When Ambush Comes To Shove
Welcome to the first large scale balance testing and style change since the mass rework of 1.2. We’ve decided to take larger approach with many smaller changes on numerous systems rather than targeting single weapons or ships directly. This wide lensed balance update provides for you as players and us as developers new opportunities and challenges, so we want you guys to be talking to us every step of the way and we’ll do the same so we can improve how we approach balance and the game as a whole.
We’re going to be communicating our reasons, and what you can be expecting next from this set up every step of the way. We will still have blind testing where exact figures aren’t released, so that we can try to get a better idea of the “feeling” of our changes, but the day after, we will also have informed tests, so you can attempt to take full advantage of any numbers issues you see.
If you don’t already have the Dev App and want to help us test, grab a key.
As always feedback@musegames.com is the where we want you to tell us everything so we can file, digest, and discuss the data you bring up.
To see the timeline, what systems we’re going to change, and the full notes follow the jump
Timeline
February 24th
Balance Plans Announced
February 27th
11 pm eastern- Blind Data Test
Affected Systems
- Mobula
- Spire
- Squid
- Heavy Flak
- Harpoon
- Pyramidion
- Physics related to ship fall
- Hwacha
February 27th
1 pm eastern- Change Notes Released
February 28th
12 pm eastern- Informed Data Test
Balance Changes:
-Mobula side guns fanned outwards 5 additional degrees—to increase the difficulty of full weapon’s platform functionality without disallowing common builds
-Spire reduced turn acceleration to 10d/s2 (from 15)—to make it easier for other ships to flank the Spire
-Squid side gun turned forward to 70 degrees (from 90)—to make it easier for less experienced players to use the Squid in normal play
-Squid increased forward/backward acceleration to 8m/s2 (from 6.66)—to make it easier for the Squid to change position and react effectively in close range combat
-Heavy Flak has more damage moved to direct hit for a 70/30% split between direct and AoE (from 45/55%). Higher clip capacity to 4 (from 2) means damage per shot is reduced (115/50 explosive, from 150/180 explosive), BUT damage per second is the SAME due to increased RoF of 2 shots/s (from 0.
, and reduced reload time of 4.5s (from 5)—to increase ease of use in both range (more damage in direct for within arming distance shots) and aiming (more shots to judge arc before reload)
-Harpoon has right click to reel in with increased harpoon force to 1500000 (from 230000)—major feature request
-Hwacha now fires its entire clip with one click—to increase risk reward of the weapon and to reduce its overall reliance in matches
-Pyramidon hull health increased to 700 (from 550)
-Falling airships now respect each airship’s unique vertical drag profiles. Previously, ships all had a ‘controlled’ fall rather than accelerating due to gravity. The result is realistic falling acceleration that takes into airship vertical drag. In other words, you were closer to playing Guns of Icarus in Space than you realized.—fixed glitch that possibly introduces more interesting ways to play and shift meta