Rifleman Archive
Thread: State of the Rifles Address
The rifleman community is currently going through major changes during this combat revamp. Our focus is changing from being a beat then up front line shooter to a more thoughtful tactical role. Our once vaunt strengths of armor piercing and heavy damage AOEs have gone the way of the Dodo. In return they have given us the ability to slow down attacks, to do devastating single target hitsand the ability of cover which we do not fully understand as of yet.
For many months (read years) we had had FoTM combat templates and a completely out of control combat game where only a few professions had a role in it. I am proud to say we were one of them - I am sad to say it was because with the limitations of the old system we essentially were just lucky enough to be able to utilize them for our purposes.
The lack of mind pool healing, the ultimate armors that none could crack without special damage types, the healing that could be performed by the lowest of the medics, Buffs that were out of this world and uneven buffing all lead to a situation that had to change. When professions such as pistoleers, carbineers, creature handlers, bounty hunters and commandos were superseded by most melee professions and when only one ranged profession was considered viable we had a situation that needed to be adjusted.
The Combat Upgrade was born of that need and it has been in the works for almost 2 years. We were promised it back in November of 2003 and again multiples of times since that date. It has evolved and changed multiples of times and in focus and scale. At first they envisioned it as a re-balance, then a revamp and then finally a complete change to the system as problems show that they could not be re-balance or revamped away. The mind pool problem was especially troublesome. If they made it heal-able they created immortal doctors, if they removed it they removed the uniqueness and abilities of a few professions (the rifleman and the swordsmen).
During the CU alpha team discussions we found many other flaws with the solutions they had and basically they keep iterating the old system but never could find a decent none exploitable solution. This brought about the idea of a revolution in the system. What we are seeing now. The professions all have a role, players have a harder time playing afk as it is much faster and better to play at the keyboard and stats mean something. Well the old system was unique and fun it also was fatally flawed and basically unfixable without removing professions and fun from the system.
Going forward we should learn to accept this new system. I still have many issues with it and I am sure you do as well. All I ask is that you remain respectful and bring forward you issues in a manner that is constructive and helpful as it is much easier to get people to listen to others who are not insulting them.
Finally I would love to thank the Rifleman for the patience and the understanding you all have shown. You all are basically reasonable and cool about this and that makes my job so much easier.
Ackehece
On to our new CU issues so far
- Bowcaster - higher level one
- e11 should be an elite weapon - suggested solution swap with the laser rifle in our tree
- how does cover work in the new system
- LOS and small pebbles syndrome
Live issues
AoE Bug - AoE attacks not hitting all targets in the cone of attack (old)Cu removes this- FS Ranged Mods - Force Sensative Ranged mods are not working for ranged weapons. However Melee mods are effect ranged weapons (old)
AoE and LoS - AoE attacks causing aggro on targets that have no line of sight to the Rifleman (thru walls, different levels, etc) (old)Cu removes thisStock/Scope Graphics - Stocks and Scopes will not show on factory runs of weapons. They do on hand crafted ones however (old)Cu issue - has been addressed for now but will be looked at in futureCombat Que Clearing - When targeting a lair with an AoE attack. If you kill a MOB that is in the cone it will frequently clear the combat que (old)Cu removes this- Prone Warping - When going prone there are occassion where the player will 'warp' a fair amount of distance. This usually has a very negative result on Rifleman as they usualy go prone at or close to max range. The 'warp' frequently takes them out of range to the target (old)
Prone Auto-Fire - When going prone,frequently autofire will not work. However specials will. (new)Appears to be fixed with the CU - but autofire is still buggy- Target Locking - Frequently the 'target' will get locked on a specific MOB and will not cycle free without first targeting yourself to clear it.
One thing that I thought I'd ask: Basically all of the former concerns dealing with AoE's have been crossed out with reasoning that the "CU removes this". By this do you mean that we don't have to worry about it anymore since rifleman has no AoE's, or that the problem is/will be literally resolved in the CU?
Also, there are still a few of us old-timers around that remember when rifleman was not only not considered FotM material, it was widely considered to be weak and not worth the bother, comparable to non-stacked pistoleer now. I mastered rifle in the first month of live, and it was quite a while before rifleman tags started being commonly seen. Looking back on those times reminds me that it will be important to give things some time to play out after the CU; after all, the actual capabilities of a master rifleman changed very little from those early days to the dominating ranged profession we are considered today (aside from 2x melee damage multiplier removal), but the general perception of our capabilities changed greatly.
Here's hoping that riflemen will continue to be powerful characters, while also hoping that we start to see some more carbineers and pistoleers out there too.
Basically there was a feeling that we were usurping the role that Carbineers play so they remove aoe's from us... not something I approved of but it did solve a bunch of our outstanding issues by making them moot... otoh I want to see what they mean by nuker. I feel that we might be seeing damage multipliers in high digits when we have the advanced versions of our attacks.
LecheHombre wrote:
Excellent post Acke!
One thing that I thought I'd ask: Basically all of the former concerns dealing with AoE's have been crossed out with reasoning that the "CU removes this". By this do you mean that we don't have to worry about it anymore since rifleman has no AoE's, or that the problem is/will be literally resolved in the CU?
Also, there are still a few of us old-timers around that remember when rifleman was not only not considered FotM material, it was widely considered to be weak and not worth the bother, comparable to non-stacked pistoleer now. I mastered rifle in the first month of live, and it was quite a while before rifleman tags started being commonly seen. Looking back on those times reminds me that it will be important to give things some time to play out after the CU; after all, the actual capabilities of a master rifleman changed very little from those early days to the dominating ranged profession we are considered today (aside from 2x melee damage multiplier removal), but the general perception of our capabilities changed greatly.
Here's hoping that riflemen will continue to be powerful characters, while also hoping that we start to see some more carbineers and pistoleers out there too.
Message Edited by iixxee on 04-07-2005 12:42 AM
iixxee wrote:am I understanding that rifleman has no more AOE attacks? well ...guess im going carbineer .Message Edited by iixxee on 04-07-2005 12:42 AM
or pistol...
and ALSO rifle.
see, the new specials are entirely different.
example? pistol special: /fanshot.
guess what? you can use /fanshot with a rifle. it's an AOE (probably... we don't have access to elite skills).
there are a VERY few ranged specials that are restricted to certain ranged weapons (auto-fire seems to be mainly a carbine thing). you can't use a melee attack with a ranged weapon, but you can pretty much use ANY ranged special with a rifle, carbine, or pistol.
same goes for melee attacks/specials (exception: bleed requires an edged weapon).
JediGias wrote:
I've read that specials for one ranged class will apply to all ranged weapons (in most cases). If this is true we could have the damage of rifleman with the AOE of Carbineer if you go both routs.
Correct - that being said - AOE's are not the domain of riflemen anymore but are in other professions. I suspect if we use an outclass special it would not have a damage amplifcation for our weapon but would use the same damage multiplier the other profession has. Where you will see the benefit of stacked professions is in the generic mods you pick. Generic speed stacks, generic accuracy stacks etc.
The only profession to actually benefit more then the orginal class from a special is the commandos as their weapons have integrated dots or abilites.
Rifleman + carb aoe = carb aoe damage (with accuracy and speed of the combined classes)
Rifleman + commando rocket launcher (rifleman special multiple + commandoburst radius around target+ and speed and accuracy of combined class)