Psa: Mk-1 Paris Is Now Strongest Bow.

[Horoutama]

MK-1 Paris: 14 Damage.  0.6 Reload. 0.667 Fire Rate.

Paris and Paris Prime: 9 Damage. 0.7 Reload. 0.500 Fire Rate.

All other stats are the same.

First you made Paris Prime and Paris identical (bad move). Now you make the 25,000 cred weapon the best?

(I know this is probably just a huge oversight, but it is hilarious none the less)

[blasron]

same for braton

[Evers]

What Paris has 9 dmg? When did that happen

 

Edit: PvP feedback, sry my bad

Edited March 23, 2015 by Evers

[-CM-s7even]

When I get home from work, I'm gonna double check this on PC.

[(PSN)WiiConquered]

I don't think the Prime version should offer anything more than the most minor of benefits, but making it worse in any way just makes no sense.

[DeMonkey]

Mk-1 Strun is better than the normal Verison. Possibly better than the boar prime as well... ''Balance''

[Hueminator]

Those who hold the prime part needs more skill to win! Jk, but that is weird lol.

Edited March 24, 2015 by Hueminator

[blasron]

Mk-1 Strun is better than the normal Verison. Possibly better than the boar prime as well... ''Balance''

 

It is better than the boar (and twice has much noe with the mod) let me show you the boar

 

 

Now the mk1-strun

 

[-Jack.Of.Blades-]

MK-1 Paris: 14 Damage.  0.6 Reload. 0.667 Fire Rate.

Paris and Paris Prime: 9 Damage. 0.7 Reload. 0.500 Fire Rate.

All other stats are the same.

First you made Paris Prime and Paris identical (bad move). Now you make the 25,000 cred weapon the best?

(I know this is probably just a huge oversight, but it is hilarious none the less)

*Mind blown*

[AgentSkye]

Yes, I believe this is an oversight. Even in PvE, though, the way MK1s are handled compared to the regular versions is rather inconsistent.

 

First let's examine PvE, ignoring primes:

Switching from MK1-Braton to regular Braton, you sacrifice 25% of your magazine and an amount of accuracy that is unnoticeable without Heavy Caliber, but gain extra damage per hit and a higher fire rate to increase DPS. The extra fire rate does increase recoil slightly, but because Bratons barely have any recoil at all, it's not really a problem. Braton's potential is greater, with higher starting damage per hit, and per second both in burst and sustained, despite reloading more often. But it's not simply better. There's a trade, but it's more than worth it, and the difference only increases with mods.

 

Switching from MK1-Paris to regular Paris, you sacrifice a bit of handling in the form of reload speed and charge speed, as well as 5% status chance, but gain a great deal of extra damage. Worth it, for sure. As a newbie weapon, the MK1 helps ease you into the mechanics of the bow, but by the time you switch to regular Paris, you'll have learned to use bows effectively enough that the handholding boost--sorry, handling boost--isn't strictly necessary, and the damage increase is a big one. Paris is definitely better, but again, there's a trade.

 

Switching from MK1-Strun to regular Strun, you sacrifice a great deal of damage, but gain a slightly faster fire rate. Wait--WHAT?! That's completely backward! The fire rate is not a huge difference, 2.1 to 2.5, but the damage is: 120 drops to 84 for the Strun. This is completely reversed from the previous two MK1s examined, as the MK1 has worse handling due to being extra slow firing, but does much more damage. What is this I don't even. As far as I know, the pellet counts are the same, but I haven't tested this myself.

 

Switching from MK1-Lato to... wait--there is no MK1-Lato? Regular Lato is chosen as a starter weapon? What? Why?

 

Switching from MK1-Kunai to regular Kunai, you sacrifice half your crit chance and critical multiplier, but gain extra damage per hit, and since even the MK1's crit stats are quite bad, the difference in criticals is negligible. Turns out, half of 5% is not very much. There's technically a trade here, but it's nothing to do with handling, and is generally no noticeable loss, but with significant gain.

 

Switching from MK1-Furis to regular Furis, you seemingly sacrifice nothing, but gain damage and rate of fire increase. However, the increased rate of fire will effectively increase recoil. Again, I don't think this is a major issue because I don't remember the Furises having very much recoil. But it is a small handling loss. WORTH IT.

 

Switching from MK1-Bo to regular Bo, you sacrifice nothing at all, and gain extra damage.

 

Switching from MK1-Furax to regular Furax, you sacrifice nothing at all, and gain extra damage.

 

Switching from MK1-Cronus to regular Cronus, you--what? Skana is absolutely MK1-Cronus, everyone knows it. Just kidding, Skana is like Lato, no comparison to be done here.

 

Conclusion of PvE examination: As I said, not very consistent, but I do now notice a pattern. The regular versions of MK1 melees are just better. The regular versions of MK1 secondaries are better, but with insignificant drawbacks. The regular versions of MK1 primaries are--aside from the Strun, which is opposite and must be an error--better overall, but with small but noticeable sacrifices in handling. These, to me, represent what MK1 weapons should be: weapons that are a bit easier to use, but in the end have somewhat lesser potential. And I think this goes double for PvP, where, if at all possible we want to avoid weapons being just plain better than other weapons.

Note: I didn't ignore polarities, but all MK1 weapons seem to have the same polarities as the regular versions.

Note 2: I can't really check this, but as far as I know, no MK1 weapons have different recoil stats from the regular versions.

 

Now, on to PvP:

MK1-Paris versus regular Paris: I believe only the damage is reversed, at least in general terms. The exact numbers may (probably) need tweaking, but MK1 should be slightly lower in damage. The difference in damage should probably be less than in PvE, so that it remains a viable option if someone wants to sacrifice damage for ease of use while still using a bow. (Heck, maybe the difference in damage should be less in PvE, too). Also, I do not fully understand how damage of bows even works in PvP. I suspect the PvP section of the arsenal has different logic for which damage numbers are displayed, so that instead of the charged damage being shown, as in PvE, we see the uncharged damage (which makes them look really bad on paper). However, with the current numbers, even a charged shot dealing twice the damage of an uncharged one, as in PvE, doesn't do much. 9x2=18. 18? That's nothing. Very few weapons deal less damage than that with a single hit, and all of those are either rapidfire weapons, or shotguns (probably meaning that the PvP arsenal shows a single pellet's damage for shotguns, instead of the combined damage of all pellets. Which, again, makes them look really bad, especially since they don't tell you how many pellets you get per shot.) Is it possible that the entire mechanic of bows has been changed for PvP 2.0? I haven't played it very much, but I believe the Paris Prime (only one I've seen used) still does significant damage. 18 is not much, even with headshots. Bows are clunky. They fire slowly. They need to reload after every shot, which may not seem like a big deal given the extremely short reload, but if you're constantly doing fancy moves to stay mobile, there's a good chance it'll be interrupted nonetheless. They have slow projectiles that are affected by gravity, making them harder to hit with, and especially to headshot with, barring any oddities related to projectile hitboxes. This goes triple for Tenno, who may go to Ludicrous Speed and dash all the way off your screen in less time than it takes for your arrow to reach where you'd aimed. They also need to take the time to charge up to deal good damage, meaning that you can't even try to "spray" uncharged shots to help with difficulties in hitting your target. And if you manage to take the time to charge up a shot with a bow, aim and hit, you should be rewarded. Bows take skill to use, and that's even with high damage. Bows need high damage to be worth anything. Not oneshotting, at least not without headshots... but high.

 

MK1-Braton versus regular Braton: I can't tell, MK1-Braton doesn't show up in the list for me in the PvP arsenal.

 

MK1-Strun versus regular Strun: Same as PvE, just with different damage numbers. MK1 deals much more damage with a bit slower fire rate. Waaat! Needs a fix. Strun proper definitely needs to do more damage than MK1-Strun, but I don't think it should be better in every way. I'm not sure what to suggest to give MK1-Strun a boost. Perhaps swap the fire rates as well, to preserve the "better handling, less damage" idea for MK1s. Or perhaps give it less recoil, though I'm not familiar enough with the Strun to know how much of an issue recoil is currently. Though, as MK1 and regular versions must be balanced together, perhaps MK1-Strun could be given "less recoil" by giving Strun proper more recoil. Another potential option is a minor alteration to spread, but any change to spread in either direction could be viewed as either a good thing, or a bad thing, depending on the user's preferences for shotguns. So then a change to spread couldn't be seen as being universally "better" handling. Damage drop-off, on the other hand... Giving the MK1 less damage drop-off could improve handling by making it more consistent combined with lesser max damage. I think it's important, though, that none of these should be major differences. They should be recognizably the same weapon. That goes for any pair involving a MK1. Also, I must say, the damage numbers, if I'm interpreting them right (damage listed is damage per pellet, with Struns having 10 pellets?) seem pretty decent to me. In a perfect situation where you can hit with all 10 pellets, and at a range where you don't suffer from drop-off, the higher damage of the two Struns, 14, adds up to 140. That's high! It's not going to oneshot anyone, and that's in the absolute best-case scenario, but given the many ways shotgun damage is reduced (high spread making pellets miss, damage drop due to distance on the pellets that do hit), the best-case needs to be high, similar to bows. The full hit of a shotgun at point blank range should be devastating, and I'd say this counts, but without being overpowered, as the best-case won't happen very often. 

 

MK1-Furis versus regular Furis: In practice, they're probably pretty similar. Regular Furis deals less than 80% of the MK1's damage per bullet, but fires just over 20% faster. This isn't a completely even trade, however. Potential damage in a magazine is slightly less. Theoretical time to kill is slightly longer. Less ammo efficient. Less damage per bullet and higher fire rate means you have to stay on target more consistently to be than effective. With the Furis, you have to shoot them longer to deal less total damage. And if you're on full auto, you have less time to fix your aim because you don't have a bigger magazine and are wasting more shots while missing. Mind you, the actual difference in the totals is pretty tiny. The point is, if one of them has to be better, even slightly, it shouldn't be the MK1. But, again, this one's pretty much nitpicking. You can see DE put effort into balancing them, and did a fairly good job, as the math gives similar results. Though the math may say MK1 is ever-so-slightly better, some people may prefer the handling of the regular Furis. It's a choice; neither is significantly better, I'd say. And that's good.

 

MK1-Kunai versus regular Kunai: They are identical in every way.

 

MK1 Melee weapons do not show up in the PvP arsenal list for me, so I cannot compare without buying them.

 

I think that's all I can say on the current state of MK1 weapons. Only thing left is to discuss possible improvements. How could things be made better? Bows need high damage, but how high? The MK1-Paris needs less damage than regular Paris, but how much less? Ditto the Strun damages. And what would be the best advantage to give MK1-Strun to offset its lower damage? What changes could be made to the Kunai to offer options there? And melees? Should any of this extend to PvE? If so, because the changes needed to happen, not directly because of PvP.

 

Another thing I notice is that DE is trying to keep the handling of all weapons exactly the same as in PvE, with no changes to accuracy, fire rate, recoil (as far as I know), magazine... they only seem to adjust damage. Thoughts on that?

Edited March 24, 2015 by AgentSkye

[zavienh5]

wtf?  I'll really have to check this out

[onemoonlight]

looking at that makes me wonder if the balancing team thinks that a bigger number on reload time stat is better than a lower one ;)

[AgentSkye]

No, I'm fairly certain MK1-Paris is intended to have faster reload and charge. It's not supposed to have higher damage, too, though...

[onemoonlight]

actually, after few minutes of thinking about it, i think i've got it

 

there are two numbers that we do not know about, and they are projectile travel time and charge damage

 

the bows obviously dont do 14 and 9 damage on full charge

1. that would be silly

2. we already know that from how much damage they deal when they hit us

 

therefore, the bows go like this:

mk1 is a "spam bow" - you draw your arrow fast, you charge it fast, but the charge damage is weaker compared to the other 2 bows. Higher 'normal', non-charged damage is higher to compensate, and maybe to help you finish off the target with couple normal shots after you've landed your charged shot

 

this means that both prime and normal paris have higher charge damage and projectile velocity than mk1, and one of them has a charge damage advantage over the other, while the other has a projectile velocity advantage

 

that would be the only thing that makes sense to me, but again, we dont know what the numbers are on charge damage and velocity... because they are not listed

 

edit: we just  need all the numbers listed, all the pellets, spread, velocities, EVERYTHING

Edited March 24, 2015 by onemoonlight

[psyanide]

LOL, Scott found the cupboard the PvP balance team was hiding in. They take orders from him, now...

Edited March 24, 2015 by psyanide

[Mastikator2]

I don't think the Prime version should offer anything more than the most minor of benefits, but making it worse in any way just makes no sense.

Primes shouldn't offer benefits at all, they could be slightly different (more accurate/less recoil and less damage or bigger clip and longer reload) but choosing between MK-1 Braton and Braton Prime should not be "always choose Braton Prime".

All weapons in PVP should be equally valid and only depend on your preferred playstyle and level of skill.

[(PSN)WiiConquered]

Primes shouldn't offer benefits at all, they could be slightly different (more accurate/less recoil and less damage or bigger clip and longer reload) but choosing between MK-1 Braton and Braton Prime should not be "always choose Braton Prime".

All weapons in PVP should be equally valid and only depend on your preferred playstyle and level of skill.

I think there are enough different weapons that they'd be better off, at least for now, leaving the Primes the same or almost the same as the normal and MK-1 varients. Instead of switching the Paris and Mk-1 Paris stats, for example, they could give the Dread the vastly different stats. Instead of changing Braton and Braton Prime, the Karak could have one of their models. When more weapons are in, maybe the could go back and look at making the MK-1s varients of Primes.

And although I didn't say it right, I meant that the basic or MK-1 version should never be better at everything, not that it shouldn't be better at anything. Although again, I think that's a conversation for the future and not now.