the reason why the scout rifle was nerfed into oblivion was to force players not to play with the gun. You dont need to force players to not play grenadier. Actually you have always not enough grenadiers in public games. No one that really plays empires can tell me that you can kill infantry faster and more effective with the mortar as you can with any rifle. Since 2.22 the rifles are deadly again and its just "point crosshair at enemy". Rifleman is the class that is easiest to play.
People tend to forget that mortar needs time to reload, you need to crouch before you can shoot and you have to lead moving targets and only direct hit will kill a player with full health. It's not very easy. And if you're killed by mortar shell, and you whine about it, why not whine about everything else you get killed with. I just don't get this discussion anymore. Getting killed by anything isn't fun. Why not delete the whole game and forget it ever existed? Seriously, this is some f*cked up shit.
What I am saying is that the grenadier's anti vehicle capabilities could use a boost, but not to the point where he can waste super expensive tanks easily. For these discussions I tend to assume that both players involved are equally skilled. I agree but at the moment the gap between the grenadier and the rifleman in terms of infantry killing is far too close, especially given their difference in anti tank capabilities (the rifleman sacrifices anti infantry power for his anti tank while the grenadier make no sacrifice to get his anti infantry). The pistol is fine, the mortar is what I would like to see toned down. That post was a not very serious reply to communism's games are for fun not balance post, I had hoped my quip about the scout rifle would convey that, but I was wrong.
remember the most fun games are balanced games, if something OP, ir not fun for the one getting killed as he don't have a chance... and prolly not that fun for the one killing either (though might be depending on the type of person you are and so), as it would be boring.
Well obviously empires is still a work in progress, but I don't think the mowtar is any source of imbalance. I can see other aspects of being a gren(like mines) being a little one sided but when you have a weapon that's actually hard to use and isn't really great agianst any one thing I don't see that being imba. It floats slowly thru the air like a big get out of the way sign and doesn't kill unless its a direct hit and even then a lot of people use health upgrade skills or are near the squad leader who gives them a heal boost. And even rifleman have standard equipped body armor that limits the damage done. If you make it take a setup time to shoot it will become completely useless and only way to make it better is to improve the damage to buildings and distance which will actually be imba and basically a free more maneuverable arty. I under stand that but you can also look at it like the rifle is good enough to kill inf with just the rifle and doesn't need the nades. But he also has the ability to use those nades which are like a mowtar(except its harder to see floating thru the air) to use behind walls and flush people out. I see the rifleman's standard nades as a kill more inf option then a sacrifice. Cause its most likely that you will see more infantry then tanks at the beginning of a match or on an infantry only map.
The point is not that you can kill infantry as fast as riflemen the point is that you almost can. Have you understood that the reason we think it is wrong with the mortar is that is gives to much direct anti-inf power to an anti-tank class? But then the weapon is broken? I mean if it can't kill at range what is the bloody point with it? What is your idea for the mortar, how does it fit in to the gren? Which targets do you feel it should be good at? If we added deploy time why do you think it would be useless? Please specify when you say stuff. I think it would be awesome and not useless. The reason is that then the grens could actually use the weapon to properly support their team mates instead of trying to score individual kills with it. Yes but it would be a vulnerable arty. That is the point. It would not be a mini artillery tank, sence big whoop for you i imagine, the grenadier is not a tank. Those he just can't stand around like the artillery tank can, also the gren will have deploy time. If a gren deploy in the open he can easily bi killed by any riflemen, or an enemy gren that is already deployed. Thus this will force people to deploy in cover, but then they loose sight so they need to depend on artillery feedback and that the team mates spot the targets. Thus the mortar will have changed to a support weapon that can help from a distance, instead of a weapon that could do that but also but used in attacking as a grenade launcher. No you can't that is irrelevant to the subject. We are comparing the gren with the current mortar to the riflemen's overall anti-inf capability. Riflemens grenades is an assault weapon which he can use to clear out enemy infantry from cover fast. Also to be used as last resort against turrets. The current mortar is a grenade launcher. But if you think both weapons are the same thing why should then the gren have that anti inf capability?
This thread is an endless textwall of the same thing being repeated over and over again. Riflemen are 5x better than grens when it comes to killing infantry. I tend to play grenadier more often though, since every fucking pubber thinks turrets are gods, and the grenadier just happens to excel at rooting out the little camping bastards and their turrets. If they get close to you though, your mortar won't do you any good unless you manage to get a lucky shot before they turn you into a leaky piece of meat.
If mortar was made deployable and if the shells had more "splash" and damage, it would take down squads at once, not only direct hit-kills... I can't see how in hell would it be balanced and less of a infantry mass-killing machine. I just wonder...
I have stated several times that if it were to be deployable that the splash should be increased but the damage nerferd to an extend. But it seems like i was forced to repeat my self again. Thus people would survive one hit, thus making them chose between staying at their defence spot or move. The mortar will then act as a prober support weapon with the purpose of forcing enemy infantry out of cover.
Doesn't sound like nerfing. But whatever. Sorry for forcing you to repeat, but it seemed, that you wanted to boost splash and damage, and then you say that you want to nerf damage, and I really can't keep on track. But even if damage is nerfed and splash increased it will become a massacre machine that will kill several players at once. Especially when there're 2-3 grenadiers hitting one spot.
Yeah a small miss from my part. But do you not feel that 2-3 people working together should be useful? 3 riflemen attacking together would also cause the same havoc. 3 carbine burst at one person instant death. EDIT: But the point is that camping would be discourage. Also you seem to forget that the other team also got grens. A gren that is deployed is vulnerable for counter battery fire, sence if he is spotted another gren could deploy and kill him if the defending gren does not see him. And like i said if he is in the open a riflemen that can't kill him in one second with a rifle deserves to die. Thus it would be the same deal for riflemen, yes one riflemen can kill infantry good, but the enemy also got riflemens. The grens would in cover not be able to see the enemy, and have to rely on teammates to spot and artillery feedback, and it would take like 2 shoots to get his bearing on a target, and even more if he needs to shift fire. You are assuming that the gren would be able to bring to bear his whole mortar fire instantly, while in practise he needs cover to deploy or he dies, and he have to first kill enemy grens or he is counter bombarded.
I looked at your Suggestion sticky: Pros: *Make the mortar less "Quake 3 deathmatch grenade launcher weapon". Thats not a pro, thats a personal oppinion *Making it able to be correctly used, with higher arc and artillery feedback it would be able to kill people behind walls and in cover sence the grenades would come form such and high angle. Right now it used to direct fire, and then it can't kill people behind walls. You can do that with the mortar we have now *Making it require more team effort, because if you deploy in the open enemy riflemen or grenadiers can kill you easy, so you need cover and then you can't see the enemy, so your team needs to spot targets. And your position is still visible, sence the grenades you fire gives you away. Thats not a pro, you assume that is like that and alot people have told you that it will not work. Cons: *Could be overpowered, but that's a balance question. Thats not a con *People would miss their 1337 "Quake 3 deathmatch grenade launcher weapon". Thats just a arrogant That suggestion is not the conclusion of that or any other thread
And once again Mayam starts to derail, it says that short comments should be held in the sticky or the threads mentioned. Also you are against it so you are biased about the points. EDIT: Also if any dev or mod had agreed with you they would have talked to me about that post.
It's common to see people whining about some real or virtual imbalance and an OMFG AWESOME fix that in the real world isn't fun at all. Truth is that every idiot can avoid getting hit by mortar +- last infantry weapons changes. If you can kill gren in 0.5-2.0s at short range it's all fine.
I derailed a thread how the grenadier was overpowered in 2.2??? The whole revive of the thread is a derail
i don't look at this thread for like, 2 days, and there's 3 pages of text to read... , but read i did. okay, to make some progress in this swamp of a discussion, we need to come to some agreement and a lil' mutal respect. agree on some points and then we can work out what, if anything, needs changing. and what i'd like to say: -the grenade launcher style mortar is balanced, though i said that before. -the grenade launcher style mortar is a grenade launcher. there's nothing to be ashamed about in that manner, but that's how it handles, how it's used, and i think it would make a lot more sense to new players if it was treated ingame as one, somewhat reducing the learning curve. i'd go so far as to say that describing and modelling it as a mortar is misleading -it's also fun to use, i will give you that for sure. it takes a certain amount of skill and it's both fun to use and to fight against. bunnyhop-crouchfire-kill should be nerfed in my opinion, because bunny hopping certainly is a very frequent used and it looks silly, dumb, it's a fairly lame to be able to just bounce around a corner and nuke the guy waiting on the other side, etc. -the grenadier is less use against late game tanks than the rifleman. why? simply because it is impossible to do enough damage to a late game tank in the "continuous damage" style of attack that the grenadier has to take a tank down without it rotating it's visible armour to give it a whole load more protection, or from running away (and in seconds repairing itself back up to full health, another slight flaw in empires? but we'll come to that another day). the rifleman must get close to the tank, a generally suicidal task at all, but possible, in order to place a sticky which is able to do massive damage. when it's "impossible with grenadier" vs "very difficult with rifleman", the rifleman wins. now what i'd like to see: -there is room for an anti building / anti vehicle weapon for players who wish to work with a squad that can protect them against infantry. so, the player would be more of a support class. -there is a need for a class which can fight tanks decently, to be able to defend a squad against tanks. currently, squads can be decimated by individual tanks simply because there is no reliable anti tank weapon. -there is need for a weapon which new players can use to fight tanks. -the current "tank spam" style of empires could be improved if a team had to work together to utilise tanks fully. this would go a long way to stop the "the team which controls the map gets the most tanks and therefore wins" and would actually allow teams with better of teamwork to fight back. many people believe that controlling most of the map, you are somehow "owed" the win, that teamwork shouldn't be neccessary other than just piling onto the enemy team. in other words, that having expensive tanks should trump cheap tanks and infantry teamwork. this is the attitude which creates the "no chance of a win, no matter how well you play" situations which we have all been on the receiving end of. okay, so what there do you agree with. can we get a bedrock of agreement to start off and proposal for changes with?
Every class bunny hops around. Just yesterday I was playing and everytime someone saw I was a gren they would start running and jumping around. Thats not a problem with grens that's an over all class issue that I don't mind because stamina doesn't last forever. The mowtar excels at killing turrets and there makers but you need to shoot and pop around to corner to see if your hitting the sweet spot. If your deployed you will not know because the square on the arty feed back is so big theirs no way to tell if its hitting it. It's really weak against tanks and buildings and hard to use against infantry. Plus ammo goes pretty quickly with out the ammo upgrade skill. So there that's where "it fits" in the gren class. also.. ITS AN EXPLODING BASKETBALL! or for the tiger woods fans a exploding golf ball. A dev agrees..
I agree mainly in the points you describe how the game handles now. But on the whole riflemen better vs late game tanks that is just because people are dumb. Seriously, having three grenadiers placing mines and hiding adn starts to fire at one tank is better then trying to rush it as riflemen. IT is a matter of team work, rushing with stickys is easier to damage late game tanks without team work. We already have a somewhat good rpg and a lol mortar do you want more weapons? The RPG is the mayor anti-tank weapon it works if people cooperate with each other. But it would be better if we berferd the research armours. Tanks need suppport as they are now, tank rushes with out infantry support in early-mid game can be overwhelmed easily with rpg and ML. The rpg is better vs turrets. You will hit almost every shoot, mortar you could miss the first two on longer ranges. The arty feedback is not that big, use the whole map with buttom m. Also with bigger splash that would be a smaller issue, also your teammates can correct your fire. Engineers can drop you ammo boxes. But killing turrets the rpg does better in the direct shooting way you are describing, so i ask you again how those the weapon fit if the rpg has teh same roll the way you describe it.
It may seem better against turrets but its not. If your getting shot by a level 3 mg its gonna mess up your aim because your getting pushed back and bullets in your face. That's why you need to shoot behind cover. You only get 3 rpgs at start and those are better kept for tanks. See if you really knew about the gren class you would also know that the mowtar is used to hit behind and on the side of the turret to kill the engineer repairing it. The rpg's just give the engy more repair points.
Yes i know you can do that with a mortar, but point being it is almost the same thing like using the rpg against turrets. But the point is about the whole gren class. The mortar gives him to much versebility as an anti tank class. If it were to be deployable he would atleast make more effort in order to attack turrets and infantry at range and more specialised, instead of just bunnyjumping or kill infantry with it directly. Deployable the mortar would be more of a support weapon and not competeing with the riflemen as a assault direct kill infantry weapon.
