DUST Search - The locus grenade changes baffle me

Stefan Stahl wrote:

Here's a thought:
If grenades are a specialization then the fitting costs should reflect the choices being made by specializing.

What I'm going is that there should be an actual cognitive process of asking yourself "Do I really want to equip grenades or not?". A Caldari Railrifle user may come to the conclusion that he doesn't need grenades because he always engages at large distances. He would then proceed to use those fitting resources to improve his shields. A Gallente Assault may decide that he does need to make sacrifices in his fitting elsewhere so he can equip grenades which will help him soften up sentinels he otherwise wouldn't be able to engage due to his main rifle's damage profile.

If that's the concept we're aiming at with the grenade changes I would suggest increasing the fitting requirements for basic grenades while also making them more powerful.

Think of changes that would make you people go "Show me your best grenadier fitting". This change certainly isn't one of them.


Author	Thread Statistics \| Show CCP posts - 3 post(s)
Thang Bausch Pierrot Le Fou Industries 141	Posted - 2014.05.26 03:40:00 - [1] - Quote CCP: what was the rationale for the changes to the locus grenades? I can't make sense of them. You are planning on making damage almost double between advanced and prototype and nerfing basic grenades by around 40%.
Thang Bausch Pierrot Le Fou Industries 142	Posted - 2014.05.26 12:55:00 - [2] - Quote CCP Rattati wrote: https://forums.dust514.com/default.aspx?g=posts&m=2175239#post2175239 https://forums.dust514.com/default.aspx?g=posts&m=2175232#post2175232 As a few have responded, it's to encourage the use of other grenades than locus, as well as provide a reason to specialize. There is no need to encourage the use of other grenades. Flux grenades are already very widely used and AV grenades will be used again after you increase the damage to the point where 2 grenades can take out most LAVs. Nerfing basic and advanced grenades will only encourage 2 things: the effectiveness of proto stomping (can only afford basic grenades? too bad noob because that squad of 6 guys with 30+ mill sp and proto suits is going to clean you up even more than before now that only they can have uber grenades) and fits with no grenades. The current +100 HP and blast radius increase for each is already good incentive to fit better grenade modules. I personally run Adv locus grenades on all my Adv Min Logi fits (min commando suits sadly and very oddly don't have grenade slots and that is the only other suit I run regularly) because 100 extra dmg and a wider radius is worth the extra fitting cost. I don't run proto because I don't run proto weapons on any of my logi fits because the suit is primarily about equipment and staying alive so I can keep others alive. The tier progression is unlike almost all the other weapons (the SL is the one light weapon I can think of that deviates from this) and many of modules (armor plates are a great example) where the basic level gives a strong showing and then the adv and proto add more modestly to the base stat(s). The tier progression you are proposing for grenades is similar to shield extenders where the basic and adv are almost useless, and then there is a huge jump to the proto, which results in just about everyone only using shield extenders if they can fit complex ones. To put this in perspective, why don't you tier weapons to encourage specialization? To take one weapon as example, CRs can start at 15 HP dmg, with 17 HP at Adv and 24 HP at Proto. Sound stupid? Exactly. Finally, excluding AV grenades, grenades aren't significantly unbalanced. There are so many things that desperately need rebalancing (e.g. SL effectiveness, race car tanks with godlike armor repairing, cloakless scouts being the new assault suit) and you are breaking something that wasn't really broken?!?
Thang Bausch Pierrot Le Fou Industries 142	Posted - 2014.05.26 12:58:00 - [3] - Quote Himiko Kuronaga wrote: You... increased the damage on proto. When I cook that thing and it explodes over somebody's head, it's doing 1300 damage. How is this discouraging me from grenade spam exactly? What did discourage grenade spam was reducing the number carried to 2. If they increase the nanohive cost, that would go further. But, I don't understand why grenade spam is considered a problem. I die to grenades very rarely compared to hand held weapons or tank/DS guns.
Thang Bausch Pierrot Le Fou Industries 143	Posted - 2014.05.26 16:35:00 - [4] - Quote SponkSponkSponk wrote: [quote=CCP Rattati] Flux grenades are for finishing off suits after you've winged them, or in enclosed spaces if you have friends to spam with you, or to cook against heavies, or basically any anti-infantry role because you can actually kill people with them (this is important for logi suits that don't have sidearms as finishers) Yeup, that's another reason why I run adv grenades but basic light weapons on my adv logi suit: My grenades are my secondary. I have lost count of the number of times that a well cooked grenade has saved me a clone.
Thang Bausch Pierrot Le Fou Industries 150	Posted - 2014.05.27 17:12:00 - [5] - Quote 1) basic grenades were too effective, as shown by the overwhelming use of them by the focus segment we use, a much worse percentage than other weapons - Of course the locus grenade will be used more often. AV and Flux grenades are situational, whereas locus are more general. This is like saying we need to nerf the AR/CR/RR because more people use it than the SL or MD. of course they do because they are general anit-infantry weapons while the other are situational so they only get used when the situation fits. 2) grenades had a very strong diminishing return in damage per cap(pg+cpu) investment, penalizing if you will, specialization in grenades - So do most light weapons and many modules and that is a good thing because it reduces proto stomping. I never complain about a proto weapon being used in a pub match; only proto suits because the extra slots (along with extra PG/CPU) make the tier progression too steep. 3) basic grenades, were simply good enough - basic weapons and armor plates are frequently good enough, so why don't you reward people 'for specializing' in them? Like in my earlier post, why not make the CR basic=15, adv=17, proto=27? 4) I am certainly not an advocate of protostomping nor granting an unfair advantage to prototype, however there must be a fair incentive to specialize - well, you might not be a verbal advocate of protostomping, but your actions are promoting it. Words are meaningless if your actions contradict. - the answer to fair incentive (as others have posted) is to reduce the sp and/or increase the specing advantage. for the former, reload speed used to be x5 which was way too high for such a small increase to a skill that is not that important for dual weapon fits; the current x3 made specing into it worthwhile. For the latter, CPU reduction is not worth specing to lvl 5. If you made it dmg and/or radius, that might encourage me to spec further. 5) proto grenades have the same damage, in the early version it had an increase to 650, but that was changed to 600, the old damage - that's not the problem. You could have increased to 650 and left the basic at their current levels and I would not have complained. If you had made the progression more leveled and less pronounced (e.g. 300/450/600), I would have been disappointed but not complained. In the end, if this is indicative of how balancing will be handled (i.e. balancing things that aren't broken before balancing things that are, and breaking what was not broken in the process), then I am questioning my decision to play out this game until people move to Legion and I move to something else available on my console.
Thang Bausch Pierrot Le Fou Industries 151	Posted - 2014.05.27 17:19:00 - [6] - Quote Stefan Stahl wrote: Here's a thought: If grenades are a specialization then the fitting costs should reflect the choices being made by specializing. What I'm going is that there should be an actual cognitive process of asking yourself "Do I really want to equip grenades or not?". A Caldari Railrifle user may come to the conclusion that he doesn't need grenades because he always engages at large distances. He would then proceed to use those fitting resources to improve his shields. A Gallente Assault may decide that he does need to make sacrifices in his fitting elsewhere so he can equip grenades which will help him soften up sentinels he otherwise wouldn't be able to engage due to his main rifle's damage profile. If that's the concept we're aiming at with the grenade changes I would suggest increasing the fitting requirements for basic grenades while also making them more powerful. Think of changes that would make you people go "Show me your best grenadier fitting". This change certainly isn't one of them. I like the idea of making changes that promote a grenadier fit. I think the important thing would be to have a way to increase grenade count. Off the top of my head, maybe a low/high module that adds 1 more grenade and increases the range/dmg slightly (with only the latter increasing with each lvl increase). that could be a module that is only available if you spec into another skill beyond grenades (like a grenade proficiency). If that could only be speced into if you had lvl 5 in gernades, it would encourage specialization. Anyway, totally off the top of my head so not thought out at all.
Thang Bausch Pierrot Le Fou Industries 153	Posted - 2014.05.28 01:48:00 - [7] - Quote Meisterjager Jagermeister wrote: Well, looks like I'm too late to the discussion, CCP R. gave his last word. Before I found this thread I created a thread in FEEDBACK forum explaining my opinion. Too long for a simple repost here. Yes, good to know our feedback is being listened to.