Spiral Knights - Make Recons (and Guns) Great Again in Lockdown

Make Recons (and Guns) Great Again in Lockdown

7 replies [Last post]

Thu, 04/11/2019 - 22:16

Sgt-Brownie

So it's a well-known fact that Strikers are inherently broken, much like how Guardians are broken on the opposite side of the spectrum... and then you have Recons, who are strangely balanced within an otherwise overwhelming ecosystem.

Now, it *would* be better for the game mode if both Strikers and Guardians were nerfed into reasonable conditions, but you and I both know that'll just make all the ATcheron Strikers cry and quit the game, ultimately losing more money than it was worth it.

So instead, let's up the stakes by bringing Recons back up to speed:
1) Have the Recon Mark, the first time you bleep an enemy while under cloak, cut their defenses in half, providing more and quicker damage potential for Recon players practically free of charge.
2) Have both Recon and Death Marks affect the Guardian Shield defenses, so that now Recons have no awful matchups; again, free of charge.
3) Have the Recon Cloak start regenerating instantly the moment they uncloak, and yes, that also means even when the Cloak is broken, meaning that it's never ever broken; did I mention it was free of charge?

Bam, now every class is broken, therefore making it balanced because nobody is broken when everybody is.

Aww, but I'm sure some ATcheron Strikers will still qq about this, so I say we throw them a little bone by adding a ASI Low for Guns on their Striker class, so now they can spam their Polaris/Arcana with hard-earned ASI VH UVs even more often, and would you look at that; now every LD class gives stat buffs for at least two weapon types, ain't that just dandy.

#ThisIsLiterallyTheEasiestWayToBalanceLDPleaseDoItGHThanks

Fri, 04/12/2019 - 00:46

Hatn

I think...

I think that's a wonderful idea.

https://i.imgur.com/p7vjzcA.png

Fri, 04/12/2019 - 22:11

Tpen-Five-Fun

Not only the acherons op dmg

Not only the acherons op dmg are a problem imo, I also think toothpicks are OP because it's so quick for a sword that does wide cleave. It's worse if you have terrible ping, each strike will rubberband you a few steps back.

Yea I also think recons need some minor buffs.

Sun, 04/14/2019 - 17:14

Massive-Lag-Spikes

the classes are not what's broken

What's broken are the mechanics. The game mechanics encourage people spamming DPS rather than strategic game play. The fact that Strikers are dominant is just a side-effect of that.
It's just so much easier to abuse game mechanics as Striker so more people play it. It's only an "everything you can do I can do better" situation because the concept of "better" has been skewed by game physics.

Mon, 04/15/2019 - 07:58

Sgt-Brownie

"Erecting a Handgun Dispenser."

The only real reason why ATcherons and Toothpicks were and still are so dominant is *because* the Striker Booster is so broken in the right hands, since you can close the gap with it, bob and weave with full control between attacks, and still have more than enough boost meter to run across from one side of the map to the other in record speed; the only weakness of swords completely thrown out the window. Oh and did I mention that their health penalty is actually bugged and doesn't work? Literally and metaphorically broken, thy name be Striker Booster.

The Guardian Shield isn't much better either, since it practically doubles the longevity of whoever's holding it while also making it a forward health dispenser for the user and the rest of the team, essentially making it impossible to take down 1v1.

Meanwhile, the Recon Cloak can, like, uhhh, let you avoid teamfights altogether and try to sneakily capture an enemy base... except when you can't because they've all been captured by your team already, so all you have left is a decent support ability... except that it takes forever to pull off unlike the Guardian Shield, and you'll be damned if you can even be allowed to use it for yourself even 1v1 without your enemies doing something about it.

Wed, 04/17/2019 - 12:41

Fangel

ehhh

I... Disagree but agree with bits of this? Striker is the best class on its own, Guardian is really hard to master but, surprisingly, gets absolutely amazing the more guardians you have working together, and recon is best at ambushing and just showing up out of nowhere to suddenly hold down an area. They all have their strengths and weaknesses as is with the class, but guardian and recon have a much harder time making up for their weaknesses as striker just has to throw on health trinkets and they're good to go.

Something you do bring up that's interesting is the idea of a recon mark having a preemptive effect. I think if we implemented class damage boosts, we could make it so that exclusively recons deal an additional MAX damage boost to all marked players, regular marked or deathmarked. This maintains the important of a deathmark for teamplay, but allows recons to be more aggressive on their own by simply marking a target then ambushing them immediately. It also prevents the annoying scenario most recons encounter where you mark a striker and then they run out of your range and then shoot randomly to find you, and then the moment you reach them your recon mark wears off.

Recons already absolutely obliterate guardians, but the issue is that it's rare you go up against guardians and when you do, they're usually being assaulted by 2-3 strikers already so you never really get to see yourself shine with the deathmarking. With this change, only recons would benefit from the first tick, making teaming up with a fellow recon both an amazing tactic, but also a legitimate strategy as you could both trade off visibility while simultaneously dishing out more natural damage than a striker without a followup requirement.

Thu, 04/18/2019 - 12:19

Sgt-Brownie

:thinking:

I'm not sure if the Death Mark actually does anything against a Guardian Shield, but from what I've experienced, a Guardian can usually just stall for a long time against a Recon while one or two Strikers come on over, and while that 1v1 is already problematic enough as a result of said stalling, a 2v1 would be downright impossible without *maybe* some miraculous houdini plays; hence my suggestion.

I personally wouldn't mind your spin on the idea of the Recon Mark -- it'd still let Recons actually have a proper 1v1 presence -- so long as that damage boost wouldn't be hard limited to +6; otherwise that'd just be unfortunate for those that invested in damage and get diminishing returns as a result.

Mon, 04/22/2019 - 19:34

Fangel

i think the hard limit is alright

I was thinking either the mark makes it so recons get the full damage bonus that a black kat user would have or it grants a flat +6 damage boost. This makes the need for damage boosting gears less required (and instead timed marks and ASI gear would be perfect), but it also needs to be something that doesn't overshadow the deathmark. Deathmark is really, really powerful. It basically deletes health trinkets in practice, making recons a very high risk if they can outfoot you after deathmarking.

The deathmark doesn't do anything to the shield, but for a guardian, their shield is their lifeline, just like striker's boost and recon's cloak is. No class should directly negate or harm another class shield with their own class shield - it should be up top the player on how they're going to best the other class. Again, a lonely guardian is a quick picking for any class, and they have to stand their ground whereas both recons and strikers can choose when they want to leave. If the guardian wasn't able to stand their ground, it would not be good for balance.

That said, recon is the only class that has to bait another class to be near them for so long. Usually after the first mark enemies go on high alert, making that deathmark much more difficult to pull off, and even harder to follow up on. Giving recons a better fighting chance while not locking them into certain sets would be a huge benefit, as it even allows recons to throw on more defensive sets or focus on ASI to let them better sneak up on people and sneak away even when status is about.

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Make Recons (and Guns) Great Again in Lockdown