383 replies to this topic

[Redmond Spiderhammer]

Warrax the Chaos Warrior, on 12 December 2012 - 01:52 PM, said:

. Also keep in mind how bad it could be when people start boating (3+) them.

The piranha comes to mind... what was it like eight?

[Scarlett Avignon]

Onyx Rain, on 12 December 2012 - 05:40 PM, said:

That is what people are saying...the current system totally screws over machine guns when it comes to crits on internals....so we suggest buffing the crit multiplier....but you say that make no sense, but its like the rock vs glass and gauss vs glass example...either way the pane of glass and its function are destroyed.

How many mechs come with 1 heat sink? ...None.

Small laser has every advantage over MG...every single one except heat.....MG has no advantage over small laser...isn't even close to being on par in any area...except for its lack of heat.

Ok I take that back, rof....it fires more shots faster...but because its dmg is so tiny even that doesn't begin to put it on par with small laser. The dps is only slightly more then 1/3 that of a small lasers....factor in the spray and pray vs focused small laser damage and that 1/3 as effective is more like 1/6th as effective.

Buff it's damage. That will automatically buff it's crit performance. No need to increase it's crit multiplier.

[Orzorn]

Franklen Avignon, on 12 December 2012 - 05:31 PM, said:

Try 4 Small Lasers and one Heat Sink. Let me know how that works out.

Every mech in the game has 10 heat sinks in their engine, required. You can not play without at least 10. 10 heat sinks is 1 heat dissipation per second. One small laser produces 0.66 heat per second. 4 produces 2.64. That leaves you with 1.64 heat on your mech. Mechs have a heat cap of 30 + the number of heat sinks (although I don't know if this counts the 10 in your engine?). You could fire all 4 small lasers for 18.292 seconds without overheating using just the 10 heat sinks that every mech is required to have (and thus does not factor in to accounting for weapon weights), assuming a heat cap of 30 only. If it did count the heat sinks in your engine for a heat cap of 40, then you could fire for 24.39 seconds until overheating.

Edited by Orzorn, 12 December 2012 - 05:44 PM.

[Scarlett Avignon]

Orzorn, on 12 December 2012 - 05:42 PM, said:

Every mech in the game has 10 heat sinks in their engine, required. You can not play without at least 10. 10 heat sinks is 1 heat dissipation per second. One small laser produces 0.66 heat per second. 4 produces 2.64. That leaves you with 1.64 heat on your mech. Mechs have a heat cap of 30. You could fire all 4 small lasers for 18.292 seconds without overheating using just the 10 heat sinks that every mech is required to have (and thus does not factor in to accounting for weapon weights).

Yes, they all come with 10. That doesn't change the fact that lasers create heat which needs to be dissipated.

You can't dismiss the heat of practically the least heat-efficient weapon in the game when comparing it to a weapon that literally has infinite heat efficiency.

It's a factor.

Edited by Franklen Avignon, 12 December 2012 - 05:45 PM.

[Onyx Rain]

Franklen Avignon, on 12 December 2012 - 05:35 PM, said:

You are saying they can both do it. Not that Machine Guns deserve to be better at doing it.

Yes I am saying they can both do it...but that 1 or a few machine gun bullets is going to accomplish the same thing a gauss round would against that kind of soft target...but in the game that isn't how it plays...in the game because the dmg is so tiny and the crits are determined by a multiplier and the internals have enough hit points to deal with larger rounds that do much much more damage in just 1 hit....that the MG gets gimped by the system. It would need a 10x crit per bullet just to do .4 damage with 1 shot to the internals. A gauss round with no crit does 15 dmg to internals...but in actuality that type of target would just as effectively be rendered "destroyed" by MG rounds with less destructive force against armor then gauss rounds...because they are hitting fragile stuff. The game doesn't demonstrate this fragility equally with MGs crits as it does with even normal hits from Gauss rounds or other weapons.

Yes the system is flawed...buffing the crit rate/damage of MGs is one way to fix it...a way that makes since because you're basically shooting fragile things that are going to break easily whether it is with a MG round our a gauss round. The change to the crit system to reflect this is just an easier way to approximate reality without completely re-coding the game.

[Scarlett Avignon]

Onyx Rain, on 12 December 2012 - 05:46 PM, said:

the system is flawed

That sounds like the real problem to me, then.

[Onyx Rain]

Franklen Avignon, on 12 December 2012 - 05:41 PM, said:

Buff it's damage. That will automatically buff it's crit performance. No need to increase it's crit multiplier.

Ya that would help...and might be enough if they buff the dmg enough. That is why I think 3x damage or whatever puts it around at least 1 dps is needed...anything under that with the spray and pray mechanic won't be enough to make them very viable and worth using up the weight/crit spots for.

It is stupid to burn 1.5 tons and 2 crit spots for something that even when buffed is only half as good as a small laser when you could add an extra hs, more armor..ecm, something....something likely to make your build much better then that crap MG they didn't buff enough.

[Scarlett Avignon]

Onyx Rain, on 12 December 2012 - 05:49 PM, said:

Ya that would help...and might be enough if they buff the dmg enough. That is why I think 3x damage or whatever puts it around at least 1 dps is needed...anything under that with the spray and pray mechanic won't be enough to make them very viable and worth using up the weight/crit spots for.

It is stupid to burn 1.5 tons and 2 crit spots for something that even when buffed is only half as good as a small laser when you could add an extra hs, more armor..ecm, something....something likely to make your build much better then that crap MG they didn't buff enough.

That's the thing. MGs are not built to be efficient anti-armor weapons. Everyone is talking about making it more efficient and making them on par with lasers...

Why would you ever build lasers it a machine gun could to just as good a job or even nearly as good?

[Orzorn]

Redmond Spiderhammer, on 12 December 2012 - 05:41 PM, said:

The piranha comes to mind... what was it like eight?

Twelve.

Franklen Avignon, on 12 December 2012 - 05:41 PM, said:

Buff it's damage. That will automatically buff it's crit performance. No need to increase it's crit multiplier.

If we buffed it to even .066 damage per bullet, that take 50 rounds (5 seconds of fire) if it got all 3x crits. If it got only 1x, it would take 150 rounds (15 seconds of fire) to destroy the equipment. Taking the average, it would take 10 seconds to destroy a single piece of equipment. With 2 pieces in one location, it would take twice that time (on average).

Currently, at .04 damage per bullet, it takes 25 seconds at 1x crit, and 8.333 at 3x, with an average of 16.665 to destroy a single piece of equipment.

That means that an increase of .022 damage causes an increase in equipment destruction speed of 66%.

For comparison, a damage of .08 would take 12.5 seconds of fire at 1x crits, and 4.1666 seconds at 3x. The average being 8.333 seconds for a single piece of equipment.

[stjobe]

Franklen Avignon, on 12 December 2012 - 05:38 PM, said:

You say the system gives each "hit" (bullet, missile, laser, etc) a chance to cause critical damage. If critical damage is achieved, the weapon's damage is then deducted from the health of the item. Once the item reaches zero health, it is destroyed.

Therefore, you buff a weapon's damage, you buff how fast it can destroy equipment.

No, I think I got it.

Buffing a weapon's damage does make it destroy components more efficiently, but it doesn't alter the crit chance at all.
There's a 25% chance of critting one component, a 14% chance of critting two, and a 3% chance of critting three components. These numbers do not change, they are the same for all weapons.

Now the MWO devs have put forward two solutions to increasing the MG's viability; either buff the damage (which will make the MG destroy both armour and internals faster) or buff the crit chance (which will make it more effective at destroying internals but not armour).

You seem to be extremely against the second idea, but not the first. Let me point out that at the moment, you need to fire an MG for 2.5 seconds straight to destroy a single point of armour. 25 seconds to destroy 10 points. It is so ineffective at the moment it's ridiculous. That, to my mind, justifies a rather substantial buff to the MG's damage.

Let's for argument's sake say they buff it to the small laser's level of 1 DPS; each bullet now does 0.1 damage. How long does it take those bullets to destroy a single internal component? 10 seconds. Even at that 2.5 times higher damage than current, you'd still need to hold your reticule on the same area of the target for 10 seconds straight to destroy a single component.

That's why I said earlier that it needs both an increase in DPS and an increased crit chance. Because it's simply useless at destroying internal components even with a 2.5 times increase in DPS.

Edited by stjobe, 12 December 2012 - 05:57 PM.

[Onyx Rain]

Franklen Avignon, on 12 December 2012 - 05:49 PM, said:

That sounds like the real problem to me, then.

Yes that is why some suggest buffing the MG crits.... which again makes sense because it accomplishes the desired effect, and it is totally plausible because when you shoot fragile stuff you don't need a gauss round to destroy it....hell some of that stuff could be killed with a pair of scissors LOL...cut 1 wire...system effectively destroyed.

The more perfect solution would be to just model the entire internal structure based on real materials/design and physics....but that is technically very difficult to do and would require massive computing power to simulate all that crap and what goes on when it gets shot....you'd probably need a super computer to begin to do it accurately. So we use a simple system that approximates the desired effect...in the end.

[Rippthrough]

Easy solution, double or triple the rate of fire. Bingo, one viable weapon that also is difficult to boat now due to ammo limitations...

[Dirus Nigh]

The .50 cal was made to kill aircraft and other vehicles.

http://en.wikipedia....iki/M2_Browning

More gun camera footage. at 2m 30sec destroyers are attacked.

http://youtu.be/53LGJhjYICM

You know what that media command is f*king ****. I hate computers.

Edited by Dirus Nigh, 12 December 2012 - 06:03 PM.

[Scarlett Avignon]

Thontor, on 12 December 2012 - 05:54 PM, said:

nobody is saying the 0 heat thing isn't an advantage.. but it's nothing compared to the ability to boat small lasers

That's only because there is no design with an adequate amount of ballistic hard points to boat properly. I bet if the Piranha were in game, MG's would be looked at quite differently.

[Onyx Rain]

Franklen Avignon, on 12 December 2012 - 05:53 PM, said:

That's the thing. MGs are not built to be efficient anti-armor weapons. Everyone is talking about making it more efficient and making them on par with lasers...

Why would you ever build lasers it a machine gun could to just as good a job or even nearly as good?

No but most like me seem to believe that a half pound projectile fired at super/hyper sonic speeds is likely to ding even a battle mech enough to call it "damage", weaken it in some way. (the bullet is 1 pound, but the part that is fired is going to be less)

This game nor any other can't simulate the real world accurately/efficiently enough to account for every variable...so they use a simpler system to approximate the same effect....mech gets hit, mech takes damage, mech takes so much damage to a particular area deemed vital, mech is dead....or that area is dead at least.

lasersoffer heat damage, can melt armor instead of relying on brute force for penetration...most armor is designed to withstand impact and resistance to heat is just secondary bonus, possibly more range, they are hit/scan...meaning you point at it, and you hit it instantly (speed of light)....mg rounds take time to get there, target may have moved....they drop due to gravity....they may require raw materials that are not plentiful(to be fair so might lasers)...they run out of ammo, but a laser fires as long as it has power....tons of reasons why you would want lasers when you have MG....many of them are the very same reasons our military is so keen on developing laser weapons.

Try firing a MG on a planet that has 3x earth's gravity into a head wind blowing 100mph....see how far that bullet travels and what force it hits with....now fire a laser

Edited by Onyx Rain, 12 December 2012 - 06:06 PM.

[Scarlett Avignon]

Thontor, on 12 December 2012 - 06:00 PM, said:

that's all assuming that 100% of hits to internal structure is a critical hit.. remember only 25% for 1 crit, 14% for 2, 3% for 3..

i did the math earlier.. it would currently take 417 bullets to destroy a component (if it was the only one in that location)..

at 0.067 damage per bullet, that's still going to take 278 bullets.. 27.8 seconds of continuous fire to exposed internal structure
need to strike a balance between how fast it can destroy armor vs how fast it can destroy a component.. give it enough damage to destroy a component as quickly as a small laser, and it does too much damage vs armor and internal structure.. on the flipside if you give it the damage it should do against armor, it takes too long to destroy a component..

Again, why do we need to rely on MGs to destroy components?

[Orzorn]

Thontor, on 12 December 2012 - 06:00 PM, said:

that's all assuming that 100% of hits to internal structure is a critical hit.. remember only 25% for 1 crit, 14% for 2, 3% for 3..

i did the math earlier.. it would currently take 417 bullets to destroy a component (if it was the only one in that location)..

Yes, sorry, I did forget to mention that it was purely if you got every shot as a crit.

So its clear that the actual number is something much larger, as you posted yourself.

[Scarlett Avignon]

Onyx Rain, on 12 December 2012 - 06:04 PM, said:

No but most like me seem to believe that a half pound projectile fired at super/hyper sonic speeds is likely to ding even a battle mech enough to call it "damage", weaken it in some way. (the bullet is 1 pound, but the part that is fired is going to be less)

This game nor any other can't simulate the real world accurately/efficiently enough to account for every variable...so they use a simpler system to approximate the same effect....mech gets hit, mech takes damage, mech takes so much damage to a particular area deemed vital, mech is dead....or that area is dead at least.

lasersoffer heat damage, can melt armor instead of relying on brute force for penetration...most armor is designed to withstand impact and resistance to heat is just secondary bonus, possibly more range, they are hit/scan...meaning you point at it, and you hit it instantly (speed of light)....mg rounds take time to get there, target may have moved....they drop due to gravity....they may require raw materials that are not plentiful(to be fair so might lasers)...they run out of ammo, but a laser fires as long as it has power....tons of reasons why you would want lasers when you have MG....many of them are the very same reasons our military is so keen on developing laser weapons.

Try firing a MG on a planet that has 3x earth's gravity into a head wind blowing 100mph....see how far that bullet travels and what force it hits with....now fire a laser

So...we've successfully proven that lasers were developed because they are (in theory) far superior than machine guns at destroying armor.

Glad we agree.

Rippthrough, on 12 December 2012 - 06:02 PM, said:

Easy solution, double or triple the rate of fire. Bingo, one viable weapon that also is difficult to boat now due to ammo limitations...

This is not a bad solution at all.

[Onyx Rain]

Franklen Avignon, on 12 December 2012 - 06:04 PM, said:

That's only because there is no design with an adequate amount of ballistic hard points to boat properly. I bet if the Piranha were in game, MG's would be looked at quite differently.

Ok lets put 12 mg at .4 dps on a mech, say an atlas for $hits and giggles... and take it into battle against another atlas with 4 small lasers....12 mg is 1.92 dps.....4 small lasers is 4 dps...so the 4 small lasers is more the twice as powerful...oh but the mg spreads its dmg all over the place, and the 4 small focus it so it is much more useful....I bet you the 4 small laser atlas wins

It could put all that damage on 1 spot and core you out, or head shoot you....the MG will spray that damage all over the place, taking forever to get through the armor of anywhere vital..

[stjobe]

Franklen Avignon, on 12 December 2012 - 06:04 PM, said:

That's only because there is no design with an adequate amount of ballistic hard points to boat properly. I bet if the Piranha were in game, MG's would be looked at quite differently.

12 MGs. Okay, let's look at that.

It weighs 6 tons for the guns, and anything from 1 ton and upwards for ammo. Let's be generous and say 6 tons.
So we have a 12 ton weapon system. Incidentally, that's what an UAC/5 with 3 tons of ammo weighs. Or an AC/10 without ammo.

So, damage output. This is where the fun should start right?
12 x 0.4 = 4.8 DPS. Hey, that's almost as much as five small lasers!

No, sadly I don't think even the Piranha could make the MG look good in its current state.