In general, i appreciate this re-balance - except for your odd choice of extremely high melee damage. I was able to attach 4x 60 damage mods to the arms ... fairly early in the game + 1 small laser (because the game wants you to have one weapon) and i was able to put maximum jumpjets and maximum armor on my Grasshopper. (i think its that robot)
with that i was able to insta kill almost every opponent up to a heavy one...
- one shot kills - no heat - extremely high "to hit" chance
I have altered the ini to half the damage .. and made the high damage mods rarer .. it felt like cheating to have the original mod files.
edit: i looked into the vanilla game (i do not own the game, i just watch it when a friend plays it) - and it seems the melee damage is just as high in vanilla... so ignore the previous point, i guess
Can you please make an alternate mod for just the weapon balance modifications? i agree entirely on all the balancing changes you make but i am only looking for a weapon balance mod without extra gameplay changes like permanent evasion. Thanks. I just found out about Weapon Editor, i still think it would be neat tou.
I can dig the idea of permanent evasion blips, yet i can't help but seeing more than 3 blips as broken, i think it makes weaponry that relies on ammo a liability. That's the reason i constantly avoid any mod that messes with vanilla evasion, would use this if it went back to 3 max though, or 3 max and only 4 max for pilots with Ace Pilot (giving one over max). Like maybe the current movement:p-evasion without the last value (140:1 165:2 190:3) and +1 from Ace Pilot ?
I gotta be honest with you, I'm not downloading this mod to actually use it, I'm purely downloading it so I can endorse it properly. The truth is, I already have several ModTek-folders with my own little changes to the vanilla-rules. But your mod has given me so much to think about and try out for my own setup, that you more than deserve the endorsment ;)
First, thank you for all your efforts in creating this and sharing it with the community. It is sincerely appreciated.
I'd like to discuss LRMs. I'm having trouble seeing how they're balanced. These are my thoughts and please help me understand if I'm missing something.
LRMs have the highest long range damage/ton (including HEAT/ammo). LRMs can indirect fire which is a BIG benefit. LRMs have good stability damage. LRMs have one of the best ranges in the game.
The negative I've sometimes heard is damage "spread", but realistically, anything under 80 damage is spreading the damage over multiple hits anyway. In fact, it seems to be a benefit as you have a higher chance to get head shots because the LRM20 actually fires 20 times.
With all this considered, why do LRMs still have such good damage and stability? It seems like their damage was close to balanced (although still highest) and the rest of their amazing attributes were overlooked. When I play, I can't help but think, why wouldn't I just make LRM boats? Am I missing something?
First of all LRMs are pretty much the same as stock (other than slightly rebalancing the stupid heat values so they actually make sense)
There's a few things that may not be obvious at first glance.
1. All damage and stab bonuses for +/++/+++ LRMs were removed and replaced with other bonuses. (these were FAR, FAR too strong)
2. Indirect fire is less accurate in this mod (+5 penalty instead of +3 penalty... it's impossible to totally cancel it out)
3. LRM "clustering" has been nerfed significantly. LRMs are much less likely to hit the same (and adjacent) locations than they are in the stock game (clustering multiplier from 8/4/1 to 4/2/1). The net effect is that LRM damage is less concentrated and is spread across more locations.
4. You can no longer reduce the distance for minimum range fire.. you can only offset the penalty (best case is a +4 penalty for minimum range fire).
5. Accuracy is lower in general and faster/smaller mechs are also significantly harder to hit.
Note that we had the base LRMs at only 1 stability damage for quite awhile... but they were just too weak at those levels.
LRM Boats can still be helpful, but in my experience it will take longer to kill stuff.... I generally only use 1 at most in my lances
Since the AC5 does 45 damage, hitting a target will always require multiple shots and over multiple shots the chance to kill will be similar if not equal with both weapons. Additionally, any enemy area that has a low in life component (say 10hp) will be much more likely to be knocked out with LRMs and headshots will also be more common. I would argue the LRM's spread is an advantage but it's minor so less consider this difference moot.
So the LRM does more damage/weight and better stability damage/weight. So for a target at 500 range, wouldn't it always be better to fire an LRM than an AC5?
And then also consider the LRM can indirect fire (even if at a penalty, remember the AC5 can't even fire). And then the LRM has better range as well, although worse short range. And the ACs get an accuracy penalty on refire.
But even ignoring range, indirect fire, accuracy penalty and spread, it still has better damage and stability damage. How is that balanced? Is it because the + variants are really nerfed for LRM's and not for ACs? I'm not seeing how this works.
Single Area damage is simply better than spread damage. LRMs actually do not have much more chance of a headshot (SRMs do... and SRM6 actually gets 6 rolls). LRMs don't get 20 rolls... they cluster instead (I don't have the mechanics at hand... but I can try to look them up).
It's the entire idea of "sandpapering" armor vs piercing a single location. It depends on what mech you are fighting, angle you are attacking from etc.
LRMs are annoying to balance because any change to damage or stability represents a huge percentage change
Just some feedback on mission number and variability. With the dificulty variability set to 5 and the number of missions set to 6 there are a couple of issues I have had early game. 1: You sometimes find yourself with an entire line up of impossibly hard missions, including the breadcrumb ( a level 7 missions when your level 2 is pretty rough going!), if this happens two systems in a row you have lost a lot of money when times are tight. 2: You sometimes get the reverse where you have 6 doable missions (sometimes even all easy ones), this reaults is an absurd amount of money in 6 days game time (literally millions of C-Bills).
I tweaked to variability 3 and 5 missions max (although I think 4 is probably better), this means most missions are generally doable, but if they all are your not immediatelly drowning in cash as a result.
One thing that works REALLY well is playing with some variable mission dificulty and the tonnage limit based on dificulty mod, even though they are still relatively easy it stops the lower level missions being complete cake walks every time as you never completely outclass the OpFor.
What I would really like is a way to seriously dial back salvage levels, but there is no global for this (or at least they don't apply) and editing every mission is painful!
Thanks for the feedback! There's definitely some personal taste involved in the sim game settings and I haven't played with those nearly as much as the tactical layer settings. I enjoy having a grindy early game, but I totally see how your settings could be fun also.
You might be interested in the other mod I linked to in the description (dz consolidated company commander).... that mod does make salvage more difficult. Granted, it's quite a bit further from vanilla than this mod.
Yeah I have been tossing that one up, I am on macOS though so some mods don't always seem to work as intended (and I had to use a Windows machine to prep for ModTek), plus I quite like playing with the numbers. I have tried playing with Salvage values it's actually darn hard! The only effective way seems to be to edit the missions themselves, I did script it successfully, but could only get it to load by overwriting rather than using ModTek, which is messy or by having weird victory conditions (which means you don't get what the UI says you should). I'll try the DZ and see what I get.
Note that this mod does change salvage to 5 parts per mech... which (at least IMO) does make salvaging mechs quite a bit more difficult. Also note that I disabled pilot injuries from side torso explosions in the latest version - which should also make salvage more difficult
Hey bud.. great work !!! I have a question maybe you can educate me on... What does "ToHitMovingPipUMs": mean? Is the fist set of numbers (2,4,6,8,11,14) the negative shot modifier you see in the tool tip - # ? And the second set of numbers is "ToHitMovingTargetDistances"?? (20,100,125,160,190) is the distanced need to acquire a PiP of evasion?
17 comments
with that i was able to insta kill almost every opponent up to a heavy one...
- one shot kills
- no heat
- extremely high "to hit" chance
I have altered the ini to half the damage .. and made the high damage mods rarer .. it felt like cheating to have the original mod files.
edit: i looked into the vanilla game (i do not own the game, i just watch it when a friend plays it) - and it seems the melee damage is just as high in vanilla... so ignore the previous point, i guess
Can you please make an alternate mod for just the weapon balance modifications? i agree entirely on all the balancing changes you make but i am only looking for a weapon balance mod without extra gameplay changes like permanent evasion. Thanks.I just found out about Weapon Editor, i still think it would be neat tou.I can dig the idea of permanent evasion blips, yet i can't help but seeing more than 3 blips as broken, i think it makes weaponry that relies on ammo a liability. That's the reason i constantly avoid any mod that messes with vanilla evasion, would use this if it went back to 3 max though, or 3 max and only 4 max for pilots with Ace Pilot (giving one over max).
Like maybe the current movement:p-evasion without the last value (140:1 165:2 190:3) and +1 from Ace Pilot ?
I gotta be honest with you, I'm not downloading this mod to actually use it, I'm purely downloading it so I can endorse it properly.
The truth is, I already have several ModTek-folders with my own little changes to the vanilla-rules.
But your mod has given me so much to think about and try out for my own setup, that you more than deserve the endorsment ;)
First, thank you for all your efforts in creating this and sharing it with the community. It is sincerely appreciated.
I'd like to discuss LRMs. I'm having trouble seeing how they're balanced. These are my thoughts and please help me understand if I'm missing something.
LRMs have the highest long range damage/ton (including HEAT/ammo).
LRMs can indirect fire which is a BIG benefit.
LRMs have good stability damage.
LRMs have one of the best ranges in the game.
The negative I've sometimes heard is damage "spread", but realistically, anything under 80 damage is spreading the damage over multiple hits anyway. In fact, it seems to be a benefit as you have a higher chance to get head shots because the LRM20 actually fires 20 times.
With all this considered, why do LRMs still have such good damage and stability? It seems like their damage was close to balanced (although still highest) and the rest of their amazing attributes were overlooked. When I play, I can't help but think, why wouldn't I just make LRM boats? Am I missing something?
There's a few things that may not be obvious at first glance.
1. All damage and stab bonuses for +/++/+++ LRMs were removed and replaced with other bonuses. (these were FAR, FAR too strong)
2. Indirect fire is less accurate in this mod (+5 penalty instead of +3 penalty... it's impossible to totally cancel it out)
3. LRM "clustering" has been nerfed significantly. LRMs are much less likely to hit the same (and adjacent) locations than they are in the stock game (clustering multiplier from 8/4/1 to 4/2/1). The net effect is that LRM damage is less concentrated and is spread across more locations.
4. You can no longer reduce the distance for minimum range fire.. you can only offset the penalty (best case is a +4 penalty for minimum range fire).
5. Accuracy is lower in general and faster/smaller mechs are also significantly harder to hit.
Note that we had the base LRMs at only 1 stability damage for quite awhile... but they were just too weak at those levels.
LRM Boats can still be helpful, but in my experience it will take longer to kill stuff.... I generally only use 1 at most in my lances
If we could compare any LRM (let's say 20) to AC5.
DamageLRM20 4.29AC5 3.65
Stability LRM20 1.07AC5 0.81
Since the AC5 does 45 damage, hitting a target will always require multiple shots and over multiple shots the chance to kill will be similar if not equal with both weapons. Additionally, any enemy area that has a low in life component (say 10hp) will be much more likely to be knocked out with LRMs and headshots will also be more common. I would argue the LRM's spread is an advantage but it's minor so less consider this difference moot.
So the LRM does more damage/weight and better stability damage/weight. So for a target at 500 range, wouldn't it always be better to fire an LRM than an AC5?
And then also consider the LRM can indirect fire (even if at a penalty, remember the AC5 can't even fire). And then the LRM has better range as well, although worse short range. And the ACs get an accuracy penalty on refire.
But even ignoring range, indirect fire, accuracy penalty and spread, it still has better damage and stability damage. How is that balanced? Is it because the + variants are really nerfed for LRM's and not for ACs? I'm not seeing how this works.
It's the entire idea of "sandpapering" armor vs piercing a single location. It depends on what mech you are fighting, angle you are attacking from etc.
LRMs are annoying to balance because any change to damage or stability represents a huge percentage change
https://www.nexusmods.com/battletech/mods/136?tab=description
With the dificulty variability set to 5 and the number of missions set to 6 there are a couple of issues I have had early game.
1: You sometimes find yourself with an entire line up of impossibly hard missions, including the breadcrumb ( a level 7 missions when your level 2 is pretty rough going!), if this happens two systems in a row you have lost a lot of money when times are tight.
2: You sometimes get the reverse where you have 6 doable missions (sometimes even all easy ones), this reaults is an absurd amount of money in 6 days game time (literally millions of C-Bills).
I tweaked to variability 3 and 5 missions max (although I think 4 is probably better), this means most missions are generally doable, but if they all are your not immediatelly drowning in cash as a result.
One thing that works REALLY well is playing with some variable mission dificulty and the tonnage limit based on dificulty mod, even though they are still relatively easy it stops the lower level missions being complete cake walks every time as you never completely outclass the OpFor.
What I would really like is a way to seriously dial back salvage levels, but there is no global for this (or at least they don't apply) and editing every mission is painful!
You might be interested in the other mod I linked to in the description (dz consolidated company commander).... that mod does make salvage more difficult. Granted, it's quite a bit further from vanilla than this mod.
I have tried playing with Salvage values it's actually darn hard! The only effective way seems to be to edit the missions themselves, I did script it successfully, but could only get it to load by overwriting rather than using ModTek, which is messy or by having weird victory conditions (which means you don't get what the UI says you should).
I'll try the DZ and see what I get.
[
2,
4,
6,
8,
11,
14
],
The overall effect is that it's easier to get pips and the higher end pips are more effective (lower end slightly less)..
Now any movement at all gives you 1 pip and all mechs can generally get 2 from moving normally