Utility Restrictions

[Toom1275]

I love the new elements, and I'm happy to see "stuff every damage mod on the weapon" rainbow builds go, but there's one big problem that I have with the new damage system:

 

The three types of base damage that weapons now have.

 

I intensely dislike having my weapon choices restricted by this system as to which weapon I'd use on a particular mission.

 

 

Before damage 2.0, I'd pick the weapon I'd use on a mission based on how the weapon worked -

snipers and latrons for large-tiled maps where I'd have the range to use them effectively

Shotguns and the flamethrower against the Infested and at short ranges

assault rifles for mixed-range missions

Boar family when using Loki, and I needed to clear a room if my invisibility failed

 

Once I had the weapon I wanted to use, I'd give it the utility (clip, silence, reload, puncture) mods they'd need.

Then the damage and multishot

and finally, Ice damage, then whatever other elements, if any, I had room for

 

 

 

With the new, unbalanced base damages of the weapons now, I'm forced to pick my weapons by their main damage type, to avoid having my base damage heavily reduced against the faction I'm trying to use it for.

 

 

While the three damage types is a good idea in general, they would be much better used if they were more in balance, and faction-specialization was left to the player.

 

I recommend just making the damage types of the weapons even values. Only a very unimaginative player would bother stuffing all three base-damage boost mods to try to make a rainbow build, and using up three mod slots and a pile of mod points to try to do so. Giving a stable baseline to build off of would allow for picking that one, maybe two, base damages to amplify.

 

 

To give some of the ridiculousness of the current levels, here's this:

The Boar, Boar Prime, Sobek, Strun, Bronco, Bronco Prime, and Dual Broncos all weigh heavily into Impact damage. While on the surface, it would almost make sense for it to be so, the big issue with this is that it means these weapons are only effective against the Corpus, as neither other faction has any worthwhile shields.

 

 

Rather than discouraging lots of elements on weapons, the system currently REQUIRES elements to be placed on weapons in order to pick up the slack if you happen to want to use a weapon's function outside of the faction it was locked into.

 

I exclusively used the Flux Rifle on the Grineer Galleon defense map, because it played extremely well with Saryn's Venom spores. No more, until I can manage to stuff Corrosive or something onto it, since it does mainly Slash damage now, which the Grineer shrug off.

[Geneticfate]

I enjoy using different builds on weapons.

[Toom1275]

As do I.

 

 

The weapons I had been using before the update:

 

 

Against Corpus:

Corpus ship: short-range weapons for close hallways

Corpus outpost: long-range snipers

Defense and survival: machine guns

Synapse, Vectis, Soma, Gorgon. Supra, Braton Prime, Dera

Bronco Prime, Dual Vastos, Lex, Vasto

 

Grineer:

Asteroid mine - Longer range

Galleon - all-range

Outpost - don't play there

Galleon defense - Flux Rifle to go with Venom

Latron Prime, Burston, Snipetron Vandal, Flux Rifle, Boltor, Lanka

Ballistica, Despair, Kraken, Akbolto, Twin Gremlins, Brakk

 

Infested:

Hek /Embolist for ancient-bursting

Ogris when I feel like doing a defense with Vauban

Ignis/Hikou for general use

Hek, Ogris, Ignis, Strun

Embolist, Hikou, Twin Vipers

 

Corrupted:

Acrid balances shotgun range, need strongese weapons ONLY on the tougest enemies.

Strun Wraith

Acrid

 

Other:

Sobek,  Boar, Paris Prime

Kunai, Afuris, Spectra

 

That was as many as I could use, and made my choices based on how the weapon fit the tileset and faction.

It was pretty open to swap weapons around as new ones came out, and I shuffled things around.

 

With the new system:

 

Corpus: impact focus

Boar, Boar Prime, Sobek, Strun, Gorgon, Lanka, Synapse, Vulkar

Bronco, Bronco Prime, Dual Broncos, Sicarus, Twin Vipers, Viper

 

Grineer: Puncture

Boltor, Dera, Hek, Latron, Latron Prime, Paris, Paris Prime, Snipetron, Snipetron Vandal, Supra

Afuris, Akbolto, Ballistica, Bolto, Cestra, Despair, Furis, Hikou, Kunai, Lex, Spectra

 

Infested: Slash

Braton Prime, Dread, Flux Rifle, Ignis, Mk-1 Braton, Tigris

Aklato, Dual Vastos, Lato, Vasto

 

Truly balanced:

Braton, Burston, Grakata, Hind, Ogris, Strun Wraith, Torid, Vectis

Acrid, Brakk, Embolist, Seer, Twin Gremlins

 

tl'dr;

The only thing stopping someone from using multiple weapons / builds before was a lack of imagination on their part.

Now, you're forced to choose between sacrificing weapon utility or sacrificing damage.

Edited November 24, 2013 by Toom1275

[Dr_Dac]

It now forces weapons on you that you don't like it is not get the weapon that fits my gamestyle anymore but get the only useful weapon against this enemy type.

 

I don't like noisy Smgs but now i have to use them if i want to deal some damage against certain enemeys.

 

i don't like the new system good ideas but limiting choice was never a good idea.

[Quadsword]

Good ideas, poor implementation. I just look at that impact damage number on my Sobek and feel sad knowing that it will only truly be useful against Corpus, and just mediocre against Grineer and laughable for infested. I think for most weapons that all 3 damage types should be the same number, or at least be relatively close.

 

I just hope DE is acknowledging all the feedback they're getting from U11. Right now, I feel all the parts for a truly great combat system are here, they just need the correct implementation.

[direcyphre]

Can't say I've seen anything 'forcing' someone to use any particular weapon to kill any particular enemy. The elemental effects and their combinations all have pretty good affinity against two of the three factions, and generally any weapon can be specced to taste.

 

With the exception of the Acrid, which no longer has a significant DoT, I've been able to use just about every single weapon in every situation without much difficulty. Obviously not attempting Pluto defense without some forethought (as enemy type will be obvious going in), but I've found it quite nice being able to use all these random weapons that were pretty worthless before in the previous system.

 

Either way, as they've stated, they are going through all the weapons and tweaking them in different ways. Obviously there are some deficits in certain areas (like certain melee weapons and general proc chance), but like every update, we'll see plenty changed in the coming weeks.