Someone

Not everyone who starts APB is bad at shooting, Like they have never played a shooter before. I completely disagree that ramraiding and mugging heavily favoring Criminals over Enforcers, Farming empty servers does not compensate for always getting ambushed and losing work. A major reason why non-mission activities are not found to be engaging is from contact missions being profitable enough that it makes these activities feel like a waste of time. Which means Criminals pretty much always raid solo and rarely to play the game of cat-and-mouse/hide-and-seek/risk-vs-reward that made it interesting. Factors for crime such as the bounty system at Notoriety 5 is currently disabled and the Notoriety/Prestige intra-mission system which was a core part of the game cycle is also gone. Meanwhile Enforcer players rarely even look for raiders, car jackers, and muggers let alone mange to witness them because so few players do those activities. Most Enforcers also don't know you can impound stolen cars for easy money on any populated server, But contact missions make it feel like a complete waste of time. Simply make free ammo for the default guns if it turns out that bad, Even if the default guns didn't get free ammo players always easily earn ammo money. Just mug people or impound some stolen cars and you'll have your lunch money for ammo, Increasing profit on activates is also an available option. Hand grenades would be a bigger money sink than ammo, But people have wanted grenade spawn gone for a long time and this could solve it forever. Right now players only fail to make profit on a mission because they hadn't completed any objectives or earned any medals, The only time players lose money in a mission is due to demerit medals. I gave ammo costs for 4 types of weapons which showed the difference in scale between cheap and expensive ammo. I also stated that more types of ammo should be made so each weapon can be balanced for its cost-of-use. The default weapons are not so bad that they cannot compete with guns of the same type, In fact the FBW is considered one of the best sidearms in the game. The default car isn't the only vehicle that is free to spawn, Increasing the cost to spawn vehicles encourages players to preserve a vehicle the more expensive it is to spawn. It would make Remote Detonator unappealing to use with a high tier vehicle and encourage players to park high tier vehicles with mobile spawn more conservatively. Right now players don't usually consider buying lower tier vehicles as their one advantage (cost to spawn) over higher tier counterparts isn't sufficiently influential. Whatever gains a player is maximizing by using the most effective weapons and vehicles which are the most expensive to use depends on what they are doing. With contact missions the player is trading mission profitability for enhanced capabilities to earn contact reputation through better performance. With witness missions Criminals and Enforcers have different perspectives. Criminals don't lose profitability using the expensive equipment as long as they don't get witnessed, While Enforces trade profitability for enhanced capabilities. Again, In the very first post I stated that creating more ammo types would allow further refinement of balance issues found with specific weapons. Though that might not be at all necessary as one might think, Ammo could already be for guns what tiers stand for when spawning a vehicle. Even based on current cost-per-round basis weapons could be split into tiers like vehicles: Pistol ammo and Machine Gun ammo is the cheapest meaning any weapon that uses it is tier 1 ($0.09/$0.13) Weapon that use Less-Than-Lethal Pistol ammo would be tier 2 ($0.25) Weapon that use Rifle and Magnum ammo are both tier 2 ($0.33/$0.40) Weapon that use Generic Less-Than-Lethal ammo would be tier 2 ($0.50) Weapon that use Shotgun shells and High-velocity Rifle ammo tier 3 ($0.80/$0.87) Weapon that use Flares, 40mm Grenades, and Hand Grenades make up tier 4 ($5-$15) Rockets are their own tier like how the Mhuller M1 is when chop shopped/impounded. ($100/$50) Machine Gun and Pistol ammo should be renamed to "Long Pistol" and "Short Pistol" ammo respectively, Many weapons that use it should be changed to use another ammo type. Even if ammo prices increased 10x I don't think those weapon would break when they switched ammo type because its another means to balance these various weapons.

How often are new players losing because they are not using the best weapons and vehicles in the game? I say not that often, At most they have the wrong weapon for the situation. Again, New or bad players can always profit during missions because the default guns are free and use the cheapest ammo while the default car is free to spawn. Old players having mounds of cash is a problem all MMORPG games face and the only way to solve it without resetting the economy is adding a money sink. If I was asking for an increase to weapon rental cost you would have a point as players would be forced to "get their money's worth" out of a rented weapon to not throw money away. Making the ammo more expensive means players don't lose much money from having a wide arsenal, But over reliance on weapons which are best-in-class requires compromises. Ammo type and thus cost does not have to be the same for every weapon within a class, It's a trivial and small change that adds another characteristic to balance weapons. Armas weapons don't have free ammo and the cost of weapon rental isn't high enough to create a big difference in profitability. What permanent Armas weapons save is a players time as they won't have to grind weapon ranks to have a 3 slot weapon, Filling up those 3 slots then becomes a money sink itself. Honestly a bigger issue for P2W is the money and symbol complexity bonus from premium accounts.

Making weapons in APB a potential moneysink as a means of balancing them is not comparable to Counter Strike in any way. A match in Counter Strike is zero-sum because it has no persistence while contact missions in APB are not zero-sum. Losing the "match" but making money is a viable game choice in APB because there is persistence with money and contact reputation. Witness missions on the other hand are zero-sum because the only thing on the line is money earned within the district. If a moneysink was a bigger part of gameplay meta then there would be more competition in the marketplace for such easily made items and people would be less willing to spend so much for them. Not that it matters if you happen to successfully make huge profits selling infinitely duplicatable things on the market place, Nobody forced the other players to give you their money and time.

#1 and #3 are contradictory. If it's too easy to make money outside of missions then how does it punish new and low skilled players? Players can always profit during missions despite being new or bad, The default guns are free and use the cheapest ammo while the default car is free to spawn. #2 is merely a difference in perspective. Most cars in the game have had no place at all in the meta because there is no reason to not always spawn the best-in-class vehicles. Players currently have no reason to not always buy and use the "best" weapons in the game even on lesser skilled or equipped players.

I think weapons could have been balanced through other means already present in the game besides adjusting every weapon's characteristics over and over. Jumpshooting was garbage though and made the game worse off.

Experienced players kept overplaying the best and most meta weapons over and over until everyone got sick of it and left. Yet no one got the clue that APB didn't need perfectly balanced weapons, When the existing mechanic of money could have balanced overuse of such equipment.

Are you suggesting that only Criminals would be able to afford a 10x increase to ammo and vehicle spawn cost because Criminals can mug/ram raid? If so that tells me I'm right; But that Car Jacking/Impoundment that needs an increase to profitability and not Ram Raiding, While Mugging just needs the bounty system turned back on. I'm late to Enforcer gameplay but I have a hard time finding anyone ram raiding, mugging, car jacking, or carrying around more than $2,500. I can find stolen cars to impound but I'm grinding contacts and not money right now, But as it is now it seems like a decent riskless farming method. I would have more chances to witness if Criminals were forced to do those activities so they can afford to fight expensively with the "best" cars and guns.

Why shouldn't money be a used to balance weapons and vehicles and alter player behavior? I feel like this game mechanic shouldn't be ignored like it has been for years.

For most of the games life many core aspects of the game are still unfinished, So much focus on combat has left many other problems unaddressed. Why can players bail at any speed or in the air? Car Surfer would be more balanced if jumping off a moving car could injure/kill you. No witnessing during missions without opposition and no reason to complete missions without opposition. Non-mission making money in populated mission districts not being viable like it should be. Weapons got many balance changes but vehicles remain unbalanced and nowhere near as diverse in usage as weapons are even at the most unbalanced periods. Some vehicles are vastly superior while others are particularly underwhelming and most need more component and customization unlocks. Same goes of Player Mods. Green and Blue mods are nowhere near as diverse in usage as weapons are or their mod usage. Clotting Agent 3/2 is massively dominant over Kevlar Implants which is even less common than Fragile or Flak Jacket when it absolutely shouldn't. The locked content and the pace at which players earn it when leveling up missions is the absolute best during contact tiers 1-3. Endgame players need more of that, Separate contacts for new vehicle and character content. There are many who want more component unlocks for the "low tier" vehicles.

What if it was? Sure people's threat could get carried up and down by repeatedly playing with teammates with large disparities in skill but when is that really going to be a serious problem?

Is that really necessary to achieve a bell curve threat level system? Why can't the current mechanisms they use to determine threat bracket a minority of players as green or gold?

The only problem I had with threat was that the bracket sizes made no god damn sense! Green threat was such a small bracket of the lower skilled players that anyone who was green was basically a PVE encounter. Meanwhile gold threat was just too large a bracket compared to silver and bronze. Why has threat level never followed the bell curve?

What is absurd about it? The economic system already exists in the game, Moving ammo and vehicle spawn cost up a decimal point is not a far fetched concept. Lowering profit margins is nothing compared to game changing mechanics like mobile spawn, elective spawns, and weapons as retrievable items. Consumable items are already in the price bracket needed ($2000 per box) to make players use them selectively. New players wouldn't be affected the way you imply as the car they start with is free to spawn and the default guns don't need renting which improves their profit margins considerably. Old/good players actually gain a reason to use so called "low tier" weapons and vehicles when facing new/bad players because its more profitable. Ram-raiding, mugging, and chop-shopping becomes meaningful when its profit margins stand out. LTL, impounding stolen cars/dropped goods becomes viable money making ventures for enforcers.

This is a fairly simple but radical suggestion so hear me out and please set aside the effect of players who have at present accumulated vast sums of money. The potential ramifications of this change to the game's entire meta is probably larger than I am capable of dissecting. Money should be a balancing factor for weapons and vehicles so that the "bad" guns and cars are profitable to use while the "best" weapons and cars sink money. Therefore all Ammo, Grenades, and Vehicle Spawn cost should be multiplied by 10. 7,500 Rounds of 9mm ammo would cost $7,000 instead of $700. 4,500 Rounds of Rifle ammo would cost $15,000 instead of $1,500. 100 Frag Grenades would cost $8,000. 1,200 40mm Grenade Rounds $120,000. Rockets become $1000 a round. Half-Brick/Eight-Ball stay $1 each. Tier 4 vehicles like the Vegas, Pioneer, and Mikro cost $1,000 to spawn. Tier 3 vehicles like the Fresno, T-25, and Moirai cost $500 to spawn. Tier 2 vehicles like the Broadwing, Sentinel, and Montane cost $250. Tier 1 cars like the Calabria, Varzuga, and Han Veo remain free to spawn. This is just a few of the things which would see an increase to cost. Right now the cost of spawning in vehicles and buying ammo is negligible, Nobody thinks about how their choice of vehicle or weapons is going to hurt their wallet. People do consider how those choices affect their performance in a mission, Like whether their shotgun fits the situation or if their Vegas can carry an object. By increasing the cost of vehicles by a factor of 10 or more, Players gain a reason to use "lower tier" vehicles without having to buff them all into equality. Vehicles that are free to spawn gain a real niche by being readily spawned and destroyed with little consideration. By allowing players to lose money while winning missions because their prolific use of machine guns and muscle cars is more expensive than the opposition's shotguns and SUVs, The game gains another means to balance not just the meta between weapons and vehicles but also how and when players choose to use them. Take time-to-kill for example, There has been much talk about what it should be built around how that makes the game play. Instead of simply increasing the TTK why not give players a reason to measure the use of deadlier weapons with the cost of operation relative to the strength of opposition? Perhaps when every rocket costs $1000, Missing the OSMAW will become unappealing and even undesirable to use against lesser armed players or cheap vehicles. Trying to finish missions armed with only handguns might become a thing as players decide the cost savings is worth waiting for when the expensive gun is necessary. Grenade spam could definitely be cut down quite a bit when every grenade you hurl puts a $80 to $150 dent in your wallet. Non-mission activities such as mugging, ram-raiding, chop-shopping, witnessing, and impounding stolen goods/vehicles might need the profit per-item/action increased as well. APB is designed to have players flow between doing activities to make money and missions for contact progression, Without the possibly of losing money doing missions it doesn't work. Regular contact missions have always been the best way to make money in the game compared to the other methods available which carry more risk. Requiring players to play cheaply to make good profit doing missions makes the other means of making money become more lucrative by comparison. The lack of incentive for non-mission actives causes the overplaying of missions which makes players feel burned out, This hurts the game quite a bit. I really could go on and on about the potential ramifications this change could bring during gameplay but I cannot summarize it. If economy becomes a gameplay consideration there predictably could be issue with how premium would give those players profit margins with expensive weapons F2Ps. I imagine being forced post-patch to reset every players cash to deal with the possibly unbalancing effect of many players with huge sums of money endlessly playing very expensively. Any playstyle F2P can't consider but must face can easily become P2W in many players eyes so I can see removing the enhanced money from premium. Also, With this change Light Machine Gun ammo should be removed and the weapons that use it changed to other types. Submachine guns should be using 9mm/magnum ammo while light machine guns should be using rifle ammo. Creating more types of ammo can be used to further refine any balance issues with specific weapons.

I know no one cares about car balance but could the devs PLEASE fix the Donton Montane? It currently accelerates faster backwards than it does forwards because its front wheel drive which makes no sense as a pick up truck. It also wouldn't hurt to buff its cargo capacity to the same as the Packer Ceresco making it an alternate ram raid vehicle which again I know no one cares about.

Its been a long time but as far as I know the rank distribution makes zero sense, it should be a bell curve but its anything but. What I mean is that a minority of players should be ether Green or Gold while the majority are ether Bronze or Silver.

I don't ever recall getting rewards for completing missions or objectives without opposition.

Right now there is zero incentive for Criminals to finish objectives when assigned a mission without opposition, This is clearly a waste of the Witness system which was clearly intended to be a core game mechanic. Therefore Criminals should get normal money and standing for completing objectives/missions even without opposition while Enforces get extra money and standing for witnessing a Criminal in a mission without opposition. If Criminals actually completed objectives in missions without opposition it would give Enforcers a chance to witness the Criminals and start a mission, If Enforcers got extra money and standing for witnessing Criminals in a mission then Enforces would have a reason to search for Criminals to witness. It's very boring as a Criminal to get missions without opposition because you sit there on an 99% finish objective just waiting for opposition to show up, If missions without opposition gave normal money and standing then it suddenly becomes a fun and worthwhile challenge to try and finish a mission without being witnessed by Enforcers. Criminals being able to farm not just money but also standing on empty servers isn't an issue because getting a mission without opposition requires readying up for a mission which places you on the matchmaker which continues to search for opposition, Which means that as soon as an Enforcer joins the server and readies up for a mission you could get opposition instantly which doesn't happen with ramraiding which already exists. There is also "A civilian has witnessed you" which I don't think does anything right now but what it could do is give any Enforcer who enters your mission from the matchmaker the same money and standing bonus they would have gotten if they had witnessed you. Honestly this all seems to be how the game was supposed to work on release but they simply forgot to turn on rewards for missions without opposition making the witness system pointless.

I think the current system could work if they changed the proportions which IIRC has it that green is the rarest rank by intention. If I could just adjust the proportion of the playerbase that would be fit into each threat it would be: 10% Gold 15% Silver 25% Bronze 50% Green

Blowtorch repair rate should be nerfed but it's not a game changing mod so that's probably why it hasn't bothered even the most anal of players under the most ridiculous circumstances. Also all the people who complain about runners ether need to get good or stop lying, 90% of the time you could run it's with a hold item that you could more easily walk to a broken camp location. One person with map knowledge can move the item to a broken location that allows a disorganized team to defend it, Compare that to running which inherently leaves your dead teammates behind and it becomes clear which tactic is more "dishonorable". Not to mention the massive engine power debuff on holditem/vip in vehicles which already gives runners a headache unless they are organized. The only thing broken about running right now is that no vehicles compete with the Vegas 2x4/4x4 and Faction heavy vehicles, The Fresno is honestly the only vehicle that competes with those two. Ether buff various other vehicles to various degrees or nerf the Vegas and the faction heavy vehicles to be inline with the rest the vehicles in the game, Or he's an idea add a cooldown to respawning vehicles with the Vegas 2x4/4x4 and Faction heavy vehicles having the longest cooldowns. Also nerfing Mobile Spawn Point was a mistake because it made it equality easier to chase and run while at the same time making it harder to camp.

I only remember picking up two primary weapons that I could switch freely between and even resupply but I had to drop my secondary weapon, Also if I switched to my secondary weapon before dying I would't drop my primary weapon. I can't remember if I then dropped my secondary weapon but I think I seen people with two secondary weapons. I disagree that it was unbalanced and in fact I must insist that it added so much to the game people got mad because it made the game "less causal". Thinking and remembering about what it took to get the OCA + HVR combo, Getting two complementary primary weapons like that meant someone had to choose a risky but rewarding engagement. -If you had an OCA you needed to kill the HVR user before they switched to their secondary weapon, Which is not easy because even assuming you get within range to use your OCA on the HVR user they will for certain switch to their secondary weapon to fight you. -If you had an HVR you had to to kill the OCA user at a range that gave you time to pick up their OCA, That usually meant you had to fight the OCA user with your secondary weapon because he HVR slowed you down too much and you don't want to drop the HVR. I personally don't recall feeling that the HVR + OCA combo was overpowered or unfair, Fighting them wasn't different from fighting a person equipped with just and OCA or just and HVR. Sure a good HVR user in an excellent position was even harder to dislodge if they also had an OCA, But them having an OCA didn't really matter as it was their ability with the HVR that made them powerful not the OCA. On the flip side someone with an OCA + HVR was actually less powerful at close range then OCA + a typical secondary weapon but more far flexible at holding positions then OCA + secondary weapon. Really that just shows that the HVR is a little too good as it does slightly more damage then it needs to.

It was a GREAT mechanic but I remember the most hated thing about it was IIRC that you would pick up two primary weapons if you dropped your secondary, People thought that was game breaking because it meant winners of an engagement would double their firepower in a certain sense while the loser is left at a disadvantage. I thoroughly understand why people might not like that mechanic or think it's fair but the reality is that it isn't just balanced but also potentially raises the skill ceiling of the game. Consider an established Esports game like Quake 3/Champions where part of the game is ensuring your opponent can't collect vital weapon/item pickups after you kill them so they can never again fight you on an even playing field. Is it fair that a player who has already died should be further punished by respawning in a weaker state then the person who just killed them? I don't think most people would say that's "fair" which is why there was/is a fairly popular competitive quake 3 mod (Rocket Area) that removed item pickups and and made players spawn fully equipped after death. I don't know which was a better game but as far as I can tell vanilla Quake with it's "unfair" respawning system has lived on longer and stronger then Rocket Arena. Personally I had a BLAST with weapon pick ups and never felt that the player with two primary weapons had an unfair or unearned advantage and I was disappointed when it was removed.