Star Conflict OBT v 0.8.2 Discussion

Mercenary Center Patch Discussion
81

Engineer vs CovOps

 

1 v 1 = can go either way so I’d say fair

1 Engineer vs 2 interceptors = duh

2 Engineers vs 1 interceptor = Interceptor can always choose to disengage

 

these are academic scenarios coz

 

Fleet of Assorted roles inc. Engineer vs Fleet of Assorted roles inc CovOps = Interceptor don’t get to do much other than objectives, opportunity strikes and play the check in a checkmate move.

 

To me I’m fine ignoring the issues (R9 covops here) and put it down as a playstyle choice

 

What is xxxx is how the roles have gone sideways in Fleet v Fleet.

Interceptors are supposed to be frigate killers esp. CovOps but say in Recon T3

How often can a gang of covops run over a gang of assorted frigates & co holding the middle to get to the captain?

 

Not gonna happen often. So what’s the appropriate move here?

 

Buff them some more? or Nerf them coz T2 interceptors are still able to steamroll almost everything in T2?

 

 

To me I’m fine ignoring the issues (R9 covops here) and put it down as a playstyle choice

 

Don’t like OP’d T2 inties - go T3

Can’t run around killing stuff in T3 - go T2

 

Is there a balance fix so the two tiers match up ?

No - coz teamwork has a big say in it despite very few actually say that it does

82

If you think that any module or ship is over/underpowered, please create a new thread so we can gather the feedback.

83

So I was playing solo earlier today testing new patch, and ran into two familiar squads in combat reconnaissance. Full random (maybe a couple of duos) on our side, 4 man ESB squad on other side.

 

Our side does the smart thing and over half of the team picks cleric or tank. Enemy literally threw everything and a kitchen sink at our captain (random fighter pilot in both games). Mass surprise suicides from covert ops, stun into kill, gunship zergs, tackler slows. They came all together, they came in waves trying to push captain out of heals, they came one by one when they thought cap was otherwise occupied…

 

It didn’t end well. Funnier note: in second game, our engineers were so terrible, they either didn’t take or forgot to turn on hull healing mods for about half of the game. Look at my awesome medal in the screenshot #3.

 

 

If this doesn’t get the message through to everyone about how utterly broken frigates and specifically engineer healing still is, nothing will.

 

 

screenshot130606164950.th.jpg

 

 

screenshot130606171446.th.jpg

 

screenshot130606171451.th.jpg
 

84

How do T3 engineers feel? I’d like to hear from them. So far I think its all been t2 engineer chatter, and t3 non-engineer chatter (correct me if I’m wrong.)

 

Also, suggestion, maybe make combat drone repairs more effective and give them more hull so they can actually survive a missal?

I think rather than reducing the range of the heal, the rate of healing should have been changed.

 

As others have pointed out, the Engineer is a support class, but is now being forced into front line brawler mode.

So I was playing solo earlier today testing new patch, and ran into two familiar squads in combat reconnaissance. Full random (maybe a couple of duos) on our side, 4 man ESB squad on other side.

 

Our side does the smart thing and over half of the team picks cleric or tank. Enemy literally threw everything and a kitchen sink at our captain (random fighter pilot in both games). Mass surprise suicides from covert ops, stun into kill, gunship zergs, tackler slows. They came all together, they came in waves trying to push captain out of heals, they came one by one when they thought cap was otherwise occupied…

 

It didn’t end well. Funnier note: in second game, our engineers were so terrible, they either didn’t take or forgot to turn on hull healing mods for about half of the game. Look at my awesome medal in the screenshot #3.

 

 

If this doesn’t get the message through to everyone about how utterly broken frigates and specifically engineer healing still is, nothing will.

 

As everyone here is aware, there was already extensive discussion about engineer heals being overpowered, and it was obvious that the remote heals are the biggest issue because they stack. In a combat recon turtle the nerf to range doesn’t have an effect, and doesn’t address the fundamental problem. And as for the T1/T2 engineers, I think they have a right to be concerned when changes meant to address a problem in higher tiers may destroy the balance of lower tiers. After all, T1 moves to T2 and eventually T3; completely different metagames for each tier causes less players to stick with the game and progression.

 

Also, I feel the problem of bad players in T3 comes from so called “skilled” players of higher tiers ignoring or overlooking the importance of the dynamics in lower tiers, but that’s another topic entirely.

85

Question to the Devs,

 

What’s the specific reasoning on the nerf of the Orion Targeting Complex?

 

The dang module was already hard to use and I’m a veteran of the interceptor so I have about 150+ Skill points on using it, but the other people will be pissed on it being nerfed. 

This was due to very high statistics of kills for the Recons. And after studying logs we’ve found out that this was connected to Orion’s buff. In order to lower the DPS we’ve nerfed the module a bit.

Okay, I just have to ask: what was the specific reasoning behind nerfing the healing modules? Yes, I am a little irritated by it, because I am a T2 player and would prefer to have healing capabilities over survivability. Is it due to engineer cluster healing? If yes, why not just make it so you can only be affected by one engineer at a time? No overlaps would make for a still balanced ship. I did hate engineer clustering because it was incredibly overpowered and found it unfair to the team fighting against one.

We are thinking on that at the moment. We’ve seen a lot of feedback like yours.

I can also reassure you that we’re paying close attention to the situation.

86

I hate the new feature that I need TO SIGN IN ANOTHER STEAM ACCOUNT TO ACCESS TO MY ACCOUNT. Also I need you to add the checkbox login using Steam.

I have a new account and want to access my old account but it just wont let me because I need to sign in into an old account.

87

healer frigates are good now b/c if you want heals then you better keep an eye on the healer. At the same time though the spam of frigates where 8/12 people run frigate is kinda annoying to go up against. There is no skill in taking 8 frigates and just laying as many landmines as possible before everyone gets to the beacon and then pop pulsar rotations. Its beatable but just really annoying to go up against when your squad is the only one left alive b/c we have the common sense to not run into the 2000m cloud of red mines.

88

I hate the new feature that I need TO SIGN IN ANOTHER STEAM ACCOUNT TO ACCESS TO MY ACCOUNT. Also I need you to add the checkbox login using Steam.

I have a new account and want to access my old account but it just wont let me because I need to sign in into an old account.

You can contact our support team in order to discuss the matter. But I must say - this feature is done and works as intended. You have created an account and linked it, you were warned that this is going to be permanent.

89

I’m still new to the Game and haven’t been flyin’ that long, but the Engineer Nerf for Frigates seems to be too hard in my opinion. (Playing T2 atm)

 

It just doesn’t feel right to have to go brawl with my Frigate. Isn’t an Engineer supposed to be Mid-Range?

 

Often enough, i was the first Target of the enemy gang at midrange but at this range, i’m able to react and eventually find cover or help my mates kill the enemy.

 

Now with the reduced range of my modules, i have to go kiss the frontlines and mostly get primaried from the enemy team and die in 2 Seconds. If i don’t get primaried, i get plasma arced from behind and die in 3 seconds. Yes, i have mine fields, but those are limited :-D.

 

At the moment it’s just: Spawn, fly closer to frontline to support mates, get primaried, die in 2 seconds. Repeat and die again in a few seconds. The whole match long. Sure, i have the option to not fly close to the frontline and heal the snipers, but then i’m not a big help to my team in my oppinion.

 

That isn’t any fun at all.

Sure, the team has to support their engineers and i think that it’s fair, that Engineers die quickly when they’re not supported. But even with support, your team mates can’t do anything to protect you on the front line when your getting fire from everyone.

90

That’s not you who should fly to your mates - but they to you. You are flying on support ship for team gameplay. Not on a tanking ship.

We are monitoring the situation, and I may say that engies will be tweaked… somehow.

91

After a good nights sleep, and maybe my brain is just a bit wonky right now, but I have come to the conclusion of a few things:

 

  1. The problems in T3/T4 are not in T1/T2, and in T1/T2 engineers are far from OP currently, I have never seen an “engineer blob”, and engineers tend to die quite fast. The repair range that they had was important to keep alive.

  2. Most people complaining about engineer blobs, and saying all other ships die in 1 second(Really, that is what you guys make it sound like) are in T3/T4.

  3. The devs need to stop balancing across all tiers at once, and have a good hard look at each tier and balance accordingly. Instead of having a look at T3, see something imbalanced, then nerf it and T1/T2 also get nerfed accordingly making a ship useless there. 

If engineer blobs are such a blatant problem, the fix obviously is fix blobs, but in the end, a good working blob will always do better than a bad working blob or small gang.(Look at EVE online for confirmation, only stealth bombers and pipebomb gangs got a chance at hurting massive blobs a lot)

92

Okay, I understand that T2 is much different to T3. And before any of you ask, check the main page and you will see why I have returned to sow even more ‘useless opinions because I’m a T2 idiot who’s only played for 20 hours’.

 

Really, after thinking about it, I see the main problem as the massive jump from T2 to T3. You go from interceptors to frigates, and whilst the range reduction in T3 may have been required, it hamstrings engineers in T2. I feel like a useless chunk of metal only there to be a temporary bullet shield for others (though this does result in a lot of resistance and endurance medals :D). If they were treated as almost two separate games, maybe that would help? Just saying.

93

Sentry Drone module for the fighter tacklers.  Can I get a little info on what it does?  I’ve tried it, thinking maybe it orbits.  I don’t see it.  I have no idea what the thing does, seems to activate w/o a target.  Description says 2000m range.  Very curious and confused.

94

Here is what I think should happen:

 

All tiers:

  • Restore old healing range.
  • Healing effects do not stack - if a ship is subject to multiple healing effects, only the strongest heal applies. This means that it doesn’t matter if you’re in range of one engineer or every ship in the team is an engineer; you heal at the same rate (note: hull and shield can heal at the same time, and potentially at different rates!).
  • Reduce healing rate by about… let’s say 25% to begin with.

Tier 1 / Tier 2 Only:

  • Increase pitch and roll speeds of all Frigates by about +33%.

You’ll notice I don’t suggest this for Tier 3 and 4. This is because the “meta” I see in Tier 3 is very different to the one I see when flying Tier 2. Tier 3 meta is still Frigate heavy, whilst Tier 2 meta is “the side with the fewest Interceptors loses”. People who argue we should all just fly Guard Frigates are totally clueless as to how Tier 2 actually works - a well-equipped Covert Ops can solo a Guard Frigate in tier 2.

 

Hiding behind pulsars and minefields is not enough in a T2 match - you’ve got to bring your guns to bear. That’s where the problem lies; every Frigate knows that once that Inty gets behind them there is nothing they can do to save themselves. Their only hope is for another player to come along and save them… but when a Covert Ops can kill them faster than their allies can lock on, that hope tends to die quickly.

 

By giving lower-tier Frigates superior agility, you give them a chance to turn and fight against the Interceptor. Despite the nerf to Engineers, a quad-volley of Stabilized Railguns or Hail Plasma can still cause massive damage to an inty, and LR frigs can 2-3 hit kill them if all six guns land on target. By helping the Frigates bring this firepower to bear, you shift the meta back away from Interceptors, who now have to either hunt in packs or stay close to the Fighters / Frigates of their own side in order to get the job done.

95
  1. Most people complaining about engineer blobs, and saying all other ships die in 1 second(Really, that is what you guys make it sound like) are in T3/T4.

 

If engineer blobs are such a blatant problem, the fix obviously is fix blobs, but in the end, a good working blob will always do better than a bad working blob or small gang.(Look at EVE online for confirmation, only stealth bombers and pipebomb gangs got a chance at hurting massive blobs a lot)

That is the exact opposite of what people are saying. Problem is that if you have enough engineers, essentially nothing ever dies. Example is the screenshots in my post above, score at start was something like 12:1 on kills. Against a great squad. Simply because everyone on the team sat near the engineer frigs and got healed up to full the moment they took damage. That is the problem.

 

Same thing is present in T2 in organised play, as was seen in the tourney, but to a lesser degree due to missing mods. But folks still had to take mostly stabs and shoot from outside of signature masking range on target that has spy bots to get kills.

96

Sentry Drone module for the fighter tacklers.  Can I get a little info on what it does?  I’ve tried it, thinking maybe it orbits.  I don’t see it.  I have no idea what the thing does, seems to activate w/o a target.  Description says 2000m range.  Very curious and confused.

Sentry drone basically drops an engineering drone where you are and stays there. It does more damage than an engy drone and has slightly longer range.

IMO it’s a total white elephant. It doesn’t help against interceptors because they dodge its fire the usual amount and fights with inties are dynamic and often move 2k every few seconds, so it won’t be firing at them for long. If you drop it at a beacon it tends to get killed by AOE effects. If you drop it on top of a frigate in cover, they can usually still move to break line of sight with it, or in the unlikely event it actually causes them major inconvenience they can just kill it.

97

OK so I don’t see it mentioned but credit rewards for PvE were clearly reduced quite a bit. So people looking for a negative ninja nerf there’s one right there.

 

The purpose of PvE is to grind credits for new ships and equipment not to be a WHOLE fantastic new challenge that takes twice as long as a regular match with the same reward as PvP. Just sayin…

 

Confirm…PVE rewards has been sensibly reduced…Why? Obviously I don’t like it

98

Here is what I think should happen:

 

All tiers:

  • Restore old healing range.
  •  
  • Healing effects do not stack - if a ship is subject to multiple healing effects, only the strongest heal applies. This means that it doesn’t matter if you’re in range of one engineer or every ship in the team is an engineer; you heal at the same rate (note: hull and shield can heal at the same time, and potentially at different rates!).
  •  
  • Reduce healing rate by about… let’s say 25% to begin with.
  •  

Tier 1 / Tier 2 Only:

  • Increase pitch and roll speeds of all Frigates by about +33%.
  •  

You’ll notice I don’t suggest this for Tier 3 and 4. This is because the “meta” I see in Tier 3 is very different to the one I see when flying Tier 2. Tier 3 meta is still Frigate heavy, whilst Tier 2 meta is “the side with the fewest Interceptors loses”. People who argue we should all just fly Guard Frigates are totally clueless as to how Tier 2 actually works - a well-equipped Covert Ops can solo a Guard Frigate in tier 2.

 

Hiding behind pulsars and minefields is not enough in a T2 match - you’ve got to bring your guns to bear. That’s where the problem lies; every Frigate knows that once that Inty gets behind them there is nothing they can do to save themselves. Their only hope is for another player to come along and save them… but when a Covert Ops can kill them faster than their allies can lock on, that hope tends to die quickly.

 

By giving lower-tier Frigates superior agility, you give them a chance to turn and fight against the Interceptor. Despite the nerf to Engineers, a quad-volley of Stabilized Railguns or Hail Plasma can still cause massive damage to an inty, and LR frigs can 2-3 hit kill them if all six guns land on target. By helping the Frigates bring this firepower to bear, you shift the meta back away from Interceptors, who now have to either hunt in packs or stay close to the Fighters / Frigates of their own side in order to get the job done.

 

Why make healing rate even worse? The mass shield generator is good as is, the nanocloud if anything needs a slight buff(It takes a lifetime to repair armor on my hydra 2  :angry: ) T2 was never broken, atleast not from what I’ve seen. Everyone can kill eachother, no one was invincible.

 

Edit: before 8.0, I feel the game was in a better state tho, but maybe I feel that way because I was progressing slowly into T3 there and now I don’t feel like setting a foot into T3 anymore.

99

This was due to very high statistics of kills for the Recons. And after studying logs we’ve found out that this was connected to Orion’s buff. In order to lower the DPS we’ve nerfed the module a bit.

 

Then why dont reduce the damage bonus(maybe to 100% in mkIII)? 7sec is too low.

100

Why make healing rate even worse? The mass shield generator is good as is, the nanocloud if anything needs a slight buff(It takes a lifetime to repair armor on my hydra 2  :angry: ) T2 was never broken, atleast not from what I’ve seen. Everyone can kill eachother, no one was invincible.

 

Edit: before 8.0, I feel the game was in a better state tho, but maybe I feel that way because I was progressing slowly into T3 there and now I don’t feel like setting a foot into T3 anymore.

Why? Because Engineers are not supposed to be a floating invincibility powerup. If you want to heal fast bring your own healing! You know, those universally available modules that restore several thousand points of shield and/or hull to your ship?

 

Engineers provide a continuous heal, but it should be a slow heal. That way, players still have to actually make some tactical choices - do you want the ability to restore 2,000 hull almost instantly, or the ability to increase your critical hit rate?

 

Look, I used to fly Engineers a lot myself, especially when 0.8.0 came out and Engineer was the go-to class for everything. I know how much that class - and the Hydra 2 in particular - dominated the T2 playing field. I don’t want to go back to that. I want to see the Engineer have a role in the game that reflects what it is meant to do; buff the team.

 

The problem we have is that Gaijin are screwing with the Engineer in stupid ways. Just look at the nerfs…

 

  1. Reducing turrets from 6 to 4.

What did this do? It made the Engineer less capable in combat, which is fair because it is meant to support, not lead. However, the issue with the Engineer Deathball was never the firepower - it was how bloody unkillable they all were! Gaijin missed the point entirely, and so we come to…

 

  1. Reducing healing range.

So now we have a support class that cannot support effectively. How does that make any sense?

 

The issues with the Engineers are, and have always been, that a mass nanocloud effectively renders all damage negligible. The problems with the ship get worse the higher up the Tiers you go it seems, but Gaijin’s answers are not to re-calibrate how the healing mechanics work, but to make it so Engineers have a hard time healing in the first place.