11 replies to this topic

[ManDaisy]

With SRM and LRM, the case is its not always best to have them think on their own. While dumbfire "unguided mode" should be able to be toggled at any range, I think it would especially do well withing minimum range. Any weapons manufacturer would find it extremely fool hardy to completely disable firing within minimum range. In fact I think many warriors would put their lives first and hack around the systems to get around this because getting out of a jam with any means possible and saving you *** takes priority over saving civilians and not causing collateral damage.

[Belisarius1]

This is needed, but it doesn't require a separate toggle.

If you fire while radar passive, your missiles should dumbfire. Easy.

[ManDaisy]

I think switching in and out of radar modes would be annoying tho, also it would not allow lock overide if you had lock.

[Belisarius1]

Switching to passive would lose any lock you had.

It doesn't cost you anything in combat to flick to passive and back again; that's something you should be doing all the time anyway to evade detection. There's no reason to add yet another toggle when the function can be tied to something else.

Edited by Belisarius†, 14 May 2012 - 06:25 PM.

[ManDaisy]

While that may be the case, I still see it as a sloppy ugly hackish way of doing things. The major problem I see is that your switching radar modes when you really shouldn't, losing long range targeting info and also losing your lock "that you not using but your still losing it". Having a mode to address this is just an extra button which I don't see a problem with.

Edited by ManDaisy, 14 May 2012 - 06:31 PM.

[Belisarius1]

There's nothing that says radar switches should be rare.

Barring additional functions being assigned to active radar, the only extra thing you could do with a toggle is get a lock on one target and dumbfire another without losing that lock... but that's not actually helpful, because retaining the lock is pointless if your missiles are cycling.

You could just as easily have gone passive, fired, gone back active and then reacquired the lock while your rack reloaded.

Edited by Belisarius†, 14 May 2012 - 06:34 PM.

[ManDaisy]

Yes but more skilled pilot could dumbfire one launcher then proceed to fire on previously locked target all while not losing any information if a toggle button was there. Active radar to passive would potentially lose a lot of important information such as target damage, line of sight for spotting, etc etc. Also you would have to re-arm you lock, which could rob a few seconds off you if happened to charge at you enemy , dumbfire, and fade this, which would hamper small harrasers which are able to close and distance easily. Having a dumbfire toggle, while maintaining lock would also be to your advantage in case you decide to skirt the minimum range.

Edited by ManDaisy, 14 May 2012 - 06:43 PM.

[Belisarius1]

Again, reacquiring the lock doesn't matter if your missiles are cycling.

Dumbfiring half your loadout at one target before lock-firing the rest at a different 'mech is insanely situational. You will almost always want to concentrate fire. Dumbfiring half your missiles while sitting on the minimum range cutoff and then wanting to lock-fire the rest is both situational and silly. It's crazy to include a whole extra button for those specific situations.

Losing target tracking is more of a concern, but that's just information. It wouldn't be particularly difficult to have your 'mech "remember" the info when you came back up. Gameplay ultimately takes precedence.

Edited by Belisarius†, 14 May 2012 - 08:06 PM.

[Aelos03]

I hope to see dumb fire if missiles are fired without lock and wished i we could use lrms in close range without lock (but hard to hit with),
also i would like possibility to fire lrms without arc.

[Belisarius1]

Personally, I'd do it as follows:

Active and locked:
arc to locked 'mech.

Active and unlocked, active tag/narc spotter:
arc to spotted 'mech.

Active and unlocked, no spotter:
arc to reticule.

Passive:
straight line to reticule

Edited by Belisarius†, 14 May 2012 - 09:38 PM.

[wwiiogre]

I would love them to sim firing LRM's within safety regs. Which means your missile hatches open, you have armed missiles in the tubes and I shoot the open hatches with a Laser, AC, Missile, Flamers, SRM, PPC and your missiles explode in their tubes setting off all your ammo and you die. That is the written reason that missiles do not arm in the tubes. So they won't blow you up, not civilians, not structures. So you don't blow yourself up. What could make more sense?

Wait, but I want my cake and eat it to. LRM's have the longest range in the game for IS outside of the plinky AC2's. With LRM 20's doing upto as much damage as an AC20 per launcher and a Catapult can carry two of those. Then rain death on most mechs, even thru indirect fire and while they are out of line of sight. So why not lets unbalance that and allow them to fire at point blank distance too. Oh wait, I know why that would be a bad idea, it would unbalance the game. How do I know this, cause I have been playing BattleTech since it came out.

Chris

[ManDaisy]

Don't assume your the only one, so have I. LRMs only get a penalty to hit minimum range, they do not however have any risk of exploding on you as you claim. PPCs on the other hand do.