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Post by iw5000 on Jul 15, 2015 11:36:29 GMT -5
Good post here, about the soon to come rebalance. Talking about how everything is going to change.....and what you need to do to prepare. Here's a copy. ----------------------------------- www.reddit.com/r/CruciblePlaybook/comments/3dcoz6/how_to_prepare_for_the_announced_200_rebalancing/Deej has alerted us that 2.0.0 will come before TTK, and that it will address crucible balance issues. www.bungie.net/en/Forum/Post/138574853/0/0/1The relevant part:Update 2.0.0 will address a lot of your concerns, including weapon balance. No specifics, at least not yet. Your favorite guns and armor may suddenly be garbage. The most powerful choices will probably change. We cannot know exactly what or how Bungie will change about the game. I AM NOT MAKING A JUDGEMENT ABOUT WHAT SHOULD GET NERFED, I DON'T CARE. I WILL USE THE STRONGEST CHOICES AVAILABLE, AND SO SHOULD YOU. I'M JUST GOING TO NOTE THE OBVIOUS TARGETS SO THAT WE CAN MAKE PLANS. PLEASE DO NOT COMMENT HERE IF YOU WANT TO MAKE THOSE JUDGEMENTS. The obvious targets of re-balancing are: Exotic HCs, Shot Package, Final Round, Double Down/FS combo, and ARs. Guardians that are not prepared will be raging, complaining, and confused. For us this chaos is an opportunity. They will struggle to come to grips with the new normal, becoming even less of a threat than before. We will hit the ground running, already holding the exact tools we need. How do we get prepared?1) Save up Crucible and Vanguard marks. The wide variety of choices affords a great deal of flexibility in the face of uncertainty. 2)Save Up Motes of Light and Weapon Parts. This will allow you to re-roll to get whatever the new top tier perks will be. 3) Save a couple etheric light. To ascend whatever gear becomes the most powerful choice. 4) Keep at least one high stat gun from each major gun class. It's a judgement call, trying to guess which weapons will be the new kings of the meta. Fortunately, we can place many bets by filling our vaults and alt characters with guns. 5) Hold onto armor pieces that grant reload speed, and extra ammo for each class. Suggestions for each Class of weapon- Yellow entries are weapons with a good chance of becoming part of the new 2.0.0 meta. Other entries might become part of it, but the chances are not so great. I welcome your comments here, especially if you can reference one of the guides to show why a weapon should, or should not be included. Pulse Rifles A few Pulse Rifles are hovering around the edges of the current meta already. It would be surprising if they get nerfed. With current information, they are the odds on favorite to dominate the next meta. Having at least one of the following is the number one priority: Hopscotch, Messenger, Red Death. Hand Cannons The current domination of exotic hand cannons is likely to be the focus of nerfs in 2.0.0. This may open up space for other hand cannons to shine. Hawkmoon might emerge unscathed, since Sony paid good money for it to be exclusive. It is also possible that all HC get nerfed as collateral damage in the same way that ARs all got nerfed to deal with Suros. Considering all these factors, we want a Hawkmoon, and maybe some others if they are not to hard to get. Hawkmoon, Revelator, Timor's Lash Scout Rifles Scout rifles are in a bad spot right now. The 2.0.0 rebalancing might buff them. If that happens there are a couple that might emerge very strong indeed. MIDA is undoubtedly the strongest right now. MIDA, Ghaleon's, One/One Synthete Auto Rifles Currently terrible. Maybe some of the nerfs will get repealed. Even that may not be enough. So many things would need to change to put ARs back on the list, that it will be difficult to predict what stats will be best. These are just rough guesses. Vanquisher IIX, Silmar's Wrath, your old sweet Vanilla AR, Suros Other Primaries The strange guns that go in the primary slot. Vex is strong, almost strong enough for T1 right now. Universal remote, could become the de facto replacement for TLW in today's TLW/sniper setups. No Land Beyond, Already a beast in the right hands, but likely to remain a poor choice for most players. Vex, Universal Remote Shotguns Unless shot package is addressed probably no change here. If it is, range becomes much less important, while RoF becomes much more important. Full auto would return to the crucible. FR could become a good alternative depending on the exact nature of any nerf. Lord of Wolves is somewhere between a pulse, a fusion, and a shotgun. I don't have any experience with it, so I cannot say how well it would do. If the easy free special ammo from DD/FS gets addressed, Invective could become attractive. Dry Rot, Invective, Found verdict, anything with full auto.Snipers Final round may very well get addressed. Be prepared by having a regular high quality sniper. FS/DD extra ammo may be targeted, Ice Breaker is an obvious solution. Her Benevolence, Some really sweet vanilla sniper from your vault, Ice Breaker Fusion Rifles If shotguns get hit pretty hard, fusion may become a top choice. There are 2 ways to go, High impact, and low impact. Give/Take Equation, Exiles curse TLDR: Get ready to be crushed by people that planned ahead for the 2.0.0 re-balancing.DO NOT COMMENT WITH "I TOLD YOU SO," WISHLISTS, NERF MECHANICS, OR ANECDOTAL EVIDENCE ABOUT YOUR FAVORITE GUN I DIDN'T MENTION. THIS SUB IS NOT THE PLACE FOR THAT. EDIT: corrected link.
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wittyscorpion
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Post by wittyscorpion on Jul 15, 2015 11:56:31 GMT -5
The gist I got from this: 1) Don't throw away anything you got (which I almost never do until I run out of space ) until post patch, because garbage can be turned into gem by a little wave of Bungie's magic wand of rebalancing; 2) Pause reforging / ascending / purchasing / etc and start hoarding motes / marks / ELs / etc (basically in the same vein as my prepare-for-TTK suggestions). Post patch a new breed of tier 1 weapons and perks will arise to replace the current ones; 3) and last but not the least: if you have an OP weapon, use it now! . Gjallarhorn the hell out of Weekly / NF / PoE / Dragon Strike playlists, Thorn / TLW / shotty / Final Round snipe everything in Crucible / ToO, etc, while they last.
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Post by iw5000 on Jul 15, 2015 12:03:31 GMT -5
The gist I got from this: 1) Don't throw away anything you got (which I almost never do until I run out of space ) until post patch, because garbage can be turned into gem; 2) Pause reforging / ascending / purchasing / etc and start hoarding motes / marks / ELs / etc (basically in the same vein as my prepare-for-TTK suggestions). Post patch a new breed of tier 1 weapons and perks will arise to replace the current ones; Funny I posted this, as just this morning when I got up...I spent about 30 minutes cleaning out a lot of destiny guns. I deleted about eight new ones (mostly Pulse and Autos), and about six or seven old guns I haven't used in months. Oh well. I did get another ten motes or so. Fortunately, I have everything on the list up there. For what that's worth.
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wings
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Post by wings on Jul 15, 2015 12:03:56 GMT -5
Errr I really can't see the Universal Remote replacing The Last Word. Its range is poo for a primary shotgun. Looks like I might benefit from the patch update anyway. Hopefully Final Round will be changed to something like Luck In The Chamber. Really, wasting two shots to get the one shot body kill for a weapon that is supposed to be the exemplar of marksmanship is really dumb.
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wittyscorpion
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Post by wittyscorpion on Jul 15, 2015 12:20:32 GMT -5
Errr I really can't see the Universal Remote replacing The Last Word. Its range is poo for a primary shotgun. Looks like I might benefit from the patch update anyway. Hopefully Final Round will be changed to something like Luck In The Chamber. Really, wasting two shots to get the one shot body kill for a weapon that is supposed to be the exemplar of marksmanship is really dumb. I tried UR + SR combo briefly in last IB, and the result is borderline satisfactory. By design, UR must always feel UP against other shotty, if nothing else at least for the fact that primary ammo is never going to be a problem in PvP. Is TLW better than UR? Absolutely. However, if you are playing a role of camp y sniper, UR can be situationally more useful than TLW when fending against Shotty rushers. The rushers usually don't expect you to have a one shot weapon so they tend to get really close, making UR superior than TLW in that particular situation. Any kind of buff on UR and/or nerf on Shotty can make UR a bit more viable.
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markopolo
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Post by markopolo on Jul 15, 2015 13:35:08 GMT -5
Imma confused
Is this a crucible only rebalancing or a whole game balancing?
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wittyscorpion
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Post by wittyscorpion on Jul 15, 2015 13:39:57 GMT -5
Imma confused Is this a crucible only rebalancing or a whole game balancing? Patch 2.0 will address a lot of things, weapon balancing is one of them and should be applied to both PvE and PvP. That said, since Bungie's infrastructure supports having different behaviors for PvP and PvE, it won't be surprising that they will have things broken down into 3 sections: a) general rebalancing, b) PvE specific balancing, c) PvP specific balancing. It probably helps to list out what Bungie has said on patch 2.0: From last week's weekly update: 1) Bounty/quest redesign details have been revealed; 2) Things to come: Anything beyond these on patch 2.0.0 are all speculations at this point, whether they are from Reddit posts, Bungie.net forum threads, news articles, etc.
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wittyscorpion
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Post by wittyscorpion on Jul 16, 2015 19:19:35 GMT -5
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Post by TheHawkNY on Jul 16, 2015 19:53:58 GMT -5
So, still almost 2 months away?
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Post by qupie1 on Jul 16, 2015 20:23:28 GMT -5
Dont think it is that dat away, sure hope not.
Hard light could become a serious good weapon, I am aafraid pulse with become king though. Fusion will probably still be subpar.
And last but not least,props to bungie for having the balls to nerf ghorn. Lets see how the fans respond to that!
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wittyscorpion
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Post by wittyscorpion on Jul 16, 2015 20:25:40 GMT -5
Let's get the obvious out of the way first:
(Possibly) hugely nerfed: Gjallarhorn(!), Thorn (PvP), TLW, Shotty top tier perks mildly nerfed (in terms of ammo): Ice Breaker, Black Hammer (Hopefully) hugely buffed: Nechrochasm, Hard Light, No Land Beyond
Weapon classes: various buffs and nerfs that require real world experimentation to understand how they stack with each other, so too early to tell. Although it is pretty safe to say that 1) AutoR is definitely buffed, and 2) ScoutR is even less viable for PvP because its close range ability is further nerfed.
Design Intention, range wise (closest -> farthest, Primary and Special only): Shotty -> AutoR -> FusionR -> HC -> PulseR -> ScoutR -> SniperR
Essentially, I think that Destiny's PvP will become mainly a game of matching weapons to ranges. Whoever can do that better is more "skilled" in Destiny's sandbox.
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markopolo
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Post by markopolo on Jul 16, 2015 20:37:00 GMT -5
They fucked with my Icebreaker? Mothafuckers gonna get cut
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mannon
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Post by mannon on Jul 16, 2015 21:51:36 GMT -5
Does Icebreaker really need messing with? Yes yes the special ammo growing ability is pretty amazing, but as a sniper rifle it's got a lot of damage, but also a massive kick and really bad sustained DPS. Honestly it's best used picking off enemies here and there or slowly whittling down a boss when you can't or won't go get more ammo. It's really sub optimal for PvP and can't really burn bosses... But then if it's only ammo they are adjusting I guess that doesn't really change much more than to simply exaggerate what's already true of it.
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wittyscorpion
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Post by wittyscorpion on Jul 16, 2015 23:01:58 GMT -5
After reading through the finer details, I also get the impression that:
with a few notable buff exceptions (in which the current versions are too weak to be used anyway), the entire tuning will feel like a sweeping nerf.
1) Bosses in PvE will feel harder to take down
GHorn loses power in wolf pack rounds, IB takes longer to Synth ammo, BHammer no longer does DPS out of thin air, Fatebringer can no longer effectively snap shot distant enemiegs, shotty damage is nerfed… the list goes on and on.
2) TTK in PvP will generally feel longer
should be a positive change considering lag is here to stay.
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wings
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Post by wings on Jul 16, 2015 23:47:59 GMT -5
So Triple Tap is a better perk than White Nail then?
Their excuse to nerf Gjallarhorn is a bit silly.
Icebreaker usage in the Vault of Glass will be interesting.
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qupie
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Post by qupie on Jul 17, 2015 2:20:28 GMT -5
The excuse they made is a valid one, though they should have mentioned other arguments as well.
I think the icebreaker/Ghorn/Bhammer nerfs are valid. I hope they keep it through the initial whine phase on reddit.
Black hammering/icebreaking at extreme ranges is boring as hell. The icebreaker is a great weapon to switch allot with your primary, not to camp in the corner of a map.
I hope hand cannons remain valid though, the range nerf is valid, but the magazine should not be reduced too much. I hope it will be -1 for weapons up to 10 rounds and -2 for above. Not more!
It is a shame not allot of ppl on reddit can see how some weapons completely unbalance PvE, and that unbalanced PvE can also be a problem (not only crucible).
People are even whining about the thorn nerf... Seems to be an awesome change if you ask me. Stacking poison? Count me in! I think it actually got a buff for PvE (appart from the hand cannon changes)
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wings
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Post by wings on Jul 17, 2015 2:58:49 GMT -5
The excuse they made is a valid one, though they should have mentioned other arguments as well. Well I jumped on that as I was just leaving before work but I still don't know if citing LFG posts demanding a Gjallarhorn to join is the sole reason for a change. If there is no burn or solar burn, Skolas will be killed fastest with a Gjallarhorn. They even allowed players to burn him by adding in supplicants to the fight based on time rather than Skolas' health. Also, people will want to kill Skolas fast because the fight can last pretty long if you wipe with Skolas' health pretty low and the absense of checkpoints means repeat attempts are making gamers tired. Don't want Gjallarhorn being so prevalent in high end-game content? Make a few weeks where void burn is the modifier, since more people have the Truth than the Gjallarhorn. And, as annoying it is to see stupid requirements on LFG, it is the hosts' right. If they are trying to make it more accessible they can add matchmaking as an option. Even with Crota, the Gjallarhorn had an exaggerated demand because of being under-leveled and there was no solar tracking launcher sold by the Vanguard Quartermaster. You're not going to down him using machine guns are you? Sniper rifles are designed to corner camp with at the back of the map, or they'd give us an ACOG scope or a red dot sight so we'd have more peripheral vision and less zoom. That's actually how they are supposed to be used. I expected the Black Hammer to be changed but I'm not sure on this one. It's probably a way of preventing people from stun-locking Urrox. Ice Breaker at 8 seconds per round to recharge, including the loss of all ammo upon death, will probably make the Vault of Glass tedious and new players might be punished by not having a Praedyth's Revenge may be. Or it's to finally punish lazy players who insist on cheesing the Oracles section up top. Who knows.
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qupie
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Post by qupie on Jul 17, 2015 3:11:29 GMT -5
Corner camped as in, engaging a sniper battle, yes. Corner camped as in, I sit outside of the range of every single enemy and kill them one by one? NO!
As for the LFG part, it is a result of the OPness of Ghorn imho, not the cause. Scolas is not the only thing in that equation, there are loads of moments where Ghorn is simply OP. There is an easy way to get tracking rockets now, and why would you even need a solar rocket against Crota?
Like we discussed before, Ghorn makes:
a) PvE content easy, completely invalidating some part of some fights. We wanted interesting boss fight mechanics, but ppl get mad if you can't totally skip them with Ghorn? b) Ghorn demands for harder (more spongy) enemies, to counter "a". This results in Ghorn being the only valid exotic choice. c) Ghorn makes 90% of exotics obsolete in PvE
All those are bad things, not even speaking of some players feeling left out without one, which is also a factor.
Allot of ppl are extremely salty though. The change might be 80% damamge or something, there are no details and there are loads of ppl whining about 'x' being worthless now. Simply no way to tell until we get precise numbers. People are saying hand cannons will be worthless, but there are simply no details as of now.
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wittyscorpion
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Post by wittyscorpion on Jul 17, 2015 3:30:00 GMT -5
On the GHorn topic: As I stated earlier in the Xur thread, the solution to the problem is to 1) have plan to nerf GHorn, 2) let Xur sell GHorn so Year 1 players can enjoy its supreme power against all year 1 content, and 3) nerf it right before TTK. Step 1: check Step 3: check Step 2, in 30 minutes?
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wings
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Post by wings on Jul 17, 2015 3:53:43 GMT -5
Corner camped as in, engaging a sniper battle, yes. Corner camped as in, I sit outside of the range of every single enemy and kill them one by one? NO! As for the LFG part, it is a result of the OPness of Ghorn imho, not the cause. Scolas is not the only thing in that equation, there are loads of moments where Ghorn is simply OP. There is an easy way to get tracking rockets now, and why would you even need a solar rocket against Crota? Like we discussed before, Ghorn makes: a) PvE content easy, completely invalidating some part of some fights. We wanted interesting boss fight mechanics, but ppl get mad if you can't totally skip them with Ghorn? b) Ghorn demands for harder (more spongy) enemies, to counter "a". This results in Ghorn being the only valid exotic choice. c) Ghorn makes 90% of exotics obsolete in PvE All those are bad things, not even speaking of some players feeling left out without one, which is also a factor. Allot of ppl are extremely salty though. The change might be 80% damamge or something, there are no details and there are loads of ppl whining about 'x' being worthless now. Simply no way to tell until we get precise numbers. People are saying hand cannons will be worthless, but there are simply no details as of now. It is up to Bungie to make the AIs chase you across the map. Gears of War does it with even larger maps, even on the easiest settings, so why can't Bungie do it? It's really not the players' fault the AIs are very limited. First time I played Crota's End I was absolutely gobsmacked with how dumb the AIs are at the bridge section by not chasing me up the steps from where you enter having completed the Abyss. You even see a Thrall climb a wall in your very first story mission, seemingly the only Thrall that can do this. And then Bungie makes pillars scattered all over the "high end-game content" that you can just jump on and the Thralls cannot harm you? You ever thought that rockets are overused because machine guns aren't just viable? Why risk constant exposure when dealing with large taargets when a safe rocket or two will do? I'd love it if I could use my Jolder's Hammer more often, since I have like ten of them or something, because I want to. But I'm not going to risk a potential wipe if this is the case. A solar tracking launcher now is easy, not during TDB where you had to rely on RNG from an engram or something unless I have missed something? Plus, it's handy having solar because of the solar shields for the wizards in the Deathsinger's stage beforehand, so you can save a space in your inventory and you will not suffer from ammo depletion upon changing element of your launcher. I do think the Gjallarhorn should be nerfed since it can evade game mechanics, but then the game should never have catered towards those who wish to burn bosses.
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qupie
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Post by qupie on Jul 17, 2015 4:10:34 GMT -5
I really don't get those 'its up to bungie' comments when discussing these kind of things. It is also 'up to bungie' if they make your weapons allot less feasible on that range, right? It gets about the same results.
Making enemies chase you makes a totally different game, as people will try to "pull" one enemy at a time if content is hard (as is done in MMO). Not saying that is a bad thing per se, but it is not the direction Bungie choose to go. I am sometimes amazed how people can feel 'cheated' or 'they should have done x' with stuff like this. They are not obligated to do 'x' at all. It is their game and they have a vision how to make it best. There are millions of ways to design a game, and just because you found an exploit in their game, doesn't mean you have a claim to use it forever.
People feel like they get punished for (ab)using certain strategies. Why is that? Bungie addressed it this way, they could have given PvE enemy snipers infinite range, but they chose this path. Nobody is getting punished. You are playing a video game, and you are exploiting something the developers probably didn't think of when designing it. Is it that weird that something might change then? It happens in every game, sooner or later. People find expoids which make the game less fun (in the eye of the developer, at least) and things get patched.
Machine guns are pretty good btw, people simply use them wrong, and they are not good when there is a burn in play.
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wittyscorpion
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Post by wittyscorpion on Jul 17, 2015 4:12:37 GMT -5
On the GHorn topic: As I stated earlier in the Xur thread, the solution to the problem is to 1) have plan to nerf GHorn, 2) let Xur sell GHorn so Year 1 players can enjoy its supreme power against all year 1 content, and 3) nerf it right before TTK. Step 1: check Step 3: check Step 2, in 30 minutes? Did he bring GHorn today? No. As a matter of fact, he did not bring any weapons?!, that's a first...
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qupie
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Post by qupie on Jul 17, 2015 4:24:21 GMT -5
Oooh, the rumor treadmills are spinning quite hard right now
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wings
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Post by wings on Jul 17, 2015 6:58:49 GMT -5
I really don't get those 'its up to bungie' comments when discussing these kind of things. As in, if they were really that bothered about using a sniper rifle with impunity from enemy attacks, they should have either made the maps even smaller, or made the AIs attack at further ranges. Why doesn't the Devil Walker target players at a further range than it does currently? Poor programming? In Destiny I can stand in front of a Walker beyond a certain distance but I can't do that with the Brumack in Gears of War. If you give AIs better intelligence, you then wouldn't need to worry about sniper rifles being 'abused'. Let's see how the proposed changes affect each weapon then: 1. Black Hammer Now vendor sniper rifles with Triple Tap will outperform the Black Hammer unless I've misunderstood the perk. Who on earth is going to grind for a Black Hammer, or if anyone has it, to actually use it? At least taking only one round from the magazine upon landing all three precision shots would probably be more reasonable. You don't think this is their way of encouraging people into new Raid gear rather than insisting on using old Raid gear at all? Bungie claims sniper rifles should reward precision by their change with Final Round and then they nerf the only sniper rifle that requires precision to justify its use completely. 2. Ice Breaker The recharge time has increased from 5 to 8 seconds. This means the Ice Breaker can be 'out-DPSed' by a legendary sniper rifle with a reserve of 18 rounds. Special ammo in PvE isn't usually that scarce to make Ice Breaker's ammo regeneration that sacred, and it cannot pick up special ammo anyway. So all it's doing is saving the need for heavy ammo synths on your heavy machine gun for Atheon may be. You're going to give up your exotic slot for less DPS? How often do people use these two rifles? I only use Ice Breaker for Oracles and Atheon but I can go without easily. So long as the supplicants drop enough special ammo, then there's no real reason to use these two exotics. The only issue I can see special ammo being short and needing to use synthesis packs regularly, is if the lobby has a fair amount of inexperienced players so wipes are frequent.
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Post by qupie1 on Jul 17, 2015 8:13:38 GMT -5
I find it hard to believe the range on walkers is an AI thing, technically maybe, yes. I don't know. But increasing the range sounds like a very easy thing to do to me, so they probably don't do it for another reason. I agree with you though that the BH nerf is a bit too much, auto reload and taking 2 instead of 3 rounds from reserve would have been better imho. But the fact that it was (slightly) OP, I think nobody can disagree with. It was the most used sniper by far, and made some engagements simply too easy. Sure they could alter those engagements, but why would they if they could simply nerf one weapon? If almost everybody uses one weapon, it is probably OP.
On the icebreaker, sure it's dps is outclassed by other snipers, as it should be. You get free ammo for this one, and you never have to reload. It is a beautiful weapon to use at the oracle phase of VoG for example (when not cheesing). Shooting stuff with your primary/heavy and switching to take out hobgoblins. I guess that is the niche they want it to fill. You can still cheese with it, but it takes a bit longer.
I see absolutely no reason why they would want to discourage ppl from doing old content though, why would any developer want that? Especially in a game which is often criticized for lack of content. Seems extremely far fetched and counterintuitive.
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Post by iw5000 on Jul 17, 2015 8:22:44 GMT -5
Good post Wings
I have a few quick thoughts
1. One thing I took from this article is the amount of micromanaging Bungie does. Take a close look at the Thorn chart. Bungie has actually monitored the 'gun equipped' rates of players in the Crucible. And they look to fine tune that. This REALLY fuels my conspiracy theories that much of the Xur charade going on, is mostly about trying to micro-manage equipment and gun useage rates. If a piece of exotic armor isn't being used much, they tinker with it's drop rates.
2. I agree with Witty. This isn't really a gun 'OP' update nerf. Trying to fine tune OP weapons in the PvP. What this update really is this. It's a "WE ARE GOING TO STOP 7min NIGHTFALLS UPDATE'. I think people will agree, the new 365 are simply crushing much of the content, that isn't PoE35. Even last night with the Heb's, the three of us kind of/sort of steamrolled the PoE34 without to much effort. Nothing needs to be added with the 7 to 12 min Nightfalls and almost comical Weekly 32's. The Lv 32 weeklies are basically the old ROC strikes now. Screw around, zero effort. So this update is a move to basically weaken everything universally, to simultaneously buff up the PvE content.
3. The above being the case, people maybe should hold their applause on Bungie's nerfing of the GHorn. If a lot of stuff is weakening by 1% to 5% universally....then by default the game's best gun is still going to remain top tier. What's going to compete amongst the launchers? Grenades and Horseshoes nerf just smacked all those re-rolled Rhadeghasts and made them less useful. And while on this....Bungie never said, just HOW much the nerf was to the wolf rounds. 2%? 4%? Would that even matter? The Ghorn already destroys everything in the game with probably 15% over-spillage on each kill. It might just kill now, with only 5% over-spillage. So what?
4. Speaking of Ghorns...the chart seems to indicate that 25 to 35% of the players were using the gun during PvE encounters. So is it safe to say, that only 1 in 3 players have this gun these days? In any harder PvE stuff...people will use this. Why wouldn't you? That's still A LOT of players without it, as that chart indicates active players. The 1 to 2 million still playing the game. The 9 to 10 million who have stopped playing, most all of them do not have this gun.
5. I don't think the 'White Nail' nerf to the Black Hammer will be that big. One, it's still one of the hardest hitting snipers in the game. Period. And with the nerf....if you equip some armor that gives extra ammo...you can essentially run 21 to 24 bullets with your sniper, when including their bonus of +3 to the base. Basically, Bungie is going you a free '3-crit shot' pass whether you get crit shots or not. You fire three shots, regardless of whether you get crit shots...you get an automatic free 3 bullets. That should be enough on most dumb bosses. Think about that. Even on bosses who are a bit harder to hit.... I rarely would hit more than 6 to 9 crit shots in a row(before eating up reserves) So effect there is minimal. And on dumb bosses, like the archon priest, Phogoth, etc.... This nerf will have no effect. You never needed more than 15 shots to kill him anyways. Now having 20+ bullets....he's going down regardless.
6. Agree with the overall thoughts on sniping. If Bungie wants to make fundamental PvE gameplay changes...cheesing with sniper rifles should be priority number 1. Nerfing BH and IB doesn't address the fundamental problem of just corner sitting and sniping all day. What they need to do is set up coding to ensure that stationary snipers (say over 20 seconds?)...get swarmed with AI attacking, to move the sniper to a new spot. THAT is how you fix it, not by nerfing snipers. All their nerfs did was make hiding snipers now sit in corners for 75 seconds rather than 55 seconds. How is that a fix? Dumb.
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Post by qupie1 on Jul 17, 2015 8:38:58 GMT -5
To ad though, I agree that 8 seconds might be a bit too much, but an increase is not a bad move imho. Icebreaker and Ghorn were the two most used exotics in PvE, so I guess they wanted to put them in line with the others. I also has the huge explosions going for it though. Maybe patience and time will be used more now (which ironically is a better name for the icebreaker after this patch )
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Post by iw5000 on Jul 17, 2015 9:14:53 GMT -5
Lol
So true!
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malgato
True Bro
Farm ammo, then everyone wipe.
Posts: 1,195
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Post by malgato on Jul 17, 2015 9:21:29 GMT -5
I use Icebreaker all the time. I only just got Gjallarhorn this week, so haven't really had a chance to take it for a spin. But the reason I pretty exclusively use Icebreaker for my exotic is that I feel every other exotic in the game does NOT provide any advantage for PVE. Instead of nerfing, maybe they should think of ways to make it desirable to use some of the other exotics.
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Post by iw5000 on Jul 17, 2015 9:26:56 GMT -5
I'm going to compliment Bungie here. This is touching upon my above comment #6...how to handle sniping
The Prison of Elders story line, the whole 'arena' angle.... is pretty much just a clever disguise/excuse to implement what is essentially a dumb map design. One big arena. An environment that doesn't have to look pretty or have intricate leveling. It's just a big box. But by getting players to buy into this dumbed down design (via the story)....it's allowed Bungie to cleverly solve one of the most annoying parts of the prior raids. Cheese sniping.
I've done a number of PoE 34's and 35's now...and the coding mechanics are cleverly down. There are no cheese spots. And while you can still snipe (which is good)...if a group ALL decides to corner snipe together, they will effectively get run down out of that corner spot in due time. You will either have to 1) move, or 2) fight off the attackers. The AI coding is very clever, with how the waves of enemies will push against corner sniping. And what I have seen so far...a good group almost needs to have one person sniping, and at least one person shotgun bashing against charging enemies. This is good. The game is forcing players to work as a unit, and forcing coordination, which is what a good raid is supposed to do. PoE34 and 35 does this very well
TLDR....Rather than nerf snipers...Bungie should do what they did with PoE 34 &35...code AI to encourage movement, which thereby forces players to use teamwork, AND other weapons.
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