12 replies to this topic

[MechTech Dragoon]

I'm going to come at this a bit from a "add/remove mechanics" standpoint, rather than straight nerfing numbers. Despite requiring more resources for something like this...you are likely to get less community backlash than from number nerfing. So, lets get into it.

Add a "toggle fire mode" button into the game, controlled via scroll wheel selecting weapon group, middle mouse click changing firing mode for weapons in the group. Below is a change list.

Switching firing modes will trigger the cooldown period of a weapon, this also gives the game time to cause the weapon to switch to another state.

Atms- 3 firing modes, first being 1damage/missile, at the max range currently, 120m minimum.
second being 2damage/missile, 700m range, 90m minimum.
Third being the all terrifying 3damage/missile, 320m range, no minimum.
Switching firing modes is in order. This would require people using atms to be, well, tactical, with their positiong since going from the max range to the closest range requires 2 reload times.

Lrms-2 firing modes, one indirect, one direct fire stream. Change IS lrms to stream fire, but closer between missile launches to clan lrms. Reason for this is the stability mechanic below. Increase indirect missile "lob" and increase spread when in indirect fire mode. Decrease lrm minimum range on both sides, decreased more on direct fire mode.

Srms-Change to stream fire for all launchers, longer fire time for clan srms, reduce spread overall significantly.

Streak srms- Change to stream fire for all launchers, longer fire time between missiles than regular srms, remove cooldown disadvantage for clan streaks.

LBX autocannons-2 firing modes, 1 slug, one spread. Slug does not benefit from increased crit damage.

IS Standard/Hvy/Light PPC-2 firing modes, second firing mode causes damage equal to 1/4 of total damage to installed component of user and removes minimum range.

Regular/ultra autocannons-Change is autocannons to burst fire like clan, increase clan number of projectiles, reduce projectile scale and screen shake, increase velocity.

Rotary autocannons-Increase projectile number, reduce screen shake/projectile size, increase velocity.
(autocannon changes are due to stability mechanic below)

Heavy lasers-Drastically reduce beam times to IS-like levels, widen beams to cause splash, converting heavy lasers to brawling lasers (as they should be)

Heavy gauss-Increase projectile size slightly to reduce headshots, hvy gauss headshots are a bit of a problem.
(Cause stability increase during charge and after firing)

Replace consumables with corresponding equipment. (Arti beacon launchers being similar to narc and taking a pre-included 2 shots, cannot add additional ammo, same weight/slots/tonnage as narc, massive cooldown time. Uav launchers, again, same weight/slots/tonnage as narc, pre included 4 shots, fires directly up before expanding into uav. )
https://mwomercs.com...90#entry6133290 <Suggestion for coolshot replacement.

Energy weapons-Instead of a nerf to energy weapons, remove ghost heat values, instead add a per-click firing limit where needed, similar to gauss. People will still be able to spam lasers, but in a chain-fire spam fashion since lasers dont have a hold down charge time, but it will increase the time between laser shots, instead of having a "shoot it all and die" type of deal. Assuming it takes you say 0.05 of a second or less between clicks, after ten laser shots you've lost a half second of dps overall, and spread the beams out more, but only slightly. This would also be less confusing than ghost heat, and reduce laser poking slightly.

Reduce overall beam duration for lasers significantly, add a pre fire(different on a per/weapon basis, smaller for pulse, longer for ER) charge up time that goes automatically when the weapon begins firing. (not a hold down charge like gauss, weapon just charges and then fires after the click). Along with this, add a "pre fire glow" to all energy weapons on their corresponding hardpoint locations, matching energy weapon color.
And improve....combat...fidelity...people need to know what type of ppc/laser is hitting them, suggesting making all weapons of a certain class on a per-faction basis uniform.
Ex being, IS standard lasers are red, clan er's are orange, IS er's are blue. Laser width changes dependent on laser size, so telling between different laser sizes is relatively easy.

The reason for this is multifold, With an increase in fidelity, pre-fire glow and a pre-fire charge time, people facing energy boats will have time to react and twist to incoming laser/ppc fire, know exactly what is hitting them and laser fire will also come in very slightly staggered due to the firing at a time number limit.
This will effect lights/mediums less, given that pulse lasers and small lasers overall would have a very small pre fire charge time, and even shorter beam duration's than before.



Add stability into the game. This could be done through a stability bar, (in the spot where the consumables bar used to be) which goes up when losing components, and being hit by missiles/ballistic weapons and when firing ballistic weapons. A "add point" system to the bar similar to heat, as the bar goes up, your reticule starts to shake, the bar goes down at a set rate/second dependent on your weight class and actuators(more actuators, more stability bar reduction). Cause heat values above a 70% threshold to attribute to the stability bar at a rate/second until heat levels are below the set threshold.

With this change, and the above changes, as well as the smaller lock on window, you can effectively remove ghost heat, Since laser weapons are now staggered and have a firing indicator, enabling reaction time to incoming fire, and lasers are extremely inaccurate when reticule shake is involved.

Ballistic weapons will now cause, and contribute, to your stability,(this means mgs too) as well as having more shots/fire on both is and clan side, spreading out damage, while also increasing your chances of landing shots on enemies while stability bar is high.

Due to reticule shake and lock window decrease, locks will be harder to maintain when under fire or high in heat, indirect fire will also spread more.

With the stability bar, remove or reduce the screenshake on jumpets however cause them to contribute to the stability bar at a high rate while in use instead, improving fighting while jumping. Drastically nerf initial thrust, buff thrust speed and burn time.
Heavily reduce leg damage when falling.


Mwo's crit system is REALLY cool, and very robust, however, it doesn't see much action due to large amounts of pinpoint fire and low structure values.
With the above changes, increase overall structure values by a decent amount. Reason for this is going to be the increase in projectiles being fired via autocannons, (more crit chances) and to increase peoples willingness to fight when armor is open, currently when armor gets opened, people get VERY afraid to fight. Id suggest a 50-75% increase in structure values across the board.


All of these suggested changes compound together into an increase in weapon flavor and variety, as well as a higher skill cap to landing pinpoint fire and taking down enemies and more intense longer fights, instead of "i alpha'd and you died"

This would also add further equipment options in the future, such as different gyros, cockpits or actuator upgrades, and gives clanners an actual reason to equip hand actuators, and more of a reason to hold onto lower arm actuators since they effect stability.


I am aware a weapons overhaul like this would be taxing, however the system is outdated, and needs a refresh.

If this topic gets some traction, ill do up a spreadsheet of values and get a little more into the nitty gritty of how all of this would work.

[Harrels Badgerton]

I like consumables as equipment but would have to pass on most of this. It sounds like rewriting half the game, tons of fiddly bits and weird mechanics that seem to come more from table top than shooter balance. The ammo thing sounds good, especially for LBX, but it's just too much to juggle.

If you want to be able to spread damage, increase twist speed, make jump jets better, and increase laser duration a bit.

[Digital_Angel]

While I think you have some cool ideas, overall I agree with Harrels. Increasing twist speed, undoing much of the nerf that was done to JJs long ago and increased laser duration are a much simpler fix to the pinpoint alpha issue. Your proposed changes add a lot more complexity to the game both for the player (having to keep track of firing modes) and a LOT of work for the dev teams for changes that would take a lot of time and effort to implement. The complexity you are suggesting also greatly increases the chance of it not being implemented well even if PGI made these changes.

I do think some of your missile changes could be worth talking about, but I don't see multiple firing modes ever happening. They were supposed to be a thing for ACs at one point and have never been implemented.

I can get behind the consumables as equipment idea, but i don't think it is necessary either.

Implementing a stability system could be a great thing. Remove some of the inherent screen shake from JJs, and having is come from stability damage sounds like a great idea. I just don't think that the firing mode changes re needed to do this. Ballistic and missiles weapons could cause stability damage as well as falls, JJ use, and damage to components (especially legs and CT). This way you could reduce raw damage on ballistics and missiles but possibly still improve their total effectiveness by causing both damage and stability loss. That loss of stability then causes screen shake. With the loss of accuracy from screen shake, the velocity of pretty much all projectile weapons could be increased while maintaining balance of these weapons compared to lasers.

[MechTech Dragoon]

Personally, my only problem with the current much talked about solution to balance is, well, its boring and outdated.
The devs main problem with the ac firing mode switching was always the switching ammuntion types, firing modes they should be able to do, switching ammo types is......another story. Just from a programming standpoint thats, ugh, gross.

The firing modes would require a weapon to have multiple states, but a few pieces of equipment already do, however more simple being that its just on or off, best example though being ECM switching between states of function.

The firing mode changes for lbxs would come with a wider increase in lbx spread, while the slug being single shot (like all IS regular ac's are now), this warrants a change to regular IS acs since slug shots fire like regular IS acs so we increase projectile count, this then couples with stability, making slug shots which are pinpoint more rewarding but harder to land, while regular acs fire more rounds overall causing more stability damage on an enemy. Clan shots fired then need to increase to keep the clan/IS ac balance. But now theres more rounds on the board and a reticule shake function, so we reduce projectile size reducing blinding, and reduce overral screenshake from individual shots. So now theres more shots fired, increasing spread compounding with reticule shake, so we increase velocity a bit to account for that.

All in all, everything here compounds together. I do need to make a larger pdf/spreadsheet to outline it all, since a forum post wont do it and theres half a ton worth of connections between all the different extra functions there.

Complicated back end mechanics should warrant a bit more thought i think than just point and click it does the damage. MwO is supposed to be an mmo shooter after all.

[justcallme A S H]

No surprise the no is steaming ahead... Some whack stuff in there that just adds complexity.

No thanks.

[Geewiz 27]

I think the majority of this is unrealistic.

[Lukoi Banacek]

It's even less intuitive than the current version of things and overly complicates mechanics. Consider how thinly PGI already treats the NPE, and the "documentation" of ingame mechanics. If you don't have a masters degree in google-search, it's already beyond casuals and new folks on how ghost heat works, let alone many of these other things already ingame. Your options would require a MUCH heavier investment in that sort of information/education from PGI than they've demonstrated over the last 5+ years.

There are already enough variables PGI is struggling to deal with, this just adds to that. Given their history with pendulum-swing changes versus iterative changes, this wouldn't bode well imo.

Definitely NOT a fan of more screen shake than we can already get from being hit, using HGR etc. That plus dakka blooming on many mechs, other negative impacts to visibility etc, aren't something I'd vote for.

[A Headless Chicken]

so, complicate the game further by adding more mechanics. sure, that always makes things better right?

[Y E O N N E]

> Crit system doesn't see much action.


Lol, I'm done.

[Navid A1]

XkrX Dragoon, on 15 August 2018 - 09:08 AM, said:

Heavy gauss-Increase projectile size slightly to reduce headshots, hvy gauss headshots are a bit of a problem.
(Cause stability increase during charge and after firing)

ok... serious question.

what made you think projectile size has something to do with anything????!!!!

Edited by Navid A1, 15 August 2018 - 09:03 PM.

[Quicksilver Aberration]

Navid A1, on 15 August 2018 - 08:55 PM, said:

what made you think projectile size has something to do with anything????!!!!

Other than clipping on all the invisible walls on maps like Tourmaline and Ruby.

[justcallme A S H]

Navid A1, on 15 August 2018 - 08:55 PM, said:

ok... serious question.

what made you think projectile size has something to do with anything????!!!!

I would guess that it is 3 seasons of Competitive Play?

[denAirwalkerrr]

Yeonne Greene, on 15 August 2018 - 07:47 PM, said:

&gt; Crit system doesn't see much action.


Lol, I'm done.

Repeat that in the face of CGauss...