We like to see variety within VHFs by having a very big, very fast unresponsive ship, but the responsiveness it had made the ship too sluggish to dodge fire. As a result the responsiveness is getting buffed which directly increases Anaconda's groupfight power.
This was really a nightmare to duel already. The sides and front profile are ridiculous to try and hit. A buff to help with groupfighting is reasonable, but trying to duel this is really difficult now.
Manta is an example of a ship that's great in duels and lackluster in groupfights mostly due to its size, shape and turn rate. Instead of buffing it in a role it'll never be good at (groupfights), we're giving it some extra arcs on guns and CD to mine trap and trade at early turns better. It has all 6 guns shooting top left or top right and 3 guns shooting bottom left and bottom right. That means a Manta will want to pass under a ship to get all 6 guns on the target while the target will want to pass under a Manta to force it on the 3 guns. A duel buff overall.
Um, I'm not really sure if I understand the point of this, when a turning marlin can fire guns at these arcs anyway.
(03-31-2018, 11:33 AM)Antonio Wrote: Nephthys
-Armor: 13.6k -> 14.2k
-Turn rate: 64.96 -> 66.24
Similarly to Courbe the stats didn't reflect its size. Turn rate buff will help it utilize the 7 guns more while armor increase is a minor buff all-round.
Seems obnoxious when you compare it to the avenger, since it now has more armor and faster turning speed.
(03-31-2018, 11:33 AM)Antonio Wrote: Odin
-Turn rate: 68.75 -> 66.03
-Regens: 66 -> 64
Odin is a prime example of a ship that has top tier stats in everything without being overpowered in any. The result is the ship being strong all-round and having no weakness. While that's great for the Odin players, it's not great for everyone else. Turn rate is getting nerfed to tune down its dueling potency. It'll undoubtedly still be a great groupfighting ship.
Overkill. It was basically a guardian with improved stats. The ship isn't designed to be on defensive all the time to justify such a slow turn rate. If you made it like the Guardian but with only slightly inferior stats in every manner to compensate for the hitbox and shape, it would be preferable to just killing the turn rate.
(03-31-2018, 11:33 AM)Antonio Wrote: Raven's Talon
-Responsiveness 0.4605 -> 0.4441
Small responsiveness buff to increase groupfight potential. Same as Prosecutor.
I really think this should get a turn rate buff as well. It's not good at anything. Might as well make it a duelling ship with high turn rate since it's quite big.
As mentioned before at Greyhound, being a 5 gunner usually means being very small or very fast. Wraith was both which resulted in great groupfight potential as well as duels. We're nerfing the latter. Some might notice that the Wraith is much easier to deshield than do hull damage compared to other VHFs and that's because it has a bigger shield bubble while being smaller compared to them. Considering shield consistently goes down in groupfights and hull is the thing people struggle with mostly, it still remains a strong groupfighting ship.
Also seems like overkill. Cutting the core would have been preferable so that it didn't do so much damage in a group fight.
Also, dev team's stance on Titan, Tachi, Wyvern, Eagle and Sabre?
(07-12-2018, 05:54 PM)Sciamach Wrote: Outcast slavery is actually far better for the victim than the corporate slavery and crime-less imprisonment of the Houses down in places like Liberty Rheinland and Bretonia
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(04-01-2018, 11:32 AM)Reeves Wrote: The idea of the change is fine, the Odin was too good in far too many things without enough disadvantages, but I think you've missed the mark of what it should be getting reductions in, which is certainly not turn-rate. The Odin is a visibly sleek ship and as such should have its hull cut down to perhaps the Falchion's amount, or honestly within the range of 10,900 and 11,000, and see its core reduced to 1160 recharge, that way, it's forced to be played with the same niche that it's always had. Sliding.
It's very absurd to see an agile looking ship being slower than some 7 gun VHFs with more core and armour, though the argument of shape can be used, I think shape becomes less of a factor if your opponent has an easier time working his way around you because you physically cannot play the ship the way it was designed to be used. As it currently is, it has to be flown like the Sabre, though it actually can't be flown like the sabre because it's somewhat slower and lacks the 7th gun.
I fail to see how making heavier 7 gun VHFs faster and making lighter 6 gun VHFs slower does. That just defies the logic behind their roles. Especially if we reflect on the Nepthys which has been historically comparable to the Avenger but with a 7th gun.
This isn't a rant about "oh noes, Odin trash now, Lich and Sabre OP." It's a logical explanation that highlights an oversight in the rebalance, while highlighting other areas of the ship where tuning would make more sense. More fragility to match its appearance and less of a core recharge rate make sense when the ship and all the lore behind it are taken into consideration, it's a ship built with a keen focus on high engine performance.
Let's clear up some misconceptions first. Defining an "agile looking ship" is a subjective and highly variable. Something that "looks like it's agile" to one player probably won't look so to the majority, and there's always going to be a bunch of people saying the opposite. We try to stay away from subjective measurements and therefore don't balance a ship's turn rate based on what we "feel how agile it looks".
Instead, we look at each ship individually and what role the ship needs to fill relative to primarily its size, shape, and then purpose, area, opponents it fights, etc. It's the same for all classes and I'll give you examples to demonstrate. Bergelmir is the smallest bomber in the game. It's also the slowest light bomber and one of the slowest bombers in general with terrible responsiveness. Why? Because instead of saying "it's small so it makes sense it's fast" and making it overpowered we do what it requires for the ship to be balanced. It goes against logic because yeah, a smaller ship should be faster, but if the ship would be too good or too bad with that in mind, balancing a ship comes before that.
Similarly, we have a Corsair cruiser as the biggest cruiser in the game being one of the faster ones. Why? Because when it had the worst turn rate -while- being as big as it is, it was garbage. We buffed the turn rate to make it viable in spite of the logic of bigger=slower. If we applied that logic to every ship in the game many of them'd become overpowered/underpowered, it's necessary to keep the game balanced. There are other examples such as Libdread being the slowest BS, Chimaera being the slowest HF (slower than some VHFs), etc. Bottom line is, we balance a ship individually based on what we need to do to make it balanced. If it requires a big ship to be fast, so be it. And so we come to VHFs which I didn't want to mention before.
Why are 7 gun big VHFs like Nephthys, Lhotse, Courbe, Arbeiter getting/already have high turn rates on top of the extra gun? Because we have to look at their role within VHFs and advantages/disadvantages compared to other ships. Let's take a bunch of them like Guardian, Odin, Wraith and Stellion. Comparing the first group with the second one, what're the differences you can immediately spot? First one is that all 4 former ships are bigger. Say we give all of them low turn rates by following the logic "big=slow". Because they are bigger, they're easier to hit. Because they're easier to hit, they're worse in duels and noticeably worse in groupfights. In order to compensate that, they need some tankiness. They get it, but we look at it again and they're still lacking the turn rate compared to a smaller ship. The smaller ship will outperform it in every scenario that isn't mindless jousting because it's faster -and- smaller.
Then they get an extra gun. But they're still too slow because they're big and can't utilize the 7th gun for duels, while in groupfights 6 guns already drain your core so the extra gun is felt much less and the size problem remains. So they need extra turn rate in order to utilize the 7th gun -and- be better at something than the 4 latter ships who're smaller. They become more suitable for duels but they're still worse in groupfights because size and shape define 90% of a ship's capability to dodge unless we drastically change a stat (Bergelmir).
What's the end result? The first and the second group both have some advantages/disadvantages rather than making them flat out worse. As Traxit mentioned, people often overlook size because it's not instantly evident when you're reading stats on paper, so it seems that a ship with 68.75 turn rate, 7 guns, 14k armor and 15k core is super strong, while in reality it dies very quickly in a groupfight. To summarize, big 7 gunners are made for dueling because size is such a big disadvantage in a groupfight that we'd have to drastically change a stat like responsiveness to make them as good as smaller ships. Instead, we take the less resisting approach and make them better duelists. Don't get me wrong, big ships can still groupfight and small ships can duel, at the end of the day it's all about skill as snubs have the highest skill ceiling and gap of all classes.
As for why did we nerf the turn rate and not something else? Mostly because Wraith got its turn rate nerfed as well. Odin was strong all-round and we could've picked any stat to nerf. We chose turn rate. Complaining why we chose A and not B sounds like nitpicking. As for the Lich and Sabre comparison, Odin still has: about the same armor and B/B, much better core than the Sabre (2 levels above) and a bit better core than the Lich (1 level above), 1 less gun, better size, arguably the same shape (some people have no problem shooting a sabre while some hate it because of the holes) and a bit less responsiveness.
The main thing here is size and core. Odin will be worse in a duel, but it's -supposed to be- because it's better in a groupfight. Core and size mean much more in the latter while turn rate and guns mean more in the former. That's a perfect example of advantage/disadvantage scenario. Also, if we make Odin good at duels and nerf the groupfights, Hessians end up with 2 ships that fulfill the same role because they're both made for dueling more than groupfights. By doing that we remove variety and flexibility for Hessians. If you're looking to duel people, fly the Sabre. Otherwise, fly the Odin. At the end of the day both ships can do both, but we made small differences to emphasize the advantage/disadvantage scenario.
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@Kyoi & @"WPeregrine" and everyone - this update was rushed and the changes were done in less than 3 weeks since I returned to the team which is why in the first paragraph I mentioned the following:
(03-31-2018, 11:33 AM)Antonio Wrote: We'll make another balance pass for VHFs so if you're surprised a name isn't on the list, there's likely a good reason for it.
With that in mind, yes, some ships have been forgotten in all the rush such as the Wyvern. Wyvern will most definitely get nerfed in a future patch.
Anaconda's whole purpose is to be great at duels because it's that big so it dies when focused in any other scenario. While the responsiveness is buffed, it's still one of the least responsive ships in the game.
Avenger is worse, I agree. Nephthys has 200 more armor and 1 less bot/bat, overall it's negligible. The turn rate is less than half a degree difference as well. With Avenger getting an extra gun they'll be basically identical. We'll keep track of the big fat 7 gunners and how they fare in the future, I'm not against an Avenger buff seeing as everyone prefers the Guardian anyways, the 7th gun will make it more appealing.
Raven's Talon is already pretty agile, if the responsiveness won't be enough it could go to 70+ turn rate, but it requires testing the ship first.
Titan will also most definitely get nerfed. Tachi, Eagle and Sabre look alright and funnily enough those 3 ships are the ones that people have different opinion on the most. Some call the Sabre overpowered because it's unhittable while some say it should have a better core or be faster, some call the Eagle bad because of its size while some love its turn rate. I'd say all those 3 ships do the role they're designed for alright, with Tachi needing a bit more analysis because seeing good BD pvpers is a rare sight. Seeing as it has very low armor and below average core, if the ship is too small and good at dodging a turn rate nerf is a possiblity.
As mentioned before at Greyhound, being a 5 gunner usually means being very small or very fast. Wraith was both which resulted in great groupfight potential as well as duels. We're nerfing the latter. Some might notice that the Wraith is much easier to deshield than do hull damage compared to other VHFs and that's because it has a bigger shield bubble while being smaller compared to them. Considering shield consistently goes down in groupfights and hull is the thing people struggle with mostly, it still remains a strong groupfighting ship.
lmao
Why Rhineland lawful get so much nerfing love
You can ignore reality but you can not ignore consequences of ignoring reality
I called those ships out because of polarising opinions on them in the community.
Eagle has a very awkward issue of being almost unbeatable in duels because of a broken hitbox at the front and fast turn rate. However, it is way too easy of a target in group fights because it is large and the hitbox is perfectly fine at the back.
Tachi is all round too good. It is small enough to outbox anything and too difficult to hit be it in duels or group fights. All around the ship appears to be roughly the same size at every angle so it does not appear to have any angles to exploit. The only weakness is a minor one in terms of health, but it hardly matters when it does not get hit. It is also quite fast and absolutely shreds an already broken ship like the Wyvern in a duel due to its size and speed.
What I really dislike about Sabre is that it seems extremely lacklustre in duels and groupfights. It is slow and large enough (esp the shield bubble) to be ineffective at duelling. The 7th gun does not matter much when there is no core to make use of it. Its big enough that it keeps taking damage in group fights. I am quite alarmed to hear people complaining about it being unhittable since I regularly fight top tier players who use sabre and they do noticeably worse than if they were on just about any other ship. At the same time, people have conflicting opinions on how it should be used. What is the dev team's vision for the role of sabre? Should it be for duelling or in group fights?
(07-12-2018, 05:54 PM)Sciamach Wrote: Outcast slavery is actually far better for the victim than the corporate slavery and crime-less imprisonment of the Houses down in places like Liberty Rheinland and Bretonia
The sabre is no longer a violation of ship balance and is now an average ship, as it should be. It's still good if used by skilled players, but that goes for any ship's particular quirks, really.
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(04-01-2018, 02:04 PM)Yaoquizque Wrote: Would that be a good idea to properly hitbox wyvern and perhaps upscale the model by 10% or something?
When you have to upscale a model you know something's -really- wrong with it. That's a last resort option and I'd rather give it a Templar turn rate if that's needed to make it balanced. What part of the hitbox is broken specifically? From what I see it's just a little bit bigger Chimaera with VHF stats, that's the main issue. We make it a balanced Chimaera of VHFs by giving it the lowest turn rate.
Same goes for Tachi if it's too small -and- too fast, I explained that in the post about the Odin. The turn rate nerf wouldn't be so drastic but it would be felt for sure. What do you mean with the broken Eagle hitbox at the front @Kyoi? If there's a bug please report it in the appropriate thread, it's much easier to track stuff from there.
Sabre won't likely be changed as it's average right now. It's alright in both duels and groupfights. In duels it has 7 guns but low core to force you to pick your shots carefully at close range or use efficient guns (5 8.33s on a Sabre are not recommended). It's not too quick because it's not too big either so the turn rate is average. Size is average as well, shape is as I mentioned a debatable topic but it's okay overall, nothing special. In groupfights that mediocre size, average responsiveness and shape allow it to perform good while dodging and bad while focusing people, because core's what matters the most there.
Overall an average snub and considering it's a generic one we've no intention of changing it atm. Problem with generic tech is that if it's too good everyone starts using it and you'll see Sabres vs Sabres only, remember 4.85? Same goes for any other generic ship or weapon, they must be regulated especially to not be too good. We're still lookin at the Scraper for that matter after it lost the meme responsiveness.