What's the most unique and interesting thing about dust? Being able to create unique fittings. However usually the best way to make suits is to stack as much hp as you can. Obviously the very skilled get away with a little more versatility but seriously what's the point? Stack 1000 hp with very minimal speed reduction, equip a rifle, win. Ttk needs to be increased and hp mods need to be nerfed in terms of capacity costs.

Also a speed reduction to ALL armor needs to be increased.

Hp mods you idiot

No that just means that scrub can stack even more hp. Hp needs to be less valuable. Active tanks and speed tanks need to be resurrected before this game becomes fun and interesting again.

What do you run in those low slots? If you're running the same thing as everyone else, 9/10 times it will be brick-related module.

I see your point but I think that is solved instead by increasing ttk and hp capacity costs. Why would you need 1000 hp to survive a fire fight. That's ******* ridiculous. I remember when we use to have about 500 to 600 to survive a fire fight.

Increased low-slot variety is the reward. We can take the risky road to that end, or we can take the obvious and direct route. If we take the direct route, we also have a shot at fixing Armor v Shield imbalance. Two birds with one nerf.

Let's pick another game. One with lots of options:
https://youtu.be/NXmy8kUE5qc?t=20

Now imagine if this game had one type of gizmo that worked better than all other types of gizmos.
In every tryhard siege wagon created, that gizmo could be found. Not just once, but stacked.
What do you think this game's developers would do?

---

Back to Dust, for 6 straight months 80% or better of every killfeed in every match read:
"Assault Rifle"

At the time, did you see this as a problem? It seems obvious now that we're accustomed to battlefield variety, but at the time (as I'm sure you recall) there were some who didn't see the problem. A few of 'em are running for CPM2.

"Don't nerf Armor ... because Scouts"

^ Is this really your reasoning? Come on, Breakin. You can do better. Dig deep.

If you think other low slot modules are crap, how do you propose we fix them?

when really there's only a few truly viable ways to fit suits.

if you think stacking HP = Win I'd have to ask if you've played dust before. Sure in a 1 on 1 engagement, preferably with a logi repping you a lot of HP is a good thing. You'll still die in one shot to a plasma cannon, remote, forge gun, nova knives and most upper end sniper riffles all because your so slow. Armor reps insanely slow even with a couple complex mods. Even with 20-30 reps a second your looking at almost a minute to recover if you have around 1000 armor.

Honestly the way to win in dust has pretty much and always will be killing the other guy quickly. Load up on dmg mods, equip a good weapon and profit. Speed/maneuverability helps as well. While the strafe glitch isn't there any more you'll still dodge some bullets. Plus the whole TTK is greatly increased if it takes you less time to get from one kill to another.

I will agree shields kind of suck right now, but there isn't a lot they can do. Tweak the numbers a little to much and you get what we used to have in the old flaylock/shotgun scout days. A scout could rush threw a squad blazing away, come out the other side wait half a second and be back at full shields. There was no team work involved with shields. Logi's can do anything to them and if they recover to fast it makes the hard to hit scouts way to OP.

Given that shields basically have no draw backs compared to using armor I'd say for the most part shields are okay. Perhaps lower the cost of some the shield mods, but other than that their good. If people want higher shield HP totals, comparable to armor then they need to nerf the base shield recovery of most drop suits. Very few people even need to touch a recharger or regulator. They just stack extenders.

Armor on the other hand you have to equip everything. Your drop suits base armor stats are usually pretty pathetic. IF you tried to get by on your base recovery you'd be there a very long time, even in a scout.

Until the Scan/damp system isn't "always win/Never win" you can't make them useful. Because no matter what you do, you will never make a heavier suit stealthy enough to get passed by a scout's passive scans. You will always be on the enemy tacnet unless they have no scouts in play.

And even if they don't, if you get caught, you don't have the scout mobility to fall back on. You're dead, because your EHP is 1/3rd everyone else's.

If the so-called EWAR system was dynamic and had a functional use for anything but scouts and gallente logis, this might be a different story.

I proposed two new extenders with cat merc and Ripley Riley.

Would you like a link to the proposal?

That's the kind of crap I will randomly spitball out adipem.

To clarify, I have little use for naked assertions that something is OP or UP.

For example: armor got buffed in two stages before rattati took over. If I recall correctly, rather than simply buffing armor to come up to shields, both times shields were nerfed.

Rather than nerfing ze plates, perhaps reverting some nerfs bit by bit would help.

Another idea I have for fixing shields would be to normalize all caldari suits to 30 hp/s at the calsent 3/1 recharge delay/depleted delay.

Then normalizing min suits at 25/sec with the current calassault 3/5 delays to bring their shields to higher utility.

Reading ...

What effect, if any, do you anticipate this proposal would have on low-slot utilization rates and loadout variety?

Calsent will be roughly equal to am/galsent.

Amarr assaults would have the option of current meta shield extenders at lower cost (I shifted the current cost to the reinforced extenders), use heavy extenders for the unenviable times of brawling with gallente in close, or use flux extenders to minimize low slot usage of regulators and rechargers so that damps and such might be used without gimping the fit.

Calmandos would wind up sucking less overall by having options.

Scouts? You're more likely to be able to predict that. I haven't found a calscout fit to fall in love with yet.

The other d*ck recommendation I want to make is have reactive/standard plates double all shield penalties and having extenders (and the reinforced extenders) double all armor penalties.

Dual tanking needs to die in a fire.

Nah dude I have a life, I don't play on the weekends.

Besides, wtf would a little nerd battle proove?

Right, it's everyone else's fault that 9/10 low-slots sold are Armor Related.
It has nothing to do with Armor. It's all about player mentality.

First of all, I am better than you at dust. Let's get that straight.

Now moving on. There's not versatility, you're clearly delusional. There is simply a few wiggle mods for fitting but regardless nobody makes fits without 50% or more mods related to hp. I seriously don't know how many times I have to say that for it to sink in. I'm not saying brick tanks are good, I'm not saying all other mods are useless. I am saying that when half or more of your suit is related to stacking hp then there's a problem with dust considering we have other attributes to mess with (regen, speed, stamina, ewar, etc).

The fix is simple. Increase ttk and make hp mods less attractive. Make them harder to fit and increase their penalties.

Look ma! Epeen!

Hey boot. You saying you're better means jack all. Especially when the topic is balance concerns.

@ sota pop

Whatever dude. If you truly think a pissing contest between two people proves anything you're an idiot. Like I said in my original posts, obviously skilled players get more versatility because they can afford to have less hp.

I'm honestly blown away that you two are attempting to blame heavily skewed data on player sentiment and skill.

How do you propose Rattati balance anything if usage rates are meaningless?
Couldn't the same arguments be made to excuse every form of imbalance?

In my book, the idiot is the guy who points to a year of heavily skewed usage data and says "it's the way it is because of sentiment".

I'm not making assumptions, Sota. The usage data is right here: http://dust.thang.dk/market_tryhardinator.php

We all have access to the same information. If you're saying the information we all have access to is insufficient to make claims, then none of us can make claims. If no one can make a claim, we are all -- every single one of us -- wasting our time.

I reject your claim. It's an idiotic claim. We can all make observations in game. We can all compare those observations with market data. We can make whatever claims and inferences we wish. Some more accurate than others. That is the nature of user feedback, and user feedback has value.

What are you even talking about now?

I followed. Didn't feel lectured at all :-)

PS: Owe you an apology. Had initially grouped you with SoTa. Clearly, you are not in the "everything is fine" camp. Also, the CPM2 comment was directed at Sgt Kirk and Aeon Amadi (not you).

Please. I'm not going to lie to everyone and try to convince people I'm running an "I'll be nicer" campaign. I doubt too many people are stupid enough to believe that.

Dude, I'm not admitted that I'm wrong. I stand by my every position.

I'm right. You're wrong. I'm acknowledging the fact that Breakin is somewhere between.
I'd initially thought he was dead wrong. Turns out, he is only partly wrong.

That's the second or third time you've called me stupid in this thread, Sota.
Not sure what you're basis is, but do you really think I'm stupid?

If not, why say it?
If so, put a number on it. Then tell me your number. I'm truly curious.

You don't want to put a number on it?
Come on, Sota. It isn't hard.

Use a scale of 1-10.
Tell us where you think I am.
Tell us where you think you are.

Adipem I think the point I'm dancing around is that it doesn't matter what you do to lower HP use.

The majority of players will always opt for the path of least resistance. Only the more experimental players will generally dicker around with alternate fits.

This is evident in the FOTM seesaw. If people would actually look for anything but KDR max rektage we would have seen it. They wouldnt have specced into the calscout/galscout when they were flagrantly OP. They wouldn't have gone HMG amsent during the days of fat and they wouldn't have run like kids into a toys 'r us for the calogi during the slayer days.

You will never lower the majority use of HP mods until their use is rendered moot.

Better to make the other sh*t equal than to circle the same drain we have for three years.

So ...

Despite the fact that we've managed to achieve diversity everywhere else in the game, we will not be able to do so with low slots. The vast majority of low-slot modules sold will always be brick-related, and we just have to deal with that. Can't fix it. Our very best bet at mitigating the lack low-slot diversity is to decrease high-slot diversity.

This doesn't make practical sense to me, Breakin.

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I say, let Armor Modules remain the very best low slot modules. But make them somewhat less awesome than they are now. And make 'em tougher to fit. This way folks won't be inclined to mix things up rather than stack the same "best module" over and over again.

This makes more practical sense to me.

Guess i just am a harsher poster?

Somehow, i remember you being a bit rougher in dealing with people who constantly post the same opinion hoping it changes.

Precisely correct. In my mind, variety means we're doing something right. We've come a long way since the days of everyone running the same suits and guns. We see variety in usage rates of suits, primaries, secondaries, equipment, and high slots. I see no reason why we should stop just short of the finish line. The persistent lack of variety in low slot utilization, to me, represents a clear opportunity for improvement.