152 replies to this topic

[kalashnikity]

fwiw 6 micro pulse only have a +2.5 heat when standing still on forest colony classic, so you can burn two alphas of 5 HSL and 6Upulse, and then keep burning with the 6 micro several times. .

Edited by kalashnikity, 04 March 2025 - 10:31 AM.

[1453 R]

kalashnikity, on 04 March 2025 - 10:29 AM, said:

fwiw 6 micro pulse only have a +2.5 heat when standing still on forest colony classic, so you can burn two alphas of 5 HSL and 6Upulse, and then keep burning with the 6 micro several times. .

Been trying the 9xHSL thing just to see where Void's coming from. Just had a match on Frozen Classic Night, dove through the tunnel to get behind the enemy team (after pausing at the end of it to give them a chance to get into position so I didn't get goobered by the whole enemy team). Found a stationary Black Lanner who clearly wasn't aware the fight was already on; managed to sneak up behind him and burn his CT off from behind with the very last dribbles of my HSL barrage. Pristine to dead in one single strike, guy did zero damage. He was, doubtless, mad pissed, but it did show me why people are being more wary than I usually am of these little schnitzels.

The uPL version wouldn't have been able to make that kill - I would've either left him with a red CT but still operational, or had to settle for burning off a shoulder instead.

Edited by 1453 R, 04 March 2025 - 11:01 AM.

[Meep Meep]

Void Angel, on 04 March 2025 - 01:12 AM, said:

What I'm seeing with this 'mech is that people will sometimes completely ignore massive incoming fire from an Assault 'mech that is literally killing them right next to me, just so they can try to ruin my match. That's not a rational threat assessment, any more than it's rational for Assaults to chase you over creation - that is literally the worst thing they can do in response to Light harassment, and everyone should know that. They're simply acting out of hate for the new 'mech, albeit one that is legitimately powerful.

Ikr? Ain't it grand?

[Void Angel]

kalashnikity, on 04 March 2025 - 10:24 AM, said:

why do 9HSL, when you you can alpha with no ghost heat using 5HSL and 6 Micropulse?

57 alpha vs 49.2 alpha?

Max heat vs

I can do alpha, half alpha, alpha, half alpha then another partial alpha without overheating...

Well, that alpha damage is important; you simply don't get a lot of dwell time with a Firemoth. Also, you get the 5% heat bonus from the So8 - and have all of your weapons in the arms.

I use the HSL/uPL on other CTs - it's also a nice build, but with a slightly different emphasis.

Edited by Void Angel, 04 March 2025 - 10:23 PM.

[BlueDevilspawn]

The Fire Moth is so fast that it effectively stunts nascar before it begins. Frankly I don't see a problem with forcing fights considering the alterative is to continue rotating. Most of the population has learned that it's squishy enough in the legs. On top of that, nothing will change until we see how the Fire Moth does without its inadvertent extra back armor.

[Meep Meep]

On certain maps I can get shots on the slowest assaults before they even have a chance to fully leave the spawn. But players are adapting and you see more and more 'escorting' the slower mechs now. As to the rear ghost armor I think that isn't really going to change all that much because I rarely get shot in the back even when running away. Everyone goes right for the legs.

[GreyNovember]

Meep Meep, on 05 March 2025 - 10:34 AM, said:

But players are adapting and you see more and more 'escorting' the slower mechs now.

This sort of behavior seems to have died off.

The population of lights dropped back down to their usual levels, while simultaneously giving me more folks who don't understand that in order to fight a light mech, you just put your back to a wall, and stop isolating yourself from the deathball.

[Meep Meep]

Ah. Well I haven't been able to play recently due to my isp upgrading the entire hub I'm connected to so cool that they have sank back into their normal habits.

[Void Angel]

GreyNovember, on 05 March 2025 - 01:37 PM, said:

This sort of behavior seems to have died off.

The population of lights dropped back down to their usual levels, while simultaneously giving me more folks who don't understand that in order to fight a light mech, you just put your back to a wall, and stop isolating yourself from the deathball.

I both love and hate wallers. Walling does make it harder to damage them without effective return fire; mostly just by making it take longer to burn through their armor. But it also takes them out of the fight, because now I control how much attention they pay to the rest of the battlefield, and I can just drop artillery behind them and go shoot someone else - maybe I can get him to wall, too, and now it's a 10-12 fight until they decide that it's safe to leave their security blanket.

I consider walling a training-wheels tactic, at least in Quick Play. I drove Atlases as a main Assault for a long time, and I got my Ace of Spades on a Spider 5D - I've never myself practiced walling.

Edited by Void Angel, 05 March 2025 - 09:59 PM.

[Void Angel]

Meep Meep, on 05 March 2025 - 02:12 PM, said:

Ah. Well I haven't been able to play recently due to my isp upgrading the entire hub I'm connected to so cool that they have sank back into their normal habits.

I feel your pain; I've only just gotten internet where I am this last month, and my ping is often atrocious. Light piloting levels have fallen back to normal now that a lot of us have done the event items and thus no longer actually need to play the 'mechs.

What hasn't - anecdotally - fallen completely back to normal is the prevalence of laser-vomit finger-painting builds. Those are legitimately powerful anyway, and I think a few people have just stayed with them after swapping out to fight the wave of Firemoths and other Lights.

That was one of the interesting and fun side effects of the influx of Firemoths; people picked up other Lights as a counter, or just to play their own builds because of the reduction in overall tonnage.

[Malgron]

My experience with firemoths is that they're broken. On release day one they were easy to target and leg. Damage was predictable and appropriate.

Since then, I've had multiple cases where I've had massive laser alphas on mechs that were facing me and only going forward/backward do virtually no damage. This happens even when I play fairly tight convergence mechs like the banshee.

[Void Angel]

But nothing changed in the game during that timeframe, did it? Were you playing at different times, or on different servers? From my end, I found that people were not having trouble shooting my Firemoths, except the Rear Torso bug of course, but I'm bouncing off a satellite through Bulgaria, so I'm dealing with disgustingly high ping. It might be hard for me to tell.

Edited by Void Angel, 10 March 2025 - 11:13 PM.

[kalashnikity]

Now that things are "normalized" I can say that firemoths are a real pain in the neck, when they do randomly show up.

They are perfectly balanced, there is no "free lunch" in this game, whatever they gain in mobility is lost in firepower and lack of armor.

Having free MASC and a little extra armor buff in not game breaking, as almost every mech already had buffs of one type or another, even if that buff is just beautiful geometry and rational weapon and cockpit placement.

I'll still make a case for either adding ~5 points of leg structure (at best), or shifting ~5 armor from the arms to the legs (at worst).

[1453 R]

the Fire Moth's M.A.S.C. isn't 'free', so folks know. It's hardwired to the chassis, yes, but the tonnage is still accounted for. I can think of a whole lotta folks who'd love to rip the M.A.S.C. out of the thing in exchange for gaining one ton of gun weight, at least on some builds.

[kalashnikity]

I thought they made it weigh zero tons? Or was it only half normal weight, so 1/2 ton?

[Void Angel]

kalashnikity, on 10 March 2025 - 06:42 PM, said:

I thought they made it weigh zero tons? Or was it only half normal weight, so 1/2 ton?

It weighs 1 ton, and it's dramatically nerfed, in order to keep the stock engine of the Firemoth from breaking MWO- and to balance the Firemoth's exceptional repositioning speed.

[Void Angel]

Incidentally, they also have more leg durability than a Locust already. It's the leg hit boxes - and fanatical focus fire - that make their legs seem abnormally fragile.

[1453 R]

Void Angel, on 10 March 2025 - 11:14 PM, said:

Incidentally, they also have more leg durability than a Locust already. It's the leg hit boxes - and fanatical focus fire - that make their legs seem abnormally fragile.

I'm honestly not sure the Locust is in a great spot, though. Sure, a couple of them have niche applications - the MRM LCT-1M is one of my absolute favorite little meme goobers - but most Locusts have an anemic armament that doesn't remotely compare to the Flea or the Piranha and not really much else going for them. The only Locusts I ever see in matches anymore is Pirate's Bane doing Stealth Armor nonsense, and those aren't usually very impactful on the match. Sneaky Peanut Butters are one of those lights you don't necessarily ignore, but also don't let worry you overmuch because the best they can do damage-wise is a quartet of SXPL, and not only is that not suuuper dangerous but it also forces them to engage and stick where their stealth is useless.

Not that I have any idea how to fix any of that, because the Locusts with weapon quirks have some of the most ludicrous SuperMegaUltraQuirking in the game. That LCT-1M I love gets, like...three and a half tons of MRM ammo per ton of MRM ammo and nearly double the DPS out of its launchers alongside a gargantuan velocity boost, and it's still a barely-viable edge-case Meme Goober. I cannot really fathom the amount of quirking that'd have to happen to allow a Locust to match a Piranha or a Fire Moth in gunnitude.

[Der Geisterbaer]

1453 R, on 11 March 2025 - 06:11 AM, said:

I cannot really fathom the amount of quirking that'd have to happen to allow a Locust to match a Piranha or a Fire Moth in gunnitude.

An increase of machine gun RoF from +50% to +100% on the LCT 1-V would bring it into PIR-1 territory (as far as ankle biter mg setups are concerned) but the latter actually would then need a bit of help in terms of ammo

Edited by Der Geisterbaer, 11 March 2025 - 09:06 AM.

[kalashnikity]

1453 R, on 11 March 2025 - 06:11 AM, said:

I'm honestly not sure the Locust is in a great spot, though.

I have to disagree, any mistakes you make and your opponents are unforgiving, but my PB routinely pulls in games with over 400dmg. I didn't believe it at first either, but I kept seeing others getting crazy high damage numbers so I eventually got the hang of it (mostly). Yes, I switched to single heat sinks, I hated putting that double heat sink in the arm.

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And then there is this little bugger, the LCT-3V is a absolutely brutal... when built right. It's putting out the equivalent firepower of 4xHMG and ~4xMXPL, just keep doing the circle of dead and bug out when more than one or two people are shooting at you, it's even good at chasing down and killing other lights. Hit scan for the win.


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Honorable mentions to the other two I own...

LCT-3M makes a fairly good mid range support mech with two AMS. :shrugs:

A[1:20E0|oc|F@pA0|i^|i^|_@qA0|i^|i^|i^r:0|_@|F@|F@s:0|F@|F@t@0u@0v20w303030

LCT-1M I try and stay close to the slow guys and support their mid range fire power.

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I suppose you could use SPL on either one.

That's all I own, so now I'm inspired to buy the missing Locusts and level them up.

Bonus points for putting the Meep Warhorn and Wings on it.