181 replies to this topic

[Y E O N N E]

Grus, on 24 July 2018 - 01:17 PM, said:

#doubt keep in mind as well some of the IS mechs get a %to crit reduction on top of skill maze. I can't think of one of the top of my head for clans that have that.

Very, very few 'Mechs have that crit chance reduction quirk (the ANH is among them, IIRC), and the Skill Maze values aren't high enough to mean anything at all.

Regardless, the IS side isn't the one with the crit-happy MG spam. For every one MG Flea or Arrow, you will find three Piranhas or Mist Lynx. This is the Clans owning themselves.

[ChapeL]

I just wish PIR players stopped bitching about "skill" when I kill them in a "super stock" BJ-2. You get to be the bane of all mechs with exposed body parts... I get to keep you honest.

[KoalaBrownie]

Quicksilver Kalasa, on 24 July 2018 - 11:29 AM, said:

lolwut

Compared to tabletop they're absolute tanks. Double structure and armor, often with huge buffs on top of that while weapons have the same damage or less.

Bush Hopper, on 24 July 2018 - 11:46 AM, said:

Generally speaking...isn't it funny that when you see posts about OP light mechs and you check the leaderboard for their light mech scores, that you nearly always find horrible scores or hardly / none matches played in light mechs for several seasons?

Yeah and the #1 reason: light mechs are boring.

Restrictive loads out with no unique combat role outside of a few infrequent modes. Why would I invest time playing in a mech that bores me to tears?

Flanking around the assaults and shooting them in the back is MUCH more interesting when you're in a mech that's too slow to run away.

Edited by KoalaBrownie, 24 July 2018 - 01:45 PM.

[Quicksilver Aberration]

KoalaBrownie, on 24 July 2018 - 01:32 PM, said:

Compared to tabletop they're absolute tanks. Double structure and armor, often with huge buffs on top of that while weapons have the same damage or less.

The reason armor/structure was doubled was because you can direct more focused damage in this game and RoF of weapons is at worst double what it was in TT. So no, they aren't absolutely tanks, they are incredibly fragile because those to-hit modifiers were better at protecting lights than anything in this game.

KoalaBrownie, on 24 July 2018 - 01:32 PM, said:

Yeah and the #1 reason: light mechs are boring.

And taking away yet another solid configuration that they can actually do manages to fix that?

KoalaBrownie, on 24 July 2018 - 01:32 PM, said:

no unique combat role outside of a few infrequent modes.

Their "unique" combat role is to attack from angles that no other mech could reasonably do because it would be caught out, because while that may be boring to you, not everyone wants to play stupidly and see if they can get away with it.

Edited by Quicksilver Kalasa, 24 July 2018 - 02:00 PM.

[KoalaBrownie]

Quicksilver Kalasa, on 24 July 2018 - 01:59 PM, said:

The reason armor/structure was doubled was because you can direct more focused damage in this game and RoF of weapons is at worst double what it was in TT. So no, they aren't absolutely tanks, they are incredibly fragile because those to-hit modifiers were better at protecting lights than anything in this game.

And yet I regularly land hits that would 1-hit kill a light in tabletop and yet don't even destroy a component in this game. So yes, they are tanks in comparison.

Quicksilver Kalasa, on 24 July 2018 - 01:59 PM, said:

And taking away yet another solid configuration that they can actually do manages to fix that?

Balancing a configuration doesn't "take it away" unless a player relies on OP builds. When I last played people complained that MGs were useless. Now it's the opposite. Perhaps a middle ground is preferable. Also piranha doesn't do anything new that a ER SL boat didn't already. Still closing to point blank and shooting at a guy's rear end.

Quicksilver Kalasa, on 24 July 2018 - 01:59 PM, said:

Their "unique" combat role is to attack from angles that no other mech could reasonably do because it would be caught out, because while that may be boring to you, not everyone wants to play stupidly and see if they can get away with it.

And yet I reasonably do it all the time in a heavy mech while rarely getting caught out. Call it stupid if you will, but when I flank around in a Catapult and get two solo kills while the rest of my team sits at long range or charges one at a time and gets killed to a man without a single kill, then I'm pretty sure I'm the only one contributing something beyond a distraction.

Edited by KoalaBrownie, 24 July 2018 - 02:29 PM.

[Quicksilver Aberration]

KoalaBrownie, on 24 July 2018 - 02:14 PM, said:

And yet I regularly land hits that would 1-hit kill a light in tabletop and yet don't even destroy a component in this game. So yes, they are tanks in comparison.

That's a faulty comparison, because you can land even larger alphas in this game than you could in TT on one component. Yes, a Heavy Gauss Rifle doesn't instantly gib a light in this game, but guess what, you can actually land 2 Heavy Gauss shots on the same component significantly easier than you could in TT. Same with double Gauss, double PPCs, or any laser boat which can now land 8 lasers all on the same spot.

KoalaBrownie, on 24 July 2018 - 02:14 PM, said:

Balancing a configuration doesn't "take it away" unless a player relies on OP builds.

That assumes that these are OP, and they aren't. Piranhas fall apart just from a few glancing laser blows.

KoalaBrownie, on 24 July 2018 - 02:14 PM, said:

And yet I reasonably do it all the time in a heavy mech while rarely getting caught out.

Yeah, for the same reason that people think Piranhas are OP, because they don't know how to play the game. Understanding what you get away because the enemy is just bad and actually what is a good move is an important part of becoming a good player, because one reinforces really bad habits (hint, it's the former).

Edited by Quicksilver Kalasa, 24 July 2018 - 02:36 PM.

[KoalaBrownie]

Quicksilver Kalasa, on 24 July 2018 - 02:35 PM, said:

That's a faulty comparison, because you can land even larger alphas in this game than you could in TT on one component. Yes, a Heavy Gauss Rifle doesn't instantly gib a light in this game, but guess what, you can actually land 2 Heavy Gauss shots on the same component significantly easier than you could in TT. Same with double Gauss, double PPCs, or any laser boat which can now land 8 lasers all on the same spot.

Yes you can land 8 lasers on the same spot, and the same spot next to it, and the same spot next to that, and then the empty space next to that as the mech runs out of the crosshairs.

It's not a faulty comparison to say that an AC/20 to the rear torso of any light mech would almost certainly kill it in tabletop and yet here, seemingly double AC/20 sometimes doesn't take out a single component

Quicksilver Kalasa, on 24 July 2018 - 02:35 PM, said:

That assumes that these are OP, and they aren't. Piranhas fall apart just from a few glancing laser blows.

Piranaha durability and MG balance are separate issues.

Quicksilver Kalasa, on 24 July 2018 - 02:35 PM, said:

Yeah, for the same reason that people think Piranhas are OP, because they don't know how to play the game.

And yet balance changes happen all the time in this game, so claims about this that or the other being OP are often proven legitimate.

Quicksilver Kalasa, on 24 July 2018 - 02:35 PM, said:

Understanding what you get away because the enemy is just bad and actually what is a good move is an important part of becoming a good player, because one reinforces really bad habits (hint, it's the former).

If the enemy are bad players or I'm a good player the result is the same, I'm playing better than them in an individual match. Sometimes they play better than me. Either way your statement is wrong.

Edited by KoalaBrownie, 24 July 2018 - 03:26 PM.

[Quicksilver Aberration]

KoalaBrownie, on 24 July 2018 - 03:26 PM, said:

It's not a faulty comparison to say that an AC/20 to the rear torso of any light mech would almost certainly kill it in tabletop and yet here, seemingly double AC/20 sometimes doesn't take out a single component

Without factoring quirks and criticals, 2 AC20 in this game is equal to a single AC20 in TT as far as damage ratios go. Quirks and criticals definitely muddy the water, but that's expected, that's kind of the point for them. That's also only taking into account alphas, there is significantly more damage being slung around per 10 seconds than in TT. For example weapons like AC2s/AC5s can throw MUCH more damage downwind in the time an AC20 could get one shot off compared to in TT.

Either way, the differences between TT and this game are moot because lights fall apart pretty fast when playing against players that can actually shoot and move somewhat coordinately with a team.

KoalaBrownie, on 24 July 2018 - 03:26 PM, said:

Yes you can land 8 lasers on the same spot, and the same spot next to it, and the same spot next to that, and then the empty space next to that as the mech runs out of the crosshairs.

Obviously that's not what's happening or there still wouldn't be people complaining about lolphas or laser vomit.

KoalaBrownie, on 24 July 2018 - 03:26 PM, said:

Piranaha durability and MG balance are separate issues.

MGs only came about because literally every other weapon a light would use were nerfed into the ground. So yes, you are right they are separate issues but MGs only became used because the nerfing of things like cSPL left a giant vacuum.

KoalaBrownie, on 24 July 2018 - 03:26 PM, said:

And yet balance changes happen all the time in this game, so claims about this that or the other being OP are often proven legitimate.

Balance changes that are significant rarely happen in this game. The MKII and Annihilator have been dominant for many months. The Cheetah and Lynx have been some of the dominant lights for over a year now. So no, they are rarely if ever legitimate.

KoalaBrownie, on 24 July 2018 - 03:26 PM, said:

If the enemy are bad players or I'm a good player the result is the same, I'm playing better than them in an individual match.

Sure, but if you don't understand that the difference between you are their play is that they made a much more costly mistake than you then you can't say what was a good move and what isn't. Getting away with something dumb because the enemy is dumber doesn't make you smart, it just means you are less dumb.

Edited by Quicksilver Kalasa, 24 July 2018 - 03:58 PM.

[KoalaBrownie]

Quicksilver Kalasa, on 24 July 2018 - 03:56 PM, said:

Sure, but if you don't understand that the difference between you are their play is that they made a much more costly mistake than you then you can't say what was a good move and what isn't. Getting away with something dumb because the enemy is dumber doesn't make you smart, it just means you are less dumb.

No such thing as a dumb tactic, just tactics that work and tactics that don't.

What's actually dumb is thinking that there is only one correct way to play. That's the sort of mentality that loses wars.

[Quicksilver Aberration]

KoalaBrownie, on 24 July 2018 - 05:13 PM, said:

No such thing as a dumb tactic, just tactics that work and tactics that don't.

No, there is such a thing. Success is not a black/white thing, there are varying levels of success and there are probabilities of certain things working in a variety of more situations. I never said there was only one way to do things, that was a leap in judgement YOU made about my argument.

[KoalaBrownie]

Quicksilver Kalasa, on 24 July 2018 - 05:22 PM, said:

No, there is such a thing. Success is not a black/white thing, there are varying levels of success and there are probabilities of certain things working in a variety of more situations. I never said there was only one way to do things, that was a leap in judgement YOU made about my argument.

If you characterize things as "good" and "dumb" or "good players" and "bad players" you are thinking in black & white. You even pre-judged a tactic that I espoused as dumb probably because it doesn't fit within your own limited experience.

Edited by KoalaBrownie, 24 July 2018 - 06:42 PM.

[Quicksilver Aberration]

KoalaBrownie, on 24 July 2018 - 06:41 PM, said:

If you characterize things as "good" and "dumb" or "good players" and "bad players" you are thinking in black & white. You even pre-judged a tactic that I espoused as dumb probably because it doesn't fit within your own limited experience.

There is a reason vagueness exists in language......in this case good and dumb are part of a spectrum.

The reason I "pre-judged" it because you are a heavier mech trying to do what a light should (light or medium pretending to be a light like a Viper), if a team were coordinated enough, they would jump on you with minimal issue. You wasted time you could've been doing damage on "flanking" the enemy.

Edited by Quicksilver Kalasa, 24 July 2018 - 07:07 PM.

[KoalaBrownie]

Quicksilver Kalasa, on 24 July 2018 - 07:05 PM, said:

There is a reason vagueness exists in language......in this case good and dumb are part of a spectrum.

The reason I "pre-judged" it because you are a heavier mech trying to do what a light should (light or medium pretending to be a light like a Viper), if a team were coordinated enough, they would jump on you with minimal issue. You wasted time you could've been doing damage on "flanking" the enemy.

No the reason you pre-judged is because you can't stop to imagine how it will work.

Flanking with a heavy isn't about enemy team co-ordination, it's about hitting the enemy when they're too committed to respond and hitting them from a direction where you have a chance to withdraw or at least cut off a lot of pursuit. Also ideally you hit an enemy that has isolated themselves from the main group. You attack at a point and time that will cause the most damage and the most disruption.

If you hit them when they're not busy of course you'll get killed just as easily as you'd get killed hitting them solo from the front.

And if you do hit them when the rest of your team is engaging and the enemy team pulls three mechs off to deal with you, then your team now has a 2 mech advantage- if you can draw the enemy away even further without (or before) dying then all the better

Edited by KoalaBrownie, 24 July 2018 - 08:18 PM.

[Weeny Machine]

KoalaBrownie, on 24 July 2018 - 01:32 PM, said:

Compared to tabletop they're absolute tanks. Double structure and armor, often with huge buffs on top of that while weapons have the same damage or less.



Yeah and the #1 reason: light mechs are boring.

Restrictive loads out with no unique combat role outside of a few infrequent modes. Why would I invest time playing in a mech that bores me to tears?

Flanking around the assaults and shooting them in the back is MUCH more interesting when you're in a mech that's too slow to run away.

First of all you are right in the loadouts. Because of weight issues lights cannot use many of the heavier weapon systems. However, you are also very wrong:
1. You can play sniper lights (Raven with ERLL), you can play Harassers (Wolfhounds, ACH) or you can brawlers (PIRs). There is quite a difference how those mechs are played. If you try to brawl in an ERLL Raven...oh well

2. Because most of the light mechs need to get close, you are mostly on your toes - no other mech class has that. Simply because a good alpha will badly damage your mech and a dual heavy gauss means you are trash. May I ask in which tier you guys (VonBach and KoalaBrownie) are? I wonder because, as I already pointed out, in lower tiers the tiny mechs and lights in general cause much more issues because it takes time of getting used to counter the tiny lights whereas in the upper tiers they seem often very fragile.

3. Flanking an backstabbing someone in a slow mech is good and well when you have a chance to get away. When you are next to the enemy team with no way to disengage it is, sorry, dumb, because the team will just turn and splatter you. So your flanking and backstabbing gained you nothing but an even trade.

4. Yeah, why should people play "boring" mechs (again, light mechs are the most exciting mechs out there for aforementioned reasons)? Can you answer me, though, why there are so many laser vomit mediums, heavies and assaults? I mean, they are the epidom of boredom. When I play heavier mechs I simply stay away from those builds.

5. Unique combat roles? Oh, tell me what unique combat roles medium, heavies and assaults have them. The point is, there is unfortunately no such thing in MWO


In general once more: I am really wondering how some people here even dare to make big-mouthed statements about how easy lights are to play when their leaderboard scores show hardly or even none matches played in lights and/or terrible scores (which completely blows their argument out of the water simply because they obviously cannot get the OP light mechs to work). I question their knowledge to make proper statements because they clearly lack hands-on experience.

Edited by Bush Hopper, 24 July 2018 - 09:17 PM.

[Quicksilver Aberration]

KoalaBrownie, on 24 July 2018 - 08:16 PM, said:

No the reason you pre-judged is because you can't stop to imagine how it will work.

Flanking with a heavy isn't about enemy team co-ordination, it's about hitting the enemy when they're too committed to respond and hitting them from a direction where you have a chance to withdraw or at least cut off a lot of pursuit. Also ideally you hit an enemy that has isolated themselves from the main group.

Again, this is the job of a light because you are essentially trying to find duels, find an isolated mech and take it on yourself because you are also isolated (equal fights where you might have the element of surprise as opposed to forcing more uneven engagements); not to mention, you are also taking armor from the main body of which you have the 2nd highest of the weight classes.

Now it might be different if you had buddies and were doing a split but you haven't indicated that. This isn't an issue of the fact that I lack imagination for your "brilliant" tactics, it's that the tactic is based on faulty logic.

KoalaBrownie, on 24 July 2018 - 08:16 PM, said:

If you hit them when they're not busy of course you'll get killed just as easily as you'd get killed hitting them solo from the front.

And if you do hit them when the rest of your team is engaging and the enemy team pulls three mechs off to deal with you, then your team now has a 2 mech advantage- if you can draw the enemy away even further without (or before) dying then all the better

You could easily do the same thing in a light, without sacrificing as much firepower or armor and still actually manage to get away rather than be committed to a lost fight (barring super spuds). I'm not saying you can't do it and pull some good games (because it is PUG queue, the starch is pretty heavy), I'm saying that you are better off doing it with a light and playing a heavy with the main body.

It also heavily relies on the team to make some seriously bad mistakes (which it's PUG queue so of course they will):

• Never scouting you in the first place, against coordinated groups, getting behind them is generally much harder.
  
• Engaging before dealing with an easy kill in the backfield.
  
• Sending 3 mechs to squirrel on a mech in the back.

Tactics that rely on the enemy being bad aren't generally good tactics.


This is actually the reason why some comp players avoid solo queue, and why comp teams generally try to scrimmage against teams of similar skill level, because often the better teams (or players in regards to solo queue) make mistakes and aren't punished for them like they would against better teams. It's how bad habits form, just like your backstabbing/flanking solo heavy. Just because it works against some players doesn't mean its good.

Edited by Quicksilver Kalasa, 24 July 2018 - 09:34 PM.

[x Deathstrike x]

Bush Hopper, on 24 July 2018 - 09:11 PM, said:

May I ask in which tier you guys (VonBach and KoalaBrownie) are?

https://leaderboard....?u=KoalaBrownie
Average K/D 1.14
Average W/L 1.03

https://leaderboard....earch?u=VonBach
Average K/D 0.61
Average W/L 0.95

Both not T1 I would assume.

Edited by x Deathstrike x, 25 July 2018 - 10:38 AM.

[Prototelis]

Bush Hopper, on 24 July 2018 - 09:11 PM, said:

In general once more: I am really wondering how some people here even dare to make big-mouthed statements about how easy lights are to play when their leaderboard scores show hardly or even none matches played in lights and/or terrible scores (which completely blows their argument out of the water simply because they obviously cannot get the OP light mechs to work). I question their knowledge to make proper statements because they clearly lack hands-on experience.

It's because the biggest "lights op" criers can't throw up good numbers in whatever lights happen to be meta at the time.

The PIR is the current best example of this phenomenon.

But I wouldn't worry, they're going to find a way to nerf the mean ol light mechs. This is after all, a community curated for crybabies.

[Bud Crue]

x Deathstrike x, on 25 July 2018 - 09:09 AM, said:

https://leaderboard....?u=KoalaBrownie
Average K/D 1.14
Average W/L 1.03

https://leaderboard....earch?u=VonBach
Average K/D 0.61
Average W/L 0.95

Both not T1 I would assume.

Stop by, see a thread, see stat pseudo-stat shaming, log in to first point out that the folks whose stats are being projected may very well be T1 (see my awful stats for comparison) and then second, to jump your sh!t about what a weak sauce thing that is to do...

...then I looked at the underlying posts that lead up to this point.

Nevermind.

[x Deathstrike x]

Bud Crue, on 25 July 2018 - 09:56 AM, said:

Stop by, see a thread, see stat pseudo-stat shaming, log in to first point out that the folks whose stats are being projected may very well be T1 (see my awful stats for comparison) and then second, to jump your sh!t about what a weak sauce thing that is to do...

...then I looked at the underlying posts that lead up to this point.

Nevermind.

Point taken. Forget about the Tier then.
Stats are still a good starting point for assessing somebodies credibility for understanding the game, if and I repeat IF that persons plays seriously and not just for fun

[Bud Crue]

x Deathstrike x, on 25 July 2018 - 10:15 AM, said:

Point taken. Forget about the Tier then.
Stats are still a good starting point for assessing somebodies credibility for understanding the game, if and I repeat IF that persons plays seriously and not just for fun

Dude!
I said “nevermind”.
You ruined the joke.