Bugs and Balance Housekeeping Update - 22/07/2015 v47800

(PixelTwitch) #41

[QUOTE=Szakalot;535072]strong disagree; there is a simple counter to phantom (pre-patch) one-hit kill, and that is to GTFOut of the way! I only play fletcher, who is pretty weak in direct confrontations against phantom, since sticky splash damage gets eaten away, and otherwise weapons are below average.

What you gotta do is just move away, and dictate the engagement.

If you expect to gun every opponent down with just good aim, you are hopelessly not keeping up with the game ; )

You wouldn’t contest an equally skilled aura on her station without explosives either, would you? is that ‘uncounterable’?

Phantom was OP because of being above average in every single way, and without any weaknesses.[/QUOTE]

I agreed that he needed a bit of balancing and I do not believe that every Merc should be able to kill every Merc.

and while he was “above average in every single way” he never had anything he was great at too…

His problem was skill requirement to play and his ability to frustrate players.
I had no issues with Phantom in both competitive and public play. Sure I had few frustrations every now and again in public when playing as a light Merc but overall the problem was the 1 shot ability more than anything else. However, I was not talking about myself. Generally in gaming people have a habbit of blaming the first thing that they see. I honestly believe in phantoms case they got frustrated with the one hit kills and stuff like that and then looked into why and in an attempt to back up their argument they quote every single stat they can to demonstrate their point.

We for the most part are the exception here…
Most people don’t care about X stats or Y mechanic they just care about their own perception of balance. If a certain Merc is gunning them down all the time and they personally cannot (even if it is due to a skill gap) retaliate they blame it on balance. I try and think of things from multiple levels and angles. One thing I came up with when it comes to Phantom was…

If 2 players of equal skill (low skill) played Dirty Bomb, 1 as Phantom and 1 as almost any other Merc the Phantom would win.
However, if you raise the skill level for these 2 players you soon reach a point where the Phantom would hardly ever win vs most Mercs.

Believe me when I say there is a reason we are not seeing Phantoms replacing Fraggers in competitive play and in pugs.

By doing these sorts of numerical nerfs you effect most skill levels fairly equally.
Only by tweaking mechanics can you really start to tweak individual skill levels individually.

This nerf has basically balanced him in low skilled play and NUKED him on the higher end.

(PixelTwitch) #42

Have you tried knifing a downed body?
Tried to figure out where the blshlock is shooting you from?
Having to run with your pistol out rather than your cricket bat?
dealing with the increased stutter?
Playing Sparks or Phantom?

lol

Honestly dude… Game feels fairly different and not really in a good way (in my opinion)

(poiuasd) #43

Screwing up player’s input is not an acceptable way of trying to balance something, the melee turn speed limit is horrible.

(PixelTwitch) #44

Its the sniper sway all over again…

(spookify) #45

[QUOTE=PixelTwitch;535076]Have you tried knifing a downed body?
Tried to figure out where the blshlock is shooting you from?
Having to run with your pistol out rather than your cricket bat?
dealing with the increased stutter?
Playing Sparks or Phantom?

lol

Honestly dude… Game feels fairly different and not really in a good way (in my opinion)[/QUOTE]

I have not but I will try the new patch soon… Now I am scared…

(ragnak) #46

Meele turn rate limit is stupid as hell, i kinda ignored that part when i was reading notes but its feels HORRIBLE. How can you even put something like that in a game ? Now its pretty much impossible to gib someone with knife and turn around and fight when you are getting shot.

Sound is still as horrible as it was, or even worse because i cant tell from where im getting shot. There is so much wrong with audio that it need a rework and not some small number tweaks (especially that i still cant hear footsteps most of the time). Why does friendly things sounds louder than enemy ? Why is sound getting cut off so often ? Why does explosives muffles every other sound ? And so on. I honestly cant bear the sound in this game and will say with a straight face that its the worse audio from practical stand point i heard in at least a decade (if we ignore brink that is, which was also god awful).

MG is also polluted with bugs for how long now ? Its hard to spot if someone shots you, you cant hear it for **** most of the time, it have bigger hitbox then model and so on.

I should probably give up about having decent audio at this point =/. As a side note, stop nerfing accuracy, i dont want another brink but i feel that you still think that brink gunplay wasnt horribly bad.

(Domipheus) #47

Not looked at all issues, but wanted to point out an immediate thing I noticed: fps seems much better.

(montheponies) #48

Would have hoped for some anti-cheat improvements, at least providing a one button reporting function from the scoreboard menu, rather than the current absurdity of leaving the server, filling in a form, trying to remember the server and player name and then finding the form hangs on you…Nice that you can now view the steam profile of the hackers on the server though (typically new accounts).

(Szakalot) #49

[QUOTE=PixelTwitch;535075]

and while he was “above average in every single way” he never had anything he was great at too…

His problem was skill requirement to play and his ability to frustrate players.
I had no issues with Phantom in both competitive and public play. Sure I had few frustrations every now and again in public when playing as a light Merc but overall the problem was the 1 shot ability more than anything else. However, I was not talking about myself. Generally in gaming people have a habbit of blaming the first thing that they see. I honestly believe in phantoms case they got frustrated with the one hit kills and stuff like that and then looked into why and in an attempt to back up their argument they quote every single stat they can to demonstrate their point.

We for the most part are the exception here…
Most people don’t care about X stats or Y mechanic they just care about their own perception of balance. If a certain Merc is gunning them down all the time and they personally cannot (even if it is due to a skill gap) retaliate they blame it on balance. I try and think of things from multiple levels and angles. One thing I came up with when it comes to Phantom was…[/quote]

I’m only gonna talk about the pre-patch phantom, as I haven’t tried this patch yet (and from the complaints, it sounds like the melee changes nuked him, like you said.

I don’t see any reason why balancing should cater to all skill levels. You balance around the high skill level, and let the rest of the game sort itself out. If its a problem on pubs; you can address that by limiting spammy classes/abilities (cooldown nerfs on 8v8 servers, anyone? : ) )

Every game has the low-skill weapon that can own other newbies of similar skill level. ETQW was full of spammy vehicle point&click, artillery, explosives left & right, etc.
W:ET had panzer, and rifle nade. And so were these abilities nerfed in pubs, to limit the spam. As you went to higher leveled players, things turned out fine, a rifle-nader really had to know the map to trap a circle-strafe-jumping opponent, etc.

If 2 players of equal skill (low skill) played Dirty Bomb, 1 as Phantom and 1 as almost any other Merc the Phantom would win.
However, if you raise the skill level for these 2 players you soon reach a point where the Phantom would hardly ever win vs most Mercs.

Imo pre-patch Phantom was a king of 1on1s. You could easily soften your target from distance, and charge for a 100hp stab. Which is why it got so much whine, cause on pubs people don’t know how to play, fall back to their teammates, and are surprised when a 1on1 phantom gets them.

Believe me when I say there is a reason we are not seeing Phantoms replacing Fraggers in competitive play and in pugs.

Yup, some mercs are clearly better off on spammy 8v8 servers, than in a tightly controlled 5v5. Rhino, Nader, Phantom, even Skyhammer (haha) all get juicy spammy kills in the 8v8 clustershag, but can’t keep up with the real slayers & team backbone like fragger n sawbonez.

This is always going to be a tricky thing to balance, between high-skilled 5v5, and spammy pub 8v8. Which is why I’d really love 8v8 servers to implement some type of cooldown nerfs, to bring the gameplay closer to 5v5.

This nerf has basically balanced him in low skilled play and NUKED him on the higher end.

Looks like it, yeah.

(BomBaKlaK) #50

Fine tuning patch ?
Mouahhahahahahahahahaha !
Melee ?
Mouhahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha ! What is this joke ?

Totally broken ! …
Balance ? Look like a last minute change more than a real patch …

(DarkangelUK) #51

[QUOTE=BomBaKlaK;535086]Fine tuning patch ?
Mouahhahahahahahahahaha !
Melee ?
Mouhahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha ! What is this joke ?

Totally broken ! …
Balance ? Look like a last minute change more than a real patch …[/QUOTE]

Use your grown up words and give some proper, in-depth feedback.

(Phantomchan) #52

So much this, it’s in my opinion the most stupid thing you can do and looks like a desperate last resort attempt to bring balance. If they want true balance with the melee stuff, then they should moreso tinker with the times where players can damage other players in with a melee attack instead of the movement restriction.

(Domipheus) #53

On second thoughts, FPS still gets progressively worse, and input lag seems an issue. Sometimes mouse input gets completely ignored for a few frames. The lag when someone with even a modestly high ping (100) joins is insufferable,

As for knifing to gib, no issue. Phantom still seems usable. Kek sure has been nerfed slightly, but it’s not as bad as folk say. Still a cracking gun. Sure it’s annoying that sensitivity is lower when using the katana. But, it’s a ****ing katana. Agree shouldn’t be there for other melee.

(Phantomchan) #54

[QUOTE=Domipheus;535090]
Kek sure has been nerfed slightly, but it’s not as bad as folk say. Still a cracking gun.[/QUOTE]
It’s still a great weapon and pretty darn strong. Still one of the best in my opinion.

(BomBaKlaK) #55

When I use melee I feel stuck in a massive bowl of jelly !

(neg) #56

so what are the chances of getting refunds for merc purchases? because this is pretty much as far away from what the devs have been saying the game should be and they seem to go further and further away from it with every patch…

honestly if i wanted to play games with retarded spray and garbage aimpunch id play CSGO

but hey if splashdamage wants to butcher another title the same way they did ETQW and Brink i guess thats cool? atleast ETQW had some mod support so the community could fix the game rofl

(Raviolay) #57

Yep the only thing I don’t like about this patch so far is the gibbing with knife, you cant gibb and snap quickly to a target and shoot no more…

(spookify) #58

I agree knifing is F’ed up!!

(Ceres) #59

“Fine Tuning” = lost about 50 fps. On top of that I can barely see **** from all the muzzle flash, blood, healing station animation and so on and so on. Another pointless change that nobody asked for. Just separate the commands or something. I don’t want airstrikes/arty particles or w/e they are called to be bound to muzzleflash and blood processing.

(BioSnark) #60

Thoughts on/experience with Phantom,

From what I experienced, he’s still quite strong stomping public games. Like most mercs, I consider him significantly stronger in certain maps/locations than in others. I also don’t use him for camping or katana so I can’t speak to that. Was generally running him on offense on objective servers.

On a particularly badly matched chapel offense (majority of players under level 10 on both teams and few good shooters) I went 26/1 and I’m an above average shot, nothing special.

The shield remains a strong tool for flanking, disengaging, and a decent tool for opening head-on firefights (aimpunch nerf probably reduced that last, and extremely cheesy, aspect somewhat and I was playing with that in mind.) When I lost firefights, it was because my aim was **** and I deserved to lose or I had too many opponents. Even without the shield, he’s still an above average merc via weapon/hp/speed. I do not understand phantom people complaining that he’s garbage on the nexon forums and I have to assume they were using the katana as an aim crutch. I also don’t like the stealth aspect of the shield. If it were removed, I think phantom would be far easier to balance for the low player caps of “competitive” matchmaking / competitions as well as the crowds in public servers. With it, I think people are unreasonable to expect a stealth character to be balanced for both player counts in a game like dirty bomb. I can’t speak to if phantom’s balanced now but it feels less like cheating to play in public games, which is always good.

Thoughts on melee,

The turn limit doesn’t make sense with the current melee system. I assume the goal of the change is to add a skill floor to melee use. It doesn’t feel natural or consistent with the rest of the game. As I said elsewhere, I’d either

A) Make melee deal damage proportional to the amount of time it hits an enemy during a swing.

Or,

B) Make melee fire a single shot or shotgun per swing.

Or even,

C) Keep the turn limits on heavy melee strikes but significantly adapt the animations and movements so it feels like the heavy melee attack involves forcefully lunging. It has to feel natural, not weird and arbitrary, to justify altering player controls.