooting, doing 20 or so damage, hiding again. Relocating. Popping up again, doing another 20 damage, hiding again. This feels too inefficient, I dunno.

It works wonders if there is one sniper, picking off weak targets while the rest fights the main force fights, but I have never seen this work well if the sniper was heavier than a Medium. Never works if there are more snipers than other roles.

I keep seeing single people very far in the back with very heavy Mechs, as if they were afraid to scratch the paint. I often have teams with 4 or more of them. That's usually when they stomp us really hard. I keep wondering at the motivation behind this gameplay. Which is where this post comes in. I mean, they obviously enjoy the sniping gameplay, that is easy to notice, but if you keep getting rolled over, maybe it is an idea to move to a second favourite role if it is more useful... Or is that just the german in me coming out?

I try to use Mechs/builds where I can fill more than one role in game, depending on what we were short of. So I do not really understand people that pigeonhole themselves into one task.

What is it that makes people hide behind a rock and ideally the same rock for the whole game? Cover is great, but it should be used to get to an objective. It sometimes feels like being in cover the only objective people have...

(PS: Yes, slight rant, I had a lot of games recently with people doing little more than hiding all game.)

[Eisenhorne]

They are playing it badly. A BLR-1G in a sniper configuration can sit at 900 meters, and pump 45 pt salvos into the enemy repeatedly, which will add up quickly. I don't usually bring them to quick play, because they're really only useful in certain maps, but if you're trying to skill up a mech for faction play it makes sense to do it in quick play. Of course it's better to switch to a laser vomit configuration to level it, but i can understand people wanting to practice sniping. But yea, most people are just bad at playing snipers.

[SilentScreamer]

Darakor Stormwind, on 01 July 2018 - 08:01 AM, said:

I try to use Mechs/builds where I can fill more than one role in game, depending on what we were short of. So I do not really understand people that pigeonhole themselves into one task.

(PS: Yes, slight rant, I had a lot of games recently with people doing little more than hiding all game.)

Yes, bad teammates can lead to frusteration....

Hard honest truth - For many players, effective gameplay is different from what they consider "fun" gameplay. Unless you are in charge of a CompTeam, let other players enjoy MWO how they want (as long as they don't TK). Sniper mech bore me to tears but I have a friend that loves piloting them and does very well.

Edited by SilentScreamer, 01 July 2018 - 08:37 AM.

[TWIAFU]

It is easier to sit in the back behind your 'team' and fire at max range right up until your 'team' is dead and then the wannbe sniper walks backward in a straight line getting slaughtered in record time.

In other words, easier to fight until you have to fight back and then they really show how leet skillz are.

Just death cam watch them, happen all the time, even every time.

These types of pilots play for damage and erroneously think that is the measure of a pilot while loosing just about every drop or are carried to a win by the 'team'.

This type of mentality has lead to the over abundance of peek a boo play that has caused more harm to the game then anything else.

IMO.

[Phoenix 72]

Well,I can understand bad players. It's not like I am god's gift to Mechwarrior Online myself.

What I do not understand is non-teamwork oriented people in a teamwork oriented game, unless they are so good they can carry pretty much everything.

But oh well, to each their own I guess. I know I have heard enough complaints about my inability to twist. I can either hit the target or twist, but not both. So I go with facetime builds most of the time. Adapt or perish, I guess.

Edited by Darakor Stormwind, 02 July 2018 - 12:46 AM.

[Brethren]

Without resorting to noob bashing I kind of have to agree on the notion that people are doing it wrong.
If you want to be a boon to your team as a sniper the most important thing is your positioning.

• Toward that end do not take up a position that is most safe for you. (In the back field of your team, on high ground, in LRM cover, without a way for lights to get you! ) Usually being 800m away is quite enough to shield yourself from 50% of the enemy team.
  
• Your long range weapons will have lower dps than medium or shot ranged builds. So you need to start firing early in the game and not stop riding that heat scale to end up with a good amount of damage.
  
• Know your map and the areas the enemy team will likely go to or pass through. Your role is to deny the red team that area! By doing so you can herd the opposing team into a unfavourable position or at least restrict their movement and will gift our team with the ability to move and fire more freely.
  
• Don't move in and out of cover in your position too often. You may be running hot, but that guy peeking around the corner doesn't know that. He only sees the enemy sniper that is still holding position and will likely back down into cover.

Don't know if that covers all of it, but this is my take on a sniper role. My favourite is a quad-PPC Warhawk on Polar Highlands. I'm on either left or right flank, up high on a ridge (damn low arm mounts), preferably having a look down a long shallow valley. Firing distance somewhat between 700-1000m. And every red that peeks around or above gets some PPC fire. Nobody likes to get hit by PPCs and so they back down. If I see an enemy push I call it and keep laying into them until my team repositions.


tldr: Contribute to your team! Snipe for area denial!

Edited by Brethren, 10 August 2018 - 05:24 AM.

[Tarl Cabot]

Quote

tldr: Contribute to your team! Snipe for area denial!

^^ Just want to really stress that.

People snipe/long range cause that is what they do in many other games, they believe it will keep them safest the longest, win or loss. What most forget though it is should be used for area denial, not to get free hits without fearing return fire, which is the reason many go this route. Most drops people are not really communicating but many do watch the minimap, generally following the herd (of cats... : ) ) On some maps long range fire, if constant, can prevent flanking maneuvers, or at least slow down that flanking maneuver from becoming the front line.

Edited by Tarl Cabot, 02 July 2018 - 03:27 AM.

[YueFei]

Darakor Stormwind, on 02 July 2018 - 12:45 AM, said:

Well,I can understand bad players. It's not like I am god's gift to Mechwarrior Online myself.

What I do not understand is non-teamwork oriented people in a teamwork oriented game, unless they are so good they can carry pretty much everything.

But oh well, to each their own I guess. I know I have heard enough complaints about my inability to twist. I can either hit the target or twist, but not both. So I go with facetime builds most of the time. Adapt or perish, I guess.

Having longer-ranged weapons is important to control the map and deny open movement.

I play mechs with brawl loadouts 100% of the time these days, but I know it wouldn't make sense to have an entire team of 12 guys with short ranged weapons. Such a team composition would be exploited hard by an enemy team with 12 mechs that have range, because they wouldn't need to sit near cover, just sit in or move to a wide-open area (knowing we can't punish them for it) and overlap their fields of fire for deadly effect.

I absolutely rely on teammates with long range weapons to help me out and create opportunities for me to advance and get close to the enemy. The teammates with long-ranged weapons are the ones that force the enemy mechs to be "honest" in their positioning, and get behind some kind of cover, and that is precisely what obstructs their lines of fire and creates "shadows" in which the brawlers can advance.

With regards to shooting or twisting, but not both at the same time: just keep honing the actions until it becomes instinctive. Another thing that helps is to use a peeking technique that gives you a better chance of seeing the enemy first (and thus shooting first), and that is to take advantage of perspective. Try to corner farther away from the corner that you're peeking from. There's a CS:GO video about this that explains it with pictures and everything:


This way, even if your momentum prevents you from pulling back into cover before the enemy can shoot back at you, it gives you a slight edge in seeing them first (or at least at the same time), so that you can shoot and immediately start twisting.

The other thing you can do is to try to still be moving laterally relative to the enemy when you begin twisting. Once you're twisted into a fully-shielded posture, you can halt yourself and start reversing back into cover. That way, if an enemy shoots at you at a moment when you aren't twisted to shield, at least you're moving laterally, forcing him to lead the shot, making the shot more difficult and making it less likely he'll hit the component that he wants to. This also reduces how much convergence he gets on any non-hitscan weapon since he must lead the shot and the convergence will be set against whatever background is behind you. Lasers are hitscan but also damage-over-time, giving you more time&margin-of-error to twist against them anyway.

You're not going to successfully twist and block all incoming fire, but that should tip the odds in your favor.

Edited by YueFei, 07 August 2018 - 11:05 PM.

[TooDumbToQuit]

If I could see and shoot I'd snipe a lot more. But I have to use the advanced zoom to see 500m.

Sniping behind your team is total BS. But if you can get on the side or at a good angle to "the battle" it can be great. And even better if you have a friend because the enemy can't just sit and wait for you.

MWO is not about fighting one on one. It is about finding and making "three on one" situations. A good sniper can do that. He can force an enemy mech into an almost no-win situation.

Hands are really hurting so I'll give you all a break.

[DarkFhoenix]

It's the map that dictates how effective your chosen role is . Tourmaline desert is excellent for sniping .

[Renzor the Red]

I enjoy sniping, but in the non-LRM variety. One of my favorite mechs is my Arctic Cheetah that I use to run around at the edges of fights, flank, and hit backs and components with my 2 C-ER-LL's. It's a lot of fun. There is a learning curve, though, and just splashing that kind of damage isn't very effective. Now that I'm getting better at it, I really enjoy that style. I reach out well over 1000 meters with that.

[The Lost Boy]

This games currencys are armor and heat. Both of wich you spend to win and not sharing armor is you not helping your team pay for victory.

[Kubernetes]

Because people don't understand how ineffective it is in solo quick play. Snipers can make sense in FP or comp (occasionally group queue), but they're worthless in solo.

Watch how teams Nascar and rotate in solo queue. What happens if you set up 900 away from the front? Half the match you won't be able to shoot anything because the enemy is out of view. It means you're worthless half the time. You also don't have enough dps to meaningfully impact the game even when you do have clear shots.

What you do do is take your armor out of your team's available HP pool. Fewer targets to shoot means that your teammates who do fight up front eat all the damage. Which means they get rolled and then the enemy walks up to the snipers/lrmers with a big numbers advantage and shoot you in the face.

If you want to be a sniper, play FP or group or comp and coordinate with a team. In solo queue snipers are a liability 95%+ of the time

[Tarl Cabot]

renzor51, on 11 January 2019 - 12:10 AM, said:

I enjoy sniping, but in the non-LRM variety. One of my favorite mechs is my Arctic Cheetah that I use to run around at the edges of fights, flank, and hit backs and components with my 2 C-ER-LL's. It's a lot of fun. There is a learning curve, though, and just splashing that kind of damage isn't very effective. Now that I'm getting better at it, I really enjoy that style. I reach out well over 1000 meters with that.

Before any quirks are added you are doing approximately damage of only 1 C-ERLL. Optimal Range 740m (pre-quirk/skills) then that 10.75pt damage drops to 0 pts beyond 1,480m. Halfway point between optimal-max is 1110m.

And you are using the ECM pod, yes? Then you are also not sharing any sort of ECM shielding.

And have you lowered your mouse sensitivity to obtain a steadier aim? /shrugs...

If you just started last month, your avg matchscore has increased some, among other items but then you are still at least Tier 4. If a player actually pays attention and not a rambo type player they do not stay long in Tier 5/starter Tier but we do have long time players who could barely meet your first season MS, for a variety of reasons, some outside the player's control but they still play the game.

[Veolfen]

My problem is, as a Bushwacker & Marauder Tier 2 pilot, is that i see more Bushwackers, Linebackers, Rifleman, Hunchbacks & lightmechs on the frontline than heavies. When push happens, if it's the ennemy team, our frontline shatters because mediums can't tank a push, and if our team tries a push, it's mainly 1 assault &/or 1 heavy and the meds/lights while we have 3 heavy/assaults snipers staying far behind.
I get very angry when i see 3 fresh mad cat mk2/battlemaster/etc... when the whole team is dead.

Of course, when i say "when the ennemy team does it" and "when my team does it", it's actually a 50/50 since it happens for them too (we are the "ennemy team" of others after all)
It's just to point out that this is very frustrating and it happens a lot.

Incredible when as a Bushwacker pilot i always go in to share armor, start the push (i swear when we have a lot of brawlers but people just want to stay undercover getting sprayed by lrms & shot at by snipers) and notice how i'm mostly followed by other meds & lights, with at best a few heavies. (Also i take care of Assaults "speed", i'm not the kind of guy who at 14 mins expect the assaults to be there pushing)
Sometimes i wonder if I shouldn't just create a new account called "FollowMeLet'sPush" where i play a "high speed" atlas (the fastest he can be), and yell "FOLLOW ME WE HAVE TO PUSH" 10 times on the mic, to lead the pushes.

Edited by Veolfen, 12 January 2019 - 01:33 AM.

[Renzor the Red]

"This games currencys are armor and heat. Both of wich you spend to win and not sharing armor is you not helping your team pay for victory. "

"And you are using the ECM pod, yes? Then you are also not sharing any sort of ECM shielding."

"Half the match you won't be able to shoot anything because the enemy is out of view. It means you're worthless half the time. You also don't have enough dps to meaningfully impact the game even when you do have clear shots.

What you do do is take your armor out of your team's available HP pool. Fewer targets to shoot means that your teammates who do fight up front eat all the damage."

I see some pretty oversimplified points of view in comments like this. For one thing, light mechs don't really 'share armor'. That's not their role, and lights that pretend to be heavy/assault brawlers get wasted.

Every type of mech has roles, and this super awesome game's customization makes those roles very fluid.

My arctic cheetah sniper, for instance, stays at the edges of confrontations to provide support fire. I target damaged components and enemies' backs. I also make opponents feel more surrounded and split up groups, dividing the individual attention. There have been many times where I've stopped an enemy group's advance so that they could spend minutes screwing around trying to target me, or 'chase the squirrel'. If I were to 'share my armor', that'd be stupid and a waste of my mech's potential. I haven't been playing long, but I've had 4xx and 5xxx match scores doing that. Not to mention scouting. I love doing the sniper thing.

That said, I also play other roles with other mechs. With my Redline, I brawl with a group and focus on flanking. When my Kodiak, I 'share armor' and do assault mech stuff. I don't really 'share my ECM' as my ACH sniper, because I'm more on my own. But I share ECM with my Hellbringer, because in that I fight with the group.

It seems like things are pretty balanced in MWO. Even LRM 'snipers' have their limitations.

Edited by renzor51, 12 January 2019 - 02:01 AM.

[The Lost Boy]

Fast lights share armor by being hard to hit targets. They draw fire to themselves at times ( causing the other team to waste heat firing at them) so friendlies can use thier armor and heat pummeling the guys shooting at the MASC Flea.

[ImperialKnight]

Nothing wrong with sniping, just that most players snipe in the wrong mech and wrong position.

Lights and Mediums with ECM and excellent choices for PPC/ERLLas builds IF they know what they are doing.

If positioned well, they serve as dangerous distractors that the enemy struggle to manage. If the enemy don't return fire, the sniper is free to pick off weakened mechs or unarmored backs. If the enemy return fire, you've successfully turn an enemy that's not firing at your team, sometimes more than one.

And sniping is not static, the sniper needs to keep moving relative to the position of the team, for maximum effect.

The problem is people do it with heavies and assaults, which takes away both firepower and armor from the frontlines. AND a lot of times, dies with pitiful damage, because an enemy light can simply backstab an assault to death easily because of their terrible positioning

Edited by ImperialKnight, 15 February 2019 - 06:48 PM.

[General Solo]

Snipers can hit mechs whilst non snipers cannot return fire due to range
A snipers range is its advantage, shoot when other close builds can't
The whole point actually

This means the enemy mech is dead or severely damaged by the time it does finally come into its own effective weapons range.

So a sniper on the front line is doing it wrong, its the wrong type of build for front line duty, go back to mech lab

Snipers draw enemy fire which is the same as sharing armour,
Remember the purpose of sharing armour is to draw fire away from a team mate, weather the enemy hits or misses is irrelevant.

If the sniper is not drawing fire, hes being ignored and so if any guid putting hurt on the enemy.
Sniper can see a bigger view and so can notice week smokey mechs to put down for some quick kills for the team.

Snipers can control portions of the map if in a good positions, they can hamper NASCAR for example
eg a very good wall sniper can hamper nascar on HPG or canyon network for example

Snipers can provide overwatch and cover the brawlers and provide intel on targets not visible to closer units.

Many see a sniper and note: Dat sniper guys outta position he could get ganged by a lance of lights, what a noob
But the sniper see's it differently and its part of their brilliant and cunning plan.

For when that light lance approaches, the guid sniper will shoot legs on incoming lights.
Even if the lights succeed in closing, yes the sniper is in trouble, its 1 v 4 for him

however for the rest of the team it is now 11 v 8, a big advantage
We maybe lose one sniper but the enemy has the potential to lose more mechs than our team

Snipers just another mech in the tool kit like brawlers, med range pokers and "Support mechs"

Edited by OZHomerOZ, 15 February 2019 - 07:02 PM.

[General Solo]

TooDumbToQuit, on 08 August 2018 - 12:42 PM, said:

If I could see and shoot I'd snipe a lot more. But I have to use the advanced zoom to see 500m.

Sniping behind your team is total BS. But if you can get on the side or at a good angle to "the battle" it can be great. And even better if you have a friend because the enemy can't just sit and wait for you.

MWO is not about fighting one on one. It is about finding and making "three on one" situations. A good sniper can do that. He can force an enemy mech into an almost no-win situation.

Hands are really hurting so I'll give you all a break.

I'm confused which is it BS or great

Im kidding

Sounds like

Done for selfish reasons and poorly, ineffectually is BS
Done for any reason well is great