DUST Search - Announcement:Vehicle Changes and Beyond

Xak Arji wrote:

Foundation Seldon wrote:

Skybladev2 wrote:

What the hell, LAVs get more HP than dropships. Do you understand, that aiming at dropship is much easier, than at LAVs? Invincible murder taxi makes no sense and you want to repeat you balance mistake? LAVs should tank with speed, not shield/armor.

I want to ask CCP, how they see each type of vehicle operating on a battlefield?
I.e. HAVs: we start a match, call in RDV, get into the tank, ride to closest enemy nest, shoot people, then repeat. Or take a hill and do sniper shots all the game suppressing enemy ground units.
LAVs: we start a match, drive to nearest objective, jump out and take the objective. Then get in again, drive to another objectve (or whatever) fast, do our local job and can leave LAV without fear, because it is cheap.
But what should we do with weaponless dropship after first drop the beginning of the match? Tell me your vision, please.

A few things about why this post is bad :

1. LAVs have more base HP than Dropships ... but Dropships have twice as many slots. Effectively what this means is that a fitted Dropship will easily be able to tank more than anything an LAV could. Being that the LAV is restricted to 2 high / 1 low and 1 High / 2 Low what you'll see is that you cant simultaneously fit an extender, repper, and a resist onto an LAVs most desirable stat (Gallente Armor, Caldari Shield) at the same time. Dropships don't have this limitation.

2. You bring up Invincible Murder Taxis but forget that a lot of the reason they're invincible to begin with is because they have an insane base resistance on top of great fitting options. Comparing the new paradigm of vehicles to what we see in current LAVs is flawed logic. Even if the next LAVs had the exact same health as the current LLAVs they'd still be no where near as effective at tanking the same amount of damage thanks to changes to the modules / slot layout / lack of resistance.

3. L. A. V. - Light ATTACK Vehicle. Believe it or not there was a point in closed beta where this acronym was an accurate description of what the LAV was on the battlefield, and Im not referring to the invincible murder taxis we saw in Uprising. There was a time where people would willingly jump into an LAV fitted with Missile turrets and be able to effectively rack up a fair amount of kills because the LAV + Turret Gunner was an effective glass cannon on the field. With the changes to Missile Turrets and the decrease in range of Blaster Turrets this stopped being the case and they became, as you implied, strictly Murder Taxi / Transport vehicles. In my eyes, and clearly in the eyes of CCP, this is something worth changing.

4. Off the top of my head though I could see a Weaponless Dropship as something one could use while coordinating with squad members for transportation across a large map. The fact that it's weaponless would mean that you could fit a CRU or Scanning Modules without worrying about needing CPU/PG extenders in order to do so while also potentially increasing the overall tankiness of the vehicle. It'll be more niche and less commonly seen no doubt but it's something that could potentially be useful when there's a fair bit of communication used.

One reason this^^^^^ post is bad.... You're implying that a dropship is something *other* than a defenseless flying burrito. Since the ADS will be removed that is all they will be. What good is a CRU *if* you can't maneuver like an ADS to avoid a forge bolt, even if you could it's a two hit kill. Two hits that can come from *any* direction unlike an LAV, unless you're 10 ft off the ground. Then you run the risk of the recoil from any AV bouncing you right into the ground to an insta-death. A LAV can take cover around crates, under pipes, etc. A DS has the option of an occasional tower, still you're exposed to *at least* half the map. You have to remember he's speaking of a base DS. As soon as a rail or forge decides to fire at em, they are toast. So CCP, what function to you propose other than being flaming fireworks for infantry do you see the DS being worth? Being airborne brings ALOT of attention to you. If you have no offense than the unreliable random gunners, and the maneuverability of a flying sausage, and barely the HP of an LAV, what can you do with it?


Author	Thread Statistics \| Show CCP posts - 9 post(s)
Foundation Seldon Gespenster Kompanie Villore Accords 118	Posted - 2013.10.03 21:06:00 - [1] - Quote The QQing in this thread is at pretty hilarious levels right now. I've said it before in other threads but there's no point in comparing the effectiveness of current AV to the values of future vehicles in a rebalance that is built to address the effectiveness of both. Calm down guys. Feedback : I'm genuinely okay with the slots / health values of the vehicles that we'll be seeing in 1.7 with the caveat that I'm sure the AV will be balanced with respect to these new values. I just hope that all levels of AV are accounted for when balancing these values because there's no point in creating a situation where the vehicles are only balanced towards the lower end spectrum of the AV available in the game. If there are no plans to bring higher tiered vehicles in to the game within the near future then its essential that tanks are able to effectively deal with all levels of it. It goes without saying that the Plasma Cannon, AV Grenades, Forge Guns, and Swarms need to all be adjusted when taking these things into account. Shield Recharge Rates : I thoroughly love the buffs here and when accounting for the ability to duck under something to build up shields quickly and effectively it'll mean that things like dual tanking a Madrugar with 2 Heavy Extenders or Extender + Booster will become far more viable than it is now. Shield Boosters : The 'instant injection' aspect of these modules is going to seriously change the shield tanking paradigm. Undoubtedly a huge buff and something I'm looking forward to getting my hands on. Shields v. Armor You've done a lot to differentiate the two classes of tank and I can certainly appreciate the direction you've gone with them. Resist : The resist modules are another real game changer on this paradigm. 40% Shield Resist and 60% Armor Resist in a single module is huge. Heavy Shield Boosters v. Heavy Extenders on Gunnlogis At first glance it doesnt look like there's much reason to run any Heavy Extenders over 2 instant injections of 1900 Shields that can be used at any time but I think when taking a closer look at the PG values and such the cleverness of the design here reveals itself. Running an Extender + Booster + Resist is going to leave you with far more disposable PG that could be used with padding your armor or putting in an armor repairer. Running Booster + Booster + Resist puts all of your eggs in one basket because you'll need your lows dedicated entirely to PG upgrades but conversely you can tank significantly more damage because the 2 Injections of HP amount to an additional 3800 shields at your disposal. Large Missile Turrets : Full auto? Baller. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Hopes going into 1.7 that weren't addressed. "Missile Momentum" with small turrets in a moving vehicle is absolutely insane. This was part of the larger Missile Turret nerf that happened in Chromosome and since then having them setup in anything other than a Dropship or a Stationary Vehicle (ie. NEVER THE LAV) was more or less a lost cause. I'd like to see the return of being able to actually aim missile turrets in a moving vehicle without having the shot go in wildly different directions thanks to hitting a bump.
Foundation Seldon Gespenster Kompanie Villore Accords 118	Posted - 2013.10.03 22:30:00 - [2] - Quote I will say that one of the hallmark aspects of the vehicle changes listed is that there'll be far less SP required to invest into vehicles in order to get something competent. The only difference between active resist / booster modules is cooldown time and aside from that they all have the same effectiveness. There's not a huge difference between different extender modules and with the way fittings are limited now your standard layout is almost always going to be "Extender - Booster - Resist" regardless. In fact if you compare the trees in the current state of the game vs. the tree that we'll be getting in 1.7, even when taking the turret skill changes into account, there's actually far less SP needed to effectively max out your tank.
Foundation Seldon Gespenster Kompanie Villore Accords 123	Posted - 2013.10.24 11:38:00 - [3] - Quote Skybladev2 wrote: What the hell, LAVs get more HP than dropships. Do you understand, that aiming at dropship is much easier, than at LAVs? Invincible murder taxi makes no sense and you want to repeat you balance mistake? LAVs should tank with speed, not shield/armor. I want to ask CCP, how they see each type of vehicle operating on a battlefield? I.e. HAVs: we start a match, call in RDV, get into the tank, ride to closest enemy nest, shoot people, then repeat. Or take a hill and do sniper shots all the game suppressing enemy ground units. LAVs: we start a match, drive to nearest objective, jump out and take the objective. Then get in again, drive to another objectve (or whatever) fast, do our local job and can leave LAV without fear, because it is cheap. But what should we do with weaponless dropship after first drop the beginning of the match? Tell me your vision, please. A few things about why this post is bad : 1. LAVs have more base HP than Dropships ... but Dropships have twice as many slots. Effectively what this means is that a fitted Dropship will easily be able to tank more than anything an LAV could. Being that the LAV is restricted to 2 high / 1 low and 1 High / 2 Low what you'll see is that you cant simultaneously fit an extender, repper, and a resist onto an LAVs most desirable stat (Gallente Armor, Caldari Shield) at the same time. Dropships don't have this limitation. 2. You bring up Invincible Murder Taxis but forget that a lot of the reason they're invincible to begin with is because they have an insane base resistance on top of great fitting options. Comparing the new paradigm of vehicles to what we see in current LAVs is flawed logic. Even if the next LAVs had the exact same health as the current LLAVs they'd still be no where near as effective at tanking the same amount of damage thanks to changes to the modules / slot layout / lack of resistance. 3. L. A. V. - Light ATTACK Vehicle. Believe it or not there was a point in closed beta where this acronym was an accurate description of what the LAV was on the battlefield, and Im not referring to the invincible murder taxis we saw in Uprising. There was a time where people would willingly jump into an LAV fitted with Missile turrets and be able to effectively rack up a fair amount of kills because the LAV + Turret Gunner was an effective glass cannon on the field. With the changes to Missile Turrets and the decrease in range of Blaster Turrets this stopped being the case and they became, as you implied, strictly Murder Taxi / Transport vehicles. In my eyes, and clearly in the eyes of CCP, this is something worth changing. 4. Off the top of my head though I could see a Weaponless Dropship as something one could use while coordinating with squad members for transportation across a large map. The fact that it's weaponless would mean that you could fit a CRU or Scanning Modules without worrying about needing CPU/PG extenders in order to do so while also potentially increasing the overall tankiness of the vehicle. It'll be more niche and less commonly seen no doubt but it's something that could potentially be useful when there's a fair bit of communication used.
Foundation Seldon Gespenster Kompanie Villore Accords 123	Posted - 2013.10.25 05:44:00 - [4] - Quote Xak Arji wrote: Foundation Seldon wrote: Skybladev2 wrote: What the hell, LAVs get more HP than dropships. Do you understand, that aiming at dropship is much easier, than at LAVs? Invincible murder taxi makes no sense and you want to repeat you balance mistake? LAVs should tank with speed, not shield/armor. I want to ask CCP, how they see each type of vehicle operating on a battlefield? I.e. HAVs: we start a match, call in RDV, get into the tank, ride to closest enemy nest, shoot people, then repeat. Or take a hill and do sniper shots all the game suppressing enemy ground units. LAVs: we start a match, drive to nearest objective, jump out and take the objective. Then get in again, drive to another objectve (or whatever) fast, do our local job and can leave LAV without fear, because it is cheap. But what should we do with weaponless dropship after first drop the beginning of the match? Tell me your vision, please. A few things about why this post is bad : 1. LAVs have more base HP than Dropships ... but Dropships have twice as many slots. Effectively what this means is that a fitted Dropship will easily be able to tank more than anything an LAV could. Being that the LAV is restricted to 2 high / 1 low and 1 High / 2 Low what you'll see is that you cant simultaneously fit an extender, repper, and a resist onto an LAVs most desirable stat (Gallente Armor, Caldari Shield) at the same time. Dropships don't have this limitation. 2. You bring up Invincible Murder Taxis but forget that a lot of the reason they're invincible to begin with is because they have an insane base resistance on top of great fitting options. Comparing the new paradigm of vehicles to what we see in current LAVs is flawed logic. Even if the next LAVs had the exact same health as the current LLAVs they'd still be no where near as effective at tanking the same amount of damage thanks to changes to the modules / slot layout / lack of resistance. 3. L. A. V. - Light ATTACK Vehicle. Believe it or not there was a point in closed beta where this acronym was an accurate description of what the LAV was on the battlefield, and Im not referring to the invincible murder taxis we saw in Uprising. There was a time where people would willingly jump into an LAV fitted with Missile turrets and be able to effectively rack up a fair amount of kills because the LAV + Turret Gunner was an effective glass cannon on the field. With the changes to Missile Turrets and the decrease in range of Blaster Turrets this stopped being the case and they became, as you implied, strictly Murder Taxi / Transport vehicles. In my eyes, and clearly in the eyes of CCP, this is something worth changing. 4. Off the top of my head though I could see a Weaponless Dropship as something one could use while coordinating with squad members for transportation across a large map. The fact that it's weaponless would mean that you could fit a CRU or Scanning Modules without worrying about needing CPU/PG extenders in order to do so while also potentially increasing the overall tankiness of the vehicle. It'll be more niche and less commonly seen no doubt but it's something that could potentially be useful when there's a fair bit of communication used. One reason this^^^^^ post is bad.... You're implying that a dropship is something other than a defenseless flying burrito. Since the ADS will be removed that is all they will be. What good is a CRU if you can't maneuver like an ADS to avoid a forge bolt, even if you could it's a two hit kill. Two hits that can come from any direction unlike an LAV, unless you're 10 ft off the ground. Then you run the risk of the recoil from any AV bouncing you right into the ground to an insta-death. A LAV can take cover around crates, under pipes, etc. A DS has the option of an occasional tower, still you're exposed to at least half the map. You have to remember he's speaking of a base DS. As soon as a rail or forge decides to fire at em, they are toast. So CCP, what function to you propose other than being flaming fireworks for infantry do you see the DS being worth? Being airborne brings ALOT of attention to you. If you have no offense than the unreliable random gunners, and the maneuverability of a flying sausage, and barely the HP of an LAV, what can you do with it? So a few things : 1. Lol 2. What the Dropships are currently has nothing to do with what Dropships will be after these changes have been implemented. Remember that this is an update that addresses both the power / effectiveness of various vehicle chassis, modules, and mechanics but is also set to deal with the power of AV. So saying that Dropships will be a "flying burrito" isn't really based off of anything tangible. In other builds of the game they were quite competent in both their ability to avoid AV and tank a decent amount of damage. 3. "You have to remember he's speaking of a base DS" uhhh ... what? Weaponless =/= "Base DS". If you're running an unfitted anything on the battlefield then your **** deserves to get blown up for being dumb in the first place because you do so with the knowledge that you're using it as something thats strictly for early game transport and is meant to be recalled asap. Talking about anything with respect to it being unfitted is pointless to the discussion of overall vehicle balance.
Foundation Seldon Gespenster Kompanie Villore Accords 186	Posted - 2013.11.10 14:31:00 - [5] - Quote SKOTTY HELLM-2 wrote: Resistance Modules are Absent....I don't see how LAV's can be Ruined Further...Sure that I'll be Proved Wrong. I guess you missed the part where AV Grenades and Swarms had their damage reduced a bunch (Current STD level will be Proto Level in 1.7), Swarms additionally had their range nerfed, and how Forges are up next on the chopping block for being rebalanced as well. I'd suppose you also skipped the part where LAVs have amazing shield regen now. Edit : Actual additional Feedback thanks to Fitting Tool I feel like unless Scanners get WP gain much like the current iteration of Dropsuit scanners then there's not going to be much reason to go out of your way to fit one, beyond them needing an absolute ton of CPU (50ish for STD level, yikes!) the fact that they have really long cooldown times now further de-incentivizes their use. Couple that with more fittings going to be focused around maximizing one's eHP then I don't really see much reason to use one over Shield Extenders / Boosters on a Caldari vehicle or a Nitrous / Damage mod on a Gallente vehicle. Just something to consider.