42 replies to this topic

[Codejack]

roflplanes, on 13 February 2013 - 05:40 PM, said:

For once, shockingly enough, I 100% agree with you. I'd LOVE to see these implemented. One more thought though, how would you feel about speeding missiles (at least LRMs) up a bit as well? They're somewhat slow currently (even after the last patch buff) to be any kind of effective with your proposed changes.

Absolutely; if their tracking is turned down, there's no reason not to.

[Critical Fumble]

focuspark, on 12 February 2013 - 03:04 PM, said:

SSRM should have a 270m targeting laser which lasts for 2 seconds. If the laser can be kept on the target for 0.5 seconds continuously or 1.0 seconds cumulative before the 2 seconds elapses fire the missiles and have work just like they do now.

Keep hope alive, brother!

In all seriousness, when ECM first came out most of what I said about it conveyed marginal disappointment - I felt the system was unfair tp PUGs, but I was more favorable towards it because I had gotten tired of the sky-blackening clouds of LRMs and endless streams of SSRMs. Now I think that its unfair to PUGs, needlessly limits variety, and cheapens tactics in the game.

Now, slight tirade on my way to why I disagree: Why was missile damage buffed in the first place? From what I've heard the original MW:O LRMs had a damage of 1/missile; but that their feedback indicated that it was too weak. Now, that thinking contraption in my skill goes, "Why were they too weak?" Its likely not double armor's fault, as almost every other weapon in the game does standard damage and only a few get the "weak" label. My thought is that in a game where you can choose the exact point where your shot will hit, weapons where you instead choose a cone where your shots will lad are inherently weaker - in part because of the loss of accuracy, and in part because of that making them less valuable to boat.

"But Crit, SRMs aren't weak, I just got 1k damage with them!" Oh, but they ARE weak - at 200m. They're well and truly brutal at spitting distance because their spread hasn't gotten wide yet, and an entire volley can land on the same mech section. The problem lies less in the TT values and alterations they made, and more in the nuances of how the individual weapon systems, fire control, and crit mechanic works.

I'd like it if missiles behaved with the paradigm the rest of the game used: 1:1 TT damage, reaching their desired effective range in 0.5 seconds or less. Add in the nuance of SRMs having a more cylindrical, rather than conical spread (less accurate at the immediate range, but relatively more accurate at the end of their range) and leaving LRMs with lock-on so that they can use indirect fire without having to have been a mortorman.

ECM without weapon denial, coms denial, and cloak could still be valuable - if the things it canceled out were actually dangerous. Some argue that Artemis is dangerous, but either way its hard to tell how much use it is without any concrete description of how it effects spread. But let's go through the rest of them.

BAP: Mostly, this poor thing suffers from inflation. All mechs have an innate 800m spotting radius, if there was high ground in the middle of an some of our maps, you could pick up targets anywhere. It makes spotting and recon more of an attribute than a role. If they used bigger maps or brought the innate spotting down a dedicated recon would be valuable and a real choice. Then ECM's BAP cancelling effect would actually mean something.

NARC: It has one purpose: boosting LRMs. Unfortunately, if fails miserably to do so, even without ECM as far as I can tell. For its cost and the risk and difficulty of using the thing, you'd think it wouldn't be unreasonable for it to project the "R"-target effect by itself and assure that a certain percent of the inbound LRMs would gravitate to where it stuck. Then ECM's NARC cancelling effect would actually mean something.

Also, TAG. Though technically not canceled by ECM, if you get disrupted, your TAG is useless. They really need to give TAG some extra features, possibly make it equipment as well.

DocBach, on 13 February 2013 - 04:34 PM, said:

The 'Mechs are limited by the amount of modules they can carry - they have to make a choice to sacrifice other modules, and if its not mastered, you won't be able to carry all of the modules to get the "full" effect

I object to the system (ECM, not yours), but at least in your way you'd have to choose to have ECM mech, rather than something else. It also depends on them making more worthwhile modules, though.

[roflplanes]

Codejack, on 13 February 2013 - 05:47 PM, said:

Absolutely; if their tracking is turned down, there's no reason not to.

Ok, now I'm interested. They were never really intended (in my humble interpretation) to be indirect fire weapons WITHOUT the aid of TAG or NARC (and even then only with special warheads, I thought...) like they're currently implemented. The flight path, first of all, is an artillery trajectory, and not a direct-fire weapon flight path.

If LRMs functioned more like they used to in MW2, they would be plausible for use as a direct fire medium-long range missile system. it's really hard, however, to aim (or even spray) a projectile at an enemy when it arcs as far vertically as it flies horizontally before it impacts the target area....

With a flatter launch trajectory and a faster flight speed, they might just be viable in both roles with AND without a spotter (and the corresponding tracking from the spotter's data...).

[roflplanes]

Critical Fumble, on 13 February 2013 - 06:15 PM, said:

Its likely not double armor's fault, as almost every other weapon in the game does standard damage and only a few get the "weak" label.

IN MY HUMBLE OPINION... weapons aren't given the "weak" label because most players are such poor pilots that even TRULY weak weapons are dangerous to them. I'd LOVE to see armor values dropped to where they should be for a "hardcore"-type mode.

AC/20s are weak. Gauss Rifles are weak. Even LRMs and SRMs are weak. But since people can be killed by them (in the hands of relatively-skilled opposing pilots) relatively easily, they feel that the power levels are appropriate.

[Codejack]

roflplanes, on 13 February 2013 - 06:23 PM, said:

Ok, now I'm interested. They were never really intended (in my humble interpretation) to be indirect fire weapons WITHOUT the aid of TAG or NARC (and even then only with special warheads, I thought...) like they're currently implemented. The flight path, first of all, is an artillery trajectory, and not a direct-fire weapon flight path.

If LRMs functioned more like they used to in MW2, they would be plausible for use as a direct fire medium-long range missile system. it's really hard, however, to aim (or even spray) a projectile at an enemy when it arcs as far vertically as it flies horizontally before it impacts the target area....

With a flatter launch trajectory and a faster flight speed, they might just be viable in both roles with AND without a spotter (and the corresponding tracking from the spotter's data...).

I'm not concerned about that; I'm not even particularly concerned about sticking to TT.

My point is and has always been that the equipment in TT was balanced, and the equipment in this game is not. If they want to change things, fine, as long as everything changes to be proportional.

I'm all for your idea except that it seems like more work to implement; my idea was to just change the numbers around so that everything sorta/mostly works the way it does now, but balanced.

You want ECM to have a cloaking device? Fine, but make it 400m extended to 500m with sensor modules. You want it to affect missiles? Fine, but just extend lock-on time, don't pull this hard-counter nonsense, right? You want it to affect the HUD? Fine, but quit messing with IFF. Oh, and I can make a nice argument comparing ECM interrupting PUGS communication as similar to the old UAC/5 unjam macro issue

In this case, ECM needs to be toned down and BAP, NARC, Artemis and TAG need to be buffed up, some of them significantly. Then adjust the missile spread and damage numbers to make them as effective as they should be.

This would even allow some fun, like if you have BAP and Artemis shooting at a TAGed and NARCed enemy, the missiles would act like they did back when Artemis first came out; super-missiles for the team who can put all of that together.

[focuspark]

Critical Fumble, on 13 February 2013 - 06:15 PM, said:

Now, slight tirade on my way to why I disagree: Why was missile damage buffed in the first place? From what I've heard the original MW:O LRMs had a damage of 1/missile; but that their feedback indicated that it was too weak. Now, that thinking contraption in my skill goes, "Why were they too weak?" Its likely not double armor's fault, as almost every other weapon in the game does standard damage and only a few get the "weak" label. My thought is that in a game where you can choose the exact point where your shot will hit, weapons where you instead choose a cone where your shots will lad are inherently weaker - in part because of the loss of accuracy, and in part because of that making them less valuable to boat.

LRM damage is slightly debuffed. Remember they doubled armor and internal structure values, but only increased LRM damage by 70%. I agree, LRM still do too much damage, but that's the answer to what you asked. AND yes LRM suffer the spread damage issue, so they're not quite on par with PPC.

I see your concern about LRM20, but LRM20 are big, heavy, hot, and few volleys per ton of ammo. Honestly do not think they'ed be over powered. LRM20 spread should the size of an Atlas with the center where you put your cross-hairs.

[Loc Nar]

Quote

Great; for those of us who have seen the lagshield get worse

Or wait for this game to die so someone can make a real Mechwarrior game....

Then you don't understand the netcode/lagshield issue; it has never had anything to do with location, bandwidth, ping, etc.

Other games don't have this problem; I wonder why a group of developers that is consistently insulting to its playerbase would have a bad reputation....

There are like 5 of you claiming that; everyone else is still *****ing about the lagshield.

Easy; watch your target teleport 2 inches across your screen in between the time you hit the button and the time the game actually decides to fire.

Then it is separate from the lagshield/teleporting issue, which is still alive and well.

You're telling me that I am a bad player when THERE IS LITERALLY NOTHING I CAN DO WHEN THE LAG IS BAD?!

Yea, the game is hideously unbalanced and everyone who is not just a vicious troll admits it.

Not really, because you are either lying or you just aren't playing this game.

We are dealing with people who are either mentally deficient or are intentionally lying.

I am savoring every drop of tears former streakcat pilots shed after failing to adapt once their beloved hundred hand slap got taken away. Please continue, my glass is getting low.

[blinkin]

Loc Nar, on 14 February 2013 - 12:18 PM, said:

I am savoring every drop of tears former streakcat pilots shed after failing to adapt once their beloved hundred hand slap got taken away. Please continue, my glass is getting low.

i giggled at that a bit more than i probably should have.

i have been trying to be nice since within this thread Codejack has been staying fairly reasonable. i would like to encourage him when he is actually being a useful member of this community.

on a side note my streak cat A1 "WTFBBQ" was the first streak cat that i ever saw in the game. this was back in closed beta. i created it immediately after they added in chain fire. this was also back when there were no max engine sizes and streaks always hit center torso. it was far worse than anything that most of you have ever seen. 97kph <-BASE and every shot hit the center torso.

i may be the original source of the streak cat epidemic.

Edited by blinkin, 14 February 2013 - 12:44 PM.

[Codejack]

Loc Nar, on 14 February 2013 - 12:18 PM, said:

I am savoring every drop of tears former streakcat pilots shed after failing to adapt once their beloved hundred hand slap got taken away. Please continue, my glass is getting low.

I adapted just fine; this isn't a complaint about the game being too hard, it's a complaint about the game not being fun.

No, the lagshield sucks, so I mostly just run my Commando.

[Fut]

Codejack, on 13 February 2013 - 02:53 PM, said:

I think that that would help with balance, but the problem would still remain that new players are just at a hideous disadvantage. No new players = no growth = dead game.

So you're proposing a game where people can play for months to advance their Pilot Skills, and their 'Mechs, but gain no advantage over new players?

I do believe that this is not only crazy, but impossible.

New players should fear seasoned 'Mech pilots. Nothing in this game should change that.

[blinkin]

Fut, on 14 February 2013 - 12:40 PM, said:

So you're proposing a game where people can play for months to advance their Pilot Skills, and their 'Mechs, but gain no advantage over new players?

I do believe that this is not only crazy, but impossible.

New players should fear seasoned 'Mech pilots. Nothing in this game should change that.

new players should fear seasoned mech pilots because they have better skills, not just because they cbilled their way to success.

skill and only skill should determine a pilots worth.

[focuspark]

blinkin, on 14 February 2013 - 12:42 PM, said:

new players should fear seasoned mech pilots because they have better skills, not just because they cbilled their way to success.

skill and only skill should determine a pilots worth.

But I would argue accrued XP should count towards that fear as well... that's why I want to see a skill system more reminiscent of EVE Online and a lot less "module based".

[blinkin]

focuspark, on 14 February 2013 - 12:47 PM, said:

But I would argue accrued XP should count towards that fear as well... that's why I want to see a skill system more reminiscent of EVE Online and a lot less "module based".

i will admit i am ok with the skill system because the changes are small enough that individual pilot skill can overcome them.

my main concern is veteran players, who have just been around longer but are not necessarily skilled, curb stomping new players just because they have better equipment.

trial mechs are already enough punishment as it is.

Edited by blinkin, 14 February 2013 - 12:51 PM.

[Fut]

blinkin, on 14 February 2013 - 12:42 PM, said:

new players should fear seasoned mech pilots because they have better skills, not just because they cbilled their way to success.

skill and only skill should determine a pilots worth.

blinkin, on 14 February 2013 - 12:51 PM, said:

my main concern is veteran players, who have just been around longer but are not necessarily skilled, curb stomping new players just because they have better equipment.

Wait a minute....
You realize that you're basically saying that anybody who has spent C-bills upgrading their 'Mechs is just "Paying to Win (with C-bux)"? So, should we all change our loadouts back to stock? I mean, that bigger engine we all have is way too much of a non-skill based advantage over new pilots.

Edited by Fut, 14 February 2013 - 12:58 PM.

[focuspark]

blinkin, on 14 February 2013 - 12:51 PM, said:

i will admit i am ok with the skill system because the changes are small enough that individual pilot skill can overcome them.

my main concern is veteran players, who have just been around longer but are not necessarily skilled, curb stomping new players just because they have better equipment.

trial mechs are already enough punishment as it is.

Agreed, gear should not make the MechWarrior. Experience (both real and accrued points) should.

[blinkin]

Fut, on 14 February 2013 - 12:54 PM, said:

Wait a minute....
You realize that you're basically saying that anybody who has spent C-bills upgrading their 'Mechs is just "Paying to Win (with C-bux)"? So, should we all change our loadouts back to stock? I mean, that bigger engine we all have is way too much of a non-skill based advantage over new pilots.

no i am saying that balance should be a persistant thing that should not be overcome by simply being around for a while.

balance should be done through:

• tonnage
  
• crit space
  
• heat
  
• ammo
  
• repair and rearm (hint hint wink wink)

new players should not be punished just because they are new. things could be better but the current system is acceptable.

[Fut]

blinkin, on 14 February 2013 - 01:01 PM, said:

new players should not be punished just because they are new. things could be better but the current system is acceptable.

You're looking at things from a strangely warped perspective. New players are not being punished for being new.
They're starting from the beginning, with the basics. Once they've played for awhile they'll start to get the benefits that others have.

How many people would stick around to play if there was no progression in the game besides the skills that they personally gain from spending hours upon hours sitting at their computer. There has to be something to work towards. Better 'Mechs, the ability (ie. money) to purchase bigger engines, more armor, Endo-Steel to fit more weaponry...etc.

This game would be incredibly lame money was eliminated and anybody, even people on their first day, could buy any 'Mech they wanted, and fit it with any equipment they wanted. It completely negates the need for the 'Mech Lab actually, might as well just do away with that and let everybody choose from the standard Variants with no ability to modify them.

blinkin, on 14 February 2013 - 01:01 PM, said:

repair and rearm (hint hint wink wink)

You have no idea how badly I want Repair/Rearm back. If I could change one thing about the game right now, we'd have R&R back.
I'm a bit confused though, because R&R costs will make things so much harder on new players. No? So why do you think that this will make things better for them?

Edited by Fut, 14 February 2013 - 01:13 PM.

[Codejack]

Fut, on 14 February 2013 - 12:40 PM, said:

So you're proposing a game where people can play for months to advance their Pilot Skills, and their 'Mechs, but gain no advantage over new players?

What? No; you still need to unlock all of the modules, with the usual "pay2win" option of converting mech XP. The modules just aren't going to be essential in order to even think about fighting an ECM mech, the way the current implementation is going.

Say, 400m base detection range against ECM goes to 450 then 500 for the sensor modules, etc.

Fut, on 14 February 2013 - 01:12 PM, said:

I'm a bit confused though, because R&R costs will make things so much harder on new players. No? So why do you think that this will make things better for them?

I think with the cadet bonus they should be fine.

[blinkin]

Fut, on 14 February 2013 - 01:12 PM, said:

You have no idea how badly I want Repair/Rearm back. If I could change one thing about the game right now, we'd have R&R back.
I'm a bit confused though, because R&R costs will make things so much harder on new players. No? So why do you think that this will make things better for them?

repair and rearm punishes all players.
repair and rearm punishes players with expensive equipment the most.
new players tend to have lower quality equipment.
therefore new players tend to be punished less with repair and rearm.

this is why i say RR is good for new players. it tends to reduce the ammount of expensive gear on the field. veteran players are more likely to have cheap mechs. this gives new players more of a fighting chance.

only very highly skilled players will be capable of consistently supporting expensive gear.

also the srm catapult debate would go away because most players could not afford to play them, and i could continue to pilot the "hello kitty" in peace.

in regards to your previous comments:

as much as i hate to do it i am going to invoke some of the MMO FPS out there. very good example Battlefield 1942: there was absolutely no progression. you did not level up. you did not buy gear. you chose one of 6 (i think) classes and then you fought in the match. it was a very successful and fun game that started an entire franchise (that was then butchered by EA, but that is another topic). the fun in that game and i believe the majority of the fun in this game revolve around testing your skills and tactics against other players.

it is only in the past few years that these RPG elements have worked their way into non-RPG style games. the games before these changes could still be very fun and have plenty of replayability.

the part of this game that will keep people coming back is the numerous mech build combinations that can change the nature of gameplay and the fact that each match demands different tactics because players can be unpredictable and the mechs they pilot can also be unpredictable. the replayabilty comes from the almost endless combinations of tactics and machines that can appear in a single match.

[IraqiWalker]

Please, ECM doesn't need to get NERFed. It's not even affecting 90% of weapon systems in the game. Also, this is what ECM is supposed to do, it's Electronic COUNTER Measures. It's meant to mess with your electronics, be glad you can still chat with people even under ECM. IF they were going for realistic ECM effects, getting a lock would be the least of your problems. Also, if you're running streaks but don't expect that your opponent will counter it, that's just poor thinking on your side.

ECM has added a whole new frontier of strategic thought and planning that the game lacked. Why is it that most of the people that complain about ECM are usually the ones that just don't try to counter it? It's not that tough to counter a mech with ECM. Hell even PPC (one of the most widespread weapons in the game) counters ECM, and if you can't land a shot on a mech using PPC then it doesn't matter if it had ECM or not.

Honestly Streaks are a bigger problem than ECM at this point. Especially with how they always fly into the CT portion of the target, a guaranteed core weapon basically. At least they affect everyone. ECM only affects LRMs and Streaks, and even then it only counts as a nuisance. your team's ECM shuts it down, PPC disables it for 4 seconds, and of course, you can choose to just SHOOT the ECM mech with bullets and lasers, and SRMs and TAG, and Autocannons, and PPCs, did I forget any weapons systems that can hit a mech with ECM?