101 replies to this topic

[Max Grayson]

After watching the fantastic play test vids provided by PGI through IGN and others, i noticed that many of the mechs in game were equipped with a "well rounded" varitey of weapons. But have the Dev's tested Max damage load outs on Mechs in the game. Examples mechs with double AC20's and a ppc or 3 ppc's like on the awesome, or a AC10, Med lazer, strk 6? on a raven?

While i appluad the weapons make up on these mechs in the video; i just do not feel this is a good representation of how players will set up their mechs in acutal game play.

Depending on game mechanics and allowable mech configs, i truly feel players are going to "maximize" and specialize mechs regardless of developers "intended" mech weapon configurations. I anticape heavys and assualts as max damage brawlers, or max damage range configs will be the pre domiant configurations.

Yeah yeah on a "balanced" lance and how a light mech should be able to run around heavys and assualts and kite them to death. But if i am in an awesome or atlas and I one shot alpha light and medium mechs why would i care if i loss a little armor to one or two lights plinking away at me?

Edited by Max Grayson, 11 May 2012 - 07:04 AM.

[Toothman]

Because they have anti alpha workings in place already. If you can hit a fast light thats close up on you in your awesome or atlas you are probably lucky. Not to mention the heavy that comes over the hill and hits the spot the light just weakened on you. This is NOT previous MW games.

[Max Grayson]

Toothman, on 11 May 2012 - 07:17 AM, said:

Because they have anti alpha workings in place already. If you can hit a fast light thats close up on you in your awesome or atlas you are probably lucky. Not to mention the heavy that comes over the hill and hits the spot the light just weakened on you. This is NOT previous MW games.

Define "anti aplha". Everything i have read, from the blogs to the ISN news points to alphas being included in the game. As far as being "lucky" to hit a fast moving light, I am guessing player skill will make "lucky" shots happen more then you think.

[wpmaura]

I almost want to say that alphas are not guaranteed to hit a single point .

[PANZERBUNNY]

wpmaura, on 11 May 2012 - 07:31 AM, said:

I almost want to say that alphas are not guaranteed to hit a single point .

OH noes my health bar is going down......wait a minute.....damage to allocated to locations? This game just got harder!

[Max Grayson]

wpmaura, on 11 May 2012 - 07:31 AM, said:

I almost want to say that alphas are not guaranteed to hit a single point .

How about this, i understand from the dev's that hitting a single point with an alpha will be "difficult" (read that in a dev's post somewhere). But to quote mission impossible-difficult is not impossible

[Adridos]

You can hardly make boats when you have to respect tonnage and hardpoints.

[Max Grayson]

Adridos, on 11 May 2012 - 07:36 AM, said:

You can hardly make boats when you have to respect tonnage and hardpoints.

ok, can you point to anything seen from the mech labs, game vids, or other informatio provided, that leds you to believe that tonnage and hardpoints will be an issue to boating?

Not trying to troll just asking questions, based on the brief mech lab pics it still looks like a player and replace 2 or 3 medium laser with one ppc or ac10 or whatever. so instead of having 8 to 10 weapons a player could still have 2 or 3 devestating weapons

You can't tell me that within 2 hours of beta starting some player with a spread sheet will have the Min/Max calcuations for every mech in game. You all know the type of player i am talking about

Edited by Max Grayson, 11 May 2012 - 07:46 AM.

[Grokmoo]

Its a good question. I am also interested to know whether the devs have playtested min maxed teams vs more balanced teams.

For example, have they tried playing with 10 or 11 Awesomes plus 1 or 2 scouts vs a balanced mix of mechs. Obviously we want the balanced mechs to easily win in this situation. If the 10 Awesomes win handily or even put up a good fight, then this would indicate that the game still needs some pretty extensive balancing.

I'm sure everything will be ironed out by the end of the beta, though.

[Garth Erlam]

There is boating, but it's no more useful than a mixed-bag build. Also people need to remember that because of the hardpoint system, you can't just add weapons all over the place.

That said, is the Swayback a boat? The Jenner? The Catapult C1?

Popular builds in the F+F currently do stack similar weapons, but they're based on the above variants so...

Max Grayson, on 11 May 2012 - 07:43 AM, said:

Not trying to troll just asking questions, based on the brief mech lab pics it still looks like a player and replace 2 or 3 medium laser with one ppc or ac10 or whatever. so instead of have 8 to 10 weapons a player could still have 2 or 3 devestating weapons

Three PPC's - 30 damage. Eight medium lasers - 40 damage (and 13 less tonnes, and almost half as much heat)

[Max Grayson]

Garth Erlam, on 11 May 2012 - 07:47 AM, said:

Three PPC's - 30 damage. Eight medium lasers - 40 damage (and 13 less tonnes, and almost half as much heat)

Ah thats the info i was looking for, thank you for the response. Properly balancing the damage to weapon types is the perfect answer to boating, well done and thanks again

Edited by Max Grayson, 11 May 2012 - 07:51 AM.

[neodym]

Garth Erlam, on 11 May 2012 - 07:47 AM, said:

There is boating, but it's no more useful than a mixed-bag build. Also people need to remember that because of the hardpoint system, you can't just add weapons all over the place.

That said, is the Swayback a boat? The Jenner? The Catapult C1?

Popular builds in the F+F currently do stack similar weapons, but they're based on the above variants so...


Three PPC's - 30 damage. Eight medium lasers - 40 damage (and 13 less tonnes, and almost half as much heat)

hmmm..... tell us please whats the max Medium laser and PPC range... and recycle times

Edited by neodym, 11 May 2012 - 08:05 AM.

[Max Grayson]

Garth Erlam, on 11 May 2012 - 07:47 AM, said:

There is boating, but it's no more useful than a mixed-bag build. Also people need to remember that because of the hardpoint system, you can't just add weapons Willy-nilly

This sounds so much better

Edited by Max Grayson, 11 May 2012 - 08:10 AM.

[Okie135]

neodym, on 11 May 2012 - 08:04 AM, said:

hmmm..... tell us please whats the max Medium laser and PPC range... and recycle times

Assuming canon ranges. (Because the LRM ranges in the videos were)

PPC Max Range: 540m
Medium Laser Max Range: 270m

At range, the medium laser is actually the most efficient weapons in battletech with 3 heat, 5 damage, and weighing only 1 ton.
But its range is somewhat limited as a mid range weapon.

Edit:Because I can't spell well today. Was up late last night coding... Threads are mean sometimes.

Edited by Clark, 11 May 2012 - 08:15 AM.

[Redshift2k5]

I'm sure they've tried some munchkin builds, but the real test will come when they start letting players join the beta, I think they will do their best to push the envelope in ways the Devs haven't thought of

[Max Grayson]

Garth Erlam, on 11 May 2012 - 07:47 AM, said:

There is boating, but it's no more useful than a mixed-bag build. Also people need to remember that because of the hardpoint system, you can't just add weapons all over the place.

Three PPC's - 30 damage. Eight medium lasers - 40 damage (and 13 less tonnes, and almost half as much heat)

Using the above examples and the rest of the information provided and the vids you guys put out. Now correct me if i miss understand, but the hardpoint system combined with different aimpoints for weapons on the arms vs weapons on the torso will play the most significant role as far as the effectiveness of boating.

for example you can cleary see in one of the vids provided that the lasers on the torso have a different aim point then lasers on the arms, i can only then deduce that the most effective weapon combinations are the ones that are the easiest to line up all weapons in said group on the target.

In the example you provide of 8 mediums lasers vs 3 ppcs the damage out put of the 8 medium lasers is greater then that of the 3 ppcs all things considered equal (range and heat not withstanding). However, i can easily see where a 3 ppc config is supperior over the 8 med laser IF its faster and easier to line up all 3 PPCs then it is to line up all 8 medium lasers exspecially if some of the lasers are in the torso and you have to wait for the torso to catch up to the arm aimpoints

Edited by Max Grayson, 11 May 2012 - 08:49 AM.

[neodym]

I predict massive medium laser boating

[Redshift2k5]

Well the triple PPC loadout is also sacrificing a lot more tonnage and critical space for the ability to do comparable damage at a possibly better concentration of fire.

Too many tradeoffs with weight, space, range, heat, cycle time, cost, convergence to say one is better than the other, although certainly 3 PPCs vs 6-8 medium lasers will have the advantage in some situations and less so in others.

neodym, on 11 May 2012 - 08:54 AM, said:

I predict massive medium laser boating

That's why there are strict hardpoint limits- Even if you have the tonnage to carry a large, even obscene, number of medium lasers, the number of energy weapon hardpoints will be a hard cap on how many m.laser you can stack onto a mech. In some cases it is canon for a mech to bring several medium lasers, and some mechs will give you more or fewer hardpoints to work with. Bringing nothing but medium lasers will have it's advantages and disadvantages (high heat, low range, poor ability to concentrate fire on one location)

Edited by Redshift2k5, 11 May 2012 - 08:59 AM.

[Felicitatem Parco]

One of my self-appointed tasks during the Beta is to build and test Boats as much as possible so I can relay feedback to those who are interested just in case I find some configurations that appear too overpowered. Mind you, I will use the regular overpowered boats as I play the game, but the too overpowered boats will get reported as something that might need to be addressed.

And, yes:

neodym, on 11 May 2012 - 08:54 AM, said:

I predict massive medium laser boating

I will medium Laser boat. Look at the Hunchback Swayback variant mentioned by Garth, or the Komodo Mech, or the Brigand LTD-X1

Edited by Prosperity Park, 11 May 2012 - 08:59 AM.

[Max Grayson]

Redshift2k5, on 11 May 2012 - 08:54 AM, said:

Well the triple PPC loadout is also sacrificing a lot more tonnage and critical space for the ability to do comparable damage at a possibly better concentration of fire.

Too many tradeoffs with weight, space, range, heat, cycle time, cost, convergence to say one is better than the other, although certainly 3 PPCs vs 6-8 medium lasers will have the advantage in some situations and less so in others.

Abslutely, obviously we dont know the best boat/load configs (aimpoints, torso rotation, DPS per ranges etc) yet since we havent played; but as someone mentioned in the thread, as soon as beta roles out I have the absolute confidence in the players pushing the limit of the game mechanics to determine the best DPS min/max's within hours of the beta release, just as much as I have faith that PGI then will take that information from beta and balance the game

Edited by Max Grayson, 11 May 2012 - 09:00 AM.