74 replies to this topic

[pattonesque]

GoodTry, on 07 December 2021 - 07:14 AM, said:

Do you like out-of-nowhere 50-pt alphas?

The ECM helps but the MAD-4L has to expose the entire mech to get that alpha off. If it does this enough times to kill me without me dealing with it it's kinda on me

[pbiggz]

GoodTry, on 07 December 2021 - 07:14 AM, said:

Do you like out-of-nowhere 50-pt alphas?

Im not accusing you of saying its OP. You get credit for being more nuanced than that. I am pushing back against this fear of power. Mechs should be strong. They should be fun to play. The marauder II is a beautiful example of a mech that is fun to play when played well. Putting those alphas down range feels fantastic, but it has numerous easy ways to counter it to mitigate or eliminate it as a threat. It's made of paper. It's slow. It has to show itself entirely to fire. Stealth armour makes it more usable, but vastly limits its DPS due to heat buildup. If someone closes, you have to turn stealth off, meaning other people are more likely to detect you and come for you.

Aside from that, there are lots of mechs, brawlers, and snipers, who can put similar alphas into people. The OP of this thread is singling out the marauder II because its an inner sphere PPC gauss sniper. People are still traumatized by fake memories of the PPC gauss poptart meta, and OP in particular is just using this as a trojan horse to push his fake Inner Sphere Overpowered narrative, which is laughable, and should be dismissed out of hand.

Edited by pbiggz, 07 December 2021 - 07:23 AM.

[GoodTry]

pattonesque, on 07 December 2021 - 07:21 AM, said:

The ECM helps but the MAD-4L has to expose the entire mech to get that alpha off. If it does this enough times to kill me without me dealing with it it's kinda on me

Again, I'm not saying it's OP. It's just not a good dynamic for the game to have big PPFLD alphas flying around from mechs that can easily hide and position anywhere. "Live in fear" is not a fun game mode.

What do you think it adds to the game?

[pbiggz]

GoodTry, on 07 December 2021 - 07:28 AM, said:

Again, I'm not saying it's OP. It's just not a good dynamic for the game to have big PPFLD alphas flying around from mechs that can easily hide and position anywhere. "Live in fear" is not a fun game mode.

What do you think it adds to the game?

Nobody is living in fear man. This phobia of making mechs good needs to be discarded.

[pattonesque]

GoodTry, on 07 December 2021 - 07:28 AM, said:

Again, I'm not saying it's OP. It's just not a good dynamic for the game to have big PPFLD alphas flying around from mechs that can easily hide and position anywhere. "Live in fear" is not a fun game mode.

What do you think it adds to the game?

it kinda adds the -4L to the game, no? I probably wouldn't play it if it could only manage a 40-point alpha. too many downsides otherwie

[GoodTry]

pattonesque, on 07 December 2021 - 07:36 AM, said:

it kinda adds the -4L to the game, no? I probably wouldn't play it if it could only manage a 40-point alpha. too many downsides otherwie

In other words, sure, we all have to worry about out-of-nowhere 50pt PPFLD alphas, but at least the MAD-4L (one of 500+ variants) is played more now. Even if people still generally do poorly in it.

If you want the MAD-4L to be played more, quirk it in a more traditional way. Give it twice the heat quirk. Then it can spam ERLL+Gauss alphas all day. Give it a huge range quirk, or a cooldown quirk plus an ECM quirk.

There are all kinds of ways to make people play the MAD-4L that don't negatively affect play for other players.

Edited by GoodTry, 07 December 2021 - 07:46 AM.

[pbiggz]

GoodTry, on 07 December 2021 - 07:42 AM, said:

In other words, sure, we all have to worry about out-of-nowhere 50pt PPLD alphas, but at least the MAD-4L (one of 500+ variants) is played more now.

If you want the MAD-4L to be played more, quirk it in a more traditional way. Give it twice the heat quirk. Then it can spam ERLL+Gauss alphas all day. Give it a huge range or cooldown quirk.

There are all kinds of ways to make people play the MAD-4L that don't negatively affect play for other players.

Any way you slice it, making a mech good could be construed as "negatively affecting play for other players" because the game is entirely about shooting the bad robots. You're presenting a balance objective that's basically impossible to quantify beyond "you don't like getting sniped".

[Teenage Mutant Ninja Urbie]

pattonesque, on 07 December 2021 - 07:36 AM, said:

it kinda adds the -4L to the game, no? I probably wouldn't play it if it could only manage a 40-point alpha. too many downsides otherwie

a good point to make; it's -one- mech to do the 50pt alpha, that otherwise wouldn't see play -at all-
now, ofc there could have been other ways to make it 'playable', but the cauldron chose that way.
and I'm really not opposed to it and think that it's a unique thing that 'adds' to the game as a whole.

now, if it's overdone I'm sure we have enough eyes on it to hammer it down in a next pass a peg or 2.
don't see that happening because of QP though

Edited by Teenage Mutant Ninja Urbie, 07 December 2021 - 07:55 AM.

[pattonesque]

Teenage Mutant Ninja Urbie, on 07 December 2021 - 07:55 AM, said:

a good point to make; it's -one- mech to do the 50pt alpha, that otherwise wouldn't see play -at all-
now, ofc there could have been other ways to make it 'playable', but the cauldron chose that way.
and I'm really not opposed to it and think that it's a unique thing that 'adds' to the game as a whole.

now, if it's overdone I'm sure we have enough eyes on it to hammer it down in a next pass a peg or 2.
don't see that happening because of QP though

yeah like, also actually landing that 50-point PPFLD alpha is not terribly easy. If someone is standing still, sure, but the two weapon systems are split between high torso and low arms and the velocity isn't that good. It's a 50-point alpha but you really have to wrangle it, and if you're able to wrangle it given all the disadvantages, why shouldn't it be rewarding?

[GoodTry]

pattonesque, on 07 December 2021 - 08:30 AM, said:

It's a 50-point alpha but you really have to wrangle it, and if you're able to wrangle it given all the disadvantages, why shouldn't it be rewarding?

That's a pretty narrow view, that ignores the change in gameplay for the other players.

Basically what you're saying is that it's still hard for people to have fun in the 4L, even if at the same time they are making others have less fun when they do land the 50-pt PPFLD alphas from out of nowhere.

So we made a 50-pt PPFLD alpha mech with JJ's and ECM, and decreased fun for everyone—those who play it and those who don't. Winning!

Edited by GoodTry, 07 December 2021 - 08:37 AM.

[pbiggz]

GoodTry, on 07 December 2021 - 08:34 AM, said:

That's a pretty narrow view, that ignores the change in gameplay for the other players.

Basically what you're saying is that it's still hard for people to have fun in the 4L, even if at the same time they are making others have less fun when they do land the 50-pt PPFLD alphas from out of nowhere.

So we made a 50-pt PPFLD alpha mech with JJ's and ECM, and decreased fun for everyone—those who play it and those who don't. Winning!

First, you are suggesting that the presence of the 4L is "decreasing fun". That's an assertion backed up only by the bad faith arguments of the OP.

Second, PPFLD is not the bogeyman its made out to be, especially when its tied to a notoriously fragile and ungainly hundred tonner.

[pattonesque]

GoodTry, on 07 December 2021 - 08:34 AM, said:

That's a pretty narrow view, that ignores the change in gameplay for the other players.

Basically what you're saying is that it's still hard for people to have fun in the 4L, even if at the same time they are making others have less fun when they do land the 50-pt PPFLD alphas from out of nowhere.

So we made a 50-pt PPFLD alpha mech with JJ's and ECM, and decreased fun for everyone—those who play it and those who don't. Winning!

well, no, it's fun when you get it right. And if I'm noticing one on the battlefield and I successfully take it down, it's also fun. descending on one of those with an SRM Arctic Wolf is fantastic, for instance. Getting hit by that 50-point alpha sucks but so does a 70-point alpha from a Dire Wolf or a 105-point double-tap from a FNR-6U and I don't think either of those are OP

[GoodTry]

pattonesque, on 07 December 2021 - 08:49 AM, said:

Getting hit by that 50-point alpha sucks but so does a 70-point alpha from a Dire Wolf or a 105-point double-tap from a FNR-6U and I don't think either of those are OP

The difference is that the other alphas are not PPFLD, and can be rolled. Other 50-pt PPFLD alphas are shorter range (2HGR), suffer ghost heat, or come from big mechs without ECM+JJs.

And I'm not saying they are OP. I'm saying they are more annoying to play against than they are worth, so they are a net negative for the game.

Edited by GoodTry, 07 December 2021 - 08:55 AM.

[pbiggz]

GoodTry, on 07 December 2021 - 08:52 AM, said:

The difference is that the other alphas are not PPFLD, and can be rolled. Other 50-pt PPFLD alphas are shorter range (2HGR) or come from big mechs without ECM+JJs.

And I'm not saying they are OP. I'm saying they are more annoying to play against than they are worth.

It doesn't matter if a laser alpha can be rolled, they're often twice as big.

[GoodTry]

pbiggz, on 07 December 2021 - 07:22 AM, said:

The marauder II is . . . made of paper.

Where do you get the idea that the MAD-4L is "made of paper"? It's a 100-tonner that has more armor and is more agile than a King Crab, Dire Wolf, Fafnir or Kodiak.

It looks like literally the only mech in a game that it not "made of paper" by your standards would be the Atlas?

[Brauer]

GoodTry, on 07 December 2021 - 07:28 AM, said:

Again, I'm not saying it's OP. It's just not a good dynamic for the game to have big PPFLD alphas flying around from mechs that can easily hide and position anywhere. "Live in fear" is not a fun game mode.

What do you think it adds to the game?

The 4L can neither hide easily (it's huge and had to expose a lot) not position everywhere (usually carries a single JJ and is quite slow). It deserves a bit of a tweak imo and will get one, but it's not some ridiculous mech.

[GoodTry]

Brauer, on 07 December 2021 - 09:19 AM, said:

The 4L can neither hide easily (it's huge and had to expose a lot) not position everywhere (usually carries a single JJ and is quite slow). It deserves a bit of a tweak imo and will get one, but it's not some ridiculous mech.

You didn't answer my question.

[Brauer]

GoodTry, on 07 December 2021 - 09:21 AM, said:

You didn't answer my question.

It adds a niche for the 4L and an additional mech and build for people to play.

[GoodTry]

Brauer, on 07 December 2021 - 09:22 AM, said:

It adds a niche for the 4L and an additional mech and build for people to play.

Is that worth other players having to hide from 50-pt PPFLD alphas flying around? I'm guessing your answer is yes, but mine is no.

There are so many other ways to make the MAD-4L more playable.

[Brauer]

GoodTry, on 07 December 2021 - 09:24 AM, said:

Is that worth other players having to hide from 50-pt PPFLD alphas flying around? I'm guessing your answer is yes, but mine is no.

There are so many other ways to make the MAD-4L more playable.

1. I don't see a lot of 4Ls about
2. You have misrepresented what the mech is capable of a number of times
3. It's not unique