60 replies to this topic

[hanitora]

Quote

One thing that might help would be a lock on warning of some kind.... right now, I don't think there are any indicators that you've been locked with missiles or what direction they're coming from, which, if you're in the middle of a firefight, you often can't stop and look so you know where to take cover.

If you press R and something gets targeted, and that something is facing you with side or front, then you are locked and missiles are coming and you need to take cover to the best of your ability

As to where they are coming from, you should know that. Situational awareness. It's not like the enemy has a chance of spawning in one of many places. They always spawn in the same place and chances are you can see the missiles being launched if you're looking toward that place. Thus it is quite reasonable to assume that is where the missile boats are.

Edited by hanitora, 31 October 2012 - 05:00 PM.

[Aversin]

hanitora, on 31 October 2012 - 04:58 PM, said:

If you press R and something gets targeted, and that something is facing you with side or front, then you are locked and missiles are coming and you need to take cover to the best of your ability

Thats the thing. If it's an LRM boat, you can't always see them to target back or determine if you are the target of a missile lock. Since they don't need LoS on you in order to have LoE. If you had something that told you there was an actual missile lock, not just a target lock, that might help a bit so that you know to find cover.

[Iulianus]

Is the problem a single missile boat that's spamming his LRM on you, or being targetted by a lance full of LRM boats all at once? There are counters to either one. The simplest answer is to play the striker role against them. Quickly get inside the minimum range of the missile launcher and they can't hit you. Remember that for every LRM in the mech, they have less hardpoints/criticals/weight to use for close range weapons. Especially, as a fast light mech against an isolated, dedicated missile boat hiding in the back of their line. I love to flank around unseen and jump the Cats from @100m. Otherwise, there are a couple more tactics.

Power down (shortcut key P) will remove their ability to lock. The downside of this is that it makes you an easy target for snipers.

AMS isn't perfect. However, grouped AMS spam counters LRM spam fairly well. It takes teamwork, though. You have to have a few lancemates, all with AMS, and all of you have to stand close enough together so that the multiple AMS systems work together to reduce even more missiles.

[wDraco]

Col Forbin, on 31 October 2012 - 11:26 AM, said:

Maybe they plan to have Guardian ECM kill lock somehow? If I was in charge, I would either:

drastically increase LRM ammo costs. I mean, they should be magnitudes more expensive that ballistic ammo.

drastically reduce the hit rate unless Tag or Narc are applied, as in make it not worth firing
with Artemis allowing reduced range, direct line of sight volleys (LOS from the actual missile boat)

the only counter mesure is the ECM (electronic counter mesure) only when the DEVs put it at work the LRM rein will end.
For those of you that dont know what it is here is a short description.

Designed to interfere with guided weaponry, targeting computers, and communication systems, the Guardian is typically used to shield allied units from such equipment by emitting a broad-band signal meant to confuse radar, infrared, ultraviolet, magscan and sonar sensors.

[Firewuff]

I would love the Guardians to come back into play, the issue I have is scouts who tag you and unless there us verticle cover indirect fire is way too effective.

I think that this is less of an issue if the team matching was better. When you get groups going up against random people then the groups almost always win as they HAVE coordinated lrm boats and scouts, random groups cant coordinate in the same way

I agree that the PPC causing lock loss or at least the chance of would be a good game balancer.

[Mad Pig]

AMS + Speed + Terrain keeps piggie free from the pain.

[hanitora]

Aversin, on 31 October 2012 - 05:19 PM, said:

Thats the thing. If it's an LRM boat, you can't always see them to target back or determine if you are the target of a missile lock. Since they don't need LoS on you in order to have LoE. If you had something that told you there was an actual missile lock, not just a target lock, that might help a bit so that you know to find cover.

No, that isn't the thing at all. A LRM boat does not need to be the one targeting you. ANY MECH targeting you means that you're a giant bullseye for LRMs. Whether the missiles are actually coming or not is irrelevant because the chances that they are coming are significantly higher than the chances that they aren't coming.

[Jasta]

I think LRM's are at a pretty good place purely damage wise. There was a period in CB where LRM's sucked and they were incredibly boring and pointless.

However they do need some tweaks in their overall effectiveness.

• Cover needs to work obviously. Get rid of the 'hologram' buildings and rocks.

• AMS may need to be buffed slightly. Maybe make it easier for allies to form AMS shields by displaying an icon on your HUD for every AMS system you are in range of (including your own).

• Lock on warnings would be a huge difference - especially if it gave you some idea just how many enemies (or even missiles) are locked on to you. The few extra seconds you get to run to cover would be critical.

This isn't even science fiction - this is stuff modern ECM suites do in fighter jets now. In game I'm seeing it being represented by a simple bar which increases in size and or changes colour with the number of locks currently on you, maybe with a warning tone. Green is good, yellow is time to worry, red is time to run like hell.

• Lastly some kind of active rather than passive ECM would be nice. Not sure how canon this is.

Fixing these things would also make stuff like NARC and TAG more useful. Currently they're pretty pointless.

[DarklightCA]

I've never had trouble with LRM's, I stick to cover and usually have a AMS on me. I go from cover to cover and pick off mechs. However I seriously doubt a team would all go LRM. LRM's are nice and good support but they cannot do close range. With a lot of tonnage spent on those LRM's and ammo, they won't have much in the way of good close range weapons. Pretty much any mech with good fire power will rip them to pieces once they got close. LRM mechs depend on variety to support them. Scouts to get targets for them and medium and heavy mechs to keep other mechs off there backs.

I pitty a team that was all LRM campers. As annoying as I find LRM mechs, what I really look out for are those blasted streak cats. There is always one when I am engaging another mech. Just pop pop pop, getting blasted by missle after missle. That is far more annoying.

[Silvar]

There was point in CB when LRMs were useless and that was not fun Reducing LRM damage is not solution in my opinion but after tweaking more NARC and TAG's one option would be to add tad more Dispersion when firing "indirect" like mentioned earlier in the Thread. (15-30% increase would be fine i think needs testing tough) (oh and NARC definetely needs to be longer lasting it is Joke now)

If you have problem with Missiles and get constantly killed by em then you are doing something wrong and need to change your playing style it is as simple as that. (you get spotted/scouted and artillery/airstrike is called to your position it will hurt)

I agree that holo Rocks and Buildings need to be fixed soon so cover works better.

I play mostly LRM mechs (Catapults currently) So i am 1 of those EVIL LRM users (tough i configured my catapults so i can use LRM's the whole fight.) 1600-2000 missiles loaded overkill but i like it)

[Anuri]

LRM's are fine - just learn to avoid them.

Yesterday i was in a team with only 1 dedicated lrm user and we won 5 matches that i had time to play - he was doing the moste damage and got lots of kills.

The other teams had more lrm users with them and they made 1-2 kills at moste. You have to learn to use LRM and to avoid them - thats a piloting skill, and using your brain - nothing else

Edited by Anuri, 31 October 2012 - 10:22 PM.

[nferno6]

I think the circles needs to be red untill the lrms hit..your mech is like a homing tracker...if you lose him on the radar or with the reticle, the lrm's just follow straight line...but shoot some lrm in a random direction, and see what happens when you suddenly pick up a mech and hes targetted....those lrm's swarm beautifully like a swarm of angry wasps
...

[Atreus Ofiach]

this topic was beat to DEATH in the closed beta forums... but the OP fanboi defenders won the argument in PGI's eyes... oh well...... GG PGI

[Minos Murdoc]

Crazy Eight, on 31 October 2012 - 04:05 PM, said:

A: Make LRMs have a shorter range. So players with LRMs have to get closer into the battlefield thus increasing the risk.

B: Make maps with more Cover. so missiles can't reach players so easily.

C: Make Larger maps so players have more room to maneuver and flank one another more easily. and thus missile spammers would have to watch there surroundings more.

To answer b &c they are making more maps.
As to A they already have a range of 1000m which for a "long range missile" is a joke. And most of the ballistic weapons a and large lasers have a greater range that them. I've been in my lrm boat and been sniped but guass, ac, er PPC, large lasers in a couple of hits.

[Atreus Ofiach]

Youngbull1980, on 31 October 2012 - 11:58 PM, said:

To answer b &c they are making more maps.
As to A they already have a range of 1000m which for a "long range missile" is a joke. And most of the ballistic weapons a and large lasers have a greater range that them. I've been in my lrm boat and been sniped but guass, ac, er PPC, large lasers in a couple of hits.

If you want to go with canon/lore 1000meters was a crazy shot for the ****** targeting systems in most mechs. ALSO the missles come in from almost directly overhead beyond 600meters so cover is almost no concern.. FFS my 7 year old nephew got 4 kills and 900 damage just LRM spamming in a catapult lol

EDIT : his best game was 6 kills 970 damage. he played for probably 5 hours and never got less than 700 damage and 2 kills just mashing the LRM button.

Edited by jordanfoy, 01 November 2012 - 12:04 AM.

[Minos Murdoc]

Well all i can say to that is he's doing better than me. i'm averaging 2kills and 300-400 damage in my Cat. but then i'm getting LRM, guass and ac fire on me. seems to be oh look a Cat Taken him out. But its a game and STILL IN BETA.

They will be adding, removing, balancing, fixing for a while. People keep forgetting this is still beta and not finished product.

Edited by Youngbull1980, 01 November 2012 - 12:31 AM.

[Ran]

It would be nice of projectiles had 'hp' and thus could be shot down. Why is the AMS system the only thing that can hit incoming missiles? Why can't I use a laser as a last ditch attempt to knock out a few missiles before they slam into my ship? I'm not asking for cluster explosions by way of a domino effect, but it would be nice if a player could -actively- play the Anti-Missile role for his or her team with Mid/Long range lasers.

[yeebok]

Col Forbin, on 31 October 2012 - 11:55 AM, said:

From what I can tell after my "AH HAH!" moment last night, yes. They will come down around you if you had some most of the way to you, but very spread out. Kind of like if you lose Tag lock at the last second you can see the missiles spread out.... I will test more tonight, and post my thought.

I think it also depends on a few other things. You have to keep in mind that when they lose lock, maybe until 1 sec after you power down, there are still missiles being launched. To me it appears once a missile loses lock, it heads for where the target was, but less accurately. So if you hide and then power down, missiles could still be heading pretty much right at you for at least another 5 or so seconds including flight time. Whether those ones hit you or not is pure luck.. that said there's often such a cloud of the things that even with an AMS you can't stop many of them - and powered down, there's no AMS.

IDEA : It would be very nice if you could swat LRMs with lasers. Firing upwards would be a hassle, and probably enough of a counter to adding that.

[Agent CraZy DiP]

I think people are forgetting that ECM will be added to the game at a later date.

[Atayu]

The best and last anti LRM item you will ever need if used right. Cover, yes that is right cover. you know stuff you can hid behind all over the place. You say there is no cover close and they are locked onto you. Well that means you were not being aware of your surroundings and got to far away from some cover. LRM's easy to use easy to dodge.