Rebalancing part eleventy: shopfood

[Louderer789]

I still think this is better than color coding :>

[Mastura]

Excellent Idea.
Bump.
Offer to do 2hb.
DEFINITELY need more non-goblin high-tech futuristic cyberpunk sci-fi weapons options.
like those spinning saw blades tied to wire, or laser-wire that comes out of a small device like in Johnny Nmemonic, moar lightsabers, and a cacophany of 1hb/2hb opportunist melee weapons like chairs/street lamps/BRING BACK THE BEAM!

[Contra]

honestly, why bother?

Just delete the junk from the database and fill shops with well known useful froob weapons.

Div 9 for soldiers, yatamutchy for agents, sol fire executioner for melee advs, sol k-91 monsters for pistol users, and so on, the list can usually be found on profession forums in some outdated guide.

Also, the q50 rk weapons ( pump master, redline grenade launcher, barret r-06 a-m sniper and so on, every profession has one) should be all available from profession questlines. Make a long quest chain on newbie island with those weapons as final reward.

Yes, game will be simplified a bit.
No, world wont end.

bump!!!

[Psikie]

Lets stop the bs here. Not knowing the exact mechanisms of how damage works and with an almost guaranteed risk of having a few idiots creating insanelly overpowered weapons this suggestion has about 0% chance of going anywhere.

I can see it now, some jack wagon making all ranged weapons with both AimedShot/FullAuto, and all melee now includes Sneak/Dimach. Along with min dmg being raised to 350 for dual wield weapons and 450 2h weapons all with 1/1 speed.

Here is a different suggestion, why not make all rk weapons have the tradeskill process that makes them 000 or c01 weapons but lower equip requirements a bit?


http://auno.org/ao/db.php?id=271570
http://auno.org/ao/db.php?id=271576

[Wyoming]

Shotgun rifle!

[Louderer789]

I can see it now, some jack wagon making all ranged weapons with both AimedShot/FullAuto, and all melee now includes Sneak/Dimach. Along with min dmg being raised to 350 for dual wield weapons and 450 2h weapons all with 1/1 speed.

Here is a different suggestion, why not make all rk weapons have the tradeskill process that makes them 000 or c01 weapons but lower equip requirements a bit?


http://auno.org/ao/db.php?id=271570
http://auno.org/ao/db.php?id=271576

Did you miss the part about FC approving the changes? Anyway here's why we shouldn't use your suggestion:

1. People hate tradeskills.
2. Those weapons suck, and are all the same.
3. People always hate tradeskills.

[Psikie]

Lets revisit OP premise...

Rebalance all the shopfood armor and weapons (a.k.a. 95% of AO's loot).

Did you miss the part about FC approving the changes? Anyway here's why we shouldn't use your suggestion:

1. People hate tradeskills.
2. Those weapons suck, and are all the same.
3. People always hate tradeskills.

1. Rebalance doesn't mean all weapons have to have Xan upgraded weapon stats.
2. Those are improvements on the current suck weapons that doesn't make them equal to SL/AI but usable by froobs who are stuck with rk shopfood weapons anyway. (actually they have different dmg types which makes them different)
3. It's a very easy "in game" or "rp" logical transition as opposed to the magical maguffin approach.

[Louderer789]

1. Rebalance doesn't mean all weapons have to have Xan upgraded weapon stats.

No one is suggesting this...

2. Those are improvements on the current suck weapons that doesn't make them equal to SL/AI but usable by froobs who are stuck with rk shopfood weapons anyway. (actually they have different dmg types which makes them different)

Their stats and reqs clearly made by someone with no feel for what makes a useful weapon ingame.

3. It's a very easy "in game" or "rp" logical transition as opposed to the magical maguffin approach.

Just as much work, with zero practical application. The 001/c01 weapons were clearly database garbage from the moment we saw them in a testlive rip. That combined with the process and limitations of making them leads to almost no one using them.

[Psikie]

Just as much work, with zero practical application. The 001/c01 weapons were clearly database garbage from the moment we saw them in a testlive rip. That combined with the process and limitations of making them leads to almost no one using them.

If you are in to min-maxing I suppose you have a point. But you can not argue that the 001/c01 weapons are improvements over their base counterparts.

[Cratertina]

If this is a petition, signing right here.

[Cratertina]

Is there any real drawback to improving old weapons?

say making them better versions of themselves?

[jorricane]

Just make the damn C00 upgrades so that people who actually would use them could actually get them, and explain it clearly in a startup quest for pete's sake. Not a full solution, but at least it makes older shopfood somewhat useful.

[Gimpynoob]

Those upgraded weapons, IIRC have higher requirements and better damage than their base counterparts. They are not much better than their basic counterparts with similar requirements. This associated to the messy tradeskill system makes them unused. What would be helpful and contribute to make them popular would be to increase their damage output, but not to lower their requirements. A big problem with AO is that most equipment is crap if equipped at the level it can be farmed by the toons that need it. If the devs had the sense to reset the ql of most of the RK and SL loot reducing the ql of the equipment but maintaining its stats and requirements it would do more to revive this game and increase player retention then all the system changes combined.

[Psikie]

Just make the damn C00 upgrades so that people who actually would use them could actually get them, and explain it clearly in a startup quest for pete's sake. Not a full solution, but at least it makes older shopfood somewhat useful.

Those upgraded weapons, IIRC have higher requirements and better damage than their base counterparts. They are not much better than their basic counterparts with similar requirements. This associated to the messy tradeskill system makes them unused.

I agree with these. However, I would like to point out that AO is supposed to be an MMO, NOT single player with +10 sword of mountain-slaying, or the Doom BFG being able to solo every mob they come across. Giving old rk weapons a facelift with tradeskill process does make them "better" without making them equal to sl/le/ai weapons that people pay to have access to.

Making the tradeskill process simpler or questable would be fair. Making all weapons closer in ability to pay account weapons kind of defeats purpose of paying for them imo.

[Farlath]

Warning: wall o' text.

the 000 weapons were a great idea with a horrible execution. Possibilities to improve them:

1. double the max damage, halve the min damage, keep current requirements. (some might benefit w/o being overpowered from doubled crit as well) would make a the ql 200 C01 pistols 60-356(121) with 1335 pistol and 668 fliq req, 800 mr. better options in SL, but still a very nice gun, possible for froobs to get on and would be an epic weapon for them.

2. keep the damage the same, drop skill requirement by 50%. would give us a pistol with 121-178 (121), that requires 668 pistol, 334 fling and 400 mr. Not very useful on rk except for raid mobs with very high acs, very viable leveling weapon in sl though.

Stats for each class of weapons at ql 200:
option 1

Assault Rifle: 1335 AR, 1202 FA, 1002 burst, 67-504(133)
1h Ranged Energy: 1335 RE, 1002 burst, 668 fling, 60-356(121)
2h Ranged Energy: 1335 RE, 1002 burst, 668 fling, 80-364(242)
Grenade: 1335 Grenade, 668 fling, 66-600(132)
Pistol: 1335 pistol, 668 fling, 60-356(121)
Rifle: 1335 rifle, 668 AS, 67-560(133)
Smg: 1335 smg, 1002 burst, 66-424(132)
Bow: 1335 bow, 668 AS, 67-384(280)
2h Shotgun: 1335 shotgun, 668 fling, 55-548(274)
1h Shotgun: 1335 shotgun, 668 fling, 41-412(206)
1hb: 1335 1hb, 802 brawl, 668 fast attack, 269 dimach, 81-468(162)
2hb: 1335 2hb, 802 brawl, 668 fast attack, 101-592(202)
1he: 1335 1he, 802 brawl, 668 fast attack, 269 dimach, 75-344(149)
2he: 1335 2he, 802 brawl, 668 fast attack, 269 dimach 101-522(202)
Melee energy: 1335 ME, 802 brawl, 668 fast attack, 269 dimach, 97-514(194)
2h piercing: 1335 piercing, 802 brawl, 668 fast attack, 269 dimach, 109-442(217)
1h piercing: 1335 piercing, 802 brawl, 668 fast attack, 269 dimach, 76-370(185)


option 2:

Assault Rifle: 668 AR, 601 FA, 501 burst, 133-252(133)
1h Ranged Energy: 668 RE, 501 burst, 334 fling, 121-178(121)
2h Ranged Energy: 668 RE, 501 burst, 334 fling, 160-182(160)
Grenade: 668 Grenade, 334 fling, 132-300(132)
Pistol: 668 pistol, 334 fling, 121-178(121)
Rifle: 668 rifle, 334 AS, 133-280(133)
Smg: 668 smg, 501 burst, 132-212(132)
Bow: 668 bow, 334 AS, 136-192(280)
2h Shotgun: 668 shotgun, 334 fling, 109-274(274)
1h Shotgun: 668 shotgun, 334 fling, 82-206(206)
1hb: 668 1hb, 401 brawl, 334 fast attack, 148 dimach, 162-234(162)
2hb: 668 2hb, 401 brawl, 334 fast attack, 202-296(202)
1he: 668 1he, 401 brawl, 334 fast attack, 148 dimach, 149-177(149)
2he: 668 2he, 401 brawl, 334 fast attack, 148 dimach 202-261(202)
Melee energy: 668 ME, 401 brawl, 334 fast attack, 148 dimach, 194-257(194)
2h piercing: 668 piercing, 401 brawl, 334 fast attack, 148 dimach, 217-221(217)
1h piercing: 668 piercing, 401 brawl, 334 fast attack, 148 dimach, 152-185(185)

[Louderer789]

I'm still here Michi, and I work for free. Make me your database master.

[Ophiuchus]

Rocker for minion \o/

[Litestrider]

I absolutely adore all the crappy useless RK weapons! Personally, I don't particularly care what exactly happens to their stats, but I am very interested in some aspects of this. First, I really don't want to see any of the weapons outright removed. I'd be ok if they remain useless and were made hard to find, maybe tucked in some obscure shop or given to the loot table of some random enemy in a dungeon. All of the guns have descriptions and histories and stories, and I'm completely in love with that. Whether it's something as simplistic as the medium shotgun "This pump-action Shotgun can shoot one shell at a time. Archaic.", or some of the other weapons that practically have novels written on their descriptions, the little stories and blurbs that almost every weapon carries just makes me giddy and I think losing them would be a tragedy.

Also, I really don't want to see more profession locks introduced. I really feel like profession locks are an incredibly hamfisted method for balance. It would probably be easier to just go on a profession lock spree and wind up with a lot of well-balanced weapons that are exclusive to one or two professions, but I feel like something would be noticeably lost in the process compared to toughing it out and making all the weapons balanced and yet accessible to anyone willing to put in the effort.

As far as the stats, leaving some variety to them rather than homogenizing them all would make me really happy, even if the differences are rather subtle. I think the -000 system could work really well applied en masse, they just need to tweak the base numbers, and make the upgrade system as a whole more integrated and easier to access. Also, the weapons do need to be touched on in some way because a surprising number of the RK weapons boast a combination of full auto and aimed shot as their primary feature. If the update hits live and ties those cooldowns together, those weapons will be even more useless than they already are!

[Cratertina]

I wonder how would proper 220 do with them vintage rarities?