Way OP. They do the most damage, set you on fire AND home better than heat seeking missiles IRL. Also, what's up with the rockets not exploding when they hit a block? It just sort of bounces around it.
Nerf Rocket Puppies
I think I'll make a more proper writeup since I agree with Rocket Puppy groups basically being death gods but the thread is more just a one-off complaint than anything.
Basically, it all stems to one point: the missiles these things fire deal an absurd amount of damage, and are far more dangerous than just about anything. Let's break this down:
1- These things home in on you. This, for the most part, is not a big deal. I'd say the homing function is the Rocket Puppy's defining feature among all other mobs. However, having the missiles believe the closest straight line should be its ultimate target and thus switching at a moment's notice is pretty damn annoying.
2- The missiles travel faster than you. Greavers don't even do this, and wolverports aside they're the fastest mobs in the game. God help you if you're trying to shield from something else because then you're super screwed.
2.a- Rocket Puppies have a crazy rate of fire relative to the danger of their attacks. If you evade the missile long enough, it will just belt out another one by the time the first explodes. Red Rovers fire slower than this; there is no respite.
3- Their base damage is already quite strong. I'd estimate that with standard tier-appropriate gear, a Rocket Puppy can destroy you in about four hits, give or take a freak Vitapod blessing. I can't think of another enemy that can do that, and this is in Tier II. Even Boosted/Heavy Plate Shields and the Stone Tortoise get easily broken if you take a head-on shot, which combined with the homing function and speed will most likely happen if you do try shielding at just about any point.
4- They set you on fire. When a missile hits, the result is the same as a blast block: immediate radial damage. However, what sets this explosion apart is everything within has got a high chance of being set aflame, which increases the damage dealt by a significant amount. This is a standard danger for all fire mobs, but there's no indication whatsoever that Rocket Puppies can do this until it happens, and they're one of the few mobs who can even inflict it outside of a Fire stratum. Red Rovers already have the fire bracket cornered anyway, this is like if oilers suddenly started Shocking you.
All considered, this might not be a big deal, as from the get-go Rocket Puppies are a fairly rare occurrence and with the above points, even one poses a legitimate challenge if you happen to catch its eye. Basically, it's that rare big dude that doesn't quite qualify as a miniboss but is clearly a cut above the rest of the fodder you cleave through en masse. That's fine.
The incredible, glaring, infuriating problem is when they show up in numbers.
Three or more Rocket Puppies is nothing less than a death sentence, and this is never more apparent than in an Arena. Iron Edges in Tier II and III have an evidently high chance of making any Gun Puppy wave be fully-staffed by Rocket Puppies, and in the third room you risk running into eight of them at once. Even in taking advantage of the standard Gun Puppy blind spot and striking away at them from behind there's a significant chance that you'll still be caught by one across the room, and then it's death time. God help you if you or a party member happen to be anywhere but the extreme edges of the room when they spawn, because then the arena just turns into a horrible mess of explosive hell from which there is no escape but the release of 30% of your heat.
To date, I have yet to participate in an eight-wave of Rocket Puppies without the entire party wiping at least once, even with staggering revives. Guaranteed death at any point in the game simply should not happen. My basic suggestion, looking back at this, would be to increase the cooldown time between firing missiles, and remove the chance to set players on fire with the missile explosions. This would still make them a decent threat when encountered alone, likely render them far more manageable when in groups, and won't neuter what makes them unique. If you're unwilling to do either of those things, then for the love of god please meet us all halfway, and remove those bastards from Arenas.
The only thing I would change is how fast they turn around. (missiles not puppies)
I've had moderate success running behind other puppies when there are multiples. When they spawn a lot of them at once in an arena, as long as you're not in the middle, you can take them out one at a time, usually. The only gripe I really have about them is the absurd amount of damage. If you could block them more than twice without any shield in the game shattering like porcelain, it'd be perfectly fine, imo.
Whatever happened to being able to shoot down the rockets?? could do it in preview, and it wasn't easy. Is that really so imbalanced?
Cradle rockets are actually made out of rubber.
All happily bouncing along walls towards you like excited kittens.
I could rant about how overpowered Rocket Puppies are, but I'll keep it short. I'm a Helm upgrade short of Tier 3 and I'd say I'm fairly good a player, but moments ago a depth 10 solo arena match of first four, then eight more (ASDF) Rocket Puppies would've been deadly for me if it weren't for a full inventory of health and remedy capsules. Yes, they're surviveable. No, that doesn't make them fair at all.
Shaezerus did an excellent job listing all the strong points of Rocket Puppies. Therefore, I'll follow in his footsteps in suggesting what all could be done and in what amount to make Rocket Puppies, in my opinion, a balanced opponent without stripping it of its unique trait.
"1- These things home in on you." While it's a great unique characteristic, these missiles home too well - they can barely be dodged when alone, nevermind when there's four or even eight of 'em. A homing missile in a game like this should be dodgeable, even in the heat of light battle (firing a gun, shieldpushing enemies back). However, make the homing too light and it'll be close to irrelevant. The missiles have to clearly home onto the player, but do it in some way other than pin-point precision. I'll come to this later.
"2- The missiles travel faster than you." It's hard to dodge something coming at such a high speed even if its arc is straight, nevermind when it homes on you. The missiles have to be slowed down significantly.
"2.a- Rocket Puppies have a crazy rate of fire relative to the danger of their attacks." Absolutely. It's impossible to dodge and attack at the same time except in a perfect environment for fighting a Rocket Puppy.
"3- Their base damage is already quite strong." "4- They set you on fire." This would be bearable if the missiles weren't impossible to dodge, and it makes sense to take a load of damage from such a projectile. However, because fun > realism, I do suggest a toning down of damage. Alternative status effects would be painful save for Poison - Ice, Shock and Stun would slow you, making dodging pain.
I hinted at my solution at point one, and I have two options.
1: Add a delay to the homing. This is fairly obvious: instead of coming straight at you, the missile would cruise past you if you dodge, then realize its error and change its arc. However, I think either the missile speed or lifetime would have to be quite long for this to work. A low-speed, short-living missile might get barely one retry, if that. If the missiles' lifetime is increased, it could be easily countered by futher lenghtening the reload time of the Rocket Puppy.
2: Make the missile home on in you for two, three seconds at a slow speed, then have it speed up and rush at you at a straight or near-straight trajectory. Personally, I find this option more interesting. It would make using the missiles against other targets a viable tactic - just stand in front of, say, another Rocket Puppy when a missile locks onto you, then dodge, and boom! The at-first patrolling missile would make sword-hacking the Puppy quite difficult, but I believe the tactical use of the missiles would make up for that.
Gotta agree with everyone who's posted so far, these things are ridiculously hard to kill in numbers. I don't mind one or two of them being the "miniboss" of a particular level because they pose a fair challenge in low numbers, but eight of them? Really? It's ridiculous!
Of course, a simple fix would be just that, make a pair or maybe a triplet of Rocket Puppies a boss-type enemy. I mean, you don't get eight Trojans nor giant Lichens at the same time, do you?
i wouldn't mind 8 trojans, at least that would be survivable! 8 giant lichen though... *shudders*
my least favorite part is how the rocket puppies can fire rockets out of the back of their heads, so that the direction they're facing has no bearing on which way they actually shoot
this makes them impossible to block or dodge, nevermind that even if the rocket goes out the right way it can do a perfect u-turn in the air and hit you anyway
I love how Rocket Pups, while stationary, are seriously bad.
But I agree they are dangerous - silly dangerous - in large groups.
My suggestion on improving it.
1. Make Rocket Dogs not Aggro until you shoot them first.
I think many are already like this. ESPECIALLY in arena and other large clashes... you should be able to pick them apart as a team, one by one.
2. Make Rocket Pups forget aggro if you dodge enough shots.
ie. Rocket Pups forget they were attacked after firing 1, 3, 5 shots.
So people who go in guns blazing against a line of Rocket Pups... are gonna get shot to bits.
People who pick them apart, step dodging, or using hit and run, will be able to systematically COPE with them.
Most important it prevents getting owned by eight rocket pups at once ... IF you have the teamwork to not aggro four different ones at once.
They should not do the most damage of all the constructs. If they are homing, travel extremely fast, and can cause status effects, they should be balanced with the other constructs in that they don't do as much damage.
Rocket Puppies are STILL way overpowered on Tier 3 at least. Spawning Rocket Puppies in Arena makes it a (bad) luck based mission, ruining all fun of it. There's a rant from me above, and it still applies.
EDIT: Now that I brought this up again, I have another suggestion. Make the rockets destroyable with gunfire. That would make dealing with them SO MUCH easier.
i don't agree that much, arenas normally have options, if u don't think u ready to face 8, 10, 12 w/e number rockets u shouldn't go there, if u go nerf eveything that's hard there wont be any fun, anything's easy, the point of the game is to find the strategy to a certain level, not make it so easy u can just solo it the 1st time without dieing. besides it is pretty easy to avoid those 8 rockets, if u know the arena already, wich u should if u want to be a good player and never die, u know that when that wave is goin to come u need to be next to wall so u dont get targeted, then u can just take your time and destroy one by one with your sword's charged attack, when i solo, one charged attack of ascended calibur is enough or a full combo (3 attacks) to get it done, most of the times they never even shoot.
if u mistake and attract more than one or 2 at the same time in tier 3 u re death, that's how a tier 3 should be, a mistake kills you, otherwise the game just loses its fun in dungeons making it even more about money/recipes/alchemy than it already is.
jez u guys just want everything to be tankable with 5* gear all the way not caring whatever shows up :P
All of you are forgetting that gun puppy rockets can hit your opponents, including the puppy the launched the rocket. It is also possible to out run them, you just have to keep on changing your direction.
Angelgod: It's nothing short of an extraordinary feat to survive such an event without at least a death - if you're honest in your words, I congratulate you on having some insane skills and luck. However, to the point: I don't want the Rocket Puppy nerfed because it's difficult - I want it nerfed because it can create practically impossibly difficult battles. For example, at times, it is impossible to avoid attracting the attention of two or more Rocket Puppies - if you even happen to be in the middle of the arena when they spawn, you're as good as dead, simply for not being in the right part of the stage when you kill a certain opponent. That is completely ridiculous.
Autofire, if only that worked as well as you picture it. However, the reality is that two Rocket Puppies are quite difficult to dodge if you want to get any damage in - nevermind if you have opponents following you. It is possible, but compared to the rest of the monster cast it is ridiculously difficult and a single mistake tends to suck half your health away.
i recently got to tier 3 so ive only been in 2 BA with rockets and unfortunately i wasnt soloing so smart ppl on the party just attract all the turrets attention and once theres one turned back im screwed even after all the rest on the party is death, not to mention theres area of damage and that the missiles can change targets. so if someone your teamates mistake it can mean a death for the team, the advatange in party is that if you commit a mistake since theres more ppl and more life on your side one mistake might not mean entire death of the party, while soloing if u commit a mistake u got yourself killed.
but in tier 2 i always soloed BA's without dieing, after a certain point of knowing the gates and ea floor, only deaths were sometimes if i was stupid enough to believe i could survive just more 3 or 4 devilites with 1 life bar so i didnt waste that pill. while those rockets were never a problem to me cuz im take attention to see if the guy im killing is the last of certain wave that can cause a new wave to show up, if so i always kill it near a wall.
u say its ridiculous but a BA on strat 6 gives ridiculously amount of crowns, even more than firestorm citadel, if u solo that u can probably craft a 3* item just from selling the mats and the crowns u get, i dont think it should be an easy task to get that much in 10-15 min and from 10 energy
Trust me, you WILL find yourself frustrated to death (and literally dead, too) once you meet a bunch of Rocket Puppies in an Arena match. In Tier 2, they're bearable, but in Tier 3, they're ridiculously powerful in every single way.
i played vs them already and its the same thing if u get rocket puppies in tier 2 and u re in the middle u re death and if u re next to the wall is incredbly easy since all u gotta do is run around and use charged attack on the back, ive done that on tier 3 not as often though.
edit: u gotta agree with me that if u re next to a wall when they spawn its incredibly easy to kill them all in the battle arena no? thats tier 3 theres gotta be penaltys on mistakes.
Rocket Puppies can damage themselves, and other monsters. If you stand next to one and shield, you can watch it kill itself.
They're not overpowered. You're just not using them to your advantage. And if this is about the Rocket Puppies in arenas, it's quite simple to avoid getting hit. Circle around the arena, and the Rocket Puppies will blow each other up.
I think rather than suggesting a decrease of the Rocket Pup's difficulty, I think people should attempt to develop strategies against it. No where have I seen people seriously discussing how to deal with specific monsters (please refer me to a thread if I'm being ignorant; threads complaining about X don't count). I regularly venture a full group of knights into T3 arenas, have eight of them spawn, and the entire group emerges without taking crippling damage, let alone suffer a single death. Granted, not everyone is as skilled (or lucky?) as us, but I don't think it's an accident that we can efficiently deal with them.
I feel like Rocket Pups are one of the last remaining, truly difficult enemies. I was really upset by the "monster balance" update. I think TRD should let people develop a meta game before taking a hatchet to the "problem" of monsters or scenarios being too difficult.
I'd be happy with being able to destroy the missiles.
I did find it odd when they nurfed a bunch of things that seemed fine and then left this one as is, I have to agree that more than one of these things is pretty much a death sentence, the best example I can think of is on the firestorm citadel in that room where there's a respawning rocket gun puppy and the idea is to kite the rockets into the zombies, well obviously nobody playtested that area because the majority of rockets weave inbetween the zombies, around all obstacles, circle the player until they have nowhere to go and then hit them for >50% of their health, set them on fire and knock them into a group of zombies who then kill them, even if the player tries to kite the rocket into the impassable forcefield the rocket just flies happily straight at the thing until either managing to push its way through or simply fly around it...
If OOO is really happy with how deadly getting hit by a rocket can be then they need to nurf its firing rate and targeting algorithms and if they're happy with both of those things then they need to change the damage output.
i think the closed fights on fiend theme strat 6(specially the city) re way more op, theres 4 or 6 devilitis throwing chairs incredible speed(think they faster than 2 hit swords) and theres a bunch of kats or greavers, think those devilites way worse.
While they are definitely OP, a good way to get rid of em in arena is to have them kill themselves. Run around and let them destroy a few of their own first, then finish em off.
Angelgod is correct completely, the rocket puppies are not that hard ESPICIALLY in an arena environment, you just need to see the paten of when they will appear and be at the edge then CAREFULLY make your way around smacking 1 at a time, simple. If you get caught in the middle you're screwed, but by this lvl you should know not to be caught in the middle. And if you do get a couple shooting at you just hide behind another mob (shields up) and let them take the hit. Also devilites are the thing i get killed by the most even with 5* gear, they're little expletives in a closed environment.
That is the only issue I ever have with them, is when their missiles disappear and then reappear next to you. That is DEATH.
I literally fell off my chair, rofling when I first saw these things shoot and chase people down. One of my teammates was running all over the place and the missiles was shifting and changing course every step of the way.
Good times... good times. Lots of elemental defense? If you're expecting one or 8 to pop out, prep for it. I've had little experience with them but found them manageable.
I like how people who obviously never encountered T3 rocket puppies quip in.
T3 rockets are faster and you can NOT dodge them to make them smash into other puppies. It's just impossible, they home in far too good. The only method of making them hit another puppy is to hide behind one. At which point you either get hit by the explosion, or by the rocket coming out of some orifice of the puppy you are trying to hide behind.
I'm not asking for a damage nerf (t3 stuff is pretty obviously set up so that it's deadly if you don't gear for it, so I'm guessing that's intentional), but their turn rate, homing and speed is ridiculous when combined.
PS.: you could also make them a "boss" subset of puppies with their own elemental themes to avoid "the arena of death". Freezing rockets, toxic rockets, graphite rockets etc. sound cool.
Shooting rockets should be easier. Nothing more.
How can you not be in the middle when pressing the Party Button? Tips would be VERY much appreciated.
Assuming that Rocket Puppies are purposely made to be OP, I would appreciate thinning the frequency of which they appear as opposed to just nerfing them. A T3 Rocket Puppy is challenging, but survivable in most cases, but only if you aren't forced to deal with more than two of them in the same area.
i just entered a 1st stage tier 3 level and i got scared when i saw a group of rocket puppies D:
while i attacked one another gun puppy "abused" my camera angle and shot a fast rocket at me from the lower section of my screen. D:
Its nearly impossiable to dodge the tier 3 rockets due to their god-like technology and when you face more than one at a time your shield will break D:
id rather face alpha wolvers than rocket puppies.
well im sure its fine if you can dodge enough :P
but due to a great percentage of players not playing near CAL,USA, it may seem pretty hard. (i live in australia btw, constant red bar)
but i do have to agree on one thing, their shooting delay is pretty ridiculous for their ability. Using a grey owlite shield, it can take d rockets at most before breaking, and this with a max elemental UV. Probably just nerf their shot-clock.
-1
I did a few T3 Arenas today, in the last part, I can one hit them with FoV charge (CTR MAX). I can also do the same with my Asc Calibur/Levi. All you have to do is learn not to die. It not THAT hard.
Yes, because it's so easy to dodge six missles at once, when they're all coming from different directions.
It's doable if you stay in a corner until you finish off the mobs that spawn them, but if you trigger them all, that's basically a death sentence.
Don't believe me? I'll show you sometime this week. Mail me ingame. IGN Bigfootm
Say it's about this or I WILL deny it.
I'm not saying it's impossible, I'm saying it's ridiculous compared to the difficulty of other turret types in the same 8-turret scenario.
IMO, I just hate all those T3 Gremlin Bombers... Combined with a Healer and 8 Shock puppies. THAT I can't stand although I have done it before.
Man, Rocket Puppies. All the other puppies get easier at tier 3 but these guys are just cheaters. It wouldn't be so bad if the rockets simply blew up when they hit a wall so you could use cover.
gotta agree here that rocket puppies are actually OP simply because they have the best of everything, hell even a grey owlite shield which should be the best shield against them breaks on the third missile strike, but the problem isnt just one thing as before mentioned, if just one aspect of them is nerfed then while still being OP compared to all other constructs they arent ridiculous.
seriously 12 rocket puppies at once in an arena is just death, there is nothing else for it, but if they all either
a) had a much slower rate of fire than all other gunpuppies, as in their missile must have timed out and then some before they fire again or
b) deal significantly less damage which is the wrong approach IMO (they are freaking missiles they are supposed to hurt, though the fire seems odd)
c) make them figurative glass cannons so they take very little damage to destroy but can easily kill you
d) reduce the rate at which rockets recalculate trajectories, the effect of which is to make their homing abilities less 'god' like and more dodge-able, changing direction just once every few seconds rather than constantly
e) reduce rocket turn rate, if they miss they may timeout before being able to turn around enough to make another try
it would have a difficulty more inline with what you expect and what is manageable, especially with lag
its doesnt take much to change an opponent which when faced in bulk, especially in small areas, becomes almost unbeatable with out the use of energy and it does seem to be a pretty common gripe amongst most players
rocket puppies have the range, the damage, the homing abilities, the fire rate, and status infliction capabilities that make all other enemies seem insignificant
also as a note it is actually impossible to have less than 2 rocket puppies targeting you at once in an arena (the one you are attacking and the one directly opposite as in my experience they can 'see' as far as they can shoot which happens to be about 3 times the distance a standard 5* blaster can fire and further than you can see on screen)
Agree, the only good thing about them is that you can guide the rocket (T2 and T3) into another enemy. When I faced 8 Rocket Puppies in an arena, I stand behind a Rocket Puppy and let another Rocket Puppy fire away, in this way, the Rocket Puppy I am standing next to will catch fire. But apart from that, everything Rocket Puppies can do are seriously bad and overpowered.
can we have a gun that can shoot out like rocket puppy :D ? PLEASE ? we don't mind if it requires 100 or 1000 or 10 000 van ,jelly or whatever tokens.
I am sure all Spiral Knights will love it , fast attack speed and bullet , strong elemental damage,far range , good chance to cause strong fire ,and don't even have to aim , just stand behind the wall / obstacles shooting the missles out and be amazed at the intelligence of homing missles !
Only good thing about the new turrets is they took out the rocket puppies. Problem is there are still chances that you can run into a large group. I.E. There was a spiked bridge that was lined with 6 rocket puppies. We holed up in a barricade made of blocks to let our shields recharge and to our horror, 2 missiles did a 90 degree turn on the dime, then dragged into the base. It was a goddamn mess.
Way what you want about blocking or getting the missiles run into other enemies. If you get a spiked bridge lined with rocket puppies, you're screwed.
Only good thing about the new turrets is they took out the rocket puppies. Problem is there are still chances that you can run into a large group. I.E. There was a spiked bridge that was lined with 6 rocket puppies. We holed up in a barricade made of blocks to let our shields recharge and to our horror, 2 missiles did a 90 degree turn on the dime, then dragged into the base. It was a goddamn mess.
Way what you want about blocking or getting the missiles run into other enemies. If you get a spiked bridge lined with rocket puppies, you're screwed.
Rocket gun puppies are really hard in mass but the biggest problem is that they will never explode unless they hit a living target. But if they nerf it, they'll have to do something about the rocket gun puppy room in FSC which would be made a lot easier. I guess the best thing is indeed to ban them from the arenas. That's all
I'm going to have to agree.. I don't mind the homing, or the damage, or the status effect. But they simply shoot too many rockets. Being in an arena when 8 spawn.. Ya.. good luck surviving that. At the VERY LEAST, drop the fire rate down to 50 or even 25%. They just aren't survivable in numbers.