448 replies to this topic

[Void Angel]

Bombast, on 21 August 2019 - 02:57 PM, said:

Without a doubt. It's weird how many people, bad or in this case good, don't seem to realize that maximizing engagement affects two things - What your team puts out, and what your team takes it.

How someone in the 99% percentile can think he's playing MWO on a one-way street is beyond me though.

It's because they get by with hand-eye coordination at first, then develop tactics by trial and error - this leads to generally good tactics, but also often causes uberitis. Note how much of Kusok's responses are simply ex cathedra pronouncements. He's not actually making an argument - he's presenting his opinion as fact. But while his stats show an effective player, his argument is only partially correct because of the exact same error that the OP made - disregarding the impact that damage rotation has on firepower, and thus being able to shoot as a team.

Uberitis is a terrifying illness.

[Tiantara]

PhoenixFire55, on 21 August 2019 - 03:26 PM, said:

Well one other argument I'd like to bring as a 98% percentile chap is that armor sharing concept we've discussed here so far had an assumption that all player on the team have equal potential contribution. However due to obvious skill difference between players it is just not so. In that context for example me sharing armor in order to prolong the life of someone who is significantly lower skill level might very well actually be counter-productive towards winning. I.e. even alone against 2 enemies I will be able to do more having full armor than me and say 40% percentile chap together while having half the armor both.

Now personally I don't give a sh*t and would still share armor in hopes of the other guy actually being usful, but still ... I know that it had bitten me in the azz more times than I can count. Its tricky ... you know all the "good" and "bad" players by now, but the middle ground of the playerbase is like a random numbers generator - sometimes they'll do the right thing and sometimes they'll decide to screw you and themselves over.

- Agree with said above. If you good at shoot and have nice suitable build, you can easy kill 2-3 heavy damaged players at the end of play and get victory to the team. But, if team die and left nearly half of enemy mech fresh... well, there nothing can help. Not sharing armor for nothing, not preserving armor for come back.
Same problem with players who run for speed and agility and put less ammo than need for play. "Walking stick" without ammo at the end really frustrating. Especially when enemy also have no weapon or ammo but have on 1 mech more than your team.
- That all about I said in previous comments. If I can deliver more damage and more accurate than pilots near me, why I need to run in not acceptable for my mech range and share armor to draw attention on me while others shoot into the air?
It's like - I have 45 pinpoint damage to target but I'm assault, so I need to become slow target for focused fire just to let my teammate do 5 damage or 15 because they not in range, have less weapon, overheat after each shoot, and have 15% chance to hit enemy already. If team let die their main damage cannons staying close like 80-120m by enemy fast light or by backstab attack - why share armor with such a team and even bother to playing moving target in shooting gallery.

- Ah,, somewhere up was said about kill stealing... In that game no such thing as kill stealing. If you die only to get solo kill - that plain not smart. And I really often see how pilots run into ambush only to catch some wounded light or do final blow to retreating heavy. Because of fear that someone kill their target. Team win or team got defeat. Only that matter. Pilot can heavy damage half of enemy team and don't kill anyone, but that greatly helps teammate. And he get kmdd and assist.
But run off to kill one and die with say... 230dmg - just one of many thing that make random more unpredictable and less strategic at all. And all you can - preserve armor, load more ammo, shoot more precise and hope that teammates do same and not only scratch their own targets.

[FRAGTAST1C]

Tiantara, on 21 August 2019 - 10:04 PM, said:

But run off to kill one and die with say... 230dmg - just one of many thing that make random more unpredictable and less strategic at all. And all you can - preserve armor, load more ammo, shoot more precise and hope that teammates do same and not only scratch their own targets.

That depends on the mech that you're piloting and on what you got a solo kill on, isn't it? When I used to pilot a Piranha, despite having bad stats, I'd quite often get a solo kill on Fafnirs or other assaults. Then, a minute or so later, I'd die having done 250-350 damage but I'd have got a solo kill. That's a trade that could be good if the team takes advantage of it. Other times, in the same Piranha, I'd get over 600 damage but it'd all be hit-n-run and not really get a good trade in terms of killing or even disabling some enemy mechs.

If you're an assault and kill an equally dangerous enemy assault by yourself, then that is a decent trade, which again depends on how your teammates react to the situation.

[YueFei]

OZHomerOZ, on 16 August 2019 - 06:47 PM, said:

Well yes maybe you can, but is it wise? I still think shooting the narc dude is a much much better thing to do compared to jumping in front of a narced team mate being shot by a lance of Supernova A's
BTW Did u survive your valiant Armour sharing?
Edit: Were you sharing armour or ECM?

I was sharing armor. The NARC dude wasn't in range for me to shoot at (he ran off; there's no reason for the NARCer to hold line-of-sight). My buddy was getting pounded, so I slid my mech in between the LRMs and my friend. Not like I need my arms anyway, there's nothing in them.

Quote

Yeah but even if shielded (torso twisting I'm guessing you mean that), a hit still reduces their pool of available armour.
They can't shield all day eventually they going to run out of shield.

If it's the only shot available, of course you still take it. It's the same concept in basketball, where if the shot clock is expiring, you should still jack up a shot no matter how awful its chances are. That doesn't change the fact that you still want to try to maximize the efficiency of your shots as much as you can.

Quote

All true, but done correctly, exposing a minimum of your mech and since your adding your fire to a mech that another team mate just shot.
That same team mate has already provided you with a distraction needed for a good trade.

As for fast reflexes required, I find its more about practice and body memory. Doh may be I got fast reflexes for an old guy.

Edit: IMO, Focus fire is King, sharing armour has its place I agree, I just think Focus fire is more important is all.

Edit: Spellingz, there to their

Focus fire is about deleting enemy mechs as efficiently as possible, armor sharing is about preventing that focus-fire from happening. I think we both agree.

The main point that I just wanted to address is to those people who believe that somehow focus-fire is always magically possible, thus armor sharing is impossible. But the enemy always gets a vote, as they say. Going back to the basketball analogy, yeah sure the layup is the most efficient shot, that doesn't mean the opposing team is always gonna let you have that shot.

[Tiantara]

FRAGTAST1C, on 21 August 2019 - 10:25 PM, said:

That depends on the mech that you're piloting and on what you got a solo kill on, isn't it? When I used to pilot a Piranha, despite having bad stats, I'd quite often get a solo kill on Fafnirs or other assaults. Then, a minute or so later, I'd die having done 250-350 damage but I'd have got a solo kill. That's a trade that could be good if the team takes advantage of it. Other times, in the same Piranha, I'd get over 600 damage but it'd all be hit-n-run and not really get a good trade in terms of killing or even disabling some enemy mechs.

If you're an assault and kill an equally dangerous enemy assault by yourself, then that is a decent trade, which again depends on how your teammates react to the situation.

- But all that sacrifice for the team and team victory make statistic worse. Yeap, you can heavy damage one mech by stripping half of weapon and kill another and die like with 300-350dmg, but you die and ratio show that you play less good than others.

[YueFei]

Void Angel, on 21 August 2019 - 09:02 PM, said:

It's because they get by with hand-eye coordination at first, then develop tactics by trial and error - this leads to generally good tactics, but also often causes uberitis. Note how much of Kusok's responses are simply ex cathedra pronouncements. He's not actually making an argument - he's presenting his opinion as fact. But while his stats show an effective player, his argument is only partially correct because of the exact same error that the OP made - disregarding the impact that damage rotation has on firepower, and thus being able to shoot as a team.

Uberitis is a terrifying illness.

Yep. Since I'm rolling with sports analogies, this would be like those star college athletes who have been able to get away with bad habits and subpar mechanics due to sheer athletic talent... but once they go to the Pro level, they suddenly find that they can't get away with those bad habits and mechanics anymore. Then they either turn a critical eye inward and re-vamp their mechanics and their game-IQ, or they crumple and wash out of the league.

[FRAGTAST1C]

Tiantara, on 21 August 2019 - 11:22 PM, said:

- But all that sacrifice for the team and team victory make statistic worse. Yeap, you can heavy damage one mech by stripping half of weapon and kill another and die like with 300-350dmg, but you die and ratio show that you play less good than others.

Sure, I'm not discounting the fact that surviving for the entirety of the match and constantly doing damage is what is required. But when a 20t light mech can single handedly take out a 100t assault before it can do any real damage, then that's a trade worth making. However, it is far too often some light mechs die within the first 15 seconds of getting to the centre instead of being patient. I'm not talking about those things.

Ultimately, some loadouts and some mechs are made to deal a lot of damage while some kill with surgical accuracy. Only those really good players can make almost any loadout work in their favour. If a guy like me can take out a Fafnir while piloting a Piranha and die after having done only 250-350 damage, then that's good for the team 'cause given my skill level, that's a decent contribution. If someone like "bear_cl4w" pilots a Piranha, he can destroy half the enemy team on his own.

Either way, I digress. I just wanted to address that point by saying that specific mechs, if they can get a solo kill on much higher tonnage mechs, then their contribution for that particular match is quite a good one.

[O L L O]

Tiantara, on 21 August 2019 - 11:22 PM, said:

- But all that sacrifice for the team and team victory make statistic worse. Yeap, you can heavy damage one mech by stripping half of weapon and kill another and die like with 300-350dmg, but you die and ratio show that you play less good than others.

He improved his win/loss ratio - the one stat to rule them all. A player with a better WL ratio trumps a player with a better KD ratio or higher end score. The game is about winning fights, not surviving or scoring high.

[Prototelis]

WLR is generally the best measure of a player.

However if you have a high WLR and low average scores its probably because you get carried, which when the game was more active was pretty common in GQ.

Edited by Prototelis, 22 August 2019 - 01:16 AM.

[Tiantara]

Prototelis, on 22 August 2019 - 12:45 AM, said:

WLR is generally the best measure of a player.

However if you have a high WLR and low average scores its probably because you get carried, which when the game was more often was pretty common in GQ.

- Best if everything depends on pilot. But if you loose not because you play bad, but because whole team got wiped - that a bit another thing. Its all about random and how lucky you are to get nice and smart team in whole.

[Prototelis]

You lose more often than you win because you play bad.

How do you not understand this by now?

[Tiantara]

Prototelis, on 22 August 2019 - 01:17 AM, said:

You lose more often than you win because you play bad.

How do you not understand this by now?

- Ahha... say that to my damage numbers.

Spoiler

[Prototelis]

Do you know what an outlier is?

[Tiantara]

Prototelis, on 22 August 2019 - 01:32 AM, said:

Do you know what an outlier is?

- So I have no choice than? Play only on best mech to make my WLR best and don't have fun with mech worse to play or play on every mech I like to have no matter how bad they are and how terrible their builds?

[Prototelis]

Do you expect me or anyone else to take you seriously because you've had a handful of good games?

Do you know what an outlier is?

[Teenage Mutant Ninja Urbie]

Tiantara, on 22 August 2019 - 01:49 AM, said:

- So I have no choice than? Play only on best mech to make my WLR best and don't have fun with mech worse to play or play on every mech I like to have no matter how bad they are and how terrible their builds?

dude, no.
on the contrary. I rarely play these days - but when I do, I (usually) bring my worst mechs to QP. literally the still fresh(ish) and unskilled ones. you have to work in these to get your numbers - and working means getting better at some aspect of the game.

if you don't wanna improve, then yes: slap some lurms onto anything, "do your damage" from behind and do what the rest of the farmers do.
but if you wanna improve, skill up your mechs and once finished, skill the next one. preferably something very different, so you learn a different aspect of the game.


and do fun stuff in between, when you're bored. you can't escape the nascar, but you can at least have fun from time to time

[Bombast]

Tiantara, on 22 August 2019 - 01:28 AM, said:

- Ahha... say that to my damage numbers.

Spoiler

Your average Match Score is around 200, give or take 10-20 depending on season. If you could break 1000 damage on a regular basis, that average would be more around 400.

You get lucky every once in a while. You are not a solid player.

Tiantara, on 22 August 2019 - 01:49 AM, said:

- So I have no choice than? Play only on best mech to make my WLR best and don't have fun with mech worse to play or play on every mech I like to have no matter how bad they are and how terrible their builds?

Based on this thread, your biggest problems appear to be positional and tactical. If you solve those two issues, you can often overcome most "non-optimal" mechs and builds and play some fun stuff.

Though, fair warning, my experience has been that the better one gets, the more frustrated one will become with their teammates behaving like... well, you. Frustration can lead to a desire to drive wins, and bing bang boom now you're running nothing but meta to try to compensate for people flanking in Jagers and hating every minute of it.

[Teenage Mutant Ninja Urbie]

Bombast, on 22 August 2019 - 05:01 AM, said:

Though, fair warning, my experience has been that the better one gets, the more frustrated one will become with their teammates behaving like... well, you. Frustration can lead to a desire to drive wins, and bing bang boom now you're running nothing but meta to try to compensate for people flanking in Jagers and hating every minute of it.

true, it's a trap.
but to quote Dune: "Knowing there is a trap is the first step in evading it."

that's what the Urbie K9 is for. or the LOLcust. or the Stealthmando. or driving a lurmboat when you're a dakka-enthusiast.
meta is all fine and dandy, and it exists for a reason. still.. can't change the nascar - CAN change your racing-car.

[Xiphias]

Tiantara, on 21 August 2019 - 10:04 PM, said:

Same problem with players who run for speed and agility and put less ammo than need for play. "Walking stick" without ammo at the end really frustrating. Especially when enemy also have no weapon or ammo but have on 1 mech more than your team.

Every choice in MWO is a tradeoff. You can go faster or you can take more ammo. Yes, sometimes players run out of ammo at the end of a match and lose because of it, however they've probably done enough damage to kill several mechs (unless their build is terrible).

Consider the other side though. How many matches do players die before they are able to use up all the ammo that they took? In these cases the extra tonnage could have been spent on something else that would have enabled them to survive longer and contribute more to the team. Outside of FP, more than 1000 damage worth of ammo is usually unnecessary. That's enough to solo kill at least 4 mechs if you're a good shot.

The best case scenario is that you kill the last enemy with your last shot. That means you took exactly the right amount of ammo. Taking a bit extra to be safe (and make up for the rest of your team) is fine, but if you are sacrificing speed/agility to take more ammo that you don't end up using, then you are handicapping yourself and weakening your team as a result.

Quote

It's like - I have 45 pinpoint damage to target but I'm assault, so I need to become slow target for focused fire just to let my teammate do 5 damage or 15 because they not in range, have less weapon, overheat after each shoot, and have 15% chance to hit enemy already. If team let die their main damage cannons staying close like 80-120m by enemy fast light or by backstab attack - why share armor with such a team and even bother to playing moving target in shooting gallery.

Getting focused down isn't what armor sharing is about, it's about preventing that for your team. I run a lot of lights. On the short range ones you have to rely on your team drawing enough attention to enable you to get close. I can actually kill mechs from behind faster than an assault because the back armor is significantly weaker. You might be doing more damage, but my damage is actually more effective, however I can't do that damage unless you move out of cover and draw fire.

That's just one example, but the bigger picture is that the more targets a team presents to the enemy the harder it is to focus them down and the longer you are able to keep your teammates alive the more guns you keep up and more damage the team can do. All of these things drive wins.

Tiantara, on 21 August 2019 - 11:22 PM, said:

- Best if everything depends on pilot. But if you loose not because you play bad, but because whole team got wiped - that a bit another thing. Its all about random and how lucky you are to get nice and smart team in whole.

Over a large number of matches the randomness cancels out though. Everyone else is also playing all their matches with/against random teams, yet good players are able to get higher WLRs and weaker players have lower ones. The reason for this is that there is one consistent factor in every match you play and that factor is you.

You might unavoidably lose an single match do to factors outside of your control, however if you are consistently losing more matches than you win it means that there is something you are doing (or aren't doing) that is causing you to lose matches.

[Jman5]

Bombast, on 22 August 2019 - 05:01 AM, said:

Though, fair warning, my experience has been that the better one gets, the more frustrated one will become with their teammates behaving like... well, you. Frustration can lead to a desire to drive wins, and bing bang boom now you're running nothing but meta to try to compensate for people flanking in Jagers and hating every minute of it.

It's why I don't try to focus too much on wins and instead just try to focus on simply playing whatever I'm piloting better. Wins are an objectively good metric in a certain sense because it cuts through a lot of the variables. However, in terms of trying to get better, a win or a loss is too binary in the short term. WLR is an end product of a season, but the number itself doesn't really provide a very useful insight other than: I'm doing something(s) better/worse than before. Matchscore has its own problems, but because it's more granular it's easier to see what is changing.

Also, you can't fixate on the mistakes others are making, or it will drive you insane. Sure it's useful to note how they screwed up in order to learn, but the main focus needs to be on the mistakes you made or improvements you could make. It doesn't matter where you rank on the leaderboard, you have to remember that there is always more to learn, always mistakes to correct, always improvements to make.

I had a brutal loss on River City yesterday despite being up 4. I had no clue what happened until I watched the recording. It turned out that 4 guys on my team got absolutely shredded when they inexplicably decided to charge straight into the 5 or 6 enemy mechs while the rest of the team was going the other way.

Clearly that turned an easy win into a nail biter. However, when I look at my own performance, I was too focused on what was in front of me to even notice that a chunk of my team was plunging to their deaths. If I had been paying attention I would have known that we were in trouble and I would have pushed harder. If I had drop called we likely would have had an easy win. There was also some early game things I could have done differently. Going forward I'm going to make it a point of emphasis to try to pay attention better to improve my map awareness. Also next time I get River City, I'm going to do my early game positioning differently.

None of that would have been learned if I had just stopped at: Well these dodos on my team suicided so we lost. GG.