Big Balance Thread

[Adelion]

@warget

Sure. If you would like to suggest what has to be toned down, I would like to get your input.
But one very important thing to remember is: how would your nerfs affect the average players? Will they actually enjoy playing the game, or will it be similar to Winds of Magic, which had some people praising it for “finally making the game hard”, while vast majority of people cursed Fatshark for ruining their experience?
This game lives by having a community of both hardcore and casual players enjoying it.

In short - fine. If you don’t like the buffs, suggest what you want to be nerfed. I will write it down.

As said, it is simply to much to even start with. It is like going in two different directions.

For the average player: We have five (FIVE (5!)) difficulties. The average player if he is really average and casual can play Champion difficulty as nearly everything the game has to offer can be witnessed there already. If the casual average player insists on playing Legend, the highest official non-dlc difficulty than that is an issue with that player.

That said, the majority of nerfs which are discussed would rarely affect Champion difficulty, and only slightly Legend because a lot of stuff has been powered up to cater to Cataclysm. So currently it is overkill for below difficulties which is the general problem if you always balance for the highest difficulty (or even higher). Balance scales down badly. If we nerf some stuff it will only reduce the overkill. The majority simply does not care for these nerfs. The majority wouldn’t even notice them. The ones cursing Fatshark are the “prideful”.

[Kitten]

@alsozara

I’ve heard @Kitten swear by Drakira’s for a ranged spam longbow build.

Yep. Spam headshots on Patrols, Bosses and Chaos Warriors. You can even run AS on Charm too. Skaven/Inf/Inf/AS/EP.

Serrated with double shot body shot breakpoints on Specials is the lowest effort Longbow build though. You’re basically Bloodshot/BH without having to melee kill vs Specials.

[Drakonhammer]

Took a quick look:

For properties 15% dodge is a bit too good imo, I’d go for 10%.

@alsozara

This just seems entirely inpenetrable to most players. It won’t get picked because nobody will want to calc whether or not it’s actually a buff for their build.

From memory -25% Critical power would mean the +0.5x Critical modifier turns to +0.375x. Factor in the overall power difference and you get 1.0x/1.5x(crit) vs 1.15x/1.525x(crit) with the talent. For this talent to work it’d need to be +1.0x Critical modifier in FS speak, but dagger and 1h sword I believe have higher modifiers. I’m not aware if any of her staves do - I’d have to look at the armoury mod (which feeds into your point most players won’t do this).

@alsozara

TBH I prefer what the Onslaught Tourney Balance mod did with this talent.

I like this (Blazing Twins) more, it’s more unique. Ofc, Burning Head itself needs to be buffed. Main concern is Blazing Twins vs Blazing Echo imo, they fill a similar niche, just differ by non RNG vs RNG.

Otherwise I agree with your feedback.

What hampers On Yer Feet Mates imo isn’t the revive speed etc., it’s the fact your allies often don’t realise it’s happening and get instagibbed again the moment they revive. I’d change it give them 1s invulnerability but solely for teammates that get revived, not ones that are alive.

imo 10% dodge distance and MS, but I’m not sure what exactly the breakpoints are for ridiculousness with certain move techs.

imo FS should just change these to match the descriptions, as in Ideal gives damage solely and Heroism gives actual power (so damage, cleave, stagger).

While this makes the talent more useable to me it just sucks. It’s totally counterintuitive to keep ranged weapons reloaded for specials etc. I don’t think this is a fun tradeoff, just annoying.

Very creative but I’d roll the bombs granting both effects into the three bomb passive. Free bomb per x enemies slain would be a great replacement in this tier however. (I’d almost be tempted to base it off gasrats, ratlings and warpfires, to simulate Bardin salvaging scrap metal etc but that’d be unreliable and a grudging).

Hekarti does not need a buff, it is already far better than Incandescence in most situations especially on Cata with ample elites. It lets you use walls much more often, it doesn’t get picked largely due to Radiant Inheritance being so good, not because it itself is a bad talent. It is not.

Incandescence needs to be turned into a more appealing / interesting option than just dumping hedges everywhere like Tzeetchian botanist.

imo not needed - it’s solid as is for its role. At most I’d change Repel so it doesn’t downscale stagger strength so badly vs hyperdensity.

Might be a bit too good with how BW plays.

Weapons:
On MWP: imo give (at the very least) rightclick mode -33% monster damage or worse. Handgun still has a leg up over MWP vs shielded SV.

1h axes: Give them halved push cost. More survivability but reliant on the player actively using their pushes for it.

Throwing axes: roll ranged attacks into one, the stronger one, and give them a block (two, maybe three stamina shields), push and push attack. Also don’t nerf reload duration but make it once you hit R you don’t need to hold R to reload (swapping weapon etc. would still interrupt).

Javelin: Good start. Dunno if this would be enough.

Moonfire: Reduce recharge rate by two thirds and double lockout. Tourney rebalance had pretty good ideas on how to nerf it without it losing its uniqueness, I’d go with that. Really FS should lean into recharge and lockout with this weapon, it feels like they were afraid to be too stingy with those and so it’s just way too good. DoT probably needs adjusting down but maybe slower recharge and lockout are enough.

Crowbill: Agree. Needs a buff but I’m honestly not sure what’d be unique and interesting. Cleave could work I guess.

Otherwise imo those are some good changes.

[warget]

@Drakonhammer

For properties 15% dodge is a bit too good imo, I’d go for 10%.

@Drakonhammer

I like this (Blazing Twins) more, it’s more unique. Ofc, Burning Head itself needs to be buffed. Main concern is Blazing Twins vs Blazing Echo imo, they fill a similar niche, just differ by non RNG vs RNG.

@Drakonhammer

imo 10% dodge distance and MS, but I’m not sure what exactly the breakpoints are for ridiculousness with certain move techs.

Noted.

@Drakonhammer

What hampers On Yer Feet Mates imo isn’t the revive speed etc., it’s the fact your allies often don’t realise it’s happening and get instagibbed again the moment they revive. I’d change it give them 1s invulnerability but solely for teammates that get revived, not ones that are alive.

From my experience, one of the hidden stats, which I would like to call “Unchained Effect”, where the players feel obligated to sit on a full ultimate “just in case”. But in situations outside of that, I can agree - being revived mid-death is really bad.
My suggestion basically wanted to tackle the same problem in a different way. (Though, granted, I forgit about the value of ranged revives)

@Drakonhammer

imo FS should just change these to match the descriptions, as in Ideal gives damage solely and Heroism gives actual power (so damage, cleave, stagger).

Ideal’s description says it grants Power Level, but I do agree, that making Heroism just match it’s description would have made things much easier for everyone (and for Warrior priest too actually)
Sadly, for now, we are stuck with “Power Level of heavy attacks = Damage of Heavy attacks”, so I tried to wing it around based on gut feeling + some previous comments I have seen.

@Drakonhammer

While this makes the talent more useable to me it just sucks. It’s totally counterintuitive to keep ranged weapons reloaded for specials etc. I don’t think this is a fun tradeoff, just annoying.

Noted.
Although, there needs to be an alternative. Any ideas? <_>

@Drakonhammer

Very creative but I’d roll the bombs granting both effects into the three bomb passive. Free bomb per x enemies slain would be a great replacement in this tier however. (I’d almost be tempted to base it off gasrats, ratlings and warpfires, to simulate Bardin salvaging scrap metal etc but that’d be unreliable and a grudging).

I feel like making double bombs baseline is a bit excessive. Though I have seen someone mention that it would help Engi by serving as a “panic button”. (I, personally, would like this talent to be a trinket trait though.)

@Drakonhammer

Hekarti does not need a buff, it is already far better than Incandescence in most situations especially on Cata with ample elites. It lets you use walls much more often, it doesn’t get picked largely due to Radiant Inheritance being so good, not because it itself is a bad talent. It is not.

Incandescence needs to be turned into a more appealing / interesting option than just dumping hedges everywhere like Tzeetchian botanist.

Sounds like a reasonable point.
Any suggestions on how to change Incandescence? (Should probably be related to SotT double wall passive to keep it themtic)

@Drakonhammer

Might be a bit too good with how BW plays.

Yes, but that’s why I gave it a reduction of the venting rate. Might not have been enough, of course

@Drakonhammer

Throwing axes: roll ranged attacks into one, the stronger one, and give them a block (two, maybe three stamina shields), push and push attack. Also don’t nerf reload duration but make it once you hit R you don’t need to hold R to reload (swapping weapon etc. would still interrupt).

Although making them a melee weapon is one of the most popular sugesstions (I have seen it everywhere), I worry if it is too much work for less than stellar results. How would you block when out of ammo? Just put your dukes up? And how would push attack function when you have no ammo?
And the starting reload time needs to be faster. As it currently stands it is probably worse than Handgun. Making it “press and wait” would just be a band aid to how clunky it feels.

And thanks for constructive feedback!

[Frostysir]

I have tried that for flavor a number of times but my conclusion on it was that it´s only really useful for things bigger than chaos warriors. And elfbow doesnt even hit chaos warriors that hard, let alone monsters who usually have projectile resistances.

…

Serrated meanwhile? Easy breakpoints, bloodshot? Murder some random mob and instagib any visible special/elite smaller than a mauler in a single draw at a speed that even a bounty hunter can respect.

[Ensrick]

For the Grail Knight level 10, I think the Virtue of the Ideal as it makes it the most powerful in most situations, but I have played quite a bit with all three as GK is my favorite class in the game (peak 13th-century looking fantasy knight with the iconic great helm).

Going down to a max stack of 20% seems a bit harsh and boosting Virtue of Heroism to 35% makes it the obvious choice and you’d probably never want to go down to a 20% power bonus. If anything I’d keep the max at 30% power and have it stack 6x for 10 seconds on each stack with a 5% bonus per kill. This way it lasts a bit longer but takes a bit more work to keep at max.

The Virtue of Heroism at 25% can be a better option when using mostly heavy attacks because it basically works like a 25% damage bonus, whereas Virtue of the Ideal works well mainly with hordes since it wears off fairly fast and the power bonus grants better stagger for temp health.

On mercenary Paced Strikes with ‘The More the Merrier’ and ‘Reikland Reaper’ gets ridiculously powerful compared to GK’s horde clearing ability. I think Virtue of the Ideal is good as is and it isn’t even nearly as good as Mercenary’s bonuses in a crowd, but Virtue of Heroism probably does need a boost to 30% damage or 35% to be more competitive.

The Virtue of Knightly Temper should probably add some crit chance (maybe 2% per stack for 10 seconds, stacking 5x up to 10% per critical strike), because it isn’t reliable and the huge power and/or damage bonus from the other talents make your crits stronger anyway. This talent as it is was fun when you get a crit on Blessed Blade that can wipe out a monster or 3 chaos warriors in one use, but it’s nowhere near as reliable or useful as the other 2 talents. Or, maybe to add some defensive options to the level 10 row, you could have it grant 4 temp health per crit on top of what it already does.

This class is a completely melee-focused class that can rival slayer, critmancer, or shade in damage output but is reduced to a less durable foot knight in the wrong hands. I wouldn’t consider reducing any of the level 10 talents. If anything, the Knightly Temper and Heroism need a boost to be as good as Virtue of the Ideal.

[Drakonhammer]

@warget

@Drakonhammer

imo FS should just change these to match the descriptions, as in Ideal gives damage solely and Heroism gives actual power (so damage, cleave, stagger).

Ideal’s description says it grants Power Level, but I do agree, that making Heroism just match it’s description would have made things much easier for everyone (and for Warrior priest too actually)
Sadly, for now, we are stuck with “Power Level of heavy attacks = Damage of Heavy attacks”, so I tried to wing it around based on gut feeling + some previous comments I have seen.

Weird, I thought it used to say damage. Did FS update it or am I just wrong?

I do think Ideal → damage and Heroism → power would be an idea. Otherwise I feel one will just generally be better than the other. The damage one can afford to be a bit higher as it’d affect damage only while the other is a general offensive boost.

For new talents/total replacements I’m honestly not sure off the top of my head. I’d like to see another support one on SotT. And RV 15% power is nice just basing it on having zero ammo or not reloading is bad design.

@warget

Although making them a melee weapon is one of the most popular sugesstions (I have seen it everywhere ), I worry if it is too much work for less than stellar results. How would you block when out of ammo? Just put your dukes up?

That’d actually be extremely badass, but that’s a good point. If he had a spare axe that comes out for blocks it’d beg the question why he doesn’t throw it (maybe Okri covered it in superglue?). Unless he just starts punching pactsworn.

@warget

Making it “press and wait” would just be a band aid to how clunky it feels.

I disagree. Yeah, the reload is too long, but hold to reload I find extremely annoying. Even if the reload was shorter, I don’t like it. You basically have to bind to a mouse key to avoid the nuisance of it occupying a finger. It’s a hassle on the input end, not gameplay.

@Ensrick

The Virtue of Knightly Temper should probably add some crit chance (maybe 2% per stack for 10 seconds, stacking 5x up to 10% per critical strike), because it isn’t reliable and the huge power and/or damage bonus from the other talents make your crits stronger anyway. This talent as it is was fun when you get a crit on Blessed Blade that can wipe out a monster or 3 chaos warriors in one use, but it’s nowhere near as reliable or useful as the other 2 talents. Or, maybe to add some defensive options to the level 10 row, you could have it grant 4 temp health per crit on top of what it already does.

I was thinking +5% base crit with Virtue of Knightly Temper just so you aren’t totally reliant on stacking 2x crit on weapons and trinkets to get use out of it. It is a very good talent though imo especially on exec with +10% crit on light 3 and + 20% on heavies, so I’m hesitant to buff it more. Granted, I haven’t tried GK on Cata yet.

[alsozara]

I was thinking more on Thrill of the Hunt. My biggest problem with the talent as is is that it’s an unintuitive proc condition for blunderbuss (aiming for headshots often means not shooting into an optimal place to hit the most targets) and feels just a tad low when not in Ult.

I don’t know if this is actually a good idea, but something along the following lines is what I’m thinking:
Reload speed 20% → 15%
Can stack twice
Has an alternate proc condition that fits BB’s playstyle a bit more naturally, something like “on headshot or hitting X times with 1 shot”

I dunno maybe that’s too much of a buff for BB? @Radina.Shevu you’re a Kruber aficionado, what are your thoughts here?

[alsozara]

@Drakonhammer

While this makes the talent more useable to me it just sucks. It’s totally counterintuitive to keep ranged weapons reloaded for specials etc. I don’t think this is a fun tradeoff, just annoying.

It should be noted that currently Last Resort applies to the last shot fired. If it continues this trend with the changed condition of empty magazine rather than empty ammo, it would actually be insanely good for Handgun and Crossbow, which would both get 100% uptime on the buff. Not sure if that is how @warget intended it to function, but worth pointing out I feel.

@Drakonhammer

I like this (Blazing Twins) more, it’s more unique. Ofc, Burning Head itself needs to be buffed. Main concern is Blazing Twins vs Blazing Echo imo, they fill a similar niche, just differ by non RNG vs RNG

Then why not just replace Blazing Echo with burning twins?

[warget]

@Drakonhammer

Weird, I thought it used to say damage. Did FS update it or am I just wrong?

I do think Ideal → damage and Heroism → power would be an idea. Otherwise I feel one will just generally be better than the other. The damage one can afford to be a bit higher as it’d affect damage only while the other is a general offensive boost.

As far as I remember, it was Power from the very release of the career.

When it comes to making Heroism grant Power instead of damage - the current version does that by literally having a stat called "increased_weapon_damage_heavy_attack", so changing the talent would require either creation of a completely new stat or rewriting a lot of existing code. Which I am a bit hesitant to propose since I sort of hope we can test things out in a mod and I don’t know if code wizards can do that through modding alone.

@Drakonhammer

That’d actually be extremely badass, but that’s a good point. If he had a spare axe that comes out for blocks it’d beg the question why he doesn’t throw it (maybe Okri covered it in superglue?). Unless he just starts punching pactsworn.

The most realistic implementation would be similar to Javelin - no blocks, but has an attack pattern. That would cause everyone much less headache.
BUT
At the same time, it has the same stats and or attack pattern as 1h Axe, then it would sort of be just a straight upgrade.

@Drakonhammer

I disagree. Yeah, the reload is too long, but hold to reload I find extremely annoying. Even if the reload was shorter, I don’t like it. You basically have to bind to a mouse key to avoid the nuisance of it occupying a finger. It’s a hassle on the input end, not gameplay.

Fine, I will write it down with the alternatives.

@Drakonhammer

I was thinking +5% base crit with Virtue of Knightly Temper just so you aren’t totally reliant on stacking 2x crit on weapons and trinkets to get use out of it.

Yeah, I thought about doing a same a few years ago, but when I suggested it, I got slammed for suggesting power creep xD
Will write that down.

@Ensrick

The Virtue of Knightly Temper should probably add some crit chance (maybe 2% per stack for 10 seconds, stacking 5x up to 10% per critical strike), because it isn’t reliable and the huge power and/or damage bonus from the other talents make your crits stronger anyway.

I think the other suggestion is a bit less complicated, but I agree, Virtue of Knightly Temper is not reliable and might benefit fro ma buff. I am just hesitant to add even more buffs to GK at the moment. >_>

@Ensrick

Going down to a max stack of 20% seems a bit harsh and boosting Virtue of Heroism to 35% makes it the obvious choice and you’d probably never want to go down to a 20% power bonus. If anything I’d keep the max at 30% power and have it stack 6x for 10 seconds on each stack with a 5% bonus per kill. This way it lasts a bit longer but takes a bit more work to keep at max.

The Virtue of Heroism at 25% can be a better option when using mostly heavy attacks because it basically works like a 25% damage bonus, whereas Virtue of the Ideal works well mainly with hordes since it wears off fairly fast and the power bonus grants better stagger for temp health.

On mercenary Paced Strikes with ‘The More the Merrier’ and ‘Reikland Reaper’ gets ridiculously powerful compared to GK’s horde clearing ability. I think Virtue of the Ideal is good as is and it isn’t even nearly as good as Mercenary’s bonuses in a crowd, but Virtue of Heroism probably does need a boost to 30% damage or 35% to be more competitive.

Well, The More the Merrier gets a bit of a nerf in this suggestion, so Virtue of Ideal isn’t being discrimanted.
I am not sure if Heroism would become a 100% best pick though. Since it only affects heavies (which means some weapons benefit from it more than others).

@alsozara

I don’t know if this is actually a good idea, but something along the following lines is what I’m thinking:
Reload speed 20% → 15%
Can stack twice
Has an alternate proc condition that fits BB’s playstyle a bit more naturally, something like “on headshot or hitting X times with 1 shot”

Yeah, I feel like this would be an unnecessary Blundebuss buff.
…
But at the same time, I was thinking “maybe make this talent have a way to proc in melee?”
Something like making it also/instead trigger on melee headshots/kills?

@alsozara

It should be noted that currently Last Resort applies to the last shot fired. If it continues this trend with the changed condition of empty magazine rather than empty ammo, it would actually be insanely good for Handgun and Crossbow, which would both get 100% uptime on the buff. Not sure if that is how @warget intended it to function, but worth pointing out I feel.

Wait, I actually completely forgot about this! D:
That’s definitely not how I intended it… probably have to rethink it then.

@alsozara

Then why not just replace Blazing Echo with burning twins?

Already wrote it down in the alternatives xD

[alsozara]

@warget

Yeah, I feel like this would be an unnecessary Blundebuss buff.

Yeah I very much get that. On the one hand I really don’t want to buff Bluntsman, but on the other hand I really wish BB was more synergistic with his tree. Yes you can headshot with it, but I just can’t see it as a headshot weapon when aiming centre mass to hit all pellets just seems so much more intuitive. I wish its reload speed didn’t feel so feast or famine based on whether or not you’re in Ult.

@warget

But at the same time, I was thinking “maybe make this talent have a way to proc in melee?”
Something like making it also/instead trigger on melee headshots/kills?

Interesting idea, I have no issues with that idea, though I’m not sure it would achieve a whole lot either.

@warget

Wait, I actually completely forgot about this! D:
That’s definitely not how I intended it… probably have to rethink it then.

Yeah probably one of those talents that needs to be completely redesigned.

[James]

@alsozara

I really wish BB was more synergistic with his tree

Easiest fix would be to increase Thrill of the Hunt duration by 2 seconds and give BB a bullseye pellet.

It’s already really easy to proc headshots against chaos/beastmen hordes to the point I run conservative. But it’s genuinely insufferable against skaven hordes, a bullseye pellet would help.

I believe it’s just changing one line to true

Weapons.blunderbuss_template_1.actions.action_one.default.bullseye = true

I did mess around with a “sniper”/reduced spread BB, it suffered a lot against against hordes
-shielded hordes especially- unless I increased reload speed, mobility and/or ignore shields.

[warget]

Bullseye pellet? Is it when at least one pellet always hits with perfect accuracy?
I thought it already had that… Granted, it’s been a while since I actually played blunderbuss for more than one or two matches

[James]

It doesn’t. BB has a bald spot in the middle so you gotta aim slightly up to consistently land headshots.
It’s not too bad tbh since it’s just for proccing ToTH or recovering some ammo.

[warget]

@James

BB has a bald spot in the middle so you gotta aim slightly up to consistently land headshots.

I though it just has a weird “recoil” where the pellets don’t actually match where you are shooting at…
Changing that would probably be nice but it’s a buff for bluntsman, and not everyone would like that

Also. Increasing the duration of Thrill of The Hunt wouldn’t really change anything for the lower end players, since landing ranged headshots moving targets is a rather steep skill requirement. Buffing something that is already good but requires high mastery is a bit redundant.
At least from what I understand. I might be wrong, obviously.

[alsozara]

@James

It doesn’t. BB has a bald spot in the middle so you gotta aim slightly up to consistently land headshots.

See shooting half your pellets above something’s head to proc talents just seems super unintuitive to me. Agreed a bullseye pellet would probably help.

[James]

I think it’s a QoL buff a lot of people would be fine with(Its not adding a 13th pellet)
A duration increase would help the “lower end players”, just a more forgiving window to chain it.
Besides you’re probably underestimating those players.

[warget]

@James

I think it’s a QoL buff a lot of people would be fine with(Its not adding a 13th pellet)

Yeah, I wrote it down just in case.

@James

A duration increase would help the “lower end players”, just a more forgiving window to chain it.
Besides you’re probably underestimating those players.

This doesn’t really change the issue of it requiring to do a ranged headshot in the first place. It’s not a problem on a stationary ambient enemy (but you don’t care for reload time as much in that case), reasonably challenging on a target that just walks towards you, and gets really hard if you get fighting into the mix (because of a variety of factors, like animations, allies pushing enemies around, and the need to move yourself every now and then to not get hit). The experienced players can at least semi-consistently chain headshots and get great benefit out of this taalent, but for lower end players, this talent is a feast or famine.
Adding duration to it would make chaining it easier, sure. But that’s just giving a reward for already being good at a character with high skill floor. Meanwhile, giving it a way to also/instead proc by other means would actually lower said skill floor by allowing it to be used to soften the punishment of a whiffed shot.
I know a plenty of people who avoid Huntsman for the sole reason of him being very headshot focused. He has high skill ceilling and that’s great, but until the skill floor is lowered, people will ask for buffs to him even if you buff the rewards for headshotting to ridiculous levels.

His main probalem is not that he is weak, his problem is high bar of entry.
(Sorry if I got a bit emotional here.)

[DVD.exe]

Why continue to mess with the bad idea of blunderbuss having a one tru pellet when it’s easier, better, and more efficient to make all pellets capable of triggering headshots again and also make it so conservative shooter/passive can’t trigger more than once during a single shot?

[alsozara]

@DVD.exe

Why continue to mess with the bad idea of blunderbuss having a one tru pellet

Can you elaborate why exactly that’s a bad idea?

@DVD.exe

it’s easier, better, and more efficient to make all pellets capable of triggering headshots again and also make it so conservative shooter/passive can’t trigger more than once during a single shot?

I mean I’m not against the first half of that, not so sure about the second. CS sure, probably shouldn’t proc more than once anyway, for Waste Not Want Not though I don’t think eg manbow getting multiple procs of the passive is an issue, and I don’t know about taking that away from it just to try to make BB fit with the passive better.