Arcen Games

General Category => Bionic Dues => : keith.lamothe October 01, 2013, 03:08:47 PM

: Part Stats Balance/Polish, Round 4
: keith.lamothe October 01, 2013, 03:08:47 PM
Ok, as I mentioned in the other thread we're really in the short rows here in terms of not much time left for 1.0.  But balance changes (at least numbers tweaks, not so much mechanics overhauls) are generally ok for this last phase, so let's keep this going if anyone still has issues with the parts/stats/etc.

For reference here are all the player-side stats:

Weapon-specific:
+%Attack
+%Ammo
+Range
+%Splash-radius

Shield-related:
+Shields
+Regen
+Damage-reduction

Propulsion-related:
+Stealth
+Overload
+Trap-skill

Computer-related:
+Sensors
+Hacking
+Virus
+Mines
+Sentry-turrets

Second-order:
+%Power-generation (exo-wide)
+%Attack (exo-wide)
+%Shield-related-stats (exo-wide)
+%Propulsion-related-stats (exo-wide)
+%Computer-related-stats (exo-wide)

Other:
+Power-generation
+Power-consumption
-Power Cost of other parts in same system


So please let me know which ones still have significant issues in your mind, or if you think it's fine for 1.0 as-is.


Thanks! :)
: Re: Part Stats Balance/Polish, Round 4
: Misery October 02, 2013, 08:58:47 AM
Hm, I'm finding most of these things right now to be pretty well balanced.  There arent really any part types that are useless at the moment.  Though I havent really had a chance just yet to see exactly how the new trap-skill affects the damage on sentries and mines as my equipment changes.

Splash radius can get a little loopy for certain very specific weapons.  Yet for others it's just fine.

The Assault Exo is still very, very hard to kill.  Though it's hard to say what that's from;  the random level-up of enemy bots isnt hitting some of the ones that manage to shoot me the most often, so it's kinda hard to get a full idea on how this is working right now.

Other than that, I cant really think of any real issues.  I'd say this is the most balanced the game has been yet, and it's doing pretty darn good.
: Re: Part Stats Balance/Polish, Round 4
: keith.lamothe October 02, 2013, 12:13:20 PM
Awesome :)

Yea, I think I'll leave the numbers where they are for 1.0 unless someone has some suggestions.  I could tweak the Assault's +%shields bonus down some more but I think it may benefit from feedback from a wider range of skill levels (everyone here has gotten pretty good at the game by now).  Anyway, we'll see :)
: Re: Part Stats Balance/Polish, Round 4
: Misery October 03, 2013, 05:28:26 AM
Hmm, it's not specifically part-related, but I do think the attack values for enemies, at least on Expert, could have the growth rate upped a bit further.  Enemies that should probably be dealing decent damage like the limited-ammo sniper types dont do much even after a few levelups.   In some cases it might be that the base attack power is too low. I havent messed with the new difficulty enough yet to judge it on that one, but it's likely that I'll find the same problem there as I go through it.  I'd like to finish my current playthrough first though.

Also, regen, it seems like it's pretty hard for enemy shots to turn regen-able damage into permanent damage.   I think that's part of why my AssaultExo is nigh invulnerable to anything but heavy attacks (like, at least a couple hundred damage at a time).  That mechanic overall is working nicely, but that's my one issue with it right now.  EDIT:  Not just that though, but enemy attack values arent keeping up well with the rate at which shield values provided by items are going up.  Heck, I've got both a capacitor and a shield item that are providing over 100 shields available in the store, both are blue items.  For how far I am in this playthrough, and where the enemy attacks are currently (even among things that are gaining enough levelups) that's definitely a bit much.


EDIT:  Ok, the bit with the enemy bots, seeing it go further, the problem seems like the bots that have low attack to start with, say 30 or so, they almost dont grow in attack power whatsoever as the game goes on.   Bots that started out with decent attack are getting stronger properly, but for the ones that started low.... well, it leads to things like snipers that do no damage, and stuff like that.  Heck, I've had a few missions that were mostly enemies of that type, where pretty much the entire bot population for the mission could barely even scratch my science exo.

I'll stick with the points I mentioned about the shield items and regen though.

Good grief though, so many numbers.... I dunno how you manage to balance things out in the first place. 
: Re: Part Stats Balance/Polish, Round 4
: keith.lamothe October 03, 2013, 12:05:24 PM
Yea, I think when I shifted the player stats away from exponential to a three-linear-stages approach I kind of "disconnected" it from the enemy stat progression.  The enemy progression _will_ still catch up to you, but there will be definite points where the curves are pretty far apart.

Time to rewire the enemy progression :)  Probably not for 0.931 though as Chris is already in the process of releasing that.  So the one after :)
: Re: Part Stats Balance/Polish, Round 4
: orzelek October 03, 2013, 04:53:23 PM
I knew that when you told that there will be no more drastic changes... you were pretending  8)

Progression rewire you say?
: Re: Part Stats Balance/Polish, Round 4
: keith.lamothe October 03, 2013, 04:56:53 PM
I knew that when you told that there will be no more drastic changes... you were pretending  8)

Progression rewire you say?
It's about 30 minutes of math changes, if that :)  The starting and ending stats would be the same, but it would progress faster in the early game and slower in the late game.
: Re: Part Stats Balance/Polish, Round 4
: Winge October 03, 2013, 11:14:42 PM
Still feels like Reactors are a bit too rare.  At the very least, it would be nice to see them in the store more often.  Beyond that, things look pretty good to me.
: Re: Part Stats Balance/Polish, Round 4
: keith.lamothe October 03, 2013, 11:19:49 PM
Still feels like Reactors are a bit too rare.  At the very least, it would be nice to see them in the store more often.  Beyond that, things look pretty good to me.
Well, the store inventory size just got 50% larger recently, which naturally increases the total chance of a reactor.  And recently their seeding rate was increased 25% across the board.  I'm guessing you mean even more than that?

Perhaps I could have them be WAY more likely from Reactor Fab missions.
: Re: Part Stats Balance/Polish, Round 4
: Misery October 04, 2013, 12:05:00 AM
The game does seem to have this tendancy to give mostly overchargers instead of either type of reactor, at least as far as reactor missions go.  I think the last reactor mission I did gave me like 9 overchargers and half of a slave reactor.

Speaking of reactors, I have one to show here, in case it's generated stats are a glitch:

(http://i.imgur.com/eOK6P2d.jpg)

Yeah.... power balance from 12 to 2300 with one mid-game item.  I do have another reactor or two on that Exo, so I can see where the number might be coming from (sort of), but I'd wondered if it was supposed to generate with stats like that.
: Re: Part Stats Balance/Polish, Round 4
: keith.lamothe October 04, 2013, 12:34:43 AM
Speaking of reactors, I have one to show here, in case it's generated stats are a glitch:
Y'all kept saying the rarities should have more of an impact ;)  A mark-10 purple has stats similar to a mark-18 white.  And the slave reactor type has like a 2x to power gen on it, which (dubiously, but intentionally) does not deduct from its item budget for other effects at all.  And you happened to roll a slave reactor that dumped ALL its item budget into +%PowerGeneration.

So basically in the midgame you scored an endgame-quality power component.

But I had been given the impression that most of you found that sort of thing disgusting RNG generosity fun ;)


So to answer the question: it's kind of on the edge of the model, but yes, those numbers aren't a glitch.
: Re: Part Stats Balance/Polish, Round 4
: Misery October 04, 2013, 02:10:05 AM
Oh yes, finding the occaisional rare super-part is indeed satisfying, haha.

Also the enemy bots are scaling much better now, in terms of attack power.  That puts the challenge level pretty much back where it should be.  And their shield levels are good too.

Aint too many problems with the balance right now, not that I can think of anyway.
: Re: Part Stats Balance/Polish, Round 4
: keith.lamothe October 04, 2013, 02:22:59 AM
Also the enemy bots are scaling much better now, in terms of attack power.  That puts the challenge level pretty much back where it should be.  And their shield levels are good too.

Aint too many problems with the balance right now, not that I can think of anyway.
I didn't actually change the enemy stat progression at all today, btw, it's on my list but I've not gotten much time on Bionic today.

What may have happened is that you passed from to a stage of the exponential curve that's a bit faster than what you were in (the beginning is glacial), so it's closer to your own exo's tri-linear "curve" :)
: Re: Part Stats Balance/Polish, Round 4
: Misery October 04, 2013, 03:06:28 AM
Aha, I see what you meant in the explanation of how you're going to change it, then.    Indeed it was very glacial before the point where I'm at.

Should make the challenge consistent right from the start then, I assume.  Much better than it getting easier and easier followed by a big difficulty spike.
: Re: Part Stats Balance/Polish, Round 4
: nas1m October 04, 2013, 03:53:58 PM
The game does seem to have this tendancy to give mostly overchargers instead of either type of reactor, at least as far as reactor missions go.  I think the last reactor mission I did gave me like 9 overchargers and half of a slave reactor.
Same here. I just did a Reactor Fab mission on Expert (being in *desperate* need of power producers) and got - guess what - 8 overcharges, 0 reactors. This is a little... unfortunate :-\. Is this just the RNG loving me more than usual or could the occurrence chances for actual power producers stand some tweaking?
: Re: Part Stats Balance/Polish, Round 4
: Winge October 04, 2013, 08:23:41 PM
Until this afternoon, I had never gotten a reactor from the Reactor Fab mission.  Could be RNG love, although I would almost say that at least one reactor should be guaranteed from a reactor fab mission.  That said, I'm not sure that putting a rule like that in the mission would be a good idea.  Thoughts?

: Re: Part Stats Balance/Polish, Round 4
: Misery October 05, 2013, 01:26:35 AM
Hm, Hacker parts:  These are really, really rare.   Hardly any loot comes from Science lab missions, and the store almost never carries these either;  almost all hacking points have to come as bonuses from other items, or from a computer-enhancing stat.   Considering how important hacking is.... particularly in higher difficulties where store prices are high.... this is definitely a problem.  They're alot more difficult to come by then reactors are right now.

Also, sentries can become pretty strong now, which isnt bad... the actual attack levels with them scale up well with trap-skill... but they're a little too easy to use.  So a suggestion:  dramatically lower how much ammo each sentry has.  70 per sentry is way too much.  The player can get alot of sentries to use per mission with the right parts, so even if they only had 10-15 shots each, you could still do some real damage with them, and use them to take out tanky sorts of bots.


Aside from that, and enemy attack scaling, which you're already working on.... I'm not really finding any further problems as I continue through the game.
: Re: Part Stats Balance/Polish, Round 4
: keith.lamothe October 05, 2013, 03:17:08 AM
Awesome, thanks for the feedback on the hacker frequency and the sentry ammo, both of those can be readily adjusted :)
: Re: Part Stats Balance/Polish, Round 4
: keith.lamothe October 05, 2013, 05:09:45 AM
Ok, here's what Expert's normal bot health multipliers look like, in the existing model and the new one.  The new one follows the same basic approach as most of the part stats with the three-linear-phases:

- The first third of the progression gives +A per level and ends at 1/6th of the end value.
- The second third of the progression gives +B per level and ends at 1/2 of the end value.
- The last third of the progression gives +C per level and ends at the... well, end.

The result is progression, and escalation of that progression (when you move to a new third), but compared to the straight exponents it's without the glacially-slow part at the beginning or the "each level is way more than the last" at the end.
: Re: Part Stats Balance/Polish, Round 4
: keith.lamothe October 05, 2013, 05:33:34 AM
A few other changes from this thread:

* Hacker parts are now about 50% more likely to be picked when a new part is generated.

* Reactors are now about 10 times more likely to be picked when generating loot in/for a Reactor Fab mission.

* Player Sentry Turrets:
** Max Ammo from 80 => 10.
** Attack from 120 => 150.
** The idea being that you can still get a ton of total sentry shots, but you won't get them from just a few turrets.

I did a test win of a Reactor fab mission.  3 of 4 of the loot pieces were Slave Reactors.
: Re: Part Stats Balance/Polish, Round 4
: Misery October 07, 2013, 01:26:14 AM
Hmm, looking on Mantis, there's one thing I wanted to mention:   http://www.arcengames.com/mantisbt/view.php?id=12858


That particular change seems unnecessary to me for a few reasons:

I'm at the 20 days left point in my current game, and with my science exo's current trap skill, they'd have over 20 shots each.    They're already very strong as is, and I have 20 of them.  This is WITHOUT me concentrating on trap-skill or turret stats;  the science exo's build is entirely about hacking.    That's a "kill the entire mission" level of ammo.   Heck, I already killed 50% of the bots in my last mission with about 8 or 9 of my 20 sentries;  and the science exo isnt the only one that has them.  AND, that's a late-game Expert mission with alot of high health bots.   If I actually concentrated on trap-skill and propulsion boost, the things would be basically unstoppable, AND last more than twice as long as ammo goes.  The low ammo is the only thing that keeps them from being able to just murder everything.

I know the ammo change to the things might seem a little extreme at first, but after extensive testing with that, the things are still quite strong.  Particularly once their range goes up.  They're hard to kill for most bots, as typically the only things that kill them quickly are explosive weapons, but that's IF the bot in question even gets close enough.  Usually I find the central threat to sentries is actually SilenceBots when they have followers.   The only thing players really need to keep in mind in order to use sentries effectively is that they're meant to be used in groups.  They dont run out of ammo as fast as you might think when they're powered up.  I'm seeing shield levels of 2000-3000 on average for many bots, and if I have a bunch of sentries down, say, a group of 8, a 2500-health bot will only take one shot from about 5 or 6 of those 8 sentries in order to kill at the current attack level my own sentries have.   In other words, just that one group can kill LOTS of things if used right.  Particularly as most missions also have numerous low-health bots as well, not just mid or high ones.

Anyway, that's my thoughts on that after messing with the things a bunch.
: Re: Part Stats Balance/Polish, Round 4
: keith.lamothe October 07, 2013, 01:33:54 AM
Fair enough.  I could drop the base ammo to like 5 to further emphasize that you need a trap-skill-build to murder levels with them (as opposed to light/moderate diversion use).  Then I'd probably up the ammo boost form trap skill to +10% so it's still 2-points-to-get-1-extra-ammo.  Unless that winds up still being too much.

The base attack/shields could also come down a bit, for the same reason.

On the other hand, this is one of those things where I wonder if not being OP will basically just cause people to ignore them because of the hassle involved in proper use.

Even there, of course, it needs to not be out-of-control-OP, and I guess clearing a mission on Expert would qualify as that.
: Re: Part Stats Balance/Polish, Round 4
: Misery October 07, 2013, 02:58:39 AM
Aye, that's true, if they're weakened it might indeed cause people to just not use them much.   

One thing you could try is lowering the numbers of turrets that items give you at a time;  larger groups of them would be harder to place, and smaller ones are not only easier and quicker to place, but you'd want to support their attacks with your own to maximize them, which is very different than just letting them kill everything for you.   Attack and health actually seem pretty good to me; it's mainly the fact that it's so easy to get large numbers of them going at once that can really wreck even high health bots before they even have a chance to fire back.

Or at least that's what I'm thinking.   It sounds like it'll be tough to balance and test properly.
: Re: Part Stats Balance/Polish, Round 4
: chemical_art October 07, 2013, 09:51:53 AM

On the other hand, this is one of those things where I wonder if not being OP will basically just cause people to ignore them because of the hassle involved in proper use.

Even there, of course, it needs to not be out-of-control-OP, and I guess clearing a mission on Expert would qualify as that.

I see two distinct points.

One, that turrets need to be strong in order for the common person to want to use them at all.

Second, that turrets need to not be so strong that it murders higher difficulties, which is inherently less common person audience.


Therefore, rather then the current situation of B dictating A, let A be very strong yet for B have it weaker. In other words, across difficulties, why not have turret stats changes. It already happens for armor although in a different direction.

It can be as simple as Normal and below get 40 shots, hard they get 20 shots, then expert gets 10.

In fact, why not have different ammo across the board for things?
: Re: Part Stats Balance/Polish, Round 4
: Tridus October 07, 2013, 02:37:44 PM
In fact, why not have different ammo across the board for things?

Because the wild swings in health already mean you need less ammo to kill things on lower difficulty.
: Re: Part Stats Balance/Polish, Round 4
: chemical_art October 07, 2013, 03:21:45 PM
In fact, why not have different ammo across the board for things?

Because the wild swings in health already mean you need less ammo to kill things on lower difficulty.

the lower health means you get a lot more overkill. so ammo is more important. keep in mind this in practice would only give more ammo for normal and below.
: Re: Part Stats Balance/Polish, Round 4
: Misery October 07, 2013, 07:04:42 PM

On the other hand, this is one of those things where I wonder if not being OP will basically just cause people to ignore them because of the hassle involved in proper use.

Even there, of course, it needs to not be out-of-control-OP, and I guess clearing a mission on Expert would qualify as that.

I see two distinct points.

One, that turrets need to be strong in order for the common person to want to use them at all.

Second, that turrets need to not be so strong that it murders higher difficulties, which is inherently less common person audience.


Therefore, rather then the current situation of B dictating A, let A be very strong yet for B have it weaker. In other words, across difficulties, why not have turret stats changes. It already happens for armor although in a different direction.

It can be as simple as Normal and below get 40 shots, hard they get 20 shots, then expert gets 10.

In fact, why not have different ammo across the board for things?


The thing about the lower difficulties though:  Pretty much everything murders bots rather easily on those.  On normal it's common for many bots to only take one or two hits from many weapons in order to be destroyed.  On top of that, the player is less likely to really be trying to squeeze as much power out of their items/builds as on the higher difficulties.


As the ammo goes though in the current version, even without doing anything to increase my trap-skill level further I'm already at twice the amount of ammo per sentry in my current game.   Even just that makes things distinctly easier in many situations, as enemy bot groups now take twice as long to overrun sentry groups.   With the exception of course being those sorts of bots that'll kill them in one hit with like 10 zillion damage per shot.  It is definitely a bit of an issue.

I wonder if their range extension should be lowered a bit?  That's usually where the problem happens the most.  Alot of enemy bots dont outrange these guys at all, and so must traverse numerous tiles in their direction before having a chance to do any damage.  It also means that what I'm calling the "hallway of sentries" tactic does much more damage to approaching bots in each turn as it otherwise would.   The more I think about it, the more I wonder if these things even need a range extension.   It's a change that made more sense coming off of how they used to be, but since their health/attack is at a pretty good level now, it might be unnecessary at this point. 
: Re: Part Stats Balance/Polish, Round 4
: keith.lamothe October 07, 2013, 08:03:33 PM
Good point on the range thing; I'll probably change it to be much slower in increasing once we're post-1.0, but for 1.0 I don't mind these being a bit more useful than perhaps they should be :)
: Re: Part Stats Balance/Polish, Round 4
: chemical_art October 07, 2013, 08:24:57 PM
As a normal player, i suppose for many reasons i find sentries too much trouble to really use. Therefore i dont focus on getting loot to boost , it then becomes less useful still, etc. It Is a brutal apathy cycle. Nerfing turrets will make it more niche as powergamers will use it as casuals then ignore it. I propose seperating the powergamers and the casual gamers, rather then trying to balance for the power gamers at the expense of the casuals.
: Re: Part Stats Balance/Polish, Round 4
: Winge October 07, 2013, 09:15:19 PM
I haven't had a chance to reply, but I think that you and I have very different experiences with turrets.  Not to say I find them useless; there are missions where I need them just to be able to thin the hordes.  However, my turrets die.  A lot.  In my expert game, with roughly 17 trap skill, my turrets die to 2 shots from Leader Bots (which were boosted to level 12 before I reached 30 days remaining...ouch).  They barely survive the first shot.  I'd be curious to know what you and I are doing differently--how many turrets are you placing and at what level?

Now, I'm not saying that I want the TF2 Engineer's invulnerable turret of death.  I see sentries as a way to 'thin out the chaff' by picking off weaker enemies and distracting more dangerous enemies, which is why I think having more ammo is a good idea.

As far as range goes, I agree completely.  I would try 4-5 points per range increase.  One other possibility is diminishing returns, although that would probably not be very intuitive for the player.  Basically, the first extra point of range would require 3-4, and each additional range after that would require one additional point.

So, with Trap Skill = 17:
Now:  Range = 11
4 pt:  Range = 10
5 pt:  Range = 9
Dr 3:  Range = 9
Dr 4:  Range = 9

For Range 12, need a Trap Skill of:
Now:  18
4 pt:  24
5 pt:  30
Dr 3:  33
Dr 4:  49 (non-Ninjas need not apply?)

Thoughts?
: Re: Part Stats Balance/Polish, Round 4
: Misery October 07, 2013, 10:09:44 PM
Good example of why this is going to be hard to balance, heh.   

My own experience is that the things actually dont die easily at all, and I often have to remove them myself after the fight is over so I can continue, if I'd put them in a spot that blocked some path or whatever.  SilenceBots will just eat the things, but most other enemies dont seem to be able to.   The occaisional extremely high health bot being a possible exception, but they're rare.  Shieldbots can screw them up as well.... if I havent already captured it for myself.    Other than that though, if I've been using them throughout a mission, chances are most of them will still be there at the end of the mission. 

4 or 5 turrets in a group is often enough, unless there's a particularly enormous horde coming.  They can be placed either in a very long hallway.... where their range hits things before they can get close, or if I'm dealing with something that the simple range just wont kill, I can put a longer string of them down, giving the rear ones more chances to fire as the bots concentrate on the ones at the front.  Doing the hallway thing is annoying though.  They can also go in a room, with the idea being to catch the enemy bots as they pass through the entrance to the room.  The key here is making sure that the bot has to fully enter the room before it can target anything;  if it can stand just outside, in the hall, this will not be too effective.   When done right, the bot enters, and is shredded immediately.     And finally, they can be placed around corners.  Generally this one is the easiest to do.  Bot comes around the corner, immediately gets shot a whole bunch.   With any of these tactics I can also support with my exos if need be.... generally the sniper and brawler are best for this.... but I dont actually need to do this very often at all, it's pretty rare. 

My sentries are being placed at trap level 19 right now, I think?  I dont always place them in groups, either;  sometimes one or two can be used to just add extra damage to my Assault Exo hitting things with his basic laser (which does about 1000 per hit by itself right now) or something like that.


I can show screenshots as well if it helps to illustrate exactly what I'm doing here;  I just dont have time to do that right at this moment.
: Re: Part Stats Balance/Polish, Round 4
: Winge October 07, 2013, 10:58:12 PM
Well, by the sound of it, we have similar tactics.  You use a few more turrets (I typically have them as fire support, so I usually place 2-4 at a time), and, by the sound of it, you're better at placing them--I'm still learning the LoS, and typically, I'm more willing to sacrifice a Turret than an Exo  ;).  I am curious what day you are on--my Assault is nowhere near 1,000 damage with its laser, but then I specced that Exo to take hits, not dish them out.  FWIW, I think my Assault's Overload is over 1,000  >D

A lot of the issue in my game is the aforementioned Leader Bots.  They are level 12 and (pre-nerf) had over 5,000 HP.  My Sniper can barely one-shot them with the Railgun, and I've stacked +% all attack on him.  Oh, and their 'pistol of uselessness' was dealing upwards of 200 damage at 9 range.  One hit puts a turret (or most of my Exos, for that matter) in the red.  The only way my turrets survive those is 1)  enemy Blaster Masters (<3) or 2) serious fire support from my Sniper.  As you mentioned, Silence Bots and Shield Bots also throw a monkey wrench in the mix.

I think I'll go back to that game tomorrow and check it out a bit more.  Part of my 'wow, what happened to my sentry' woes may have been bad placement or RNG love.
: Re: Part Stats Balance/Polish, Round 4
: Tridus October 08, 2013, 07:26:42 AM
As a normal player, i suppose for many reasons i find sentries too much trouble to really use. Therefore i dont focus on getting loot to boost , it then becomes less useful still, etc. It Is a brutal apathy cycle. Nerfing turrets will make it more niche as powergamers will use it as casuals then ignore it. I propose seperating the powergamers and the casual gamers, rather then trying to balance for the power gamers at the expense of the casuals.

"Normal" players don't need them, the game isn't hard enough at that level to need the entire bag of tricks. Which is just fine. Turrets don't need to be buffed into an IWIN button just because you don't need to use them to win on lower difficulty.

The absolute last thing we need is two sets of rules for everything depending on the difficulty level.
: Re: Part Stats Balance/Polish, Round 4
: chemical_art October 08, 2013, 08:41:49 AM
As a normal player, i suppose for many reasons i find sentries too much trouble to really use. Therefore i dont focus on getting loot to boost , it then becomes less useful still, etc. It Is a brutal apathy cycle. Nerfing turrets will make it more niche as powergamers will use it as casuals then ignore it. I propose seperating the powergamers and the casual gamers, rather then trying to balance for the power gamers at the expense of the casuals.
The absolute last thing we need is two sets of rules for everything depending on the difficulty level.

The absolute last thing we need is the top %0.1 of players to dictate the rules of a game.
: Re: Part Stats Balance/Polish, Round 4
: Misery October 08, 2013, 08:48:41 AM
Well, by the sound of it, we have similar tactics.  You use a few more turrets (I typically have them as fire support, so I usually place 2-4 at a time), and, by the sound of it, you're better at placing them--I'm still learning the LoS, and typically, I'm more willing to sacrifice a Turret than an Exo  ;).  I am curious what day you are on--my Assault is nowhere near 1,000 damage with its laser, but then I specced that Exo to take hits, not dish them out.  FWIW, I think my Assault's Overload is over 1,000  >D

A lot of the issue in my game is the aforementioned Leader Bots.  They are level 12 and (pre-nerf) had over 5,000 HP.  My Sniper can barely one-shot them with the Railgun, and I've stacked +% all attack on him.  Oh, and their 'pistol of uselessness' was dealing upwards of 200 damage at 9 range.  One hit puts a turret (or most of my Exos, for that matter) in the red.  The only way my turrets survive those is 1)  enemy Blaster Masters (<3) or 2) serious fire support from my Sniper.  As you mentioned, Silence Bots and Shield Bots also throw a monkey wrench in the mix.

I think I'll go back to that game tomorrow and check it out a bit more.  Part of my 'wow, what happened to my sentry' woes may have been bad placement or RNG love.


I was around day 23 when those stats were had.   Havent gone nuts with the +all-attack values on any of them, I've mostly focused on getting direct damage from specific weapons up.   And getting a zillion hacking points and computer points on my Science Exo.  Heck, he went from having 24 sentries to 65 sentries from one new item being applied.  Because math, I think.

There was one point though where the turrets just couldnt handle something, which was one mission where I ran into some sort of crazed horror with 12,000 attack and double actions and way too much health; pretty sure that was the mission where all 3 buff bots appeared at once.   Forget what type of bot that was.  No amount of turrets were taking THAT thing down easily, that's for sure.  Particularly since there was a shieldbot nearby.    Those damn buff bots can be really nasty.   Definitely some RNG !!FUN!! happening that time.



As a normal player, i suppose for many reasons i find sentries too much trouble to really use. Therefore i dont focus on getting loot to boost , it then becomes less useful still, etc. It Is a brutal apathy cycle. Nerfing turrets will make it more niche as powergamers will use it as casuals then ignore it. I propose seperating the powergamers and the casual gamers, rather then trying to balance for the power gamers at the expense of the casuals.
The absolute last thing we need is two sets of rules for everything depending on the difficulty level.

The absolute last thing we need is the top %0.1 of players to dictate the rules the bottom 75% use.


Wait, what's the problem with the sentries now?  I cant think of any concievable reason to buff the things, particularly on lower difficulties where they can often annihilate things in a single shot anyway.  Or am I not reading the issue right?
: Re: Part Stats Balance/Polish, Round 4
: Tridus October 08, 2013, 09:29:39 AM
As a normal player, i suppose for many reasons i find sentries too much trouble to really use. Therefore i dont focus on getting loot to boost , it then becomes less useful still, etc. It Is a brutal apathy cycle. Nerfing turrets will make it more niche as powergamers will use it as casuals then ignore it. I propose seperating the powergamers and the casual gamers, rather then trying to balance for the power gamers at the expense of the casuals.
The absolute last thing we need is two sets of rules for everything depending on the difficulty level.

The absolute last thing we need is the top %0.1 of players to dictate the rules of a game.

Oh please. You want to rewrite things to have a second set of stats to make sentries absurdly overpowered because you think they're a pain to use, on easy difficulties where they're ALREADY really powerful if you bother to use them?

That's ridiculous.
: Re: Part Stats Balance/Polish, Round 4
: chemical_art October 08, 2013, 10:53:09 AM
Turrets do not exist in a vacuum. they are troublesome to use, , peroid. on lower difficulties they simply are not worth the time to use compared to other options. nerfing turrets simply  wont change that. considering how other stats  change at certain difdiculries to help them be competitive, i dont find the concept ridiculous.
: Re: Part Stats Balance/Polish, Round 4
: keith.lamothe October 08, 2013, 11:10:03 AM
Expert wouldn't be the top 0.1% of players at this stage.  More like the top 20%, I think.  The game is honestly pretty easy right now all-around once you've put some dedicated thought into how to use each available tool.  Which is ok for 1.0, I think.  Brutal challenge is still available and there's plenty of room for further balance work, etc.

On the lower difficulties, basically by definition, a player doesn't need to worry about even understanding all the tools available.  Otherwise they probably wouldn't be much lower in difficulty.  So on normal a player probably doesn't use sentries unless they're experimenting or particularly enjoy the concept of deploying minions.  And there's actually quite a few in that last category, I think :)

Anyway, as it stands you don't have to specifically gear for sentries to have a very powerful sentry option available to you, and they are already way more powerful in terms of relative-stats on lower difficulties, so I don't think that they need to be _more_ useful at this time.  What happens in the future, we'll see.  There may need to be other factors than just the numbers or the balance of the sentries themselves.
: Re: Part Stats Balance/Polish, Round 4
: chemical_art October 08, 2013, 11:26:51 AM
Expert is top 20%? Rouge players are even hardcore then i thought. considering i consider expert the equivilant o 9/9 on ai war, and i know less then 1% of total players could finish.


Actually, ill have to respectfully disagree with the 20%. Maybe 20% of alpha players...who by definition are the most skilled/devoted players to begin. Considering the same for anyone who  posrs on the forum, i simply am skeptical.
: Re: Part Stats Balance/Polish, Round 4
: Misery October 08, 2013, 11:35:38 AM
Expert is top 20%? Rouge players are even hardcore then i thought. considering i consider expert the equivilant o 9/9 on ai war, and i know less then 1% of total players could finish.


Actually, ill have to respectfully disagree with the 20%. Maybe 20% of alpha players...

In an overall sense, the game is a bit easier than some other Roguelikes even on Expert and possibly on Misery, sort of.   To some extent it depends on the RNG though, as to which bots end up selected for the army list, and which bots are getting leveled up, and which arent.   

I'll be interested to see what players outside of the alpha/beta think of those two difficulty levels after they get their hands on the game. 
: Re: Part Stats Balance/Polish, Round 4
: chemical_art October 08, 2013, 11:43:39 AM
While that may true, that woud then imply that sales would be tiny. Rougelikes atent big sellers, which is why not many are made.  Id hope more for a good seller then a tiny brutal one.

On the other hand the game lets you save. Thats a big plus for sales.
: Re: Part Stats Balance/Polish, Round 4
: Tridus October 08, 2013, 12:11:08 PM
Turrets do not exist in a vacuum. they are troublesome to use, , peroid. on lower difficulties they simply are not worth the time to use compared to other options. nerfing turrets simply  wont change that. considering how other stats  change at certain difdiculries to help them be competitive, i dont find the concept ridiculous.

Lots of things aren't necessary to use on easy, because easy is easy. This isn't any different from AI War, where you can get away with not using all your tools on 6/6 a lot more easily than on 9/9.

That doesn't mean turrets are bad or need a buff. Neither is true. You just don't need to fiddle with them when your regular guns can mop the floor with everything on that difficulty. On high difficulty that's much less true. As it stands right now if you buff the turrets on easy, they're going to wipe the floor with nearly everything single handidly.