First Energy Draw Test Imminent

The weapon changes are HUGE. Items like a global weapon cooldown duration increase of 15%, weapon cooldown modules dropping at level 5 from 12% to 5%. In other words we'll be pacing our firing far more via a forced mechanic. Then some changes (good and bad) which will effect a huge amount of meta builds.....

Inner Sphere and Clan AC/5’s, Clan LB5-X AC’s, and Inner Sphere and Clan U-AC/5’s: Heat increased from 1.0 to 1.5; Cooldown increased to 2.3.

Reduced Damage of Inner Sphere Large Pulse Laser from 11 to 10 (thus setting the Energy cost at 10) and reduced Clan Large Pulse Laser Max Range from 1200 to 840.

The Gauss charge mechanic has been removed, Gauss Cooldown has been increased to 6.71, Max Range has been reduced from 1980 to 1320, ‘Mechs are now restricted to equipping no more than 2 Gauss Rifles*. ‘Mechs with more than 2 Gauss Rifles already equipped will be considered Invalid, and will be unable to launch into matches.

Edit: Flamers and MG's suddenly get quite interesting with their ability to bypass the heat draw mechanics. Small lasers get heavily hit though as range doesn't factor in under the new system unless I missed something.

 

New mechanic new meta!

 

I still need a lot of testing, but I'm liking it so far! Battles may start to feel like Battletech again,...

 

I'm surprised and not surprised at the same time by this. MWO has been around for a few years and is starting to get a little stale in terms of the mechanics; the hardcore are the people that play. Average / Casual players who may have played a while ago may come back with something new to cut their teeth on.

 

I like the idea of the energy draw changes, but I don't see the point of the other weapon changes. Make one change, see how that is, don't throw a heap of other nerfs in the mix, that just makes it harder to determine what effect the energy draw mechanic has on the current game.

 

I unashamedly decided to take a break for a bit once its implemented on main, not for any rage feelings but because I'm not an old vet sitting on hundreds of millions of c-bills or a new player with no mechs. Want to see what the shakeout is before I retool mechs as I suspect most of mine will either be gimped as they're current meta. Not entirely convinced the energy draw system will achieve their stated goals at all from comments people have made on PTS.

 

I don't have a sufficient bandwidth to download PTS, unfortunately.

 

TOnite im gonna try this new energy "resource". I really was afraid that PGI would implement it.. Now the nightmare is Real! Poor Noobs, it's not gonna be easier for them.

 

I reduced the download requirements by copying the games files from my Steam install into the newly created PTS folder. I then ran the repair tool (not patching using the normal client). This reduced the download requirement a lot (I don't know how much) but I was ready to go much quicker than a full download.

I used that same technique for the Tournament client as well.

 

Phew, thanks for the info. I throught about this, but I didn't expected to get worked in efficient manner (I supposed that it'll download all stuff anyways).
But thanks, downloading installer now.

 

Ghost heat implies something unseen or unclear. The reason Heat Scaling was dubbed "Ghost Heat" was because it came out of nowhere with no explanation and certainly no way to know HOW much heat you would be generating.

Although I have mixed feelings about the first PTS of power draw, the system is anything but Ghost. With some mechlab additions to tell you what your energy pool is and the energy value of your weapons, it should all be very clear for any pilot. The bar is very intuitive for PGI, color me surprised. It is very easy to understand what's happening when you're firing weapons and you see it drain / recharge. When your bar is depleted, there is a very clear indicator light and a sound effect to let you know. At that point, it's pretty easy to know how much extra heat your are generating. It's linear and basic math. It was pretty simply to know, on the fly, how much extra heat I would get from firing any combination of weapons. If I fired 3 LPL and 5 ML I know i'm generating 25 energy past the threshold of 30, resulting in ~12.5 extra heat being generated.



That said, even though the system is a lot clearer and intuitive, it simple encourages boating in a different way. Instead of "working around" ghost heat with build diversity, energy draw actually encourages boating of large lasers with it's linear punishment. I do like that it's something a pilot can choose to do. To take that extra heat, by choice, and not be too severely punished for doing so. I like that part of it. However heat might not be the best deterrent... not sure exactly. Some have suggested heat for energy weapons and recoil for ballistics and missiles. Things like that might add some more flavor to the system, but then we get back into how clear it all is to the player. In this first PTS, it is clear the starting values will need to be adjusted so people don't simply spam loads of large weapons. You could alpha 7x LPL on a BNC-3M for example, without overheating. Reached something like 98% on a neutral map. Absolutely insane how this system allows higher alphas on some fronts when it's entire purpose was to reduce them.

The clarity and simplicity of this system begins to suffer when you change the values for every weapon and mech. At that point, a player could no longer directly associate energy draw with the damage of that weapon. A LPL might draw 15 energy, but only deal 10 damage. Or the penalty for drawing too much energy might become exponential instead of linear. At which point the player no long understands how much extra heat he will produce for a given set of weapons. I do believe PGI will be going down this route with the next PTS changes. They said it would be early this week, so it's easy to guess that it will be simple number tweaks.

I will give PGI credit for introducing even more variables for balance into a game over-loaded with variables... I wish PGI was more willing to make drastic changes to the base weapon systems in an attempt to balance. It would be much easier to test with just some xml changes, and it could very well be what's best for the game. Not another system to balance and values to keep track of. If you drop this mechanic, drop ghost heat, and find a better solution through base weapon stats and quirks, I feel like we'd have a much easier game to understand fully. Oh well.

 

The irony is they just changed the PTS server draw mechanics to remove that simplicity and transparency that so many were praising the new system for. They're also making lost of changes to weapons now to fit the new system.........:

Heat Penalty Changes
We have increased the base Heat Penalty incurred when exceeding your Energy allotment. Again, we want to remind everyone that these are still test values, and are subject to change prior to any potential release.
• Heat Penalty has been increased to 1 point of Heat for every point of Energy over which you have exceeded your Current 'Mech Energy Value.
For example, exceeding your Current 'Mech Energy Value by 10 Energy would incur a Heat Penalty of 10 Heat.
This is an increase from the original PTS Heat Penalty of 0.5 Heat for every point of Energy.

Override Damage
• Damage received from Override no longer applies to the Head.

Weapon Energy Value Changes
AutoCannon's
Feedback received based on the original PTS values indicated that full-damage, single-projectile weapons were slightly imbalanced when compared against duration-based weaponry. As a result we have applied a 20% increase in Energy Consumption for the AC weaponry listed below, including a same 20% increase in Energy Consumption for all other full-damage, single projectile weapons (details for those listed elsewhere in this post). We have also set all LB-X AC weaponry to follow the correct Energy per Damage ratio outlined in the original PTS post.

All LB-X AC Weaponry
• All LB-X AC weaponry has been set to the correct .75 Energy per 1 point of Damage ratio.
AC/2
• Energy Consumption increased to 2.4 Energy total (from 2)
AC/5
• Energy Consumption increased to 6 Energy total (from 5)

AC/10
• Energy Consumption increased to 12 Energy Total (from 10)

U-AC/5
• Energy Consumption increased to 6 Energy total (from 5)

C-AC/2
• Energy Consumption increased to 2.4 Energy total (from 2)

C-AC/5
• Energy Consumption increased to 6 Energy total (from 5)

C-U-AC/2
• Energy Consumption increased to 2.4 Energy total (from 2)

C-U-AC/5
• Energy Consumption increased to 6 Energy total (from 5)

AC 20's and LB-X 20's
We've received a lot of feedback specifically calling for lower Energy Consumption values for close-range, brawl-focused weaponry. However, we ultimately felt that factoring in both weapon ranges and weapon projectile types would have caused too large an adjustment, and would lead to some undesirable results with certain weapons; particularly when many close range weapons are still proving to be quite potent with the current PTS values.

That said, we are looking at improved DPS as being the defining trait for close range, brawl-focused weaponry. We've made some adjustments to AC/20's with that approach in mind.

AC/20
• Energy Consumption increased to 24 Energy total (from 20).
• Cooldown duration lowered to 4s (from 4.6s).
C-AC/20
• Cooldown Duration lowered to 4s (from 4.6s)
C-LBX/20
• Cooldown Duration lowered to 4s (from 4.6s)
C-U-AC/20
• Cooldown Duration lowered to 4s (from 4.6s)
• Heat Generation lowered to 6 (from 7)

Clan Lasers
Although their power and efficacy has been reduced in previous balance changes, Clan Laser tech is inherently very powerful. While many have called for a simple reduction to their Energy Consumption in the context of the Energy Draw PTS, we feel that giving the Clan Lasers some of their inherent power back is better suited to what these weapons should represent, and how they should be distinguished from their Inner Sphere counterparts.

Clan ER Medium Laser
• Max Range increased to 770m (from 688m)
• Duration decreased to 1.05s (from 1.15s)
Clan ER Large Laser
• Duration decreased to 1.35s (from 1.5s)
Clan Medium Pulse Laser
• Max Range increased to 594m (from 561m)
• Duration decreased to .7s (from .85s)

SRM's
Some of the feedback we've received regarding SRM behavior on the PTS has trended toward a desire to simultaneously fire 4xSRM6. This feedback makes sense, given the number and viability of Loadouts using 4xSRM6 configurations and the role they can play in brawling. However, testing has shown this weapon to be relatively on-target in its efficacy based on its existing values in the PTS.

That said, we are going to explore some options in this PTS update to help justify 4xSRM6 loadouts within the context of the Energy Draw system. To that end we have decreased Energy Consumption for SRM 6 and C-SRM 6 weaponry. However, these Energy reductions must come with a trade-off. To that end we have increased Missile Spread for all SRM 6's and SRM 4's by 20%.

A 20% increase to Missile Spread will look (approximately) like this:



The inner circle is the existing Missile Spread. The outer circle is the new Missile Spread.

Applying this Missile Spread increase to SRM 6's necessitates that the Missile Spread for SRM 4's also be increased, to help maintain sufficient balance between the two weapon systems. However, the increase to SRM 4 Missile Spread does not increase its overall Spread by a large enough degree to require a similar reduction to its Energy Consumption.

Keep in mind that further changes may be forthcoming as we continue working toward adequate SRM balance, within the context of Energy Draw.

SRM 6
• Energy Consumption decreased to 7.5 Energy total (from 9)
• Missile Spread increased by 20%
C-SRM 6
• Energy Consumption decreased to 7.5 Energy total (from 9)
• Missile Spread increased by 20%
SRM 4
• Missile Spread increased by 20%
C-SRM 4
• Missile Spread increased by 20%

PPC's
On the existing PTS build PPC weaponry is testing a bit stronger in the context of Energy Draw than we want them to be. To compensate for this some of their values have been tuned to bring them more in line with the other mid-to-long-range options. Their Energy Consumption has also been increased to account for the changes to Direct Fire weaponry outlined elsewhere in this post.

PPC
• Energy Consumption increased to 12 Energy total (from 10)
• Cooldown Duration increased to 5.25s (from 4.6s)
• Heat Generation increased to 10 (from 9.5)
ERPPC
• Energy Consumption increased to 12 (from 10)
• Cooldown Duration increased to 5.25s (from 4.6s)
• Heat Generation increased to 15 (from 14)
C-ERPPC
• Energy Consumption increased to 15 (from 13.5)
• Cooldown Duration increased to 5.25s (from 4.6s)
• Heat Generation increased to 15 (from 14)

Gauss Rifles
Testing on the existing PTS has shown that players are utilizing Gauss Rifles as a way to supplement their volley damage and offset their Heat Penalties. This use-case disrupts the overall goals we are aiming to achieve with the implementation of Energy Draw. Changes to Gauss Rifles have therefore been made to help reinforce the tactical loop outlined in the original PTS announcement post.

Our goal is to have the base values of Gauss Rifle weaponry reward players who strive to learn and master the Energy Draw system through in-game actions, rather than raw Loadouts. During the investigation of potential changes to Gauss Rifles we saw an opportunity to further differentiate the larger, heaver Inner Sphere Gauss Rifles from their Clan counterparts, without affecting their offensive characteristics.

Gauss Rifle
• Energy Consumption increased to 20 (from 15)
• Component Health increased to 10 (from 5)
C-Gauss Rifle
• Energy Consumption increased to 20 (from 15)
• Explosion Chance increased to 100% (from 90%)

 

I think they realized ttk did not go down so nerf all teh weponz, nerf all teh funz.

LRMs are A OK.