54 replies to this topic

[Teirdome]

NamesAreStupid, on 14 November 2012 - 01:07 PM, said:

Could you update your graphs for the new patch?

Was there a patch on the 13th I missed? The heat numbers were actually incorrect for Pulse Lasers and Small Lasers prior to the 6th, but with the fix to heat generated over duration in the 6th's patch they are now correct.

[New Day]

Teirdome, on 15 November 2012 - 11:17 AM, said:

Was there a patch on the 13th I missed? The heat numbers were actually incorrect for Pulse Lasers and Small Lasers prior to the 6th, but with the fix to heat generated over duration in the 6th's patch they are now correct.

No, I just thought you didn't update them for Nov 6., my bad.

[Hida Kisada]

Excellent guide, certainly deserving of a sticky.

Without your ranged section i'm not sure if i'll be won over or not as yet but your current suggestion to ignore ER Large Lasers i find to be misguiding because their heat efficiency doesn't take into account their role enhancement/utility.

I'm currently primarily running a HBK-4P with 7 Small Lasers, 2 ER Large Lasers, and all the DHS that'll fit. Depending on background heat this generally enables me to fire 3-5 shots with either group without worrying about heat. Thanks to the pair of ER Large Lasers i have an 18 dmg (potentially) strike up to 675m with less dmg out to 1350m, this allows me to participate in the fight long before many other mechs, this extra dmg against mediums/scouts at range has proved incredibly valuable to my combat efficiency.

Since my normal effective range would be 90m with just smalls or mixed based on my secondary shot choice i find that for the size and heat having 2 ER Large is nearly ideal. Obviously these could just be Large Lasers, but since that would reduce my max dmg range to 450, and the heat of the ER Large isn't a particular issue i feel this wouldn't be worth while.

While i can certainly see and agree with you that an ER Large Laser is by far the least heat efficient laser system you can mount, i feel that the utility it grants outweighs this problem to a degree. On Mechs mounting a bank of high heat short range systems already, large numbers of pulses and smalls generally, having one or a pair of ER Lasers may be quite worth it if you already have a strong heat dissapation system.

Also - apologies for the wall of text, this probably was way more wordy than necessary.

[Ryft]

This was a well written guide. I think I've gotten some good info out of it... particularly some of the broader rules of thumb. Additionally I think it will inform my decisions on what weapons to use against what type of targets even with prebuilt trial mechs (consider the Atlas K or Cicada laser choices, for instance).

Hida Kisada, on 15 November 2012 - 06:18 PM, said:

Thanks to the pair of ER Large Lasers i have an 18 dmg (potentially) strike up to 675m with less dmg out to 1350m, this extra dmg against mediums/scouts at range has proved incredibly valuable to my combat efficiency.

Edited for brevity, somewhat. Anyways, my points:

1) I think you are confusing the word efficiency with effectiveness? Maybe not. Probably not important either way.

2) At the range you are talking about for those ER large lasers, what sort of tracking are you really getting against fast moving scout mechs? For the short period of time that you are likely to see them, that probably isn't anything close to 18 damage. Additionally, with all those small lasers, you will not really want to engage on open terrain against slower, heavier mechs either, since two ER larges are going to be outgunned against heavy LRM fire, Gauss guns, etc. Rather you would choose to navigate blocking obstacles to close in. That limits the use of the ER larges against slower targets, too.

I personally think you would be better off switching to regular large lasers for drastically better heat in exchange for similar damage and range.

Might be worth checking out the ranges you actually find yourself firing at, as well as how much damage you think you are actually getting per shot. Evaluate. Adjust armament if necessary.

I'm considering buying a hunchback soon as a support brawler, and going with either smalls or mediums in the torso, and pulse mediums in the arms for brief shots of opportunity against fast moving targets, or brief glimpses of mechs between buildings as I pass by, etc.

Edited by Ryft, 15 November 2012 - 10:03 PM.

[Hida Kisada]

Ryft, on 15 November 2012 - 10:01 PM, said:

1) I think you are confusing the word efficiency with effectiveness? Maybe not. Probably not important either way.

i think you're right.

Ryft said:

At the range you are talking about for those ER large lasers, what sort of tracking are you really getting against fast moving scout mechs? For the short period of time that you are likely to see them, that probably isn't anything close to 18 damage.

Very frequently i'm firing at mediums and heavies in excess of 600m with the ER larges. Typically i'll only fire on scouts with them if no other targets are available or they are moving in a way that's easily trackable. - eg they are circling someone at a distance and coming towards me/moving away, much like you described. I've put fire onto targets and been able to see decent dmg start to accumulate at ranges of 1000 m since people will suprisingly stand around while being hit, particularly if they are already engaged with closer targets.

I'll have to give the regular Larges a try, but my primary concern is dmg fall off for further shots, it can be compensated easily enough but since i typically only fire the larges or the smalls heat hasn't been much of an issue while using ER Larges. I'm looking forward to your Range discussion as it will likely aid me in making a final choice.

Edited by Hida Kisada, 15 November 2012 - 11:25 PM.

[John MatriX82]

Ryft, on 15 November 2012 - 10:01 PM, said:

I personally think you would be better off switching to regular large lasers for drastically better heat in exchange for similar damage and range.

I use a similar 4P laserboat with standard large. You still can hit someone if you want above 450 meters, but even in brawling you can safely use LLAs if you need (those times when you don't have enough yaw/pitch on your smlas alpha). I however play it lik a switch, under 90m only smlas, as soon as my target runs out of that range i melt it with llas.

Extremely nice guide btw Teirdome, definitely needs a sticky.

[Ewigan]

After reading this guide i switched the Med lasers on all of my commandos to med. pulse lasers. and now i do a LOT more damage, and definitely way more focused.

so thanks for the guide!

[Hammerhai]

Thank you. Great stuff

[SquareSphere]

GREAT GUIDE! Loved the analysis

[Wrenchfarm]

Fantastic guide! Great info in here.

Hida Kisada, on 15 November 2012 - 11:24 PM, said:

Very frequently i'm firing at mediums and heavies in excess of 600m with the ER larges. Typically i'll only fire on scouts with them if no other targets are available or they are moving in a way that's easily trackable. - eg they are circling someone at a distance and coming towards me/moving away, much like you described. I've put fire onto targets and been able to see decent dmg start to accumulate at ranges of 1000 m since people will suprisingly stand around while being hit, particularly if they are already engaged with closer targets.

I'll have to give the regular Larges a try, but my primary concern is dmg fall off for further shots, it can be compensated easily enough but since i typically only fire the larges or the smalls heat hasn't been much of an issue while using ER Larges. I'm looking forward to your Range discussion as it will likely aid me in making a final choice.

I've had good success with two regular large lasers in my Cent-AL's main cannon. Much like you describe, people are surprisingly slow to react or notice you frying them from a distance. I like to find a big slow mover like an Atlas or a tunnel visioned brawler and take my time melting specific target spots. Damage drops off after 450m, but it still does great work, especially if they are too fixated to really do much against it. So I get your argument for the added utility. Might want to try dropping down to regular LLAS to see if the reduced heat build up will let help you brawl better.

[Bagheera]

This is great stuff. Definitely want to give it a more complete read later, but lots of good tips in here.

One thing:

Teirdome, on 30 October 2012 - 11:44 AM, said:

Which Laser is Right

Pulse Lasers are significantly more effective at killing Lights than Normal Lasers. This is simply because a faster target is more difficult to track. If you’re only going to get half a second of track time on a light (and half a second is a really good tracking time against Lights imo), then a Medium Laser is only going to do 5 ticks for 2.5 damage. Meanwhile a Medium Pulse Laser is going to do 6-7 ticks for 3.6 to 4.2 damage. That’s a 44% to 68% increase. Considering it's 7-9 tons (assuming SHS) for a second Medium Laser, this is a steal.

Let's look at a graph to further explore this idea:

The Large Laser line seems to be missing from this chart. At a glance, the rest of the charts (which are awesome, btw) had them all represented.

[Teirdome]

Bagheera, on 16 November 2012 - 11:10 AM, said:

One thing:

The Large Laser line seems to be missing from this chart. At a glance, the rest of the charts (which are awesome, btw) had them all represented.

Good catch! I freaked out myself the first time I created the chart and was convinced I messed something up.

It's unfortunately hidden by the ER Large Laser. I should modify the chart to make that more clear. The ER Large and the Large both have the same damage and duration, so therefore they have the exact same line.

Edited by Teirdome, 16 November 2012 - 12:06 PM.

[Teirdome]

I have added the following charts for medium laser boating:




And for Double Heat Sinks:



I've found these charts to be pretty accurate, though the spikes aren't quite as rough in the game. Really they should be a bit more round because the full laser heat isn't reached until approximately 2 seconds after the weapon has been fired. I'm going to leave them with the pure maths for now however.

If you find a result different from these (keep in mind that they map to un-talented mechs, so you can adjust a little lower if you have the two heat-related talents), please let me know. I only have one mech without talents (the AS7-D described in the main text) and the numbers matched up quite well. I also ran the CDA-2A multiple times and found the numbers matched when I went to a DHS coefficient of 1.61 (Elite talented).

Also, if you would like other weapons, I can easily run those graphs as well.

[ElcomeSoft]

I love this thread... but I cannot bring myself to change my DRG-5N away from the 1 Gauss (4t) and 2 LL. I tend to use the speed to stay at range and i'm reasonably decent with the LL's against any mech up to around 85kph. On the build I use just 12 DHS (300XL engine).

With my DRG-5N I considered using my leftover 320XL from the AWS-9M, dropping the two LL's for 2 MPL's and shoehorning an SRM4 with 1t of ammo into the CT. Even though I like the idea of extra speed, I'd feel bad with the SRM4's because I can't use them for toffee and I would feel much more vulnerable using the MPL's over the LL's.

I suppose that when I buy the DRG-1C, I could try a 2/4 MPL build with the 320XL and perhaps an AC/10 or UAC/5 to back me up as a much closer range brawler/H&R type.

I just wish LPL's were a bit more viable. Specifically with the LL's I can tickle an enemy mech from such a large range that most of their weapons do nothing to me or do some insignificant level of damage. An LPL would give me, in certain circumstances, an advantage over the typical ML user if only they weren't so heat hungry.

My YLW uses 2 MPL in the CT so when my AC/20 runs dry or I lose my arm, I can zombie a little better than the typical ML build. I noticed that reasonably early on when I was using that mech, that I was doing more damage with the 2 MPL's after the AC/20 had gone than plain ML's. (Actually did better with 1 LL than 2 ML's but typically combined the 1 LL with the Gauss... slightly prefer the AC/20 with 2 MPL over 1 LL + Gauss).

I hope this is updated on Tuesday night/Wednesday morning (UK time) so that I can tweak up my builds, giving me that little extra edge for my play style (4 of the most important words in many games, especially MWO in my opinion... for my play style. I have a friend who is heavy into BT with the fiction books and played Tabletop and he gives me the "WTF?" look when I tell him about some of the builds I theorycraft and use because he finds them clumsy/clunky/awkward but I find them effective).

Great job! If Devs are seeing this, I recommend small bonuses be provided to people who contribute to the MWO Community to this degree. As a beneficiary of some bonuses from the guys running World of Tanks (free gold issued directly, in closed beta, by Overlord himself and my Website was voted one of the top 10 resources for WoT guides, earning me some nifty prizes), I feel like people whom devote their time to helping players, both new and old, in this kind of manner should receive a little something for their efforts, even if it is just a great big thumbs up with their links in your own Newbie/Oldbie guides or a skin/bobblehead/small amount of MC/Mechbay slot.

A little effort from players and developers alike goes a very long way

[dakuth]

Exceedingly useful info. However, I think several posts here have highlighted an issue I have.

That is, I think pure Damage Per Heat Ton is a little misleading. I mean - you're looking at graphs that are showing how to fire continuously for 30+ seconds. How often do you get into a fight where you can literally mash the laz0rs ever moment they cool down -- for 30 seconds in a row? Perhaps time flys a lot faster when the light starts flyin' than I realise, but I would have thought 2-3 shots would be the most common number of shots you could pull off before needing to hold fire for some reason other than heat (lose line of sight, lose track, etc.) If I've pumped a 4th shot out without a pause, they must be AFK or perhaps stuck on terrain.

I would be far more interested in analysis of ranges (which you said is coming), spike damage over short periods of time and the heat implications that has. Basically, I believe in actual practice, spike damage is more important than pure DPS. Particularly DPS over an extended period -- which is what we seem to be calculating here (i.e. Which lasers, that I can continuously fire for 30-60secs, will do the most damage in that time) -- would seem to me to be mostly of theoretical interest (and as a baseline) than actual practical use.

[Teirdome]

dakuth, on 18 November 2012 - 05:27 PM, said:

Exceedingly useful info. However, I think several posts here have highlighted an issue I have.

That is, I think pure Damage Per Heat Ton is a little misleading. I mean - you're looking at graphs that are showing how to fire continuously for 30+ seconds. How often do you get into a fight where you can literally mash the laz0rs ever moment they cool down -- for 30 seconds in a row? Perhaps time flys a lot faster when the light starts flyin' than I realise, but I would have thought 2-3 shots would be the most common number of shots you could pull off before needing to hold fire for some reason other than heat (lose line of sight, lose track, etc.) If I've pumped a 4th shot out without a pause, they must be AFK or perhaps stuck on terrain.

I would be far more interested in analysis of ranges (which you said is coming), spike damage over short periods of time and the heat implications that has. Basically, I believe in actual practice, spike damage is more important than pure DPS. Particularly DPS over an extended period -- which is what we seem to be calculating here (i.e. Which lasers, that I can continuously fire for 30-60secs, will do the most damage in that time) -- would seem to me to be mostly of theoretical interest (and as a baseline) than actual practical use.

I agree with you that showing out to 60 seconds is a ridiculous I originally wanted to only calculate continuous firing to a maximum of 30 seconds, but a number of posts I read encouraged me to go with the 60 second version. There were a surprising number of people in other threads I read who claim that they fire for more than 30 seconds continuously.

I have been thinking through numerous ways to present spike damage. It's a little more difficult with Lasers simply because of the firing duration portion of the calculation. I'm playing with a couple charts to investigate hitting with multiple lasers and then examining the cooldown periods, but haven't had the time to do in-game verification of my results.

[dakuth]

Teirdome, on 20 November 2012 - 08:13 AM, said:

I agree with you that showing out to 60 seconds is a ridiculous I originally wanted to only calculate continuous firing to a maximum of 30 seconds, but a number of posts I read encouraged me to go with the 60 second version. There were a surprising number of people in other threads I read who claim that they fire for more than 30 seconds continuously.

I have been thinking through numerous ways to present spike damage. It's a little more difficult with Lasers simply because of the firing duration portion of the calculation. I'm playing with a couple charts to investigate hitting with multiple lasers and then examining the cooldown periods, but haven't had the time to do in-game verification of my results.

Ohh. Sounds interesting. I'm looking forward to reading what you have.

[MustrumRidcully]

It's true, Lasers are difficult to figure for spikes. 8 Medium Lasers may theoretically sound like 40 damage alpha, but that's ignoring the beam duration. One thing I considered was either cutting off the damage after 0.25 seconds, figuring that a quarter second would be "alpha" enough. Alternatively, one could weigh the damage down based on the duration, say...

damage_idealized = damage_shot * ((3 - duration)/3). (So a Medium Laser would be at 3.33 damage for alpha purposes). I don't think we'll have the chance to gather enough experimental data in the game to actually get a completely realistic estimate.

[Rayyner]

Excuse for brake language, I am Russian gamer.

But there is a question.

Where (in what place , link) may I read and download official manuals and helps on MWO: Mech_Warrior_Online from corporate-designer off this game?


Not people-talks, its interesting information from first hands. About mechanics to calculate heat, damage, weapon systems, how devices work, mech-drawing (engineer-concepts-drawing for methods-simple-to-kill) and other technician manuals (helps) off game.

Its important not talks , but accuracy information about game-mechanical.

[Ryft]

No such manuals exist, to my knowledge.

I myself am hoping for some data on how damage drops off after the primary effective range has been surpassed... is it a gradual decrease to zero at twice the listed range? is it half damage until twice the listed range? Is the maximum range not twice the listed range, as I was led to believe? Those sorts of questions.

Edited by Ryft, 11 December 2012 - 10:39 AM.