HEAVIES are useless

(Senethro) #101

They’re not supposed to be balanced with regards to killing each other, but rather with the ability to perform objectives (though killing each other is most of this).

When one team is assaulting a distant location and the other is staticly controlling it, its going to be the case that a fast bodytype and a slow bodytype will have different successes at these activities. This is a useless tangent already since the design can’t be changed but I’m going to finish: It would be easier to balance a map around optimum team compositions which might be O: 3L 4M 1H, D: 2L 3M 3H than around random team compositions with teams of unsuitable bodytypes.

TLDR: A semblance of map balance is more important than bodytype balance.

(tokamak) #102

Agreed, balancing them on their combat effectiveness alone is a bad idea. The role a heavy needs to be playing is being the spine of the team, denying areas to the opponent and making sure they can fall back on him.

But right now this simply isn’t the case, as a light you can easily run into a firing heavy and kill him. Lights can traverse maps with impunity because heavies can’t deny them anything, all the while heavies are denied a lot of space themselves.

(peteXnasty) #103

On the issue of map travel, splash damage COULD say " well if you’re walking from the spawn to the frontline every few minutes, your team is doing it wrong" and to tha they are right; a heavy needs to wait for a revive over ALL due to travel times, and as a result should not be point blank mixing it up to avoid being put down. However, this is also counteractive to the idea of the heavy as a front line offense guy. It makes more sense on defense.

And again, heavy gameplay is pointless when all your team gas is one AI medic.

IMO the only things that need tweaking are the survivabiliy to a small amount, and the weapons. The heavy weapons, minus the hjammerdiem, offer nothing useful. A SMG will beat a maximum in a one on one every time because it will be guarenteed to stay on target. If the maximus and chinzor are so difficult to aim, then make it take chunks out of people. Its simple balance, low damage/high acc, high damage/low acc. Make lights have to really think about how to approach a MG weilding heavy rather than just a slide tackle and hipfire.

And for gods sake my guy must weigh 360 lbs. A 90 pound stringbean should not be able to knock me down. I think it makes sense and helps the synergy between classes even more if lights could only knockdown light and medium, and only medium and heavy can knock down heavy. And if a heavy managed a melee attack it should be a helluva knockback.

Always do your heavies a favor people…health buff and kevlar. Always. My heavy medic loves you for it, and I have a FULL supply meter to hand out! Seriously…heavy medic is the way to go.

(Senethro) #104

[QUOTE=tokamak;319699]Agreed, balancing them on their combat effectiveness alone is a bad idea. The role a heavy needs to be playing is being the spine of the team, denying areas to the opponent and making sure they can fall back on him.

But right now this simply isn’t the case, as a light you can easily run into a firing heavy and kill him. Lights can traverse maps with impunity because heavies can’t deny them anything, all the while heavies are denied a lot of space themselves.[/QUOTE]

Mmmhmm, now theorycraft me up a heavy buff that makes them viable in combat that doesn’t make them more successful on defense than offense. Even trickier, devise a way that an increase in Heavies as a proportion of the player population will be a net benefit to attacking teams. With Heavies being less suited to offense, even if they were made viable in combat it might lead to more people playing them and being wasted player slots on attacking teams.

(tokamak) #105

Simply increasing their damage (as well as other incapicate effects) does the trick. Yes it enhances their defensive capability as well, which currently just sucks. Defenders don’t lend their strength from heavies, it’s the way the maps and spawns are set up that need tweaking.

The offence/defence roles aren’t that cut and dry as you make out to be. An attacking team still needs to guard the objective they’re trying to complete. A heavy should be there to protect any immediate threats to this objective while lights and mediums can skirmish across the rest of the map.

(RaKeD) #106

This is an extract from antoher post of me discussing the same issue:

Interesting discussion so far.

Here are my thoughts on the heavy:

Special weapons aren’t compensating the slow movement speed a heavy has to deal with, this simply means special weapons for the heavy class aren’t good enough.

It is ok for me that the automatic nade launcher isn’t that effective to kill ppl but the machinge guns are the real problem in my opinion.I am going to explain why i made this statement.

All LMG’s and the gatling gun, start to get an artifical bullet spread(Not recoil !!) very early.This makes automatic fire impossible to controll.Recoil would mean a player needs some skill to handle the recoil and compensate for it.Bullet spread just happens and there isn’t much you can do.(Crosshair circle starts to expand and bullets are going all over the place in this circle)

The minigun isn’t instantly recovering completely from bullet spread when you stop shooting.In fact the gatling gun needs a lot of time to completely recover from the artifical bullet spread which starts as soon as you start shooting (Crosshair circle get s bigger instantly but isn’t recovering instantly when one stops shooting).

This makes even shooting burst not effective as you have to wait too long till the artifical bullet spread is completely gone! The Chinzor MG is an exception but it has a pretty bad accuracy and bullet spread from the start, like the minigun.

The Maximus LMG on the other hand is more accurate but has a random and almost uncontrollable x-axis recoil.This means you can’t provide effective supressive fire either, especially at medium to long range.

All LMG’s and the minigun just aren’t effective at medium or long range, it is not possible to lay down effective supressive fire at a certain spot.They can not provide supressive fire, except at very close range.Furthermore more and more heavy players report that they are getting killed or heavily damaged in close quarter combat from medium and light players(mainly carb-9 imo).I mention this because it is seems like the heavy special weapons are meant to really shine in close quarter combat but the fact is, they do not shine there either.

The heavy doesn’t have that much more health, in fact they can be mowed down pretty fast with headshots and headshots are easy to pull of on heavys as they walk so slow.In my opinion the health doesn’t have to get increased by much but the main reasion heavys aren’t effective are the weak special weapons.

Also read these discussions about the heavy class if you are interested:

http://www.splashdamage.com/forums/showthread.php?t=25752&highlight=open+discussion+heavy

http://www.splashdamage.com/forums/showthread.php?t=26418&highlight=open+discussion+heavy

Btw, what do you guys think about enhancing the running speed of the heavy class to the running speed a medium class has?By this one can attack as a team and isn’t falling behind.

I think competitive players will exploit the faster running before buffing anyways and by this the other players in the team don’t have to wait for the big heavy all the time.

(TeoH) #107

Woa heaven forbid.

You’re looking at this from too simplistic a position, as just movement speed versus some general ‘combat strength’, which is why you’re only considering the idea of giving heavies ‘better guns’. If the classes are defined only in terms of how quickly they move and how quickly they kill things in general, then every defensive situation would call for a team of heavies holding the position. Light and medium characters are intended to kill things too, there aren’t any flags in this game, the ability to kill things shouldn’t be class specific.

The best way to differentiate the classes is not by how much damage the bullets from their generic rapid fire hit scan weapon hit for, but by the utility they bring to the table. The light class brings the ability to reach a forward position quickly and to take alternate routes that make them more suitable for flanking positions and getting close in behind people. Their available weapons reflect this because their only ‘long range’ weapons are actually completely terrible, and consume the same slot as the required SMG. As a result, lights are close range fighters, with the movement to get in range and access to the best weapons for the job (Carb).

This makes sense, it would not make sense for a heavy, the slowest and least mobile class in the game to be the close range flanking class, you’re just being silly. It is completely reasonable that a light with a Carb who manages to get in close to a heavy with a GL and a AR will take the heavy down. Remember you can also use a SMG as a heavy if you wish, in which case you have the same close up damage along with more health; but then you have to consider what your role is, as you’re not about to bounce off the walls and run in close behind enemy lines as a heavy, and that’s the part of the class that isn’t going to change anytime soon.

Currently, medium bodies bring the all-round utility of having effective long range weapons and close range SMGs in addition to reasonable speed. The medium rifles/ARs are very effective when scoped over long range, and they still get a SMG in the secondary slot so they lose no potency up close, they’re in a pretty good place. Now the heavy…

Since there is already a class that fills the long range ‘snipey’ niche, the way to design the heavy is to give it seperate and more unique utility that doesn’t just fall into close or long range hitscan weapon gubbins. I believe this is what SD have tried to do, as the heavy has access to 2 GLs, a minigun that can shoot continually at a choke point for about a minute, and a couple of shotguns that don’t really work well because the game isn’t designed in a way that accomodates them. The 2 ideas that i would assume they were going for would be the ability to shut down a choke point for an extended period with the minigun (By continually firing at it, regardless of anyone being in LOS or not), and the ability to clear out defensive nests and giant piles of mines and sentries with the GLs. Now you could argue that those weapons don’t necessarily do their jobs particularly well, or that their jobs might not be overly important due to the gametype, but i believe the idea of letting them access unique utility is the way to design the classes.

(TeoH) #108

now theorycraft me up a heavy buff that makes them viable in combat that doesn’t make them more successful on defense than offense.

The way you do this is, instead of just giving them bigger machine guns, you give them a utility weapon that performs a specific task and functions as support in a way that’s useful for the attacking team. Example:

Singleshot Combined EMP/Concussive grenade launcher or RPG with air detonation function

A GL which is used from long range, fires a single shell with a very low rate of fire (4-5 seconds) and low ammo, which detonates like the current GL weapons in a small area for average damage, but also has a secondary effect of a much wider conc/EMP blast, which knocks people down for an extended period of time, detonates mines and temporarily disables sentries. The damage part of the blast would function like a normal grenade but the EMP/conc would be much wider as well as travelling through terrain, allowing you to shell the walls of small rooms, or hit the front of heavy cover.

With the long ROF and single shot mechanic, a reload function would be redundant as you’d essentially be reloading after every shot, so the reload button for this weapon could be repurposed as a detonate button, allowing you to throw grenades at people in high windows, and detonate in the air to ensure the conc hits them. The long ROF means that you cannot spam a choke with it, there’s too long between shots, and it’s almost entirely useless up close. The primary role of this weapon would be to mess up a defensive position immediately prior to your team rushing it.

Easy example of this in use would be the end hack objective on Resort. Heavies currently serve no purpose for the offense on this map because the objective is a long run from the spawn, and the GLs aren’t really effective at clearing out the objective room or the snipey balconies from long range. Heavy pretty much has to run all the way up into the valley of death to accomplish anything, so they’re pointless due to their speed. The EMP/Conc launcher however wouldn’t need to be fired directly inside the objective or land directly on the heads of people on the balconies in order to be effective. The heavy would only need to run part of the way forward, close to the end of the bot route in order to shell the side of the objective room, or air det on the balconies from long range. This immediately clears all mines, knocks down any defenders which drops their accuracy to nothing, and stops sentries, it’s a solid way of leading a push and it’s compatible with the heavy movement speed.

(peteXnasty) #109

Dont forget, a carb 9 will easily beat out any weapon a heavy has from short to long range simply because all of irs bullets will hit

Even my favorite gun, the hjammerdiem, requires a solid shot to do any good but only fires 2 before cycling…a smg in between those shots sprayed means I am dead. A smg spraying from outside my range means I am dead. Every heavy weapon is outclassed by every other gun in the game and serves no role. The minigun isn’t area control; its a joke. A light will just dash into it and try to headshot you before he dies, and the odds are in his favor.

Other than massive supply pools, heavies ARE outclassed in every area and are better suited to mediums. Why have 2 grenade launchers when you have one timer? Why have a MG that can’t hit anything and doesn’t do enough damage in burst fire to beat sustained SMG’s and are outshot by AR’s?

Its less of a heavy thing I’ve decided and more of a gun/general gameplay issue. Headshots as always in every game, matter too much and negate the health bonus, the SMG’s low damage and poor range are offset by the huge ammo pool, massive clips, and near 0 recoi and spread (minus the tampa, the most fun one IMO), and the gaby weapons offer nothing to the table in crowd and area control (minus the EZNL). Rework the guns, lower the hadshot modifier, and give heavies either knockdown resistance OR better damage mitigation.

(peteXnasty) #110

Honestly there’s a good reason that every human player is light with a carb 9. Heavy isn’t fun and isn’t effective.

5 games in a row today for me seeing killfeeds dominated by one player slaughtering the entire team then planting the objective bfore we can run back

(WallWeasels) #111

Really it all hinges on two points: What the classes are meant to do and what are they intended to add to the game?

Usually a “slow and heavy” class in a game is more sided towards defense, because its slowness makes it tricky to use on offensive situations. They can be used on offense when speed can be mitigated for travel purposes, like teleporters in tf2.

But what about the light classes? Light classes usually revolve around speed, recon and hit and run tactics. They usually revolve around flanking and have the best movement in the game (be it jetpack, sprinting, running, etc). They can be equally effective both on offense and defense, but most uses tend to be more 60/40 shifted toward offense.

Medium classes tend to be the…middle class. They will be the meat of the game, what most people need to be playing, and the “average” class. They counter-balance the polarizing heavy/light situation.

So really what do people want heavy to add to this game? Its clear the advantage of light, but not as defined as SD thinks. There aren’t a massive amount of jumps that a medium can’t make either, or they can be easily bypassed. For instance on Container city the “repairable” staircase can be jumped by a light. But you can merely bypass this by doing the objective and allowing the rest of the team up that way. Should an entire team ever be all lights? No! Should an entire team ever be heavy? No!

I personally think an easy way to balance the bodytypes would be changing the importance of the classes effects on bodytype. Operative? maybe that should be more sided to light for its speed. Soldier? Maybe that should be sided more towards Heavy. Engineer? Maybe all around, but different bodytype Engineers can do different things. Medic? Light or Medium maybe, etc.
However the issue with this concept is that it requires a significant change of gameplay as it stands :confused: So its nothing more than a pipe-concept and therefore fairly pointless.

So overall, the issue is what SD wants the bodytypes to do and to mean when in the game. It was clear by intent that you cannot switch bodytype at all when inside a game (even before the map starts). So I’d say by context they want all bodytypes useful in all maps.

In my opinion the reason why heavy isn’t used is: Health gain is literally 1-2 more shots than a medium and 2-3 shots from a light. Since most combat in this game is close to mid range this few shots is barely worth it. Addtionally Heavy Weapons are fairly useless, that or useless in comparrison to the medium weapons, who are trumped by basically the SMGs in general. This is a weapon balance situation that is helping the class imbalance situation. :confused: Weapon balance is a problem because its based on the flawed system Brink currently uses for recoil vs spread

I personally love the Gerund but only since I’ve been playing without using SMGs at all. Gerund + Sea Eagle all the way :stuck_out_tongue:

(dommafia) #112

I would be happy if the heavies took less damage for body shots. Maybe 30% less? That way if someone is skilled and headshotting you then you will still have a fighting chance. If someone is just trying to spray and pray you to death they will fail, miserably. This will make the heavy an actual “oh **** i have to face a heavy” threat.

The crazy random x-axis recoil is bs too on the maximus for example, it would be a viable weapon otherwise.

(tokamak) #113

I think it should be exactly the other way around. Less damage from body shots. Heavies with their slow movement speed are already highly vulnerable to headshots and the high fire rate as well as the spread of the SMG’s makes it very easy to deal with heavies.

(dommafia) #114

wait what? “less damage from body shots” that’s exactly what I’m proposing. And I disagree with your headshot comment. Going full auto decreases headshots by a longshot. I drop people a lot faster when I do control burst to the head even at close range.

I don’t see how you can say that it should be “exactly the other way around” of heavies taking 30% less damage from shots to their body.

(the 30% just being an arbitrary number for the time being, the point is heavies taking less damage from body shots.)

(Happymonster) #115

on the risk of total controversy i would suggest

tie-ing body type to classes i.e.

heavy : soldier engineer
medium: medic soldier
light: medic operative

this way teams are forced to use the different body types to get objectives done, it will require however a different way of swapping bodytypes/classes than there is now

and to make this work weapon restrictions would have to be extended
(sniper rifles only on lights for instance to prevent sniping soldiers with endless ammo, and theres more; like ammo count should be much higher on heavys than on lights, but this is all to much speculation for now)

ofc this doesnt solve the problem of weapon balance which still needs to be done

ok start flaming

(tokamak) #116

[QUOTE=dommafia;323012]wait what? “less damage from body shots” that’s exactly what I’m proposing. And I disagree with your headshot comment. Going full auto decreases headshots by a longshot. I drop people a lot faster when I do control burst to the head even at close range.

I don’t see how you can say that it should be “exactly the other way around” of heavies taking 30% less damage from shots to their body.

(the 30% just being an arbitrary number for the time being, the point is heavies taking less damage from body shots.)[/QUOTE]

I meant head shots, less damage from headshots. It’s easier to score headshots on a slow predictable heavy.

(Misnomer) #117

[QUOTE=TeoH;319837]The way you do this is, instead of just giving them bigger machine guns, you give them a utility weapon that performs a specific task and functions as support in a way that’s useful for the attacking team. Example:

Singleshot Combined EMP/Concussive grenade launcher or RPG with air detonation function

A GL which is used from long range, fires a single shell with a very low rate of fire (4-5 seconds) and low ammo, which detonates like the current GL weapons in a small area for average damage, but also has a secondary effect of a much wider conc/EMP blast, which knocks people down for an extended period of time, detonates mines and temporarily disables sentries. The damage part of the blast would function like a normal grenade but the EMP/conc would be much wider as well as travelling through terrain, allowing you to shell the walls of small rooms, or hit the front of heavy cover.

With the long ROF and single shot mechanic, a reload function would be redundant as you’d essentially be reloading after every shot, so the reload button for this weapon could be repurposed as a detonate button, allowing you to throw grenades at people in high windows, and detonate in the air to ensure the conc hits them. The long ROF means that you cannot spam a choke with it, there’s too long between shots, and it’s almost entirely useless up close. The primary role of this weapon would be to mess up a defensive position immediately prior to your team rushing it.

Easy example of this in use would be the end hack objective on Resort. Heavies currently serve no purpose for the offense on this map because the objective is a long run from the spawn, and the GLs aren’t really effective at clearing out the objective room or the snipey balconies from long range. Heavy pretty much has to run all the way up into the valley of death to accomplish anything, so they’re pointless due to their speed. The EMP/Conc launcher however wouldn’t need to be fired directly inside the objective or land directly on the heads of people on the balconies in order to be effective. The heavy would only need to run part of the way forward, close to the end of the bot route in order to shell the side of the objective room, or air det on the balconies from long range. This immediately clears all mines, knocks down any defenders which drops their accuracy to nothing, and stops sentries, it’s a solid way of leading a push and it’s compatible with the heavy movement speed.[/QUOTE]

This needs to be given more of a look. Just adding this type of weapon would rebalance the opening stage of Container City. If the weapon relies greatly on reflect damage for quick use, it makes direct shots the only way to get people through the door or on the right sniper perch, but extremely useful for taking out the container window area over the objective.

I would add that it should have a very slow weapon switch time to prevent quick switch rockets at your feet. Also important for self damage to keep it a ranged weapon.

I still think the heavies need a bit more health so they have a chance to deploy heavy weapons as right now they are an ambush class without a good ability to get to ambush. (Anyone ever see how effective the Gatlung is when you disguise your way behind enemy lines as a Heavy Operative? Very had to accomplish, but that is one of the few instances you are a force to be feared…until that light with a Carb-9 spawns behind you of course).

(Stormchild) #118

Maybe Heavies should have an additional defense boost, a little bit like an extra “kevlar”, only not affected by piercing bullets, and cumulative with kevlar, of course. It is a bit different than extra life, but it would match the idea of a bulky and tough body : natural armor.
This means if you get kevlar, + a heavy natural armor bonus + the usual extra life, then you could tank a bit longer for the heavy weapons to shine more ?

Also for their weapons, some minor tweaks might do the trick, it should happen it the complaints continue for a little while, but every FPS have these balance issues with weapons after all. Look back in ETQW and the hyperblaster… yet the game was gold.

Tying body types to classes would have so many consequences… I don’t favor it much.

(Smokeskin) #119

  1. heavy weapons must be made better than other weapons, rather than worse in everything but clip size

  2. the heavy has only 29% more health than a medium, but their hit box seem to be more than 29% larger, which mean they actually have worse survivability against spray fire, even before you count their slower speed. This is ok if the heavy weapons become sufficiently good, but it is important to acknowledge that the heavy is at a disadvantage in terms of survivability against anything but grenades and accurate fire.

  3. the heavy should have their sprint speed buffed to medium levels, allowing them to arrive at the front along with the rest of the spawn wave. The “takes longer to arrive but is more powerful once he arrives” might sound good, but it works out poorly in terms of teamwork, and it becomes a serious hindrance on maps where objectives are far from the spawn, and I doubt these maps are balanced with this difference in mind. This could be implemented as a 10 second speed buff after spawning.

(tokamak) #120

Can’t agree on seeing their speed buffed. The slow speed simply means you need to think carefully about where you move as you can’t quickly readjust and go off somewhere else. The rest is spot on.