Spiral Knights - Possible changes to dual special damage weapons

Possible changes to dual special damage weapons

333 replies [Last post]

Sat, 12/31/2011 - 12:40

#251

Isenfir

An Idea I Believe would fit Well

I can see where you guys are coming from for the base damage upgrade and keep split damage, but honestly, wouldn't you rather just have two separate guns? Especially with the new loadout stations, there's even less of a point to split damage. I would rather have a piercing antigua line for wolvers and fiends, and a shadow line for gremlins. Like I said in my earlier post, make Argent Peacemaker pure piercing and have an Undead damage bonus, and make Sentenza pure shadow with a Gremlin damage bonus. It would fit the descriptions while still having a very nice niche

Argent Peacemaker desc talks about "gunslinger priests" and "ushers for those who refuse to leave this world" which makes the Undead damage bonus, plus the fact that we are lacking in piercing guns, not to mention have no FAST piercing guns, we should make it piercing.

The reason Argent Peacemaker should NOT do elemental damage is because there is absolutly no reason why it should do well against constructs, and in fact, it should be weak against them. Think about it, contructs aren't affected by holiness because they cannot be affiliated with it, so the gun should treat it as such.

Sentenza desc talks about "contains the soul of a knight" and "wielded by an evil one" so it should do shadow damage, and since Gremlins are closest to a knight, it should get a Gremlin damage bonus or no bonus.

Sentenza shouldn't be piercing or elemental, because shadow damage fits it a whole lot better than the other two.

Do you see my point now? And if it's really needed, I'm sure the devs might be able to come up with a third line for elemental damage, and if not, I see no problem.

Sat, 12/31/2011 - 15:00

#252

Alice-In-Pyroland

Most people are looking at

Most people are looking at this pragmatically, not how it fits in with the weapon's aesthetic. More to the point a piercing Antigua line gun would be essentially useless since regardless of speed pierce weak mods still dodge so it would be inferior to a Callahan.

The problem isn't a weapon being niche, it's when a 'niche' weapon is being outperformed at its own niche which makes it worthless. The peacemaker been a niche FSC gun would be fine if it wasn't for the fact Blitz Needle is superior in every way. Sentenza being a niche gremlin sniping tool would be fine, if it wasn't that the Umbra Driver and Biohazard are both currently better against gremlins. The Dread Venom Striker is fine for example because it does have a niche that it does better than other weapons, the peacemaker and sentenza are not fine because they don't have a 'niche' they're good at. The whole point of a weapon being niche is that it excells at that particular job, and the closest thing either of these guns have to a niche they aren't outperformed in is as Lockdown guns; which is a legitimate point but at the same time they won't actually be any worse at it if made pure-typed.

That's not to say the be all end all solution is making them pure typed weapons, but they absolutely need buffing in some capacity.

Sat, 12/31/2011 - 15:30

#253

Isenfir

@Echoez

It actually need a little bit of buffing AND pure damage, and have you used an antigua line against wolvers? It doesnt miss most of the time, and while I haven't used a callahan, im sure antigua's are faster. as for a niche FSC gun, thats why I added undead bonus. Sentenza is much better than a biohazard for gremlins, Biohazards can't hit [crap] if it could dodge(don't get me wrong, I love it, but its for slimes). I have never tried an umbra driver, but I'm sure a sentenza as I described it would do equal if not better than it. Dread venom striker is a very niche weapon, used for turrets, cornered enemies, and bosses. Also, as a niche weapon, it isn't used as much as general weapons. Overall, you argument as I noticed seemed a little biased to what you think, compared to what most people think. Think I'm an idiot, you're the one who said Biohazard surpasses Sentenza against gremlins pal.

And while I'm not sure what you're trying to say, which I think is against pure damage, my point is that pure damage would not only make the weapons BETTER in their niche, it would also attract more users to them. Show an antigua some love.

Sat, 12/31/2011 - 15:43

#254

Juances

Graveyard!!!

Why didnt they move this thread there already?

Sat, 12/31/2011 - 15:54

#255

Alice-In-Pyroland

I have used both a peacemaker

I have used both a peacemaker and a sentenza against wolvers, it does hit but the number of shots that connect wouldn't out-dps a Callahan which was my point. Unless you were consistently hitting enough to make up the difference in damage per bullet, and that simply isn't practical if being mobbed by multiple wolvers. Point being a Callahan would likely outperform a pure piercing antigua, unless the gun was altered in such a way that ensure it hit enough to make up the difference in damage per shot.

The Biohazard can be used against gremlins with great ease, there are dozens of videos demonstrating this and it hardly takes much practice to get right. Whilst it isn't as immediately efficent as a Sentenza in that regard, the higher damage per shot plus the aoe on the charge and poison status all add up to it being better. The Sentenza is better at sniping menders within a group though. As for the Umbra, the charge one shots gremlins so I'm afraid it does completely outperform the Sentenza there lol.

As for the DVS, you haven't actually addressed what I said? It's niche but it excells at those niches, which is precisely what the AP and Sentenza currently don't do. Saying very few people use it proves precisely that point, the purpose of something being "niche" is precisely that is has limited, specialize use lol Unless your argument isn't in favour of making the guns more specialized and simply making them more generally useful, but that's besides the point.

Also I don't know why you're suddenly getting passive aggressive, but I never once said or even implied that I thought you an idiot and your rather bewildering assertion that anyone with a contrary view point must be bias and calling you an idiot puts one off trying to have an otherwise reasonable discussion with you. For that matter making a note of someone being bias towards their own point of view seems like a rather unusual strawman, if one didn't have any bias you wouldn't be able to have a discussion at all.

Sat, 12/31/2011 - 16:34

#256

Isenfir

Ok, I'm sorry

I'm very competitve, and stubborn. Plus I'm used to troll/noobs very often. Sorry :/
But I did say it needs both a boost and pure damage, and I still belive pure damage would make them much more useful in their nature.
also I still think Biohazards slow shots makes it less than easy to hit gremlins with it unless there are a ton in a concentrated area, which in that case it would be hard to hit just one with the charge. As for umbra, I haven't ever used any alchemers so I wouldn't know, but would it really 1-hit a gremlin even in a party of four?

@Juances
I thought graveyard was only for dead threads?

Again, I apologize >.< (I swear the Y gene has a major trait for stubborness/competetiveness)

Mon, 01/02/2012 - 12:28

#257

Embodien

Noooo leave RSS but if you

Noooo leave RSS but if you were to change it...make it full elemental otherwise i think it would fail. Its used as a semi kind of gun by bombers and making it piercing would kinda kill it. The ionised salt bomb already has piercing :/

Tue, 01/03/2012 - 23:27

#258

Antistone

(Clearly I'm late, haven't

(Clearly I'm late, haven't read everything, but...)

Nick, based on your suggestions, I don't think you perceive the same problems that I do with split special weapons. I think the issues are:

#1: The 50% Problem
In terms of raw effectiveness, split special weapons are really no different from split normal weapons; they're good against 2 monsters, middling against 2, and weak against 2. But no one wants a 50% normal weapon either, when a similar 100% special weapon is available, because the pure special weapon gives double the bonus, and people play smart so that the penalty hardly ever matters. If you introduced 100% elemental and 100% shadow swords tomorrow, the brandish and sealed sword lines would be even more niche than the antigua and sun shard lines are now.

#2: Incomplete Set
The overwhelming majority of players are going to collect one weapon of each damage type, so they can switch off between them. Getting three weapons with different special splits would be roughly as good as getting three 50% normal weapons with different types, except that they don't exist. Even if you're willing to eschew swords entirely (which most players aren't), there's no elemental/shadow weapon to complete the trifecta.

(Actually, even if you fixed this they'd still be worse than 50% normal weapons against Vanaduke, but that's a problem with Vanaduke, not the split special weapons, and probably not a very large one.)

#3: Lying User Interface
The role of psychology in player strategy and enjoyment should not be underestimated. The damage colors in Spiral Knights are flaky in general (I have no clue why, PLEASE fix them already!) but because the penalty for bad damage is slightly higher than the reward for good damage, the split special weapons do ~99% damage to middling foes instead of 100%, and so their damage looks GRAY instead of BLUE. That makes players feel like they're being ineffective, even though the actual difference is negligible. This is basically a case of your user interface flat-out lying to your players, and frankly it should never have made it through QA.

So here is what I suggest:

Either find a way to balance half-special weapons (ALL of them, including 50% normal) or make all non-pure-normal weapons equally specialized. You could do the latter either by changing all pure special weapons into 50% normal (rebalancing as necessary) or by making 50% normal weapons into pure special weapons and making split special weapons "100% of both" (so that they deal 167%/97%/30% to different monsters instead of 133%/99%/65%). You could take different approaches for swords, guns, and bombs if you wanted.
Add new weapons so that you have all three special splits covered--at least in guns, and preferably in swords as well.
Fix the dang colors already.

I don't think that adding "bonus damage vs. X monster" is a good plan. There's already several weapons in the game with traits like that--how often to THEY get used? They've got the incomplete set problem (even worse, the hypothetical set contains 6 weapons instead of 3), and the general problem that you don't seem to be able to balance weapons with varying levels of specialization, and on top of that they reduce the number of stacking damage bonuses players can get from other sources (since they're capped at 6 ranks). Having that bonus ON TOP of pure damage MIGHT make them useful (unlike, e.g., the Cautery Sword), but they'd still be clumsy and niche.

Wed, 01/04/2012 - 01:02

#259

Chronovore

@Antistone

I believe you're off on a couple of particulars.

for #1:
If you ignore the enemies that the weapon is weak against ("people play smart so that the penalty hardly ever matters" - which I would mostly tend to agree with), the damage output of a split special/special weapon is closer to that of a weaker full-special weapon than it is to that of a split normal/special weapon. A full-special weapon does 1.5x damage to a vulnerable enemy compared to a neutral enemy, a split normal/special does 1.25x under the same circumstances, and a special/special does ~1.43x. But where a normal/special weapon does less damage to vulnerable enemies and the same damage to neutral enemies as a full-special, the special/special does less damage to both vulnerable and neutral enemies compared to a full-special with the same base damage. Looked at another way, split special/special weapons are the same against vulnerable enemies but weaker against neutral enemies compared to split special/normal weapons with the same base damage.

Effectively, a special/special is more specialized than a special/normal, but less specialized than a full-special, and weaker overall (assuming the same base damage) than either.

#2:
No disagreement here, I'd just like to note that "Dualist's Pistol" would be a great name for a split elemental/shadow gun. :-)

#3:
The penalty against resistant foes is significantly higher than the bonus against vulnerable foes. A special/special weapon does ~87.5% damage against one weakness and one strength, not ~99%. This is what gives rise to the distribution I mentioned in #1 (87.5% * 1.43 is approximately 125%).

The other aspect of the antigua lines' overall weakness is that compared to other guns they have lower damage per shot, no status effect or multi-hit ability, and their higher rate of fire isn't faster by enough to counterbalance that (and I'm not sure that any amount of fire rate alone could be enough, given the physical limits of how fast people can hit the fire button). So (assuming a target like the training bots that takes full damage from everything) other guns generally still have better single target burst damage (which can translate into knockdown against dodging enemies in some cases) and single target sustained damage, plus possibly status effects and/or multiple-target abilities and/or a more useful charge attack.

As I said in my earlier post, I think all that the antigua lines really need is more base damage (which has the bonus of keeping them thematically the same, AP good against evil, Sentenza good against the living).

Wed, 01/04/2012 - 02:11

#260

Antistone

@Chronovore: Where are you

@Chronovore:

Where are you getting your damage numbers? Because they don't seem to match my in-game experience, the wiki, or numerous other forum threads I've seen on the topic.

For example, according to the wiki, the Divine Avenger (normal/elemental) at depth 28 does about 65% damage to beasts and gremlins (153/234 = 65.38%) and 140% (328/234 = 140.17%) to constructs and undead. The Polaris (pure elemental) does 33% to beasts and gremlins and 188% to constructs and undead.

For comparison, if we look at the Radiant Sun Shards in stratum 5 and pretend for a moment that the middle number is the base damage (which is untrue, but probably close), it does 69% versus slimes and gremlins and 146% to undead. If we subtract a couple percentage points because the middle damage is actually worse than neutral, that's just about exactly equal to the 50% normal weapon, just like I said.

Now, those numbers aren't quite what I posted above--maybe there's some noise, or maybe the numbers I remembered from another forum thread were rounded more than I thought. But those are pretty close to what I said, especially on the important point (split special is almost the same as split normal), and your attempted corrections appear to move in the wrong direction...

Wed, 01/04/2012 - 07:49

#261

Chronovore

Having gone back and looked

Having gone back and looked at some more data, I've come to the conclusion that we're both wrong. Looking at the data (from http://forums.spiralknights.com/en/node/7447 ) for the Divine Avenger, Fang of Vog, and Acheron (all split normal/special swords, and damage values taken at the lowest depths listed), I see the following; these are listed in order of base damage for the attack for reasons that should become clear:
Base Damage, Bonus Percentage
117, 142%
131, 145%
183, 145%
203, 143%
234, 140%
251, 137%
292, 130%
363, 123%
483, 117%
531, 115%
600, 114%
I don't know about you, but this looks like a pretty clear pattern to me (albeit with one outlier); there appears to be a negative modifier to the bonus damage percentage which increases with base damage. Similar data, from the Callahan, Polaris, BTB, and Hail Driver (all pure-special, although one is a sword and the rest are guns).
77, 191%
88, 192%
88, 192%
112, 183%
131, 172%
203, 140%
213, 138%
258, 132%
266, 131%
296, 128%
386, 121%
A very similar pattern here. Notice that at very low base damage values, the pure damage gets roughly 2x the percentage boost against vulnerable enemies that a similar-base-damage normal/special does, but as the base damage increases that advantage goes away; with a base damage of 292, a normal/special split weapon gets a 30% damage increase, while with a base damage of 296 a pure-special weapon gets a 28% damage increase. It looks like the higher the weapon's (or more accurately, the attack's) base damage is, the less it matters whether it's split normal/special or pure-special. Assuming the same holds true for the special/special weapons, the antigua lines with their very low base damage are more negatively affected by being split damage than a high-base-damage weapon like the DA is. And by extension, since guns generally speaking have lower base damages than swords, split damage is less of a penalty for a sword than it would be for a gun.

Edit - upon further reflection, if you take the values from the first table, and slot 1/2 the base damage into the second table with twice the bonus percentage (for example 234, 140% -> 117, 180%) they fit very neatly, and suggest that at very low base damage values there is in fact a drop-off in the bonus percentage; the peak seems to be very near to that 88 base damage (or ~176 base damage for a split normal/special weapon).

Edit 2 - upon additional further reflection, once base damage gets high enough, split normal/special weapons actually appear to get more bonus damage than full-special weapons! A split normal/special weapon with a base damage of 203 gets a 43% damage increase, while a full-special weapon with a base damage of 203 only gets a 40% damage increase - the split normal/special actually gets 6 extra bonus damage compared to the full-special. The split normal/special is still getting 40% bonus damage at 234 base damage, while we can extrapolate from the 483 split-damage entry that at ~242 base damage a full-special weapon would be getting ~34% bonus damage. So if we changed the Divine Avenger from split damage to full elemental, we could expect to see its projectile bonus damage go up, but the bonus damage on all its swings (including the charge attack's direct damage) go down, since the projectile has a base damage of 131, but the swings are all in the 234+ range.

Edit 3 - doing the same thing for the resisted damage on the Callahan, Polaris, BTB, and Hail Driver gives the following:
77, 36%
88, 35%
112, 32%
131, 29%
203, 23%
213, 23%
258, 21%
266, 21%
296, 21%
386, 20%

This lets us extrapolate the approximate damage for a (hypothetical) split special/special with those base damage values (values in parentheses are normalized as if they were doing 100% of a modified base damage to neutral enemies):
77, 146%, 119%, 68% (92, 123%, 100%, 57%)
88, 146%, 119%, 68% (105, 123%, 100%, 57%)
112, 142%, 113%, 66% (127, 126%, 100%, 58%)
131, 136%, 101%, 65% (132, 135%, 100%, 64%)
203, 120%, 82%, 62% (166, 146%, 100%, 75%)
213, 119%, 81%, 62% (173, 147%, 100%, 77%)
258, 116%, 77%, 61% (199, 151%, 100%, 79%)
266, 116%, 76%, 61% (202, 153%, 100%, 80%)
296, 114%, 75%, 61% (222, 152%, 100%, 81%)
386, 111%, 71%, 60% (274, 156%, 100%, 85%)
Rounding errors have been accumulating here, so this last set of values are pretty approximate, but they should serve to get a sense for how a split special-damage weapon works out.
And what we see is that special/special split weapons show the following pattern; as base damage increases, the overall ratio of effective damage/base damage goes down, but the distribution of that damage improves. A 77 base damage special/special has a similar distribution to a 363 base damage normal/special (but does around 1/4 the damage to all enemies), while a 203 base damage special/special has a similar distribution to a 182 base damage full-special weapon (but does around 9/10 the damage to all enemies). So increasing the damage of a split special/special should both improve the distribution and increase the effective damage of the weapon.
Unfortunately, there isn't really damage data available for the AP/Sentenza, and comparing the RSS is tricky because it's only 4* (so the damage starts dropping off before getting to the lowest levels of the clockworks, and it does so in a manner which doesn't keep the same normalized damage percentages from depth to depth). This makes it difficult to check whether this is an accurate depiction of the behavior of special/special weapons.

Wed, 01/04/2012 - 11:30

#262

Antistone

Nice find. So you're saying

Nice find. So you're saying that as your attack grows stronger, you get less bonus for using the right damage type, and MORE penalty for using the wrong one. That's...pretty bizarre. Someone should curve fit this data (probably in another thread).

But if neutral special damage = normal damage and split damage weapons calculate the effects of each damage type independently (which I think is what you assumed in your split special projections), then a split special weapon still HAS to be identical to a split normal weapon when the target is strong or weak (since the neutral 50% is effectively normal in those cases), and only the "middling" damage varies. According to your projections, split special weapons should be equal to split normal weapons when their base damage is around 135, better with low base damage, and worse with high base damage.

So low base damage of antigua line actually means that it should be better as split special than as 50% normal. (Of course, players who switch off weapons will ALWAYS be better off with pure special, because the low number won't matter.)

Wed, 01/04/2012 - 15:42

#263

Myllakka

---

Oh Nick, you got my hopes up and it's been slowly crushing down for the last month. Are you just trolling us? ;c

Wed, 01/04/2012 - 15:50

#264

Fallconn

NONONONONONONONO

PLZ DONT GO THROUGH WITH THIS :*(

Wed, 01/04/2012 - 16:31

#265

Uuni

What about normal damage?

Any buffs to the normal damage weapons? They seem really lackluster especially in Lockdown. Hitting 2 bars off from a striker with valiance is pretty damn bad considering how slow the bullets go compared to strikers and antigua alchemy path. Sudaruska and triglav as well, hitting a little more normal damgae than GF and DA but completely lacking elemental/shadow damage, slow walkspeed when charged. Added status is nice but it's really rare due to 2nd hit only having the chance to status and being abysmally slow weapons anyways. Also way slower than GF and GA

Wild hunting blade and dread venom striker need a buff as well, or at least a decent charge attack...

Wed, 01/04/2012 - 18:01

#266

Chronovore

I tried to post this earlier, but the forum ate it

Whoops, when I made that last table I forgot to double the base damage values to make up for the split damage being calculated independently. So it should be:
154, 146%, 119%, 68% (184, 123%, 100%, 57%)
176, 146%, 119%, 68% (210, 123%, 100%, 57%)
224, 142%, 113%, 66% (254, 126%, 100%, 58%)
262, 136%, 101%, 65% (264, 135%, 100%, 64%)
406, 120%, 82%, 62% (332, 146%, 100%, 75%)
426, 119%, 81%, 62% (346, 147%, 100%, 77%)
516, 116%, 77%, 61% (398, 151%, 100%, 79%)
532, 116%, 76%, 61% (404, 153%, 100%, 80%)
592, 114%, 75%, 61% (444, 152%, 100%, 81%)
732, 111%, 71%, 60% (548, 156%, 100%, 85%)
This worries me, since unlike the first (incorrectly calculated) version it implies that you should see "highly-effective" coloring for split-special weapons vs. neutral targets up to a pretty high base damage (around 265 or so!). Of course, at very low base damage values the observed low-end drop-off in bonus might reverse this, and the AP/Sentenza should be somewhere off the low end of this new chart. Unfortunately, to test that hypothesis would require a very low base damage 5* weapon with either split-normal or pure-special type, and there isn't one. Alternately, a 5* split-special weapon with more than 150 base damage would give a way to check the values extrapolated here, but there isn't one of those either.

This would be so much simpler if the weapon * vs. depth modifier seemed to be calculated independently from the bonus damage based on type, but it doesn't. So there seems to be a different curve to deal with for every combination of weapon * vs. depth. Maybe I'll spend some time looking at 1* weapons at depth 1 and see what sort of curve shows up there, but I think that looking at this more thoroughly will have to go in another thread.

This corrected table puts the point where split-normal and split-special would balance around 265 base damage, possibly with another tipping point somewhere below 154 base damage. If there is another tipping point, it implies the bonus drop off becomes pretty precipitous at very low damages.

Wed, 01/04/2012 - 18:02

#267

Servitor

Regarding damage bonus/penalties...

I recall seeing somewhere that damage bonuses (such as elemental vs construct or undead) deal a 25% damage boost, while damage penalties (such as piercing vs slimes or constructs) deal a 75% damage reduction. (Someone please correct me on this if I'm wrong)

If this is true, then I always saw the big problem with the Antigua lines was that they were only effective against 2 families in the game. On the other 4, they either took a 50% or 75% damage reduction. I think that to make the AP pure piercing would make it an effective ranged counterpart to the flourishes (fast attack, good against single mobs) while making the Sentenza pure shadow would make it a good choice for people who don't like alchemers. Making the AP elemental wouldn't help it at all, seeing as we have 4 elemental alchemers, plus the polaris filling that slot.

Wed, 01/04/2012 - 18:05

#268

Seburo

I'd love to see the Antigua

I'd love to see the Antigua line get a changeup, but another Full-Elem gun would be a waste. There's already a metric ton of them. However full-piercing is pretty rare in guns, and there currently is no full-pierce gun that also allows for mobility. If I understand the Wiki on the Magnus line correctly the knock-back doesn't allow you to move & fire, and Blitz/Plague Needle root you while they autofire. Setting up the Argent Peacemaker as a full-pierce gun, leaving in that it allows for the player to be mobile while firing, would fill a (very useful) spot not occupied by any other gun.

Wed, 01/04/2012 - 18:49

#269

Chronovore

@Servitor

That's what the giant wall-of-text conversation Antistone and I have been having is about; what are the actual damage type bonuses and penalties. And it looks like the answer is "it's complicated". Instead of a flat percentage bonus/penalty, the percentage differences between strong, neutral, and weak appear to be modified by how many *s the weapon has, what depth you're at, and what the weapon's base damage is. And it's calculated separately for individual attacks, so a weapon's charge attack will have a different percentage bonus than its standard attacks, since they have different base damage values.

Wed, 01/04/2012 - 19:08

#270

The-Rawrcake

Ok guys we have 1. people

Ok guys we have 1. people against split piercing with great back up infos and 2. people that go WAAAAAH DUN CHANGE ME GUN and they list no reasoning (if you do you are not the only one that has done this I am not attacking anyone specific. You are not alone.) and if they attempt to back themselves up they awkwardly explain themselves.

So what we need to do to seperate the swordsman that take AP down into FSC then come to this thread thinking their opinion is useful from the people that have actually used these guns / other guns to compare (gunners).

The bottom line is that this thread is for gunners. Not swordsman with your poor little side-arm that you want to be untouched. If this thread does not involve you, so so sorry I am sure there are plenty of threads relating to swords that you can give more better infos in because you are good at that.

in a kind way I will say this... goooo awaaayyyy (please).
_________________________________________________________

HOKAY

The only good enough uses to influence you to get either of these guns for PvE is currently:

1. AP in FSC shooting past vanaduke barriers.
2. Hitting greavers from attacking you.
3. Clearing things quick, like blocks, which is not an in-combat use.

Now the other uses for AP are clouded by:

1. Polaris has better single target damage on not only the things that AP is effective on, but number-wise effective on 4 total families instead of 2.
2. Polaris kills gun puppies more effectively (mainly due to better single target damage and interruption)
3. Nova Driver brings amazing AoE (area of effect damage) while still having comparable if not better single target damage as well as great use number-wise on 4 families instead of 2.
4. Polaris brings utility
5. Other Alchemers can bring utility
6. Polaris bullets are easier to hit devilites with same mobility and takes no thought nor any aim period with higher burst damage as well.
7. Callahan is better at finishing off devilites and hitting devilites with much more explosive single-target power and possible utility stun.

Sentenza is clouded by:

A. Callahan is better for sniping any dodger, specifically gremlins and beasts and especially more effective sniping dodgers while you are in a group. Because those two things are the only things one would even consider using a Sent on, it is pretty much knocked out.
B. Umbra Driver and Biohazard are effective number-wise on 4 families instead of 2 as well as they bring utility and AoE
C. Umbra Driver and Biohazard work equally well on cornering gremlins as well as Callahan being the most effective on gremlins by straight up knocking the hit gremlin down.

And that pretty much shuts out Sent from PvE unless you like cooler looks instead of cleaner kills.

_________________________________________________________________
NOW: let's say that this change goes through:
In PvE:
AP gains:

1. Much more effective (75% damage to 125% damage jump) on constructs
2. Higher single target damage and effectiveness on ALL types of gun puppies (beating the Nova Driver at gun puppy sniping)
3. More effective (112.5% damage to 125% damage jump) on undead excluding Vanaduke.
4. Now named the BEST single target damage elemental gun! (Nova Drivers / alchemers are now AoE as they should be and not mashed into one target, Polaris used as utility / utility on gun puppies which is interrupting)

AP loses:

1. Damage on greavers, though still effective because it is all about quick bullets to interrupt the greaver attacks.
2. Damage on Vanaduke

Sent gains:

1. Much more effective (75% damage to 125% damage jump) on slimes.
2. More effective (112.5% damage to 125% damage jump) on gremlins.
3. Now named the BEST single target damage shadow gun! (Umbra / Biohazard will be used for AoE or poison or whatever the heck someone takes a Bio for).

Sent loses:

Nothing because it did not have any non-clouded uses in PvE.
________________________________________________________

Please tell me if I said something off or missed something. Remember, you might find Sent or AP useful on something, but that does not mean it is not clouded by another gun. This is why we are for the changes...

Why are you against them?

Wed, 01/04/2012 - 20:15

#271

Chronovore

@The-Rawrcake

As a fellow gunner, I have this to say:

1. Ditch the attitude. It isn't helping. If anything, it sets back your argument by making it hard to see past the ad-hominem attacks to any value in your reasoning.
2. The percentages you just presented are pure fiction (and I say this as someone who just a few posts back was presenting similar percentages). Did you just skip over the posts where Antistone and I were hashing out what was wrong with the flat-percentage model of bonus damage? I realize those posts were pretty long, but not significantly more so than yours just now.

Wed, 01/04/2012 - 22:13

#272

The-Rawrcake

Skip past the percentages and

Skip past the percentages and the "attacks" as most call them. I am not sensitive and would not mind if someone outright hated me, as long as they provided information I did not know. Personally I am working on getting rid of all of the "attitude" from a recent event.

Anyway, my post was not at all in response to your post, actually I could now care even less about percentages if we are all so confused on them. It was more towards the person saying how he did not want the guns to change to pure yet provided no reasoning.

If you read the other part of my post its based on experience with other guns in comparison to no-aoe, no-utility antigua lines. Not just numbers. Though whatever you are on to with this percentage model, I have always been told 25% bonus damage on a weak monster, 75% resistant to what they are strong against multiple times.

Disregard my numbers, I am personally not willing to go through it with a fine toothed comb. I'd rather just compare gun mechanics like I did.

I can understand things after experience with guns like, oh, I need burst damage not sustained damage on dodgers to get as much damage thrown out as possible before they dodge (so I use a Callahan which is slow and 2-shot). Therefore, an antigua would miss a lot of its weak 6-clip bullets when wolvers are dodging like crazy. There are more things to account for like this rather than numbers.

Thu, 01/05/2012 - 02:26

#273

Arquebus

Yay math!

@Chronovore & Antistone: It's nice to see some other people crunching numbers in this thread! I made similar points a few pages back, but with so little data on the wiki it's hard to make exact statements. Your numbers are really interesting, and I'm fascinated by the idea that the type modifier doesn't work on a straight scale... which might explain why there isn't a helpful NPC in town who explains what the actual system is!

Thu, 01/05/2012 - 02:37

#274

Grenze

Ok, so you are going to try to fix those weapons.

Mind you which are great as it is and alot of people like them, excluding the bombs of course, those getting are fine. But, oh but, where's making the Triglav and Saduruska better? The thing that some many owners of the weapon want? What about about some of the oddball armors that just seemingly don't compete with the more used ones. AKA Shadowsun Slicker/Stetson, Chaos Cowl/Cloak etc etc. And what about the unfinished lines, might I add have been raved about for months? The Spur line, where is the 5 star of it, What about the Deluxe Vitasuit, I see no 5 star of that, what's the point in upgrading to a 4 star thing if I can just get a 5 star one?

I'm happy that weapon balance is finally being truely CONSIDERED after so long. But as awkward as the Antigua line is, there are some weapons/equipment that are in dire need of becoming useful.

Edit: Also any reader of this post don't bother replying to me cause I stopped caring to argue on these forums, it's useless and a waste of time because people are stubborn, there are clearly better lines and everyone knows this, don't defend the worse lines because all that means is the thing you are defending doesn't get better which I guess bad for you, you don't like better do you? Popular Consensus aka the majority of players in the game, your traffic for developers reading, states that there are obvious superior lines and if you don't believe check out you own made Bazzar part of the forums and tell me if you start to see a pattern.

With that I'm done, good day to all of you.

Thu, 01/05/2012 - 02:38

#275

Quotefanboy

Here's the problem

If you make the weapon ONLY one element, then the Sentenza and Argent Peacemaker are going to break Alchemer lines. No, break guns in general.

All elemental or shadow damage for a 6 shots, which is already on par with its damage. Now alchemers may do element, but it's only 2 shots. THe Polaris may have 3 strong shots, but the massive push-back makes it hard to land all 3 hits unless they're in a corner, which makes run and gunning annoying, especially for your team mates. They'll destroy the competition without giving a care in the world.

Now, what I'd suggest, is keep them dual element, but make it "Normal" instead of "Piercing"

Normal means it'll never get more powerful. It'll balance it out more, and not make it very "oddball" if you would. The "piercing" resistances would be lost and all you'd have to worry about is the Normal damage backing up your elemental/shadow when it fails. Therefore you'll always do decent, but never trancend to a level of godhood.

The damage on it, already, is amazing due to its speed. Therefore we shouldn't make it a god of a weapon, like what would happen if you did this. Look what you did to the brandish, that thing can't be beaten now.

Also: If you're willing to do "Elemental" and "Undead" to the AP, or "Darkness" and "Gremlin" to Sentenza, may I ask this?
Why don't you make the Hunting blade "Piercing" and "Beast" and also make the Cold Iron Vanquisher "Elemental" and "Undead" and the like? Just asking.

Thu, 01/05/2012 - 15:21

#276

The-Rawrcake

@Quotefanboy

>>>"If you make the weapon ONLY one element, then the Sentenza and Argent Peacemaker are going to break Alchemer lines. No, break guns in general."

Now this isn't toying with numbers partially and I can answer THIS without being scolded:

How alchemers work is that, on hit, they have a bullet split off to the left. That split bullet can also bounce off of what it hits then hit something else. After this is said, that makes 3 hits from a single shot of an alchemer.

Not only this, but you have to account for hitting inbetween two mobs, clipping both of them (so like shooting your antigua in the middle of two close together monsters, dealing 2 numbers of damage). Now that is just per bullet with an antigua. With an alchemer split bullet and the scenario I said in my post, you now have more than one bullet which can end up two-monster clipping.

Then comes the charge attack. It splits off 4 bullets, all to the same direction every time, which each of those will also ricochet.

Basically this is why the alchemer is an area of effect damage gun.
1. It doesn't scatter mobs everywhere like a polaris and 2. isn't as simple as a 6 shot gun like the antigua lines.

Currently and after the change, the AP and Sent will remain the only guns with 0 AoE and 0 utility. They will become the best single target damage guns but nothing else.

>>>>"All elemental or shadow damage for a 6 shots, which is already on par with its damage. Now alchemers may do element, but it's only 2 shots. "

Remember that alchemers deal more damage per bullet as opposed to an AP or Sent. And also keep in mind that in lockdown you do not want sustained damage, you want burst. So because of this, Alchemers will remain the gun to go for as a gunner in lockdown other than Polaris.

And, as I said earlier, alchemers have split ricochet bullets.

>>>>"to a level of godhood."

Comparable but better single target damage, 0 area of effect damage, and 0 utility =/= godhood based on what I have said.

_______________________________________________

Quotefanboy, THANK YOU for giving reasons on why not to make pure regardless of the reasons! you actually tried as opposed to others. You can read over what I posted and take in what might change what you think, but please post if you disagree / know something I missed.

Thu, 01/05/2012 - 23:05

#277

Quotefanboy

Time for my wordywords.

KK. Lets see what I can get out of this.

Before I start, the deflection is random. I've seen it go to the right.
Now:
True, but 3+3 = 6. Correct?
The AP and the Sentenza shoot... how many shots? 6?

Now, we put this into the equation. When you fire a Antigua line gun, the bullets always hit because every shot is individual. For an alchemer, you have to get the bullets to deflect.
Now we get 2 factors:

A.) Random deflection. The bullets bounce randomly, and therefore it won't always work.
B.) The first monster. If you're shooting at a crowd, you're gonna hit the monster in front, and because the deflection works the way it does (logically) it'll bounce back to you, hitting nothing. Granted, you can work it to hit monsters, but the random deflection may cause it to not work, plus it's a lot harder to hit with for the same amount of bullets. Granted, the bullets are more powerful, but less reliable.

That's my view on it, anyhow. I see what you mean, and they are more powerful per shot, but in the end less reliable. Sure, burst damage is true for lockdown, but my random deflection shows why "run and gunning" is much harder in PvE

Oh, and also, if they get an additional "Undead/Gremlin" damage buff? Oh god.

Comparable but better single target damage, 0 area of effect damage, and 0 utility =/= godhood based on what I have said.

True, and I understand that the utility and AoE is lacking, but think of it like this. In jelly king, with my friend's Sentenza, he does 26 damage a shot. Imagine that going up to 49ish. 49 times 6 (which is near an alchemer line bullet). Plus, if they change the charge attack to only be the hawk/eagle bullet, and they make that stronger to make up for the lack of standstill bullet swarm.

And no problem.

Sat, 01/07/2012 - 15:35

#278

Witalon

Please

Please do not change Radiant sun shards damange. Please. I love them being elementals/piercing split. Please dont change it. And for antigua line, change it. But please dont change RSS.

Sat, 01/07/2012 - 16:04

#279

Batabii

So how long before the admins

So how long before the admins reach a decision on this?

Sat, 01/07/2012 - 16:07

#280

Benb

@Batabii

I sure hope soon.

Sat, 01/07/2012 - 16:16

#281

Athaza

With the nerf to Gremlins and Wolvers

With the nerf to Gremlins dodging every 1 second increased to 4 and wolvers bite warping in tier3 fixed Sentenza doesn't really need a change anymore.

Sat, 01/07/2012 - 18:01

#282

Batabii

I still think sentenza is way

I still think sentenza is way weaker than it needs to be, it seems to do less damage per bullet than blitz needle to similar enemies, and rarely knocks down/interrupts. Even the charge attack is shockingly weak compared to most gun charges, multihit penetration notwithstanding. Plus it seems the damage calculation is messed up; where it should be NEUTRAL to jellies, it's giving me grey damage numbers, and against gremlins I rarely see super effective damage.

Sun, 01/08/2012 - 10:10

#283

The-Rawrcake

@Quotefanboy

"Before I start, the deflection is random. I've seen it go to the right.
Now:
True, but 3+3 = 6. Correct?
The AP and the Sentenza shoot... how many shots? 6?"
_____________________________________________________
The deflection is not completely random. Go to the ATH and shoot at a wall. Report what you find. Shoot at that wall from many different angles.

Ok, on average, my split bullets hit about 3 times a bullet while decently AoE ing.

I know for a fact that it takes more time for an AP and Sent to shoot off 6 bullets than it takes for alchemers to shoot off 2.

And I also know for a fact that alchemers deal more damage per bullet (a lot more).

The reason I am getting off so many shots is because I am used to positioning splits and go for the pocket etc. / not the front mob.

So that is how I look at it, the power of AoE vs. no AoE in a group of mobs. If you have an alchemer, shooting AP / Sent in a big group of mobs is just silly.

Also the charge attack disintegrates mobs in pockets (also disintegrates single mobs when you learn where to position). Charge attack of AP and Sent is poop.

Then comes utility, which AP / Sent also has none of. It will be a pure single target damage gun, nothing else to it. It shines where it needs to shine (single target) and will not shine where it will not shine.

Thus why it will not be "god-like"

__________________________________________
"49 times 6 (which is near an alchemer line bullet). "
__________________________________________

What? You either A. have no damage bonus which is the most important gun stat or B. never used an alchemer.

Without damage bonus, a single bullet gets up to 80 on JK. With damage bonus, over 100. Again, around 50 for a Sent is reasonable guess I'll give ya that, and as I said, it will shine in single target while say an Umbra will shine in AoE. But not nearly as critical as how you put it.

Also, you can side clip splits on JK, dealing over 200 per shot. charge attack will be over 500 per charge shot due to side clipping. But you cannot always side clip.

Sun, 01/08/2012 - 17:43

#284

Tiagolima

In my opinion, ISB should be

In my opinion, ISB should be the biggest point of this discussion, first because the charge time people say it has is terrific for pve and pvp. Second, normal and piercing could be accepted, but with slime bonus is just a stupid thing..

I recommend to make it shadow and normal/elemental. Why? Because there is divine armor with shadow and elemental, and it is the only special/special armor that doesn't has a single weapon that gives both at the same time!

It would be good against slimes ( since it has that bonus against them ) and constructs, pretty cool in my opinion. If it could keep the shock effect ( over the slimes damage bonus ) it would be a real murderer of mecha knights, turrets and all constructs!

Btw, i agree with Athaza, sentenza is now much better after the update on wolvers and gremlins.

Just my two cents.

Sun, 01/08/2012 - 18:19

#285

Batabii

but doesn't sentenza

but doesn't sentenza penetrate mobs?

Also I was under the understanding that the Drivers tend to reflect to the left of where they were fired...

But yeah everything sentenza can do in PvE, Callahan can generally do better, even on Gremlins.

Mon, 01/09/2012 - 01:12

#286

Quotefanboy

Hmm..

You got me on that. The Alchemer line can shoot 2 faster then Sentenza's 6, and yeah I don't use bonus damage on my guns. I go more for attack speed. I'd like to get more bonus damage on guns, but I like CTR Med for my Alchemer and Catalyzer (when I finally find that ctr med I'll be so happy) and bomb CTR med to make my graviton and Shiver/Stagger max. With guns I don't care much for damage, just for safety, but enough about my playstyle.

Alright time to break TLDR this one

Deflection: The deflection is a 90 degree angle. I have tested.
Damage: An elemental alchemer, on depth 14 neutral damage, it did 35ish Normal, 63ish Super effective. Hopefully the antigua doesn't go up to 55-60ish for elemental damage.
Single Target and AoE: The deflection is too random. I try to make it deflect, I do shoot in gaps, but it doesn't deflect that often. Then again that would make it, when it does deflect even once, really good because that's an entirely extra bullet, yet overall when running away and shooting the Antigua line would be a bit better unless they're gapped.

Overall: I get what you mean, and I never used an Umbra/Prisma gun. I don't know the damage up on it, and in the end that's what you truly need to compare the Sentenza/Argent Peacemaker. The Single target will be amazing.

Also: the Sentenza/Argent Peacemaker's charge is bad, but with this update, and the brandish, I expected it to be updated to be better. I mean the brandishes 5 star became 3 star, so anything is possible. Why don't I think the Alchemer won't get an update? Because they aren't talking about the Alchemer right now, but knowing they're doing this, and what they did before, they'll probably get something amazing aside from this. Maybe some utility.
That's all based on a guess though.

I guess I could just say, for the Alchemer, it'd be nice if the bullets ricocheted without the use of hitting something. That'd be cool.

All in all I'd like it to be neutral. They'd be useful in more areas, and still usable in areas where they aren't doing super powerful damage.

Tue, 01/10/2012 - 02:39

#287

Darkbrady

Most of this discussion is

Most of this discussion is with the guns and being a bomber, I couldn't care less about that (if it makes them better, good; gunners need a wee kick, it should certainly not make them worse though, they have it bad enough already) but I wanna just jump in and cast my vote as far as the RSS goes.

How is it a niche weapon? Honestly, I use my RSS absolutely everywhere. Elemental+fiend bonuses make it a legend in GYs, Candlesticks, FSC etc, and the piercing keeps it generally useful against most other things that don't elemental resistance or dodge. As things are, it can pan out against most constructs (covering at neutral damage) and be useful in most places, certainly never ever a niche class weapon. It doesn't need to be made stronger at all, but it's already capping at 4*, it can't afford to be made weaker by dropping a damage type and being restricted to less useful areas, otherwise it'll never be able to keep up in T3 areas.

Yes, I am aware that it is only a 4* weapon and technically shouldn't keep up with 5* gear, but it doesn't upgrade to 5* /because/ it already keeps up with them. Change the damage output on it and we'll be losing out on one of our most useful bombs. If we want piercing, then DBB does the job absolutely fine, there's no need for a piercing only RSS because most mobs that are weak to piercing have that nasty DODGE ability (wolvers, gremlins) that make RSS a pain to use on them, so when it comes down to it, DBB will almost always win (it's already the bombers weapon of choice for downing Trojans) so when it comes down to a choice for a piercing bomb, DBB will always win, which would make teh RSS not useful enough to bother carrying in a loadout.

Thu, 01/12/2012 - 05:16

#288

Frederick

Bump

Bump, sorry but i really wanna see a reply from admins

Thu, 01/12/2012 - 17:13

#289

Hmmnm

My thoughts

1. dual damage weapons may be odd ducks, but damage bonus weapons may be even worse.

2. Making Sentenza pure damage is a good idea. However, pure shadow sentenza will make shadowtech alchemer and biohazard almost completely useless. If you want to make Sentenza pure shadow damage, I would suggest upgrading shadowtech alchemer and biohazard as well.
For example, shadowtech alchemer should have a chance to cause medium curse. Right now, there is only one weapon in this game that can cause curse.
Biohazard is already not very popular, because its bullets are small & slow and the charge attack is difficult to use. I'd improve it by
1. make the charge attack bullets slightly larger.
2. The charge attack should ignore shields.
3. the charged shot automatically explode if the tagged enemy is killed or after the charge orbits the enemy for approx 20 sec.

3. Pure elemental Argent Peacemaker is a good idea. The elemental alchemers will still be popular because it can inflict status, while polaris will be popular because of its large and easy to aim bullets.

4. Radiant sun shards is actually already a pretty popular bomb. No need for upgrades. Instead, the ionized salt bomb needs to be fixed.

Fri, 01/13/2012 - 08:25

#290

Blackdragoniv

There must be something wrong with the math

IDEA -- What about for dual damage types do something like this, lets just say your using a weapon that is Piercing and Shadow (Blackhawk) to a slime and both damage types, not including weaknesses, were to do 50 damage.

So when you deal damage, always place the damage types in the order they are listed on the weapon (Normal/Piercing - Shadow/Elemental) lets take a Blackhawk for example (Piercing - Shadow)

Show the damage like this: 25 - 75
Then you would be able to properly define that 25 is grey for reduced damage from peircing vs slimes and 75 is bonus for shadow vs slimes.

As for the actual numbers, that could be fixed by balancing Weakness and Resistances rather than having one higher than the other (resistances are lower damage by more than you would get from bonus damage). This is what causes weapons like the Blackhawk from dealing the full damage you'd expect to slimes.

Fri, 01/13/2012 - 12:06

#291

Chronovore

"resistances are lower damage

"resistances are lower damage by more than you would get from bonus damage"
This is not generally true. Whether the penalty is larger than the bonus depends on the weapon's base damage. Many weapons fall into the range where the bonus is larger than the penalty. For example: Polaris in stratum 6; bonus goes from 68 to 81, penalty goes from 34 to 41. It would only take a small increase in the Sentenza/AP's base damage to put it into this range as well (at least at lower depths, where the depth modifier has less of an effect).
Bonuses and penalties are NOT multiplicative, they are additive. For very high and very low weapon damages, the penalty is higher than the bonus. For intermediate weapon damages, the bonus is higher than the penalty.
Whether split-normal, split-special, or pure-special weapons get the best combination of bonuses and penalties depends on the base damage.

Fri, 01/13/2012 - 13:40

#292

Blackdragoniv

Sorry I need to ask. Are you

Sorry I need to ask. Are you sure it's additive? That wouldn't make scene what so ever, there's almost always a Multiplicative situation somewhere to build a stable ratio for development. Have you honestly de-compiled the game and looked? Because honestly that makes no scene, if it was additive without any multiplicative systems, that would almost make the differences in damage a static value, even when focused off base damage. There's obviously something that isn't being taken into consideration and it's most likely an unknown static value that is being multiplied because the loss/gain of damage isn't a static number so yes its going to be relevant to the base damage, and YES it's probably going to involve multiplying a value. [This is getting a little off-topic so back on topic!]

The weapon you've used in your example does not imply additive. Additionally, normal (non resistance and non bonus) damage is usually good information to provide as well.

QUOTE: "For very high and very low weapon damages, the penalty is higher than the bonus. For intermediate weapon damages, the bonus is higher than the penalty."

This could simply be a "wanna be damage cap", and a "Stop the low level people from going here".

Additionally the reason why the Blackhawk falls into the category of " very low weapon damages" is probably because each value of damage is taken separately, meaning its not taking the full damage and spitting out the new number. It's taking both numbers, processing their low values. and odds are, applying the "Stop the low level people from going here".

Fri, 01/13/2012 - 19:27

#293

Chronovore

I'm pretty sure it's additive

I'm pretty sure it's additive (which is not the same as saying it is independent from the base damage) - as sure as I can be without looking at the source code. I spent a fair amount of time analyzing observed damage values for 5* weapons at depth 27 & 28. If you graph bonus damage as a flat value vs. base damage, you get a significantly simpler function than if you graph it as a percentage of base damage.

The amount of bonus damage received at those depths is approximately K*(100 - (MIN(B, 160) - 125)^2/100), where B is the depth-adjusted base damage and K is a multiplier based on depth. That 160 is the point at which base damage is no longer factored into the bonus damage. At depth 28, a pure special weapon that does 203 damage to neutral enemies receives ~81.5 bonus damage. A pure special weapon that does 386 damage to neutral enemies receives the same ~81.5 bonus damage. A split special/normal weapon that does 600 damage to neutral enemies (300 normal, 300 special) receives the same ~81.5 bonus damage.
At depth 27, those same weapons do 200, 378, and 590 damage respectively. They receive ~77.5, ~77.5, and ~77.5 bonus damage respectively.
These three examples would be the first hit of the Barbarous Thorn Blade, the charge attack of the BTB, and the charge attack of the Divine Avenger, respectively.
The Callahan's normal attack does 131 and 129 damage at depths 28 and 27 - pretty near the peak bonus damage. It receives 94 and 88 bonus damage at those depths.

The resistance penalty is approximately (B - 20)*0.85 at both D27 and D28.

I might not have the exact values that get plugged into those functions, but I do have a pretty good idea of their shape:
The bonus damage starts low, goes up with base damage (not linearly, however), reaches a peak at around 125 base damage, starts to go down again, and then flattens out completely at around 160 base damage. The resistance penalty starts low and goes up (slower than the bonus to start), but instead of reaching a peak it keeps increasing linearly.

Now, I can't guarantee that I have the exact details of the formula correct, or that the same formula is used for all tiers, or that weapons below 5* follow the same formula, or that the formula doesn't have another special case outside of the damage ranges I had damage numbers for (which would be from ~58.5 special damage to ~386 special damage), but every 5* weapon I had damage numbers for at those depths fit the same curves with quite small levels of error.

Fri, 01/13/2012 - 19:47

#294

Iknorite

Whether Nick actually reads these or not, I will talk

I'm conflicted with the idea of changing for the Antiguas. I think the split damage doesn't matter with Argeant Peacemaker during Vana fights, and I think Polaris would still be a common gun to use during the levels of FSC. Also there are already 5 Different guns: Magma Driver, Storm Driver, Hail Driver, Nova driver, AND Polaris that do elemental damage. Sentenza strikes me as an intentional gun for uses in pvp, personally, i'd like to keep it that way. Biohazard and Umbra driver are already very nice shadow damage guns, and no matter how many gremlin bells and whistles Sentenza could have, using magnus line to sniped mendors and gremlins in general works out fine. As for Sun shards, This IS one of my favorite weapons. Even without a 5* version I love using this bomb line even with split damage. Making it pure piercing gets rid of any form of elemental damage bomb, purely for damage. (Ash of Agni is still a status bomb no matter how much the dots do) Maybe because my personal Sun shards has contruct high uv, but I find it works out fine against Constructs and Undead. Please please leave Sun Shards alone. Its split damage and explosion style both make it a unique and special bomb to me personally.

Fri, 01/13/2012 - 20:14

#295

Blackdragoniv

A chance to evolve

Regardless of how things work, Maybe normal damage shouldn't be "normal" maybe it's time Normal damage is known as "Blunt"

Personally I think having 3 "Special" types of damages, + Normal, and one type (Peircing) cannot go with Normal, is what causes alot of the these damage errors, I don't think OOO's code was prepared to deal with Dual Special type cases. And I think the way to fix that would be to remove normal and have a new type of "default" damage.

This would allow damage to have two, simple categories, "Physical" ("blunt" and Piercing), and for the lack of a better term, "Magical"(Shadow and Elemental). I personally see this situation as chance for OOO to progress. An example of this in game development was Portal, while developing the original portal, there was an issue with ceiling to ceiling transfers, they didn't remove them from the game, they fixed the functionality and actually used it in-game (During the escape you stand on a piston that were to crush you into the ceiling). So why remove or change an item from the game because it doesn't function as planned? Why not take advantage of the situation and improve the game so it functions as intended?

EDIT:1
@Hmmnm your forgetting the Nova Driver, that would become useless with the AP being full Elemental

EDIT:2
The MAIN reason I find that these weapons should not be changed is not because I like them (even though i have the Silversix AND the Blackhawk) but because they provide a unique twist that no other weapons in the entire game have to offer. and I feel THAT is what the game needs to keep. These diverse weapons and items that allow for so much customization.

EDIT:3

Hey Nick what I think you ment to say was QUOTE:
"Silversix - Pure elemental damage, add an FIEND damage bonus
Argent Peacemaker - Pure elemental damage, add an FIEND damage bonus
Blackhawk - Pure shadow damage, add a BEAST damage bonus
Sentenza - Pure shadow damage, add a BEAST damage bonus"
(Ofcourse I'm assume that by "original concept" you mean currently, if I'm wrong, then you probably mean that the original concept was for a Undead Killer, and a Gremlin killer.)

(Found the edit button! I actually didn't see it to be honest... Should probably make it more noticeable guys ^^)

Fri, 01/13/2012 - 19:57

#296

Blackdragoniv

@Hmmnm your forgetting the

@Hmmnm your forgetting the Nova Driver, that would become useless with the AP being full Elemental

Fri, 01/13/2012 - 20:05

#297

Blackdragoniv

Diversity

The MAIN reason I find that these weapons should not be changed is not because I like them (even though i have the Silversix AND the Blackhawk) but because they provide a unique twist that no other weapons in the entire game have to offer. and I feel THAT is what the game needs to keep. These diverse weapons and items that allow for so much customization.

[Sorry about the triple post... Thought I should add this as it is a really important fact]

Sat, 01/14/2012 - 06:17

#298

Stingz

Simple Fix

Have they tried increasing the base shadow/elemental damage of the antigua lines, to make up for the piercing damage?
Since the only problem i have with my Blackhawk is the amount of shots to down anything.

Mon, 01/16/2012 - 05:25

#299

Blackdragoniv

@Stingz you make Piercing

@Stingz you make Piercing sound like a bad thing... I personally just think that OOO wasn't anticipating making a double special type when that part of the game was being developed.

Additionally keep in mind, the faster the fire-rate the less DMG per Bullet, that's just expected. If everything hit for 100 damage. Cutters and Autogun's would be OP xD

Thu, 01/26/2012 - 14:53

#300

Tsubasa-No-Me

Have you considered?

What about just changing the ratio of Pierce to Shadow/Ele?

Less pierce, more other.

The rounds are just so filled with energy that it envelops the round... its plausible...

~Tsu

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Possible changes to dual special damage weapons