Is Arty really that bad? Let's find out

(watsyurdeal) #1

His weapons

Dreiss, Aug, and BR-16

All marksmen weapons, built for accuracy above all else. If you can land your shots, they’re great.

His abilities

Ammo packs

Portable ammo, nuf said, better than ammo stations imo

Artillery Strike

This is where I think Arty falls apart, his ability is very picky about where it will allow you to drop the strike. Even Kira’s isn’t this wonky, it’s like trying to tell your niece where the put the puzzle pieces.

So I’m going to throw this out there…

Why not give Arty the Javelin???

There’s a youtube vid out there that showcases various abilities not added in yet.

Instead of making a whole new merc…just give Arty the Javelin instead.

(Azure Emulation) #2

But then Arty won’t have any arty to call down anymore.

His Artillery Spotter needs serious review and revision. It’s frustrating to have more than half the map be “invalid” for targeting, and the targeting system itself is clunky. More importantly, the artillery strike deals little damage, and has such a short duration and AoE that it can barely perform any area denial.

His only redeeming factor is him being a mobile ammo carrier with a Dreiss AR. That’s still no excuse for him keeping an area denial ability that’s heavily outclassed by those of Skyhammer and Kira. The sad part is that multiple small airstrikes at different areas of map is good in theory, it has the potential to be useful, but it doesn’t do much with how underwhelming its stats are currently.

Several buffs and fixes can be made to either the duration, AoE, damage, maximum number of strikes to call when completely cooled down, or more than one of those qualities of the artillery. On top of that, the targeting system… I can go on forever about the different fixes that can be made for this.

(watsyurdeal) #3

To be fair

http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/artillery

“mounted projectile-firing guns or missile launchers, mobile or stationary, light or heavy, as distinguished from small arms.”

So a rocket launcher still would be considered artillery…

(sinKrin) #4

I’d like to see a reduction in the lock-on timing. He can’t move the strikes once set, unlike Kira, so it gives him a disadvantage (besides the inability to lock in some locations)

(watsyurdeal) #5

Not only that but Kira can launch her strike in safe place then walk around with it. Arty has to expose himself a lot, so that gets him killed a lot.

(Gi.Am) #6

[quote=“Watsyurdeal;13599”]His weapons

–SNIP–

So I’m going to throw this out there…

Why not give Arty the Javelin???

[/quote]

Because you need a direct sightline to hit something with it.

Artystrike can be used very well from positions where you don’t have a direct line of sight.
and has unlimited range. That allowes for alot of nice stuff that you couldn’t pull off with a rocketlauncher.

His Artystrike demands very good map knowledge, but as soon as you have memorized the good green spots in a map targeting becomes a breeze and can be executed from save distances and places.
Sure the targeting routine could be better, but thats imo the only improvement that is needed, the ability itself is good and well balanced.

(scorchingPainting) #7

My changes to him would be to have the artillery go off a little faster, not be reset when hit by gunfire and make the whole expolosion land as one. I cant tell you how many times Ive got a series of hitmarkers on that thing. It’d be nice if it dropped as one explosion instead of over a second or so. (Also, fix the terminal problem, ofc.)

I was talking to my brother about him aswell. He reckoned you should maybe get a little benefit per strike when you havent used them, like bonus HP, or bonus gun damage or something. So that, in those maps where his ability is “blocked”, he can still function at a decent capacity.

Edit: I think all of these changes combined would make him a bit OP, but a few of them might make him able to contend with the other mercs :slight_smile:

(Low_SkiLL169) #8

Hey, yesterday i start to play Arty. ( i’am from German sorry for the “bad” english )
But… the Artillery Strike… neeed’s a buff.
He do the same Job like Skyhammer but this Artillery Strike is so bad…

I think

  • instant look, mmm u press and hold " Q " button to see the arena and than do a Leftklick on ur mouse to fix the point and send the Artillery Strike. Than u can do the looktime to the firetime… to " balance it ".

  • more place to fire the strike. Like “Azure Emulation” say “It’s frustrating to have more than half the map be “invalid” for targeting”.

  • more dmg ??? … maybe u fix the 2 points… u dont need a dmg buff…

From 10 Artillery Strike’s … maybe i get 1 kill… but always the XP to hit with AOE.
And i don’t want to sent out my 2 strikes at the same time and spot…
Than buff the dmg and only have 1 Artillery Strike with more DMG.

Yeah… it has to be quick… more arena to drop it and… maybe more dmg to kill people with
one stike. BUT not to kill the EV in 2 strikes… that would be bullshit xD

Edit: When u look on Skyhammers Airstrike it has more reload time, but when u hit it does massiv DMG. And when u can’t call a airstike u have a Nade. This is nice.

Kira, i dont have this merc… but, i think laser has the same time like the airstrike from Skyhammer and do goooood Dmg and u can move it. Okay Kira has lower hp.
But at all… the Artillery Strike sems do be the weakest.

(Indefinite) #9

[quote=“Azure Emulation;39521”]But then Arty won’t have any arty to call down anymore.

His Artillery Spotter needs serious review and revision. It’s frustrating to have more than half the map be “invalid” for targeting, and the targeting system itself is clunky. More importantly, the artillery strike deals little damage, and has such a short duration and AoE that it can barely perform any area denial.

His only redeeming factor is him being a mobile ammo carrier with a Dreiss AR. That’s still no excuse for him keeping an area denial ability that’s heavily outclassed by those of Skyhammer and Kira. The sad part is that multiple small airstrikes at different areas of map is good in theory, it has the potential to be useful, but it doesn’t do much with how underwhelming its stats are currently.

Several buffs and fixes can be made to either the duration, AoE, damage, maximum number of strikes to call when completely cooled down, or more than one of those qualities of the artillery. On top of that, the targeting system… I can go on forever about the different fixes that can be made for this.[/quote]
Above all else, I think Arty’s ability needs to be changed to emulate the behavior of the Wolfenstein:Enemy Territory [Field Ops] Artillery ability. It doesn’t need to be as sometimes frustratingly lethal; but at the least, it should last long enough for people to notice it ever happened.

(OmaGretel) #10

I really think Arty is quite awesome if it weren’t for the artillery spotter mechanics. I think damage and AOE are quite ok considering the cooldown time. Why not just remove the targeting time completely? You would still have to expose yourself, just not stand there for a second and then get hit by some -5HP hit from miles away.

(approvingGlow) #11

The artillery spotter is hard to learn and hard to get used to.

Hard to learn, because if you don’t know your artillery spots on the map already, you have to stand there for half a minute trying to find the exact magic pixel it would work on, getting yourself killed.

Hard to get used to, because the targetting process is such a pain. You often end up wasting 2 strikes on one location, because you almost never get a clear understanding if it worked now or not. In the heat of the battle, the duration to confirm 1 strike is so long, that you often get killed while aiming.

The measly AoE size isn’t really worth any of that trouble.

So how about this:
You hit Q once, you go into targetting mode instantly. The areas where you can strike, are now transparent green boxes reaching into the sky. You press Q again, you instantly call in the strike on the aimed spot without any further delay. If you press a weapon number, you abort.

(Dwu) #12

Imo they could just give Arty Wolfenstein:ET style artillery with a longer cooldown.

(Jojack) #13

This^^

With the targeting too. In ET you just pushed the button for binoculars (just like the designator in DB), but the difference was there was no time to activate. You just pointed and clicked and got back to cover and your barrage came in a few seconds later. Not sure why Arty needs the 2 second activation time or whatever it is. I understand it for Kira, but not Arty.

(avidCow) #14

I’m sure I spotted that RTCW style ability being used in an early beta or alpha video. Multiple timed explosions in a generalised area would be more useful for area denial than one quick detonation.

(Gi.Am) #15

I haven’t played ET but looked at a few vids to get an understanding of the artillery back then and I see two problems with it in Dirty Bomb.

  1. Map design the Maps of ET seems to be bigger in scale and with a bit more alternative routes/cover/indoor areas. I got the feeling that the ET artillery in DB could pretty much shut down an Area like the complete Terminal objective/forward spawn area or the whole area surrounding the EV start on Chapel.
  2. The primary job of the Firesupport guys (aside from giving out ammo) is destroying the EV. An ET style artillery seems too unreliable for that job.
(capriciousParsely) #16

Honestly, id rather see rework. Make him pull out a laptop which turns your screen into a big overlay of the map. You can now choose 2 spots on the map to call down mortar. The mortal could act the same or they could make them prolonged but enemies close will hear a warning. This would make him slower, but sure as hell easier to use and less frustrating to play. Fixing the spotter manually would take ages on each map.

(Cappe) #17

I think ET style arty would be a lot better than the “thing” we got now. Arty’s arty has very little impact on the game, it can barely kill anyone if it hits and can’t even destroy an EV with both shots hitting not to mention that you can’t even spot right on top of the EV. And your arty strikes are marked on the ground so everyone can see it.
Do it like ET,

  • get hit = dead (same as airstrike and laser in DB),
  • artillery itself should last longer, 1 strike to call in, multiple hits over a longer time, for example arty lasts 15 seconds and hits at 5s, 10s and 15s, might not be as good to destroy the EV but it would do some actual objective/repair/plant denial
  • the arty strikes were not marked on the ground untill the first bomb made a scorchmark
  • make it same point (with bino/spotter) and click targeting
  • be able to target everywhere with no “roof” above it
(Jojack) #18

[quote=“ironicKrill;49380”]I think ET style arty would be a lot better than the “thing” we got now. Arty’s arty has very little impact on the game, it can barely kill anyone if it hits and can’t even destroy an EV with both shots hitting not to mention that you can’t even spot right on top of the EV. And your arty strikes are marked on the ground so everyone can see it.
Do it like ET,

  • get hit = dead (same as airstrike and laser in DB),
  • artillery itself should last longer, 1 strike to call in, multiple hits over a longer time, for example arty lasts 15 seconds and hits at 5s, 10s and 15s, might not be as good to destroy the EV but it would do some actual objective/repair/plant denial
  • the arty strikes were not marked on the ground untill the first bomb made a scorchmark
  • make it same point (with bino/spotter) and click targeting
  • be able to target everywhere with no “roof” above it[/quote]

15 seconds would be way to long. I think it was like 5-7 seconds at the highest level tier in ET. Also, after a spot was marked with the binoculars, a puff of smoke (blue for friendly, pink for enemy) could be seen before the barrage happened. It was certainly less noticeable than what DB has though.

(Cappe) #19

[quote=“Jojack;49401”][quote=“ironicKrill;49380”]I think ET style arty would be a lot better than the “thing” we got now. Arty’s arty has very little impact on the game, it can barely kill anyone if it hits and can’t even destroy an EV with both shots hitting not to mention that you can’t even spot right on top of the EV. And your arty strikes are marked on the ground so everyone can see it.
Do it like ET,

  • get hit = dead (same as airstrike and laser in DB),
  • artillery itself should last longer, 1 strike to call in, multiple hits over a longer time, for example arty lasts 15 seconds and hits at 5s, 10s and 15s, might not be as good to destroy the EV but it would do some actual objective/repair/plant denial
  • the arty strikes were not marked on the ground untill the first bomb made a scorchmark
  • make it same point (with bino/spotter) and click targeting
  • be able to target everywhere with no “roof” above it[/quote]

15 seconds would be way to long. I think it was like 5-7 seconds at the highest level tier in ET. Also, after a spot was marked with the binoculars, a puff of smoke (blue for friendly, pink for enemy) could be seen before the barrage happened. It was certainly less noticeable than what DB has though.

[/quote]

This is how an ET strike went:

  • You call in the artillery strike with your binocs and hear the „Firing for effect!“
  • 5 seconds later an effect grenade is flying in, marking the target area with blue or red smoke.
  • It takes another 5 seconds till the first frag projectile comes flying in.
  • In a time window of 5 seconds 4 big frag grenades will go down randomly in the mentioned square place.
  • The whole process takes 15 seconds from calling it in till the last grenade explodes.
  • If you have signals level 3 or higher, the strike will last twice as long and 8 frag projectiles will go down.
(Jojack) #20

[quote=“ironicKrill;49420”][quote=“Jojack;49401”][quote=“ironicKrill;49380”]I think ET style arty would be a lot better than the “thing” we got now. Arty’s arty has very little impact on the game, it can barely kill anyone if it hits and can’t even destroy an EV with both shots hitting not to mention that you can’t even spot right on top of the EV. And your arty strikes are marked on the ground so everyone can see it.
Do it like ET,

  • get hit = dead (same as airstrike and laser in DB),
  • artillery itself should last longer, 1 strike to call in, multiple hits over a longer time, for example arty lasts 15 seconds and hits at 5s, 10s and 15s, might not be as good to destroy the EV but it would do some actual objective/repair/plant denial
  • the arty strikes were not marked on the ground untill the first bomb made a scorchmark
  • make it same point (with bino/spotter) and click targeting
  • be able to target everywhere with no “roof” above it[/quote]

15 seconds would be way to long. I think it was like 5-7 seconds at the highest level tier in ET. Also, after a spot was marked with the binoculars, a puff of smoke (blue for friendly, pink for enemy) could be seen before the barrage happened. It was certainly less noticeable than what DB has though.

[/quote]

This is how an ET strike went:

  • You call in the artillery strike with your binocs and hear the „Firing for effect!“
  • 5 seconds later an effect grenade is flying in, marking the target area with blue or red smoke.
  • It takes another 5 seconds till the first frag projectile comes flying in.
  • In a time window of 5 seconds 4 big frag grenades will go down randomly in the mentioned square place.
  • The whole process takes 15 seconds from calling it in till the last grenade explodes.
  • If you have signals level 3 or higher, the strike will last twice as long and 8 frag projectiles will go down.[/quote]

Yup, I thought you were saying the actual barrage lasted for 15 seconds, not the whole process. I’m picking up what your laying down now.