Because I felt like creating one.
Where's the balance?
Published on August 10, 2009 By Kitkun In Sins of a Solar Empire

So there's been a bit of dicussion on balance lately. Most of it's focused on other things so far, but some caps have long been more viable than others. I'm looking to see what the community thinks would be fairly balancing in regards to buffs and debuffs in the abilities.

I'll start with my suggestions and opinions, and I'll be trying to keep things away from what we already have. Try and get a bit more diversity into the game.

Color coded for fun.

TEC:

Kol Fine as is.

Sova Fine as is.

Akkan: Buff

Colonize+ Fine as is.

Ion Bolt: Change AM from 85/85/85 to 85/80/75. (AM intensive, gives more incentive to level it up. Only good for interrupting anyways.)

Targeting Uplink: Change Accuracy bonus from 5/10/15 to 6/12/18, change Range bonus from 8/17/25 to 10/20/30. (Allows Flak to take out SC just a bit faster and gives the longer ranged TEC ships a bit more of a boost.)

Armistice: Fine as is.

Dunov Fine as is.

Marza: Mixed

Radiation Bomb: Fine as is.

Raze Planet: Fine as is.

Incendiary Shells: Allow it to stack, change Damage/Sec from 3/4.5/6 to 1/2/3, change duration from 15 to 8. (Not really that much of a buff. The Rate of Fire of a Marza allows it to maintain a stack at about 3.)

Missile Barrage: Bump up graphics more.

Advent:

Radiance: Buff

Detonate Antimatter: Fine as is.

Animosity: Fix so that debuffed ships cannot attack other ships with any weapon that could attack the Radiance. Add 2% Mitigation, change cooldown from 35 to 45. (Actually makes it useful, since as is you just give a new order.)

Energy Absorption Armor: Fine as is.

Cleansing Brilliance: Fine as is.

Halcyon Fine as is.

Progenitor: Mixed

Colonize+:   Fine as is.

Malice: Change target cap from 8/16/24 to 12/20/28.

Shield Regeneration: Change shields restored per second from 37.5/50/62.5 to 37.5/47.5/57.5. (Another awesome ability. Ready the flames, plz.)

Resurrection: Fine as is.

Rapture: Fine as is.

Revelation: Buff

Reverie: Fine as is.

GuidanceAdd 3/6/9 AM recharge. (Make it useful. You just run out of antimatter faster otherwise.)

Clairvoyance: Start with Autocast off.

Provoke Hysteria: Fine as is.

Vasari:

Kortul: Buff

Power Surge:  Fine as is.

Jam Weapons:  Fine as is.

Disruptive Strikes Fine as is.

Volatile Nanites: Change debuff range from 2000 to 2500, change damage upon death range from 1000 to 1250, change damage upon death from 150 to 200. (A bit more useful against large fleets.)

Skirantra: Buff

Repair Cloud: Fine as is.

Scramble Bombers: Kill this ability. (Move it to Lasurak or something. Suggestions for replacement welcome.) 

Microphasing Aura: Fine as is.

Replicate Forces: Change from 3 copies to 6 copies. (Much more useful in smaller groups.)

Jarrasul: Mixed

Colonize+: Change Duration from 240/480/720 to 240/360/600add 1/2/3 extra constructors for duration of buff. (Building structures really, really fast for a short while. Not like you're going to take this over others often.)

Gravity Warhead: Fine as is.

Nano-disassembler Fine as is.

Drain Planet: Fine as is.

Antorak: Buff

Phase Out Hull Fine as is.

Distort Gravity Fine as is.

Subversion: Change build rate penalty from 50/100/150 to 100/200/300, add damage over time to amount to 8/12/16% of planet health and 5/7.5/10% of population, change AM from 100/100/100 to 100/110/125, change cooldown from 75 to 150, remove stacking. (Powerful now. For damage, remember that it's over 5/7.5/10 minutes. Using stacking means the ships has to wait there or you have mutiple of these, both of which go against the hit-and-run nature of them.)

Stabilize Phase Space: Fine as is.

Vulkoras: Buff

Phase Missile Swarm: Change to fire Phase Missiles with 15/30/45% chance to bypass shields. (Again, more a bug fix.) 

Deploy Siege Platforms Fine as is.

Assault Specialization: Fine as is.

Disintegration Fine as is.

 


Comments (Page 5)
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on Aug 19, 2009

We know scramble bombers needs a re-work. Why not kill 2 birds with one stone?
Multiple squads and the speed of bombers is why I haven't messed with it. Any channeling ability could easily be made useless whenever there's a Skirantra anywhere in the gravity well.

Going to mess around and see if I can apply some effects to them in the meantime.

Messed with GRG again.

 

on Aug 19, 2009

@Darvin:

Good points in general...  Nano is still going to be better in general though...  Its pretty hard to beat a DoT that hits hull directly and debuffs armor which further increases the effectiveness of the DoT.  GRG needs to at level 3 deal somewhere between 1400 and 1600 damage to make it even half as powerful as Nano.  I mean, sure, you are getting up in CB territory, but even with FF, you can't nuke an entire fleet or deal 1000 DPS to all targets in range (can be done when CB+Malice is used properly.)

So, you actually may want it to deal more...  Call me crazy, but 2000 damage for a level 3 ability that has to go through mitigation and can't synergize to smash fleets might not be out of the question.  Let's say you are up against an Advent in their culture and they have full research.  They will neutralize 75% of that, meaning that you are only dealing 500 damage, and if the CD is 5, 100 DPS for an obscene amount of AM.  That is equal to CB, but just like the other super-abilities (Nano/MB/SR/DP), the strength isn't in damage, but rather the other things it does...

CB synergizes with Malice to deal 1000+ DPS.  Sure, its hard to line up a shot that will do that, but you can ensure that every ship short of a Kol is dead.  8000 damage will kill anything in sight that isn't a Kol.

Nano can continually damage multiple targets, has low AM cost, debuffs armor, the list goes on.

Missile Barrage is the most powerful offensive ability in the game for obvious reasons.  3000 damage to all enemies in range is a death sentence for non-caps and a threat for any non-kol.

Shield Restore heals the entire fleet for a crazy amount of health.

Drain Planet deals massive damage to planets but also gives you an income bonus.

 

The point is, these abilities are powerful because of secondary things, not just their damage, so giving GRG an insane damage buff doesn't seem all that out of the question...  That said, I don't want it going over 2000, but still, I'd say that 2000 is the peak...  So, I'm revising my previous statement of 1400-1600 to 1500-2000.  This does need to be powerful.

That said, the reason you shouldn't go over 2000 is that you are giving this to the hardest ship in the game to kill.  The Egg gets nano because the frame itself is rather mediocre.

The Kol on the other hand has high DPS, and is the hardest ship in the game to kill.  It is after all pretty dang hard to kill a ship that has 6500 hull, 4500 shields, and a 33% damage redux ability plus FH.

 

So, I suppose I'm just throwing stuff around so that someone like N3rull*, Amish, or Darvin who know the details of this game's balance can come in and fine tune it.  I'm just stating facts.

 

*If you read this, how on earth do you pronounce your name?  Its been bugging me for a while now...  So far I've got Nerul (sounds like Nero, but with a "ul" on the end of it...)  Yes, random, but its bugging me... A lot...

on Aug 19, 2009

Volt_Cruelerz
@Darvin:
*If you read this, how on earth do you pronounce your name?  Its been bugging me for a while now...  So far I've got Nerul (sounds like Nero, but with a "ul" on the end of it...)  Yes, random, but its bugging me... A lot...

It's pronounced 'Neh-rul', if I'm not mistaken.

Well, the Sova's the only capital I'm really concerned about balancing, so why not?

Missile Batteries does need an AM decrease. Lower it from 125 to 105-110 or so.

Embargo is fine, just needs its bugs to be worked out.

Heavy SC... should have an AOE affacting the SC of other carriers. A very short range (1000-2000) that affects the Carriers in the radius should have their ships affected.

Heavy Manufacturing also would need to be rebalanced. Personally, I think it should again have an AOE, but in exchange increase AM to something around 150 and it's cooldown slightly increased.

on Aug 20, 2009

so giving GRG an insane damage buff doesn't seem all that out of the question...  That said, I don't want it going over 2000, but still, I'd say that 2000 is the peak...  So, I'm revising my previous statement of 1400-1600 to 1500-2000.  This does need to be powerful.

I'd agree with you that 1500-2000 is probably a reasonable value if we want to create an ability that really is a match for nanos.  Of course, I wanted to give a more conservative value here, as I don't think the purpose is to create the next nanos.

 

If you read this, how on earth do you pronounce your name?

A lot of the time people get my name confused with "Darwin".  This is how it's pronounced, except with a 'v' instead of a 'w'.

on Aug 20, 2009

O K   -- I will chime in with some thoughts before y'all break something.   Ol' Stick in the Mud Cykur time 

Kol:
GRG:  I agree it needs to be upped in damage by 100-200 pts.  Maybe 1K range increase across the board.  I wouldn't reduce AM or cooldown.  If you give this ship the ability to cycle that fast and combine it with a Dunov, once they get a few levels it will become a capship ganking platform.

Sova:
Embargo:  Be very careful how you buff Embargo.  Sova rushers often buy ship levels, so sometimes you are dealing with a level 2 Embargo from the get go.  By making the ability last so long, you are actually Empowering the rushers, not end of game Sova users.  Also annoying is when rushers only stay in system long enough to trigger Embargo, then get out so you can't shoot at them anymore.  If you are going to buff anything on Embargo, I think it should also be made a channeled effect so the Sova has to stay put while it does the Embargo (it isn't really doing a blockade if it is running for its life, right?). 

The real problems with the Sova are not Embargo, which is situationally very strong, but the ships other lackluster abilities.  By giving it strong buffs to Heavy Fighters and Rapid Manufacturing as you have done, you are giving TEC the ability to field resilient strikecraft that can survive or be replaced quickly in the face of moderate flak.  Another interesting idea would be to replace Rapid Manufacturing with a long range "Torpedo" attack that hits for about 1200 damage at approx 10K range.  This way a high level Sova would still have some teeth even if its strikecraft were being countered.

Akkan:
Colonize:  I would give it the extra extractor, but not the resource boost.  If this was working properly, the advantage is those extractors should be up and running almost instantly.

Marza:
I don't think it needs an Incendiary Shell boost.  It is passive damage for no antimatter, and the Marza has other strong abilities.

Missile Barrage needs to be even more visible, and this is from someone who has massacred opponents with it.

Dunov:

Make the EMP attack 360 degrees.  This would actually give TEC a semi usable counter to Advent.  As it stands, the poor Dunov often gets killed whenever it has to point its nose into a dangerous fleet to try and use one of its best abilities.

Radiance:

Animosity:  Better to leave it alone.  If your ships can only shoot the Radiance, a Radiance / Rapture Vengeance combo will force you to break off your attack or risk losing your fleet.  As it stands, this can happen if the other guy isn't paying attention, but to create a combo on powers that can be rapidly repeated, you are creating a situation where you can be slaughtering the enemy fleet, and they literally can't shoot back without killing themselves even more....totally overpowered!  At least now the guy has a chance to save himself from this deadly synergy if he is paying attention.   On the other hand, I totally support the mitigation / armor bonus to help keep the Radiance alive if they do keep shooting at it. 

Halcyon:

This is a really useful ship....I'm not sure that it needs buffs, but if someone who has crunched the numbers thinks those other abilities are totally worthless, I guess I don't have a huge opinion on it.

Progen:

I don't have an opinion about the modest shield nerf...but you are actually buffing the colonization effect by allowing it to last so much longer....900 is 15 minutes!  And you are almost doubling the level 2 effect to 10 minutes.  While you are nerfing the cost deduction, you are allowing for much more time for savings to be reinvested, which actually makes the net effect a buff! 

Revelation:

Agree Provoke Hysteria could probably stand to be 50 sec instead of 40. 

Kortul:

Agree with general buffs to Power Surge and Jam Weapons, as well as Disruptive Strikes fix.  I would take Volatile Nanites to maybe 200 damage, not 250.  Yeah, it is hard to do, but if you trigger a Volatile Nanites chain reaction, it can wipe a clusterd fleet out pretty fast.  This is NOT a channeled / interruptable ability, so you don't want to make it too easy to get this effect going.

Skirantra:

I would much prefer to have Scramble Bombers be changed into an interrupt like Raging Amish suggests.  A buffed Kortul can handle the anti air role.  Agree that Replicate Forces could be buffed.

Jarrasul:

If no other ship got buffed, I would agree that Nanite armor reduction is OP and could take a hit.  If all these buffs go through, I think it isn't a big deal anymore because several other ships will be nastier.

Vulkoras:

Agree with all of the listed buffs / changes.

Antorak:

Phase Out Hull:
Don't add the defensive Buff you mention -- Vasari ships will be escaping left and right!  Phase Out Hull probably doesn't need changed, it is already quite powerful when used properly.

Distort Gravity:
Yes, it needs some tweaking to increase duration and maybe rotation to allow it to help ships around it more effectively.  I would not nerf the PJI affect, this is the best part of Distort Gravity that makes it worthwhile...it also doesn't really the anti starbase effect, though I think the Antimatter cost reduction makes sense so the Antorak itself can keep moving.

Subversion:

I would put the durations back to where they were...those increased durations are way too long.  Let it stack, but add the mild population damage effect.  This would allow a world that gets continually subverted to be losing population and take an economic hit, but not be at any risk of being "destroyed".  If it DID get those long durations, the Antorak could use its mobility to move from system to system subverting the building capabilities of worlds and totally crippling an enemy empire's ability to build.  You would get "Antorak Rushing" where the Vasari player just doesn't let his enemy's build anything by running the Antorak back and forth across his few starter systems.

 

 

Well, for what it is worth, those are my thoughts...I tend to be kind of cautious, but as you can see, I do think several ships need some love.  Kudos to all the thought and debate that has gone into this thread!

 

on Aug 20, 2009

Watch out for that Gauss gun. Please. 2000 damage? That's more than Vulk's disintegration does. Hold your horses before you make a one shot ship killer.
With 2000 damage the gauss gun will two-shot every structure in the game except those with shields. It will one shot frigates (remember, mitigation is not always at 65%, it starts from 15% - if Gauss was used on a frig without bumped mitigation, it would one shot it).
If that thing is going to be a spammable massacre weapon mounted on the toughest ship in the game, then I suppose the squishy desolator's ultimate - disintegration - should do 5000 mitigated damage over 16 seconds instead of what it does now and restore 1000 shields over that time instead (much more useful than hull, because you can use it before you're actually half-dead). It would be mitigated down to about 1800 channeled (disruptable), single target damage over 16 seconds. If MB can deal a million damage over 24 seconds, CB can deal howmuch? to any number of targets that happen to be in a cone, then this would not be so badly OP for an ultimate ability.

But I still think it is better to keep gauss gun toned down, cheap and spammable, instead of being a nuclear sniper rifle mounted on the fastest starbase in the game (that's about as tough as kol is).

My idea would be around 400-500-600 damage with 7-6-5 second cooldown and 55-50-45 AM cost for Gauss.
That kind of thing.

 

Oh and one more modification to the list up there - Volatile Nanites.
250 damage, not really. 150 is OK.
But the ability's range is screwed.
The explosion radius is 1000 and the VN apply in the radius of 2000 from the target. How does that compare ot Malice AOE or MB? It is not even enough to catch a medium sized fleet and the splash radius never catches more than 2-4 ships unless the enemy is using 100% LRF spam formed into a Fleet with cohesion set to 'tight'.
I would say - leave splash damage at 150 or maybe even nerf it to 120 or 100, but triple both the application range and splash damage. That way this ability will not become useless if the enemy makes three wrong clicks and spreads his force around a bit.

 

*If you read this, how on earth do you pronounce your name? Its been bugging me for a while now... So far I've got Nerul (sounds like Nero, but with a "ul" on the end of it...) Yes, random, but its bugging me... A lot...

Nerull comes from D&D (Greyhawk) fantasy universe. It is the name of the deity of death.
The books of the series supply a 'pronounciation' form - Nare-ull , which happens to be my alternative nickname whenever Nerull or N3rull is unavailable. So it seems that in the twisted mind of whomever created this name, Nerull is pronounced like this -> 'Ner' as in "snare" + accented 'ull' as in "pull" or maybe "wall" (if it was like pull, I think the author would have written Nare-ool instead?).
I personally say Nerull like a combination of net and rule.
If you're not sure what I mean by giving other words as an example - dictionary.reference.com has audio files with word pronounciations.

on Aug 20, 2009

@Darvin: that was actually aimed at N3rull.

@N3rull: thank you.

 

I've said before I want Disin buffed.  I was thinking direct damage to hull.  But I suppose your idea would be more useful.  Either way, it needs a buff.

And CB+M is devastating.  The theoretical damage cap would be... 2050 DPS.  Don't even question that kind of power.  10200 damage is unlike anything else in the game save for MB.  Anything hit by that will die.  Even a Kol would only be safe if level 6+.  This will kill all in its path.  I generally say 1000 DPS because when used correctly, it will generally deal between 750 DPS and 1000 DPS.  The 2050 would only happen if all their ships were in a line.

I don't know...  I mean, I envision GRG as something more powerful, but takes longer to reload.  Seriously, how do you reload a slug that big in less than a day!?!  This sort of round really should do something devastating.  I'm still liking the idea of it more or less being a 3-5 use thing per battle (assuming you have the AM).  Make the CD something like 30 seconds.  So, I'm still thinking that it should deal massive damage at once or should act like a machine gun.  Pick one...  I've said what I want...

on Aug 20, 2009

I'm probably going to cover a few points that Cykur has already touched on, but I figured what the hell. Why not. If I don't mention the abilitiy, then I'm ok with what changes you put up there.

Kol:

I'm happy with Finest Hour, Flak Burst and the Shield. Flak burst is sufficient as stands, and the shield fits the "Never Gonna Die" mentality of the Kol.

The GRG seems to be in huge debate here. TBH I'm happy with what's up there. You didn't change it too much. If anything, I'd say only change the antimatter costs. This ability cannot be made too powerful. At most this ability should do 1k at lvl 3. You have to remember that if a Dunov actually makes it to level 6, the current Kol becomes near invincible. -75% cost in antimatter raises the power of flak burst AND GRG by 300% so that it does 4X the normal damage. That's power. Anti-cap power and Anti-Strikecraft power.

Sova:

Give it a fix for embargo, but I agree with Cykur here. Sova rushing worked because you could buy your way to level 3 and get Lvl 2 Embargo out early. I'm not sure if it does, but Embargo should steal minerals too. I thought it did, but i'm not entirely sure it still does.

The fighter buff either needs to be AOE as Eadtaes has suggested, OR It needs to give a much more significant boost to the fighters, as your post has suggested. The ability would need to be nerfed if made into an AOE, but as you've suggested I believe you went a little far (Sova Spamming is a tactic that used to work). Make the Armor 2/4/6.

Akkan:

Just give free mines for the Akkan. 1/2/4 is good. You gotta remember this is a HUGE resource boost considering you don't have to go around spending the time to make them.

Dunov:

Cykur has the right idea. EMP needs a bigger firing arc. Having to fire straight forward means you're going to get one shot off heading into the battle head first, and then it'll be annoying to do it again. The ability costs so much to use and really only destroys antimatter, so 360 degree firing arc is appropriate.

Magnetize needs a bug fix. It only stops abilities from being fired in the future. It needs to also stop abilities mid-use.

Marza:

Leave incendiary shells alone. For a passive buff, the ability is quite good. The ability fits the Marza's balance. You can either risk antimatter stores on Radiation bomb AND Raze Planet, or keep all the antimatter for Raze Planet and use the lesser cousin Incendiary shells.

Radiance:

Leave Animosity alone. when you get a Radiance, you're either getting DA and EAA, or you're getting Animsity and EAA. Either way, Animosity is buffed through the third ability. It also aready has a cap limit on the number of ships that must target it (8/16/32). Since it's a battleship with a lot of armor (most of any Advent Cap, just as much if not more than a Kol with the level 3 ability actually), this ship is already equipped to take punishment. Between repair bays, shield regen, EAA, and the fact that the ship is tough already, I say leave animosity alone.

Halcyon:

Adept Drone Anima. Either make it an area of effect (which probably doesn't make as much sense here as with a Sova, so really I'm just putting the option out there, it's not my preferred option), or go with what you have.

Mothership:

Since the other races colonize abilities are being buffed, I don't see the need to nerf this ability. Cykur nailed it on the head. This bonus is both a blessing and a curse. You get cheap upgrades, but you must buy them in a short time span to take advantage of them, meaning if you want planet health/logistics slots/tactical slots, you must buy them when you get the planet, which means Advent players must spend money at a time that may be less than convenient (TEC and Vasari needn't worry about this, they can buy whenever they want).

I miss the olden days of Malice having a HUGE AOE rather than the current target cap they put on it (8/16/32). It's not useless by any means. It's just...not as useful as before. Just reminiscing.

Just leave Shield Regen Alone. The ability is the ultimate "passive" abilitiy in my mind. Not passive as in costs no antimatter. Passive as in passive aggressive. This ability is easy to counter (Ion bolt anyone?), and Vasari can just bypass shields altogether, so I say leave it.

Rapture:

I actually think Vengeance is still too weak (largely because of the target cap limit on Animosity), but the other abilities on this cap are good enough that this doesn't bother me.

Revelation:

I'm not sure how good Guidance really is, because the only abilitiy I can think to use this where it'll make a significant difference is with Malice or lvl 6 abilities. HOWEVER with Malice I don't think the ability stacks, so really guidance just makes the cap go through antimatter stores quicker and the enemy feels the effect of Malice for shorter time and to less effect.

For guidance, I really think the ability needs a rework. I don't think I've ever used this tactically to any avail. Reverie is the only ability on this ship I give a damn about until level 6. Personally, I'd like to see it scratched and turned into some sort of seiging ability. An AOE effect bonus like the Halcyon, except for seiging, would be nice. This would fit the Advent balance perfectly.

Call it "Induced Decimation". Allied ships that can seige within the AOE get either a damage bonus (Like on the Rapture), or a lower reload time (Like on the Halcyon). Can't be too powerful. At level three I think it would make everything 25% more effective. That'd be enough.

I think clairvoyance needs to last longer. I'd argue as far as double the time, but then again, maybe leaving it alone is a good option too. I say all of this because the whole point of this ability is to get information about your opponent. Right now I don't bother with it because you don't get to see the gravity well for all that long. Just a little too meh at this point.

I'm a bit slow to suggest upping Provoke Hysteria any further. It's already devastating, and you need to remember a Revelation does 50 damage per volley to planets. The only caps that do more damage by normal seiging are the Desolator (53), and the Marza (57). Most other caps fall into the lower to mid forties, so really, the Revelation does enough as is.

Kortul:

See points below

Skirantra:

Repair cloud should have its heal rate lowered by 50% but have it's duration increased by 50%. This would fit the "SAVE THE FIGHTERS" role much better.

Scramble Bombers: I've alread expressed my opinion here.

Replicate forces: Either make it four copies or make the copies last 33% longer. Either is fine by me.

Evacuator:

Sorry, I disagree on coloinze. Leave the duration alone. Either up the build rate bonus or the # of extra constructors ONLY. Doing both is a bit drastic.

Nano-disassembler: Considering the ship has to be facing its target, I think the ability is fine. Just keep your caps away from it and let your fleet destroy the egg. Really, this ability is only useful as an anti-cap ability. (can kill a frig with one shot sure, but an entire fleet with this ability? nope) If anything, make it -1/-3/-5. Otherwise, the incentive to get the ability is kinda gone.

Marauder:

Change the duration ONLY. Instead of 6/8/10, make it 18/24/30. I just think the proposal you've made will never happen. I say that just because what I'm suggesting is easier to program. What you're proposing would make it so that Vasari would never lose a cap.

You've changed distort gravity a bit much. The only change I'd make is the antimatter cost reduction that you propose. I like that. Makes the ability actually useful.

For subversion, I like the idea of doing damage to the population over time. This is a good incentive for the ability. Just gotta keep it small (like 1 population down every 5 seconds because the ability can stack).

Vulkoras:

PMS needs the bug fix.

Leave the seige platforms alone. Leave disintegration alone too. 

 

on Aug 20, 2009

Leave power surge alone. at level 1/2/3 this ship does 33%/100%/300% more damage.
God, Amish, please don't write such bullshit. You sound like an utter noob.
Green 75% weapon cooldown does NOT mean that the weapon cooldown is reduced by 75%, meaning 4 times the number of shots fired. It means that the weapon cooldown is multiplied by 1/(1+0.75) and this basically means the DPS is multiplied by 175%.
Level 3 Power Surge increases the Kortul's DPS by 75% flat, not 300%.
I have zero idea nor I have any interest in learning how the f... you could really believe it was +300% damage. Everybody who sees a Kortul with 3/3 power surge in action will clearly notice its DPS is not even doubled, let alone quadded.
Come ON.

PS. Along that line, how do you think Assault Specialization on Vulkoras works? Bombing cooldown 100%. Do you really believe the cooldown is zeroed and the Vulk's DPS becomes unlimited? I ran extensive tests on it and the DPS is clearly doubled, which proves my version.

Conclusion: Power Surge SUCKS. Needs serious tweaking.
It increases the ship's DPS by some ~50 (about 4 assailants worth of DPS... wow, that's about as good as skirantra's ultimate used on assailants! LOL!) and grants less than 20 shields/second of regeneration (at level 10 with 3/3 power surge and all possible upgrades done!!! SHIIIIIIIIIT!!!)
As it is, the tooltip may as well read: "increases Disruptive Strikes effectiveness by 25/50/75%".

" because of the fact that all frigates naturally go to the "battle ball" formation.
every player with positive IQ, who is ok with MB, knows full well that three clicks cause your ball to disperse into a ten times bigger, sparse cloud. Just click behind the ball, the ships will accelerate and spread out all over everywhere.
I say again, leave the damage at 100-150  but triple the radius of the initial VN application and if each subsequent splash.
I am sorry Amish, but I have a hard time believing you know much about using VN (after your story of how awesome Power Surge is).

on Aug 20, 2009

Yeah...  N3rull is right about the Kortul's PS.  It is a widely help misconception that it increases damage by 300%.  It increases it by about 80.  So, no this isn't worth the while and it needs a buff.  It it did buff damage by 300%, then of course it would be worth it, but as it currently stands, no.  It is pretty worthless.

I'd say perhaps leave the damage as it is normally, but buff the range as N3rull suggested.

on Aug 20, 2009

Another Siddy. Peachy. I'll admit I was wrong. Of the Vasari Caps the Devastator is the one I have the least experience with.

Green 75% weapon cooldown does NOT mean that the weapon cooldown is reduced by 75%

Not sure why I'm a moron for thinking that. I'm well aware of the use of (1/(1+X)) formula for most of the stuff in this game. I didn't think it applied here. As you've pointed out, it obviously does.

Volatile Nanites is a battleball counter to me. If the enemy is smart enough to micro in order to disperse the fleet, then he should be rewarded. I've rarely used this cap as I only ever tend to get an Egg/Desolator/Maruader/Skinatra/Egg. In that order.

In the future please be more civil. I have no problem with being corrected. I do have a problem with the way you did it.

 

on Aug 20, 2009

It increases it by about 80

I ran a test. The kortul at level 8 does 78 DPS alone, without upgrades (whoever makes Beam upgrades anyway? That's 80% of this guy's dps). Triggering Power Surge increases it by 75%.

Now, Mathematical blasphemy allows me to extrapolate that damage onto level 10, basing on damage increments throughout previous levels, and state that it should be about 85 DPS at lvl 10. That's without weapons upgrades, but it doesn't really change too much cause nobody in his right mind does beam upgrades, which constitute the main source of this bloke's firepower.

That means, 3/3 power surge at level 10 increases the DPS by... 85x0.75 = 63,75.

- 64 extra DPS
- on level 10
- spread over three targets in a 60%-20%-20% ratio
- the latter two of which being totally random bank targets
- assuming that the Kortul has enemies on both sides (so that all banks are working)
- and that damage is of course mitigated, so it actually goes down to 20DPS over 3 targets.

LooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooL

oh sorry, almost forgot to mention that awesome below-20 shields per second of regeneration.

LoooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooL

In the future please be more civil.
It really hurts to know that someone experienced in this game is trying to sabotage balance changes on a ship that's pretty weak, basing on false 'facts' originating in his imagination.
You know, as a Maths student I have so far given private lessons (with much success) to a number of kids. And I learned one thing - it pays off to smack a good student over the head when he happens to write bullshit. He becomes more cautious, thinks his next moves over and suddenly begins to understand the material thoroughly, instead of blindly following algorythms he was taught at school.
Maybe you ain't my student, but you damn well reserved a smack over the head for sabotaging our Dreams of Balanced Sins!

Volatile Nanites is a battleball counter to me. If the enemy is smart enough to micro in order to disperse the fleet, then he should be rewarded.
Only that it takes about 5 seconds to counter what would take the Vasari player 30-40 seconds to do anyway (most ships don't just pop up in dozens every second to rack those 150 dmg up the charts). 3 seconds is enough to make the 'battleball' 5 times larger, completely negating all VN effects but the 25% extra damage. AND if the player is smart enough, he won't form a battleball when charging a lvl6 Kortul in the first place.
Countering Mb or CB+M is damn more sophisticated than this and the margin of error is incalculably smaller.

on Aug 20, 2009

In all fairness, the Devastator is still a piece of crap. Fix the bug on it, and it's still a piece of crap. Buff power surge, it's a decent anti-support cruiser option. The fact that it hits many targets rather than one target with the beams to me says it's better against multiple targets rather than one individual target. Who knows. Practice with the fixed version would tell.

Jam weapons is still awful. Even with a big AOE I still think it's awful.

Volatile nanites is decent as it stands, but as the game stands, I don't think I've ever had a human actually use this on me outside of Cykur. Against humans, the egg is the only cap that's going to make it to level 6 (if your opponent doesn't micro it away). I've rarely seen this ship ever make it past level 3. It tends to be what Vasari players get when they need to counter a fighter/bomber ball because sadly it's the best anti-strikecraft ability the Vasari have.

Overall the cap sucks. The overriding factor with the cap now is that disruptive strikes is bugged, so no one uses this cap. Even if the ship was like I thought it was, it would still suck.

I was wrong. I appreicate the numbers, and the fact that you called me on it. I'm not all knowing and I definitely needed to be corrected.

on Aug 20, 2009

peace and respect, brotha

on Aug 20, 2009

Right back at ya

Really wish there was a smiley that shows a tipping of the hat

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