Shotgunners.

[Idiotas]

Shotgunners need their range nerfed.

I see shotgunners do like 20 damage when they are close by and when they are like so far away they take 80% of your life or they even 1 hit you.

I don't mind having them a 1 hit (headshot), but do something about the range. It's a shotgunner... they deal damage from close by and not from 20 meters far away.

[DoctorB0NG]

Agreed. I think their range needs to be reduced and their spread also needs to be reduced to compensate for the reduced damage.

[HaTe]

Is there anyone who can accurately explain how the shotgun works as is?

Name Warhead Body Dmg Neck Dmg Head Dmg Range ROF SC

Shotgun---3---------15--------45---------75---------15--------1---8

This was it in Renegade. You don't need to know what warhead means. Body, neck, and head damage are all self-explanatory. Range = 15. To put that into perspective, the chemsprayer and flamethrower had a range of 30. RoF = 1 means that it could fire one shot per second. SC means spray count, meaning that it shot 8 bullets per shot. There's also a spray-angle, but that would likely just confuse people without something to relate it to.

[Ap2000]

I don't mind the range, but an increased spread would most likeyl fit it.

Doesn't seem to me any compensating is necessary.

[Bananas]

I would like to see the pattern be less random. It's lame having RNG shots.

Also having the damage start to fall off/be lowered after certain ranges would be nice.

[DoctorB0NG]

I would like to see the pattern be less random. It's lame having RNG shots.

Also having the damage start to fall off/be lowered after certain ranges would be nice.

Agreed. One of the main things I love about Ren is it really rewards accurate aiming which ATM the shotty seems too random to reward that.

[XD_ERROR_XD]

Well, that's not the only thing. Even shotgunners in the original renegade had a somewhat long range. It often didn't feel like it because indeed, high spread, and sometimes it felt like it had an insane range because you got a headshot with one of the shells(?) 2 shots in a row, taking away half of someone's HP.

What i rather think the problem here is sprinting. You can sprint forward, but not sprint backward. therefore, in a 1v1 where the defender has to retaliate, he simply cannot run away as quickly as the attacker. if you knew both players could run at exactly the same speed, all you had to do was move backward effectively, and you had the situation entirely under your control, forcing the attacker to switch to his pistol.

In this case however, the attacker can run like 1,5 times as fast, run normally for a split second to fire, then sprint again, forcing the defender to turn his back to his enemy to stay out of his firing range. To avoid this, people camp corners. hard.

How do you balance an issue where the problem is (also) a game mechanic, and not the weapon? I really don't think the blame can be put on the weapons entirely.

[Gaysha]

What i rather think the problem here is sprinting. You can sprint forward, but not sprint backward. therefore, in a 1v1 where the defender has to retaliate, he simply cannot run away as quickly as the attacker. if you knew both players could run at exactly the same speed, all you had to do was move backward effectively, and you had the situation entirely under your control, forcing the attacker to switch to his pistol.

In this case however, the attacker can run like 1,5 times as fast, run normally for a split second to fire, then sprint again, forcing the defender to turn his back to his enemy to stay out of his firing range. To avoid this, people camp corners. hard.

How do you balance an issue where the problem is (also) a game mechanic, and not the weapon? I really don't think the blame can be put on the weapons entirely.

Sprinting is one of the things that makes the infantry combat in this game move so well compared to oldren. Its not a problem what-so-ever, its a solution. Camping corners is way more prevalent in oldren because of how slow everyone is and the defender has a HUGE advantage compared to what they have in renx.

The defender gets to choose the angles and terrain, that is plenty of advantage against any and all infantry they might meet. A shotgunner that decides to run at a well-established infantry somewhere has a serious disadvantage and the sprinting mechanics gives them a chance to bum-rush even the most seasoned of snipers.

If you hold tight corners where you might get jumped by a shotgun you cant run away from, then thats a risk you take when you choose that path and approach. Which is great, thats what shotguns are supposed to do.. They are meant to be dangerous upclose.

EDIT: Forgot to say that i agree with the majority in this thread:

Buff the spread (reduce it).

Nerf the damage.

Nerf the range.

Edited April 30, 2015 by Guest

[HaTe]

Agreed with gaysha, but I think it's still pretty obvious that they need a nerf.

The overall thoughts on the balance changes thread are:

Buff the spread (reduce it).

Nerf the damage.

Nerf the range.

If we can all at least agree on that being the best course to take, we can start talking actual number figures to be able to measure the change.

[XD_ERROR_XD]

Gaysha, what you're mentioning here is correct, but it's still as much as an excuse to justify spamming shotgunners as anything else. IF you are not in the right situation to use the shotgunner, DON'T use it. Sprinting has made shotgunners too good at too many fronts where it's supposed to be a bad pick, this simply cannot be justified. it's free infantry, there's absolutely no reason to not to go back to base and switch your class. And if you get caught miles away from your nearest PT... bad luck for you.

[HaTe]

Yes but nerfing or getting rid of sprint isn't realistic for the game at this point. So the same affect can be given with nerfing the weapon. Sprinting backwards isn't really realistic either and would look goofy too. Is that what you were suggesting, or were you just making a point, error? Would you agree with the changes proposed so far (the ones I posted above)?

[XD_ERROR_XD]

Yes, i do agree. And no, i honestly don't know how to fix the sprinting issue. that would require me to put a lot more of thought in it. I've bee trying to come to a solution, though.

[RoundShades]

There is a sort of option to it.

Among a handful of "normalization" the shotgun's weapon needs, because right now it is highly unreliable where it shoots and how much damage it does. It could probably use 120 as maximum normal damage, limit 1 bullet per shot to count for headshot damage, and have the spread to perfectly fit into the torso area of a target the length of the HoN inside walkways when ADS, and be 25% wider if not ADS.

That normalization gives it 2 hit damage, plenty of chance for the bullets to stray but plenty of chance for good aim to maximize potential, and reason to use the aim secondary.

What the shotgunner may need after that, if that is still too much effective range to try to backpedal from, is an actual honest to goodness speed handicap of 10%. It isn't much, sprinting still outruns a backpedaling enemy, but not by as much. And someone smart enough to actually sprint away from a shotgunner will actually GAIN ground so it isn't a death sentence.

Also, if the devs are reluctant to give it a dead-stop range cutoff, then it can keep the longer end of it's range for realism, as long as actual bullet damage recieves "dropoff". It would be the only weapon in the game to have damage dropoff from range, but it would make sense to make it actually do less damage outside of range, instead of do less damage by chance unless it accidentally does full damage in which case OOPS LOL!#!

[Canucck]

What i rather think the problem here is sprinting. You can sprint forward, but not sprint backward. therefore, in a 1v1 where the defender has to retaliate, he simply cannot run away as quickly as the attacker. if you knew both players could run at exactly the same speed, all you had to do was move backward effectively, and you had the situation entirely under your control, forcing the attacker to switch to his pistol.

It's the movement changes in b4 that make this harder atm. The sluggish character acceleration and having to re-accelerate anytime you change direction too fast made kiting less viable. Those changes should go away (I think Rypel was looking at it)

Backwards sprinting would be really really bad though

[Axesor]

Its not about shotgunner...

Whats wrong about weapons range? Thats why is there spread so its not so effective for longe distances.

Agree with less spread+bit less damage, but not range nerf. If I could I would even added +3m weapon range.

There is problem with other characters who are too weak or too OP and cant/not doing do what they were made for.

In my opinion, this listed characters are good now and can fill their roles, they are not overpowered or underpowered:

Rocket Soldiers-OK

Marksman-OK

Shotgunner- +-OK, but could be modified with the above written points.

[RoundShades]

Ehh but the other free classes take a long time to kill because it's arcade and not generic military shooter. The shotgunner falls under that category. Really, a lot of classes have pretty fast kill times in this update. Officer, shotgunner, chem sprayer, even IMO grenadier. Autorifle and Marksman are pretty much the 2 that don't, and marksman can get opportunity kills or luck out on their range at times. Other classes don't get quick kills, they either melt armor and still kill slightly faster than autorifle, or they instakill but fire very slow.

Now, the Ramjet, a 1k unit, can NOT 1 hit kill without a headshot, and it fires a single bullet meaning the single bullet MUST hit the head. So, why does the shotgun luck-kill someone in 1 hit? Even at medium ranges with some luck? It really shouldn't, it should be below lethal even if slightly even with a headshot, however that can be facilitated and the bodyshot damage still be ~100 and it still be decent at a medium range. Now, I don't care if it gets damage or range nerf, but to do what I just described, likely will take some adjustment of both as well as spread.

Matter of fact, one thing I didn't mention because it doesn't really fit in this game, is volumetric projectiles. What you could do, is do a variant of volumetric projectiles because I played a game with a literal volumetric shotgun where any pellet did 100 damage but all the pellets hitting 1 target didn't do anything additional and that is NOT for RenX. But, if you went the distance to make it so there were 9 pellets, 1 pellet did 20, 2 pellets did 40, 3 pellets did 60, 4 pellets did 80, 5 pellets did 100, but 100 was the max, and 1 pellet was allowed to claim "headshot damage" for the entire spread making it's total max 20x3.5...145 damage a shot? So it does 20 at long range, 60 if lucky at long range or if poor aim at close range, and 80-145 with better aim. Which is a lot more balanced than 1 hit kills point blank and 120 damage down a damn tunnel.

Again, just providing several development related ideas here. I don't care what happens, I just really don't like a free class having 1 hit kills in a game that really doesn't facilitate that sort of thing, especially random 1 hit kills from a medium range because the spread happened to be human shaped and clustered all to one side.

[Canucck]

If someone gets close enough to 1shot you with a shotgun from full hp you're either not paying attention or positioning yourself very poorly. 1shots are never medium range... you have to basically have your shotgun inside their head

[RoundShades]

Well, currently, they have 12 pellets do 16 damage (could be vice versa but don't think so), and that is 192 damage.

Each pellet is capable of 2.5x headshot multiplier since after beta1 (beta1 shotgun couldn't headshot). That is a deep barreltap max damage, we are talking head touching the origin of the bullets, of 480. Enough to 1 hit kill any class.

For a reasonably distant shot to 1 hit kill, it simply needs for 1 bullet to headshot, and 10 bullets make contact. That spread happens sometimes, moon shaped spreads and all sorts of shtuff that'd make you scratch your head.

For a medium range shot to kill, it isn't asking for much, for 10 bullets to contact and 1 to headshot is nearly reliably reproducable with twitch-shooting with good timing. As long as they are just close enough for their torso to fill your ADS reticle. That is honestly probably reliably doable to anyone standing on one side-ramp of the HoN by anyone standing on the opposite side's ramp, from window through the building to the other window for instance.

Now, for closer range, Bar sandbags to one of it's doors, it is almost impossible NOT to instantly kill someone. You need only land 3 bullets with a headshot, the inner spread really, and you do 120 damage with just those bullets. You then need only 4 other bullets, about half the shotgun spread, to kill them.

So, the shotgun is both, reliably situationally overpowered as a shotgun with an acceptable margain of 15 degrees of error from center-shot in obtaining a lethal or very close to near lethal shot, I mean full health to deep red or worse, AND overpowered if the spread is random and at medium range you get hit with half or more of the shots.

[HaTe]

I think it should be established that there are VERY few developers left working on this game right now. With that in mind, reading through each balance thread whilst still working on the game is a hassle. There is not a set group of developers that read through these threads and decides where to go from there, and then another set of developers that work on it. There's pretty much one developer in charge of all of this. This is why we need to help out now more than ever. Edit: This has just recently changed, so expect to hear more about it coming up. The same principle still applies, but one thing in specific that I mentioned above is now not so true.

We need to keep it simple. Walls of text or complicated solutions to even understand are not going to help the game progressively move forward (read Attainable in the SMART goals). That's why myself and several others are making it a priority to attempt to simply the balance process. Brotranquility, I completely respect and salute your willingness to help and knowledge on the matter. Quite frankly, though, your long posts that often don't quite establish a clear point may not be the right direction to take for balance purposes. Again, I more than appreciate your dedication to help, but if you could attempt to keep things simplified, it could help the process to run more smoothly.

So far, my basic understanding of the discussion taking place is this:

Buff the spread. Make it less random.

Nerf the damage. With less spread, this would likely need to be significant.

And then we have people wanting a range decrease, and people against that action.

Am I correct in making this summary?

[Canucck]

So far, my basic understanding of the discussion taking place is this:

Buff the spread. Make it less random.

Nerf the damage. With less spread, this would likely need to be significant.

And then we have people wanting a range decrease, and people against that action.

Am I correct in making this summary?

I hope not.

The only 2 things that should change are

1) Fix character acceleration; and

2) If ADS has any kind of benefit for shotguns it needs to be removed. ADS/slow are completely contrary to how a shotgunner should be played (same for anything in ren tbh)

[HaTe]

You think that buffing the acceleration would fix the shotgun being voted as the #1 most OP gun in the game right now, though?

The one's waiting around corners are OP too, in my opinion, and editing the acceleration would do little to fix that.

Again, I'm just trying reiterate what other people are saying on the matter. Having every single person on the same page is never going to happen, so being democratical here is important.

[Canucck]

Yes. (lol @ #1 issue)

If someone runs blind into a corner they deserve to die. You can approach corners in ways that fuck with corner campers, or sometimes you just shouldn't try to go around that corner.

If you have a medium or long range weapon, you either kill them before they get in range or you run the fuck away. It doesn't matter how expensive your character is, if you let a short range high damage character get into a comfortable position on you, only you are to blame. Even if you know they're bad and you can beat them, if you don't realize that they still have the advantage in that situation then you deserve to die still.

The only other way should be to kite them, which is hindered atm by character acceleration issues.

[HaTe]

Fair enough. That's just the first I've heard of this solution for the shotgun. I think error might agree with you as well though. If we could get more opinions on this, that'd be great.

Yes. (lol @ #1 issue)

Well all things balance concerned need to be taken into account. From professional players to casual players who do not play much, we need to acknowledge and attempt to represent them all.

[RoundShades]

Brotranquility, I completely respect and salute your willingness to help and knowledge on the matter. Quite frankly, though, your long posts that often don't quite establish a clear point may not be the right direction to take for balance purposes. Again, I more than appreciate your dedication to help, but if you could attempt to keep things simplified, it could help the process to run more smoothly.

It does work on the SMART acronym, and reading is super fast unless you do it aloud, but fair enough.

Problem) The shotgun shouldn't instakill. It should probably take 2 well placed shots, 3 if not perfect.

Reason) It is a free weapon. If you want something to punish someone at point blank range, then make it cost something. Officer comes to mind.

Option 1) Apply volumetric projectiles to shotguns, but in a different way:

1) 12 pellets like normal

2) moderately midrange like normal

3) Current damage roughly

4) Each of the 12 pellets is linked to the same damage. To hit an enemy with all or 1 of them, does 190 damage.

5) Have literal damage dropoff by range, evenly from max damage at 1 meter, to full range having 30 damage.

6) Increase max damage at it's longest range to 50 damage if ADS.

7) This comes with a perk of hitting multiple enemies with it's full damage too

While I don't want to do this, it works in another game.

Option 2) You could take the same volumetric projectile idea:

1) still 12 pellets

2) same damage a pellet

3) same range

4) same spread and ADS

5) However, now 9 pellets are the max damage. You can hit with less and do less damage, but any 1 thing hit with more than 9 pellets, will just do 9 pellets worth of damage. Obviously the headshots will count. That way, it also caps the max damage

Easy Fix) Just bring it down to 5 pellets in an "X" shape, same spread angles per distance, with 2x more damage a pellet. That way, headshots are unlikely, multiple pellets hitting at midrange is less likely, and it still does the high bodyshot damage of 120 and headshots around 160. Ever play Rainbow 6? The original? Yeah. Just do that.

ADDED BENEFIT) Headshots are now directly linked to "aiming dead center", not a random stray head bullet, since 1 bullet always travels dead center and the other 4 always travel in the exact same angle in an X shape.

[Gaysha]

Autorifle and Marksman are pretty much the 2 that don't, and marksman can get opportunity kills or luck out on their range at times. Other classes don't get quick kills, they either melt armor and still kill slightly faster than autorifle, or they instakill but fire very slow.

I regularly shut-down 5-10 people in the first minute using marksman. Its by no means a slow-killer. I would list it as needing a nerf but since its so difficult to use, i think its great.

Its the best basic infantry gun by far.

TL;DR Dont underestimate MUH MARKSMSANHN!

Edited April 30, 2015 by Guest

[RoundShades]

Autorifle and Marksman are pretty much the 2 that don't, and marksman can get opportunity kills or luck out on their range at times. Other classes don't get quick kills, they either melt armor and still kill slightly faster than autorifle, or they instakill but fire very slow.

I regularly shut-down 5-10 people in the first minute using marksman. Its by no means a slow-killer. I would list it as needing a nerf but since its so difficult to use, i think its great.

Its the best basic infantry gun by far.

TL;DR Dont underestimate MUH MARKSMSANHN!

Most people argue it's the shotgunner. I argue the second, is the grenadier. I put marksman ahead of flame and autorifle. I don't even rate the engineer in this, as far as use I put it ahead of the marksman as well.

[HaTe]

Player acceleration will be reverted back to as it was in Beta 3.

Is there anyone that feels that the discussion should continue with the shotgun, or is this edit going to balance it to where it needs to be?

[salarite]

I agree with the people asking for a range nerf. Countless times I was able to run away/get a fair distance from shotgunners, only to die anyways, because they still to high damage at mid ranges currently. That is unrealistic.

[HaTe]

I agree with the people asking for a range nerf. Countless times I was able to run away/get a fair distance from shotgunners, only to die anyways, because they still to high damage at mid ranges currently. That is unrealistic.

This is how I feel too. Even from my perspective as a shotgunner, I feel as if I shoot way too far.

Keep in mind that the shotgun range in Renegade was HALF of the chem sprayer and flamethrower.