GUNS & GUNS SKILL v1.3 Balance Issues

[Serenum]

Can some one explain the logic of making the mines/mine balloons take more than one hit to detonate? Trying to clear an old mine field with direct fire seems like it is more difficult than it should be. Was there a problem with people air bursting mines near enemy ships being OP?

Good question.
Beside the hitbox of mines seem a bit strange, they are not easy to hit.

[HamsterIV]

I don't feel like making a new thread for this, but I finally figured out how to use mines aggressively. I side mount them on my Hwachafish. The hwacha breaks their engines and leaves target ship unable to evade, I can then close to appropriate mine range and start pumping out little bundles of grief until the hwacha reloads. The high mounted Goldfish helm give me a great view from which I can gauge the range and the ship is maneuverable enough that it isn't very hard to get into position, especially against a crippled opponent. Mines can also be used to discourage my victim's teamate from getting too close, especially if he wants to ram me off my prey.

For ammo I ask my crew to bring burst. Even if no mines go off from proximity fuse, the 6th mine will set detonate the 1st mine, and if the field is tight enough all mines will go off simultaneously. It is also great to watch one mine catch two ships in its blast radius.

The new patch has been out for weeks and I am probably not the first to figure out the new toy muse gave us, but I feel pretty proud of myself anyway.

[Pickle]

I've not tried burst with mines, but I sometimes use them as a mortar.  It's difficult to judge the range from the helm, but effective when you get a near-miss detonation.

[HamsterIV]

Burst does not increase the proximity fuse distance, but it does make it easier for one mine to trigger another. I have spent some time experimenting with how wide a minefield I can create and still have them all go off simultaneously. With burst rounds the answer is a pretty big chunk of sky. normally it takes too long to get 5 mines in the sky so that the 6th will detonate the 1st any where near the target. However if the ship is crippled, mines make a devastating finishing move.

[Letus]

I just did some math between Lochnagar rounds and other rounds for the Typhon Heavy Flak, and these are the numbers I got based on full clip damage

Fully armed charged rounds deal total of 766.6 Explosive
Fully armed heatsink rounds deal a total of 663.75 Explosive
Fully Armed Lochnagar deals 663.75 Explosive....

Granted, Lochnagar is now the closest range shot there is, but the fact that it damages your gun so badly, it's basically a one shot heatsink.  If your gun is on fire, just fire it again and rebuild...

I don't know, I just find it a bit...less impressive when you realize the thing that makes your gun a glass cannon deal as much damage as a full clip of the weakest ammo....especially since the Loch was the shot for Flak at one time...I am heavily split on it now that I know the numbers...I can see both sides of the argument and frankly, agree with both sides now.

[Ninjamanj]

Do javelin Light harpoon guns need something to make them more usefull?

I haven't played Guns Of Icarus Online for very long but one thing i have noticed is your see many different weapons on the ships but one you almost never see is the Javelin Light Harpoon gun. Honestly i have a feeling this is cause it is next to useless. There are so many other guns that are much better that people use. Yes it does lots of hull damage and can pull ships towards you but it does not do crazy amounts of hull damage and the pull does not do a whole lot. What i am suggesting(there are probably better ideas) is to make it so when the javelin hooks onto another ship you can then send small explosives down the rope that do damage. You would be able to get 1-5(mabey) total mines that you can send down it then the rope would break and you have to re-hook them. This would make the javelin Light harpoon guns so much more useful cause you would have a way you could get some sure hit shots. If you can hit the ship with the harpoon. If this is added i would even decrease its accuracy a bit since it would be a easy way to do a bunch of damage.
This is just a idea and I belive there are some that love the Javelin light harpoon gun but many others may agree with me, just please don't start raging at me.

[Captain Smollett]

This had actually been proposed before a long time ago however the devs dismissed it since there was no obvious mechanic to build into the game order to allow harpoon removal, which they felt would be necessary.

The harpoon has needed love ever since 1.2 (when ship mass was increased) however it requires quite a bit of work and the devs have been working on higher priority projects.

That being said I think the obvious changes would be to increase piercing damage, increase towing strength and allow the tow to be controlled by letting the gunner reel in with the right mouse button.

[Sammy B. T.]

To balance most guns Muse just has to tweak numbers and multipliers. To balance the harpoon though, Muse would have to tweak physics.

I can understand the hold ups as that is daunting.

[linkox]

explosive guns destroy ships parts too easy(engines, weapons..) especially the manticore. As gunner its annoying if the enemy has a manticore, you are always at repairs every time manticores fires the 16 explosives

[Spud Nick]

It might be annoying but it is balanced.

[RearAdmiralZill]

explosive guns destroy ships parts too easy(engines, weapons..) especially the manticore. As gunner its annoying if the enemy has a manticore, you are always at repairs every time manticores fires the 16 explosives

The explosive damage isn't killing your components, rather the shatter damage is, just so you know. The hwacha is balanced though. It's much less effective at longer ranges, and while it can totally disable a boat, it has weak killing power on its own.

[Gambrill]

That being said I think the obvious changes would be to increase piercing damage, increase towing strength and allow the tow to be controlled by letting the gunner reel in with the right mouse button.

The only problem is using the mouse wheel changes your weapons ammo loadout.

[Alistair MacBain]

U could take that feature out.
At least for me.
Im always using shortcuts for that.

[N-Sunderland]

That being said I think the obvious changes would be to increase piercing damage, increase towing strength and allow the tow to be controlled by letting the gunner reel in with the right mouse button.

The only problem is using the mouse wheel changes your weapons ammo loadout.

[Dilwo]

I'm really not a fan of the mercury field gun nerf. I feel like you went about it all wrong. The ONLY problem I really had with the gun was when people ran two of them, now there's no point in running even one. You should just make it a one gun per ship sort of deal.

The BIGGEST problem with the field gun nerf however, is the speed. You took a sniper rifle basically and made it have the speed of a pistol. Think about a sniper rifle in real life, the bullets move FASTER than other guns. It's like taking a barret and making it travel at the speed of a 9mm. Doesn't make much sense does it?

If you gave it back the normal speed, but kept the drop and reduced range of movement, it'd be fine.