>_>
*stare*
...
...
...
Ok, my fail ._.
Buff the Plague Needle
Fri, 04/27/2012 - 10:14
#52
@Trollingyou
Fri, 04/27/2012 - 10:51
#53
@Veacon:
I haven't used an alchemer-line in FSC.
APs do roughly 98~123 (As you progress through the depths) in KoA per shot without UVs. I have ASI VH UV and I wear full Deadshot to get ASI Max!/Undead Max!
It changes my damage to about 136~160/shot. These are just rough numbers I recall while hitting zombies.
I'd assume AP is best for single-target and an alchemer-line is better for a fustercluck of enemies that decided it was a great time for a group hug. AP's hitbox has been known to hit multiple targets, despite being single bullets though.
~Sev
Fri, 04/27/2012 - 13:58
#54
-
+1
Fri, 04/27/2012 - 19:13
#55
@Veacon
Um... I wasn't comparing the Biohazard and the Plague Needle. I was explaining damage mechanics and the Bio (while it does have a unique mechanic) was an example of an effect in the game related to that.
THAT part wasn't directly about the Plague Needle, since it's not affected by that mechanic. That was kind of the point.
As an aside: testing the Biohazard in the RJP will only give you a slight taste of the mechanic I was talking about. Using it that high up in levels, 5* weapons take a huge debuff, and it doesn't get as big of a damage increase for neutral targets on the charge...
Even though it's getting off topic, and no offence intended... I'm having trouble figuring out if you're misunderstanding or just skimming posts and taking what you want from them.
The POINT, was that the Blitz is subject to a mechanic that gives it massive damage and the Plague (and Pepperbox) fall just short, so there's a HUGE difference in damage.
I don't really think that the poison/fire versions of these weapons SHOULD fall under this high-damage threshold (and it's possible that their damage is as low as it is because any higher would put them up over this threshold in the damage mechanics. This could certainly be a necessary thing to keep them from being VERY overpowered.) However, there is a massive disparity in what these guns can do.
Regarding Alchemers VS AP in FSC: When I go full gunner in FSC, I take my AP, Nova Driver, and Blight (not yet plague) needle.
Facing zombies, I use BOTH the AP and the Nova depending on the circumstances and I swap between them very frequently.
Now, this isn't a thread about FSC zombie gunning tactics, but to put it simply, they both get the double-target-hitting big hitbox per shot effect against enemies that are close enough together. Basically, the AP is better at things farther away (better range) and things that are VERY close to each other, but the same distance from you (because you can repeatedly hit BOTH of them with each shot.) The alchemer is better against large groups that are spread out, enemies that are grouped together closely, but with one slightly closer to you than the other (aim for the one in back to get multiple ricochets between them - you can get 12 hits with two shots if they're close enough together,) and for times when you want to do VERY high damage in one shot, but will need to keep moving (with the charge.)
In terms of potential "carnage" inflicted on zombies, they're both about equal. =D
Fri, 04/27/2012 - 20:11
#56
Sooooo
Off topic:
I have an undead med volt driver. Should I ditch it and make an AP?
On topic:
Don't worry about offending people, no offence taken :D
Toastnaut, I do understand your lengthy post about how damage mechanics work. I was not comparing the plague needle and the biohazard, but I was going(have already tested) to test it out with the biohazard to see if this is really the case, which it was. Now I understand why there is such a huge damage difference between shooting slags and shooting trojans with the plague, as compared to its overused counterpart. What my testing showed me was that the damage difference between what you can do to x-weak monsters and x-neutral monsters is not truly a linear comparison. Your post has been informative in telling me the finer details. I didn't opt to reply about how the game works because there's not much to say.
Its not too complicated really, its almost similar to a potential barrier in quantum tunneling: Particles which are unable to cross the potential barrier get reflected backwards. Those that are continue along on their merry way. I.E. Plague and Blitz, respectively.
If this is really the case then I'm not sure if the devs are too unwilling to change the damage done by the Plague and the Pepperbox since any slight tweak in data would result in an exponential leap in damage done. But I'm pretty certain that a 33% is not just an extremely slight difference in whatever values the plague and blitz have. Hopefully a dev can reply to this to clarify matters.
Note that according to damage tables from wiki, Fearless Rigadoon and Final Flourish have a rather insignificant damage difference, 442 vs 509, a 15% damage difference, which means that the devs probably CAN edit the damage numbers to maintain balance between weapons.
However wiki is not so reliable so I'm going to need some numbers from the community itself.
I am also extremely curious about the damage difference between the neutralizer and the biohazard, since they are the next best comparison similar to blitz/plague.
More +1 please :D
Fri, 04/27/2012 - 20:47
#57
+1
great idea do feel other guns need to be buffed first like nuetralizer/biohazard
Fri, 04/27/2012 - 23:18
#58
Good stuff
Glad to hear we're on the same page.
I guess your last reply confused me because it looked like you were trying to compare the plague/blitz to the biohazard.
I understand what you meant now.
As for the Driver, stick with it. AP is worth making anyways if you like guns, so even if it's a low priority it'd be worth comparing them yourself. The Volt Driver with undead med as a UV will serve you well, though.
Sun, 04/29/2012 - 23:35
#59
An idea
After giving this some thought, I have an idea.
Hopefully this thread hasn't been back and forth so much that it's fallen off of the radar for the developers, because it is perhaps a reasonable solution to the underwhelmingness of such a difficult weapon to obtain which is really supposed to be a reward for playing PVP.
The actual problem with the Plague Needle vs the Blitz isn't that the Plague needle is a BAD weapon, it's actually quite good. The problem is that it's the SAME in function as the Blitz, but unbelievably underpowered by comparison.
Rather than making it more powerful to narrow the gap between them, another solution would be to come at it from a different direction.
If the weapon DIDN'T function identically to the Blitz, then the damage disparity wouldn't be a problem, even if it was not THAT much different.
The change that I suggest that the Plague (and perhaps the Pepperbox, which is somewhat in need of a buff as well) fire one or two more shots per attack on the NORMAL attack only, NOT the charge. So rather than 6, 6 and 15 for the charge, it would be 7, 7 and 15 or 8, 8 and 15.
This would achieve the following things:
1) It would slightly increase damage without risking making the damage statistics do funny things. The actual damage that it does is fairly balanced, until you compare it to the Blitz, so that wouldn't really NEED a buff itself.
2) It would artifically increase the Proc chance for poison (and fire for the pepperbox) again without changing the actual weapon mechanics. Rather than risking making it inflict a status too often and make it overpowered, it would just very slightly increase the chance, but also increase the utility of it, making it easier to widely spread the status using the same probabilities.
3) It would make it a bit different from the Blitz. Most players who use autoguns will tell you that if you're not charging, you're using it wrong. This is pretty simple evidence that these weapons have one "firing mode" that is fairly underpowered, and one which is perhaps fairly overpowered.
In this way it would also give players who perfer not to charge their weapon an autogun that is good for them, without decreasing the usefulness of the Blitz or changing the weapons for those who like to use it as a "charge only" weapon.
Mon, 04/30/2012 - 00:55
#60
YEAH!
+1 to that!
Not only am I famous, but I inspire Hipster...ness... Yeah.
~Tsu
Mon, 04/30/2012 - 02:12
#61
Toastnaut
That sounds pretty brilliant, actually. You also bumped the thread before I could.
More Math:
Based on my previous calculations, I'm going to assume that the blitz does 192 per needle with 0 damage bonus.
Plague, doing 33% less, is going to do 128 damage per needle.
So, with each charge shot, assuming all needles hit, blitz will do 192x15 = 2880 damage.
Plague will do 128x15 = 1920
With additional needles, that will be 2048 for 16 needles and 2176 for 17 needles.
Also, 2560, still less than blitz(significantly), with 20 needles.
Note that with extra needles there will be a slightly longer time taken to fire a full clip, which leaves you slightly more vulnerable to anything, which I don't really mind because if you're using the needle you should be watching your surroundings closely.
+1 to your idea.
Hopefully devs read this and act!
Mon, 04/30/2012 - 03:43
#62
Make sure you note, I
Make sure you note, I suggested the extra shots NOT count on the charge.
The charge would be the same, it would just add utility to the normal attack.
Blitz would still MASSIVELY out-do the others for damage on the charge, but that's what it's for. It's the pure damage one, the others are (in theory) mainly for the status. They just don't do that often enough to make up for the loss in damage right now, really.
(Also, on the charge, it's much more than 33% less damage. Someone posted damage numbers above, but I'm too lazy right now to dig that up. :P)
Mon, 04/30/2012 - 07:03
#63
Ho Snap
Okay now I must confess I didn't really read that post. :( Sorrrryyyy
Well regarding this particular buff, I'm not too sure if its really too much of a buff per se, since needles are used almost exclusively for their charge attack. Furthermore if additional needles were to be added on the normal attack only in a bid to make it more of a status inflicter, then the plague needle and volcanic pepperbox will be trying to play the role of a needle and a haze bomb, which it is heavily outclassed by the blitz and the VV or AoA.
Hence I am for the buffing of the plague's (and pepperbox's) base damage, or give them more needles in their charge attack.
Mon, 04/30/2012 - 07:14
#64
More bullets on normal attack...
It could work with the plague needle, more chances for poison is always good. Don't know if it'll work as well for volcanic pepperbox though, cause the nature of fire status is just plain damage with very little utility. Of course, that's for another thread.
Will it fir the 7-8 shots in the same amount of time it takes the blitz to fire it's 6 shots? We don't want our poor knights staying immobilized any longer than they already are.
Mon, 04/30/2012 - 08:00
#65
Idea: Make the first shot
Idea: Make the first shot have 6 needles, and the second shot have 9 needles. Make it fire the first 6 faster than it normally does, and the last 9 at the current speed (well, at the current time per clip)
Mon, 04/30/2012 - 17:49
#66
Well, to a large extent, the
Well, to a large extent, the point of my suggestion was to try to help to get it away from being a "charge only" weapon.
Adding more damage to the charge wouldn't help balance the weapon, it would just make it Overpowered (you could argue that the way the blitz is now, that it IS, but it also doesn't get a status. It's more powerful, but it's less useful.)
I like the idea of having the first and second attack slightly different, Fehzor. The problem I see there is that the solution was also aimed to be something that wouldn't (hopefully) add more need for new coding or animations. I'm assuming that the autogun firing animation would have to be changed if the firing duration was changed, so for the sake of simplicity, one or two more shots in the same amount of time as normal.
Getting off a few more normal shots in the same time could make up some of the difference that keeps most players from using the normal attack of the autogun line in favor of the charge.
Wed, 05/02/2012 - 07:56
#67
I'm not too sure
If the needle has much use beyond its charge.
For all variants, their damage not on the charge is really quite pitiful; I distinctly remember my plague doing 30-50 with the normal attack to slags, and just over 60 to trojans.
In a party of 4, you're not going to be killing anything with that, and again, if its just a status spreader it will be severely outclassed by a hazebomb blitz combo.
BUMP
You said AP is good for anyone who's not snarby though, lol.