The Return Of "please Remove Damage Mods" Topic

[ArcLightCRO]

Let me start by saying this: there is no TL;DR so you can totaly ignore if you want.

 

The idea of this topic is to make every weapon valuable for the endgame and not to have always same Ogris/Torid/Acrid/Boltor approach.

 

So why this?

I was thinking to myself: That guy isn't half crazy as it seems at first. Why so? Well first and foremost everything comes to this: Every weapon has 8 no defined slots except polarity. Half of the mods are not even used because you always want to have 3-4 that are must.

Basicly once you put in damage, multishot and AP mods you got only 5 slots left which should be more then enough, but again it's not. If you but Bane mods, that's 4 slots, if you put in some of the new dual stats again 4 slots. But we will cover that later so lets get back to topic.

 

Idea is to give more versatility to the game (A.K.A. having other weapons on higher tiers).

 

So we might not need to "lower the current enemy armor" since it's broken because with this system it is not.

We also know that Warframe is found on numbers so taking on account my masters degree in electrical engineering I thought of a few ways how to deal with it. As armor scales linear to a point and exponential later that's the main reason why you get "insane armor and HP values".

 

So bacisly armor scales close to this:

 

Idea for fix is simple: add a way to deal with the armor that is not armor ignore weapons.

So let me toss in a few numbers now.

 

First of remove the "100% armor ignore" weapons and turn it to something easier.

 

Serrated blade: 70% armor ignore

Armor Piecring : 50% armor ignore

Physics Impact/Impact: 30% armor ignore

 

But that's just insane with the current system!

That's why we are changing the system right now.

 

Second get a way to chip of enemy current armor by a %.

To start with numbers I was thinking of something like this:

 

Lets say enemy has 1000 armor:

 

I really don't know how the calculation is done by what number of armor ignores what % of damage but, if we can lower that armor that would be great! With this system we can!!!

 

When you shoot at real armor it gets damaged and it's usefulness is dropping and you have more chance of being injured. If we apply this same real life principle to the game (and we can by math) we could have the current armor system not change, devs would not need to experiment too much, just fix a few numbers and that's it.

 

So let's present a number that's not too crazy and not too low either. By removing the damage mods (hornet strike, serration) or changing them to a level of pressure point (this would be my choice) instead of having crazy 200+% you have it 100% at best or 90% like point blank on shotgun is.

So the base value for easier calculation would be 20 base damage = 0,5% armor chipping/drop rate.

Let's return to our 1000 armor baddie. If you take regular Braton he surves our purpose for this calculation and we are gonna compare him to our favourite Boltor later. So Braton by default is 20 bullet (normal) type damage. That means if you fire 1 bullet at our guy he will loose 0,5% of the current armor value!

 

Why current? Why not base?

Well that way we can get a logarithmic drop where enemy looses armor at a decent rate that is not too fast and yet it does not take apsurd number of bullets to take him down.

So lets do it like this:

We are firing our Braton unmodded at a 1000 armor baddie.

First shot chips of 0,5% armor which is 5 armor. Now our baddie has 995 armor.

Second shot chips another 0,5% of armor which is now 4,975 armor. This would go rounded down to 4! and now our baddie has 991 armor.

After 10 shots our baddie would have 955 armor.

After 11 shots that's 951 armor!

So to take a look at a armor drop rate it would be close to this:

 

But that is just to slow! A full clip of 30 bullets would only remove around 150 armor!

That's why you have mods!

So a piercing hit gives you 60% armor ignore. For easier math we will go with 50%

This mod would now serve dual purpose!

 

First of our buddy would have 500 effective armor to start of BUT base is still 1000. That means that chipping works the same as before taken from REAL, not EFFECTIVE armor.

So what's the 2nd purpose of piercing hit would be to add a % to current chipping rate. 50% out of 0,5% is 0,25%.

That means our braton now takes of 0,75% of armor per shot instead of 0,5%. This number would be rounded up which means if you have 0,8042% would be 0,8%  and if you have 0,8064% would be 0,81%.

Let's get back to our Braton.

 

We have the same 20 damage Braton with 50% AP on it. Now we are firing a bullet at our baddie!

First shot is 7,5 armor, rounded down that's 7 and he has 993,

Another shot and that's 7,4475 armor, again rounded down it's 7 and that's 986 armor.

After 7 shots that's 751 armor, 4 shots less then un modded Braton!

 

Increasing damage of Braton with a damage mod of a 100% would be 1% unmodded or 1,5% modded with 50% AP. So that would go even faster! This is the reason why we don't need 200+% of serration and damage mods but bringing them close to melee/shotgun levels!

 

Now we take our Physics Impact Boltor.

Base damage is 18 so that's not 0,5% it's less it's 0,45% (10% less damage = 10% less chipping rate).

But our Boltor is Physics Impact! On the earlier table that's 30% armor ignore!

Now our 1000 armor baddie has 700 effective armor instead of 0 and chipping rate is not 0,45% it's 0,585% which rounded up is 0,59%. At start it chips away more then Braton. With extra 50% AP mod it would be 80% armor ignore and the chipping rate would be 0,81% and with 100% damage and 50% AP mod it would be 1,62% per shot.

By adding multishot you could be getting around 3% per shot which in clip of 50 bullets would not be whole armor but close to a 25-30% of the base value. Another clip would not get another 25% but only 15-20% from starting value.

 

By looking at lex with 70 base damage would be 1,75%, with 100% extra damage 3,5% and with another 30% AP mod (No return) would be 4,55 that is 4,6% per shot. With multishot almost 10% of current per shot, Our 1000 armor buddy would be loosing as much as 90 armor per shot, and also take into account that 30% armor ignore means that he is treated as 700 armor enemy for your damage.

 

Now when you look at it you might not wanna empty a clip of gorgon into a target but rather take Lex out to deal with armor first then make a swiss cheese out of him.

 

Now we can deal with our 130 level enemies and their armor much easier because more armor they have the faster it drops and we can adjust the numbers accordingly (so if their armor is dropping too slow we say that  15 damage is 0,5% or that 20 damage is 1%, it's all balancing it out, but not broken like now).

We are also implementing a way of using the extra mod set instead of rainbow + multishot +damage + dualstats.

 

 

How to deal with elemental damage to armor now?

Instead of giving 400% resistance to everything let's scale it out so we don't have to have rainbow on our weapon.

Let infested armor take extra damage from fire but only 5-10% damage from shock and cold.

Let corpus armor take extra damage from shock but 5-10% damage from fire and cold.

Let grineer armor take extra damage from cold but 5-10% damage from shock and fire.

That way we still let the effect play out (shocked, on fire, slowed down), but not bringing insane resistance to everything. Armor chipping would not be affected by elemental damage!

 

Now you might wanna think about it... do I put cold on my shotgun while fighting infested or do I put in extra ammo in the clip/faster reload or even Bane mod. Do I rather put Crowd Control for stunlock instead of cold?.

Also now it would be good idea to have weapon loadouts where you have predefined sets for your style of play. That way you don't have to search for all mods, just click loadout 1 and apply, later you press remove all to let mods go back free for another loadout that might be using same mod.

 

But what if I transmute or fuse the mod by accident?

Well a message will pop "This mod is in X set of X weapon, are you sure you want to fuse/transmute it".

 

So now to conclude this:

This would make every weapon in the game viable as well as the damage type and style of play.

Priority targets (like 130 lvl corrupted ancients) could be taken down by a team fast since coordinated fire would be too much for single target.

You could not equip mods that are not even "seen" by most let alone used.

There would be no "God tier/Mid tier/Oh my god tier" frames.

 

Make melee weapons more viable but not being scaled by same math cause cutting >50% or enemy armor per charge would break the current system. For them 20 damage should be 0,05% because with standard 0,5% per 20 damage for 200 damage charge weapons and 150% would be 500 damage per swing and 90% of sundering strike with 70% of base serrated ignore would be crazy. For them a value of 0,05% per 20 damage or even lower would be suggested for chip rate.

 

Hope you like what you see and hope DE takes a look at the topic (Steve fingers crossed) :)

Edited August 16, 2013 by ArcLightCRO

[CasuLL]

why do people make it look so easy to do coding -_-..

[ArcLightCRO]

why do people make it look so easy to do coding -_-..

Code is pretty much there mate, Armor values, hit registration, just need to do a few "for" and "do while" loops

[jmthebigman]

so removing 100% armor ignore weapon stat will wreck allot of weapons which then will need a severe dmg boost.

creating another problem.

 

better would be damage scaling. cause this would also solve skills not scaling well, as weapons that dont scale well.

 

tl;dr bad idea,dont do it, no

[ArcLightCRO]

so removing 100% armor ignore weapon stat will wreck allot of weapons which then will need a severe dmg boost.

creating another problem.

 

better would be damage scaling. cause this would also solve skills not scaling well, as weapons that dont scale well.

 

tl;dr bad idea,dont do it, no

 

Guess you didn't read it all. Most of 100% AP weapons have a bit lower damage BUT would chip armor at better rate. In terms DPS would be brought to about same level.

[Azure_Kytia]

A well thought out and constructive proposition towards an even equipment system. in regards to the snarky comment about "you don't know how hard it is to code", the base of the code is there, it could simply be repurposed and adjusted for a system like this.

 

A lot of outcry will likely be had for this thread as people immediately react with "But, my OP weapons!!!", but that's life.

 

+Support

Edited August 16, 2013 by Azure_Kyte

[ArcLightCRO]

A well thought out and constructive proposition towards an even equipment system. in regards to the snarky comment about "you don't know how hard it is to code", the base of the code is there, it could simply be repurposed and adjusted for a system like this.

 

A lot of outcry will likely be had for this thread as people immediately react with "But, my OP weapons!!!", but that's life.

 

+Support

Thank you.

 

Not a coding expert but I also understood that most of the code is there and I've worked on few alpha testing games so I know how rewriting the code can be a problem so. Considering this game is not in alpha but open beta I've had to come up with a system that just "adjusts" the current system since DE said that it's "working as intended" which would say they don't want to rewrite that part of the code, but adjust it.

[S3raph]

Firstly, I have no idea why you felt the need to mention your "masters degree in electrical engineering".

Maybe you did it so people would take your idea more seriously or you just need that type of validation from random people on the internet. To each his own.

I, however, find it a bit strange that a person with a "master's degree in electrical engineering" does not know simple mathematics. Do you know what a logarithmic graph looks like? Or did you just find the word "logarithmic", and thought "Hey, this sounds fancy. Maybe I'll use it in my thread"?

The graph you drew above is an EXPONENTIAL graph. "Logarithmic" is the exact opposite of what you are trying to explain.

[ArcLightCRO]

Firstly, I have no idea why you felt the need to mention your "masters degree in electrical engineering".

Maybe you did it so people would take your idea more seriously or you just need that type of validation from random people on the internet. To each his own.

I, however, find it a bit strange that a person with a "master's degree in electrical engineering" does not know simple mathematics. Do you know what a logarithmic graph looks like? Or did you just find the word "logarithmic", and thought "Hey, this sounds fancy. Maybe I'll use it in my thread"?

The graph you drew above is an EXPONENTIAL graph. "Logarithmic" is the exact opposite of what you are trying to explain.

 

I was talking about logarithmic drop of armor, you have me there, armor increases exponentially after certain point. It's same as multiply/divide, so let me make you happy and edit the word.

 

Also real drop is not logarithmic per say (it's linear to a point where number is rounded down), but approximation is.

 

I was pointing out my masters degree out so you know I'm not some average Joe who came up with a system but actually what I'm talking has come out of MATLAB, Excel, FEM analysis and other tools used by engineers which are not CAD, EPlan an such as many people think.

 

Edit: What I wanted to say is that I came up with system because I like numbers and that's the reason I'm an engineer.

P.S. I can also use "Trust me I'm an Engineer" 

Edited August 16, 2013 by ArcLightCRO

[S3raph]

I was talking about logarithmic drop of armor, you have me there, armor increases exponentially after certain point. It's same as multiply/divide, so let me make you happy and edit the word.

 

Also real drop is not logarithmic per say (it's linear to a point where number is rounded down), but approximation is.

 

I was pointing out my masters degree out so you know I'm not some average Joe who came up with a system but actually what I'm talking has come out of MATLAB, Excel, FEM analysis and other tools used by engineers which are not CAD, EPlan an such as many people think.

 

Edit: What I wanted to say is that I came up with system because I like numbers and that's the reason I'm an engineer.

P.S. I can also use "Trust me I'm an Engineer" 

 

Again, the armor drop is not logarithmic. It's inversely exponential. A logarithmic graph looks like this

 

http://www.sosmath.com/algebra/logs/log4/log42/gl02.gif (don't know how to add an image)

 

Your idea sounds good (even if there's no mechanism in place for armor 'shredding', don't know where you got that idea) but the way you're trying to sell it (by using incorrect terminology) just bugs me.

[MECT_HET]

Bioware are already done the best armor dealing calculations:

 

this

this

http://cloud.steampowered.com/ugc/594731763049512948/6E91CB9019C3158E008A4A8123AD797EB5F36574/

and this

 

Everything is ready to apply. Why do DE wasting their time trying to reinvent the wheel - I haven't an idea

 

 

Edit:typo

Edited August 16, 2013 by MECT0HET

[ArcLightCRO]

Again, the armor drop is not logarithmic. It's inversely exponential. A logarithmic graph looks like this

http://www.sosmath.com/algebra/logs/log4/log42/gl02.gif (don't know how to add an image)

Your idea sounds good (even if there's no mechanism in place for armor 'shredding', don't know where you got that idea) but the way you're trying to sell it (by using incorrect terminology) just bugs me.

It's a factorial drop of inverse Log(X!)^-1 (look at 20-120 graph, should be 2nd)

http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=Log%28x%21%29%5E-1

It is how to put it logarightmic ;)

Edit for S3raph: Trust me I'm an Engineer

Edit n02: It doesn't have to be factorial, factorial is a bit over the top TBH, but it's inverse log fucntion

Edited August 16, 2013 by ArcLightCRO

[Transvistinator]

As much as i want to support this, Even armor ignore weapons struggle spitting out dps late game, And by late game i mean 40-50+ on Xini when the enemy levels start to get to the 150-200 mark. From the stand point of a person who has every mod give or tak a few minor ones, Removing armor ignore would either

A)Cripple endgame to the point where its impossible to get past high defence waves

B)Compleatly throw off damage stats

 

Now, To be fair this is a decent suggestion, But you have to remember that even though this is still in closed beta, Things take a while to change, Adding this armor chipping effect is a decent idea, But what happens when that armor removal curve starts to round off at high enough levels for guns to still do no damage. In the end the real problem is you dont really need to change anything

 

In anything, Theres always gonna be somthing better than somthing else without that imbalance life is impossible. Plus all this talk about high level armor problem isnt really a problem, Seeing as you use the right tool for the job, Anyway any potatoed weapon even the MK1 braton, Can deal with level 50 enemys with ease.

 

E.G You want to destroy a city? You wouldnt use a small 5m radius missile would you? You would want to have an upgrade from the rest of the stuff. I.E Somthing like a hydrogen bomb because thats the right tool for the job.

 

Another huge factor to add in is the fact is the sense that armor ignore weapons are mainly ( Bar a few ) are higher mastery and take time to make via Clan tech or boss farming adds progression to the game and a sense of achivement, E.G Someone owns a Braton for example, They get on fine and are exploring the planets and having a good time, But then theyre stuck with the problem that they have to upgrade their gun for the higher planets ( Say they got to pluto ) By then they'll need to know about the atributes in the game, And having basic armor ignore is a good thing, For starters out the concept of the entire modding thing is allready super complex for them adding %armor "Chipping" Would make it worse.

 

So anyway slightly off topic but the main gist is

TL:DR- Tweaking "Endgame" Of sorts is fine, But there has to be somthing better than somthing so people can progress, And adding armor "Chipping" Further adds complexity to the fact that newbies dont get taught about the modding system, What armor is, And how important it is to migate it.

[S3raph]

It's a factorial drop of inverse Log(X!)^-1 (look at 20-120 graph, should be 2nd)

http://www.wolframalpha.com/input/?i=Log%28x%21%29%5E-1

It is how to put it logarightmic ;)

Edit for S3raph: Trust me I'm an Engineer

Edit n02: It doesn't have to be factorial, factorial is a bit over the top TBH, but it's inverse log fucntion

 

Ok got me there.. didnt realise what you had in mind :) 

[ArcLightCRO]

As much as i want to support this, Even armor ignore weapons struggle spitting out dps late game, And by late game i mean 40-50+ on Xini when the enemy levels start to get to the 150-200 mark. 

 

A trully constructive response mate :) thanks.

 

To take it a bit out of context here. That's not becuase of enemy armor, armor ignore do tend to bypass it completely it's just that the damage on them is not high enough (as I said Braton is 20 and Boltor is 18).

This would also give a bit better HP scaling. Also if you take a look at: read in Dr. Evil voice "1 milion armor". The 1% or per say 10% with lex is a decent number and armor goes down very very fast when focused down by a group and Damage is applyable.

As I said it comes down to balance of the numbers.

[DeadlyNerd]

why do people make it look so easy to do coding -_-..

Code is not the problem, problem is integrating the new code into the old and at the same time keeping things stable.

Granted, this is impossible if one doesn't know his own code, but one wouldn't be a professional programmer if he didn't know his own code.

[noir_kero]

o,O okay..  I'll trust you you're an engineer.

 

I kinda got lost in the explanation of the idea up there. But I like the armor shredding part, how about rather than applying it to all type of damage, just apply it to "bullet" and similar type damage, and armor ignore type doesn't shred armor but does full damage as it is now (no changes).

 

Since bullet and similar type damage deals more raw damage than AI type anyway, I think it's viable. Its more, if you use bullet type you can't treat it the same way as you treat AI weapons.

 

And also weapons have tiers, so its not having all weapon as good as each other, but having same tier weapon more viable at high armor scaling (more weapon option for high level), example of the problem was supra "bullet" type, cannot compete with lanka "serrated blade" or flux "serrated blade" (which is a tier 6) at high armor enemies, or gorgon (tier 3) can't compete with boltor (tier 2).

 

Elemental resistance is a different story, which I don't know the story ....

[Rhorge]

Christ, the whole system is getting an overhaul, can you people please hold your horses till the new system is here then praise/hate/criticise it.

[Andoryuu]

So, instead of getting armor values from client and synchronizing only HPs and status effects, game would also have to calculate and synchronize armor?

Poor host that gets to process few Twin Vipers trimming down an Ancient...

[LazyKnight]

I read over your topic it seems needless complex. You did a great job presenting your idea, I just think it is far more than what the game needs(would fit great in a table top RPG). 

 

No one that plays shooter games like bullets sponge NPC that have complex armor mechanics that take time to dismantle and is nearly a bane to players that like the genre. I get highly irritated if it takes more than 2 seconds to drop a normal NPC and even heavy units should never take more than 6-8 seconds to kill.

 

Push for this idea if they screw up update 10.

 

So, instead of getting armor values from client and synchronizing only HPs and status effects, game would also have to calculate and synchronize armor?

Poor host that gets to process few Twin Vipers trimming down an Ancient...

This idea would be murder on the CPU and would likely raise the system requirements drastically.

 

 

Edited August 16, 2013 by LazyKnight

[BlueReaper46]

Is this a good idea? maybe, if used properly it would basically allow a player to use whatever weapon they wanted, but I guarantee that someone will find a way to make a weapon OP and that is all that will be used.

 

The idea of it decreasing in a logarithmic fashion is good, but maybe do it logistically? this way higher level enemies cant be reduced to <1 armor, and it could keep at a reasonable level.

 

Will the coding be easy? Probably not, I can see a lot going wrong at first(enemy armor dropping below 0, and making them invincible), but if they do it right and it scales well it would make all weapons useful.

 

Though it may be easier to just make it so weapons without AI just do that destructive damage, and leave the rest as they are, this would balance it out in a way. Sure the Boltor might do more damage at first, but by the time the enemy dies it would be the Braton that had a higher or equal output due to destroying armor.

[RationalPi]

Code is pretty much there mate, Armor values, hit registration, just need to do a few "for" and "do while" loops

Sort of, though it depends on how the code is organized as well. OOP is  would make this type of thing fine but from what I understand many game developers have begun using entity frameworks which make it slightly more difficult to canniblize code but easier to update, maintain, and add.

[Kinamu]

Code is pretty much there mate, Armor values, hit registration, just need to do a few "for" and "do while" loops

Depending on how the code is written it could be done with a simple function call with an addition of 1-2 extra function, or the damaging functions need to be completly rewritten. Based on how messy the codes are from the hotfixes.and the number of generated bugs with every new hotfix, I imagine Warframes code to be a mess. So yeah, maybe the whole damaging part needs to be rewritten for this change.

 

Neverthless, good idea.

[Fluff-E-Kitty]

I will fist admit that I didnt read over the full thing. you should always put a summery at the top of things like this, witch I know you had to do in lab reports, so treat it as an experiment.

anyway, I like the idear of making each and every gun capabul of being viabul at any level, however they already are. it is more dependent on the persons preference and play style then the actual gun.I see alot of people still using the braton at high levels. its the same with frames and why there are so many.

 

the way the elemental mods work right now, I usually jest keep Ice on them for shields and AP because there is no resion not to put it on there, but work with the base stats after that. 

 

the risk we have with making all guns very similer is simplification, in other words trying to make each gun be able to deal the same dps or otherwise, waters down the actual stats of said guns to be so much alike that you would have to give them tires and create a signal gun that is better then all the others. in other words call of duty styel unlocks where the next to best thing is also NOT what you start with or what you currently have (or at lest what most modern military games do with unlocks. call of duty or any game- jest look at the snipers unlock path and you will know what i mean. the 50 cal is never what you start with and always what gets used at the end) and then it means whatever comes out next will ither always overshadow the last and create power creep, or it will jest be another step on the upgrade path.

its not alwas about how fast a gun is at tacking donw a target, its about how you use it. I prefer on shot stuff like a lot of other people, but I also rather like full auto low clip, low damage, but high firerate things.

 

oddly, a game that did this sort of sidegrade system semi well was blacklight retribution. its a terribul game now becasue the DEs are idiots and the power to buy everyhting is too grate, but my exampule is in the tsmg. it was a very light, very fast smg type thing with a small clip. it didnt do a lot of damage but the number of bullets it put out was amazing, and when aimed right due to the way headshots worked, it would kill faster then assalt rifle. I made the grekata in warframe hopeing to get that feeling back, but even with the point stick mod on it, it seems under powered even with all the crits I was getting.

 

I wont argue with you that the damage system needs work, and to make mods or guns a bit different in there calculation, but at the same point moving form one type of gear to the next also keeps the game working (assuming players are buying gear, or at lest in playing also sometimes funding the servers). we also have to rember that mods make guns alot more powerfull and that is why there base stats are so low. you cant expect something to be amazing without mods on it (with some exclusions to that like the accrid and gremlins).

I would say that the point of impact calculations need the most change, like getting shot in the face not have as much armor as torso, although I think it is done like that currently.

Edited August 16, 2013 by Fluff-E-Kitty

[DeadlyNerd]

bump for justice