78 replies to this topic

[ASC]

The problem here is that there are also other factors which mix into this making it too complicated to work out here without some idea what the devs actually want to have. I mean, the issue isn't really say LargeLaser vs MediumLaser, but maybe 1Lvs2M which you could switch between in mechlab.

for example, if someone switched out a LLaser doing 10dmg/s, for 2 MLaser doing 5dmg/s each, cycle time of 0.8 of the large laser but generating 0.6 of the heat each(1.2 together) this could be considered balanced; considering the LLasers range advantages.

But it also matters whether or not the devs have included other effects such as heavy blows upsetting the balance of the target mech.

tbh its a balancing nightmare, only way to really to fine tune it is to get people playing and see what works.

[Belisarius1]

eZZip, on 11 April 2012 - 12:30 PM, said:

Having the same DPS does not make the rate of fire irrelevant. For hitscan/near hitscan weapons, having more damage per shot (which usually comes with low RoF) is very important to the point that even lower DPS is acceptable to achieve this. Benefits of high damage per shot instead of high RoF include not having to stay exposed to do lots of damage, having all the damage go to one place, and having lots of damage be dealt even if you get circlestrafed immediately afterward (where with a high RoF but low damage per shot, you would not be able to hit anymore). The biggest disadvantage is that if you miss, you are possibly screwed, but how hard is it to hit a giant machine that is not very maneuverable?

It's amazing that this even needs to be explained, but I'm glad someone's willing to do it.

Siilk, on 12 April 2012 - 02:37 AM, said:

But that is a source of imbalance. Bigger guns already have better DpS. If it is accompanied by high burst damage, all the benefits, you described, are applicable to them, thus making smaller weapons even more inferior. Not only their DpS is naturally lower, they make you stay and expose yourself for much longer time to deal any significant damage. And, of course, good luck placing all the damage in one spot. For that exact reason, I think that RoF should not change that much with weapon size increase. Maybe RoF should even be higher for the bigger gun, being the main source of damage increase with per-shell damage staying more or less the same.

High rof weapons are suppression tools, and they have different but more-or-less equal roles compared to bigger guns. They're not automatically inferior.

Rof weapons have the ability to keep a target under rock and prevent it firing back. They can also fire the first shot a fraction more quickly - particularly with convergence in play - because they don't need it to be precise. They have a psychological effect too; players under heavy rof fire tend to look for cover and fight less effectively. In comparison, players who've eaten an equivalent alpha tend to assume the worst is over and come back swinging.

All that said, rof weapons do need slightly higher dps to compensate for damage concentration. It's not that hard to balance, though, and it's certainly not a reason to discard them. Making rof constant across weapons removes a really valuable and interesting source of diversity.

Edited by Belisarius†, 12 April 2012 - 03:49 AM.

[Siilk]

Belisarius†, on 12 April 2012 - 03:43 AM, said:

All that said, rof weapons do need slightly higher dps to compensate for damage concentration. It's not that hard to balance, though, and it's certainly not a reason to discard them. Making rof constant across weapons removes a really valuable and interesting source of diversity.

Agreed, I suppose it would be a good way to balance high RoF weapons and high burst damage ones.

[CaptainNapalm]

In the table top game some weapons had minimum ranges after wich they became harder to hit with. PPCs and LRMs for example. longer cycle times can simulate this as in close combat hi cycle rates alow rapid shot correction and following fire, slow cycle times do not. less of a facter when sniping i always found. this is not turn based and the aiming is totaly up to the player ,( i 'm geussing thats how it will be done) so how else do you simulate the bonus to hit of a pulse laser and the negatives for long range weapons up close? i do hope the LBX series auto canons have a propper cluster munition effect in this version as well.

[Strum Wealh]

CaptianNapalm, on 12 April 2012 - 03:18 PM, said:

In the table top game some weapons had minimum ranges after wich they became harder to hit with. PPCs and LRMs for example. longer cycle times can simulate this as in close combat hi cycle rates alow rapid shot correction and following fire, slow cycle times do not. less of a facter when sniping i always found. this is not turn based and the aiming is totaly up to the player ,( i 'm geussing thats how it will be done) so how else do you simulate the bonus to hit of a pulse laser and the negatives for long range weapons up close? i do hope the LBX series auto canons have a propper cluster munition effect in this version as well.

From the fifth Dev Q&A:

Quote

Will the ranges of the BattleMechs' weapons - and the relationships between them - be more similar to those from the BattleTech tabletop game (including, perhaps, some implementation of any of the minimum, short, medium, long, and extreme range brackets), or those from the previous MechWarrior computer games? –Strum Wealh

[DAVID] With minimum ranges, it depends on how justified we can be in putting them into the game without them being silly. For PPCs, there’s mentions in the lore about they don’t reach a full charge at close ranges so as not to damage the attacker’s own electronic systems. LRMs, being meant for long range, do not necessarily arm before they clear a certain distance. But it’s harder to justify why you can’t accurately fire an Autocannon/2 or Autocannon/5 up close, other than it was a balance to their long range in the tabletop game, so they won’t be affected by any sort of minimum range. The tabletop long ranges, on the other hand, we’re interpreting as the maximum effective range. Lasers, AC slugs, and whatnot will travel past this range, but will begin to do less and less damage, and the effects of gravity on any sort of physical projectile will make it harder to hit your target. Missiles reaching the limits of their range will automatically detonate.

("David", in this case, is David Bradley, the Game Designer "overseeing 'Mech combat and BattleTech rules")

So, it would seem that only some of the weapons that have listed minimum ranges are planned to have it, while others, for which there is little or no logical justification for the minimum range (ex. AC-2 and AC-5), would not have it.

As for the aiming issues and some of what they're doing to address them, I recommend trading the first post of the Q&A, as well as the first post of the associated Dev Blog entry.

[Nik Van Rhijn]

The problem with changing recycle times, especially drastically, is that it requires appropriate changes to heat and damage as well, with probably changes in armour value. It then makes the weapon itself totally different. An example of this is the ML in MW4 where the reduced damage (coupled with the increased armour) made it a non viable weapon in practice. It may be that PGI are experimenting with across the board reduction in time, perhaps with a corresponding change in armour.

What I can't see is recycle times being reduced to a few seconds as some are crying out for as this would just make it a totally different game.

[Yeach]

Nik Van Rhijn, on 13 April 2012 - 02:49 AM, said:

The problem with changing recycle times, especially drastically, is that it requires appropriate changes to heat and damage as well, with probably changes in armour value. It then makes the weapon itself totally different. An example of this is the ML in MW4 where the reduced damage (coupled with the increased armour) made it a non viable weapon in practice. It may be that PGI are experimenting with across the board reduction in time, perhaps with a corresponding change in armour.

What I can't see is recycle times being reduced to a few seconds as some are crying out for as this would just make it a totally different game.

+1

[Nik Van Rhijn]

With the "longer" weapon recycle times from TT, or close approximations such as 7.5 seconds. Then larger mechs could use their larger number of weapons to keep up a continuous stream of fire against the target while relying on knock and their armour. Smaller mechs would have to use speed and terrain to try and avoid return fire between cycles. It makes people think about their mech, it's loadout and tactics against the target. MW shouldn't be about just run up and fire everything as fast as possible for a kill. with convergence time being a factor it may not be so easy to pop in and out of cover for shots. It just means that people will have to think about what they are doing and adapt to the circumstances in stead of trying to change things to how they were before.
The way that mech XP etcis said to work in this game will reward people using the same mech and it's variants all the time, rather than swapping around all the time.
I have a feeling that this is going to be a very different game. For a start it is being designed from the beginning for PvP teamplay, not as SP PvE with PvP addded on.

[Siilk]

Nik Van Rhijn, on 13 April 2012 - 02:49 AM, said:

What I can't see is recycle times being reduced to a few seconds as some are crying out for as this would just make it a totally different game.

No, and here's why. You're supposing that each shot deals the full TT damage. In that case, changing RoF would definitely ruin the balance. But any change to RoF should be accompanied by appropriate change in damage per shot, so resulting DpS would stay the same. Of course, ammo count should be adjusted accordingly but armour, heat per second or other relevant parameters would have to be changed.

[T0RC4ED]

Im saying the big guns should have the high recycle times/high heat. This is subject to the ammount of ammo, weapon type and range also.
From watching the game play video it looks lke the AC20 has a 3.5 or 4 sec recycle time on it and the medium lasers have a 3 sec recycle. don't really see any problem with that because the AC 20 has a very limited amount of amo as well as limited range.

All in all im sure the devs wll put alot of attention into ballance as it wll make or break mechs that dont have alot of space for weapons.

[Nik Van Rhijn]

Siilk, on 14 April 2012 - 08:58 AM, said:

No, and here's why. You're supposing that each shot deals the full TT damage. In that case, changing RoF would definitely ruin the balance. But any change to RoF should be accompanied by appropriate change in damage per shot, so resulting DpS would stay the same. Of course, ammo count should be adjusted accordingly but armour, heat per second or other relevant parameters would have to be changed.

No, what I was trying to say was that speeding up the RoF and all other factors, past a certain point, would totally change the character of the game. Having an RoF of 3 or 4 seconds totally changes the whole character of the game.

[plodder]

Nik Van Rhijn, on 15 April 2012 - 04:15 AM, said:

No, what I was trying to say was that speeding up the RoF and all other factors, past a certain point, would totally change the character of the game. Having an RoF of 3 or 4 seconds totally changes the whole character of the game.

Yes it would, just as you say. I am sure the devs are weighing this out. All I hope is, that the weapons do what they are supposed to, and if you sacrifice multiple smaller weapons for a power punching destroyer, or vice versa, that balance is not lost, that heat, ammo, and movement is realistic to the Battletech ideas, and never arcade like. thanks for the thread to look through, I have no other insight to add.

[plodder]

Oh I forgot the poll.
I voted other. I think that large or small is only part of the aspect to consider. Type of weapon is important to me for recyle time. Could the size of the mech, the amount of energy weapons affect the recharge rate? Does the damaged mech affect the recycle rate? Thanks fellas

[Siilk]

Nik Van Rhijn, on 15 April 2012 - 04:15 AM, said:

No, what I was trying to say was that speeding up the RoF and all other factors, past a certain point, would totally change the character of the game. Having an RoF of 3 or 4 seconds totally changes the whole character of the game.

Yes, it probably would do that to some point, but I don't see why you treat it as a bad thing.

[Belisarius1]

Nik Van Rhijn, on 15 April 2012 - 04:15 AM, said:

No, what I was trying to say was that speeding up the RoF and all other factors, past a certain point, would totally change the character of the game. Having an RoF of 3 or 4 seconds totally changes the whole character of the game.

You know what else changes the character of the game? Going from a turn based tabletop dice game to a real time computer sim.

High-recycle weapons work just fine. There's nothing fundamentally wrong with them, and they add interesting options.

[Nik Van Rhijn]

Not for some weapons. The AC20,PPC & Gauss Rifle should remain high damage, slow recharge weapons. LRMs should also be slow recharge. I can see the point in having MLs and perhaps SRMs having faster reload times to give you more options. LLs could be inbetween.
It has nothing to do with going from turnbased and everything to do with the whole flavour of the game.

[Kudzu]

Belisarius†, on 17 April 2012 - 02:48 AM, said:

High-recycle weapons work just fine. There's nothing fundamentally wrong with them, and they add interesting options.

Except you go from having 40+ second slugging matches that make maneuvering and teamwork important to 15 second insta-gib encounters that favor boating and alpha strikes. That's not interesting at all.

[Jonas]

Well in real life the bigger the weapon the longer the reload time is.

Now TT rules are based on a 10 second turn that means, movement, heat, firing your weapons, taking damage, all happen in that 10 seconds.

This a simulation so the 10 second rule doesn't work. With the game trying to stay with in the TT rules the time table is more like the 1 second rule. Auto Cannons will fire faster the Ultra ones will chew through ammo and armor a lot faster. As this is a simulation we are going to be faced with recoil, and the effects of being hit with incoming fire. I also see issues with if you mount a heavier weapon on a liter chassis .Will it fit yes will you have to deal with more recoil I would hope so. The added recoil of doing those kinds of mods to your mech is where the skill will come in to play, knowing that the mech will kick hard to the right or left or up or down with each shot. Will test your skills and keep some ( not all ) but some people form going to crazy in the lab.

[Hetfeng321]

Jonas, on 25 April 2012 - 08:47 PM, said:

Well in real life the bigger the weapon the longer the reload time is.

Now TT rules are based on a 10 second turn that means, movement, heat, firing your weapons, taking damage, all happen in that 10 seconds.

This a simulation so the 10 second rule doesn't work. With the game trying to stay with in the TT rules the time table is more like the 1 second rule. Auto Cannons will fire faster the Ultra ones will chew through ammo and armor a lot faster. As this is a simulation we are going to be faced with recoil, and the effects of being hit with incoming fire. I also see issues with if you mount a heavier weapon on a liter chassis .Will it fit yes will you have to deal with more recoil I would hope so. The added recoil of doing those kinds of mods to your mech is where the skill will come in to play, knowing that the mech will kick hard to the right or left or up or down with each shot. Will test your skills and keep some ( not all ) but some people form going to crazy in the lab.

I have been surprised at the lack of courage from Piranha Games when it comes to interpreting TT rules. It is kind of ridiculous at this point. They act like that if they don't completely kneel at the feet of the BT fanboys whose only argument against anything is "It should be there because it's canon.", they will be zapped by lightning. Blindly following the rules established by a TURN-BASED TABLE-TOP STRATEDGY GAME to make a REAL-TIME FIRST PERSON SIMULATOR VIDEO GAME is a bit foolish (no offense PG but you are creating more problems than neccessary).

Look at Microsoft Studios when they made MW4 for example. Now they had balls. They messed with the silly original BT mechs that had hands and looked wierd and had other stuff that was wrong with them and flat out redesigned them so that they could work in a sci-fi simulator video game. Did they get zapped by lightning? No. Did the BT fanboys riot in the streets and burn their offices? No. Was MW4 and it's expansions immensly unpopular because they dared to alter the original BT universe? No.

Piranha Games must build MechWarrior Online from the foundation of a sci-fi simulator, not a board game from the 1980s. MechWarrior was never a copy of BattleTech in a videogame form, it was (and should still be) an interpretation of the BT universe that works as a sim video game.

Edited by Hetfeng321, 16 November 2012 - 06:42 PM.