Higby on Tank Balance

[Saintlycow]

Calling all vanu. It seems we must abbandon our glorious tanks for a while in order to be blessed with the buff ray. Please commence operation Orion immediately

[Mietz]

Originally Posted by Hamma

I'm guessing by maneuverability he didn't mean it's ability to drive over everything, it seems these changes are changing that - not how it actually moves around.

Thats even worse, because the hover height for the mag is a -crucial-, I'll repeat this, CRUCIAL, upgrade for any serious mag pilot.

The turret elevation of the Magrider is so low that shots without the rival combat hover height increase get blocked by the following:

- rock clutter
- tree roots
- bad texture seams
- small railings

The only map its not a problem is Esamir, because its terrain is so smooth.
Fuck Amerish though as a stock Magrider will miss 50% of shots because of ground elevation and clutter.

The elevation of the main mag cannon is essentially its biggest negative (even worse than having a fixed cannon) and certing into rival combat chassis was the only way to somewhat alleviate this problem.
The LVL3 upgrade is just about "perfect height" where its still lower than all the other tanks but perfectly fine and terrain clutter isn't obstructing shots.

Nerfing the hover height is just a no, a resounding NO.

I can deal with slower strafe, worse turn-rate. I can adapt my strategy.
I don't want to do battle with the map itself though.

PS: Before someone flips his shit how I'm just a bitter Vanu.
I main TR and drive Prowlers, if I was generally unconcerned and cynical I would shut the fuck up and take all the buffs that are coming my way.

[nurizeko]

Originally Posted by Sir B Smythe

What the fuck! Magriders are nerfed. Every other MBT gets a boost? Fucking ridiculous!

Can tell who plays NC!

I can tell who plays Magrider.

For Prowler all I wanted was round velocity increased and drop decreased, and some barrel stabilization.

But guess we'll see how this pans out.

[Dkamanus]

Originally Posted by Assist

The evade damage statement really makes me cringe. You guys do realize you have similar movement capabilities when it comes to avoiding damage from tanks/rockets? We're the weakest tank, the slowest tank, and now by far the least damaging tank, what is our unique feature? Our maneuverability which has just been shit on. You can turn your tank, and your gun turret, independently of each other. I guess this isn't known ? I guess everyone will continue to completely ignore that fact though, because obviously it's not part of balancing the MBT's.

You specifically mentioned me on top of Broken Arch, which by the way I learned from watching a PROWLER sit up there on my second day of playing PS2 in beta(ty Enclave). You can indeed sit there, just as I was, and can continue to do. You know the real difference between me being up there and you being up there? If you were up there in your Vanguard I could not aim my gun turret high enough vertically to every shoot at you, whereas I regularly am attacked by Vanguard's sitting at Broken Arch. News Flash There's advantages to using terrain height.

The reason the Magrider can climb mountain ranges is due to the Magburner and the strafing power, not the hover height, as I mentioned before in this post and on these forums. The hover height made it possible for the magrider to climb/strafe over dramatic inclines, which in my case usually lead to me flipping over. Your issue is not solved by this nerf, your issue is with the Magburner. I'm sure it will be nerfed soon, considering the amount of horrible players that cry about things that are not broken.

You are right about one thing, the Magrider now faces the same dilemma the other tanks do. Great balancing change. So our unique ability went from being able to hover to being able to strafe. Might as well give all three factions the same tank.

First of all, traction. Tanks had traction before in Beta, so this isn't even remotely valid anymore. Aonther thing, since the vanguards turret is OVER the tank, in order for me to get the same angle you must, I must drive LOWER in order to actually get an angle, while you don't, since you can stay on a much safer angle.

Magburner isn't the problem. It allowing tanks defy their role is what's the problem is. Just now, I entered on Tawrich and saw a Magrider above the generator room on the Northern base. How can someone say this is manuverability? I was outplayed once by a good magrider driver (and they don't give me much headache) who magburned sideways behind me and got a shot in the back. Never again I've let the happen.

Ow, but the issue is kinda resolved with this. Having your magrider running lower will make the clipping on mountain ranges easier to happen, stucking your magrider on those crevices where all other tanks get stuck. This, by itself, is a big nerf for the magrider and a deserved one. Now people will think twice before moving towards a mountain range and losing the tank for it being stuck, like the rest of the tanks.

Also, thanks to your turret stabilization, you are the only tank capable of firing with pinpoint accuracy while on top speed (50 km/h without any speed buffs), EVEN more on bad terrain. Both the prowler and the Vanguard must slow down or stop in order for the aim to stabilize and then fire. Even if you need to must give your back towards an adversary, on can still strafe and out run any aiming lateraly thanks to the magburner.

Yes, everyone can run on their sides, and most do, but considering you can put the fight on your terms much easily compared to the other two tanks thanks to the manuverability. Its kinda the NC MAX works so well with the charge ability. Getting in or out, your choice.

And even more, thanks to the way the engine works, your tank won't go running down to a hill because it's made of jelly. Its a problem with our, since we don't have good traction, something yours isn't affected. Yes, the physics makes you more suceptible to turn over and blow, but since its the slowests, that's not such a common vision anyway.

So you see, although this doesn't seem to affect too much the magrider, it ends with this joyride which is mountain cross country. You'll start to get stuck in places you weren't before thanks to this loss, and will probably have much more difficulty in reaching some places. This in itself is a huge boon to the other two.

Balance must be a priority and in this case, the Magrider was above it all.

[Hamma]

Originally Posted by Mietz

Thats even worse, because the hover height for the mag is a -crucial-, I'll repeat this, CRUCIAL, upgrade for any serious mag pilot.

Of course it is, it allowed them to do almost whatever they wanted.

Quick thoughts behind these changes:

Looking purely at performance of tank vs tank the balance is far from ideal. The Prowler makes up for it's vs tank shortcomings quite a bit with infantry farming, but on a tank vs. tank basis it is very weak. We don't really want people to feel like they HAVE to roll vs infantry loadouts with tanks to be useful, but the current state of the prowler makes that seem like the only real useful role for it. These changes (along with the previous HE nerfs) are hopefully going to encourage a lot more tank vs tank combat from each empire.

Picking a random day from last month, the effective K: D of MBTs vs. other MBTs across about 10k tank vs tank fights was:

Magrider: 1.71 Vanguard: 0.87 Prowler: 0.63

There is a lot more that goes into the "usefulness" of tanks, and non-tank based counters that keep this MBT vs. MBT balance from being as severe to the overall game balance as it is to the tank game, but I don't think that anyone is surprised to see the Magrider with such an undisputed advantage in MBT vs MBT. The overall kills per vehicle type are much better balanced, due largely to the Prowler's higher capacity for farming infantry, but again, we want to make sure tanks are tuned around combat with other tanks, not combat with infantry, and large changes were and are warranted to bring them into line.

That above is pretty hard to argue with right now. They have to try and change some things.

[Hamma]

Looks like the complaining paid off


Mags can still drive wherever they want.

[Rockit]

Hamma beat me to it. Yeah they might need to hold up on that one. The other 2 empire buffs were pretty substantial

[RobUK]

I feel a certain sense of overdue justice about the changes to the Prowler. The KD stats for tank vs tank are a stark example of what a number of us protested about in the beta forums. We said that there was far too much daylight in the all round performance between the Magrider and the Prowler. Naturally we were flamed to a crisp by the VS who were eager to protect their huge and unfair advantage.

Being able to kill infantry better than other tanks absolutely does not make the Prowler on par with the other MBT's. Most serious tankers don't care about Infantry and are interested in tank battles and vehicle killing potential.

Seeing those statistics really vindicates what we've been saying all along about the Prowler. I'm really pleased that Matt has now looked into the tank balance properly and has made some brave changes.

Hopefully now the TR won't have to drive off at full speed every time they see an enemy tank.

[Mietz]

Originally Posted by Hamma

Of course it is, it allowed them to do almost whatever they wanted.

If I get my turret elevation back I'm not going to complain.

Make the cannon elevated with every rival combat chassis upgrade without the hover height and I have no qualms.
How is this unfair?

[Stanis]

[EDIT: Highby posted a holdoff. I'll leave this up. ]

Reducing hover might be fair. Removing it sounds like a 100% nerf.

Just before the end of beta they introduced the performance chassis.
They rolled hover height into the performance chassis options.

Before that - EVERY - magrider driver I knew went with the Hover cert.

For the simple reason that all the vaunted maneuverability wasn't worth a damn if you can't actually move.
Hover 2 was about the nice point where every rock, pebble, tree branch and even joins in terrain didn't stop the tank dead.

I can't say I drive the prowler or vanguard.
I do drive the Lightning, a lot.

The tank is crap without hover.
Whether it can go up a 60 degree incline. Or magburn vertically - is a seperate issue. Without hover it didn't work on anything that wasn't a road.

If they want this to work I hope we see a 3rd chassis that puts hover back in - something that we have to buy with certs etc .. which is the real long term point of nerfs and buffs isnt it? Getting us to recert and get the xp for more things.

The last thing to remember is you can only see forwards. You may have 360 degrees of movement in a magrider - but you have a small FoV.

[Dkamanus]

lol, and NC are the Whiners. Guess the true colors of whining are shown.

[Hamma]

I still think we will see at least a minor nerf to it in the end - but I suppose it's good they don't make to many changes at once.

[Ghoest9]

I really dont see these changes making the Vangaurd much better relative to the Magmower.

[LoliLoveFart]

If they DO nerf hover height again, give me the option to raise my maingun to where it was with max hoverheight. As it stands a default magrider spends 90% of its time trying to figure out how to shoot over a slight crest while prowlers and vanguards pummel it from a similar angle.

[Dkamanus]

Originally Posted by Ghoest9

I really dont see these changes making the Vangaurd much better relative to the Magmower.

It makes our shots travel faster, having the magriders to keep moving as much as possible. And gives US the Saron HRB, since we are the hard hitting faction as well. Enforcer is a strong weapon with a very SLOW bullet. This has been fixed substancially. Added range makes shots hit easier and extra armour makes us close in to a magrider in order to go for the kill.

Good buffs all-around.