28 replies to this topic

[Eoand]

i've felt an increase in LRM spam recently (Tier 4, solo QP), so wanted to get some suggestions on how to counter it.

Some givens:
1) Teamwork is OP. (I know this, however trying to organize teamwork in solo queue pugs seems futile to me. I can only control my own play, not others.)
2) AMS - This is an option, but i dont use it on all of my builds. I really don't want to strip any armor or ammo off my quad UAC5 Sleipnir just to fit an AMS in.
3) Radar deprivation - 60% is a given for me on all of my skill trees.
4) Cover - I try to use cover as much as possible when getting LRM rained on, but it seems like the rest of the team just dies around me while i try to squeeze out as much poke as i can.

So, with those given assumptions, what other options are there tactically to counter LRM spam?

Or is it really just finding a group and using coordinated teamwork?

[Eisenhorne]

Really the answer is just Cover. If your team dies to LRM fire while you are avoiding it, it sucks, but you really can't help your teammates not suck. You just need to try to do enough damage to make up for them. Try to make yourself a target for LRM's constantly while in cover, so they get a lock and fire, and their LRM's impact on the ground. A UAC Cyclops is a good mech, so you should be able to put up some decent damage in it. Hopefully you can carry the bads who just wander into the open and die to LRM fire.

Of course on some maps it's hard to find cover, and LRM's are just a pain to play against. These are probably going to suck no matter what you do, but always try to draw LRM fire and duck behind a hill to break LOS and have the LRM's sail over your head, because every LRM fired at you that doesn't hit is one that doesn't hit someone else.

[Raso]

You've basically got the fundamentals down. The only thing to add to what you've already said is to know the maps and know where you can poke safely and where you can retreat to in a pinch.

Another bit of advice is not to retreat down an incline in a straight line. Even if the missiles have broken a lock they can still follow a trajectory that will cause them to strike you. Retreat down an incline at an angle to avoid this situation. You've probably been hit by more unguided missiles than you realize.

[SilentScreamer]

Eoand, on 13 July 2018 - 06:48 AM, said:

i've felt an increase in LRM spam recently (Tier 4, solo QP), so wanted to get some suggestions on how to counter it.

I agree, a single AMS will not make much difference against a hailstorm of LuRMs. You mentioned your skill tree is at 60% Radar Deprevation. Question, when you are "peeking" how long do you stay exposed? Two quick trigger pulls with quad UAC5 is 40 potential damage. Staying out longer will get you more time to fire but also makes you a easy target for those LRMs.

Since you are in a direct fire assault mech (CP-S) you may want to consider either 100% Deprevation, or increase your Accelleration in the Mobility Tree to decrease your exposure time when peeking. Those skills can make a big difference to the amount of missiles that hit you if your opponent is firing from 600m or farther.

[mailin]

I think you may have forgotten about ECM. Either make sure to take mechs with ECM or stay close enough to someone else who has it. Also, make sure to look in the sky every now and then. If you see a UAV call it out to your friendlies and try to take it out. One more thing for you. Whenever PGI runs an event it brings out the lrms. Guaranteed.

[Steel Raven]

From my experience, most Lurm boats owe everything to their spotter. Kill the spotters and watch for UAVs, make them work for those locks.

[UnofficialOperator]

ECM for T4 to T5 play... They can't see the red box, they don't know its enemy. Its that bad at that tier

[The6thMessenger]

Steel Raven, on 13 July 2018 - 09:02 PM, said:

From my experience, most Lurm boats owe everything to their spotter. Kill the spotters and watch for UAVs, make them work for those locks.

That's how potatoes does it.

[Steel Raven]

The6thMessenger, on 13 July 2018 - 09:41 PM, said:

That's how potatoes does it.

I know of aggressive lurmers but most LRM boats I find seem to stay on second line, racking up as much damage as they can before someone finally closes the distance.

I know not all LRM guys do this but I always run into that guy in a assault mech in the very rear.

[The6thMessenger]

Steel Raven, on 13 July 2018 - 10:45 PM, said:

I know of aggressive lurmers but most LRM boats I find seem to stay on second line, racking up as much damage as they can before someone finally closes the distance.

I know not all LRM guys do this but I always run into that guy in a assault mech in the very rear.

Being second line doesn't mean they don't get their own locks. Good LRM boats try to get their own locks. Teammates just assists in spotting, not completely provide targets.

Edited by The6thMessenger, 13 July 2018 - 11:38 PM.

[Kroete]

Eisenhorne, on 13 July 2018 - 06:51 AM, said:

Really the answer is just Cover. If your team dies to LRM fire while you are avoiding it, it sucks, but you really can't help your teammates not suck.

You can, with ams or ecm, if this is possible.
Nearly all mechs can take ams, only a few builds have not the space or wheigt left.

SilentScreamer, on 13 July 2018 - 07:38 AM, said:

I agree, a single AMS will not make much difference against a hailstorm of LuRMs.

Every single ams makes a difference. Its teamutility, if half the team takes ams ....

The6thMessenger, on 13 July 2018 - 11:37 PM, said:

Being second line doesn't mean they don't get their own locks. Good LRM boats try to get their own locks. Teammates just assists in spotting, not completely provide targets.

Throwing some missiles after a teamlock is ok, but if you want to have fun, get your own locks at 200-400m with artemis.
If a assault peeks, he gets the first 60 blindfired, on his way back i have a lock and he gets another 60 and then my skilltree gives me the possibility to give him another 60. With some bending he needs high cover to not get hit with the third salvo.

With indirect teamlocks at 900m, one maybe one and a half salvo will hit him.

Eoand, on 13 July 2018 - 06:48 AM, said:

i've felt an increase in LRM spam recently (Tier 4, solo QP), so wanted to get some suggestions on how to counter it.

Some givens:
1) Teamwork is OP. (I know this, however trying to organize teamwork in solo queue pugs seems futile to me. I can only control my own play, not others.)
2) AMS - This is an option, but i dont use it on all of my builds. I really don't want to strip any armor or ammo off my quad UAC5 Sleipnir just to fit an AMS in.
3) Radar deprivation - 60% is a given for me on all of my skill trees.
4) Cover - I try to use cover as much as possible when getting LRM rained on, but it seems like the rest of the team just dies around me while i try to squeeze out as much poke as i can.

So, with those given assumptions, what other options are there tactically to counter LRM spam?

Or is it really just finding a group and using coordinated teamwork?

1. You can try to catch some 900m lrm-boaters and make them hit the hills. But it wont safe the match if your allys stay in the open.
2. 1 ton AMS gives you more armor against lrms then one ton of armor. Depends on what you get hit with more often.
3. The crutch is nice to have, 60% are ok, but only if the lrm-boat stays more then 500m away. And it only helps if you not get seen by an enemy or uav. Most lrm-boat have max. target decay, they will hit you unter 500m against your 60%.
4. Your cover needs at least 1,5 times you mechs high if you not want to get hit by my lrms. Be glad that they nerfed the arc-lock, at this time i could hit you around your cover or over 2x your mechhigh with some bending.

Get high cover if we are at the same elevation,
if you stay in lower elevetaion them me, your cover is nearly nullified,
never go back, go to the side, or your legs will be hurt,
twist your torso and spread my damage even more,
allways watch the sky, i use 2 maxed out uavs, ignor them and you will die,
give me a better target (open torso, higher thread, legged, slower),
if i can see you, you can see me, hope you have some lrm-boats in your team,
if i cant see you but hit you, ill have for sure a little friend around your legs, kill the lights,
if my little friend brings some narc, go to the next ams boat and it will safe you from the beacon,
if you get hit by a narc beacon, find some ecm or you will die,
if you power down or overheat in my sight, ill kill you with blindfired missiles,
if you have an opened section, watch for my lasers, they will hit and remove that section,
but there will be some point where i need to cool down, its your time to get me.

If you dont want to wait that long, hope some of your teammates will push together with you and kill me early.


Play some lrm-boat (medium/heavy, 80+ kph, 30-45 tubes and heavy/assault with 60-80 tubes) and find their weakness.

Edited by Kroete, 14 July 2018 - 02:32 AM.

[JediPanther]

The better lrm boats use bap,tc mk1-7,uavs,narc or tag. Use cover and close the distance. Lrms are the worst weapon for damage as the enemy gets closer with IS lrm doing zero at 178m while clans do so little damage you laugh as they build up their heat lrming you under 200m.

If you find an enemy spotter killing it will do much to nullify lrm boats.

[Phoenix 72]

There was a lot of discussion on this in games today, going back and forth, because lurmers seem to be out in force right now.

The consensus among the Tier5 crowd was: "Nerf lurms, they are bloody overpowered!"
The consensus among the Tier1 crowd was: "Git good. Then they won't hit you."

Either way, I had many teams collapse under me today due to the enemy lurmers, so in the end I was annoyed enough to bring a Nova S with 2AMS, 1 LAMS and 30% boost to shooting AMS. Because it does not help one bit if you are safe from them and everybody else dies. I shot down over 1600 missiles by the time I was killed halfway through the match. And then my team died.

I ended up buying, playing and skilling up a Crab 27 with 2 AMS to win at least some matches today. While I think AMS is really not worth it if I consider it egoisticly, when it comes to my match score, I did not see a way around it if I wanted to get any wins today.

[TheCaptainJZ]

1600 ammo is not necessarily 1600 missiles.

[Phoenix 72]

TheCaptainJZ, on 17 July 2018 - 05:17 AM, said:

1600 ammo is not necessarily 1600 missiles.

I did not use up 1600 ammo, I shot down 1600 missiles, at least according to my after action report. I had run out of 6000 shots of normal ammo and only my LAMS was still working. My highest ever before that was 1200 in a Kitfox, which was similarly crazy in my opinion.

[KursedVixen]

Unless you go overboard with like a 3ams system Ams will only minimize damage from missiles, from my experience the best tactics are to if you can carry ECM use radar quirks, or know the maps and understand what the best cover is for missiles, I Can fully understand your want to not strip armor for Ams.

When it comes down to it though You cannot control your teams actions, so if they are not experienced enough in the game to know what to do your just plain outta luck, play to the best of your ability and just hope your team does the same..

You pretty much seem to have the basics down, though on certain maps like Polar highlands there is little cover from missiles.

[TheCaptainJZ]

Darakor Stormwind, on 17 July 2018 - 08:53 AM, said:

I did not use up 1600 ammo, I shot down 1600 missiles, at least according to my after action report. I had run out of 6000 shots of normal ammo and only my LAMS was still working. My highest ever before that was 1200 in a Kitfox, which was similarly crazy in my opinion.

I didn't think such a thing was possible. I've seen like 200 or something personally.

[SuperMCDad]

TheCaptainJZ, on 17 July 2018 - 06:20 PM, said:

I didn't think such a thing was possible. I've seen like 200 or something personally.

I've shot down over 900 missiles in a dual AMS Javelin, with 3 tonnes of ammo. And that was on HPG, not the lurm friendliest..

[General Solo]

Don't get narced
Don't stray too far from cover in case you get narced
Know were your ecm team mates are in case your out of cover and you get narced.

AMS shoots narc, but whilst AMS is shooting some lerms the narc will get through.

Locks take time to acquire, say 3 seconds, if you expose your self for less than that, you never get locked in the first place. Expose from cover shoot and return in under 3 seconds, with a few seconds wait till the next exposure in case the lermer has target decay and you have no radar derp.

If you have 100% Radar deprivation you can re-expose almost as soon as you have broken LOS.

Edited by OZHomerOZ, 17 July 2018 - 09:03 PM.

[Phoenix 72]

TheCaptainJZ, on 17 July 2018 - 06:20 PM, said:

I didn't think such a thing was possible. I've seen like 200 or something personally.

I did some research a month ago, because I was considering dropping my AMS as I deemed them not worth it, as I was rarely hit with missiles myself.

9 AMS ammo shoot down 1 missile. I have no idea whether that is before or after skill nodes. So 2000 AMS will shoot down 222 missiles, max. With the ammo buff, should be 240ish. You get 1 point of match score for every 7 missiles shot down, so 240ish missiles will give you 33 or so match score. I used the Nova, which had 2 AMS and 1 LAMS, so I could essentially fire forever. The Nova also has a 30% fire rate quirk, so while ammo lasts, it will function like 3.9 AMS. And when the ammo is gone, thanks to the LAMS I still have 1.3 AMS, so to speak.

You score would lead me to assume you had 1 AMS with 2000 ammo.

I have been vocal on the boards to bring AMS especially when you do not need it (at least in quick play), because it can help save some teammates that are not as skilled at avoiding fire as you are. At least on missile heavy weeks, the reduction in personal firepower is well worth it with the additional wins you get by saving your teams' potatoes.