63 replies to this topic

[Extra Guac]

killzone1, on 08 February 2020 - 02:10 PM, said:

Div 3
WLF-2 (6 energy -5% heat)
WLF-1 (5 energy +10% energy range)

Div 4
WLF-GR (5 energy)
WLF-1A (6 energy -10% laser duration)

Div 5
WLF-1B (5 energy -10% energy cooldown)

You never see WLF's in Solaris - I'd say they could all be bumped down by at least 1 division. WLF-1A > WLF-1 imo

The Hellbringer is still too high. It belongs in D5 or D6... maybe D7 if that's what it takes for them to win a match.

[pepe Le Peww]

I agree, they should probably all go down to D5 or D6. The bracketing really doesn't make a lot of sense. At least not for many of the mechs they threw into random divisions.

[Dionnsai]

The Solaris divisions are definitely more balanced now than they were in Season 1-2. That's clear.

However. As in every season, most clan mechs are overvalued by a division or so.

What Solaris needs now is someone from the dev team to actively participate with the Solaris playerbase and make some well thought out division changes. I don't think this has happened in quite awhile. It didn't happen at all going from season 7-8 obviously.

That said, I'm guessing with PGI's "budget cuts" and the majority of dev resources going to MW5, I doubt anything much will change, so this discussion is moot.

Bottom line for now, play the game you have, not the game you wish you had.

[C337Skymaster]

One change I'd like to see, and then iterate from there: adjust 'mechs by height, rather than by rank, just once. I'd love to see how a Piranha stacks up against a Wolfhound or a Jenner, but we'll never get that chance because the two never get to meet.

[Gilgamecc]

Yeah I think Solaris divisions should not pair up mechs that literally cannot shoot the other one. That's partly an artifact of the extreme physics issues of the Battletech universe and partly something that could be fixed by increasing the base torso pitch value to allow all mechs to shoot mechs standing directly in front of them on flat ground.

[C337Skymaster]

I know there's a height comparison chart of the original 16 Clan Omnimechs, where the Dasher is a little over 11m tall and the Executioner is only about 12.4m. If Mechs were that close to the same height, 20 tonners wouldn't stand a chance in a straight-up fight. Something that's plainly stated, repeatedly, in all of the source material...

Edited by C337Skymaster, 18 April 2020 - 08:32 PM.

[Sniper09121986]

C337Skymaster, on 18 April 2020 - 08:31 PM, said:

I know there's a height comparison chart of the original 16 Clan Omnimechs, where the Dasher is a little over 11m tall and the Executioner is only about 12.4m. If Mechs were that close to the same height, 20 tonners wouldn't stand a chance in a straight-up fight. Something that's plainly stated, repeatedly, in all of the source material...

Please. Not this again... The volumetric scaling is a hot mess no matter how you twist it. And TT canon is hardly any indication in that regard simply because it is irrelevant for TT purposes. Just let the sleeping dogs sleep. Please.

[Ghost Paladin117]

They seem to make Solaris changes simply off wins/losses and even if the mech is played at all.
It'll take a small miracle to see any further changes.

Edited by Ghost Paladin117, 21 April 2020 - 06:57 AM.

[C337Skymaster]

Sniper09121986, on 20 April 2020 - 09:01 AM, said:

Please. Not this again... The volumetric scaling is a hot mess no matter how you twist it. And TT canon is hardly any indication in that regard simply because it is irrelevant for TT purposes. Just let the sleeping dogs sleep. Please.

I agree: for literally any other purpose, it makes much more sense for the different 'mech tonnages to be relatively different sizes, and I even applaud PGI's efforts to correct TT anomalies and make the game more "realistic". But let's continue that "realism", combined with the source Lore, and not have 20-tonners pitted against 100 tonners unless the 100 tonners are able to fight back at all ranges, up to 0m. Hell, if they want, they can give us A-pods back, but make them powerful enough to take down a 'mech since we don't have infantry. We can still limit their range to 15 m in a 360 degree circle (30m across a hex). That way, if you're getting leg-humped, you set off the A-pod and obliterate the humper. "Realistically" you'd be able to kick it, instead, but since we can't have that...

[GARION26]

C337Skymaster, on 18 April 2020 - 08:31 PM, said:

I know there's a height comparison chart of the original 16 Clan Omnimechs, where the Dasher is a little over 11m tall and the Executioner is only about 12.4m. If Mechs were that close to the same height, 20 tonners wouldn't stand a chance in a straight-up fight. Something that's plainly stated, repeatedly, in all of the source material...

Which would be useless in this game as no one would want to pilot a light.
There is a reason BV values of light mechs are quite low compared to assaults of the same tech level.
The tabletop game has a way to incentivize us to sometimes want to field lights (building forces by BV, and filling tactical needs)

In a first person shooter with 'one life to live' per game there wouldn't be an incentive to pilot anything other then assaults if the BT lore was adhered to. There is a reason Phelan Ward gave up his Wolfhound for heavier mechs later in his career.

[Leone]

Table Top also allows for melee. First battletech game after a year of MWO and was rudely reminded of this when my opponent stomped all over my light swarm. Still barely eeked out a victory, but had to remember not to hug the opfor.

~Leone.

[C337Skymaster]

GARION26, on 27 May 2020 - 12:22 PM, said:

Which would be useless in this game as no one would want to pilot a light.
There is a reason BV values of light mechs are quite low compared to assaults of the same tech level.
The tabletop game has a way to incentivize us to sometimes want to field lights (building forces by BV, and filling tactical needs)

In a first person shooter with 'one life to live' per game there wouldn't be an incentive to pilot anything other then assaults if the BT lore was adhered to. There is a reason Phelan Ward gave up his Wolfhound for heavier mechs later in his career.

Nobody likes piloting light 'mechs now! So what would be the difference? Thing is, you're not SUPPOSED to be able to take a 20-tonner toe-to-toe with a 100 tonner and survive. The fact that you can shows the game is a bit broken, doncha think? If they adhered a bit more strongly to the lore, insofar as the power scale as you go up in tonnage, all that would do is change the style of play, not the equipment brought to the field.

Currently: the team is running ahead, and their Dire Wolf or Annihilator is being left behind at the back of the group, and a lone light 'mech from the other team comes running up behind it. Unless the assault has streaks and the means to overpower stealth armor, it's dead, guaranteed. The only thing that can save it is a mistake by the light pilot. That is not accurately representative of the power of an assault 'mech. However, if the light 'mech were easier for the assault to kill, all the light would have to do is not be harassing an assault at less than 200m range. (Peeking and poking from behind cover, 600 m away is still legit, and much more realistic). They would also be standing near their assaults, using them as shields while they combined fire. Scouts would stick to SCOUTING (looking from a ways away and reporting their findings back to the team) rather than thinking they can YOLO through the enemy and take out at least one, maybe two enemy 'mechs before being killed.

I haven't gotten to that book, yet, but Phelan upped his tonnage probably because he needed to be able to duel others of his rank who all piloted assault 'mechs, and who could all waste his Wolfhound with a single shot if they could land hits (which Conal Ward did land a few, but was a bit distracted). If he stuck to scouting, and only running into battle once he had assault 'mechs (such as Ranna's Warhawk) around to attract attention and dish out firepower, then his Wolfhound would be just fine. It was something about being Khan that made that position inadequate.

[dario03]

C337Skymaster, on 03 June 2020 - 08:53 PM, said:

Nobody likes piloting light 'mechs now! So what would be the difference? Thing is, you're not SUPPOSED to be able to take a 20-tonner toe-to-toe with a 100 tonner and survive. The fact that you can shows the game is a bit broken, doncha think? If they adhered a bit more strongly to the lore, insofar as the power scale as you go up in tonnage, all that would do is change the style of play, not the equipment brought to the field.

Currently: the team is running ahead, and their Dire Wolf or Annihilator is being left behind at the back of the group, and a lone light 'mech from the other team comes running up behind it. Unless the assault has streaks and the means to overpower stealth armor, it's dead, guaranteed. The only thing that can save it is a mistake by the light pilot. That is not accurately representative of the power of an assault 'mech. However, if the light 'mech were easier for the assault to kill, all the light would have to do is not be harassing an assault at less than 200m range. (Peeking and poking from behind cover, 600 m away is still legit, and much more realistic). They would also be standing near their assaults, using them as shields while they combined fire. Scouts would stick to SCOUTING (looking from a ways away and reporting their findings back to the team) rather than thinking they can YOLO through the enemy and take out at least one, maybe two enemy 'mechs before being killed.

I haven't gotten to that book, yet, but Phelan upped his tonnage probably because he needed to be able to duel others of his rank who all piloted assault 'mechs, and who could all waste his Wolfhound with a single shot if they could land hits (which Conal Ward did land a few, but was a bit distracted). If he stuck to scouting, and only running into battle once he had assault 'mechs (such as Ranna's Warhawk) around to attract attention and dish out firepower, then his Wolfhound would be just fine. It was something about being Khan that made that position inadequate.

A lone assault mech can beat a lone light mech in a lot of situations with or without streaks. So unless its a pure lrm boat assault or running no arm weapons and they get right on you a 1v1 should be fine.

Edited by dario03, 05 June 2020 - 01:11 AM.

[C337Skymaster]

dario03, on 05 June 2020 - 12:56 AM, said:

A lone assault mech can beat a lone light mech in a lot of situations with or without streaks. So unless its a pure lrm boat assault or running no arm weapons and they get right on you a 1v1 should be fine.

That hasn't been my experience, and I'm sure a lot of other pilots could attest to that, as well. If a 20 tonner wants to suck your ****, he's going to suck you to death, and even arm weapons can't save you. ONLY streaks will help in that situation, and only if you've got 20 or more tubes, so you can match his DPS. On top of that, to get a 0m streak lock with the current mechanics, your aim needs to be BETTER than that needed for a headshot. This is true up to 50m. In most other cases, it's the back they go for, and slow assaults such as Dire Wolves and Annihilators can't turn fast enough to shoot back against most lights. This would be less of an issue if they could actually turn their torsos 90 degrees, but most of them can't.

You cite the use of arm weapons, but you forget that most Clan 'mechs, and some IS ones don't have lower arm actuators, so their arms won't turn from side-to-side. On top of that, most IS 'mechs don't carry enough firepower in their arms to make a difference. The Atlas, for example, only carries a pair of mediums in the arms, and carries the rest of its weapons on its torso.

Edited by C337Skymaster, 05 June 2020 - 06:37 AM.

[Horseman]

Lower actuators are irrelevant, what gets assaults ganked by facehuggers is usually that they only mount torso weapons, and their pitch doesn't go low enough to get them on targets that are so close.

[dario03]

C337Skymaster, on 05 June 2020 - 06:20 AM, said:

That hasn't been my experience, and I'm sure a lot of other pilots could attest to that, as well. If a 20 tonner wants to suck your ****, he's going to suck you to death, and even arm weapons can't save you. ONLY streaks will help in that situation, and only if you've got 20 or more tubes, so you can match his DPS. On top of that, to get a 0m streak lock with the current mechanics, your aim needs to be BETTER than that needed for a headshot. This is true up to 50m. In most other cases, it's the back they go for, and slow assaults such as Dire Wolves and Annihilators can't turn fast enough to shoot back against most lights. This would be less of an issue if they could actually turn their torsos 90 degrees, but most of them can't.

You cite the use of arm weapons, but you forget that most Clan 'mechs, and some IS ones don't have lower arm actuators, so their arms won't turn from side-to-side. On top of that, most IS 'mechs don't carry enough firepower in their arms to make a difference. The Atlas, for example, only carries a pair of mediums in the arms, and carries the rest of its weapons on its torso.

My experience in an assault is that if a light gets on me I turn and shoot it, typically it either dies or runs away.
It definitely does not take better than headshot aim to get a streak lock sub 50m.
Using turn and twist you can usually get around fast enough to hit a light, if not you can spend some skill points on mobility if you think you are going to be getting in 1v1 assault vs light in qp a lot.
I'm pretty sure most clan mechs can run lower arm actuators, but they are also not required.
You can change the weapons in the arms.

Edited by dario03, 05 June 2020 - 10:22 AM.

[C337Skymaster]

dario03, on 05 June 2020 - 10:17 AM, said:

My experience in an assault is that if a light gets on me I turn and shoot it, typically it either dies or runs away.
It definitely does not take better than headshot aim to get a streak lock sub 50m.
Using turn and twist you can usually get around fast enough to hit a light, if not you can spend some skill points on mobility if you think you are going to be getting in 1v1 assault vs light in qp a lot.
I'm pretty sure most clan mechs can run lower arm actuators, but they are also not required.
You can change the weapons in the arms.

So, I run streaks frequently, because they're pretty easy to do well with, and I love watching 20-tonners explode in a puff of smoke. As such, I know with very high confidence that when PGI shrunk the lockon window, the difficulty in obtaining a target lock sub 50 m increased tenfold. It used to be that you just had to aim within the red lockon square. Now, the number of pixels on the screen where a target lock can be obtained does not change, even as the 'mech gets bigger in your viewscreen. Thus, at sub-50m, where the head hitbox is very large, it DOES take headshot-levels of precision to obtain a missile lock.

I also run stock loadouts, especially with clan 'mechs, because they're well built, and the Lore gives them some variation and purpose. Clan Omnimechs cannot run lower arm actuators with any arm mounted weapons apart from missiles and lasers. Battlemechs are different. Their actuators are fixed and cannot be modified. The only variant of the Dire Wolf which even presents the option of a lower arm actuator is the right-arm on the -A variant. Every other one is locked full-forward, only. The Dire Wolf can only look 60 degrees to each side, on top of that, which means it cannot engage in a circling duel, unless it is stopped and spinning on one spot, which makes it a very easy target. Even with most of the kinetic burst, speed tweak, and anchor turn nodes, the Dire Wolf is unable to spin fast enough to duel successfully with any 'mech moving faster than 130 kph. Even the 97 kph assailants present a challenge with bringing weapons to bear.

Going back to the Inner Sphere, as most arms were intended for use in melee combat on IS 'mechs, the vast majority of the weapons are torso-mounted for better protection. The weapons are also bigger and bulkier, again requiring torso-mounting to ensure that they fit.

It occurs to me that this is the Solaris section of the forum, as well, at which point 1v1 is guaranteed, due to the nature of the game, at which point 20-tonners in Division 2 can use ****-sucking as a primary tactic, since they don't have to worry about a second 'mech which can shoot them freely.

Edited by C337Skymaster, 05 June 2020 - 02:38 PM.

[C337Skymaster]

Tell you what, I challenge you to play 10 games in a Dire Wolf or Annihilator tonight, and the Annihilator is required to use a STD 200 engine. Atlas is also acceptable, but only up to a 300 rated engine. Get going nice and slow, with a complete inability to turn, and see how you fare in 1v1 duels with 20 ton 'mechs. Get yourself good and separated from your team if you want the real experience. Those times you see the light 'mech make one pass and run away occur when your teammates come quickly to your rescue and the fight is no longer 1v1.

[dario03]

C337Skymaster, on 05 June 2020 - 02:38 PM, said:

So, I run streaks frequently, because they're pretty easy to do well with, and I love watching 20-tonners explode in a puff of smoke. As such, I know with very high confidence that when PGI shrunk the lockon window, the difficulty in obtaining a target lock sub 50 m increased tenfold. It used to be that you just had to aim within the red lockon square. Now, the number of pixels on the screen where a target lock can be obtained does not change, even as the 'mech gets bigger in your viewscreen. Thus, at sub-50m, where the head hitbox is very large, it DOES take headshot-levels of precision to obtain a missile lock.

I also run stock loadouts, especially with clan 'mechs, because they're well built, and the Lore gives them some variation and purpose. Clan Omnimechs cannot run lower arm actuators with any arm mounted weapons apart from missiles and lasers. Battlemechs are different. Their actuators are fixed and cannot be modified. The only variant of the Dire Wolf which even presents the option of a lower arm actuator is the right-arm on the -A variant. Every other one is locked full-forward, only. The Dire Wolf can only look 60 degrees to each side, on top of that, which means it cannot engage in a circling duel, unless it is stopped and spinning on one spot, which makes it a very easy target. Even with most of the kinetic burst, speed tweak, and anchor turn nodes, the Dire Wolf is unable to spin fast enough to duel successfully with any 'mech moving faster than 130 kph. Even the 97 kph assailants present a challenge with bringing weapons to bear.

Going back to the Inner Sphere, as most arms were intended for use in melee combat on IS 'mechs, the vast majority of the weapons are torso-mounted for better protection. The weapons are also bigger and bulkier, again requiring torso-mounting to ensure that they fit.

It occurs to me that this is the Solaris section of the forum, as well, at which point 1v1 is guaranteed, due to the nature of the game, at which point 20-tonners in Division 2 can use ****-sucking as a primary tactic, since they don't have to worry about a second 'mech which can shoot them freely.

C337Skymaster, on 05 June 2020 - 02:42 PM, said:

Tell you what, I challenge you to play 10 games in a Dire Wolf or Annihilator tonight, and the Annihilator is required to use a STD 200 engine. Atlas is also acceptable, but only up to a 300 rated engine. Get going nice and slow, with a complete inability to turn, and see how you fare in 1v1 duels with 20 ton 'mechs. Get yourself good and separated from your team if you want the real experience. Those times you see the light 'mech make one pass and run away occur when your teammates come quickly to your rescue and the fight is no longer 1v1.

I have never heard anyone else make this headshot levels of precision claim. And since for some reason the whole balance of streaks is to make them an easy counter to lights I find it very unlikely that they would need such precision.

The Dire is one chassis, just about all the other clan assaults can have lower arm actuators. Sure you lose those actuators if you put ballistics in both arms of an omnimech but you don't have to do that on plenty of builds. You also don't have to have those actuators to fight mechs that are right up on you. And if you have difficulty with a light getting behind you, find a wall to back up to.

You can fit plenty of weapons on plenty of IS mech arms, you don't need the majority of assault weapons in the arms to fight a light, some spl or mpl as backup weapons is fine.

In solaris yes you could take a 20t mech and get right up on an assault, but if said assault is running arm mounted weapons they can shoot you.

And why am I required to run a small engine in that challenge?

Edited by dario03, 05 June 2020 - 03:12 PM.

[Horseman]

C337Skymaster, on 05 June 2020 - 02:38 PM, said:

I also run stock loadouts,

There's your problem.

C337Skymaster, on 05 June 2020 - 02:42 PM, said:

Tell you what, I challenge you to play 10 games in a Dire Wolf or Annihilator tonight, and the Annihilator is required to use a STD 200 engine. Atlas is also acceptable, but only up to a 300 rated engine.

Selecting mechs and optimizing your builds so that they're viable against most of the opponents you face is part of the game. If you refuse to do so (and "I run stock loadouts" is an implicit admission of that), don't be surprised when you lose. Nobody put a gun to your head and forced you to play stock mechs, you did that yourself.