Toning Down Soma

[Boondorl]

just leave the freaking soma alone. the phage in all honesty is WAY more powerful, and if you think otherwise i will be MORE than happy to provide proof to that claim.

 

Are you being serious right now? The Phage is a gun with 20m of range. 20m. Soma is hitscan and can perfectly headshot anything at any range. It also makes good use of the rifle mods, while Phage is forced to use shotgun mods.

 

I'm baffled this is even an argument. This is straight up paper-DPS. Your precious paper-DPS means nothing. Soma will still be getting a whopping 6.6 crit multiplier, a crit on every shot, and 4x the damage from crit headhots. At least Phage has a unique mechanic and forces you to ADS first in order to get a decent enough spread to actually do that damage. Soma is the most unimaginative laser rifle I've ever seen in a game. 

[shut]

Are we claiming we should nerf the mods now? Because they seem to be reasonably balanced on every other rifle. Perhaps it's not the mods, and actually is the Soma.

 

 

A veteran with a well-modded MK1-Braton can defeat Alad V in a matter of seconds, and a returning player who bought a Prime Access pack with his shiny new Boltor Prime will find it mathematically impossible to win. In the end, neither player enjoys the fight.

 

The problem with mods is scaling. They scale far too much, to the point where the game becomes almost entirely stat-based rather than skill-based. This should not be the case for any shooting game.

 

 

EDIT: To clarify, I'm not saying that these "top-tier" weapons like Soma and B-Prime don't need some balancing. Far from it, really.

However, they are not the main culprit for the "omfg this guy just blew up the map before i even entered it" moments that new players experience. The mod system is to blame.

Edited March 29, 2014 by SortaRandom

[(NSW)Omgwtfl9lbbl]

The main problem with the Soma is that its drawbacks (mainly, ammo inefficiency) are not noticeable unless you are planning to do high level long defenses and survivals, which DE is not balancing for. For the intended content, it rips through everything with virtually no drawback. It is not the most powerful gun with all things considered, but for the standard level of play that DE balances for it is definitely on a different level because of its high accuracy, low recoil, amazing mag size, sheer spraying power, and high damage per shot (relative to those levels).

 

The problem really is that DE's overall balancing is all over the place and who knows what the hell they really intend to aim for as a standard. I don't think they know themselves. The crazy power of the mod system makes hitting that balance with all these guns that much worse.

 

I honestly don't care to nerf it, though. I think DE has some much bigger problems on their hands and I would rather see the mod system and enemy stats/scaling revisited and revamped first. I think looking at the Soma is relatively unimportant compared to these two things. And no, I'm no Soma fan - I'm not even high enough mastery to use it unless I hop on a friend's account.

[Rafarix]

I'm not worry about the Soma personally.

 

I am however very scared of the level of power creep when Soma Prime comes out.

[ObviousLee]

Are you being serious right now? The Phage is a gun with 20m of range. 20m. Soma is hitscan and can perfectly headshot anything at any range. It also makes good use of the rifle mods, while Phage is forced to use shotgun mods.

 

I'm baffled this is even an argument. This is straight up paper-DPS. Your precious paper-DPS means nothing. Soma will still be getting a whopping 6.6 crit multiplier, a crit on every shot, and 4x the damage from crit headhots. At least Phage has a unique mechanic and forces you to ADS first in order to get a decent enough spread to actually do that damage. Soma is the most unimaginative laser rifle I've ever seen in a game. 

and while you are aiming down the sites, i click the fire button and run forward, killing EVERYTHING at LEAST 3 times faster for the simple reason the MONSTROUS damage is applied with 15 beams spread in a 90 degree angle. you HAVE to aim, with the soma, i dont with the phage. and i can get ANYWHERE faster than ANYONE with zephyr, allowing me to completely mitigate that 25 meter damage falloff. why dont you take a break and calm down, because you seem to be all fuckin huffy puffy over a games weapon that in your opinion is an over powered rifle.

[Axterix13]

Are we claiming we should nerf the mods now? Because they seem to be reasonably balanced on every other rifle. Perhaps it's not the mods, and actually is the Soma.

The problem is the mods (and how the mod system works in general).  And they aren't any more balanced for other rifles.  On the low end, many weapons start out as crap, not really fun because they can't kill squat.  And once you slap in the full compliment, with Catalyst and maybe some formas, other weapons take down most things with ease outside of endless modes with 50+ mobs.

 

And again, the Soma is hardly alone in what it does.

Edited March 29, 2014 by Axterix13

[TC-Guardian]

No it does not need nerfing. Saying that DE will not balance for defence and survival is BS, both are part of the game and the recent stats show that these game types are extremely popular. I personally find the Some is very weak, its main downfall is ammo conservation, lasting 20min on a T3 survival or 20 wave on T3 defence with out nova, rifle ammo mutation, and copious ammo boxes is just not viable. (Also 20 min is not a overly long survival, it is the minimum for a prime part)

There are also other weapons which far out damage the soma, my ogris can one shot level 60 infestation consistently, my dread hits 34K+ crits on grineer, my Lanka hits 100K+, my Castanas hit 2K damage per explosion to all in the radius, my braton prime although weak averages 350 base damage per body shot with up to 10K crits, my dual ichors with loki average 16K crits (due to invis so it perma crits), my penta does similar damage to my ogris.

And then there is boltor prime, on T3 it is consistently hittin 1K-4K base damage with 7K-14K crits with a similar effect to a Paris arrow meaning damage on kill gets transferred via the flying body to those behind. Its magazine matches Soma but with a much more manageable fire rate. Ammo consumption is slightly better than the soma. Mix boltor prime with a nova and you will be one shoting heavy gunners up to wave 20 on T3 defence.

Also, DE have stated that they are bringing in T4 keys to accommodate for these "op" weapons. This is a Cooperative game that has a near infinite level cap, there is currently nothing which is OP, not even trinity or nova.

[zebar1313]

Want a solution? Up it's mastery rank to build it. Problem solved. Not everyone and their kitchen sink will be using it if it was a Mastery 12 gun. Would at least motivate players to get that high. A lot of the people i know from previous clans and matches only got to mastery 6 and stopped leveling after that because they got the only gun they wanted (soma) I think by making it a high mastery rank without nerfing it would be more viable than having a million complaint threads flooding the wiki

[(NSW)Omgwtfl9lbbl]

No it does not need nerfing. Saying that DE will not balance for defence and survival is BS, both are part of the game and the recent stats show that these game types are extremely popular. I personally find the Some is very weak, its main downfall is ammo conservation, lasting 20min on a T3 survival or 20 wave on T3 defence with out nova, rifle ammo mutation, and copious ammo boxes is just not viable. (Also 20 min is not a overly long survival, it is the minimum for a prime part)

How in the world can you be having ammo issues that early on?

[-InV-Skitz0]

the soma's damage  falls of in high wave defense or survival, all though i personally dislike the gun i could care less if they nerf it or not.

[shut]

No it does not need nerfing. Saying that DE will not balance for defence and survival is BS, both are part of the game and the recent stats show that these game types are extremely popular. 

 

DE stated themselves that they do not intend to balance around "high-level T3 Defense" enemies; their target is around level 40. Players only find themselves playing far into Defense and Survival because those are the only modes that are not completely trivialized by their overpowered weapons.

 

Again, this is a problem with mods more so than it is a problem with weapons like Soma. The boosts that mods can give are simply far too powerful.

[ThePresident777]

Soma is a top tier weapon.  Weapon Tiers are intended design in Warframe.  Soma is not the only top tier weapon.  Therefore Soma is not an outlier.  Outliers are a common definition of OP.  Since Soma is not an outlier, Soma is not OP.  Therefore, the premise of this thread is false.  Since the premise is false, the conclusion id false.

[TC-Guardian]

How in the world can you be having ammo issues that early on?

Well Idk what I do differently, but Solo, No Ammo Drum, Ammo Boxes, Side Arm, Melee or Warframe abilities, with a Carrier. I just tested and I got 8:50 before my soma emptied on a T3 Survival.

[Cysic]

The Soma isn't really overpowered.  The mods are.  Not that hard to do 40x the base damage.  The high damage means that Soma's ammo consumption, which should be its drawback (and was definitely something I felt before I had it nicely modded), winds up not being an issue.  That mod power issue is what needs to be fixed, and there's not much point at looking at the stats on most weapons until it is.  Especially as there are other weapons with comparable damage.  And some require lower mastery even.

 

There's also the extra bonus on critical head shots that should probably go, but that's not the Soma's fault.  Just a silly mechanic that allows for even more damage multiplication.

 

Short version: you're complaining about something that isn't the real issue, while trying to single out one specific item out of a bunch.

This is more-less bang on. Soma's issue isn't so much itself but the mod setups available. If something has enough crit to be worth using, it essentially just becomes a second damage multiplier, since the only things worth crit modding are Rifles and Point Strike is so potent. If it's a second damage multiplier, then it essentially just functions like a second Split Chamber or Serration in that it doubles the base damage again.

 

Of course, there's a few weapons that strike a nice middle-ground (the Aklex for example have a decent crit rate that makes headshots rewarding and the build viable without overpowering other options) but most of them seriously need to be retuned. Crit is generally either so low it's meaningless or so high that it might as well not be critical strike at all; see: Synapse.

[ObviousLee]

Well Idk what I do differently, but Solo, No Ammo Drum, Ammo Boxes, Side Arm, Melee or Warframe abilities, with a Carrier. I just tested and I got 8:50 before my soma emptied on a T3 Survival.

what loadout are you using in terms of mods?

[Archistopheles]

Let's get this out of the way now. Yes, I know DE said they wouldn't change the Boltor Prime. No, I don't care. They've changed their mind before, and this gun is in dire need of rebalancing.

 

I'm sure by now we all know the Boltor Prime is OP. However, I'd like to offer some actual feedback on how to tweak the Boltor Prime without nerfing it into the ground.

 

A straight up base damage nerf is not needed. This thing does 54 damage per shot. That's more than low enough. However, its real problems lie in its accuracy and recoil. I'm not sure why they chose to make this thing an assult rifle, but it definitely shouldn't be. So, how do we change the Boltor Prime without destroying it?

 

First, the magazine size should be reduced to 50. This thing definitely doesn't need 60 shots. 50 is more than enough.

 

As a result, the recoil should be increased making it act like a regular AR, and the reload speed should be increased to 3s instead of 2.4s.

 

The accuracy isn't so much of a problem. What it could use, however, is some more recoil. Grakata has the same accuracy as any other AR (aside from Boltor), but is more weighed down by recoil. This promotes bursting for longer ranges and keeps the spammability up close. Boltor Prime should act in a similar way, and the lack of wind up time would make bursting doable.

 

I also think Latron Prime's should as well. Regular, non-crit rifles like the Boltor Prime should get a 1.5x modifier, crit rifles should get a 2.0x modifier, and bows and snipers should get a 2.5x modifier. Regardless of whether that's changed or not, Boltor Prime still needs to be brought down to something like 1.5.

 

Maybe give a slight base damage buff to compensate. Something like 55 instead of 54. That way it still does the same damage when critting at base, it just won't scale so outrageously well.

 

Boltor needs to see some changes. It's simply not a justifiable Prime Access or RNG weapon. It's more like a MR12 clantech weapon at this point.

 

Ftfy

[TC-Guardian]

what loadout are you using in terms of mods?

critical delay, rank 4

hammershot, maxed

heavy cal, rank 5

vital sense, max

shred, max

point strike, rank 4

serration, rank 8

wildfire, unranked.

[ObviousLee]

critical delay, rank 4

hammershot, maxed

heavy cal, rank 5

vital sense, max

shred, max

point strike, rank 4

serration, rank 8

wildfire, unranked.

i see your problem. most of my mods are maxed. my advice would be to toss another forma or two(not sure how many you actually have on it) and max out your mods. might yield better results. and remember, there is ALWAYS room for ammo mutation. but even that doesn't help after a while.

[(NSW)Omgwtfl9lbbl]

critical delay, rank 4

hammershot, maxed

heavy cal, rank 5

vital sense, max

shred, max

point strike, rank 4

serration, rank 8

wildfire, unranked.

If you build like that, it is no wonder that you have issues. That's honestly a horrible build, even disregarding your non-maxed stuff.

 

I'm assuming you have one forma somewhere.

 

Your build:

http://goo.gl/a8cbqO

Average 257 damage per shot

 

Alternative build (uses 2 more points, since you have a forma somewhere this should be doable unless you modded in a D polarity or something):

http://goo.gl/QeyHR7

Average 650 damage per shot

 

A maxed out build using Heavy Caliber but still keeping Shred will average 1189 damage per shot, with about an average of 4637 damage per headshot (though good luck maintaining headshot streams with Heavy Caliber). The way you have your Soma built, you're actually doing less damage per shot than my alt account's Mk1-Braton.

Edited March 30, 2014 by omgwtflolbbl

[Boxyninja]

soma isnt an lmg to start it because it dosent act like one at all, and the Grakata is a smg not a AR.

[Rokusho66]

the problem is its accuracy. there is no other weapon with that kind of accuracy RoF AND crit insanity. the grakata works under the same idea that it relies on crits to meet its full potential but it pales in comparison to the soma which is WAY more accurate then even the gorgon in terms of LMG's. twin vipers also utilize crits to do real dmg but doesn't have the accuracy of the lato while it does it.

 

the other thing is... I don't think crits are being calculated right. I have had moments with my dex furis where I went from 71 dmg to 745 or some insane number that's way higher then 2X normal dmg even if crits ignore armor.

 

I also found it odd that the soma came out exactly when lephantis did.... hmm... insane crit weapon with high accuracy coming out the same time a boss wich had only certain tar... oh $%@! it.... lets face it soma was designed to make lephantis eat @#!$ and now its causing everything to eat @#!$.

 

simple fact is there is always going to be a "best weapon" people gravitate to and I just find myself having more fun grabbing guns I love and telling the people who tell me to get the "good weapons" to eat it while I assassinate/takedown 3 unware corpus crewman with a plasma sword. (yeah I know dmg 2.0 nerfed it a bit but I still love it all the same... mite be my fav melee tbh).

 

like when dual ether used to be the best melee... or Orthos used to be the best...

[ClaireWithBlankie]

Lets nerf the AkBroncos while we're at it right? 

[TC-Guardian]

If you build like that, it is no wonder that you have issues. That's honestly a horrible build, even disregarding your non-maxed stuff.

 

I'm assuming you have one forma somewhere.

 

Your build:

http://goo.gl/a8cbqO

Average 257 damage per shot

 

Alternative build (uses 2 more points, since you have a forma somewhere this should be doable unless you modded in a D polarity or something):

http://goo.gl/QeyHR7

Average 650 damage per shot

 

A maxed out build using Heavy Caliber but still keeping Shred will average 1189 damage per shot, with about an average of 4637 damage per headshot (though good luck maintaining headshot streams with Heavy Caliber). The way you have your Soma built, you're actually doing less damage per shot than my alt account's Mk1-Braton.

cheers, I'm not a huge fan of the soma, just have a general dislike for all wind up weapons so I'm unlikely to use it much but I'll keep that setup in mind.

[Marthrym]

Poor Soma. So much hate... Why?

[Inez]

Poor Soma. So much hate... Why?

New player and his buddy start playing warframe. After some time has passed, they each hit rank 6. His buddy grabs a Soma and starts getting far more kills than him.

This obvious solution is: come to the forums and whine. And completely ignore all the far superior weapons while he's at it.