TheUltimateGhost, on 23 January 2022 - 07:17 AM, said:
Okay so if I understand you right, you're saying that balancing lock-ons around top players will make lock-ons unusable for lower-tier players (if that was not your point, please correct me).
Lock-ons let the game aim for you. There is almost no way for you to influence where / how accurately they hit. Whether it's a completely new player or a top-tier comp player, as long as they have a lock, the missiles will hit the same components.
So by design lock-ons are stronger the worse you yourself can aim. Very simply said:
If the game aims better than you, lock-ons are the best weapons.
If the game aims worse than you, lock-ons are the worst weapons.
With that in mind, balancing lock-ons around top-tier gameplay would make them stupidly overpowered in lower tiers.
Now for my personal opinion:
Lock-ons currently are slightly overpowered. They are still a decent weapon even at the highest level of play. This shouldn't be the case in my opinion.
Hi there... I've been down for ~20 days (
give for minimal online blips to finish the January HBK-IIC-A Event anyway and very brief Forum poking) due to some computer problems. Don't ask. It was one of those hardware-related inevitables that happens to everyone after so many years on a single computer. At least I'm back up and running.
Anyway, it seems that I need to give you a rough idea of what's really happening with players of various Tiers who use Lock-On Weapons and why. Please pardon my being rather verbose about this, because that's the only good way by which I can really draw the whole picture. I'll start with the Tier-based part, albeit I should note this is coming from a Solo player type of view in the scope of what I've been able to observe...
- Tier 1 — Always able to use Lock-Ons with ease. Never a problem to them, because it's the player's skill, body stability, mental speed, and computer power all at once which is making Lock-Ons remain constantly OverPowered to them.
- Tier 2 — Able to use Lock-Ons somewhat proficiently, but not near easy as Tier 1 people can. Also not suffering from any noticeable issues either, even though their situation is not near as perfect as Tier 1 people have.
- Tier 3 — Lock-On Weapon usage here is suffering from the effects of people only having locally-average capability, not the best computer, a Team that usually doesn't work together well enough, and Game Mechanics that really leave something to be desired (more on that shortly)...
- Tier 4 — Players at this Tier and lower have a very hard time getting any Locks at all without being blasted to hell before they can fire anything using a Lock-On generally... Very heavy involvement of slower computers, worse bodies, bad Teams, and so on.
- Tier 5 — Worst possible situation here... Lock-Ons are generally literally worthless unless you happen to get that one random Team which is willing to help the Lock-On user with helping them... Probably better off using a MRM instead, or relying on Lasers/Ballistics/PPCs for doing damage. Of course, if the player's body/mind/aim are junk, then the end result is that they're going to ultimately quit MWO anyway, even if they enjoyed the concept of MechWarrior in general.
...and that brings me to the core stack of reasons for which the Tiers have ended up this way. Let's go over that here...
- MatchMaker — Whether anyone wants to accept it or not, MWO's MatchMaking Systems have unfortunately hit an unwanted point of failure. I'm rather sure you have seen it... many different Match scenarios happen where the MatchMaker's brakes have come completely off, and people in Lower Tiers are being made as lambs to a slaughter for the Higher Tiers to feed upon. Nobody is able to implement additional measures at this time without causing extreme Match delays, even though this is the first & largest layer of what is hurting the Player Base as a whole. If things weren't problematic at this stage, then MWO might have recovered the size of the Player Base from December 2015 once again.
- In-Game Communication — While there may be things both good and bad being said about the Community at large, the biggest problem that I'm constantly hearing (and obviously observing from others) during any Match is the severe lack of Comms between players. People need to use their Microphone, Command Wheel, and/or Target-locking Key far more than they do now, or they're going to lose the Match over not having their Team being aware of what's around them. You might be seeing better activity up in Tier 1 gameplay on a regular basis, but it is far worse down in Tier 3 through Tier 5 on that same normal basis.
- Lock-On Mechanics, part 1... Angles & Times — I constantly get angry remarks from other people about this. Sadly, that's something which even those in The Cauldron can't fix because of the requirement for hard MWO Game Client program code changes. Certain people who I'm avoiding naming here (but would most certainly enjoy blasting down into a heap of rubble on the battlefields) totally messed up Lock-On Angle & Times so horrifically that one must have the ability to afford a super-fast computer, a perfectly stable & quick combination of body, mind, and aiming capability coupled with the lightning ability to dodge Enemy fire, and all while waiting up to 4 Seconds getting a Direct Line-Of-Sight Lock at around 300 Meters with a TAG in use. Most people will unfortunately get wiped out in that situation, even though they're probably firing some Line-Of-Sight Weapons while they're trying to get that critical Lock completed. Unlike some of your above remarks, the Lock-On Angle has been effectively removed (I certainly can't find the available Angle to use either.) while gaining the initial Lock to fire with, therefore requiring an aim better than a Laser/Ballistic/PPC User happens to have. That was never how the Lock-On System was meant to operate, but getting the needed fix applied will be like pulling the teeth of a mythical dragon. And firing in any manner that maintains the Lock to deliver with? One must keep their Mech's own Center Torso constantly and perfectly aligned with the Target which they're firing upon, thereby requiring that they launch from a safe place. But with the way things are designed at current, doing so works against the Lock-On user even though they're supposed to get a good position and think tactically on how to land the shot. It's like someone took the whole "Thinking Man's Shooter" aspect out of MWO entirely, and turned the game into another "Hawken" equivalent. But where did that get "Hawken" today? It's essentially gone from the public eye, if not entirely dead now. I'm rather sure we both never want MWO to end up dead like that. Topple on this the Lock Time being far too heavily linked to Sensor Range as well, and far too penalized at longer Range brackets. Most of the Teammates which I've been made aware of are unwilling to help set the Lock up for delivering with. Nobody has more than around 7 Seconds at 800 Meters on an ECM-covered Enemy Mech to wait for a Friendly Teammate beginning to deliver damage upon the opposing forces. When one is at 300 Meters to the Enemy Target on the field and has a Direct Line-Of-Sight standing, getting a Lock to fire with should never take more than three-quarters of a single Second (as in, 0.75 Seconds) with an ECM-covered opponent. Both of these factors (again, Lock Angles & Time) need serious repairs done, as those waiting patiently for the Lock-On Missiles to land on the opponent are expecting some rather fast gratification for sticking their necks out in a "Let's Help Each Other" manner and trying to get the Team as a whole moved forward in order to gain the Match Victory from what battles occur there. Even so little as getting a Team re-positioned requires that people and their equipment can all work together.
- Lock-On Mechanics, part 2... Missile Spread — And the above in "part 1" doesn't even account for the OverNerfed Baseline Spread (set by the same nuts who messed up the Lock Angles & Times before those of The Cauldron first arrived) on most Lock-On Weapons themselves. Along with the Artemis Versions generally being considered not worth the weight expenditure by most people, the Spread in general (regardless of Artemis being used) makes the largest launchers rather prohibitive to even think of equipping for use. People can understand additional Missiles not hitting due to things like ECM/AMS or the Mech being small, but having more than 1 Missile from a Standard LRM20 which was chain-fired (regardless of whether or not it was part of a LRM-boating setup, as chain-fire means sequential shots and not big Alphas being thrown) end up subsequently not hitting on an Assault that wasn't covered by any ECM/AMS protection is outside reasonable expectation (such as the expectation level from that of how a person feels after being made super-exhausted from a nine-hour day or more of work with two additional hours lost in transit) in general. They invested the Tonnage & Slots for all the Weapons/Ammo/Equipment and any other things which enable their Loadout, then put in all the required effort to get that Lock and finally deliver the damage while leaving their Center Torso vulnerable to taking one heck of a severe wrecking in return. What justice is there in making 40% of their Lock-On Damage miss by default, when being behind a hill is no longer feasible? It certainly is not in the way that MWO's Lock-Ons are designed at this time.
...and now I get to one final note of summary on this...
Simply put, all Lock-On Weapons at this time have been balanced in design currently so that they fail to be of much use in the Lower Tiers while those in Higher Tiers get to enjoy them with impunity. (
I think you understood my point earlier, even if the knowledge/understanding of game implementation state was unclear, which I hope is now far more clear with this post.) Even if reworks in the methodology still need to be done, all Lock-On Weapons need to have their capability curve fixed up so that even those with shaky hands, slow bodies, slow minds, and/or slow computers can use them at least 50% better than they are able to now. There is no reason to continue leaving the useability so far down the hole on players in Lower Tiers that they have no choice other than avoiding equipping those various Lock-On Weapons for operation. I'm sure you're even thinking of complaining back at me about things getting OverPowered in the final result, but I'm going to kindly ask you to squelch that thought, because it happens I explicitly don't want any form of adverse result to happen either. If there's one thing I probably share with you in terms of thought, '
TheUltimateGhost', it would be that I also do not want Lock-On Weapons to become the "No Skill Weapon" which people (
likely rather falsely) complained about a few years back. (
And that's even though I know Lock-On Weapons take a huge amount of Skill to use!) That said, Lock-On Weapons still need to be more functional in the Lower Tiers than they are now. Managing to fix that would likely lead to Higher Tiers getting more players who have enough learning as to incur Lock-On Weaponry being naturally less effective at that level of play too. Hmm... Maybe some of those in The Cauldron can take a better look over the matter and work toward getting it fixed up a bit???
~D. V. "
seeing correlation or connection which goes beyond the scope of just the Lock-On Missiles alone" Devnull
(
p.s.: I have likely missed something which I meant to say with this post. Knowing my self the way I do, it will probably lead to me doing a facedesk in about 8 hours. Feel free to chuckle!!!)
[
Minor Edit by the Post Author for some mixed-up wording... How the hell did that happen?!?!?]
Edited by D V Devnull, 12 February 2022 - 06:59 AM.