DUST Search - Legion: Redesign Vehicles

Godin Thekiller wrote:

ZDub 303 wrote:

Godin Thekiller wrote:

ZDub 303 wrote:

There is room for vehicles that require teamwork/multiple operators as long as their are alternatives for people who would rather play solo with their vehicle.

It would kind of sad if the only reason for HAVs to exist is for blowing up installations, each other, and a gate here or there. All of which can also be accomplished, in some cases more effectively, by remote explosives.

I guess if you want to keep it the way it is lower blaster turret RoF and rotation speed by about 20%, add significant dispersion and buff AV by about 25% and swarms by about 60% and we can call it day.

Try approaching a well defended gate by infantry or small vehicles, possibly even HAV's, and blowing it up.

And buffing and nerfing stuff like that won't fix anything, just start another buff nerf cycle. That's CCP's problem; they never learn from the past...........

No I can see your reasoning. Make sure elements are removed that require teamwork. Make sure the TTK from infantry AV is approximately that of a large rail turret. We don't want to force teamwork so we should make sure HAVs are readily soloable. That certainly is one way to go, I can understand the appeal to that approach.

Making sure there's no forced teamwork where it's not necessary =/= removing teamwork. Insults and and downplaying doesn't make you look good in a argument, just sayin.


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ZDub 303 TeamPlayers Dirt Nap Squad. 2950	Posted - 2014.05.19 19:55:00 - [1] - Quote I wouldnt mind seeing HAVs split into a two user operated machine. It doesn't make a lot of sense in a 16v16 scenario on Dust but in 24v24 - 32v32 I think multiple people makes more sense. Also, if they redesign the skill tree for vehicles, a two user operated HAV can make more sense than it does currently in Dust. It would certainly help given their overwhelming power.
ZDub 303 TeamPlayers Dirt Nap Squad. 2950	Posted - 2014.05.19 20:04:00 - [2] - Quote Godin Thekiller wrote: ZDub 303 wrote: I wouldnt mind seeing HAVs split into a two user operated machine. It doesn't make a lot of sense in a 16v16 scenario on Dust but in 24v24 - 32v32 I think multiple people makes more sense. Also, if they redesign the skill tree for vehicles, a two user operated HAV can make more sense than it does currently in Dust. It would certainly help given their overwhelming power. numbers is not the reason why it is a bad idea. Also, that doesn't solve any of the problems that has been repeatedly been mentioned about it. The biggest reason why having a split gunner HAV doesn't make sense in Dust is because there are no other alternatives for a ground based vehicular warfare for a solo player. Otherwise you will have two conflicting views about HAVs. The first being, 'they are tanks! they should be amazing!" vs. "no single player should wield so much power at the cost of only isk" That sums up about 90% of HAV forum posts.
ZDub 303 TeamPlayers Dirt Nap Squad. 2950	Posted - 2014.05.19 20:21:00 - [3] - Quote Godin Thekiller wrote: Let's see: 1: Pilot skills for and pays for (most of the time) for the HAV. 2: Pilot calls in the HAV. 3: lore explains why the pilot controls both the turret and the driving 4: It'd be boring just to drive the HAV, and not get to shoot. Since you couldn't use the search function, I gave them to you. 1. Could and should be redone in Legion (skill to operate and not skill to build should have been how it was from the beginning). 2. See 1 3. Lore should never overwrite balancing game mechanics. 4. Opinion... also, like I said.. there are no other options for solo ground vehicle operation which is why HAVs exist in their current state. Add in other types of solo ground vehicles and a lack of solo HAV operation wouldn't be such a problem.
ZDub 303 TeamPlayers Dirt Nap Squad. 2950	Posted - 2014.05.19 21:42:00 - [4] - Quote Godin Thekiller wrote: 1: I want you to think about why having two seperate skill paths for building and actually using it doesn't work 2: read 1 3: No, it doesn't; however, CCP shapes the lore around the mechanics, and the lore has been already placed (it also works out, just isn't balanced right. If blam would had stop changing **** constantly, and Wolfman didn't break the entire system, it would had been balanced a long time ago). 4: LAV's don't need a turret control for the pilot, as it's unneeded, and no other land vehicle is out (other than MAV's will probably have the pilot control the medium turret). And yes it would. Question, how much have you used vehicles, what have you used for them, and for how long have you used them? 1-2: There shouldn't be a skill path to build vehicles at all, just to operate them. This opens up the option to deploy from corp assets in the future, something that wouldn't really work in our current system on Dust all that well. 4: You are missing my point I think. What is the difference between an LAV and an HAV? Mechanically, think about what really defines both of those vehicles. At its core a vehicle is just a art asset backed up by a table of predetermined values. Ideally, you would like to have a spectrum of vehicles available which fulfill different functions that improve the game play experience. "Balancing" refers to tweaking that table of values to a point where the game play experience is fun for all parties involved in an engagement involving said vehicle. You need to think much larger scale for vehicles in legion other than just LAV and HAV. In a lot of ways those vehicles are trying to fulfill too many roles at once because so many parts of that spectrum are missing in Dust. Imagine Legion has Speeders, LAVs, APCs, MTACs, MAVs, HAVs, HTACs, HAPCs, etc etc to fill different niches of that spectrum. I'm not necessarily saying HAVs MUST have separated driver/gunner layout but more that HAVs may not necessarily have to have a single-player operated mechanic either. atm it fills many roles and imo it has too many strengths and not enough weaknesses, but it has to or it becomes irrelevant as it is literally half of the available land vehicles in Dust. To echo what Aeon Amadi is saying, vehicles in Dust atm are somewhat lacking in purpose. They are just overpowered death machines mostly and always have been. Even in their darkest hours around 1.3-1.5 with AV being particularly powerful, you still would struggle to win in PC against tank spam. This, imo, is because of two reasons. Tanks fulfill too many roles at once (lack of other options being the reason why) and player count is too low to support a truly meaningful use of tanks other than rolling death machines. fwiw I've never been a hardcore tanker nor have i ever seriously tanked in PC but I've driven tanks in chromosome, 1.0, 1.1, 1.2, 1.3, 1.5, 1.7, and 1.8.
ZDub 303 TeamPlayers Dirt Nap Squad. 2950	Posted - 2014.05.19 22:20:00 - [5] - Quote Godin Thekiller wrote: 1-2: You said that it should yourself, you're making no sense at this point 4: MAV's and APC's are the same thing, and there's no such thing as a Heavy MTAC (nor should there, that's too much.). Anyways, why do you think there's no current roles for vehicles? There's nothing for them to do other than go pew pew at everything they see. Add things for them to do, and that would change. HAV's need to be what they do naturally: be a force multiplier. Have a large force in front of you? callin a HAV and you become much larger force. Wall in your way, or a hard to destroy installation stalling process? HAV. Vehicles blocking your process, you guessed it, HAV. Now, how to make it from just becoming the ultimate killer? make large turrets turn kinda slow, as well as add a small bit of inaccuracies to the turret so it's hard to hit fast moving and small targets. Want me to do the rest of them, as I can. I got all day. 1-2: read it again, I said skill to operate and not skill to build is how it always should have been. HAVs should be a force multiplier, agreed but should the game revolve around who has more HAVs? Cause that pretty much sums up Dust atm... By your solution then, how fast/slow should large turrets move relative to how fast they move now? What does 'a small bit of inaccuracies' truly mean? You want to add dispersion to the large blaster turret I assume? How much dispersion would be balanced? How hard should it be to kill a dropsuit with a large blaster?
ZDub 303 TeamPlayers Dirt Nap Squad. 2952	Posted - 2014.05.19 23:32:00 - [6] - Quote Godin Thekiller wrote: 4: That's a given that will always happen, no matter what. Anyways, lots of critical things that needs to be done should be inside of vehicle unfriendly plexs, so if you have little infantry, you wouldn't get anything done, rather you might lose, as well as lose gear (try to drive in a plex with infantry that has tons of AV ). Basically discourage being a severely vehicle heavy team vs. a balanced team. For the tracking speed, the only one that needs lowering is the blaster, which should be slightly slower (say 10-20%), which could be bring back by a (this time working) tracking speed skill. As Far as the blaster dispersion, I'd say making between the difficulty of using the rail and the current blaster for hitting infantry. An alternative would also be to lower the ROF, and boosting the damage (or both tbh). The rail also should get a different sight, as the dot it gets now makes it too good at sniping infantry. The rocket (those aren't missiles, and I refuse to call them missiles ) launcher is fine tbh. It'd make it to where only the skilled would need to be able to killed infantry, and only if they try, or get lucky (the idiot is standing still, or is way too close). Okay so then it comes back to the main point. Should large turrets be effective against infantry at all? If you nerf the blaster so that its relatively ineffective against infantry (similar to the railgun or the 'rocket' turret) then what is the point of the HAV? It literally becomes a vehicle designed to counter itself... not necessarily bad in its own right but, imo, it loses its purpose in the current Dust meta. If the large blaster was reduced in efficacy (like we both believe it should be) what, do you think, people should call in HAVs for? In that case, given limited vehicle bandwidth and 32v32 sized matches (just theoretically, assuming legion moves up in match size once on the PC) would a team prefer an HAV that has ~2-2.2x the stats with a two man operation scheme vs an HAV with a combined operation scheme? I can see a strong case for the more powerful, 2 man, variant if you have two people that could work well together. I could also see, with more vehicle options, a reason to prefer a more agile anti-infantry based MAV... like an APC or an MTAC or even a solo operated 'assault' LAV. With a smaller, more agile, yet lower damage variant of the current HAV meant to hunt down assault LAVs and MTACs with the larger HAV variant designed to protect infantry and lighter vehicles against solo operated HAVs and APCs. Giving us a rough idea of: Light Ground Vehicles: Light Assault Vehicle - small troop transport and rapid anti-infantry vehicle MTAC - fast moving anti-infantry mech Medium Ground Vehicles: APCs - Armored transport for squads with a more bunker-like setup. Small turrets that protect infantry near a point and provides a spawn point for squads to assault objectives. Essentially a mobile bunker, similar to APCs in Mag. Medium Assault Vehicle - Reworked version of the current HAV. A smaller, more agile tank with a single medium turret. Meant for some anti-infantry capability while also being quite strong against MTACs and LAVs (small turrets). Has some resistance against infantry AV but meant more as a 'hit and run' style where they rely on their relative speed to get out of sticky situations. Heavy Ground Vehicles: Heavy Assault Vehicle - A reworked version of the current HAV with far more armor and resistance. Fairly resistant against AV and medium turrets while being essentially immune to small turrets and infantry AI. Separated gunner and vehicle seat, allows two small turrets and one large anti-vehicle based turret. Meant for 'bunker-busting' and taking down medium vehicles. Slow moving but can withstand a great deal of punishment. while none of this is perfect... I just wish to highlight the idea that 'one-size fits all' with the current HAV isn't the only way to go. Giving each vehicle a specific niche can create a dynamic battlefields where infantry and vehicles coexist to support each other. But this doesn't work in 16v16... just not enough players to really support it imo. I would prefer the dust meta over the one i'm proposing in a 16v16 match lobby probably. Also, very slow turret rotation is very very painful with a mouse (have you tried tanking with a mouse? I gave up on the Madrugar, its almost impossible to turn a large turret without turn the whole vehicle). Having a separated gunner on a large turret would be a boon as they can focus on moving the turret with A-D while the driver focuses on moving the vehicle with WASD. Its just a thought at least... its not perfect but if we nerf large blasters I think you'll see HAVs will feel like the counter to themselves with no other real purpose. I can literally distill HAVs down to two things atm. 1: Kill infantry? Large Blaster 2: Kill HAVs? Large Rail That... is pretty much it. Nerf the large blaster and it becomes 1: Kill infantry? Don't use a tank 2: Kill HAVs? Pick an appropriate large turret.
ZDub 303 TeamPlayers Dirt Nap Squad. 2953	Posted - 2014.05.20 01:51:00 - [7] - Quote There is room for vehicles that require teamwork/multiple operators as long as their are alternatives for people who would rather play solo with their vehicle. It would kind of sad if the only reason for HAVs to exist is for blowing up installations, each other, and a gate here or there. All of which can also be accomplished, in some cases more effectively, by remote explosives. I guess if you want to keep it the way it is lower blaster turret RoF and rotation speed by about 20%, add significant dispersion and buff AV by about 25% and swarms by about 60% and we can call it day.
ZDub 303 TeamPlayers Dirt Nap Squad. 2954	Posted - 2014.05.20 02:09:00 - [8] - Quote Godin Thekiller wrote: ZDub 303 wrote: There is room for vehicles that require teamwork/multiple operators as long as their are alternatives for people who would rather play solo with their vehicle. It would kind of sad if the only reason for HAVs to exist is for blowing up installations, each other, and a gate here or there. All of which can also be accomplished, in some cases more effectively, by remote explosives. I guess if you want to keep it the way it is lower blaster turret RoF and rotation speed by about 20%, add significant dispersion and buff AV by about 25% and swarms by about 60% and we can call it day. Try approaching a well defended gate by infantry or small vehicles, possibly even HAV's, and blowing it up. And buffing and nerfing stuff like that won't fix anything, just start another buff nerf cycle. That's CCP's problem; they never learn from the past........... No I can see your reasoning. Make sure elements are removed that require teamwork. Make sure the TTK from infantry AV is approximately that of a large rail turret. We don't want to force teamwork so we should make sure HAVs are readily soloable. That certainly is one way to go, I can understand the appeal to that approach.
ZDub 303 TeamPlayers Dirt Nap Squad. 2954	Posted - 2014.05.20 02:24:00 - [9] - Quote Godin Thekiller wrote: ZDub 303 wrote: Godin Thekiller wrote: ZDub 303 wrote: There is room for vehicles that require teamwork/multiple operators as long as their are alternatives for people who would rather play solo with their vehicle. It would kind of sad if the only reason for HAVs to exist is for blowing up installations, each other, and a gate here or there. All of which can also be accomplished, in some cases more effectively, by remote explosives. I guess if you want to keep it the way it is lower blaster turret RoF and rotation speed by about 20%, add significant dispersion and buff AV by about 25% and swarms by about 60% and we can call it day. Try approaching a well defended gate by infantry or small vehicles, possibly even HAV's, and blowing it up. And buffing and nerfing stuff like that won't fix anything, just start another buff nerf cycle. That's CCP's problem; they never learn from the past........... No I can see your reasoning. Make sure elements are removed that require teamwork. Make sure the TTK from infantry AV is approximately that of a large rail turret. We don't want to force teamwork so we should make sure HAVs are readily soloable. That certainly is one way to go, I can understand the appeal to that approach. Making sure there's no forced teamwork where it's not necessary =/= removing teamwork. Insults and and downplaying doesn't make you look good in a argument, just sayin. lol nah it doesn't matter. You and I disagree on this.. we're not convince each other either way. I truly don't believe there is any way to balance solo HAVs until you've removed the large blaster turret or nerfed it to a point where its no more effective against infantry than the large rail or rocket turrets. Or unless the TTK from infantry is so low that we essentially return to 1.4-1.5. So I guess I would make heavy armor reps an active module, change vehicle damage mods to 10% passive and nerf the large blaster significantly against infantry. Then, introduce a tech II type of HAV that has separated setup with about 2.2x the EHP of the current HAV. Its optional, you still get your solo HAV and people who do wish to have a separated setup can have that as well.
ZDub 303 TeamPlayers Dirt Nap Squad. 2955	Posted - 2014.05.20 04:28:00 - [10] - Quote Essential a better HAV? But it requires two players to operate, meaning an equivalent force would be two basic HAVs. I could definitely see it work. Possibly repurpose the Marauder into a separated setup (or give it a new name, doesnt really matter). You give it exactly twice the HP of a basic HAV and make the specialist tank operation skill give +% base resistance per level. In terms of damage, twice the dps would make it so basic HAVs couldnt compete.. thats probably right tbh. But these are just numbers I threw out... it would change in an any sort of iterative balancing. I could see something along the line of increase RoF instead of raw +damage. So.. for example. Maurader HAV Operation +% Resistance per level +% to racial turret RoF per level. That gives it more punch without having it essentially one shot anything that comes near it. You could tweak max velocity and acceleration as well. It becomes a heavier HAV essentially. It has more power but it requires more users to operate. There is a drawback to offset its positives. There is a spot for a two-person tank. I think there is a great number of players who would like to use something like that, despite your assertions that there is not.

ZDub 303 TeamPlayers Dirt Nap Squad. 2955	Posted - 2014.05.20 04:42:00 - [11] - Quote Godin Thekiller wrote: Wait, you think you know how vehicles work, yet you don't even use them much, and you think this is a good idea......... I'm done here Oh? Please, prove me wrong. I'm not so stubborn as to believe I'm always right. What is the role of an HAV in Dust? What am I missing here?