Messages

16

Gameplay / Re: The Meta is dead, long live the Meta.

« on: July 20, 2017, 10:21:04 am »

Well, here's a counter to that; how would incresed drop really affect the Gatling, which has no drop, or the Banshee, which has the same issue.

Exactly... So why make a change that only affects half the guns? If jitter, drop, and speed were all changed then it would affect all guns. It's not elegant but is more balanced than an extreme jitter value

Another discussion I remember was reducing ROF or DMG. That kills its use in light carro and Lflak and doesn't effect Gat much due it its high clip and very slow empty time. Jitter is a great solution for Gat but I would've never guessed the end result of 90% and nothing else

17

Gameplay / Re: The Meta is dead, long live the Meta.

« on: July 20, 2017, 09:17:31 am »

But why only affect jitter-limited guns? And why such a high value of 90%? This makes guns which aren't significantly jitter limited but still have jitter, like mortar and Lflak, jitter limitted, while affecting jitter-limited guns like Gat and Banshee to an extreme degree

18

Gameplay / Re: The Meta is dead, long live the Meta.

« on: July 19, 2017, 01:07:13 pm »

Greased was overpowered and arguably too long ranged. Increased jitter was proposed as a partial fix for jitter-limited guns like Gat and Banshee. I remember values argued as high as 30%, which some considered too high but seemed fair to me as a captain with many ships based entirely around greased.

90% is very high. Even if you can still hit the opponent ship, you're much less likely to hit the right component. Try it out in practice where you can see the near doubling of the jitter radius. Light carro is practically useless unless point blank. If the goal was to make greased exclusively for very close engagements and to use regular up to that, then it only partially accomplished that

Jitter is only a partial fix because nine guns are completely unaffected by jitter - like Hades and Lumber. They are limited by projectile speed and drop. Proposals included increased drop and reduced speed without affecting arm-time. I don't know why it was decided to only affect jitter-limited guns

19

Gameplay / Re: The Meta is dead, long live the Meta.

« on: July 18, 2017, 09:53:02 am »

The Hand is the most active and vocal member of the Player Council since they control the direction of discussion and what goes through. It used to be Atruejedi, and say what you want but it was highly organized and democratic. Frankly, I loved how focused and efficient it was. I stopped because discussion was constantly off topic and the new Hand said they didn't care about balancing the game and just wanted to change stuff

On a side note, it's curious how simple and apparently unanimously supported tweaks don't make it into testing, like the long overdue slight reload time decrease for the Minotuar, while more divisive changes actually make it into the game after many weeks of discussion and testing

20

Gameplay / Re: The Meta is dead, long live the Meta.

« on: July 18, 2017, 07:20:12 am »

I think that's an excellent idea Naoura

21

Gameplay / Re: The Meta is dead, long live the Meta.

« on: July 17, 2017, 03:49:18 pm »

https://trello.com/b/YJLpPUqW/experimental-crew-formerly-player-counsel

I'd like some sort of vote system since discussions can be abused. For example, when the idea to remove the DPC properties of Heatsink was proposed most players in Discord were against it. Now it's in the game without any explanation or discussion on the forum or Trello. Forum population is higher and greatly more varied than Discord - which only captures a limited subset of the playerbase

If the player counsel is going to ignore the forum then it should at least be posted on Trello so users who don't have the time or will to sit in Discord can still see some discussion. Forum posts are ideal since more players can contribute feedback and ideas

22

Dev App Testing / Re: Dev App Testing change-log: 14 July, 2017

« on: July 16, 2017, 09:52:49 am »

Extended mag is good on guns with quick empty clip times, like Hwatcha and Flaks. For these guns it offers higher DPS than Greased and makes it by far the best non-utility ammo. On guns with long empty times like Gat it's worse than Regular ammo

23

Dev App Testing / Re: Dev App Testing change-log: 14 July, 2017

« on: July 15, 2017, 09:46:28 am »

What's extended mag good for?

24

Gameplay / Re: The Meta is dead, long live the Meta.

« on: July 03, 2017, 06:13:26 pm »

Interesting, definitely shuffles ammo priorities around a bit.  Charged is definitely going to unseat Burst as the go-to gatling gun ammo at medium range, both because Burst no longer gives it that magazine extension and because even a little bit of range extension helps it interact with light flak better.

I think Greased might still be a top-tier DPS ammo on the Aten and Accelerator, since those two guns are likely to be unaffected by the jitter multiplier and already effectively ignored the speed penalty.  They will continue to enjoy the DPS boost with no downside.  Which is probably a good thing, in a lot of situations those two guns really need that 60% RoF boost to be useful at all.

However, its use on the Banshee and Nemesis is now dead: both of those guns already have pretty noticeable spread, and certainly can't afford 90% more.  Those two will probably want to use extended magazine when it comes out, until then it's between burst (since they do have some AoE worth considering) and charged (both would benefit from the slight jitter reduction).

The changes are quite interesting for Hwatchas.  Burst is no longer the king of Hwatcha ammo: while it does still massively boost its disable power, because its AoE is shatter damage it no longer appreciably improves its killing power.  Likely a tossup between Greased and Charged for killing, I'd give an edge to Charged due to Greased only working at absolutely point-blank range.  The important takeaway for the Hwatcha is this: you now have to choose between boosting disabling and killing, you can't boost both at the same time.

Charged is likely to unseat burst as the preferred light mortar ammo.  While the mortar does have a fair share of its damage in AoE, 25% of the whole thing is more than 10% of half.  The magazine penalty on charged will likely make the damage a closer call, but the real thing that tilts the decision in favor of Charged is the slight range extension that allows the mortar to start firing earlier.  However, extended magazine may be a strong contender when it comes out.

Burst was never used on Gat due to lower DPS than regular and no benefits. The mid range ammo was heavy clip due to its ability to maximize DPS to a particular component. For example, if more than 20% of your regular shots would've missed the armor then heavy clip is better. Charged may take over this use on Gat now due to longer max range and slightly lower jitter. Charged Gat DPS is slightly lower than regular, so it doesn't win in damage - only accuracy

Charged Hwatcha does 9% more DPC to hull but burst will still be the primary mid range ammo due to better disable power (and armor or balloon damage). Heatsink would've retained this DPC roll but it's been nerfed to uselessness. Often you want to keep disabling them with burst even if armor is down. If you want to maximize hull damage then the best ammo is heavy clip to ensure all shots hit hull directly. Charged is only better if every shot will hit hull and you don't care about disables

Burst was never good on the mortar. It had a limited and secondary use for pre-firing and disabling, but regular is much better at killing. Charged was a good secondary ammo due to increased DPS. It may become the primary mortar ammo now due to the nerf to greased

25

Release Notes / Re: 2.0.3 Ammopocalypse Update!

« on: July 03, 2017, 05:49:14 pm »

• Magnate (Player Council): -10% armor, 15m/s2 turn acceleration (from 21), 15m/s max turn speed (from 12.5), 3.5 vertical acceleration (from 3)
  
• Burst Rounds (Player Council): Vanilla clip size (down from +20%), +10% AoE damage (from none), -15% rate of fire (from none)
  
• Heatsink Clip (Player Council): Vanilla clip size (down from +30%), extinguishes all fire on reload (from 3)
  
• Charged Rounds  (Player Council): +20% projectile speed (from none), -20% jitter (from none)
  
• Greased Rounds (Player Council): +90% recoil jitter
  
  

Magnate: still feels too weak for PvP due to poor repair cycles

Heatsink: it had a nice role for reducing arm time and high DPC, which was useful in a few guns like Light Flak. Based on these notes it has the same stats but with a big DPS and DPC loss due to the -17% damage. Why kill heatsink? Nobody ever claimed it was OP and there's no reason to kill its role

Charged: there was a suggestion to increase max range of charged by 20% while keeping projectile speed the same (through the projectile life property). I liked this idea. Increasing projectile speed just makes certain guns that require its use, like Hflak and Merc, easier to shoot. There's no reason for this

Greased: the original suggestion was around +20% jitter and even then many player complained this was too much of a nerf to greased. I thought 20% was okay. 90% is too much. Some guns aren't affected at all by this, like Hades, whereas others may find 30% of their shots missing the component at normal greased ranges

26

Gameplay / Re: The Meta is dead, long live the Meta.

« on: July 01, 2017, 11:01:35 am »

How are changes voted on?

27

Feedback and Suggestions / Re: MKII Carronade: cannonball or dragonbreath?

« on: May 12, 2017, 11:56:30 pm »

Or the minotaur, as I've said repeatedly.

Impact would fit the Mino II so much better than the LJ II, and that's just going off of how it's used currently. Wouldn't have to change as much overall for the graphics of it. Mino would work perfectly for the Impact damage, and actually breathe some life into the poor girl.

How would impact be balanced for the Minotaur?

28

Feedback and Suggestions / Re: MKII Carronade: cannonball or dragonbreath?

« on: May 10, 2017, 04:42:11 pm »

I like option one with the description of being a slug. Scattershot effect is okay if it's longer range than standard carro

29

Feedback and Suggestions / Re: MKII Carronade: cannonball or dragonbreath?

« on: May 08, 2017, 08:23:01 pm »

Keep heavy clip in mind. Making it powerful but increasing spread doesn't balance it out. If anything it should have less spread than the original so heavy clip is less necessary. I'd prefer a longer range version - slugs with some jitter and maybe burst AoE. Shells are more interesting though

Fire isn't flechette. Giving it fire damage doesn't keep its role as a balloon popper. Fire is by far the best damage in the game (excluding impact). It has the second best value against armor and is nearly as potent as flechette and explosive against balloons and hull. I assume that's the reason a heavy fire gun doesn't exist. If you wanna give it fire properties, give it an ignition chance. Fire damage is difficult to balance for a heavy weapon

Equal to or less spread, not greater. Longer range - high close range power will be abused by Fish. Ignition chance, not fire damage

30

Feedback and Suggestions / Re: Guided missiles are too well guided

« on: May 03, 2017, 07:12:12 pm »

I last used the Tempest when it was first introduced in dev app and assumed they had fixed it to not circle back. You're spot on Hamster, but this technology wouldn't exist in the 60s. I'm unaware of any SACLOS (semi-automatic command line of sight) system that allows a missile to circle backwards. Most examples were produced in the 70s and some are still in service today. They were first introduced in WW2, where much of the game's content is based on