371 replies to this topic

[Throat Punch]

LaserAngel, on 30 January 2013 - 01:32 PM, said:

The King Crab splits those AC/20 between the arms and torso.

http://mwomercs.com/...83#entry1778983

The Jagermech only has shoulder and upper arm actuators. One more thing, how many of you guys are willing to endure my LRM 30 fire at 500m to try to headshot my Catapult? Incoming Missile even from a single launcher is an excellent form of suppression.

The KGC -0000 has an AC/20 in each arm. I just checked in Heavy Metal Pro.

Quote

The KGC-0000's role is simple: smash down any opposition that stands in the way. Its primary weapon systems, the twin Imperator-D super-heavy autocannons, make this an easy task. The combined damage output is enough to strip the armor from even the strongest 'Mech after a few bursts. Because they mounted these weapons in the arms, the designers also installed very simple hand actuators, which serve primarily as housings to protect the massive Imperator autocannons when not in actual use. The actuators open and close during combat, an effect that gives them the appearance of pincers or claws-one of the characteristics from which the 'Mech draws its name. To soften up the enemy at range, the King Crab houses a Doombud LRM-15 rack in the left torso. The ammunition feed requires a delicate balance and regular, careful maintenance to keep it in working order. Field conditions often tempt techs assigned to this 'Mech to by-pass or jury-rig a constant variety of temporary "fixes" to this system, which only compound the problem after repeated use. The drawback to using such large weapons is the lack of ammo for extended operations. By mounting the Magna heavy laser in the right torso, the engineers hoped to give the BattleMech some staying power on the field and a little extra punch at long range. Though the Magna is one of the most reliable heavy lasers in the Inner Sphere, that single weapon offers no real solace to a MechWarrior who hears his last reload spin into place.

[Taron]

As i said, there is absolutly nothing wrong with the Catapult.

All that whiners only see the advantages, but the Catapult is also vulnerable very easy. So i ask again: What's wrong with the Catapult?

[Josef Nader]

The King Crab is one of my favorite mechs ever, Morsdraco, but the only reason it can mount AC20s in it's arms is due to a special TT rule called crit splitting, where you can spread the critical between different (adjacent) sections of your mech in order to fit big things into places they wouldn't normally fit at the cost of greatly increasing the chances the weapon gets knocked out. The King Crab has sholder, upper, lower, -and- hand actuators (the crab claw cowlings over the AC20s). The downside is that it packs several criticals worth of AC20 in the side torsos.

In other words, we probably aren't going to see a King Crab, and you can't pack AC20s into the arms of any mech but the Yen Lo Wang, the Raven 4X, and the Jagermechs.

[LaserAngel]

Morsdraco, on 30 January 2013 - 01:41 PM, said:

The KGC -0000 has an AC/20 in each arm. I just checked in Heavy Metal Pro.

I find it pretty hard to disagree with the Record Sheets on the King Crab showing the AC/20 split between the arms and torso. The ratio is different with some using more criticals in the arms or in the torso instead. Still, you are going to take the firing arc penalty with split criticals. The King Crab doesn't sacrifice the hands either. I recall a friend mentioning the King Crab grabbing another mech in melee to pin them and then fire both AC/20s. Scary stuff.

[Throat Punch]

My point was the K.Crab was the only mech i could recall that had AC/20's in the arms. I didn't dispute they were in the torso. It's been so long since ive played TT and I don't play that variant of the K. crab (i play my own variant). I just knew the K. Crab have dual arm AC/20's. /shrug

[Lawnug]

Seems like a crazy amount of nerd rage and mech centric egos on this topic. I love the Cat and always have. It's a complicated strategy with advantages requiring some pilot skill, but OP'd it is not. The logistics of this 'old school' table top game allow for extensive and sometimes comprehensive understanding of mech layouts and mechanics which uniquely advantage the player/pilot. Every mech is killable...spankable like prize pumpkins. The issue of defining one's own mech preference as a competitive analysis of other mechs is ridiculous (worthy of ridicule, FYI). I destroy all mechs... but, not in every other mech, Go play 'Halo' if you need that kind of mindless uniformity. Otherwise learn yourself some new strategies or suck up the deficiencies of your favorite mech because there is inequality in a game with so much personalization, of course it might be there are better pilots out there who 'get' that.

[Grey Ghost]

Only the K2 gives me pause due to it's extremely generous Ballistic slot layout, but I don't see how nerfing it's torso twisting would accomplish much of anything. If only FASA had put the MG's in the center torso all those years ago...

[Taron]

You should not talk about the King Crab here, it's about the Catapult.

[locilocisu]

You only need to do 60 point of damage to a big hunking box on its side to cut its firepower in half.

That's the weakness of the A1 chasis. You could not have any firepower just from several AC20 shots. And since the CAT has to face the enemy to land a shot, it's easy to do this, especially if the CAT is distracted trying to kill someone else.

[Zero Neutral]

Leave my Cats alone... Do you really think the STK-5M with 5 SRM 6 + Artemis is not a boat friendly build? Or the STK-3H for LRM? or the STK-3F for Large Lasers?

[Lykaon]

Serapth, on 29 January 2013 - 02:11 PM, said:

It's the k2 variant that shouldn't exist in game. A to SRMs, they should simply give them a minimum range of say 20 feet if fitted arms.

K2? really? I would think the A1 is the primary culprit.It seems to me that you need to work at it to not make a cheesy A1.

By and large the K2's issues are it's hardpoint selections essentially demands that you go out of the box to make it effective.
And that is mostly due to craptastic machine guns and the twin ballistic slots the K2 has.
Machine guns are complete junk (and even the proposed changes won't help make MGs a true battlefield weapon) so of course when building a mech first thing you do is pull out the useless junk ie machine guns.
What do you replace the MGs with?

the issue is we have machine guns that are crap but only .5 ton the next weapon we can fit in is AC2s that are 1100% heavyer.At this point we may as well go big or go home so we put in Gauss Rifles or AC20s.


Personally I go with quad large laser K2.

[MegaBusta]

Zero Neutral, on 30 January 2013 - 03:06 PM, said:

Leave my Cats alone... Do you really think the STK-5M with 5 SRM 6 + Artemis is not a boat friendly build? Or the STK-3H for LRM? or the STK-3F for Large Lasers?

The stalker also has a dramatically smaller torso twist range... and ALSO zero horizontal arm motion. Staring one in the face can be deadly, but catching one from the side or behind also buys you several more seconds before it can strike back. The catapult just TURNS ITS HEAD AND SHOOTS.

No one is really bitching about boating. It's the torso flexibility compared to everything else.
The cataphract, which is the next closest comparison for the catapult besides the dragon, has much less going for it, if you think about it.

- It has horizontal arm motion, but it's half of the range of every other mech in the game with lower actuators. Almost not worth mentioning IMO. By the way, the catapult's total VERTICAL range of motion is greater as well.
- A wide cross section compared to the catapult
- Lower kph/engine rating ratio than the catapult, meaning slower rotation and movement or more tonnage dedicated to the engine
- Low arm weapon mounts means you have to expose more of the 'mech to fire over things, meaning the cat has more viable firing positions
-SLIGHTLY smaller cockpit compared to catapult, but not much...
All this for slightly less than five tons (after factoring in "internal structure tax").

Lawnug, on 30 January 2013 - 02:09 PM, said:

Seems like a crazy amount of nerd rage and mech centric egos on this topic. I love the Cat and always have. It's a complicated strategy with advantages requiring some pilot skill, but OP'd it is not. The logistics of this 'old school' table top game allow for extensive and sometimes comprehensive understanding of mech layouts and mechanics which uniquely advantage the player/pilot. Every mech is killable...spankable like prize pumpkins. The issue of defining one's own mech preference as a competitive analysis of other mechs is ridiculous (worthy of ridicule, FYI). I destroy all mechs... but, not in every other mech, Go play 'Halo' if you need that kind of mindless uniformity. Otherwise learn yourself some new strategies or suck up the deficiencies of your favorite mech because there is inequality in a game with so much personalization, of course it might be there are better pilots out there who 'get' that.

Your response is a really long winded version of "it's fine, L2P nub, I'm awesome.". Thank you for being constructive and providing valuable insight.

Also welcome to the forums.

[Taron]

Again, this is about the Catapult ....

[Ghost_19Hz]

I like the idea about other heavy mechs gain torso travel. And yes quad LL K2 is pretty good.

[Zylo]

Josef Nader, on 30 January 2013 - 05:25 AM, said:

Right, you're qualified to comment on my playstyle and skill level despite the fact that we never once dropped together. I'm not interested in ruthlessly "winning at all costs" and I do play MWO for fun rather than to give myself a second job. This doesn't preclude me from being competitive, it just means that I don't want to dump dozens of hours a week into constantly dropping in 8 mans in my cookie cutter build till I can headshot any mech in the game within seconds of spotting it. I'd much rather spend my time chewing the fat and experimenting with different mech designs. It seems that this automatically makes me a terrible pilot. Gocha.

You assume I have only 1 account and have never met you by chance in game. You should probably practice a bit more and work on those mech builds. Next time we meet in game, I'll be sure to film it to prove my point.


Anyway, this really comes down to you not being able to use the advantages other mechs have over the catapult to exploit the weaknesses of the catapult. I'm glad you aren't a dev or we would be stuck with boring mechs that have no weaknesses or advantages compared to other mechs.

Edited by Zylo, 30 January 2013 - 04:10 PM.

[Zylo]

Josef Nader, on 30 January 2013 - 09:26 AM, said:

1) Because playing the same mech over and over again ad nauseum is boring. I'm a dedicated Atlas jockey and I rarely drop in my Atlas nowadays. I'm tired of playing it all the time. I want to mix it up.
2) Some people play for reasons other than WINNING AT ALL COSTS, and in PuG, 4 man, or casual 8 mans you can get away with not bringing a catapult if you know what you're doing.
3) Some people just don't like the feeling of playing cheese. I play the mechs I want to play and wholly accept the pros and cons of each chassis, learning to work around them.

Seriously, quit your ******* whining about the catapult, practice a bit and learn to counter it.

If you were serious about your comment #3 this thread wouldn't even exist because you would realize that the mechs used by the enemies also have pros and cons.

Edited by Zylo, 30 January 2013 - 04:31 PM.

[MegaBusta]

Zylo, on 30 January 2013 - 04:30 PM, said:

Seriously, quit your ******* whining about the catapult, practice a bit and learn to counter it.

If you were serious about your comment #3 this thread wouldn't even exist because you would realize that the mechs used by the enemies also have pros and cons.

Of course each mech has their pros and cons; things become overpowered when the pros outweigh the cons, which they easily do here IMO.

Are you familiar with matchups in fighting games? Even the best, SS tier characters tend to have bad matchups. But they are flat out better in most or even all the other ones, and as such are considered by far the best in the game.

The catapult is Wesker in MWO. A slightly larger cockpit hitbox does not counterbalance its advantages.

[Zylo]

Kdogg788, on 30 January 2013 - 10:54 AM, said:

My last reply here as this is getting ridiculous.

Catapult A1: Knock off the ears.
Catapult K2: Gausscat - Explode the Gauss or core them.
Catapult K2: AC20 Cat - Can be outmaneuvered or outranged as well as having a slow recharge.

Any Catapult loadout can be recreated with another mech chassis. Any Catapult build can be destroyed in the field as easy as any other. I've ridden in and destroyed every possible Catapult build you can imagine and I can say with my hand on a stack of bibles, that the Catapult is no stronger than any other heavy.

-k

Well, the 6 missile hardpoints can't be matched exactly but the stalker can run with 4 or 5 missile racks + lots of energy weapons to make up for the lower number of missile hardpoints.

Either way this thread seems to be more like "I can't beat the cat using my favorite mech so the cat must be OP" with later claims that there are no issues beating the cat.

If there are no issues beating the cat I question why it even needs to be nerfed. Seems like someone is whining because they can't beat it and then change their story to say they can actually beat it to prevent looking like they have no idea how to play.

MegaBusta, on 30 January 2013 - 04:45 PM, said:

Of course each mech has their pros and cons; things become overpowered when the pros outweigh the cons, which they easily do here IMO.

Are you familiar with matchups in fighting games? Even the best, SS tier characters tend to have bad matchups. But they are flat out better in most or even all the other ones, and as such are considered by far the best in the game.

The catapult is Wesker in MWO. A slightly larger cockpit hitbox does not counterbalance its advantages.

Actually it does to players who know how to aim.

Sorry if you can't headshot a catapult.

[GalaxyBluestar]

Zylo, on 30 January 2013 - 03:12 AM, said:

The A1 is a perfect example of a mech that would be very expensive to run. All those SRMs aren't cheap to rearm, and if that XL engine gets destroyed that won't be cheap either.

The issues with ECM and the AC/20 cat jumping out from behind cover come down more to tactics and teamwork, any mech with high burst damage could have that same advantage if they are attacking from cover or have been hidden by ECM.

Also in the case of the original complaint of this thread, torso twist really doesn't matter much when a mech with high burst damage pops out from behind cover and attacks. If the high burst damage mech attacks a soft target it will be dead before it has a chance to fight back. This isn't just the catapult that could pull this off, any mech with high burst damage could do it.

sorry i had to go and couldn't finish the discussion with you so i'll make a quick summery...

the original thread complaint? whinge away catapult is fine with uber twist it makes up for most of it's fire power being relatively easy to knock off on the a1 - c4 chassis. i would NOT NERF it's torso movement and the k2 needs to have the eye of scrutiny apon it for these positive and negative effects...

zylo we'll beg to differ about the k2; weapons mounted in a torso that shouldn't accomadate them, one of the few who can duel fire most powerfull ballistics in game when it should have main weaponry in arms to offset it's low profile and flexibility in the field advantages. in the torso you can gain same armour advantage as the cataphract and theres a grey area to say which is best, arm fire arc/convergence or torso fire. then the k2 is deployed in game with small maps tons of cover for sneaking around {then there's ecm} and rnr gone means there's no discentive for bringing such expensive equipment. why else do you see so many closerange weapons on mechs? cause brawling is still prominant and only the odd sniper and the lrm boats are stopping every match being a 300m or less rockem sockem tornament with robots.

the problem is it's a mixture of a build that shouldn't be possible in the game and a game that shouldn't be locked in it's current parametres. for now a slight reluctant no nerf vote but when we have bigger maps and rnr back we'll see if the cat is still as dominant in these min/max forms as they are now...

oh and that bit about equivalent builds to counter cats... i hear they're mostly assault mechs or bigger mechs, so doesn't that prove that the cat is punching well above it's weight with the added lighter chassis advantages when it shouldn't?

Edited by GalaxyBluestar, 30 January 2013 - 05:04 PM.

[MegaBusta]

Zylo, on 30 January 2013 - 04:55 PM, said:

Actually it does to players who know how to aim.

Sorry if you can't headshot a catapult.

You're bringing personal experience into this. I'm trying not to. I'm not basing this off skill level, I'm assuming all things equal.

If the larger cockpit was significant cockpit shots would be more common than they are. I can count the times I've been cockpitted since I entered closed beta on my hands, the number of those that were at the helm of one of my Catapults is a fraction of that, and the number of those that occured when I was moving at a speed of something other than 0 km/h is one, MAYBE two.

And this is assuming the catapult or somone else isn't giving your cockpit a seizure with SRMs or something.

People in this thread arguing for Cat nerfs are giving reasons why. All you say is effectively "it's fine, learn to play *******"