Balance Redefining shotgunners and Volkov

[ganein14]

This is just my two cents on the matter, but why not give Volkov a general buff in all aspects, but limit him to one per team?

[Pushwall]

1 hour ago, ganein14 said:

This is just my two cents on the matter, but why not give Volkov a general buff in all aspects, but limit him to one per team?

While that would definitely be the easy way to fix the "everyone buys him and nothing else" problem, there are a lot of problems with it.

One, it would just lead to people fighting over him like Reborn. Old players keep picking him because unit so OP and then the new players sulk because they never get an opportunity to try him out... so new players stay at home camping PTs hoping for Volkov to die so they can pick him... so then they get shouted at for hogging a unit that someone else would do better with.

Two, it just makes low player count situations on the server even more painful. Who as Allies wants to play 1 vs 1 against a Soviet player using the unit that can counter everything even harder than current Volkov already does? Nobody, and thus it becomes harder to get the player count to rise past 1 vs 1.

Three, the whole Reborn issue where multiple people can buy a commando at the same time and oh hey now you have 2 or 3 OPkovs running around when the game is balanced for only 1. Even if this somehow gets fixed or we aggressively moderate it (which is pretty harsh when it's possible for people to do on accident because EVERYONE WANTS TO BE THE COMMANDO) there's still the other issues.

While we do use build limits on some things, it's all vehicles which aren't subject to that last bit of abuse, and can't really be "fought over" - Demo Trucks and Yaks have an incredibly high turnover rate and Yaks would create traffic issues if a bunch of them were landed at once, and you never really want more than 2 MGGs or MRJs anyway.

[Pushwall]

With regard to the whole tankiness thing. We could definitely tweak that but the thing is, with his appearance the way he is, it is very hard to justify him being flimsier than a captain. I believe @Ice had a "more human" version of the Volkov texture sitting around at some point; I'd love to have that if I take the direction of tweaking him into a more fragile but more powerful artillery infantryman, justification being that he's only barely being kept alive by his cybernetic augmentations. From a bit of internal documentation we have:

Quote

This legendary hero of the USSR gave his life and soul to protect the Motherland and, in an unprecedented world-first experiment, was resurrected as a cyborg to continue his service in the Red Army.

 

[Killing_You]

12 minutes ago, Pushwall said:

Volkov clones still comprise at least 80% of the Soviet team on tech level 5 maps, and then when you dip to lower tech levels suddenly every Soviet infantry sees a good amount of use.

To me, this is the biggest problem with Volkov. Even though he's a "jack-of-all-trades, master-of-none" type unit, his versatility and price tag make him an attractive choice, even if something else would be better. Having him fill a niche that's not "a little of everything" would go a long way.

I just replayed Let's Make a Steal and Test Drive to see how Volkov played in a mission that wasn't "Soviet Soldier Volkov and Chitzkoi" (where the current balance philosophy seems to draw from), and interestingly enough, he plays a bit more like Tanya. Great against infantry, not so much vs vehicles. Unfortunately, going this route would overshadow flamers and snipers a bit... hmm...

I like the artillery idea more, now that I think about it.

-It fills a niche that no other Soviet infantry currently fills (long range anti-building, potentially anti-defense)
-It doesn't overshadow the RPG or the Shockie, since those are better for AT
-It doesn't overshadow the Sniper because his scope will mean he's better at hitting infantry
-It doesn't overshadow the Flamethrower because his niche is close range

I think this sounds good. Repurpose the Handcannon to be a long range artillery shell that does good vs buildings and infantry, not so much vs vehicles.

5 minutes ago, Pushwall said:

With regard to the whole tankiness thing. We could definitely tweak that but the thing is, with his appearance the way he is, it is very hard to justify him being flimsier than a captain. I believe @Ice had a "more human" version of the Volkov texture sitting around at some point; I'd love to have that if I take the direction of tweaking him into a more fragile but more powerful artillery infantryman, justification being that he's only barely being kept alive by his cybernetic augmentations. From a bit of internal documentation we have:

I have one that I made a while back, but fair warning, it's super old and super terrible  

[Pushwall]

9 minutes ago, Killing_You said:

I have one that I made a while back, but fair warning, it's super old and super terrible  

Send it over please, I'd like to see it even if I don't end up using it.

Basically we just need his face to look more like the RA boxart (with the eyepiece modelled on instead of just being a flat texture like the retexture was).

9 minutes ago, Killing_You said:

-It doesn't overshadow the Sniper because his scope will mean he's better at hitting infantry

...oh. Well in that plan I had he did have a scope (which would have, again, been based on the box art eyepiece) to make it easier to scout and get precision against vehicles from afar. If his only weapons are artillery and maybe a Makarov though, I guess that's not a concern.

9 minutes ago, Killing_You said:

I just replayed Let's Make a Steal and Test Drive to see how Volkov played in a mission that wasn't "Soviet Soldier Volkov and Chitzkoi" (where the current balance philosophy seems to draw from), and interestingly enough, he plays a bit more like Tanya.

And in "Situation Critical" he plays pretty much the same except everyone he shoots suffers fire death. Maybe that's where the inspiration for the napalm grenades came from...

[des1206]

What if we let Volkov fly? No Soviet infantry can fly as far as I know. 

But seriously, I like the Kovtillery idea. There isn't any anti-building siege infantry (oh how I miss the old nader!) so Kov could fill that role. I say we should turn him into a long-range all-around fighter by keeping his nades, let it do a lot of slow burn damage and no direct damage so he can "siege" attacking infantry from long range before they get to him. Group rushing a base? Better bring a mixture of shocks and flamers. Going solo to annoy enemy from afar? Get a Kov. However, let him keep his mobility since Allies have fast units that can respond to siege units quickly.

The only potential downside of retooling his battlefield niche would be giving the Allies a boost given their fast and stealth vehicles that can easily escape shocks and RPG,, and you just wait until the Chronotank comes, who's going to chase it down and counter that? If we keep Volkov's current role, we should up his price to $1800 so he's not overused.

Edited March 21, 2018 by des1206

[Pushwall]

56 minutes ago, des1206 said:

However, let him keep his mobility since Allies have fast units that can respond to siege units quickly.

V2s/TTs can't back into a bunker/infantry tunnel/rock formation to thumb their mechanical nose at rangers/longbows/phase tanks. Volkov can. As an artillery unit I don't think he needs to be so mobile when he has all the advantages of being infantry-sized. Especially since, as OWA said, he is one of the tankiest infantry - whereas V2/TT are some of the most fragile vehicles

[ChopBam]

I personally like all the little abilities Volkov has. Very versatile, which makes him unique. If he's OP, increase his pricetag till he's not always the most attractive infantry to buy in T5 situations.

[Pushwall]

2 hours ago, ChopBam said:

I personally like all the little abilities Volkov has. Very versatile, which makes him unique. If he's OP, increase his pricetag till he's not always the most attractive infantry to buy in T5 situations.

Hmm. If we go up to say 1800-2000, people who know how to stay alive only need to wait 1-2 more minutes to be able to buy the only Volkov they'll ever need for most of the game, and by the time they finally die they'll still have enough money for another one, unless maybe the Soviet team lost their entire economy in the meantime, but even then he probably managed to make up the difference for himself by accumulating combat credits anyway. (Which is part of why I really wish we could do the Counter-Strike thing where money rewards for kills are based on your weapon/unit rather than being entirely based on target value. But still partially based on that. So then Tanya and Volkov would rake in hardly any cash for kills and Techies a lot.) So it barely makes a difference to the people who are actually threatening with Volkov. If we increase the price further beyond that, then the players with less self-preservation and situational awareness will save up all that money, get outsmarted by the first good longbow/phase tank/tanya/sniper that finds them, and then they've pretty much thrown the match by spending so much time relying on budget units and then doing nothing with the big chunk they spent. But then again, this is also a problem with phases and may also be with chrono tanks. 1800-2000 is probably the limit for how far we can push it, but I don't think a price increase alone is the solution. I might try it though since it's quick and simple, and if it doesn't help, then look into focusing him into a specific role.

[ChopBam]

Sure. At the very least, this won't be quite as big of a problem:

3 hours ago, Pushwall said:

Volkov clones still comprise at least 80% of the Soviet team on tech level 5 maps

The general populace will put more consideration into using alternative units.

[Raptor29aa]

Ok so after reading many posts I’ve gathered these conclusions:

speed nerf = debatable since most allied units are fast (idea being slow heavy + armored sort of tank-human)

Keep arm as cannon = yes please

make all weapons long range = debatable but leaning yes

keep infantry grenade secondary = debatable unless the burn is removed/nerfed (a slow burn might be favorable as in medic/apc + anyone = dead kov)

remove infantry shotgun arm = generally no (expensive tanya food/ Longbow+tanya fodder) 

change characteristics of shotgun arm = yes... but how... debatable (descussed inaccuracy and burn possibility)

remove kovtillery = a faster, more expensive, version of shock trooper

Only allow one = no

rocket arm secondary = no

AA or flak secondary = no

Lastly super rifle weapon = likely no

[Alstar]

I'd like to return to Shotties topic.
Sergeant - Indeed, they are pretty good even at longer ranges. I saw people shooting down others from rather huge ranges and still taking kills. Guess thats the unexpected outcome of afterburn damage changes. I feel like their range should be reduced a bit as a compensation for that. Regarding their secondary, i really enjoy the slug. It feels very effective against vechicles and because of that shottie is always my #1 pick when facing mixed enemy unit comps. Also, HSing someone with secondary always feels good

If it has to go away, let it be. If it's bound to be replaced, i guess some kind of specialized armor shredder slug would be nice.

Starshina - In all the games i used it i dont think i have ever got a single kill from secondary. I dont know if i just suck that badly or its unreliable, but i couldnt hit the broad side of the bar with it. If you keep on missing at bunch of enemies who are inside your barracks then you know that something is not right. If i buy Starshina, its for primary exclusively.
 

[thedisclaimitory]

4 hours ago, Alstar said:

I'd like to return to Shotties topic.
Sergeant - Indeed, they are pretty good even at longer ranges. I saw people shooting down others from rather huge ranges and still taking kills. Guess thats the unexpected outcome of afterburn damage changes. I feel like their range should be reduced a bit as a compensation for that. Regarding their secondary, i really enjoy the slug. It feels very effective against vechicles and because of that shottie is always my #1 pick when facing mixed enemy unit comps. Also, HSing someone with secondary always feels good

If it has to go away, let it be. If it's bound to be replaced, i guess some kind of specialized armor shredder slug would be nice.

Starshina - In all the games i used it i dont think i have ever got a single kill from secondary. I dont know if i just suck that badly or its unreliable, but i couldnt hit the broad side of the bar with it. If you keep on missing at bunch of enemies who are inside your barracks then you know that something is not right. If i buy Starshina, its for primary exclusively.
 

your right as they do have a verry fare amount of range but what happened to them making enemies catch of fire  what ever happened to that  but anyways maybe they need a small but slight nerf on the serge and star shina's  range a very small tiny bit 

[Raptor29aa]

3 hours ago, thedisclaimitory said:

your right as they do have a verry fare amount of range but what happened to them making enemies catch of fire  what ever happened to that  but anyways maybe they need a small but slight nerf on the serge and star shina's  range a very small tiny bit 

Nerf the range or widen the spread?

Are you talking 1m or 15m?

Or are you talking about the burn damage not being long range?

Either way it would seem strange to have a shotgun blast disappear at midrange. Rockets cannons and missiles blow up at max range. Bullets fall at long range (especially sniper rounds). But a shotgun blast mysteriously not traveling mid distance would seem odd. 

PS I agree with Alster I too like using the slug especially for tanks. (I just think the Soviet secondary is worthless)

[Cat]

Regarding the Volkov issue again, I haven't played Red Alert singleplayer for some time but I still remember Volkov's loadout:

Silenced AT Cannon (used in Soldier Volkov & Chitzoi and Deus Ex Machina)

Silenced Handgun (used in Lets make a Steal and Test Drive)

Incendiary Rounds (fired from an unidentified silenced firearm, used in Situation Critical)

C4 (used in all his mission appearances except Test Drive)

I'm okay with his role right now, being a fast running and healing infantry having small pieces of other infantry combined into one. His AT gun should be a weaker and non-hitscan version of shock trooper's tesla coil, the silenced pistol (or the current AP cannon primary) should be a lower-range and weaker version of Dragunov and the Incendiary Rounds (AP secondary) being a weaker version of grenade/flamethrower . I don't mind his 3-round artillery burst gets removed as that's no where being a weaker version of any infantry weapon, I rather let him have the Engineer's C4 if we want to make him dangerous against buildings.

And his binoculars stays.

[Raptor29aa]

1 hour ago, Cat said:

the silenced pistol (or the current AP cannon primary) should be a lower-range and weaker version of Dragunov and the Incendiary Rounds (AP secondary) being a weaker version of grenade/flamethrower .

A high tech pistol with specialty incendiary ammo... I like it...

[OWA]

12 minutes ago, Raptor29aa said:

A high tech pistol with specialty incendiary ammo... I like it...

Sounds a bit like a flare gun.

[Pushwall]

2 hours ago, Cat said:

I don't mind his 3-round artillery burst gets removed as that's no where being a weaker version of any infantry weapon, I rather let him have the Engineer's C4 if we want to make him dangerous against buildings.

Thing is, then he just supplants the Engineer, Flamethrower and Shock Trooper at that role. Engy has C4 but no other weapon that damages buildings - and unlike the Allied issue of Engy vs Tanya, Soviets don't have to deal with AP mines so Volkov's lack of mine-clearing charges would be a non-issue for this role. Flamer and Shock only do good damage to buildings at their MCT - which is also what C4 does. If Volkov were to be good against buildings I'd rather go the siege route so he's different from those units - and nerf his CQC anti-infantry ability or speed so we don't get the current issue where he's still a comparable infiltrator to flamer/shocky despite not having a weapon with MCT bonus damage.

2 hours ago, Cat said:

And his binoculars stays.

I would love to give binoculars back to Tanya and Volkov. However there is a pretty big issue with binoculars which is that it is easy to accidentally select them when you want to select your other weapon. This was a pretty big issue for Volkov when he had them, since he has to constantly switch between the AT and AP cannon depending on what he needs to deal with. For Tanya it was a little less concerning but still noticeably so - an infiltrating Tanya, if her presence is already known by the Soviets, really wants to select her C4 ASAP when reaching the MCT without fumbling through binoculars, and then reselect the colt to fend off infantry without fumbling through binoculars.

Though I might look into using Reborn's Elite Cadre logic for having a keybinding that adds+autoselects / removes binocs from your inventory.

[OWA]

A bit of a weird suggestion, but seeing as Volkov is practically a walking tank and is presumably quite heavy because he's partly made of metal, could he be made to trigger and take damage from AT mines?

[Pushwall]

11 minutes ago, OWA said:

A bit of a weird suggestion, but seeing as Volkov is practically a walking tank and is presumably quite heavy because he's partly made of metal, could he be made to trigger and take damage from AT mines?

Seems the mine logic is just "is this target an infantry preset" or "is this target a vehicle preset". I just tried giving Volkov the AI script marker for heavy vehicles and he doesn't trip AT mines. So we'd have to amend the script for that, however I also feel like this would result in Allies feeling like they have to AT mine their buildings to protect against the dreaded Volkov invasion, when they already scrape the mine limit just trying to cover all the best vehicle attack routes.

[OWA]

1 minute ago, Pushwall said:

Seems the mine logic is just "is this target an infantry preset" or "is this target a vehicle preset". I just tried giving Volkov the AI script marker for heavy vehicles and he doesn't trip AT mines.

It's presumably possible somehow, seeing as Cyborgs can trip EMP mines in Reborn, but other infantry cannot. We could also always submit a request for a scripts modification if we wanted to prototype it.

[SilverShark]

On 21.3.2018 at 7:07 PM, Pushwall said:

Basically we just need his face to look more like the RA boxart (with the eyepiece modelled on instead of just being a flat texture like the retexture was).

[Pushwall]

4 hours ago, SilverShark said:

Face is a little better than what KY had though the idea would have been for his whole head to be human (except the eyepiece).

Doesn't matter though as I am leaning more heavily towards the "still very much a cyborg = walks too slow to avoid fights he doesn't like as easily" route instead of "more human = more fragile". I could possibly have a "more human" Volkov as an alternate camo option though, whether it's this or something less cybernetic. (Which would of course be purely aesthetic and not change his performance outside of maybe more recognisable sounds for received headshots.)

Part of me wishes sprint capability could be set per unit, in that case I would probably retain Volkov's current jogging speed but remove the ability to sprint.

[Killing_You]

I've honestly never liked that look for Volkov. It's not really a "cyborg" look so much as "robot with a little bit of skin pulled over its 'face.'" It also seems to me like a half hearted attempt to justify a jagged, low-poly head.

Personally, I think the eyepiece would be enough to communicate to the player that he's a cyborg, as well as the slightly slower speed and higher damage resistance. He doesn't need to be completely metal and wires, especially since the coat, gloves, and hat would cover most of the enhancements.

Here's a few pictures that better demonstrate what I mean, one of which being Volkov concept art for a different mod, incidentally enough:

[NodGuy]

21 minutes ago, Killing_You said:

I've honestly never liked that look for Volkov. It's not really a "cyborg" look so much as "robot with a little bit of skin pulled over its 'face.'" It also seems to me like a half hearted attempt to justify a jagged, low-poly head.

Personally, I think the eyepiece would be enough to communicate to the player that he's a cyborg, as well as the slightly slower speed and higher damage resistance. He doesn't need to be completely metal and wires, especially since the coat, gloves, and hat would cover most of the enhancements.

Here's a few pictures that better demonstrate what I mean, one of which being Volkov concept art for a different mod, incidentally enough:

 

I agree.

And man, I was super excited when I used to follow C&C Renevatio. A shame that it died. It would've easily been my favourite C&C mod.

[OWA]

I really like this one:

[neko soldier]

There's also the RA2 scraped concept art and box cover for him.

[Ice]

Regarding Volkov's aesthetics, I've always leaned more towards KY's vision in that he's meant to be clearly a human who's been mechanically augmented with experimental bionic technology (in the 1950's, for that matter); He's not a robot and shouldn't look like a Terminator.

IMO (assuming we ever got a new character model), the "enhancements" should look relatively clunky, primitive and prototypical, like something you'd expect to see in a Wolfenstein game or something. With this basis, his design would serve to reflect the time period APB takes place in, as well as show the cruelty of the human experimentation which enabled his transformation to even be possible.

NOTE: The image below is a very extreme example and Volkov would obviously look nothing like this (and definitely not a zombie lol), but it does have some elements of how his visible mechanical/cybernetic components, if any, should generally appear; primitive, prototypical, cruel and reflective of their time period. His eyepiece (assuming we copy the RA1 box art) would by far be the most refined-looking piece of technology in his design.

 

Still, perhaps the easiest solution would be to simply give him the face of the RA1 box art, with a similar uniform to his current in-game model, plus the addition of some SN-46 body armour or something similar.

[Raptor29aa]

On 3/23/2018 at 8:51 AM, OWA said:

Sounds a bit like a flare gun.

Hey flarguns still hurt.  Maybe a burn pistol may not be the right direction. (It would give that awesome hand a purpose)

On the other hand If Volkovs grenades (and kovtillery) did self harm if in splash range then he wouldn’t be much of a CQC unit. (Just like how the rocket soldier does self harm in CQC also)

PS I have no idea why my text looks different in this post

Edited March 25, 2018 by Raptor29aa

[Pushwall]

So here's what I may be deciding on. I will still run this through some people I can find to test with.

Shotgunners:

• Pretty much what I said before; Allied shotgunner has a new dragonsbreath round which, instead of inflicting quick burn damage, melts through armour like butter (twice as much armour damage as a captain or flamethrower) but is a little weaker in raw damage. This can easily force retreats out of enemy shocks/kovs if he gets close enough to land some good blows even if he doesn't manage to kill. However, it's not strong enough to break through the Stormy Valley church barricade despite being somewhat fire-based, just so that there's no "imbalance" where one team's shotgunner is allowed to breach that place solo but the other isn't. Secondary fire is removed.
• Soviet shotgunner has a new buckshot round which behaves a lot like the old dragonsbreath in terms of range/spread/damage, but doesn't set people on fire and has very weak anti-armour damage. However against unarmoured targets, its damage is comparable to what the old buckshot secondary fire used to dish out - its damage mechanics are basically identical to that of a pistol, only in shotgun form with high raw power. Secondary fire is removed.
• They may have a bit of a harder time struggling against vehicles due to lacking their old secondaries (Allies no longer have slug for reliability, Soviets no longer have uberbuckshot dealing extra damage to point-blank vehicles), but if you want to tackle vehicles, you should really be getting pretty much any other non-free non-pistol unit. These guys are CQC, anti-MCT, anti-infantry and more specifically anti-the-enemy-team's-commando through and through.

As for Volkov:

• Slowing him down to the same speed as the NBNW Sentinel (6m/s, slower than the 6.5m/s of captains/rpgs/flamers/snipers), so he is more forced into committing to fights and shouldn't be able to kite Allies around their own base as much. Instead the shock trooper sort of takes up his old "mobile AT trooper" mantle by being increased to 7m/s (same as a rifle soldier).
• AT cannon range up by 30 metres; now outranges RPG (but not by much).
• AT cannon damage down from 70 to 50, ROF up to 1 shot instead of 0.75 per second, and uses the same warhead as the Light Tank (which suffers a damage penalty against the armour of heavier vehicles). So he should be great at taking down incoming light vehicles like rangers, phases and LTs, but not so great against medium tanks and APCs which have heavier armour and enough health to not get killed in one magazine. His range still means he can harass the heavier vehicles though. This should set him somewhat apart from the RPG/Shock who ignore armour strength entirely, and should give the Allied APC a bit more of a relevant niche in non-air maps (its superheavy armour knocks the AT cannon down to a mere 30 damage a shot as long as its armour is up). This warhead change also allows it to deal ever so slightly more damage to buildings than the old trishot.
• No more trishot as the AT cannon kinda fills both roles. Instead he has a scope to scout with (and to get more precision against vehicles when he doesn't need to make use of his speed, given that scoping in forces you down to walking speed)
• AP weapons might stay relatively unchanged, maybe with the shotgun becoming a little better so it's more worthwhile, and napalm grenades also becoming a little stronger in exchange for either becoming bouncy grenades again like in the old days like Raptor suggested, or maybe sticky like early Delta. Why would I bring back this feature? Because the fact that both of those tend to end up as "duds" in CQC, discourages them from being used in such a way. At long range they never had problems with noclipping through terrain, flying 50 feet into the air on touching a slope, or anything like that - only when up close. So then the shotgun should be more prominent for CQC, with maybe one or two napalms to try to apply burn, instead of the current situation where if you're 1v1 you can just unload 6 napalm nades while sitting in prime shotgunning range and autowin with hardly any aiming necessary.
• Unsure on price. Being more reliable at vehicle-sniping can be deadly especially with multiple... but then he also lacks the alpha-strike damage of the old one and is also much more vulnerable in close combat than before due to his speed, as well as the new behaviour of the Allied shotgunner making it hard for him to stay in the field for too long especially in areas that are too far from a supply truck. May keep it price as it currently is, and tweak it up if he turns out too OP or down if UP (Price will probably not go down too much in the latter case as he still has considerable overlap with RPG/Shocky)

So basically taking my initial "no kovtillery" idea while also keeping a modest enough level of long-range building exterior damage that he isn't useless if the Allies are pinned in their base, while also not being able to snipe buildings from halfway between the range of an RPG and a V2 which kovtillery could, and also trying to reduce his overlap with the shock trooper.