Armor/MH Balance

[Alien]

Nex is good as it is, just collect some hp, armor before rushing

Ever tried that against kojn or bundy? Good luck with that.

Taking armor? Last time I played with bundy, iirc, it was CTF on mental space, and yes, I took armor and even took mh. Laser is more powerful in that map than nex, though.

[alpha]

Nex is good as it is, just collect some hp, armor before rushing

Ever tried that against kojn or bundy? Good luck with that.

Taking armor? Last time I played with bundy, iirc, it was CTF on mental space, and yes, I took armor and even took mh. Laser is more powerful in that map than nex, though.

Not taking armor. Attacking in ctf vs someone nexing like crazy.

[Bundy]

Note: All the stuff I write is from my TDM/1v1 experience. I also play CTF at times, but my knowledge about the balance in this mod is much less! This seems to be a big problem in the hole discussion. There are more players who prefer CTF over 1V1/TDM. For that reason, it is good to see what will happen in the other mods when we change something. But I bet that nearly no CTF player can see any problem with the shotgun. They often enough throw it away, as it is not that useful there

Megahealth improvement, one more try :

This is a item placement issue... place 25 health further apart; by the principle of simplicity, four 25 healths placed together is intended to equal a megahealth.

I agree, that it is a item placement issue. There are rare exceptions like final_rage, where the megahealth is very important. My idea about improving the megahealth is more a "global" solution, to fix it on all maps, instead of fixing every map. But it is very important to show all the cons when this would happen. It will effect CTF, too. And the CTF player base is bigger then the TDM base.

Placing 25er health further apart doesnt fix the overall problem. You are always forced to move around while taking health packs for not being effected by rot. I dont know why the megahealth is intended to be the same as 4x25er healthpacks, is it a rule or something? In other games it makes sense, as the magical damage number is 100, but that is not the case for nexuiz. You can also get 100 health faster with the 25er packages, because of the respawntime. The only downside is, that you dont have 100 at once.

So maybe another solution would be: reduce the respawn time of the megahealth. It spawns in 30 seconds, while 4x 25er packs spawn in 25seconds. But I prefer the idea of improving the megahealth that way, that is gives more health

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Oh and the laser that is ridiculously over-powered as well

Just watch waldi play, he might as well use the shotgun + laser all game, from playing him and others I find that people can just run at you with the shotgun and do insane damage from a starting weapon, sometimes I don't even see the point of picking up another weapon in nexuiz.

I really don't understand why folks think there's so much fun and balance in starting weapons being craptastic. The point in picking up more weapons is to have more options and versatility, not so that you can just get back in the game until you die again and the right of passage of finding a decent weapon begins once again.

Let´s try ...

Starting Tools:
I will compare the nexuiz spawner with the quake3 spawner. Maybe we can find something which could be improved in nexuiz (or Q3 )

The Q3MG does a lot of damage overtime and its real strength is on mid to long range. The shotgun with first fire archives the same goal, but is weaker on the longrange, therefor stronger on shortrange. The Q3MG doesnt have a 2nd fire as the shotgun, which does lot of damage in a very short period. This makes the shotgun superior on very close range when it is combined with good aiming and ping. You also have a lot of ammo for the shotgun at start.

There is also no option in quake3 like the laser to push your enemy around and prevent him from hitting you. You have allready options at the start of nexuiz, while you dont have efficient options in q3 (gauntlet is really not worth to mention here, if we compare it to the laser).

I completely agree with TVR that the laser is one tool which make nexuiz unique, so I dont think it would be a good solution to remove it from 1on1/tdm. Laserjumps help a lot in terms of mapcontrol. But they also have a small disadvantage: I can hear where my enemy is, when he uses the laser and that way it is easier to hide or do some predicition-shots at him. Of course, this doesnt help a lot when you dont have a good weapon to spam with.

150 Health: While you need that much health to prevent being an instakill when you spawn, it seems to be a lot when you dont get spawnfragged. That is one reason you can run at others and do a lot of damage, as you are very healthy at the start allready. Compare this with a "stacked" player who got 100 Health and 100 Armor, the difference is only 50 health. One more reason to improve the Armor/Megahealth?

Nexuiz is very unforgiving when you arent able to prevent the shotgun guy from getting next to you (and that will happen in most cases when you miss the first shot or he is using the laser very well). So watching at this, it is clear that a spawn next to you in Nexuiz is a lot more dangerous then in Q3. I also think that it is not only the shotgun which makes the spawning guy that tough, it is the combination of laser/sg/150health with to much ammo.

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Nex is good as it is, just collect some hp, armor before rushing with your laser to enemy base immediately after respawning. If you need fast rockets, use hagar. It's basically is very fast rockets with small blast radius.

In CTF you are able to "refresh" in the base and get a very healthy stack, this is not possible in 1v1/TDM (think about even skilled players/teams!). There are a lot more fights for the armor and weapons, so you are constantly under pressure. In TDM a nexhit will help you in 0,1% of the times (for the rare situation that you grab a powerup because you got nexed), while at CTF it can help you to escape.

I am fine with the nexgun damage BUT testing it with less damage on a server wouldnt be wrong. I wonder a bit that all think that reducing the damage would be the best solution instead of improving at least the mh and maybe also the armor. It archives the same goal without big changes. But I guess I miss something.

[alpha]

Why do you think CTF people don't realize the shotgun problem?

I am CTF-er and I can tell you that SG is imba, plain and simple.

But I was told it won't get fixed until hell freezes over.

For now lets test lower dmg nex.

And by the way the whole argument of MEGA vs 4*25 is rather moot, because I can name like.... umm.... 2? maps where there actually are 4 25-packs close enough to each other.

[ai]

Listen up people, there is one GOLDEN rule you are missing. NEX isn't meant to be a shock rifle, I bet Nex was meant to be more on the lines of a railgun. So WHY nerf it, that's just stupid. Get it to your tiny little brain Alpha.
Anyone complaining about the railgun in Q3 saying to remove it or make it a shock rifle?

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I'm really sick of these topics...
So, let's get back to topic (if you want to talk about nerfing Nex ... again.... start a new topic).
About the health armor thing, which IMO doesn't need changing. But I suppose it wouldn't hurt to try and give the MH 150 or something to see how that goes.

[alpha]

Get it to your tiny little brain Alpha.

I'm really sick of these topics...

You know, everyone in these constructive topics are just sick of your comments already, me included.

Don't like the topic? Don't read it, don't comment on it, and get lost.

[Bundy]

Please dont start a flamewar at each other. Everyone has his oppinion and this topic (balancing) is huge. For that reason we have to see it from many sides. Sure, the nexgun damage itself is not the mainpart here, but it is part of the balancing overall.

For me it is clear, that armor and mh is to weak. But as you see, many doesnt agree with me, thats fine. I see the game from another perspective, as I played tons of Quake3 TDM. That influenced my thoughts about the balance in _this_ game.

To simplify my thought process about part 1.):
One small room with one MH or Armor as the powerup inside of it. Both start with 150 health, like in the real game, have the Nexgun and aim with 100% accuracy (so rot can be neglacted) with the normal damage of 130. You need 2 shots to kill your enemy as you know. My problem is, that the powerup doesnt change that.

[alpha]

My problem is, that the powerup doesnt change that.

Well let's see it's because nex is overpowered? :/

Or MH should somehow be magically tied to amount of nex shots you can sustain?

Sorry I dont get it.

[Bundy]

Yes, I think the megahealth and also the armor should negate one hit of the highest damaging weapon, which is the nexgun. The rifle headshot cannot be taken as an example, as it needs more aimingskill to hit the head instead of just hitting. As mentioned, that is the way I know it from other games and I think that these are fairly balanced in terms of Powerups vs Weapons. Weapons vs weapons is another topic. Quake got the Railgun/Shaft/Rocketlauncher where we have the Nexgun/Mortar/Rocketlauncher.

Right now you die to fast in TDM/1v1, which is not only because of the nexgun. As written in my first post: we have a lot of splash, we have a lot of high damage combos and we have a strong starting weapon. Improving the powerups would change that a bit and this just sounds right for me.

some more examples ...

Nexuiz example:
normal starthealth (150) and the nexgun as a startweapon which deals 130 damage.
If one takes the MH with the current settings, he got 250 Health.
2 Hits are needed to frag the other, even if you take it

Quake3 example:
normal starthealth (125); and the rail as a startweapon which deals 100 damage.
If one takes the MH with the current settings, he got 225 Health.
3 Hits are needed to frag the other, instead of 2

Quake1 example:
normal starthealth (100); and the rocketlauncher as a startweapon which deals 100 damage.
If one takes the MH with the current settings, he got 200 Health.
2 Hits are needed to frag the other, instead of 1

Quake2 example:
normal starthealth (100); and the rail as a startweapon which deals 100 damage.
If one takes the MH with the current settings, he got 200 Health.
2 Hits are needed to frag the other, instead of 1

Quake live example:
normal starthealth (125); and the rocketlauncher as a startweapon which deals 100 damage.
If one takes the MH with the current settings, he got 225 Health.
3 Hits are needed to frag the other, instead of 2
normal starthealth (125); and the railgun as a startweapon which deals 80 damage.
If one takes the MH with the current settings, he got 225 Health.
3 Hits are needed to frag the other, instead of 2

And to answer your question: I am fine with the current nexgun, compared to the other weapons. There are also the shotgun and the mortar ... but really, thats another topic. This discussion would go to nowhere if we think and write in detail about that, too

[divVerent]

Why not simply change Nex damage to 120? But I tell you, except in theory, it'll change NOTHING and the Nex would stay just as overpowered as it is now.

Also, the Nex is not a starting weapon.

Unreal Tournament: start health = 100, redeemer does 1500 damage.
With megahealth, he got 200 health.
1 Hit is needed to frag the other, instead of 1.