Ships with the power to kill

[Zenark]

I mean technically I can eat a steak with a spoon but why would I when there are knives and forks?

Because eating a steak with a spoon is a challenge, and although frustrating, could be a hilarious experience for those who like to try odd stuff, ie. The Cake Clan!

I think that's a big reason I don't fly a typical 'kill ship', everyone else does, and I like to fly outta the box. Getting a Gat/mortar kill is like "Meh, easy." But getting a kill with Mine/Flamer? "Hah! Did you guys see that! It worked!"

So much more satisfying when people are surprised and/or repulsed by the fact that you ate that steak with a spoon.

[Rainer Zu Fall]

Eat the steak with bare hands and your teeth I say. More effective than the spoon but still no fork and knife needed.

Caution: Might lead to strange situations when taking this too literally.

[James T. Kirk]

Like I said in the Pyra OP thread, disablers need a strong buff.

In terms of winning, piercing/explosive is a low-risk/high-reward build and disablers are a high-risk/moderate-reward build.

A disabler/brawler team needs to outclass a brawler/brawler team.

We have all these fantastic disableing weapons, and it pains me to see most of them go underused because gat/mortar not only leads to faster kills, but is much easier to kill with.

[Zenark]

Okay, here's a sad thought. If the Carronade, flamer, Artemis and other disabling weapons were removed from the game, most matches wouldn't change. It's RARE for me to see someone on the other team using a disabling weapon as their primary, Pub or competitive. It's 80% gat/mortar, 10% merc/flak or LJ, 10% disabling. Such a shame, but hey, whatever works best.

[Echoez]

Double Carronade Ramidion never gets old with some moonshine.

[James T. Kirk]

Oh yes, removing disablers would also remove most of the fun from the game, but that's probably not a surprise coming from me.

I just want to see disablers get themselves a nice little niche in the competitive field. Preferably flamers, but at this point, I'd be happy for anything other than merc/LJ.

[N-Sunderland]

There is one downside to buffing disablers. The moment that happens, a lot of the same people who complain about gat/mortar (I don't mean anybody in this thread, I'm referring rather to the type of person who plays one match and decides "HWACHA OP") will start complaining that they can't do anything against disablers, they're OP, they take the fun out of the game, they should get nerfed, etc. Anybody who was around for old fire (or more recently, the old carronades) will know what I'm talking about. Fire was never OP, carronades weren't either. It's just that once you got caught in them and didn't know how to deal with them, you were stuck. Sorta like the current double hwacha Galleon, which isn't actually that hard to deal with.

So yes, I would like to see disablers brought back. I do think it would help balance the game. However, Muse always has to cater to everybody, and sadly I can say from experience that powerful disablers make the learning curve steeper for newcomers.

[treseritops]

Anybody who was around for old fire (or more recently, the old carronades) will know what I'm talking about. Fire was never OP, carronades weren't either.

Which fire are you talking about? I think I started two patches before Mobula. Didn't they get buffed during the last patch? Plus having extinguishers respect cool-downs helped fire become very powerful.

I just remember basically ignoring fire when I first started playing because it didn't seem to do much damage and was so easily dispatched. I was cranky when fire got harder to put out but then I realized it had actually made the flamethrower and incendiary rounds work now and was pleased with the expansion and development. 

[N-Sunderland]

Fire used to disable guns with a single charge. It was that way from release until February.

[Eukari]

It's a zero-sum game. If brawlers are strong, people want stronger disablers. If disablers are strong, people will want stronger snipers. When snipers are strong...you get the picture.

I certainly agree that, as things are, it's far more efficient to simply roll Gatling/Mortar or Flak and just blow things up than it is to try and disable first. But I think others are right when they say that if we buff disabling, it'll just make things harder on newer players who don't know how to counter it. How do you break the cycle? I don't think you can. When one thing gets stronger, everything else gets relatively weaker.

[Echoez]

Disabling wasn't stronger than outright brawling, it was viable and just required the enemy team to think and cooperate to counter it, something that people don't realy do on Pubs, which is sad.

Sure having a steeper learning curve is harsh, but in the end it makes the game far more interesting to play that just seeing the same loadouts used by practically everyone. Newbies will always think disablers are OP no matter how you look at it, so if you decide to cater for those people, you will ruin it for others that actually dedicate time and willpower into playing it more and learning about it, you will never make the newbies stop crying about something they deem OP, so for me, it's useless to try and please those people, because seriously, they will never be pleased.

[James T. Kirk]

This game's too complicated.
Let's just give everybody guns and allow boarding.

Joking aside, (because that was a joke) maybe cycling through possible loadouts and metas is the way to go until we find the perfect balance.

Maybe not. I'm not really sure. The only meta cycle I've been through was gat/flak to gat/mortar.

Any input from some of you older air dogs?

[Echoez]

This game's too complicated.
Let's just give everybody guns and allow boarding.

Joking aside, (because that was a joke) maybe cycling through possible loadouts and metas is the way to go until we find the perfect balance.

Maybe not. I'm not really sure. The only meta cycle I've been through was gat/flak to gat/mortar.

Any input from some of you older air dogs?

The most famous is probably the Heavy Flak era.

Other than that.. I miss old Kerozene.

[N-Sunderland]

I think that we should also think about what could be done outside of balance. Since the learning curve can be rough, better tutorials (pretty sure that's being worked on), making tutorials mandatory, and adding other touches like loading screen tips could be hugely beneficial to making the game easier at lower levels.

I think it was Howard who said in the fireside chat that they're working on revamping beginner matches, so we'll just have to wait and see if that helps.

@James T. Kirk

As Echo said, there was the heavy flak era earlier this year. That gun was... Well... Insane. The projectile was faster, it did a sizeable amount of armour damage, and there was no arming time. If you stayed away from a heavy flak, it would tear you to shreds with lesmok. If you got close, it only got more powerful with charged. And that's only one. A single heavy flak could dismantle a Pyra. When you consider that you could fire four at once using Galleons...

There was also the extremely short-lived Artemis era (more like Artemis week), during which a single Art was a better disabler than the hwacha, and a trifecta Junker loaded with three was literally unbeatable. Or you could look back to the other Artemis era, where the thing was heat-seeking. No explanation needed.

The worst one was in November. The only viable gun was the merc. That's all. You couldn't take any other gun or you'd lose. The double merc Pyra had no counters, and people had to make gentlemen's agreements not to use them.

[Echoez]

I think that we should also think about what could be done outside of balance. Since the learning curve can be rough, better tutorials (pretty sure that's being worked on), making tutorials mandatory, and adding other touches like loading screen tips could be hugely beneficial to making the game easier at lower levels.

I think it was Howard who said in the fireside chat that they're working on revamping beginner matches, so we'll just have to wait and see if that helps.

So much this, can't beliebe how right you are right now. For one more time I will feed you with a salute..

Tutorials need to be MUCH more elaborate than they are now and loading screen tips would also be hugely beneficial.

(Also Sunderland now your Salute meter shows the exact ammount of temperature in which water boils in Fahrenheit degrees.)