605 replies to this topic

[Ensaine]

Felbombling, on 08 August 2018 - 11:37 AM, said:

There were a bunch of posts made between when you two logged out last night and this morning. Are you going to go back and address any of them? Just curious.

I was wondering the same thing......some VERY good stuff here, and yet......

Chris Lowrey, on 08 August 2018 - 09:01 AM, said:

I can ask the Art team what our options are when it comes to that, but that would be entirely in their hands.

they reply to a post about a trail/colorization of NARC.......and nothing else, like, I dunno, the big topic of the state of the MM?

[r0b0tc0rpse]

Ensaine, on 08 August 2018 - 12:30 PM, said:

I was wondering the same thing......some VERY good stuff here, and yet......



they reply to a post about a trail/colorization of NARC.......and nothing else, like, I dunno, the big topic of the state of the MM?

Matchmaker seems to be ignored.

Machine guns are a problem. Equipment health is a problem. Not sure what to do to get their attention.

[Jman5]

Ensaine, on 08 August 2018 - 12:30 PM, said:

they reply to a post about a trail/colorization of NARC.......and nothing else, like, I dunno, the big topic of the state of the MM?

???

My suggestion he replied to had nothing to do with NARC. It was about Coolshot, which is a relevant topic for this discussion. Also what do you expect the art team to do about Matchmaker?

Edited by Jman5, 08 August 2018 - 12:41 PM.

[r0b0tc0rpse]

Jman5, on 08 August 2018 - 12:40 PM, said:

???

My suggestion he replied to had nothing to do with NARC. It was about Coolshot, which is a relevant topic for this discussion. Also what do you expect the art team to do about Matchmaker?

Stop. Rewind. He's saying that Chris and Paul are addressing requests for getting trails added to narc (I can see that slow **** coming at 20 FPS, but a trail would certainly let teammates see other people getting narc'd and from where, in the context of balance; who cares?), but are not addressing anyone's concerns about matchmaker.


Weapon tweaks are micro problems. Matchmaker is the macro problem that is driving players away from the game, and every minute spent talking about which laser should be linked with which and if this heat dissipation should be X or Y would be better spent on increasing match quality which more directly and with greater effect improve player experience and retention.

edit: I can't fathom why that word is censored.

Edited by r0b0tc0rpse, 08 August 2018 - 12:54 PM.

[Jman5]

r0b0tc0rpse, on 08 August 2018 - 12:49 PM, said:

Stop. Rewind. He's saying that Chris and Paul are addressing requests for getting trails added to narc (I can see that slow **** coming at 20 FPS, but a trail would certainly let teammates see other people getting narc'd and from where), but are not addressing anyone's concerns about matchmaker.


Weapon tweaks are micro problems. Matchmaker is the macro problem that is driving players away from the game, and every minute spent talking about which laser should be linked with which and if this heat dissipation should be X or Y would be better spent on increasing match quality which more directly and with greater effect improve player experience and retention.

edit: I can't fathom why that word is censored.

He's quoting Chris' reply to my suggestion which had to do with Coolshot not NARC trails.

Look, I would love it to see matchmaker addressed, but I think that is for another discussion.

[Chris Lowrey]

The quoted post was in reference to coolshots, not Narc trails. Here is the quoted text that I was responding to:

Jman5, on 08 August 2018 - 08:35 AM, said:

Speaking of Coolshot, you know one minor thing that I think would help players would be to beef up the visuals when a player drinks a coolshot. Currently it's a barely noticeable little splash that emerges from the back and bottom of the mech. Standing in front during a fierce duel you will almost never notice it.

I would like to see a much more obvious visual cue that the player has taken a coolshot because it allows opponents to make informed decisions and makes the gameplay deeper.

So for example, if I'm dueling some hot build with a cooler one, I will often press them knowing that they will hit heat cap and lose most of their DPS very shortly. However, if suddenly I see the coolshot effect bathing his mech, I can then decide to disengage or alter my strategy.

Perhaps this is something Paul or Chris could bring up with the art team.

Also, I would have nothing to do with any kind of match maker alterations, so that is something that I simply would not be able to respond to. Out of my wheelhouse. But Paul has already commented a few times in this thread on that subject.

[NUMBERZero1032]

Paul Inouye, on 08 August 2018 - 10:52 AM, said:

What we hope to gain:
- Is the heatcap/faster dissipation route something that is a feasible net gain for the laser vomit issue?

Wait wait wait wait nonononono, take a look at this first.

NUMBERZero1032, on 07 August 2018 - 05:48 PM, said:

Speaking of boogyman, check out these LRM boogymen that have been enabled
14.11 DPS: https://mech.nav-alp...#c779dffe_SNV-A
13.57 DPS https://mech.nav-alp...0bc30_HGN-IIC-B
13.04 DPS https://mech.nav-alp...63b396fc_KDK-SB (100% heat efficiency, no skill nodes required)
13.04 DPS https://mech.nav-alp...#9b8540d2_SNV-A (100% heat efficiency, no skill nodes required)
10.81 DPS https://mech.nav-alp...#d0ea6aaf_NCT-B
11.77 DPS https://mech.nav-alp...33332_ON1-IIC-A
12.18 DPS https://mech.nav-alp...#af304e6e_WHK-B
12.28 DPS https://mech.nav-alp...941c6_BAS-PRIME

If you increase the dissipation, these mechs here, which already get a crazy amount of DPS, are going to get an even higher DPS than before. With skills, that Supernova could probably get like 18 or more DPS. It's the dissipation on these mechs, not the cap.

That said, I think heat cap/dissipation test is a very good idea. But I just wanted to show you what else this could be affecting.

[Daurock]

NUMBERZero1032, on 08 August 2018 - 01:00 PM, said:

Wait wait wait wait nonononono, take a look at this first.


If you increase the dissipation, these mechs here, which already get a crazy amount of DPS, are going to get an even higher DPS than before. With skills, that Supernova could probably get like 18 or more DPS. It's the dissipation on these mechs, not the cap.

That said, I think heat cap/dissipation test is a very good idea. But I just wanted to show you what else this could be affecting.

I tend to agree with the sentiment - It won't take a lot more dissipation than found on live to be able to reasonably remove heat as a factor from many builds. Some builds that are now hot eventually, but not immediately, (UACs, RACs, SRMs, or some medium pulse builds, for example) could potentially become over-bearing with more heat dissipation, requiring a re-balance of them when compared to builds that TODAY create little heat concern. (Like std. AC5/10 builds.)

Edited by Daurock, 08 August 2018 - 01:16 PM.

[Xetelian]

Paul Inouye, on 08 August 2018 - 10:52 AM, said:

Just a heads up.

For next PTS:

- Full reset to what is on live servers right now.
- We will be looking at the effects of a locked heat cap and faster dissipation proposal from long ago.
- Spectrum of 'Mechs will be buffed in terms of agility/mobility and that list will be provided prior to PTS going up.

What we hope to gain:
- Is the heatcap/faster dissipation route something that is a feasible net gain for the laser vomit issue?
- The agility/mobility buffs to the selected 'Mechs, is it buffed enough/too much? While we'll be doing a small subset of the 'Mech line-up, we are going to be targeting the slowest performers and a few suggested by the community to set a standard to address the rest of the 'Mechs.

While LRMs are being covered in a few changes in August's patch, we will be investigating other items that the community has put on the table as well. This will be tested in a subsequent PTS after the above. We are not going to stock pile a bunch of changes into a single PTS as there are too many variables at play to have proper testing coverage.

Go back to before the desync, Put a 350 engine in an Atlas and use THAT as a baseline balance for assaults all the way down to heavies and lights.

Using the DWF as a baseline was absurd and it has totally crushed the brawling that mechs could previously do.

Want to curb laser vomit? Help us twist off the damage.
Want to raise TTK? Help us move out of bad situations faster with mobility accel/decel. As it stands if you step into the wrong spot you're toast because you cannot back out of it fast enough.




I asked Lowrey after the desync on a stream if he would be giving the 100 ton mechs agility and he said yes, then gave them like a 5% boost or less and that really made me mad.





Using a 350 engine atlas predesync as a baseline brings brawling back which can counter laser vomit better.



Using a DWF as a baseline for agility, a mech that was known as a glass cannon weapons platform, known for heavy weapon loadouts of all kinds while the rest of the 100 tonners that were given the same agility AREN'T the same kind of weapons platform that it is killed them.



All you needed to do was nerf the agility on the KDK 3 and maybe the TBR, everything else, including the spirit bear, didn't need to be nerfed in an attempt to balance one variant and one chassis.

Edited by Xetelian, 08 August 2018 - 01:37 PM.

[Jman5]

Daurock, on 08 August 2018 - 01:14 PM, said:

I tend to agree with the sentiment - It won't take a lot more dissipation than found on live to be able to reasonably remove heat as a factor from many builds. Some builds that are now hot eventually, but not immediately, (UACs, RACs, SRMs, or some medium pulse builds, for example) could potentially become over-bearing with more heat dissipation, requiring a re-balance of them when compared to builds that TODAY create little heat concern. (Like std. AC5/10 builds.)

Yeah this is what I'm worried about which is why I prefer the idea of something reasonable like a 50 heat capacity cap (base+internal HS), but then leave dissipation rate as is right now. I could certainly be wrong, but I think tinkering with just heat capacity is enough to bring down some of the excessive Alphastrikes without mucking with all the other balanced builds that aren't using 20-25 heatsinks.

Edited by Jman5, 08 August 2018 - 01:40 PM.

[Xetelian]

Jman5, on 08 August 2018 - 01:39 PM, said:

Yeah this is what I'm worried about which is why I prefer the idea of something reasonable like a 50 heat capacity cap (base+internal HS), but then leave dissipation rate as is right now. I could certainly be wrong, but I think tinkering with just heat capacity is enough to bring down some of the excessive Alphastrikes without mucking with all the other balanced builds that aren't using 20-25 heatsinks.

How can they lower heat cap without completely ruining laser vomit mechs entirely?

Fire_shutdown_startup_Fire is not a solution to the problem.


Take 2 damage off the HLL and decrease its duration/heat to compensate it
Take 1 damage off the ERML and decrease its duration/heat to compensate it

Don't nerf the rest of the lasers.


Lowering the heat cap is just like adding a ghost heat link between large and medium lasers.

[Chados]

I’ll tell you something else that will be a waste of tonnage and slots on patch day....

AMS.

Why bother? With the ECM buff there’s bound to be ECM cover on the average team, that’s how it was when ECM was where it was before the 90m range nerf. I can drop two tons of useless weight on a Jester for a TC2 instead. Thanks, Chris!

[Reno Blade]

First of all, thanks for this great opportunity for a direct discussion between the Community and PGI !


Clan laser nerfs in general:
Even if the community would say just to increase the IS armor, the clan vs clan (and is vs is) balance needs to also be considered, as the other builds are then always inferior to a clan laser vomit build, because the clan mechs don’t have the same defense as the IS mechs which got buffed to counter the laser vomit power.

As mentioned in the podcast, having low-dmg builds with massive defensive quirks fight each other can be much fun, but it would take very long, while the high dmg and low defense mechs die in few seconds, even if they are assaults (see agility topic below).
I think overall a small nerf to dmg and duration for clan lasers (and duration for IS lasers) would be a good start and the overall balance for boating lasers (or other weapons such as LRMs) come down to the heat systems (see below).

In general many people seem to focus too much on larges clan vs is alphas (e.g. Deathstrike vs Annihilator), but balance (Faction, Weapon, Mech Class) has to consider each combination:
slow vs fast vs light vs med vs high dmg vs low dmg vs agile vs boating vs dakka …



Negative quirks:
When you reverted the negative quirks on the Timberwolf, Direwolf and the Victor (I think), everyone was very happy. I’m not sure if anyone would even use a mech with negative quirks, because everyone just “more” power and many chassis are only used because of large quirks.
I think it might be something else if every mech had some kind of negative and positive quirks so you always have some sort of trade off.
Not sure here, but maybe if you could invest more points into skills by “sacrificing” other skills/quirks ...



Skill tree:
I can’t say much about time investment as I’m still sitting on historical GXP/SP.

I think a Skill tree with more points per branch would make the decision more meaningful. If you can buff the hell out of a single aspect (e.g. put 80 points into mobility, sensors if we have the InfoWarfare feature, or weapons) it could feel more like you really specialized rather than just “leveled” your mech.
Radar Deprivation vs Target Retention:
I think the Radar Dep countering the lock for 100% seems to be a mistake and should be more a feature for ECM or Stealth Armor.
Considering the InfoWar feature below would re-balance the whole issue for lighter vs heavier mech balancing for missiles with the dependencies of distance and mech for the target info and target lock.



LRM OP vs useless:
The LRMs, especially boated over 60, when not countered can be effective.
What makes the LRMs so annoying is the the combination of indirect fire, the shake and the amount coming down on you when the enemies have multiple boats and you just can’t escape fast enough (well, that’s true for most weapon systems).

An heavy/assault boat that fires on another heavy/assault has easy play if properly positioned/supported, even with a smaller lock reticule. Faster mechs that need to be more mobile and can’t keep the aim steady while running will have much more negative impact of the incoming lock “nerf”.
This might be opposite of what is wanted to be achieved with the upcoming change (presented by Chris before).


So could a “nerf” to spread/tracking be a solution?
If we nerf the effectiveness (e.g. spread, tracking), the weapons dmg/ton is going back down and the weapon will be seen as trash again.
So if the boating and dps can be reduced (e.g. longer cd and more GH) the chance to rush an LRM boat is increased and you also have more reason to use backup weapons (to prevent the rush).

This comes back to the topic of the heat system (to prevent large alphas) or just the base cooldown (as we already have missile cd quirks on medium mechs to counter low hardpoints/tonnage available).
Together with the InfoWar, the whole LRM gameplay would already be much different and more dependent on mech and skill than on boating capacity.



Agility of mechs vs weapon mechanics (e.g. beam durations, lrm streams and AC bursts):
I always thought that reducing the agility will make it harder to track fast targets (e.g. improve the life of lights fighting heavies).
The problem comes from the majority of fights which are between slower and larger mechs which are easier to hit (and to hit where you want) because the twist speed is slow and the movement speed is not enough to make it “difficult” to hit with your own slow-twisting assault with tons of weapons.

This means that assault vs assault (and heavies) has a much faster killing speed than fighting against light (or fast med).
This is also one of the bigger reasons why using a large engine to go faster is better than to use more weapons and armor – you can dodge damage better than you can absorb it, especially with large alphas firing at you.

Is a buff to twist speed the solution?
It would let slower mechs spread some of the damage by twisting, but the large alpha damage is still taken and the faster mechs would still have the bigger survivability when dodging some of the weapon damage (beam/projectiles).
So I think a nerf to dmg and dps overall will provide more benefits for assaults overall than an agility buff, if the dmg/dps reduction is affecting mostly the boats -> that’s why the overall heat and damage/dps values need to be “nerfed” somewhat (what PGI already tried and the community hated). If we can achieve it by reducing dmg/dps values or by using GH/ED or something heat/cd related…


This leads me to the important balance aspect of …


Heat scale vs Energy Draw vs higher dissipation:
A higher dissipation will make low heat dps dakka much more sustainable where you can get the risk that some dakka builds will never overheat, so they can use the max dps.
Increasing the heat on ballistics would be required, but this sounds counter-productive to the weapon type.

I would like to see either a higher base capacity, but with a slower dissipation, or an Energy Draw system (preferred) that has a heat-over-time effect to basically achieve the same if you fire too much in a short time.
This would require ALL builds (even low heat dps dakka) to stop dps-ing longer, even with more DHS.
Also the heat bar would not be as jumpy and flamers would be much more useful.

The advantage of an Energy Draw with HoT is that it offers a better trade for high alpha/dps over smaller alpha/dps with higher sustainability than the current GH or flat heat/dmg values.
We could have PPC+Gauss or even 6x PPC back, but you would “suffer” a heat-over-time effect (similar to the current GH spike, but over longer time) maybe over 10 seconds that basically neutralizes your dissipation without making you instantly shut down.

And with a larger maximum pool you could more easily divide the bar into % brackets for heat side effects such as slow down of your mech/torso/arms when over 70% heat.
The gameplay could have more maneuvering, tactic and strategic retreats rather than deathballs, because you have to get out of combat if you want to use a lot of weapons while smaller mechs with lower amount of weapons can continue to do skirmishes/brawling.


And lastly the second important part mentioned already partly above…


Information warfare:
This was dropped because of laser damage dependent on the targeting on PTS4 of the InfoWar, but it seems the core feature is a huge missed opportunity to make the game more interesting.

This treated ECM as a soft counter to lock speed instead of being on/off for LRM/Streak locks.
Together with the range and speed differences of light/med vs heavy/assault, the InfoWar PTS was one of the most important pillars missing from the Beta that we can easily implement without much risk (if we ignore the laser dmg part).
This alone would re-adjust all the missile based gameplay and allows for other tweaks to missiles.

Thanks

[Jman5]

Xetelian, on 08 August 2018 - 01:45 PM, said:

How can they lower heat cap without completely ruining laser vomit mechs entirely?

Fire_shutdown_startup_Fire is not a solution to the problem.


Take 2 damage off the HLL and decrease its duration/heat to compensate it
Take 1 damage off the ERML and decrease its duration/heat to compensate it

Don't nerf the rest of the lasers.


Lowering the heat cap is just like adding a ghost heat link between large and medium lasers.

The whole purpose of this PTS is to reduce alphastrike of these laserboats. By introducing a capacity cap, you encourage laserboats to run a smaller alphastrike. I don't think it will ruin laserboats, but I do think it will require them tone down their giga-alphastrikes.

Adding a heat capacity cap keeps damage numbers from getting too ridiculous. I think it's better than the approach where we play wack-a-mole with balance every month tweaking individual weapons.

Didn't we try both those changes you suggested in the last two PTS and everyone hated it?

[Chris Lowrey]

NUMBERZero1032, on 08 August 2018 - 01:00 PM, said:

If you increase the dissipation, these mechs here, which already get a crazy amount of DPS, are going to get an even higher DPS than before. With skills, that Supernova could probably get like 18 or more DPS. It's the dissipation on these mechs, not the cap.

That said, I think heat cap/dissipation test is a very good idea. But I just wanted to show you what else this could be affecting.

Yep. As I indicated in an earlier post, this is not something that just affects lasers, but will have repercussions across the weapon line including PPC's, MRM, SRM, and yes, LRM. We are moving forward with testing to observe all of this, and on my end, everything is going to be under the microscope with this test, not just lasers. So be sure to not just limit your feedback to this test to just lasers, but all the weapon types. We will be watching.

[Marmon Rzohr]

Thank you for the write-up.

I must however say that I'm very disappointed with the content of this post. This has not generally been the case over the years as Roadmaps and posts about balance from the staff have generally left me excited about future patches. I'm afraid this is not the case here and hasn't been for the past year.

This text does not inspire confidence in me as a customer no matter how hard I try. I think the whole general plan of balancing the game has not only proved a failure quite conclusively by now but has made this generally great game noticeably worse.

Quote

It has never been the intention of MWO online to have Time to Kill in a state where you can destroy a mech in only a handful of shots.

I think this best summarizes the issue with the current balance direction. How many shots would be a good time to kill ? 5 ? 10 ? 20 ? Defeating enemy players is what makes a PvP game satisfying and worth playing. If defeating just a single enemy pilot would take 3 minutes in a 1v1 engagement then the game would feel dull and tedious. Any semblance of outplaying or besting the enemy would be lost in the grind of overlong combat. In the lore and feel central to MechWarrior pilots are the elite of the elite, not a couple of brutes who whack each other with ineffectual weapons again and again until one eventually grinds out a victory. Combat should be tense and exciting, not slow and tedious.

And this is coming from a player who welcomed the uniform increase in HP that came with the Skill Tree and lower cooldowns, as well as armor and structure quirks that are central to durable brawling mechs.

I implore you.

Think of what makes the game visceral and satisfying. Save the colorful variety of playstyles we used to have. Removing quirks which make ancient and unwieldy BattleTech designs useful and fun for the first time in the history of the franchise and making weapons ineffectual and slow is NOT playing into the strengths of this truly very unique and special game you've made.

Clan laser vomit needs a slight nerf and many other playstyles need buffs. We want mechs to feel like machines of the future not like big, overloaded trucks with small engines. We are fans through and though. Consider the community's balance documents. Put them in a PTS. Let us try them out for size. Don't ignore us like so many game developers do.

Quote

94 efficient alpha

Finally I'd like to address this. The Dire Wolf Gauss Vomit build popularly nicknamed the Space Whale has been in the game since the Clans were introduced. It has only been situationally good for only a short period of time post the Jump Jet nerfs. It is not efficient. It's bad. There is a reason this build is not used in competitive play OR by the best ranking solo Q pilots. One can make a 4xMRM40 Annihilator with 160 alpha damage a 2xMRM40, 2xMRM30 Annihilator with 140 alpha damage (Thanks to r0b0tc0rpse for the correction). And it can fire all of this without shutting down. That doesn't mean it's good.

Edited by Marmon Rzohr, 09 August 2018 - 03:27 AM.

[Imperius]

Paul Inouye, on 08 August 2018 - 10:52 AM, said:

Just a heads up.

For next PTS:

- Full reset to what is on live servers right now.
- We will be looking at the effects of a locked heat cap and faster dissipation proposal from long ago.
- Spectrum of 'Mechs will be buffed in terms of agility/mobility and that list will be provided prior to PTS going up.

What we hope to gain:
- Is the heatcap/faster dissipation route something that is a feasible net gain for the laser vomit issue?
- The agility/mobility buffs to the selected 'Mechs, is it buffed enough/too much? While we'll be doing a small subset of the 'Mech line-up, we are going to be targeting the slowest performers and a few suggested by the community to set a standard to address the rest of the 'Mechs.

While LRMs are being covered in a few changes in August's patch, we will be investigating other items that the community has put on the table as well. This will be tested in a subsequent PTS after the above. We are not going to stock pile a bunch of changes into a single PTS as there are too many variables at play to have proper testing coverage.

So basically I will alpha and my 2x ER-PPC 2xGauss sniper will kill itself instead of shutting down. Guess I’ll wait for the next one.

The MK II will be excluded from the torso twist / agility buffs. Speculation I know but I’m rarely far from the mark on my observations. It was nice ammo per ton got looked at though I haven’t checked any of the changes in a long time.

8v8 was dismissed so that pretty much ruined chances of me returning.

I have many years of feedback on here, twitter, and Reddit. At this point though it’s just hard to be constructive about it at this point. I’m just cynical now.

Since seasons came out I’ve played only 400 games.

[r0b0tc0rpse]

Chris Lowrey, on 08 August 2018 - 12:58 PM, said:

The quoted post was in reference to coolshots, not Narc trails. Here is the quoted text that I was responding to:



Also, I would have nothing to do with any kind of match maker alterations, so that is something that I simply would not be able to respond to. Out of my wheelhouse. But Paul has already commented a few times in this thread on that subject.

I play on the lowest graphics settings, I didn't know there was a visual queue to a cool shot, I just see it on thermal. Anyway, that's not really a factor here. Matchmaker is. Why can't we get a word on it?

Marmon Rzohr, on 08 August 2018 - 02:14 PM, said:

Thank you for the write-up.

I must however say that I'm very disappointed with the content of this post. This has not generally been the case over the years as Roadmaps and posts about balance from the staff have generally left me excited about future patches. I'm afraid this is not the case here and hasn't been for the past year.

This text does not inspire confidence in me as a customer no matter how hard I try. I think the whole general plan of balancing the game has not only proved a failure quite conclusively by now but has made this generally great game noticeably worse.



I think this best summarizes the issue with the current balance direction. How many shots would be a good time to kill ? 5 ? 10 ? 20 ? Defeating enemy players is what makes a PvP game satisfying and worth playing. If defeating just a single enemy pilot would take 3 minutes in a 1v1 engagement then the game would feel dull and tedious. Any semblance of outplaying or besting the enemy would be lost in the grind of overlong combat. In the lore and feel central to MechWarrior pilots are the elite of the elite, not a couple of brutes who whack each other with ineffectual weapons again and again until one eventually grinds out a victory. Combat should be tense and exciting, not slow and tedious.

And this is coming from a player who welcomed the uniform increase in HP that came with the Skill Tree and lower cooldowns, as well as armor and structure quirks that are central to durable brawling mechs.

I implore you.

Think of what makes the game visceral and satisfying. Save the colorful variety of playstyles we used to have. Removing quirks which make ancient and unwieldy BattleTech designs useful and fun for the first time in the history of the franchise and making weapons ineffectual and slow is NOT playing into the strengths of this truly very unique and special game you've made.

Clan laser vomit needs a slight nerf and many other playstyles need buffs. We want mechs to feel like machines of the future not like big, overloaded trucks with small engines. We are fans through and though. Consider the community's balance documents. Put them in a PTS. Let us try them out for size. Don't ignore us like so many game developers do.



Finally I'd like to address this. The Dire Wolf Gauss Vomit build popularly nicknamed the Space Whale has been in the game since the Clans were introduced. It has only been situationally good for only a short period of time post the Jump Jet nerfs. It is not efficient. It's bad. There is a reason this build is not used in competitive play OR by the best ranking solo Q pilots. One can make a 4xMRM40 Annihilator with 160 alpha damage. And it can fire all of this without shutting down. That doesn't mean it's good.

You cannot, in fact, make quad MRM40 ANH MB, they are 7 slots.all missile hardpoints in the side torsos.

[The6thMessenger]

Chris Lowrey, on 08 August 2018 - 02:08 PM, said:

Yep. As I indicated in an earlier post, this is not something that just affects lasers, but will have repercussions across the weapon line including PPC's, MRM, SRM, and yes, LRM. We are moving forward with testing to observe all of this, and on my end, everything is going to be under the microscope with this test, not just lasers. So be sure to not just limit your feedback to this test to just lasers, but all the weapon types. We will be watching.

Please stop nerfing LRMs any further. Change it's role: make TAG and NARC mandatory for Indirect-Fire, and make it more valuable Direct-Fire accordingly. I can assure you (for whatever it's worth), that this will actually make the LRMs for much of the people who actually look down upon it.

[Imperius]

The6thMessenger, on 08 August 2018 - 02:29 PM, said:

Please stop nerfing LRMs any further. Change it's role: make TAG and NARC mandatory for Indirect-Fire, and make it more valuable Direct-Fire accordingly. I can assure you (for whatever it's worth), that this will actually make the LRMs for much of the people who actually look down upon it.

Except the Tier 5’s who can’t aim consistently to use NARC and TAG. Before you say teammates the majority of complaints about LRM’s seemed to come from solo players.

I still wouldn’t touch LRM’s with any mech.