Ranger kinetic shot

Issues dealing with gameplay balance.
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Aetherion
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Ranger kinetic shot

Postby Aetherion » Wed 16 May, 2018 1:33 am

I'm not sure if this should be in the bug section or balance. The ranger kinetic shot has been found to affect retreating units at full 25 damage per model, despite the damage type being piercing.

Double rangers with the upgraded blast thus have greater retreat killing certainty than nades or shees given the range and lack of need to aim or position. Also, we (myself and Lomors) believe that in our highly accurate and scientific tests of repeatedly blasting banshees that the damage appears to scale with the level of rangers. I have included the replay of our tests if anyone wishes to view them (proof of scaling at 5:50, retreat at 6:00ish ignore my comments in chat i suck at math), although there is some downtime as we figure things out.

In any case, I believe the kinetic shot should not be the equivalent of an ole reliable on retreat as eldar already have sufficient ways of gimping stuff on retreat without needing one that reaches from the next screen, at tier 1 at the cost of 35 power.
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lomors
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Re: Ranger kinetic shot

Postby lomors » Wed 16 May, 2018 1:37 am

Yep, the main our idea is to at least reduce the damage taken by kinetic pulse on retreat. It should at leaste be reduced as any range damage is reduced.
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Oddnerd
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Re: Ranger kinetic shot

Postby Oddnerd » Wed 16 May, 2018 3:12 am

I don't think the fact that it is piercing matters - it matters what kind of damage source it is. The damage from the splash is not a ranged attack, it's an aoe effect from an ability.
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boss
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Re: Ranger kinetic shot

Postby boss » Wed 16 May, 2018 10:15 am

Well I guess we can nerf it then
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Re: Ranger kinetic shot

Postby Thibix Magnus » Wed 16 May, 2018 10:27 am

definitely, it already has some good wipe potential without doing it on retreat
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Re: Ranger kinetic shot

Postby Toilailee » Wed 16 May, 2018 12:28 pm

I don't really understand why it does so much damage anyway. 25 piercing damage with a splash in T1 with a massive range on top of a knockback is way too fucking much vs high model count squads. In particular it breaks the whole match up vs chaos since now instead of heretics being able to control/soft counter rangers by swarming them, rangers now hard counter heretics.
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Cyris
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Re: Ranger kinetic shot

Postby Cyris » Sun 27 May, 2018 11:27 pm

I am strongly in the "Current Rangers are interesting but OP" camp. Reducing the kinetic shot damage, or even removing it, would be fine in my book.
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Re: Ranger kinetic shot

Postby Kvn » Mon 28 May, 2018 12:40 am

Cyris wrote:I am strongly in the "Current Rangers are interesting but OP" camp. Reducing the kinetic shot damage, or even removing it, would be fine in my book.


It doesn't deal *any* damage unless you drop an extra 20 power on the upgrade.

[Edit: thought it dealt no damage out of gate. Remember that from patch notes way back when the cooldown got lessened. Can't find said patch notes, so will have to test out later when I have access to my proper computer to be certain. Might be mistaken.]

[Edit again: Not mistaken, just blind. Patch 2.6 for anyone curious.]

Can we reign it in with the whole "remove Falcon shield, remove Falcon av damage, remove kinetic pulse" stuff? The retreat damage sounds like a bug that should certainly be fixed, but the whole remove-this-that-and-the-other-thing-from-the-game line of thought seems to be flaring up recently.
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Re: Ranger kinetic shot

Postby Black Relic » Mon 28 May, 2018 1:22 am

Just take away the damage. Keep the ability, hell make Kinetic shot have a smaller AoE and increase it to normal when the upgrade is purchased. But dont remove it.

Plus lowered their keen sight radius by 10 to 30 from 40. Then consider giving the rangers an ability in t3 (or t2) that allows them to deploy a "mine" that has a keen sight radius of 20?? but no sight radius or maybe like a sight radius of 1 or something if it causes a bug.

The mine will be detectable by the enemy and know to go around BUT if the eldar player is paying attention then the they know a unit is nearby but doesn't know where. Plus it offers protection against infiltration tactics that can be countered by destroying the "mines" to allow for easier passage with infiltration. Will have to be a weak mine though.

Could be worth giving it a shot.
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Re: Ranger kinetic shot

Postby lomors » Tue 05 Jun, 2018 12:45 am

We wanted to note that it does too much damage on retreat.. Rangers are now actually really decent. Please don't let it change into "nerf it into oblivion" thread. :/ Because of rangers nerfs some patches ago it took me like half of a year to actually make them 50/50 decision when I'm thinking if I should buy shuri platform or rangers.

Edit: what I'd want is reduced damage on retreat + I think what we REALLY could is making a limit on how many rangers squads you can have to avoid cancer in team games. That would really help. Like max 2 squads would work really well.
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Re: Ranger kinetic shot

Postby Antandron » Wed 06 Jun, 2018 4:30 am

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Re: Ranger kinetic shot

Postby Thibix Magnus » Wed 06 Jun, 2018 7:23 pm

their set-up / de-setup time is being nerfed already. Removing kinetic shot damage on retreat is necessary. Sure it's not a lot, but beyond that let's just see how they softly evolve, they don't seem that broken as to deserve any reckless move. Maybe a small price increase on the pathfinder update, but carefully. They seem close to ok now.
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Re: Ranger kinetic shot

Postby Torpid » Thu 07 Jun, 2018 6:49 am

I think that them doing such high damage on retreat and frankly such high splash damage in the first place with kinetic pulse is the wrong direction for them and neither are necessary. I'd remove both and either slightly reduce the cost of the pathfinder upgrade or further reduce the CD on kinetic pulse when they have it.
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Re: Ranger kinetic shot

Postby Thibix Magnus » Thu 07 Jun, 2018 11:38 am

Torpid wrote:I think that them doing such high damage on retreat and frankly such high splash damage in the first place with kinetic pulse is the wrong direction for them and neither are necessary. I'd remove both and either slightly reduce the cost of the pathfinder upgrade or further reduce the CD on kinetic pulse when they have it.


that would be quite interesting...
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Re: Ranger kinetic shot

Postby Torpid » Thu 07 Jun, 2018 3:44 pm

Ultimately snipers are meant to be better vs the higher hp low model units and worst vs spam races. But kinetic pulse doing such huge splash damage atm runs contrary to that. They can literally take off a solid 30% of the hp of a GM squad in a single shot. That's huge, especially when it also works on retreat. Heretics fail even more and it isn't obvious to me why that is. Kinetic pulse is meant to be more of a supportive ability not an offensive one, much like rangers as a whole.
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Re: Ranger kinetic shot

Postby Kvn » Thu 07 Jun, 2018 5:05 pm

Torpid wrote:Ultimately snipers are meant to be better vs the higher hp low model units and worst vs spam races.


I could point out that Rangers' ability to pick off high hp models has been nerfed quite a bit, but there likely isn't a point right now.

Torpid wrote:But kinetic pulse doing such huge splash damage atm runs contrary to that. They can literally take off a solid 30% of the hp of a GM squad in a single shot.


They can't. KP deals 25 damage in a splash of 5 range. Basic GM models have 100 hp, and both leaders have 140. Even if the entire squad got hit by the shot (which it usually wouldn't given that GM tend to spread out and the model targeted by the ability would, on average, be near the front instead of the center) it would still do less than a quarter of the hp of the squad.
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Re: Ranger kinetic shot

Postby Aetherion » Sat 09 Jun, 2018 11:43 pm

Removing kinetic shot entirely is frankly retarded; it has been a staple of eldar play for so very long, compensating for the lack of jump troops in tier 1. When I played Eldar somewhat competitively (beginner level lul) but also watching the best of the best, kinetic pulse did not do damage. But that was a time when rangers were either toxic 1 shot kill on GM, gaunts, shootas, sluggas and a whole range of t1 light infantry, or just overpriced detectors that was asking for a vehicle rush. I am glad we moved away from that (mostly), with both rangers and sniper scouts. For me the best use of rangers wasnt really the damage output. It was the scouting information with the vision range and truesight that Eldar need to maneuver properly and see the enemy coming. Also the setting up of plays with kinetic pulse and holofield. The lower cost of the rangers allows you to do that (along with pop cost of 6). I find the double ranger meta a little distasteful, with all the sniping and kiting without retaliation. AoE damage is just icing on the cake that deals with blobs as well. I mean if people insist on having damage on the shot, give it like 5 explosive damage to kill that retreating unit that didnt deserve to get out anyway. Also you could snipe a tank :)

The proposed setup and tear down time nerfs sound quite promising, ideally lighter units will be able to wriggle into range to get a shot off if the rangers do not move after every shot. Ultimately I believe the splash damage on retreat is more bug than feature and really doesn't have a place on the Eldar roster. Having splash damage if they don't retreat...eeehhh 25 AoE damage doesn't actually sound like that much on paper, especially if the units are levelled. But at Tier 1, thats nearly a quarter or more of light infantries health. 2 rangers = half of their health gone before the fight begins proper. And with 35s CD? If you poke them half a min before and kite until its off cooldown, the fight might be over already.

Does it weaken the Eldar T1 if the damage is removed? Of course it will, the question is the extent to which they are weakened. If the pressure with kinetic shot damage disappears, does that allow the enemy to roflstomp your power and completely deny T2? Is there any thing that can be buffed to counteract that? Personally I would love fleet on DAs, Shees or Rangers out the gate, but that's probably (OP)/ far above my knowledge and experience to discuss.
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Re: Ranger kinetic shot

Postby Nurland » Sun 10 Jun, 2018 1:13 pm

FoF out of the gate for Shees/DA would be super OP. Rangers on the other hand could cost 5 power more and get it. Also could lower the patjfinder gear to 15 power at that point.

Not sure if that change would be needed though...
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Re: Ranger kinetic shot

Postby PianoMan » Sun 10 Jun, 2018 2:12 pm

fof outta the gate
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Asmon
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Re: Ranger kinetic shot

Postby Asmon » Sun 10 Jun, 2018 5:51 pm

We could tie kinetic shot damage to T2 with a 5 power upgrade, and lower the pathfinder upgrade cost by 5 power in T1.

Rangers need their upgrade to be competitive and you feel like getting two of them most of the time (it's hard to win with only 3 squads in T1), especially since it'll be easier to micro than 1-1-1-1. With no damage on the kinetic shot, getting 2 will be less of a displeasure for your enemy and since it won't deal that much damage any longer, players will tend more to play multiple DA or Rangers and shuri (which is still the better combination but as I pointed out requires more micro).

I'm not sure if really rangers are design-wise supposed to be better vs low-model-count races. We need to remember they're also the only detecting unit of Eldar and therefore will be required in a lot of match-ups, especially vs LA, KN, CS and IG (mostly Inq). In the past we tried to delete the need of additional detectors with such things as Shoota's Nob upgrade, which seem overall too strong. We don't want detection on DA (do we?), so we need to let rangers be both accessible and competitive against a shuri.

At the moment Rangers shine because of their damage in T1 and their utility in the end game. The end game part is fine, so let's just reduce the damage in T1.

The decision to make them slower by increasing CDs is not the best move imo.
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Re: Ranger kinetic shot

Postby Broodwich » Mon 11 Jun, 2018 4:38 am

Rangers need to cost more to get out period. Their low price is what makes it easy to spam in the first place, and once they get the upgrade they really put the hurt on.

Snipers didn't scale well before all the changes were made. Instead of removing it entirely, what if we tie the AoE damage on KP to t2? (or an upgrade in t2)

Without it I still think they have excellent utility throughout the game due to their energy regen buff that went in with all the other changes
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