Spiral Knights - A True balance for lockdown

A True balance for lockdown

12 replies [Last post]

Sat, 07/12/2014 - 02:33

Xpekt

Lockdown is by far my favourite pass-time in spiral knights, being enticing and exciting and overall giving us an other means of fighting a non ai enemy.

But with any mmo that has progressed from a flaccid PvE only environment to the all out war that is PvP misbalances and miscalculations occur.

I have to say the first few months of lockdown where actually pretty fun, back in the day when i just had an ash tail and a faust i could still play even against higher tier players with full 5* sets.

Unique variants

Then a few updates rolled in and Uv's became a thing suddenly I couldn't land a hit, why ? because someone who was significantly richer bought that asi high GF and can seemingly swing it faster than my light based weapon i.e flourish.

Now i know this has been said countless times over and over but i'll say it once more some uv's are op.

Now I am not going to continue doing a rant on how uv's are bad instead i am going to try to explain how we can balance them for the poorer players.

Firstly keeping on the note of asi ,certain scaling of attack speed on certain weapons like heavy ones i.e gf should scale much lower.
Why so ?
Well gran faust is a high risk - high damage weapon, being if you choose to use it you have to use it well in order to deal damage as you are putting yourself in a vulnerable situation.

Now with asi this high risk to high damage scenario is more like a high damage to relatively small openings for it to be considered risky at all, dealing horrendous amounts of damage with little to no risk at all.

So certain scalings should be lowered to maintain the weapons original purpose.

Support / Defensive classes.

Let's face it a very small portion of the community plays recon / guardian and when they are played only a few players manage to shine. This is caused by the one sided damage over defensive strategies. Recon as a class is quite good overall , some players actually do use it to it's full potential but it's still relatively lacking in many games. Whilst recon serves a high damage high health and the ability to cloak some players refrain from it due to it's lack of mobility and if not used properly can be quite obvious.

Many times you can either predict a recon or simply see it's footsteps, I for one think that recons should be a fear all over the map so i suggest that the footsteps are removed or made less obvious and the mark that you get on your head when recons are nearby has a shorter radius so recons can get closer to their target before they can just dash away. This makes recon an assassin in a way picking off single targets and capturing points and actually keeping your enemies on their toes as the recon description says . Currently the mark is also said to increase damage dealt by ''reducing their defences'' I honestly see no true difference that arises from this.

In all games with PvP there is always the true support class and in our case it is the gaurdian, one of the most neglected classes out there. Guardian can be quite useful don't get me wrong but in certain cases a gaurdian is nothing more than a moving damage bag. the shield useful to protect team-mates is useless in team fights as the shield upon either the gaurdian or the players get hit by one or more gf hits will break. Rather than simply ''buffing'' the shield we could add an extra layer of utility, the gaurdian could truly serve his purpose by actually protecting his allies. We all know that gaurdian aura right ? the one that when we first saw taught it was a cool shield to keep the baddies away ? Well that's the idea in a sense as we take the gaurdian shield and actually make it so players can't walk into the your allies when this shield is up but since the obvious abuse is going to come with a team full of guardians spawn camping i suggest that the shield remains as it is but when a gaurdian shields an ally for say 30 - 15 seconds he/she can activate the gaurdian shield to temporarily block players from entering say 8 - 10 seconds and healing them 1 bar health per second so 8 - 10 health regen. This shield could be broken but the amount of players would not affect how fast it breaks / forms. The stronger gaurdian shield could be activated by yes ... another hot key allocated towards it.

But why change the gaurdian shield at all ? see guardians right now have little utility in team fights as their shield give way very quickly thus giving them the ability to hold off enemy attack allows the team to turn a fight around , capture a point and even make a clean escape making it almost a necessity to have a gaurdian on your team

For striker there isn't much to say as it is the squishy damage dealer we all know and love and doesn't really need any particular changes.

Classes picking.

We all played on a team with all striker, actually that's almost every game so this leads back to the other classes being neglected. What i suggest for both balanced and diversity is that a team would spawn in the class room right off and have about 30 seconds to decide what class they want to pick. Classes would be limited such as 2 guardians 2 recons and 2 strikers or something like that and it would obviously change in 4 v 4's etc. This would give a new element to the fight rather than having 4 strikers fight off you would have a balanced team effort.

Leaving the game.

I'm sick of people that just leave the game for no reason and it really frustrates me too when victory is so close and it's just thrown away. I suggest that when you leave a game you get some form of penalty being a short suspension maybe an hour or 2 for the first few times you leave and increases progressively with increase of leaves. Now i'm not saying any names but certain people tend to leave when they get killed i.e rage quit and this may hence help prevent that along with leaving the game because of the statement i said about class picking, i.e ''I didn't get the class i want so i am going to leave hahahahah'' and so on...

These were a few things that could help balance certain things i found to be irritating in lock-down, feedback is always appreciated and i thank you if you actually read all my text

Sun, 07/13/2014 - 01:23

Fangel

Here's a few other fixes.

I'm going to go over the problems you stated, and give other potential fixes and/or modify what you've given.

UVs
UVs are fine where they are. UVs don't make a player better, they just make them faster. A good example of a player who's fast but not exactly the best with their weapons would be Revans. There might be other factors involved, such as connection, but for a player who has weapons that are more-or-less considered "god tier", they aren't exactly a god on the battlefield(Not a bad player, but definitely not a player that will turn the tide of battle by simply being there).

The weapons are only as good as their wielder.

Non-strikers
As a primary recon/guardian, I can speak a bit from experience on this end of the spectrum. The recon footprints are a bother, but they aren't what breaks the class. Removing the footprints would be a step in the right direction, though. The deathmark is what makes this class so beautiful as completely removing all defense from an enemy will reduce that penta-heart skolver down to only a few hits. The range on the deathmark is a little large, however it is fine with the current size. Recons emphasize bombs and guns anyways, so we don't want to reduce range on the cloak too much.
However, it would be nice to have a better visual for the deathmark "pulse", so we know when we will mark enemies better. If you are trying to not be found, you can time your walking so that a striker will run past you before the pulse goes off. Perhaps even speed up the pulses when moving, and slow them down when standing idle.

For guardians, the shield simply breaks too quickly. What it needs are status resistances, and to buff teammate defense (think defense orb) for a few seconds while within the shield range. The defense buff would last for teammates another 8 seconds after leaving the shield range, and all would remain invulnerable while within the shield range. The shield should not act as a defensive wall, as that prevents all sword users from being able to attack a shielded guardian.

Classes
Forcing people to be a certain class would hurt. However, it would be nice to have a class cap of (max players on a team - 1). On a team of 4, only 3 could be strikers, and on a team of 6, only 5 could. This eliminates the ability to have amazing 6v6 recon battles though, which are some of the most fun things I've experienced in lockdown.

Leavers
Don't penalize leavers, but also don't penalize the team that the leaver was on. Either reduce spawntimes for the team that has a leaver, or increase spawntimes for the team with more players. If this seems sort of iffy, add monsters into the game that will fight for the team with less players. Ever wanted to have a gremlin fight with you?

Sun, 07/13/2014 - 01:33

Floerail

for leavers..

i disagree with leaver penalty.. some people have problem like dc or something that force them to leave~
but i rather make leaver rank board (lulz) than give penalty like that~

Sun, 07/13/2014 - 07:56

Fehzor

Honestly I think its best that Three Rings give up on lockdown. Trying to support it in terms of balance with the rest of the game is a bad idea, and it will never be seen as a top tier PvP game. Why is this? Because it is a minigame attached to Spiral Knights, that is biased by money. I don't care if I'm just bad, when someone can cheat using their money to run through my mist bombs that they don't resist normally, it feels bad to me and it makes them a better player. On top of that is the diversity of gear that you would need to really work well-- if I have ash of agni/venom veilor and you're Hippo and have every single bomb with ctr very high on them all, then you're at a huge advantage. Not every player needs every weapon, but a common core of usable weapons would be nice. This doesn't bode well for PvP either.

To fix this, you would have to make lockdown just as viable as playing in the arcade, kill punch, provide for more equal opportunity bits of gear... by the time you got done with it, it wouldn't be lockdown, nor would it be profitable for the game-- all of those UV rolls. Then once you manage to improve it all up, people would still find some knit picky thing to complain about.

Sun, 07/13/2014 - 08:33

Xpekt

@Fangel Floerail and Fehzor (The Triple f's)

@fangel uv's aren't balanced as you might think and i am not looking at it from the wrong perspective either.

Whilst i completely agree that you still need to have a certain level of skill to utilize the uv's to their maximum potential ,some weapons just completely break the barrier that they just become a clicking fest due to their severe overpowered nature which deviates from their original creation.

I actually decided to try an asi vh gf using trinkets and an asi med uv, i can assure you i got 20k plus in almost every game and it was op. I for one am not the best player with swords I moreover prefer my guns but having a sword which is intended to be heavy and slow and suddenly it's swing time is reduced so it could match that or at least come close to a light based weapon, whilst still dealing tons of damage is way too overpowered.

This is the summary of the games i played with asi vh gf.

Get into fight , 5 people chasing me .... lol let me just double click whoops missed doesn't matter i can swing again lol they all died.

Not to mention it's ridiculous aoe...

But take an ff with asi vh whilst still attaining a certain level of ''opiness'' it still serves it's purposes as a light damage fast weapon.

What i am trying to say here is that certain uv's as also mentioned by fehzor that alter the game mechanics i.e resistance to mist bombs should be looked over.

So the scaling for gf asi would still be significant but it would not change this high risk factor that it was intended to bring out when developed

@fehzor Same for bombs which primarily deal status effects, someone who has invested 50$ or more to the game can easily get armour that can virtually walk over a good majority of bombs and remember bombers can only carry 4 bombs and unless bombers have some form of sword or gun they are walking targets (Due to helpful team-mates who just want kills cough cough damage) In turn making these bombers seem even more useless.

So at what fehzor said what i would do to somewhat balance it out but not entirely negate this invulnerability is 2 suggestions;

1. We give mist bombs a small explosion with a minor knocking effect effectively increasing it's damage output slightly
2. Increase the status from weak to moderate as to add the effect to any player. (Max resistance players will have the effect reduced but not negated)

Also @Floerail a problem i encountered a lot in my games is dc and i suggest a way to make it so players can reconnect to games that they have been disconnected from.

Sun, 07/13/2014 - 10:24

Holy-Nightmare

On UVs, when you use a VT you

On UVs, when you use a VT you don't expect a Skolver to rush through and GF combo you, you would however expect them to walk through a Shivermist. Status UVs ruin area denial weapons like VT,SS, and SMB.

Skolver allows the user to take advantage of higher damage while making the use of large swords harder, Vog cub makes large swords more viable at the cost of damage. ASI UVs make some of the harder hitting swords almost as fast (if not faster) than your standard small swords.

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On classes, Recon footprints are troublesome, the point of being invisible is not being seen. Thanks to the sword debuff recons have trouble and with UVs haze bombing is an iffy topic, as for guns most would prefer striker due to its mobility over a pinch of CTR and ASI. (Recon needs gun damage boosts)

Thanks to armor perks and UVs guardian shields become rather useless except as protection from light gunfire and haze bombs, ultra damage gunfire can break your shield fairly fast and leave you at range with no shield. (guardians need flinch immunity and a sword damage perk to hit back harder and make strikers think before tackling a guardian)

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Forcing players out of their comfort zone would get OOO rage, rather make it so that people see the underused classes as something just as viable.

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As for leavers I kind of like Fangel's idea, but I don't think a little gremlin would help much. Rather make a Trojan spawn on the map (damaging it doesn't improve your score) that targets the enemy team (give it a massive agro range, a nice helping of ASI and tracking, and enough AI not to walk into hazes), If it dies it respawns a few seconds later outside the ally team's base.

Sun, 07/13/2014 - 23:52

Xpekt

@holy-nightmare

When you say forcing players out of their comfort zone you make it sound bad, currently there is no balance i.e class caps and hence no balance thus making to two other classes useless as stated before hand by Fangel who said that with penta trinkets strikers just get such a buff.

Now i am going to talk moreover on the mechanics of the current class system rather than the picking before the game as i feel it is more important.

Striker had not always been the most viable class i have been playing this game since it was released and one faithful summer after a lot of suggested for PvP , OOO decided to realise lockdown. The first day of lockdown was truly beautiful ..... none knew what was going on and people where trying out new weapons and classes and it was all good fun.

There was balance strikers couldn't tank guardians served their purpose and recon was my favourite class for sneaking up on people.

While even I use penta trinkets though i usually substitute on for asi i agree that strikers shouldn't have as much health as they currently do.

This will make people rage including me because i am hell set on striker and i have been using it for ages but it is what has to be done.

Why so ?, well I think the only way to balance lockdown would be to remove health trinkets out of the picture secondly i know how squishy strikers can be and that they can be 2 shot with a vailance so i suggest remove the -3 health debuff as to sort of balance it out.

I also suggest that gaurdians get a +5 health buff so they can be truly tanky along with the suggestion stated before hand.

In this way strikers aren't moving tanks, recons are no longer invisible gaurdians and gaurdians are actually viable to tank.

I think this might bring balance to a somewhat screwed up system.

Mon, 07/14/2014 - 07:34

Holy-Nightmare

STORYTIME!

Suppose you come up to a scrawny dog with a bone in his mouth, if you try to take the bone he will try to kill you, if you hand him a steak he will drop the bone and be your best friend.

A similar story could be made about lockdown, don't force players to play certain classes but make it so that they know that using the other classes can get them big numbers as well.

HP trinks in any pvp game make things less balanced, In TF2 you have certain classes with more HP but their weapons may be hard to use or they may have low mobility, In AQW members have the choice to pick up and use a +3000 hp amulet but the PVP community condemns it so much that everyone uses the nonmember +1500 out of respect for each other, In Unreal Tournament you can pick up little vials of HP boosts and armor but doing so requires you to search out those items each life.

In SK all you need to do is buy the enamorocks in the AH, Alch them into pentas, buy some slots and slap them on and congratulations, you can now beat nearly any untrinketed player in LD. That is isn't winning by pure skill it is winning because you bought it.

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Recons rely on invisibility to play, bad idea removing it. Guardians already have a ton of HP compared to either of the untrinketed classes, so nah. Strikers were made to hit and fall hard, more HP would just allow them to tank a DA/GF to the face and run back to spawn to heal (like usual).

Mon, 07/14/2014 - 08:09

Autofire

You are experiencing a PICNIC ERROR!

*sigh*

The problem is that HP scales very, very badly. If HP were to scale after heart trikets applied, then we'd all be happy! I'm saying that Strikers lose...let's say 33% of their max HP, rounded up. If I put on Pentas, then I lose 33% of their bonus. I will still be tankier, but...

Also, the same thing should effect other classes, so that Guardians get 33-50% more HP. As crazy as this sounds, it would truly make the Gaurdian a good tank...

Mon, 07/14/2014 - 08:34

Xpekt

@holy-nightmare

I agree that the community which is biased to the tanks striker set would not take it upon lightly having such a change, but it's something that has to be done...

Think of it as a bandage you can either leave it there , festering the wound or you can rip that sucker off hurting a little but in time will heal and it can begin to heal from the damage.

Think of the current system as a bandage put on to stop the bleeding (players leaving due to bordem of PvE), ok at first the bandage was good it helped us , we liked it but now 2 yrs have past and we see no change and the wound is festering and people are leaving ...

Face it balance changes are something that don't only apply to ld, normal runs also suffer a bit from this....

Whilst changes i said might not be perfect as to what the game would require it's the basis of what needs to happen. You mentioned tf2 and i presume you are talking about the heavy class. Be it as it may the chance of a scout i.e striker to take on a heavy on his own and life is minimal and same should apply to current mechanics of lockdown. Now in tf2 you have a diverse set of classes all have strengths and weaknesses. Here is where we hit the bump in our metaphorical road spiral knights has 3 classes so this lowers diversity of roles. Take tf2 you have multiple roles to satisfy certain requirements in a fight range, health , damage , utility and so on. Therefore having one class that is dominant is very easy , why ? because if there isn't this dominant class the game would become boring.

People in our community aren't as thoughtful as you mentioned in AQW and will abuse any edge the developers give. Take uv's, op weapons, op classes name it and it's probably being abused. I am no saint in all this for i too abuse these mechanics, why ? because if you don't you'll find yourself dying every time you spawn...

Now back to my original point which if you haven't yet figured it's written in the main thread is to give more utility to guardians and giving recons a bit more stealth whilst also increasing base health for gaurdian and potentially but not likely removing health trinkets and removing the striker -3 health debuff to counteract the massive change. By doing what i initially said we could bring a somewhat balance to our system, why ?

Like i said in games like tf2 you have multiple classes which all serve a different role, now since in this game we only have 3 classes due to the small staff we try to include these features in these classes. Giving gaurdian an actual shield to hold back enemies would serve well in a team fight and it might change the course of it, now this is encompassing the high damage dealing factor of the tf2 heavy whilst protecting his allies as he is intend i.e medic, whilst recon currently does have some assassinating properties but lacks the so required stealth decreasing the mark range and removing the footprints may make the recon more like the spy a silent assassin which when uncloaks deals tons of damage to single / multiple targets unexpectedly. Whilst also making striker more like a scout who is fast and deals a lot of damage but when facing a heavy on his own doesn't win instantly and for him to overcome a gaurdian would require a lot of skill and kitting not simply break shield a couple of hits and he's down.

I hope this explains what i am trying to encompass.

Mon, 07/14/2014 - 08:38

#10

Xpekt

@autofire

Thank you for understanding what i am trying to say.

Mon, 07/14/2014 - 09:53

#11

Fehzor

@Xpekt

No, not the same for bombs. All of the players see the bombs, and know that they need tweaking. When I was new and I'm talking T1 new, my friend made an observation about the weapon types, and it went something like-

"Swords are for dealing the bulk of damage, guns are for support and safer damage, and bombs are just kind of there for crowd control. So really swords and guns are necessary, and bombs aren't."

It would help the game considerably if the developers changed bombs to work better, as it would open up more combat options, provide even greater incentive to craft items, and would not hinder the UV market. Even if CTR wasn't as effective, it would still be lusted after. Lockdown on the other hand needs far more tweaking than bombs do, and as I said would show less for it.

Mon, 07/14/2014 - 11:06

#12

Holy-Nightmare

@Xpekt

There is no dominant class in TF2.

At close to medium range few outdo a Heavy but the Spy (who has low HP) is able to get in close to KO him, the Sniper can take out a buffed Heavy in a few long range headshots (which require skill). The Demoman can set traps (which takes a brain) to lure the Heavy into and is capable of dealing enough burst damage to take out nearly any class (though he can't take this massively damaging trap around with him.

The Spy is capable of KOing any class but being able to get behind enemies (even while disguised) is a feat in itself. Spies can turn invisible but they can be revealed by stray bullets, and any fire weapon.

The Sniper is capable of dealing massive damage (though to only one player at a time) and often hangs back from the group, supporting the front lines by picking off key targets but also reducing the capture rate. Due to many maps being filled with twists and turns there are few maps where snipers can see the full field.

I could go on but the point is that TF2 is a great PVP game due to the balance each class has, you can choose any class and make a sizeable contribution to your team but you have to sacrifice something.

Short of Bombs, the UVed/Trinketed striker loses little and gains massive mobility and power.

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A True balance for lockdown