Biccy's Ideas - 9) The APU

[DigestiveBiscui]

Before i explain what i feel the problems are / what i would like to see fixed please understand that these are simply my ideas that, after playing the game during its core times (when it was at its very best), i feel need to be adjusted in order to make this a better experience and not another moment where the game looks promising only to be shot down by bad moves which has happened again and again.

APU CHANGES - PRIORITY HIGH

Wow devs.......just wow. How on earth did it get to the point where the APU monk was an utterly useless class that might as well be removed entirely from the creation list? Thats kind of a trick question really as I, along with most of the community, could probably tell you where you went wrong, and i'm going to right now. My advise to you is that you listen, and focus on this above most of the crap currently being worked on. People don't need new storyline missions - they need the stuff they want to play fixed.

I'm going to put the three main points into sub category's so it's easier to follow. Here goes:

1) ANTI-BUFF

So here i am in Neocron years upon years ago. The game is at it's most popular, op wars are regular and everything kind of has a use in terms of classes and what they can give. Some things needed tuning yes, but a few things made sense and worked correctly. So here comes my first question.

When you guys had a meeting (If you had a meeting) which incredibly stupid person suggested to remove Anti-Buff from the APU and give it to the damn PPU? PPU's gave enough utility in a fight. The healed, buffed, rezzed and looked after themselves in case they were focussed. APU's would be able to pick off targets with an anti-buff and try to burst before it was noticed - THAT WAS THEIR JOB.

So you removed what they were good at and you then filled it with nothing? Please explain why anyone would think of this as a good idea. You took away their use, gave it to someone else and expected people to keep playing them? Ok, ok...their damage was still decent and i suppose the PPU could simply call it out, right? That's fine....but then...........this happened

2) Reticle

Someone give me a child to punch. I get why you did it...kind of. APU's were able to target things that couldn't hit back and made farming a joke, amongst other things - BUT THIS WAS NOT A FIX. APU PvP in OP wars and solo was down to twitch reactions. It was different to the PE / Tank / Spy and thats what made it great. You royally screwed that and again, left them with nothing.

Let me recap here...so far you've taken away their main spell and then created it so that all of their damage spells need to be properly aimed to fire...and still given nothing back. Right now they're near the bottom of the list in terms of decent fighters where once they ruled the roost - and rightly so. They weren't called an aggressive psi monk for nothing.

Surely it couldn't get much worse

3) Damage / Frequency

Turns out it could! Not only did you destroy them, you also decided to completely ruin their rate of fire for good measure. Do you all play tanks in the office? Did you not like getting utterly dicked by an APU and thus decided you would make them utterly pointless for anyone to play? I agree that MAYBE their rate of fire in nc1 was a little high but by that i mean A LITTLE HIGH - not 75% or something utterly stupid.

WHAT NEEDS TO BE DONE

I'm sorry if I seem angry - but I am. I'm angry that you've let this get to the level it has and it's never really been noticed. Some simple, simple changes can make APU's worth it again and i suggest you do it tomorrow, not in a month when you're done making another story mission or re-releasing MC5. Sit down, change it, and patch it. The 3 main changes are below - they are simple, effective and can make them worth while again:

1) Return Anti-Buff to APU's
2) Remove the reticle
3) Up Damage and Frequency by 15% - This is a rough number and i would like some ideas about it.

It's that simple from my eyes - I look forward to seeing what others say

[Deus Ex Machina]

I cannot contribute much, since I haven't played an APU much, but i experienced them often from the receiving end (of Holy Lightning around 5 corners mostly). And thats why they were nerfed in the underground, stamped on and a nuclear bomb was set off on them for good measure too.

Now while that sounds like i hate APUs: I did. But I find they should return to (some) glory. But its not that high pressing priority you seem to make out of it, prior to Evolution 2.2. there was a really long time in which the power of APU + PPU was unconquered, and it was only one playable and necessary class really, instead of three.

The reticle:
I don't know how it runs high up on the ladder (will know sometime maybe, can't access the Testserver at the moment), but in the low area there is no difference between firing with reticle open vs. reticle closed in regards to damage. I also noticed none in regards to casting. So I really don't know why it should be removed, i think the reason it was implemented in the first place was because you could shoot through walls without it (or was that seperate?)- And that is nothing we want returned, thank you. That would crush the new player base again I bet. And if you do less damage but must still not aim like the other classes, and when you aim you do more, there is nothing wrong with that.

What you want for the APU is too much at once again - and NOW. Thats what went wrong with the APU in the first place, so the way up again should be slow.
The reason WHY the APU took this deep fall was all the changes they made to him - AND the change they made to the PPU Shields. I don't know, maybe the old APU would be okay with the new PPU shields - as he might finally fall as fast as he should, and not be invincible. But who knows.

Fixing the APU must not make other Classes useless again. Thats the very N° 1 priority in that issue.
Maybe classing up Damage or/and Frequency is a first step on that road.

But one thing that was also very involved with the old APU nerf: Not enough people test. And the less quality feedback, the worse the output. That was true then and it is now. So please come and test the things you know about, or think you can contribute to. Even now, when other issues are on the testserver (thats directed to all, not to the Thread Starter specifically)

[William Antrim]

Increase RoF to around 50 a minute for the Holy Lightning/Fire Apoc IMO. Not the old 105/min like they used to be but something more than they are currently (30/min ish?).

Bring back DoT on the Fire Apoc. It is a good combat vs stealthing spies, light them up so you can see them run and others can target them. Yes I am aware that this takes away from Holy True Sight Sanctum but you want the APU to have a use then this is one use he can have.

Leave the reticle as it is. If it is open too much then increase the chance of spell fizzle but please let the APUs damage be consistent for his spells. Let the player know full well he is going to hit that guy for xxx damage (obviously adjusted according to resists as normal).

On that subject also please can we have our DoT back on our Wyatt Earps (they too were cheap and reliable effective tools against stealthers).

[Biglines]

Wow devs.......just wow. How on earth did it get to the point where the APU monk was an utterly useless class that might as well be removed entirely from the creation list? Thats kind of a trick question really as I, along with most of the community, could probably tell you where you went wrong, and i'm going to right now. My advise to you is that you listen, and focus on this above most of the crap currently being worked on. People don't need new storyline missions - they need the stuff they want to play fixed.

I'm sorry if I seem angry - but I am. I'm angry that you've let this get to the level it has and it's never really been noticed. Some simple, simple changes can make APU's worth it again and i suggest you do it tomorrow, not in a month when you're done making another story mission or re-releasing MC5. Sit down, change it, and patch it. The 3 main changes are below - they are simple, effective and can make them worth while again:

I think you really need to do a bit more research in the things that have happened before you start ranting like that. The DEV team that is currently working on the game is a team made of completely of volunteers, who have only just recently been able to start bringing out patches at an incredible pace compared to KK, having fixed more things in neocron than have been fixed in most of the past decade. They are not the ones that "broke" apu's, they are not the ones that left neocron ages ago. So show some respect please.

APU's are not as overpowered as they used to be yes, but an apu at this point does not break the game at all. The old, easily exploitable mc5, does. So priority one should always be: Fix gamebreaking game elements > make some guy's favourite class overpowered again

And this is coming from someone whose favourite classes in the game are the APU and the Melee tank.

[DigestiveBiscui]

I am aware of the situation, but the dig at the Dev's wasn't aimed at the current ones but more the previous ones that destroyed something that was once good

[Ascension]

I am a biased long serving APU player, and hate my class as it stands right now. Anything that rectifies the current situation I would happily welcome.

I don't care what anyone else says, but on a PvP basis PE's are more viable than an APU, putting an APU to the bottom of the pile.

[William Antrim]

The Fire Apoc is still ok vs unbuffed players but everything else its crap just the same as Pistol PEs and Melee tanks.

[Torg]

i think the problem is not so much the APU but overpowered WOC rifles. can you image a world without (devastating) WOC weapons? would you try an APU vs a CS tank or a FL spy? how would you tune APU damage or frequency to meet either?

[Powerpunsh]

havent we already located the problem? Its all about range and -in my opinion - weapon efficiency. But who am i to believe in. :P
And yes we already talked about all other complications (abuff and stuff).

I would rather like to know when the balancing will start and what are the first changes to test.

[phunqe]

One thing I am absolutely sure of: PRETTY PLEASE, with a warbot cola on the side, take the Antibuffs away from the PPU and give them back to the APU.

The amount of PPUs this has spawned is ridiculuous since one PPU cannot handle everything. If the APUs get their stuff back the amount of PPUs will hopefully go down to a reasonable level again and the fun factor up where it belongs

As for the rest, I haven't played an APU other than for leveling a PPU so I am not really qualified to voice an opinion there. In general it does however seems a few changes are needed from listening to others playing.

[Dribble Joy]

As has been said by me and others; if you return anti-buffs to the APU, then you marginalise the role/necessity of the other classes.

Give anti-buffs to a class and you only make their inclusion mandatory in team PvP.

You either end up with a situation like the monk-o-cron days where whole OP team turned up in jawa suits or PPUs are more of a necessity than ever.

It may seem like a regression, but I say remove anti-buffs completely.

[DigestiveBiscui]

I have no idea how that would work - other than destroy a lot of what OP wars have to offer. I for one don't want to sit there like a retard while a PPU heals a fully buffed tank all day long, soaking up all the damage because there's no way to remove his buffs.

No....just no

[Doc Holliday]

As has been said by me and others; if you return anti-buffs to the APU, then you marginalise the role/necessity of the other classes.

Give anti-buffs to a class and you only make their inclusion mandatory in team PvP.

You either end up with a situation like the monk-o-cron days where whole OP team turned up in jawa suits or PPUs are more of a necessity than ever.

It may seem like a regression, but I say remove anti-buffs completely.

I still disagree with this point. Apu is STILL very flimsy and you STILL need people capable of dishing out a beating on people. Tanks fulfil that role. Spies (with their stealth) are still useful as that fast hit and run ability especially with the aks and dots that stack on them. The apu would be useful in an op fight with an antibuff but he will still remain a relatively easy target given how weak they are.

Simple thing to do is to patch this in on test server and lets test it rather than reiterating a point time and time again that really is one opinion on what might happen. I would love to do some testing like this. Lets see how it pans out.

Op war team composition would be about balance in my eyes if this were to happen. Yeah of course you bring apus for the antibuffing but you ALSO need other chars with a bit of a higher chance of survivability (Tanks and one day i hope we can say the Private eye) to soak up some of the fire either through blocking shots etc or by being so damn good everyone comes for you

[phunqe]

As for making a class mandatory by the antibuffs, what we have now is a mandatory zerg of PPUs, so it is not really working either..

[DigestiveBiscui]

It's not just the anti-buff that makes the PPU useful though