73 replies to this topic

[feeWAIVER]

Wraith 1, on 09 May 2024 - 08:38 PM, said:

I challenge you to find any other game that gives every opponent multiple segments that can be damaged and destroyed independently, making pinpoint and front-loaded important distinctions to make in the first place.

No, really, I'd love to have more than one game to play.

Robocraft.

[simon1812]

feeWAIVER, on 09 May 2024 - 05:00 AM, said:

This has been on my mind for a while.
I wonder who came up with the acronym PPFLD?
I challenge you to find any other game that uses this terminology.

PPFLD is just direct damage. DD. Simple.
Lasers are a DOT. They do Damage Over Time. Simple.

Never in all my years have I heard the bloated acronym PPFLD until I played MWO.

dont know what to tell, been enjoying the game so far without thinking about it.

[LordNothing]

Wraith 1, on 09 May 2024 - 08:38 PM, said:

I challenge you to find any other game that gives every opponent multiple segments that can be damaged and destroyed independently, making pinpoint and front-loaded important distinctions to make in the first place.

No, really, I'd love to have more than one game to play.

reminds me of how much fun ksp + various combat and multiplayer mods is. lose some thrusters and get in a situation where you have to throttle up to use your gimbals to turn left enough to kill your rotation. hopefully without re-entering the atmosphere. good luck finding the 5 people that do that.

Edited by LordNothing, 09 May 2024 - 09:31 PM.

[Quicksilver Aberration]

LordNothing, on 09 May 2024 - 08:59 PM, said:

its not so much a matter of reliability (thats more a uac thing) as repeatability. you just add a few more factors which effect the precision of your weapons. projectile trajectories are very dependent on initial conditions, from there its a matter of integration. you would just have more starting conditions to worry about.

I mean semantics aside, regardless of implementation, consistency or repeatability whichever you want to call has plagued MWO. Adding mechanics for the sake of "realism" (ignoring the fact most of the tech in battletech doesn't exist and the concept of mecha being the ultimate weapon beyond goofy) just doesn't make for a good game. That said, typically milsim are actively about making cover more important by making gunnery while moving very unrepeatable or inconsistent compared to sitting still such that you end up with a game even more entrenched and about long range than what we have currently :laughing:. Given the hate for "sniperwarrior" and people considering the TTK currently to be too low, I'd hazard a guess this would cause problems. Not to mention likely make the game even more niche than MWO/MW5 are currently.

LordNothing, on 09 May 2024 - 08:59 PM, said:

since i brought up uacs i might as well bring up jam mechanics based on player behavior. spam and jam. fire hot and jam, fire controlled bursts with managed heat and prosper. for future mwo replacement.

Yeah, I disagree, heat is a resource in this game and disincentivizing its use and people that constantly bring up how this game should make you manage heat more is just....goofy especially if it impacts weapons differently. Wanting harsher penalties for going over is one thing, but heat management and how it impacts builds is still pretty critical to how you play the game. Unless you were talking like RACs, which then I would ask what's the point in having both of them.

That said, I do dislike the implementation of UACs, I'd have honestly preferred them just be burst fire ACs (with no double tap or jam chance, but higher damage potential) and honestly I think making cACs burst fire was unnecessary when heat and ghost heat are literally meant to cap the power of weapons if they become to potent. Lighter but hotter was kind of the original idea behind most Clan tech but that slowly became less a thing.

[RockmachinE]

LordNothing, on 09 May 2024 - 08:17 PM, said:

im not really asking for a redux of the physics code here. the game already supports features that are pro-sim. you just need to choose better numbers. accuracy is based on skill, precision is more based on the weapon system, i really only want to see the latter be more chaotic. give everything spread and make everything burst and break perfect convergence. then skill becomes a matter of managing chaos.

I disagree. Adding random elements like weapon spread benefits people who are slower and have worse hand eye coordination. Players who have better reflexes, better aim and overall better hand eye coordination, who are essentially better gamers, would be punished by taking away their advantage arbitrarily.

LordNothing, on 09 May 2024 - 08:17 PM, said:

accuracy is based on skill, precision is more based on the weapon system

We are approaching it from completely opposite angles. Your view is that the game should replicate reality and skill should be based on managing the intricacies of the simulation itself. My view is that its a game first and foremost and gaming itself is a skill.

The thing is that MWO just isn't a realistic simulation. Your argument is that it should be, mine is that it shouldn't.This is all fine. The reality though is that it isn't.

And thank god that it isn't because realistic simulations appeal to a very small audience and MWO would have died out ages ago if it did.

Your argument is moot here. Its like me going to DCS World forums and insisting that they should make their hardcore aircraft sim more arcadey.

Edited by RockmachinE, 09 May 2024 - 11:27 PM.

[Gasboy]

feeWAIVER, on 09 May 2024 - 06:47 AM, said:

LRMs are AoE dmg.

So are PPCs. Both are still direct damage. Though LRMs are also capable of indirect fire sooo yeah...

Still a silly thing to have the ol' jimmies rustled over.

[Gasboy]

Quote

I challenge you to find any other game that uses this terminology.

All games have some terminology that is unique to them, or nearly so. The best thing about the English language (along with other living languages) is that the speakers of the language can make up new words and terms as needed. You don't have to like it, but grumping about it won't stop it from happening. Ignore it.

But I'll bet you lunch in a good restaurant that when someone types out 'so weapons that do instant, direct damage' in a forum about MWO, someone's thinking 'ppfld'.

[feeWAIVER]

Gasboy, on 10 May 2024 - 05:10 AM, said:

So are PPCs. Both are still direct damage. Though LRMs are also capable of indirect fire sooo yeah...

Still a silly thing to have the ol' jimmies rustled over.

PPCs are direct dmg w/ splash.

LRMs are AoE because they can hit bystanders in the area of effect, ability to hit multiple mechs at once.

[Quicksilver Aberration]

feeWAIVER, on 10 May 2024 - 05:42 AM, said:

PPCs are direct dmg w/ splash.

LRMs are AoE because they can hit bystanders in the area of effect, ability to hit multiple mechs at once.

It's not, this actually goes into a better explanation: https://www.esports....es/aoe-meaning/

LRMs are effectively split damage no different than LBX, their damage potential is capped at a specific number unlike AoE whose damage potential only multiplies as you add targets.

[LordNothing]

the only true aoe weapons in the game are the airstrikes and arty.

[KursedVixen]

Wraith 1, on 09 May 2024 - 08:38 PM, said:

I challenge you to find any other game that gives every opponent multiple segments that can be damaged and destroyed independently, making pinpoint and front-loaded important distinctions to make in the first place.

No, really, I'd love to have more than one game to play.

Mech commander any of the other mechwarrior games mechwarrior 5 battletehc tabletop..... earthsiege1&2 and the tribe series (good luck with these old games)

[CMDR Sunset Shimmer]

feeWAIVER, on 09 May 2024 - 05:00 AM, said:

This has been on my mind for a while.
I wonder who came up with the acronym PPFLD?
I challenge you to find any other game that uses this terminology.

PPFLD is just direct damage. DD. Simple.
Lasers are a DOT. They do Damage Over Time. Simple.

Never in all my years have I heard the bloated acronym PPFLD until I played MWO.

Well, okay, you are correct in that PPFLD is direct damage. But you're missing the finer details of WHY the playerbase here settled on PPFLD.

In tabletop, it's very, VERY uncommon for a battlemech to be able to hit every single shot in the same location, you have a multitude of weapons firing at a singular target, each of those weapons has a chance to hit a different part of the mech.

In the MechWarrior series, given how we have instant convergence [or near instant in the case of MWO] of all weaponry on the mech to a "pinpoint" location, you can "Front load" the damage of said Direct Damage weapons to hit that singular location.

Because of the overlap between BattleTech Tabletop mechanics and MechWarrior as a franchise, the term got coined years ago in ongoing discussions, especially around the idea's of weapon convergence [which used to be much slower in the beta BTW, you actually had to hold a target for a few moments to really get the convergence to, well, converge where you wanted the damage.]

You also have to consider, that term was also coined in relation to the older game's of Mech3 and 4's "poptart" meta [poptarting is a mech using it's jump jet's to clear cover just enough to keep themselves mostly hidden, yet still clear their weapons for the shot] In older MW titles, Poptarting was a huge problem for the average mechwarrior to deal with mostly due to hit detection and lag due to lower internet speeds and poor hitreg. A decent enough player would frontload their damage into direct damage weaponry such as gauss and ppc's, jump over a building, and fire their shot, due to the latency issues, said mech would be back in cover generally before any reasonable player could fire back on the poptart mech. Also one of the reasons MechWarrior Online's jumpjet's are so mediocre, because there were attempts to bring this playstyle back into the meta, and the community pushed back pretty hard against it.

Is it weird that we use such terms? Sure I suppose to the "Average" gamer... but every game has it's own lexicon of terms that get's used, it's no different here. If you don't know jack crap about the FGC, you're not going to know what a neutral is, or what footsies are, or a korean backdash... ect.

Part of playing games like this is learning that lexicon, you don't have to like it, but the community doesn't have to change just because someone doesn't are for it. If it's such an issue for you, just use "Direct damage" when discussion PPFLD and most people will likely get what you're talking about here... or, learn to engage with the community as it is. But from the inside looking at this complaint, it just looks like someone new complaining and not wanting to learn the terms that have been around in this community since probably around 2012 if not further back. So you do you, but it'd do you better if you're gonna stick around, to learn, instead of complain.

[feeWAIVER]

CMDR Sunset Shimmer, on 13 May 2024 - 08:55 AM, said:

Well, okay, you are correct in that PPFLD is direct damage. But you're missing the finer details of WHY the playerbase here settled on PPFLD.

In tabletop, it's very, VERY uncommon for a battlemech to be able to hit every single shot in the same location, you have a multitude of weapons firing at a singular target, each of those weapons has a chance to hit a different part of the mech.

In the MechWarrior series, given how we have instant convergence [or near instant in the case of MWO] of all weaponry on the mech to a "pinpoint" location, you can "Front load" the damage of said Direct Damage weapons to hit that singular location.

Because of the overlap between BattleTech Tabletop mechanics and MechWarrior as a franchise, the term got coined years ago in ongoing discussions, especially around the idea's of weapon convergence [which used to be much slower in the beta BTW, you actually had to hold a target for a few moments to really get the convergence to, well, converge where you wanted the damage.]

You also have to consider, that term was also coined in relation to the older game's of Mech3 and 4's "poptart" meta [poptarting is a mech using it's jump jet's to clear cover just enough to keep themselves mostly hidden, yet still clear their weapons for the shot] In older MW titles, Poptarting was a huge problem for the average mechwarrior to deal with mostly due to hit detection and lag due to lower internet speeds and poor hitreg. A decent enough player would frontload their damage into direct damage weaponry such as gauss and ppc's, jump over a building, and fire their shot, due to the latency issues, said mech would be back in cover generally before any reasonable player could fire back on the poptart mech. Also one of the reasons MechWarrior Online's jumpjet's are so mediocre, because there were attempts to bring this playstyle back into the meta, and the community pushed back pretty hard against it.

Is it weird that we use such terms? Sure I suppose to the "Average" gamer... but every game has it's own lexicon of terms that get's used, it's no different here. If you don't know jack crap about the FGC, you're not going to know what a neutral is, or what footsies are, or a korean backdash... ect.

Part of playing games like this is learning that lexicon, you don't have to like it, but the community doesn't have to change just because someone doesn't are for it. If it's such an issue for you, just use "Direct damage" when discussion PPFLD and most people will likely get what you're talking about here... or, learn to engage with the community as it is. But from the inside looking at this complaint, it just looks like someone new complaining and not wanting to learn the terms that have been around in this community since probably around 2012 if not further back. So you do you, but it'd do you better if you're gonna stick around, to learn, instead of complain.

Yikes, I didn't post in hopes of a scathing wall of text lecturing me to "learning the game" from tier 5.
I was more hoping someone could point to the autistic German who coined the term PPLFD.

But thanks nonetheless.

[Quicksilver Aberration]

Etymology of PPFLD would be hard considering I think they dumped the forums at some point between steam release and closed beta and it became part of the mechwarrior lexicon during MWO, memory could be hazy a bit but I don't remember it every being said during the MW4 era.

[Void Angel]

Ooh, a fallacious appeal to authority! Nice. Nobody at all could have noticed that the tier 5 is correct and you didn't have a counter-argument.

[feeWAIVER]

Void Angel, on 13 May 2024 - 10:36 AM, said:

... and you didn't have a counter-argument.

That's kind of the point.
Is this a topic worth arguing, really? Relax.

[CMDR Sunset Shimmer]

feeWAIVER, on 13 May 2024 - 09:47 AM, said:

Yikes, I didn't post in hopes of a scathing wall of text lecturing me to "learning the game" from tier 5.
I was more hoping someone could point to the autistic German who coined the term PPLFD.

But thanks nonetheless.

I'm only tier 5 because I don't nolife this game anymore.

You, are the one who has an issue with the term, that has been used for a long, long time, and I've got a year on you in this game, I'm a legendary founder, I've been here since the 2nd wave of closed beta test invites, my original account name is in the credits.

My point wasn't to lecture you to "learn the game." it was to educate you on the origins of the term, and to point out how idiotic your whining is over a term that doesn't even harm you other than "it's weird!"

So I dunno, go touch grass mr tier 1... might do you some good.

[Void Angel]

Quicksilver Aberration, on 09 May 2024 - 12:20 PM, said:

Some people want Mechwarrior to be a true sim, but even back in 2001 with MW4, the game had already started to emphasize gameplay over simulation elements.

I remember how lot of the balance "discussion" when Clans released revolved around that desire, with some people wanting canon overpowered Clantech, and others wanting the Inner Sphere to have a fair chance. But the game isn't an online LARP and shouldn't be treated like one - the same is true for the "simulation" fantasy some people still cherish.

Spoiler

[aside]And it is a fantasy, because it doesn't make sense - not just in terms of MWO's genre format, but also just in terms of consistency in the tabletop game. The random hit locations of TT Battletech are a great example: you can't do a called shot on a 'mech unless it's shut down (and I think that was a later rule addition; can't be sure, I lost my original rulebook somewhere.) This is ostensibly because their targeting systems are old and busted, having been patched together and refurbished possibly for centuries. But fast forward to the Clan invasion, and they can, because they've super-duper targeting computers and enhanced neural implants to make them more accurate - super cool! But do their advanced technologies make the Clans more pinpoint accurate? Er... no. They're more likely to hit an enemy, but they roll on the same hit table as everyone else once that happens - unless they took a large penalty to accuracy in order to call the shot (and not roll in the first place.)

All of which illustrates the point, that Tabletop Battletech wasn't a simulation game either. Tabletop made you roll to simulate the uncertainty of combat and make its conceit of immense war machines more immersive. And it worked, as many of us can attest, but Tabletop still wasn't a simulation. So people who want games in the Mechwarrior genre format to artificially "simulate" the inaccuracies of tabletop, they're asking for something that never really existed - or else already does, depending on how you're looking at it. Every time I miss my enemy's open torso and hit his arm, that dice roll has been simulated; the difficulty of landing that shot due to relative motion, torso twist speed, defensive torso twisting really is the expression of that random roll. Making my aim artificially bad in order to "simulate" some sidebar text by making out neural-assisted targeting in the year three thousand to be less effective than a modern tank turret isn't simulating anything that ever existed in any of the games. Genre conceits only go so far - and in fact the source material itself abandons them when the Clans use the same to-hit rules with their non-degraded war machines. At some point, the Rule of Cool always applies, and FASA themselves applied it.[/aside]

As long as the game fits the setting themes (and it does,) many of the sim and LARPer crowds' complaints really just boil down to picking an arbitrary hill to die on and pretending that dying there allows them to gatekeep Battletech fandom from the rest of us.

feeWAIVER, on 13 May 2024 - 10:48 AM, said:

That's kind of the point.
Is this a topic worth arguing, really? Relax.

That is the clumsiest attempt to turn criticism back on your critics that I've seen in a while. 1/10, would not be trolled again.

[feeWAIVER]

Void Angel, on 13 May 2024 - 11:19 AM, said:

I remember how lot of the balance "discussion" when Clans released revolved around that desire, with some people wanting canon overpowered Clantech, and others wanting the Inner Sphere to have a fair chance. But the game isn't an online LARP and shouldn't be treated like one - the same is true for the "simulation" fantasy some people still cherish.

Spoiler

[aside]And it is a fantasy, because it doesn't make sense - not just in terms of MWO's genre format, but also just in terms of consistency in the tabletop game. The random hit locations of TT Battletech are a great example: you can't do a called shot on a 'mech unless it's shut down (and I think that was a later rule addition; can't be sure, I lost my original rulebook somewhere.) This is ostensibly because their targeting systems are old and busted, having been patched together and refurbished possibly for centuries. But fast forward to the Clan invasion, and they can, because they've super-duper targeting computers and enhanced neural implants to make them more accurate - super cool! But do their advanced technologies make the Clans more pinpoint accurate? Er... no. They're more likely to hit an enemy, but they roll on the same hit table as everyone else once that happens - unless they took a large penalty to accuracy in order to call the shot (and not roll in the first place.)

All of which illustrates the point, that Tabletop Battletech wasn't a simulation game either. Tabletop made you roll to simulate the uncertainty of combat and make its conceit of immense war machines more immersive. And it worked, as many of us can attest, but Tabletop still wasn't a simulation. So people who want games in the Mechwarrior genre format to artificially "simulate" the inaccuracies of tabletop, they're asking for something that never really existed - or else already does, depending on how you're looking at it. Every time I miss my enemy's open torso and hit his arm, that dice roll has been simulated; the difficulty of landing that shot due to relative motion, torso twist speed, defensive torso twisting really is the expression of that random roll. Making my aim artificially bad in order to "simulate" some sidebar text by making out neural-assisted targeting in the year three thousand to be less effective than a modern tank turret isn't simulating anything that ever existed in any of the games. Genre conceits only go so far - and in fact the source material itself abandons them when the Clans use the same to-hit rules with their non-degraded war machines. At some point, the Rule of Cool always applies, and FASA themselves applied it.[/aside]

As long as the game fits the setting themes (and it does,) many of the sim and LARPer crowds' complaints really just boil down to picking an arbitrary hill to die on and pretending that dying there allows them to gatekeep Battletech fandom from the rest of us.



That is the clumsiest attempt to turn criticism back on your critics that I've seen in a while. 1/10, would not be trolled again.

I'm not sure what simulation vs fantasy has to do with PPFLD acronyms..
If you want to be angry with me, that's okay, but please stay on topic.

[Quicksilver Aberration]

Void Angel, on 13 May 2024 - 11:19 AM, said:

As long as the game fits the setting themes (and it does,) many of the sim and LARPer crowds' complaints really just boil down to picking an arbitrary hill to die on and pretending that dying there allows them to gatekeep Battletech fandom from the rest of us.

This is true, the amount of odd gatekeeping is crazy to me (especially when the term "dumbing down" comes up like it always does). Especially when the conversation inevitably veers to what makes Mechwarrior "Mechwarrior"