95 replies to this topic

[Shifty McSwift]

lazorbeamz, on 22 October 2018 - 05:32 PM, said:

Your example is too extreme. Literally 8-9 laser clan mechs are one of the main highlights of this game. Something that makes one of the most important parts of the gameplay and makes people come back and play MWO. Which i cant say about 15 laser light mechs. This is a weak argument.

You could use 2 heavy pulses and 6 erml and substantially reduce the heat cap for mechs with 8 energy slots? You think 2 heavy and 6 erml is the thing that gets people "coming back to play"? Yeah and I have the weak argument... Psh.

And lemme guess your threat would be "if I can't fire 2 HLL and 6 ERML i'll quit forever!!"

[lazorbeamz]

You are just being completely dishonest and unfair when you are trying to compare 2+6 meta clan vomit and 15 laser light mechs. Or 0 armor for that matter lols.

[Shifty McSwift]

lazorbeamz, on 22 October 2018 - 05:41 PM, said:

You are just being completely dishonest and unfair when you are trying to compare 2+6 meta clan vomit and 15 laser light mechs. Or 0 armor for that matter lols.

They were specifically facetious responses to your claim that if you can't fire 2HLL and 6ERML that its the end of the world or some ****, there would still be tons of usage for HLL and erml and options for 8-9 laser clan mechs if the heat threshold was too low to spam 2HLL and 6ERML, you are that one being facetious that was my point with the random references.

[Josh Seles]

Here's my own post from a different thread that was also about the recent patch and it's effects. It says pretty much everything I'd say in a completely new post.

Josh Seles, on 19 October 2018 - 05:00 PM, said:

I haven't been able to try out this latest patch because of school reasons but it looks interesting. The last time I played was PTS 2.1 and I did try all the PTS's. After looking through the patch notes, PTS notes, footage and opinions, I'd say this was the right sort of change implemented wrong. Feel free to take my opinion however you want. I'm just tossing this out there after all.

Here's my personal take on what needs to happen:
- IS DHS stays at 0.22 dissipation
- C-DHS goes to 0.20 dissipation
- Both DHS heat capacity goes to 0
- Mech heat capacity gets locked at 40 or 45 (preferably 40, but I can accept 45)
- 15% Skill tree boost is the only way to increase heat capacity while using DHS.
-- 40 x 1.15 = 46 heat cap
-- 45 x 1.15 = 51.75 heat cap
- Having heat penalties like in MW3 and 4 would also be good (HUD disruptions and speed loss)
- Single Heat sinks can get the heat-cap increasing trait. SHS are a different story and different discussion. They could be the low dissipation/high capacity option.

I did think that PTS 2.0 was pretty close to something good. I think all it needed was a few small weapon heat changes. 2.1 wasn't bad either, but I found 2.1 wasn't restrictive enough.

[process]

2 HLL 6 ERML is a pretty arbitrary benchmark for heat, and if we're being honest that probably affords way too much of an alpha given the current dissipation rate.

A lower heat cap would directly address the energy alpha problem while simultaneously forcing players to construct their mechs more creatively. Like, hypothetically with a low cap and no ghost heat, maybe your choices could be 8 ERSL, 8 SPL, 6 ERML, 6 MPL, 2 HLL, 3 LPL, or 3 ERLL. The values could be tweaked, but now you have a range of combinations that are suited for specific roles.

I'm also open to the idea that, through a trade-off mechanic in the skill tree, you could be afforded a higher heat cap at the expense of dissipation, for those who wish to continue the large alpha meta.

[Y E O N N E]

process, on 23 October 2018 - 06:09 AM, said:

I'm also open to the idea that, through a trade-off mechanic in the skill tree, you could be afforded a higher heat cap at the expense of dissipation, for those who wish to continue the large alpha meta.

That's what the SHS are for. SHS currently have 50% more cap and 36% less dissipation than DHS. If you want cap for a big alpha, and you are also willing to sacrifice engine size, you can boat SHS to get caps in the 70+ range.

[process]

Yeonne Greene, on 23 October 2018 - 06:51 AM, said:

That's what the SHS are for. SHS currently have 50% more cap and 36% less dissipation than DHS. If you want cap for a big alpha, and you are also willing to sacrifice engine size, you can boat SHS to get caps in the 70+ range.

That's true, but as you note there's structural cost to that, namely weight and crit space. I suppose that energy weapons tending to be lighter somewhat complements a SHS build's need for a greater tonnage investment, but I still think it's convoluted to couple weight, crit space and heat mechanics.

My preference would be to keep the behavior of heatsinks closely related and more of a straightforward weight/space trade-off. I think the skill tree is in a better position to enhance certain play styles without fundamentally affecting a build.

[Tombstoner]

process, on 23 October 2018 - 08:01 AM, said:

That's true, but as you note there's structural cost to that, namely weight and crit space. I suppose that energy weapons tending to be lighter somewhat complements a SHS build's need for a greater tonnage investment, but I still think it's convoluted to couple weight, crit space and heat mechanics.

My preference would be to keep the behavior of heatsinks closely related and more of a straightforward weight/space trade-off. I think the skill tree is in a better position to enhance certain play styles without fundamentally affecting a build.

Capacity should always have been set to 30 with no increase per heat sink. All capacity does is promote alpha strikes with peek and poke. Heat neutral mechs are considered bad by the designers, but they easily exist because of hard points. Balancing this game via factor models is fundamentally FUBAR... IT cant be done correctly. The game is operating in a tiny window that people seem to be willing to tolerate. A high alpha is not fundamental an issue. it's the ability to accurately place that hit all in one spot. That's why people do it. TTK has been and always will be too short. can increase armor per tone cause speed interacts with armor to make lights way to hard to kill. This is why PGI went crazy with mech quirks. they directly modified specific mechs with arbitrary bonuses. Don't get me started on art work and mech geometry interactions with TTK. Accuracy modifiers where always the only way to do balancing along with a complete departure from Table Top game stats. They kept too much of some and not enough of others and completely FUBARED heat management leading to today's topic once again.. alphas being too high and TTK too short makes focused fire way too easily an occurance.

[Kubernetes]

Tombstoner, on 24 October 2018 - 01:39 PM, said:

Capacity should always have been set to 30 with no increase per heat sink.

Low, static cap was tried on one of the public test servers. It was bad because it severely limited build diversity. Builds like the 4 ERPPC Warhawk were unplayable. So yeah, your suggestion was tried and it didn't work.

[Throe]

[delete by user]

Edited by Throe, 08 November 2018 - 03:38 PM.

[Dragonporn]

Seriously guys, this is total BS. Damage goes through the roof. Average damage for Mediums went easily around 500, often going towards 800+. I end matches in my freaking Osiris with 2 MGs and 5 Lasers over 500-700 almost every time. I could barely break 300 damage pre-patch. Heat management went outta window, you just running and gunning non-stop. This is ridiculous.

Pulling TTK even lower and increasing heat dissipation so hard literally turns this game into Quake 3 Arena with mechs. I really hope PGI makes some adjustments. It's not like it is unfair or anything, because having no heat to manage is beneficial to most builds out there, but game just doesn't feel like MechWarrior anymore...

[Rafe Yomin]

Nightbird, on 17 October 2018 - 05:54 AM, said:

Patch has so many obvious unintended consequences that the amount of time wasted for all the PTS sessions is appalling.

You still believe it's "unintended"? After people pointed out exactly what would happen on the forums, if the changes would go live, after people made video's showing the effect to be the exact opposite of what they stated they wanted to do?

Anyone who believes anything is "unintended" is more stupid than those of PGI who actually think we believe any word they're saying. After 6-7 years, people should know better. Otherwise they deserve whatever they get .

[Nightbird]

Rafe Yomin, on 25 October 2018 - 08:37 AM, said:

You still believe it's "unintended"? After people pointed out exactly what would happen on the forums, if the changes would go live, after people made video's showing the effect to be the exact opposite of what they stated they wanted to do?

Anyone who believes anything is "unintended" is more stupid than those of PGI who actually think we believe any word they're saying. After 6-7 years, people should know better. Otherwise they deserve whatever they get .

PGI states what they intend to do with each balance patches, issues they intend to address. You either have to take them at their word, and label effects outside of what they state as unintended, or you can just see them all as liars. I'd rather take view that it's the former.

Edited by Nightbird, 25 October 2018 - 01:21 PM.

[A Really Old Clan Dude]

Let me throw a curve ball at the high alpha laser vomit mechs.

Dont change the heat scale for them anymore, or range or anything.

Set the recharge of the each and every laser to be based on the engine size. Now I dont have the exact formula but for example a 200 engine will recharge 2 lasers at a time, 300, three at a time.

If you wait long enough between salvo you can still fire all of them but if you want to fire every 3 seconds you may not have all your lasers recharged yet. Having every laser recharging as soon as they fire it no different to an autocannon reload time. Lasers simply cause more heat. To say that one mechs recharge of 12 lasers is the same as one with 2 simply doesn't make sense.

It will also give you a reason to take mixed builds and much more like the stock builds.

[FupDup]

A Really Old Clan Dude, on 25 October 2018 - 01:34 PM, said:

Set the recharge of the each and every laser to be based on the engine size. Now I dont have the exact formula but for example a 200 engine will recharge 2 lasers at a time, 300, three at a time.

Bro, a mech built around laser boating is going to inherently have a higher engine size because of excess tonnage but needing more heatsink slots. You're just putting another nail in the coffin of low-engine cap mechs.

In general people need to stop suggesting additional nerfs to low-engine mechs. Being slow and having fewer internal heatsink slots is more than plenty of a downside.

Edited by FupDup, 25 October 2018 - 01:55 PM.

[Throe]

[delete by user]

Edited by Throe, 08 November 2018 - 03:35 PM.

[Shadowomega1]

Throe, on 25 October 2018 - 02:08 PM, said:

This isn't fair. You're replying to someone who is saying the consequences were both obvious and unintended, which is true and correct. Your accusation that the devs are openly intent to destroy the game is wrong. This is a prime example of Hanlon's razor: Never attribute to malice what can be better explained by ignorance or stupidity. In this case, specifically cognitive dissonance, but they're similar concepts. Either way it isn't malice.

I'm basing this on the graphs that were released with the changes. They're obviously still balancing via spreadsheet, which is known to have been a problem for some time now, and they just refuse to acknowledge it.

Yet on the boards people showed them the outcome with spreadsheets and we still got to were we are now. I even pointed out this back in my earlier posts about people wanting to properly curb high alphas. Most just want the weapons directly nerfed as they could spam away with another weapon, yet the cycle will come around again and slap that weapon system as well. Instead I propose a easier fix to high heat alpha completely removing all ways to add extra heat save one, skill tree, which would at best add 5 heat for a total of 35 heat. No weapons would need a nerfed, in fact many weapons would likely receive small buff or two. Yet people rattled against it and here we are.

[Aidan Crenshaw]

IIRC, the intention behind the heat changes was to reduce peak alpha sizes, not nerf Laservomit. Thus, while the overall DPS increased, the design goal was met.

[Y E O N N E]

Aidan Crenshaw, on 25 October 2018 - 09:42 PM, said:

IIRC, the intention behind the heat changes was to reduce peak alpha sizes, not nerf Laservomit. Thus, while the overall DPS increased, the design goal was met.

Pragmatically, nobody was really using the 71-78 point HLL+cERML vomit builds because they were already too hot for the kind of sustain you really want. Those are also the only builds that were rendered unusable by the heat changes. All other laser vomit builds are now stronger than they were.

process, on 23 October 2018 - 08:01 AM, said:

That's true, but as you note there's structural cost to that, namely weight and crit space. I suppose that energy weapons tending to be lighter somewhat complements a SHS build's need for a greater tonnage investment, but I still think it's convoluted to couple weight, crit space and heat mechanics.

My preference would be to keep the behavior of heatsinks closely related and more of a straightforward weight/space trade-off. I think the skill tree is in a better position to enhance certain play styles without fundamentally affecting a build.

Heat, weight, and crit space are the fundamental balancing tools of BattleTech and MechWarrior. Everything makes a trade-off in those areas to do what it does. Capacity vs. dissipation should not be in the tree because that renders the SHS moot while, at the same time, providing very little operational trade-off once in the match.

[Moldur]

It's a buff for everything but the hottest clan alphas I feel, My alpha warrior Cauldron Born of yore, 6xerml + 2xLPL almost shuts down and does less damage. It's only reduced by 6 damage, but still. I feel like damage is one of the only sacred lambs of MWO, but PGI has even gone as far as meddling with those ever since they needed a reason for heavy lasers to exists.

That's obviously a very fringe build. Your mid alpha IS builds are the sweet spot right now I think. Better heat, faster rate of fire, lower duration.

Honestly, I don't think the crusade against high alphas is justified. By high alphas, everyone means high alpha laser vomit builds, and they really mean high alpha clan laser vomit builds. They lost an ST instantly one time, or their light died, or it was the scape goat of their frustrating match. I'll tell you this. It's basically impossible to sling the same amount of damage as other solid builds unless the enemy just lets you. The prohibitive heat of each shot that you don't want to waste, and match time excludes the possibility normally. Besides targets that stand still, you're not really that great at anything. Its specialty is blowing STs on people that are standing still (or legs if you are a sadist). You also have incredibly long face time compared to everyone else. You're using a weapon (clan lasers) that PGI has practically relegated as an auxiliary/assist tool. Roll damage? Wasted shot. huge heat spike. Need to sit and cool-off, defenselessly.
Target close? Probably moving around. High duration and heat = really bad at close range.
Your mech is likely made of toothpicks and glue too or just has giant, easily identifiable torso segments (and no structure or armor quirks).
IS mech gets close = bad.
Fast mech = bad.
Mech with low face time that can return fire = very bad.

Most of the time, my giant clan laser builds (which have fallen out of favor for me) are putting out some mid range damage with their C-LPLs on targets of opportunity or chain firing some focus target while at 90% heat just to contribute damage for my teammates. Neither of which should be situations anywhere close to complaining about. No, the build is only OP when you're standing still in your brawler Griffin, oblivious, and someone blows your ST and XL in 1 go.

Edited by Moldur, 25 October 2018 - 09:57 PM.