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View Full Version : [R#186] T#198/T#199 - The Last Release Candidate - Patch Discussion



Alduin
19-07-14, 15:43
Cheers runners,

please discuss the current testserver patch, which will mark the end of phase one of the Balancing Project, here. Please make sure that we do not break the newbie experience, after all we do not want to drive new players away with this patch! The corresponding patch notes may be found here (http://forum.neocron-game.com/showthread.php?155700-R-186-T-198-The-Last-Release-Candidate-Patch-Notes).

Slauncha,
Alduin

Nidhogg
19-07-14, 15:59
Just wanted to say, literally awesome work you've done here!

Kronos
19-07-14, 16:29
Cracking update from team!

Hopefully no issues from this so we can get it onto Titan quickly! But we need you guys to test it, and report back in the Bug Forum. The QA team will then be able to get anything cleared up.

See you all on Vedeena ;)

Powerpunsh
19-07-14, 17:26
Well done guys!! Patch it as it is and force us to play it. best way to find out how it works. My only exception for now is that PVE damage is cut half. :)

Massaker
19-07-14, 18:06
Cheers runners,

please discuss the current testserver patch, which will mark the end of phase one of the Balancing Project, here. Please make sure that we do not break the newbie experience, after all we do not want to drive new players away with this patch! The corresponding patch notes may be found here (http://forum.neocron-game.com/showthread.php?155700-R-186-T-198-The-Last-Release-Candidate-Patch-Notes).

Slauncha,
Alduin

This could be the first post for the blog of the balancing team ;) where is the post? :)

If I have some time the evenings of the weekend I will have a look on the current patch. But well done so far ;)

Tino
19-07-14, 18:08
Woohoo i might start playing again =)

Massaker
19-07-14, 19:05
I can't shoot with any weapon with my HC Tank (grenade launchers, rocket launchers, raygun cannons, fusion cannons, plasma cannons/waves, flamethrowers, freezer cannons and gatlin cannons... so all weapons and fresh bought from the npc's)
Rifle/pistol Spies and APU's don't have the problem. All weapons/spells work fine. So I created a new character to check if my character is buggy. But as I was in the woc temple to push my stats and draw the dirty knife there was no hit and no damage visible... The fists with ALT+H also don't work :(
As we figured out on the test server it's a class related problem. With a Spy, APU/PPU and PE you can hit with the fists. I lomed my PE on HC and.... surprise... the cannons work fine...

EDIT: if you have points on psi use and psi in your psi pool bar you can shoot with the hc/mc weapons.

The PSI consumption is increased, again? With the last patch a resist/combat/support buff took ~130 PSI. Now it's raised to ~173?? That's a little bit to harsh I think. Now you can buff one player if you have more than 450 PSI and take a PSI booster and wait a few seconds to buff the next player. The new formula should affect not all spell classes in common. The PSI consumption of the PPU spells was OK before.

The devourer still does too much damage. A full buffed APU with 80 fire resist, heavy fire belt, shields and running heal dies after 5 shots by the poison stacks: it doesn't matter if I change the belt to a heavy poison belt. The behavior is still the same. So please have a look on the flamers again. They are too overpowered.

Alduin
19-07-14, 19:34
I can't shoot with any weapon with my HC Tank (grenade launchers, rocket launchers, raygun cannons, fusion cannons, plasma cannons/waves, flamethrowers, freezer cannons and gatlin cannons... so all weapons and fresh bought from the npc's)
Rifle/pistol Spies and APU's don't have the problem. All weapons/spells work fine. So I created a new character to check if my character is buggy. But as I was in the woc temple to push my stats and draw the dirty knife there was no hit and no damage visible... The fists with ALT+H also don't work :(
As we figured out on the test server it's a class related problem. With a Spy, APU/PPU and PE you can hit with the fists. I lomed my PE on HC and.... surprise... the cannons work fine...

EDIT: if you have points on psi use and psi in your psi pool bar you can shoot with the hc/mc weapons.

The PSI consumption is increased, again? With the last patch a resist/combat/support buff took ~130 PSI. Now it's raised to ~173?? That's a little bit to harsh I think. Now you can buff one player if you have more than 450 PSI and take a PSI booster and wait a few seconds to buff the next player. The new formula should affect not all spell classes in common. The PSI consumption of the PPU spells was OK before.

Ouchy! I placed an additional check to avoid psi use becoming less than 1 into the equation but in the wrong place -.- Dumb mistake -.- Thanks for spotting this and thanks to Bifrost and Kronos for tracing it down so fast! Am fixing it right now!

Alduin
19-07-14, 20:52
A hotfix has been pushed to Vedeena. In addition to fixing the weapon usage issue, the psi use of all spells has been lowered by 20%.

Massaker
20-07-14, 11:24
I can't get into hacknet by hacking a GenRep in an outpost, plaza, headquater of my faction or in my appartmemt. Hacking belts also doesn't work. I only hear login security passed but if I click on the belt I read in the chat "damn locked".
I bought new hacktools (tl 30, 55 and 75) from the npcs but its still the same behavior.
Checked this with two characters. One full hacker and one rifle spy

Edit: I tried to hack a warbot (80/80) but the hacks are too difficult now. My spy has 95 hacking and the screens look like this:

12381

Same problem with Mad Copbots (48/48) and Substandard Cyberguard (16/16)

Alduin
20-07-14, 13:33
I can't get into hacknet by hacking a GenRep in an outpost, plaza, headquater of my faction or in my appartmemt. Hacking belts also doesn't work. I only hear login security passed but if I click on the belt I read in the chat "damn locked".
I bought new hacktools (tl 30, 55 and 75) from the npcs but its still the same behavior.
Checked this with two characters. One full hacker and one rifle spy

Edit: I tried to hack a warbot (80/80) but the hacks are too difficult now. My spy has 95 hacking and the screens look like this:

12381

Same problem with Mad Copbots (48/48) and Substandard Cyberguard (16/16)

Thanks for spotting this! I am on it!

Kronos
20-07-14, 17:32
Thanks for spotting this! I am on it!

He's found the problem, and it will be fixed. But we are not releasing a hotfix to Vedeena for this, as we don't see the need currently. But rest assured, it will not make it's way onto Titan ;)

Massaker
20-07-14, 17:40
The damage of the turrets is too low. I can counterheal my tank with nanites and medi kits against a gatlin turret mk3. Damage could be increased by 20%. Now the turrets are only toys with no usage (maybe the stun traps are usefull) and any op fight team will laugh about the damage output and will not destroy them and earn them when they take over the op.

Kronos
20-07-14, 17:42
The damage of the turrets is too low. I can counterheal my tank with nanites and medi kits against a gatlin turret mk3. Damage could be increased by 20%. Now the turrets are only toys with no usage (maybe the stun traps) and any op fight team will laugh about the damage output and will not destroy them and earn them when they take over the op.

Hmm, have you tried all the turrets? Or just the Gat's MK3 ?

Massaker
20-07-14, 18:18
The artillery turrets are quite ok. The damage big gatlin turrets, plasma turrets, small mg turrets (the yellow ones) and the laster turrets are also a little bit too low.

Drachenpaladin
20-07-14, 20:01
The artillery turrets are quite ok. The damage big gatlin turrets, plasma turrets, small mg turrets (the yellow ones) and the laster turrets are also a little bit too low.

I don't think the turrets should do more damage then the average mid-level mob. Otherwise OP-fights turn into PvE and you don't want that to happen, amirite?

Ryosai Bladewin
20-07-14, 21:54
Okay so i went on a weapon testing spree last night and i have to say... if the APU development is in the final stage on the testserver, APUs are more effective when they throw their psi modules into someones face instead of actually casting it once the patch goes live.

As an example, Holy Lightning 258 damage on the testing Drom. 128 on a spider in the sewers in P1. 128?!
The rare barrels are all dealing 76 damage per hit at the Drom.
Holy energy beam deals actually only 4 damage less than the holy lightning. Holy Toxic Beam deals 256 damage which would easily equal the holy lightning, same goes with the fire apocalypse, the holy/rare beam spells in general deal all between 250-260 damage. The only exception being Holy Frostration which deals a fancy 130 damage.

This was tested with 197 apu.

Now i logged onto my spy to check the disruptor. 3x 361 damage. Healing Light: 2x 430. wtf?

As for my tank. Cursed Soul, 4x 130 damage. Ravager 3x 233. Warhammer direct hit on the drom. 404 damage.


You might want to consider looking into those numbers.

Ascension
20-07-14, 22:22
The devourer stacks fire, but fire Apoc still doesn't.. not sure why.

Ivan Eres
21-07-14, 01:02
Great work so far. The changes in the patch notes look very good especially the ones related to weapons and classes. You guys rock! Keep it going.

I wish I could be testing too but my only private computer at the moment is a macbook 2,1 from 2006 :-(

Petalustig
21-07-14, 12:37
Too strong:
Dissi+Pulselaser Rifles
Ak
Gatlin Rifle+Pistol
Devo stacks
(Thanks for bringing back the Rifle spy he is now stronger than before the nerf)

Too weak:
Apu ( Freq Ok.. Dmg not enough.. maybe because that fire apoc and the other rare apu spells have a low tl)
Blessed Heal ( heal the same like the tl3)
Ionic Weapons (Rifle+Pistol+Heavy) they useless now
Runspeed too slow
And maybe some Nc Players

All tested on a still standing Tank.. We Tested not all Weapons but most of them..

Bragi
21-07-14, 22:12
Too strong:
Dissi+Pulselaser Rifles
Ak
Gatlin Rifle+Pistol
Devo stacks
(Thanks for bringing back the Rifle spy he is now stronger than before the nerf)

Too weak:
Apu ( Freq Ok.. Dmg not enough.. maybe because that fire apoc and the other rare apu spells have a low tl)
Blessed Heal ( heal the same like the tl3)
Ionic Weapons (Rifle+Pistol+Heavy) they useless now
Runspeed too slow
And maybe some Nc Players

Can you quantify all this? How long did it take each weapon to kill the target, what resists and armour did the target have and what skill values did the attacker have?

Sevendust
27-07-14, 03:35
Yeah Something isnt right.

To START: the frequency shown on the weapons that are MORE than a 1 shot burst are still off from the actual frequency.
Tested the DPM on some weapons & not only the DPM, but the dmg per burst is very low...

Shooter = PE with ~213 R-C, ~135 WEP
Target = Tank with high resists in all stats. Don't want to post any numbers cuz it's one of my prized possessions ;)

Termi = 28 dmg / 35/min = 980 DPM
Pain Easer = 64 dmg / ~63/min = 4042 DPM
RoG = 64 dmg / 36/min = 2304 DPM
Desperado = 47 dmg / 50/min = 2350 DPM
Libra = 58 dmg / ~66/min = 4094 DPM

Then again the Libra might be pretty balanced. Others are very low compared to Retail currently though

I dunno if yall are wanting to go by tested numbers vs the DROM, so ill re-test on droms in a few.

Bragi
27-07-14, 03:55
Termi = 28 dmg / 35/min = 980 DPM
Pain Easer = 64 dmg / ~63/min = 4042 DPM
RoG = 64 dmg / 36/min = 2304 DPM
Desperado = 47 dmg / 50/min = 2350 DPM
Libra = 58 dmg / ~66/min = 4094 DPM

Are those per-hit damage values or per-burst values?


I dunno if yall are wanting to go by tested numbers vs the DROM, so ill re-test on droms in a few.

Yes please.

Also, how do you know a weapon's freq is incorrect? Are you timing it?

Sevendust
27-07-14, 04:09
Per burst.

& Yeah, lol. Stopwatch app. Im not sure on the Libra, it might be more shots per min than 66, but its easily noticablely faster than 1 burst/sec. Thats why I did the "~" for the /min. In-game it says 179/min on the weapon, & divided by 4 for the 4 shot burst is only 44.75 shots/min.

DMG vs DROM:
Termi = 181 dmg
Pain Easer = 357 dmg
Ray of God = 376 dmg
Desperado = 278 dmg
Libra = 320 dmg

Alright, so I tested vs a more average resist setup. Granted, most of everyone will take a bit less dmg from the Termi, Pain easer, Libra, & Desperado than the following numbers, but the RoG dmg is about what ppl will take.

Termi = 53 dmg (<- the termi used to fire much faster than what it currently does btw)
Pain Easer = 102 dmg
Ray of God = 81 dmg
Desperado = 82 dmg
Libra = 94 dmg

Sevendust
27-07-14, 05:38
Also, RAYGUN weapons are still not registering dmg most of the time on-hit.

Sevendust
27-07-14, 07:45
ALSO, we did alotta dueling and dmg testing tonight, and an executioner hit a tank for ~70, and the SLASHER on the same tank hit for 190 (1 burst). Slasher is definitely broken, and im guessing the disruptor is also. Will test more tomorrow. Overall with multiple weapons, some do too little, and some do too much.

(on another note, faster firing weapons should have a higher DPM imo. Thats alot more clicks on the target someone has to do just to match the damage someone does with a few clicks.)

Also, the LIBERATOR fires faster when modded with a silencer & turned on. Will test this also with other guns tomorrow.

Bragi
27-07-14, 14:06
The indicated frequency on the weapons accounts for reloading time as well.
Also the shotguns fire two rounds but only land one hit, so their DPM based on their freq is always going to be off.

I'm going to to some extra testing too today, everything I've done so far points to them working (http://i1287.photobucket.com/albums/a626/BragiNC/rifles_zps419e98ba.jpg) (four weapons off the curve are the freezers), but something might be going wrong when it comes to players.

Bragi
27-07-14, 18:14
Spent some time today doing a bit of testing.

Tested all rifles with 245 RC, 158 WEP against the test NPC in the shooting range.

http://i1287.photobucket.com/albums/a626/BragiNC/rifles2_zpsf2517b58.jpg

The two lines off the curve are the freezers and the fusions (which are still affected by range).

Added the spreadsheet (hope you can read it, the forum doesn't take .ods files), info-screen data seems to be consistently off from base PvE damage (pretty much half).
So unless our frequency calculations are off, things seem right (for this stage).

I did do some other testing of the way sub-skills affect weapons that looked a bit odd, but I need to do more detailed work.

Bragi
27-07-14, 23:14
My brain hurts.

Tested nearly all weapons of TL 75+ (except freezers, fusions and the ion rifle (because I realised I had forgotten the latter until half way through) at RC values from 125 to 245.

Sub-skill effect is more pronounced on higher TL weapons - a given sub-skill increase gives a higher % DPM increase for a higher TL weapon than a lower TL one (in general, there are a couple of odd exceptions). I have an inkling as to why but that's for when I've slept on it.

Have a speadsheet.

Sevendust
28-07-14, 03:45
Tested vs Drom NPC
193 WEP, 214 R-C/P-C
90 WEP, 231 H-C (meant to test with 253 H-C)

Overall yeah, freezers & ions are too weak, but the fusion pistols are fine...and none of the fusion weapons were doing more dmg from farther away, so they're not affected by range from what I saw. The fusion pistols are fine, but the rifles & cannons are really weak. ALSO, I still stand by my belief that faster firing weapons should do more dmg in 10 secs than a slower firing weapon. Thus, I still believe weapons like the EoF, Judge, First Love, AKs, DoY Assault Rifles, speedgat pistols & rifles need a small dmg increase. OTHERWISE, everyone will use the slower firing weapons cuz they can do just as much dmg with MUCH less clicks.

--- RIFLES ---

75 Tsunami Assault Rifle TSU-3265 327 DMG
78 Unregistered 'Black Market' RF-102 Rfile 329 DMG
79 Enhanced Gatlin Rifle 292 DMG
87 Terminator 189 DMG
93 Pain Easer 375 DMG
97 Ionic Shotgun Rifle 276 DMG
98 S.W.A.T Assault Rifle 249 DMG
102 FAR-6000 Reaper Assault Rifle 255 DMG
103 Desperado 292 DMG
104 Libra 336 DMG
108 Infiltration Assault Rifle IAR-47 288 DMG
113 Ceres Assault Rifle CAR-47 297 DMG

75 Prototype Tangent-Laserbeam-RiflE 642 DMG
76 R-AS331 Raygun 337 DMG
81 Tangent 'Stabber' Pulselaser Rifle 708 DMG
82 Enhanced Plasma Rifle 230 DMG
85 Tangent Lightbringer 2 FR-345 171 DMG
88 Raygun Yager's Gaze 370 DMG
88 TG Raygun Rifle 370 DMG
98 Ray of God 395 DMG
101 Thunderstorm 286 DMG
105 Redeemer 133 DMG
110 Healing Light 816 DMG
114 First Love 282 DMG
115 Disruptor 1023 DMG

--- PISTOLS ---

77 Enhanced Spitfire Gatlin Pistol 408 DMG
88 Wyatt Earp 286 DMG
91 Liberator 492 DMG
95 Ionic Shotgun Pistol 306 DMG
96 S.W.A.T. Backup Gun 184 DMG
106 HVAP-100 Freeman Pistol 307 DMG
107 Craftsmans Dream 6100 342 DMG
110 Dreadfire Prototype 03 500 DMG
113 Ceres Handgun BHG-9 320 DMG

75 Prototype Tangent-Laserbeam-Pistol 408 DMG
80 Ryker Napalm PP_v42 276 DMG
83 Ryker Atomfist FP-26 Fusion Pistol 356 DMG
86 TG Raygun Pistol 371 DMG
86 Blacksun RP-97 371 DMG
92 Tangent Assault Pulselaser Pistol 561 DMG
100 Judge 304 DMG
100 Juggernaut Crossbow Pistol 418 DMG
102 Steiner F.P 1.0 310 DMG
103 Slasher 603 DMG
105 Beam of Hell 314 DMG
108 Ray of Last Hope 402 DMG
112 Executioner 428 DMG

--- HEAVY WEAPONS ---

75 TG-275 Freedom Strike 106 DMG
75 Tangent Speed Gun 208 dmg
76 Ryker Vulcano Grenade Launcher 320 DMG
81 Enhanced Gatlin Cannon 224 DMG
90 Judgement Day Launcher 260 DMG
92 Winding Argument 318 DMG
100 Ionic Shotgun Cannon 233 DMG
102 Equilibrium of Forces 248 dmg
108 Devourer 321 DMG
110 Moon striker 261 dmg

72 Plasma Cannon 416 DMG
75 Fusion Cannon 125 DMG
75 Prototype Tangent-Laserbeam 416 DMG
78 RayGun Cannon 166 DMG
81 Tangent Plasma Wave 627 DMG
84 Tangent Plasma Cannon 456 dmg
87 NCPD TriDe Fusion Cannon 127 DMG
90 S.T.O.R.M. Laser 370 DMG
90 Special RC13 Raycannon 185 DMG
90 TG Raygun Cannon 185 dmg
97 Summer Leech 233 dmg
100 Ravager 684 dmg
105 Cursed Soul 512 DMG
107 Malediction 125 DMG
112 Doom Beamer 183 dmg
114 Creed 359 dmg

Massaker
28-07-14, 15:33
The main idea of this balancing is to have the same damage in one minute with cannons of the same tech level. So a slow firing weapon make more damage with one shot than a weapon with a faster frequency. So after one minute both weapons should do the same damage. I'm against the idea of increasing the damage of faster firing weapons. Than we have the same problem as before: overpowered weapons and nobody will use the other weapons (WOC AK)

Alduin
28-07-14, 17:35
Several things:
* The frequency stated in the info window is shots and not bursts per minute
* The closure of the reticule actually determines the probability of a weapon to hit on an approximate per burst basis, this holds for beam as well as for conventional weapons. If you watch closely in bursts of conventional weapons there are also shots which sometimes miss
* The damage output (not the frequency!) depends non linearly on the difference between a player's (sub-)skills and the weapon's requirements

On the progress side of things: the bugs which surfaced throughout the last week have been eliminated in the development version. There is only "one" showstopper left in our way to releasing this patch: improvements in terms of server stability. More details on the planned work and balancing in the era after phase one will follow soon in form of a blog post.

Dropout
28-07-14, 19:23
The main idea of this balancing is to have the same damage in one minute with cannons of the same tech level. So a slow firing weapon make more damage with one shot than a weapon with a faster frequency. So after one minute both weapons should do the same damage. I'm against the idea of increasing the damage of faster firing weapons. Than we have the same problem as before: overpowered weapons and nobody will use the other weapons (WOC AK)

So what would the point of using a fast freq weapon?
Its harder to use than a slow freq weapon (unless you have really bad aim and just spray&pray).
Fast freq weapons needs a slight dmg boost over slow freq weapons.

William Antrim
28-07-14, 20:13
Are you still using that pistols are more damaging than cannons formula? I only ask as it would confuse the shit out of new people just by defying the laws of physics and common sense.

Massaker
29-07-14, 13:00
So what would the point of using a fast freq weapon?
Its harder to use than a slow freq weapon (unless you have really bad aim and just spray&pray).
Fast freq weapons needs a slight dmg boost over slow freq weapons.

A slight damage boost would be OK but it should not bring the situation back that every Spy will use the AK/Reaper Assalt and no one use the other weapons. The idea makes me a little bit nervous that we get the overpowered weapons back...
Do you have an idea that will be a good compromise for all weapons?

William Antrim
29-07-14, 18:19
Yes. A slight boost. :)

hatmankh
29-07-14, 22:42
I always thought cannons were meant to have slightly more damage to compensate for having the highest runspeed debuff, pistols with the lowest and rifles somewhere in between.

brand
30-07-14, 17:40
problem now is.since the runspeedcap the runspeed is so low now that the speedreduction from using hc wepaon had to be reduced from20% to 10 %. now with all people moving so slow it doesn t make a big difference and spy are getting caught easier than before. well but i think the problem in the future will be spys are equal in 1 on 1 with tanks and tanks will just get raped in op fights or in the wastelands because spys can stealth and will surprise them. and with the aoe dmg atm it s not likley to kill a spy in stealth. something has to be done with the runspeed so spys are harder to catch but tanks need more dmg to have a chance to kill them when they got them in aim.

William Antrim
03-08-14, 10:08
I always thought cannons were meant to have slightly more damage to compensate for having the highest runspeed debuff, pistols with the lowest and rifles somewhere in between.

They were. Originally.

Personally Id rather see cannons dishing out the most damage but having the slowest player speed. Aiming should be fairly slow (reticle closure speed) on them also - low wep lore ofc.

Rifles and to a higher degree pistols should have faster speed of player movement (pistols being faster) and faster reticle closing speed. Their damage should be proportionate to this also - ie lower than the cannon.

Rifles should have a mid-range effect on movement speed and pistols should have none. You need 2 hands to hold a cannon and aim it, the same with a rifle, even whilst hip firing.

Pistols being one handed, and the shortest ranged should be favoured in terms of aiming and speed but the pistol player would need to be able to hold his aim that much more consistently to compete with the tank. The tank should be able to put a big hole in the rifle/pistol user if he gets him in his sights.

This would be A) common sense and B) the most balanced.

Sevendust
04-08-14, 02:57
Yall are forgetting that a tank has the highest defenses, and spies are the 2nd lowest. Thats why rifles & pistols should be doing around the same dmg as tanks if not a tad more (how it is currently on the test server). Otherwise, Spies would be useless unless sniping.

ANYWAY, I'm gunna be on the test server for a good bit tonight. Looks pretty much like yall have everything sorted and fixed, so is there anything else I should test?

PS: I know ive read that ammo was changed so there was no increase in total ammo dmg from using the base ammo vs modded ammo, but I'm wondering if it's supposed to be the exact same ENERGY dmg on the ammo on certain types. (Ie: a few that I saw were base ammo (just an example): 220 ENR, and High-Frequented (the ammo that was MORE enr and no additional dmg type): 220. Kinda seems like this change made a bit of ammo mods useless...change em around to add different dmg so they're not useless maybe? That can come in a later patch though. Those were really only used for PvE.

brand
04-08-14, 12:25
but atm spys do a lot of dmg to tanks on the testserver. so when a spy does what a spy does, stealthing around and attack tanks from behind, tanks need a chance to turn and make the spys stealth real quick. that s why spys can t be as strong as tanks in 1 on 1 because he s able to stealth. but because of his low resistance spys need their speed advantage again

Ryosai Bladewin
05-08-14, 13:28
Just my two cents, but back in NC1 spys were practically frag meat for tanks. Unless the spy did what he was made for, sniping the fuck out of other people from a distance instead of roflcopter-killing everything with the disruptor.

Well then, let's see how this works out with the new patch.

Trivaldi
05-08-14, 23:20
As the patch related to this discussion has moved to Titan, please continue any discussion (and raise any unmet points), in the new discussion thread. Thanks.