Med Spray Patch Announcement

[Nickolai 206]

Nice shifting the meta a little, sadly nobody to shoot at on NA.

Would be nice seeing some unpopular guns getting a buff like the Thumper. 

I got it for trading 3PS for it... thats how much little value it has.

[Nerima 61]

18 hours ago, SkittyM said:

Honestly curious why people refer to this gun.  It was bad from the beginning and you never see it ingame.  It's also one single preset out of i think 6?  Sales have to be Below Zero for the last 6 years on it.

I simply hate when stuff like this happen. If you making adjustments to weapons make sure you do it properly, keeping in mind things like presets. This is simply how it should work in the correct game development process. I'm not against this obeya nerf, I'm against this hell of a mess.

 

I fell into this before - with jg knock knock. When cj in jg was meta I decided not to buy 3-slotted version in favor of knock-knock, simply because keeping enough modification when you have 10 characters is near impossible.

Then they ""adjusted"" cj in shotguns and ever since then its a deadweight in my inventory. I even contacted support a few times about this topic - and of course they wont do nothing. Even such a simple thing as changing my unplayable knock-knock to proper 1140.

 

This is not fine at all, regardless if bz was a good gun or not.

 

God talking about this without swearing is tough.

Edited August 19, 2021 by Nerima
typo

[vsb 6174]

4 minutes ago, Nerima said:

I simply hate when stuff like this happen. If you making adjustments to weapons make sure you do it properly, keeping in mind things like presets. This is simply how it should work in the correct game development process. I'm not against this obeya nerf, I'm against this hell of a mess.

 

I fell into this before - with jg knock knock. When cj in jg was meta I decided not to buy 3-slotted version in favor of knock-knock, simply because keeping enough modification when you have 10 characters is near impossible.

Then they ""adjusted"" cj in shotguns and ever since then its a deadweight in my inventory. I even contacted support a few times about this topic - and of course they wont do nothing. Even such a simple thing as changing my unplayable knock-knock to proper 1140.

 

This is not fine at all, regardless if bz was a good gun or not.

 

God talking about this without swearing is tough.

preset guns shouldn't be sold as permanent options at all imo, for exactly this reason

[MonkaS 215]

mark my words no amount of balancing is going to make all the guns viable so could you please stop changing them or at least revert back to like 2014 or 2015 yea ntec was still on top for the most part but cqc weapons were all viable and felt good.   

[Noob_Guardian 418]

2 hours ago, MonkaS said:

mark my words no amount of balancing is going to make all the guns viable so could you please stop changing them or at least revert back to like 2014 or 2015 yea ntec was still on top for the most part but cqc weapons were all viable and felt good.   

CQC weapons were viable and felt good before they buffed them, then nerfed them, then buffed them, then nerfed them.

 

You don't have to "revert" all guns just to fix that issue. They didn't need to initially buff the OCA after making CJ effect it, because it was still heavily used and a great gun. It didn't need "buffed" and it didn't need to be altered again afterwords what 2 times after that.

 

PMG was always iffy, was unusable before initial buff, but has been only had minor nerfs until the recent pass. Which im not sure how it handles now. It's been problematic at a wierd place between cqc and mid-range and doing a bit too good at both in comparison to other cqc weapons. Especially without the need to go into mm.

 

Shotguns were broken back then, so I'd rather not go back to that. However, shotguns will forever be a hassle to balance properly. They did have some decent balance at one point, however they've always had a few that were  either overpowered, or under powered since, and they've never entirely as a class been well balanced.

Edited August 19, 2021 by Noob_Guardian

[sweetLemonade 112]

37 minutes ago, Noob_Guardian said:

CQC weapons were viable and felt good before they buffed them, then nerfed them, then buffed them, then nerfed them.

 

You don't have to "revert" all guns just to fix that issue. They didn't need to initially buff the OCA after making CJ effect it, because it was still heavily used and a great gun. It didn't need "buffed" and it didn't need to be altered again afterwords what 2 times after that.

 

PMG was always iffy, was unusable before initial buff, but has been only had minor nerfs until the recent pass. Which im not sure how it handles now. It's been problematic at a wierd place between cqc and mid-range and doing a bit too good at both in comparison to other cqc weapons. Especially without the need to go into mm.

 

Shotguns were broken back then, so I'd rather not go back to that. However, shotguns will forever be a hassle to balance properly. They did have some decent balance at one point, however they've always had a few that were  either overpowered, or under powered since, and they've never entirely as a class been well balanced.

The only way this game will ever have guns that are balanced (especially shotguns and snipers) is increasing the TTK to higher values, around the TTK values of Apex Legends with lvl4 shields have to specify since some people 'played' Apex and think it has a lower ttk than apb :'), I've thought about increasing it to Kev3 levels but 2STK shotguns would still be a thing, which it shouldn't be. Lowering RNG, to the point of essentially nullfying it, is also a major step in the right direction.  

RNG has no place (or should be kept to BARE minimums) in FPS/TPS games. End of story. Not only will this allow for MUCH more room for adjusting TTK values of all the different weapons they've added, it'll make the game more skill based and reward good players.  

but hey, i'm just a boomer...what do I know...  

 

If they continue with the current weapon TTK's (which obviously they will), I'd like to see the PMG be converted it into a burst SMG so that it differentiates itself from other SMGs (akin to the Prowler in Apex)

3-5shots per burst, 4 bursts to kill? Whatever they decide to do (please not with current TTK...), I think it would be for the better. (even then, this idea of having it be burst with current ttk is so odd, bleh)

 

On-topic of weapon balancing, mods are also a thing that should get MAJOR changes:

-Removing the ability of HS to "lower" RNG (the fact a mod lowers RNG shouldn't be a thing, HS should only add zoom fov, RNG should not be thing to begin with)

-RS should stay (with explanation down below as to why)

-Removing IR, CJ and Bando (no, a mod shouldnt impact range, ttk or add bullets to your mag)

 

Now, this is more out there, but what if SMGs and pistols in APB would be 100% accurate when zoomed in (or at least keep it at bare minimum), while having RNG when being hipfired at further ranges? (keeping hipfire only viable at CQC ranges)

This change is probably out there and maybe would be flawed in some way, shape or form that I can't think of right now, but I really think it's a step in the right direction (I adore Apex' gunplay)

 

Going a bit off-topic from your reply, but I'd love seeing better movement mechanics in APB. Walljumping, wallclimbing, airstrafing, they'd be sick ways to outplay an opponent holding the corner with a JG (especially paired with no RNG)

And a plethora of suggestions that were burried on the old forums (ones that come to my mind rn are Esther's clan system & clan war suggestion, map changes people have been telling them for years, removing running missions and other general mission tweaks etc.) This does require more tweaking of the base code and probably more man power that they aren't willing to invest (even though it would MAJORLY help them if and when the EU hits) so I do understand why they would refrain from them.

but hey, i'm just a boomer...what do I know...  

 

Edited August 19, 2021 by qb

[MrChan 337]

3 hours ago, MonkaS said:

mark my words no amount of balancing is going to make all the guns viable so could you please stop changing them or at least revert back to like 2014 or 2015 yea ntec was still on top for the most part but cqc weapons were all viable and felt good.   

You're right that there are far too many guns for a 100m draw distance and sub 1 second ttk to make all of them, or even most of them, competitive. But I think we could do better than the 3 gun meta we had for what felt like a very long time under G1.

[MonkaS 215]

3 hours ago, MrChan said:

You're right that there are far too many guns for a 100m draw distance and sub 1 second ttk to make all of them, or even most of them, competitive. But I think we could do better than the 3 gun meta we had for what felt like a very long time under G1.

just because there are 3 ranges close/mid/long doesn't mean the game has ever been dominated by just 3 guns its always been 4 or more the issue is there are to many that aren't even viable alternatives to the best in slot and that makes the game not only boring but incredibly frustrating especially to new players who don't understand that they just wasted those joker tickets they grinded on a perm weapon that just sucks. 

[Flaws 1033]

9 hours ago, MrChan said:

You're right that there are far too many guns for a 100m draw distance and sub 1 second ttk to make all of them, or even most of them, competitive. But I think we could do better than the 3 gun meta we had for what felt like a very long time under G1.

LO has contributed significantly more to a stale meta than G1 ever did though. LO made the JG the single best shotgun and best CQC weapon and thats been the case for nearly 3 years straight now. Under G1 we had the JG, CSG, OCA, OCA Whisper, PMG and all of them were viable depending on playstyle. Now if you're playing at top level you want to pull out a JG and sit on corners which is the most boring CQC gameplay has ever been. The same goes for weapons like the FAR as well which was technically a better N-TEC 5 even before the initial nerf of the 2014 N-TEC 5 but before LO made it accessible for Joker Tickets it was way harder to get your hands on it so everyone naturally went with the classic AK-47 looking gun (not to mention that it looks and sounds much better than both the FAR and STAR) and thus it remained meta for all these years. They ruined long range as well because before you would see the heavy HVR, Scout, OBIR and Obeya rifle in play now its almost exclusively DMR-AV at high level because it is the most efficient after everything else got nerfed to shit and it blows up cars in 3-5 shots because they forgot to nerf AV weaponry accordingly when cars got turned into wet cardboard.

 

I'd say that G1 made a mistake many years ago when they listened to players complaining about them constantly making reskins of weapons and started trying to make unique new weapons instead because we're now stuck with all these other guns which don't really have much of a place in the game yet they all need separate balancing on their own further complicating a matter which LO can scarcely handle already. There need to be bigger, core changes to a lot of those weapons and I'd say that converting a lot of them into reskins of some of the main meta weapons would absolutely be the way to go.

 

For example, why do we have so many assault rifles in the game? You only really need like 3 and the rest should all just be reskins of these 3. Base 3 would be N-TEC 5, FAR and ATAC (this wouldn't apply to legendaries). STAR becomes a FAR reskin, Frenzy becomes an N-TEC reskin. Misery probably shouldn't even be an AR to begin with, I'd make it an Obeya reskin. Even if you want to keep some uniques like the ACES Rifle, you could but you can still cut down significantly on balance issues by merging many weapons that are practically identical but have some super slight differences just for the sake of calling it a different weapon.

10 hours ago, qb said:

Going a bit off-topic from your reply, but I'd love seeing better movement mechanics in APB. Walljumping, wallclimbing, airstrafing, they'd be sick ways to outplay an opponent holding the corner with a JG (especially paired with no RNG)

I would love to have more movement mechanics in APB, this is why I love Apex's movement and gunplay so much. I've been a jumpshooting advocate in APB for years now because it makes the game way more fun and its the kind of mechanics that made this game good to begin with. But LO seems to think otherwise in how they nerf almost all kinds of movement and force you to be a sitting duck with basically every weapon. Instead of going towards fun, arcadey gameplay (which is what APB was always intended to be), we're headed towards boring CS:GO type gameplay where you can't move an inch if you want to hit the broad side of a barn with an AK-47 (N-TEC 5). The more RNG they throw into the mix the more they kill their own game.

 

The only way to salvage this atrocity is to revert everything to pre-LO state and not touch it until the engine upgrade is fully released and even then, get someone who actually understands and plays the game to do these changes. Swallow your pride and your ego and admit that you've failed at your job because your game is on its knees because of shit like this (among other things).

Edited August 20, 2021 by Flaws

[Frosi 722]

16 hours ago, MrChan said:

You're right that there are far too many guns for a 100m draw distance and sub 1 second ttk to make all of them, or even most of them, competitive. But I think we could do better than the 3 gun meta we had for what felt like a very long time under G1.

Basically this. 

 

APB has a lot of guns and no one is talking about making all of them viable in a competitive environment and be able to compete with one another, it is simply not realistic. However, there's also the problem of stale gameplay caused by having too few guns sit at the very top such as you mentioned. It isn't fun facing the same hand full of guns over and over especially while attempting to play something that isn't one of those select few weapons.

 

The other issue is what is a good "baseline" and what isn't (insert baseline joke here). Having a meta is fine, but if said meta is unhealthily strong within its own vacuum then that hurts the overall gameplay, this was seen with the OCA prior to this patch and its INCREDIBLY low ttk of 0.62 with CJ3. It wasn't fun to play against and it was so unreasonably ahead of most other SMG's that it was nearly impossible to buff other SMG's to compete as well as doing so posing the fact of creating even more unenjoyable weapon options to go against. Think of the OCA nerf of a change aimed to bring it from 110% strength back to 100% strength, something still very strong but not to the point where it hurts the overall gameplay.

 

This patch (so far) has not shown signs of weapons that were adjusted completely falling out of the meta, instead, what appears to be happening instead is a bunch of lesser used weapons popping up more as players are experimenting and giving more things a shot which is a good thing. 

 

Also something Little Orbit is hopefully very aware of is that shotguns, in particular the JG and to an extend also the CSG pose the very same problem of being so incredibly strong due to APB being a third person shooter and the ability to maximize the amount of time behind cover in which the enemy will not be able to return fire. However, shotguns over the years have proven over and over to be either overpowered due to being too consistent or worthless because they weren't consistent at all which means that the past 9 or so years of attempting to balance shotguns has basically done nothing and always ended up with one of two results.

 

Diversity is key, there will always be a meta but once those guns exceed a certain strength then no amount of buffs to underused guns will make them playable in comparison while keeping the gameplay from becoming too frustrating. 

[Flaws 1033]

39 minutes ago, Frosi said:

APB has a lot of guns and no one is talking about making all of them viable in a competitive environment and be able to compete with one another, it is simply not realistic. 

Make some of them reskins of others that they are already almost identical to, like I suggested in my previous post. We don't need 4-5 different ARs that are almost an N-TEC but are very, very slightly different. There are simply way too many guns to balance while also trying to keep each of them different in some way and the game doesn't need that.

39 minutes ago, Frosi said:

However, there's also the problem of stale gameplay caused by having too few guns sit at the very top such as you mentioned. It isn't fun facing the same hand full of guns over and over especially while attempting to play something that isn't one of those select few weapons.

What we had during G1 was better for the reasons I stated in my previous post. We had multiple strong weapons in each category and you would see them get used mostly equally. You could only make an argument about the N-TEC 5 being overused (instead of also having the FAR be used along with it) but that was only the case because the N-TEC 5 is free and available very early on from contacts while the FAR used to be an event only weapon and it had a full priced Armas variant. That, paired with the fact that the N-TEC 5 simply looks and sounds way nicer made it the definitive AR, plus it had reskins (of higher quality than the FAR) making it way more appealing overall (I believe this to be objectively true). And regarding the STAR 556, while it is a decent starter gun which you can mostly spray with, it is still the "starter gun" and as such most people would automatically assume that it is relatively bad and will want to immediately swap to something better. I'll also have to remind you that many players do use the ATAC variants as well as the Raptor which are also assault rifles. You mostly see the N-TEC at high levels but lesser players tend to struggle with it so they opt in for something easier to handle such as the ATAC/Raptor or simply not an AR altogether.

 

Close range is currently vastly JG/OCA dominated while long range is mainly DMR/DMR-AV and the occasional Obeya rifle because HVR and OBIR got nerfed. It used to be that CSG, PMG, HVR, Scout, OBIR were just as viable in their respective categories but that is no longer the case.

 

It has been getting more and more stale while unpopular guns aren't really becoming any more popular (yeah, save for the DMR). Instead, some popular weapons are slowly falling out of favor because "well X popular gun is shit now, might as well just use Y popular gun from now on" and I've seen that a lot recently.

41 minutes ago, Frosi said:

This patch (so far) has not shown signs of weapons that were adjusted completely falling out of the meta, instead, what appears to be happening instead is a bunch of lesser used weapons popping up more as players are experimenting and giving more things a shot which is a good thing. 

When you make a weapon worse or a lot worse, people will naturally steer clear of it and look for the next best option. For example, RNG is frustrating and only takes away from the enjoyment, it does not add to it. In the end when everything blooms out to hell people will just cease to have any enjoyment from the game and leave.

1 hour ago, Frosi said:

Also something Little Orbit is hopefully very aware of is that shotguns, in particular the JG and to an extend also the CSG pose the very same problem of being so incredibly strong due to APB being a third person shooter and the ability to maximize the amount of time behind cover in which the enemy will not be able to return fire. However, shotguns over the years have proven over and over to be either overpowered due to being too consistent or worthless because they weren't consistent at all which means that the past 9 or so years of attempting to balance shotguns has basically done nothing and always ended up with one of two results.

Shotguns have always been overpowered due to APB being third person but never on the scale of the current JG. The current JG is the top CQC pick for everyone right now. The only people who pick SMGs (almost always OCA nowadays) instead are players who prefer to give up some of that power in favor of more fun gameplay elements like tracking instead of point and clicking (which is subjective for everyone of course). As such I believe that shotguns in general need some kind of rework, like someone had the 3 shots to kill idea which we never really saw being tested out or talked about all that much.

50 minutes ago, Frosi said:

Diversity is key, there will always be a meta but once those guns exceed a certain strength then no amount of buffs to underused guns will make them playable in comparison while keeping the gameplay from becoming too frustrating. 

There is only so much weapon diversity you can have in a game that isn't played exclusively for fun but instead for some form of competition. You can have 3 maybe 4 different weapons in each category which differ to each other at most and even then there will always be 1 or 2 which are the top picks at highest skill level in their category. And thats why I think that merging some of the weapons will at least make use of their skins while simultaneously make the overall balancing process significantly easier by lowering the amount of factors that need to be taken into account when any change is made to any weapon. I also think that most people who already own a lot of these unique weapons that came from Armas or from the Joker Store will not be particularly mad about it since their purchase would now be more viable than before.

 

You say that gameplay becomes too frustrating when certain weapons are too strong and you are right. I will once again give an example using the N-TEC 5 because it is a good example. What used to be the case was that you could outplay a lesser player who had a CQC weapon with the N-TEC in a CQC situation if you really had mastered it (jumpshooting included). Now with all the spraying (bloom) nerfs to it it is basically being forced to lose out to a CQC weapon even if it is being wielded by a worse player. You are essentially creating an artificial barrier and thus reducing the skill ceiling of the weapon. You can't shoot slower in order to compensate for bloom in close range because CQC weapons have faster TTK anyway even if you're minttk-ing with the N-TEC so you're losing out even harder if you do that. The only option is to chance it and spray while being a sitting duck (pretty low chance of success) because jumpshooting with it has been severely nerfed unless you're hugging the enemy. The N-TEC was never good at pushing a CQC player, especially of similar skill level. If you tried to jumpshoot, you'd get minttk'd in mid air because you're stuck in a falling arch which is always 100% the same and any experienced player can track it perfectly. If you tried to push a corner on foot you'd get minted even faster becuase thats what CQC weapons are designed for.

 

The same thing happens if you pit the N-TEC against a Carbine or an OSCAR, both of those have way more mobility because hipfiring is their strong suit which made them harder to kill at close and mid range for an N-TEC user. Now its even harder because you also have to shoot slower with the N-TEC (due to all the bloom) while also tracking someone who has maximum mobility, while you have little to none yourself, being forced into ADS.

 

So yes, gameplay is indeed very frustrating when certain weapons are too strong in comparison to others, especially when it doesn't have to be the case and it didn't use to be. The same logic applies.

[Frosi 722]

31 minutes ago, Flaws said:

Make some of them reskins of others that they are already almost identical to, like I suggested in my previous post. We don't need 4-5 different ARs that are almost an N-TEC but are very, very slightly different. There are simply way too many guns to balance while also trying to keep each of them different in some way and the game doesn't need that.

While technically correct, this is a free to play games and these guns were monetized in the past, changing one gun into another regardless of how commonly used it is will upset players. There is no winning scenario here even if it seems like a logical or 'simple thing' to do.

 

33 minutes ago, Flaws said:

What we had during G1 was better for the reasons I stated in my previous post. We had multiple strong weapons in each category and you would see them get used mostly equally.

I don't agree with this at all, G1 meta while there were guns that aren't in the meta right now wasn't exactly great and IMO was a great example of what I mean with "guns that are unhealthily strong".  Here are a few examples of gameplay that sooner or later was deemed frustrating.

 

Being tagged by an 850 DMG HVR and having to wait 15 seconds to regen.

PMG being the meta SMG by far due to its range which meant that sometimes fights would be decided by pure RNG as well as the not so uncommon scenario in which you got out ttk'd by a PMG on 20-30 meters, once again due to pure rng.

Every mission having multiple N-tecs as it was the essentially the only usable AR in the game despite the others not exactly being bad on paper. 

39 minutes ago, Flaws said:

You could only make an argument about the N-TEC 5 being overused (instead of also having the FAR be used along with it) but that was only the case because the N-TEC 5 is free and available very early on from contacts while the FAR used to be an event only weapon and it had a full priced Armas variant.

The FAR is accessible on both Armas and through events correct, however, in the past that has not stopped a weapon from becoming the absolute meta pick. Old version of the CSG, Whisper, Trouble Maker or even Scout are good examples of this and none of those were available as part of an event either. 

Looks, sound or whether something is a starter gun or not does not impact the Meta because the Meta isn't decided by those stubborn to try something new for whatever reason they might have. The meta is outlined by those willing to play something new and match it up against the meta to see if it does well, an example here is the DMR AV which has been slept on for a while but was popularized after good players picked it up during the CET and did surprisingly good with it in an environment that matched some of the best players against one another, this is and will always be more meta defining than any gun sound, look or prejudice.

 

Neither the STAR or FAR are good enough at mid range to reliably compete with the N-tec or the guns the N-tec can take on within its effective range. They are better in CQC but this tradeoff was not worth losing out on mid range capabilities.

 

46 minutes ago, Flaws said:

When you make a weapon worse or a lot worse, people will naturally steer clear of it and look for the next best option. For example, RNG is frustrating and only takes away from the enjoyment, it does not add to it. In the end when everything blooms out to hell people will just cease to have any enjoyment from the game and leave.

I feel like you contradict yourself in this statement, if the weapon in question (The N-tec) was made a lot worse then people would've steered away from it already or even back when it was at the 2.4 Modifier Cap initially many months ago which was also in an environment in which the FAR was even better than it is now. This isn't the case however, NONE of the weapons changed in this update have dropped in popularity by a noticable amount which is an indication of a set of changes that don't disrupt the meta but instead leave some room for new weapons that break into the meta. I'd argue it won't take long for weapons like the PMG or even Manic to see more of a use again while guns like the Cap-40 may not become the most popular but will at least have a decent chance combating an OCA.

 

50 minutes ago, Flaws said:

As such I believe that shotguns in general need some kind of rework, like someone had the 3 shots to kill idea which we never really saw being tested out or talked about all that much.

I agree here, over the past 10 years Shotguns have been re-iterated around the same idea of a 2 shot kill with a big delay in-between shots, this concept is fundamentally flawed as it plays into the idea of playing around corners / corner popping heavily for as long as the JG / CSG follow this concept they will always end up overpowered or flat out bad.

 

54 minutes ago, Flaws said:

So yes, gameplay is indeed very frustrating when certain weapons are too strong in comparison to others, especially when it doesn't have to be the case and it didn't use to be. The same logic applies.

Your last paragraph doesn't make a lot of sense as it revolves around the idea of the N-tec's CQC being killed entirely which isn't the case because if it was, people would've steered away from it back then and especially now. The N-tec will continue to be a dominant pick, however if you want to full auto it you now need to be closer to your target OR opt to burst it in 3-4 round bursts which due to its very fast recovery and extremely low recovery delay will always be strong regardless of its max bloom value. You could argue that you're changing the way the gun is played in CQC and how that is something 'bad' but I feel like players with a mindset like that are preventing themselves from improving heavily. 

 

G1 has allowed stagnant balance to kick in by not making changes, this has allowed players to spend years playing a weapon and making them believe it is fine that way but as LO took over the game the game has started to evolve and with it evolved the meta, however, due to the stagnant past of APB's balance players have often perceived these changes as an attack to their favorite weapon / playstyle, often not accounting for the overall health of the game for their own sake. To an extend you prove this point by saying that a worse player with a CQC gun can beat the N-tec, stagnancy has allowed for the idea of "my gun should beat this guy because he is a worse player" to fester when in reality he SHOULD have something going for him playing a CQC gun into a mid range gun, somewhat levelling the playing field, if you're the better player you can adapt to the situation and optimize the way of playing your mid range gun in CQC even after a direct nerf.

 

If you find yourself in a CQC scenario against guns that you feel like the N-tec can't match in that very scenario then you can opt into using a gun that is better suited such as the ATAC or FAR for AR's or weapons such as the Carbine, Oscar or OCA much like in a different scenario you would consider opting into using a gun better suited for long range instead of the OCA you have equipped.

 

The patch has been out for 3 days now and so far the meta has shown no signs of shifting, only time will tell but at least now they can actually focus on buffing weapons instead of having to pay attention to just whatever seems to be overperforming. In a game like APB the meta SHOULD always be evolving through continuous balance, if something is too strong it might see adjustments and if it ends up too bad as a result then it should receive adjustments to bring it back up. 

[axtasia 16]

11 hours ago, Flaws said:

The only way to salvage this atrocity is to revert everything to pre-LO state and not touch it until the engine upgrade is fully released and even then, get someone who actually understands and plays the game to do these changes. Swallow your pride and your ego and admit that you've failed at your job because your game is on its knees because of shit like this (among other things).

It would be nice.

Unfortunately, it looks more like LO will make the min TTK for weapons - 10 seconds, lmao. For example, now obeya has been fixed, people will start using OBIR more often, and then LO will also fix this weapon. And so it will happen with every type of weapon. xd

[Frosi 722]

10 minutes ago, henjey said:

It would be nice.

Unfortunately, it looks more like LO will make the min TTK for weapons - 10 seconds, lmao. For example, now obeya has been fixed, people will start using OBIR more often, and then LO will also fix this weapon. And so it will happen with every type of weapon. xd

The intend is not to bring up the TTK across the board, its been this low for countless years and changing away from it will be as much of a bad change as making the TTK too fast as seen with the OCA prior to this patch.

[Chilavert 9]

We are waiting for the fix in the next patch:
- buff pmg because the wasp is stronger now
- fix N-tec 5 because it has already been fixed for several years, no need to stop at this
- fix oscar
- fix obir
- Med Spray? let's pretend once again that we fixed it
- Han Coywolf? we will continue to pretend that everything is in order with this car. But rather, let's add speed when moving at the final stage of the mission
- N-hvr damage reduced to 55

[Flaws 1033]

1 hour ago, Frosi said:

While technically correct, this is a free to play game and these guns were monetized in the past, changing one gun into another regardless of how commonly used it is will upset players. There is no winning scenario here even if it seems like a logical or 'simple thing' to do.

A free to play game with little to no playerbase left, which is in desperate need for some kind of re-launch under a new engine. I think LO can overlook a couple of people who may or may not be upset over it for the sake of making the game better for everyone by making it feasible for themselves to balance it in any way.

1 hour ago, Frosi said:

I don't agree with this at all, G1 meta while there were guns that aren't in the meta right now wasn't exactly great and IMO was a great example of what I mean with "guns that are unhealthily strong".  Here are a few examples of gameplay that sooner or later was deemed frustrating.

 

Being tagged by an 850 DMG HVR and having to wait 15 seconds to regen.

PMG being the meta SMG by far due to its range which meant that sometimes fights would be decided by pure RNG as well as the not so uncommon scenario in which you got out ttk'd by a PMG on 20-30 meters, once again due to pure rng.

Every mission having multiple N-tecs as it was the essentially the only usable AR in the game despite the others not exactly being bad on paper. 

The FAR is accessible on both Armas and through events correct, however, in the past that has not stopped a weapon from becoming the absolute meta pick. Old version of the CSG, Whisper, Trouble Maker or even Scout are good examples of this and none of those were available as part of an event either. 

There are a few changes LO made which I agree with such as the damage nerf on the HVR and the PMG's range capabilities. I also like the current state of the Cobra being fun and the Yukon not being literally broken anymore. However, most other things were better off the way they were at the time. Everything else needed to get buffed to be able to compete with the big players or better yet, get merged with them, instead of slowly killing off everything that is meta one by one.

1 hour ago, Frosi said:

Looks, sound or whether something is a starter gun or not does not impact the Meta because the Meta isn't decided by those stubborn to try something new for whatever reason they might have. The meta is outlined by those willing to play something new and match it up against the meta to see if it does well, an example here is the DMR AV which has been slept on for a while but was popularized after good players picked it up during the CET and did surprisingly good with it in an environment that matched some of the best players against one another, this is and will always be more meta defining than any gun sound, look or prejudice.

 

Neither the STAR or FAR are good enough at mid range to reliably compete with the N-tec or the guns the N-tec can take on within its effective range. They are better in CQC but this tradeoff was not worth losing out on mid range capabilities.

There is the issue of the meta and then there is the issue of weapon popularity where the vast majority of APB players do not necessarily care about the meta (bronze district for example) as they play the game in a more casual way. The same goes for any game. In a game like APB if a weapon looks more appealing to a casual player they are more likely to pick it up. If a weapon is easily accessable to a new player, they are more likely to pick it up. I think that if you put the FAR next to the N-TEC in the contact purchase list, for the same exact price you'd see a lot more FAR players than now over the course of a year. New players would usually prefer swapping to something other than the starter gun and thats where the N-TEC comes in as the next obvious choice, because the FAR is more complicated to obtain even now and new players have no idea about the Joker Store or how to get Joker Tickets. They likely don't even know about the FAR's existence because it isn't in the contact purchase list.

1 hour ago, Frosi said:

I feel like you contradict yourself in this statement, if the weapon in question (The N-tec) was made a lot worse then people would've steered away from it already or even back when it was at the 2.4 Modifier Cap initially many months ago which was also in an environment in which the FAR was even better than it is now. This isn't the case however, NONE of the weapons changed in this update have dropped in popularity by a noticable amount which is an indication of a set of changes that don't disrupt the meta but instead leave some room for new weapons that break into the meta. I'd argue it won't take long for weapons like the PMG or even Manic to see more of a use again while guns like the Cap-40 may not become the most popular but will at least have a decent chance combating an OCA.

People did steer away from the N-TEC back when it was at 2.4 initially but it didn't stay that way long enough for everyone to catch up to the fact that the FAR (a weapon which is way less accessible to people who don't spend money on APB anymore as they'd need to grind to get it permanently for 10K JT, which is A LOT) has become superior and even if they did catch up they didn't have enough time to get it or couldn't be bothered before the N-TEC got slightly buffed again. Many of them went for the Obeya rifle instead and the ones that hadn't were just trying to see if they could make the N-TEC still work somehow. I was one of them until I ended up switching to the FAR after some time. This update has been out for 2-3 days and if it remains this way, I expect people to slowly replace the N-TEC with something else once more, such as the Obeya rifle. But this also doesn't mean that any new players won't go directly for the N-TEC first so the weapon's popularity is unlikely to go down. The meta however will change and it will likely be replaced.

 

Yeah, if PMG suddenly turns out to be better than whatever was done to the OCA it will suddenly be back to nothing but PMG again like it was last time the PMG got buffed but the OCA was nerfed. And this is assuming that people don't start corner camping with JG even more now than before as it is still the top meta pick with or without this patch.

1 hour ago, Frosi said:

Your last paragraph doesn't make a lot of sense as it revolves around the idea of the N-tec's CQC being killed entirely which isn't the case because if it was, people would've steered away from it back then and especially now. The N-tec will continue to be a dominant pick, however if you want to full auto it you now need to be closer to your target OR opt to burst it in 3-4 round bursts which due to its very fast recovery and extremely low recovery delay will always be strong regardless of its max bloom value. You could argue that you're changing the way the gun is played in CQC and how that is something 'bad' but I feel like players with a mindset like that are preventing themselves from improving heavily. 

There is a difference between preventing yourself from improving and the game's skill ceiling being artificially lowered thus making the outcome of something you do more RNG than before. It will be a dominant pick because it will be popular overall but when the meta settles and someone figures out the current best pick, everyone (who plays meta at least) will gradually change to that instead.

1 hour ago, Frosi said:

G1 has allowed stagnant balance to kick in by not making changes, this has allowed players to spend years playing a weapon and making them believe it is fine that way but as LO took over the game the game has started to evolve and with it evolved the meta, however, due to the stagnant past of APB's balance players have often perceived these changes as an attack to their favorite weapon / playstyle, often not accounting for the overall health of the game for their own sake. To an extend you prove this point by saying that a worse player with a CQC gun can beat the N-tec, stagnancy has allowed for the idea of "my gun should beat this guy because he is a worse player" to fester when in reality he SHOULD have something going for him playing a CQC gun into a mid range gun, somewhat levelling the playing field, if you're the better player you can adapt to the situation and optimize the way of playing your mid range gun in CQC even after a direct nerf.

 

If you find yourself in a CQC scenario against guns that you feel like the N-tec can't match in that very scenario then you can opt into using a gun that is better suited such as the ATAC or FAR for AR's or weapons such as the Carbine, Oscar or OCA much like in a different scenario you would consider opting into using a gun better suited for long range instead of the OCA you have equipped.

 

The patch has been out for 3 days now and so far the meta has shown no signs of shifting, only time will tell but at least now they can actually focus on buffing weapons instead of having to pay attention to just whatever seems to be overperforming. In a game like APB the meta SHOULD always be evolving through continuous balance, if something is too strong it might see adjustments and if it ends up too bad as a result then it should receive adjustments to bring it back up. 

It is true that G1 had stagnant balance and while I agree that the meta should evolve I believe that whoever is deciding on what the meta should look like currently doesn't really play the game and doesn't understand what kind of game APB is or what is fun/enjoyable to use in it. And even if they do play then they are not very good the game, not enough to be in charge of balancing at least. I think that it should be mostly brought back to what it was when it worked for most people (pre-LO), even while being stagnant, until such a time comes where someone more competent, who is good at the game, is able to go and make changes to the meta and evolve it instead of killing it off. Preferrably after the engine upgrade is fully released so that we can see weekly changes, instead of having to wait over half a year for a single thing to be adjusted.

 

And why yes, while I agree that the ATAC and FAR should be better in CQC than the N-TEC, I still think that the N-TEC should still be allowed more room to defend itself in CQC and not allow this much RNG to get in the way of that. The whole point of an assault rifle is to be good at everything but not too good at anything and the N-TEC never was too good at anything. At high level it would get absolutely obliterated by any CQC weapon in CQC, Carbine and OSCAR at mid range due to their mobility and any long range weapon at long range. Every weapon of every range could defeat an N-TEC assuming that the skill difference between the two players isn't too vast.

 

Someone who picks a CQC weapon already had A LOT going for them in a CQC situation because their weapon is designed for CQC. It kills faster, its made for hipfire thus more mobility, it doesn't require acrobatics or ADSing or spraying while crouching, etc. It was already balanced well enough where even a lesser player did have more than enough advantage over an N-TEC user but now it is overwhelmingly so. Way too much, to the point where it scarce matters how good the CQC player is at all and that is the problem. Again, it creates an artificial barrier which you cannot fight through skill but you rely 100% on luck even in scenarios where you should win it because you've sat down and you've mastered your weapon.

Edited August 20, 2021 by Flaws

[FakeBungo 248]

3 second grenade resupply is worst change since LO's decision to unban and support hackers

[RandomNoob 3]

Imma slap IR3 on me OCA now, 37m baybe, those N-Tecers will be scared

[Hexerin 1143]

On 8/19/2021 at 5:56 AM, Nickolai said:

Would be nice seeing some unpopular guns getting a buff like the Thumper.

Just like all shotguns, will never actually be viable so long as they remain pure RNG. The "high tier" players meme'ing with them is not indicative of actual gameplay balance.

[stateofthegame 23]

5 hours ago, RandomNoob said:

Imma slap IR3 on me OCA now, 37m baybe, those N-Tecers will be scared

ir3/hs3/ms OCA meta is upon us

[Noob_Guardian 418]

On 8/19/2021 at 6:12 PM, qb said:

The only way this game will ever have guns that are balanced (especially shotguns and snipers) is increasing the TTK to higher values, around the TTK values of Apex Legends with lvl4 shields have to specify since some people 'played' Apex and think it has a lower ttk than apb :'), I've thought about increasing it to Kev3 levels but 2STK shotguns would still be a thing, which it shouldn't be. Lowering RNG, to the point of essentially nullfying it, is also a major step in the right direction.  

RNG has no place (or should be kept to BARE minimums) in FPS/TPS games. End of story. Not only will this allow for MUCH more room for adjusting TTK values of all the different weapons they've added, it'll make the game more skill based and reward good players.  

but hey, i'm just a boomer...what do I know...  

 

If they continue with the current weapon TTK's (which obviously they will), I'd like to see the PMG be converted it into a burst SMG so that it differentiates itself from other SMGs (akin to the Prowler in Apex)

3-5shots per burst, 4 bursts to kill? Whatever they decide to do (please not with current TTK...), I think it would be for the better. (even then, this idea of having it be burst with current ttk is so odd, bleh)

 

On-topic of weapon balancing, mods are also a thing that should get MAJOR changes:

-Removing the ability of HS to "lower" RNG (the fact a mod lowers RNG shouldn't be a thing, HS should only add zoom fov, RNG should not be thing to begin with)

-RS should stay (with explanation down below as to why)

-Removing IR, CJ and Bando (no, a mod shouldnt impact range, ttk or add bullets to your mag)

 

Now, this is more out there, but what if SMGs and pistols in APB would be 100% accurate when zoomed in (or at least keep it at bare minimum), while having RNG when being hipfired at further ranges? (keeping hipfire only viable at CQC ranges)

This change is probably out there and maybe would be flawed in some way, shape or form that I can't think of right now, but I really think it's a step in the right direction (I adore Apex' gunplay)

 

Going a bit off-topic from your reply, but I'd love seeing better movement mechanics in APB. Walljumping, wallclimbing, airstrafing, they'd be sick ways to outplay an opponent holding the corner with a JG (especially paired with no RNG)

And a plethora of suggestions that were burried on the old forums (ones that come to my mind rn are Esther's clan system & clan war suggestion, map changes people have been telling them for years, removing running missions and other general mission tweaks etc.) This does require more tweaking of the base code and probably more man power that they aren't willing to invest (even though it would MAJORLY help them if and when the EU hits) so I do understand why they would refrain from them.

but hey, i'm just a boomer...what do I know...  

 

I really disagree with the idea of removing HS's accuracy gain. It makes no sense to have a scope and the weapon "not" be more accurate.

 

Improved rifling i though would have been good increasing the TTK, which it did exactly what it needed to when it had been reworked, but it created wierd bloom recovery sitations, and made people salty because they couldn't cqc an ntec as good while being a god at ranged battles.

 

CJ can stay, in general it only lets 1 bullet downstream faster for the ttk, and in multiple comparisons, only mildy alters the ttk. By the time a weapon sprays 2x what it could kill (16 shots with oca) it would have fired 18 in comparison to the normal 16. The issue with it has always been that they had lowered a number of weapon's TTK's to below .70, and then buffed them with accuracy buffs. Making CJ3 oca and others really obnoxious.

 

Removing Bandolier makes no sense. Also, it doesnt effect mag size, it gives you more ammo. You're thinking extended mag, which removing also makes no sense. If you're salty because people out spray you, they have an obnoxiously slow reload speed. The issue is people don't know how to counter it. I love EM3 on a star, it lets me kill 4-5 players in a single mag. I see no issue with it because i hate reloading, and ontop of that, it's gotten me killed a handful of times because the reload time. It's really give or take.

 

I think such movement would be garbage in apb. They removed the jump fire from most weapons already thank god). It was toxic af when you could easily jump fire, especially with say the scout snipers, because the cover system in this game is trash. It doesn't actually protect you half the time, you still get shot from behind it due to hitboxes being "over" it. They had fixed some of it by raising some cover and lowering the hitbox, however it's still an issue. While such things sound cool. They'd have to rework the entire ttk system to compensate, and then it would be even worse. Whiners already got the strife and HVR damage nerfed, and those are the 2 highest ttk weapons for their classes.

 

I really wish they worked on clan systems, but it isn't something they added

[Frosi 722]

On 8/17/2021 at 2:11 AM, koenyboy500 said:

Can you update these stats to the APB DataBase site as well?

The DB is now updated to reflect these changes. https://apbdb.com/changes/

 

(Its not showing the Frag grenade Max damage radius change, however, on the Frags actual page the value was changed from 4 to 3)

Edited August 22, 2021 by Frosi

[NotTheEnforcer 222]

On 8/18/2021 at 9:03 PM, Iazer said:

and you're one of those people that cares about realism of weapons in a game that is fundamentally an arcade shooter. lmfao

And youre crying because shotguns ingame can do something that shotguns can do literally by nature. Cry more, nobody else gives a shit lmao

[BlatMan 718]

20 hours ago, NotTheEnforcer said:

And youre crying because shotguns ingame can do something that shotguns can do literally by nature. Cry more, nobody else gives a shit lmao

I don't know of a shotgun IRL that spreads wider than your mom's rear, and that's assuming she's in good shape.

[NotTheEnforcer 222]

8 hours ago, SquirrelFace said:

I don't know of a shotgun IRL that spreads wider than your mom's rear, and that's assuming she's in good shape.

Another crybaby who cant stand shotguns? Add it to the pile lmao