20 replies to this topic

[JumpingHunter]

I would suggest nerfing all Rotary Autocannons damage by 35-50%. This family of weapons is very strong (RAC/5 deals 11 DPS, RAC/2 deals 6,5 DPS), they are relatively light, they dont occupy a lot of slots and most importantly, they simultaniously are being a rapid firing weapons and are having very large blinding effect. The two most important tweaks they certainly need is the damage nerf and the removal\rework of blinding explosion effect.

Seriously, this is just dumb. Whenever i play against a team with more than ONE player with RACs, even if they both have only one RAC/5, they literally smelt my allies. 11 DPS is a massive number, basically this is the same as Clan ERLL that fires every second, generates only half of normal C-ERLL heat per second, and PERMANENTLY BLINDS THE TARGET. This is not ok, at all, whenever i play against team with 2 or more RAC boats it is 90% chance of have 12-2 or 12-3 loss. When you are being fired upon with RACs you cant even fall back normally, because you can't see whatever is going on on battlefield. And it is not a "blinding" utility weapon that deals no damage, every second you spend in front of the RAC boat your armor decreases by at least 11 points. And you can't effectively back off. And you cant shoot the RAC off even if you have 91.5 alpha strike damage, because you dont know where is it and you can't see due to explosions. Players who usually boat RACs will respond to all this points with lines such as "go to the cover", "hit R and fire back" or sometimes even simple "play better". RACs HAVE to be nerfed, or soon it will be the ONLY weapon that can be seen on battlefiels, because it can outdamage every other weapon.

If fact that even couple of RAC boats can constantly let their teams win with scores like 12-2 or 12-3 is not enough, I found this: When i was testing weapons, i tried to maximise damage potential of my Atlas. I usually run a 4xML + 4xSRM/6 + AC/20. Without the AC/20 my alpha damage number (The "firepower" stat in the "Mech stats" Window in Loadout section in MechLab) was 71.5 With AC/20 it went to a 91.5, because AC/20 deals 20 damage per shot. And when i installed a RAC/5 instead of AC/20, my damage number went all the way up to 126.2. 126.2 CARL!!!. RAC/5 occasionaly deals 54,7 DAMAGE. This is 34,7 Damage MORE than AC/20, the most powerful single shot cannon-type and truly iconic battletech weapon. But there is more: AC/20 Weights 14 tons and occupies 10 slots. RAC/5, on the other hand, weights only 10 tons and occupies only 6 slots. So, the weapon that deals MORE THAN TWICE BIGGER damage than AC/20 (in game's opinion, at least) weight nearly 33% less and occupies 40% less space. What a balance. RAC/2 is also a nonsence, because it weights only 8 tons and occupies 3 slots. The AC/2 have equal weight and occupies only 2 slots less. But while AC/2 deals 2 damage per shot and rougly 2,7 DPS, RAC/2 deals 32,2 damage in "firepower" stat of the mech and deals 6.5 DPS. This is NOT ok. RACs HAVE to be nerfed, even game itself is telling us that they are OP.

The same thing with all UACs but they aren't SO unbalanced. Still, a DIrewolf with all his hardpoints filled with UACs can deal humongous DPS and blind people just as RAC boat does. So they also probably have to be stricted a bit.

Edited by JumpingHunter, 30 January 2022 - 06:55 AM.

[Tiy0s]

RACs aren't OP because of the inherent spread they have. Sure, you can farm damage, but in a 1v1 scenario most builds will beat a RAC build.

"71.5 With AC/20 it went to a 91.5, because AC/20 deals 20 damage per shot. And when i installed a RAC/5 instead of AC/20, my damage number went all the way up to 126.2. 126.2 CARL!!!. RAC/5 occasionaly deals 54,7 DAMAGE. This is 34,7 Damage MORE than AC/20,"

Rac damage in mechlab is not calculated by alpha. I recommend against using that number.

RACs are not OP. They do not need to be nerfed.

Edited by The Glasswalker, 02 February 2022 - 08:08 PM.

[Rosarius]

Disagree. Just don't stare at the flashing lights and you're golden.

(apologies for poor quality, YouTube is still processing the video)

[Scout Derek]

Oh, it's another one of these "X weapon is too powerful because it does X better than others" (when this isn't the case usually).

I recommend you just learn the game realistically.

[MyriadDigits]

JumpingHunter, on 30 January 2022 - 06:02 AM, said:

DPS

Raw DPS sounds really strong on paper, but in reality is far less impressive than it looks. Weapons that rely on DPS, especially RACs, are very vulnerable to an enemy peeking in and out of cover to shoot. Further, due to the rather low damage per hit (0.9 per bullet for RAC2 and 1.5 per bullet for RAC5) even if the target isn't able to reach cover, they can very easily spread the damage by twisting. RACs also have some amount of bullet spread, which makes it more difficult to focus damage near their optimum range.

Also, raw DPS doesn't factor jams or ramp up time. A pilot holding the button down for 5 seconds from rest won't actually do 54.7 damage with their RAC5 because the weapon needs to ramp up before firing.

JumpingHunter, on 30 January 2022 - 06:02 AM, said:

Players who usually boat RACs will respond to all this points with lines such as "go to the cover", "hit R and fire back" or sometimes even simple "play better".

Well staying in/near cover, as explained above is very effective at countering RACs and any other DPS reliant weapon (its also quite useful against other weapons too and is a generally good practice to maintain). Additionally, if you're playing near cover especially poking in and out, returning to cover is typically a simple matter of releasing 'W' and holding 'S' instead. If a RAC mech is watching your poking spot hard enough that you can't effectively poke back, then you simply don't poke that corner. Go find a new corner.

And before you go ahead and scream about me being a RAC boater, my favored builds are AC20/SNPPC or Gauss builds. (or an RL80 Locust).

JumpingHunter, on 30 January 2022 - 06:02 AM, said:

soon it will be the ONLY weapon that can be seen on battlefiels, because it can outdamage every other weapon.

A 3SNPPC 2AC20 KGC can instantly vomit almost 70 damage onto the head of a pin. 4RAC5s would need 1.6 seconds (slightly more if firing from rest), to do the same damage, and said damage would be easily spread if the target twists during those 1.6 seconds.

A 1UAC20 2UAC10 2UAC5 DWF fires 50 damage per trigger pull. RNG willing that's 100 damage in less than 0.7 second. It'd take 4RAC5 more than 2.2 seconds to match that damage.

A 2LGR 3ERPPC mech fires 50 pinpoint damage instantly, and can do so from well beyond the range of a RAC2. On the right map it can even do this beyond sensor range of most mechs.

5ERLL is 45 (or 55 for clan) damage in 1.1 seconds (1.25 for clan), which is still faster than 4RAC5, has greater range than RAC2, and is a laser so there's literally no travel time. Not to mention lasers are quite a ways lighter than RACs, and don't need ammo, so they get plenty of tonnage for heat sinking.

MRM40 is 40 damage in a hair less than half a second. 4RAC5 would need almost a whole second to get that damage out, and there are mechs that can run 3MRM40 (though more typically 4MRM30 because MRM30 is even better at getting that damage out quickly).

Doesn't look like its outdamaging much of anything to me, certainly not by any margin that matters.

JumpingHunter, on 30 January 2022 - 06:02 AM, said:

(The "firepower" stat in the "Mech stats" Window in Loadout section in MechLab) was 71.5 With AC/20 it went to a 91.5, because AC/20 deals 20 damage per shot. And when i installed a RAC/5 instead of AC/20, my damage number went all the way up to 126.2. 126.2 CARL!!!. RAC/5 occasionaly deals 54,7 DAMAGE. This is 34,7 Damage MORE than AC/20, the most powerful single shot cannon-type and truly iconic battletech weapon. But there is more: AC/20 Weights 14 tons and occupies 10 slots. RAC/5, on the other hand, weights only 10 tons and occupies only 6 slots. So, the weapon that deals MORE THAN TWICE BIGGER damage than AC/20

The Firepower stat in the mechlab measures the single click alpha of every weapon except explicit DPS weapons, which is just RACs and MGs. Instead of alpha size, RACs and MGs add 5 seconds of firing to the firepower stat.

RAC5 is not firing a massive slug for 54.7 damage. Its firing about 40 tiny bullets that accumulate to 54.7 over 5 seconds of shooting.

JumpingHunter, on 30 January 2022 - 06:02 AM, said:

Still, a DIrewolf with all his hardpoints filled with UACs can deal humongous DPS and blind people just as RAC boat does. So they also probably have to be stricted a bit.

UACs, especially clan UACs, are hot. (RACs are also hot as ballistic weapons go btw) Not to mention the fact that using their singular feature that makes them actually better than standard AC has a flat chance to jam the weapon entirely.

[KursedVixen]

I don't think their damage needs nerfed but their time to jam the jam bar idea is ludicrious it should jam like the Ultras... only if you fire more than one shot...

[Aidan Crenshaw]

nvx 116, on 03 March 2022 - 03:17 PM, said:

Vixen does know the game..... they carry more teams than you do

1. Scout Derek was replying to JumpingHunter, the OP, not KursedVixen, who only recently joined the topic.
2. Not debating the first half of your post, but the second... nah, I don't think so:
https://leaderboard....Derek&f=67&l=67

[Ch_R0me]

I would rather say - decrease blinding and every hit around RAC hardpoint (or the weapon itself) increases jamming chance.

Weapon as it is in damage dealing is fine.

[The Basilisk]

JumpingHunter, on 30 January 2022 - 06:02 AM, said:

Snip

There is an easy experiment that you can do to comprehensively see that this claim is wrong.
Use a Jager Mech or a Rifleman with 2 RAC5 or 3 RAC 2 and try to do damage versus other mechs.
You will find yourself dead befor beeing able to do any significant damage.
Since you have to stare down the enemy while firing you will quickly die due to PPFLD.

The literaly only reason this works is cuz there are certain mechs that are already very strong with ballistics but are even stronger on UAC5 or UAC2 Builds (heck maybe even on multi AC10 builds).

[An6ryMan69]

RAC's are kind of like MRM's in that they CAN do lots of damage, but it is all spread out across the enemy, works best under only certain situations, generates lots of heat, doesn't normally result in lots of actual kills, and is pretty consistently beaten by a skilled player staying calm and doing pinpoint damage against you with massed lasers.

Just leave them alone.

EDIT - And yes, the Firepower stat is just a stat. I observed a guy a while ago run around with a Shadow Cat armed with only 2xAC2 as his weapons, so a Firepower score of 4, and he did like 650 damage and got three kills in a QP match. So, Firepower is only not just a stat, it's actually a pretty meaningless one.

Edited by An6ryMan69, 08 March 2022 - 11:34 AM.

[Burpitup]

Stop it. Just go buy some and use them for a while. They jam all the time.

I tried an experiment with my Bushwacker with 3 of them and put 3 ac2s. On average of 5 games I did 35 less damage with the ac2s. A whole 35. I averaged 783 with the rotary 2s. 748 for the ac2s.

They are fine.

[chaosshade2638]

I just want the fireball size nerfed. Even if you're getting hit in the back with them, they completely blind the cockpit.

[JumpingHunter]

Hi, thank you everyone who answered in this topic. I still can't reliably defend myself from the RAC or UAC monsters, and they really tend to be the most scary thing i can see on the battlefield, but i guess "scary" is the perfcet word to describe them, considering everything that was said in this topic. It seems like RAC deals more of a mental threatening damage than damage to armor of the 'Mech, and facing seemingly infinite stream of exlosions is very scary and annoying, but it looks more scary that it is in reality. I guess these weapons isn't really OP, yet the balistics still seems to be the carrying factor in the game. Probably the best way to make it perfectly fine is to remove or heavily redice the fireballs and explosions a target of RAC user suffers from. Again, even if this is considered as "fair" balancing idea, it just isn't safe for people with light epilepsy, or with the generally poor eyesight. After all, why dont PPCs get their lore-friendly ability to turn off or glitch out the HUD for like, 3-4 seconds, like they did in MW3 and MW4? That would be nice alternative to these big fat explosions all ballistics produce.

Covering behind the cover is a very good idea, but some mechs dont have big alpha strike damage, or will overheat to death after even one, so if i do use chain firing, how do i evade the RAC fire? Please tell me, if somebody know how to do that.

To the ScoutDerek and others who like to say "oh look another one who cant play and complains about op weapons": keep in mind that not everyone is veteran, i am, for example, not completely new, but can not consider myself even remotely experienced enough to know all the tricks. Piloting a sniping 'Mech like Nova Cat Prime with stock loadout is not easy at it own, and having blinding stream of fire sticking to your face from 2000 meters away and ripping off one of your arms (that ACTUALLY happened once at this range, and it was very confusing) is not helping at all. If you are so skilled that you can reliably protect yourself from all the cheesy things like blinding exlosive wall of fire - please tell me full algorythm of doing so, with steps and explainations about how to perform those steps correctly. That would be very helpful, at least much more helpful than simple "learn to play noob" thing you said.

Edited by JumpingHunter, 10 July 2022 - 05:10 AM.

[ScrapIron Prime]

To reliably defend against rotary autocannons, you need… a buddy. RACs are great at suppressing and damaging a single target that is not too fast or too pop-tarty. But to do that, they need face time with that target, meaning they’re not dodging, twisting, jumping, or covering. A second enemy mech has the opportunity to fire back on the RAC hose and direct that fire to any part of the RAC mech at will, quickly weakening it.

Thats the trade off. Be a fire hose of damage at the cost of not being able to avoid or spread incoming fire.

[martian]

JumpingHunter, on 10 July 2022 - 04:59 AM, said:

Hi, thank you everyone who answered in this topic. I still can't reliably defend myself from the RAC or UAC monsters, and they really tend to be the most scary thing i can see on the battlefield, but i guess "scary" is the perfcet word to describe them, considering everything that was said in this topic. It seems like RAC deals more of a mental threatening damage than damage to armor of the 'Mech, and facing seemingly infinite stream of exlosions is very scary and annoying, but it looks more scary that it is in reality.

The main trick is not to panic and move your 'Mech, or at least twist your torso to spread the incoming damage.

JumpingHunter, on 10 July 2022 - 04:59 AM, said:

I guess these weapons isn't really OP, yet the balistics still seems to be the carrying factor in the game. Probably the best way to make it perfectly fine is to remove or heavily redice the fireballs and explosions a target of RAC user suffers from.Again, even if this is considered as "fair" balancing idea, it just isn't safe for people with light epilepsy, or with the generally poor eyesight.

The noise and explosions are one thing that boosts RACs, so at least somebody uses them.

JumpingHunter, on 10 July 2022 - 04:59 AM, said:

After all, why dont PPCs get their lore-friendly ability to turn off or glitch out the HUD for like, 3-4 seconds, like they did in MW3 and MW4? That would be nice alternative to these big fat explosions all ballistics produce.

PPCs disable enemy ECM in MWO. They also deliver nice concentrated damage which is something you can not say about RACs. PPCs also can not exhaust their ammo magazines.

JumpingHunter, on 10 July 2022 - 04:59 AM, said:

Covering behind the cover is a very good idea, but some mechs dont have big alpha strike damage, or will overheat to death after even one, so if i do use chain firing, how do i evade the RAC fire? Please tell me, if somebody know how to do that.

RAC boats do not have big alpha either, and they overheat quickly too.

JumpingHunter, on 10 July 2022 - 04:59 AM, said:

To the ScoutDerek and others who like to say "oh look another one who cant play and complains about op weapons": keep in mind that not everyone is veteran, i am, for example, not completely new, but can not consider myself even remotely experienced enough to know all the tricks. Piloting a sniping 'Mech like Nova Cat Prime with stock loadout is not easy at it own, and having blinding stream of fire sticking to your face from 2000 meters away and ripping off one of your arms (that ACTUALLY happened once at this range, and it was very confusing) is not helping at all. If you are so skilled that you can reliably protect yourself from all the cheesy things like blinding exlosive wall of fire - please tell me full algorythm of doing so, with steps and explainations about how to perform those steps correctly. That would be very helpful, at least much more helpful than simple "learn to play noob" thing you said.

The effective range of RAC-2 is 540 m. The maximal range of RAC-2 is 1080 m.

The effective range of RAC-5 is 450 m. The maximal range of RAC-5 is 900 m.

Therefore, RACs can not rip off your arm on 2000 m because even with some quirks they will not reach 2000 m.

[JumpingHunter]

martian, on 10 July 2022 - 11:14 PM, said:

The main trick is not to panic and move your 'Mech, or at least twist your torso to spread the incoming damage.

Yeah, that seems to be right, at least now sometimes i can do that.

martian, on 10 July 2022 - 11:14 PM, said:

The noise and explosions are one thing that boosts RACs, so at least somebody uses them.

I think it is generally a bad idea to balance weapon out by giving it such abilities like blinding or disorienting. Maybe it actually was the only way to balance them out properly to not make them overpovered/too effortless or to not left them too underwhelming, but if weapon need such crutch as the blinding light effect and disorienting audio effect then it is just very poorly made weapon. I am probably not that good at game design as PGI employees are, but i just think that this is very dishonorable way to balance a weapon. If it is bad, maybe giving it some kind of rework will be better than just making it generally annoying and horribly effective agains new players while still not that good agains veterans. Maybe it will be a good idea to make this weapon able to raw up like minigun in TF2, and then make it fire in large burst with limited number of shot in it, and after burst will end you will have to wait the cooldown timer, like with normal weapons? So players will be able to do something in that time window when RAC doesnt fire, and then any minor buff to RAC wont instantly make it OP? So it will be something like the opposite of UAC: you pre-spin your RAC and then fire a large burst, like a laser, but after that you have to wait until the cooldown timer will end ot fire again. It will give devs a space for balancing maneuvers and small buffs to a weapon in general, and it will literally give players a short time to fire at the RAC boat without having epilepsy-causing firewall in their monitors.

martian, on 10 July 2022 - 11:14 PM, said:

PPCs disable enemy ECM in MWO. They also deliver nice concentrated damage which is something you can not say about RACs. PPCs also can not exhaust their ammo magazines.

I know, but it still would be neat if PPC could glitch HUDs like in MW4 or MW3. Like the ECM does in MWO already. Just as a little decorative detail...

martian, on 10 July 2022 - 11:14 PM, said:

The effective range of RAC-2 is 540 m. The maximal range of RAC-2 is 1080 m.

The effective range of RAC-5 is 450 m. The maximal range of RAC-5 is 900 m.

Therefore, RACs can not rip off your arm on 2000 m because even with some quirks they will not reach 2000 m.

Maybe it was someone with smaller ACs with maximized range skills, and maybe it was not exactly 2000 meters, i just meant that sometimes ballistics can deal quite a big damage at the extreme far range, especially to the slower mechs, like Nova Cat.

Edited by JumpingHunter, 12 July 2022 - 04:13 AM.

[JumpingHunter]

Also question for everybody who say that RACs and UACs so bad because they require face time, tell me, why then so, SO many people use them? In average match, there are at least 3-4 people on each team with mass UACs or RACs. These people get many kills and deal a lot of damage, usually they are the ones who survive the entire game. Very rarely i can see match without UACs or RACs. Why so? Especially if these weapons not that good, why would they use them so much?

Edited by JumpingHunter, 12 July 2022 - 05:41 AM.

[ScrapIron Prime]

it entirely depends on volume of fire. A Dire Wolf with 2 UAC/5, 2 UAC/10, and 1 UAC/20 will make people run because standing in front of it is suicide. But it too suffers the issue that its not twisting damage if a second mech is shooting back at it. The key is to minimize the number of times there are multiple mechs shooting back.

And remember, those massed UAC/RAC builds do lose games as well... mostly when they didn't minimize that return fire.

[MOPCKOE]

Up! ROTARY SC*M haven't heat, 100000 ammo, NO RELOAD , 1000+ meters range, and fu*ing shake me!!!

Even the LRM can get used to, if not for the idiotic maps, on which, apart from an open meadow and a couple of hillocks, there is no ****. But Rotary/Ultra AC ruins the whole gameplay and makes the rest of the weapons useless.

[MOPCKOE]

It's funny, but in such forums there are always a lot of defenders of imbalanced sh*t. Rotary / ultra is just a mockery of the rest of the weapons.

RAC just sprays you with piss without aiming, keeps you out of cover, cuts all armor + blinds, no heat, no ammo limit.
Argument Time for promotion - it's just ridiculous, I won't even argue.

Clowns compares it to an MRM that flies 500m with a 2 second lag lol.

Fans stand on the field on a dull 40km.h bag and pour everyone with a “trigger on the floor” from their ROTARY urine.

Jamming funny allows you to completely cut off the armor from the torso of any Heavy Mech while it is reloading and SHAKING.

**ck your game, really.

Rotary/lrm/ultra rednecks will always defend imbalanced sh*t, burn.

Edited by MOPCKOE, 04 August 2022 - 02:16 PM.