87 replies to this topic

[DoRkcHoPs]

Why is it that the gauss rifle is being punished so much? Weighs alot, takes up a ton of space, explodes when damaged, low health, relatively low damage, delayed fire, limit 2 firing at once, slow fire rate.

What are it's benefits? Shoots far, fast projectile, crits internals on open components, ammo doesn't explode, no heat generated, shakes cockpit with a unique more ominous sound. Seems the negatives outweigh the benefits. Considering you can fire 4 erppc's in some cases why cant we get some quirks for the gauss rifles?

I could understand limiting heavy gauss to 2 (though technically the max is 2 anyway) but why gauss and light gauss? its only 30-40 damage every 3 to 4 seconds, there are plenty of ppfld builds that do just as much at nearly the same range with a basically heat and ammo explosions being the only negatives.

[Meep Meep]

DoRkcHoPs, on 24 November 2022 - 11:39 PM, said:

but why gauss and light gauss? its only 30-40 damage every 3 to 4 seconds, there are plenty of ppfld builds that do just as much at nearly the same range with a basically heat and ammo explosions being the only negatives.

Thats always the biggest negative for large alpha builds is heat. Gauss generates little heat and with its long range at least for the smaller versions thats basically a penalty free sniping dps monster if you could boat them. Most ppfld builds have a visible beam or projectile trail to follow even boated ac but gauss rounds are nigh invisible and the muzzle sparks don't stand out too much. So yeah there had to be some way to keep them from taking over the wallflower sniper role.

[DoRkcHoPs]

40 damage is not high alpha by any stretch of the imagination and with 4 light gauss you pretty much can't fit anything else into the mech.

Edited by DoRkcHoPs, 25 November 2022 - 12:01 AM.

[Bassault]

Gauss is amazing... you can snipe from afar to deal a decisive alpha strike, AND you can defend yourself up close. All it takes is one or two well aimed gauss shots and you can kill or cripple a light. Gauss is mostly for heavies and assaults however, as the tonnage required is quite heavy. It also generates no heat at all, and they are easy to aim with at close-medium ranges due to high velocity. Gauss rocks.

Edited by I LOVE ANNIHILATORS, 25 November 2022 - 12:05 AM.

[DoRkcHoPs]

I LOVE ANNIHILATORS, on 25 November 2022 - 12:05 AM, said:

Gauss rocks.

i dont disagree, but it would be nice to stop ******** on gauss and have 1 or two mechs that give them some perks.

[Meep Meep]

DoRkcHoPs, on 24 November 2022 - 11:56 PM, said:

40 damage is not high alpha by any stretch of the imagination and with 4 light gauss you pretty much can't fit anything else into the mech.

It's high enough that you can quickly core out most mechs if you can just sit and fire away especially if you have tasty rear armor to shoot.

[Bassault]

DoRkcHoPs, on 25 November 2022 - 12:09 AM, said:

i dont disagree, but it would be nice to stop ******** on gauss and have 1 or two mechs that give them some perks.

What do you mean by "give them some perks"?

[DoRkcHoPs]

like add a +1 or +2 HSL to gauss or half the cooldown or whatever you can think of other than giving them another negative.

Meep Meep, on 25 November 2022 - 12:15 AM, said:

It's high enough that you can quickly core out most mechs if you can just sit and fire away especially if you have tasty rear armor to shoot.

extremely rare, and its damn near impossible to core anything with gauss these days, shoot twice and 90% of the team has cored you out at almost any range.

[Meep Meep]

DoRkcHoPs, on 25 November 2022 - 12:29 AM, said:

extremely rare, and its damn near impossible to core anything with gauss these days, shoot twice and 90% of the team has cored you out at almost any range.

If you are shooting twice with anything other than heavy gauss and getting return fire then I think it might have more to do with positioning than the actual weapon.

[DoRkcHoPs]

Meep Meep, on 25 November 2022 - 12:32 AM, said:

If you are shooting twice with anything other than heavy gauss and getting return fire then I think it might have more to do with positioning than the actual weapon.

erppc and er ll is very common along with ac/2 and ac/5, unless you are playing on a mech with ecm its really quite easy to be swarmed by lights or mediums after 1 or 2 shots.

Edited by DoRkcHoPs, 25 November 2022 - 12:42 AM.

[Meep Meep]

I'm talking about other gauss due to the long range. Heavy gauss are close to mid range and you will of course be spotted immediately when trying to use them. But an ecm gauss sniper at 800+m isn't going to be noticed unless you are firing directly into their face or the front of the group and thats a positioning issue not the weapon.

[DoRkcHoPs]

Meep Meep, on 25 November 2022 - 12:47 AM, said:

I'm talking about other gauss due to the long range. Heavy gauss are close to mid range and you will of course be spotted immediately when trying to use them. But an ecm gauss sniper at 800+m isn't going to be noticed unless you are firing directly into their face or the front of the group and thats a positioning issue not the weapon.

sure sure with ecm its less of an issue but more gameplay options is better, only a few mechs can hold 4 gauss and of those i dont think any have ecm so why not give them a quirk to be able to fire faster or +2 to hsl?

[Meep Meep]

fnr-5

This is about the only mech I know that can do quad light gauss with ecm and the only others to pull it off are the anni, nightstar and king crab. So not really all that much variety to choose from.

[DoRkcHoPs]

Meep Meep, on 25 November 2022 - 01:09 AM, said:

fnr-5

This is about the only mech I know that can do quad light gauss with ecm and the only others to pull it off are the anni, nightstar and king crab. So not really all that much variety to choose from.

but they could have gauss rifle quirks to make them more different from each other

[Meep Meep]

The fafnir has a gauss quirk. It's basically your go to gauss sniper by design. The other mechs with the hardpoints and tonnage to mounth them are specialized for other projectiles. It's not like there is a lack of gauss mechs though as long as you are fine with two of them with other weapons mixed in.

I see something similar to this more than a quad light gauss fafnir since you can alpha it with no penalty.

cp-11-p

[DoRkcHoPs]

10% cooldown is such a basic perk it might as well just say -10% Ballistic cooldown. Give me something more unique, -50% gauss charge, +1 HSL, +2 HSL, +25% Gauss Critical Chance, -25% Gauss Explosion Chance, +25% Gauss health, stuff like that.

[Curccu]

DoRkcHoPs, on 25 November 2022 - 02:13 AM, said:

10% cooldown is such a basic perk it might as well just say -10% Ballistic cooldown. Give me something more unique, -50% gauss charge, +1 HSL, +2 HSL, +25% Gauss Critical Chance, -25% Gauss Explosion Chance, +25% Gauss health, stuff like that.

https://mwo.nav-alph.../mechlab/hbk-gi

[GoatHILL]

Gauss rifles are meant to be long range sniper weapons, the charge up mechanic ruins it for that role.

Get rid of the charge up and gauss would be great as is.

[Curccu]

GoatHILL, on 25 November 2022 - 02:29 AM, said:

Gauss rifles are meant to be long range sniper weapons, the charge up mechanic ruins it for that role.

Get rid of the charge up and gauss would be great as is.

Not really, they just require more skill to use well, to anticipate enemy movement.

IMO charge is good way to balance gauss.

[VeeOt Dragon]

not a fan of the charge up but i wouldn't just get rid of it. if i were to get rid of the charge mechanic i would increase the cooldown equal to at least how long it takes to charge up. perhaps a little longer.

the reason that the Gauss rifles explode and the ammo doesn't is in the nature of the weapon. the ammo are just solid slugs with no propellant so nothing to go boom. as for the weapon itself it has a number of capacitors that feed the weapon. its those that explode. (if you have ever seen a heavy capacitor blow its rather spectacular). mind you those capacitors only fail spectacularly when fully charged. for simplicity's sake they just made it always go so they didn't have to program in a function that only explodes if charging (in TT and lore the weapons were just charged up and left that way until the weapon was fired only need to charge again after being fired). think of it this way

standard IS Gauss
slots-7
tons-15
dmg-15
heat-1
cooldown (not including charge time)-4.25 sec
optimum range-810
ammo per ton-12

now compare that to the closest other IS ballistics damage wise (just going with the standards and not the LBX and UAC since they have their own advantages and disadvantages just in the nature of the system)

AC/10
slots-7
tons-12
dmg-10
heat-2.5
cooldown-2.25 sec
optimum range- 450
ammo per ton-23

AC/20
slots-10
tons-14
dmg-20
cooldown-5 sec
optimum range-270
ammo per ton-8

now its easy enough to see that the gauss has better range and heat than both. its only 1 ton heavier than the AC/20 but takes up the same crit space as the AC/10. the damage sits dead in between. now you can get better damage on the AC front with UACs but keep in mind they take up 1 more ton and 1 more crit slot as well as producing more heat and don't forget that UACs have a nasty habit of jamming when you need them most. so the biggest advantage of the Gauss rifle over other ballistics is their range and dmg per heat. ( EDIT: also the Gauss rifle has more ammo per ton than the AC/20 but not as much as the AC/10)