I want to address some confusion that cropped up last time: The current goal is to created a design for dropsuits' base stats, in regards to shield tanking, that makes it easier to balance the suits and modules as a whole. Shield modules differ compared to armor modules in that they are percentage based gains/losses as opposed to hard-set values. This makes it difficult to balance the suits and shield tanking in general as any changes have overarching, dynamic effects across the entire spectrum.

Big buff to Gal Assault? Didn't see that one coming.

Do you really think that today's GalAssault needs a buff to shield performance?
A simple Yes/No will suffice.

"Unified Theories" sound good, but I can't get behind the proposed buffs in the HP department. These will only lead to a widening of the performance gap between both Vet & Newbro and HP-oriented & Non-HP-oriented playstyles. Both of these are bad for Dust, and I can't see how the benefits of this proposal will outweigh the drawbacks.

Chromosome had its flaws, but it was a good time to be a newbro. They bumbled about, just like today. They dropped like flies, just like today. But when a newbro got the drop on a vet, he had damn good odds of killing that vet. Prototype or not. HP tanked or not. I fell in love with this game as a newbro in Chromosome. Call it nostalgia, but in my opinion, that is the direction we should be heading in if we want better NPE, higher retention rates and a healthier playerbase:

* Higher odds of success when outplaying/outpositioning one's opponent
* Fewer get-out-of-jail-free cards afforded by HP tank
* A better balanced playing field for non-HP-oriented playstyles

Player thinking, planning and skill should play a part in any shooter. And in a shooter with as many loadout options as Dust, different playstyles and configurations should be encouraged rather than marginalized in the wake of King HP. When a newbro gets the drop on one of us and manages to keep his shots on target, we owe that newbro good odds of success. Spin-and-win is an NPE killer, and reinforcing the predominant meta by slowing TTK will ultimately amount to another free pass for vets (and another kick-in-the-teeth for those of us who don't stack HP).

That's my two cents, at least.

PS: The correct answer to my question, was "No. GalAssaults are not in need of a shield buff."

The Ehp -Mobility model that is being adhered to works against shields. If shield suits are supposed to be 'skirmishers that pop in and out of battle using cover and speed' then should have speed. 5 high slots on a Caldari assault fully skilled gives you 707 shields with no equipment, no grenade and no side arm you can squeeze on a total of around 370 armor with no speed penalties. 1077 Ehp, 7.28 sprint. Amar assault you can get 399 shield and 806 armor, 1205 Ehp, 6.98 sprint, plus a sidearm, plus a grenade, plus a nanohive. Balancing suit speed to Ehp does little to balance much about the suits when the difference in speed does little when the Amar weapon deletes the Caldari suit in 0.4 seconds. While the Caldari weapon barely finishes spooling and getting a couple shots off. The game is no where near balanced, and so far all we have done is balanced the ratio of speed to possible Ehp. 700 armor can move as fast as 700 shields which given the status of shields puts armor at a huge advantage.

Shield suits of equal Ehp to armor suits should be much faster as they have to stay out of scrambler range.

As far as Cal and Gal being mirrors of each other, Gal is actually in the right spot. LEss armor than Amarr, but more regen. Giving them more base armor means they could have the same hp as Amarr AND higher base regen than Amarr. This is not good. Instead, Leave Gal where they are, and simply buff Cal. Although personally I think Cal should come out with slightly more hp than Gal After the change, considering Caldari are all about stacking all the shields.

Ill stop posting about the SCR though, since this thread is about regen delays.

Your mom would appreciate that.

I agree that the shield numbers need to be refined, as they're all over the place now. However, why on God's green earth would we buff armor tanking suits at all? Repping a few more HP per second, sure. Like 5 HP more max. I do not understand why the armor based suits need any type of shield buff what so ever.

Armor suits would have no weakness with these proposed numbers. If anything it would encourage dual tanking and King HP even more...

My thoughts exactly.

"Shield tankers are being outperformed by armor tankers. Let's buff 'em, but while we're at it let's also buff armor tankers."

Does not compute. Flowery unified theory or not.

1. I'm looking at your numbers. Looks like you're proposing a buff for anyone and everyone who tanks HP. Not just the underperforming shield-tankers; you've somehow managed to squeeze in a substantial buff for armor tankers as well.

2A. There's more to TTK than base HP values. Otherwise, folks wouldn't run ferro or reactive plates.

2B. Sure. But I doubt that any member of CPM would knowingly support changes which would worsen overall balance or detrimentally impact NPE. I imagine that most CPM would agree that "grow the player base" should rank among our top priorities. Reinforcing the predominant, proto-friendly meta will not help in that cause. I include you in this assessment of CPM. I believe you mean well, even when you're dead wrong. I don't think that you recognize King HP for the problem it is.

2C. I agree that Dust isn't and shouldn't become a twitch shooter, but I also believe that there should be consequence to making mistakes, being caught unaware and being out-positioned/out-played. Stacking brick and shields should not be made a substitute for smart play.

3. A vet fails to check his surroundings, advances from cover, and is gunned down from behind by a newbro. A newbro gets the drop on a vet, watches as he advances from cover, guns him down from behind ... and dies to spin-and-win. Which player should feel cheated? Which player is more likely to quit Dust and play other games?

4. 100% in favor of better armor-v-shield balance. Always have been. I'm simply opposed to solutions which will further entrench King HP.

How exactly does a buff to the GalAssault regen/delay translate to better armor-v-shield interplay?

Everything. I'm openly opposed to further entrenching King HP, and I've explained precisely why. Negative feedback and concerns are absolutely constructive feedback, whether you want to hear them or not. There are other ways to fix armor-v-shield interplay. I'd encourage you to explore alternatives. Even those that -- god forbid -- might take a toll on your personal playstyle.

To check out caldari commando stats, I took it to advanced. Put my SP where my mouth is, or erm might have been before stating my opinion on whether your proposal would helped it or would that make it OP.

Well, it need far more than just a shield recharge buff. Far more than the min commando. Its the only commando suit out of my 3 advanced commando suits (Amarr and Minmatar) that I cannot fit a single proto light weapon on without both a pg and cpu mod.

Minando has Wyrokami or Freedom MD + BK-42, damage mod, 2x shield extender, plate, rep.
Amando has Kal tactical sniper + GB9 breach, 2 damage mods 2 plates rep

Calmando has Kal Tac Tactical sniper + SB39 RR, 2 shield mods, PG mod, 1 plate + 1 cpu mod.



I downgraded the calmando to a adv tactical sniper + RR, and its shield rates + delay are still abysmaly low. You have to run regulators, but you only have space for one, because you still need an armor repper.

A round about way of saying i approve for the calmando.

Right. Because you're smarter than us, Aeon. Keep telling yourself that.

I dont see how this is helpful mate.

I know that you're better than this so please explain in simple terms how a buff to the shield stats of armour tanking suits is going to help you balance shield modules and fittings?

People have a problem with your proposal because before anything else it instantly smacks you in the face that certain suits appear to be getting a big buff. I look at the bonus you propose to give to the Amarr assault, the Gallente Assault, the Gallente Scout and feel that you are giving me even more of a reason to not run a primarily shielded suit.

Without proposals for how this will help you change the actual modules I can only see this.

TL/DR: Set a racial regen baseline common for all racial suits. Move scouts and sentinels beyond that baseline for reasons of hit and run (scouts) and defence (sentinels). Deal with armour - shield balance separately by buffing shield regen mods.

-snip-.

1) Essentially what we have now, is medium suits as the benchmark for shield regen. Scouts then have better regen to emphasise hit and run gameplay. Sentinels have better regen as they are the most tanky class and need to rely on self-regen, since there is no option to support shield regen remotely. Also remember that the game is designed so that the specialised suits (heavies, and lights) have better base stats in trade for less slots, in order to push them to certain roles, in comparison to mediums that have more slots to allow more choice in what stats they want their suit to have. I don't see anything wrong with these principles.

2.) I appreciate that the specific numbers are up for debate, but whatever values are chosen, this design principle will always result in a relative nerf to sentinels and scouts compared to mediums. It could be argued that shield tanking sentinels and scouts are fine, and it is the shield tanking mediums that need a buff. Now, I know balance isn't the goal here, it's clear design principle. But this leads us to another problem.

3) If base regen stats on mediums are too good it discourages the use of regen mods. Yes rechargers are buffed by base recharge being buffed, since they are percentage based. However the opposite is true of regulators as they are a percentage reduction. Buffing base regen also amounts to a buff to extenders, further encouraging the fitting of purely extenders, which leads to dual tanking, and a boring "king hp" meta.

4) So with medium suit regen kept constant, to maintain the proposed regen relationship of heavy < medium < scout, sentinel shield regen would need a significant nerf. This presents a problem because how to you buff sentinels in a way that makes up for nerfing their shield regen? It's a thing that shield tanking sentinels rely on heavily, as there is no remote shield regen option in game.

My entire suit list is shield. I don't feel like this will make the difference we need.

We need to look into racial bonuses much like eve, where you get your normal stats for skilling each level, but the frame will have a set bonus just for being them.
This could enhance shield tanking without armor suits getting more love than they already have.

Look at the modules, tinker with them, give caldari a shield module fitting bonus.

Anything but this.

The cal assault just keeps getting worse and worse.....

I don't want to have to textwallate every post...

This thread suggests that all suits have a shield problem, hence the need for normalization..

But the fact, carved into maths and observable data, is that the only race that feels the shields lackluster performance ATM IS CALDARI! This could be solved with one addition, a fitting bonus for shield mods.

Data and math will also show you how a max plated cal anything outperforms its non-plated counterpart, even if max shield fitted.

Cover is a joke. Take cover from one, and the guy on the hill finishes the job. Long range is a joke. We now have fatties that can fly and cross huge gaps in a single sprint.

Dust has changed a lot. Time to bring the caldari back to speed.

So you disagree that giving the cal as a race a fitting bonus to shield mods would fix all this?

The title of the thread said shield stats... /hardfacepalm


Edit: MEANING CALDARI

Priceless, you won't even consider a racial bonus. Then respond with that. I've tried to keep my loathing of you out of this....

*steps into thread*

There's a lot of instigating in here.

You can't effect one attribute of the game without affecting the other. Everything is related.
Even if say I changed a stat that primarily benefits x race it will still trickle down to the others but that's already been addressed.

CPM already knows my stance on the issue, fix shields no matter what, Aeon and breaking are doing a great job on that so I'mnot too bothered besides looking over the numbers they post. I'm the one sitting in the corner trying to figure out when this change happens how do we stop the impending dual tanking storm, because it will come.

As much as I believe this game needs more TTK, dual tanking as is (or will be) is not the way.


(This post was not constructive sorry Aeon)

True.

I guess the carrot would be buffs to damage mods, biotics, EWAR mods and codebreakers. Though I suspect buffing damage mods and myofibs would be bad.

If we refrain from buffing assault and logi base shield regen and delays we should avoid a rise in dual tanking. Buffs to shields should come from the modules that encourage synergy in a dedicated tanking type. Modules such as energisers (% based so less effective on armour tanks) and regulators (which compete with armour and synergise with energisers) are what should be looked at.

We have a baseline tfor shield stats right now and it is garbage.. has always been garbage..

Just wanted to say -

Props to Cross and Aeon. This might be getting a bit heated in here but you two are sticking with it and fighting back. Best CPM interaction ever I think.

Much rather have disagreements with people who will actually give a damn and post stuff rather than agree with a load of yes men who barely do anything for the community.

A lot of this looks more like our (CPM) 'step 2'
#1 is the base suit stats having a method that provides a solid foundation
#2 is tuning the mods (and hopefully adding a few options as well) to give shields more love and diversity
#3 is looking at possible comparative issues with weapons, such a profile bias, this is more of a side step.
#4 is looking at the raw stats of the armor mods.

The iterative balance process takes this one step at a time and allows for more finite adjustments as well as leaving entire steps alone if balance is reached before they are enacted.

That's just a roughed out framework of course, but it should illustrate the concept and context.

One step at a time is key.

Cheers,
Cross

Hindsight is easymode.



It's not a matter of Hindsight, some were very outspoken regarding the armor hardener buff and shield regen nerf, and the true reason shields were superior was that you could STACK ARMOR PLATES AND DAMAGE MODS. But this is for another thread at another time.

Buffing Gallente shields just makes the buffer better on a suit that can stack armor plates and damage mods.

Repping an extra 10 shields per second under cover is not going to matter much when the player is getting blasted before his shields rep more than one cycle.

"not even close to an armor stacked player with a rep tool"

Then shields still fail in the overall meta. Thats why I was asking about support equipment.

If shield suits cant compete as a team against armor based suits, its still not balanced.

To clarify: We have indeed seen wonders suggested in the past that went stale within weeks.

I can see where this leads, and its glorious.

But, the steam can't stop once this starts rolling. This isn't something that can be drug out over a year and expect to have any shield players left. The initial change will leave us balanced... but out-supported. Things have to move quickly.

On that note, the more we buck and argue, the longer it will take. See the big picture and you will be on board.

Nobody runs more shield fits than me, sorry for all the heat. o7

dual tanking will always be a thing unless doing so is directly penalized.

I've suggested doing so, but I'm outvoted.

you dont outright penalize dual tanking. you make it impossible to make a viable fit.

meaning the pg and cpu cost of a dual tank would leave you running sidearms with no equipment. that would solve everything naturally.

the easiest way would be a fitting bonus to the modules. either increase fitting cost of the modules or reduce fitting capacity.

im also wondering about the overall design here. regarding caldari suits mostly, their slower suits need more regen than the more mobile suits

Come on Apidem. Gallente buffs in the OP are very similar to Caldari buffs. Shield buffs hold more value for Caldari suits, and besides, balancing armour and shields wasn't the intention of the thread.

I'm much more worried about significant buffs to assaults and logis, whilst leaving sentinels and scouts where they are. Without doing anything to try to maintain balance.

I think if this goes through how it is, balancing will need to be done. Either by nerfing the suits getting buffed, or buffing the suits being held relatively constant.

I guess it's simple logic.

"Never attribute to malice, that which is adequately explained by stupidity" - Hanlons Razor.

I mean, it could be out of malice... but given aeons track record of being wrong it's probably just failure to actually comprehend.

http://i.imgur.com/eshWaQK.jpg

Overall I support the above proposed changes. Some suits, such as Min and Gal Assault, seem to benefit too much from these changes, but to really get the payoff they'll have to invest in shield regen mods and make sacrifices elsewhere. And recharge delays are really such an incredible handicap that it's best to err on the side of liberality in buffing shield regen. Anything egregious will be adjusted swiftly, i.e. when the Rail Rifle was nerfed into the underworld.

Having said that, scouts will be nerfed into oblivion by these changes. They're already extremely squishy compared to assaults. If they end up having the same delay and only 5 more regen than assaults there REALLY will be no reason to run scout.

I suggest that the proposed changes be altered to create some distance between scouts and assaults:

- Reduce all scouts' proposed delays by 1 second.

- Increase all scouts' proposed recharge by 5.

So on one end you'd have Caldari Scout with recharge of 55 and delay of 2 seconds. On the other end Amarr Scout with 40 and 3.5.

If everything else is getting a buff to shields then scouts need one too because right now scouts are somewhat UP and without some love it's going to get worse.

---

Commandos also merit a little more love. It's a mistake to always give them stats that fall just above sentinels in these progressions. The only thing that commandos have in common with sentinels is a larger hitbox, which is an extreme handicap. Otherwise they are slower assaults (major handicap) with less regen that can run two light weapons and no grenades. No grenades is also a handicap in this grenade crazy game. They don't even have more EHP than assaults due to their slot layouts. Their shield regen needs to be brought closer to assaults. My suggestion to accomplish this is simple:

- Give commandos the same regen and delays as logistics

Just following a strict pattern without acknowledging the reality of how scouts and commandos are performing is going to leave them even more in the lurch. We need more scouts and definitely more commandos in the field, but if the above proposed changes go through without tweaks in their favor you'll find that players will be running them even less than they do now. Heed my words CPM!!

False. Dual taking is not penalized in Eve, it's just pointless to do so since you have all kinds of mods that make killing things easier. A dual tanked ship will lose to a normal ship because it either A) doesn do as much damage as the normal ship or B) doesn't apply damage as well as the normal ship. The problem with Dust is there is no way to have things like tracking disruptors or target painters, so HP is almost always the betterchoice. In the case of Caldari, dual tanking is the only way to survive.

If you are looking at depleted delays may I just state that I am strongly of the opinion that depleted delays should simply last a fixed percentage longer that non-depleted delays.

It's simple. It makes sense. It results in an interesting gameplay mechanic where you try not to let your shields become completely depleted. This also reduces the value of armour on your shield tanking fit, as the goal is to not get into armour in the first place, helping to distinguish between tanking styles and rewarding fits that contain synergy.

I understand that "Step 2" will involve improving shield modules, which will help shield tankers, but make no mistake. Aeon's angling for a buff for armor tankers (unless he has since changed his mind).

Yo CPM! What are your thoughts on allowing damage mods to be placed in low slots as well? Armor tankers get to have the best of both worlds while shield tankers have to choose, and in their low slots they have no choice: regulator and reactives.

I'm just looking at the numbers, and it looks to me like Aeon's angling for a buff for Armor Tankers. Unless, as I said above, he has since changed his mind. What am I missing here, Breakin?

Being right once or twice doesn't mean you're now infallible, to presume so implies a massive amount of arrogance and ego (which pairs up nicely with the implication that you might actually be incompetent). As the proverb says "Even the sun shines on a dogs ass some days".

But hey, this only happens cause you have a habit of feeding the trolls with your dramatic "leave britney alone" freakouts ("GOD, I'M NEVER POSTING NUMBERS ON THE FORUMS EVER AGAIN, STOP BEING MEAN TO ME")

Also yep, myo's are broken: Which is why you're defending the status quo with them so hard to keep them the way they are right? Cause superman leaps and punching for 700 damage is in no way overpowered and you totally don't run them on a lot of your fits at all, because making use of something that's overpowered totally isn't in poor taste. But whenever someone tries to rationalize with you about it, you refuse to even listen to other viewpoints. Where's the objectivity? I mean you seem to only want people to agree with you and have a flip-out any time they don't.

I like how you just attribute all the legitimate complaints people have had as only being complaints about you. Most of it is reacting to a questionable proposal and only a small portion of the reactance is actually attributed to your motives. As far as my viewpoints on the proposal, it's been summed up relatively adequately by enough other people that most of what I have to do here is attempt to correct your belief that people are reacting to you rather than to a questionable proposal.

In fact your false attributions tend to be the reason why people react to you, rather than to your proposals. It's rather hard to discuss something with a person who is being irrational / in denial ("they didn't like it because they don't like me!" instead of "they didn't like it because they didn't like it, also they said it was stupid" - and thus we get to "I am invested in this so attacking my position means they're attacking me").

I think one of the problems I an having with this thread, and maybe others are as well, is that the statement ' this is not a shield balancing thread' comes up anytime anyone has a critique of any of the numbers, especially the amar/galente regen buff...

So are we to assume the intent if this thread is to completely disregard balance of suits in any way for the sake of forcing through I couple people's vision?

Is this not short sighted?

Is it not similar to saying: ' We would like to set a baseline for grenade damage, basic grenades will now do 500 damage with a radius of 12 meters and no one better mention how this makes armor and shield suits imbalanced as it is not the intent of the thread.

Short answer, yes, buffing gallente and Amar shield regen is short sighted and I would like to hope not self serving.

Then give me numbers showing how a slight improvement to Gallente shield delays is going to make them OP. And it's the same reasoning Rattati gave to the speed/hp curve: it might throw some things out of whack for awhile, but those will be more easily corrected when we have a solid foundation to build on. Right now shields are chaotic and garbage, but Aeon has a logical progression that will smooth things out. If Gallente suddenly become OP (they won't) then it will be easier to correct that than to try and make shields work on such a whacked out system.

We're trying to fix the foundation of the house, and your worried that the work might knock some pictures off the wall. Fixing the foundation is more important than having neatly hung pictures.

It's easy.. if the numbers create the amar or galente suits shield stats to regen faster then your baseline is wrong.

It's not difficult to understand, stop saying ' but it's just a little ', if just a little doesn't matter to you then make the stats ' just a little ' worse... after all its ' just a little ' what possible difference could it make?

Why is it so hard to create a baseline system that does NOT buff the shield stats of armor suits?

I know I know.. " it's just a little "...

Aeon, can you not kill two birds with one stone in phase one rather than open up the possibility that amar could hypothetically have 100000000 reps per second? I know you aren't being serious, but at the same time would it not be easy just avoid giving amar 10000000 reps per second in the first place?

Two or three posts back you replied to my comment saying for all it matters the numbers could show amar sentinel shields regen in at 10000000hps but it wouldnt matter due to whatever you do in phase two, I'm stating why not just take care of the issue in phase one.

You have contradicted yourself right here brahhh! Why do the assault suits have lower shield delays compared to logistics on you're spread sheet?

I'm sure the same will be done for armor in the future with Caldari being lowest on the totem pole. I don't expect Caldari to receive armor repair buffs.