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Next, the DPS/TTon for the weapons in MWO + other CBT weapons that I added according to the model, their DPS/TTon, and their expected/ideal DPS/TTon under the model:
MustrumRidcully, on 11 February 2013 - 11:24 PM, said:
I think there is a good reason why people still use medium lasers.
For example, if you use 5 Medium Lasers and have Double Heat Sinks, just with the engine sinks you have a neat heat production of 3 Heat Per Second.
You also have a heat capacity of 50. That means you can fire for 16 seconds before you overheat, dealing a total of 80 damage.
Sure, now you're mech is really hot, but you already dealt 80 damage to your enemy. 2 Gauss Rifle in the same time would have dealt 120 damage, but it would also have costed over 30 tons to achieve that. You just invested 5 tons! No wonder that Garth and Paul love their Cicadas and Jenners.
For example, if you use 5 Medium Lasers and have Double Heat Sinks, just with the engine sinks you have a neat heat production of 3 Heat Per Second.
You also have a heat capacity of 50. That means you can fire for 16 seconds before you overheat, dealing a total of 80 damage.
Sure, now you're mech is really hot, but you already dealt 80 damage to your enemy. 2 Gauss Rifle in the same time would have dealt 120 damage, but it would also have costed over 30 tons to achieve that. You just invested 5 tons! No wonder that Garth and Paul love their Cicadas and Jenners.
Yes, engine HS are the only reason why energy weapons seem to be not so terrible. Engine DHS are basically ~14 free tons (not 10, since all DHS that cost tonnage drain .14 HPS, instead of the 0.2 HPS of the engine HS) that have to be dedicated to DHS. If you don't use up that DHS capacity, you are essentially wasting tonnage. This is why pure GR builds (i.e. without any energy weapons) are wasteful: you're not using up your DHS capcacity.
Thinking of it this way, the 5xML configuration is actually ~20 tons worth of weaponry, while the GRs are >30 tons (calc in ammo/a couple DHS). At this point the comparison isn't so ridiculous anymore ... only the GRs are doing their damage out at 600+m, and can keep on shooting at full rate.
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Most combat engagements are not over theoretical infinite time spans. So it really matters to not overheat too quickly.
This would radically change if their were heat penalties. Then suddenly those 16 seconds might come with such harsh penalties towards the end that you cannot hope to achieve this damge potential, and your 5 tons of weight investment are wasted.
This would radically change if their were heat penalties. Then suddenly those 16 seconds might come with such harsh penalties towards the end that you cannot hope to achieve this damge potential, and your 5 tons of weight investment are wasted.
The problem is that if you start calculating based on engagement time, all of the variables will change based on the engagement time you pick. I'm guessing that the rate of change will be a function of, or related to, DPS/TTon
DPS/TTon is a constant value that represents a weapons capabilities at maximum, and is therefore, IMO a better index for comparison. It is true that some weapons (energy weapons and UACs) have better burst fire potential than others (energy weapons because heat isn't hard limit, and UACs because of the UAC mechanics). I believe that this can be factored into a model for balancing, which is what I've tried to do.
Mr Mantis, on 11 February 2013 - 11:36 PM, said:
Yah fancy charts. I am not a numbers guy i have to be able to visualize the comparison. There are a lot of things that go into what a balanced weapon is, you cannot only consider one aspect verses another but a comparison between all the factors.
you need weight, heat, fire rate, range, and size. On top of that you have to understand how much it can be boated, what chassis can carry it, and what weapons can be mixed with it on each chassis. so just comparing one small part of the weapon and saying it is not balanced is somewhat narrowly viewed.
you need weight, heat, fire rate, range, and size. On top of that you have to understand how much it can be boated, what chassis can carry it, and what weapons can be mixed with it on each chassis. so just comparing one small part of the weapon and saying it is not balanced is somewhat narrowly viewed.
Are there any other charts you'd like to see?
As for the factors, all of them (weight, heat, fire rate, range and size) are part of the formula, except for size. I'm not sure how to factor in size just yet. As for how a weapon can be boated, if a particular chassis has a combination of hardpoints that makes it dominant, then the problem is with the weapon balance itself. In an ideal situation, all weapon hardpoints would be equal in value because there's always several good weapons to put into the slots.
For example, when the GR K2 was dominant, this wasn't a problem with the GR K2, or dual-GR mechs in general. The problem was that there simply were no better weapons than the GR at that time. If they tried to balance the GR by making the GR K2 impossible, you wouldn't be balancing the weapon: the GR would still be the best weapon, and mechs with ballistic hardpoints would be at an advantage. You would also limit the addition of future mechs (there are alot of mechs that carry dual GRs in stock or would definitely have the hardpoints for it).
IMO, hardpoint configurations should be there for giving each mech character and a set or roles that it can fill. You can't balance a weapon by limiting how its carried ... it will still be over/under powered.
Zero Neutral, on 12 February 2013 - 05:40 AM, said:
Good effort.
Unfortunately it is difficult to tell which model the devs are actually using. If you knew then I'm sure you could more accurately convey balance on their own terms.
Unfortunately it is difficult to tell which model the devs are actually using. If you knew then I'm sure you could more accurately convey balance on their own terms.
I'm almost certain that what the devs are doing is looking at weapon usage statistics to figure out which weapons are underperforming, and then tweaking stats. This isn't a bad method (it is based on experimental data), but its inefficient.
Znail, on 12 February 2013 - 09:21 AM, said:
There are some problems with this post. The main one is that it seems to pretend that all of the post is based on math, which it isn't. The formula and the modifers are all based on gut feeling numbers and can very well be wrong. This is fairly obviously why lasers for instance ended up with different numbers despite most people agreeing that lasers in general are fine in MWO.
First of all, the numbers are not based on gut feelings. You need to re-read the details on the model and the details on the modifier magnitudes. The Slope/intercept of the line was based on the overall trend of weapons in MWO right now, and the magnitude of the modifiers was based on the weapons that are currently, indisputably the top tier weapons.
Secondly, as for the lasers, they are not fine. The only reason that they're used at all (see my reply to Musticum Ridcully) is due to the free engine HS, and the fact that most mechs can't max out on GRs/UACs and missiles.
If you want to see how bad it is, take a CTF-3D. Make a 2xGR config and run it. Now, strip those GRs, and use the tonnage to fit 4xLL and as many DHS as you can. Both have comparable alphas and recycle times, but the GR config can fire all day forever, and the LL config will overheat in 3-4 shots.
Additionally, the 2xGR config is wasteful because it doesn't tap into all of the DHS potential of the mech. For a more ridiculous comparison, and if you have the Ilya, compare the 3xUAC config (27 tons base + 3 more tons of ammo than the GR config) vs the LL config.
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Another issue is that the model doesn't consider critical slots at all, despite several weapons having that as main balancing factor, like the AC/20. That is somewhat countered with that Ammo is given a rather low modifier and it is mostly ammo based weapons that also takes up many critical slots.
You pretty much answered the question yourself. Ballistics have a higher base tonnage and a higher base crit-value. Energy weapons can take up a little or alot of space depending on how many DHS you mount. This is another part of the overall energy weapon advantage that I have modified for.
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In the end so do I consider it more accurate to model things around only weight and crit spaces by considering heat as simply needing heat sinks to counter and thus ending up also having a weight and crit worth. Thus a PPC+HS should be compared with an AC/10+Ammo+HS. But energy weapons and ammo weapons will end up with different advantages in the end and wont be totally equal. It will simply be innefficient to try and have enough HS to continiously fire energy weapons, but on the other hand so will it be equally innefficient to have ammo for unlimited shooting of an ammo weapon. This is a difference from the TT as there so could you manage both of those, but the double armour and increased rate of fire shaked up that balance.
I agree in principle that ammo weapons and energy weapons have, and should have, different advantages and characteristics. You're also absolutely right that the doubling of armor and change to recycle times completely upended CBT inter-weapon balance (a balance which wasn't perfect to begin with, albeit not terrible).
However, currently, everything is skewed away from energy weapons. In my calculations, I figured in the tonnage for 2.5 minutes of continuous fire for ammo based weapons. This is more than enough for a normal game that ends with you surviving and dealing a lot of damage (assuming you don't spend the opening minutes of the match firing into the air). Even figuring this in, the GR and UAC5 (and even less than top tier ballistics like the AC5, AC10, and AC20) vastly out-perform their energy weapon counterparts.
