Thoughts on how the nerf cycle changes trends in weapon use

(i. This is going to be a very Vanu perspective post as it's what I play most)
(ii. I'm not 100% about certain buffs, nerfs and dates. I'm working here with a general idea)

I never used to think of the PPA as OP. It was one of the first things I got for my Magrider in late 2012. I got it because I liked having a futuristic Vanu styled weapon as opposed to a conventional one on top of my tank. My friends used it, said it was ok, but a bit weak. You did not see many of them around.

Recently it was nerfed and there were a great many posts about it being OP. Did it get buffed at some point? I don't recall it getting buffed. So what changed?

Other things got nerfed and suddenly it became a viable option in the absence of others, and everyone started using it. And herein is the point of this post: Does anyone think about the knock on effects of nerfing one weapon on other existing weapons?

Let's take the Orion. Hated it would seem by a good amount of people and decried as OP. In 2013 I don't recall too many Orion OP threads. It was acknowledged as being a better started weapon then the Gauss SAW and the Carv but there was not thread after thread about it. So again, what changed? It was not buffed. Other LMGs were nerfed to the point that people looked at the Orion and said "NOW, that is not half bad". Add the fact that it is a very good starter weapon and it's absolutely everywhere and therefore under much more scrutiny.

What other weapons have come to the forefront that were previously gathering dust. I hear people talking about the Kobalt a lot now. You never used to see a Kobalt. What else?

Also what are your thoughts on these, perhaps, unintended knock on effects of nerfing one weapon on other weapons? Is it good that previously unused weapons now get used? Is it good that it exposes imbalances in weapons that people did not notice before? Is it bad as it creates trends with 'everyone' using weapon X?

The PPA is now a better close range weapon than it was and can't be spammed at long range effectively anymore while the Orion is just the VS's 'best" close-quarters LMG and in their case they get it for free you'll see just as many NC using the Anchor once they get their hands on it I know it's the only LMG I use now. The problem with nerfs is that everything is balnced around infantry and what bothers them so the things that actually break the game and are overpowered like long-range infantry AV and C-4 don't get touched because they don't effect infantry they only benefit them. Infact the only change I've ever seen to benefit vehicles was implementing the sunderer deployment shield and that was just to keep infantry fight's from being interrupted by other infantry because the infantry classes are too good at soloing vehicles.

Interesting post. I had the same thought recently about something all factions turned into the Flavor of the month: AV grenades.

Those things have been around and have been just as effective since launch iirc. But somehow, out of the blue, every single person was spamming them and they became loadout of choice for Heavies.

All of a sudden, without any changes to their stats, AV grenades became OP and needed an immediate nerf. after 2 years.

Things seem to get to a critical mass in this game and people just get sick of it. Ie: ZOE 4th factioning, PPA spam everywhere, Dalton spam when it had 100m blast radius, AV nades, Furies being nerfed like 5 times and recently becoming a hot topic for nerfs again as people start using them more, like the Orion people now see the Anchor as OP after being ignored by the player base for a long time, and these are only a few examples of when a weapon becomes overused to the point that people see it as OP all of a sudden.

I knew the PPA was extremely good and possibly OP over a year ago. It was simply overshadowed by the Saron for people to notice. I think a large part of the problem is AI weapon are really only good at killing infantry while AV weapons are still decent at AI, so AI weapons are only worth taking for the ability to farm (why most AV weapons sniper rifle accurate? Does it really need to be able to pull off headshots at IRD to hit something the size of a... well a tank?).

As for the Orion, not really sure about it being OP but it does seem to be used just as much (and I see the Auraxium variant of it used more than all other directive weapons combined) as when people complained about the CARV being OP. Though it could be to all other LMGs being lackluster and the Orion being the only one really worth using. I don't really use LMGs when I play VS so I don't have much of an opinion on them.

Overall I think it is due to that people really don't like fighting VS (myself included) and I personally don't think it can be pinpointed to a specific weapon (which people on here are trying to do). I think it is due to the fact that the faction seems to have a low floor and high ceiling, while TR has a low floor and ceiling while NC has a high floor and ceiling. So if you are TR you are going to find yourself outgunned by the better players in the faction and if you are NC you are going to find yourself swarmed by lesser experienced players.

There's definitely been an increase in sticky grenade spam as well. Both the AV and sticky grenade spam are very likely due to directives. Heck, even the missile HA primary people complained about is encouraged by directives.

Somehow C4 seems to have escaped being touched - despite being literally a tactical nuke in the hands of a single infantry peon.

Game balance is definitely weird thing and totally based on FOTM as people complain about whatever kills them the most during a particular period.

Directives is a huge pusher for style; I used to pull a class of choice were as now I look at my directive list for class and weapon to pick the optimal combination to level two at the same time. This made me go grind another AR (on VS which says a lot!) simply to get it rather then grab a better weapon.

my observations (Emerald):

1. after the Dalton splash nerf, people actually use the Zepher now. however, Duster is still very underpowered, i've yet to be killed by it

2. after HEAT nerf, only people with stock MBTs seem to use it. all others jumped on the AP bandwagon, the best (and only useful) MBT primary in the game at the moment

3. nobody uses Grenade Launchers for carbines/assault rifles anymore. instead, people switched to Heavy and use their Rocketlauncher as makeshift grenade launcher

4. some ESF pilots stopped using Rocketpods completely after they got constantly nerfed. now, pilots rather use AI primaries (Airhammer, Banshee, light PPA) for farming as well as Hornets to hunt down vehicles. this wasn't the case around one year ago as Rocketpods were the go-to secondary for AI and AT work

5. similarly, no ESF pilot uses the AA rotaries anymore after the nerfs. the defaults became the best alrounder

6. Bulldog usage went back for both Sunderers and Galaxies. instead, people use the Basilisk/Drake or Walker, especially after the latter's velocity buff

7. Fury/Marauder on a Harasser was the number one farm vehicle in the game around one year ago: find a group of infantry, point, click, receive certs. nowadays, i tend to see much more AT Harasser setups, no one ever goes for grenade launchers any more. surprisingly enough, the only prevalent AI setup became the Canister

8. after the Striker went from lock-on to dumbfire/Coyote-style, hardly anyone uses them anymore. @TR ->

The true beauty of the Dalton is wrecking vehicles and it is still totally OP in that regard, really needed that reload speed nerf very badly. All the splash damage does is make it less useful vs. infantry. But then again we all know, nerf cycles in general favor making all vehicles less effective vs. infantry, its not necessarily about overall game balance.

Unless you're doing directives. But AP master race indeed. I still managed to get the Python HE to get me somewhere further in my Lightning directives, but its like doing hard mode.

You'll see a return to rocket pods if AI primaries get nerfed - the Banshee nerf is already incoming and really from my usage of all 3, the AH and LPPA aren't far behind the Banshee. If anything, the AH is the superior weapon of the 3 because you can actually use it more effectively vs. air, and do some damage to ground vehicles... loving it.

Rotaries are dumb... there's NO reason again to use them, aside from directives. They're worse in the role they're designed to do even. Go figure. SOE logic.

The Bulldog on the Gal is still fine, the problem was Gal/Lib Bulldogs, the sunderer Bulldog was a casualty not of its own doing. The Basilisk is one of those stupid cycles - the original Basilisk wasn't too bad but people said it was UP, so it got buffed, then it got really nerfed again. I hate the Basilisk that we ended up with now. The Viper went through that period of buffs, then it got nerfed too.

Meh - TR may have lost the Striker, but the ZOE's been that way for how long now? Useless beyond useless.

You had a refund for ZOE.

I share the same story with the PPA. It actually was my very first weapon unlock in the game back in 2012. Haven't used it much though. After a while I was looking for a fury equivalent but I didn't find one. So I replaced the PPA with a Walker when it was introduced because air was so incredibly strong at that time

I remember that shotguns haven't been very popular until the introduction of the godlike vanilla pumps. Had some good times with my Nighthawk back in the days. You really felt like a special snowflake with a shottie in your hands. Now shotguns are practically everywhere. Even slug shotties seem to be fairly popular. And the Jackhammer, man the Jackhammer was considered useless for a long time. Now it's a popular choice and some even deem it op. Did it get buffed? I have no idea.

I agree strongly. The game balance is an ecosytem, changing one area can end up having a profound affect on another area. Likewise, things like Power Creep (the game changing as more players either get access to more weapons or more players figure out how to use them more effectively) can also end up having profound effects across gameplay.

For the PPA, there were a lot of nerfs to reliable (effective, owned, and used) anti-Tank measures. AV Mana Turret (range nerf + aiming bug), Tank Mines (bigger + implant to see them), ESF Noseguns (resist table adjusted up for Tanks vs. them), Striker (nerf and then weapon type change), Phoenix (bug), Lib (power nerf), etc. These change all increase the survivability of the Tank as a platform, opening up their weapons that risk exposure to be more powerful (as that exposure is now less dangerous to the Tank).

For Banshee, there were nerfs to the non-AI Noseguns (upped the resist rate vs. most targets, which made them still good vs. other ESFs, but bad vs. most other targets), the Power Creep of the Air game led to ESF vs. ESF matchup being much more dominated by Top Pilots and Gank Squads, and changes with Libs and Gals made crewed Libs/Gals much more effective vs. ESFs. This put the average ESF pilots in a position where they did not want to do A2A (Libs and Gals are bad targets, and ESF battles are won by mapwide roaming/hunting A2A ESF Squads and Top Pilots), which meant these ESF pilots changed to more G2A. For G2A, ESF pilots could choose (1) AI Nosegun (Banshee = very, very good vs. Infantry), (2) Rocket Pods (good vs. Infantry, ok vs. Tanks), or (3) Hornets (good vs. Tanks, ok vs. Infantry). SOE provided a Cert refund on Acquisition Timer (which was a major Certline for many ESF pilots) which helped those players get the Certs to unlock the Banshee. SOE also added many things which motivated players to Grind more: Implants, Directives, new items (needing Certs to unlock), etc. This grinding pushed players to want to farm Infantry (very plentiful, easy to kill, high rewards). Many Mosquito players opted to use the Banshee and farm AI.

If we increase the survivability of a unit, we improve the efficiently of its riskier weapons.

If we narrow down what targets a unit can take on, we push it to farm those targets it can still kill well, and to start using loadouts that are best for killing those targets.

The PPA for a long time got very sporadic usage, I think it was only in the last 6 months before the nerf that its popularity rose. I can see SOE playing the "whack-a-mole" game of nerfing whatever flavor of the month weapon that people are currently complaining about until everything has been nerfed to oblivion, just like ZOE or the striker.

I think this is why there needs to be a dynamic pricing system for all equipment, so that whatever gets pulled more often rises in price until its no longer attractive. The alternative is to continue to whack one mole, then the next, and so on until every weapon is identical to another or has been nerfed until obsolescence.

Generally the reason you see a large number of threads about balance on a small number of weapons at a time, is that the community largely deals with the biggest elephant in the room first. Work on the biggest issue at the time (or perceived issue) and then move onto the next.

Of course back in the day, no-one used a Dalton. The Zepher was the go to Lib weapon for every situation. This was also back when LoL pods were LoL pods and you would see high ranking players just trolling all over the map with pods and Zephers.

That's true. but what interests me is how those weapons may not have changed in months if not years, but in the past no one batted an eye lid. It's how changes to weapon X influence the use of weapon Y and bring it into the forefront that I find fascinating.

the nerf cycle works like this...

There is a list of every thing in the game on a wall.

The High Command of the Nerf Bat Battalion gathers in a room and coordinates their plan of attack on just how and what they want nerfed and in what order. After much deliberation they finally decide on a list and begin with the first thing on their list. So, forth they ride to forumside to QQ, whine, *****, complain, moan, groan, gripe, whinney, cry, pout, make sad faces and all in all do everything they can to convince the powers that be to nerf said item. Upon it being nerfed, they move to item #2 on the list and repeat.

Should the game they are aiming to nerf sustain its playerbase long enough for the Nerf Bat Battalion to make it through their entire list, they simply begin again with the deliberation and the Forumwars.....and the cycle perpeutates itself infinitely until the game they are after goes down in a ball of unfun, boring, broke, buggy, lopsided, garbage, bland, shallow, lame, unimaginative, drab, grey, gay, uneventful flames.........

Upon successfully destroying a game they return to the bunker for many bottles of "Loyalty until death", many happy rather faggish gropes of each other and the congratulations and cheers go up among the Battalion and they commence to plan their next operation....

The nerf sparked an interest in the since-release laughed at shredder. It got a fat nerf, complete removal of splash damage.

More like, before the armor buff everyone used HEAT and after it, everyone used AP.

I still see plenty or rocket podders. AA nose gun used to be the only one used then after PU2 with various balance changes everyone moved towards to default nose gun. For some odd reason banshee and LPPA has raised vastly in popularity in second half of 2014.

I don't see any change to basilisk popularity on anything.

To me, half of harassers on release used fury, the rest was an even split between halberd and ES AV. Then after fury nerf it was all AV and marauder. Today canister or bulldog is a common sight. Ranger harasser is still a unicorn.

I started using PPA when Ive heard its OP. I got back to Orion when Ive heard its OP. I started playing HA when Ive heard his shield is OP.
Thank you Forumside for letting me know which things are the best.

Interesting post. I think resistance levels should have a tune up. Saves having to tinker too much.

Elaborate please.