23 replies to this topic

[Navid A1]

Ok... now that I played a number of matches in the PTS, this is what I think with regards to heat:

• 50 heat cap in this PTS is pretty close to the perfect sweet spot. A great change from the previous iteration

• Brawlers now have access to some level of usable capacity to deal max dps, while having high enough dissipation to back it up during a prolonged fight

• Large heat/damage spike laser builds are still possible but require much more conservation in order to continue firing after the first alpha. This is excellent. pls keep this.

• PPC boats now have enough capacity to unload one or two full salvos before being limited by heat, This is a good change compared to Live and PTS2.0. You can't spam PPCs as much, but limits are also not so high that you can't even fire once.

• Light mechs behave much better compared to PTS 2.0, since they do not have access to large number of heat sinks and a lower heat cap limited their ability to use their max dps in the first 20 seconds of a fire fight, which is how most lights are played.

The changes in PTS are mainly emphasizing on boosting external heat sink performance to provide enough dissipation to push damage output towards a dps play style, rather than alpha. This means that dps builds that have access to large number of heat sinks will benefit the most.



This brings us to the Clan v IS balance issue.
IS mechs usually have much less number of double heat sinks due to size and tonnage limitations, and usually can't compete with clans in heat dissipation in prolonged dps oriented fights.

To solve this issue, and base on the simulations I showcased earlier, I think two options are feasible enough to implement for IS only:

Option 1: (I prefer this one):

• Increase the dissipation rate of innersphere internal engine heat sinks (0.25 for double and 0.16 for single)

and

• Change the innersphere external heat sinks to provide additional heat capacity (+1 cap for double and +0.5 cap for single)

Option 2:

• universally reduce the generated heat from innershpere energy weapons by 10%

This PTS really feels like a positive change. For the first time in 6 years, I feel that I'm testing something towards improvement.





Also... here are some of the comparisons you might find useful:

Spoiler

Edited by Navid A1, 26 August 2018 - 09:38 AM.

[Cypherdrene]

Great charts as always Navid, just ran some tests with heat management focused Skills on different build and I have to agree with you.

TTK seems like it could increase thanks to the mobility buffs and a mix of alpha and staggered fire. While it could be too soon to call it perfect, PGI has done a good job this time.

[Y E O N N E]

Adding to internal sinks just adds 0.5 to 0.55 dissipation to IS 'Mechs with engines as big or bigger than 250; I'm not convinced that is adequate. Can you please show me that graph?

I think bumping dissipation per external sink is the way to go. Internal sink buffs help Lights, which is nice, but doesn't seem sufficient for heavier 'Mechs. It's also more intuitive than making some DHS within a single 'Mech not the same as others.

Also, meta IS WHM runs 19-20 DHS with the 3x LL + 6x ERML build, not 18. Might want to re-run that test so we don't get a skewed picture.

Edited by Yeonne Greene, 24 August 2018 - 01:38 PM.

[Navid A1]

Yeonne Greene, on 24 August 2018 - 01:34 PM, said:

Adding to internal sinks just adds 0.5 to 0.55 dissipation to IS 'Mechs with engines as big or bigger than 250; I'm not convinced that is adequate. Can you show me that graph?

I think bumping dissipation per external sink is the way to go. Internal sink buffs help Lights, which is nice, but doesn't seem sufficient for heavier 'Mechs.

Also, meta IS WHM runs 19-20 DHS with the 3x LL + 6x ERML build, not 18. Might want to re-run that test so we don't get a skewed picture.

0.5 extra dissipation may seem small but that, on top of a low number means more percentage, which directly applies to sustained dps. Besides, I didn't want to differentiate IS and C external DHS any more than providing more heat cap due to larger size.

Also, ligher mechs with lower number of DHS are not really competing with clan counterparts the way laser vomit heavies and mediums do. And they already received more dissipation due to external truedubs.

[FireStoat]

If this patch were to go live for the weekend, I'd probably binge play this game for close to 72 hours. My preferred playstyle is to brawl or lean towards sustain builds as opposed to the usual clan laser vomit that entails of 2 alphas and then a long cooldown period behind cover. It humbly feels like brawling is being encouraged once more with the greatly increased sustain heat recovery and agility buffs.

I was surprised that the Ice Ferret didn't feel beaten into the ground with this patch, as opposed to the last test server patch. The Marauder IIC and Er PPC Warhawk Prime also felt very competitive with the better cap of this patch and the same heat recovery. I get the feeling that this build will probably be nerfed back some, but it was a lot of fun to at least try out these new values with energy intensive mechs of the different weight classes.

[Rydiak Randborir]

I think PTS 2.1 is good enough to push to Live, where intricate balancing can be done through observation of a MUCH larger test-field of players. I'm not even entirely sure IS energy weapons need a blanket-heat buff, but I'd rather tweak weapons versus messing with heatsinks in a system where heatcap is fixed for both factions.

[SFC174]

I think this is much better. It is no longer a "uninstall the game" mechanic change (although I still prefer where we're at live, I also recognize that a substantial percentage of the population disagrees).

That said, I still think dissipation needs to be tweaked a bit. Leave external heatsinks alone, but perhaps give a general buff to the first 10 internal engine heatsinks across the board. This will be of smaller benefit to large, external DHS boating Clan mechs (a small buff to 10 of 25-30 heatsinks is pretty small), but will help lights from both sides, as well as some of the heat limited IS ballistic builds that carry few heatsinks beyond the 10 engine. I also think it would be a pretty simple change to implement for PGI.

[Sable]

I already disagreed with you Navid but i don't feel like copy/pasting from the main thread. If this current build went live i don't imagine i'd play that much. It exasperates the high alpha problem rather than taming it.

[Ragedog4]

Im finding the 50 cap is too high to encourage the high alphas which defeats the purpose of the balance. Now I dont agree with 40 but finding somewhere around 45 sounds more actuate. The current 50 only shortens the balance gap between Heavys and Lights. Not Assaults and lights. On top of that the IS heatsinks do need a bit of a increase, no nerf on Clan like some have brought up before, they are fine if we have a 45 cap. Just a slight buff to IS DHS and SHS should do the trick.

[Jonathan8883]

I am working my way down... 2 assaults, 4-5 heavies, 4-5 mediums, 3-4 lights, 1 game each.

I like the extra mobility on many mechs. I could not tell much difference on my Victor, but I definitely could on my Battlemaster.
So far on assaults, cooling is fast enough that it takes longer to overheat.
Heavies do seem to be a bit more prone to overheats (I managed to kill myself in a Hellbringer) but have more sustain IF you have sufficient cooling. That's a success.
My Crab (which carries a lot of HS) seems untouched, but my Ice Ferret (2HLL, ECM) definitely is running hotter.

Lights tomorrow (ACH, Urbie, Kit Fox, Javelin).

[Josh Seles]

Hi Navid.
Just came from the PTS and its gameplay is so much better than live servers. The improved mobility and the low heat cap with high dissipation is pretty nice. This sort of change is just what we need when compared to live servers.

However:
- PTS 2.1 did feel like a step backwards from PTS 2.0, sort of. I think the 50 heat cap is slightly too generous. Build usability in general did increase, but it also saw a partial return of the laser alpha-vomit builds that we are trying to reign in. I know you were advocating for a 45 heat cap earlier during PTS 2.0 and I think that may be the way to go.

- I've seen your efforts to save mechs like the 5x MPL Wolfhound and it's well appreciated as the Wolfhound is one of my favorite lights. But this PTS has reaffirmed my opinion that some weapons are too hot, like Med Pulse Lasers, ballistics, missiles, and PPCs (SN-PPC especially). The other non small-class lasers were mostly ok, in general.

- The weapons mentioned above would not need large changes either, something basic and generalized. Something like -1 heat for all of them, call it good for now, and revisit it on the next PTS.

- There are numerous other weapon buffs I'd like to see, but that's a long list of changes for another time and thread.

Edit, added:
- Some people have been calling for asymmetrical balancing for the 2 different DHS and I would not be opposed to it, but not outright supporting. Maybe 0.2 for all IS DHS and internal C-DHS with 0.18 or 0.19 for external C-DHS.

- Another thing people have suggested is transferring the large increases in heat cap to SHS instead. Not sure how that would turn out but it would be interesting to see.

Edited by Josh Seles, 25 August 2018 - 12:28 AM.

[Jackal Noble]

Yep. Heat Cap of 50 is too high.

[Kurbeks]

+1 for charts and summary

First option is much better as it would help all mechs not just laser boats. As not only IS laser boats but also dakka/missle boats/mixed weapon mechs carry less or significantly less DHS than clan equivalents.

[Kurbeks]

And i think 50 heat cap is good, much better than 40.

[MiZia]

@ Navi why not use this
Ao5220G1|i^|Vg|i^pk0|i^|i^|`?|`?qk0|i^|i^|`?|F@|F@rY0|i^|i^|F@|F@sY0|i^|i^|F@|F@t`0u`0v40w101010
for the Whm?
Know u r comparing similar Builds to show off differences but 2dhs more is a big chunk

[Jonathan8883]

Every light match went well except the one where I walked in front of 3 assaults. My Javelin (jj, 6xsrm2) overheated on every kill shot, but the enemy Atlas and Linebacker overheated too, so all's fair there.

Overall, I support these changes.

[Navid A1]

MiZia, on 25 August 2018 - 05:14 AM, said:

@ Navi why not use this
Ao5220G1|i^|Vg|i^pk0|i^|i^|`?|`?qk0|i^|i^|`?|F@|F@rY0|i^|i^|F@|F@sY0|i^|i^|F@|F@t`0u`0v40w101010
for the Whm?
Know u r comparing similar Builds to show off differences but 2dhs more is a big chunk

Thanks.
Updated the comparison with 19 DHS. Yes, it makes a difference.

20 needs too much armor shaving

Edited by Navid A1, 26 August 2018 - 09:39 AM.

[Chados]

I saw a lot of Clan gauss/PPC builds in 21 drops. That and Clan LRM boats are the new thing. So are machine gun crotchlocks to counter them.

Three quarters of the mechs in use were Clan as well. I ran Fleas and a Grasshopper 5J mostly. The R5K is fine but the FLE-17 is real hot. The 19 isn’t useful at all, it’s even worse than live, but the FA is nasty with two ERSL and a ML backing six MGs and MASC, and it’s not a hot build. My GHR-5J runs ER rainbow lasers (2 each ERLL/ERML/ERSL) and an SRM2 and it rides the heat curve like a Loki running heavy lasers but it’s useable. A 4-LL Jester isn’t, it just hasn’t got enough room under the cap. The GHR mobility buff is needed badly and should go live ASAP. It seemed that Clan laser mechs were running less HL of all sizes and more ERML. Clans also skew hard toward missiles still, and on the GHR two AMS with overload skills made a big difference.

Ultra autocannon and rotaries are really getting kicked in the nads with this. A pair of ultra-10s is hot and I saw several shutdowns from people unable to cycle the guns because of heat. A single RAC2 can shut you down from heat. That needs to be looked at.

Overall, I find this patch very meh but I won’t pitch a fit if it goes live. I do suggest that 20-30 ton energy mechs get a native dissipation boost, though, higher than they presently have, and the heat on laser AMS needs to be reduced too.

[SFC174]

I didn't play any RAC mechs, but I ran into several 2 and 3 RAC2 examples that seemed to do quite well (Bushies, MAD-3r, etc.). I may have to go back and try one, but the only mech I've spec'd into that weapon is the MAD-3R.

[Slambot]

Agree with most of what OP says, 50 heat cap too high. IS needs either a reduction in overall heat generation from lasers, or buff internal heat sinks to compensate for the trouble IS has mounting many external ones. Unscrew the LPL to make it somewhat viable again.