Balance Discussion

[Sensuki]

War Bows were actually the best ranged weapon in v392, but Josh nerfed the sh1t out of them in v435. Hunting Bows have always been terrible.

[mstark]

I'm a pretty huge fan of bow wielding characters (rangers) in BG2, is it possible to play anything similar to this sort of class? Or is bow useless full stop? I'd rather not have an animal companion.

[Sensuki]

They need a damage bump or something. We'll see what the next patch brings and then revisit the issue I suppose.

[wanderon]

They need a damage bump or something. We'll see what the next patch brings and then revisit the issue I suppose.

 

Time is winding down (30 days to release) do you still think we will get another build of the BB?

[Sensuki]

Yeah, I think there will be one more.

[GreyFox]

If they don't add accuracy back in, I'm definitely going to mod it back in - because it kneecaps casters and shield using builds quite a bit and makes Savage Attack not very good. +1 Acc and +3 Interrupt should be fine. Everyone needs accuracy, not everyone needs interrupt.

 

I'll have to PM you and ask you which mods you use when you play the game because it seems you literally play exactly like I do so I would probably just go along with your version of the game. Thanks for all the effort you've put into testing and showing of PE.

[Whipstitch]

 

For balance reasons, ranged attacks should always provide less DPS in a game like this.

 

I'm afraid it isn't nearly that simple. Ranged attackers flat out have natural dissonance with melee attackers. Ranged guys want to win by not being successfully attacked at all and melee guys want to win by being within targeting range and having math that can beat up your math. Thus melee goons have natural synergy with other melee goons just by virtue of lining up and making it harder for opponents to flank the group or focus fire. If melee characters also deal more damage than ranged attackers on top of that then you're left with a situation where you only use ranged attacks when forced to by the terrain. That's the situation the poor ranger is in right now, a class that can neither tank or spank and thus needs either a lot more damage or a lot more utility to fit into groups with even a passing interest in melee.

Edited February 28, 2015 by Whipstitch

[dukefx]

It's not just the ranger. The only class that is kinda OK right now with a ranged weapon is a wizard with an implement. With the proper talents ofc.

[Sensuki]

Nah it's just bows that are weak. Arquebuses/Arbalests/Blunderbusses are actually quite good. Pistols/Crossbows are okay.

[dukefx]

And that's why nobody was complaining about those. We (well, I at least) are talking about bows and implements. Those you mentioned were OK in the first place. I even mentioned I want bows on par with arbalests in an earlier post. In short: bows are really bad for everyone, and implements as well unless you are a wizard.

Edited February 28, 2015 by dukefx

[Sensuki]

I agree, although I did make an Implement using Rogue and it wasn't terrible. It wasn't great either.

[Odd Hermit]

I think they need to really assess each weapon's purpose. And I think each has an obvious direction -

 

Crossbows should be best for less skilled weapon users. Your caster who just needs to do some shooting to conserve spells.

 

Bows should be best for those heavily focused in them - IE ranger, ranged rogue/fighter - with high reward for mastering them and best "sustained" output.

 

Guns should be for those not intending to spend long in ranged combat: high ranged burst, then run into melee.

Edited February 28, 2015 by Odd Hermit

[Sensuki]

Well, Crossbows and Pistols are well balanced.

Crossbows are more accurate and do more base damage.

Pistols are less accurate and have higher DR bypass, so when armor is high the pistol does more damage.

 

They both have the same attack/recovery speed, even though the reload animations are different lengths

[Odd Hermit]

The big balance problem I see is that the larger guns do similar/more DPS while doing more "alpha"/burst, relative to other ranged weapons. Honestly, I haven't used pistols much, but I know bows were very weak while and leadsplitter and arquebus were just dominating for me.

 

The actual damage might be balanced on paper, but the game has several factors that favor hard-hitting over fast hitting. DT is the obvious thing, but there's also a lot of passive heal over time which counters sustained damage more than it does burst which requires more active healing(or defensive) abilities to react to which cost enemies time/resources.

Edited February 28, 2015 by Odd Hermit

[forgottenlor]

Is it effective/possible to make a gun or crossbow ranger in the current beta?

[Sensuki]

Yeah well, the game in general favors hard hitting over fast hitting, except in some cases where dual wielding is pretty good.

I haven't really used pistols or crossbows much in a playthrough. What I meant was, is that they are balanced against each other. Lead Splitter is probably better than both of them, but it's a 'magical' blunderbuss. 

Hopefully bows are given a bump in the next patch.

[Luckmann]

Is it effective/possible to make a gun or crossbow ranger in the current beta?

Absolutely. The main "problem" with that idea is actually the Ranger class itself, which is.. underperforming. But as a concept, yeah, especially Blunderbuss or Arquebus should work well. I personally can't comment much on Crossbows or Pistols, though.

[Shevek]

All these balance problems with heavily favoring hard hitting weapons became an issue when they messed with the armor system by shifting entirely to dt and lowering overall weapon damage. Weapon balance felt best in v364.

Edited February 28, 2015 by Shevek

[roguelike]

Well, Crossbows and Pistols are well balanced.

Crossbows are more accurate and do more base damage.

 

Pistols are less accurate and have higher DR bypass, so when armor is high the pistol does more damage.

 

They both have the same attack/recovery speed, even though the reload animations are different lengths

 

Can you explain how?  I'm still trying to understand the mechanics of PoE, if we fudge the numbers* and say that the pistol and crossbow fire at the same same speed and that the pistol's average damage + penetration is equal to the crossbow's damage, it seems like they're the same weapon but the pistol has 5 less points of accuracy, the option to use a shield, and a crit damage penalty.  Oh and it's good against wizard veils, lol.

 

*A fine crossbow seems to attack 6 times for every 5 a fine pistol does and has 31.5 average damage vs 24.5 + 6 penetration, so if anything these numbers are fudged in favor of the pistol.

[Sensuki]

Pulled the base stats

 

Crossbow:

 

22-33 base damage
40 interrupt

Pistol

 

17-25 base damage
6 DR bypass

-0.3 crit multiplier
30 interrupt
-5 Accuracy

Crossbow is better

 

Reported it: http://forums.obsidian.net/topic/70706-435-crossbow-and-pistol-balance/

Edited March 1, 2015 by Sensuki

[Odd Hermit]

Maybe sorta not really worth noting but the pistol has one more small advantage in that it pierces arcane veils. That said, I'd still say crossbow is better seeing those stats.

Edited March 1, 2015 by Odd Hermit

[Luckmann]

Pulled the base stats

 

Crossbow:

 

22-33 base damage

40 interrupt

 

Pistol

 

17-25 base damage

6 DR bypass

-0.3 crit multiplier

30 interrupt

-5 Accuracy

 

Crossbow is better

 

Reported it: http://forums.obsidian.net/topic/70706-435-crossbow-and-pistol-balance/

The -0.3 crit multiplier seems... overboard, unthematic and unnecessary.

 

I'm not saying that it'd "fix" pistols, just that I see absolutely no reason why that'd be a thing.

[Sensuki]

It was probably added to tune down Arquebus crits or something. I don't mind guns not getting as good crits, pistols just need better damage or something. 

[roguelike]

I'm sure someone's done this before and better, but out of my own curiosity I threw together a rough dps chart for the weapons in the beta just so I could get a handle on how weapon damage, attack speed, and accuracy all interacted.  I wouldn't swear by these numbers, the underlying data is rather shoddy, but they do seem to predict a few things accurately, like the pistol being strictly worse than the crossbow and damage penetration bonuses being better than accuracy.

 

 

 

 

Obviously it doesn't account for talents or abilities, but there's some clear general trends:

1) The blunderbuss and arquebus are really good.  Not just the best ranged weapons, but the highest sustained damage in the game without talents.  Everyone says that it's not worth taking the time to reload these guns, but it seems absolutely worth it.  Maybe it's a mistake in the data, but I think people might be really underrating guns.

2) One-handed maces do better than generic two-handed weapons?  I'm not sure I believe this.  

3) Rapiers, for when you want a dagger that attacks slightly slower.  Unless I'm missing something, these are worse than both hatchets and swords, making them the worst melee weapon in the game and arguably the worst weapon in the game.

4) Hunting bows, the other contender for worst weapon.  5m more range, 10 less accuracy than a wand.

5) Pistols are not quite this bad, I forgot to factor in the +10 accuracy for one-handed weapons.  Still, the arquebus is so good, I'm not sure why you would ever pick a weapon from a lower tier.  Even with talents, seems difficult to make up that 25% or more damage shortfall.  I don't have an arbalast to test, but they're probably pretty good too.

[gnoemli]

the problems with huntingbows and Pistols not beeing balanced is long known... for some reason they don't want to change their stats but neighter give a explanation to WHY their stats are like they are... for me its the same problem like why a 1h weapon is not that much faster than a twohander and thus makes no sense to chose one...

As seen in your chart, there's no setting where they hit better than an other choice...

huntingbow needs to be faster or do more Damage...

Can't say much about Rapiers, as i never took them...