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On March 28 2017 22:53 Elentos wrote: Absolutely needs adjustments, good god enemies in MP are complete bullet sponges on higher difficulties.
That isn't new to the Mass Effect series on higher difficulties.
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On March 31 2017 14:44 Yurie wrote:Show nested quote +On March 31 2017 14:40 Bacillus wrote:On March 31 2017 10:33 Yurie wrote: As far as I know conversations choices are accumulative and doesn't really change based on a single choice most of the time. If you pick logical the entire game your conversations will start being logical on all choices since that is how your character acts and others knows about you. I havn't played through it twice so I am just taking others words for it.
Basically you effect your personality by the choices you make and your character then gets different dialogue choices based on that. Meaning a full logical person won't get a wacky choice in the conversation. While a fully happy go lucky type won't get a very logical choice even on the logical option. As previously mentioned, that is just what others say and I don't have two runs to be able to verify it. So is it kind of like a hidden renegade/paragon system where you score points towards certain branches and those then unlock better or different dialogue options for those branches? As I understand it, more the second case than the first. Same conversation end point/information given but with different dialogue from the NPC and you. Interesting. I'd imagine that kind of system makes dialogue trees damn bloated sometimes. Just imagine the amount of written and acted dialogue, no surprises if there are some lapses in the quality here and there.
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On March 31 2017 15:44 Disengaged wrote:Show nested quote +On March 28 2017 22:53 Elentos wrote: Absolutely needs adjustments, good god enemies in MP are complete bullet sponges on higher difficulties. That isn't new to the Mass Effect series on higher difficulties.
More like abysmal balancing in MP. Vanquisher is 1.5times better than the second best weapon in the game. Then it just gets worse, some of the weapons there is no reason at all to actually use. It is simple to fix the most glaring issues though, just buff the worst weapons to twice their current damage and they will be just bad instead of horrible.
If you want people to use abilities to kill stuff they need roughly a 100% damage increase to start being viable on gold. Else you are better served to shoot more instead of using most abilities.
Playing using the Vanquisher and hitting weak spots the enemies in MP aren't that big of bullet sponges, even on gold. For example the Outlaw Sharpshooter dies to two head shots while the normal Outlaw Raiders dies to one weak spot shot or three body shots. Vanquisher normally has a four shot clip, so against outlaws you often kill 2 enemies per clip even when off host with the iffy hit detection. The Outlaw semi boss, Berserker dies in 4 scoped weak point shots if you manage to hit them all. More often in 6 shots or so.
The horrible gun balance in MP is just so strange. It is very simple to check actual damage output of a weapon for rough balance to then fine tune. Multiply damage per shot with amount of shots you can get off in 1 minute (including reloading) multiplied with a 0.X score for bullet spread. Then after all weapons are within 200% of each other you can start making them unique. (I know this is overly simplistic but they havn't even done something as basic as this when you actually try using the weapons.)
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I have so much fun on Veold. Driving around in my snowmobile and ramming kett all day erryday. It's also quite beautiful and some of the plots are interesting. I can't say that I've gotten addicted to the game in the way I generally get addicted to big new releases when it's all I think about and all I do for three-four days straight.
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If only the mako could drive like the nomad, although the glitchy questionable physics of me1 has its charm.
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I've been using the Inferno sniper rifle (in SP) and it melts things pretty fast. Having infinity ammo is also great.
Haven't played a lot of MP yet but are Remnant weapons available there?
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On March 31 2017 21:15 Thezzy wrote: I've been using the Inferno sniper rifle (in SP) and it melts things pretty fast. Having infinity ammo is also great.
Haven't played a lot of MP yet but are Remnant weapons available there? They're available. Getting them is another story.
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Also of questionable worth. Some people swear by the shotgun (forgot the name sorry) but so far the only remnant weapon i have used in MP was the SMG (equalizer i think). Anything else simply gets outdone a lot by the vanquisher sniper.
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On March 28 2017 20:08 Elentos wrote:TotalBiscuit did a WTF video on single player. Despite saying he hates breaking a game's rating down to a number, he said he would call ME:A "the most 7 out of 10 game ever". Good, but with flaws. Many flaws in fact. But nothing to justify all the venom the game gets. That's probably how I'd describe it too, but I'd probably be a bit harsher because I didn't like a lot of the characters/general direction of the story. Gameplay was pretty good though, and I think the fact that it made me feel like completing the entire story is a sign that at least there's an addicting aspect to the general atmo of the game.
At the end of the day everything was just fine. It just reeked of mediocrity in a lot of places and didn't have a lot of standout moments that really showed potential to be a great game. But where it showed potential, I really hope they capitalize if they end up making another game in the near future.
Also the loyalty missions for some of the characters were really dry and uninteresting. Liam's was really atrocious imo. Definitely wanted to throw him out the airlock.
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On March 31 2017 22:15 Tula wrote: Also of questionable worth. Some people swear by the shotgun (forgot the name sorry) but so far the only remnant weapon i have used in MP was the SMG (equalizer i think). Anything else simply gets outdone a lot by the vanquisher sniper.
What is so good about the Vanquisher? According to a quick stat lookup it does about 270 damage, has a rate of fire of 125 and a clip of 4. By comparison, the Inferno I use does about 200 damage, rate of fire of 180 and a clip of 5 but it has infinite reloads. Haven't used the Vanquisher yet so maybe it reloads very fast but the only strong point I see is that it has more damage per single clip.
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On March 31 2017 22:52 Thezzy wrote:Show nested quote +On March 31 2017 22:15 Tula wrote: Also of questionable worth. Some people swear by the shotgun (forgot the name sorry) but so far the only remnant weapon i have used in MP was the SMG (equalizer i think). Anything else simply gets outdone a lot by the vanquisher sniper. What is so good about the Vanquisher? According to a quick stat lookup it does about 270 damage, has a rate of fire of 125 and a clip of 4. By comparison, the Inferno I use does about 200 damage, rate of fire of 180 and a clip of 5 but it has infinite reloads. Haven't used the Vanquisher yet so maybe it reloads very fast but the only strong point I see is that it has more damage per single clip.
All stats are changed in multiplayer. Vanquisher 2 does 883 damage. Vanquisher 1 is enough to one shot the Chosen/Raiders/Assemblers on Gold (hardest difficulty). Then there are no sniper rifles that normally one shots things it two shots (with some buffs they do but then it is easier to double tap). Vanquisher has 4 ammo normally, they have 1 ammo.
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On March 31 2017 22:52 Thezzy wrote:Show nested quote +On March 31 2017 22:15 Tula wrote: Also of questionable worth. Some people swear by the shotgun (forgot the name sorry) but so far the only remnant weapon i have used in MP was the SMG (equalizer i think). Anything else simply gets outdone a lot by the vanquisher sniper. What is so good about the Vanquisher? According to a quick stat lookup it does about 270 damage, has a rate of fire of 125 and a clip of 4. By comparison, the Inferno I use does about 200 damage, rate of fire of 180 and a clip of 5 but it has infinite reloads. Haven't used the Vanquisher yet so maybe it reloads very fast but the only strong point I see is that it has more damage per single clip.
Simply put my benchmark for multiplayer is "does this weapon kill a mook in 3 seconds max" by that standard almost all assault rifles are out. My Turbocharge specced Soldier with a revenant X in hand (damn you loot boxes) has a hard time killing 3 raiders before their counterfire kills me. The vanquisher on the other hand does with a single headshot/weakpoint or 3 body shots (depends on your character level actually. My level 1 salarian infiltrator which i am currently leveling has a sliver left over after 3. That would likely change once the gun levels up or I add some weapon damage bonus).
The N7 Valiant (the upgrade to the Vanquisher) on the other hand needs 2 headshots and at least 4 bodyshots. For a sniper rifle that is simply not good enough to be up to par on Gold.
The Isharay (also a commonly seen sniper same rarity as the Vanquisher) does more damage but only has a single shot. So you need to be very confident in your aim to use it.
After a few more days of playing (and reading boards) my biggest gripe with MP is that some core functions simply don't work currently. Receivers (one of the big factors in making AR good in ME3) don't work, Smart chokes for shotguns don't seem to work (at least the aiming doesn't change and eyeball comparisons shot against the wall at reasonable distances don't show a difference either) and I am fairly iffy on the pistol meele bonus. Those things aren't balancing issues they are core functions of the loot/weapon system and currently they seem to be straight out missing. Moving a point or two around in a table to balance damage rates should be fairly fast, but if those things are broken (as they are) it will take months to fix.
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On April 01 2017 02:26 Tula wrote:Show nested quote +On March 31 2017 22:52 Thezzy wrote:On March 31 2017 22:15 Tula wrote: Also of questionable worth. Some people swear by the shotgun (forgot the name sorry) but so far the only remnant weapon i have used in MP was the SMG (equalizer i think). Anything else simply gets outdone a lot by the vanquisher sniper. What is so good about the Vanquisher? According to a quick stat lookup it does about 270 damage, has a rate of fire of 125 and a clip of 4. By comparison, the Inferno I use does about 200 damage, rate of fire of 180 and a clip of 5 but it has infinite reloads. Haven't used the Vanquisher yet so maybe it reloads very fast but the only strong point I see is that it has more damage per single clip. Simply put my benchmark for multiplayer is "does this weapon kill a mook in 3 seconds max" by that standard almost all assault rifles are out. My Turbocharge specced Soldier with a revenant X in hand (damn you loot boxes) has a hard time killing 3 raiders before their counterfire kills me. The vanquisher on the other hand does with a single headshot/weakpoint or 3 body shots (depends on your character level actually. My level 1 salarian infiltrator which i am currently leveling has a sliver left over after 3. That would likely change once the gun levels up or I add some weapon damage bonus). The N7 Valiant (the upgrade to the Vanquisher) on the other hand needs 2 headshots and at least 4 bodyshots. For a sniper rifle that is simply not good enough to be up to par on Gold. The Isharay (also a commonly seen sniper same rarity as the Vanquisher) does more damage but only has a single shot. So you need to be very confident in your aim to use it. After a few more days of playing (and reading boards) my biggest gripe with MP is that some core functions simply don't work currently. Receivers (one of the big factors in making AR good in ME3) don't work, Smart chokes for shotguns don't seem to work (at least the aiming doesn't change and eyeball comparisons shot against the wall at reasonable distances don't show a difference either) and I am fairly iffy on the pistol meele bonus. Those things aren't balancing issues they are core functions of the loot/weapon system and currently they seem to be straight out missing. Moving a point or two around in a table to balance damage rates should be fairly fast, but if those things are broken (as they are) it will take months to fix.
The best thing they can do if they are broken is to state they are then change weapon's base line stats to account for that. Once they do manage to get them working they just change to numbers that are suitable at that point.
Doesn't really matter, currently all you need is a Vanquisher I and you are done for weapons since nothing else competes and the higher levels aren't needed, even on gold. Makes it easier on the loot tables for players. Though if you don't like sniping or play with a gamepad (console) you need to run harder strats.
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Played the gold APEX mission with -50% sniper damage and +50% assault weapon damage. First time I went with Falcon II and Cyclone X and it went decently. Second time I went with Vanquisher II and Cyclone X and was much more happy with the game. This is with a MASSIVE damage differential to normally and the Vanquisher felt balanced compared to Assault Rifles. It likely was more likeable to me since I was used to the Vanquisher, not that it was better at this point, it was about even.
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A huge qol improvement would be to skip the transitioning scenes after the first time they've been shown in the current session. So everyone sees them at least once but is bit annoyed by 30 sec transitions between planets and even more from surface to surface.
Or are they in accordance with the individual PC's loading times?
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On April 02 2017 01:05 Artisreal wrote: A huge qol improvement would be to skip the transitioning scenes after the first time they've been shown in the current session. So everyone sees them at least once but is bit annoyed by 30 sec transitions between planets and even more from surface to surface.
Or are they in accordance with the individual PC's loading times? fuck no this is my biggest grip with the game so far. I read a book while exploring different planets.
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On April 02 2017 01:29 Sermokala wrote:Show nested quote +On April 02 2017 01:05 Artisreal wrote: A huge qol improvement would be to skip the transitioning scenes after the first time they've been shown in the current session. So everyone sees them at least once but is bit annoyed by 30 sec transitions between planets and even more from surface to surface.
Or are they in accordance with the individual PC's loading times? fuck no this is my biggest grip with the game so far. I read a book while exploring different planets. I did the exact same thing. Explored 30 planets, read 30 pages (maybe, didn't actually check).
The time is always the same as far as I know. When landing on a planet it would be logical you can't skip it until it has loaded since the load times there should be pretty big.
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Those transitions are really annoying. They're 20 seconds long for planet to planet every time. So much wasted time in a system with 7 planets with like 1 anomaly one a planet. And since there's absolutely nothing planet-side for most systems, it's even more bewildering - not like there's anything to load on the planets that warrants the time.
I don't know how many planets and anomalies there are in total, but I imagine it's well over 100. Over 30 minutes stuck in transitional scenes. For me this actually detracted more from the game than any facial animation.
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I agree about the planet transitions being more annoying than facial animations. They were nice the first two-three times. Then they were just more of the same and I want to skip them. I assume that is something that will be added within the next 6 months, worst case with the first paid DLC if it is more work than we think.
Maybe loading the planets takes more than we think but we should still be able to skip once it is loaded.
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Or just show me an old fashioned load screen. At least that way I know why I am bored (personally I doubt its loading time, since the true load screens only appear for about 2 seconds).
On Multiplayer balance: Today I spent 4 hours trying to finish the Apex mission with the rifle bonuses against Kett Gold. After getting sync killed from 3 rooms away (and my team falling apart completely because no one picks the appropriate chars/loadout for apex missions...) and getting upload as final objective for the 6th time in a row (which is flat out impossible with rifles you simply can't kill the enemies fast enough to keep up) I gave up on this mission (and Multiplayer for a day or two).
Simply put until they re-balance the MP I am done with it. I don't need to farm Gold with an infiltrator (even if i can do that in my sleep) if the best AR in the game at a high level and on an appropriate char cannot finish a Gold mission. There is no incentive to keep playing or to try out different stuff if nothing except Sniper is viable.
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On April 02 2017 04:50 Tula wrote: Or just show me an old fashioned load screen. At least that way I know why I am bored (personally I doubt its loading time, since the true load screens only appear for about 2 seconds).
On Multiplayer balance: Today I spent 4 hours trying to finish the Apex mission with the rifle bonuses against Kett Gold. After getting sync killed from 3 rooms away (and my team falling apart completely because no one picks the appropriate chars/loadout for apex missions...) and getting upload as final objective for the 6th time in a row (which is flat out impossible with rifles you simply can't kill the enemies fast enough to keep up) I gave up on this mission (and Multiplayer for a day or two).
Simply put until they re-balance the MP I am done with it. I don't need to farm Gold with an infiltrator (even if i can do that in my sleep) if the best AR in the game at a high level and on an appropriate char cannot finish a Gold mission. There is no incentive to keep playing or to try out different stuff if nothing except Sniper is viable.
I played that three times to complete it.
First time we wiped on wave three since I didn't want to use revive packs or cobras after seeing the team coordination we had.
Second time we wiped on wave 6 since we could not kill the stuff fast enough.
Third time a person using the Assault Rifle Revenant carried us hard. We used ~7 cobras on wave 6 to complete it. Considering you can enter the mission with 20 of them that seems reasonable. I didn't think that rifle was any good but that person carried us super hard.
A thing to note. You always get the same missions in the same apex mission, even if you repeat it. They are part of the set. So if you get Kett upload on wave 6 it is very hard to complete and requires cobra spam to take down fiends and Ascendant enemies. Secondly you can't do all 4 on one spot since you will keep getting wraiths and similar coming in and stopping it. Doing two at once seems best, even if one has to be abandoned it spreads the enemy.
Sync kills are a bit sad when considering that lag can make them warp a short distance on your screen, only thing to do is to keep the distance and assume they will gap close you. Especially the Fiends are annoying that way since they shouldn't have a gap close but suddenly end up close to you and has a huge grab range.
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