Ground Combat Balance - V21 Experimental 6

[Chris]

There's been quite a few changes for the ground combat in Experimental 6. The most obvious is a reworking of the TU % and accuracy of the various weapons; this is according to the logic outlined in the Weapon Role thread (they are similar to those in the Experimental TU Balance patch released a few days ago).

In general, TU costs for shots have been reduced but accuracy has also been reduced somewhat. I'd be interested in people's feelings on the changes - it's a pretty big rework overall, but I think it's made combat a bit more mobile overall.

Here's the changelog:

- Weapon TU costs rebalanced extensively to reflect experimental balance patch

- TUs now capped at 99 instead of 79, and you can gain 2 TU per battle instead of 1 TU

- Starting attributes returned to a 30-70 spread for everything, including TU.

- Reduced pistol range to 10 tiles, from 16 tiles.

- Heavy weapon move penalty removed

- Reduced reload costs to reflect the fact that they use flat TUs rather than a TU %

- C4 / Plasma Charge damage halved, as the blast radius changes had made it extremely powerful

- Increased the number of defensive aliens in the larger UFOs

[KateMicucci]

Is the 20 round LMG a joke?

[StellarRat]

Is the 20 round LMG a joke?

It's not supposed to be, but there are many that would argue that. I think 30 would be a good compromise.

[KateMicucci]

When the scatter laser uses 20, that's too few, but from a verisimilitude point of view it's using the same 1 kilo power cells as all the other lasers. The LMG has a 4kg belts that occupy twice as much space and only do the same damage per shot as the AR.

50 round belts were already a compromise on 100 or 200 round belts.

[Caaygun]

I think 20 is fine for its current balance. MG is too powerful already and even more so with the removal of heavy penalty, at least that should be balanced with the low clip size.

[Chris]

No, they're not a joke, I'm still considering what to do with them.

But at the moment MG's are still totally OP, so I don't know why you're complaining about them tbh.

[legit1337]

No, they're not a joke, I'm still considering what to do with them.

But at the moment MG's are still totally OP, so I don't know why you're complaining about them tbh.

Because an MG is supposed to have large magazines? Why don't you get that? I'm really trying not to be offensive here, but I have been trying to explain that concept for a week now to no avail.

It is as fundamental to the representation of an MG as loud gunshots are to a representation of a gun. One without the other is kinda dumb.

If you need to balance the MGs to make up for (at LEAST) 30 round magazines, nerf them in some other way.

Edited March 7, 2014 by legit1337

[KateMicucci]

You can have a perfectly balanced weapon with a 20 round magazine... but it isn't a belt fed machine gun.

I'd rather have 25 accuracy or 5 round bursts back than these tiny belts.

[Chris]

More than likely I'm going to nerf the ammo capacity of the other weapons so the MG has a larger belt by comparison.

As I've been explaining for some time, we're making a game rather than a realistic depiction of military combat. Any game where soldiers by default exchange fire with single shots despite having automatic weapons is not going to have realistic ammo levels in it else you'll never need to reload your weapons.

I find it strange how people pick and choose the abstractions they decide are immersion-breaking.

[KateMicucci]

I find it strange how people pick and choose the abstractions they decide are immersion-breaking.

Because I'm not asking for a "realistic depiction of military combat" Chris. The weapons actually should fit the roles of their video game archetypes. There are several ways to balance MGs that don't involve turning them into a different weapon.

Any game where soldiers by default exchange fire with single shots despite having automatic weapons is not going to have realistic ammo levels in it else you'll never need to reload your weapons.

Alright... so what? Forcing the soldiers to reload X times per mission doesn't seem like an important balance consideration at all.

And as it stands, the lowered accuracy levels, lowered shot costs and high cover % are doing plenty to burn through ammo already without adding in arbitrary low mag sizes.

Edited March 7, 2014 by KateMicucci

[StellarRat]

No, they're not a joke, I'm still considering what to do with them.

But at the moment MG's are still totally OP, so I don't know why you're complaining about them tbh.

Chris, what about a 7 round burst, 1/4 more accuracy and a 21 round magazine? Or making them use 100% TU to fire? You could also make an MG magazine with lots of rounds that is so heavy that it would require another soldier to carry it. That would require more committment to the weapon by effectively taking two men to use it. If you think they are OP with more than 20 round magazines there are plenty of options to nerf them. My main problem with the small amount of ammo is that a PITA to reload them all the time from just a playing the game perspective. They fire just enough times that you don't always pay attention (like you would with a rocket launcher), but not enough times that you don't have to babysit them. Plus you have to load your soldier down with at least 5 ammo cans. I will have the same complaint if you nerf the others weapons ammo capacities to make the MG "look better". One thing I know for sure is that people are going to complain about the twenty round magazine constantly (specially new players) from now to eternity and it likely be a complaint in the reviews, IMO (If you care about that kind of stuff.) I fully realize you're not trying to make a combat simulator here, but there has to be an alternative besides simply removing the weapon from the game.

I find it strange how people pick and choose the abstractions they decide are immersion-breaking.

The simple explanation for this is that you called it Light Machinegun and made it act a lot like a light machinegun, made it look like a light machinegun, therefore people expect it act mostly like a light machinegun in all respects. If you would have called it a ScatterBlaster or something, no one would have an issue. The fact that everyone is complaining about the small points is a testament to the fact that you close to some reality on many things in the game. That's a good thing not a bad one, except when stuff like this comes up. Edited March 7, 2014 by StellarRat

[Chris]

@KateMicucci - if you don't believe that ammo management should be a balance consideration, I'm not sure we'll find much common ground. Making the MG incredibly inaccurate is another way to reduce its power, but that causes other issues.

@StellarRat - yes, we could reduce the number of shots fired by the MG, but to me that seems counterproductive. The defining characteristic of an MG is that it fires a lot of bullets, more so than anything else.

I also disagree to an extent that players will complain forever about the ammo counts. I think when we reduce the other weapons and the MG once again has the largest clip and all ballistic weapons have the same mags as their advanced counterparts, I imagine people will understand the abstraction better. A standard AR has a 30-round mag (12), which roughly equates to a man-carried LMG having a 50-round mag (20). From there it's not that much of a logic leap that the weapon that fires loads of bullets runs out of ammo more quickly.

@everyone - as I've not decided what I'm doing with the MG yet (if anything) and I don't see anyone posting any new arguments that weren't posted in the last thread, let's get back on topic with the thread and discuss the (fairly major) changes that have been made rather than those that have not.

[Skitso]

Yeah, I don't like the new LMG either. Just put the burst back to 5 bullets and belt to 15. Then choose a TU cost for firing and reloading for balance purpose. The thing just doesn't feel right atm, and it wasn't even broke to begin with...

EDIT: sorry to continue babling about the MG Chris, didn't see your post above before writing my own...

Edited March 7, 2014 by Skitso

[StellarRat]

@StellarRat - yes, we could reduce the number of shots fired by the MG, but to me that seems counterproductive. The defining characteristic of an MG is that it fires a lot of bullets, more so than anything else.

OK, but I don't remember anyone complaining about five or the ammo supply.

Back on topic, you removed reaction fire from MG's recently. Can we get it back please?

Edited March 7, 2014 by StellarRat

[KateMicucci]

Now that aliens can get 4 reaction shots a turn suppression is more important- but flashbangs are still broken. I've used 3 so far against groups of aliens and not managed to suppress anyone and gotten reaction fire for my trouble.

Sebillians (low level ones at least) can't hit anything even when they're spraying bursts at xenonauts only a few tiles away.

Close range bonus can cause a pistol to go from 11% accuracy to 40% accuracy just by walking one tile closer, yet it is still 11% for several tiles further back. Weird jumps in accuracy. Why isn't there a high starting accuracy with reduced accuracy for every tile away an enemy is instead of close range bonuses and long distance penalties and a completely flat value in between?

[Chris]

I'll decide the reaction fire choice when I decide the MGs as a whole. And no, but it's not that surprising nobody complained about the ammo supply when they could fire the weapon ten times before they had to reload it.

Skitso, I think you dislike the MGs for different reasons to everyone else. I don't think giving them a 15-round belt would make anyone else in the thread happy

Anyway, enough talk about the MG's for now, we're two pages in and it's literally all anyone has talked about so far. There's a lot of big changes in this update that this thread was intended to get feedback on.

[Chris]

Kate - do you have a screenshot of that weird close combat accuracy jump? It sounds like pretty major bug.

[Skitso]

Skitso, I think you dislike the MGs for different reasons to everyone else. I don't think giving them a 15-round belt would make anyone else in the thread happy

With 5 bullet burst and 15 rounds in a belt you get 3 bursts without loading. If damage per bullet was upped to compensate, I think most us here would be happy. But ok, enough of MG already.

Edited March 7, 2014 by Skitso

[StellarRat]

With 5 bullet burst and 15 rounds in a belt you get 5 bursts without loading. If damage per bullet was uoped to compensate, I think most us here would be happy. But ok, enough of MG already.

Back to grade school for you!

[Skitso]

Fixed already Typing from a mobile

[StellarRat]

Non-machinegun related. It turns out that there really might be a bug in suppression. Check out the error thread. My guys attempted to take a ship last night and despite use all kinds of fire and seeing suppression markers they were gunned down by aliens that didn't seem to care much. The whole team wiped out. The reason I'm saying this is that it's affecting my ability to actually determine balance.

[kabill]

Non-machinegun related. It turns out that there really might be a bug in suppression. Check out the error thread. My guys attempted to take a ship last night and despite use all kinds of fire and seeing suppression markers they were gunned down by aliens that didn't seem to care much. The whole team wiped out. The reason I'm saying this is that it's affecting my ability to actually determine balance.

Have managed to find evidence of the non-suppression-related reaction fire bug as well. It's less critical, though: just assume if you see an alien that hasn't shot at you that it can take its maximum number of reaction shots!

[legit1337]

@chris

Reducing the ammo count on other weapons is a bad idea IMO. 20 round assault rifles was already stretching it, making them any less would completely invalidate any kind of authenticity the game still had.

And yes, soldiers today still use single shot for fighting battles. In fact, fully automatic fire is extremely rare unless you are fighting in a city. Engagement ranges past 100m almost require single-shot for any kind of accuracy.

Can't you see the absurdity of 20 round magazine LMGs? and 12 round magazine assault rifles? I don't care if it is "balanced" (and I don't agree that making you reload every 3 shots is balanced anyway), it doesn't feel or sound right.

@everyone

I picked this game up because I wanted a game that accurately depicted and immersed me in an alien invasion during the cold war.

That means period accurate weapons, with authentic (if not real-to-life) characteristics, and a battlescape engine that was not only robust and realistic, but also rewarded squad based tactics used in real life.

The development of this game seems to be moving further and further in the direction of an arcade game with strategy and immersion thrown in as an afterthought. Just like the newest X-COM EU.

I've sat through a lot of design decisions I have not agreed with. I've grit my teeth and lived with it. I always justified it to myself that the developers knew what they were doing and I would adapt. Not this time. This game is starting to not resemble the game I came here hoping would be made.

This isn't a temper tantrum. I'm not demanding changes be made "or I'm leaving" or any other kind of childish ultimatum. Chris can very well do what he damn wants with his own game.

But unless something changes, I've come to realize this game really isn't something I am interested in playing, and I am seriously considering dropping it completely.

Edited March 7, 2014 by legit1337

[KateMicucci]

Kate - do you have a screenshot of that weird close combat accuracy jump? It sounds like pretty major bug.

Not of that incident.

What % of an accuracy boost is bug territory? Trying to reproduce it now the highest I've gotten is 16%.

[SwiftDus]

new member:) biggest x-com fan ever... just wondering. is there any possibility to maybe increase the max carrying weight of the soldiers.? i allways load up my soldiers with : laser rifle, 2 clips, stun rod, 3 grenades and armour. that makes em very slow and tired.

hoping you can add a few shots in the laser rifle clip..

thanks 4 a FANTASTIC remake/new game !