Weaponsmith Archive

Ok, first, I will do my best to stick to Weaponsmith stuff and not get into what needs to be changed in other professions to make ours better. Second, I think post was a great idea. Bravo.


Pistols:

Much of what needs to be canged/fixed here has to do with damage types and balancing the power of the pistols against each other. A geonosian sonic is twice as strong as a tangle, making the tangle useless. rather than nerfing the sonic, i say drop the tangle pistol. if the rumors are true about mitigation going away, then the fact there is only a 50pt hole isn't going to matter when it is about 100dmg worse than a decent made Sonic.

The n00b weapons need a change as well. While I would prefer to see the XP requirements changed in the combat fields, this can also be accomplished by changing some damage types. everything is energy. give a striker pistol light AP, and then swith something like the D-18 to kinetic dmg with AP0.

No new pistols until you fix the ones we have. There is plenty of work to do right in front of us. If we can get all the pistols working to a point that they all still have a meaning when you are a master, then it will be like revamped content, as it should be, and nothing new will need to be added right away.

Reduce the HAM addition on scopes to a number that can be fully experimented out in 5 points of great sucesses. I don't believe a scope should add any HAM at all, but I can slightly see the point, which is moot with other changes said to be coming.

Increase the number of power handlers needed. Only the D-18 should require just one. Balance the Handlers so that they will add the dmg, reduce the speed, according to the number put in (a 5-10dmg -.1spd handler that goes in a pistol four times adds 20-40 dmg, reduces speed by -.4, and one that only requires two increases by 10-20dmg and reduces spd by -.2).

Rifles-Carbines:

Pretty much just read the pistols section. Also, HAM constraints on the stock need to be reduced. +28 with no experimentation is simply too high, I don't care if you are concerned about the +40 dmg. If it bothers you that much, reduce it to a max of +30. I know it can't be too much of a bother since you gave us 25/25 imperial stocks with a -.5 speed reduction and no HAM cost.

Separate some components to be carbine only. Help them be more unique. Give us a restraint dmg type carbine with low dmg output that increases the action affecting states that carbineers can apply with their specials for crowd control. I'm thinking something along the lines of the tangle pistol stats or lower.

Heavy Weapons-Specials:

The resource requirements on the consumable weapons are ridiculous, especially the rocket launcher. Drop them.... By at least 1/3... Preferrably by half.

The LLC, Flame Thrower, and Acid Launcher good. The main issues with these lie in their profession trees, not in the weaponsmith.

Guns in general:

Make all optional components show up the final builds, factory created or not. I want to see a scope and a stock on my DXR-6b. Give us some color options. One interesting way of doing this is to add a line of optional metals/chemicals/gems that will change the color of the final product.

Melee Weapons:

Balance it out and give us the Razor Knucklers. We also need brass knuckles with an AP0 unarmed grind. There should be no difference in the difficulty of grinding any novice profession. They should all require exactly the same amount of time based on 6hrs of playing time per day.

More components, or increase the number required. Swords are folded hundreds of times, yet we make 1 core. The best way to help limit production runs is to increase the core requirements so no weapon can be made with a 999 schem. And keep your nerfing hands off our schem size. DO NOT REDUCE THE MAX SCHEM SIZE.

More polymer. For every mix of metals you have, polymer should be required.

Balance the 1H weapons. The strongest weapon is an acklay gaffi; a weapon usable at brawler box 1. Re-classify the acklay bone to replace geonosian core slots only. This way it can only be used in the limited schematic items of scythes and hacks. This also makes it so multiple bones are required to make a weapon, reducing the number of acklay weapons available. Balance this through the classes by creating a 1H weapon and a polearm weapon that use these these bones, or create better loot to enhance the other weapons with. Preferrably, make new weapons that require multiple pieces of the loot to make the item to help limit the numbers that can be made.

Munitions:

Damage ranges are fine. Reduce schematic requirements, schematic complexity, and resource usage. These are consumable weapons and should not require the same as weapons that will last 10 times as long.

Overall weapons, Experimentation, and Resources:

I think if they plan to reduce buffs and armour effectiveness, no weapon damage ranges should be changed. The buff/armour changes will already make combat more difficult. In addition, with the HAM changes coming, there will need to be a balancing of HAM costs.

Get rid of this gated resources crap. Everything numbers from 1-1000. Balance the weapons as needed to keep them in their same damage range, but this certain resources can't go over certain numbers is ridiculous and requires more programming than is necessary. It's one of those nice thoughts in a perfect world.

Separate speed and damage experimentation. This would go FAR in helping balance out slices, as now speed would be equally as desirable as damage. It would also go far in separating the 10pt smith from the 12pt smith.

Put all 100 assembly and experimentation points in the trees, none in the master box. This allows people to specialize in certain weapon types, while not granting full benefits since there are many high end weapons they will not be able to craft.

Put more emphasis on weapon range modifiers and cap it. Personal range + weapon range / 2 = % of chance to hit. 125 would be the cap on both, with te extra 25% helping against the dodge defense stackers, making them easier to hit. Also increase the effectiveness of experimenting on HAM and Range mods.


Most of the combat revamphas nothing to do with the weaponsmith himself/herself, it has to do with player speed caps and things more directly combat related. the above mentioned things, though, could help.

---

Mor-Dan wrote:

but that is a combat thing, not a weaponsmith thing. i don't see us having a role there. our role is to help balance a weapon and make them all useful in reference to combat, or to come up with a change to experimentation/assembly that affects the combat ability of the weapon.

at least that is how i see it...

---

Well, that's the thing. Saving a new nefarious exceptions, weapons are pretty balanced -- it's just the systems they're implemented in completely wrecks that balance. Bear in mind, they jacked all the certsdown shortly before Launch, which really added to the mess. The lack of proper cert scaling results in gating a ton of weapons, the linear speed overpowers many and things like Legendary weapons just make them completely worthless against any opponent equipped with such high-end weaponry.

IMHO, things like experimentation and gated resources would be a crafting balance concern, not a combat balance concern. Granted, the system would work more logically if the hard caps were placed on weapons instead of resources, but that would be a huge project that would do little for combat balance specifically. That doesn't mean I wouldn't like to see a very needed experimentation revamp, I'm just trying to be realistic about priorities for combat versus priorities for crafting. I'd like to think our primary role is going to be regarding the rescaling of certifications and the tweaks implemented to ensure we preserve that appropriate scale, as that is going to have the greatest impact to combat.

(Just as a disclaimer, these are just idle stipulations and opinion. Don't assume that I'm speaking on behalf of the actual design docs, I'm just stating how I would see it in general!)

---

SeaRaptor wrote:

In addition, I disagree with the original poster's comments about DOTs. In my opinion, DOT attacks are one of the biggest problem with PvP.

---

Agreed. I also think Legendary weapons (and just any one-shot-kill ultimate weapon-of-destruction)need to be refined, severely. Legendary weaponry, especially with DoTs, are pretty much the bane of PvP's existence.

Outside of that:

• AP system needs to be less retarded.


• Cert system needs to be less retarded.


• Munitionsneed to be less retarded.


• Speed system needsto be less retarded.

And just all of the other obvious design flaws need to be revamped, not necessarily directly pertaining to weapons.

This is just what I personally think should be high priority, not necessarily what's going into the combat balance. They should be posting the design docs in the very near future and you'll be able to see for yourself whether or not your hopes come true.

---

BoberFett wrote:

Gated resources are necessary. You're not supposed to be using superconductive Iron.

---

true, but that is with the current set up. if they rate everything on a 1-100% effectiveness system, then gating isn't needed. the weapon caps at the level they capit at. you can say with perfect resources a T21 will not go over 375dmgs and do it without gating the resources at 100 on one thing and 250 on something else. a cond of 100 being its max makes it 100% effective for it's use. what does it matter if it shows up as 100 or 1000? i am saying don't gate the resources, cap the dmg/speed of the weapon. for instance, no matter how perfect your resources are, without an enhancement of some kind your condition will never start higher than 975. 975 is the condition of a weapon made with perfect resources (1000 to any required stats).

does that make more sense?



and i agree, the cert system, and speed systems are jacked, but there is nothing to change in WS to fix that unless you jack up weapon speeds. instead of doing that, just change the weapons formula or add speed caps. maybe set it up so the speed cap is the speed of the weapon. no matter what mods you have, your 2.1spd gun will NEVER fire faster than 2.1 x delay mod of the special you are using. but that is a combat thing, not a weaponsmith thing. i don't see us having a role there. our role is to help balance a weapon and make them all useful in reference to combat, or to come up with a change to experimentation/assembly that affects the combat ability of the weapon.

at least that is how i see it...

---

SeaRaptor wrote:

1. Grenades and munitions need to be balanced. That is, they need to not suck. They need more charges, and (possibly) be easier to craft. In addition, all grenades other than the C12 should NOT becerted in the Commando tree, IMHO.


2. Each weapon in our inventory needs to be "good". It's hard to quantify that term, but that's the most general way I can put it. There needs to be a potential customer for everything we can make, particularly junk no one uses right now like the Tusken or Power5.


3. We need to give each weapon a unique identity. The DLT20 and DLT20a are the same bloody weapon (poor schematic placement notwithstanding). The scythe and the Hack have the same crafting requirements (???). The DL44 will always be better than the Metal DL44 b/c of resource caps, thus making the DL44 useless. All of these need to change, IMHO.


4. Weapon certs need to better match up with weapon schematic placement in the WS tree. I can't make a laser rifle until Firearms 4. But a Rifleman will start wanting that Rifle at Rifles 2 (manyhours worth of work on the fledgling WS' part vice a few minutes for the aspiring Rifleman).


5. Weapon certs themselves need to be re-arranged. Why is the second best rifle certed in a box that's so easy to get? Why are VKs certed at TKN (this was a knee-jerk change)? The entire certification system needs to be examined and re-worked.

That's all I can think of off the top of my head.

---

I always thought the dot weapons, (Reb blaster, fietherweight, etc), dot strength should reflect the qaulity of you minerals.

Or add another box (Rancor bile), for strength.

Then again, I am FOS

---

Wargfang wrote:

With swords, Id like to be able to put a core in a core and effectively fold it ! Perhaps I could do this x times and each time see some sort of improvement....

Ooooooo

---

Bob explain to me what you mean by fold a core? Can I powerup a core with a core now? I don't know...Guess I am a WSithing idiot...