2028 replies to this topic

[Marcus Tanner]

StUffz, on 08 December 2012 - 12:17 PM, said:

Sorry, but read again the definition of Guardian) ECM:

...

ECM works as intended.

The wiki is misleading, to the point of being incorrect.

"Within it's effect radius, an ECM suite has the following effects on the following systems. The ECM suite does not affect other scanning and targeting devices, such as TAG and targeting computers." Total Warfare, page 134.

It goes on to mention specific effects on Active Probes (like Beagle), Artemis IV, Narc Missile Beacons, and C3. It does not mention target locks or reduced scanning range.

In Tactical Operations, there are a number of optional rules for ECM. These include the optional rule for ECCM, the ghost targets setting, and the use of ECM in the case of double-blind games. From the double-blind rules:

"As a general rule, ECM/stealth systems mask a unit's nature and precise location from enemy sensors, but the systems' powerful jamming devices make it clear to the enemy that something is out there." Tactical Operations, page 223

"To be affected, the spotting unit must be in the normal operating radius of the ECM/stealth system (note that stealth systems only affect the target unit and do not have a radius of effect, and so are only taken into consideration for the unit mounting that equipment)." Tactical Operations, page 223

An interesting note in these rules is that "all units have a 360-degree visual arc; 'Mechs have a 360-degree view compressed into the forward view screen." <<< Naturally this is not part of MWO, and that is probably for the best.

In the tabletop, ECM does not affect visual targeting at all. It can make targeting a unit outside your LOS more difficult, so long as the spotter is in the ECM field (so it might mask your heat signature if someone was using heat vision, but it wouldn't affect your ability to get a visual lock and wouldn't affect heat vision at long distances). This is what they mean by "mask a unit's nature and precise location from enemy sensors", a clause that only refers to detecting units that are not in your line of sight.

Note that stealth systems, unlike ECM, *do* have an effect even when the stealthy mech is in your visual range. These often involve polarizing light in such a way as to actually make a Stealth-equipped mech more difficult to see, even with the Mk1 eyeball.

Understand that a targeting system doesn't need to use IR or radio signatures to identify a target. Visual recognition software is well past good enough to recognize a mech silhouette. A computer could simply track the visual input the pilot is getting and to a better job at threat recognition than the pilot.

http://www.forbes.co...al-recognition/ <<< If computers can do this now, with nothing more than a conventional civilian visual spectrum camera, they can do one hell of a lot better telling a giant robot from the building beside it.

ECM works as PGI intended it, not as Battletech intended it.

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What ECM *can* do is be set to throw out "ghost targets" as an optional rule from Tactical Operations. This might be a more sane alternative to the mechanics PGI has in operation now.

"An ECM suite can be tuned to generate "ghost targets" that may affect the ability of enemy units to properly target friendly units." <<< In tabletop terms this adds additional modifiers to hit a target so long as the enemy pilots aren't aware enough to ignore the false positives (a die roll).

If an ECM can produce false target blips and heat signatures nearby, then enemy units could very easily lose shots or waste flights of LRMs on targets that aren't there, particularly if they rely on indirect fire or heat vision scanners.

This would call for balancing streak boats some other way, but it would do a great deal to handle people who are practically sleepwalking through their use of LRMs.

[steelblueskies]

-ecm is supposed to be an offensive system. you get up on the enemy and disrupt them in proximity, preferably by sneaking in from behind, unseen. instead we have a magic shield. a 360 degree all map magic shield. even bap won't detect units outside fov even within its active detection range of 4 hexes.

-lrm lock on is a whole cloth fabrication to suit missile fire with lrms to real-time in tt the only place missile lock can be found is in reference to streaks. in tt lrms fire and deal damage based on successful number of missiles that hit roll, in the same turn.
(and for those calling lrms support weapons, please learn. a fire support role exists. but long range missiles are not, in any place, specifically referenced as a "support weapon system" canonically.)




-lagshield/netcode, and performance issues make the brawl and light situation out of whack with intent, but are being worked on, however ecm mechanics compound said problem rather than remain neutral.


-ecm shouldn't be able to be locked by bap sensors. but theres a difference between knowing a target is there, and knowing exactly where, what, and who the target is.ditto for being able to direct fire using the artificial lock on mechanic. when canon says active sensors should know the ecm is there, this does not jive with complete blindness at range and a low signal bar when in the bubble.
a red triangle+bounding box with no designation, no damage doll, no weapon readout, and no target assignment letter or distance is how it should appear when detected, at worst, to jive with the somethings there. the option to add multiple false target signatures with the same missing information near the ecm target is also skipped. (i wager this may actually be to avoid placing further stress on the ui functions which have been cited as a performance hurdle being worked on presently, as well as a standard design decision, though i am unable to understand the choice.)

-weapon lock as a mechanic needs a revisit as seems clear at present, as well.

we have aimed shot accuracy with all direct fire systems.

we should have "not perfectly accurate to reticule fire" if we do not select target and hold target for lock(at least for a much briefer period than missile locks). this would also serve to aid in balancing out the no lock-on mess across weapon types while paving the way for proper targeting computers later(it is assumed that I.S. mechs have targeting computers of limited capability, and that the clan equipment by that name is a better version, much as c3 is listed as an upgrade to same), to have their intended effect for all weapon systems by improving accuracy, not just "reduce missile lock time and target info speed" which seems the path it would be pigeonholed into now.

i recognize that this also would be punitive until netcode revisions work their way in.
this is relevant because the lack of such(poor accuracy for pot shots, requiring lock on for accurate direct fire) makes the disparity present between weapon systems even more blatant.
(this also relates to why in gods name does weapon impulse shake view and not reticule. incoming hits are sufficient to knock the pilot about but not cause shots to fly slightly untrue??????? the latter would have been gameplay as trading fire makes both machines less accurate, while the current solution is pure visual gobbledygook instead of gameplay and hurts performance to boot. locking on to reduce or eliminate the degree of off-true shots when taking fire would have been an element as well.)

-ecm further diminishes or flat out disables many of the whole cloth piloting modules that have been added, and are not canonical. target info gathering, sensor range, 360 target retention. some more than others.

-lastly, we lose friendly position data, as well as indirect data. this implies we have c3 systems integrated by default in all mechs. where are they and their tonnage so i can remove them to fit more useful things, and/or train with teammates into better tactics without relying on them? if i cannot rely on the system, i and most others will likely drop it in favor of something we know we can get mileage out of for the space and tonnage.

----------------------------------------------
that said.

your game, your house rules in translatingto realtime. not gonna cry about it, but i will present honest lists of how i see it, what comes up in conversation while planning to deal with it, and what thoughts keep coming up and making no sense with information presently available. no hostility intended, this is pieced together from multiple smaller documents, mostly notes after conversations or matches. hopefully it helps in the beta ironing out process, if only as another aggregate statistic.


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p.s. may any grammatically assiduous readers forgive me or pray for me for this post. it's have the flu bad..

[Thatguyoverthere]

I've had quite a bit more time to play with and without ECM. Here's more of my input. Note: This is all PuG gameplay.

• I find LRMs to still be in good use; Unless you're going up against a team which is very coordinated and manages to keep a blanket of ECM over all their units at all times, but this is a worst-case scenario. And against this kind of team, LRMs won't make a difference anyways. Even if our team loses, I can hardly say it's the LRM's fault, since I've seen plenty a game lost when the team without any ECM beats the team filled with it, even if two mechs on that winning side are LRM boats with a couple medium lasers. Secondly to this, when playing as a 3L, I can dart around the enemy ECM-Atlas and counter it, allowing my teammates to open fire and knock it down within 15 seconds. The important thing to note here is that all these cases are when the enemy has coordinated ECM. In cases where the enemy does not, LRMs are free to fly. I conclude that ECM does not nullify LRMs as a weapons.

• I find SSRMs to be in the same boat. Once again, it's important to note that ECM is not always affecting every enemy mech. In addition to this, one's own team can carry ECM, and gain the advantage over their enemy. (Sure, some games might be a flat-out loss, but if anything is to blame it's the coordination and skill of the enemy. I reiterate that several teams I have been in, lacking any ECM whatsoever, have flattened ECM-Equipped teams.)

• In regards to targeting, ECM plays its role, cloaking a mech from radar at long ranges. I find that using thermal vision and calling out battle-grid locations via team-chat can still effectively give my team an idea of where the enemy is.

• Close range jamming of mech radar by ECM works as intended, and has weaknesses (my own ECM) and strengths (hiding me from allies).

• In regards to the ECM-Equipped Atlas. While teams usually will group together around such a mech, it's possible for a couple light mechs to move around back of the group and fire on the Atlas while the remainder of the team focuses fire on the front. The ECM-Atlas usually is destroyed within 20 seconds this way. In addition, the more ECM-Atlases that there are, the less light mechs there are to swarm a grouping of my team. This makes keeping distance much easier. Finally, capturing the enemy point is made much easier in this scenario, since the slower mechs are left to fend for themselves while the lights on the team run back to defend the point. This opens the slow mechs to the full-fire of my team. TAG can also be easily trained on the Atlas, leaving it open to a rain of LRMs. Note: The only thing that ECM really does here is prevent LRM fire. Multiple Atlases together are a threat whether they have ECM or not.

Conclusion:
ECM has both strengths and weaknesses. I find that it's not ECM that determines the winning or losing team, but the coordination and skill of the team itself. Not everyone wants to pilot a lightweight (or medium weight) mech just for the use of ECM (The Atlas is also expensive). Those who do usually have played enough to attain the CBills necessary to buy such a mech, upgrade its engines, its weapons, unlock better pilot skills, etc.. As such, they are more skilled players. Keep ECM in its current state!

Edited by Thatguyoverthere, 08 December 2012 - 02:31 PM.

[krolmir]

Old ECM gameplay in MW4 (and prior) was totally different than MWO version. Old version prevented Identification of target as friend or foe, until about 300m(not the 100m cloaking device it is) . However, you could still target that enemy, no matter what. I think the best way to balance SSRM builds is to give each missle a relatively high miss chance, and to give them the same terrible grouping that regular SRM's have now. Instead of them peppering your R/L/C torso exclusively; they could spread hitting the arms, feet, and torso. The one's that miss could be due to leg, arm, and torso movement. Streaking inbetween the legs, or the arms and torso. This make sense considering I can shoot my laser, gauss, A/C, and PPC's between them now. The faster the target the higher the miss chance will be. If your silly enough to be stationary then you have earned the full face frontal you'll get. As of right now the ECM is hurting role warfare as much as it helps it. Nothing like a slow moving light mech trying to stay ECM'ed to make my kill count per match climb.

[Marcus Tanner]

steelblueskies, on 08 December 2012 - 02:20 PM, said:

-ecm is supposed to be an offensive system. you get up on the enemy and disrupt them in proximity, preferably by sneaking in from behind, unseen. instead we have a magic shield. a 360 degree all map magic shield. even bap won't detect units outside fov even within its active detection range of 4 hexes.

While I applaud the vast majority of your post, and even the majority of this paragraph, I think the idea of ECM as an "offensive" tool is perhaps the wrong word for it.

ECM is there as a kill-switch to prevent electronic warfare from getting out of hand, and thus making a game lame. It is primarily a defensive measure. It is not supposed to be a powerful piece of EW equipment in and of itself.

It is supposed to stop Beagle (hiding info sounds defensive to me). It is supposed to stop Artemis (defensive). It is supposed to stop NARC (defensive, in the same way). It is supposed to stop C3 (which is an offensive tool, so this use of ECM is defensive). It is supposed to prevent nearby enemies from seeing you through the fog or trees or hill with non-LOS sensors (again, hiding is defensive).

Stopping your opponent from finding their buddies, on the other hand, is offensive.

[solops]

I Love My ECM Atlas!

[Jonnara]

Although I do not like the stealth been added into ECM.

I think this should only be an activating ability like the modes used in disrupt and counter.

So add in a stealth mode, that only effects the user it self and when in stealth mode no other effects from its disrupt or counter modes are in use.

Should also reduce the users sensor range making it a visual tool for scout purposes. Which would enforce role warfare.

[Ghost-Wolf]

I think ECM is a bit too good. I like it but it has to be made less effective. Maybe effective range or so. Or (more phat) the ECM using Mech can´t fire itself weapons (especially Streaks) if its active. Although I agree! It gives a great tactical kick to the game. But I see more light mechs on the Battlefield than ever before. And this is due to ECM. The Lights should not be the Kings on the Battlefield. It doesn´t fit to the BattleTech Universe...

[Umbra8]

I'd be perfectly happy with ECM if they took out the stealth components and long range targeting issues. Stealth armour could be a separate armour type and is cannon. If they wanted some extra missile defence they could have tracking ordinance lose lock at the periphery of the 180 meter bubble and could just dumbfire to the last known mech location from there, which while not an issue in TT would be a perfectly reasonable adaptation to an online simulator and would still be pretty close to the cannon interpretation of Guardian ECM. What we're getting now is ECM with Stealth armour, and stealth armour in TT took up two critical slots in each arm, leg, and side torso and generated 10 heat points while active (citation here: http://www.sarna.net...i/Stealth_Armor). I don't think we'd be seeing nearly as much concern about ECM if the two components were introduced separately and I still think we'd see an expansion of the depth of gameplay while doing so.

[Cest7]

I don't think its use should be infinite. It needs a timer, heat generation, etc.

Or maybe just triggered with a cooldown. Always on makes it seem OP

[CatHerder]

After playing a few days I can honestly say that ECM works well if both teams have equal number of ECM boats. If not, then it's a heavily lopsided competition. So for those of us who don't have 7 other buddies to go hunting 8-packs with, then the game is all but over.

I just played about 12 rounds, won the first 3 because no team had ECM. Lost the rest because my team lacked ECM and the other team had an ECM boat (the worst case was the last round - 3 ECM boats on opfor). I was playing with PUGs on all of them. That's the problem - matchmaking doesn't take ECM (let alone count) into account.

The problem isn't its effects, it's the blanket effect to 180m the devs pulled out of their butts. ECM needs a BIG TIME nerfing.

Also, think about this: the only people truly happy with ECM are those that are lucky enough to already be in a clan, or those who prefer pure brawling. Everyone else (90% of the population, I daresay from reading this thread) hates it.

I think the blanket effect is the biggest problem with it.

Edited by CatHerder, 08 December 2012 - 05:56 PM.

[StUffz]

CatHerder, on 08 December 2012 - 05:55 PM, said:

After playing a few days I can honestly say that ECM works well if both teams have equal number of ECM boats. If not, then it's a heavily lopsided competition. So for those of us who don't have 7 other buddies to go hunting 8-packs with, then the game is all but over.

I just played about 12 rounds, won the first 3 because no team had ECM. Lost the rest because my team lacked ECM and the other team had an ECM boat (the worst case was the last round - 3 ECM boats on opfor). I was playing with PUGs on all of them. That's the problem - matchmaking doesn't take ECM (let alone count) into account.

The problem isn't its effects, it's the blanket effect to 180m the devs pulled out of their butts. ECM needs a BIG TIME nerfing.

Also, think about this: the only people truly happy with ECM are those that are lucky enough to already be in a clan, or those who prefer pure brawling. Everyone else (90% of the population, I daresay from reading this thread) hates it.

I think the blanket effect is the biggest problem with it.

Following your thesis the solution would be to limit ECM equipped mechs to 1 (4vs4) or 2 (8vs). This would be an option without nerfing ecm to death.

[Marcus Tanner]

Take a moment to think about how limiting it to 2 ECM mechs per side would work.

What if more than 1/4 players wanted to bring ECM? The rest would be stuck with long waiting times to get into games. While some of you would be fine with that kind of price, it is really lame for someone who wants to have fun in this game but can't.

It's better to make ECM such that having it on every mech or only one side is simply no big deal.

[Rynad]

Need to put back in knock down, if ECM is going to be this strong, the light mechs need to be hampered. Otherwise it becomes Atlas and Commando streak groups.

[ThePhil]

My opinion on ECM? See you next patch. This one took the fun out. We need to have something like ECM. But it is just far too effective in its current iteration.

Since the original post asked for recommendations here goes: Have ECM decrease enemy sensor range to 50-60% effectiveness. This allows for the bonuses applied by the Beagle to still give a benefit, and doesn't make LRM and ranged support mechs worthless.

[Franck991]

Umbra8, on 08 December 2012 - 05:03 PM, said:

I'd be perfectly happy with ECM if they took out the stealth components and long range targeting issues. Stealth armour could be a separate armour type and is cannon. If they wanted some extra missile defence they could have tracking ordinance lose lock at the periphery of the 180 meter bubble and could just dumbfire to the last known mech location from there, which while not an issue in TT would be a perfectly reasonable adaptation to an online simulator and would still be pretty close to the cannon interpretation of Guardian ECM. What we're getting now is ECM with Stealth armour, and stealth armour in TT took up two critical slots in each arm, leg, and side torso and generated 10 heat points while active (citation here: http://www.sarna.net...i/Stealth_Armor). I don't think we'd be seeing nearly as much concern about ECM if the two components were introduced separately and I still think we'd see an expansion of the depth of gameplay while doing so.

I agree.

As far as game development goes, their choices are theirs to make, and i respect that... Even though i don't catch the logic...

It bugs me that, say, they carefully balanced the XL engines to have terrible drawbacks, telling ppl its a powerful peice of equipment. Alright, sounds wonderful to me, but then they take these individual powerful peices of equipment, each one of them capable of adding a layer of tactic, strategy, depth, and as many roles, take away all their drawbacks, merge them into one candy peice of equipment, keep the price low and fit it all into a two slot thingy...

Sure someone, somewhere, must have thought something like... dho!

Anyway, i see this more as a preliminary test than the real thing, so...

I wonder if the goal is precisly to merge roles to prevent confusion within PUGs when the real thing goes live... I'd be deceived.

Edited by Franck991, 08 December 2012 - 08:23 PM.

[Arcturious]

The problem isn't ECM, it's Light mechs.

Seriously, if you get a match with 4-5 light mechs on the other team you're in for a hard fight.

What ECM does is now those light mechs stick together. Rather than split up and suicide or do a benny hill impersonation they start playing as a pack, or a murder in the case of Ravens lol.

ECM really does nothing. It's the flaws in the netcode that are making ECM seem to be over powered. When there was no real reason to run Raven's, Commando's etc other than personal preference they were balanced (still over powered but not game breaking).

Now that everyone is running them, if you get put on a team with only 1-2 lights and the opponents have 4-5 you will likely lose. That's nothing to do with ECM and all about how hard it is to hit a light mech.

I've posted a snippet of a game below to show the issue. Now we won this game - we also had less ECM than the enemy (only 1 on our team I believe to 3-4 on theirs). We had less light mechs. What we did have was a hell of a lot of luck and perhaps skill but you just can't tell. I've picked a bit that shows how hard it is to get a hit on light mechs for me and I believe pretty much everyone else.

So this game fits all the complaints - enemy had more ECM etc. Yet we still won. The fight was much harder than it had to be though. If you think of it as a damage multiplier - only about 1/3rd of shots actually connect. Even when they do it's only for around 1/3rd of the duration. The damage I did in this game would be x3 if you could hit the enemy. That would have wiped out the light mechs pretty damn quickly.

So it's not ECM that's the issue. It's that ECM is bringing to the front the huge issues with light mechs.

[ltwally]

ECM:

• Weighs only 1.5 tonne
  
• Generates no heat
  
• Requires no ammunition
  
• Effects all allies within 180m
  
• Beyond merely killing Artemis and Beagle, it eavily nerf's LRM and near totally negates S-SRM
  
• Messes with enemy sensors
  
• Alters (sometimes radically) game-play

When you have a piece of equipment that so heavily changes game balance, where the team without it is at a serious disadvantage against the team with it, where everyone wants to be protected by it.... you know you have a serious problem.

By no sane definition is ECM balanced.


PGI: I think someone has been spiking the company water. You might want to look into that. Oh, and, please hit ECM with a serious nerf bat. Beyond killing Artemis, it should have little (if any) effect on missiles, and beyond killing Beagle the sensor stealthing needs toned down, too.

[Marcus Tanner]

Rynad, on 08 December 2012 - 07:33 PM, said:

Need to put back in knock down, if ECM is going to be this strong, the light mechs need to be hampered. Otherwise it becomes Atlas and Commando streak groups.

Well, it sounds to me that we might end up with all Atlas, all the time if lights become junk.

Arcturious, on 08 December 2012 - 08:32 PM, said:

ECM really does nothing. It's the flaws in the netcode that are making ECM seem to be over powered. When there was no real reason to run Raven's, Commando's etc other than personal preference they were balanced (still over powered but not game breaking).

ECM means that formations walking across an open field in caustic survive.

In a context where gauss rifles, ER large lasers, PPCs and ER PPCs are all unimpressive, ECM is a substitute for cover.

It also prevents a certain amount of coordination with PUGs. While they often stick together more, it's harder to concentrate fire when you're in some rocks or buildings and you can't see who is fighting what, where. Having targets who up tells you who a teammate is firing at, allowing you to go concentrate fire rather than each firing on a different enemy. It's often possible to look at your immediate surroundings, but just behind the next building is a different story.

[BR0WN_H0RN3T]

Pls take ECM away from the Atlas D-DC. PGI - u guys are taking crazy pills. Balance for you guys is like watching a pendulum swing back and forth.

Edited by Brown Hornet, 08 December 2012 - 09:25 PM.