Marine rebalancing v1 Discussion Thread

[xXen0zS1ay3rXx]

No idea how these changes went through or who thought they were a good idea or well balanced.

The tiny stat buffs from mutators do not justify such MASSIVE changes to the guns, currently way too strong and overtuned.

[StephenNelson]

I’m pretty sure the changes only lasted one round, and the xenos won that round anyways. Everyone is acting like they are currently active.

[DefinitelyAlone0309]

I’m pretty sure the changes only lasted one round, and the xenos won that round anyways. Everyone is acting like they are currently active.

The update was tested for a total of 4 rounds, which xeno only won once, which was thanks to marines being stupid as usual and boilers being MVPs

[immaspaceninja]

Bipod: i dont understand why it needs that firerate debuff while folded, it's already pretty niche

Rifle stock: Running speed with it is snail-tier, walking speed with it is dead snail-tier. It doesn't feel good to use and the firerate debuff looks unneeded

Miniscope: Kinda helps battle the scope delay if you wanna reposition yourself slightly, since you dont have to unscope, but thats it.

Paratrooper stock: PARATROOPER STOCK GANG YUHHHH

I think it's a good idea to encourage swapping attachments during the OP. Some attachments are just not good enough to keep on your gun the whole time, like UGL and bipod. Make the delay on removing/attaching stuff smaller, decrease the amount of space they take when put in a bag

[KittyHawkpilot019]

needs more testing tbh
i missed the round..

[RuAlastor]

My experience from both sides:
1. Playing xenos was a bit hard and we had to rely on our queen both times I had a chance to play as xeno.
Finally, I was loosing my health as a young prae, when 5 people were shooting me. Anyway, marines had no chance to kill me as I could easily outrun them. Still the only thing killing t3s (but for their stupidity, ofc) is SADAR.
BUT again, xenos were mostly bad. Drones building some shitty defenses and doors (please, don’t build doors, they’re killing your sisters), only 2 t3s out of 4 by 12:30 during one round, not robust queens, low numbers compare to xeno buff time and so on.
2. As a marine. cuckshot was still superior to any weapon. Lowpop still 90% relied on their specs.
Pushes in the open field were easier and marines were able to kill more benos during that phase. Deploying after 12:30 still rekt’d marines
Overall, need more testing

[Vispain]

Simple Solution to any Ubermensch marine issues we are seeing.
Nerf Shotguns' DMG output. The stun isn't any issue. Its the fact it one-shots anything ranging from T1 to T2...with T3s even dropping to half health as a result of it at times.

Plus, shotguns are currently not only a major meta but a viable one because the mechanics allow it to be. Currently I'd say gun wise, at least 75% of all weapons carried the marine force in XvH rounds (the normal rounds) carries shotguns.

In any HvH round... the marines normally carry rifles. Why? Because they are better in longer range. In XvH, the meta is take a shotgun... or even, take a shotgun and a rifle... Hell I'd take a bet that in HvH est. 10% of marines take shotguns and in HvX 60%+ take shotguns...
Example: I just randomly popped onto a round right now and checked DS1. Out of 11 Marines, 8 had shotguns or a mix of shotgun + rifle...


A DMG nerf to shotguns would decrease this meta I think and prevent any marine buffs from being too strong.

[Gnorse]

as someone else on this thread said, we're suffering from the results of powercreep.
Instead of buffing xenos with mutators and then buffing marines with better guns, and then redoing the same thing like two months down the line, we should just debuff everything and take them back to normal numbers.

On that note, the gun rework is appreciated since we're able to do jackshit to mutated xenos at the moment. however, it does feel too much. half a regular M41A mag put a pred into crit and I'm pretty sure I missed half of the shots.

[DefinitelyAlone0309]

Simple Solution to any Ubermensch marine issues we are seeing.
Nerf Shotguns' DMG output. The stun isn't any issue. Its the fact it one-shots anything ranging from T1 to T2...with T3s even dropping to half health as a result of it at times.

Plus, shotguns are currently not only a major meta but a viable one because the mechanics allow it to be. Currently, I'd say gun wise, at least 75% of all weapons carried the marine force in XvH rounds (the normal rounds) carries shotguns.

In any HvH round... the marines normally carry rifles. Why? Because they are better in longer range. In XvH, the meta is take a shotgun... or even, take a shotgun and a rifle... Hell, I'd take a bet that in HvH est. 10% of marines take shotguns and in HvX 60%+ take shotguns...
Example: I just randomly popped onto a round right now and checked DS1. Out of 11 Marines, 8 had shotguns or a mix of shotgun + rifle...


A DMG nerf to shotguns would decrease this meta I think and prevent any marine buffs from being too strong.

While I agree that Shotgun has been in fashion for a while now, marines need it to punch holes through tougher xeno like queen/crusher/Warrior/Defender. Even then, M41 has been buffed to a point that it can compete with shotgun's damage (unless vs the really tanky xeno), but with way less risk involved. The way I see it is that shotgun is a huge punishment tool. If a xeno doesn't respect the shotgun and makes a mistake, the shotgun is there to whack it, with buck or slug.

And what's wrong with PFCs taking shotgun+rifle? I'd call that adaptability. The main thing you should really look into is what they invest attachments on, and what weapon do they use more. For myself, while I carry a Mag Harness/Gyro/Bayo shotgun with me, I find myself using my vanilla M41 with 3 AP mags and 2 HEDPs way more because I don't have to risk at much. Xeno can also very easily punish shotguns, but you only see the stupid Crusher/Queen/Rav getting body blocked and PB'd to death, rather than the 1v1 or 1v2 that happen around the map.

I'm fine with the marines having their buckshot or PB nerfed, but there need to be something for them to punch through beefy xeno, because mass M41 fire is hard to achieve (you have to somehow teach every player how to aim/track/focus fire effectively) and there's a certain point where it's simply not effective anymore (Elder Empress and Elder T3s).

So while it's easy for me to say "OH, SHOTGUN IS BROKEN, IT SHOULD BE REMOVED FROM THE GAME", I won't. Because of the presence of shotguns (Buck and Slug), I find myself making more calculated plays, and playing safer overall and no longer throwing my face against marines and hoping that it works since I can count on them missing their M41 clicks, and I kinda like it.

Also, good players take a slug shotgun for HvH so omegalul on that part. It's not "how many players are taking shotgun?" that we have to ask ourselves, it's more like "how many players are actually making good use of their shotgun?". Because I assure you, there're not that many people who can use a shotgun effectively.

[Boersgard]

Simple Solution to any Ubermensch marine issues we are seeing.
Nerf Shotguns' DMG output. The stun isn't any issue. Its the fact it one-shots anything ranging from T1 to T2...with T3s even dropping to half health as a result of it at times.

Plus, shotguns are currently not only a major meta but a viable one because the mechanics allow it to be. Currently I'd say gun wise, at least 75% of all weapons carried the marine force in XvH rounds (the normal rounds) carries shotguns.

In any HvH round... the marines normally carry rifles. Why? Because they are better in longer range. In XvH, the meta is take a shotgun... or even, take a shotgun and a rifle... Hell I'd take a bet that in HvH est. 10% of marines take shotguns and in HvX 60%+ take shotguns...
Example: I just randomly popped onto a round right now and checked DS1. Out of 11 Marines, 8 had shotguns or a mix of shotgun + rifle...


A DMG nerf to shotguns would decrease this meta I think and prevent any marine buffs from being too strong.

A HUGE reason the shotguns are meta right now is because they are the only thing that actually WORKS. This is what happens when you have such shitty alternatives. Buckshot could probably do with some nerf to damage (imo shotgun should be a finisher, not a starter and an important deterrent against aliens diving into marine formations trying to instigate FF) but absolutely not before marines have viable alternatives.

[Boersgard]

While I agree that Shotgun has been in fashion for a while now, marines need it to punch holes through tougher xeno like queen/crusher/Warrior/Defender. Even then, M41 has been buffed to a point that it can compete with shotgun's damage (unless vs the really tanky xeno), but with way less risk involved. The way I see it is that shotgun is a huge punishment tool. If a xeno doesn't respect the shotgun and makes a mistake, the shotgun is there to whack it, with buck or slug.

Yes, absolutely. I find when I play xeno that I am always watching the shotgun users. They are the only ones who will actually kill me if I fuck up (aside from sadar). If I see a cade with two M41's and a smartgunner, I won't even think twice about running up and punching one of them in the arm and running back to cover. They will NEVER do enough damage to kill me. If they throw/launch grenades I can run faster (without agility mode!) than it takes for the grenade to go off, even if it lands right at my feet.

But put a guy with a shotgun on that cade and it's "fuck that, I'll try to hit somewhere else". What's really important with the shotguns being good deterrent isn't so much the damage as it is the stun on top of it. It's just long enough for other marines to pile on and put you into crit. This would probably still be true even if PB shotguns were only doing ~50% damage to mature warriors instead of 75%.

But there's also a huge balance/gameplay problem in this game, and it's the alien power ramping which encourages marine 'metarush' because it creates a snowball effect that prevents marine wins once enough time passes. The entire aging/mutator system does it all wrong. and makes it impossible to effectively balance because the balance is a literal shifting target through the entire round. Ancient xenos are OP as heck, especially with mutators. While young xenos are comparatively useless.

Xenos need less power ramping - they should be running around as essentially mature (with slightly better stats than now) for the entire match. If you absolutely MUST include this time-based power ramp, tie it to a mutator option so that cocky xenos who think they're good can take it, suffer a weakness early game, but get much stronger late game.

[Steelpoint]

Having strong guns would be fine if Xenos were more expendable and easier to grow

[CABAL]

You make it seem like it's impossible to land a PB. A lurker/runner/rav misses its pounce, a Warrior misses its lunge and it goes on c/d. Aka any regular situation in which you get PB'd ingame. Don't make it seem like getting PB'd as a xeno is unimaginable. My point still stands.

Isn't that the point? Xeno made a mistake, it has to pay. Besides, Warrior can't miss his lunge.
There are plenty ways to prevent simple chain PB's from faster firerate stock: Long wield delay even with a-grip. Better to shit on idea, than try to balance it out, right?

It is possible and imaginable to PB xeno, yet it have to be nearly brainless xeno. In many rounds as a defender, drone or sentinel I died exclusively to PB buckshot. Nothing else was able to stop me. Every single of those deaths was caused by my brainless charge at marines/single marine treating them like they all have M39 and Pulse Rifles only. PB is the only thing to stop brainless charges, otherwise they are effective, atleast to the point of xeno survivability.

You have many arguments for PB in previous posts.

[Vispain]

I think what EVERYONE is forgetting is that xenos are INHERENTLY melee based. Saying the shotgun should punish xenos is one thing overextending is one thing, but that's not the context its truly being said in. Rather, as it is, the state of the shotgun is simple. It has the ability to punish every single xenomorph class that attempts to engage it with melee (which every single xeno class can/will do) with insta-death. How is that fair?
It really isn't.

I've used the "it punishes those xenos overextending" facts before. The issue with the shotgun, unlike other marine equipment like claymores for example or the RPG, is it does that way too much in both usage overall, is supposed be a BASIC weapon, and insta-kills most times it hits because the main enemy it faces *xenos* is going to attempt to close the gap.

The shotgun should have more STUN POWER, at the cost of a good bit of its DMG output. Remember, the marine loadout is NOT designed to fight xenos. We do not know of xenos. Our loadout shouldn't be specialized to deal with them. Hell, HvH rounds really show just how much the Shotgun Meta relies on marines knowing their foe is xenos and this will likely stay so for as long as we continue to have only HvX rounds (possibly forever). As it stands, the shotgun appears to be in a situation where it is heavily meta'd, heavily used, OP against most xenos, and faces very little downside in HvX. Rifles, pistols, SMGs, and other varied weapons all have their downsides and positives... the Shotgun? Not so much. For a weapon that is being used by people with no idea of their foe... it acts awfully well as a specialist anti-xeno weapon.

[DefinitelyAlone0309]

I'm fine with the marines having their buckshot or PB nerfed, but there need to be something for them to punch through beefy xeno, because mass M41 fire is hard to achieve (you have to somehow teach every player how to aim/track/focus fire effectively) and there's a certain point where it's simply not effective anymore (Elder Empress and Elder T3s).

[Vispain]

I suggest more shotgun STUN humph to replace a bit of the DMG nerf. It'd still give the shotgun its punishing factor, but remove the whole insta-kill schtick. As for massed M41A fire... after a long time playing I think its simple and people pick it up easy. For example, If you took away shotguns for three weeks people would become experts with massed fire. If you nerfed shotguns a little and more people used them en masse, the meta would change again. I'll tell you this much... back when we had AP meta... we were getting really fuckin' good at massed fire...wiping out hives left and right...

[CABAL]

You can't stun T3's. Any nerf for PB is buff for them. Give more power to the most powerfull xenos. Good idea!

[DefinitelyAlone0309]

I suggest more shotgun STUN humph to replace a bit of the DMG nerf. It'd still give the shotgun its punishing factor, but remove the whole insta-kill schtick. As for massed M41A fire... after a long time playing I think its simple and people pick it up easy. For example, If you took away shotguns for three weeks people would become experts with massed fire. If you nerfed shotguns a little and more people used them en masse, the meta would change again. I'll tell you this much... back when we had AP meta... we were getting really fuckin' good at massed fire...wiping out hives left and right...

You mean QF AP meta when AP box and 10 mags cost like 30 points each? You mean the QF that basically made M41 shoot as fast as one can click (which mean you aren't as punished for missing your shots as much because you can click again and have the same results)? You mean back then when a lot of old vets were still playing and still kicking ass because they were vets and would excel with every weapon thrown their way anyway?

Well, we don't have it anymore. Because the devs have nerfed both QF and AP (cost wise). And new castes + increased in evo rate have made it harder and harder.

[kastion]

You wanna make the game balanced while leaving marine firepower high? Make it where marines can only fire the way they are facing, or make it where they get a delay to fire behind them instead of instantly turning and shooting. Then xenos could actually fight marines with outmaneuvering instead of just pouncing or neuroing and then killing them. Marines wouldnt want that though.

Alernatively, make marines only see in front of them so they cant even see the xeno sneaking up on them

[NethIafins]

stay on topic. This is not a discussion on balance in general

Just this balance patch

You are unnecessarily arguing here which reduces my ability to get something from your feedback and reduces my faith in humanity

[kastion]

stay on topic. This is not a discussion on balance in general

Just this balance patch

You are unnecessarily arguing here which reduces my ability to get something from your feedback and reduces my faith in humanity

Your patch sucks. Ok you can close the thread.

[Steelpoint]

The collapsable SMG stock is a god send and is something I've been hoping for a long time, I only wish it was not tied to a rarer variant of the stock. I think the penalty of having to take a few moments to unfold your stock to get that advantage would offset the availability.

Buffs to the SMG are also appreciated since for most of the time people state the SMG is a giant trap for new people, which is not oft untrue. As a Medic I've always taken a Shotgun, not because it is the meta but because I've never found a reason to take a SMG over it.

I would appreciate if SMG ammo was more compact than M41A ammo when putting it inside webbings, armour or belts or akin. But that's more a request.

[NethIafins]

Your patch sucks. Ok you can close the thread.

thanks for respectable and detailed review

[NethIafins]

The collapsable SMG stock is a god send and is something I've been hoping for a long time, I only wish it was not tied to a rarer variant of the stock. I think the penalty of having to take a few moments to unfold your stock to get that advantage would offset the availability.

Buffs to the SMG are also appreciated since for most of the time people state the SMG is a giant trap for new people, which is not oft untrue. As a Medic I've always taken a Shotgun, not because it is the meta but because I've never found a reason to take a SMG over it.

I would appreciate if SMG ammo was more compact than M41A ammo when putting it inside webbings, armour or belts or akin. But that's more a request.

I think I will add this stock to specialist vendors

[Steelpoint]

That's a nice first step, however I also think SMGs need a bit more viability in ammo availability for Specs to seriously consider taking them. In terms of the amount of magazines they can have on them.

I can kit out a M41A and carry it with almost the same level of ease I can currently kit out a SMG. Which gives me very little incentive to take one when the only difference will be that I can holster my SMG.