Rifleman Archive
Thread: Special Protections are Ridiculous
Shlo_mo_shun wrote:
Ok, a few facts from a Master Armorsmith.
First, the hard cap for stun in composite is 45%....(3-15% stun layers) However, since there are artificial 'gates' for many resources (including those required for stun layers) the highest you WILL currently ever see is possibly 39% or 40%. 39% is the highest I have heard of.
So, the first poster is absurd when he complains about Riflemen getting owned as opposed to everyone else. Fact is, you have the most effective weapon for defeating a heavily armored foe. Any other stun weapon is AP0, which means they suffer a 50% immediate reduction that your Jawa doesn't suffer. So that pretty much puts that to rest.
Additionally, you primarily attack an unhealablepool, further compounding your advantage. DO I think riflemen are overpowered, NO. They work as intended, and some of the other professions are broken in various ways, making them not work as intended.
Do I think armor is overpowered in general. Maybe a little. Mostly in the sense that Composite has only one weakness, the HAM....and it isn't that much worse than many other armors that have large weakensses in terms of vunerabilities. Plus, it makes soloing high-end MOBs too easy, although it balances out in PvP cause everyone can wear the same stuff.
As an armorsmith, Shlo_mo_shun, what would you think of this?
In my opinion, all armor should have some vulnerability or weaknesses. Putting stun protection on Composite now means that it has some protection against everything. I would think that the way to balance this would be to make it so that there is a cap on how much overall protection an armor can have, and not just because it raises HAM. I mean a real cap. For instance, you could have 80% Kenetic, but you would only be able to get, say , 10% Cold if you did.Also, no armor should be able to protect against all damage types. So, if you add Stun protection, it should make it vulnerable to something else (maybe some selectable vulnerability or some automatic fomula, like +Stun makes it vulnerable to Heat).
A balance like that would still allow you to put high resists into the armor, but somebody would still be able to do damage to the armor. The attacker would not know what damage type. He would just have to try different weapons. Also, you could wear armor pieces with different weaknesses so as not be completely vulnerable to a single damage type. In this way, no one can walk around nearly impervious to all attacks.
As an armorsmith, what are your thoughts on something like that?
Shlo_mo_shun wrote:
Ok, a few facts from a Master Armorsmith.
First, the hard cap for stun in composite is 45%....(3-15% stun layers) However, since there are artificial 'gates' for many resources (including those required for stun layers) the highest you WILL currently ever see is possibly 39% or 40%. 39% is the highest I have heard of.
So, the first poster is absurd when he complains about Riflemen getting owned as opposed to everyone else. Fact is, you have the most effective weapon for defeating a heavily armored foe. Any other stun weapon is AP0, which means they suffer a 50% immediate reduction that your Jawa doesn't suffer. So that pretty much puts that to rest.
If a target is vulnerable to the damage type it drops the AR to zero along with the AP. So it doesn't matter if the Jawa rifle is AP1 when hitting composite that is stun vulnerable. It looses the AP bonus. Also since composite is stun vulnerable, those AP0 weapons do 100% damage.
Damage is then modified for stun resists. So all stun weapons would be doing 61% vs 39% resist composite armor. Doesn't matter if it's AP0, AP1, or AP3.
Additionally, you primarily attack an unhealablepool, further compounding your advantage. DO I think riflemen are overpowered, NO. They work as intended, and some of the other professions are broken in various ways, making them not work as intended.
Not quite. The primary attack for a Master Rifle is usually StrafeShot2. Which is random HAM pool. We do have the ability to target the mind though.
Waste93 wrote:
Shlo_mo_shun wrote:
Ok, a few facts from a Master Armorsmith.
First, the hard cap for stun in composite is 45%....(3-15% stun layers) However, since there are artificial 'gates' for many resources (including those required for stun layers) the highest you WILL currently ever see is possibly 39% or 40%. 39% is the highest I have heard of.
So, the first poster is absurd when he complains about Riflemen getting owned as opposed to everyone else. Fact is, you have the most effective weapon for defeating a heavily armored foe. Any other stun weapon is AP0, which means they suffer a 50% immediate reduction that your Jawa doesn't suffer. So that pretty much puts that to rest.
If a target is vulnerable to the damage type it drops the AR to zero along with the AP. So it doesn't matter if the Jawa rifle is AP1 when hitting composite that is stun vulnerable. It looses the AP bonus. Also since composite is stun vulnerable, those AP0 weapons do 100% damage.
Damage is then modified for stun resists. So all stun weapons would be doing 61% vs 39% resist composite armor. Doesn't matter if it's AP0, AP1, or AP3.
Additionally, you primarily attack an unhealablepool, further compounding your advantage. DO I think riflemen are overpowered, NO. They work as intended, and some of the other professions are broken in various ways, making them not work as intended.
Not quite. The primary attack for a Master Rifle is usually StrafeShot2. Which is random HAM pool. We do have the ability to target the mind though.
Waste93,
What you speak ofis the way it would work for armor that is vulnerable to Stun. But that is not to what he was referring. He is talking aboutarmor witha stun layer. That means it is no longer vulnerable to stun. Therefore, Shlo is correct. Here is the difference:
Take two stun weapons, one AP0 and one AP1. Let us say they both get a 500 point base (combat window)hit against an AR1 (light armor)target. If that target is stun vulnerable, both do 500 points of actual damage because, when the target is vulnerable to stun damage, armor and resistance factors are bypassed, so there is no adjustment to the base number due to armor or resistances. The combat window damage is the actual damage. However, add even a 1% stun layer to the armor, and there is a dramatic change. Now, the target is no longer vulnerable to stun.
So, for AP vs. AR, they are at the same level, Light. Therefore, the AP1 weapon still gets no bonus from AP vs. AR, but neither does it take a penalty from AP vs. AR. Next, taking into account resistances, the weapon takes a 1% hit (5 points) for the resistances, so it does 495 points of actual damage.
The AP0 weapon on the other hand, gets a 50% penalty for AP0 (no armor piercing) vs AR1 (light armor), so the damage is reduced to250 points due to AP vs. armor. Then another 1% damage (2.5 points or 3 points) is deducted for the resistances, so the actual damage is now 247.
The two weapons go from doing the same damage against a vulnerable target to a difference of 248 points of damage against one with 1% resists. So, you can see adding even 1% protection makes a huge difference in the amount of damage caused by the the two weapons. And that is what Shlo is saying.
The calculations should be independent. And adding stun layers shouldn't remove the armor vulnerability. Has it been tested to see which method is occuring?
Sotaudi wrote:
Waste93,
What you speak ofis the way it would work for armor that is vulnerable to Stun. But that is not to what he was referring. He is talking aboutarmor witha stun layer. That means it is no longer vulnerable to stun. Therefore, Shlo is correct. Here is the difference:
Take two stun weapons, one AP0 and one AP1. Let us say they both get a 500 point base (combat window)hit against an AR1 (light armor)target. If that target is stun vulnerable, both do 500 points of actual damage because, when the target is vulnerable to stun damage, armor and resistance factors are bypassed, so there is no adjustment to the base number due to armor or resistances. The combat window damage is the actual damage. However, add even a 1% stun layer to the armor, and there is a dramatic change. Now, the target is no longer vulnerable to stun.
So, for AP vs. AR, they are at the same level, Light. Therefore, the AP1 weapon still gets no bonus from AP vs. AR, but neither does it take a penalty from AP vs. AR. Next, taking into account resistances, the weapon takes a 1% hit (5 points) for the resistances, so it does 495 points of actual damage.
The AP0 weapon on the other hand, gets a 50% penalty for AP0 (no armor piercing) vs AR1 (light armor), so the damage is reduced to250 points due to AP vs. armor. Then another 1% damage (2.5 points or 3 points) is deducted for the resistances, so the actual damage is now 247.
The two weapons go from doing the same damage against a vulnerable target to a difference of 248 points of damage against one with 1% resists. So, you can see adding even 1% protection makes a huge difference in the amount of damage caused by the the two weapons. And that is what Shlo is saying.
Waste93 wrote:
The calculations should be independent. And adding stun layers shouldn't remove the armor vulnerability. Has it been tested to see which method is occuring?
Ok, a few facts from a Master Armorsmith.
First, the hard cap for stun in composite is 45%....(3-15% stun layers) However, since there are artificial 'gates' for many resources (including those required for stun layers) the highest you WILL currently ever see is possibly 39% or 40%. 39% is the highest I have heard of.
So, the first poster is absurd when he complains about Riflemen getting owned as opposed to everyone else. Fact is, you have the most effective weapon for defeating a heavily armored foe. Any other stun weapon is AP0, which means they suffer a 50% immediate reduction that your Jawa doesn't suffer. So that pretty much puts that to rest.
Additionally, you primarily attack an unhealablepool, further compounding your advantage. DO I think riflemen are overpowered, NO. They work as intended, and some of the other professions are broken in various ways, making them not work as intended.
Do I think armor is overpowered in general. Maybe a little. Mostly in the sense that Composite has only one weakness, the HAM....and it isn't that much worse than many other armors that have large weakensses in terms of vunerabilities. Plus, it makes soloing high-end MOBs too easy, although it balances out in PvP cause everyone can wear the same stuff.