41 replies to this topic

[Theobald Hauser]

Okay, my apologies then. ^^
As you were quoting me explaining to the previous poster that i didn't understand what he meant, it was... a weird move.

And thanks.

[Chromoid]

Why is it that the players are always the ones to come up with the rational ideas for balancing stuff in the game?

Top-notch suggestions guys. Now let's just hope that those in charge will listen.

[Rawrshuga]

Amarius, on 21 January 2013 - 04:07 PM, said:

Suggestion list : -> Electronic Countermeasures Stealth Module, that does divide the lock distance by 4, ignore BAP, and make enemy mechs disappear from sensors in a 180m radius around as ECM1 does.

Looks like to put quite a bit of effort into this. Interesting idea on using modules to provide different modes to ECM, but there's 3 things I'd like to make points on.

1) If ECM is to be modular, then what is the default (standard--no module) mode?

2) From what I can figure the ECM stealth module you proposed, by itself, renders all the other modules redundant. Denial of targeting information outside of 200m (1/4 default detection range) renders all other detection systems useless. Combined with total radar jamming inside of 180m which again denies you targeting information, and therefore denies you targeting sharing, locking, etc. there would be no need for any other ECM module at all.

3) ECM already does not follow the TT rules, so there's no need to make it different from the TT rules. The TT rules as you have link state quite clearly that "[color=#000000]The greatest drawback to the Guardian is its limited range, which extends out to only 180 meters."[/color]

It does not provide a cloaking effect in the TT rules. It could only JAM sensors that were less than 180 meters away from it. That is why many players feel that ECM is highly unbalanced the way it is at the moment.

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-> Since BAP is said to allow to detect hidden mechs through terrain, could it be implemented ? If it is, I'm all excited about an old FX i've been unable to find a picture for, that was in the Battlezone remake of 1998: the SITE camera effect. When activated, you could see the lanscape around you (and the landscape only, not the units, even the hidden ones, and that's exactly the point), in a 200m bubble, entirely in wireframe. It was so cool.

Unfortunately the BAP does none of these things at the moment. It can't even detect mechs behind terrain within 200m. If it could I would not have been surprised by two splatcats that suddenly appeared in front of me from around a slope at 100m. Which resulted in a pretty darn quick return to scoreboard. All BAP does is extend your sensor range and reduce your detailed targeting information time by 25% ('by', not 'to' -- unlike ECM. Enemy ECM reduces your sensor range BY 75%). With BAP as is, you still need LoS, and targets still need to be in your front arc to be detected. Which, for something that is the same tonnage, crit space, and cost as an ECM Suite, you have to say is pretty damn underpowered in comparison.

[Rawrshuga]

I do like your MG suggestion, though I think 4 damage per second would be way too much. Here's why.

An MG weighs 0.5 tons. An AC/2 6 tons. That's 12x difference.

1 ton of AC/2 ammo = 75 rounds = 150 damage potential.
(all ACs have the same damage potential per ton with the exception of the Ultra AC/5 and AC/20 which have slightly less.)

1 ton of MG ammo = 1000 rounds / 10 shots per second = 100 shots x 4 damage = 400 damage potential.

So what you propose is to turn the MG to a weapon with 1/12 the weight of an AC/2 with 3x the damage potential per ton of ammo at the cost of little to no heat. Sorry, but can you see how unbalanced it is? Even if you factor in the range difference, such a damage buff would make 1 MG more dangerous than an AC/20. I haven't even factored in the c-bill cost yet.

Perhaps MGs ought to do more damage. But not THAT much damage. I do like the idea of incremental heat, but here's an alternative suggestion. Since MGs have no recycle time, then the recycle bar for it is redundant. How about instead of engine heat, MGs have their own barrel heat... which is displayed in the 'recycle bar'? The longer you fire, the greater the heat builds up. When the bar is full your guns shutdown and you can't fire again until the bar empties (all barrel heat dissipated and gun is deemed safe-to-fire once more).

[Rawrshuga]

Oh and BTW I think that a GAU/8 has more in common with an AC/2 than it has with an MG. In fact it is called an autocannon. MGs are more like present day 50 calibre HMGs. Also, in the Mechwarrior universe MGs were actually primarily anti-personnel weapons and only seen on 'crowd-control' and urban mechs. They were usable in an anti-vehicle role, but not really anti-mech weapons per se.

[Theobald Hauser]

Chromoid, on 21 February 2013 - 09:15 PM, said:

Why is it that the players are always the ones to come up with the rational ideas for balancing stuff in the game?

Top-notch suggestions guys. Now let's just hope that those in charge will listen.

Thanks a lot.

Rawrshuga, on 22 February 2013 - 02:32 AM, said:

Looks like to put quite a bit of effort into this. Interesting idea on using modules to provide different modes to ECM, but there's 3 things I'd like to make points on.

1) If ECM is to be modular, then what is the default (standard--no module) mode?

Nothing. ECM suite does nothing in itself.

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2) From what I can figure the ECM stealth module you proposed, by itself, renders all the other modules redundant. Denial of targeting information outside of 200m (1/4 default detection range) renders all other detection systems useless. Combined with total radar jamming inside of 180m which again denies you targeting information, and therefore denies you targeting sharing, locking, etc. there would be no need for any other ECM module at all.

1- Already doing that
2- Stealth is only effective at long range (> 250m with advanced sensors)
3- Devs won't take away this ECM capability, as they have said in the past
4- That's TWO modules that would be necessary to nullify the others, which can't be done by one-ecm-slot-only mechs
5- The 180 disrupt bubble is vulnerable to your own ECCM, that everyone can afford in this concept.

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3) ECM already does not follow the TT rules, so there's no need to make it different from the TT rules. The TT rules as you have link state quite clearly that "[color=#000000]The greatest drawback to the Guardian is its limited range, which extends out to only 180 meters."[/color]

Yes ? I don't see the point about being different.

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It does not provide a cloaking effect in the TT rules. It could only JAM sensors that were less than 180 meters away from it. That is why many players feel that ECM is highly unbalanced the way it is at the moment.

It's not highly unbalanced because of TT rules, it's unbalanced because of Mechwarrior gameplay. It's two different things.

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Unfortunately the BAP does none of these things at the moment. It can't even detect mechs behind terrain within 200m. If it could I would not have been surprised by two splatcats that suddenly appeared in front of me from around a slope at 100m. Which resulted in a pretty darn quick return to scoreboard. All BAP does is extend your sensor range and reduce your detailed targeting information time by 25% ('by', not 'to' -- unlike ECM. Enemy ECM reduces your sensor range BY 75%). With BAP as is, you still need LoS, and targets still need to be in your front arc to be detected. Which, for something that is the same tonnage, crit space, and cost as an ECM Suite, you have to say is pretty damn underpowered in comparison.

Well, yes, I know, that's why I'm suggesting...

Rawrshuga, on 22 February 2013 - 02:55 AM, said:

I do like your MG suggestion, though I think 4 damage per second would be way too much. Here's why.
(...)
Perhaps MGs ought to do more damage. But not THAT much damage. I do like the idea of incremental heat, but here's an alternative suggestion. Since MGs have no recycle time, then the recycle bar for it is redundant. How about instead of engine heat, MGs have their own barrel heat... which is displayed in the 'recycle bar'? The longer you fire, the greater the heat builds up. When the bar is full your guns shutdown and you can't fire again until the bar empties (all barrel heat dissipated and gun is deemed safe-to-fire once more).

They still have an effective range of 90m and a max range of 200... There's nothing like "too much damage" with those ranges. Furthermore, as with the AC/2, it's a high dps that can't be directed on a specific part, it spreads over the target due to the two actors moving. The effective killing power is lower.

I did think of something like weapon specific heat, but
1- Wanted to be simple so that chances were higher to be listened by devs
2- Why only for MGs and not lasers and ppcs ? Heat is already sort of an abstract concept...

I would be for a barrel heat system, personaly, for MGs, yes.

Rawrshuga, on 22 February 2013 - 03:05 AM, said:

Oh and BTW I think that a GAU/8 has more in common with an AC/2 than it has with an MG. In fact it is called an autocannon. MGs are more like present day 50 calibre HMGs. Also, in the Mechwarrior universe MGs were actually primarily anti-personnel weapons and only seen on 'crowd-control' and urban mechs. They were usable in an anti-vehicle role, but not really anti-mech weapons per se.

I don't think so. It's a half a ton machinegun throwing pound-weighted slugs.
In the Battletech universe MGs are weapons that have excessive bonuses against infantry but still do 2 damages per round each against mechs. Let it be right. It was never said, anywhere, that they couldn't be used and usefully used against armored targets. They are even great weapons against tanks. And by infantry we are also talking of powered armors that wouldn't be scratched by real MGs.
Furthermore, wielding only one MG is only really useful in a crowd-control role, yes, wielding 3 or 4 of them (we have 3 to 5 mechs specifically designed for that according to hardpoints) should be a viable battle tactic against mechs.
(There's a Spider, a Cicada, a Hunchback, a Centurion and a Dragon variants that have multiple ballistic hardpoints that can't be used for something else. I tried.)

(Also, "autocannon" is not a real weapon designation, it's for semantic.)

And, as of the 19th february patch, the big critical bonus they have is still of very very very little use.

Edited by Amarius, 22 February 2013 - 04:19 AM.

[Rawrshuga]

My point about the unbalancing of the MG is to do with weight+space+cost+damage+range, not just damage. You addressed the damage part but what about it weighing only 0.5 tons when most weapons of similar damage capability that you are proposing weight 6-14 tons and take up (with one exception) more space?

4 AC/2s would weight 24 tons. 2 AC/20s would weigh 28 tons. And you're proposing that it's balanced to allow a 35 ton mech capable of moving 150km/h to use an equally devastating weapon set up that only weighs 1 ton (ammo not included)? You can't see how that's unbalanced?

And okay... the GAU is not an "autocannon" but it's not referred to as a machinegun. It's referred to as a cannon. There's a significant difference.

[Regrets]

I like bringing ECM closer to TT rules. I was reading my BT compendium the other day and ECM is super OP in this game compared to that version.

[Theobald Hauser]

Rawrshuga, on 22 February 2013 - 04:49 AM, said:

My point about the unbalancing of the MG is to do with weight+space+cost+damage+range, not just damage. You addressed the damage part but what about it weighing only 0.5 tons when most weapons of similar damage capability that you are proposing weight 6-14 tons and take up (with one exception) more space?

4 AC/2s would weight 24 tons. 2 AC/20s would weigh 28 tons. And you're proposing that it's balanced to allow a 35 ton mech capable of moving 150km/h to use an equally devastating weapon set up that only weighs 1 ton (ammo not included)? You can't see how that's unbalanced?

I think you don't see the balance either. Your argument is like saying "AC/2 are better than gauss riffles, they have a better dps and weight three times less". In fact, they're not better. Try them. Pinpoint consideration and initial damages are far more important than dps in this game.
It's the same for higher damage MGs too.
And think about the weight and damage differences between medium and large lasers, too.

And even there, my point is not that MGs should have 4 dps, it's that they need to have a lot more than 0.4.

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And okay... the GAU is not an "autocannon" but it's not referred to as a machinegun. It's referred to as a cannon. There's a significant difference.

Battletech MGs are still heavier and firing more powerful ammunitions. Theyre can't physically be anti-personal-only weapons. It's WAY OVERKILL.

And don't forget that i'm suggesting that they MGs come with an additional weakness (incremental heat/barrel heat).

[IrrelevantFish]

Rawrshuga, on 22 February 2013 - 03:05 AM, said:

Oh and BTW I think that a GAU/8 has more in common with an AC/2 than it has with an MG.

No, it really doesn't. The GAU/8 fires so rapidly that individual shots blur together (it sounds more like a constant blat than the rat-a-tat-tat we typically associate with rapid-fire weapons), literally shreds tanks, and has so much recoil that A-10's visibly slow down when they fire it. Without a significant deflection angle, a <0.5 second burst from a GAU/8 could blow a gaping hole through several inches of the near-magical armor plating described in BT lore.

Rawrshuga, on 22 February 2013 - 03:05 AM, said:

MGs are more like present day 50 calibre HMGs.

Once again, no they are not. HMG's are slow firing, anti-materiel weapons (ie, for use on lightly armored targets such as APC's and parked aircraft). Unless there are multiple houses, an engine block, or over a mile of air between you and your target, the .50cal round is complete and utter overkill for killing people.

Frankly, BT-universe weapons make absolutely no sense, and attempting to correlate them with real-life weapons is an exercise in either futility or ignorance. For example, the AC20 weighs as much as some naval cannons, fires shells bigger than most naval cannons, and yet has the range of a medieval catapult.

[Rawrshuga]

IrrelevantFish, on 22 February 2013 - 06:20 AM, said:

Frankly, BT-universe weapons make absolutely no sense, and attempting to correlate them with real-life weapons is an exercise in either futility or ignorance. For example, the AC20 weighs as much as some naval cannons, fires shells bigger than most naval cannons, and yet has the range of a medieval catapult.

Well if you read the first two posts of the thread you'd notice that I didn't start the comparative with real world weapons nor did I try to 'balance' the game based on the weight and firepower of real world weapons. I merely attempted to address what you've just said there in a less direct manner. All my arguments regarding balance were based on existing weapon damage, rate-of-fire (DPS), weight, damage potential (damage x munitions/ton), space, and the knock on effect of availability to battlemech types. So I really wish you quoted Amarius' second post on this thread when you said that, instead of mine.

Edited by Rawrshuga, 22 February 2013 - 06:07 PM.

[Rawrshuga]

Amarius, on 21 January 2013 - 04:07 PM, said:

On one hand, you can totally disagree with any postulate, but, as it's a thread about discussing suggestions, there's little use all things considered. It's not a poll (at this time anyway) so "that's totally bull****" won't serve any purpose, "I think that this thing needs tuning and that's why and how" and even "it's a really bad idea because..." are really appreciated.

So far, it hasn't really felt that way.



In the interest of clarity for the other readers I'll bring a different angle to the 'discussion' regarding MG damage.

While I am in agreement that MGs do too little damage at the moment (0.04 per shot x 10 shots per second = 0.4 damage per second) I do not agree with the line of thinking.

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Simply put, let the range not to change, but significantly boost the weapon dps (by a magnitude of 3 or 5, even more if kept in mind that they had AC/2 dps in TT (that is, 4 in MWO, ten times more thant they have)).

I conceed that I did jump the gun here in thinking that he meant that MGs should do as much damage as AC/2s, and I do apologise. My concern was with the framework of thinking. Adding the comparison with a real world weapon did not help my growing suspicion that this thinking was not entirely going along the lines of what would be balanced in the game as a whole.

Here's what I'm thinking in regards to balancing the MG to the game. Let's compare the MG to two of it's closest counterparts in the MWO game as they are. These IMO are the small laser and the small pulse laser.

Small laser:
Damage: 3, Duration: 0.75, Recycle:2.25s, Heat: 2, DPS (damage / duration+recycle*): (3/3) 1, HPS 0.67 Range: 90/180 (effective range/max range) weight: 0.5 (let's assume tons, shall we?)

(* recycle only starts after a laser finishes firing, therefore recycle begins only after the firing duration is complete, so total time between shots = duration+recycle)

Small pulse laser:
Damage: 3, Duration: 0.5, Recycle: 2.25, Heat: 3, DPS: 1.09, HPS: 1.09, Range: 90/180, weight: 1

Machine Guns:
Damage: 0.04/shot, Duration/Recycle: NA (Rate of fire of 10 shots/second), Heat: 0, DPS: 0.4, HPS: 0, Range: 90/200 weight 0.5 (+ 1 ton per 2000 ammo)

Now just looking at the DPS per these weapons you can see that the Machine Gun is woefully underpowered. But what if we consider the new critical seeking power of these Machine Gun (patch 1.2.190) ?

Patch notes state:

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- The Machine Gun has a 14% increased chance to crit once, an 8% increased chance to crit twice, and a 3% increased chance to crit 3 times.
- When the Machine Gun crits, it will deal 12.5x the amount of normal damage per bullet to an internal item.
- The Machine Gun crit damage is 12.5 x 0.04 = 0.5 per crit. Max crit of 3 times = 1.5.
- Due to the rate of fire, the Machine Gun is now a heavy crit seeker and will be VERY effective vs. items on non-armoured locations.

I can't comment on the increased crit chance since I have no idea what the base crit chance is. But as you can see from the multiplers machine guns do immense damage versus internals. Having been on the receiving end of this effect, I can tell you that machine guns can kill you in a very, very short time once your armour is removed at least that's how it felt. I no longer have a machine gun friendly mech to try this from the user's end so I can't comment on that.

From my experience playing the game and using machine guns when I had a Raven-4x, this critical-seeking was what I thought the role of machine guns was (in MWO not the Mechwarrior Universe as a whole). So I'm quite pleased that the present patch addressed this. But the question remains, is it balanced? For that let's examine weapon loadouts available to battlemechs.

The list of mechs that can mount a ballistic weapon is extensive so I'll limit this to mechs that primarily (mostly--higher than 50%) have ballistic slots. They are as follows: -

Cataphract CTF-4x - 70 tons 4B, 2E, 1M (B-ballistic hardpoint, E-energy hardpoint, M-missile hardpoint)
Cicada CDA-3C - 40 tons 4B, 1E
Spider SDR-5K - 30 tons 4B, 1E

As you can see any change to machine guns heavily affects 2 mechs primarily. Why only 2? Due to their tonnage ballistic weapons other than machine guns are not really an option for the Cicada and especially not for the 30 ton Spider. The Cataphract-4x can easily mount multiple autocannons which they readily do. (yes, cicadas do mount autocannons as well but due the their low tonnage they definitely do not mount more than 2 autocannons)

The heavily reliance of machine guns of these two lighter mechs combined with the present game mechanics puts them at sort of an awkward position. Before the critical damage boost, these mechs merely annoyances. Mosquitoes if you will. Now they're still mosquitoes, but the kind that carry malaria. They still can't really hurt you, but if they can get at your internals, they'll kill you. But is this balanced?

Personally, I don't think so. While these mechs may have the ability to rapidly kill any mech that has lost it's armour, they don't really have the ability to strip armour themselves (1 laser?). Consider that any mech with the ability to rapidly strip armour has a similarly effective ability to blow your internals to nothing in the first place. This means that these mechs do not really have any role to play except farm kills from other players.

Conclusion:
Despite the critical buff to machine guns the damage model is still too low when taking into consideration the loadout available to certain mechs. This damage ought to be brought closer to the line of the small lasers so that machine guns are a viable weapon especially for lighter mechs which cannot afford to carry the heavier autocannons. Simply inceasing the damage to 0.1 per round (1 DPS--half the DPS of a small laser--with a damage potential of 2000rds/10rps=200x1dam=200 damage per ton of ammo) an increase of 2.5x the current damage, would go a long way to make Machine Guns reasonably unattractive but still viable weapons, especially if used in large numbers, which is coincidentally the ONLY loadout option available two mech variants in the game that are unable to realistically carry autocannons.

I don't think the solution is an RoF increase. That would have too much of a knock on effect on ammunition consumption and damage potential. I think everything should remain as it is now, but the damage buffed by 2.5x and the critical damage multiplier reduced from the new 12.5x to 6x to maintain that effect of that change without overpowering it once the normal damage is increased.

[Rawrshuga]

Amarius, on 22 February 2013 - 06:04 AM, said:

I think you don't see the balance either. Your argument is like saying "AC/2 are better than gauss riffles, they have a better dps and weight three times less". In fact, they're not better. Try them.

Well I hope my previous post addressed where I'm coming from in regards to the MG damage. As for this point, well I do run a 4 AC/2 CTF-4x and when I face a twin-gauss user one-on-one, it's a 50/50 battle. Head-to-head I mostly win, unless he gets a good first shot on or is such a l337 sniper that he headshots me. If he pop-tarts ... it gets dicey as the battle favours his one-hit punch ability. But the 4 AC/2 Cataphract is still a death dealer. I tried the twin Ultra/5 with twin AC/5 combo, but found it less effective overall than the quad AC/2 loadout. But really, that's down to play-style. Know the strengths of your mech and play to them and almost any loadout is effective.

[Theobald Hauser]

Rawrshuga, on 22 February 2013 - 07:33 PM, said:

So far, it hasn't really felt that way.

Appreciated doesn't mean I have to agree with you.

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(...)
Now just looking at the DPS per these weapons you can see that the Machine Gun is woefully underpowered. But what if we consider the new critical seeking power of these Machine Gun (patch 1.2.190) ?
(...)
Personally, I don't think so. While these mechs may have the ability to rapidly kill any mech that has lost it's armour, they don't really have the ability to strip armour themselves (1 laser?).
(...)

I don't think you know what critical mechanics are. They only affects components (and even not the engine). You won't kill anyone with them.

Rawrshuga, on 22 February 2013 - 07:50 PM, said:

Well I hope my previous post addressed where I'm coming from in regards to the MG damage. As for this point, well I do run a 4 AC/2 CTF-4x and when I face a twin-gauss user one-on-one, it's a 50/50 battle. Head-to-head I mostly win, unless he gets a good first shot on or is such a l337 sniper that he headshots me. If he pop-tarts ... it gets dicey as the battle favours his one-hit punch ability. But the 4 AC/2 Cataphract is still a death dealer. I tried the twin Ultra/5 with twin AC/5 combo, but found it less effective overall than the quad AC/2 loadout. But really, that's down to play-style. Know the strengths of your mech and play to them and almost any loadout is effective.

You're proving yourself that your point is invalid: you win when the other player has lesser skill.

Edited by Amarius, 23 February 2013 - 03:52 AM.

[Rawrshuga]

Amarius, on 23 February 2013 - 03:52 AM, said:

Appreciated doesn't mean I have to agree with you.

No. It doesn't. It means something else.

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I don't think you know what critical mechanics are. They only affects components (and even not the engine). You won't kill anyone with them.

Ah, so engine destructions, ammo explosions, and cockpit destruction all aren't criticals. I see ...

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You're proving yourself that your point is invalid: you win when the other player has lesser skill.

The fact that you think that proves something else, to me.

[Theobald Hauser]

Rawrshuga, on 23 February 2013 - 05:02 AM, said:

No. It doesn't. It means something else.

Your point ?

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Ah, so engine destructions, ammo explosions, and cockpit destruction all aren't criticals. I see ...

There's no engine or cockpit critical destruction in this game at the moment.
Ammo destruction implies that the right (unknowable as not seen on paperdoll) location is already stripped of armor, and that there is some ammo to begin with, and no CASE and/or an XL engine if torso location. And a really lucky streak of TWENTY critical hits in the SAME ammo slot (10 hp).

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The fact that you think that proves something else, to me.

Your point ?



The "I'm so mysterious" sentences are getting old.
Please stop.
Don't be a child because I disagree with you or you have some misconceptions about the game.

[IrrelevantFish]

Rawrshuga, on 22 February 2013 - 06:07 PM, said:

Well if you read the first two posts of the thread you'd notice that I didn't start the comparative with real world weapons nor did I try to 'balance' the game based on the weight and firepower of real world weapons. I merely attempted to address what you've just said there in a less direct manner. All my arguments regarding balance were based on existing weapon damage, rate-of-fire (DPS), weight, damage potential (damage x munitions/ton), space, and the knock on effect of availability to battlemech types. So I really wish you quoted Amarius' second post on this thread when you said that, instead of mine.

My apologies for being unclear. I wasn't commenting on game balancing, merely the accuracy of your statements regarding real-life equivalency. Amarius didn't mention HMG's and his referring to the GAU simply confused me, whereas you were clear enough in your intentions for me to disagree with you.

As far as balancing the game, though, I'm of the opinion that the Rule of Cool applies and technical accuracy should be ignored.

I'm also of the opinion that you have an excellent point about the crit-seeking mechanic of MG's. Dedicated kill-stealing variants don't seem like a fun addition to the game.

However, with a 2.5x damage buff, MG's would have an identical DPS, longer range, and higher crit than small lasers, all without generating any heat whatsoever. Yes, you still need to add ammo, but a single ton is sufficient for at least a couple MG's, whereas each small laser needs five double heat-sinks to maintain perfect heat efficiency. I think a 2.0x damage buff is more reasonable.

I must add, though, that fixing MG's won't really fix one of the biggest problems with ballistics, particularly where lights are concerned: the weight gap. With energy and missile weapons, you've got a fairly broad range and steady progression, but ballistics have a giant gap between the 0.5-ton MG and 6-ton AC2.

[Theobald Hauser]

IrrelevantFish, on 28 February 2013 - 04:26 PM, said:

As far as balancing the game, though, I'm of the opinion that the Rule of Cool applies and technical accuracy should be ignored.

Same.

Quote

I'm also of the opinion that you have an excellent point about the crit-seeking mechanic of MG's. Dedicated kill-stealing variants don't seem like a fun addition to the game.

They even don't kill-steal. You won't kill a mech with crits, except non-reliable highly improbable ammo destructions.
And yes it would be no fun even if it could.

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However, with a 2.5x damage buff, MG's would have an identical DPS, longer range, and higher crit than small lasers, all without generating any heat whatsoever. Yes, you still need to add ammo, but a single ton is sufficient for at least a couple MG's, whereas each small laser needs five double heat-sinks to maintain perfect heat efficiency. I think a 2.0x damage buff is more reasonable.

Longer range ?? Both have 90m.
Longer max range. By 20m. Not a powerful advantage.

No heat as is yes.
And, thus the OP idea of weapon incremental heat.

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I must add, though, that fixing MG's won't really fix one of the biggest problems with ballistics, particularly where lights are concerned: the weight gap. With energy and missile weapons, you've got a fairly broad range and steady progression, but ballistics have a giant gap between the 0.5-ton MG and 6-ton AC2.

Light ACs will come, one day, in the far future.


And never forget that MGs can only be boated on vastly underpowered chassises. That makes balancing them a whole other point.

Edited by Amarius, 01 March 2013 - 04:39 AM.

[IrrelevantFish]

Amarius, on 01 March 2013 - 04:38 AM, said:

They even don't kill-steal. You won't kill a mech with crits, except non-reliable highly improbable ammo destructions.

You're correct. My bad. However, now that I truly understand crit mechanics, MG's seem to be even more worthless.

Amarius, on 01 March 2013 - 04:38 AM, said:

And never forget that MGs can only be boated on vastly underpowered chassises. That makes balancing them a whole other point.

I disagree. Plenty of heavier mechs have unfilled ballistic hardpoints due to the 7-ton minimum required to fill them with something useful. Make machine guns worth the weight/crits, and you'll see a significant impact on the effectiveness of all ballistics-equipped mechs. Yes, Cicadas and Spiders would be disproportionately affected, but that doesn't mean Cataphracts and Dragons wouldn't get a significant boost, as well.

[Theobald Hauser]

IrrelevantFish, on 05 March 2013 - 04:26 PM, said:

You're correct. My bad. However, now that I truly understand crit mechanics, MG's seem to be even more worthless.

Technically, they're better than before, but they were so useless and are so little better now that it just doesn't matter at all... Relativity 101.

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I disagree. Plenty of heavier mechs have unfilled ballistic hardpoints due to the 7-ton minimum required to fill them with something useful. Make machine guns worth the weight/crits, and you'll see a significant impact on the effectiveness of all ballistics-equipped mechs. Yes, Cicadas and Spiders would be disproportionately affected, but that doesn't mean Cataphracts and Dragons wouldn't get a significant boost, as well.

Ballistic equipped heavier mechs can boat them, but it's a waste of hardpoints, A Phract 4x can mount 4, but than has little firepower left, and can't even mount an enormous engine (290 max). He would just be underpowered (2 1-slot-energy hardpoints, 1 1-slot missile hardpoint...)
Furthermore, heavy and assault mechs gain reduced bonuses to use MGs, because they need you to be really close, which is difficult with slow mechs. MGs are mainly quick mechs weapons.
It's also hard to have some effective synergies with MGs, other short range weapons ? SRMs and that's all ?

The Dragon 5N is a unique point in this reasoning, that's why I spoke of it earlier - its hardpoints configuration makes it only capable of using 3 AC2s, forgetting the other slots as heavy firepower, or 3 MGs, which are useless, as ballistic goes. Other variants are just better.