Thoughts on any of the recent balance changes?

doxjq · 2016-05-24 22:32:34 UTC

Curious as to whether other people are thinking similar things.

Thunder: Some what useful now, and I nearly always have him in my squad. But I have a feeling we’re going to see a nerf for his concussion grenade in the next update. Too many people complaining about the 15 second cool down in comparison to how long he can reduce their movement. I’m kind of on the fence about it, because in general game play it seems fine, but it’s almost too efficient for controlling spawn waves now where enemies only have one way to push out of spawn (defenders on last stage of Trainyard, defenders on last stage of Chapel etc)

Phantom: Super annoying in ranked. His EMP takes out your own teams deployables. Personally I think the change still leaves him a little underwhelming and would have suited some kind of ability that did damage to enemies but so be it, it’s still an improvement I guess.

Fragger: Where did the HP nerf come from out of curiosity? I don’t think I’ve ever seen anyone talk about his health or him needing a change - kinda reminds me of jump sniping being disabled out of no where. Tbh I don’t really notice the 10hp enough to care for it though, but I’m seeing quite a few complaints about it.

Tough: Actually super good at the moment. So good that I’ve started using my first gen crown gold S72 Arty instead of my CW S82. Mechanic and extra packs was always nice but in pubs where most medics are terrible, that super low regen is too good to not have at the moment.

Arsenal crates: Awesome idea and really needed. Personally I think it takes a little too long for newer players to get enough gear to be content with, which is probably why so many of them get bored fast, so hopefully it helps player retention a bit.

Ammo symbols: Tbh this is actually starting to bug me. People don’t spawn with full ammo, as soon as they use one clip they have an ammo symbol above their head. I main Arty so I’m constantly seeing people with ammo symbols who don’t really need ammo. Personally I think it should be an option you can set yourself in options, where you can choose how little ammo people have before it shows you a symbol.

Personally I think some of the gen2 cards are just worse than the gen1 cards. S72 Arty, M91 Fragger, S92 Thunder for 3 examples etc. I would like to see silver/gold/cobalt gen1 back in trading, where perhaps you could choose what generation you would like to trade up to. No harm in having both? I’m not sure.

Just a few off the top of my head. Any others I am missing?

LifeupOmega · 2016-05-24 23:18:34 UTC

Don’t forget the CR42 Sawbonez.

Fletcher? Nothing changed really. They can still spam you out with no worries.

Dawnlazy · 2016-05-24 23:21:21 UTC

I think 140HP Fragger makes him finally balanced. He’s still stupidly easy to play well, but it might actually be possible to run a 5 man team WITHOUT being obligated to have a Fragger all of the time, especially with Thunder being so strong now. Speaking of Thunder, I feel like he should have been left at 160 HP and only benefit from the Fragger nerf, 170HP + Stark is nigh impossible to beat in a fight. Time will tell if it was excessive though. As for the Fletcher nerf, I’ve played him on some PUGs over the weekend, he still felt really strong BUT I haven’t played against enough other Fletchers to make up my mind, plus with the small buffs/new loadouts for the other engies I still have to try them out and see if they’re ever worth picking now.

Amerika · 2016-05-24 23:51:22 UTC

Thunder’s emp was removed which was a pretty big nerf IMO. I also hate that they double downed on the flash and slowing mechanic. Not because it’s terrible but because it’s super annoying on that low of a CD. So you can still flash a room and do very little and now get eaten alive by a turret or deal with a health station but you can be more annoying over the course of a match!! So the problem of Thunder’s grenades not being as good as Fragger’s in organized competitive play wasn’t really fixed AND they managed to make him extremely annoying in the process. Fragger’s 140hp and Thunder’s 170hp did more for Thunder’s viability than his ability changes did.

As for Phantom…ugh. I didn’t know about him disabling teammates equipment with FF on. That’s obviously a bug and should be fixed. But even when it is fixed he still has an annoyingly long CD on his cloak now which was only put into place to offset the attachment of the EMP to his cloak. So, you trade in the ability to use your cloak in a lot of intelligent ways for an EMP that doesn’t solve his issues. He had issues in organized play because he’s a character with abilities that needs chaos going around to thrive. He couldn’t get close enough to justify his pick over mercs with similar weapons/hp and better utility. He’s good on pubs and not so good in organized play. So he needed utility…which virtually everyone agreed on. But WHY give him utility in the form of the EMP (all while taking it away from Thunder) that only turns on with his cloak and is a radius around him?

He has trouble getting close enough to do damage in organized 5v5 because there isn’t enough going on for him to make optimal use out of his cloak/armor compared to other mercs. Soooooooooooooooo, why would you try to fix that by including an almost melee range emp bubble? They could have given him a BF style spotting mechanic to have some parity with the other recons. Or they could have given him a thrown/shot ability similar to Aimee’s snitch that would produce the EMP bubble that could be shot from range. Both of those solutions fixes his utility problem while also not requiring him to be in close, which was his biggest issue in organized 5v5, to do it. Yet we got a bubble and worse cloak mechanics

So was Phantom improved? Yes. Was he improved correctly that fixes his main issues? Nope. Same with Thunder. Except he gets the added bonus of simply being truly annoying now.

doxjq · 2016-05-24 23:58:14 UTC

I don’t find the bushwhacker turret to be any different. The setup time means nothing to me, most of the problems in regards to the balance were the strength of it, damage output & also the limiting places you can put it since you have to be behind it to set it up, so 1.6s from 2.0s just seems like a redundant change to me.

Yeah I think 140hp for Fragger is fine too, and you’re quite right about Thunder. I feel 160hp was more than enough given the strength of the Stark but time will tell. In its current state it’s virtually impossible to lose an individual battle against anyone (Rhino already charged included) with Thunder if you can aim well with the Stark.

But yeah I dunno. I’m finding the concussion nade better for controlling spawns right now than a Fragger nade, so it’s definitely an interesting change and I’m enjoying it.

doxjq · 2016-05-25 00:00:03 UTC

Personally I’d like to see the option to spin his turret around, so that perhaps when you have it out ready to put down you could just tap zoom to spin it around 90 degrees and again to spin it around 180 degrees or something.

Verticules · 2016-05-25 03:05:44 UTC

On Fragger, I die to shotguns more often now, but my lines don’t look much different, if at all. Doesn’t feel excessive, but I don’t feel the health nerf was needed either.

blonk · 2016-05-25 09:09:12 UTC

Thunder: It’s a tricky one. He’s gone from being mildly irrelevant to entirely obnoxious to fight in the minds of the guys I play with, but I think it’s a good thing in general. They’ve found a place for him and I think they need to be careful not to completely ruin that with any changes they might make. If anything the flashes need a slightly longer cooldown, but anything more than that and I think he’ll fall back into irrelevancy. I loved him before the changes so woteva

Phantom: In pub play he’s one of my favorites at the moment. Combined with some of the new loadouts he’s very effective. The new EMP thing is only useful some of the time but when it works, it works fantastically. Knocking out mines so a fletcher can dash into the trainyard track controls, plant and dash out only for you to shoot the mines as the proxy runs in to defuse causing her to kill herself is almost orchestral. I think they’ve done very well with this change, personally. If it had some more relevancy to the objective I’d take him in my squad nearly all the time.

Though that thing about FF in ranked…ugh

Fraggo: He does feel a little bit on the soft side to me, it makes just careering Arty/Sky a bit more appealing. Don’t really think he needed it, I reckon if they gave it back to him Thunder would seem a little less bullshit as well

Arse crates: I got a 1 hour credit booster so yeah

TheStrangerous · 2016-05-25 13:35:32 UTC

I’ve yet to experiment with thunder. But all I can say is, the way they approach Phantom as a saboteur instead of recon, is the right direction. Similar to how Spy in TF2 could sabotage enemy deployables, the emp wave works with Phantom, but needs some reworking.

pumpkinmeerkat · 2016-05-26 16:05:03 UTC

Would like to see the EMP separated from Phantom’s refractive armor and function similarly to Phoenix’s healing pulse as a second ability. The armor cooldown could then be reduced to what it was before Unlock and Load update.

Thunder feels more effective in 1v1 fights with extra HP but less useful overall without EMP and also more spammy with a longer flash/concussion effect and short cooldown. He’s easier to play but also less rewarding IMO.

SaulWolfden · 2016-05-26 16:24:22 UTC

[quote=“pumpkinmeerkat;183552”]Would like to see the EMP separated from Phantom’s refractive armor and function similarly to Phoenix’s healing pulse as a second ability. The armor cooldown could then be reduced to what it was before Unlock and Load update.

Thunder feels more effective in 1v1 fights with extra HP but less useful overall without EMP and also more spammy with a longer flash/concussion effect and short cooldown. He’s easier to play but also less rewarding IMO.[/quote]

He was never rewarding to begin with imo.

Reddeadcap · 2016-05-27 19:04:17 UTC

Thunder’s EMP given to Phantom was a strange idea imho and I think it could be just been also given to Phantom, that said his higher health and buffs to concussion grenades was much needed.

The MK46 could’ve been given more damage and accuracy at the cost of some ammo and firing speed as the Mk46 feels dependant on headshots rather than headshots being a risk-reward and that the enemy is concussed first.

Phantom cloak, for it’s effectiveness could’ve also been given less visibility while moving or lower sound as there’s an obvious indication that he’s about when deployable are acting up and his huge cool down time once he’s uncloaked

JJMAJR · 2016-05-28 06:19:00 UTC

Reason behind my new profile pic:
[spoiler]Phantom’s changes were pretty trash in my opinion. They destroy your own team’s setup in FF servers, which means an incredible amount of pain for your team. Not only that, but SD decided to reinforce the weaboo melee shit with having Phantom only use heavy melee weapons.

It’s a disgusting display of disrespect towards people that actually want to try being good at stealth, by being a pain for their team if they want invisibility in any form, and having the trashiest movement speed/damage resilience combination in the game.

I honestly propose SD to rethink their shit with Phantom. They didn’t go the melee-intensive route because Phantom was cancer in closed beta with an instant-death sword, so they should learn that is a lost cause.

Instead of having a melee-ranged assassin (which clearly doesn’t work) have Phantom emphasize the importance of defensive stealth. Offensive stealth isn’t going to become anything big, because that defense is always going to be more coordinated and stronger than offense unless with heavy application of force.

However, defensive stealth is much different, where it’s all about ambush and preparation instead of sneaking into a tightly secure place using a bottleneck.

Therefore, Phantom would be a lot stronger if he was rebalanced defensively and to synergize with deployables instead of being a hindrance to them.[/spoiler]

Thunder:
[spoiler]Thunder has become more of an assassin instead of a killing machine. That’s actually pretty freaking amazing. He seeks out Rhinos, other assaults, and recons, and wrecks their face. I kind of view the flashbangs like a whole new kind of sniper rifle because of that.

Thunder also has become more combat-capable than Fragger. He has better grenades, more health, and at the cost of slightly worse weapons. The Stark makes Thunder a sniper, the Timik basically what Phantom should be, and the MK46 basically makes him more survivable with augments. Unfortunately I fear that the MK46 augments may recently have been outdone by the other weapons…[/spoiler]

Fletcher:
[spoiler]I believe this was the class that Phantom was balanced around if I were to give SD a little more credit. Unfortunately Fletcher remains to be a very good pick over most other explosives characters due to how much damage his stickies deal, him having a CQ defense tool, and Objective Specialist. Thus, Phantom got EMP instead of Thunder.

Unfortunately this did little to nothing due to how Phantom screws things up for himself in competitive play.

Another unfortunate thing is that Fletcher still is capable of dishing out major damage due to how his ability is either useless or overpowered, due to only having one ability.

I would say that Fletcher’s explosives should be nerfed to dish out 75 damage, but buff his health to 130 HP (a lot, but for good reason) to compensate for the fact. He could be a tanky objective specialist instead of a mass murdering vanguard of destruction and impending failure.[/spoiler]

But like I said, I give up…

Drac0rion · 2016-05-28 10:08:36 UTC

I’ve been pretty vocal about Phantom after the update, not gonna bother copying those walls of text to here as well.

But the assault mercs have become interesting for me now as well.

Nader is pretty fine where she is. So I’m going to leave her out and compare the other 3 assault mercs. (Maybe +10hp at best to bring her hp closer to the rest of the assault mercs.)

Rhino, 200hp, primaries are all shotguns.

Fragger, 140hp, M4A1, K-121, BR-16, guns that are decent to great at all ranges.

Now these two are pretty balanced in this state in my opinion, as Rhino is limited to close range, but therefore also has by far the highest hp pool.
Fragger however has hp closest to the average merc, but also has access to guns that allow him to play at almost any range.

And now we got Thunder, 170hp, MK46, Stark, Timik.
Thunder got guns that are almost on the same level as Fragger’s. (Not going to discuss MK46’s effectiveness compared to rest of the guns at the moment.)
Yet while being effective at almost any range like Fragger, Thunder has got hp pool close to Rhino.
Now abilities aside, Thunder is a extremely strong merc in terms of stats.

As an end result I’d like to see Fragger remain at his new 140hp and Thunder possibly at 150hp also including that his concussion nades have been reworked to the desired level.
I simply don’t think an assault merc would deserve such high hp as Thunder has right now considering the guns he owns compared to the rest of the mercs in the game.

While of course Thunder shouldn’t be nerfed immediately to then stay out of play for months, his ability should be slightly reworked to put him on par with Fragger, so that the meta around assault mercs wouldn’t just be picking Fragger over Thunder or vice versa just because of the latest nerfs/buffs to the other merc. They should both be solid picks in a team comp.

My suggestion on reworking the Concussion Grenade:
[spoiler]
Ideally the conc nade would be even in value with the frag nade.

Since I’m not a fan of CC as strong as the current conc nade in a shooter, I’d prefer the blind effect to be limited to 2sec max. I mean if something that’s possibly an explosive is thrown anywhere in front of you, you’d never stare directly at it. In compensation Thunder would always cover up his screen with his hand just at the moment of the conc nade explosion to avoid blinding himself. (Maybe he can also announce it out loud to allies so that ally mercs facing the conc nade would also prevent themselves from the flash effect.)

The movement limiting right now is also a little ridiculous to me.
The concussion effect should last about 4sec in my opinion, limiting the movement speed by 25%-35% or so. At least you can shoot back while concussed and I think the blurry vision is pretty neat.

The current counterplay is a joke at the moment. Fragger is at least vulnerable while cooking his nade, while Thunder can just toss one out and it detonates within a second. Please add the nade cooking mechanic to conc nades as well, just maybe have it cook a second or two less.

Now to compensate for all the nerfs:
I’d like to see the concussion grenade to get a slight radius buff as well as finally having some well deserved damage in his nades. Instead of ridiculous CC power I think taking some damage up front is much less annoying to deal with than a 6sec blind where you can’t even slightly move towards safety.
60 damage with a 1.2 - 1.5 times the radius of a frag nade + the CC on top of it should be pretty decent and near close to the effectiveness of a frag nade.
(Inner radius of the nade would be 60dmg, 4sec slow, 2sec blind
middle radius would be 50dmg, 3sec slow, 2sec blind
outer radius would be 20dmg, 2sec slow and blinded if facing towards the center of the explosion.
I wouldn’t mind the inner radius of the conc nade to be lethal to maybe 80hp mercs, but then the CC part should be nerfed even further.)

The real difference between the use of frag and conc nade should be that Fragger has to use his nade from a cover that can possibly one shot mercs, while Thunder could pretty much toss one out mid combat without much penalty that would deal some AoE damage and slightly disorient the enemies.
(If Thunder takes a second or two to cook, he could hit a perfect conc nade and enemies take full effects, if he simply tosses it near them, enemies will be able to avoid the blind and reduce or even avoid the damage/concussion part of the nade based on their distance from the nade.)

This is simply my idea of how I’d like both of the abilities to function.
Theorycrafting is fun.[/spoiler]

TheStrangerous · 2016-05-28 16:48:25 UTC

[quote=“JJMAJR;184029”]Reason behind my new profile pic:
[spoiler]Phantom’s changes were pretty trash in my opinion. They destroy your own team’s setup in FF servers, which means an incredible amount of pain for your team. Not only that, but SD decided to reinforce the weaboo melee @$!# with having Phantom only use heavy melee weapons.

It’s a disgusting display of disrespect towards people that actually want to try being good at stealth, by being a pain for their team if they want invisibility in any form, and having the trashiest movement speed/damage resilience combination in the game.

I honestly propose SD to rethink their @$!# with Phantom. They didn’t go the melee-intensive route because Phantom was cancer in closed beta with an instant-death sword, so they should learn that is a lost cause.