"Improved Vehicle Damage" Rifleman Skill

I'm making this poll to try and analyze the usefulness of the Rifleman's "Improved Vehicle Damage" skill as measured by usage. I'll reserve any comments until after the poll has accrued some votes, first.

It's a straightforward question, if you never play rifleman of course you won't use the skill. If you never play a rifleman for tanks, of course you wont use the skill.

Dizzyone has posted some very detailed math analysis of the skill's effectiveness too, hopefully if he reads this he might link to it, or bump the old thread.

In the interest of full disclosure, I made a poll similar to this one a while back, do a search if you like, but please vote on this one first.

 

If i was forced to use rifleman for driving vehicles I would, but if Im vehicle driving I would only ever be engy or grenadier, or if Im dicking about, scout for some 3-phase no armour jeep madness.

 

The only time I use roflman for driving is when i'm jeeping or apcing so that I can get close and sticky a tank. In that case, speed upgrade is more important than damage.

 

see, these results are already indicating what we knew way way way before. I was thinking that maybe, because we have a MASSIVE influx of new players, that maybe new players would do things differently from the veterans... maybe even for the better. But the same issue is still there.

the skill is useless; or rather, not useless, but just WAAAAaaaay less useful then the engie's repairing or the grenadier's all-around way better tank skills. This skill needs changed. Badly.

 

I agree with you my Sea Water Friend, this skill is craphouse sorry for words but it's the only way I can discribe the skill, I know theres crapper skills but this goes into the craphouse catagory with rifleman damage (doing only 3-4 extra damage a shot just don't seem alot.) First time I Played I thought yeah, this skill is awesome (I Thought the NF light tank was a super strong tank back than too lol) Anyways this skill got me killed multiple times. Even today I've tried using it recently, it's not that good or big of a deal doing a small bonus amount of damage as you could go engineer and repair yourself and you can fire much more with vehicle cooling, I wouldn't want to say completely useless but I think it needs either a Buff or a whole change of the roflman's vehicle idea?


YAY Scardybob calls rifleman, roflman :D!

 

+20% ?

 

I heard that its bugged and doesnt work?

Oh and the improved vehicle damage is not worth it.
The engineer and grenadier abilitys/skills are far to
good to not use them.

Buffing the skill is a dangerous task balance wise...
I mean why researching better cannons if I only
have to take a skill...
Think of rails and plasma weapons with like 20 % more damage D:

 

never use it.

 

Roflman is not a tanking class. You should replace this skill with another infantry buff.

 

what about replacing it with a power that has to be activated and gives you 10 seconds of unlimited ammo.

 

i know empires is unrealistic ,but thats just a nowai:D (and it would be gay vs cv)

/ontopic i barely ever use that skill, if i want to drive a tank i go engy or gren

 

If you're driving a tank but you're not a grenadier, you're doing something wrong.

 

If you mean engineer, then yes.

 

You guys realize like 1/2 the skills are pretty useless right?

 

i do realize this; this one just particularly bugs the crap out of me. But come on, who uses melee upgrade in a serious game? Really? REALLY?

 

Excellent sniper hunting skill.

I say we trade in the vehicle damage skill for a grenade related skill.

'Improved Grenade Weaponry'
150% damage from grenades.

Not much on a HE nade, but your stickies now pack a punch!

 

nice idea

 

ty

<filler>

 

I think part of the game's design, though, is to try and have every class be useful in a tank -- not to just have one or two "tank driver" classes.

Of course, we know it hasn't really worked, with engies and grenadiers being much more useful in tanks than the other two. (The fact that every single grenadier skill helps you as a tank driver has something to do with this as well. Honestly, apart from the engineer ability to repair/supply ammo -- which they don't technically need to be drivers to do -- Grenadiers are basically the tank driver class already. Are we all right with that?)

If we don't like that situation, there are basically two options here:

* Buff rifleman / scout drivers somehow.
* Nerf Grenadier / Engie drivers somehow.

Since we're talking about the damage upgrade here... do you people think there's a reasonable amount of damage upgrade that would make you choose a rifleman to drive a tank? Obviously there's a "way too good" point where everyone would be a rifleman-driver (one hit kills everything, whee!) And clearly it isn't high enough right now. Is there a sweet spot between those two where it would be useful without being overpowered?

Additionally. Riflemen may need another skill to be a viable tank-driving class. (I think that that's part of what this poll shows -- obviously, since it's their only skill that helps when you're driving a tank, anyone who used them in that role would take it. But nobody does.) The class has the fewest skills, so it seems logical.

What would be appropriate, though? Riflemen are an anti-infantry class, mainly. So some sort of skill that helps tanks against infantry? But, tanks are already good against infantry...

How about a skill, "Anti-Infantry Tank Defense", which somewhat reduces the damage all infantry weapons (specifically including mines) do to your tank? It wouldn't reduce it too far, so you couldn't just use it as a substitute for defusal (driving into a massive minefield would still = death, never mind that you'd probably flip regardless of the damage), but it could protect against the stray mine or two, make stickies less insta-kill-ish, guard against grens a bit, and so on.

Now, yes, that might sound awfully good. But remember, you'd have to be a rifleman to get it (which means, no grenadier or engie abilities). Would you still do it? I think it might be a fair tradeoff, if the damage reduction was balanced appropriately.

Alternatively, if we want something easier to implement: Move Increased Armor to the rifleman. Not a big deal. Increased Armor doesn't really fit obviously into either the Grenadier or Rifleman role, so it could go to either... and Grenadiers have three skills that are useful in a vehicle already. They don't need it; Riflemen do.