33 replies to this topic

[DM30]

Yep, bringing up this tired old topic again, but don't leave just yet. I'm coming at this from a new angle, so just hear me out.

 

So, for a long time the Incinerator has been a fairly hot topic of debate (see what I did there? ) and I think a lot of people can agree that it's in a kind of weird place when it comes to balance. It's not overwhelmingly overpowered, but it does a couple of things too well, especially for something that's supposed to be designed around a support role. I don't think simple number adjustments are sufficient to fix this, either. Straight damage or health nerfs don't really address things like how broken its synergy with the Tech is, and straight nerfs like that could cripple it in areas where it's already vulnerable like surprise attacks. Instead, I'm suggesting a deeper rework of its design.

 

Summary:

-Rebalance primary weapons so Papa isn't the only weapon worth using

-Rework SAARE so that there's a reason to use the primary mode over the alt-fire mode

-Adjust how heat absorption from other mechs works

 

 

1: Primary weapon balance

This part mostly is just stat tweaking, but it's a glaring problem with Incin at the moment. There's no really good reason to not use the Papa on it, and this is the first thing that needs to change. I'm suggesting the following:

 

Baby:

(Disclaimer: my grasp on its current stats is a little rusty, so I'm just going to list out what I think the weapon's attributes in general should be rather than focusing on what values to adjust.)

In general this should be the longer-range option for primary weapons on the Incin--not quite as much damage as the Papa, but better reach and accuracy.

-Spread should be tight with a relatively good effective range, up to medium ranges or a bit beyond

-Damage per shot should be moderate, to give it an average-to-high overall DPS in line with other sustain weapons like SMC.

-Heat per shot should be high enough to supply constant firing of the SAARE

-Possibly a slight ROF increase

 

Papa:

Should stay about the same role that it is now: closer range, higher rate of fire, faster heat generation. But, it should be dialed back so that it's not THE choice like it is for the vast majority of Incin play currently.

-Damage per shot should be about the same as Baby damage levels

-ROF should stay high

-high spread, relatively low effective range (similar to Vulcan)

-Heat per shot needs to be significantly reduced. It's higher heat generation should come mainly from the higher ROF and not from each shot itself.

 

Mama:

I've barely played this weapon because I didn't like the feel of it, so I can't say much about it. My only real change for this weapon would be to speed up the spool-up time when starting to fire, and possibly increase the max ROF slightly. People with more experience with this weapon are welcome to chime in here.

 

 

Overall, I feel like Baby should be the general longer-ranged option, Papa is the close-up damage-focused option, and Mama should be the area-denial/heat utility option like it is now (I feel like Mama in general is in a pretty good place already, it's just too outshined by the Papa)

 

 

2: SAARE rework

This is the meat of this topic. Right now, there is zero reason not to try and use the alt-fire mode of the SAARE as much as possible. You gain additional damage, heat transfer, and splash radius without sacrificing anything (unless you're using Baby, which doesn't supply enough heat to support constant firing). This is frankly dumb. There need to be real reasons to use BOTH modes of the SAARE, and that's what I'm aiming at here.

 

Note: I'm going to talk about stats in reference to current values for the two firing modes, with 1 equating to the current primary mode and 2 representing the current alt-fire mode. This is just for simplicity instead of worrying about raw numbers.

 

Primary mode:

This is the mode that will take the role of both current firing modes on the SAARE. It will be a middle-ground between the two modes we have now.

-Damage dealt should be in a rough range of 1.25-1.5 of the current damage values (so just below/at halfway between regular damage and alt damage now)

-Heat drain per shot should be around 1.5

-Heat transferred to the enemy should be in the range of 1.5-1.75, or possibly even higher

-Splash radius should be around 1.5

-ROF should be the same as what both modes are now

 

The goal here is to adjust the SAARE to focus more on heat-delivery rather than straight damage. The heat inflicted should be enough to force an enemy to retreat after a few direct hits without being so overbearing that fighting an Incin becomes completely frustrating. Ideally heat drain should be balanced with heat generation for the primary weapons so that a Baby can supply full ROF of the SAARE without stopping, and if both are fired constantly I think the mech should overheat after around 10 seconds or so, so a little bit of heat management is still necessary. The behaviour of the Papa-SAARE combo should be around the same as what we have now (bursts of Papa fire and constant fire of SAARE. The overall damage output is just toned down). Mama should have enough heat generation to also supply a constant SAARE fire rate, maybe overheating after around 8-ish seconds.

 

 

Secondary mode:

This will be completely new. A few people have talked about wanting a flamethrower-type weapon in the game, and I think this is the perfect place to implement that. Switching to the alt fire mode on the SAARE will cause it to fire a continuous stream of fire that travels a relatively short range, deals moderate damage and overheat enemy mechs extremely quickly. This will be useful for controlling crowded objective points in Siege or MA, and could be a helpful way to force enemies to disengage if they try to jump the Incin alone in an ambush. It might not kill the enemy, but it can force them to back off long enough for help to arrive, or to keep whittling their health down with the primary weapon.

 

-DPS will be the same or just slightly more than the DPS of the new primary fire mode (the short range can offset the damage, so it won't be the same situation of 'always use alt-fire' like we have now)

-I imagined the range being similar to the range of a MIRV shot, but I'm flexible on this one. It should be long enough to be useful but not so long that there's no reason to use the primary fire mode.

-Heat drain per second will be THE SAME as the new primary fire mode. Switching modes will not provide an advantage of being able to fire your primary weapons longer. The mode switch is for different utility purposes, not one being better than the other.

-Heat delivery for mechs caught in the stream will be very high, enough to fully overheat a mech in around 2 seconds or so of direct hits. Possibly there should be a small 'aura' effect where enemy mechs close to the flame or to the Incinerator itself will also experience a small amount of heat transfer.

 

 

3: Heat absorption

-The Incin should no longer drain heat from enemy mechs, only teammates. As it is, if an Incin is on the enemy team and it's not currently shooting at you, it's supporting you as much as it's supporting its team by draining your heat and allowing you to fire longer. This goes against it's intended team-support role.

-To control the effectiveness of the Tech-Incin combo, I suggest that the amount of heat that the Incin drains from allies decreases the longer that ally is firing its weapons, until eventually the Incin isn't draining heat from them at all. If the allied mech stops firing (say for 1.5-2 seconds), the heat drain returns to full strength. This way techs won't be able to simply lock their heal beam on an Incin and heal forever. The Incin still allows them to heal longer than normal, but the Tech will still have to pause every now and then.

 

 

And that's it! That is my idea for a mechanic re-work on the Incinerator to make it a more balanced and interesting mech. I'm sure there are holes and problems with this suggestion, though, so please poke away at it and discuss! I want to see what sort of ideal set of mechanics we can come up with to make the Incin fun to play and not cause people to rip their hair out when facing one dug in with its team with a Tech.

 

 

I realize that this kind of rework isn't really feasible for Reloaded at the current time, but I still wanted to put it out there and see what people though.

Edited by DM30, 05 August 2015 - 08:49 PM.

[LaurenEmily]

I like the incinerator the way it is. Sure it can be cheesy (like a lot of other things at the moment) but make one mistake with your heat control and you're most likely dead. Also the emp cripples it completely. None of the other 'cheesy' mechs have this kind of a risk. (vulcan gren, berserker etc..) To me the incin seems like the definition of high risk/ high reward in hawken.

 

However of course the tech breaks it, so couldn't it just be changed so that an incin can't take heat away from techs ?

[Panzermanathod]

 

Summary:

-Rebalance primary weapons so Papa isn't the only weapon worth using

(((Papa isn't the only weapon worth using. It's simply the most offensive oriented. Personally I switch between the three if the situation calls for it. Just because people want damage doesn't mean it's the only worthwhile weapon.)))

 

-Rework SAARE so that there's a reason to use the primary mode over the alt-fire mode

(((Fair enough)))

 

 

Baby:

(Disclaimer: my grasp on its current stats is a little rusty, so I'm just going to list out what I think the weapon's attributes in general should be rather than focusing on what values to adjust.)

In general this should be the longer-range option for primary weapons on the Incin--not quite as much damage as the Papa, but better reach and accuracy.

-Spread should be tight with a relatively good effective range, up to medium ranges or a bit beyond

-Damage per shot should be moderate, to give it an average-to-high overall DPS in line with other sustain weapons like SMC.

-Heat per shot should be high enough to supply constant firing of the SAARE

-Possibly a slight ROF increase

 

(((Now, I don't mind BBY getting a slight buff, but if it doesn't get one I won't mind)))

 

Papa:

Should stay about the same role that it is now: closer range, higher rate of fire, faster heat generation. But, it should be dialed back so that it's not THE choice like it is for the vast majority of Incin play currently.

-Damage per shot should be about the same as Baby damage levels

-ROF should stay high

-high spread, relatively low effective range (similar to Vulcan)

-Heat per shot needs to be significantly reduced. It's higher heat generation should come mainly from the higher ROF and not from each shot itself.

 

(((What do you mean that the PPA should have faster heat generation that should also have heat per shot significantly reduced?)))

 

Mama:

I've barely played this weapon because I didn't like the feel of it, so I can't say much about it. My only real change for this weapon would be to speed up the spool-up time when starting to fire, and possibly increase the max ROF slightly. People with more experience with this weapon are welcome to chime in here.

 

(((No, I agree. The only thing I want changed for the M4MA is a faster spin-up. )))

 

 

 (I feel like Mama in general is in a pretty good place already, it's just too outshined by the Papa)

 

(((They have two different roles. It's like saying for a tech the Hawkins outshines the Redox.)))

 

 

Primary mode:

This is the mode that will take the role of both current firing modes on the SAARE. It will be a middle-ground between the two modes we have now.

-Damage dealt should be in a rough range of 1.25-1.5 of the current damage values (so just below/at halfway between regular damage and alt damage now)

-Heat drain per shot should be around 1.5

-Heat transferred to the enemy should be in the range of 1.5-1.75, or possibly even higher

-Splash radius should be around 1.5

-ROF should be the same as what both modes are now

 

The goal here is to adjust the SAARE to focus more on heat-delivery rather than straight damage. The heat inflicted should be enough to force an enemy to retreat after a few direct hits without being so overbearing that fighting an Incin becomes completely frustrating. Ideally heat drain should be balanced with heat generation for the primary weapons so that a Baby can supply full ROF of the SAARE without stopping, and if both are fired constantly I think the mech should overheat after around 10 seconds or so, so a little bit of heat management is still necessary. The behaviour of the Papa-SAARE combo should be around the same as what we have now (bursts of Papa fire and constant fire of SAARE. The overall damage output is just toned down). Mama should have enough heat generation to also supply a constant SAARE fire rate, maybe overheating after around 8-ish seconds.

 

(((I'll be fine with this.)))

 

 

Secondary mode:

This will be completely new. A few people have talked about wanting a flamethrower-type weapon

 

(((I literally did not read the rest of this suggestion. You had me at flamethrower)))

 

 

3: Heat absorption

-The Incin should no longer drain heat from enemy mechs, only teammates. As it is, if an Incin is on the enemy team and it's not currently shooting at you, it's supporting you as much as it's supporting its team by draining your heat and allowing you to fire longer. This goes against it's intended team-support role.

(((Not quite. I get what you're saying, but the Incin does get more benefit from this. That said, if it gets changed to allies only that's fine)))

 

-To control the effectiveness of the Tech-Incin combo, I suggest that the amount of heat that the Incin drains from allies decreases the longer that ally is firing its weapons, until eventually the Incin isn't draining heat from them at all.

(((No. This is altering a mechanic for one mech combo, and such a change that effects its synergy with all other mechs just to nerf one particular set isn't right to me. Not to mention adding another wrinkle into the heat drain that most players, Incin or otherwise, will not pay much attention to. )))

 

[Guns_N_Rozer]

there will be no family , no PAPA no MAMA no BABY 

[kaiserschmarrn_]

I like the incinerator the way it is. Sure it can be cheesy (like a lot of other things at the moment) but make one mistake with your heat control and you're most likely dead. Also the emp cripples it completely. None of the other 'cheesy' mechs have this kind of a risk. (vulcan gren, berserker etc..) To me the incin seems like the definition of high risk/ high reward in hawken.

 

However of course the tech breaks it, so couldn't it just be changed so that an incin can't take heat away from techs ?

2300 n00b wants to win.

[nepacaka]

any changes to inci will be good... =/

[LaurenEmily]

2300 n00b wants to win.

 

Can't tell if kidding or not but whatever it is, if you find joy in making posts with the level of content similar to this your life must be very exciting.

[Draigun]

Honestly, the Incinerator should have been removed from the game. Vana mentioned it before, but this mech just doesn't make sense in this game.

 

But, if it is kept, these suggestion would be just what the mech needs to bring it down to levels that aren't insanely overpowered in suppression.

[kaiserschmarrn_]

Can't tell if kidding or not but whatever it is, if you find joy in making posts with the level of content similar to this your life must be very exciting.

To be serious for a moment, let's look at your response.

1. Making a mistake in heat control means the same this as it does with every other mech (overheating, what a surprise!), this is not some special disadvantage for an Incinerator, especially when it's considered how easy it is to not make a mistake.

2. The EMP does the same goddamn thing it does to every other mech. You can't fire for a few seconds. Again, this is not a special disadvantage for incinerator.

3. EVERY OTHER MECH has the risks that you point out in your response (Overheating/Getting EMP'd). In fact, any decent Incinerator will not overheat, making overheating even more of a problem for other mechs.

4. Incin is not high risk. You have a C-class health pool, very good speed for a heavy, and DPS that can rival that of 2 assaults, not to mention the support capabilities. The only drawback to the Incin right now is its relatively small fuel tank.

[LaurenEmily]

To be serious for a moment, let's look at your response.

1. Making a mistake in heat control means the same this as it does with every other mech (overheating, what a surprise!), this is not some special disadvantage for an Incinerator, especially when it's considered how easy it is to not make a mistake.

2. The EMP does the same goddamn thing it does to every other mech. You can't fire for a few seconds. Again, this is not a special disadvantage for incinerator.

3. EVERY OTHER MECH has the risks that you point out in your response (Overheating/Getting EMP'd). In fact, any decent Incinerator will not overheat, making overheating even more of a problem for other mechs.

4. Incin is not high risk. You have a C-class health pool, very good speed for a heavy, and DPS that can rival that of 2 assaults, not to mention the support capabilities. The only drawback to the Incin right now is its relatively small fuel tank.

First of all i'm not trying to defend this because i don't want my OP toy nerfed, i'm terrible with this thing and i don't play it when i want to win.

 

The Papa bear, basically the only viable gun for this mech takes 3 seconds before it's ready to shoot. If you overheat you will have to wait almost 6 seconds until you can start doing damage again also including your ability & secondary gun. The unstable heat generation together with the random extra heat from enemies/teammates makes overheating so easy that it will happen almost guaranteed at some point, no matter how good you are. Assuming we are talking 'high tier' play here, 6 seconds near a enemy without a weapon means your death. 

That sounds pretty high risk to me.

[kaiserschmarrn_]

First of all i'm not trying to defend this because i don't want my OP toy nerfed, i'm terrible with this thing and i don't play it when i want to win.

 

The Papa bear, basically the only viable gun for this mech takes 3 seconds before it's ready to shoot. If you overheat you will have to wait almost 6 seconds until you can start doing damage again also including your ability & secondary gun. The unstable heat generation together with the random extra heat from enemies/teammates makes overheating so easy that it will happen almost guaranteed at some point, no matter how good you are. Assuming we are talking 'high tier' play here, 6 seconds near a enemy without a weapon means your death. 

That sounds pretty high risk to me.

It's a good point, but the question is not when you overheat, it's IF you overheat. Overheating in Incin is a very easy thing not to do.

[Meraple]

2. The EMP does the same goddamn thing it does to every other mech. You can't fire for a few seconds. Again, this is not a special disadvantage for incinerator.

It's a higher disadvantage to PPA Incinerators, due to obvious reasons.

 

4. Incin is not high risk. You have a C-class health pool, very good speed for a heavy, and DPS that can rival that of 2 assaults, not to mention the support capabilities. The only drawback to the Incin right now is its relatively small fuel tank.

It's high-risk because people throw more EMPs at Incinerators than at other mechs.

 

 

tl;dr lolemp

Edited by (KDR) Meraple, 06 August 2015 - 04:13 AM.

[Skrubdos7]

2300 n00b wants to win.

Spoiler

[Panzermanathod]

It's a good point, but the question is not when you overheat, it's IF you overheat. Overheating in Incin is a very easy thing not to do.

It's easy to not overheat with all mechs if you know what you're doing. The Incin just has the advantage of being able to shoot a lot more, and even then it's not the faultless advantage that some people think it is.

 

2. The EMP does the same goddamn thing it does to every other mech. You can't fire for a few seconds. Again, this is not a special disadvantage for incinerator.

 

(((Yes it is more of a disadvantage for Incin. Especially for PPAincin. All Incin weapons have a spin up time, and can't fire SAARE without heat (which the EMP will clear out. The Incin will spend the longest amount of time unable to effectively retaliate if hit with EMP)))

 

 The only drawback to the Incin right now is its relatively small fuel tank.

 

(((That is not Incin's only drawback)))

[kaiserschmarrn_]

Spoiler

bruh... what even? This sh*t laced, yo.

Spoiler

Edit: Dat censoring though

Edited by meatmissile_, 06 August 2015 - 07:38 AM.

[eth0]

I'd like to see a reworked incin ability where he gets a timed heat absorption instead of a butt-stomp AND a passive ability.

[Meraple]

All Incin weapons have a spin up time, and can't fire SAARE without heat (which the EMP will clear out.

EMP doesn't clear out heat on Incinerator- the heat bar doesn't go down and you can still F people.

[Panzermanathod]

 the heat bar doesn't go down and you can still F people.

[nepacaka]

The only drawback to the Incin right now is its relatively small fuel tank.

 

to be more correct, problem is not in his small fueltank, problem in low fuel regeneration rate. Vanguard also have a small fueltank and it is not a problem, because he have a good fuel regen.

and it is actually not a drawbacks for Inci, because he mostly walking.

 

If you overheat you will have to wait almost 6 seconds until you can start doing damage again

 

and? brawler also have a 6 sec overheat. but he can't shooting 5 min without stopping and don't have 210 DPS.

Edited by nepacaka, 06 August 2015 - 11:06 AM.

[LaurenEmily]

Not related to anything but i found this funny

Spoiler

 

Spoiler

Skrubdos7 has 2 posts in the forum. Both of them contain this same image. No one else would care enough to post that twice other than himself using another account for whatever reason. Don't you have anything better to do ?   

[kaiserschmarrn_]

Not related to anything but i found this funny

Spoiler

 

Spoiler

Skrubdos7 has 2 posts in the forum. Both of them contain this same image. No one else would care enough to post that twice other than himself using another account for whatever reason. Don't you have anything better to do ?   

interesting! The pic is quite outdated though.

Spoiler

[Meraple]

Spoiler

Skrubdos7 has 2 posts in the forum. Both of them contain this same image. No one else would care enough to post that twice other than himself using another account for whatever reason. Don't you have anything better to do ?  

People generally don't want a bad reputation but still want to point out bad things.

I'm not sure if that's the case here since his main has a similar name.

[kaiserschmarrn_]

People generally don't want a bad reputation but still want to point out bad things.

I'm not sure if that's the case here since his main has a similar name.

I'm not sure he likes me.

D:

Maybe hes a burger-eater

*shudders

[nepacaka]

to be honest, most of problem caused by PPA Inci. because he can shoot with big-saare every second. with BBY or MMA he rate of fire slower and he not deal insane damage.

 

and Inci actually may overheat only with PPA if you not control it.

i mean, with any other weapon he gain not enough heat and it is very easy to control, you just spam with small-saare and you will never overheating.

Edited by nepacaka, 06 August 2015 - 11:31 AM.

[LaurenEmily]

People generally don't want a bad reputation but still want to point out bad things.

I'm not sure if that's the case here since his main has a similar name.

 

 

interesting! The pic is quite outdated though.

Spoiler

 

Oh that's kindos ? lol my apologies then, just didn't make any sense to me why someone would care so much about how anyone else is doing..

[StubbornPuppet]

Apparently, I played the Incinerator wrong when I used to use it.  Will have to take all of the above tips and pick it up again... but will have to turn the sound down, as this damned Harley Davidson of a mech and all of it's "Thwappa thwap thwap thwap thwap thwap..." drives me almost and crazy as real Harley's.

[DM30]

I like the incinerator the way it is. Sure it can be cheesy (like a lot of other things at the moment) but make one mistake with your heat control and you're most likely dead. Also the emp cripples it completely. None of the other 'cheesy' mechs have this kind of a risk. (vulcan gren, berserker etc..) To me the incin seems like the definition of high risk/ high reward in hawken.

 

However of course the tech breaks it, so couldn't it just be changed so that an incin can't take heat away from techs ?

 

That's an option, but that doesn't address the issue of Papa being the go-to option for maximizing damage output and standard SAARE being pointless compared to alt-SAARE.

 

 

 

 

Papa isn't the only weapon worth using. It's simply the most offensive oriented. Personally I switch between the three if the situation calls for it. Just because people want damage doesn't mean it's the only worthwhile weapon.

 

Debatable. In most scenarios, putting the most damage onto the enemy team will be more valuable than what the other primaries offer. If you need to break up an entrenched group, the extra damage, splash, and heat transfer of the large SAARE will do that best, and Papa is the primary that best gives you the option to use large SAARE to its full potential. If you want to push back an enemy advance, the same thing applies. Dueling someone 1v1, you want to do the most damage to kill them fast and the extra splash range makes hitting them easier. Mama needs a couple of teammates nearby supplying heat to fire SAARE at full ROF, and Baby generates so little heat compared to the others that it cripples the SAARE's effectiveness completely. I honestly can't think of a single situation where I wouldn't want the Papa's heat gen when using the Incinerator now.

 

 

 

 

What do you mean that the PPA should have faster heat generation that should also have heat per shot significantly reduced?

 

Right now the Papa generates more heat per shot than the Baby, AND it fires significantly faster so the difference in heat buildup between the two is enormous when those factors are combined. If the Papa generated the same heat per shot as the Baby did, the faster ROF would still give the Papa a higher heat generation rate overall but it wouldn't be such a massive difference and the two weapons would be more in line with each other.

 

 

 

 

No. This is altering a mechanic for one mech combo, and such a change that effects its synergy with all other mechs just to nerf one particular set isn't right to me. Not to mention adding another wrinkle into the heat drain that most players, Incin or otherwise, will not pay much attention to.

 

Fair point. This part might be a step overboard.

 

 

 

I'd like to see a reworked incin ability where he gets a timed heat absorption instead of a butt-stomp AND a passive ability.

 

This does sound interesting.

[Panzermanathod]

 

and? brawler also have a 6 sec overheat. but he can't shooting 5 min without stopping and don't have 210 DPS.

 

Incin doesn't have the highest HP of the game, the potential for a bit of added defense, and natural health regeneration with no limits.

 

As for going against groups, wouldn't Mama be viable as well? Can't do as much damage but it can mess up a group in its own way. Not to mention that MamIncin can Infinit-shoot better than PPA.

[nepacaka]

Not to mention that MamIncin can Infinit-shoot better than PPA.

 

not better. easier to control - yes. but not better! here there difference.

[Kindos7]

...his main has a similar name.

 

 

I am not skrubdos7. I don't know who he is, I've only seem him on public matches and dueled him once.

If I wanted to hide my identity, I wouldn't pick a nick that looks so similar to mine. That should be obvious to anyone.

[Meraple]

 I am not skrubdos7. I don't know who he is, I've only seem him on public matches and dueled him once.

That's weird, someone pretending to be you.

 

If I wanted to hide my identity, I wouldn't pick a nick that looks so similar to mine. That should be obvious to anyone.

Hence:

I'm not sure if that's the case here

Edited by (KDR) Meraple, 07 August 2015 - 06:08 AM.

[Panzermanathod]

not better. easier to control - yes. but not better! here there difference.

I'm not talking about damage. I am talking about ease of control and the very act of shooting forever for Incin, in which case M4MA does shoot forever better than PPA. The PPA requires some pausing with the PPA but all M4MA has to do is keep shooting. There is no penalty for M4MA to shoot continuously at full blast, but there is one for PPA. In fact, I would go as far as to say BBY and M4MA shoot forever better than PPA.

[Rainbow_Sheep]

Similar to orblord, I would like to see nerfs/reworks introduced over time.

For example lowering the big Saare RoF and then seeing what the mech is like then

[Panzermanathod]

If Big SAARE's RoF is lowered then I'd say, if it otherwise is untouched, lower the spin up time for PPA. PPA requires constant letting loose of heat and with it being lowered that's more time not shooting it, and as such potentially more time in letting PPA spin down.