18 replies to this topic

[vader333]

Dear Dev's

The condensed Version of post.

Soviets:

1. Desolator Splattershot does not enhance Deathspray's damage on Armoured units and structures enough.
Propose: Armour cancellation or Deathspray-specific damage 'accelerator' ( damage = Deathspray original+ incremental damage from splattershot EFFECT/sec )

Japanese:

1. Giga Fortress Reload time too long. Damage done per second too low.
Propose: Increase Damage, and decrease reload time.
Additionally: Tie Giga fortress to Nanocore Mainframe and power supply. Disable or destroy all Giga fortresses upon infiltration of Nanocore Mainframe or power down.

2. VX Striker and Mecha Tengu transformation speed.
Propose: Increase Transformation time to 1.5 seconds

Allied:

1.Edit: Pacifier is actually quite Ok, after further testing.

2. Harbinger too accurate and reload too fast. Dmg per sec may be slightly high.
Propose: Reverting to Vanilla.

3. Harbinger anti-air machine gun too effective.
Propose: Restricting angle of attack of machine gun to either 120 degrees left or 120 degrees right (like the proton cannon).

Edited by vader333, 27 December 2010 - 08:53.

[TheWorms]

S.1.

After reading your explanation again, do you mean something like a mini toxic corrosion effect?


J.2.

Do you mean the cooldown of the ability or the lift?
Or maybe the model animation?


A.2.

Well, I did change it from the Upheaval source. Should it be left unchanged then?

Edited by TheWorms, 27 December 2010 - 10:20.

[V.Metalic]

A3: Stupid, since the machine gun is on the nose, it can rotate to 240°, unlike the proton cannons which are in the hull.

[vader333]

Honestly, V, you didn't have to be so blunt. I consider gameplay more important than the video game's accuracy in following reality and logic. This is also a balance thread. The alternative solution that would be consistent with reality would be to either disable the chain gun's aa ability, or weaken it, which will probably make it just a decorative stick on the harbinger. This will not only make it not possible for the harbinger to use the gun as effective selfdefense in all situations without exception, but also limit the opportunities for the player to exercise, and shine Through, their micro management, which is the distinguishing mark between a good and an extremely good player.

With my proposal, it will make it possible for the player to Effectively defend the Harbinger with the chain gun, by taking advantage of the excess loops made by dog fighters, while requiring the player to actively steer the harbinger so that the targets are on the 'right' side.

This is also the reason I suggested tethering the giga to the nanocore mainframe and power instead of nerfing the laser and cannons. It maintains the usefulness of the unit, while simultaneously solving balance problems and opening up new areas for players to strategize and engage in. In the giga's case, it raises the value of mainframes, from a mere tech enabling structure, to a necessary structure for the most powerful unit ingame, and also raises the usefulness of infiltration and powering down a base (in giga's case, powering down the base could save you).

I probably sound uber defensive, launching this salvo for such a short text, but I like to be clear when what I think is a good idea is at stake.

[vader333]

TheWorms said:

do you mean something like a mini toxic corrosion effect?

no I don't mean like a mini toxic corrosion effect. The gist is merely to make the desolator as per uprising standards. If you have played uprising, you will find that the desolator destroys tanks and buildings RAPIDLY, when the target is under splattershot effects. The damage done, from a superficial observation, appears to function like acceleration: damage done per second is always increasing. Damage starts off low, but then increases quickly, to the point that it takes nomore than 5 full seconds to destroy a refinery.

TheWorms said:

Do you mean the cooldown of the ability or the lift?
Or maybe the model animation?

the lift and model animation seem like one and the same thing to me. If you need me to be specific, what I mean is the time taken for the mech to transform from air mode to land mode. No, I do not refer to the ability cool down. I refer to the animation which occurs immediatly after activating the special ability of mechs. In particular, it is the inability to attack, and the vulnerability of the mech while transforming, that I suggest be lengthened.

Edited by vader333, 27 December 2010 - 17:27.

[V.Metalic]

By my opinion your suggestion for balance is redundant. Harbinger is supposed to be strong, stronger then ussual units. Harbinger and Giga Fortress are Tier 4 units, they are ment to be strong. Also Red Alert 3 use some portion of realism, and rotation of the weapons belongs to this. If Harbinger's nose chain gun has a possibility to rotate into 240°, then he can rotate 240°. But others dont bother what I say.

Edited by V.Metalic, 27 December 2010 - 20:03.

[TheWorms]

I don't know what came into me and made the chaingun anti-air, but if it's too effective, some damage decrease might work (against air-units)
Now that I remember it, I left this out unchanged before release.

About the desolator, have you also tested that in Bibber's Upheaval if the said damage theory works?

[Francula]

I'm copying what I posted on ModDB..

Allies:

1. The Future Tank needs more armor and needs to do more damage. It gets destroyed way too quick for the price in my opinion.

2. Can Chrono Tank have aggressive behavior mode set to "on" at all times - to fire at all enemy units/buildings/structures within range AFTER teleportation. Requesting to have the proton canon of these tanks have a suspend/stop/freeze effect on enemy units/buildings/structures for a few seconds like the first chrono tank in mod 3.1(not sure of what version) - this will compensate for the weak armored ground units of the allies in my opinion. I like the new Chrono tank look and proton canon effects.

3. Can we have the time bomb earlier at the start of the game?

4. Can we have the Marines do more damage? Especially to non armored units. Those shotguns should kill!

5. Can allies power plants slightly make more power?

6. Mirage tanks need more armor in my opinion. The allies' ground armored units are just too weak to fight the empires' and soviets'. Almost always forces allied players to stick to air raids.

7. Pacifier FAV's accuracy needs to be increased. Also, This unit should have aggressive behavior mode set to "on" at all times when on secondary attack mode - to fire at all enemy units/buildings/structures within range.

8. Harbinger chain guns - anti air guns are a great idea. Keep'em


Empire:

1. The Steel Ronins are to powerful. A mob of 5 can do so much damage either using they're primary or secondary attack. Maybe you can reduce they're armor? They last to long because of this they do so much damage.

2. Giga fortress needs to do more damage when they are in "head mode"

3. Archer maidens do too much damage. I noticed 1 veteran archer maiden can take down a twinblade helicopter in just 2-3 shots..

4. Mecha tungus' need to build a few seconds longer. They build too fast I think.

Soviets:

1. Can the motorcycle units(forget their name) auto fire their molotovs even when moving like starcraft 2's phoenixes? And can the molotovs do more damage to unarmored units. Fire should burn foot-soldiers. This will make them more useful as a counter to ground rushes.

2. Can we have more distance and coverage to the Desolator spray? Can we have the Desolators be the same "big" size as the tesla troopers?

3. What is the new ability of the engineer? I thought he can build a small bunker with 1 bot to repair machine units

4. Reapers need to hit any flying units.

5. Can we have the Grinder tank run over enemy foot soldiers/bears/dogs/terror drones/dolphins(when they are up in the surface attacking) without stopping? Make them run over these small unarmored units like any big tank.

6. Can we have the Kirovs slightly bigger and more durable? Also make the crash explosion damage bigger and more significant?


Once again thanks guys for this awesome Christmas mod!!!

Thanks for listening
-Francula

[vader333]

TheWorms said:

About the desolator, have you also tested that in Bibber's Upheaval if the said damage theory works?

Bibber did say that the Uprising version of deso used a different damage type or something. But, what I am suggesting is irrelevant to damage type, is it not? I only know C++ programming, not too sure how XML would handle it.

V.Metallic said:

By my opinion your suggestion for balance is redundant. Harbinger is supposed to be strong, stronger then ussual units.

Yes, the Harbinger is supposed to be strong, but not OP. Allow me to make a few more tests, along with the chrono tank to ascertain if balancing is necessary.

Francula said:

Allies:

A1. Agreed.

A2. Let's balance the current Chrono Tank before making further changes.

A4. Marines? You mean PK's. If you've been on the receiving end of a PK rush, you'll know they're strong enough already.

A5. They already do. Too much more, if you ask me...

A6. Do more testing... It's like shopping for clothes. You can only know it if looks good generally, but without trying it on, you can't know whether it will look good On You.

A7. Ditto

A8. Define good 'idea'. Good for lore, realism and story, or good for gameplay?


J4. Could you confirm this?


S1. Agreed

S5. Try playing with a soviet human player, and arrange with him to use Grinders heavily, and you tanks. You'll find it (Grinder) is already extremely powerful.

S6. While I also like this idea, and have proposed it numerous times (dreadnought scaling), I think TheWorms is quite decided on this issue: NO.

Edited by vader333, 28 December 2010 - 05:38.

[Francula]

A8. Define good 'idea'. Good for lore, realism and story, or good for game play?


I think the Harbinger is good the way it is right now for game-play wise. I think the chain guns hitting air units at all angles is pretty good in my opinion. Maybe this will change once all the other units are balanced like the uber powerful archer maidens being balanced..

-Francula

[vader333]

Could you elaborate why the Harbinger is "Handicapped", "Less Effective than it Should Be" without the AA chainguns, and why it would be "Better" and "Balanced" with the AA guns? Just to hear your views.

[Francula]

- Could you elaborate why the Harbinger is "Handicapped", "Less Effective than it Should Be" without the AA chainguns, and why it would be "Better" and "Balanced" with the AA guns? Just to hear your views.

Most of my feedback is from game play. The Harbinger easily gets destroyed by air to air targeting units that come cheaper and more in number at an earlier time in the game. Without the support of the apollos or any air to air or land to air attacking units the Harbinger is an easy unit to dispose off for its price and what its supposed to be (allies' super unit). Also I think the since one Harbinger can only attack one air to air unit at a time it doesn't make it that unbalanced to be in the over powered category in my opinion.

Example
4 miggs against 1 Harbinger I think is balanced fight. I even think 2 migg will come out victorious.
6 tengus againt 1 Harbinger - the Harbinger doesn't stand a chance.
4 apollos against 1 Harbinger I think is balanced fight. I even think 2 apollos will come out victorious.

-Francula

Edited by Francula, 31 December 2010 - 01:35.

[NRedAlert]

Francula, on 30 Dec 2010, 19:33, said:

- Could you elaborate why the Harbinger is "Handicapped", "Less Effective than it Should Be" without the AA chainguns, and why it would be "Better" and "Balanced" with the AA guns? Just to hear your views.

Most of my feedback is from game play. The Harbinger easily gets destroyed by air to air targeting units that come cheaper and more in number at an earlier time in the game. Without the support of the apollos or any air to air or land to air attacking units the Harbinger is an easy unit to dispose off for its price and what its supposed to be (allies' super unit). Also I think the since one Harbinger can only attack one air to air unit at a time it doesn't make it that unbalanced to be in the over powered category in my opinion.

Example
4 miggs against 1 Harbinger I think is balanced fight. I even think 2 migg will come out victorious.
6 tengus againt 1 Harbinger - the Harbinger doesn't stand a chance.
4 apollos against 1 Harbinger I think is balanced fight. I even think 2 apollos will come out victorious.

-Francula

The original Harbinger didn't have AA at all. You need to send some AA fighters with your Harbinger, don't send it alone. Also, the Harbinger and the Giga are not "super units" that are suppose to be invincible, their counters are cheap T2 AA units.

[R3ven]

T1 in the case of the Allies

[Francula]

More Feedback...

Empire:

1) The greater king oni is too powerful. It's an apocalypse tank that shoots air and land units and has an instant kill ramming secondary attack that is able to hit and destroy multiple units in a row. The ramming attack instantly destroys units which I would expect more from the grinder tank with its massive front grinder rollers. Having two of these things attacking your base is enough to set any faction back to a point of no recovery. Can we lower the armor of this unit? It stays alive too long and does too much damage.

Thanks for listening.
-Francula

[NRedAlert]

Francula, on 10 Jan 2011, 20:56, said:

More Feedback...

Empire:

1) The greater king oni is too powerful. It's an apocalypse tank that shoots air and land units and has an instant kill ramming secondary attack that is able to hit and destroy multiple units in a row. The ramming attack instantly destroys units which I would expect more from the grinder tank with its massive front grinder rollers. Having two of these things attacking your base is enough to set any faction back to a point of no recovery. Can we lower the armor of this unit? It stays alive too long and does too much damage.

Thanks for listening.
-Francula

Have your tried the Apoc against it? The Apocalypse can take down any armored unit on the Battlefield (FutureTank, KO, GKO) with ease. If you're the Allies, use Harbingers.

[Francula]

I see. Now it makes sense - I did notice that when I attack with Apocalypse tanks with a mix of the armored untis of the soviet faction the GKO's are manageable... except that all the other empire units that I encounter with the GKO's are over powered in my opinion. Specifically the Steel Ronin's and Archer maidens(they usually all attack together depending on the AI scheme). Plus these units always come with those Tank busters. This combination of units are just a powerful wrecking force in my opinion. Perhaps toning down those Archer maidens and Steel Ronins is the right thing to do and keeping the GKO's the way they are???



Thanks for responding
-Francula

Edited by Francula, 15 January 2011 - 02:17.

[Destiny]

...or you could bring anti-infantry support.










...ya know how cheap those conscripts are?

[TheWorms]

Coding the AI was a new thing for us. Well, for me. I don't know about the others.
If anyone is interested, we would like someone with experience in AI coding to help out.