121 replies to this topic

[Quicksilver Aberration]

Tesunie, on 28 September 2018 - 08:32 PM, said:

Okay. If heat scale is so well off right now, then why do we have GH?
Without GH we get some really crazy damage values. Hence, heat scale could use some work.

The point of GH is to curtail the simplistic power of spamming single weapon systems. Heat alone no matter the setup (high dissipation/low capacity INCLUDED) does what ghost heat does for better or worse.

Tesunie, on 28 September 2018 - 08:32 PM, said:

And why is it people constantly work on creating builds that work around said GH?
As mentioned above, even GH has it's issues. People are always trying to work around the system to get that "little bit more".

This should be seen as a good thing given it pushes ever so slightly towards mixed than we would see otherwise (do you really want to see Giga Drill Whales, because removing GH is how you get Giga Drill Whales.

Tesunie, on 28 September 2018 - 08:32 PM, said:

Also, why is it that GH seems less detrimental against Clan mechs, but more detrimental on IS mechs (from my experience), despite lower GH caps on their weapons?

Basically this partly to do with bad balance between the tech bases and a completely separate issue from any abstract/conceptual issue you might have with ghost heat.



The problem is you are conflating two very different issues (three if we count you bringing up tech base balance) and expecting a single system to solve both problems when it never will without some sort of complex system.

Heat caps damage and doesn't really care about the source.
GH caps damage output from specific sources in order to incentivize weapon combos to boost damage output in some fashion.

Edited by Quicksilver Kalasa, 28 September 2018 - 09:43 PM.

[Reno Blade]

So with the planned changes we will have much higher dissipation and a tiny bit less capacity overall.
Crazy, but what would happen if the heatsinks had MUCH lower dissipation instead of higher?

e.g.
give DHS 0.10 instead of 0.15(now, or 0.22 next patch) and keeping the capactity.
and SHS 0.06

It would make the game much slower, and any high heat build would take double the time to cool off, right?
wouldnt that be "better" if we consider the goal as lowering the overall dps (especially of high heat laser alpha builds)?

Edited by Reno Blade, 29 September 2018 - 05:42 AM.

[Quicksilver Aberration]

Reno Blade, on 29 September 2018 - 05:41 AM, said:

It would make the game much slower, and any high heat build would take double the time to cool off, right?
wouldnt that be "better" if we consider the goal as lowering the overall dps (especially of high heat laser alpha builds)?

The slower the pace of the game, the more you make the game brawly because nothing else can keep up the damage. We literally already saw this during closed beta when SMALL lasers were meta. Back then the only real range weapon anyone bother with was Gauss and that was because it escapes heat. The difference between live with lower dissipation and the current World Tournament with level 1 tech only is that you have the speed in live to close the gap more than you do in the tourney.

Edited by Quicksilver Kalasa, 29 September 2018 - 11:15 AM.

[HARDKOR]

Tesunie, on 28 September 2018 - 11:15 AM, said:

However, seen as you seem to be about throwing a couple of sly insults around, I'll leave the statement that I don't want my MW to become like MW4 where it was difficult (when I played it) to find people playing with ammo and heat turned on. So if you wish to be part of the no heat and unlimited ammo crowd, then "maybe we need a no heat or ammo kiddy pool for the guys who's sole desire is to turn this into a suburban soccer league where everyone gets a participation trophy".

Um, I despised NH/UA and I firmly believe it was what finally killed the game off.

In this game, the kiddy pool would be rigging the game up to be balanced towards bracket builds.

I also like the idea of making heat more of a gradual effect. Right now, I only really consider it in a "am i going to shutdown" paradigm, and in a "is this going to cause me internal damage" paradigm.

I would love to see other effects hit home before we hit the shutdown point, and I think that if done correctly, these effects could be used as quirks to differentiate mechs.

Examples that are plausible, effective, and would add flavor as well as provide balance to builds -

Reduced mobility at higher heats. Make some of the less maneuverable mechs less susceptible to this, as their reduced mobility is due to the hardening of these systems from heat. Make some of the most maneuverable mechs susceptible to permanent damage in overheats, due to the more fragile nature of their systems.

Volumetric steam that vents from different places on different mechs. Some mechs need to keep moving if they want to see when they are hot(probably the ones with perfectly high mounteed hard points), or they sit in a cloud that blocks their vision, some mechs vent to the side and rear and obscure the vision of teammates in a close firing line(most mechs would be like this), and others are tuned to vent at ground level and are ideal for running hot while not moving(save this for mechs with terrible geometry and low hard points)

Add in a "grey out" mechanism that correlated heat vs G forces and at extremes, lowers the gamma and makes it slightly harder to see detail when turning really hard while going fast or when overheating, and makes it very hard to see if you do both. After all, it's not just the mech that's going to shut down...

In short... simply changing the balance of the guns is a fight between types of players, and is counterproductive overall, as people will always game a system to whatever extremes they can. Instead of playing with the numbers, add more simulation related effects and I think you'd see both sides come together in support.

[HARDKOR]

Another thing that could be done about boating...

Use the physics engine to calculate recoil based on weapon location and let this affect weapon convergence.

Effects -

Arm mounted weapons will have more recoil in that arm, but affect the cockpit less. This balances out a lot of things and gives the mechs that run matching weapons in each arm a reason to exist besides faster aiming and wider fire arcs.

Weapons mounted in the same section of chassis will recoil together and have the best convergence.

Lopsided builds will pull to one side. This is probably great for alpha builds, as it helps hide your guns, but it also makes it a lot harder to pull off the 1, 2 punch of a high alpha mix.

Builds that boat out both arms as well as side torsos, but keep it balanced, will see the arm guns drift out over time, when sustaining fire, so this makes the UAC2 and MG boats less deadly the longer they keep shooting.

I'm not saying it would be good to have this be a strong effect, but if done with some subtlety, could provide a lot of flavor to mech builds, allow for personal style and preferences to determine how people min/max their builds and increase the number of viable mechs, and it would increase the simulation feel of the game significantly.

[Tesunie]

Quicksilver Kalasa, on 28 September 2018 - 09:41 PM, said:

The point of GH is to curtail the simplistic power of spamming single weapon systems. Heat alone no matter the setup (high dissipation/low capacity INCLUDED) does what ghost heat does for better or worse.


This should be seen as a good thing given it pushes ever so slightly towards mixed than we would see otherwise (do you really want to see Giga Drill Whales, because removing GH is how you get Giga Drill Whales.


Basically this partly to do with bad balance between the tech bases and a completely separate issue from any abstract/conceptual issue you might have with ghost heat.



The problem is you are conflating two very different issues (three if we count you bringing up tech base balance) and expecting a single system to solve both problems when it never will without some sort of complex system.

Heat caps damage and doesn't really care about the source.
GH caps damage output from specific sources in order to incentivize weapon combos to boost damage output in some fashion.

GH was presented as an example of a possible issue of the heat scale system. I mean, wouldn't it be amazing if we could get a heat scale system figured out that could somehow remove (or at least greatly reduce) GH as a mechanic? Of course, I also don't believe we can ever actually remove GH either at this point. It does it's job reasonably well.

With a heat cap solid at 30, we probably could have removed most of GH from the game. But I agree that 30 probably was too restrictive (despite how much I enjoyed it, but it also didn't really effect many of my builds). The 50 solid cap felt just like live, but possibly better from the increased dissipation. As many mechs (particularly IS mech I believe) take the minimum 10 DHS, 50 was the same values of what many mechs in live already had as a threshold amount. So it "didn't go far enough" if it was going to actually make the changes it desired. 45 may have been the sweet spot for a capped threshold, but we never actually tested it so...


In relation to tech balance... That really is a large topic. Part of that topic is heat scale, and how effectively Clans can approach that issue within the current game. Their ability to take massed DHS (just like anything boated it seems) counters many potential controls, such as GH to some extent. How to correct this could be approached in part with the heat scale. I will not claim to have any solutions for this large issue, or even the heat scale for that matter. All I can say is PTS Heat Scale 2.0 felt really good to me and was a lot of fun for me as I played it. 2.1 felt like less than 2.0 on my personal fun scale, and felt a lot like live...


My question ends up being; how hard should we keep setting GH limits to curtail high damage attacks (it's main goal from my understanding)? Recall, GH was to limit all too similar of types of weapons from making too good of a combo together. Mostly in the form of "the same type of weapon" large boating, but also in overly effective weapon combos (such as Gauss and PPC for an example). In some ways, GH is good in diversifying builds and removing "king weapon to rule them all" situations. But any restriction you place by GH tends to be worked around for similar or even better results, at least until we kill every weapon combo possible (if we take it to the extreme). (No, I'm not even suggesting to kill "every weapon combo", it's just the extreme possible conclusion that GH restriction could lead to if everything went into "lock down".)


You say heat caps damage. I do understand and agree. Once again, we fall into how well does it do it, for what builds and then for what tech types. There are cases where heat seems to oppressive and punishing for some weapons/builds. There are cases where certain tech types can mitigate the heat scale capping of their weapons, either through available play styles/tactics and/or build options. (We also have Cool Shot consumables, which adjusts this as well.) Etc. We really don't want to stand here all day presenting specific builds and how heat effects it. That's typically not very productive...


I'll leave this with the remark that, just because the heat scale currently isn't "bad" doesn't mean we can't look into it for possible refinement and improvement. It probably just means we should be more careful about it, so as not to ruin something that is working currently.



I'm starting to wonder if anyone else kinda wishes PGI did PTS of patches before their release...
I wonder if that would be helpful, or more of a hindrance to progression.

[Quicksilver Aberration]

Tesunie, on 29 September 2018 - 06:20 PM, said:

With a heat cap solid at 30, we probably could have removed most of GH from the game.

FFS, no you couldn't. Instead of boating PPCs/Gauss I would just boat dakka and MLs. AGAIN, no matter the settings, heat by itself does not prevent boating. We've already hade a taste of this with ED, we know that is what happens.

Tesunie, on 29 September 2018 - 06:20 PM, said:

You say heat caps damage. I do understand and agree. Once again, we fall into how well does it do it, for what builds and then for what tech types. There are cases where heat seems to oppressive and punishing for some weapons/builds.

That's not a heat problem then, those weapons are just needing tuning. That's how balance works.

Tesunie, on 29 September 2018 - 06:20 PM, said:

I'll leave this with the remark that, just because the heat scale currently isn't "bad" doesn't mean we can't look into it for possible refinement and improvement. It probably just means we should be more careful about it, so as not to ruin something that is working currently.

I'm not against that, but people need to understand that a tech base issue or a weapon imbalance shouldn't immediately be a heat issue.

[Reno Blade]

Quicksilver Kalasa, on 29 September 2018 - 11:13 AM, said:

The slower the pace of the game, the more you make the game brawly because nothing else can keep up the damage. We literally already saw this during closed beta when SMALL lasers were meta. Back then the only real range weapon anyone bother with was Gauss and that was because it escapes heat. The difference between live with lower dissipation and the current World Tournament with level 1 tech only is that you have the speed in live to close the gap more than you do in the tourney.

Yes, this is one draw back to tackle.
With recent ask to give Gauss some heat, it might reduce this risk.
And brawling with anything above Small Lasers being also affected by the heat (e.g. even 4xSRM6A would be high heat after few shots without the fast cooling), these builds would also be severly limited in the damage output, even on brawling range.

It's a shame we couldnt get this tested on PTS before, so we are back to speculation/theory here.


And to the fixed 30 heat cap (including removing GH or not...) , I think the problem becomes obvious when comparing 2 PPCs vs 2 AC20, or even 2 AC10.
Having the dmg/heat value differences we have now, the system doesnt allow for this very limited capacity without shifting the balance very strongly to the low-heat builds.
But no matter if low cap or low dissipation, both would ultimately sacrifice the high-heat weapons.
If this would only affect laser alpha, or any other alpha, or only dual PPCs too much, we can only guess now.

PGI went with the med-cap/high-diss which allows for any build to be reasonable good dps/burst without any large impact.
If there is no further change to the heat cap/dis, then the best way to reduce alpha power would be to tighten GH limits and penalties.

some examples:
1 - group GH groups (large+med lasers, but remove small/micro lasers from groups of meds)
2 - tighten GH limit of some weapons by 1 less weapon (e.g. max 3x SRM6, max of 30 LRMs, max of 30 MRMs, max of 30dmg laser ... )
3 - increase heat penalty (like they did with SRMs over the limit, but stronger)
I know GH is disliked/hated by many, but it is still required in the current use of heat values (system and weapons) to reduce boating of single weapons without reducing the weapons solo-stat to unusable (e.g. without making AC20 heat = 20).

[Quicksilver Aberration]

Reno Blade, on 30 September 2018 - 01:04 AM, said:

Yes, this is one draw back to tackle.
With recent ask to give Gauss some heat, it might reduce this risk.
And brawling with anything above Small Lasers being also affected by the heat (e.g. even 4xSRM6A would be high heat after few shots without the fast cooling), these builds would also be severly limited in the damage output, even on brawling range.

Not really, again all you need to do is look back to closed beta. SRMs were still used more than PPCs/LLs were.

[Tesunie]

Quicksilver Kalasa, on 30 September 2018 - 07:29 AM, said:

Not really, again all you need to do is look back to closed beta. SRMs were still used more than PPCs/LLs were.

Okay, I'll get to your bigger post towards me later (due to time constraints).

I wanted to make mention that in close beta, the PPC (and most ACs as well) were not used as often as other weapons due to hit reg issues. Lasers were hard to use back then as well, as you had to lead large distances to get your beam to actually deal damage. As such, you did not know where you where hitting, nor how much was hitting.

SRMs did a shotgun effect, so even with poor hit reg across the board, they still maintained some level of performance just by sending damage everywhere. SSRMs also back then sought out everyone's CT... Each of them also had small splash radius of a couple Ms, meaning that even a glancing hit often did a lot of damage to nearby components (often far more than the 2 damage per missile). It was actually discovered that (S)SRMs (Streaks were better due to their homing nature and seeking out CTs) would often deal 5+ points of damage per missile...

Heat wasn't the reason so much. Damage dealt and hit reg were far more of the reasons for different weapons being favored back then.

[Quicksilver Aberration]

Tesunie, on 02 October 2018 - 11:46 AM, said:

I wanted to make mention that in close beta, the PPC (and most ACs as well) were not used as often as other weapons due to hit reg issues.

Except this falls apart because Gauss WAS used in CB. The reason why? It didn't have heat.

Tesunie, on 02 October 2018 - 11:46 AM, said:

I wanted to make mention that in close beta, the PPC (and most ACs as well) were not used as often as other weapons due to hit reg issues. Lasers were hard to use back then as well, as you had to lead large distances to get your beam to actually deal damage. As such, you did not know where you where hitting, nor how much was hitting.

This was true even back in MW4 yet ranged weapons were still the dominant facet of multiplayer. So that's not really the reason why.

Edited by Quicksilver Kalasa, 02 October 2018 - 11:50 AM.

[Tesunie]

Quicksilver Kalasa, on 29 September 2018 - 08:22 PM, said:

FFS, no you couldn't. Instead of boating PPCs/Gauss I would just boat dakka and MLs. AGAIN, no matter the settings, heat by itself does not prevent boating. We've already hade a taste of this with ED, we know that is what happens.

You missed some key words I used...

For emphasis this time:
"I mean, wouldn't it be amazing if we could get a heat scale system figured out that could somehow remove (or at least greatly reduce) GH as a mechanic?"

"With a heat cap solid at 30, we probably could have removed most of GH from the game" (To go into farther depth there, if the heat cap was at a solid 30, would we still need GH on PPCs? After you shoot more than 3, you are already at the heat cap. ISMLs would be capped at about 6ish before threshold limits. Another case of removed GH. Etc. We could remove most of GH linkage. Gauss and PPCs would probably need to be retained, as well as maybe a few others.)

Quicksilver Kalasa, on 29 September 2018 - 08:22 PM, said:

That's not a heat problem then, those weapons are just needing tuning. That's how balance works.

How many weapons need adjustment then? All of them? Nearly all of them? Just some of them? Is it going to be build dependent? Is it certain specific weapon combos on specific variants? How much whine are we willing to hear when someone's build get "nerfed" for "doing only moderate performance"? Come on here. We've heard the complaints enough any time a nerf goes in. But if we just buff everything forever, that also leads to problems.

Heat is part of the problem. Right now, there are no penalies for boating DHS, but there are for boating nearly anything else. Just like boating weapons, the ability to boat (fit more of them than other tech types) CDHS seems to be leading to some problems. Could the entire heat system use to be looked into? Should we just adjust CDHS (and listen to the whine again)? Continue to buff everything else (IS DHS) (and listen to a different type of whine anyway)? Or maybe, we could rework the whole heat scale system, with more flavor and with a more careful eye to balance?

You see, balance encompasses a lot of things. Not just changing specific weapons, but it can (and does) also include possible changes to entire systems. I mean, we just had a "balance" pass on missile lock on systems. The WHOLE system was revised, and not just "Artemis locking speed". The changes addressed a loophole that's been around since forever with Artemis improving SSRMs (when they were not suppose to be). With that mentioned, why can't we look at the heat system for possible better balance there?

Quicksilver Kalasa, on 29 September 2018 - 08:22 PM, said:

I'm not against that, but people need to understand that a tech base issue or a weapon imbalance shouldn't immediately be a heat issue.

We've had a LOT of issues with the heat scale and weapon balance. Heat is a part of weapon balance, so we should consider the heat scale when talking about weapon balance. Or rather to place it in your own word basis:
"I'm not against that, but people need to understand that a tech base issue or a weapon imbalance shouldn't immediately exclude a heat issue."

This one here is a two way street. It might indicate a heat scale issue. Thus, it does not hurt to look into the overall heat scale to see if it can be better refined and balanced.



All too often in this thread, you've been taking what I say as definitive and absolutes, or taking them to extremes I never mentioned. I'm using specific terminology of "maybe", "might", "could be", etc for a very distinct reason.

---

I do have a question for you; Out of all the PTS presented, which one did you have the most "fun" in? Excluding numbers, which felt best to you? (And, yes. Saying you prefer the live version better than any PTS is a valid answer here if you wish.)

Personally, I liked 2.0 the best as it seemed most fun to me. None of the builds I tested worked poorly on that version, and it just felt good to play under those changes. I even took in some of my higher HLL/ERML builds onto the server and they worked about as I expected. Not saying that version was perfect, but I really liked the direction it was heading towards.

[Tesunie]

Quicksilver Kalasa, on 02 October 2018 - 11:50 AM, said:

Except this falls apart because Gauss WAS used in CB. The reason why? It didn't have heat.


This was true even back in MW4 yet ranged weapons were still the dominant facet of multiplayer. So that's not really the reason why.

It was used as a low/no heat alternative close range weapon for brawlers. Back then, it was difficult to hit with them at longer ranges. However, they were still rarely used over lasers and missiles (particularly SSRMs). The nastiest builds back then was the Splacat, Streakcat and Boomcat (dual AC20s), and even then the Boomcat was seen less often because of the hit reg issues. But if that Boomcat hit someone.... ouch they felt it. So it took less reliable ability to hit with the chance that, if it did hit it was likely to cripple or kill it's target.



MW4 the ERLL was basically king. With it's pin point (not hit scan) damage, it could rip mechs apart at good ranges. However, MW4 doesn't have relevance to MW:O, as they run off different systems. For the record, MW4 from my understanding did have some lag compensation in it, as in, it was client authoritative, so if you saw a hit, you hit and dealt damage. However, that same system left it open to cheats... A lot of people in that game would have "double health" among other things... But all wasn't that bad either, as many servers did have a "no legging" honor code.

For the record, in MW4 when I did get into the multiplayer action (late in the game's life), I used an AC20, ERML Shadowcat and did well with it. (Until aforementioned cheater with double health was in the match).

This game already has too many differences from MW4 to even be compared reasonably. PPFLD weapons still did reasonably well in Close Beta and the starting of Open Beta, but missiles and lasers seemed to still be more preferred due to hit reg issues. (If it helps any, I joined in Open Beta.)

[Quicksilver Aberration]

Tesunie, on 02 October 2018 - 12:08 PM, said:

You missed some key words I used...

For emphasis this time:
"I mean, wouldn't it be amazing if we could get a heat scale system figured out that could somehow remove (or at least greatly reduce) GH as a mechanic?"

"With a heat cap solid at 30, we probably could have removed most of GH from the game" (To go into farther depth there, if the heat cap was at a solid 30, would we still need GH on PPCs? After you shoot more than 3, you are already at the heat cap. ISMLs would be capped at about 6ish before threshold limits. Another case of removed GH. Etc. We could remove most of GH linkage. Gauss and PPCs would probably need to be retained, as well as maybe a few others.)

This is a copout argument. Yes, spike heat weapons wouldn't need ghost heat because the heat cap would be low enough to not be worth mentioning. That said, that doesn't make a solid heat cap of 30 better since GH would still be around for low heat weapons (it may mitigate the issue of spike heat weapon being boat, but a lot of other issues arise out of that). That's not a solution, it's missing the point.

Tesunie, on 02 October 2018 - 12:08 PM, said:

Heat is part of the problem. Right now, there are no penalies for boating DHS, but there are for boating nearly anything else. Just like boating weapons, the ability to boat (fit more of them than other tech types) CDHS seems to be leading to some problems.

If heat were a problem it would be universal....and changing heat as we saw in the PTS does not actually fix that imbalance, not even close.

Tesunie, on 02 October 2018 - 12:08 PM, said:

You see, balance encompasses a lot of things. Not just changing specific weapons, but it can (and does) also include possible changes to entire systems.

I'm aware of the idea that balance encompasses many things, you just don't seem to be aware of the relationship between all of the systems.

Tesunie, on 02 October 2018 - 12:08 PM, said:

I mean, we just had a "balance" pass on missile lock on systems. The WHOLE system was revised, and not just "Artemis locking speed". The changes addressed a loophole that's been around since forever with Artemis improving SSRMs (when they were not suppose to be). With that mentioned, why can't we look at the heat system for possible better balance there?

There is a difference between a bug and working as intended (though many programming jokes could be made).....

Tesunie, on 02 October 2018 - 12:08 PM, said:

We've had a LOT of issues with the heat scale and weapon balance. Heat is a part of weapon balance, so we should consider the heat scale when talking about weapon balance.

Just lol, I'm glad you can do word association but the relationships don't impact each other like you seem to think they do. It isn't a 2-way street because the relationships are different. Changing the heat system DIRECTLY impacts the relationship heat has with EVERY weapon. Changing one weapons impact on heat however doesn't have that same impact.

Tesunie, on 02 October 2018 - 12:08 PM, said:

For the record, MW4 from my understanding did have some lag compensation in it, as in, it was client authoritative, so if you saw a hit, you hit and dealt damage.

No, it wasn't. You definitely had to lagshoot back in those days. Maybe it was additions that Mektek and crew made after the fact since I know Evilcow was particularly worried about "hackers" but you definitely had to lagshoot even with hitscan lasers sometimes.

Tesunie, on 02 October 2018 - 12:08 PM, said:

For the record, in MW4 when I did get into the multiplayer action (late in the game's life), I used an AC20, ERML Shadowcat and did well with it. (Until aforementioned cheater with double health was in the match).

And I could do well with a jumping 2 HLL Linebacker DFAing lone targets, that doesn't mean it was meta.

Tesunie, on 02 October 2018 - 12:08 PM, said:

This game already has too many differences from MW4 to even be compared reasonably. PPFLD weapons still did reasonably well in Close Beta and the starting of Open Beta, but missiles and lasers seemed to still be more preferred due to hit reg issues. (If it helps any, I joined in Open Beta.)

No, they didn't. No one bothered with MLs/LLs/PPCs/AC20s/massed SRMs until DHS were added to the game. Before that it was mostly about the Gauss, Smalls, and maybe LRMs.

Tesunie, on 02 October 2018 - 12:08 PM, said:

I do have a question for you; Out of all the PTS presented, which one did you have the most "fun" in? Excluding numbers, which felt best to you?

Live if I'm being honest because I don't think laser alphas are as much a problem, in fact I still think dakka is actually stronger than lasers currently. Maybe if they had lowered the heat values on lasers a bit as well as the heat cap and finally added heat to Gauss I would've been preferred 2.1 but they didn't.

Edited by Quicksilver Kalasa, 02 October 2018 - 12:30 PM.

[Tesunie]

Well, seen as no one can say things outside of "absolutes" here apparently, and it "must be one way or another", i see no farther reason to even bother posting a discussion.

I mean, if saying "maybe" is a copout... and making the point as to why it "might work that way" is a copout... why bother? You don't seem to actually read my posts fully.

I also am enjoying the solid fact that, when I present in game mechanics, I suddenly "don't understand the game mechanics"... every... single... time... Apparently, I don't understand the game that I play many hours a week on. I don't understand anything about any game mechanics because... I'm making some theoretical statement on a possible change that may or may not have beneficial effects on the game...? I mean, it's not like I've exactly been saying anyone here has been wrong, but yet every time I turn around I'm being told how wrong I am.

So, once again I'm going to say it:
- MAYBE having a 30 heat cap MIGHT HAVE helped the game. (I think 35-40 could have been better.)
- MAYBE it could have produced a POSSIBILITY that ghost heat could be REDUCED or eliminated.
- It is POSSIBLE that there may be an underlying imbalance within the heat scale, that MIGHT be able to be adjusted.
- There MIGHT be a POSSIBLE imbalance between tech types, of particular note between CDHSs and and ISDHS and how one side can boat them over the other side with more ease.
- It is even POSSIBLE that an overall change to the heat scale might aid in correcting that imbalance.
- Part of the POSSIBLE imbalance between the tech types (and one side's apparent ease of boating them) may lay within the core heat scale system, where the max threshold goes up for every heat sink taken.

So it MIGHT be POSSIBLE that a look into the heat scale system MAY lead to better balance within the whole of the game. MAYBE. A POSSIBILITY. As in, it is something to look into and CONSIDER.


Notice a complete and utter lack of absolutes in the above stated statement? I didn't use any intentionally, because there are many other alternative ideas to consider. I am not about to discredit those possible alternative ideas, because I know they could very well be better (or worse) than a proposed change to the core heat system.

[Quicksilver Aberration]

Tesunie, on 02 October 2018 - 04:50 PM, said:

I also am enjoying the solid fact that, when I present in game mechanics, I suddenly "don't understand the game mechanics"... every... single... time... Apparently, I don't understand the game that I play many hours a week on. I don't understand anything about any game mechanics because... I'm making some theoretical statement on a possible change that may or may not have beneficial effects on the game...? I mean, it's not like I've exactly been saying anyone here has been wrong, but yet every time I turn around I'm being told how wrong I am.

Just because you play often doesn't mean you understand how to play. I've seen play mechwarrior for 6+ years that still don't understand how to play the game or the mechanics of it.

Tesunie, on 02 October 2018 - 04:50 PM, said:

So, once again I'm going to say it:
- MAYBE having a 30 heat cap MIGHT HAVE helped the game. (I think 35-40 could have been better.)
- MAYBE it could have produced a POSSIBILITY that ghost heat could be REDUCED or eliminated.
- It is POSSIBLE that there may be an underlying imbalance within the heat scale, that MIGHT be able to be adjusted.
- There MIGHT be a POSSIBLE imbalance between tech types, of particular note between CDHSs and and ISDHS and how one side can boat them over the other side with more ease.
- It is even POSSIBLE that an overall change to the heat scale might aid in correcting that imbalance.
- Part of the POSSIBLE imbalance between the tech types (and one side's apparent ease of boating them) may lay within the core heat scale system, where the max threshold goes up for every heat sink taken.

Yes, but WHY do you think all of this? What side-effects could making those changes have? What is the relationship and interplay between heat sinks, weapons, ghost heat, and heat?

For example one of the things that strikes me is you want to reduce ghost heat with this change? But why? What does that honestly help with since the system would STILL BE NECESSARY for certain things and what else about the game does that impact to simply reduce some of the potential complexity of ghost heat? It seems like you are going for a blanket change like PGI often does rather than a more targeted approach to a variety of issues. So rather than fixing the imbalance through more direct means you are wanting to change the heat system which really just shifts the issues rather than actually fixing them. Mitigation isn't really a solution, that's just buying time.

Edited by Quicksilver Kalasa, 02 October 2018 - 08:24 PM.

[Tesunie]

Quicksilver Kalasa, on 02 October 2018 - 08:23 PM, said:

Just because you play often doesn't mean you understand how to play. I've seen play mechwarrior for 6+ years that still don't understand how to play the game or the mechanics of it.

Oh. Lately I've just been getting told I know nothing because I'm not in X% of the player population. So, whatever on that. Seems to be the latest attack people use to "discredit" someone else. If I disagree with you, I must not know what I'm talking about.


As far as your questions:
"WHY do you think all of this?"
I think "all this" (very precise there) from actual game play, and distinct differences I see from what can be done within the game itself. I could go over all this again... Though I didn't test every possible build nor meta possible within the PTS 2.0, I will say again that it "felt" good, and honestly I had some of the most fun in that session of PTS (I played well more than the 10 minimum required for the "prize") than I have in a long time in the live game. The solid heat cap with higher dissipation felt more fun to play. Some more balance passes could have been used, for example flamers and Gauss where still a little problematic, but a lot of other things just felt nicer. It lead to more fluid game play. It just seemed like you could do more, but also wasn't getting dropped as quickly as with live.

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"What side-effects could making those changes have?"
Oh, I'm sure there will be a lot of possible side effects I haven't considered (obviously), and as mentioned before there are many other suggestions to balance. In this case here, with lower heat threshold and faster dissipation, it lead to more of a whirlwind of action, rather than "alpha a high heat, high damage alpha. Sit behind a wall or building when you get too hot for 30+ seconds" (take the phrase with a grain of salt). There was a lot more positioning, movement and just plan attacking.

Personally, for the PTS, none of my builds changed. They all worked mostly normal, but was rewarded after the opening volley (an alpha shot) with more trickle fire. Or, I could even alpha and then tuck behind cover for a moment and go back out. This doesn't mean 30 cap was "the best", but it felt more impactful than 50 (which is what most every mech has in live). With the 50 cap, it just lead to "like live" conditions, but with much better cooling times.

As for specific side effects from a locked heat threshold cap, it would lead to a few other changes. For one, it would effect high heat alphas, forcing either more groups of weapons to fire or lower alphas. A build with, for example, 12 ERMLs (Nova Prime), could probably group the fire up and remain reasonably effective. If GH for lasers were removed, it could then alpha at the cost of overheating, but not so badly it would melt like it does now with GH.
Ultimately, yes. This change would either force more creative solutions to produce higher damage at lower heat, or make people want to exchange more face time to deal that damage. This could be both good and bad, depending upon the situation.

I also felt that PPCs got a boost with the PTS 2.0 and 2.1. Working within GH limits (which could probably be removed with the heat being capped at 30, but 35-40 cap would probably be more preferred), I found that two PPCs with laser backups could work very well. Shoot the two PPCs, wait a moment, then you could shoot the MLs while the PPCs were on cooldown. It just, to me, seemed to open up more build options while also removing a lot of restrictions that were on other combos.

Overall, I felt it made the game "faster" in movement and positioning, but slowed down time to death just a bit. Considering I have had (no joke here) a Riflemen get one shot KOed in the CT by a single mech (It was an Annihilator), I do think that TTK is a little fast in this game sometimes. On the PTS, I didn't see that happen so much.

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"What is the relationship and interplay between heat sinks, weapons, ghost heat, and heat?"
Lots... This is a very long question to answer. Lots would need to be covered.
Short answer version:
- Heat sinks determine how often you can "get back into the fight". it is suppose to help restrict abilities, typically damage. It's suppose to be another resource you are to manage while in the game, similar to weapon cooldown, ammo and even JJ fuel.
- Weapons influence what you can do. What weapons you take determines what you can do. The weapons you can use are limited by what heat resources you have available, as well as other resources such as ammo. (At least in relation to heat scale, excluding range, type, role, etc.)
- GH is suppose to limit overly powerful combos and the effectiveness of bringing more of the same thing. It is suppose to punish someone who breaks it for that combo or high boated effectiveness by depleting heat resources, rather than raw damage or accuracy. It's suppose to be a balancing mechanic to curb and discourage power creep and potentially game breaking combos and abilities. (Similar in nature to why APs disable a single nearby ECM unit.)
- Heat itself is the resource that determines what can be done at any given time (to put as simply as possible). Heat regulates and is suppose to help balance out abilities. There is a reason most weapons pay more heat for range and/or more damage, among other things. Heat is the resource that heat sinks take control of. It's part of the limiters in this game.

Obviously, I've done a very simplistic explanation of the systems and their relationship. The short of it is, it's all about resource management. When you have too much of a resource (or can get too much of it), it makes it's impact on what it's suppose to be limiting weaker. It's like playing a video game that only gives you three lives to beat the game in, but you know of a way to get as many lives as you want within the game. Suddenly, the life cap/resource become irreverent. It may not make the game any less difficult per level, but it makes the game easier/too easy. Right now, I feel we have ways to get too much heat resources in this game, making it's effects too weak in some cases. Once again, of particular note about CDHS. For them, it's not about how much they can cool individually, but how many that can be taken due to their fewer crit slots they occupy. (Crit slots are another limiter/resource you are suppose to manage. But that would lead to another topic, but also relates to heat scale...)

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"For example one of the things that strikes me is you want to reduce ghost heat with this change? But why?"
Many people who play this game has wanted GH removed, changed or reduced. I feel that GH does what it's suppose to do, but that there are possible other options that might perform that task better, either out right on it's own or partnered with a much weaker GH system. People shot down energy draw due to it's complexity and "hidden" aspects. However, GH has a lot of issues. Just looking at the PPC line, it seems like LPPCs are very harshly punished with GH, and you can't even mix LPPCs with any other PPC without being even more harshly punished.

GH has it's merits. It's done a lot of work for this game. That doesn't mean we can't discuss or seek alternative options that have the potential to be better. I feel that the PTS isn't used enough, and that there are many possible alterations that could be tested for validity that just don't go anywhere otherwise. I would bring up the Community Weapon Balance Document as one such prospect that could have used a PTS. It would have been very interesting to have seen if it would have worked as those people whom created it thought it would. I also feel that we didn't test the suggested new heat scale out far enough with these PTS. You made suggestions yourself that may have improved upon the 2.1 PTS: "Maybe if they had lowered the heat values on lasers a bit as well as the heat cap and finally added heat to Gauss I would've been preferred 2.."


"What does that honestly help with since the system would STILL BE NECESSARY for certain things and what else about the game does that impact to simply reduce some of the potential complexity of ghost heat?"
It would be reduced to affect far less. It could be used to prevent overly powerful weapon combos still, and if certain specific weapons that become boated are deemed too effective still. But it would massively simplify far more options overall with it's reduction, once again with the theory that we adjust the heat scale in some manner.

Quicksilver Kalasa, on 02 October 2018 - 08:23 PM, said:

It seems like you are going for a blanket change like PGI often does rather than a more targeted approach to a variety of issues. So rather than fixing the imbalance through more direct means you are wanting to change the heat system which really just shifts the issues rather than actually fixing them. Mitigation isn't really a solution, that's just buying time.

I feel that the current heat scale system has something inherently wrong with it. I think a more solid heat cap could provide a better point to balance from. I believe it could have the potential to not only reduce GH's effects, but also has the potential to remove many of the IS mech quirks (if not even some clan ones too). I have felt that balance by Quirks was always kind of a poor choice. It's okay to give a bit of a helping hand to variants and chassis that under perform and/or to provide a little flavor, as that is what (in my opinion) quirks should be more used for.

So, I'm not trying to fix just tech level imbalance, nor just GH or the heat scale. I feel that by changing the heat system we could have something that is a bit multi-part. For one, I think it would be more Battletech like (the core base of this game), while also still playing to the different aspect of being a FPS rather than a TT Strategy game. I feel it's a good interpretation of that aspect of BT within MW.
I also feel it would help free up the differences between tech levels, permitting better overall balance to continue to farther refine balance. Sometimes, you just can't keep putting bandaids on something (changing individual weapon/equipment stats) and you just have to do something a bit more. We've been adjusting weapon/equipment stats. Maybe it's time to try something else.
The last part (that I can think of right now) is that we could lessen the restrictions of GH with a more solid cap. A hard cap means we don't have to plan on people adjusting their alpha levels according to their current heat cap, but by the cap that's hard set.

As a rough example of why I'm behind a hard heat threshold cap, do you recall/know those simplistic games where you often times have a bow or cannon, and you have to determine the arch and power of the shot to try and hit targets? Well, the easiest way to often times beat those games is to lock yourself at a single arch but adjust only the power for every shot, or adjust only the arch and leave the power the same. It's easier to adjust one aspect at a time, rather than both. If you adjust both arch and power after every shot, you tend to get wild results. In this game, that relates to us having both alpha heat limits AND heat threshold caps both being adjustable. We will find it very hard to seek balance as long as both aspects (just like arch and power) are in constant flux. You adjust for this alpha heat with that threshold cap for this much damage, and people adjust one or the other to get the same damage (or more) by adjusting how much heat they make or by how high their threshold/dissipation rates are. (We aren't sitting at too bad a spot right now. Doesn't mean it can't be better though.)

I wouldn't call a change to the heat scale "mitigation". Constantly adjusting weapon/equipment values is starting to feel like "mitigation" that's just buying time at this point. I do believe it's about time we try something else.

[Quicksilver Aberration]

There's a whole lot of "I feel"s in that explanation and not a lot of why.

Heat scale alone will not fix the tech imbalance, period. It also won't fix the need for ghost heat, period. Will it mitigate the issues with either one? Potentially, but I highly doubt it because it misses the point. Changing the heat cap doesn't fix the fact that most Clan mechs will still get more sustained DPS because the amount of DHS they can mount more than makes up for the "hotter" weapons (keeping in mind their weapons are only hotter because of the damage they do typically so they keep similar DPH ratios as IS weapons). The heat cap does nothing to counteract that which is why even with a heat cap of 40, Clans were still dominant. Changing the heat cap also doesn't remove the need for ghost heat on dakka either, since the game would be a lot more DPS oriented dakka is gonna have to reigned in.

I also think there is a lot of strawmen being thrown around. For example, you aren't dominating QP in a mech that has to hide for 30 seconds because it is too hot so why are you trying to balance for it. In fact the most dominant mechs in QP are dakka mechs because there is so much meat you have to chew through. Gameplay is always going to be more rigid in QP especially with 12 v 12 because there are more eyes on the field which tends to lend itself to very static poke games (though honestly when QP is at its worst, a team just cowers behind cover the entire time and the enemy just face rolls the passive team). The fluidity of matches has less to do with balance and more to do with maps and numbers because QP honestly doesn't feel imbalances near as much as the more coordinated game modes.

Edited by Quicksilver Kalasa, 03 October 2018 - 09:59 AM.

[Tesunie]

Quicksilver Kalasa, on 03 October 2018 - 09:57 AM, said:

There's a whole lot of "I feel"s in that explanation and not a lot of why.

Heat scale alone will not fix the tech imbalance, period. It also won't fix the need for ghost heat, period. Will it mitigate the issues with either one? Potentially, but I highly doubt it because it misses the point. Changing the heat cap doesn't fix the fact that most Clan mechs will still get more sustained DPS because the amount of DHS they can mount more than makes up for the "hotter" weapons (keeping in mind their weapons are only hotter because of the damage they do typically so they keep similar DPH ratios as IS weapons). The heat cap does nothing to counteract that which is why even with a heat cap of 40, Clans were still dominant. Changing the heat cap also doesn't remove the need for ghost heat on dakka either, since the game would be a lot more DPS oriented dakka is gonna have to reigned in.

I also think there is a lot of strawmen being thrown around. For example, you aren't dominating QP in a mech that has to hide for 30 seconds because it is too hot so why are you trying to balance for it....

I refer to a lot of balance as "feels", because sometimes "spreadsheet warrior" doesn't entail the whole story. Also, I gave up presenting exact numbers in debates (unless vital) due to too many people shooing it off because of X reason, making it a colossal waste of time for me to have done all that work. As this isn't my actual thread/suggestion, I don't desire to sit here for hours on end creating the formula/math to prove the point, that's more or less the OP's job to do. It's more so his thread and his point to make. I may agree with the statement that PTS 2.0 seemed better to me than PTS 2.1, and that PTS 2.1 felt almost exactly like "Live Plus" (as mentioned in a previous post, 2.1 had a heat cap of 50, and the more or less average of many mechs in live matches is 50, then it added the increased dissipation...).I agree with the general statement that, for what it was seeking to do, 2.1 did not go far enough. Then again, despite how much fun 2.0 seemed to be, it may have gone "too far" for what it's intention was.


As far as heat scale possibly addressing tech imbalance, it could. Part of the "core game mechanics" should have made this rather obvious I would have thought (something you recently accused me of not knowing a few posts ago...). Clan weapons produce more heat when used compared to IS weapons (as an average).

Here's my best explanation; imagine having a bank account where you could only ever use $500 a day without suffering penalties. It wouldn't matter if your income is greater than $500, you still could never draw more than $500 at one time. Have a larger purchase, take smaller amounts out for several days (firing smaller groups of weapons) or take as much out as you need and pay the price.

Now, IS mechs with this might have lower income (cooling) due to average heat sink size, but their weapons also cost less income (heat) to use. It would be easier for them to remain within their limits. Clans though can get higher income (cooling) due to their average heat sink size being smaller (among other things), permitting them to take more of them. However, their weapons would cost more income (heat) to use. They would be taxing their hard amount limit draw a lot sooner than IS, even though they are putting more money into that bank.

To put it another way, a hard cap would close the gap in the heat abilities between Clan and IS capabilities. Clan may have more range and damage, but at more heat costs which max out their available heat sooner, but they are able to use that heat again more often due to better overall cooling. IS may have lower cooling, but their weapons tend to run cooler as well. So they will be able to shoot more before taxing their heat.

Right now, Clans can typically place more heat sinks on their mechs than IS counterparts due to the fewer crit spaces they occupy. As of right now, that increases not only their dissipation to high levels, but also permits them to dip even farther into the heat with their increased heat thresholds. This means they continue to be able to use more. This leads to Clans having higher overall alpha levels, speed and cooling abilities.

As a game design, the faster dissipation with lower threshold (or at least some kind of locked cap) means that players are more active. Move active means they get to do more things more often. Don't know about you, but having more options and more things to do tends to be more fun for me, as I like having things to engage me into the game.


One of my goals with balancing is to remove some parts that have failed as a balancing mechanic. One such point is quirks. Quirks should have been used to help under performing chassis and to provide flavor. Instead it's been toted around as a source to balance IS vs Clan, hence a common argument with Clan vs IS balance is "but IS has so much health from quirks". But, that leaves some mechs like the Riflemen out, and some Clan mechs like the Linebacker in... So that still isn't entirely true...

Another point is GH. With a lower, or at least hard, cap to heat thresholds, many of the GH restrictions could be removed or lessened. Some points of it just wouldn't be needed anymore, but I've already mentioned that.


On the note of Clan still having more DPS, that may be true, but between cover and typical MW:O play, it would be mostly mitigated unless everyone was standing out in the open. Most times, a fight becomes determined after one or two alphas. The first few hits makes more of an impact than those hits 30+ seconds later. (In a stand up fight.) If Clan and IS have relatively more equal alphas due to locked heat thresholds, overall game play probably would become more leveled between the two tech levels. It's a possibility I believe could be the case. I just wished we had more time per PTS (or just more of them) to see if this really could have been the case.

I'll also mention that Clan tech was designed to be more trial/gladiatorial/single dueling based than massed warfare (by lore's description). So, Clan Tech having better DPS when on an open field would actually make sense... So it might be able to work out with Clans having more DPS. I will also mention on this note that in PTS 2.0, IS mechs seemed to hold far more of their own against Clan tech, and many of their quirks could have been reduced/removed for possible better balance. (Something none of the PTS really did, which saddens me.)

Overall, I think we could have used far more testing of far more concepts before PGI made any decisions. Capped heat thresholds could have been a possible answer. Then again, so could the community weapon document thingy (whatever they called it) might have also worked. Increasing IS DHS abilities might have done it... or...

I'm not one to exclude any concept. I wished I could take many of the player suggested concepts and actually test them and see how they worked. I believe in actual testing for data gathering. Something about just trying it out and seeing how it works seems to be better to me than debating the numbers in a dry manner. (I'd love to test out the "make X problem weapon explode 50% of the time when it shoots" in live games, just so I can watch the person saying that explode... so they could see just how bad that suggestion really is...)


As for the "strawman" of the super high alpha... I've seen plenty of Gauss and Laser clan assaults (and some IS mechs that try to copy it), but not so much the "boogeyman" that many people refer to. Then again, I've been feeling that balance has been off for some time now. It's far better than it has been in the past, but that also doesn't mean it's perfect either.

On the farther point, balance should be achieved for all game modes. Though I do agree that QP probably shows imbalance less than some other possible modes (simply due to the randomness of the mode), it does show it. We should strive for better balance, even if everything "appears good". As mentioned before, just because it's good doesn't mean it might not need improvement.

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Just to be clear in relation to the thread itself, I agree with the OP that PTS 2.1 did not go far enough for what it was intending to do. This does not mean I agree with everything mentioned in the OP. I felt 2.0's number felt good (was it 40?). going under that value I don't believe would have worked. Either way, I believe it could have used far more testing and data gathering.

[Y E O N N E]

Having an easier time staying within the hard limit doesn't do squat as long as the output under there is still worse and it takes longer to back away from that limit once you do butt up against it. The DPS part also isn't mitigated by cover; having more DPS means that the exploitable window of opportunity maneuver against you is smaller and it gives you the option to apply pressure, knowing that if you do you have the output advantage.