1.3.3 GUNS AND GUNNER SKILL BALANCE

[Crafeksterty]

Lesmok on the mercury is actualy very viable.

It disable ANYTHING in one hit, and if aimed or lucky, you can disable 2 or 3 components or weapons in 1 shot with lesmok. Because lets not forget, the mercury actualy as PIERCING. It pierces thru the ship. If you shoot a mercury at a goldfishs heavy gun that is aiming directly at you, chances are, that back engine will also die.

On a galleon, you can disable the visible heavy gun, and the heavy gun behind it. I dont think you need lesmok for that.
A pyramidion gets its back engine disabled even when pointed torwards the ship that shot that mercury.

Some other guns get benefitt from lesmok too. Like Mortar, Lumberjack, hades etc.
It is an ammo type that very much was everywhere.


Now that HEAVY FLAK is not a prefered weapon to be using lesmok at, all of a sudden you see a different opportunity.

Charged if it hits, does more damage then when we used Lesmok with it.
Heatsink, if combined with buff gives you 3 shots with the same dmg as default. Giving in for a second chance if you miss one.
But does same ammount of dmg as charged if all 3 hit.
Lochnagar... Srsly, its so beutiful when it happens.

A galleon with 2 heavy flaks alone does pretty decent armor damage. So really, you dont have to worry about only shooting when their hull is down.


If you constantly shoot the heavy flak, the more you get used to it. Naturaly. So dont wait for the shot to hit or miss until you take your second shot. It has a quick enough reload time to give a good chance for another 2 shots to land. Every time i see pub gunners shooting an LJ and wait for it to hit or miss. I can expect it if they are inexperienced to the game, but the gun is forgiving enough to be fired a bit maniacly.

The heavy flak, in high skill level is used sparingly because the players then have built a build around that fact. Armor down, heavy flak.

[Kain Phalanx]

Wait wait wait ~ are you seriously suggesting using a flak on the front of a goldfish?

Also I don't really understand what you're arguing; you're saying lesmok makes the flak harder to shoot?

The heavy flak was stock and atleast once effective on the Goldfish.  I am discussing changes to lesmok/flak so guffawing at what you deem effective currently doesn't make sense.

Yes, I've already explained this.  You aren't sure where your first shot will go, but having a second shot lets you adjust your aim.  The reload is too long to maintain a bead in all but the ideal situation.

[Sammy B. T.]

Gunners should strive to know where the shot is going.

[Surette]

Yes, I've already explained this.  You aren't sure where your first shot will go, but having a second shot lets you adjust your aim.  The reload is too long to maintain a bead in all but the ideal situation.

It's harder to shoot with lesmok, which is why you have two shots. If you want the ease of firing with lesmok (and thus have less of a need to adjust your shot), you get one shot. Makes perfect sense to me. If you're truly completely unaware of where your first shot will go, you should practice more.

[The Djinn]

It's harder to shoot with lesmok, which is why you have two shots. If you want the ease of firing with lesmok (and thus have less of a need to adjust your shot), you get one shot. Makes perfect sense to me. If you're truly completely unaware of where your first shot will go, you should practice more.

Agreed.

Additionally, if this was something that really needed a fix...would you rather increase the H. Flak's ammo to 3 shots (which would be very strong), or decrease the Mercury Field Gun to 1 shot? We shouldn't be able to have a 2-shot Lesmok Merc, in my opinion.

In short, Kain, the general consensus of this thread (which has a lot of skilled captains and gunners in it) seems to be that the Lesmok H. Flak works just fine as-is. If you disagree, I'm interested in hearing your suggestion to fix the problem with some actual in-game ideas for balancing it with the existing guns. All we can really do without those is show why we think you're incorrect in your assumption, which doesn't seem to have much effect: it's just causing us to argue at each other unproductively.

So what would you do to fix this issue? What do you think is wrong with either Lesmok or the H. Flak, and how would you resolve the difference without making a ammo-specific exception for one gun in particular?

[Kain Phalanx]

I'd already said I'd stop arguing because of the general consensus.  I don't think the consensus of a bunch of veterans who clearly want to brag about their skills is as powerful as you do though.

I already gave an example.  Lesmok reduces the the direct damage done.  RoF or clip size could be adjusted to compensate for some guns, though I don't think many would need it.  There are plenty of options and I don't see why it should be up to me to fix it.  This strange mindset that acts like I'm the one changing things is weirding me out.  Are you trying to rewrite history and ignore the obvious?  The flak gun has two barrels and each one fired one shot by design from the beginning aside from the quirky lochnager and heatsink for some reason.  Lesmok isn't quirky, it just increases range.  Muse is the one who changed things.

I understand and agree that balance is usually more important than realism/game feel, but this is taking a butcher knife to a scalpel problem.

Less damage for more accuracy makes more sense than less damage with the added problem of less accuracy in practical use for more accuracy.  Now that I think about it, Heavy Clip used to be that way, but the speed reduction was removed.  What's going on there if we're just trying to add more skill requirement instead of having ammo types actually help you?

[Crafeksterty]

The heavy flak was stock and atleast once effective on the Goldfish.

Before, the heavy flak went thru armor. Every ship with no heavy gun was innefective

Less damage for more accuracy makes more sense than less damage with the added problem of less accuracy in practical use for more accuracy.

I, dont understand? Lesmok was designed to increase maximum range, and easier to lead with because of bullet speed.
The draw back for armed time weapons is that the arming time will arm from further away.

So if you shoot lesmok at short range with guns such as hades, or heavy flak. It will hit the ship before the projectile is armed. Which results in only the primary damage to inflict. which is less damage. Like i said before, Lesmok is practicaly used on Mortars, mercuries, hades, flamethrower, Lumberjack.
With the heavy flak, if your target is way far from you, lesmok takes the cake. Or else it is very difficult.
The primary thing coming from the heavy flak is its devestating damage. I mean lochnagar one hits every ship just not goldfish and Galleon.


If there is any complaint coming from me regarding the heavy flak, it is that it needs an informative ironsight much like the lumberjack.

[Surette]

I'd already said I'd stop arguing because of the general consensus.  I don't think the consensus of a bunch of veterans who clearly want to brag about their skills is as powerful as you do though.

What? I'm terrible on a heavy flak; I just think it makes logical sense to practice gunning to more accurately predict where your shots will go, as that's kind of what gunning is about. How about instead of dismissing opposing viewpoints as "veterans clearly wanting to brag," you take them for what they are: opposing viewpoints.

I understand and agree that balance is usually more important than realism/game feel, but this is taking a butcher knife to a scalpel problem.

Yes, balance is always more important than realism, which is why more or less everything in the game doesn't make any sense realistically speaking. Sorry, but "it has two barrels" isn't an argument for changing game balance. How much of a chance have you given this change? Most of the people who have been playing consistently in the past year seem to agree that the heavy flak and lesmok ammo are (finally) in a good place. And that's not me saying your ideas aren't worth as much because you've been away from the game—because that's certainly not true—I'm simply saying Muse didn't make these changes lightly. The flak and lesmok ammo have been the center of numerous debates, and I think you're discrediting Muse for updates that they have been extremely careful with simply because it's different from how it used to be, and it's not in line with the fact that the gun has two barrels.

[Kain Phalanx]

"Practice gunning."  I could, but I can't make other people practice gunning.  Neither can I kick bad gunners off of ships, not that I want to.  I can be a baby and not fly with low levels like many are doing because the minimum skill bar keeps getting raised.  I'm sure that's great for the game and community.  All I'm asking is for partial effectiveness at range for everyone instead of all-or-nothing hits for only the skilled.

"Balance is always more important than realism."  No, not always.  If an fps game rebalanced an underpowered bolt action sniper rifle to fire semi-automatically without changing the model it would reek of incompetence and players would not take the game seriously.  This still applies with suspension of disbelief in a fantasy setting.  Firing your massive double-barreled cannon twice battleship style is fun.  Using a fluff explained experimental ammo like lochnager that limits you to one shot for those crazy enough to want to is great, I'm on board.  Lesmok just increases range and accuracy, and it should do so in an intuitive and fun way.  Notice I said realism/game feel, because they go hand in hand, and game feel and fun are closely connected.  It's also important.

[Alistair MacBain]

Im flying alot of sniper Galleons and mostly pack in some lumberjacks and heavy flaks and i keep getting hits. Sure i would get much more when i use a highlvl crew but if noone uses harder to hit guns most people cant get practise with.
Its just not real that only the highlvl can hit with heavy flak or lumberjack. I keep seeing it different. Yeah the highlvl may have a much higher hitrate but its still pub games.

[Crafeksterty]

The thing is Khain, that there are many other options. And as soon as you get an orginized crew, you will quickly see more options.

I usualy fly the spire, like alot. But it is not always i bring my most effective loadout because my most effective loadout requiers teamwork from the rest of the crew that are specific to their roles on my ship.

I also consider my ship and loadout acording to my teamates ship and loadout.

This is some very high skill level thinking that changes loadouts based on yourself, your crew and your team. With extensive knowledge and skill, we can make effective builds everytime differently. Heavy Flak or not.

Once you get to meet people, and does not have to be high level, you can still orginize and try out builds that work out with Heavy flak. And you will quickly notice how it yields a completely different play style than if you had some other heavy gun. I assume that you use a heavy gun on either a spire or Galleon as on a Goldfish is dooable, one goldfish with heavy flak ALONE almost cannot make it effecient. A goldfish with a heavy flak should team up with a ship that plans to open up an opportunity for a goldfish with heavy flak to land those hits.

Because the heavy flak is that important. As soon as you have a heavy flak on your team, you want those shots to hit, mostly and MOSTLY when their armor is down. And when they do hit, youve just taken 50%-100% of hull health.

I understand your concern. That it is not a friendly weapon. How the weapon works is a very different gun to bare from the others, as much as the others are from the rest. Like my comment was before, i only wish that it had an ironsight for easier shots. And ofcourse encouraging then the use of Range finder with the heavy flak.

[Captain Smollett]

I've often found shooting the heavy flak has little to do with level and a lot to do with the player.  Some people are just naturals with it.

I had a level 1 1 1 player on my ship in his tenth game last week hitting 80% accuracy with heavy flak off my galleon broadside with impeccable timing while enemy armor was down.  I wish I remembered his name since he communicated and happened to be quite good but suffice to say it's not out of the ordinary to find a player like that (one of our ducks was found way back when after we saw him shoot the flak as a brand new player).

If you run one enough on your ship your bound to find someone who can handle that gun, whether vet or new player; once you find them, friend them and destroy enemies happily ever after.

[Moriarty]

80% is crazy, especially after the lesmok nerf.

I mean these days long range shots are kinda a cooperative exercise, where the gunner engineer guesses where the enemy ship will be in or about 8 seconds and the enemy ship does its best to catch the round with its hull.

 

[Wundsalz]

I generally like the current weapon balance. It allows a lot of viable builds. After having played the game with this patch for quite a while here's a rating of the current weapons ranging from 0 (absolutely useless) to 10 (absolutely overpowered) based on my guts. I won'm mention nor discuss weapons I think to be in the well balanced 4-6 area and elaborate the issues I've got with the other ones.

Harpoon ( 1 ):
broken mechanics - a pretty much useless weapon as it has always been since I've picked up the game. I can see some utility usage for it on a support Galleon but that's about it. Fix the physics for it already to unfold the potential this gun concept has got!

Flamethrower( 2-3 ):
Currently flames provide decent balloon damage, okayish hull damage (with max stacks), almost neglectable damage to engines and weapons and they can kick people off their guns, which can be useful. Flame intensive builds can be rendered useless with organized chemspray usage - that's a big and unique disadvantage. In general I consider the damage output of the flamer too low to compete with gatlings, mines or even carronades.
I think it might be a good idea to shift the role of the flamer a bit towards the disabling. Smollets idea might be a good approach to step into this direction. Also it might be worth to consider increasing the flamers damage to engines and weapons while reducing the damage inflicted to the hull armor.

Light Carronade ( 3 ):
They are decent balloon poppers, okaish disablers (with heavy) and okaish hull strippers. I personally like carronades - they can do a lot of jobs, but unfortunatly barely any proper. When I think about which close range light weapon to use I'll much rather end up with the hull ripping gat or the mine-launcher as a serious disable weapon. I'd like to see this weapon outright buffed. A bit more flanchette damage to make it more useful for balloon popping ( as well as disabling and hull stripping to a lesser degree) should do the trick.

Light Flak( 3 ):
Arming time and a rather limited max. range significantly constrain the usefulness of this weapon significantly and in my opinion the damage output of this weapon rarely justifies these limitations. A spread reduction and increase of the max range (by 25-50%) would probably make this one more attractive in comparison to mortar, artemis and banshee.

Heavy Flak ( 3-4 ): I just consider it a bit underpowered since the lesmok nerf. It's a highly specialized weapon which requires a relatively high amount of teamwork to be useful in the first place. Imo It should be better at the job it's supposed to do.

Banshee ( 3-4 ):
Another one of these 'stuck in the middle' weapons. decent explosive damage + some fires for mid-close range. I use banshees occasionally but think artemises or mortars to be better replacements for it in most builds.

Artemis ( 8 ): powerful, pin point accurate disable power combined with okayish hull damage with an insanely wide field of operation and long range while not even having an arming time. We see them way to often these days. There are probably many approaches for a fix elaborated in one of the threads dedicated to this weapon already. Here are three ideas anyway: reduce the hull damage inflicted by this weapon or cut it entirely. This would force players to bring a true longrange explosive weapon (which should be the flak, imo). Also consider an arming time for it (600m-ish). This would make close range disablers (like carronades) more attractive. Last but not least drastically reducing the projectiles speed could make aiming with the artemis significantly harder - justifying the devastating effect their impact have.

[Captain Smollett]

I pretty much agree with all the number rankings here other than the heavy flak.  Heavy flak gets a solid 5 for me.  When it works, it's amazing, though generally not suited for low level or even mid level play since it requires a good bit of coordination and a gunner that almost never misses.

As for the light Carronade you totally beat me to the punch.  Artemis is currently being looked at by awkm and then I think he's going to take a look at the light flak and fire weapons.  After those, the light Carronade definitely needs a bit of loving, probably just a 20-25% dps boost either with an additional shot, more flechette or higher rate of fire to make it a great weapon again.  Once that happens squids should become much more competitive.