140 replies to this topic

[MadSavage]

The whining on these forums needs to stop. I honestly hope PGI isn't taking it all seriously.

ECM IS NOT BROKEN

4-MANS AREN'T RUINING THE GAME

LAG MAKES LIGHT MECHS VIABLE

- ECM is not broken. It does nothing to stop you from shooting direct fire weapons or targeting your enemies, nor does it prevent you from seeing teammates. If you haven't played the game long enough to become accustomed to these things, then the problem is yours, not the game's.

- The only advantage 4-mans have is their communication. Group players are often no better than exclusive puggers, they just understand the fundamentals of group fighting and focus fire. If in-game voice chat was properly implemented without a third-party client being necessary, then 4-mans could actually enhance the effectiveness of pug players by calling focus targets. In this way, the community would be better off with groups of organized players. There is also nothing stopping puggers from connecting with 4-mans and getting better at the game.

- Without lag, light mechs would be totally unusable. It currently only takes a few medium laser blasts to drop their CT armor when they're standing still, so what's to stop that from happening when net-code is fixed and we have no lag issues? Be careful what you wish for. I'm sure once that happens, people will be whining about how useless light mechs are.

[Felix]

cause ya know an item that completely counters a weapon system with no skill, no heat, tiny weight and crit requirments sure is awesome!

Edited by Prosperity Park, 05 January 2013 - 09:40 AM.
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[J4ckInthebox]

Quote

cause ya know an item that completely counters a weapon system with no skill, no heat, tiny weight and crit requirments sure is awesome!

A no-skill counter for a no-skill weapon.

Good enough for me.

[Joseph Mallan]

I don't quite agree with what you are saying. I agree with your sentiment though. ECM is OP but only because it is functioning more like Angel than Guardian ECM. 4 Man should be the foundation size of the game with PUGs and 8 mans lows and highs for this game depending on you PoV

Lag gives Lights an unnatural advantage. Lights need to be viable, but the firepower of an Assault Mech should ruin a Lights day.reducing the Lag shield would do this. The Pilot's skill should be what makes the light Mech survivable/deadly, not a games server.

Edited by Joseph Mallan, 05 January 2013 - 08:57 AM.

[MadSavage]

Felix, on 05 January 2013 - 08:53 AM, said:

cause ya know an item that completely counters a weapon system with no skill, no heat, tiny weight and crit requirments sure is awesome!

Pretty ignorant. ECM costs tonnage as well as two crit space. That's pretty big in terms of optimizing a build. If you play the game with LRMs and SSRMs as primary weapons, then you're doing it wrong. Missiles have always been secondary weapons in the lore or primary weapons for support role mechs. If you are a support role mech boating LRMs, you are usually far away from the fight and can use tag to get a target lock.

[Felix]

MadSavage, on 05 January 2013 - 08:58 AM, said:

Pretty ignorant. ECM costs tonnage as well as two crit space. That's pretty big in terms of optimizing a build. If you play the game with LRMs and SSRMs as primary weapons, then you're doing it wrong. Missiles have always been secondary weapons in the lore or primary weapons for support role mechs. If you are a support role mech boating LRMs, you are usually far away from the fight and can use tag to get a target lock.

1.5 tons, the same as an AMS unit, which it does everything it does and more.

And ok lets look at those mechs, show me a few unmodified support mechs that use TAG to counter ECM. Take your time, I have all the time in the world for you to look. Know what the most of them use? NARC beacons, but oops, that is blocked by ECM...

Edited by Felix, 05 January 2013 - 09:03 AM.

[Joseph Mallan]

But to put ECM in perspective MadSavage, AMS is at least 1.5 tons/2 crits and does not have nearly the impact of Guardian ECM.

by Felix!

Edited by Joseph Mallan, 05 January 2013 - 09:03 AM.

[Serapth]

MadSavage, on 05 January 2013 - 08:58 AM, said:

Pretty ignorant. ECM costs tonnage as well as two crit space. That's pretty big in terms of optimizing a build. If you play the game with LRMs and SSRMs as primary weapons, then you're doing it wrong. Missiles have always been secondary weapons in the lore or primary weapons for support role mechs. If you are a support role mech boating LRMs, you are usually far away from the fight and can use tag to get a target lock.

Are you kidding? ECM is a fraction of the size/weight of say... NARC and about 10x better. You can easily add Endo/DHS to a Commando or Raven and accommodate ECM and a better weapon load than the stock mech. On an Atlas, 2 crits and 1.5 tons is the same as running a single bloody AMS.


Do me a favour... never get into game design.



I have another feature request... can we please get an ignore button on these forums?

[Roughneck45]

I would have agreed, but then I read your third point.

Lights are OP, only because of netcode and collisions. They will fall into place once those things are fixed, not become underpowered.

[SJ SCP Wolf]

Savage is a better player than most of you could ever dream to be (and so am I). I also agree with him.

1. ECM is fine. L2P
2. 4 mans are awesome, if you don't have friends, make some you socially awkward penguin.
3. Current lights, lag is the only thing that keeps them alive. Until they are properly addressed the lag shield is needed.

Edited by SJ SCP Wolf, 05 January 2013 - 09:04 AM.

[Joseph Mallan]

Felix, on 05 January 2013 - 09:01 AM, said:

1.5 tons, the same as an AMS unit, which it does everything it does and more.

And ok lets look at those mechs, show me a few unmodified support mechs that use TAG to counter ECM. Take your time, I have all the time in the world for you to look. Know what the most of them use? NARC beacons, but oops, that is blocked by ECM...

An unfair comparison as TAG was normally the property of the scout not the Fire support.

[Serapth]

SJ SCP Wolf, on 05 January 2013 - 09:04 AM, said:

Savage is a better player than most of you could ever dream to be (and so am I). I also agree with him.

1. ECM is fine. L2P
2. 4 mans are awesome, if you don't have friends, make some you socially awkward penguin.
3. Current lights, lag is the only thing that keeps them alive. Until they are properly addressed the lag shield is needed.

Again, can we please get an ignore button on these forums?

[Felix]

Joseph Mallan, on 05 January 2013 - 09:04 AM, said:

An unfair comparison as TAG was normally the property of the scout not the Fire support.

yes but he said by lore those boats should sit back and use their own TAGs to do their locking, I want to see what lorem echs he is talking about that will sit back and TAG their own targets. (Pro tip: There are none.)

[8RoundsRapid]

So, after a pretty thoughtless OP that displays vast amounts of ignorance and lack of cognitive capacity, the OP then goes on to call others ignorant? Priceless.

I thought we went through this yesterday...

[Mcguire]

So lets get this right...You run a light mech with Ecm and you and your 3 friends enjoy the game and are worried that you cant 4 drop in ravens anymore?

[Marcus Tanner]

MadSavage, on 05 January 2013 - 08:58 AM, said:

If you are a support role mech boating LRMs, you are usually far away from the fight and can use tag to get a target lock.

If you are a support role mech boating LRMs, you are usually far away from the fight and cannot use tag to get a target lock.

If you are a support role mech boating LRMs, you usually aren't supposed to have TAG at all. When role warfare is working, using TAG is the role of the scout.

If you are boating LRMs then you're not playing the game wrong - you're just playing an LRM boat (primary LRMs but almost always with some secondary weapons).

[SJ SCP Wolf]

Serapth, on 05 January 2013 - 09:05 AM, said:

Again, can we please get an ignore button on these forums?

You post history reads like a lesson out of "I am a Terrible Player: A Guide to Blaming the Game for all your losses and Deaths"

Edited by SJ SCP Wolf, 05 January 2013 - 09:14 AM.

[Joseph Mallan]

Felix, on 05 January 2013 - 09:06 AM, said:

yes but he said by lore those boats should sit back and use their own TAGs to do their locking, I want to see what lorem echs he is talking about that will sit back and TAG their own targets. (Pro tip: There are none.)

Your point is understood.
Are you sure? There are something like 2,700 different Mech variants, I cannot trust my memory to your assertion. I kinda remember at least one TAG carrying LRM boat. But it could have been a Custom as I have over 3,000 of those!

[MadSavage]

Joseph Mallan, on 05 January 2013 - 08:57 AM, said:

I don't quite agree with what you are saying. I agree with your sentiment though. ECM is OP but only because it is functioning more like Angel than Guardian ECM. 4 Man should be the foundation size of the game with PUGs and 8 mans lows and highs for this game depending on you PoV

Lag gives Lights an unnatural advantage. Lights need to be viable, but the firepower of an Assault Mech should ruin a Lights day.reducing the Lag shield would do this. The Pilot's skill should be what makes the light Mech survivable/deadly, not a games server.

ECM is implemented as it is in the lore. The biggest problem is that it has not been implemented in this way in previous mechwarrior games, so the playerbase is uncomfortable with it, myself included. Lag shield is unnatural but at the same time it does give a certain degree of survivability to lights. They are not invincible, four dragons can kill four commandos or ravens quite effectively. The problem is that players don't expect a light to pose as much of a threat as a heavy, which is understandable. The real balance is between the number of players fighting. In a fight between a dragon and two ravens, the ravens should win, not because of firepower or tonnage, but because it's two vs one.

Felix, on 05 January 2013 - 09:01 AM, said:

1.5 tons, the same as an AMS unit, which it does everything it does and more.

And ok lets look at those mechs, show me a few unmodified support mechs that use TAG to counter ECM. Take your time, I have all the time in the world for you to look. Know what the most of them use? NARC beacons, but oops, that is blocked by ECM...

OK, you can equip a catapult with two LRM 15s and TAG, that solves your problem.

[Kenach]

Tolkien said:

Since it most certainly wasn't answered in the patch notes:


Question 1 is about ECM)

How was it considered balanced to introduce a 1.5 ton 2 slot piece of equipment that does all of the following:

i) Counters Artemis
ii) Counters BAP
iii) Counters TAG bonuses and the whole system inside of 180m
iv) Counters NARC - a system which weighs more and requires real skill and teamwork to use
v) Counters other ECMs
vi) Destroys LRM locks
vii) Destroys SSRM locks
viii) Ruins information sharing via minimap
ix) Scrambles HUD display of enemies
x) relegates AMS to the dustbin
xi) Requires no exploding ammo
xii) Generates no heat
xiii) Costs less than a much less useful module by a factor of 15...
xiv) Doesn't use up a weapon hardpoint

Going by tonnage and critical space the ECM should be about as useful as a small laser plus a regular heatsink.
Or a medium laser and a little armor,
Or an AMS and a ton of ammo
etc.

As it stands now, ECM is the single most useful item in the game in terms of how it affects the battlefield.

Here's a link to the existing unanswered question from 'ask the devs' 29: http://mwomercs.com/...ost__p__1598770

edit: That question is over 200 likes at last count.