Imbalance of npcs, red builds and effects of build diversity
In this thread I want to discuss the case for lowering dps player damage. Right now average dps builds (also the meta build overall) consist of crit chance crit damage and 6 core red. Most builds stack out of cover damage, damage to armor, damage to health. With players having the ability to hit number like 18 percent out of cover or soon to be 19 damage to armor (walker harris 2 pc contractors, weapon attribute) over 200 percent crit damage while at crit chance cap. skill players and tank players weapons on heroic and above content have been rendered pea shooters, ineffective at defending ones self effectively. This is because the gap from a all red build and a no red build is so drastic by the power of red attributes it forces npc scaling to be overly tuned for non red players. There is a clear desire by the devs to get skill players to use their guns more. Talents heavily incentivize this (spike surge, sadist, eyeless ect). However if players do so little damage and have to expose them selves for far longer periods of time to do underwhelming damage why would they bother. This is where the meta of turret and drone came from. Why expose yourself to getting massively damaged for little net damage gain firing your weapon when you can just sit behind cover and spam your skills safely. The problem with this lies not within the power of the drone and turret but the ineffectiveness of weapon damage by non red using players against npcs on heroic and harder content. So with that being said let me just express how much extra damage and dps buld really does then a non red tank build for example.
Weapon damage
red often around 130 percent or more (90 core attribute 15 on specialization and 10 percent one piece brand set of whatever weapon archetype you choose plus 15 on weapon itsself)
Tank is around 30 percent via the specialization and weapon.
Crit damage
Red is usually around 170 to 200 if their watch is ranked and they are geared properly this while still having 60 crit chance on wherever gun they choose.
Tank is at 10 chance and 50 damage could be ten percent higher on either or if they have a weapon attribute with this on there
Multiplicative damages
Reds stack these wherever they can. Damage to armor, health, out of cover. Fox’s and contractors are red player favorites in builds. Hollow man making rare appearances as well. These are also paired with their multiplicative bonus of choice on their weapon. As stated above 18 out of cover (10 on gun 8 on foxs) or 14 damage to armor (contractor 8, 6 on gun) (more when new brand set appears 2 pc walker 5)
Tank may have one of these 10 out of cover or 6 damage to armor on gun but at the expense of crit chance or damage
Talents
Reds have multiple multiplicative damage talents. Two most popular are glass cannon and vigilance netting the player a further 55 percent multiplicative damage bonus. Assuming it’s the perfect version normal glass would net you 25 plus 25 from vigilance for a gain of 50 percent.
Tanks gain none. Often using protector and vanguard or tardigrade.
These power level differences in the game have lead to extraordinarily tanky enemies for some and moderately tanky enemies for full dps builds. This effect leaves tank and skill players feeling as though there is zero point in firing their weapon as it does such insignificant damage on higher difficulties. To solve this I think damage builds need to be nerfed down some. This will tighten the damage scale between all reds and no reds considerably and make non red builds viable to shoot again again. That is after npcs are scaled down to compensate for dps reductions for players.
As for how to balance npc power. I would like to see this strategy adopted. Instead of tanking up npcs further and further as we have been doing since division one. Why can we not use the npc intelligence to scale difficulty instead. Make npcs slightly more tanky but just moderate changes to health and armor. However jack their damage up some (make armor more important) and make them more Aggressive. Make them flank more. More accurate in Using their skills. Make playing from cover more important. Also make it so npcs shoot back when your out of cover faster on higher difficulties. Target player skills more ferociously. These changes would make heroics and legendaries far more difficult and satisfying to play rather then unloading mags into them to get the same intended difficulty spike (the way it’s done today). It would also make different attributes more appealing with different factions. If your fighting cleaners on heroic might want to bring some hazard pro or burn resist for when they close In on you With their flamethrowers or hit you with their napalm launcher. Imagine having to actually build to the encounter rather then just having to build for damage. This would be far more satisfying to me and I suspect many others. Players today get frustrated as hell dumping a mag into a npc then getting dropped in two bullets by that same npc as they reload. It’s infuriating and a real reason why so many people are burning out on the game. These are some changes I think could help in the long term. Let me know your opinions.
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