141 replies to this topic

[MrTBSC]

TAMTAMBABY, on 26 February 2023 - 11:41 AM, said:

I wish it had an emp gun it would be nice
10 seconds limit is enough

https://www.sarna.ne...ki/TSEMP_Cannon

[BLACKR0SE]

I love weapon animations, I hope the weapon to be added will have a nice animation.

[BLACKR0SE]

Lockheed_, on 26 February 2023 - 11:10 PM, said:

Last thing I heard was that new weapons will have the same weapon model and animations as existing weapons. They don't have the capacity to make new ones.

https://youtu.be/y0fmXrdAZHw?t=87

it would be nice if they made it like pop-up headlights.

I wish they would add headlights like this to every machine

Edited by TAMTAMBABY, 27 February 2023 - 04:06 AM.

[LordNothing]

TAMTAMBABY, on 26 February 2023 - 12:47 PM, said:

I love weapon animations, I hope the weapon to be added will have a nice animation.

the system is not modular enough for that unfortunately. every possible submodel is baked into every mech and to have every one animated would be a serious nightmare to maintain. a proper modular system would open a lot of doors. like weapon variants and premium equipment. being able to visually identify every weapon in the game. or even being able to shoot off particular weapons.

[kalashnikity]

I'm voting for everything that is available in MW5 via mods, NOT JUST WEAPONS.

XXL & XL gyro that reduce weight at the expense of slots, and the gyro that add a slot to the CT (compact?) but adds one ton, small cockpits can add a torso movement speed penalty but allow an extra slot and minus one ton, hardened armor, and XXL engines, more. This would add a lot of diversity to possible builds, such as putting two slot weapons in head slots, and three slot weapons in the CT.

Can we get an Arrow IV up in this 6itch?

Plasma rifle is visually stunning.


HAG has already been mentioned, agreed with slowing the rate (slightly) maybe by a factor of 2, to not make it too OP.

How about those MGx2 and MGx4 and Gatling MG?

Everyone is focusing on weapons, but I want the build mods even more.

[Gas Guzzler]

I think HAGs obviously.

I would also like to see more laser options for IS. Particularly higher damage/range lasers.

[Widowmaker1981]

Tbh, it seems to be scraping the barrel at this point for new weapons, looking at Sarna..

HAGs sound the most interesting.. description wise they are basically Rotary Gauss Rifles, which would mean .. what, lower heat, longer range, faster projectile RACs, presumably balanced by longer spin up times and maybe low damage / ton of ammo? Id assume that, best case, we get something re-using existing weapon mechanics, and it feels like RAC mechanics fit best - TT Rule wise they seem to be more akin to cluster shot Gauss rifles which sounds.. boring and no different in practice to LBX ACs.

X-Pulse lasers give IS a hotter but longer ranged version of Pulse lasers and Improved Heavy lasers give clans a more accurate (read: shorter burn time?) version of the heavy laser that explodes when critted. Those are nice for variety i guess, and extremely low effort to implement since you could re-use existing models and firing animations and just change some values.

HVACs are a mixed bag. The HVAC5 is utterly useless, looking at the tonnage premium you pay. 50% more tonnage for more velocity and longer range on guns that are very heavy for their damage, and already decently long ranged and high velocity? Seems like a no, dawg. Similar for the HVAC2, its a 25% tonnage premium so less bad but the AC2 has even less need of range or velocity. The HVAC10 is the only one that would get use, 16% extra tonnage isnt a bad investment to get an AC10 that syncs nicer with PPCs, and its a slot smaller than the AC10 too***. I guess these are also easy to implement - re-use existing AC models, change stats.

light ACs seem like a easy to add way to give smaller IS mechs more access to ballistics (which would lead to some hilariously overpowered mechs until quirks got fixed, im sure)

Nothing else seems interesting. Clans get RACs at some point in the timeline, so they could put those in, which might lead to some fun (read: infuriating) builds and is again low effort to add, but other than that im more interested the new builds that things like XXL engines, compact cockpits and small gyros would unlock and thiings like improved jump jets.

***im thinking 4 of those in torso mounts on an Annihilator sounds.. brutal (if you could make 56 tons of ACs work with a STD engine)

Edited by Widowmaker1981, 31 March 2023 - 09:52 AM.

[Gas Guzzler]

I think all of those are easily implementable. I would think even altering the color pallet would be in scope... I used to do that to make new torpedoes in Star Trek Bridge Commander having zero knowledge of programming.

There is also MMLs which I believe would essentially function as IS ATMs and wouldn't be tough to implement.

[sycocys]

kalashnikity, on 30 March 2023 - 10:10 AM, said:

I'm voting for everything that is available in MW5 via mods, NOT JUST WEAPONS.

XXL & XL gyro that reduce weight at the expense of slots, and the gyro that add a slot to the CT (compact?) but adds one ton, small cockpits can add a torso movement speed penalty but allow an extra slot and minus one ton, hardened armor, and XXL engines, more. This would add a lot of diversity to possible builds, such as putting two slot weapons in head slots, and three slot weapons in the CT.

I wouldn't go as far to say its all balanced in stuff like the YAML mod, but they actually baked in the concepts of what should be happening for at least the equipment balance (and some of the weapons).

Get these bonuses for a cost there.

I doubt they'll add much in the way of equipment though it would be nice for them to at the very least make CC useful, and maybe make a narrow range of mechs that can equip an angel ecm/tag. Maybe change it so tag breaks stealth and bap counters it at a similar range to shut down mechs.

Weapons-wise they could have a pile of manufacter based weapons each with their own buff/debuff and not have to do any additional modeling or anything.

The one thing I'd personally like them to do still is make the bonus tree a net zero or at least have a functional cost to tuning up your mech beyond its normal capabilities. A net zero system would be the best, you can't mod your lasers to have shorter duration - and not have an offsetting cost for that like higher heat or reduced range.

[PocketYoda]

Nothing yet...

[Leadpaintchips]

LordNothing, on 19 January 2023 - 02:46 PM, said:

i generally dont like stupid weapon mechanics in games. especially in a mechwarrior/battletech game because you have a fire control system that lets you set up weapons your way, then you got this charge mechanic that mucks that all up. its not a good design choice. and also i say the same thing about rac spin up. brrrt machines spin up really fast its hard to notice.

If we're basing it off of the Battletech system, then we should be getting seasick off of just walking with our mechs because we're vastly more accurate then what the tabletop game had even experienced mech pilots being. The numbers just don't match up for us to be as accurate as we are. If we're basing it off of proximity to reality, then none of us should be using a mouse and we should all be using those mechpod things they had set up.

Throw in that Gauss are almost hitscan and the stream for RACs being as damaging as it is while also being nearly pinpoint, and those 'stupid mechanics' are stopping from people getting dropped out of matches even faster then they already are.

[Quicksilver Aberration]

Widowmaker1981, on 31 March 2023 - 09:40 AM, said:

than that im more interested the new builds that things like XXL engines, compact cockpits and small gyros would unlock and thiings like improved jump jets.

XXL engines without the heat component would be as broken as compact engines would be (compact being broken in the opposite direction). Same with XL gyros and compact cockpits which would become auto-upgrades for most mechs (2-3 tons for 1 slot is a steal, especially on an IS mech) and there is no point to improved jump jets in this game because there are quite a few mechs that already have above their technical limit for JJs and no one really bothers (Griffin comes to mind as it was one of the first iirc), I mean people would strip some JJs off the Viper if they could. Improved JJs sole purpose is for skirting around the limit of JJs to walk speed where engine upgrades might not otherwise (example the optimal weight for a 10/15/10 is 30 tons and leaves 2.5 tons and 10 heat for weapons, while a 50 ton 7/11/10 has 7 tons and 15 heat for weapons and more armor). That's not really a thing in MWO.

[pbiggz]

Quicksilver Kalasa, on 31 March 2023 - 09:48 PM, said:

XXL engines without the heat component would be as broken as compact engines would be (compact being broken in the opposite direction). Same with XL gyros and compact cockpits which would become auto-upgrades for most mechs (2-3 tons for 1 slot is a steal, especially on an IS mech) and there is no point to improved jump jets in this game because there are quite a few mechs that already have above their technical limit for JJs and no one really bothers (Griffin comes to mind as it was one of the first iirc), I mean people would strip some JJs off the Viper if they could. Improved JJs sole purpose is for skirting around the limit of JJs to walk speed where engine upgrades might not otherwise (example the optimal weight for a 10/15/10 is 30 tons and leaves 2.5 tons and 10 heat for weapons, while a 50 ton 7/11/10 has 7 tons and 15 heat for weapons and more armor). That's not really a thing in MWO.

People are still stripping jumpjets because paul nerfs have never really been fully rolled back and JJs still feel like dogshit.

[Widowmaker1981]

pbiggz, on 04 April 2023 - 04:47 AM, said:

People are still stripping jumpjets because paul nerfs have never really been fully rolled back and JJs still feel like dogshit.

Do they? I think they feel fine, personally. Lights and mediums jump really well, assuming you dont strip out too many from maximum (and at 0.5T each, fitting 4+ is easy...). It would be weird to me to say the JJs on a Shadow Cat feel 'like dogshit', for example.

If you mean the slow lift speed on larger jumpjet mechs.. ill agree, poptarting with fatties isnt really viable and JJs on big mechs are only useful for getting up slopes/ledges and turning faster.. but thats fine. I dont think we actually want Blood Asps and Dire Wolves poptarting, and they work fine for getting around.

edit: I would agree that improved JJs are fairly pointless, though - its unlikely anyone would want to equip more JJs than a given chassis maximum since thats normally 5-6 on mediums anyway. (There is the Urbie which should cap at 2JJs and would use imp JJs but.. well. It caps at 6JJs because PGI broke an ton of their own rules to allow that stupid trashcan to be a good mech in MWO)

Edited by Widowmaker1981, 04 April 2023 - 06:39 AM.

[Volume]

another quiet vote for HAGs here
though HVAC would be easier to implement and lower effort required

[LordNothing]

Widowmaker1981, on 04 April 2023 - 06:08 AM, said:

Do they? I think they feel fine, personally. Lights and mediums jump really well, assuming you dont strip out too many from maximum (and at 0.5T each, fitting 4+ is easy...). It would be weird to me to say the JJs on a Shadow Cat feel 'like dogshit', for example.

If you mean the slow lift speed on larger jumpjet mechs.. ill agree, poptarting with fatties isnt really viable and JJs on big mechs are only useful for getting up slopes/ledges and turning faster.. but thats fine. I dont think we actually want Blood Asps and Dire Wolves poptarting, and they work fine for getting around.

edit: I would agree that improved JJs are fairly pointless, though - its unlikely anyone would want to equip more JJs than a given chassis maximum since thats normally 5-6 on mediums anyway. (There is the Urbie which should cap at 2JJs and would use imp JJs but.. well. It caps at 6JJs because PGI broke an ton of their own rules to allow that stupid trashcan to be a good mech in MWO)

jumpjets are an all or nothing kind of thing. they cost something like 25 nodes and the maximum number of jets (and all the space and tonnage involved). while there is sometimes a use case in the gray area between full jets and no jets, such as the single jet for maneuverability and climb assist, or the min number of unbuffed manditory jets on an omnimech which can be used for light jumping and softening falls. they are kind of a pig and i dont use them on every mech that supports them.

if i was going to improve jump jets, id actually improve them for horizontal jumping rather than poptarting. having them pitch controlled would be nice. they would kind of operate in ground effect and once hovering you drop your crosshair to pitch forward and accelerate, or pitch back and slow down or reverse, basic helicopter style flight (no roll though for simplicity). of course such game mechanics, as simple as they are, are probibly not going to be given much effort.

[Widowmaker1981]

LordNothing, on 05 April 2023 - 07:57 AM, said:

jumpjets are an all or nothing kind of thing. they cost something like 25 nodes and the maximum number of jets (and all the space and tonnage involved).

This is entirely untrue. A mech like a Shadow Cat does not need to take a single JJ node to have very effective jump jets, and mechs like a phoenix hawk can jump fine with 3 or 4 jets out of their maximum of 6. Im not really sure what you want JJs to accomplish, they arent meant to make mechs fly like a helicopter.

[LordNothing]

Widowmaker1981, on 05 April 2023 - 08:33 AM, said:

This is entirely untrue. A mech like a Shadow Cat does not need to take a single JJ node to have very effective jump jets, and mechs like a phoenix hawk can jump fine with 3 or 4 jets out of their maximum of 6. Im not really sure what you want JJs to accomplish, they arent meant to make mechs fly like a helicopter.

the problem is that jumpjets were never really meant for poptarting. they were meant for jumping hexes and the more jets the more you can jump. that is, horizontal jumping. mechwarrior 2 had this feature, and it was one of the things mw4 dumbed down (not sure about mw3, i have only played the first mission or two). mwll had fully vectorable jumpjets that could do vertical as well as horizontal jumping, but it was cumbersome to configure and use. instead of a jj being a one trick pony it serves more than one function.

jj in mwo have little utility beyond wall scaling and poptarting and the power proposition isnt worth the commitment of nodes, space and tonnage. also they dont mantle very well, making them less good at climbing vertical walls. id rather be able to jump straight up and nose down at the right moment to catch the ledge. its simple, intuitive, and doesnt require any major controls changes. you can use it for evasion or rapid advancement, to cross trenches, etc. and if you set it up so that vectoring skill handles the horizontal and lift speed handles the vertical, then there is some more tradeoffs at play in node selection. if you only wanted to pop tart, you could leave vectoring on the table.

whats more important is that the base values those skills buff can be used to make new jj types. so you buff the forward thrust and nerf the vertical, you got a new jj type that is better for horizontal maneuvering at expense of poptarting. that would at least give me some options, even doing the lazy 'no new mechanics' thing.

but you can really take it a step beyond that. you can trade vertical thrust for forward thrust proportionally in real time. say by the torso pitch value (mapped -1to1) use that number to compute the forward thrust (negative value is reverse). then vertical thrust would be 1-abs(forwardThrust), then scale each by their respective base values and quirks. thats like four lines of code. yaw control is already in, and roll is really not needed, its not a flight sim.

also a shadowcat is an omnimech with a full complement of fixed jjs, and every one has jj quirks. thats something that better work well out of the box. controlling thrust will not take poptarting away either if thats what you are worried about. just keep level while jetting, release aim and fire as usual.

Edited by LordNothing, 06 April 2023 - 12:27 PM.

[Leadpaintchips]

LordNothing, on 05 April 2023 - 12:49 PM, said:

also they dont mantle very well

Doesn't help that there's a ridiculous amount of lips around a good chunk of the higher ledges in game. Coming back, the amount of frustration I get from just getting denied any vertical movement because I didn't start my jump far enough back.

Edited by Leadpaintchips, 06 April 2023 - 12:19 PM.

[LordNothing]

Leadpaintchips, on 06 April 2023 - 12:19 PM, said:

Doesn't help that there's a ridiculous amount of lips around a good chunk of the higher ledges in game. Coming back, the amount of frustration I get from just getting denied any vertical movement because I didn't start my jump far enough back.

the map design in general does not lead to good jump jet use. i think a good design rule is that every place can be reached on foot, but jump jets can be used as a shortcut. so you not only need places to jump to, that are useful locations to hold, but also have foot access, or at least access to a line of sight position, to deal with the occasional holdout.

maps are a big reason why i don't use jump jets very often. jumpjets on many maps are about as useful as lerms in solaris city.

i mean you can fix all the maps, or you can write four lines of code to make jump jets more useful. i wrote more code yesterday just to clean up my mech spreadsheets, and i did it between games.

Edited by LordNothing, 06 April 2023 - 12:59 PM.