@techmind_ said in Merge engineers into support engineers to circumvent pathing issues.:

The main problem is 1) shit pathfinding 2) small assist range.
It's same shit pathfinding and bad range at all tiers.
Kennels/hives fix both problems, kennels have worse bp but can fly anywhere.

Pathfiding is not fixable, but better range is changeable.
We need a way to contrate bp efficiently in specific area.

Deploy button on engineers
After deploy engineers cannot move and get double range effectively transforming into small hives

No pathfinding - no problem

As a casual player I see whole game from prism of emotions (will make this a signature)

Using ground fire to kill subs:
1st emotion is WTF???
2nd emotion is "I broke the game"
3rd - "MUAHAHAHAHA"
4th (after realizing that game balanced around this) - "I really supposed to do this each time?"

It's super effective. It rewards paying attention
It's pain to use. It's counter-intuitive

It's sad that game actually balanced around this use. Will be hard to fix.

Add "Gameplay discussion" forum with subforum "New player help"
Rename "I need help" forum to "Tech support"

I cannot find subforum that have answers "how to play?", "how to play Cybran?", "how to play Air?" in easy form. There are some videos on youtube but youtube is bad place for discussions and noob questions

"I need help" forum is tech-support forum as I can see. Please rename it for clarity.

People that trying to play and fail will find this forums and no answers. So they sometimes go to balance forums. You know what comes next

I have seen pull request about them
https://github.com/FAForever/fa/pull/3122

Looking at this pull request I see lack of faction diversity.
Aeon one is bad Cybran without upgrades but with underwater
Sera one is just bad Cybran

I suggest making them more different.

For Aeon:
Best and Worst

Make them even more efficient than Cybran but with really small range.
Something like

• 800 mass for 60 BP (13.(3) mass/BP)
  10-15 range (T3 engineer have 7)

For Sera:
Strong and Strange

Something strong and out of pattern. They are aliens after all. Not have to be mine idea.
As I see it:

• 1300 mass per 60 BP (21.(6) mass/BP)
  35 range

upgrades to

• 2600 mass per 120 BP
  50 range

Takes 3x3 slot

For compare:
Cybran: 1050 per 75 BP (14 mass/BP) 25 range
UEF: 1050 per 50 BP (21 mass/BP) no maximum range
T3 Eng: 312 per 30 (10.4 mass/BP) 7 range
SACU with upgrade: 2750+ per 98 (28+ mass/BP) 10 range

Remove veterancy for all units but

• experimentals
• ACU

As compensation buff hitpoints:

• Striker by 1 hp
• All T2 units by 10-20%
• All T3 units by 20-30%

Reason:
Sim speed (notably in ASF battles)

@Marked_One AFAIK HARMs depth was changed several times

@arma473 said in Veterancy removal for most units:

That would completely remove the whole "vet vet vet vet vet vet vet" angle to the game

As for me that the only reason to keep vet on EXP and ACU
It brings emotions

From noob poin of view

I'd prefer to not add extra complexity
so please - no reclaim decay

Reclaim speed - will mess with T1 stage (stated as healthy). Also can mess with starting buildorder even more than reclaim amount nerf

Reclaim numbers - will need simple and predictable system
For example
T1 - 81%
T2 - 64% (20% less)
T3 - 49% (40% less)
T4 - 36% (55% less)

...
T9 - 1%

@Psions You can ignore FtXCommando in this subforum

His opinion almost newer differs from theme to theme. He don't provide valuable arguments either. Probably he sees many of things too obvious to explain.

SACU BP nerf:
Big buff to engineer stations I see.

Engineer upgrade cost almost as another SACU (1500 mass)
This makes eng-SACU BP/mass ratio 35+. More than twice as Cybran eng-station.

WTF balance team?

If you so scared of RAS SACU then put BP and RAS upgrades to same slot or just remove RAS upgrade from game

Seraphim rambo:
Phim have 2 ways to make a rambo:

1. Overcharge + NanoRegen + Gun Upgrade (range and sensors)
2. Overcharge + NanoRegen + Regen Aura

Second one have better tank and also a support SACU. Mixed category detected

TS stated in first post that he want to increase performance of T2 land against ACU.

Not make semi-agressive use of ACU you described impossible to worse players (like me)
Not nerf ACU against T1

I made math to check if one of his suggestions (nerfing gun damage) do help for this.
It is not but also greatly reduce chances of ACU against T1 land. To increase T2 land chances overcharge have to be nerfed instead.
TS don't like idea of nerfing overcharge. Instead he suggests to remove entire playstyle for not best players by removing auto-OC. That is how it looks for noob me.
Which in turn I don't like.

Idle ACU dies under 1k mass Cybran artillery in 12 seconds.
Or it's not actually idle.

You suggest to change game from "manage your ACU or die" to "micromanage your ACU or die". It's a bad change.

In simpler words.

It's overcharge that kills T2. Not a main gun.

So what actually you want to get by removing auto-OC or nerfing non-OC damage in half?

You stated that it's better chances of T2 against ACU. Neither of this really helps T2 against ACU.
To help T2 against ACU you'll have to really nerf overcharge.
But you don't want to nerf overcharge don't you? It's too fun to play.

I don't try to solve problem of making use of ACU riskier.
I try to solve problem of making T2 stronger against ACU without changing ACU vs T1 balance too much.
Free kills by ACU apply to T1 and T2 equally. OC and base gun have big difference.

@ftxcommando for simplicity. I needed some average value. Properly microed OC will be even stronger against T2 compared to T1

So to buff T2 against ACU we actually should keep auto-OC and remove non-auto-OC instead.

When unit stats in FAF Client will be updated?
Eg. no naval updates now

@ftxcommando

About nerfing damage of ACU:
I did some math for current state of game
Used UEF units as example stats. No regen, overkill, range, veterancy and unit loss taken in account.
Assumed 5s OC cooldown, 2 units killed by OC average.

Calculated price of ACU in units

• ACU vs T1:
  ** No OC, No Gun: ~13
  ** No OC, Gun: ~18
  ** OC, No Gun: ~19
  ** OC, Gun: ~23

• ACU vs T2:
  ** No OC, No Gun: ~3,7
  ** No OC, Gun: ~5,2
  ** OC, No Gun: ~9
  ** OC, Gun: ~9,8

So against T1 units Gun upgrade have almost same strength as enabling OC
Nerfing damage will impact T1 vs ACU
But against T2 units Gun upgrade is negligible compared to OC
Nerfing damage will NOT impact T2 vs ACU

What can be done to nerf ACU against T2 (without removing one kill OC and buffing it against T1):

• Limit OC splash damage to only one shot T1
• increase OC cooldown based on latest OC strength
• Increase ACU damage AND increase OC cooldown

Looks like something that need playtesting.
Maybe an option while creating match?

Same question for T2 and T3 engineers.

What if we 2x them instead of T1?