#81
Posted 22 March 2012 - 05:17 AM
It is an inherent problem with translating a TT game to the PC where the checks and balnces are removed by the nature of the game.
It is a problem with the role warfare and the need to level up the base chassis and variants. Choice of what to play will be based on all variants available - if there is one in there that you can't play well it would stop you advancing.
I know that the Dragon is always singled out, unfortunately it's for a reason. If you have a good zoom with reticule then the AC5 has some chance against mechs without other long range heavy weapons. If you don't, making sniping harder (a possibility) then it gets worse. The only variant (1G) or Grand Dragon is the only one most people will play. The 1C with an AC2 just compounds the problem.
I juist hope that we are pleasantly surprised by what we get in Beta and that the dev's have come up with something we haven't thought of.
I think that we will get howls of "it's broke" from one section or the other of the player base whatever they do. People seem to have too wide a spread of expectations.
#82
Posted 22 March 2012 - 06:08 AM
BV does address the 'suck' factor for the crappy AC weapons...
example:
A PPC needs 17 tons + 13 crits (7Tons/3crits for the weapon + 10tons/10 crits for sHS) to run cold - it has a BV of 176
An AC 5 needs 10 tons + 7 crits (8tons/4 crits per AC, 1ton/1 crit per HS and 1 ton/1crit for ammo) to run cold - it has a BV of 70
so a pair of AC 5s weigh 20 tons, take up 14 crits, and contribute 140BV
a PPC complex weighs 17 tons, takes up 13 crits, and contributes 176 BV
The AC5 system weighs 17% more but contributes 20% less BV
On a ton-for-ton system, the PPC is better
On a BV for BV system, the AC5 is better
now, we all know that there are some sucky risks associated with ACs (explosion, run outta ammo, distributes damage) which would explain why they have a lower BV.
In short: a well used BV balancing system does alot to counteract the sucky weapons. Especially if you tweak the BV up and down to get the balance 'just right'
In-game, take a look at the Jagermech - something that sucks wind based on tonnage. It has a BV2.0 of around 900. That is the same as a Panther - a fight between a panther and a jagermech is actually pretty fair, the jager can out DPS the panther, but the panther pokes great big holes in one go. It works out pretty ok.
And as far as the dragon/grand dragon comparisons go....
You can field 5 dragons vs 4 grand dragons using BV2.0 - that's an extra heavy mech, which is damned helpful
Or, to put it another way
you could field 3 dragons + an Emperor or Highlander...vs 4 grand dragons.
I used to love putting dargons into my 'heavy scout' lances and using them to kick the legs off of other teams med/light lances....
#83
Posted 22 March 2012 - 06:19 AM
#84
Posted 22 March 2012 - 06:20 AM
But the AC is the better secondary weapon - take a look to Marauder - it would work better with 2 AC 5 and a single PPC and 14 heatsinks instead of 16
#85
Posted 22 March 2012 - 07:33 AM
#86
Posted 22 March 2012 - 09:30 AM
Victor Morson, on 21 March 2012 - 12:50 PM, said:
So the ac2 is bad because you can't put in a single one or a huge group of them and go out and kill stuff with with ease?
If I have this right, than do you also condemn almost every other small class weapon as "bad?" Because they're either too hot in groups to put out extreme killing damage without shutting you down, or too heavy to carry enough of.. etc, etc.
It would also mean that any kind of long range support role that's there to soften incoming targets up for medium range brawlers would be simply "out" as viable.
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It is demonstrably false to say that AC2/5 had absolutely no positive use in tt and the mw video games; AC2's were useful in the tt and the previous video games on hot long ranged maps, and grouped ac5s were capable of killing stuff.
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You're assuming what you should be proving - that the ac2 is a bad weapon. You still haven't given a good reason for why the ac2's should be judged by a standard they weren't conceptually built to be under.
You also didn't address that the kind of weapons "balancing" you've been discussing inevitably by logical conlusion leads to bland uniformity of performance.
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How is it that you know that common MWO combat will be like this? it certainly isn't in TT, either.
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You're making the false assumption of thinking that by "lore" I mean written characters. I did not.
Edited by Pht, 22 March 2012 - 09:31 AM.
#87
Posted 22 March 2012 - 11:42 AM
1) AC's will hit for direct damage. That gives them a bonus over lasers (which is good IMHO).
2) AC's produce little or no heat, so they will be useful on hot maps.
3) AC2's will be good for destroying objective targets or stand alone weapons from range (Im assuming there will eventually be static defenses for capture/kill objective type drops
4) No Gauss mechs have been released, and if PGI sticks to level 1 weapons for release (which makes sense form a balancing standpoint) the AC2 will be the longest ranged weapon on the field (24 hexes vs 21 for LRM's in TT)
5) AC round will continue past max range. LRM's will explode at max range. (dev quote)
and the biggest of all....
6) AC2's have a very long range. As PGI has shown, you will need to keep EYES ON TARGET to get and keep sensor data. That means any scout is going to have to expose himself to gather intel or setup indirect fire (TAG, etc). This means that a couple of AC/2 weapons will be useful in suppressing enemy scouts in open maps,
7) Anti-scout picket mechs (dragon or a fast medium) with an AC2 or AC5 can do a good deal of harm to a 25 ton scout even with 1-2 weapons. Lights have very light armor after all...
If you can suppress or destroy enemy scouts, you have gone a long way towards winning a battle in MWO (again, if the game turns out the way they expect it to....
#88
Posted 22 March 2012 - 01:35 PM
Sprouticus, on 22 March 2012 - 11:42 AM, said:
I think we are will...
Sprouticus, on 22 March 2012 - 11:42 AM, said:
Well, the AC/2 cause 2 point of damage... that's a hard call to share, ne?
Sprouticus, on 22 March 2012 - 11:42 AM, said:
So as the energy weapons become more potent in the cold maps?
Yes, heat management is harder in hot maps, but there is a vica-versa situation too...
Sprouticus, on 22 March 2012 - 11:42 AM, said:
Depending on the ammo reserve...
Sprouticus, on 22 March 2012 - 11:42 AM, said:
7) Anti-scout picket mechs (dragon or a fast medium) with an AC2 or AC5 can do a good deal of harm to a 25 ton scout even with 1-2 weapons. Lights have very light armor after all...
With 2 point of damage, you need to hit least around 6-7 times a light mech, to have a slight chance to destroy it. Yes, it's a bad call, but try to hit a speedy (118km/s) Jenner as they running acros. If he(she) not running straight toward to you, it's won't be easy, i even call it almost impossible.
So in short: i rather choose an LRM-10 (5 tons + 1 ton of ammo = 6 tons) from a Centurion, than an AC/2 (6 tons + 1 ton of ammo = 7 tons) from a Dragon version...
#89
Posted 22 March 2012 - 03:58 PM
Cifu, on 22 March 2012 - 01:35 PM, said:
So as the energy weapons become more potent in the cold maps?
Yes, heat management is harder in hot maps, but there is a vica-versa situation too...
Depending on the ammo reserve...
With 2 point of damage, you need to hit least around 6-7 times a light mech, to have a slight chance to destroy it. Yes, it's a bad call, but try to hit a speedy (118km/s) Jenner as they running acros. If he(she) not running straight toward to you, it's won't be easy, i even call it almost impossible.
So in short: i rather choose an LRM-10 (5 tons + 1 ton of ammo = 6 tons) from a Centurion, than an AC/2 (6 tons + 1 ton of ammo = 7 tons) from a Dragon version...
You misunderstand about the hot map thing. Of course energy weapons will have advantages on cold maps. But Im hoping that heat is a REAL issue in MWO, unlike previous incarnations of MW. If it is, hot maps may favor balistics pretty heavily.
I am not saying an AC2 will be able to take down a light mech, but suppression fire is about making your enemy not want to stick their head up, not killing them. And as long as a scout is dodging and trying to not get pingged to death, they are not scouting. Direct fire will work better than LRM's if only because they dont have lock time and travel time. The travel time of the LRM's in the video was pretty slow.
Just to be clear, I am not sure AC2's and Ac5's will be viable. I'm saying that in MWO, unlike previous MW games, the game mechanics may favor such a weapon. It is very possible that even with the game mechanics, the inherent issues with AC2/5's will prevent them frmom being useful. But before we assume that is the case, and that we need to change the functionality of the weapons, lets try it out.
#90
Posted 22 March 2012 - 04:45 PM
Edited by movingtarget, 22 March 2012 - 04:45 PM.
#91
Posted 22 March 2012 - 07:39 PM
Hayashi, on 20 March 2012 - 03:13 AM, said:
Therefore, there will be an incentive for people to put AC/2 and AC/5 as support weapons on the their arms to deal with long range sniping as and when needed (which brings their range capabilities to full potential), and also makes use of their high rate of fire to constantly harass the enemy Mech when circle strafing and whatnot. However, I cannot agree with making the convergence speed based on weight. We should make the convergence speed based on role. High damage per shot weapons with low rate of fire, like PPCs, AC/20s and LRM/20s should all converge slowly. Low damage per shot weapons with high rate of fire, like Small Lasers, Machine Guns, AC/2, AC/5 and SRM2 should converge very quickly. The convergence speed can be listed in the weapon stats in the Mechlab, and as this concept was never introduced in canon BT, we can use this to balance out the uselessness of the low damage per shot weapons WITHOUT INTERFERING WITH CANON. While this post is on AC/2, I'm sure most will agree with me that SRM2 and Small Lasers generally suffer from the exact same weakness.
Well, I think it's rather nifty that we agree on the notion of faster tracking/convergence for some weapons as a balancing factor.
So... I wonder how the Devs might feel about it?
Though... I would feel that basing the tracking and convergence rates on the mass of the weapons - specifically, the collective mass of the weapons in any given location - would be generally better than using a weapon's "role" as the basis.
Take, for example, a CN9-A Centurion - the basic model with an arm-mounted standard AC-10 (12 tons), two torso-mounted Medium Lasers (1 ton each), and a torso-mounted LRM-10 (5 tons).
So, let's say that the AC-10 can track at some rate of "X" degrees per second.
What happens if we refit this standard CN9-A into a CN9-AL - the latter being a canon variant that replaces the AC-10 with a Large Laser (same range brackets as the AC, with comparable damage output; masses 5 tons) and a Small Laser (0.5 tons), adds an additional six Heat Sinks?
As the Large Laser and Small Laser together amount to less than half of the AC-10's weight (5.5 tons for the lasers to the AC-10's 12 tons - a ~54.17% decrease), I would expect the CN9-AL's laser-ladden arm to be able to track much more quickly (up to about twice as quickly, even ) than the original AC-10.
By contrast, by assigning the CN9-AL's Large Laser and the CN9-A's AC-10 (same range, similar damage output) the same tracking and convergence rates because they fill identical roles in spite of the substantial difference in mass seems... less sensible.
Though, I will agree that "(approximately) matched" (same or similar range) weapons on opposite arms the same 'Mech should usually have their tracking rates tied to the slowest weapon in the set - as an example, the arm-mounted Medium Laser (1 ton) and the arm-mounted SRM-4 (2 tons) on the COM-2D Commando should (IMO) be synchronized to the tracking and convergence rates of the heavier (and thus, presumably, slower-tracking) weapon in the set - likely the SRM-4, in this case.
On the other hand, 'Mechs with wholly "non-matched" weapons in the arms - like the DRG-1N Dragon, with its right-arm AC-5 and left-arm Medium Laser - make me wonder if we could get separate tracking indicators for each arm that could be linked to or unlinked from each other at will...
Your thoughts?
#92
Posted 23 March 2012 - 02:12 AM
Karl Streiger, on 22 March 2012 - 06:20 AM, said:
But the AC is the better secondary weapon - take a look to Marauder - it would work better with 2 AC 5 and a single PPC and 14 heatsinks instead of 16
I deliberately avoided that point because it does confuse the issue (a bit). I still stick to my point that if matches are balanced based on BV, AC's become a perfectly viable weapon. On light mechs, the AC is rather pointless (because of the free HS issue) on meds/heavies they become alot more viable, because heat starts to become an issue. On assualts, they again become less useful because assualts are often short on crit space (and ACs tend to be crit whores...)
Finally - ACs make great secondary weapons.
A favorite custom loadout I used was this:
PPC/AC10/4ML + 5HS. You can fire the PPC/AC10 with no heat, OR the AC10+4ML with no heat. works really nice.
#93
Posted 23 March 2012 - 02:59 AM
Make ACs do extra damage to buildings. Even a small explosive shell delivered into a wall can do a lot of damage. A laser would do damage, but it would melt/vaporize from the outside and so vent its pressure in a relatively less harmful way. Similar SRMs and LRMs would be expected to surface detonate doing relatively less damage.
This way, while ACs may lack punch against Mechs, they are still mission viable.
#94
Posted 23 March 2012 - 08:37 AM
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Damn Strum. You were going along great guns, then the Dragon. It would require a "third" reticule me thinks and that sounds unlikely.
But as a compromise. How about in those cases, where the arm mounted weapons are weight disparaging, they settled for a mean value, perhaps take 50% of one, +50% of the other and then averaged them. (something like that, I am all out of maths today)
#95
Posted 23 March 2012 - 12:24 PM
MaddMaxx, on 23 March 2012 - 08:37 AM, said:
Damn Strum. You were going along great guns, then the Dragon. It would require a "third" reticule me thinks and that sounds unlikely.
But as a compromise. How about in those cases, where the arm mounted weapons are weight disparaging, they settled for a mean value, perhaps take 50% of one, +50% of the other and then averaged them. (something like that, I am all out of maths today)
One issue I could see with that is people loading a particularly heavy and otherwise slow-tracking "primary" weapon (say, an AC-20 or a Gauss Rifle) into one arm and a particularly fast-tracking "throw-away" weapon (say, a Small Laser or a Machine Gun) into the other arm, and using the averaging system to boost the tracking speed of the heavier weapon.
By contrast, IMO, tying tracking and convergence rates to the mass of the weapons serves to enhance the usefulness of those lighter (usually low-damage) weapons by making them better able to keep pressure on the opponent at longer and very-short ranges, thus making them viable alternatives to their heavier and harder-hitting (and, perhaps, slower-tracking) brethren.
As such, if we couldn't get a "third reticle" to have one for each arm and one for the torso-mounted weapons (Please, Devs?), then I, for one, would prefer to see the arms tracking limited to that of the heavier, slower-tracking weapon; then it's just a matter of grouping the weapons differently and adjusting one's aiming practices.
My issue with it is in cases like the Dragon and the Victor (both having an AC in one arm, and one or more lasers in the other), I imagine that it would be occasionally-useful to decouple the faster-tracking lasers from the slower-tracking AC, particularly in cases of close-quarters combat...
#96
Posted 23 March 2012 - 05:56 PM
#97
Posted 23 March 2012 - 06:50 PM
Pht, on 22 March 2012 - 09:30 AM, said:
... yeah, pretty much. You're choosing a weapon with the purpose of killing stuff. It's like if a American Civil War era rifle weighed around the same as a modern assault rifle, choosing it instead. It's just not very good.
Pht, on 22 March 2012 - 09:30 AM, said:
Not at all. I'm condemning a small weapon class that's in a heavies body. While I'm concerned about the balance for machine guns (passable in large groups on TT, generally terrible in most MW games) as well - even mentioning it on page 1 - at least they're only .50 tons. Same for a small laser. I'm not in here saying that a Small Laser is terrible weapon. Let's compare that for a second:
Small Laser vs Autocannon/2
Damage: Small Laser does MORE than an Autocannon/2
Heat: Small Laser does the SAME heat as an Autocannon/2
Range: Autocannon/2 is admittedly very long range, versus very short range
Crits: Both Weapons take only 1 crit.
Weight: This is the big one. The small laser weighs 12 times less than an Autocannon/2, figuring one half ton of ammo.
Translation in a realtime environment, if the DPS was figured to be the same for both weapons (and generally, exactly how it plays out in Table Top as well): While you're hanging back plinking the guy armed for close range with your autocannons 2 chipping his paint, he'll pretty much advance on you like the Terminator ignoring your pathetic attacks and then can open up on you with 12 times your firepower - and that's just the hypothetical of AC/2 vs Small Laser. If they pack even better weapons, that ratio gets worse.
Even figuring the range advantage, that's just silly. It's like pitting a guy with a BB gun against somebody with a chainsaw.
EDIT: But wait, there's more! What about the LRM/20? Ten times the damage, for only 3 hexes less and a few tons more. Do you really think you'll hold that 3 hex advantage against an advancing missile boat? Or how about the ER PPC? Five times the damage for only a single hex and a slight size/weight increase, and only 1 hex less.
Long story short? The AC/2 is a failure at long range dominance, it's positively outclassed at close range, etc. In order to make it useful, they need to buff it way past it's TT roots in some manner, or implement it as a super, super cheap BV weapon.
Pht, on 22 March 2012 - 09:30 AM, said:
LRMs, PPCs, ER Large Lasers, Gauss Rifles......
Pht, on 22 March 2012 - 09:30 AM, said:
No, it's still completely true. Because other than MechWarrior 1, which might have forced you into something awful like a Shadow Hawk, they've been awful weapons that are easily superseded by all of the above weapons I listed. In MechWarrior 4, the Light Gauss Rifle had similar range and drastically improved damage and one-punch delivery; likewise, the ER PPC greatly outranged the AC/5. Honestly I don't even know what to say if you don't realize that taking AC/2 or AC/5 in these games has been a horrendous handicap.
Again, I DO make an exception for Living Legends, because they had a role to play there - they were still pretty much God Awful against 'mechs unless in large groups, but they were great anti-aircraft/infantry/hovercraft weapons that were vital to any team that wanted to succeed. If we had to deal with that stuff here, problem solved.
Pht, on 22 March 2012 - 09:30 AM, said:
What standard is that? The standard of wanting your heavy gun to kill things? You really think that's unreasonable? The range on the 5 is the same as a PPC and the 2's range advantage is minor over weapons that actually deliver damage for similar weight, so I have no idea what standard you want these judged under - except as inferior weapons.
It's a role they might be able to play nicely if a BV system is put into place. An assault carrying a lot of AC5s costing as much as an upper-tier medium would be a good trade-off.
Pht, on 22 March 2012 - 09:30 AM, said:
This isn't about all weapons filling the same role, or needing to be equal, but they all need to have a distinct purpose that gives you reason to take them over something else. Otherwise, they are what you'd call outdated. There's a reason the navy doesn't use World War 2 battleships anymore, you know. You could make arguments how they can still blow stuff up all day, but if something else does it way better, they're pointless and will do nothing but collect dust.
Pht, on 22 March 2012 - 09:30 AM, said:
You're making the false assumption of thinking that by "lore" I mean written characters. I did not.
No, I'm not, I'm talking about the 'mech fluff. Which also makes hilariously silly claims like how a "Rear firing small laser discourages attacks from behind!" and stuff.
Oh no, I'm not going to hit your rear armor - I might get tickled to death.
Edited by Victor Morson, 23 March 2012 - 06:55 PM.
#98
Posted 24 March 2012 - 03:36 AM
#99
Posted 24 March 2012 - 05:39 AM
#100
Posted 24 March 2012 - 08:39 AM
Low Caliber ACs are tough nut to crack. In an effort to make them better you encroach on other weapons. There are too many other weapons saturating the long range direct fire category to try to make each equally viable. In an effort to make the AC2/5 viable you risk making other weapons redundant. In BT fluff, the AC2/5 were lower tech which made them cheap and easy weapons to make. Beyond that, Im sure BT generals would have preferred that all their AC2/5 wielding mechs take UAC, Gauss or PPC/ERPPC instead, if they had unlimited resources to do so.
Edited by =Outlaw=, 24 March 2012 - 08:40 AM.
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