629 replies to this topic

[Meep Meep]

Captain Caveman DE, on 15 January 2022 - 06:43 AM, said:

it is as astonishing as it is kinda sad that this topic never seems to die..

Getting taken out in a couple of seconds when your attention lapses for a moment especially when you are in a fresh mech can be somewhat annoying for certain people. They then come here to vent.

[AwDangit]

Lights, especially piranhas, are annoying. I literally just got wrecked by a couple in the first minute of my last match. The remedy isn't nerfs or whining, it's solid communication and a varied mix of mechs on the team. Both of which can be super rare in QP.

I will say, piranha pilots weren't loved enough as children.

[Der Geisterbaer]

ThreeStooges, on 15 January 2022 - 04:45 PM, said:

I find it funny the last two pages have been about the two most meta clan lights with their 50-53 alpha in 4 seconds etc.

The question there is: Are those two (three) PIR variants really the "two most meta clan lights"? I do seem to recall that the most recent comp tournament saw quite a few other Lights as far more "meta" and even in my (overall limited) experiences in QP the number of PIRs I get to see isn't truly the highest of all Lights ... even when I'm driving one of my PIRs myself.

So what is your definition of "meta" in this case?

**************************

Since SharDar didn't want to do further testing now let's have a little bit of fun with maths ...

• Consider his original "best [ideal] case" scenario with both attacker and target being stationary targets
  
• Critical damage to systems is ignored to keep things simple
  
• All calculations are done without any kind of cooldown or laser duration or heat / coolrun / heat capacity skill nodes. Mech specific quirks are included
  
• As target we do have the also unskilled and stock AS7-D with its 28 points of rear center torso armor and 62 points of structure. Lower rear armor would indeed change some of the numbers but not necessarily in the way one might expect.
  
• Loadouts must be able to deliver the required damage without shutting the mech down before the kill occurs

=> The goal is to look at how long it takes a particular mech to deliver 90 points of damage at what range (based on loadout) with which actual engagement times "on target" ("burn" times and projectile travel times).



Note: I could have ignored projectile travel times in some of the calculations but I have included them in general regardless.

Let's start with the 3 clan heavy small laser + 12 clan machine gun PIR-1:

• minimum time to kill (total 90 points of damage applied): 5.264s (1.1s of combined laser + machine gun fire + 3.75 exclusive machine gun fire + 0.414s of next combined laser + machine gun fire
  
• actual engagement time on target (uninterrupted fire with used weapons): 5.264s
  
• max range to target with this loadout: 130m

Next let's look at a 3 clan heavy small laser + 12 micro pulse laser PIR-2:

• minimum time to kill (total 90 points of damage applied): 4.249s (2 full cycles for the pulse laser + a small fraction of the third pulse burn)
  
• actual engagement time on target (uninterrupted fire with used weapons): 1.649s (1.1s for heavy smalls [includes first pulse burn due to overlap] + 0.5s [second pulse burn] + 0.049s [fraction of the third pulse burn])
  
• max range to target with this loadout: 130m

Now let's see for a 2 heavy gauss + 6 med pulse laser Annihilator ANH-1X:

• minimum time to kill (total 90 points of damage applied): 3.207s (1 full cycle for the pulse lasers + a fraction of the second pulse burn)
  
• actual engagement time on target (uninterrupted fire with used weapons): 0.903s (charge time gauss [includes first pulse burn due to overlap] + travel time for max range to target with this loadout + fraction of second pulse burn)
  
• max range to target with this loadout: 220m

How about a Marauder IIC with 6 clan er medium lasers + 2 clan large pulse lasers?

• minimum time to kill (total 90 points of damage applied): 5,162s (1 full cycle for large pulse [includes first er medium burn time due to overlap] + 96.2% of the 2nd pulse burn)
  
• actual engagement time on target (uninterrupted fire with used weapons: 2.112s (1.15s for er medium burn [includes first pulse burn due to overlap] + 0.962s from second large pulse burn)
  
• max range to target with this loadout: 400m

Ofc we could have a look at a Blackjack 3 with 2 heavy PPCs ...

• minimum time to kill (total 90 points of damage applied): 10.351s (2 full heavy ppc cycles [cooldown exceeds traveling time] + travel time on third salvo)
  
• actual engagement time on target: strictly speaking here it would converge to 0 which doesn't occur in actual gameplay and since so far I included travel times to the max range it'll be the same here: 3 x 0.351 = 1.053s
  
• max range to target with this loadout: 590m (rounded down from 591).

At this point I can't be bothered to look at other mechs / builds because it should have become quite obvious already that the PIR-1 has seriously long engagement times at the closest range with not even the lowest minimum time to kill. Even the far more dangerous PIR-2 isn't the top dog when it comes to either of the inspected values. Will you be able to find builds that can't compete with these numbers within the same constraints? Sure as hell you will but you will still find more than enough others that will also beat those PIR numbers in one way or another if not all and once you take away the ideal scenario things become even worse for those "OP" PIRs.




Side note: The values for PIR-1 and PIR-2 confirm the values witnessed by SharDar once you account for margin of error in his methodology and the fact that he used quirked versions of the mechs.

And with this we can now go back to the lamenting about overpowered Lights ~laugh~

Edited by Der Geisterbaer, 16 January 2022 - 09:52 AM.

[ScrapIron Prime]

Well I think the point is how quickly one can kill with a mech that could conceivably get behind the target in short order. We know an Annihilator can crank out the damage, but Waddles McDeath isn't going to be outflanking anyone 99 times out of 100.

However... I can do the same thing with a Phoenix Hawk or a Blackjack from 300m away. 2 LL and 6 ML and 100kph and decent heat... Those mechs can dish out 96 damage in 5.5 seconds... counting the 3.5 second cooldown time for the larges.

And a Hunchback IIc or Nova can dish out 122 damage in that time frame from 400m and is just slightly slower. (I for one will be using my shiny free Hunchback IIC-A for precisely this!)

So really the issue isn't that light mechs are more powerful than assault mechs... its that assault mechs should never operate alone and should watch their six!

Edited by ScrapIron Prime, 17 January 2022 - 10:13 AM.

[DaZur]

ScrapIron Prime, on 17 January 2022 - 10:07 AM, said:

So really the issue isn't that light mechs are more powerful than assault mechs... its that assault mechs should never operate alone and should watch their six!

Get out of here with that logic nonsense!!!

[caravann]

It is part of lore.

The very first Mechs were assaults with convoy of tanks, The tanks were replaced with medium mechs

Further in timeline clan gets exoskeleton squad based infantry able to to take down assaults.

If the timeline gets even further I'd expect that there be nanobots able to take down an assault by itself and the battles goes away from land to air with reintroduce of aerofighters.

[Michael Abt]

As a dedicated light and medium player the current event offered the opportunity to follow the advice in this thread, and I tried out the other side of the fence. I bought a Stalker Misery, decked it out, and went working on the ballistic and energy challenges with it.


Light mechs*: 47 matches, WL 1.14, KD 1.65, AMS 235
*Oxide only. I have >3k matches in that mech, so I know my way around

Assault mechs*: 26 matches, WL 1.89, KD 2.20, AMS 284
*Misery only

(Edit: leaderboard data as of 19-01-22)

The majority of my matches in assaults is from FP, and a peek into my Jarl's list confirms that I have little experience with assault mechs.

https://leaderboard....h?u=michael+abt


My impression piloting the Misery literally was: "Woah! That is easy mode compared to my Oxide."

Edited by Michael Abt, 20 January 2022 - 12:04 PM.

[Blood Rose]

Hey guys, I was in my Marauder 2c last night and I found a cure to Light mechs.
The trick is to sneak up behind them and dump a gauss+many CERLL into their CT. Or equivalent.
My other trick for Assault pilots, as I discovered in my Corsair, is to get close to the cocky Light and teach him the meaning of FEAR with amassed, relentless, gunfire at point blank.

[ScrapIron Prime]

Blood Rose, on 19 January 2022 - 02:41 PM, said:

Hey guys, I was in my Marauder 2c last night and I found a cure to Light mechs.
The trick is to sneak up behind them and dump a gauss+many CERLL into their CT.

[Blood Rose]

ScrapIron Prime, on 19 January 2022 - 02:45 PM, said:

Poof

[Michael Abt]

ScrapIron Prime, on 19 January 2022 - 02:45 PM, said:

Something like that happened to me the other day in my Oxide. I ran around a corner into an assault, got one volley off before i made...

Poof

[Curccu]

Michael Abt, on 19 January 2022 - 01:31 PM, said:

My impression piloting the Misery literally was: "Woah! That is easy mode compared to my Oxide."

Well Oxide is hardmode compared to almost anything else that isn't jenner.
Played few games with Oxide during xmas vacation and it was just CT with legs, every game death by CT while sidetorsos were fresh and no I wasn't staring opponents. for some reason Jenner IIC Fury which I also played didn't as massive problem dying by CT even if is staring build (HMGs + SPL)

[Michael Abt]

Curccu, on 19 January 2022 - 11:38 PM, said:

Well Oxide is hardmode compared to almost anything else that isn't jenner.
Played few games with Oxide during xmas vacation and it was just CT with legs, every game death by CT while sidetorsos were fresh and no I wasn't staring opponents. for some reason Jenner IIC Fury which I also played didn't as massive problem dying by CT even if is staring build (HMGs + SPL)

Yeah, I know my Oxide isn't exactly on top of the food chain. ^^ I do like playing my underdog mechs though because it is more challenging, high risk high reward.

Usually I die to ST hits thanks to IS XL engine. Maybe you are more used to piloting heavies and assaults than lights? Some movement patterns and behavior vital to those weight classes are a bad choice to outright deadly for a light. It is difficult to break up trained habits. I noticed when piloting the Misery. My HBK-4G(F) has the autocannon installed on the right side, Misery on the left side. In the Misery I lost the AC20 a few times because my HBK reflex let me twist to the wrong side. ^^

[Curccu]

Michael Abt, on 20 January 2022 - 12:03 PM, said:

Yeah, I know my Oxide isn't exactly on top of the food chain. ^^ I do like playing my underdog mechs though because it is more challenging, high risk high reward.

Usually I die to ST hits thanks to IS XL engine. Maybe you are more used to piloting heavies and assaults than lights? Some movement patterns and behavior vital to those weight classes are a bad choice to outright deadly for a light. It is difficult to break up trained habits. I noticed when piloting the Misery. My HBK-4G(F) has the autocannon installed on the right side, Misery on the left side. In the Misery I lost the AC20 a few times because my HBK reflex let me twist to the wrong side. ^^

I try to play all the weight classes pretty evenly (28% is most played weight class in Jarl's) and I totally suck at assaults in quickplay, specially playing solo. I had more than 100 higher average matchscore with lights than assaults December .

But yeah Lights are most fun in QP IMO, I could play some metavomit hbr/ebj and have about 400 AVG matchscore but it is so boring that I rarely play those.

[GoodTry]

Cauldron is adjusting crit chance in March to make main guns less likely to be crit. Per Navid, the time for a machine gun mech to crit out components should go, for example, from 0.9s to ~1.2s - a 30% increase. It will be interesting to see how this affects light mech play with MG-heavy lights (Myst Lynx, Piranha).

[Der Geisterbaer]

GoodTry said:

Cauldron is adjusting crit chance in March to make main guns less likely to be crit. Per Navid, the time for a machine gun mech to crit out components should go, for example, from 0.9s to ~1.2s - a 30% increase.

~puh~ So the "knive" get's blunted without compensation thus putting even more emphasis on those - by comparison - prolonged / uninterrupted close range engagements where the attacking mech must stare at its target without much wiggle room for torso twists.

GoodTry said:

It will be interesting to see how this affects light mech play with MG-heavy lights (Myst Lynx, Piranha).

You'll most likely see them less often (which - at least for PIR-1 - isn't that often in my experience to begin with unless I'm the one bringing them in the first place) but they won't be the ones that actually will suffer the most. The actual "victims" are likely going to be machine gun centric builds on LCT-1V, LCT- 3V, LCT-PB, FLE-19, FLE-FA, FS9-E, FS9-FS, JVN-11F, OSR-1P, RVN-H, ACH-E, JR7-IIC-FY and KFX-PR

Edited by Der Geisterbaer, 25 January 2022 - 02:27 PM.

[MW Waldorf Statler]

its a Rule of Nature ...



nerf hyenas

Quote

[color=#959595]I try to play all the weight classes pretty evenly (28% is most played weight class in Jarl's) and I totally suck at assaults in quickplay, specially playing solo. I had more than 100 higher average matchscore with lights than assaults December [/color][color=#959595][/color][color=#959595].[/color][color=#959595]

But yeah Lights are most fun in QP IMO, I could play some metavomit hbr/ebj and have about 400 AVG matchscore but it is so boring that I rarely play those.[/color]
<p class="ipsLikeBar right clearfix" id="rep_post_6442938" style="margin: 10px 0px; padding: 0px; float: right; font-size: 11px;">

• Blood Rose likes this
  
• Like This

im a Old Mechpilot ,plays 10 years in league Fights in mW4 , here since the first days,
i don't like to play assaults if i'm not in a group and can rely on the others, and now without a group only once in a while ,but without counting on great chances of survival as prime target ,and am satisfied if i could make one or more kills and 400+ damage before i die

Edited by MW Waldorf Statler, 25 January 2022 - 09:38 PM.

[Meep Meep]

GoodTry, on 25 January 2022 - 01:20 PM, said:

Cauldron is adjusting crit chance in March to make main guns less likely to be crit. Per Navid, the time for a machine gun mech to crit out components should go, for example, from 0.9s to ~1.2s - a 30% increase. It will be interesting to see how this affects light mech play with MG-heavy lights (Myst Lynx, Piranha).

Is this only for main guns or also other stuff like engines, ecm, heatsinks etc? In conjunction with many mechs having a hefty crit reduction quirk this could be a major nerf to mg.

[Der Geisterbaer]

Meep Meep, on 25 January 2022 - 09:37 PM, said:

Is this only for main guns or also other stuff like engines, ecm, heatsinks etc? In conjunction with many mechs having a hefty crit reduction quirk this could be a major nerf to mg.

ⁿ

Given that the game doesn't actually know what a mech's "main" weapon is and trying to have different crit chances for different systems would require actual programming where the Cauldron so far could only get XML changes done I would say that if machine gun crit chances are going to be changed then we're indeed talking a massive nerf to the weapon system itself.

[Weeny Machine]

GoodTry, on 25 January 2022 - 01:20 PM, said:

Cauldron is adjusting crit chance in March to make main guns less likely to be crit. Per Navid, the time for a machine gun mech to crit out components should go, for example, from 0.9s to ~1.2s - a 30% increase. It will be interesting to see how this affects light mech play with MG-heavy lights (Myst Lynx, Piranha).

This is a good example why balancing by Excel spreadsheet is a bad idea.
Which class is nearly exclusively MGs? Light mechs. What does this build require? Uptime on target, very close range which make it a risky playstyle. One good hit from most assaults is enough to take a limb from a light or kill it outright.

So, in short we have here a basically direct nerf to light mechs and risk vs. reward mechanism gets further screwed with ZERO compensation.

And that's the reason why you see so much laser vomit and sniping: it is easy to use, relatively safe, needs not much up-time, and works on all range more or less well.