SDC Presents: Operation Healies4Feelies

[CMDR Aengus]

While I understand bringing to FDs attention dodgy mechanics, gamebreaking faults and exploits. The end does not justify the means.

You (SDC) know, you might garner more attention and respect if you demonstrated these things in a private group, amongst your own members.

There is no other reason bar making other players lives a misery in Open for exposing these kind of gamebreaking faults.

And this still does not demonstrate a need for nerfing healing beams. All it demonstrates is a hole in the coding for stations.

I reiterate. By all means, push the game tonits limits and beyond. Just do it in a private group with volunteers, and not unsuspecting players in Open.

 

[Charles Erika von Hackbeil]

What progress are you expecting? Enlighten us. PVE folks claim Open because having PG and Solo is not enough. So?

Progress should be the goal when opening a new thread. This is why humans invented forums. Have a read on it, it´s enlightning.

Also, I don´t share simplified view about open/pg/solo.

 

[NeilF]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kTQodsZ9llc

So, will Multi-Crew mean this can be streamlined down by 50% with just two ships being required (each with two crew members)? So magical healing turrets could be used to heal each other, then freeing up the two ships to not having to point at each other so they can then use their main ordinance to fire on other ships?

I knew there had to be something good about multi-crew!

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If you go by communities, any game community, most games would be 'better off' with one type of weapon and one type of attack, because the moment you add a second people will complain, and we end up with the whole "this is why we can't have nice things" perfect balance is near impossible and people are more then eager to find and abuse the heck out of something that can be abused, because they want to 'win', and at least in my book, when you do that, what is the point of PvP? same if a wing of people interdict and kill a single person, what is the point? 4v1 wins? yay? I honestly would hope so, if they do not then they have a serious problem.
"PvP" as a concept has become insanely competitive and 'losing' is seen almost as a taboo if you look at the various PvP related games around, which is just........sad. More important to strut about and win then you know, having an engaging, challenging and fun battle, win or lose, and where the winner doesn't smear it into losers face?

I didn't suggest reducing down to one weapons did I? I suggested that The Engineers hasn't helped with balancing?

ie: Of course there will always be inbalanced in weapon effectiveness in different situations, and superiority in numbers, BUT, I don't think The Engineers has done much but make things worse IMHO. There were balancing issues before, and then The Engineers introduced a whole new load of fairly extreme new effects, many of which risked creating balance issues... and many of which have IMHO.

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While I understand bringing to FDs attention dodgy mechanics, gamebreaking faults and exploits. The end does not justify the means.

You (SDC) know, you might garner more attention and respect if you demonstrated these things in a private group, amongst your own members.

There is no other reason bar making other players lives a misery in Open for exposing these kind of gamebreaking faults.

And this still does not demonstrate a need for nerfing healing beams. All it demonstrates is a hole in the coding for stations.

I reiterate. By all means, push the game tonits limits and beyond. Just do it in a private group with volunteers, and not unsuspecting players in Open.

A while ago I would have agreed with you... But it seems so little gets done in so many key areas relating to PvP gameplay and balance it's almost like it needs top be highlighted how ill-considered and poorly implemented some aspects of the game are?

As if to demonstrate this, a Crime and Punishment system (karma system) could easily help reign in repeat mindless illegal destruction (addressing the sort of stuff you're talking about). It's been talked about, but nothing has been done. ie: FD have decided to leave OPEN as toxic as it wants to be... So consider pointing a finger of blame at FD then?

eg: A Way of addressing C&P- https://goo.gl/s0wIe2

 

[Idrillean]

1. Targeting the healer is always the best bet here. They cannot heal and avoid incoming damage effectively.

No. Because if they heal each other, you can't take down any of both.

Understando?

Plus: If FD never intended Open to be an PVP environment, why did they create Open as PVP environment?

Blarggagh. Your interpretation is just biased and based on what YOU look after. But it's not that way, amigo.

 

[NeilF]

No. Because if they heal each other, you can't take down any of both.

Understando?

Plus: If FD never intended Open to be an PVP environment, why did they create Open as PVP environment?

Blarggagh. Your interpretation is just biased and based on what YOU look after. But it's not that way, amigo.

And as I mentioned a few posts ago, is multi-crew going to make this even worse? eg: Two ships each with two crew, each with one or more healing turrets on, healing the other ship? Leaving the ships then to point where they wish and use all the rest of their weapons where ever they wish?

 

[Morbad]

They cannot heal and avoid incoming damage effectively.

Well, I don't know if SDC can do it, but I most certainly can.

The cannons you refer to are the only weapons which seemed to avoid the nerf and remain valid.

The problem with cannon is their projectile velocity and ammo count, which makes them poor choices for use on nimble vessels. Long range mods can help, but thermal cascade effect is linked to weapon damage.

3. I'm pretty sure target lock breaker removes the target lock no matter who the target is..wingmate or enemy. (not tested much though)

That is indeed how target lock breaker functions, but healing doesn't need a target. Target lock is certainly useful so that one can fight and heal at the same time more effectively, but it's far from required.

4. Obviously the healing beams need a second pass and FD were all set to rebalance them without the need for all this silly drama.

Were they? They did let their effectiveness build up over eight months and a dozen patches. I could well have missed some announcement though.

Personally I assumed ED was never intended to be balanced around the niche that is PvP, especially as the game is not designed with those very few PvP players in mind...ive seen it happen in GW2 and plenty of other mmo's, attempting to balance PVP without separating the modes is pointless and an exercise in futility.

I think a game that makes sense is automatically sufficiently balanced and the only reason there is a difference between PvP and PvE balance is because the AI have their hands tied.

As I've mentioned before, PvP just reveals issues that would still be there in it's absence.

 

[SuBSynk]

No. Because if they heal each other, you can't take down any of both.

Understando?

If they heal each other then they cannot apply any form of decent DPS to others without taking turrets or stopping the heal....to me that makes them an irrelevance.

Just like a unbreakable 3 person healer backline in other MMO's healing doesn't really matter if you have no decent dps. You cannot be killed but also cannot kill others. Either way the healing mechanic is obviously to strong and FD are already set for a second pass on it.

I expect "PvP balance" to be ongoing for years to come due to the engineering update.

The question for me is should FD tailor the balance toward PvP whilst ruining the balance for PvE especially considering that PVP is such a tiny proportion of the player base.

 

[Duane Dibbley]

You! Eat a cupcake.

'Still having problems with that passport photo booth, I see!

 

[Idrillean]

If they heal each other then they cannot apply any form of decent DPS to others without taking turrets or stopping the heal....to me that makes them an irrelevance.

Just like a unbreakable 3 person healer backline in other MMO's healing doesn't really matter if you have no decent dps. You cannot be killed but also cannot kill others. Either way the healing mechanic is obviously to strong and FD are already set for a second pass on it.

Great thing. You got the point. Thing is, you can stagger / stun / disrupt healers "in any other MMO". You can't do that here.

 

[edgar]

And as I mentioned a few posts ago, is multi-crew going to make this even worse? eg: Two ships each with two crew, each with one or more healing turrets on, healing the other ship? Leaving the ships then to point where they wish and use all the rest of their weapons where ever they wish?

The healing only works in a wing, and multicrew ships won't be able to wing up with others, so I don't think this will be possible.

 

[DeathDingo]

Great Vid guys!!! They really need to nerf the hell out of Regeneration Sequence. This has been too OP for like 9 months now lol. If you want this Regeneration Sequence effect on a weapon, well IMO the weapon should have no offensive output on hostiles. Make the choice of either using the effect to heal a wingmate at a huge reduced rate compared to now and not be able to use it on hostiles or not run this effect and use an offensive weapon instead.

 

[Morbad]

If they heal each other then they cannot apply any form of decent DPS to others without taking turrets or stopping the heal....to me that makes them an irrelevance.

Concordant is pretty potent and and only needs to be renewed by grazing the target every ten seconds. Raw DPS also isn't the only way to be useful offensively.

If everyone has healing weapons (they do work fine as weapons), anyone not under focus fire can restore the shields of anyone who is, and with current shield strengths and resistances, even fast combat vessels can absorb a lot of punishment before being at risk.

The question for me is should FD tailor the balance toward PvP whilst ruining the balance for PvE especially considering that PVP is such a tiny proportion of the player base.

PvP/PvE is a false dichotomy.

If NPCs weren't deliberately incompetent they'd be using all the same tricks that we see in PvP. Unless you feel PvE combat should languish as a triviality for the entirety of the game's existence, the lessons learned from PvP will need to applied to it sooner or later.

 

[NeilF]

The healing only works in a wing, and multicrew ships won't be able to wing up with others, so I don't think this will be possible.

Oh! Wings and multi-crew are mutually exclusive?

ie: So you can't have four people in a Wing, 2 in one ship, 2 in another?

 

[SuBSynk]

No. Because if they heal each other, you can't take down any of both.

Understando?

Plus: If FD never intended Open to be an PVP environment, why did they create Open as PVP environment?

Blarggagh. Your interpretation is just biased and based on what YOU look after. But it's not that way, amigo.

The PvP balance conversation has been going on for 2 years now..and i never expect it to go away. I'm not a pve or pvp player and have no bias. Personally i do not want to see dev time wasted & the point i was making is should we expect FD to spend their time trying to "balance PVP" when its only a tiny minority that enjoy playing the game that way and many people consider "PvP balance" -in a game like this- to be a flawed concept either way.

 

[edgar]

Oh! Wings and multi-crew are mutually exclusive?

ie: So you can't have four people in a Wing, 2 in one ship, 2 in another?

That's how I understand it works, yes.

 

[SuBSynk]

Great thing. You got the point. Thing is, you can stagger / stun / disrupt healers "in any other MMO". You can't do that here.

Id say breaking their target lock is similar to a "stun" i still do not understand how a player can heal someone without having them targetted but i may be confused here

Ramming them, getting in their line of fire or using one of the other specials to counter their healing would work similarly i assume (cascade torps for instance). Heat would have been the perfect counter but that was destroyed due to constant moaning by those that obviously understand balance better than the devs.

 

[NeilF]

That's how I understand it works, yes.

*sigh* - Shame!

Multi-crew just seems to get smaller and smaller in scope... So now our lovely new gunner can't even heal other ships.

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The PvP balance conversation has been going on for 2 years now..and i never expect it to go away. I'm not a pve or pvp player and have no bias. Personally i do not want to see dev time wasted & the point i was making is should we expect FD to spend their time trying to "balance PVP" when its only a tiny minority that enjoy playing the game that way and many people consider "PvP balance" -in a game like this- to be a flawed concept either way.

That's so very sad!

ED has the opportunity of making OPEN an exciting place to play with & against other CMDRs. It should be able to facilitate and orchestrate interesting (legal) PvE and PvP scenarios, while all the time using a Crime and Punishment system to reduce (ilegal) toxic PvP, so you can pretty much undertake the play style you'd prefer to. But at the moment, even one of the original corner stone professions often heralded for its PvP potention during Kickstarter, Piracy, doesn't even work very well. It's not that PvP is getting too much attention, it's that it's not in truth really getting any. note: I don't count weapon balancing as address PvP really as often it's a issue in PvE (general gameplay too)!

 

[Cosmos]

The PvP balance conversation has been going on for 2 years now..and i never expect it to go away. I'm not a pve or pvp player and have no bias. Personally i do not want to see dev time wasted & the point i was making is should we expect FD to spend their time trying to "balance PVP" when its only a tiny minority that enjoy playing the game that way and many people consider "PvP balance" -in a game like this- to be a flawed concept either way.

Its more about broken combat mechanics than some sort of PvP vs PvE imbalance. I mean are you seriously suggesting players are so bad they need pre nerf thermal cascade missiles and OP healing beams to take on the brain dead NPCs? Thermal cascade didn't even work against NPCs as it did players, and if you think those heat missiles were aight before there is no helping you. Frankly its little do with some false dichotomy of PvE/PvP but more about the inabilitiy of Frontier to design combat mechanics that aren't broken.

Heat and healing are fine concepts, its not the players fault Frontier constantly fail at balancing their own game. This would likely be a different story if the NPC bots werent brain dead and were allowed to use the full suite of engineer mods. My god, the forums went into melt down after 2.1 because the NPCs were too hard, they didn't even use torps or heat missles..

I also question this 'tiny minority' statement. Please site your evidence for such a claim.

 

[sewerratuk]

...This would likely be a different story if the NPC bots werent brain dead and were allowed to use the full suite of engineer mods...

Holy crap, could you imagine the meltdown if NPC wings were given healing beams

 

[Idrillean]

Holy crap, could you imagine the meltdown if NPC wings were given healing beams

[video=youtube;rAkHGbRPNR4]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rAkHGbRPNR4[/video]

Would be the moment when PVEers start crying about beams too. Or they die because of being elderly. I mean, if the NPC-wing does the same tactics as the PVE-wing, it'll be a healing towards infinity.