View Full Version : NST thoughts on current weapon balance
Odimara Orca
31-03-19, 03:23
Hello
I had some very interesting conversations with an array of players way more experienced than me.
I was wondering if maybe somebody from NST could clarify what the finished weapon damage balance project would look like.
Couple of bulletin points:
- As there are no Bonuses in Hacknet many storebought Modules outperform the rare modules (is NST aware of this, and is this intended)
- The players I conversed with would be in favour that Rares actually do perform better than storebought weapons, to justify how hard they are to get.
-> Input here from me: Maybe lower TL Rare weapons would allow lower Mainskill Setups to be competitive as well?
-> Input here from me: Isn't it valuable to have Rares as endgame content? Building a Rarepool, having Highslot weapons built, all of those are interesting mechanics and roadblockers to the one perfect weapon.
- The PPU is currently hard pressed for a Role except buffing Tanks, Spies use Nanites, PE's selfbuff. Is it feasible to expand their role back to antibuffing?
- Either the APU is too squishy or Hybrids do to much damage. There is very little reason to play a pure APU atm, as the defensive capabilities of the Hybrid outshine the offensive cababilities of an APU by a wide margin.
- There are problems concering Hit registration with Gatling weapons, generally the Netcode seems a bit more sensible concerning hit registration
- Meele weapons seem to have received a severe nerf, the new WoC weapon performs much, much better than any other weapons across the board, is this intended and what might be the reason for this happening?
Maybe somebody of you could take some time out of your day to give us your point of view on these Question (what is intended, what isn't, what do you think deserves to be looked at, what is a sideshow from your point of view).
I'm just wondering what NST's Vision is on some of these Questions, I don't care about timeframes at all!
Regards and Thanks
Odi
Edit: There are probably Question NST knows about and I don't, an Update on where the balance project will go next (just in terms of Vision and Philosophy concering Rares, WoC, Weapon Build Quality, etc. would be much appreciated). As I said timeframes dont matter.
Odimara Orca
31-03-19, 15:28
Some corrections:
It isn't just gatlin it is automatic weapons as well ie pain easer, libby, anarchist, etc as well as beam weapons ie beam of hell, healing light, creed
It is the Warbots Bane that out performs the rest by a decent amount, not the new woc (as that would be the claw of lizard, which is currently trash)
Thanks and Regards
Odi
Hi Odi,
My thoughts regarding weapon balance are as follows;
There are certainly weapons which seem to miss more then "should" (e.g. CS blobs, EoF, dissy are the ones that spring to mind for me). This is something I aim to look into.
New MC weapons need their numbers looking at; not only to make them appealing and perhaps give MC something it doesn't yet have much access to (e.g. XRAY / differing rate of fire) but also to ensure they fit with the existing set as we do not want WoC to feel like a requirement.
More broadly speaking; there are some weapons which under perform in general (e.g. healing light vs other similar TL rares) and some that over perform). I'd like to make more weapons truly viable and the choice of which weapon to use can be more influenced by range / dmg types available / own preference / etc). This will still mean that higher TL weapons will be stronger such as Freeman > Earp but those odd weapons which under perform for their TL will be brought inline.
Rares vs non-rares lie on a fine line between viability of more builds vs glass cannons. I agree there are some instances in which they sit a little too closely together and this does devalue rares to some extent. There will be room for tweaking to make rares stronger however I don't foresee any drastic changes in this area and to get the most of a rare it will be take more points in that particular combat skill.
Edit (Addition):
Hybrids are very strong right now and do outshine APUs in most scenarios overall - although APUs do still have their place atm. I'm open to ideas on how to make APUs more attractive whilst not ruining hybrids in the process.
Hope this clears things up a little.
Odimara Orca
03-04-19, 14:21
Hey Virtus
Thank you very much.
I think everybody will agree that a wide array of viable weapons will be very good for the game.
Couple of points on APU, PPU and Hybrids:
Couple of builds to illustrate the current Situation:
---
Balanced Hybrid
123 APU / 122 PPU (or vice versa)
Wearing underwear has access to:
Blessed Absorber, Holy Protector, Holy Deflector
Blessed Heal
Holy PSI Attack
Switching between APU 1 and PPU 1 PA allows access to every spell in the game.
---
PPU Hybrid
118 APU / 128 PPU
Wearing Underwear has access to:
Blessed Absorber, Holy Protector, Holy Deflector
Holy Heal
Holy Psi Attack
Wearing PPU PA has access to:
102 APU / 152 PPU
Rare Shields
Blessed PSI Attack
If you get access to a PSI Combat Booster you get almost everything
Wearing PPU PA:
123 APU / 152 PPU
Rare Shields
Holy PSI Attack
With PSI Combat Booster and APU PA switch: Has Access to every spell in the game.
---
Thoughts:
Through the Combination of PA's and the PSI Combat Booster, the Hybrid can be built without any major drawbacks compared to a pure APU or PPU.
You can even even Switch roles midfight.
Brainstorming:
- No PPU or APU PA's for Hybrids (Question is how to implement this, would allow the creation of a Hybrid PA with + Focus though)
- The PSI Combat Booster has to be drastically changed
Currently the aiming of PSI modules is to easy, if there would be another stat which would affect aiming accuracy of PSI spells (like PPW, it is never used anyway) the PSI combat booster could buff that one instead.
These changes would also give the APU the highground on Anti Buffing. Coupled with Damage adjustments on High TL weaponry they would be much more attractive.
---
I don't think this would ruin Hybrids the 118/128 Version would still be near unkillable with reasonable damage, while allowing pure AOU's and PPU's to shine at their chosen role.
Thank you for the response Virtus.
In reguards to melee. I don't see it anywhere in the patch notes, but the damage has been significantly lowered on all melee, except the Warbots Bane. The warbots bane currently does like 35 more damage per swing than any other melee it feels. This also made weapons like the PoB, Peacemaker (this one seems to have been gutted on damage now.. which was the main way of dealing with hybrids on a melee tank), etc feel undewelming. Maybe a slight buff to damage on these again?
The new Claw of Lizard (at 311 melee) does literally 1 point of piercing damage more than the Paw of Bear. The issue is it hits energy (the highest resist in the game because of how strong armor is) vs poison.. and the damage isn't on par with the other WoC weapon if that is what was aimed for. Maybe giving this a damage buff to put in on par with Warbots bane, as well as switching the energy to X-ray would be amazing...
In regards to APU, you can (with fine tuning) make a setup that is able to use blessed shields, while using every APU spell in the game (on a hybrid). Taking away their utility essentially. The only point where the APU still shines in that regard is the damage output is still higher for APU, but at the expense of being the squishiest character in the game.
A thought for making APUS more appealing would be a rework on PSI Shield.. making it have APU requirements, and making it not stack with self casted shields (having the amount absorbed scale with APU, and with it not being able to stack with self casted shields it would make it not appealing to hybrids).. think of something like the mage shields from wow basically.. that will give APUs a buff to survivability (while still being squishier then their hybrid counterparts) and hopefully more viable.
In regards to hybrids.. (and this fits in with blessed PEs as well) the shield value of blessed shields just seems rather strong.. their damage output is fine.
Maybe another option would be to have a requirement on antibuffs about making them not usable if ppu is above X, this will make it so only APUs can use, causing APUs to have a place again in the game, as well as indirectly nerfing hybrids (keeping them still decent survivability wise, and having mediocre damage). APUs would still need help with survivability if this were the case though, as they would get hard focused even more then current.
In regards to weapons, this is from a PvP standpoint, idk / idc about pve personally.
Pistol:
Wyatt Earp - ok damage, weird aiming kind of.
Libby - Poor damage, doesn't register right.
Ionic Shotgun Pistol - Fine, good damage, used to chunk people but not spammed really.
S.W.A.T Backup Pistol - Actually really good damage output, small clip with high rate of fire, so need to reload often, mission sucks
The Anarchist - Doesn't register right, NEVER see people use.
Sucker Punch - PvE rp weapon? Idk..
HVAP-100 Freeman Pistol - Damage seems hit or miss, not seen often
Craftman's Dream 6100 - Poor Damage
Dreadfire Prototype 03 - Doesn't register
Ceres Handgun BHG-9 - Seems to be fine, don't see pistol spies often atm though
Juggernaut Crossbow Pistol - Shots are weird, doesn't seem bad, rifle counterpart seems stronger
Judge - Not too sure, but last time I used didn't same bad
Steiner F.P 1.0 - Forgot this even exists, NEVER see it
Slasher - Weak damage, I miss when this was the highest tl pistol and just destroyed people..
Beam Of Hell - Doesn't register right
Ray of Last Hope - seems ok, not seen often, damage might be hit or miss
Executioner - Hard weapon to aim, if you can aim with it, amazing damage output
Rifle:
Terminator - Statistically lowest damage output rare in the game, slow rate of fire, consumes multiple ammo
Pain Easer - Doesn't register right
Ionic Shotgun Rifle - No statement, never really see it (I think it is rifle tanks go to weapon, but you never see those anymore)
S.W.A.T Assault Rifle - Doesn't register right, mission sucks
FAR-Reaper Assault Rifle - Doesn't register right
Desperado - Actually not too bad, not sure why it gets overlooked, I guess just outclassed by ak
Libra - Doesn't register
Infiltration Assault Rifle IAR-47 - Seems fine, mission sucks
Ceres Assault Rifle CAR-47 - In a decent state, feels weaker than 2.2 version, but still good
HVSR-90 Ronin Sniper Rifle - Weak Damage
Ray Of God - Used to be really strong, feels hit or miss now
Juggernaut Crossbow Rifle - Actually really good, stronger than pistol counterpart
Thunderstorm - Another never used in pvp weapon, freezers feel useless in pvp
Redeemer - Feels weaker than in the past, not really much of a pvp weapon as you need range for it
Second Love - Great weapon, Extremely strong, probably best rifle, you need to click fire though, if you hold fire it doesn't register
Healing Light - Doesn't register right.
Silent Hunter - Damage is ok,doesn't feel as impactful as it should, sometimes doesn't register.. almost feels like ionic pistol of rifle
First Love - Blobs tend to not hit, Stam drain is horrible, weird weapon
Disruptor - Absolutely horrible.This is "The rifle spy weapon" when you thought about rifle you thought of ak or Dissy, its bad atm.
Heavy Weapons:
Winding Argument - Damage is horrible in pvp, you will hurt yourself more than the enemy, used to be used to mark stealthers
Ionic Shotgun Cannon - Damage is ok if you don't miss, High rate of fire, consumes 2 ammo instead of 1, always reloading (meh)
Equilibrium of Forces - Doesn't register right
Devourer - Amazing damage, hard to aim, sometimes (quiet often) you have full lock and it misses
Moon Striker - aoe in pvp is bad, and this weapon is probably the worst of them
MIRL-600 Warhammer - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-3181HLCwio :(
Summer Leech - Freezers feel really bad in pvp
Ravager - doesn't register right
Cursed Soul - Damage is good, sometimes blobs fly off weird, probably best hc weapon atm
Malediction - aoe is bad in pvp, unless you are trying to blind the enemy stay away from this
Doom Beamer - aoe is bad in pvp, enough said
Creed - doesn't register right
Melee: (note - Damage has seemed to have been lowered across the board,first pointed out by brendan murph, seems they were)
Paw of Tiger - Don't see melee PEs, no comment
Perforator - Knuckles are horrible..
Peacemaker - Used to be the monk killer, seems to have been gutted, horrible damage, poor rate of fire
Vein Ripper - Never see, no comment
Blade of Ceres - Not too bad, used to be great, amazing range
Soligen's Finest - Never see, seems weak on damage
The Dentists - Knuckles are horrible
Blackmists Remorse - If you can get stacks going, great weapon, if you miss with it, feels bad
Hurler King Knuckles - Knuckles are bad, you never get good stats on them, why can't it be all 120 stats like other missions?
Zsusun - Used to be much better before nerf, but wasn't stand out (btw doesn't seem to drop in belt, nor does xbow pistol)
Paw Of Bear - Higher Rate of fire, lower damage / range Blade of Ceres (used to be favorite melee)
Thunderbolt - Surprisingly good damage (not on par with Warbots Bane, but 2nd highest damage stat wise)
Claw of Lizard - A Paw of Bear that hits energy vs poison.. basically a weaker PoB that requires WOC
Warbots Bane - Much stronger than other melee weapons atm
APU Modules:
Holy Caustic Rain - Great damage once you get stacking, seems to only stack to like 8 times or so before stacks start falling off
Holy Lightning - Good Damage, good APU spell in pvp
Holy Frostration - Horrible damage, just outperformed by all APU rares
Holy Fire Apocalypse - Outclassed by HL / Caustic
Crahn's Fist - The RARE / WOC apu module that doesn't exist, where are you my love?
Holy Thunderstorm - Actually does ok damage kind of, aoe isn't good in pvp really
Holy Firestorm - aoe isn't good in pvp really, psi spells are better than hc though
Holy Pestilence - Actually doesn't good damage because of stacks.. if you could get like 2-3 APUS barreling a UG would stack up fast
PPU Modules: (Shields will not be discussed)
Holy Restoration - While it does have a place, can sometimes hurt you more than help
Holy True Sight Sanctum - Great for dealing with stealthers, doesn't work half the time
Holy Exorcist / Holy Catharsis - Don't really have much of a role, as stacking damage doesn't feel as strong as it used to back in 2.2, only antistack you might need would be poison, which you are better off just using store spell for it
Drones:
Don't See droners often in pvp, only comments will be revenge drones and raptor don't seem to register a lot
Hacknet Software:
store shields / heal are better because of overcapping / implants not working in hacknet
store attack does more damage, but "rare" attack has higher rate of fire, making it just slightly better (store is still viable)
you don't see hacknet pvp, because you don't really damage each other, nor is it a much liked place
No need to make things more complicated than they need to be. Simply making rares do more damage and reducing miss chance of weapons with reticule targeting would solve virtually every issue people have brought up (including making APUs more unique and tuning down the power (and utility) of hybrids a smidge).
As a side note, posting example builds is fine, but keep in mind that having access to an ability is not the same as capping it. Saying a hybrid has access to "every spell in the game" is pretty misleading, have an APU hit you with holy lightning and then have a hybrid with 160 apu do it. I have literally seen no-one using APU rares in pvp. For what it's worth, a hybrid with a psi buff is going to do 50-65 percent damage compared to a pure apu (depending on build). A hybrid will generally take between 2x and 3x more damage than a ppu (depending on build and damage type), and a hybrid's heal is going to be 50-60 percent of a PPU's heal. Not making any comment on those numbers, but just wanted to throw them out for some context (even with PA switching, which no one does in pvp, they are definitely not full APUs or PPUs... they are hybrids).
The issue with antibuff spells is that frequency is so easy to cap (generally satisfying requirements to cast means you cap freq). If antibuff frequency were highly dependent on APU level and it took hybrids three times longer to antibuff than APUs... that would pretty much address all issues (you could give holy rezz the same treatment). I don't know if the Neocron engine supports this, but it would also be interesting to reduce casting cost of antibuff based on the damage stat (full APUs could cast several, it would entirely drain a hybrid's psi pool and take far longer to cast). APUs getting psi shield is also interesting.
Don't do it all at once, but slowly and incrementally increase the damage (at/near cap only) of rare weapons and improve both reticule close times and chance/hit with a partially closed reticule. No need to go mucking about with major game systems that are going to have massive intertwined effects and require many more waves of balancing. Then if things still need tweaking, consider making frequency difficult to cap on non-damage psi modules (anti-buffs, anti-poisons, rezz).
All that being said, we've been seeing a lot of classes be effective at OP fights with the exception of APUs (and I'm not convinced APUs don't have a place).
Edit: Thanks for the thoughtful response Virtus. For whatever it's worth (likely not much), I think your current balance assessment is pretty good. Balance isn't in too bad of a place, some weapons miss a bit too much, some weapon lines need a bit of love, and APUs could use a slightly more unique role (see anti-buff and possibly apu-psi shield suggestions).
Thank you all for your detailed responses, it's nice to get discussions going and I encourage everyone to get involved. I value everyone's opinions as different people play differently and everyone has their experiences with the game.
I enjoy reading through your posts and I'm fine with crunching numbers with you guys. I'd actually love to get organised testing "events" going when changes are happening to get people involved and get feedback faster - this will speedup the overall delivery time of updates.
I'll try to respond to the main topics that have been raised below;
Hybrids:
They certainly do less dmg then APUs and their shields are worse then PPUs. I feel their biggest strengths are in utility and toughness to bring down.
I like the idea of making them slightly less efficient at anti-buffing and perhaps stopping the constant stream of anti's.
PSI combat boost is certainly useful to a hybrid for opening up additional utility modules like full anti, that's something I've not settled on my stance on yet.
Weapon Balance:
@Arzon thanks for taking the time to detail all the major weapons. Whilst I won't comment on them individually I will say i agree with your thoughts, as they mostly align with the testing I've previously performed. I appreciate you taking the time to write them all down and welcome others to share their experiences of weapons too.
I'll be keeping a close eye on here for responses and endeavour to respond to as much as I'm able.
Cheers! I know the biggest thing I hear from folks I talk to is that they wish some of their old favorite weapons were still good. Things like slasher and disruptor. Making a few tweaks here and there to the underloved weapons would be an awesome place to begin!
Personally, I'm in favor of "under-doing it", small little patches that nudge things in the right direction. Then wait for the dust to settle and if things need another boost... rinse and repeat until a good balance is achieved. It's so hard to achieve balance with huge "whiplash" patches that change a lot of values at once or make drastic changes to weapons. Again, just my two cents.
Odimara Orca
03-04-19, 18:33
Thanks for the great Discussion @ Everyone
What I've gathered so far:
- Everybody is in agreement that a wide array of viable weapons would be the best situation.
I absolutely agree that a close baseline performance across all rares is reasonable. The difference between the weapons could be:
Clip Sizes
Reload Times
Burst/Single Damage
Few High Damage Shots
Many Low Damage Shots
Damage types
Range
to fit individual preferences. There should be an accounting for different Techlevels as well of course.
- Nonrare and Rare damage seem a bit to close together (although there is a very fine line concerning this)
- Hybrids, APU's and PPU's
Adressing the frequency requirements of PSI modules seem like an excellent Idea to finetune the Monk class.
- Which APU spells should this affect?
- Which PPU spells should this affect?
What are we aiming for in terms of result?
How much if an advantage from pure APU's/PPU's over Hybrids (10/15/25/50/100)?
How could this be implemented if we look at the math (There would to be an increasing benefit the higher you go and at around 160 to 170 APU/PPU it would need to become exponential i think?)
Thanks and Regards
Odi
Edit:
I also agree on finetuning Blessed Shields (seem a bit too strong)
And repurposing the PSI Shield for APU's
I'd like to see the PSI Shield absorb a percentage of incoming Damage for its duration.
Although there is a question how to design the requirements and effectiveness to only benefit APU's.
(PSI Shield is only Selfcast and denies other Shields to be Cast on the user? Only real benefit shows from 160 to 170 APU upwards?)
Personally, I'm in favor of "under-doing it", small little patches that nudge things in the right direction...
I agree and it's the method I'll be using to update things - unless something it a long way out of place ofc
The hardest part will be balancing hybrids to make APU more appealing..
Increasing the frequency at higher apu levels will make apu more of a benefit but if you have 2+ hybrids it doesn't matter much, people will still get antibuffed often.
Making the antibuffs (SINCE THEY ARE A PVP ONLY ITEM) 1 line (no regular/blessed/holy, as only difference is frequency) and making requirements something large like 170 apu or so would make it out of hybrid range. This in term make apus more viable but the issue there is APUs are the squishiest setup in the game (at least spies have stealth to get away) and will just get focused at the start and dying.
Then let's say APUs are the only ones with antibuffs and they do get some defensive love, antibuffs aren't that effective in an APU only's hands. Reason being the strength of the antibuff isn't just removing the shield, it is casting a weaker shield on them prior to them replacing their own shield (which APUs can't do, and the PPU or Hybrid will just recast shield)
What about hybrids now... Hybrids even ignoring antibuffs are the kings of 1v1 / survivability
The only thing atm that can take down an (at least decent) hybrid is another hybrid (a blessed pe can stand toe to toe for a while, but will drop eventually).. taking away their ability to antibuff will make it so hybrids can't even kill each other, they will just stand around staring at each other.
In a 1v1 situation (assuming played at a decent skill level)
- Hybrid
Only loses to another hybrid
-Blessed PEs
Only lose to Hybrids
-Injector Spies
Lose to Blessed PEs and Hybrids
They have a skill based fight with PPU buffed PEs and Tanks
-PPU buffed tanks
Lose to Hybrids
They have a skill match up with blessed PEs, Injector Spy
They usually beat Unbuffed tanks, Unbuffed PEs, Unbuffed Spies
-APU
Doesn't really have a good match against anything
Might have even fights against non injector spy, maybe unbuffed PE and might be able to pull off a cheeky kill on a Tank if they get the jump.
Even if Hybrids lost antibuff, they would need tuning still, None rare shields are just too strong (namely blessed / holy) as you can see by Hybrids and Blessed PEs
At op fights, they seem to be more fair / balanced when there is no Hybrid. As soon as one side brings in a hybrid or 2, the opposite side needs to do the same to deal with them / handle the situation.. which is just not a fun play style
Imo hybrids feel strong in op fights largely because they bring the antibuff (a spy or perhaps can always be the noob buffer with an apu). Apus becoming antibuff kings will help a lot.
I'd rather see rare weapon dps (ideally by tweaking reticule behavior) go up than nerfing shields. Hybrids and pes will die a bit faster and time to kill in normal fights will go down a bit. This would make hybrids and pes do comparatively less damage than other classes which will preserve their role but give pure classes more of a niche (and defensive classes will die faster since people will be hitting more consistently).
Odimara Orca
04-04-19, 09:42
Imo hybrids feel strong in op fights largely because they bring the antibuff (a spy or perhaps can always be the noob buffer with an apu). Apus becoming antibuff kings will help a lot.
I'd rather see rare weapon dps (ideally by tweaking reticule behavior) go up than nerfing shields. Hybrids and pes will die a bit faster and time to kill in normal fights will go down a bit. This would make hybrids and pes do comparatively less damage than other classes which will preserve their role but give pure classes more of a niche (and defensive classes will die faster since people will be hitting more consistently).
This would adress Hybrids but not blessed Shield PE's as their damage would be increased as well. A small tweak to blessed Shields shouldn't be that bad right?
.
This would adress Hybrids but not blessed Shield PE's as their damage would be increased as well. A small tweak to blessed Shields shouldn't be that bad right?
.
No, of course not, it's definitely one way to do things. Could also make blessed heal a little harder to cap.
I think the biggest issue to adress first is weapons not registering.. I have a feeling that has something to do with netcode though and will be a rough thing to fix. But if it isn't, or is but fixable, that ideally should be the stsrting point, as almost half the rares are effected by this. Last night I was using a dev on an alt to test aiming on a stationary target, you can miss with full lock while nobody is moving even, does not seen right.
After hit registration is looked into damage and aiming could slowly be adjusted over time.
Odimara Orca
04-04-19, 16:40
I second Arzons suggestion Registering / Netcode should be priority one.
Thirded! Once weapons work as the should, balance numbers can be dialed in.
If you need any help with testing I am willing to help, as I assume others in this thread are
Hey all,
Great discussions still going on here which I'm pleased to see.
I've noticed talk stray to particular items which need addressing so I've created another thread to record these. I'd appreciate if you could record your ideas over there so I can keep better logs of the ideas regarding each issue
https://forum.neocron-game.com/showthread.php?157560-Unbalanced-Items&p=2241056#post2241056
I would move the posts but didn't want to mess things up ^^.
William Antrim
09-04-19, 13:51
If netcode couldnt be fixed in a short amount of time (and had to make do with the existing code) would that affect your choices? The reason I ask is because I understand your desire to balance weapons but netcode balancing may take way longer than the incremental changes described above.
I understand the NST has made significant changes to the base game over the last 6+ (i think) years but i dont know how much of the netcode has ever been altered. Originally the game was designed to run on dialup internet (nerr noo nerr noo squeeeeek do do ooo do - you might hear it, you might not) and so it might not be all that easy to change this element.
To that end, if the only "easy" to implement fixes were incremental changes to values it might be best to have these on a practical list, as opposed to a wish list.
My practical list would be - make ALL weapons under Tl100 viable and scale the damage off that swing point (not talking values here, just generically). Id like to see the game at a point where PE is the entry point to PVP (the class not the weapon) and the others are the "advanced" classes in their respective fields. Others have argued this would make the game more FPS than MMO but I would argue that in this day and age that that is a strength as opposed to a weakness.
My wish list would be - reimagine the entire game using an engine made in the last decade and have netcode and stability to go with it. You can see how the two are wildly different. I love reading this stuff however and i am glad the boards have lit up more recently with activity. So props to you all for that.
What happened to the last balancing guy? did he leave?
What about this as first proposal, then move into individual weapon adjustment?
1) Remove low-level antibuff, make Unprotector and holy antibuffs 170 APU (take them away from almost all hybrids, even with psi buff). Now hybrids don't counter hybrids.
2) Make anti shield nanites easier to use for spies.
3) Increase reticule close speed, increase delay before it opens all the way, reduce miss chance with partially closed reticule.
I think doing these things would go a long way towards seeing more variety.
Issue with removing antis from hybrid (though I agree it is a good first step) is that they would then literally be unkillable (if played right) in 1v1 or 1v2. Only APUs having anti is a fine first step, but then they will need a survivability increase as they will be focused down instantly in every fight.
The strength of antibuff is not in the antibuff itself, but in the foreign shields being applied after (if you catch the person off guard). If APU gets antibuff only (which I would like, but needs more additional changes) then we reach a few issues. 1. APUs won't be ran in current state as they are too squishy and even if they do get an antibuff off, the hybrid will just recast shield in a 1v1 setting, in an op sighting you could potentially coordinate with a hyrid or pe, but with how chaotic coms can be at times or how much is going on it would be rough. 2. You are removing the only effective way of dealing with hybrids in a 1v 1-3 setting.
It is hard to balance antibuffing without buffing APU and nerfing hybrid Survivabilities. In the past (like 2 weeks ago) I would have suggested nerfing blessed shields.. after seeing PEs in op fights that don't have blessed shields being pretty much the highest death rate, and noticing a strong difference with and without on a PE, that would destroy another class nearly just to balance hybrids. I can see why KK gutted hybrids now tbh, while some people enjoy playing them, they become a nightmare when trying to balance the game.
This is a fair point, but I think having a class counter itself is often very degenerate. Wonder if anti-nanite spies with noob buffs could be part of the solution. Slightly lower tier 1 shield reqs too?
Edit: Noob buffing could also be removed as a mechanic (with shields). In its place could be a high apu-req module that prevents Shields from sticking (for a specific color). Nanite version could also be added. This would essentially keep noob buffing in the game, but give it to apus and spies (to be clear, these would only work if someone had no shields, just like noob buffing).
Just proposing this stuff as a first step, it may be that additional balance changes (Apu survivability and hc, pc, rc damage/aiming for instance) need to be taken down the road (as well as individual weapon balancing).
Total side note, what if APUs received a self cast (30 seconds?) only buff providing some percentage lifesteal from damage delt. It would also apply a longer (60 seconds?) buff preventing the module from being recast until it expired to prevent 100 percent uptime.
Odimara Orca
10-04-19, 19:50
Some possible solutions i collected in my mind so far:
- Adjust Netcode
- Adjust Rare Damage (for currently useless ones)
- Adjust low TL weapon damage (slightly downwards)
- Proliferate pure APU's/PPU's compared to Hybrids
-- Give Antibuff to pure APU's (170 APU requirement)
-- Let points spent im APU/PPU impact frequency (substantial gains should start at around 160 APU/PPU)
- Tweak blessed shields to a more reasonable damage absorbtion (downwards)
- Remodel PSI Shield (200 APU req, substantial Damage reduction, not castable together with other Shields / Nanites)
Effects:
- More weapon variety
- Hybrid health and damage lowered
- Pure APU health, damage and utility higher
- Pure PPU utility higher
- Blessed PE health and damage lowered
Additional thoughts:
There is an Argument to reduce the power of Holy and Rare Shields further. With PPU points affecting frequency this could even end up balanced.
The Hybrid/APU/PPU problems (and to a degree blessed PE's) all revolve around shields and their counters.
Either shields need to be less accessible (no blessed PE's, no Hybrids), less effective or a combination of both (for example the role defining spells like Rare Shields and Antibuff should have very high APU/PPU requirements and Shields could be slightly less effective).
Antibuffs could also deny the recasting of shields for a set amount of time (per debuff)
Regards
Odi
Any news or updates on this? Just fixing weapons firing randomly would go a long way for weapon variety. There are some weapons I really miss being good to use. The flamethrower misses with a fully closed reticle.
Melee range could use a slight bit of tweaking especially Warbots Bane.
Hi,
Currently tweaking aiming this afternoon and hoping to have an update on PTS asap for you guys.
The more guys testing the better, as the issues are more apparent with quick moving targets rather the the slower mobs so any guys comfortable jumping on pts to pvp would be great.
I'll put a shout out on here and discord when the update goes up.
First iteration of aiming improvements is now live on PTS for all to test.
https://forum.neocron-game.com/showthread.php?157491-Psi-Shield
https://forum.neocron-game.com/showthread.php?157557-APU-spells-and-aiming
William Antrim
03-05-19, 10:41
I think you should consider giving the Private Eye the antibuff. Even if its a reduced (slower) version which is more difficult to pull off than the APU version. If the cast time was the one negative (thus requiring the individual to stay still) then this would offset the fact that he/she can take a beating and survive easier than the APU. This would counter the hybrid effectively with 3/4 of the other classes and doesnt degenerate from the quality of pvp. This would be a psi antibuff btw, not nannites.
I cant comment on nannites because i dont like them and have never liked using them.
Some possible solutions i collected in my mind so far:
- Adjust Netcode
- Adjust Rare Damage (for currently useless ones)
- Adjust low TL weapon damage (slightly downwards)
- Proliferate pure APU's/PPU's compared to Hybrids
Effects:
- More weapon variety
- Hybrid health and damage lowered
- Pure APU health, damage and utility higher
- Pure PPU utility higher
Regards
Odi
:thumbsup:
No need to make things more complicated than they need to be. Simply making rares do more damage .
They should remove rares, problem solved, stupid that players are forced to grind in a game centered around pvp, specilisation really runied the game for a lot of people long ago. You cannot compete in most cases without a rare weapon, woc caused more problems, the appeal of neocron diminished when players were then forced to kill the same mobs over and over again to obtain woc lvls to use weapons or armors that are a game changer in pvp. Player pvp skill is what should be admired and not their gear, but here we have these rares, with a poplation of about 15 at peak hours, obtaining rare weapons is boring, I don't know about anyone else but I don't play games as a second job, i play them to have fun, if its not fun i stop playing.
- Proliferate pure APU's/PPU's compared to Hybrids
Effects:
- Hybrid health and damage lowered
Odi
No, there should only be hybrids, self cast should be weaker, but casting on another player should be strong to give the monks a reason to turn up for a fight and to be sort after, but the monk should not be unkillable like old ppu monks, spliting the monks between apu or ppu is just bad in practise, it gives the apu ability to kill but no ability to defend it self which is rubbish, the ppu can only provide amazing defend but cannot kill, its rubbish, you would have to be mentally ill to have that kind of handcap, it does not make any sense even in a game. That also lead to the monkocron problem we use to have and probably still would have today if more people played, its lame... Also monks dex cap is silly, it should be way up there in my opinion about the same as a PE, its just a pistol/rifle its not like anyone could not learn to use them, I get the whole strength is lower thing but not the dex, especially people that can create fire or energy from thin air...
These are just my opinions.
I've hated the whole ppu/apu thing since day one.
Each class should have its weaknesses, but such weaknesses should be minor and also avoided with the right setup, e.i. trading damage output or higher TL weapon access with more defense.
first hybrids were massively overpowered the solution was to nerf, never do that... They should have boosted other classes to match them, then boosted npc damage and hitpoints.
specialisation kills games.
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