Ranged weapons, Nerfed?

[vanderpm]

I am posting because unlike many of the people who are content to hack-n-slash, I have been very dissappointed with both ranged weapon crafting and use in battle.

Disclaimer: All of my notes and studies here are on 20 Quality "noob-zone" equipment with the best materials available in Tryker-land.

The shorter Version is at the bottom

Lets see if I can cover the main complaints/concerns I have and have heard voiced:

1. Ranged weapon damage is totally ammo dependant, so a level 1 fighter can use a pistol and basically power-level if they have the crafting skills or buddies to supply the pistol/ammo.
-Sub note 1: Because of this a level 1 fighter can deal as much ranged damage as a level 35 ranged fighter
-Sub note 2: The most recent patch dropped the ranged weapon damage, but overall it is still insanely high for low levels and insanely low for higher levels
-Sub note 3: There should be an appreciable difference between rifle ammo damage and pistol ammo damage. A difference of 10 or 15 in damage with the loss of 5 to 10 hits per minute does not add up.

2. I actually saw somone complain about ranged weapons having too much range. Personally I think ranged weapons should be allowed to have high ranges if the correct materials are used. Of course Rifles should have more than Pistols.
-Sub note: The same person also complained that ranged weapons could hit through walls, perhaps some sort of collision detection is in order there. They have it for movement, why not for ranged weapons?

3. Firing time for ranged weapons stink. Plain and simple. A decent one handed sword can outdo a decent pistol for speed and damage bar none. Add to that you can use a dagger at the same time as the 1 handed sword and then the pistol REALLY gets left in the dust. Don't even get me into 2 handed sword damage versus Rifle or Pistol damage.

4. Ammo plans are a bit too costly IMO. I can agree that they should not be cheap because then everyoen would have them, but at least bring them on par with everything else. 100 skill points for a new ammo plan is too much, I would be extremely happy to see the ammo plans drop to 50 sp's each, I would still be happy if they only dropped to 75 sp's.
-Sub note: In the event that an SP drop could not be achieved, at least a drop in the number of materials needed to make 1 clip of ammo (9).

5. Lastly, allow fighting skills to apply for ranged weapons, or create ranged-specific fighting skills. Currently only Aim and Berserker skills work with ranged weapons.

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Ok, so, in Conclusion I'd like to sum up the problems and possible solutions:

1. Balance out the damage of Ranged weapons. I'd like to suggest perhaps basing, or at least affecting, damage by fighting level or perhaps the dexterity and balance traits (or both).

2. Collision detection of some sort.

3. Change the firing time, in the end it really comes down to how much damage you can dish out in a given amount of time.

4. Lower the cost of Ammo plans, or the cost of making ammo (and then the price of ranged combat would go down and then a few pwople might actually use it for normal combat instead of an easy 50 or so fighting skill points)

5. Fighting skills that apply to ranged combat, currently there are none, a few would be nice, a ranged weapons skill tree even better.

[mordred3]

You are in incorrect in at least one thing.

While damage is ammo dependent, ammo works like melee weapons, which is that they have a max damage which is depenent on your level.

Thus if you give a level 20 ranged fighter q200 ammo, they wont be getting much out of it because their level is so low, thus there damage wont be anywhere near max.

Ammo damage did not decrease, it has increased. The only difference is now that to get good damage you have to actually use good mats. Before you were getting max damage from store bought mats, and that was obviously a bug. I can say however that I have made more damage than pre-patch store mats with post-patch good mats.

The difference in guns is in there stats, not really their ammo. Although I think rifle ammo does more damage. Pistols are a lot faster than rifles.

Guns do have high range, or at least can. Not sure how far rifles/pistols can go up to, but I've crafted launchers with 50 or so range.

Ammo plans dont really cost much if you take into account they dont have many guns to buy. It's really just a way of balancing out the crafters. Melee crafters have to get like 10 different weapon plans - ranged users only really need get 1 or 2. Thus they make up the cost difference in plans. It seems excessive until you start getting higher and have more points. Jewerly is the same way.

I agree with some points, but others are mistaken.

Ranged combat does need love. Their are no ranged only skills (that melee doesnt get) thus it's rather stale. Furthermore all the "aim at x" are broken and or useless. Aim at head will cause stuns, but they wear off immediatly.

Secondly, yes ammo does cost too much to make - but it's not the skill points. It's the fact that it costs a few thousand to make 12 shots which can hardely even take down a creature of any worth. They could simply A) reduce the amount of materials drastically or B) Up the amount of shots per clip dramatically.

Firing time is really based off your weapon, so just try and make a fast shooting gun and you are set. Pistols can get pretty fast I believe.

I get the impression that they want to keep ranged combat difficult and sparse. It's main function will be raids with launchers and autolaunchers. Outside of specific scenarios, I dont think we should expect to see lots of people with rifles and pistols blowing up everything. It's just not feasable currently nor do I think it will become so anytime soon.

[vanderpm]

Pre-patch all choice and fine mat ammo for pistols I could do 54 (max) damage, now that same concoction only gives me 34 (max) damage. I noticed the same change in rifle ammo (max) damage. I have never used all store bought mats for ammo, only ammo linings when I could not harvest enough.

I make guns, I know the different in stats between them and the mats that have to go in them. Guns are basically two main stats: Hits per minute and range. The range I have no qualms with, I have seen some awesome rifles get 50 range but slow attack speed and visa-versa. I don;t mind that balance there, except that compared to 1 handed melee attack, even the fastest pistol (of the same quality) cannot compare. And even if you do make a ranged weapon with the fastest firing rate possible it will have nil for range and still wont do as much damage as melee combat.

If you want to make multiple ammo types it gets very expensive. I'd at least like to get slashing and piercing ammo for pistols and rifles. That is a mandatory 300 sp's (you get piercing pistol ammo with the ammo making skill). That is a lot of SP's, specially because the market is so low for ranged weapons so there is no demand for them.

I'd like to clarity that I don't mean to make ranged combat so great that EVERYONE wants to use it. Far from it in fact. But I would like to at least get it closer to even with melee. I, for one, will not be giving up on my ranged weapons, I hope that they don't give up on me.

[tanreh1]

You are in incorrect in at least one thing.

Ammo plans dont really cost much if you take into account they dont have many guns to buy. It's really just a way of balancing out the crafters. Melee crafters have to get like 10 different weapon plans - ranged users only really need get 1 or 2. Thus they make up the cost difference in plans. It seems excessive until you start getting higher and have more points. Jewerly is the same way.

Aehm..perhaps you can explain the reason behind those words to me?

IMHO, a melee crafter only needs one weapons plan to come to the same result than a range weapon crafter. Both crafter make a weapon...the melee crafter pays 55 points to make it (melee crafting 1 (25) +weapon plan(30) whilse the range crafter pays 180 points for it (rangecrafting 1 (25) + ammocrafting 1 (25) + weapon plan (30) + ammo plan (100)).
But perhaps I have missed some reason why a melee crafter has to learn 10 Plans???

[mordred3]

Aehm..perhaps you can explain the reason behind those words to me?

IMHO, a melee crafter only needs one weapons plan to come to the same result than a range weapon crafter. Both crafter make a weapon...the melee crafter pays 55 points to make it (melee crafting 1 (25) +weapon plan(30) whilse the range crafter pays 180 points for it (rangecrafting 1 (25) + ammocrafting 1 (25) + weapon plan (30) + ammo plan (100)).
But perhaps I have missed some reason why a melee crafter has to learn 10 Plans???

I simply mean that to be a feasable crafter - and by this I mean supply people with weapons - you need multiple plans. As such, a melee weapons crafter will often have many different types of plans. This becomes especially important once warriors get up and the tree splits because they will want to level up close combat/one handed to get extra skill points. Later on it breaks into different trees even.

But for ranged - there are basically only two hunting guns. Pistol and rifle. The "bow" weapons do the exact same damage as their counterparts, so it's just a graphical difference (much as the axe and sword are). And even if you bought every gun plan that's still only 6 plans. Weapons crafters get .. 10 or so. At 30 points a peice for the first plans, thats 120 points that the weapons crafter has to spend above the ranged to get *Every* weapon plan (which most wont do, but for demonstration). Factor in the medium quality plans that are 40 points each, and you see the skilll points starts to balance out.

So I just meant that ranged crafters dont really need that many plans to provide for people, since most people will just want a rifle. And like I said - it only seems daunting at first. Once you get higher and trees split you will have a flood of skill points.

I hope that makes sense.

[ralgur]

I realize artillery is supposed to play a role in raids, especially when waves of bad guys are pouring in. If they are to make ranged as good as melee, then why would anyone want melee? The balance required to make melee desireable is tough to do I expect.

[stygeon]

I may be wrong ... happens and I am okay with that. But ammo is ammo. After the cost of the plan and upgrading your Ammo Craft ability what cost is there ? It looks like you are wanting faster access to different types of ammo by lowering the sp requirements. But in the end you really dont need it as you will have sp stacked up from ammo crafting.

I see alot of people posting that they want lower sp requirements. But I do not believe there is a player yet who has reached 250 in any one skill to comment on the higher skill versus sp. Look down the road aways ... this isnt a give it to me now game. It is pretty fresh and there are alot of levels to get. I do hope they add or edit some of the actions for ranged combat but lowering the sp requirement I fervently hope they dont. That is where the true difference in characters will be seen. How did you spend your sp versus how Bob spent his.

Just my 2 cents but if you really want it all now ... this may not be the game for you. Just an observation.

[tanreh1]

Not really in my opinion.

I'd like to explain my point of view.

To effectively provide melee fighters with weapons to be effective against all kinds of mobs AND gain experience in various branches (at least up to level 100), you need exactly three plans. (It might differentiate at level ranges higher than 100...I admit that I don't have experiences or knowledge on this skills [as they are not described anywhere out of game and not in a satisfying manner in game]).

you need
Dagger
Sword
2-h Mace

With those weapons, you cover close combat, 1-H and 2-H while dealing out piercing, slashing and smashing damage, which might be good fighting different mobs with different resistances.

To get those three weapons at QL100, you need

Melee crafting 100 (250 SPs)
Sword plan and medium (30 +40 SPs)
Dagger medium (40 SPs)
2-H Mace medium (30 +40 SPs)

altogether 430 SPs
(I assumed that Dagger plan is given with the melee crafting 1)

To provide a range fighter with the same options (QL100 equipment, ability to level both his one handed and two handed fighting and giving him piercing, smashing and slashing damage), you need the following:

Range crafting 100 (250 SPs)
Ammo crafting 100 (250 SPs)
Pistol medium (40 SPs)
Rifle medium (30 + 40 SPs)
Slashing ammo rifle (100 SPs)
Smashing ammo (100 SPs)

altogether 810 SPs


Now I compare the numbers...

range crafting is nearly twice as expensive to learn than melee crafting to get the same option (get at skill branches to 100, deal out every sort of damage) while giving the range fighter one skill branch less.

To add another weapon to the list of those a crafter can build...

You need 70 SPs for a melee weapon (medium)
but you need 170 SPs for a range weapon (weapon + ammo) (medium)

So basically I could learn two and a half melee weapons for the same costs than a single range weapon.

Add to this, that I could use stanzas with melee weapons..but nearly none with range weapons...that a single shot costs me hundreds of dappers...and you have the reason why I asked for an explanation..*wink*

Sorry, if I asked at all..I didn't want to ruffle some feathers or something like that.
I designed my character as a range fighter/crafter and am somewhat majorly disappointed about the current state. So sorry again I wrote a lengthy post.

Greetings

Tanreh

[stygeon]

Dont be sorry you asked. I just do not believe anyone can honestly state that they are hurt for sp until a base of players has forged into the 200+s in skills. I do know some harvesters may have and their info on sp at those levels would be very beneficial.

Without knowing the skill map progression at those levels it is truly hard to say what needs to be done or not when the vast majority player base is still under 100.

[vanderpm]

I realize artillery is supposed to play a role in raids, especially when waves of bad guys are pouring in. If they are to make ranged as good as melee, then why would anyone want melee? The balance required to make melee desireable is tough to do I expect.

I'm talking basic ranged combat. Right now it is nearly worthless at higher levels. I'm not saying make it better than melee combat, nor am I saying make it cheaper than melee combat. I'm just saying that it needs to be evened out a little closer and that damage should somehow be tied in with skills and/or stats and not just ammo dependancy.

I have nothing to say on the subject of artillery because, right now, I cannot even make nor use artillery.