Originally Posted by
Streven7
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This discussion is meant to be focused on discussing game balance issues and more specifically changes to weapon balance that would affect the overall game balance. To start out let me say, people that defend the current state of smg's do so because they like to feel like little invincible gods nuking everything in sight and are giving no thought to the state of overall game balance. Weapon balancing is just one small part of total game balance. So to have this discussion we need to discuss the overall game balance we want to achieve and then talk about what we need to change get there.
The game was advertised as a cover based, tactical, 3rd person shooter. It is supposed to reward good tactics over pure twitch gameplay. The current power level of the smg totally breaks that design goal.
As we all know the current meta, due to how damage is calculated, is to have an smg with a high crit chance/crit damage build with lots of firearms to boost damage and then add enough health and damage mitigation to survive a few seconds out of cover. Which is all the time it takes to burn through even the toughest enemies.
With that build you can ignore cover mechanics and just charge straight ahead with little regard for anything other than staying on target. So basically a COD style of gameplay. I don't know about the rest of you but that's not what I signed up for and it wasn't what was advertised.
This has effectively killed all the creative possibilities that would be available in build selection and team composition/strategy if cover weren't so irrelevant. This smg/crit build is so effective there is little reason not to have 4 guys in a squad running the exact same build with the exact same skills just bulldozing their way through anything that gets in their way. That shouldn't be. There should be an effective counter to every strategy and build approach in the game. As it is you just slap on crit gear with high dps, equip an smg with pulse and first aid, and you go around nuking everything in sight. That is not the game I want to play.
So yeah, getting your favorite weapon nerfed always hurts but for the sake of a better gameplay experience it's what is needed in this case. The argument to bring all other weapons up to the same level as the smg in terms of dps potential doesn't change or help the issue in terms of game balance but in fact just makes the issue worse.
I'd like to see changes that put more of an emphasis on using cover and punishes players who mindlessly run out in the open. If you reduce damage on smgs it gives a guy who's using cover properly an advantage. Right now damage output is so high that even when using smart cover you get burned down in an instant by a zerg rushing opponent with an smg/crit build. I should be able to stay in cover with smart cover active and punish that guy for leaving his cover position. Instead, me being in cover just gives him the advantage of shooting a non-moving target.
Furthemore, placing more of an emphasis on utilizing cover would make all those unused skills viable again. All those unused skills and perks were designed from the perspective of players being mostly in cover and only breaking cover to gain tactical advantages. So something like seeker mine or turret would cause you to come out of cover. Sticky bomb would discourage flankers. Mobile cover and smart cover combined would be one of the most op combos ever for a skill build. Ballistic shield would have a great use for making tactical advances. I could go on and on. But, sadly, none of those things are used often because they are are severely underpowered when compared to mindlessly zerging ahead with a vector after pulsing your target.
My proposal is to simply reduce the alpha damage on smgs i.e. their damage per shot. The fact that they get as much or more alpha damage as an assault rifle, AND have higher rate of fire, AND have higher crit chance, AND have better gun handling is just absurd. What exactly is the weakness of this weapon platform? Anyways back on topic. Reduce the alpha damage and bring dps back down to a reasonable level. Plus their effective range should be reduced just a smidgen more. Right now they are so OP with crit damage that they are as good or better than most ARs at AR optimum range. When at their own optimum range they're insanely good which is why most encounters are happening at smg range and out of cover.
Doing this simple change you don't have to rebalance practically every other stat, skill, and perk in the game trying to achieve the originally intended game balance. Giving more damage mitigation doesn't help because all other weapons would still be inferior and you would ignore the cover mechanics even more.
Let smgs be the crit proccing champions of the game but bring their dps back down to the realm of sanity.
Other changes I'd recommend:
SHOTGUNS
Give shotguns a buff to armor damage and possibly give them a slight increase in alpha damage. I think their optimum range is as they should be but they should be devastating to anyone silly enough to get close enough to actually use them against.
LMG
Give lmg's a huge buff to damage on enemies out of cover. Now the weapon will fulfill it's role of suppressing enemies and forcing them into cover. THIS IS MY SINGLE BIGGEST REQUEST AND PROBABLY THE MOST IMPORTANT CHANGE TO MAKE FOR ANY WEAPON PLATFORM.
DMR
Reduce the amount of headshot bonus on dmr's. No rifle should be getting 2 million point headshot crits. That's gamebreakingly ridiculous. Because of the way damage is calculated I think that's all you need to do for them to be reasonable again is lower that headshot damage bonus.
ASSAULT RIFLE
For AR's you don't really need to do much. It think some could use some slight handling improvements but basically just tweak their alpha damage to an appropriate level so that they are the bread and butter all arounder weapon and the one that each other weapon types are trying to differentiate from. Honestly ARS are quite nice to use but are so overshadowed by the OP smgs at the moment that they feel gimped. They really are very good when using the right mods and skils. They are superb when used at their optimum range which is middle distance. Middle distance is where most encounters should happen but don't because of, again, the OP'ness of the smgs.
Well, all this sounds well and good for PVP but many of us only do PVE. How are we supposed to do the Incursion without all that dps? Firstly, I say to you that more dps is not what you need. If smg's weren't so insanely OP you would already have explored other strategies that would allow you to succeed without just adding more damage. More DPS should never be the default solution for every challenge presented in an RPG. It should be one option of several viable alternatives. Secondly, if the Incursion is so hard that more dps and less teamwork is the only viable strategy then the Incursion itself needs to be fixed. Let's not start tweaking game balance around broken pve difficulty.
For the record I think the current difficulty level of the Incursion on challenging is fine. It's not meant to be beatable by a random pug group that has poor communication and little to no skill synergy. Hard mode is easy on pug groups. Challenging is there to give coordinated high level groups challenging content to work against. If it weren't being exploited, getting one high level item a week would not break game balance in the DZ. Meaning the gear gap would not be that big an issue if that were the case. Sadly that's not the case becasue cheaters have abused the crap out of it. But even still I hold my own just fine in the DZ with a skill based build and GS of only 188. So yeah, let's not whine about how broken the DZ is. That's not true and even if it were would be another thread entirely.
In conclusion, let's get the game balance swung back in favor of using cover mechanics and smart teamwork. Let's open up all the possibilities available in all the various skills and talents.
Have fun out there guys and I'll see you in the DZ.
ADDENDUM:
Massive/Ubisoft,
If you'd like to hire me as a consultant I promise my fees would be more than reasonable. :P