43 replies to this topic

[Vellron2005]

The Mysterious Fox, on 08 August 2018 - 02:04 AM, said:

what, we've been clearing entire waves with lrms these few days during the event

You're not wrong!

Only yesterday, I had a match that was the best possible showcase of what LRMs are and how they should be used..

Was attacking on Sulfurous rift, and immediately after drop, since I know I brough LRM boats and how to use them, I say "let's push alpha gate". Naturally, the team doesn't listen, and 2 lances decide to push middle, beta gate. Shockingly, it works like a charm..

We bring both gates down, and while the enemy is busy engaging the brawlers at beta, we clear the meager opposition on alpha, and proceed to rain heavy fire on the beta defenders and turrets. First wave ends with 1 gen down, and 2 half way, and 9:12 on the score board.

Second wave, we repeat, but two lances push gamma gate. We clear a king crab and annihilator that foolishly pushed out alpha, and proceed to do even better carnage. We smash them to 30:15, and all gens down.

Third and fourth waves we mop up, to a resounding 48:20 something win.

Had 5 kills, 5KMDDs, 2 Solos, and cca 2500 damage. Pretty descent.

The point of me pointing this out is that while the enemy was busy handling 2 lances on other gates, a LRM lance on Alpha rained with impunity and devastated the enemy, crushing them completely. They did at some points try to push us and defend themselves, but we countered that, and showed them why LRMs are great.

[Sedmeister]

Vellron2005, on 08 August 2018 - 02:27 AM, said:

You're not wrong!

Only yesterday, I had a match that was the best possible showcase of what LRMs are and how they should be used..

Was attacking on Sulfurous rift, and immediately after drop, since I know I brough LRM boats and how to use them, I say "let's push alpha gate". Naturally, the team doesn't listen, and 2 lances decide to push middle, beta gate. Shockingly, it works like a charm..

We bring both gates down, and while the enemy is busy engaging the brawlers at beta, we clear the meager opposition on alpha, and proceed to rain heavy fire on the beta defenders and turrets. First wave ends with 1 gen down, and 2 half way, and 9:12 on the score board.

Second wave, we repeat, but two lances push gamma gate. We clear a king crab and annihilator that foolishly pushed out alpha, and proceed to do even better carnage. We smash them to 30:15, and all gens down.

Third and fourth waves we mop up, to a resounding 48:20 something win.

Had 5 kills, 5KMDDs, 2 Solos, and cca 2500 damage. Pretty descent.

The point of me pointing this out is that while the enemy was busy handling 2 lances on other gates, a LRM lance on Alpha rained with impunity and devastated the enemy, crushing them completely. They did at some points try to push us and defend themselves, but we countered that, and showed them why LRMs are great.

Oh dear.

[Savage Wolf]

Sedmeister, on 08 August 2018 - 01:50 AM, said:

Like I said, I don't appreciate being forced to buy other things instead of just the stuff I want. Like it was in the days of modules. You wanna buy a hill climb module and waste a slot on it? Knock yourself out! Don't force me to buy one before I can get radar dep. It's a cynical move. Simple.

You are not forced to buy other things any more than you were forced to unlock the module before.

It's exactly the same.

You want Radar Derp? Here's the price. Once it was a module and a module slot, now it's a number of skill points.
The price has changed but the concept is exactly the same.

And you don't seem to be complaining that radar derp is now not worth the price, just... I'm not really sure what the problem is.

[Sedmeister]

Savage Wolf, on 08 August 2018 - 03:28 AM, said:

You are not forced to buy other things any more than you were forced to unlock the module before.

It's exactly the same.

You want Radar Derp? Here's the price. Once it was a module and a module slot, now it's a number of skill points.
The price has changed but the concept is exactly the same.

And you don't seem to be complaining that radar derp is now not worth the price, just... I'm not really sure what the problem is.

It's really quite simple.

Pre skill tree... Spend cbills, expend slot.
Post skill tree... To get full radar dep you need...
4 x Target info gathering nodes
5 x sensor range nodes &
2 x Target decay nodes

Radar dep alone = 5 points
Radar dep whilst being forced to buy stuff you don't want to get to the radar dep nodes = 16 points.

[Savage Wolf]

Sedmeister, on 08 August 2018 - 03:45 AM, said:

It's really quite simple.

Pre skill tree... Spend cbills, expend slot.
Post skill tree... To get full radar dep you need...
4 x Target info gathering nodes
5 x sensor range nodes &
2 x Target decay nodes

Radar dep alone = 5 points
Radar dep whilst being forced to buy stuff you don't want to get to the radar dep nodes = 16 points.

So yes, Radar Derp costs 16 points. As you mention it, quite simple. So is Radar Derp worth 16 of your 91 skill points? Before it was, was Radar Derp worth 1 of your module slots.

The currency has changed, but the concept is the same.

Edited by Savage Wolf, 08 August 2018 - 04:00 AM.

[Athom83]

Savage Wolf, on 08 August 2018 - 12:51 AM, said:

How would that not be a drastic improvement in build diversity over the current situation where builds that are only good on a few maps are never used while the few that are always decent are the only ones being seen. PGI could even make new maps catering to other specific types of builds so we would see them as well.
How would this not be really awesome?

For one; while there might be a different set of meta builds per map, the problem is that you'll only be seeing said builds on those maps. In a general PUG match where you can pick a mech after the map is selected. How many brawlers do you expect each team to pick on Frozen City, Polar HIghlands, Alpine Peaks, etc? How many ranged support mechs do you expect on Solaris City, Crimson Straights, HPG, etc? When people can pick or chose what they fight in given a selected map/condition, usually META (Most Efficient Tactic Available) starts poking out more and more when compared to when there's an uncertainty or randomness to the conditions you'd be fighting in.

[Sedmeister]

Savage Wolf, on 08 August 2018 - 03:59 AM, said:

So yes, Radar Derp costs 16 points. As you mention it, quite simple. So is Radar Derp worth 16 of your 91 skill points? Before it was, was Radar Derp worth 1 of your module slots.

The currency has changed, but the concept is the same.

This is my last attempt at explaining this to you.

"Hi, I'd like to buy the apple please."
Grocery puts an apple, a banana, an orange and a grapefruit on the counter and says "that will be $16 please".
I say, "Um, I'd just like the apple which costs $5 thanks."
Grocer says "You can't have the apple unless you buy the banana, orange and grapefruit as well."
I say "Even if I don't want and am not going to eat the other fruit? Even if I just want the apple?"
Grocery "That is correct."
Me "So I have to pay for all the fruit I don't want, to buy the one I do?"
Grocer "Yes."

Are we there yet?

PS - As I said, this will be my last post on this subject as I cannot think about how to make this point any clearer...

[Savage Wolf]

Athom83, on 08 August 2018 - 04:27 AM, said:

For one; while there might be a different set of meta builds per map, the problem is that you'll only be seeing said builds on those maps. In a general PUG match where you can pick a mech after the map is selected. How many brawlers do you expect each team to pick on Frozen City, Polar HIghlands, Alpine Peaks, etc? How many ranged support mechs do you expect on Solaris City, Crimson Straights, HPG, etc? When people can pick or chose what they fight in given a selected map/condition, usually META (Most Efficient Tactic Available) starts poking out more and more when compared to when there's an uncertainty or randomness to the conditions you'd be fighting in.

Yes.

How is this not much much better than what we have now?
There will always be a meta and that limits what people bring. Right now there is only the meta of what works everywhere. Now as you said there would be a meta per map, instead of one overall.
So then there would be more metas where mechs could potentially show up in, especially the very marginal ones that would ever only work on one map. Before, would never see it, now you actually will. It will always be on that map, but who cares? You actually see it!

I seriously don't see the disadvantage to this. All you mention also apply now, but as if there was only one map.

[Savage Wolf]

Sedmeister, on 08 August 2018 - 04:33 AM, said:

This is my last attempt at explaining this to you.

"Hi, I'd like to buy the apple please."
Grocery puts an apple, a banana, an orange and a grapefruit on the counter and says "that will be $16 please".
I say, "Um, I'd just like the apple which costs $5 thanks."
Grocer says "You can't have the apple unless you buy the banana, orange and grapefruit as well."
I say "Even if I don't want and am not going to eat the other fruit? Even if I just want the apple?"
Grocery "That is correct."
Me "So I have to pay for all the fruit I don't want, to buy the one I do?"
Grocer "Yes."

Are we there yet?

PS - As I said, this will be my last post on this subject as I cannot think about how to make this point any clearer...

Let me fix that:

"Hi, I'd like to buy the apple please."
Grocery "The cheapest available package that includes a whole apple is 16$"
"Alright"

Or the bothersome customer...

"Hi, I'd like to buy the apple please."
Grocery "The cheapest available package that includes a whole apple is 16$"
"But I only want the apple"
Grocery "It's the apple that is worth the 16$ so even without the free stuff, it will still be 16$"
"But I only want to pay 5$"
Grocery "Then you cannot afford apples."

Are we there yet?

Edited by Savage Wolf, 08 August 2018 - 04:58 AM.

[Athom83]

Savage Wolf, on 08 August 2018 - 04:50 AM, said:

Yes. How is this not much much better than what we have now?

Because it leads to stale gameplay where everyone is in the same thing.

Savage Wolf, on 08 August 2018 - 04:50 AM, said:

There will always be a meta and that limits what people bring. Right now there is only the meta of what works everywhere. Now as you said there would be a meta per map, instead of one overall. I seriously don't see the disadvantage to this. All you mention also apply now, but as if there was only one map.

Except there isn't. You see ranged support, brawlers, pokers, skirmishers, midrange assault, et cetera in varying mixes every match. You rarely see the same composition between matches. In a system where you can pick and chose your mech after a map, you only see mechs and builds specifically tailored to said map. You see this already in FW, and its one of the reasons the mode gets tedious and stale pretty quickly. Why bring a pushing assault mech into Polar when everyone on your and the enemy team will be LRMs or gauss/PPC where you'd be picked apart long before you got into range and noone actualy following you up with a push? Right now, Brawling actually works to an extent on Polar, because of the mix of builds that aren't tailored to the map. But when people can pick and chose after the fact, it vastly impacts the power balance.

Plus, this is all besides the second point; This just pushes the gap between new players and the experienced even more. New players aren't going to have the large hangars of mechs to be able to have a mech for each map mode combination. In those situations, they are a lot of the time going to be in 'nonoptimal' builds while the more experienced are going to be in mechs tailored to the maps. And before you bring up "but this is already a thing" argument, yes it is already a thing. However, this thing would get far worse when you can pick and chose mechs per map.

[Prototelis]

Khobai, on 07 August 2018 - 07:01 PM, said:

the only problem with that

The problem with that is the people up front are at a numbers disadvantage because there are 1 or 2 assaults hiding in a ditch behind their team.

The IDF mechanic encourages people to sand bag their team because there is little to no difference in dps between idf and Dr.

Why move up and take shots if you can get better numbers hiding in a ditch?

[Savage Wolf]

Athom83, on 08 August 2018 - 05:30 AM, said:

Because it leads to stale gameplay where everyone is in the same thing.

Haha, it cannot lead to something we already have. And you already said that people would bring different mechs for different maps, meaning they wont bring the same.

Athom83, on 08 August 2018 - 05:30 AM, said:

Except there isn't. You see ranged support, brawlers, pokers, skirmishers, midrange assault, et cetera in varying mixes every match. You rarely see the same composition between matches. In a system where you can pick and chose your mech after a map, you only see mechs and builds specifically tailored to said map. You see this already in FW, and its one of the reasons the mode gets tedious and stale pretty quickly. Why bring a pushing assault mech into Polar when everyone on your and the enemy team will be LRMs or gauss/PPC where you'd be picked apart long before you got into range and noone actualy following you up with a push? Right now, Brawling actually works to an extent on Polar, because of the mix of builds that aren't tailored to the map. But when people can pick and chose after the fact, it vastly impacts the power balance.

Yes and now there will whole new roles to fill. Roles that only exist on certain maps, but were never filled before because you never knew if you would get that map.
And all the other roles have already proven their worth across all maps so they will remain viable. And if a mixed teams works in the current meta, it will also work on map metas (unless PGI makes a really bad map, but that is the fault of the map).
And no, brawlers are already inferior on Polar. This will not change anything except your chance not to bring it there. And the fact that you will get your chance once the map is Solaris City. So brawlers are still good.

Athom83, on 08 August 2018 - 05:30 AM, said:

Plus, this is all besides the second point; This just pushes the gap between new players and the experienced even more. New players aren't going to have the large hangars of mechs to be able to have a mech for each map mode combination. In those situations, they are a lot of the time going to be in 'nonoptimal' builds while the more experienced are going to be in mechs tailored to the maps. And before you bring up "but this is already a thing" argument, yes it is already a thing. However, this thing would get far worse when you can pick and chose mechs per map.

There is some point to this, but then again they should be in a tier where others have the same issue (if PSR actually worked). And also, just go laser vomit, it works well on all maps.

And it's not like there shouldn't still be weapon balancing, but now niche weapons can actually have their niche and not constantly be sidetracked by weapons that are general purpose. Without knowing maps in advance, niche weapons will always be garbage. With knowing our maps, we can finally bring all builds in play and then balance them accordingly.

[Sedmeister]

Savage Wolf, on 08 August 2018 - 04:58 AM, said:

Let me fix that:

"Hi, I'd like to buy the apple please."
Grocery "The cheapest available package that includes a whole apple is 16$"
"Alright"

Or the bothersome customer...

"Hi, I'd like to buy the apple please."
Grocery "The cheapest available package that includes a whole apple is 16$"
"But I only want the apple"
Grocery "It's the apple that is worth the 16$ so even without the free stuff, it will still be 16$"
"But I only want to pay 5$"
Grocery "Then you cannot afford apples."

Are we there yet?

You call that fixed?

Wow. I didn't realise that the Danish shopping experience was so Soviet.

I really hope that in real life you are either...

1) Really rich and can afford to buy all the things you do not need but are told you must buy before you can purchase the thing you went to the store for or...
2) Someone else does your shopping for you.

Please don't try to fix anything else for me in the future. I like my shopping experience here in Australia...

Edited by Sedmeister, 08 August 2018 - 01:59 PM.

[Mystere]

Prototelis, on 08 August 2018 - 05:39 AM, said:

The problem with that is the people up front are at a numbers disadvantage because there are 1 or 2 assaults hiding in a ditch behind their team.

The IDF mechanic encourages people to sand bag their team because there is little to no difference in dps between idf and Dr.

Why move up and take shots if you can get better numbers hiding in a ditch?

And yet the so-called "snipers" engaging in the peeker-poker play style do the same thing but do not receive the same vitriol from others that LURMers get.

Edited by Mystere, 08 August 2018 - 11:41 AM.

[Khobai]

Mystere, on 08 August 2018 - 11:40 AM, said:

And yet the so-called "snipers" engaging in the peeker-poker play style do the same thing but do not receive the same vitriol from others that LURMers get.

to be fair, snipers do entirely lethal PPFLD. they dont spray missiles all over the place that do mostly non-lethal damage.

hiding in the back with a x4 CERPPC warhawk is not really the same thing as hiding in the back with a x4 LRM15 warhawk. Assuming youre halfway decent with CERPPCs at least.

also the CERPPC warhawk still needs LoS and cant indirect fire. so it will attract some attention from the enemy and share armor more than an indirect LRM boat will.

Edited by Khobai, 08 August 2018 - 12:35 PM.

[Eisenhorne]

Athom83, on 08 August 2018 - 05:30 AM, said:

Except there isn't. You see ranged support, brawlers, pokers, skirmishers, midrange assault, et cetera in varying mixes every match. You rarely see the same composition between matches. In a system where you can pick and chose your mech after a map, you only see mechs and builds specifically tailored to said map. You see this already in FW, and its one of the reasons the mode gets tedious and stale pretty quickly. Why bring a pushing assault mech into Polar when everyone on your and the enemy team will be LRMs or gauss/PPC where you'd be picked apart long before you got into range and noone actualy following you up with a push? Right now, Brawling actually works to an extent on Polar, because of the mix of builds that aren't tailored to the map. But when people can pick and chose after the fact, it vastly impacts the power balance.

Right, you see a mix of all different types now... and your team wins if you happen to randomly have the most correct types (or the most "meta" all rounder builds). It's stupid. If you play Solaris City, and you randomly have 2 LRM assaults on your team, you are almost certainly going to lose. You get the opposite result on Polar Highlands. It's stupid, and impossible to balance, because it's random chance that determines if your team is well suited to the map. This is the core reason that I hate quick play. You either take a "meta" build that works at least decently well in all situations (a mid ranged trader), or you roll the dice on if you will be useful or not with a specialized build. The team with the most mechs that actually make sense for a map wins. Lame.

Khobai, on 08 August 2018 - 12:25 PM, said:

to be fair, snipers do entirely lethal PPFLD. they dont spray missiles all over the place that do mostly non-lethal damage.

hiding in the back with a x4 CERPPC warhawk is not really the same thing as hiding in the back with a x4 LRM15 warhawk. Assuming youre halfway decent with CERPPCs at least.

also the CERPPC warhawk still needs LoS and cant indirect fire. so it will attract some attention from the enemy and share armor more than an indirect LRM boat will.

It will actually share armor MORE effectively than a front line mech, since it will draw fire from weapons outside their optimal range frequently, so it takes less damage than a frontline mech would, so the enemy spends more heat / ammo for less damage.

Edited by Eisenhorne, 08 August 2018 - 12:50 PM.

[Prototelis]

Mystere, on 08 August 2018 - 11:40 AM, said:

And yet the so-called "snipers" engaging in the peeker-poker play style do the same thing but do not receive the same vitriol from others that LURMers get.

Hate those dudes too.

[Kroete]

Prototelis, on 08 August 2018 - 05:39 AM, said:

The problem with that is the people up front are at a numbers disadvantage because there are 1 or 2 assaults hiding in a ditch behind their team.

The IDF mechanic encourages people to sand bag their team because there is little to no difference in dps between idf and Dr.

Why move up and take shots if you can get better numbers hiding in a ditch?

14/17 dps over minutes,
maybe the phirana can do the same dps over the same time,
but most builds cant do that over that time, they will overheat when i still can fire.

PGIs changes for lrms encourages this with the arc/artemis nerf, i cant bend lrms at 250m anymore.
If i launch a uav i cant hit them anymore because no bending.

Edited by Kroete, 09 August 2018 - 01:29 AM.

[Mystere]

Savage Wolf, on 08 August 2018 - 04:58 AM, said:

Or the bothersome customer...

"Hi, I'd like to buy the apple please."
Grocery "The cheapest available package that includes a whole apple is 16$"
"But I only want the apple"
Grocery "It's the apple that is worth the 16$ so even without the free stuff, it will still be 16$"
"But I only want to pay 5$"
Grocery "Then you cannot afford apples."

Are we there yet?

Any grocer who does that will not last long in the business.

[Lykaon]

Sedmeister, on 07 August 2018 - 02:44 PM, said:

Almost finished listening to the lastest NGNG podcast. Was listening to discussion by devs on the state of LRM's.

I agree with all that was said but with two significant reservations.

First, I don't mind where LRM's are at, EXCEPT for the fact that I need to buy several nodes of stuff that is irrelevant to me in order to get full radar dep. So I am happy for PGI to leave LRM's where they are or even buff them further, as long as I get some kind of discount on the nodes I am forced to purchase in order to get full radar dep.

Secondly, I am more than happy with the state of LRM's, WHEN IT COMES TO FP! In FP, we get to see the map before we drop, and we have several minutes give or take to discuss strategy and how we may counter LRM heavy opposition.

The utter frustration is in QP. You see Polar as an option and already you are freaking out because the more experienced players as a rule don't bring LRM's or EMC (Why waste a ton and a half on AMS and ammo when you can find a perfectly good building or hill to stand next to for a few seconds?) and are anxiously hoping that Polar doesn't win. Drop with a brawler on Polar and I TOTALLY understand why people suicide these days (I don't for the record, I just treat it like an horrific cross between an episode of Minecraft crossed with BF1).

So I don't mind the current state of LRM's if PGI made it possible for me to choose which mech I bring to QP after the map has been selected a la FP.

End rant.

So what if you have to buy up some nodes you don't need or want. That isn't nearly as much of a burden as the cost to LRM users.

You will need to boat the crap out of launchers to penetrate AMS when it is in use. So there is a dedication to what amounts to a one trick pony build or using high mass chassis like assault mechs.

You will want Artemis at a cost of 1 ton per launcher.

You will need a TAG at a cost of 1 energy hardpoint and a ton

You will want an Active Probe to help reduce the impact of ECM counter measures.

And you will want several sensor nodes that no other build type cares about but an LRM user must have to have a hope in hades of being effective.

And then after all the "taxes" are paid an LRM carrier has maps to contend with. There are significantly more unfavorable maps to favorable ones. For ever match the Lurmer gets to play on Polar they had to play 3 x that on maps like mining collective and HPG.

And when all is said and done you don't "need" to buy any radar deprivation at all. even on Polar Highlands you can as a team over run an LRM heavy team. The advantage LRMs possess on polar is only good as long as you can keep the enemy away from you. In close quarters the LRM mechs are nigh unto defenseless and bearly capable of inflicting damage at all.


I primaraly pilot heavy I.S. brawlers these days (MRM Archer tempest or Roughnecks) I do not freak out when I see polar highlands (in particular when I'm in my Tempest it's got ECM and AMS) none of the roughnecks mount AMS and obviously no ECM. But, I know how to utilize defilade to close in on LRM heavy teams and frequently I make it my mission to destroy or supress LRM mechs on Polar because I know so many other players "freak out" on polar when they see some LRMs flying around.