Incoming Kuva Nukor nerf

[(XBOX)TehChubbyDugan]

Just now, Krankbert said:

Okay. I accept that you don't think that DE is balancing the game around solo Prodman runs.

So that means you contradicted me on something that we agree on out of spite.

"May" is in italics there for a reason.  I even specifically stated that I disagree with the idea that it's an outlier in higher level content multiple times.  I was making the point that even if it was an outlier, it doesn't matter if we're not balancing for the content where that would matter.

[Krankbert]

vor 9 Minuten schrieb (XBOX)TehChubbyDugan:

"May" is in italics there for a reason.  

Yes, it is. The "may" - italics or not - is also completely irrelevant to what you're responding to.

 

Here's something else for you to think about:

vor 15 Minuten schrieb (XBOX)TehChubbyDugan:

It's not on their radar at all, and because it has no "ZOMG WORLD ENDING RED CRITZ BUILD" video on YT, no one is running it from what I've seen in pubs and chat.  It's not popular in their stats they provided.  No one is talking about nerfing it.  Not because it's not strong.  Because it's not popular.

We're repeating ourselves. You already said this, I already adressed it, and you just keep saying it unchanged, ignoring my response, like a broken record. What do you want here? Do you want me to respond by quoting myself? Do you think you "win" if you keep posting the same thing until I leave? Do you think this is how a discussion goes? You just repeat your opinion like a mantra and keep contradicting literally everything the other person says, and when the other guy finally leaves in disgust you "won"?

[(XBOX)TehChubbyDugan]

Just now, Krankbert said:

Yes, it is. The "may" - italics or not - is also completely irrelevant to what you're responding to.

No, it's not.  We agree on nothing.  You're either putting words in my mouth or you need to learn how to read.  I'm contradicting you because I don't agree with your point that you made initially that it's being nerfed because of its strength.  It's being nerfed because it's popular.  It's not an outlier in terms of strength.  It doesn't have a faster time to wipe mobs than many other things in the arsenal, and that goes especially for the level of content they balance for.  That demonstrates that it's not an outlier in terms of the area they balance for unless they plan on nerfing a huge swath of what we have.  I have maintained these points the entire time, you are reaching desperately for anything to target me with while not answering the last question I asked because you are wrong, and we agree on nothing concerning the topic of this thread.

[Krankbert]

vor 3 Minuten schrieb (XBOX)TehChubbyDugan:

No, it's not.  We agree on nothing.

Okay. So we don't agree on whether DE balances the game around solo Prodman runs or not? Because I don't think they do and 17 minutes ago you insisted that you don't either. Did you change your mind?

[(XBOX)TehChubbyDugan]

Just now, Krankbert said:

Okay. So we don't agree on whether DE balances the game around solo Prodman runs or not?

See, this is you reaching.  You're trying to nitpick completely inconsequential things that have no bearing on the argument we were having because you have no idea how to respond.  

You're just the sort of troll that loses an argument and reverts to trying to get someone to cuss you out so they get moderated.  It's desperate and sad.

[Krankbert]

vor 4 Minuten schrieb (XBOX)TehChubbyDugan:

See, this is you reaching.  You're trying to nitpick completely inconsequential things that have no bearing on the argument we were having because you have no idea how to respond.  

No, this is me demonstrating how you will contradict everything I say, even when I'm just repeating what you said your opinion was less than twenty minutes earlier.

I said DE doesn't balance around solo Prodman runs. You seemed to disagree.
I said that you think DE balances around solo Prodman runs. You vehemently denied that.
I said that we were in agreement then. You say we aren't.

I really don't see any basis for a conversation here. You don't have an opinion, just people you disagree with

[(XBOX)TehChubbyDugan]

Just now, Krankbert said:

No, this is me demonstrating how you will contradict everything I say, even when I'm just repeating what you said your opinion was less than twenty minutes earlier.

Point out to me where I contradicted you and then where I agreed with the thing I contradicted, other than your inane nitpick about the fact that we don't agree on anything, despite my clarification that

 

Just now, (XBOX)TehChubbyDugan said:

we agree on nothing concerning the topic of this thread.

 

[Krankbert]

vor 1 Minute schrieb (XBOX)TehChubbyDugan:

Point out to me where I contradicted you and then where I agreed with the thing I contradicted, other than your inane nitpick about the fact that we don't agree on anything, despite my clarification that

Do you or do you not believe that DE balances the game around solo prodman runs. Options are "Yes", "No" and "your opinion of me is completely correct", where anything that isn't "yes" or "no" is the third one.

[(XBOX)TehChubbyDugan]

Just now, Krankbert said:

Do you or do you not believe that DE balances the game around solo prodman runs.

So you have absolutely nothing to show then.  Conversation over.

[Krankbert]

vor 11 Minuten schrieb (XBOX)TehChubbyDugan:

So you have absolutely nothing to show then.  Conversation over.

I see you went with the third option.

Edit:

By the way:

Here's what I have to show:

vor 37 Minuten schrieb (XBOX)TehChubbyDugan:

Nowhere did I say they should be balancing based on solo Prodman runs. 

vor 33 Minuten schrieb Krankbert:

Okay. I accept that you don't think that DE is balancing the game around solo Prodman runs.

So that means you contradicted me on something that we agree on out of spite.

vor 23 Minuten schrieb (XBOX)TehChubbyDugan:

We agree on nothing.  You're either putting words in my mouth or you need to learn how to read.

I assume that if you respond again, it will be to say that I'm taking things out of context and by that you'll have the last word. My last word on this will be quoting you saying the quiet part out loud and openly saying that you contradicted me on the prodman thing because you don't agree with something completely different I had said way earlier. Like I said - you don't have opinions, you have people you disagree with.

vor 33 Minuten schrieb Krankbert:

So that means you contradicted me on something that we agree on out of spite.

vor 23 Minuten schrieb (XBOX)TehChubbyDugan:

I'm contradicting you because I don't agree with your point that you made initially that it's being nerfed because of its strength.

[Jarriaga]

1 hour ago, (XBOX)TehChubbyDugan said:

Even usage numbers (which is exactly what I said.) is something they've said they wanted before.  It doesn't mean completely equal, it means they don't want popular weapons.  Spikes in the graph.  Obviously there will be weapons that will be stronger than others but they expect that those in the stronger categories will all have equal use.  They talked about this specifically when nerfing the Catchmoon. 

The problem there is that such an intent is only possible with an audience that is constantly being replaced and starting from zero. The more you play and the longer you stay, the more you optimize and move on from weaker weapons. At some point, going back from a Proboscis Cernos to an MK1-Braton feels like you are handicapping yourself. Most people won't do this and thus will inevitable stop contributing to the "even usage ideal" because weaker weapons simply do not exist for practical usage at that point.

And DE are aware of that.

After all, when they made the 2018 weapon balance pass, the flat-out said that a weapon's expected performance is directly tied to its MR bracket and stats:

Quote

We sketched out Mastery Rank groupings of 0-3, 4-6, 7-9, 10-12 and 13-15 for each weapon type with a minimum DPS and amount split between crit and status for each group. Using existing stats, weapons were sorted into the groups. If their stats were too high for their current MR it was raised along with any other properties to match.

That means that they themselves recognize that weapon tiers exist, with weapons in the 13-15 bracket like the Supra Vandal being leagues apart from weapons in the 0-3 bracket such as the MK1-Braton, which are so far behind that they are not even meant to compete if you have access to the Supra Vandal.

You can't have your cake and eat it to. You can not expect "even usage" (Even as an ideal) when performance tiers with huge performance gaps exist. This only works if they expect for players to leave the game once they peak so their usage stats are not a contributing factor. Otherwise, high-tier weapons will inevitable be favored by older/more experienced players while weaker weapons will be favored by newer players by virtue of not having access to the best. Another alternative would be to narrow down the performance ballparks to be so narrow that they might as well not exist, but at that point why not just make a single gun in each category with 400 different skins if the "top tier" and "low tier" are so close?

And that doesn't even take into account later additions made after the balance pass took place that further widened the usage gap because the game now had game modes in which the best of the best was prioritized. Namely, Arbitrations and Steel Path. Those playing those game modes will not be choosing an MK-1 Braton (Maybe Arbitrations if you happen to get the bonus, which is something outside your control and choice) because those weapons were simply not designed to operate at such levels. What works is nothing more than a happy accident.... But happy accidents that are in the high MR brackets. Why would that be other than because they are simply significantly better out of the gate?

Oh, and before you present the "MR brackets are meaningless because Kuva Nukor is obtained at MR5" argument, the acquisition loophole in the Kuva Lich system does not negate the stats-based MR bracket the weapon belongs to, which correlates to its performance. Otherwise you are implying that the Kuva Brakk, Ogris and Quartakk are weaker than or on par with the base variants because they can be obtained sooner due to the same loophole despite being superior in every way. There's also the implication of the Kuva Nukor truly "becoming" an MR15 weapon if the acquisition loophole is patched even if no changes are made to the weapon itself., but to the foundry not allowing you to pick it up until you meet the criteria.  

 

[(XBOX)TehChubbyDugan]

19 minutes ago, Jarriaga said:

The problem there is that such an intent is only possible with an audience that is constantly being replaced and starting from zero. The more you play and the longer you stay, the more you optimize and move on from weaker weapons. At some point, going back from a Proboscis Cernos to an MK1-Braton feels like you are handicapping yourself. Most people won't do this and thus will inevitable stop contributing to the "even usage ideal" because weaker weapons simply do not exist for practical usage at that point.

And DE are aware of that.

After all, when they made the 2018 weapon balance pass, the flat-out said that a weapon's expected performance is directly tied to its MR bracket and stats:

That means that they themselves recognize that weapon tiers exist, with weapons in the 13-15 bracket like the Supra Vandal being leagues apart from weapons in the 0-3 bracket such as the MK1-Braton, which are so far behind that they are not even meant to compete.

You can't have your cake and eat it to. You can not expect "even usage" (Even as an ideal) when performance tiers with huge performance gaps exist. This only works if they expect for players to leave the game once they peak so their usage stats are not a contributing factor. Otherwise, high-tier weapons will inevitable be favored by older/more experienced players while weaker weapons will be favored by newer players by virtue of not having access to the best. Another alternative would be to narrow down the performance ballparks to be so narrow that they might as well not exist, but at that point why not just make a single gun in each category with 400 different skins if the "top tier" and "low tier" are so close?

And that doesn't even take into account later additions made after the balance pass took place that further widened the usage gap because the game now now had game modes in which the best of the best was prioritized. Namely, Arbitrations and Steel Path. Those playing those game modes will not be choosing an MK-1 Braton (Maybe Arbitrations if you happen to get the bonus, which is something outside your control and choice) because those weapons were simply not designed to operate at such levels. What works is nothing more than a happy accident.... But happy accidents that are in the high MR brackets. Why would that be other than because they are simply significantly better out of the gate?

Oh, and before you present the "MR brackets are meaningless because Kuva Nukor is obtained at MR5" argument, the acquisition loophole in the Kuva Lich system does not negate the stats-based MR bracket the weapon belongs to, which correlates to its performance. Otherwise you are implying that the Kuva Brakk, Ogris and Quartakk are weaker than or on par with the base variants because they can be obtained sooner due to the same loophole despite being superior in every way. There's also the implication of the Kuva Nukor truly "becoming" an MR15 weapon if the acquisition loophole is patched even if no changes are made to the weapon itself., but to the foundry not allowing you to pick it up until you meet the criteria.  

 

You're arguing almost entirely on the basis that DE actually did a good job of placing weapons into appropriate MR brackets.  Considering the commentary about how poor a job they did when they released that balance pass, I'd say I'm not alone in saying they didn't do very well.  The MR brackets are meaningless precisely because they botched the job, and on top of that, in the content levels they balance for, my MR 5 Atomos will wipe mobs as fast as my Kuva Nukor will.  It's not an outlier in my opinion no matter what way you frame it.

And I wasn't making the argument that DE wanting even usage levels in different brackets is the right thing.  I was saying it's what they conveyed.  It was the excuse they gave for nerfing a popular weapon.  I think it was a BS excuse to start with, precisely because you can't control popularity as a developer without micromanaging the hell out of your playerbase.  The Nukor is not an outlier in terms of damage in the content they balance for because there are options available that kill just as fast and in large packs.  It's not an outlier in terms of utility because there are other weapons that can mass apply statuses to large groups rapidly.  Is it really good at those things and in the top tier?  Yes.  But it's in that tier with other things, not by itself.  There is no reason to nerf it based on it being an outlier in terms of actual stats.  The only stat they have to stand on to call it an outlier is in its popularity and I don't think gear should get nerfed because people like it.

Anecdote on the MR brackets:  An MR 9 weapon (akbolto) is used to craft an MR 8 weapon (akjagara) which by itself makes no sense and supports them not doing too well on organizing things.  Combine that with the fact that the sort of content you'd be facing when these things would be good and the sort of mods you'd have access to and you could make the argument that the MR 8 Akjagara are actually stronger than the MR 9 Akbolto.  The MR 5 Atomos will handle sortie 3 level enemies very easily.  The MR 4 Hek is arguably a better choice than the MR 7 Harpak.  No one is recommending the Harpak to players looking for a weapon to help them clear the starchart.  The Hek is universally recommended to new players because of how strong it is for its MR. 

If there are any actual outliers in terms of power vs MR bracket, it's the Atomos and Hek.  An MR 13 weapon like the Kuva Nukor with 5 forma required for full mastery should be strong.  It should be top tier.  The fact that it's in that top end MR bracket but obtainable through a bug at MR 5 is obviously going to make it more popular along with all the other factors.

[Jarriaga]

42 minutes ago, (XBOX)TehChubbyDugan said:

The MR brackets are meaningless precisely because they botched the job, and on top of that, in the content levels they balance for, my MR 5 Atomos will wipe mobs as fast as my Kuva Nukor will. 

Does the current Atomos use the old fire status effect and beam system it had at the time the balance pass was made?

No? Then your Atomos is a brand new weapon in an old skin. The Atomos that existed when the balance pass was made no longer exists, which makes your comparison disingenuous at best and asinine at worst. 

42 minutes ago, (XBOX)TehChubbyDugan said:

Anecdote on the MR brackets:  An MR 9 weapon (akbolto) is used to craft an MR 8 weapon (akjagara) which by itself makes no sense and supports them not doing too well on organizing things.  Combine that with the fact that the sort of content you'd be facing when these things would be good and the sort of mods you'd have access to and you could make the argument that the MR 8 Akjagara are actually stronger than the MR 9 Akbolto.  The MR 5 Atomos will handle sortie 3 level enemies very easily.  The MR 4 Hek is arguably a better choice than the MR 7 Harpak.  No one is recommending the Harpak to players looking for a weapon to help them clear the starchart.  The Hek is universally recommended to new players because of how strong it is for its MR. 

Yes, outliers that outperform higher MR weapons and odd crafting requirements do exist. But the existence of outliers that are in need of correction do not negate the entire rest of the system as if the outliers somehow held more weight than the combined weight of everything else that is consistent. This is particularly true when outliers are born out of changes made to other systems rather than the stats of the outliers themselves. The post-heat and beam rework Atomos is an example. The post-pellet status rework Hek is another example.

But 3, 10, or maybe 20 examples of out of 500+ weapons being out of line doesn't negate the rest unless the argument is "it's worthless because it's not perfect", which is an impossible scrutiny standard to live up to in a game with constant system-wide changes. Even the Akbolto and Akjagara example doesn't fully break the MR tiers because they both belong to the same bracket, indicating that they might as well be interchangeable. After all, it's a single tier (7 to 9), not 3 individual tiers (7, 8, and 9).

42 minutes ago, (XBOX)TehChubbyDugan said:

f there are any actual outliers in terms of power vs MR bracket, it's the Atomos and Hek.  An MR 13 weapon like the Kuva Nukor with 5 forma required for full mastery should be strong.  It should be top tier.  The fact that it's in that top end MR bracket but obtainable through a bug at MR 5 is obviously going to make it more popular along with all the other factors.

If a second weapon balance pass is made, what will be the criteria? Fire, slash and viral status weapons are automatically a higher tier because of how good their status effects are even if all other stats are crap?

Should the current Atomos be MR14 by virtue of how beam weapons and fire procs work now despite having the same stats as when the original non-existent Atomos was introduced in 2015?

And on the other side of the coin, if the viral, slash and fire status procs themselves are heavily nerfed, does it mean current high MR viral, slash and fire weapons are now suddenly MR6 even if no changes have been made to their stats and are still in line with other MR14 weapons?

Those are legitimate considerations in the name of consistency in a game in which system-wide changes are common. That is precisely why nerfs based on popularity do tend to happen, because DE often create accidental outliers that are not meant to be used in XYZ way by virtue of something else being retroactively changed. Look at the dragon key shield gating meta. Decaying Dragon keys are meant to be handicaps that reduced your shield values to make you more vulnerable, yet are now being used in order to abuse shield gating. They were turned into an advantage due to an oversight despite no changes being made to the item itself.

That's not what they intended. Yes, it's their fault they didn't fully think it through. But players now flocking to make the most out of this oversight are only rushing towards disappointment they this gets fixed. Same goes for outlier weapons.

[SneakyErvin]

57 minutes ago, Jarriaga said:

Quote

We sketched out Mastery Rank groupings of 0-3, 4-6, 7-9, 10-12 and 13-15 for each weapon type with a minimum DPS and amount split between crit and status for each group. Using existing stats, weapons were sorted into the groups. If their stats were too high for their current MR it was raised along with any other properties to match.

That means that they themselves recognize that weapon tiers exist, with weapons in the 13-15 bracket like the Supra Vandal being leagues apart from weapons in the 0-3 bracket such as the MK1-Braton, which are so far behind that they are not even meant to compete if you have access to the Supra Vandal.

 

It also means they dont really understand their own system and what it is that makes certain weapons that much stronger than the rest and why nothing competes with melee in the end. All of what they say looks really good on paper, but if that dps is a simple flat napkin value it really means squat in the end. There is a huge difference between the potential of a weapon with magnetic damage compared to those with radiation, slash, heat or whatever. Yet the dps ends up the same when they just add up the stats of the weapon. When you finaly start modding, the gap between them will increase at an alarming scale.

[Jarriaga]

25 minutes ago, SneakyErvin said:

It also means they dont really understand their own system and what it is that makes certain weapons that much stronger than the rest and why nothing competes with melee in the end. All of what they say looks really good on paper, but if that dps is a simple flat napkin value it really means squat in the end. There is a huge difference between the potential of a weapon with magnetic damage compared to those with radiation, slash, heat or whatever. Yet the dps ends up the same when they just add up the stats of the weapon. When you finaly start modding, the gap between them will increase at an alarming scale.

I will always disagree with your assertion that they don't understand their own systems. I think that simply, as shown with the Trinity nerf and the Xoris change, they expect a certain type of usage. This developer-expected usage can go directly against popular player usage. This doesn't mean that they don't understand their systems, but rather that they reject what the playerbase does with it if it doesn't align with what they want. An overton window of acceptable use, if you may. Reb also said this is why Nyx can't be given a single ability that deals direct damage no matter how low because her "theme" of not fighting directly supersedes and governs any and all possible change.

This is an overton window of acceptable use from the dev's perspective.

Misguided or not, arrogant or not, this is just a matter of a direct clash of ideals because players want to optimize the best out of the best for the sake of the best while devs don't want for this to be the case. At least not up to a certain degree.

From a dev's perspective, and as @SenorClipClopquoted: "If given the opportunity, players will optimize the fun out of the game" (Soren Johnson). From their perspective, they are saving you from yourself.

On the other hand, some things are set in stone with DE. I pointed this out myself when status was reworked last year. The initial proposal for puncture and impact were the same as what they wanted to do in late 2017 (Damage 2.5) with Khora's initial design of switching between IPS abilities (Which caused her delay as they had to rework her from scratch). The backlash was huge, and yet they tried again 2 years later. Yes, they backed down and impact now does something else, but they still tried a second time and did implement puncture as initially proposed. This is a clear example of DE being fully aware of what the community would do and wanted to do and willingly rejecting it.

[Graavarg]

Kuva Nukor is a good and well-designed weapon, but just like any other weapon it quickly becomes boring if you use it all the time. Mine has been gathering dust for quite a while now. Currently I prefer playing around with Plinx (to using Kuva Nukor), and I pleasantly surprised that a weapon I classified as "sh*t" when it came out is actually pretty awesome....

[(XBOX)TehChubbyDugan]

29 minutes ago, Jarriaga said:

Does the current Atomos use the old fire status effect and beam system it had at the time the balance pass was made?

It was sortie 3 capable before the status changes.  Moot point.
 

29 minutes ago, Jarriaga said:

But 3, 10, or maybe 20 examples of out of 500+ weapons being out of line doesn't negate the rest

They why are you guys always screaming for the nerfing of outliers lol

[SneakyErvin]

1 minute ago, Jarriaga said:

I will always disagree with your assertion that they don't understand their own systems. I think that simply, as shown with the Trinity nerf and the Xoris change, they expect a certain type of usage. This developer-expected usage can go directly against popular player usage. This doesn't mean that they don't understand their systems, but rather that they reject what the playerbase does with it if it doesn't align with what they want. An overtone window of acceptable use, if you may.

Misguided or not, arrogant or not, this is just a matter of a direct clash of ideals because players want to optimize the best out of the best for the sake of the best while devs don't want for this to be the case. At least not up to a certain degree.

From a dev's perspective, and as @SenorClipClopquoted: Iif given the opportunity, players will optimize the fun out of the game" (Soren Johnson). From their perspective, they are saving you from yourself.

How does that make sense though when they say they try to balance MR tiers equally? When the balance between the MR tiers is actually the least issue since it deals with the very base output potential of a weapon, and MR having no actual impact on power. And this isnt about us trying to optimize, this is simply what happens with the weapons when you start modding them, some of them will scale far ahead of the others if they are of the same MR even when using the most basic modding.

I'm all ok if they want to push us into melee, if that is their intent. But I'm not ok with them doing blanket changes like the MR tier, when weapons of the same type within the same tier performs on completely different levels when only modded to the most basic extent. If you have assault rifle A and assault rifle B, both being MR 10, we should expect them to perform similar if DE indeed balances MR tier. Though that isnt the case at all since DE doesnt factor in the damage type differences of the weapons, or the IPS distribution etc. when they adjust the stats based on MR. And that is why I say they dont really understand their own system or what the actual issue is.

And they really arent saving us from anything when they keep pushing us into the weapon category that is most overpowered now, utilizing pretty much the same 8 mods on every single weapon in the category. I would have far more fun if ranged weapons were actually viable, but they end up as the things getting nerfed. How does that save us from anything?

[Jarriaga]

39 minutes ago, (XBOX)TehChubbyDugan said:

It was sortie 3 capable before the status changes.  Moot point.

And so was the Boltor, which I used religiously back then. My Boltor was perfectly fine against Sortie 3 infested and Corpus even beyond Sortie level though. It dealt with them up to level 120.

So if you think this is a moot argument, let's narrow it down further: Sortie 3 under which modifier condition and against which faction? Because fire was certainly not usable against level 100 Grineer back then. It's one of the reasons why Ember was deemed a low-tier frame, because of how fire worked. My Boltor didn't cut it here either.

Was a Riven involved? Because DE don't balance base stats around Rivens. If you could only do the feat you are mentioning with a Riven, it's no feat at all. My Riven Boltor could easily handle Sortie 3 Grineer, but this doesn't count either for the sake of fairness.

Or do you mean you were using it as a primer all the way back then? If so, how is that any different against any other primer such as the Pox? 

Thus, I fail to see how throwing such a low bar measurement like sortie 3 (Which can be very broad as well depending on the conditions) makes my argument a moot point. At leas the Boltor from back then still exists, which can be used to compare it to.... well, the Boltor from today because the argument is not about what it could do back then, but rather its current performance in the game. Old Atomos and current Atomos are orders of magnitude apart for reasons other than stat changes to the Atomos per se, which is what I wanted to point out before your attempted deflection.

39 minutes ago, (XBOX)TehChubbyDugan said:

They why are you guys always screaming for the nerfing of outliers lol

Because even though the system is not perfect and will never be perfect, striving towards making it as close as perfect as it can be means removing the outliers rather than turning everything into outliers. Particularly so when the total number of outliers is so low as to stand out. It doesn't mean flat-out giving up just because perfection is impossible.

[Jarriaga]

1 hour ago, SneakyErvin said:

How does that make sense though when they say they try to balance MR tiers equally? When the balance between the MR tiers is actually the least issue since it deals with the very base output potential of a weapon, and MR having no actual impact on power. And this isnt about us trying to optimize, this is simply what happens with the weapons when you start modding them, some of them will scale far ahead of the others if they are of the same MR even when using the most basic modding.

I'm all ok if they want to push us into melee, if that is their intent. But I'm not ok with them doing blanket changes like the MR tier, when weapons of the same type within the same tier performs on completely different levels when only modded to the most basic extent. If you have assault rifle A and assault rifle B, both being MR 10, we should expect them to perform similar if DE indeed balances MR tier. Though that isnt the case at all since DE doesnt factor in the damage type differences of the weapons, or the IPS distribution etc. when they adjust the stats based on MR. And that is why I say they dont really understand their own system or what the actual issue is.

And they really arent saving us from anything when they keep pushing us into the weapon category that is most overpowered now, utilizing pretty much the same 8 mods on every single weapon in the category. I would have far more fun if ranged weapons were actually viable, but they end up as the things getting nerfed. How does that save us from anything?

Many of the problems you are highlighting existed back then. Worse even due to how Condition Overload multiplied by itself and Blood Rush using Rivens and total crit chance in the calculation. You now using the same 8 mods is a problem of the modding system rather than the weapons. Those 8 mods are so good at what they do that you don't really need anything else and work even with the Skana.

I don't think this would be an issue if you could not use Blood Rush, Weeping Wounds, and Condition Overload at once and if CO only took into account status effects applied by the melee weapon. I have already tested this out by trying The Steel Path with the simple rules of only using one of these 3 mods at a time, and not to prime enemies:

- Had specialize my melee weapon. I could no longer have my cake and eat it too.

- Melee performance was significantly closer to gun performance. Still much better, but not all the way to Pluto and back better. 

- My mod selection expanded:

1) Since I could no longer put on Berserker in WW or CO builds (Because no Blood Rush), I started once again using Primed Fury and/or Quickening. Mods I had forgotten about. Sacrificial Steel crit chance was not good enough on its own to do Berserker-only builds in the weapons I like to use.

2) Since I could not put  CO if I was using BR or WW, Primed Pressure Point and other things like Buzz Kill came back to life.

3) Since I could not prime (Because status has to be applied via melee) or use WW in CO builds, I started using the 60/60 mods again and more of them in order to compensate the 102% status you get with Weeping Wounds on a weapon with 19% status chance. For comparison, even 3 60/60 mods will only buff you to 53.2% status vs. 102% via WW. This also means I was choosing weapons with higher base status chance to make the most out of 60/60 mods on top of sacrificing additional mod slots. 

- I started using heavy attack builds more, but they fell slow. Thus, I started to see melee as an emergency in case enemies got close rather than actively seeking them out to kill them in melee. This slow kill speed was particularly noticeable in TSP Survival and Disruption.

Yes, you can then present the argument of "Why would you not use everything at your disposal? You farmed it, you earned the right to use it". But the problem there is that the melee mods we have are simply too strong. Not only that, but they can all be used at once! They let you have your cake and eat it too by virtue of not having to choose at all!

Since we take these mods for granted as a given,  our perception of what a problem is is skewed from the modding system. to just "melee being much stronger". This is partially why Pablo said last year that WF can't be properly balanced and we can't be given a higher challenge without nerfing us first. I came to that realization after I noticed just how little effort I have to put in melee thanks to how those mods work. Specially Weeping Wounds. That mod alone turns any slash-based melee into a proc monster at just 19% base status chance pushed to 102%.

But of course, most people here would rather ask for Primary/Secondary equivalents of BR/WW/CO instead of changing how those mods work in melee because they'd rather get a gun buff than a melee nerf, essentially lowering the difficulty of the entire game even further and having Pablo's argument come full circle because DE would then need to design around everyone having such power levels:

Quote

Now you're killing enemies so fast that the game is not fun anymore. So now I have the bring the enemies up to par. And then once I'm done with that, essentially what happened is I changed everything except the thing I needed to change to begin with. 

And then rinse and repeat ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

[SneakyErvin]

1 hour ago, Jarriaga said:

Many of the problems you are highlighting existed back then. Worse even due to how Condition Overload multiplied by itself and Blood Rush using Rivens and total crit chance in the calculation. You now using the same 8 mods is a problem of the modding system rather than the weapons. Those 8 mods are so good at what they do that you don't really need anything else and work even with the Skana.

I don't think this would be an issue if you could not use Blood Rush, Weeping Wounds, and Condition Overload at once and if CO only took into account status effects applied by the melee weapon. I have already tested this out by trying The Steel Path with the simple rules of only using one of these 3 mods at a time, and not to prime enemies:

- Had specialize my melee weapon. I could no longer have my cake and eat it too.

- Melee performance was significantly closer to gun performance. Still much better, but not all the way to Pluto and back better. 

- My mod selection expanded:

1) Since I could no longer put on Berserker in WW or CO builds (Because no Blood Rush), I started once again using Primed Fury and/or Quickening. Mods I had forgotten about. Sacrificial Steel crit chance was not good enough on its own to do Berserker-only builds in the weapons I like to use.

2) Since I could not put  CO if I was using BR or WW, Primed Pressure Point and other things like Buzz Kill came back to life.

3) Since I could not prime (Because status has to be applied via melee) or use WW in CO builds, I started using the 60/60 mods again and more of them in order to compensate the 102% status you get with Weeping Wounds on a weapon with 19% status chance. For comparison, even 3 60/60 mods will only buff you to 53.2% status vs. 102% via WW. This also means I was choosing weapons with higher base status chance to make the most out of 60/60 mods on top of sacrificing additional mod slots. 

- I started using heavy attack builds more, but they fell slow. Thus, I started to see melee as an emergency in case enemies got close rather than actively seeking them out to kill them in melee. This slow kill speed was particularly noticeable in TSP Survival and Disruption.

Yes, you can then present the argument of "Why would you not use everything at your disposal? You farmed it, you earned the right to use it". But the problem there is that the melee mods we have are simply too strong. Not only that, but they can all be used at once! They let you have your cake and eat it too by virtue of not having to choose at all!

Since we take these mods for granted as a given,  our perception of what a problem is is skewed from the modding system. to just "melee being much stronger". This is partially why Pablo said last year that WF can't be properly balanced and we can't be given a higher challenge without nerfing us first.

I came to that realization after I noticed just how little effort how have to put in melee thanks to how those mods work. Specially Weeping Wounds. That mod alone turns any slash-based melee into a proc monster at just 19% base status chance.

That is kinda what I'm getting at. DE needs to change the game in the right places first and not go after the quick fixes that doesnt really change anything. Which is why I say that I think they dont really understand their own system or the actual problem. Since they nerf things that arent actually universally strong, they nerf things that are popular within a certain weapon type only. They need to look at the bigger picture. I was fully behind the Bramma nerf, since it was a weapon designed for one system and ended up in another, so totally understandable that it got changed to fit better with the new and far more forgiving system.

We shouldnt be forced to adjust or gimp our own power just to make things feel balanced. DE should change things so it is equal and balanced across the board for everyone. DE enforcing a rule that tells us we cannot stack those mods would be a great start.

Like I said before, if they nerf Kuva Nukor it wont make me use some other ranged option more since I use ranged so little already. It would just mean that I wont pull out my Kuva Nukor at all, except if I wanna stack some statuses on a Lich or a boss. Currently I can pull it out to kill some trash without feeling that gimped compared to melee spamming. I dont see how that would justify a nerf, unless DE simply wants us to faceroll everything with OP melee.

edit: Just wanted to add this. Yesterday I stumbled on a Brozime (think it was him) video talking about the state of ranged combat. He sees the same issues with ranged just being flat out weak, however, he has one big issue in his reasoning. He wants to see buffs only by the sounds of it, he doesnt want melee reduced in power. Which imo is the completely wrong way to go. We need less power as a whole, not even more.

[CephalonCarnage]

2 hours ago, Jarriaga said:

If a second weapon balance pass is made, what will be the criteria? Fire, slash and viral status weapons are automatically a higher tier because of how good their status effects are even if all other stats are crap?

No, a balance pass should be made that addresses status procs entirely, and their multiplier effect on other mods. Part of the problem is not that you can apply a proc on someone, its because that proc can then be exploited to create insane multiples of damage. The proc itself isn't a problem, the damage tiers aren't a problem. The combinations (and probably the effects of the procs themselves - slash bypassing armour for example, or the old IPS being good against shields/armour/flesh when only slash counts nowadays) is. That's what they should be addressing.

[Jarriaga]

5 minutes ago, SneakyErvin said:

That is kinda what I'm getting at. DE needs to change the game in the right places first and not go after the quick fixes that doesnt really change anything. Which is why I say that I think they dont really understand their own system or the actual problem. Since they nerf things that arent actually universally strong, they nerf things that are popular within a certain weapon type only. They need to look at the bigger picture. 

I understand where you're coming from, and I agree with the highlighted sentiment. But I still think they know and they understand. They just can't properly act on such wide-range revisions and nerfs because they are scared of the backlash. Pablo implied they at times feel hostage to the community so they can't at times act on some things they want to address.

12 minutes ago, SneakyErvin said:

They need to look at the bigger picture. I was fully behind the Bramma nerf, since it was a weapon designed for one system and ended up in another, so totally understandable that it got changed to fit better with the new and far more forgiving system.

So did I. But I think this comes up as another example of people wanting to have their cake and eat it too. They asked for self-death to be removed, but they never even once considered why that was there with those weapons to begin with. They made a huge fuss about it. That, alongside Pablo's comments and the Xoris situation puts into perspective that DE can at times be scared of the backlash because this community can be very toxic towards the devs. There's also the time Scott called out Brozime on it, making a distinction about the tone of his criticism because of him implying DE actually want for people to be upset and to hate the game.

That has a chilling effect in which they either act slow, or in bandaids.

17 minutes ago, SneakyErvin said:

We shouldnt be forced to adjust or gimp our own power just to make things feel balanced. DE should change things so it is equal and balanced across the board for everyone. DE enforcing a rule that tells us we cannot stack those mods would be a great start.

Agreed. They need courage to do that though.

[Jarriaga]

5 minutes ago, gbjbaanb said:

No, a balance pass should be made that addresses status procs entirely, and their multiplier effect on other mods. Part of the problem is not that you can apply a proc on someone, its because that proc can then be exploited to create insane multiples of damage. The proc itself isn't a problem, the damage tiers aren't a problem. The combinations (and probably the effects of the procs themselves - slash bypassing armour for example, or the old IPS being good against shields/armour/flesh when only slash counts nowadays) is. That's what they should be addressing.

I agree. A general revision of all systems at once is what DE should do rather than fixing an individual system only to break it when a different one is fixed.

I was just presenting the example above because of him arguing that the 2018 balance pass was meaningless as a whole because of how the Atomos performs today in comparison with the Kuva Nukor while willingly ignoring that its functioning has changed so much from 2018 due to other external systems being changed that it can not be compared even against itself from back then despite the stats of the weapon being the same as they were in 2015.

That is why I agree with your sentiment, because even though Atomo's performance was adequate for its bracket due to how bad fire procs and beam weapons were, today it is (Perhaps paradoxically) a beast because of how beam weapons and fire procs work..... 

[Traumtulpe]

1 hour ago, Jarriaga said:

They just can't properly act on such wide-range revisions and nerfs because they are scared of the backlash. Pablo implied they at times feel hostage to the community so they can't at times act on some things they want to address.

Never have I laid my eyes upon such a sorry excuse. They can't even fix widely reported bugs within several years. It isn't worth the effort to them is all.

Remember when they made Gas terrible for no reason, and everyone told them that they had made Gas terrible for no reason? It is still terrible.

Remember when they made Cold useless for no reason (it used to prolong other status effects)? Still useless.

Remember when they made Explosive useless for no reason (was CC)? Still useless.

Weird how the only thing that matters in this game is armor and it's 99.99999% damage reduction, and how everyone uses Slash/Viral as a result, and how DE makes enemies immune (or pseudo-immune) to Slash/Viral as a result. Nobody could have predicted this...