This is the first of four revamps, one thing that everyone needs to try to keep in mind is that balancing will come after adding, so saying something like "this makes the gren OP versus infantry" is invalid. Balance against vehicles is a possible issue, but scripts can help/fix that as well. This is about function and feature, not balance unless something is "game breaking". ----------------------------------------- Slot 4 weapons: AP mines, AV mines, and Satchel Charge. Gren picks his poison. AP (Anti Personel) would be proximity mines with large blast radius, devistating to infantry but hardly noticable by vehicles. Diffusal ability acts as a jammer completely and passively disabling the mine (even from other infantry jumping on them) while the gren is within the jammer range (which would be slightly larger than the proximity range). Vehicles crush them, meaning they will go off, even if jammed when run over. AV (Anti Vehicle) would be "drive over" mines with small blast radius, devistating to vehicles. Would be devistating to infantry but only if they were right on top of it (like a vehicle pushing them). Infantry would not tigger these by themselves, need vehicle to physically contact it. Diffusal does not help here, but any infantry can diffuse them (read below). Satchel Charge is small blast radius massive building damage (can destroy any single building if detonated). Takes 10 (?) seconds to place, and once placed it starts 60 second timer. Opposing grens can diffuse. Audible beep from the charge as balancing mechanic, so it will not go unnoticed (may need to hack something so comm can hear it when in comm view regardless of his camera location, provided the cv is within audible range). Should be relatively large and ugly as hell when placed. Also should emit a bright red blinking light... shouldn't be hard to find once you start looking. Could have each type of mine in the field provided some were dropped then loadout was changed. Can only hold one satchel (two with ammo upgrade) and they do not count towards mine limit. ----------------------------------------- Diffusal ability (partially a recap) Diffusal will be improved in two ways. First, if you have diffusal, mines will automatically be "painted" (think comm targets) so you will be very aware of their locations. Second, diffusal will come with a jammer which disables the AP mines. If you stand near them, other infantry do not need to worry about the mines. Diffusal will also be nerfed in that vehicles are not immune at all from either type of mine. Possible that we make jammer portion still work on AP mines but they do virtually no damage to vehicles so you are likely to drive over them anyway, so I don't know that we should bother. All infantry will have the ability to diffuse AV mines, no diffusal kit neccisary, just unscrew the top cover and pull the wires out of the pressure plate (little RP there...). So a gren with diffusal in a vehicle will see the mines, but would need an infantry to difuse it for him or jump out and handle it himself. ------------------------------------------- Mortar and Grenade Launcher Need to change model of current mortar, name it grenade launcher. Take current mortar model, make new weapon. New weapons projectile changes: Increase speed, increase gravity (or density, we want greater arc is all), and force a minimum angle of which you can fire. What you should get is something that must be fired upward at a good angle, but does not hit the skybox and moves quick enough that people can't see it coming a mile away. Firing at lowest angle (looking straight ahead) would be about the range of max current mortar (nice 45 degree arc shooting way out there). Firing at highest angle (looking up 45 degrees, or maybe more) would fire it straight up for minimal range (around 0 feet)... straight up, straight down. -------------------------------------------- Sidenotes I'm assuming we will have more pistols, specifically regarding the current BE Pistol 2... need more options. Keep that in mind while looking over these suggestions. Also thinking about giving all classes armor detection since currently there's no way to see damage otherwise (and it would be obvious if a tank was missing all it's plating on one side). Considering converting the ability to show enemy loadout (engine,armor type, weapons)? Haven't thought it through much. Obviously gren would be getting the loadout display as well as the armor detection everyone gets, so not a trade there. Question is if he needs something to compensate for everyone getting his goodie, and if so what?
"All infantry will have the ability to diffuse AV mines, no diffusal kit neccisary, just unscrew the top cover and pull the wires out of the pressure plate (little RP there...). So a gren with diffusal in a vehicle will see the mines, but would need an infantry to difuse it for him or jump out and handle it himself." Disagree, grenadier should be the only mine defusal class, to promote class spread. "Mortar and Grenade Launcher Need to change model of current mortar, name it grenade launcher. Take current mortar model, make new weapon. New weapons projectile changes: Increase speed, increase gravity (or density, we want greater arc is all), and force a minimum angle of which you can fire. What you should get is something that must be fired upward at a good angle, but does not hit the skybox and moves quick enough that people can't see it coming a mile away. Firing at lowest angle (looking straight ahead) would be about the range of max current mortar (nice 45 degree arc shooting way out there). Firing at highest angle (looking up 45 degrees, or maybe more) would fire it straight up for minimal range (around 0 feet)... straight up, straight down." Have you been reading my posts about the mortar? "Also thinking about giving all classes armor detection since currently there's no way to see damage otherwise (and it would be obvious if a tank was missing all it's plating on one side). Considering converting the ability to show enemy loadout (engine,armor type, weapons)? Haven't thought it through much. Obviously gren would be getting the loadout display as well as the armor detection everyone gets, so not a trade there. Question is if he needs something to compensate for everyone getting his goodie, and if so what?" Again, no, at most share it between the grenadier and the scout. I'm still against satchel charges, and there's nothing about increasing the speed and damage of grenadier RPGs.
Problem is the gren would be stuck either having to jump out and diffuse or waiting for another gren with diffusal so he can move. AV mines plus a single hmg would be complete vehicle denial because of the power I'm suggesting to the AV mines. This allows a teammate to clear the path for you. I'd say gren and engi, but why not include the other two? Plus imagine the lulz as people run at the AP mines to "diffuse" them. I've read a few threads, didn't keep track of who was saying what. But obviously an engineer could tell the difference between 5 plates of composite armor and a bare side that's been shot to shit... He even gets that info at closer range already. I'm trying to simulate visual information that would be available to anyone physically in the battlefield. I don't even know what absorbant armor would look like up close, but I promise you I could tell the difference between a fully plated tank and a tank that was once fully plated and has taken so much damage you can see the driver inside. Need info regarding Satchels. As for RPG, current research upgrades should make it better (maybe needs a lvl4 or something) and if you've play the SVN you'll see that speed isn't an issue. Those things are like hornets on crack now, and I like it.
No more RPG upgrades, it needs to be better period, nobody ever researches them except when they get a team of JPL, who are like hornets on crack when you give them grenadier. You might not have read it, but I've suggested like 9000 times that it should do a percentage of total current tank HP, so it will always take 4 or 5 RPGs on the same side to take down a tank. I just don't like the idea of satchel charges, what you'd doign is basically a sabotage revamp, 70 seconds is way too long for it to be useful for anything, and if you buff it it's just going to be annoying as shit. And yes someone can tell with armor, but I really think armor detection is good as a skill, it gives you an extra tool in a fight, and I like it that way, you can either go engineer and be uber repair ammo god, or be grenadier and be able to hunt tanks effectively. If you give engineers the ability to defuse and detect armor, nobody is ever going to play grenadier again unless it gets ridiculous buffs.
Don't change the effing mortar. Give it back it's potency and remove the rofflewhore resistance to the mortar and we're fine. mortar doesn't need to be changed. it's very effective as it is, minus the rofflewhore having effectively 68% damage resistance to it.
Grenadier needs to lose the 2nd pistol (Shotty, MP). As far as the RPG goes, what empty said. Mortar and mines are fine.
Hes fine, just make rifleman's mowtar resistance to 100 hp on direct hit instead of 84 and fix dig in bug. I don't care about 9 mines and I think the RPG only needs a speed buff because with more grens they will add up and hurt tanks. I don't think RPG's should rape tanks. Satchels will promote choke point camping.
But upgrades are what throttle RPG to remain effective against vehicles. Taking a percent is hacky... Takes same amount of shells to take out a heavy as a light? Are you really suggesting that? Are you saying same as heavy with 2 plates vs light with 2, because that's not really any change from what's there right now. People will still play gren, because gren will be able to kill vehicles and detect mines, mines that are VERY deadly. Your comparisons are current engi and revamped gren, something I mentioned you shouldn't do... The engi will get his, and it would involve less killing power as well as a "tweak" to their skills. Plus you are just comparing engi in tank vs gren in tank... these adjustments are geared towards a gren as an infantry, not a driver. Nothing about the current mortar would be different except it's name and model. EVERYTHING about it outside of those two asthetic changes would be identical. The real mortar at that point is what I'm describing as different. I agree on fixing dig in bug, resists I believe will be handled script-side (as of 2.25 at least) and if not then I can handle that in code as well. Satchels only promote choke point camping if you know 70 seconds before someone is going to be in that spot... they are timed, not remoted. They're also obvious as all hell so it wouldn't be much of a surprise.
Yeah but we should be promoting grenadier as the antitank class, if it takes 20+ RPGs to kill a tank, nobody is going to use it against tanks, and guess what, nobody does.
I don't think an RPG shouldn't be able to take out a tank with researched armor alone. The gren should be come better at countering rifleman so there will be more of them to add up RPG's which will make even a weak rpg powerful. The problem currently is tanks were all given speed buffs with out any buff to the speed of the rpg. So hitting the tank is harder. Timed satchels will be absolutely useless unless they are made to be anti-building. I don't think the gren is the class that needs a revamp. There is a good reason it has a cult fallowing.
I'm kind of sick of losing and having no res, and going gren to find my RPGs do absolutely nothing. No single player should be completely invincible to any other given player at any time. Even in TF2 you can block ubers.
If the ability to rape tanks could be unlocked via research, I promise you it would get researched and used. Lvl3 is in a pretty bad place on the tree as well as not being good enough imo for the time and money, vs the strength of heavies. Did you read the OP? They are ONLY anti-building. They're basically big ass siesmics with big ass timers. I agree that generally the gren doesn't need a revamp, at least not as bad as other classes, but there are some things that need changed and to make him better at one thing we need him worse at another because as we agree, he's not really over or under powered but some tweaks need made. For example, specialize the mines but make them better at their intended purpose. You say that the gren needs to be better at countering riflemen but also that they don't need a revamp... this confuses me.
RPGs should never rape tanks, they should COMBAT them. Your advantages as an infantryman are better maneouvrability, and a smaller hitbox. Your advantages as a tank are huge armor, huge damage, huge speed and plating on each side. The grenadier needs features to help him counter the tanks advantages, he should do more damage, to threaten the tank, and be able to hit them with ease at most ranges, grenadiers should cause tank drivers to pause, not to rush forward and get a roadkill.
I only skimmed thru it thinking satchels would be a sort of 9 mine replacement. The gren's improvements to counter riflemen is the 2 nerfs to the rifleman. No change to the gren is needed.
I agree RPG should never rape tanks, I was offering up the opposite of your equally incorrect "takes 20" comment. It only takes 20 RPGs if you want to take out all sides of armor first. I agree they should combat them, and I believe the trick is two phase. 1) make lvl3 RPG a good counter to heavies, and 2) make it accessable/reasonable to research. Re-reading, I agree with everything you've said.
How about reducing the health of all armors to a max of 75 (which is composite[scaling every other armor, of course]), which solves two things: A: Shortens 1v1 tank battles. B: Helps grens. Win/Win?
QFT may i use my Q3 alegory once again? current tanks in empires are similar to megahealth, red armor, haste, quad damage and the rocketlauncher. thats way to much for that tiny bit of resources they cost. if you are in a heavy tank all you do is laugh at infantry and run them over ... lol, even in a light they dont pose much of a threat.
