Thoughts on the 1.3 changes

Psieye
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Re: Thoughts on the 1.3 changes

Post by Psieye »

JoINrbs wrote: I'm a little surprised that that isn't peoples' general feeling. I almost wonder if there's some branding issue with calling it a "Sharpshooter" instead of a "Sniper". Or maybe it's difficult enough to set up lines-of-sight in this game (especially given that there are many timed missions) that people just don't think about that aspect of the soldier much. I've seen a lot of people who are analyzing what this soldier does begin by ignoring the unique thing it does and comparing it to something else which doesn't have any bvr threat.
I think it's to do with the immobile nature of the Sharpshooter, or at least, the perceived 'correct build' of a Sharpshooter. I know when I started in LW2 I made every Sharpshooter a DfA because of stocks and DGG. These days, I find a RT Sharpshooter will get plenty of actual shots in too as well as holo marking even on timed missions. Makes for an exciting mad dash to the evac zone at the end while leaving Advent reinforcements behind.

It's hard to tell what extra, imagined constraints a given player might be under (consciously imposed or not). Like "I absolutely need to kill every enemy on the turn I see them, because wounds risk" or "the only direction I can move in is forwards".
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Dlareh
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Re: Thoughts on the 1.3 changes

Post by Dlareh »

8wayz wrote:The main point of controversy is that the Sharpshooter lacks in crowd-control or multi-attack perks/items/weapons.
I don't find this to be controversial at all. The change to Serial was more than justified; it was ridiculously powerful when used on > 5 enemies. The new drop off is small for the first few enemies you target with it, and you can save low health enemies for last.

What I think people really want are Sharpshooters is that can "one shot, one kill" most of the time -- and often enough to justify their movement cost. Simply being able to attack from further behind is not enough with how few offensive (particularly offensive damage) abilities they have compared to other shooting classes.

Instead of taking steps to make that situation better, the WIP tree prevents even stacking vital point targeting with center mass and makes the SSgt tier nearly 100% useless. I'm stumped at how anyone can think that tree is a good idea, and would hope it's fixed before release

If not, well at least we know what the premier officer class is.
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ndessell
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Re: Thoughts on the 1.3 changes

Post by ndessell »

JoINrbs wrote:
ndessell wrote:no, they see it, squad sight in lw2 boils down to you sharpshooter being further from the front line than other soldiers. they can't shoot further than anyone else except is the rare occasion your scout shinobi sees a 1-2 man pod that would be harmless for long enough to kill at range
There will be at least one other soldier in your squad who can shoot at an enemy a Sharpshooter can target when the Sharpshooter shoots, that doesn't mean that there is no value in the Sharpshooter being able to target that enemy. For example:

If you have one cover tile which you can safely attack a back-rank enemy from having a couple of Sharpshooters triples your force projection onto that enemy.

If you are fighting enemies who are approaching you, shooting them with Sharpshooters who are bvr while hunkering with soldiers in vision will reduce, and can sometimes completely eliminate, the enemy's force projection onto you.

If your squad is spread out to protect flanks and fight a battle against several pods at once, Sharpshooters can deal damage to whichever flank is in need of that damage, while other soldiers can only fight on the flank to which they are deployed.

If you do not want to remain in vision of enemies for a turn you can spot them with a soldier, shoot them with Sharpshooters, and then move your spotting soldier backward.

A Sharpshooter can project offensive damage perks onto tiles which are not safe for soldiers with offensive perks to stand on. While an Assault uses Fortify or a Grenadier uses Smoke to stay alive a Sharpshooter takes advantage of those defensive soldiers in order to use a fully-offensive perk tree to deal damage.

In general, being reductive with regard to what something does in this game is going to leave you failing to take full advantage of the things it can do which you are ignoring. Given that the unique thing Sharpshooters do is shoot from beyond-visual-range, if you are going to analyze that reductively and dismiss its effects it should be no surprise that you end up thinking the soldier is weaker than other soldiers. The soldier is only meant to be as strong as other soldiers if you use what it does to make it effective; imagine expecting an Assault to be strong if you didn't ever consider Run'N'Gun to be powerful because you reductively dismissed it as being too dangerous to use.
that not a plus for a sharpshooter, that is a plus for whoever you stick on center/pivot duty. With the ranger or gunner that would take over a sharpshooters slot, you do lose some ability to meta-game the Ai with LOS cheese, but you gain so much more in firing potential and map control. not that LOS cheese only works until advent can get eyes back on you.

-defending from multiple fronts is bad tactics
-the ending turns out of safe positions is horrible tactics


it is not reductive, to be honest with a passive meant to give a class more range than standard units. The problem is the fantasy firing deep into FoW like a true sniper not being supported well enough by game mechanics.
dstar3k
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Re: Thoughts on the 1.3 changes

Post by dstar3k »

stefan3iii wrote:Serial is still going to be really strong, you'll still regularly get 5 kills with it, and I think as it is now I would take Serial on every SS.
Saturation Fire is Gsgt level. It's only in a specific cone, but it can destroy cover. It has no negatives associated, and hits every unit in that cone -- and with lucky/good positioning, that can be _every_ unit in sight.

Given that, how can nerfing Serial just because it had poor interaction with autoloaders, rather than I.E. prohibiting the use of autoloaders more than once per turn, be justified?

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Tuhalu
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Re: Thoughts on the 1.3 changes

Post by Tuhalu »

dstar3k wrote:
stefan3iii wrote:Serial is still going to be really strong, you'll still regularly get 5 kills with it, and I think as it is now I would take Serial on every SS.
Saturation Fire is Gsgt level. It's only in a specific cone, but it can destroy cover. It has no negatives associated, and hits every unit in that cone -- and with lucky/good positioning, that can be _every_ unit in sight.

Given that, how can nerfing Serial just because it had poor interaction with autoloaders, rather than I.E. prohibiting the use of autoloaders more than once per turn, be justified?

Shalon Wood
Saturation Fire is a MSGT perk in 1.3. It's current functioning makes it destroy cover only if an enemy is behind it (and hit rates against targets in cover are not great). It's nice if you catch a pod out in the open, but it's not going to one-shot enemies right out of cover all that much.
darkerevent
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Re: Thoughts on the 1.3 changes

Post by darkerevent »

Dlareh wrote:What I think people really want are Sharpshooters is that can "one shot, one kill" most of the time -- and often enough to justify their movement cost. Simply being able to attack from further behind is not enough with how few offensive (particularly offensive damage) abilities they have compared to other shooting classes.
I have never had any significant amount of trouble getting precisely that level of performance out of a sharpshooter, except when I built it terribly, positioned poorly, or got too hasty and failed to make use of DFA -> Steady Weapon combos to maintain ideal aim from turn to turn.

As well as I can see, they're the most dependable source of "one shot, one kill" currently in the game that doesn't also place itself right in the enemies' faces. Good positioning also means they can get incidental uncovered shots against enemies who simply aren't accounting for the sharpie's presence when taking cover, and their overstacked aim gives them better odds against covered enemies than almost anybody else is going to get.

If there were more "miniboss" type enemies in the midgame (a la Mechtoids from LW1), single-target crit sharpies would probably be even more desirable than they already are. Even without such high-priority fatty targets though, they still do a lot of good work.

Also: too few offensive damage abilities? .-. They get a high-powered and extreme-range standard shot, Precision Shot for crit speculation/confirmation, and either Serial or Double Tap depending on how you want them specialized at the end. What more do they need to do their job? About the only thing I could imagine wanting to see added would be a reimplementation of Disabling Shot from LW1, but that would be mainly a utility attack anyway and would probably not see much use in LW2's combat dynamic.
Dlareh
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Re: Thoughts on the 1.3 changes

Post by Dlareh »

I don't know what difficulty you're playing on, but "one shot, one kill" has been far from the norm when you're being swarmed by M3's and have Coil weapons at best.

Would any of the other shooting classes be satisfied with just Precision Shot and an MSgt perk like Double Tap or Serial for dealing damage? The notion seems ludicrous to me.
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LordYanaek
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Re: Thoughts on the 1.3 changes

Post by LordYanaek »

Dlareh wrote:I don't know what difficulty you're playing on, but "one shot, one kill" has been far from the norm when you're being swarmed by M3's and have Coil weapons at best.

Would any of the other shooting classes be satisfied with just Precision Shot and an MSgt perk like Double Tap or Serial for dealing damage? The notion seems ludicrous to me.
Commander in my case and by the end of the game i had plasma weapons. "One shot, one kill" wasn't guaranteed but was pretty frequent for my AMF crit sniper in Waterworld.
You're overlooking Deadshot, Agression (bonus point if it doesn't compete with Center Mass) and Death from Above in your damage dealing perks. Being able to kill-aim each turn to rise THC and Crit chance close (or up) to 100% on every shot is a big part of the "one shot - one kill" build.
Choosing the right target is another part. Her priority targets were hard to hit dangerous enemies but not damage sinks like sectopods or gatekeepers. I had better soldiers to deal mass damage to those enemies so my sniper could focus on Muton (Elites), all sorts of Sneks or other annoying targets. I don't know how it works in the real military but i never imagined snipers being the best anti-tank soldier so killing annoying flehies seems natural to me and against those, the very high aim a good sniper can achieve is important.
Squadsight is a big bonus on the right map of course, but the aim stacking is really important.
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8wayz
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Re: Thoughts on the 1.3 changes

Post by 8wayz »

Dlareh wrote:
8wayz wrote:The main point of controversy is that the Sharpshooter lacks in crowd-control or multi-attack perks/items/weapons.
I don't find this to be controversial at all. The change to Serial was more than justified; it was ridiculously powerful when used on > 5 enemies. The new drop off is small for the first few enemies you target with it, and you can save low health enemies for last.

What I think people really want are Sharpshooters is that can "one shot, one kill" most of the time -- and often enough to justify their movement cost. Simply being able to attack from further behind is not enough with how few offensive (particularly offensive damage) abilities they have compared to other shooting classes.
It is controversial in my humble opinion since Serial is literally the only crowd/map-control perk the Sharpshooter has on the entire tree.

I can very much assure you that after playing with the nerfed version of In the Zone (the precursor of Serial) in Long War 1, the perk was literally dead and dusted. You were better off taking Double Tap (which was multi-target then and there) as it had a much lower cooldown and was more reliable.

I am playing on Commander - getting one shot, one kill is very easy with just a few perks to boost your Crit Chance. However surviving a 8-unit pod with more coming your way with just 1 kill per turn, even if you kill the biggest of them, is a big ask.

Hence why the Sharpshooter needs some semblance of crowd control. This was done in Vanilla with Serial and Kill Zone. All other classes in Long War 2 have some form of crowd control ability or attack and the Sharpshooter is becoming a huge liability having just a single, very limited one.

As suggested on the last page, I would also like to see Double Tap being able to target two targets instead of one. This will help alleviate the lack of crowd-control options.
Tuhalu
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Re: Thoughts on the 1.3 changes

Post by Tuhalu »

8wayz wrote:I am playing on Commander - getting one shot, one kill is very easy with just a few perks to boost your Crit Chance. However surviving a 8-unit pod with more coming your way with just 1 kill per turn, even if you kill the biggest of them, is a big ask.
Are there missions where you bring less than 8 soldiers to a swarming mission and expect the sharpshooter to carry the team with more than 1 kill per turn? If you aren't doing that, why do you need your sharpshooter to carry the team so heavily that they need to one-shot more than one thing a turn?
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8wayz
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Re: Thoughts on the 1.3 changes

Post by 8wayz »

I think you are misreading - my concern is not that the Sharpshooter has to carry the team, it is that it lacks behind the team even on missions that should allow him/her to shine.

Here is a what the other classes can do:

- A Gunner can Area Suppress, taking care on average of 4 targets. Not to mention the offensive perks they have.
- A Grenadier can use a HE, Flashbang or Smoke Grenade to save a good number of your soldiers some pain coming their way.
- An Assault can use Slug Shot, Street Sweeper, Lightning Storm and other abilities to crowd control.
- Rangers can flat out shoot at two targets every turn. The Overwatch sub-type can also take care of encroaching pods.
- Specialists can use their drone to either disable enemy units or protect one of your own and still shoot once per turn.
- Shinobis are in a bit of a twist since most players do not play them offensively, but they still can do some crowd control with Bladestorm and Reaper.
- Technicals are meant to be crowd-control kings, either with a Rocket or using the Flamethrower.

My issue is that the Sharpshooter can only shoot once per turn and at best enter a normal Overwatch (with Snap Shot), nothing else. Their only crowd-control ability is getting nerfed.

Moreover, even to take advantage of the Squadsight range, you need to have a second soldier acting as a spotter, which means that you get 1 shot/turn for the 2 soldiers altogether.
Last edited by 8wayz on Sat Apr 15, 2017 1:30 pm, edited 1 time in total.
josna238
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Re: Thoughts on the 1.3 changes

Post by josna238 »

8wayz wrote:I think you are misreading - my concern is not that the Sharpshooter has to carry the team, it is that it lacks behind the team even on missions that should allow him/her to shine.

Her is a what the other classes can do:

- A Gunner can Area Suppress, taking care on average of 4 targets. Not to mention the offensive perks they have.
- A Grenadier can use a HE, Flashbang or Smoke Grenade to save a good number of your soldiers some pain coming their way.
- An Assault can use Slug Shot, Street Sweeper, Lightning Storm and other abilities to crowd control.
- Rangers can flat out shoot at two targets every turn. The Overwatch sub-type can also take care of encroaching pods.
- Specialists can use their drone to either disable enemy units or protect one of your own and still shoot once per turn.
- Shinobis are in a bit of a twist since most players do not play them offensively, but they still can do some crowd control with Bladestorm and Reaper.
- Technicals are meant to be crowd-control kings, either with a Rocket or using the Flamethrower.

My issue is that the Sharpshooter can only shoot once per turn and at best enter a normal Overwatch (with Snap Shot), nothing else. Their only crowd-control ability is getting nerfed.

Moreover, even to take advantage of the Squadsight range, you need to have a second soldier acting as a spotter, which means that you get 1 shot/turn for the 2 soldiers altogether.
Snipers are very situational, but also very strong

- To me the tandem 2 Snipers (one at least DFA with high terrein AWC and add ons, plus a shinobi are awesome on non timed missions.
- The ghost holotargeter officer with top aim, lead by example and aim PCS could give an awesome boost to a high critical/high shot damage squad.
- They are the best rendezvous advissor I found. Just stay hunkering rebels and throwing flashbangs while enemies fall one per turn.
- Kill the VIP mission with a sniper plus an shinobi officer when are overcrowded on enemies.
- Kill the relay mission. Holotargeter gives support and an eventually free win if were lucky with LOS.
hamds28
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Re: Thoughts on the 1.3 changes

Post by hamds28 »

I'm a heavy DFA sharpshooter user and my squad comps and tactics reflect that. Sharpshooters don't feel underpowered to me and I won't be affected by the Serial nerf as I prefer AMF anyway. The new tree however is another story. Please don't make me choose between Kubikiri and Low Profile, or Independent Targeting (also known as None of the Above).

The main job for my sharpshooters is to reliably (hence the preference for AMF as a capstone) delete inconvenient enemy units, with or without high cover. I overstack aim for that reason. Heavy Rockeeters in particular are really annoying, because getting hit by a rocket is usually one dead soldier, at minimum. Bringing a sharpshooter also increases force projection without needing to find extra cover, or buy an extra set of armor. Squadsight is a really powerful perk and nests are not too hard to find. Even on guerrilla ops, I find them useful, because one turn spent bogged down in a firefight is a lot of movement lost. They don't fit well on very small squads, but small squad combat missions are anyway risky propositions and I generally try not to play it that way.

Why a Sharpshooter instead of another Gunner or Ranger? I find that the marginal benefits don't outweigh the safety and covering fire that a DFA Sharpshooter will bring. A second ranger will let you shoot twice, but with a lot less aim. A second gunner (where is all that infil time coming from?) is the same. Over an extended firefight, maybe the average damage per action of ranger or gunner might be slightly higher, but it still doesn't make up for the force projection where you actually need it.
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8wayz
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Re: Thoughts on the 1.3 changes

Post by 8wayz »

I beg to differ.

To be able to use that force projection you will need at least 2 soldiers - a Sniper and a spotter. The spotter either has to remain in Stealth, or be able to take a lot of punishment and hunker down almost every turn. In both cases the Spotter does not contribute with much to the fight, if at all.

The only time I really enjoyed using my DFA Sniper was when 3 pods were attacking the building I was in and every turn the Sniper would kill one of them with the rifle, and then finish off a second one with a pistol.

I did had 2 Rangers and a Gunner (among other soldiers), but that was the only time the Sniper actually felt like contributing to the fight.

The Sniper really needs at least two good perks than can disable or kill multiple enemies per turn. Relying on the pistol to fill this gap is counter-productive - to use the pistol the target has to be in visual range, so your Squadsight perk gets little use for those fights.
LordYanaek
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Re: Thoughts on the 1.3 changes

Post by LordYanaek »

You only need a dedicated spotter if you are trying to kill the enemy pod without real engagement and if you are doing this nobody but a sniper can do it so the situation is multiple snipers and one spotter whose lack of combat abilities isn't an issue as you are not really fighting, but assassinating enemies from a distance.
You don't need a dedicated spotter if your sniper is simply ~10 tiles behind the squad, out of LoS so low cover isn't an issue on his elevated position and he is fighting enemies in LoS of the rest of your troops. In this situation, all your soldiers are "spotters" in addition to fighters and the Sniper's main job is to reliably kill what needs to be killed exactly now.
hamds28
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Re: Thoughts on the 1.3 changes

Post by hamds28 »

8wayz wrote:I beg to differ.

To be able to use that force projection you will need at least 2 soldiers - a Sniper and a spotter. The spotter either has to remain in Stealth, or be able to take a lot of punishment and hunker down almost every turn. In both cases the Spotter does not contribute with much to the fight, if at all.

The only time I really enjoyed using my DFA Sniper was when 3 pods were attacking the building I was in and every turn the Sniper would kill one of them with the rifle, and then finish off a second one with a pistol.

I did had 2 Rangers and a Gunner (among other soldiers), but that was the only time the Sniper actually felt like contributing to the fight.

The Sniper really needs at least two good perks than can disable or kill multiple enemies per turn. Relying on the pistol to fill this gap is counter-productive - to use the pistol the target has to be in visual range, so your Squadsight perk gets little use for those fights.
It's not uncommon for the shinobi to skirt the firefight in stealth. They only break stealth when it's crucial for that extra bit of firepower and they can spot. Depending on the positioning that you contact the enemy and available cover, not all your soldiers will be able to shoot at important targets. That's where my DFA sniper excels in conjunction with Rangers especially. The amount of high cover is quite limited and those spots go to rangers and gunners that need to stay relatively safe while in contact with the enemy. Adding more soldiers that attack from medium range has a detrimental effect on my Assaults who need to approach the enemy without getting shot.

Also, what do you do when the enemy has a unit or two holed up in high cover? Assaults are supposed to deal with those, but sometimes it's not safe for the assault to charge the foxhole. Cover destruction is one option, but it's not always available. The DFA sniper is an alternative, because of all the aim bonuses and Steady Weapon, you can fairly reliably hit units even behind high cover, where the infantry Rangers or Gunners have to burn cooldowns or get bogged down trading shots. So the squad as a whole gets more mobile when covered from above by a DFA sniper.

Granted, snipers will lose a bit of power with the 1.3 changes (please please don't keep the current SSGT perks). But their role as precision strike won't change too much. I don't see that many opportunities to serial down 7-8 units at a go, and I'd rather have the kill assurance of AMF. But to each their own.

Regarding 1.3, I like the changes to promote medium sized squad combat missions, but I'm biased towards those anyway.

Flashbang changes, I'm ambivalent. I think the overpoweredness mainly comes from Sting Grenades, and that having chance to flashbang adds a layer of RNG that I'm not sure I like. Some abilities cannot be allowed to go off because they're just way too punishing. Still, a shift in tactics might mitigate some of that. I wouldn't mind a nerf to Sting grenades, that perk is pretty insane.
Jacke
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Re: Thoughts on the 1.3 changes

Post by Jacke »

I agree with you, hamds28.
hamds28 wrote:Flashbang changes, I'm ambivalent. I think the overpoweredness mainly comes from Sting Grenades, and that having chance to flashbang adds a layer of RNG that I'm not sure I like. Some abilities cannot be allowed to go off because they're just way too punishing. Still, a shift in tactics might mitigate some of that. I wouldn't mind a nerf to Sting grenades, that perk is pretty insane.
Especially here. I'd like to see this become a resistance system. sort of like what's in other games like Darkest Dungeon. It could be based upon Will with ADVENT *and* XCOM getting a resistance roll against Will to prevent being tactically disoriented. The tougher enemies would have higher Will and be harder to disorient. But so would experienced XCOM troops.
Saph7
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Re: Thoughts on the 1.3 changes

Post by Saph7 »

I'm really not sure how anybody can think that Sharpshooters are underpowered and need Serial to pull their weight. Jo has already explained why Squadsight is so powerful, but here's some data to back it up.

I'm currently playing a 1.3 campaign that's reached July. I don't bother to track damage inflicted per mission, but here are the armory stats of all my soldiers of GSGT and above. These are the troops I've used most frequently and relied on most heavily.

• Beth "Cowboy" Taylor (Master Sergeant Ranger) - 16 Missions, 64 Kills
• Eric "Scorpion" Gibson (Gunnery Sergeant Assault) - 15 Missions, 40 Kills
• Yuzuki "Sparkplug" Nakano (Gunnery Sergeant Gunner) - 14 Missions, 32 Kills
• George "Duck" Jackson (Gunnery Sergeant Sharpshooter) - 13 Missions, 44 Kills
• Tomasz "Big Time" Dudek (Gunnery Sergeant Sharpshooter) - 11 Missions, 47 Kills
• Patrick "Raven" Wilson (Gunnery Sergeant Technical) - 17 Missions, 50 Kills
• Maciej "Skids" Kwiatkowski (Gunnery Sergeant Ranger) - 15 Missions, 43 Kills
• Heather "Wildling" Spencer (Gunnery Sergeant Gunner) - 12 Missions, 36 Kills

If we rank them in terms of kills per mission:

1) Tomasz (Sharpshooter) - 4.3 kills per mission
2) Beth (Ranger) - 4 kills per mission
3) George (Sharpshooter) - 3.4 kills per mission
4) Heather (Gunner) - 3 kills per mission
5) Patrick (Technical) - 2.9 kills per mission
6) Maciej (Ranger) - 2.9 kills per mission
7) Eric (Assault) - 2.7 kills per mission
8) Yuzuki (Gunner) - 2.3 kills per mission

As you can see, the Sharpshooters get the most kills by a long way. Oh, and that Master Sergeant Ranger? She's been using a Mag Rifle for the last few missions, while my Sharpshooters are still on Laser Lances. So even with a higher-tier weapon and an XP advantage, she still gets fewer kills than my top Sharpshooter.

And this is without Serial.

Sharpshooters are quite deadly enough already.
LordYanaek
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Re: Thoughts on the 1.3 changes

Post by LordYanaek »

hamds28 wrote: Flashbang changes, I'm ambivalent. I think the overpoweredness mainly comes from Sting Grenades, and that having chance to flashbang adds a layer of RNG that I'm not sure I like. Some abilities cannot be allowed to go off because they're just way too punishing. Still, a shift in tactics might mitigate some of that. I wouldn't mind a nerf to Sting grenades, that perk is pretty insane.
Personally i would remove Sting grenades as a perk and make them a different item with a smaller AoE but a chance to stun. All the flashbangs improvement perks don't make a lot of sense to me as perks as they really look like different items. That would require a complete rework of the Support Grenadier tree of course so it's unlikely to happen.
Even as a perk, Sting grenades could probably have -1 AoE compared to flashbangs : more concentrated thus a chance to stun but less area covered. Unfortunately, when implemented as a perk you don't have the option to equip both grenades and choose which one to use. Or it should be coded like the Medkit with two different abilities that both use the same charges so each time a Grenadier with Sting grenade launches a flashbang, he can use it as a regular flashbang or as a sting grenade with reduced AoE.
It's probably not something that will be considered for 1.3 anyway.

The flashbang nerf in itself isn't really a big deal and probably mostly exist to give some room to other CC abilities when some late game enemies appear without making the early game harder with pure will based check that every enemy has a (small) chance to pass. Imagine the complains we would see if a snek suddenly resisted the flashbang and used tongue grab on a soldier. :lol:
Goofych
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Re: Thoughts on the 1.3 changes

Post by Goofych »

Saph7 wrote:I'm really not sure how anybody can think that Sharpshooters are underpowered and need Serial to pull their weight. Jo has already explained why Squadsight is so powerful, but here's some data to back it up.

...

Sharpshooters are quite deadly enough already.
There is another way to look at this. The game process can be described as a fight between chaos and order, there players task is to instill a favorable order on things while the game keeps throwing at him more and more rng. From this perspective ability to project power beyond given soldiers visual range only have meaning if it translates into ability to project order.
For example in LW1 it was possible for a sniper to damage an enemy unit for 1 and disable its weapon, very weak power projection, but reasonable order projection. Now in LW2 sharpshooters, unlike say assaults, are left with only one method of projecting order, - they make one particular piece of rng disappear, completely. The obvious problem here is what this approach, while in many ways preferable to any other form of controlling the battlefield, has a downside - you have to be reasonably sure in the outcome, otherwise you are fighting random with random, and that's usually how KIA list grows longer. Luckily Sharpshooters have skills allowing them to have +(30-40) to hit near every turn. Not so luckily, random have a final say in either you will have the opportunity to utilize this boon.
Now, i don't know what kind of SS builds you are using for your current campaign, DFA, Snapshot or this hybrid which seems to be so popular among legend testers, but that time-frame of early summer and GSGT ranks is exactly the time when SS are at their best, not because of some overpowered, broken ability, but because nobody else have theirs overpowered, broken abilities.. Later on SS would cease to be such an indispensable problem-solver then you can simply BunkerBust, CombatEngener or Shredderstorm away your problems. Now your ranger can shoot 'em with 100% to-hit too! Its not what SS are too weak or too powerful, gameplay changes drastically after last two tiers came into play, and SS without Serial on MSGT are basically the same as on SQ just with more damage now.

So, what changes could be made to SS. Mine idea would be to reduce reliance on random early game by making DFA giving free steady after kill instead of free action, but providing it regardless of elevation. Serial can be altered to be free action, charges based, similar to Reaper. Meaning, player will use Serial to mark targets, a la normal holo, but with n free action charges, and then shooting any of marked targets with a skill of SS preference will activate consecutive standard shots at rest marked targets in the order they were marked.
LordYanaek
Posts: 940
Joined: Mon Jan 23, 2017 1:34 pm

Re: Thoughts on the 1.3 changes

Post by LordYanaek »

Goofych wrote:SS without Serial on MSGT are basically the same as on SQ just with more damage now.
+4 dmg every turn or double damage every other turn is not something i would overlook though. I addition they have more Aim which as you explained is important for them to project force efficiently (and thus remove enemy RNG).
So, what changes could be made to SS. Mine idea would be to reduce reliance on random early game by making DFA giving free steady after kill instead of free action, but providing it regardless of elevation. Serial can be altered to be free action, charges based, similar to Reaper. Meaning, player will use Serial to mark targets, a la normal holo, but with n free action charges, and then shooting any of marked targets with a skill of SS preference will activate consecutive standard shots at rest marked targets in the order they were marked.
I like that idea for DFA but it means stocks would become almost totally useless given Sharpshooter is the only class to use them with some regularity (and the name should probably be changed). Also in my games it's rare (not impossible but rare) to not find some higher ground where you can plant your sniper, especially once you have some grapple armor.

Your change to Serial seems pretty complicated to code basically to remove the ability to use Free Reload in the middle of the chain while it could be solved simply by limiting the free reload to your first action for the turn (at least i would think it's easier but i could be wrong) or preventing it from being used after serial was activated similarly to how RnG can't combo with HnR or Close Encounters. Another option would be that serial refunds actions that can only be used to fire a shot but i don't know whether such a limitation is possible (it's possible to give move only or non move actions but fire only, no perk does this).
DonCrabio
Posts: 90
Joined: Fri Mar 24, 2017 7:51 pm

Re: Thoughts on the 1.3 changes

Post by DonCrabio »

Recently I started new campaign (veteran, non-ironman, yes, I'm slacker) with house rules oriented to 1.3 changes:

* no 0% supply raids (this is was boring as hell)
* almost no stealth missions (actually, I done 2 stealth hack missions to counter dark events)

I found some interesting moments:

* I don't have any use for stealth shinobies. I use only sword specked ones, they good enough as scouts and much more useful in actual combat.
* I can't level up my holobot Sharpshooter's, since I can't take them as "passengers" to stealth hacking missions.
* I have 25+ soldiers plus some narrowly specked Heaven advisers and this is not enough! Where was some days when AWC was idle. I need much more rookies.

I think SS holotargeting line can be moved to Shinobi for greater good. Sharpshooter can have two really good shooting specks, long range sniper and mobile rifleman with mix of defensive/support/overwatch skills for middle tree.

As for rookies, maybe increasing of rate of recruiting? Or passive recruiting of 2-3 rookies per month?
Last edited by DonCrabio on Mon Apr 17, 2017 3:41 pm, edited 1 time in total.
darkerevent
Posts: 103
Joined: Sat Mar 04, 2017 12:12 pm

Re: Thoughts on the 1.3 changes

Post by darkerevent »

DonCrabio wrote:* I can't level up my holobot Sharpshooter's, since I can't take them as "passengers" to stealth hacking missions.
This issue is part of why I am going to add the ability to equip rifles (and therefore SMGs) to Sharpshooters in my copy of 1.3, if the devs don't make it baseline.

That way they can be used better in Guerilla Ops (by not being forced to carry a weapon that can't be fired on the run, makes them easier to detect, and lacks a mobility bonus).
DonCrabio
Posts: 90
Joined: Fri Mar 24, 2017 7:51 pm

Re: Thoughts on the 1.3 changes

Post by DonCrabio »

darkerevent wrote:
DonCrabio wrote:* I can't level up my holobot Sharpshooter's, since I can't take them as "passengers" to stealth hacking missions.
This issue is part of why I am going to add the ability to equip rifles (and therefore SMGs) to Sharpshooters in my copy of 1.3, if the devs don't make it baseline.

That way they can be used better in Guerilla Ops (by not being forced to carry a weapon that can't be fired on the run, makes them easier to detect, and lacks a mobility bonus).
I used to do it, and it feels so right, man, this is must be by default. But this time I canceled all game changing mods and .ini modifications to get "pure" experience.
Zyxpsilon
Posts: 274
Joined: Fri Jan 20, 2017 1:26 am

Re: Thoughts on the 1.3 changes

Post by Zyxpsilon »

DonCrabio wrote:As for rookies, maybe increasing of rate of recruiting? Or passive recruiting of 2-3 rookies per month?
Better yet.. just alter the basic Startup value from the very first line of --XComGameCore.INI-- like this;

NUM_STARTING_SOLDIERS=32 ;20

Most of my games are fine with 12 more than the default (;twenty). Well, enough to accomodate five regular solid Squads.. two Bigs (7-9) Alpha strike & three spares (4-7), one of which for occasional (as in rarely since i prefer combat results) dedicated Stealth duties! :lol:
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