176 replies to this topic

[spaceghost2099]

I'd like it to be more like in mw4 where with BAP you could detect enemies that had ECM, but at a severely limited range compared to non-ECM units. I haven't had much experience with the ECM yet so that is all I can add for now.

[Panzerjotun]

ECM has just pigeon holed players into using specific mechs. Good luck winning with any regularity without it.

[Codejack]

whitelie, on 08 December 2012 - 09:45 AM, said:

I'd like it to be more like in mw4 where with BAP you could detect enemies that had ECM, but at a severely limited range compared to non-ECM units. I haven't had much experience with the ECM yet so that is all I can add for now.

That would help, but I still don't think its right that it has basically taken SSRMs out of the game for all but 2 mechs.

General Pace, on 08 December 2012 - 09:52 AM, said:

ECM has just pigeon holed players into using specific mechs. Good luck winning with any regularity without it.

And that's the real problem; yes, you CAN win without it, just like you CAN win without firing a shot (base capture), but much of that depends on luck, specifically in getting matched against a group of idiots. Which happens, but still...

[CheckFire]

I too believe that the current capabilities of ECM have unbalanced the game.

I can't argue the relative values of the counter tactics and counter systems to make ECM less effective. What I can do is call for an injection of reality: When a multi-ton mech is stomping around within a football field's distance with a nuke powerplant and super-heated weapons discharging, even an aged, blind, nose-dead hunting dog could point right at it!

I'm all for ECM at distance, that makes sense and is what the military uses (30+ year vet here), but at close distances "burn through" occurs and all is revealed. Usually it's too late to stop the attack, but you get to know what hit you. Here, you get an enemy mech right behind you and not know it. That is nonsense. No military would ever consistently field a unit with that big of a blind spot. Even a camera with image recognition would work. Since cameras can identify faces as they walk through airports and stadiums now, they should be able to pick up the optical, thermal, and radiation emissions of a mech in line of sight within a hundred yards no matter what direction they are in. Heck, we should be able to lock on a bearing from just the sound alone, given a mech with microphones on each shoulder.

So: At 100 yds or less and in line of sight we should be able to maintain an all-aspect lock despite ECM. We should have targeting comms degraded by ECM so that we can't see other teammates' locks or share ours. Even a shut-down mech has a characteristic shape that is identifiable at close visual range. They should show up too. This will encourage the development of radar chaff and smoke flare launchers to temporarily disrupt ECM, sensors and visuals. (Why are there no bore-sighted short-range heat-seeking fire-and-forget missiles? With a hot mech in front of you, pickle a few off and go on your way; none of that wait-to-lock or jamming nonsense!) ECM may allow you to sneak up on a team, but once things get close and personal the effectiveness should drop way off.

Now that I've vented my frustration at the blindness of my mechs I'm going to go back and PUG, and hope that I'm not on the wrong end of too many lopsided ECM matches. But I really hope that you developers are reading this, because I think that what I have described (or something similar) is desperately needed.

[Codejack]

CheckFire, on 09 December 2012 - 05:53 PM, said:

I too believe that the current capabilities of ECM have unbalanced the game.

I can't argue the relative values of the counter tactics and counter systems to make ECM less effective. What I can do is call for an injection of reality: When a multi-ton mech is stomping around within a football field's distance with a nuke powerplant and super-heated weapons discharging, even an aged, blind, nose-dead hunting dog could point right at it!

I'm all for ECM at distance, that makes sense and is what the military uses (30+ year vet here), but at close distances "burn through" occurs and all is revealed. Usually it's too late to stop the attack, but you get to know what hit you. Here, you get an enemy mech right behind you and not know it. That is nonsense. No military would ever consistently field a unit with that big of a blind spot. Even a camera with image recognition would work. Since cameras can identify faces as they walk through airports and stadiums now, they should be able to pick up the optical, thermal, and radiation emissions of a mech in line of sight within a hundred yards no matter what direction they are in. Heck, we should be able to lock on a bearing from just the sound alone, given a mech with microphones on each shoulder.

So: At 100 yds or less and in line of sight we should be able to maintain an all-aspect lock despite ECM. We should have targeting comms degraded by ECM so that we can't see other teammates' locks or share ours. Even a shut-down mech has a characteristic shape that is identifiable at close visual range. They should show up too. This will encourage the development of radar chaff and smoke flare launchers to temporarily disrupt ECM, sensors and visuals. (Why are there no bore-sighted short-range heat-seeking fire-and-forget missiles? With a hot mech in front of you, pickle a few off and go on your way; none of that wait-to-lock or jamming nonsense!) ECM may allow you to sneak up on a team, but once things get close and personal the effectiveness should drop way off.

Now that I've vented my frustration at the blindness of my mechs I'm going to go back and PUG, and hope that I'm not on the wrong end of too many lopsided ECM matches. But I really hope that you developers are reading this, because I think that what I have described (or something similar) is desperately needed.

My theory is that part of the story that hasn't been written about was some kind of galaxy-wide plague that turned everyone into morons

[Dasht e Lut]

"My most satisfying kill?

Last night, from over 700m away, I had my leg taken off in one shot by another mech. I was up on a hill (I think at E4/5 on Forest), behind some trees, and this mech fires once. BAM! Leg blown off! Hobble off of the hill and kinda hobble over to another hill after giving that pilot "WOW! Great shot!"

Standing up on top of the new hill looking at the same mech, well over 700m away. BAM! Cored by a single shot! Out of the match! (Of course I was out of the match once I had lost my leg. Hence the hobble to another hilltop.)

Two hits by, I think, an AC (got the ringing clank sound) and dead...

Oh, I was in a COM-2D with ECM.

Why was this other pilot's kill so satisfying? Because it puts to rest the stupidity of the "ECM has broken the game/is OP!" crowd...

As for my own most satisfying kill? Any kill I make and walk away from..."

Actually posted the above in another thread. Sorry for quoting myself but I didn't want to type all of that again.[/color]

As has been said again and again (and again...): Adapt.

Have you really ossified to the point that you can't change your tactics/loadout/playing with teammates? There are so many counters to ECM that it's just silly to whine about it!

ECM is fine. It's just a tool. I die regularly to LRMs and streaks. But mostly to ballistics. All I run are tricked out Commandos. If someone can't kill me quickly and easily, ECM or not, then the problem lies with the enemy pilot, not the gear.

Make whatever excuse you need to. But don't blame the weapon system for the lack of skill of the operator trying vainly to counter it.

In fact here's an idea so that you can continue to use your streakcat: Instead of all streaks, reduce the number by half and replace them with standard srms. That way you can have both locking capability (easy mode) with the streaks as well as the hard-hitting impact of a volley of srms! Best of both worlds! Woot!

Funny story: Friday night pugging. In a match and all of my team are down. Last one standing and the entire opfor is in the neighborhood. I'm already on the EB and I know that the enemy is coming for me. But honor must be satisfied!

Here they come. The first one to reach me? A Catapult!

Armed with nothing but streaks...

LMFAO!!! I completely ignored it! Must have pi*sed that cat driver off to no end! I just stood there watching him...

Shortly thereafter the rest of the team arrived and killed me with lasers, ballistics and srms...

Cheers!

Edited by Dasht e Lut, 09 December 2012 - 07:35 PM.

[Vanguard319]

the easiest solution would be to overhaul the matching so that one team isn't full of ECM mechs while another has none.

[bob1234567890]

many things need changing

[Kreisel]

Put together a poll over in the suggestion thread, trying to get a sense of the general sense about what would make ECM feel balanced to most the player-base (or atleast most who care to weigh in on the subject). I hope the poll is comprehensive enough to include most the ideas floating around about what needs to change or not change with it.

Personally I'm cool with all the effects of ECM being in game, but... want to see them split up... and just think there should be a larger window they don't effect. Reduction of sensor range by 25% instead of TO 25% would make me happy, after all... BAP is 25%, not 75% increase, and 25% faster locks not double (like ECM slows it by.) and it takes the same tonnage/crit space.

EDIT: fixed the link

Edited by Kreisel, 09 December 2012 - 11:02 PM.

[TomLeTigre]

my main concern is not about how ECM currently affects lock-on of missiles or target information. i rather find it annoying, that you cant spot your group mechs on the minimap / battlemap. i think this is the main reason, why i consider it op. with the current changes - exept jamming the map location of the mechs of your own (!) group i could live.

Kastergir, on 05 December 2012 - 07:15 PM, said:

[...]Do not rely on lockon weapons...they may be rendered useless. Do not rely on radar...rely on eyes, ears, thermal and night vision more. Pay more attention to surrounding terrain, possible fire lanes, escape routes etc. Increase situational awareness.

why? because heat wont tell you, at whom you are shooting. neither wont night vision. before ecm, there where so many long range engagements. now it tends to be very much close up brawl. it love to see both equally strong, as they are legitimate aspects of the mw experience.

an idea: make the minimap zoomable (via + / -). i think this would allready fix a lot. for instance: is there one of my teammates in that dir? or can i fire at everything that moves?

i disliked the state of game before ecm: lrm rain, sniper- hell, etc. but this enabled very many gameply options. fast mechs could bypass enemy lines and take out missile boats. now, i rarely see them. anyone found a lrm-cat lately? it feels like they all went ssrm (which was intended to get rid of - or at least lighten the numbers).

[Chrome Dragon]

Kastergir, on 05 December 2012 - 07:15 PM, said:

Couldnt disagree more. Its true, you see a lot of 4 man and 8 man groups ECM stomping everything, with the other side simply holding close to no chance to win. But thats not an ECM Problem. Its a Problem of how those players choose to use it. I definitely know how youre feeling, since I pilot and CMD-2D in PUG games a lot. I also pilot it in 4 man and 8 man groups. And yeah youre right, it looks like the group with more ECMs is the winner.

Then on the other hand...I find it an acceptable challenge to work with what I have to try and overcome what they throw at me...I dont really mind loosing a lot of matches since the last patch, or dieing a lot of miserable pixeldeaths. As long as I learn something out of each and every match I am playing...

Lessons learned so far: do not rely on ECM...it may be countered. Do not rely on lockon weapons...they may be rendered useless. Do not rely on radar...rely on eyes, ears, thermal and night vision more. Pay more attention to surrounding terrain, possible fire lanes, escape routes etc. Increase situational awareness.

All in all, for me, ECM as it has been implemented has upped the challenge much, and I appreciate that. Simply made MW:O a MUCH more interesting game.

The problem with calling that a player problem is that none of the courtesy mecha have ECM. I find myself being ambushed by groups of 4+ in an ECM bubble, and then dying really quick for want of my own ECM system.

Frankly, I can see why one might climb in a Jenner and charge the opposing team with the goal of dying as quickly as possible; 60k every two minutes for a loss is the quickest way to get to the cash needed to actually contribute to a team.

[Tolkien]

Kousagi, on 05 December 2012 - 07:42 PM, said:

The thing you forget is that battletech has always tried to stay pseudo realistic. ECM is a current device that is in use by military units today. They are not called ECM, but it is a electronic warfare suite. The US has the Duke/Guardian systems there is also a few other ones, but too many to name them all. So the way current ECM works does in ways mimic how Jamming systems really do work. Though its not going to be following them strictly due to certain things they are not going to bother programing in, like signal strength requirements for a signal to be jammed.

So, If you think about it, the reason narcs are jammed is cause they are a RF signal. same seems to be true with LRM/Streak guidance systems, due to how they behave. TAG how ever will work, since it is just a laser, no RF to it. BAP, would not be able to cut through a strong enough ECM either, and even if it could the RF signal would bounce back all mauled up due to the white noise from the ECM, so you would not get a clean signal back, which would mean the mechs systems could not ID it as a target or not, and since we don't have radar ghosts they can't display it like that.

In terms of balance I think they are also fine, You don't need a lock to fire your weapons at the bad guy. This was seen even in early beta's as ya just flip on heat vision and blast people as they walk out of their spawn while walking out of your spawn.

http://en.wikipedia....iki/AGM-88_HARM

That is an ARM (anti-radiation missile) that was available to both sides of the cold war since the mid 1970s. If you put out enough of a signal to illuminate a target, you put out enough of a signal to be tracked.

To soviets had several flavours of missile that would home in on ECM emissions like stink on a monkey.

For gameplay reasons the ECM neds to have a weakness like this, since right now it is too damn good.

[Fastidious]

This might not work but I think perhaps each mech should have a soft counter ECM ability inherently. Say .2, .33, .5 and .66, so at minimum you'd need 2 mechs to counter one ECM within range (200m) and possibly as many as 5 mechs. Lights would have .66, mediums .5, heavies .33 and assaults .2 soft inherent counter ECM values. As it is now you need to gain only an advantage of one ECM over the enemy team to wreck their awareness/sensors, that's ridiculous. This would offer no disrupt abilities but would stop achieving complete ECM dominance being such a minimal one ECM difference.

[HC Harlequin]

http://mwomercs.com/...cm/page__st__20

[Kaijin]

Vernius Ix, on 05 December 2012 - 07:15 PM, said:

[REDACTED]
What have I learned about ECM so far running 8 man groups? You need 6 to be competitive

2 Jenners, 2 Commandos. 4 Ravens. 6 with ECM. Cap rush. Focus fire any mech that dare to try to stop the counter. Profit.

It's stupid.

[Codejack]

Tolkien, on 09 December 2012 - 11:45 PM, said:

http://en.wikipedia....iki/AGM-88_HARM

That is an ARM (anti-radiation missile) that was available to both sides of the cold war since the mid 1970s. If you put out enough of a signal to illuminate a target, you put out enough of a signal to be tracked.

To soviets had several flavours of missile that would home in on ECM emissions like stink on a monkey.

For gameplay reasons the ECM neds to have a weakness like this, since right now it is too damn good.

I brought this up before, but got shouted down by people telling me that ECM jammed the sensors in missiles.

No, if ECM sends out jamming signals, sure it can disrupt communications and maybe even normal targeting systems, but it should light up your radar like the 4th of July.