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Kameh
Apr 27, 2004

Resident Sergio Apologist
CHAMPION

ImpactVector posted:

2) Leveling up with commander XP/skills is not the main way to increase your power outside a few key purchases. Survivors are. So you want to beeline all survivor unlocks with your skill points (especially leads you have a match for), but otherwise most skills add very little to your power.

This is what I'm perhaps guilty of not doing. I'm almost up to my 40 nodes unlocked in Skill Tier 2, but I've been focusing on offense or things related to my Outlander.

I'm 2 short of unlocking all the squads, but 2 of my unlocked squads don't have leads available yet.

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Skandranon
Sep 6, 2008
fucking stupid, dont listen to me

Kameh posted:

This is what I'm perhaps guilty of not doing. I'm almost up to my 40 nodes unlocked in Skill Tier 2, but I've been focusing on offense or things related to my Outlander.

I'm 2 short of unlocking all the squads, but 2 of my unlocked squads don't have leads available yet.

This is funny, as the last 2 squads I unlocked were the ones I had been carrying Mythic Leaders from when I started the game.

ImpactVector
Feb 24, 2007

HAHAHAHA FOOLS!!
I AM SO SMART!

Uh oh. What did he do now?

Nap Ghost
It took me ages to get a drat fire team lead, which is like the 2nd drat one you unlock.

puberty worked me over
May 20, 2013

by Cyrano4747
why can't they just make diablo 3 with guns and building

TheBlandName
Feb 5, 2012

ImpactVector posted:

There are a couple of things the game doesn't actually tell you about progression:

1) You can actually be successful in missions a decent bit higher than your personal home base rating. Not only do your stats increase when you join others due to everyone's party bonus stats, but a lot of people have higher rating weapons than are required for the missions. The rating of your hero, weapon, and base are all supposed to be equal, but won't be for a lot of people.

2) Leveling up with commander XP/skills is not the main way to increase your power outside a few key purchases. Survivors are. So you want to beeline all survivor unlocks with your skill points (especially leads you have a match for), but otherwise most skills add very little to your power.

To expand a bit more.

1) Power level is a meaningless arbitrary number that's based on a wonky formula that doesn't actually represent your ability to clear missions at all. Use it as a first estimate, and nothing more. For example, not all weapons are equally useful, a good weapon type with good perk rolls can have the same power level as a bad weapon type that was looted and has no perk rolls. Additionally, low level legendaries have vastly inflated power levels that are not accurately reflected in their actual damage.
2) Your base power level doesn't take your schematics or your hero into effect. It does assign a large value to points you've spent in the skill trees, even though points spent in the skill trees do nothing more than increase your potential to be strong.
3) The absolute most important factor in "what level missions can I contribute on" is your offense stat paired with the weapon you use. If you have low resistance and fortitude, build bunkers with windows to shoot out of, even if they're not part of the main fort's walls.

4) Even if power level worked, the "goal power level" is for a player to have a reasonable chance at soloing the mission. Add three other players are you should be able to handle much tougher content.

5) Tech is the weak stat. The highest tech in the party determines trap strength and healing strength. Your own tech only affects how strong your damaging abilities are.

Kameh
Apr 27, 2004

Resident Sergio Apologist
CHAMPION

Skandranon posted:

This is funny, as the last 2 squads I unlocked were the ones I had been carrying Mythic Leaders from when I started the game.

I have a mythic silhouetted in my inventory, but I don't know what to do with it. It's not even a specific silhouette. It's just like a bathroom stick figure.

Great Beer
Jul 5, 2004

Kameh posted:

After gaining ground, I've seem to hit a wall on quest page 3 or 4 of Plankytown. Completed missions are showing MAYBE 2 bars of increase on the completed mission screen. Surely there's a bug, because I can't see how I can get to higher levels in my lifetime.

Are you selecting missions around your level and allowing others to join? Because if so this will cause your power rating to go up and give you less XP for the mission unless you select something 20+ levels above your current power level.

Kameh
Apr 27, 2004

Resident Sergio Apologist
CHAMPION

Great Beer posted:

Are you selecting missions around your level and allowing others to join? Because if so this will cause your power rating to go up and give you less XP for the mission unless you select something 20+ levels above your current power level.

I have recently allowed public to join, and that would explain a lot if true.

I don't like the idea of doing missions solo, especially when a simple "3 med-bot activations" mission places me in a map that is starved of bluglo AND the type of survivors I need, and the survivors that ARE on the map are so spread out that I can't do anything but try to complete the mission before the timer runs out.

Great Beer
Jul 5, 2004

I either do Play With Others if i dont need a specific mission type or pick one of the orange/red missions if I can. You get more XP and its more fun from the extra challenge too.

TheBlandName
Feb 5, 2012

Great Beer posted:

Are you selecting missions around your level and allowing others to join? Because if so this will cause your power rating to go up and give you less XP for the mission unless you select something 20+ levels above your current power level.

This is not true. Your power rating has nothing to do with the experience you get from a mission. You have a commander experience level (that's hidden) that determines how much experience you get from a mission and how many skill points you gain when you level up.

ImpactVector
Feb 24, 2007

HAHAHAHA FOOLS!!
I AM SO SMART!

Uh oh. What did he do now?

Nap Ghost

TheBlandName posted:

This is not true. Your power rating has nothing to do with the experience you get from a mission. You have a commander experience level (that's hidden) that determines how much experience you get from a mission and how many skill points you gain when you level up.
This was my understanding as well. And if you're near your 40 nodes in rank 2 skills when only 1/3 through Plank that would definitely explain why your XP gains have slowed. You should be doing ~40 rating missions according to your commander level.

Tei
Feb 19, 2011

:-O

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Lk4cEHbjD4


Somewhere Mr. Torgue is looking at Fortnite with a big smiley.

TheBlandName
Feb 5, 2012
Oh dear. Is Fortnite available in Japan or other countries with big boy laws covering consumer protection for gacha games? That schematic might never be tampered with.

(Probably not, the legal protections probably don't extend to non-citizens of the nations with those laws. But uh, that's stuff the dev team really shouldn't be letting through. I am not a lawyer.)

ADDED: Oh. After some investigation of my own (instead of 2nd hand information) the application of the law is considerably narrower than I was under the impression of. Yeah, that's a fun toy for now but all existing copies are probably going to be destroyed. (I wouldn't be surprised if the -% durability loss gets changed to +% durability.)

TheBlandName fucked around with this message at 03:52 on Aug 18, 2017

sushibandit
Feb 12, 2009


The entire game should be like this. Embrace absurdity and just let us wreck poo poo while having a good time.

Tei
Feb 19, 2011

sushibandit posted:

The entire game should be like this. Embrace absurdity and just let us wreck poo poo while having a good time.

Us gamers are simple to figure out. We want bigger numbers. Just give us bigger numbers, always make the big numbers even bigger. I think every game dev in the world must be forced to play Cookie Clicker at least once.

Never make a game where a number shrink. You can always make enemies lifepoints bigger, bigger number.

Sputnik
Jul 21, 2003

I felt like a ninja, and my kung-fu was strong.

Tei posted:

Us gamers are simple to figure out. We want bigger numbers. Just give us bigger numbers, always make the big numbers even bigger. I think every game dev in the world must be forced to play Cookie Clicker at least once.

Never make a game where a number shrink. You can always make enemies lifepoints bigger, bigger number.

False. Don't make enemies bullet sponges. Make more enemies to blow up. Make your GPU melt with explosionary euphoria.

Tei
Feb 19, 2011

Sputnik posted:

False. Don't make enemies bullet sponges. Make more enemies to blow up. Make your GPU melt with explosionary euphoria.

Not against this. Probably exactly what snipers need, the feel you are firing a railgun. Maybe sniper guns should fire trough material.

Evil Fluffy
Jul 13, 2009

Scholars are some of the most pompous and pedantic people I've ever had the joy of meeting.

Tei posted:

Not against this. Probably exactly what snipers need, the feel you are firing a railgun. Maybe sniper guns should fire trough material.

Not sure about the railgun aspect, but the Scoped Bolt-Action Sniper Rifle's shots can piece multiple enemies letting you get single shot multi-kills. :golgo:

TheBlandName
Feb 5, 2012

Tei posted:

Not against this. Probably exactly what snipers need, the feel you are firing a railgun. Maybe sniper guns should fire trough material.

Snipers in this game are for killing lobbers and maybe igniting propane tanks, and they're already very good at those jobs. In all other cases enemies aren't threatening until they're close and you will get better damage out of an assault rifle or pistol.

socialsecurity
Aug 30, 2003





TheBlandName posted:

Snipers in this game are for killing lobbers and maybe igniting propane tanks, and they're already very good at those jobs. In all other cases enemies aren't threatening until they're close and you will get better damage out of an assault rifle or pistol.

I've got a legendary 1 shot sniper that still 1 shot headshots everything small and kills huskys in 2-3 it's fantastic because it Pierce's so it's easy to get multiple kills per trigger pull still great in lvl 40 missions and I haven't 3 starred it yet because gently caress malachite

TheBlandName
Feb 5, 2012

socialsecurity posted:

I've got a legendary 1 shot sniper that still 1 shot headshots everything small and kills huskys in 2-3 it's fantastic because it Pierce's so it's easy to get multiple kills per trigger pull still great in lvl 40 missions and I haven't 3 starred it yet because gently caress malachite

Don't feel like I'm relegating sniper rifles to gimmick weapon status when I say that they're supposed to be, and actually are, really good at killing two out of the four actually important mob types to kill. And in particular they're the only actually good way of killing lobbers, instead of merely adequate like assault rifles. (The only reason I said "maybe" for propane tanks is that pretty much any gun can do that job very well.)

That said, an assault rifle at medium or pistol at close range will kill enemies with less of the weapon's magazine, using cheaper bullets*, and with faster reloads. So for enemies who don't pose a threat at long range, assault rifles are better. For enemies who don't pose a threat at long or medium range, pistols are better still. (And for enemies that aren't threatening until melee range, the two auto-shotgun variants are the best.)

*Except for the LMG which is a damage hose but also uses medium bullets without doing medium bullet damage.

ADDING: I don't know, maybe you're not annoyed in the slightest? It's just hard for me to parse emotion in a post without any punctuation.

Vitamin P
Nov 19, 2013

Truth is game rigging is more difficult than it looks pls stay ded

puberty worked me over posted:

why can't they just make diablo 3 with guns and building

Greed.

Sputnik posted:

False. Don't make enemies bullet sponges. Make more enemies to blow up. Make your GPU melt with explosionary euphoria.

Yeah it is a nice side effect of no enemy variation outside type that they can chuck an absolute ton at you. There's been a few times that I've been surprised my PS4 hasn't slowed down or anything when there's a big big horde and lots of projectiles flying through the air above.

Is it just me or are they adding new environment blocks with each patch? I swear I'm seeing new kinds of buildings and environment objects.

Tei
Feb 19, 2011

Vitamin P posted:

Is it just me or are they adding new environment blocks with each patch? I swear I'm seeing new kinds of buildings and environment objects.

I don't think so, the patches are very small. I think Is just that they have poured a lot of variety in their procgen.

Bakalakadaka
Sep 18, 2004

I have a laser sniper rifle which has no scope but you can charge the shots and they'll pierce enemies and I can usually 1 shot huskies with a charged headshot unless they're way higher level. More importantly it looks and sounds cool.

Dravs
Mar 8, 2011

You've done well, kiddo.
My problem with the energy weapons is they take a super long time to reload. I have got a space gun, which sounds cool, however in reality it is just a really slow firing revolver that takes ages to reload. Also the energy bolts travel slower than regular bullets, so it is a pita to lead anything at range.

It's only good points is it bounces off walls and pierces enemies, so it work's great in a murder tunnel. However in a murder tunnel, the traps will usually kill everything anyway.

Bakalakadaka
Sep 18, 2004

Dravs posted:

My problem with the energy weapons is they take a super long time to reload. I have got a space gun, which sounds cool, however in reality it is just a really slow firing revolver that takes ages to reload. Also the energy bolts travel slower than regular bullets, so it is a pita to lead anything at range.

It's only good points is it bounces off walls and pierces enemies, so it work's great in a murder tunnel. However in a murder tunnel, the traps will usually kill everything anyway.

The one I'm talking about actually reloads really fast so it's kind of like a bolt action rifle if you're just doing charged shots.

Skandranon
Sep 6, 2008
fucking stupid, dont listen to me

Bakalakadaka posted:

The one I'm talking about actually reloads really fast so it's kind of like a bolt action rifle if you're just doing charged shots.

I kinda like the laser rifle, but it's clip is so small (3 shots), it really is only useful if you have someone with major reload buffs, or it comes with some itself.

metasynthetic
Dec 2, 2005

in one moment, Earth

in the next, Heaven

Megamarm
I played in a pug with actual good pubbies last night and did some hard missions with well designed forts and it was really fun.

I say again, once there are guilds, goon guild defense will own. If anyone is still playing by then.

a cock shaped fruit
Aug 23, 2010



The true enemy of humanity is disorder.

puberty worked me over posted:

why can't they just make diablo 3 with guns and building

Basically what I wanted based off initial impressions/gameplay demo videos.

Dravs
Mar 8, 2011

You've done well, kiddo.

metasynthetic posted:

I played in a pug with actual good pubbies last night and did some hard missions with well designed forts and it was really fun.

I say again, once there are guilds, goon guild defense will own. If anyone is still playing by then.

Yeah, when this game is good; when the party you are in actually does the objectives and designs really cool forts with death lanes, then the game is amazing. But that only happens maybe 1 in 10 games at the moment, most of the time your team will just run off to random corners of the map and start farming for mechanical parts because they need to add more of them to their stack of 10,000.

I did a destroy the encampments last night, where the rewards from the encampments are usually pretty good, and 2 of the party upon spawning in immediately ran to the nearest house and started looting rather than try to do the mission. I ended up soloing most of the mission and one other guy came to help once we got to the bonus waves, it was pretty frustrating.

Vitamin P
Nov 19, 2013

Truth is game rigging is more difficult than it looks pls stay ded
Yeah wipe out at the least the camps to win the mission before fuckering off to find propane tanks or whatever, that's just etiquette.

Tei
Feb 19, 2011

Is even more retarded when you consider that they can play in private mode, with the whole map for them. But they want to play with other people AND screw them. Is like a bad girlfriend. The game should be build more around "reward based on contribution" and create a farming mode for these that just want to farm.

Kameh
Apr 27, 2004

Resident Sergio Apologist
CHAMPION
Is it possible that these people are doing play with others but they have different quest requirements at a similar power level? Like maybe they don't need to destroy encampments, but they do have to find three locators around the map or something. So they bugger off to do that, and since somebody is actually completing the objective for the map, they get credit for completing their side quest too.

I in no way condone this, but I'm just offering an explanation for why people don't seem to want to complete the objectives besides "private farming."

Tei
Feb 19, 2011

Kameh posted:

Is it possible that these people are doing play with others but they have different quest requirements at a similar power level? Like maybe they don't need to destroy encampments, but they do have to find three locators around the map or something. So they bugger off to do that, and since somebody is actually completing the objective for the map, they get credit for completing their side quest too.

Could be, but these are rare. And you can help with the camps, then do your own quest. It could be even better ,because maybe somebody already did it (like destroy the fire truck).

Bakalakadaka
Sep 18, 2004

I always smash things that I know come up as daily quests just in case someone needs them. And I hope other people do the same because sometimes you just can't find your daily items.

Elendil004
Mar 22, 2003

The prognosis
is not good.


The discord is pretty dead, so I haven't been able to find a goon group in weeks but when it was hopping groups of goons were always better than pubbies.

Skandranon
Sep 6, 2008
fucking stupid, dont listen to me

Kameh posted:

Is it possible that these people are doing play with others but they have different quest requirements at a similar power level? Like maybe they don't need to destroy encampments, but they do have to find three locators around the map or something. So they bugger off to do that, and since somebody is actually completing the objective for the map, they get credit for completing their side quest too.

I in no way condone this, but I'm just offering an explanation for why people don't seem to want to complete the objectives besides "private farming."

No, no matter what they have the same main objective. They may have some personal quest or daily quest, but they still need to destroy the encampments for the mission to end successfully.

Roumba
Jun 29, 2005
Buglord
Where can you see a schematic's headshot multiplier? Some descriptions mention it but I don't see jack.

TheBlandName
Feb 5, 2012

Roumba posted:

Where can you see a schematic's headshot multiplier? Some descriptions mention it but I don't see jack.

You can't. Just like most important raw data about the game you can either test and verify it for yourself, or look up someone else's work and hope they tested correctly.

It's also not a multiplier, it's bonus damage. This is a distinction that matters when you talk about critical headshots. A gun with 50% crit damage and 50% headshot damage will do 100% bonus damage on a critical headshot.

This sheet compiled by a Whitesushi is (as far as raw stats go) mostly accurate. There are some gaps in the data (burst rifles have an innate 50%, for example), and the analysis on tier rankings is pretty bad from what the math suggests should be true. Still, it was right when it came to a bugged character being really good so the tiers are probably not analysis so much as collected anecdotes.

As a general rule of thumb, weapons with both high and low headshot multipliers are worse than weapons with 50% headshot multipliers. Weapons with high headshot multipliers get even worse when considering the good perks. Weapons with low headshot multipliers get better but still not as good when considering the good perks.

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Fusion Restaurant
May 20, 2015
The tiers are literally just one dudes comment from when the sheet was originally posted. I'd tend to ignore it.

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