Superheavy Infantry armor for Carnifex and Swarmlord?

Issues dealing with gameplay balance.
Yabbaman
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Superheavy Infantry armor for Carnifex and Swarmlord?

Postby Yabbaman » Thu 02 Aug, 2018 5:57 pm

Hi everyone,

What are the implications balance-wise, provided the units also receive some hitpoint buffs making them more Avatar-GUO-like?
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Re: Superheavy Infantry armor for Carnifex and Swarmlord?

Postby Phoenix » Thu 02 Aug, 2018 6:10 pm

The implications are that the Tyranid race wouldn't have access to proper vehicle armor even in T3.
That way plasma/power melee/etc. would rape them even more than it currently does. :cry:
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Re: Superheavy Infantry armor for Carnifex and Swarmlord?

Postby Yabbaman » Thu 02 Aug, 2018 6:25 pm

But they can't repair their "vehicles" + super-heavy infantry with enough of an hp pool are the most durable units in the game. Also seeing how there is no pop-cap on carnifexes, it could be an interesting balance shake-up.

This proposition is in no ways balance oriented as in "give this unit this and that to fix something and something and so forth", it just seems like a legitimate thing to do plausability-wise as they are living creatures after all and the game already has similar units that no one argues anything against.
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Re: Superheavy Infantry armor for Carnifex and Swarmlord?

Postby Dark Riku » Thu 02 Aug, 2018 8:31 pm

Like Phoenix said, that would be a big nerf to Tyranids as they won't have any vehicle armour then.
It makes a really big difference versus anything that's not AV.
A nerf that doesn't need to happen.
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Re: Superheavy Infantry armor for Carnifex and Swarmlord?

Postby Paranoid Kamikaze » Thu 02 Aug, 2018 9:16 pm

You're already expected to buy lots of plasma vs Nids. Not having to change anything when a Nid goes T3 is a huge buff for other races.

As a Nid hater I approve :D
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Re: Superheavy Infantry armor for Carnifex and Swarmlord?

Postby oLev » Fri 03 Aug, 2018 4:54 am

Yabbaman wrote:super-heavy infantry with enough of an hp pool are the most durable units in the game.

You are comparing units in a vacuum against how they perform against entire armies. Avatar and GUO face compositions that bought hard AV to deal with their other vehicle options but have inherently less DPS vs superheavy infantry armor.
Everything the Tyranids have in T2 can already be countered by plasma/inferno spam and power melee so yeah let's make Tyranid T3 even easier to counter by spamming more of the same T2 stuff.
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Re: Superheavy Infantry armor for Carnifex and Swarmlord?

Postby Cheekie Monkie » Fri 03 Aug, 2018 9:28 am

Paranoid Kamikaze wrote:You're already expected to buy lots of plasma vs Nids. Not having to change anything when a Nid goes T3 is a huge buff for other races.

As a Nid hater I approve :D

Not sure how it is in tabletop, but being expected to bring lots of plasma, not flamers vs tyranids seems wrong
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Re: Superheavy Infantry armor for Carnifex and Swarmlord?

Postby Yabbaman » Fri 03 Aug, 2018 10:48 am

oLev wrote:
Yabbaman wrote:super-heavy infantry with enough of an hp pool are the most durable units in the game.

You are comparing units in a vacuum against how they perform against entire armies. Avatar and GUO face compositions that bought hard AV to deal with their other vehicle options but have inherently less DPS vs superheavy infantry armor.
Everything the Tyranids have in T2 can already be countered by plasma/inferno spam and power melee so yeah let's make Tyranid T3 even easier to counter by spamming more of the same T2 stuff.


This would shake up team games balance, which is probably a desirable thing. But since the game is balanced for 1v1, then I guess you're probably right.
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Re: Superheavy Infantry armor for Carnifex and Swarmlord?

Postby Nurland » Fri 03 Aug, 2018 12:53 pm

It wouldn't really change that much team game meta imho. I mean most of the stuff you have against vehicles would still snare the fexes etc while plasma/inferno/power melee would rip them to pieces.

It would make them better vs tanks though.
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Re: Superheavy Infantry armor for Carnifex and Swarmlord?

Postby Torpid » Fri 03 Aug, 2018 1:42 pm

Yabbaman wrote:This would shake up team games balance, which is probably a desirable thing. But since the game is balanced for 1v1, then I guess you're probably right.


How would it do that?
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Re: Superheavy Infantry armor for Carnifex and Swarmlord?

Postby uncle pew pew » Fri 03 Aug, 2018 4:48 pm

Silly suggestion ybbaman 8-)
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Re: Superheavy Infantry armor for Carnifex and Swarmlord?

Postby TE | NoSkill » Fri 03 Aug, 2018 5:45 pm

Sniff, I see so much of myself in this post :D

Besides, superheavy vs power melee is rape. And nids cannot repair, so healing will take its time, even more so with larger hp pool. But keep trying to be creative, just elaborate more with examples and theoretical situations.
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Re: Superheavy Infantry armor for Carnifex and Swarmlord?

Postby Yabbaman » Fri 03 Aug, 2018 7:37 pm

Torpid wrote:
Yabbaman wrote:This would shake up team games balance, which is probably a desirable thing. But since the game is balanced for 1v1, then I guess you're probably right.


How would it do that?


The same way that deploying a high hp pool heavy infantry unit can help you break up the oppositions defensive composure so to speak. Only on a larger scale since we are talking about a non-unique unit here with the carnifex. You can also see some grumbling from the community with the OM terminators being buildable and how this terminator spam can win you games quite unexpectedly in t3, same here.
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Re: Superheavy Infantry armor for Carnifex and Swarmlord?

Postby Yabbaman » Fri 03 Aug, 2018 7:38 pm

uncle pew pew wrote:Silly suggestion ybbaman 8-)


creating an account just for this? silly you.
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Re: Superheavy Infantry armor for Carnifex and Swarmlord?

Postby Yabbaman » Fri 03 Aug, 2018 7:40 pm

Nurland wrote:It wouldn't really change that much team game meta imho. I mean most of the stuff you have against vehicles would still snare the fexes etc while plasma/inferno/power melee would rip them to pieces.

It would make them better vs tanks though.


Does AV snare super-heavy-inf? Didn't know it if it does.
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Re: Superheavy Infantry armor for Carnifex and Swarmlord?

Postby Nurland » Fri 03 Aug, 2018 8:01 pm

Armor type has nothing to do with unit getting snared or not. Sentinels can be snared and they are heavy infantry, Tyrant Guards are SHI and can be snared. It is the unit type that makes units get snared or not snared.
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Re: Superheavy Infantry armor for Carnifex and Swarmlord?

Postby Black Relic » Sun 05 Aug, 2018 4:11 am

What nurland said.

As you said as well, tyranids cannot repair so they would have to go back to have the heal. With this change they would have to go back to and from the base more frequently. Defeating the purpose of your proposition anyway.

As mentioned earlier since the fex and swarmlord would take more damage for everything. AV would be somewhat redundant vs these two targets now since the dps from tacs would out shine the Fex. The only thing it would provide is the snare.

So the fact that you would have no need to actually commit to a new purchase since you already have counters/damage dealer would make this change kinda meh at best.
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Re: Superheavy Infantry armor for Carnifex and Swarmlord?

Postby Yabbaman » Sun 05 Aug, 2018 7:21 am

Black Relic wrote:What nurland said.

As you said as well, tyranids cannot repair so they would have to go back to have the heal. With this change they would have to go back to and from the base more frequently. Defeating the purpose of your proposition anyway.

As mentioned earlier since the fex and swarmlord would take more damage for everything. AV would be somewhat redundant vs these two targets now since the dps from tacs would out shine the Fex. The only thing it would provide is the snare.

So the fact that you would have no need to actually commit to a new purchase since you already have counters/damage dealer would make this change kinda meh at best.


Not having to commit to av in 1v1 is certainly a buff for someone fighting such units, but then again not a single mention of how much hp they'd get or would have to have to equal vehicle armour. What if a carnifex is 5000hp unit at least and swarmlord is circa 6000hp superunit? Also, isn't base-heal faster at regenerating hp then this vehicle-auto-heal they currently have, not to mention swarmlord's "leech essence"?
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Re: Superheavy Infantry armor for Carnifex and Swarmlord?

Postby Black Relic » Sun 05 Aug, 2018 8:51 am

Yes but you would lose any ground you gained from a push because your units would have to go back to base period because everything can damage them and they are slow. I don't think it could work tbh. The vehicle thing works because only one thing can effectively hurt the fex.

IF this would be a thing the HP buff would go to `3000 hp. That is not a lot at all of SHI at all. 4000 would be pushing it way too much and make them extremely hard to deal with. It would be a lot of HP to go through. I wouldn't mind doing this in my mod because it is a different game than this one. But not here. Although another assumption would be that these fexs would make better bullet sponges since everything does damage them now.

But I don't want to go back to 7th edition so fexs are vehicle armor where lascannons would only deal 1 wound to a monster creature and that is eventually what would happen here. F that I like 8th edition so we are keeping fex vehicle armor so lascannons can hurt them. A lot. If you want that type of justification. :)
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Re: Superheavy Infantry armor for Carnifex and Swarmlord?

Postby Torpid » Sun 05 Aug, 2018 9:05 am

Yabbaman wrote:
Not having to commit to av in 1v1 is certainly a buff for someone fighting such units, but then again not a single mention of how much hp they'd get or would have to have to equal vehicle armour. What if a carnifex is 5000hp unit at least and swarmlord is circa 6000hp superunit? Also, isn't base-heal faster at regenerating hp then this vehicle-auto-heal they currently have, not to mention swarmlord's "leech essence"?


You could theoretically balance it more or less so it is similarly challenging to kill a fex/SL as it is now by giving them shit-loads of hp. But each race has differing amounts of hard vehicle AV vs power melee/plasma/inferno so... That is gonna be hard to balance. Suddenly chaos spamming BLs and CSM is gonna be able to beat late-game nid things and lightning claw terminators would be practically unstoppable while orks would be pretty screwed with their T2 vs a BS Fex. Even more than they are atm...

Plus gauging that hp change is a difficult balance decision. They are balanced quite well at the moment so why change that and risk messing up the balance?

And your previous post about why it would shake the meta I can't understand for the life of me.
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Re: Superheavy Infantry armor for Carnifex and Swarmlord?

Postby Yabbaman » Sun 05 Aug, 2018 10:03 am

Black Relic wrote:Yes but you would lose any ground you gained from a push because your units would have to go back to base period because everything can damage them and they are slow. I don't think it could work tbh. The vehicle thing works because only one thing can effectively hurt the fex.


Well that's exactly how this game plays, it's a constant back and forth territory-wise and is mostly about effective trades in terms of damage. And it obviously could work because this idea is implemented with Avatar, GUO and terminator varieties.

Black Relic wrote:IF this would be a thing the HP buff would go to `3000 hp. That is not a lot at all of SHI at all. 4000 would be pushing it way too much and make them extremely hard to deal with. It would be a lot of HP to go through. I wouldn't mind doing this in my mod because it is a different game than this one. But not here. Although another assumption would be that these fexs would make better bullet sponges since everything does damage them now.


Well, the hp buff is a totally arbitrary value, can go to whatever works for balance, so discussing what's a lot and what's not is kinda moot now that most people seem to dislike the proposition. The assumption that a change such as one proposed makes a unit a better bullet sponge is precisely why I created this thread. SHI units work because nothing damages them well-enough and fast-enough and in this way they have their niche late-game.
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Re: Superheavy Infantry armor for Carnifex and Swarmlord?

Postby Yabbaman » Sun 05 Aug, 2018 10:11 am

Torpid wrote:
Yabbaman wrote:
Not having to commit to av in 1v1 is certainly a buff for someone fighting such units, but then again not a single mention of how much hp they'd get or would have to have to equal vehicle armour. What if a carnifex is 5000hp unit at least and swarmlord is circa 6000hp superunit? Also, isn't base-heal faster at regenerating hp then this vehicle-auto-heal they currently have, not to mention swarmlord's "leech essence"?


You could theoretically balance it more or less so it is similarly challenging to kill a fex/SL as it is now by giving them shit-loads of hp. But each race has differing amounts of hard vehicle AV vs power melee/plasma/inferno so... That is gonna be hard to balance. Suddenly chaos spamming BLs and CSM is gonna be able to beat late-game nid things and lightning claw terminators would be practically unstoppable while orks would be pretty screwed with their T2 vs a BS Fex. Even more than they are atm...


Assymetric balance is what this game is all about. And I would love to see more lightning-claw terminators too. Orks wouldn't be screwed the least bit in t3 with their flash gits, ork t2 is weak anyway.

Torpid wrote:Plus gauging that hp change is a difficult balance decision. They are balanced quite well at the moment so why change that and risk messing up the balance?


No reason really other than a topic for discussion, besides hp value is only a number, not much of change to adjust it if needed.
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Re: Superheavy Infantry armor for Carnifex and Swarmlord?

Postby Nurland » Sun 05 Aug, 2018 1:34 pm

I just don't see this making the game more exiting or fun to play. Now you have to kinda go heavy on the power melee/plasma/inferno early on but you also have to be ready to transition into AV. With this change you would have to be ready to transition into spamming more same units which isn't transitioning at all.
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Re: Superheavy Infantry armor for Carnifex and Swarmlord?

Postby Yabbaman » Sun 05 Aug, 2018 3:39 pm

Nurland wrote:Now you have to kinda go heavy on the power melee/plasma/inferno early on but you also have to be ready to transition into AV. With this change you would have to be ready to transition into spamming more same units which isn't transitioning at all.


In 1v1 - yes, it won't make it any more "fun" to play (nothing will short of a new faction). In 3v3 mixed faction game though you'll have to deal both with armor and increasing number of SHI units, some of which may in turn be able to deal with your armor in novel ways so to speak, like a venom canon carnifex.
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Re: Superheavy Infantry armor for Carnifex and Swarmlord?

Postby Paranoid Kamikaze » Sun 05 Aug, 2018 5:02 pm

Yabbaman wrote:
Nurland wrote:Now you have to kinda go heavy on the power melee/plasma/inferno early on but you also have to be ready to transition into AV. With this change you would have to be ready to transition into spamming more same units which isn't transitioning at all.


In 1v1 - yes, it won't make it any more "fun" to play (nothing will short of a new faction). In 3v3 mixed faction game though you'll have to deal both with armor and increasing number of SHI units, some of which may in turn be able to deal with your armor in novel ways so to speak, like a venom canon carnifex.


No, it'll be plasma spam in ALL game modes. It's a huge nerf to Nids.
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Re: Superheavy Infantry armor for Carnifex and Swarmlord?

Postby Yabbaman » Sun 05 Aug, 2018 5:14 pm

Paranoid Kamikaze wrote:
Yabbaman wrote:
Nurland wrote:Now you have to kinda go heavy on the power melee/plasma/inferno early on but you also have to be ready to transition into AV. With this change you would have to be ready to transition into spamming more same units which isn't transitioning at all.


In 1v1 - yes, it won't make it any more "fun" to play (nothing will short of a new faction). In 3v3 mixed faction game though you'll have to deal both with armor and increasing number of SHI units, some of which may in turn be able to deal with your armor in novel ways so to speak, like a venom canon carnifex.


No, it'll be plasma spam in ALL game modes. It's a huge nerf to Nids.


What are you objecting to? Did I say anything about plasma?

Also, would be good if you could figure out at what hp level would it still be a nerf for either of the units.
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Re: Superheavy Infantry armor for Carnifex and Swarmlord?

Postby oLev » Mon 06 Aug, 2018 5:11 am

What you're saying is let's completely imbalance one race so the random team play meta changes when they are involved on certain lanes of certain maps.
Not change for the better, because you certainly can't explain the logic for that, just change for the sake of change while appealing to some wider notion that team game meta is currently intolerable enough to make any change preferable.
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Re: Superheavy Infantry armor for Carnifex and Swarmlord?

Postby Yabbaman » Mon 06 Aug, 2018 9:17 am

oLev wrote:What you're saying is let's completely imbalance one race so the random team play meta changes when they are involved on certain lanes of certain maps.


Did I mention any maps or lanes? I also don't propose to completely "imbalance" anything.

oLev wrote:Not change for the better, because you certainly can't explain the logic for that, just change for the sake of change while appealing to some wider notion that team game meta is currently intolerable enough to make any change preferable.


What can change this game for the better? What "wider notion" and have I even used the word "meta". Are you stupid or just trying to show off?

Change for the sake of change can be good too btw.
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Re: Superheavy Infantry armor for Carnifex and Swarmlord?

Postby Nurland » Mon 06 Aug, 2018 10:45 am

Yeah. This is just a rather big rework of a factions T3. And I don't see it making the game more fun or anythimg better.

It would also most likely take a long time to get it right so it would not be broken.

Anyhow this suggestion will make playing vs nids a lot more one dimensional in team games as well. You just buy more of the same shit that counters the T2....
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