Balance Pass Post 1: Vehicle Weapons and the Harasser

Rumble repair isn't a problem. It also isn't a bug, like many people seem to suggest. It was temporarily disabled over the summer, and SOE's response was, "We are fixing it, it will be back and working as intended." It is the one thing that makes the Harasser unique. The problem is that the combination of best acceleration, highest sustainable speed, and overly effective composite armor makes rumble repair seem OP. I'm not going to lecture you on it, but here's the short version of why I disagree.

Every vehicle can repair when it wants. The Harasser's advantage is simply that it can do it at full speed, with some protection for the repairer. You can do the same thing with a tank, just have the secondary gunner bail out and walk along the side. NAR is actually good on a Harasser, because, like an ESF, you dictate the engagement, and you can (usually) escape when you want to. The problem is, with such low base health/resistances, you either don't have time to make any impact, or you stick around and get killed. We've had some success using NAR on long-range setups, and just parking the front towards the enemy, and letting the driver repair from the semi-safe back seat.

The other thing is, you cannot repair and shoot from a Harasser at the same time. The third seat is a death trap; just like Liberators, a 3/3 is a sign of 3 free kills. So, the driver has to continue driving, and the gunner has to stop shooting to repair. Every other vehicle can shoot and repair at the same time, but they can't move (much). So, if tanks shoot and repair, and Harassers can move and repair, who can move and shoot? Oh ****, other Harassers! Like the original intention for ESFs, Harassers combating Harassers works surprisingly well, they play right into each other's hands.

TL|DR: Rumble-seat repair isn't OP, until it's combined with suped-up secondary weapons, OP (necessary) composite armor, and a general player base that still fails, after all these months, to employ the best counters against it. Repair is the one thing that really sets the Harasser apart, and I want it to keep that. Like I said above, delete composite armor, buff base health, and let repair stay. The other key point about upping base health is it would make repairs take longer. The one thing I forgot to mention above is that, in a 2/2 MBT duel against a 2/3 Harasser, as soon as you suspect the Harasser is breaking off to repair, both tank players can bail, full heal their tank, and begin moving to a new location before that one guy in the backseat can top himself off, get back in the gun, and start firing again (assuming all repair tools are equal).

Realistically, whats the worst that could happen? Bolt action sniper rifles not having their time to kill doubled by NW?

A headshot actually killing everything except shielded heavies AS ADVERTISED?

Two tank mines kill a harasser just like everything else. The problem is not the damage, the problem is that the detonation is bugged. Fix this and you won't have to play with the damage. In fact, just increasing the blast radius should fix it without breaking anything else. Speeding up the timer would also work.

But yeah, protection against C4 needs to be removed. If someone gets two bricks of C4 on your Harasser, he deserves that kill.

The composite armor nerf does not make much sense. Harassers cannot out-tank a tank. I think people complain because they forget that there are two people in that Harasser. A 2/2 MBT will obliterate a Harasser. Two 1/1 Lightnings will obliterate a Harasser. Two people in any tank combination is superior to a Harasser.

I almost reported this post for common sense. What're you doing on the internet, the real world needs you!

They are pretty stable though, you've got to do something fairly daft to flip one (they've got exceedingly good traction too, and bizarrely their wheels don't seem to be in the terrain hitbox).

The thing is though any remotely decent Harrasser driver is gone before any second salvo is incoming, unless they are daft enough to be sat stationary to begin with (which actually shows the power of the Harrasser that it can sit still, be used like a tank and still largely escape most of the time).

Lock-ons are the best chance anyone has got, it is just that yes, they aren't that effective either (mostly again due to speed, toughness and low profile).

Indeed, Harrassers are more or less immune to Pheonixes if they are driven sensibly.

Who knows, but it was the moment I really realise that Harrasser probably needed to be toned down quite a bit.

but... but... I can only rez 2 people in the time it takes a sniper to re-chamber a bullet.

plz dont move radar in other slot

Indeed, the problem is moving self-repair combined with serious toughness and high speed (and high offensive ability).

I think the Harrasser would be fine now (maybe still with a slight nerf) if they just removed moving self-repair, but they've said they won't do that........ so I think it needs a significant toughness reduction (especially against small arms IMO - given the lack of other effective options).

How about darker nights?
This dude ZoranTheBear has some nice ideas.

One must be able to do what others could only dream of to be superior on the battlefield. Flipping sours the victory.

Believe me, the wheels definitely collide with terrain hitboxes. (And player hitboxes as well)

I use Google translator, so do not judge strictly for the accuracy of speech.
Dear SEC, why cut back Harasser? Why cut back on protection against land mines? and so he blows up pretty quickly, for that is the case then let's cut all the equipment protection against mines, all fractions

Why cut protection from bullets? what in the world? Now let's blow up the tanks of guns??? Do you have any brains? If someone does not know how to play and constantly crying that he is killed, it does not mean you have to nerf the rest.
Where is the logic in the fact that the sniper kills a character with one shot, and the rocket, the idea is a hundred times more powerful, can not kill an infantryman from the first. Where is your logic?? What kind of idiot comes up with all these features? Where is the realism?

So riding a harayzere quite complex, and you make of it useless trough on wheels.
If you love so much to trim characteristics of equipment and weapons, in this case, give opportunity to reset the certificates. And it turns out we are investing real money or accumulated difficulty certificates, buy guns, improve it. But in the end you turn it into a piece of crap. Cheating respected developers .. Are not you ashamed?
And reset certificates at least 1 time in 2 months. free. Because otherwise lose the desire to play and to pump whatever you are doing in the future and you have to swing a useless something else. Then everyone starts to cry and you cut that, too.
I apologize for the harshness, but it is only a small part of that simmering in mind your ridiculous logic. And maybe you even just my forum Banned for saying that, but someone has to tell the truth.
Thank you for your attention

I understand what you're saying. Check out my other post in this thread, a little more detail on the health vs resistance thing. What I was trying to say is, if we simply give the Harasser more base health while simultaneously removing composite armor as a whole, the entire situation would be significantly improved.

Removing Comp Armor gives us one 'durability' to tune. You have one set amount of health to dismantle, the only person that has any real fear of NAR at this point is the Lightning driver. Stealth becomes more useful, both for attack (shooting/positioning) and defense (run & repair). Every vehicle can go up against a Harasser and know exactly what it's going to take to down it. We can actually talk about 'balance'.

Even without all of the proposed Harasser changes, simply closing the latency between passing over mines and subsequent detonation (any chassis with Turbo can do it, AFAIK, and Racer without?) automatically makes mineguard viable. Mines are one of the true threats to Harassers now: Comp Armor does nothing against mines, and since everyone basically runs Comp Armor instead of Stealth and laughs at mine-guard, this is one of the few real counters. 1 mine = ~70% health. 2 mines (you get 2 just for certing tank mines!) is a kill.

Players will argue that mines are too visible, they cost too many certs or resources, you can't carry enough of them to be effective, etc. I will tell you those same players throw mines down in the middle of a road instead of under the shade of trees or in bushes. I admit its the ultimate cheese tactic, but playing mines at the bottom of a vehicle ramp still works all too well, because no one can be arsed to check on their way to the terminal. These players don't talk on comms and ask fellow squad-mates to pull engi kits with them to mine up obvious choke points and the naturally concealed mine spots while assaulting a base; they are blinded by kill lust, padding their KDR and score, and that golden 30 XP for flipping the flag.

I'm ranting, whatever. Mines are actually fantastic against Harassers when players have the foresight to use them. Composite Armor is a can of worms, it should have never been included. The unfortunate side-effect of the CompArmor phenomenon is that the base buggy is currently too weak to be viable, hence the prevalence of Composite Armor. It's a Catch-22, just delete it and let everything else sort itself out.

Everyone has their own opinion, though. I can't convince a single person the Harasser needs more health and no armor

First, this is a video game based around player versus player. This means that balance takes priority over realism.

Second, the "nerfs" that will be hitting the harasser are actually quite reasonable. It's incredibly fast. It is more durable than a lightning. And it can repair without having to stop.

Basically, the only nerf to the harasser is an increase in C4 and tank mine damage and a SLIGHT decrease in the effect of composite armor to bring it's durability below that of a tank.

I hope the enforcer modified gets some love.

then after it will make it vulnerable to C4 will be vulnerable to everything.

You say on your sheet when if you compare shooting at Harasser of striker and of the Phoenix? Where is your vaunted balance?

Striker point and doing all missiles. Fall even through the shelter ... this is the first ...
now the second - sasstoyanie our rockets 300 meters in the other 500.
Coves and plus speed and agility in our missiles are not present. You can walk away from it.

where the balance?

The worst thing that can happen is putting the final nail in the coffin of Rifleplay.

0HK Snipers, engaging Midrange Gunplay.


Pick one.

"Midrange Gunplay" wasn't any better or worse before everyone and their sheep got NW5.

In fact, I'd argue that there were fewer people camping every aviable ridgeline.

Probably because everyone was getting 0HK'ed?

Exactly.

So unless camping = "engaging gunplay", snipers used to do the gameplay a favor IMO.

ymmv

Indeed, but only flaming death would await a Flash trying such things (and everything else couldn't do it).

I dunno about the wheels, but I spend a bit of time actively trying to flip a Harrasser (I failed) and they didn't seem too.

A Harrasser with a bit more base durability and no composite armour would likely be about balanced, as things stand Harrassers have to be balanced around composite because I would imagine 99% of certed Hassassers have it.