First the Lynx/MCG and now the Striker, Vulcan and Marauder reworks? Are SOE ignoring the VS and NC?

NC needs:

1) an Illuminati pyramid had.
2) a pirate captain hat

balanced.

I think Lockdown is pretty situational with MAXs, but when you compare it to the other ES MAX abilities it simply isn't that bad.

It is better than current ZOE, it is arguably slightly worse than Aegis Shield, however that is because it isn't very useable in many cases (that it is situational) not that it isn't actually pretty powerful in some cases (like holding buildings in an outfit or farming biolabs with Pounders etc.).

More over Aegis Shield isn't great either (it is just ok in more situations than Lockdown, without actually being powerful anywhere), it is less useful/powerful than Charge in most situations.

And who says it is only TR. Yes, TR is the focus at present. But Higby has already stated that he wants to roll out the heat mechanic to all VS weapons soon. And the directive weapons are just the start.

First of all: The ZOEs damage buff only works out until 10 meters, therefor we only need to account for Infantry weapons within their max damage potential.

A 143 damage weapon takes 7 bullets to deal 1001 damage. A soldier have 1000 hp. If you increase the damage by 10%, the weapon will now deal 167.3, but we'll round it up to 168 for the sake of it. It will not matter.

Now, if you fire 6 bullets with this weapon, the minimum necessary to reduce the TTK, you will deal 948 damage. Iin order to land the killing blow, you need to fire off a seventh bullet and therefor the damage buff is completely pointless and the ZOE is mathematically impossible to benefit from.

I have done the same math for a 167 damage weapon, and the result is the same. The Bullets required to kill are equal, ZOE or not.

It doesn't matter how well you position yourself or how well you flank the enemy. The damage buff will not benefit you in any way, and therefor the ZOE is useless.

I disagree with your calling the game a financial failure. For more than a year, PS2 was the largest earning game for SOE. I have not looked recently to see if EQ:N Landmark replaced it in the top slot. There are many flaws in PS2 that you can point out, but you cannot call it a financial failure.

I personally like Charge for both VS and TR.

NC seem to love the shield, and i don't play NC but i think i would pick charge for them as well.

Heat mechanics are already being reworked, Higby also said they'll take a look at the MAX abilities for all three factions. Aside from the Corvus I only hear good about VS assault rifles and LMGs. The lasher is the only real point you have, and most people agree it needs to be looked at.

I think the NC shields popularity comes down to two things.


1) it looks like it should be really effective so people use it until they learn it isn't remotely as good as it looks.

2) it is very visable so everyone notices it (most of the % use stuff have had Aegis Shield not that high comparatively, in fact orginally Aegis Shield was used less than Lockdown, and much less than ZOE) which makes people subjectively think it is used more than it actually is.

Thing is, your hear and I've tried them. Aside from the default one they are all bad or just not a factor. CME is pointless compared to NS-11A, Corvus has the highest TTK in the entire game out of all guns, Terminus is a gun that is worse at CQC than h-v45 and worse at range than the default so its meh at best. This is also shown in the VS gun usage graph that only default and h-v45 are used by VS. Rest are a waste of certs. And do you have a source for heat mechanics being reworked? Again, let me find that VS usage graph on LMG, only the orion and sva-98 are worth using as VS.

Edit: found.





This clearly shows the lack of options for VS in both these categories. Also why you see so many with Orion, because there isnt anything else worth getting at all.

EDIT again: you also forgot my point about Vs pistols being the worst ingame, lead by the spiker. Also the phaseshift either needs love in form of more sight options or dmg drop off needs to be improved. And charge up mechanic is still clunky 1 year later.

I use the shield because I want it to be good, it seems really cool. Although charge would probably save my life more. They just need to make it less buggy, clientside hit detection doesn't work well with a directional shield though, they could probably extend the shields coverage a bit.

Do you think high quality patches and tweaks will happen if they need to mass produce all patches for all 3 factions in the same time frame? SOE has a small team and handling this is impossible. They had a long time to develop one vehicle, the Valkyrie, and it still isn't good cause of all the whine and constant demands. How much quality control will there be if they need to recode all weapons in the same timeframe needed to develop the Valkyrie. People on Forumside need to start thinking how hard it is to do such ideas. If you think devs could easily design 32 functioning weapons within I guess 3 months cause its ermergawd slow then please try doing it yourself.

Sure, lets take a few examples. How long was ZoE broken? how long was the striker beyond broken and even clipped through terrain? 9 months. If you are telling me one of the biggest companies in the world (i know the ps2 team isnt that big, but its still bigger than most games), cant re-balance a gun they released before 9 months, they are simply working too slow. There is no excuse for a weapon balance to take 9 months. And the list goes on. No matter how much you white knight for SOE, its a fact that development, optimization and balance takes way too long.

I don't know but whining at some point does get irritating and I think thats how the devs feel. If the Vanu playerbase would stop making threads of self pity then we would actually be able to get somewhere. SOE is somewhat related to Sony so I wouldn't consider them big. Ubisoft is big however so this would be unacceptable for their $60 games but this is F2P. Their budget isn't great, this is a promotion of the forgelight mainly, and the cash is just on the side. They are mainly preparing the game for PS4 to make some big bucks there. Whatever the PC community doesn't like, such as shallow gameplay. Well thats what would be going into the PS4 version since thats what they like. People join this game because its F2P, and a combination of COD, BF, and Halo. It has planetside elements but thats just a way to draw in the vets. As long as you paid your money, their mission is a success.

So far the Heat mechanic is looking like a nerf more than a buff.
To make it work, it would need some serious rework as any delay in the cooldown period before overheat will make it a flat nerf (assuming ofc that they won't let the pre-overheat shots be higher than existing battery capacity).

For the time being it's a gimmick, and not a very useful one at that.
Infinite ammo is a curiosity, not a boon. And it will give the finger to VS engineers without a rework of the ammo box functionality.

TL;DR: It's a train wreck waiting to happen.

TL;DR You, like most other, are focusing on balance and ignoring the fact that you are getting something new, unique, and possible fun. How would you feel if NC came on here and started ******** about VS getting all the attention while they are ignore, all because you are getting heat mechanics.

Facepalm.

Fun?
Tell me Ghost, if something was done to TR weapons that ends up making them even worse in an area where they're already worse off than the NC and VS guns? So far the heat mechanic will give the "benefit" of infinite ammo (which won't do squat in 99.9% of fights), at the cost of making the already smallest damage before reload on just about every weapon classification even smaller?
Basically this mechanic has the potential of causing frustration more so than anything.
And in my book 'frustration' doesn't lead to 'fun'.
That's not the kind of attention TR are currently enjoying, quite the opposite in fact.
You're having frustrating elements of your arsenal improved, we're looking to get the opposite treatment.

It would be like giving TR guns a chance to jam if you don't let the weapon cool down every so often to make up for the generally larger mag sizes.
Does that sound fun? It certainly could be 'interesting'.

While I don't agree with the OP's premise that TR get coddled by the devs, the fact that VS AR's haven't been touched yet when 1/2 of them are atrocious (especially our default AR) is kinda BS. Really, I think that LMG's and Carbine's are in a good spot overall balance wise, but the fact that VS (and even NC) medics have mediocre weapons at best outside of 1-2 standout's is kind of bad.

i was speaking about the first update, with the enhanced audio and they did some changes to the lasher at that time too, as well as a few other guns.....but its been too long since then......

i do think the VS should get updated, but once SOE gets over the hump of reworking the ALL MBT secondaries, i think then would be a good time to start asking for some consideration.


they are making 3 new MBT weapons, the thresher, enforcer, and marauder. higby confirmed that a crewed tank is something they want to do soon as well......phase 2 of the resource system is coming SOONTM

i think that the heat mechanic is something that should be considered to be put on all weapons of the Vanu (at least all that can have it sensibly, Sniper rifles wouldnt be able to have it.)

(just not in its current state, it needs a bit of work still before this could be considered, but personally i think these kinds of cool things should be kept on the Directive weapons, becuase then there is more motivation to get them)

its an interesting idea that is far more unique than what you guys have, and it would give them a way to fix the Spiker by making is more like the phaseshift, where you have normal 2 round burst and then a charge up that has a similar heat system. i think that would be the best way to fix the spiker and the Vanu as a whole

well they are re-working ALL MBT secondaries, the canister will likely become a ground hammer