more love for gunners

[panzer_unit]

So, Kion and I are plowing through Train S2 last night... it's rough but we make it to the bossfight. My PA's... Durega, Zubba, everything... aren't working at all to knock these things down. I'm resigned to taking the usual craploads of damage and having a fun roll on the floor every now and then.

Then Kion pulls out a laser and starts spamming Mayalee Prism, producing flawless knockdowns all the time. I'm still beating away in melee, no different than before... so IMO it must be that Mayalee Prism has a higher-priority knockdown effect than Durega or anything you can do with a melee weapon.

It's nice that there's some obscure use for Mayalee Prism, but it's really damned annoying that these things CAN be knocked over... just not by the people who get knockdown as basically their only form of defense.

[Pillan]

Well, given that every month we get another update that says “enemies weakened and drop rates increased”, and the most recent one effects enemy STA, maybe we’ll see an increase in the melee art effects as well as bullet effects.

[panzer_unit]

Sega can do whatever it wants with overall difficulty level, but I'd like to see Fortefighter be the #1's with what few special effects they get (to wit: launch, wipeout, blow away) rather than having to rely on a Guntecher muscling creatures around. Talk about an ego-bruising!

We'll be hiding behind Fortetechers for defense next :/

[Kuya]

Panzer...why are you not a gunner anymore? http://www.pso-world.com/images/phpbb/icons/smiles/icon_razz.gif

Guess lasers are ok...or you can be like me and infect SE4 them, run to the next room and wait it out. I do this because:
1) I'm a newman so my HP looks close to a beast's ATA
2) I'm playing at work so I have to play in a super small window to hide myself.

http://www.pso-world.com/images/phpbb/icons/smiles/icon_biggrin.gif

[panzer_unit]

I'm still a gunner... just not right now. I've got a lot of good light element melee weapons, so I'm all the way fighter while HIVE S2 is hot.

EDIT: Lasers can be way better than okay. Supposing you're not playing at work you can virus and then stick around with a laser to keep the midbosses pinned down while the rest of your team goes on full offensive for huge damage. I wonder if it works on SEED Vitace too?

<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: panzer_unit on 2007-09-06 10:21 ]</font>

[CelestialBlade]

I'm one of those people that thinks Rangers are just fine and Melee isn't as gimped as everyone seems to say....but this is something I do agree with. Bullet PA effects seem to be much more reliable than Skill ones, and IMO nobody needs Knockdown more than a Melee-type. See Levia's Kamatoze topic, for instance.

Not sure if Sega's even aware of this but considering they ARE willing to listen to our opinions....maybe it'll get some sort of improvement in the near future. We'll see.

[Niloklives]

o.O I can rising strike them no problem....TD works too.

Also for the gunners, nades work just as well as mayalee prism. so virus these guys with the cheap ones then nd pin them down with nades...or if you're like me, and don't care about time...just virus them and leave the room for about 20 seconds then come back and do it again.

[panzer_unit]

Really? I hit 'em with the knockdown moves on Tornado Break and Anga Durega and they didn't fall... just spazzed out on me with some attack instead. I don't think I got through the final move on Durega un-interrupted. I forget if I hadoken'd them with Renzan or not, and Bogga Zubba didn't do jack but that's launch so it probably doesn't count.

I'll see where I can get with Rising Strike next time I go through... especially since I'm working on a high-grind shop rapier anyway.

[Pillan]

On 2007-09-06 10:34, NIloklives wrote:
just virus them and leave the room for about 20 seconds then come back and do it again.


Dilla Grena are a very strange enemy. Their HP is so low that, despite their half ranged and half melee damage, shots from any gun still do more damage/time than virus. They're the only large mob that I can think of that takes less than 1000 from each tick of Virus at 100+.

Of course you could virus trap them and attack them, but I don't have that option when I play GT.


EDIT:

More on topic...

Rising Strike seems to have a higher knockback level than most skills. I haven't tested whether it works on them, though, since I deleted the art.

<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: Pillan on 2007-09-06 10:49 ]</font>

[panzer_unit]

Something else I noticed about them - I forget if this is S or S2 but probably applies in both cases - is that my grenades would only knock them down if I did more than 100 damage to one of their target points. Not relevant to what was going on last night (fortefighter w/ elemental pikor says no) but something to make a note of.

EDIT: delete Rising Strike? wtf. That's really pro, or just insane.

<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: panzer_unit on 2007-09-06 10:59 ]</font>

[Pillan]

On 2007-09-06 10:51, panzer_unit wrote:
Something else I noticed about them - I forget if this is S or S2 but probably applies in both cases - is that my grenades would only knock them down if I did more than 100 damage to one of their target points. Not relevant to what was going on last night (fortefighter w/ elemental pikor says no) but something to make a note of.


I'm pretty sure there is an HP percent relationship to flinching effects in general (e.g., twin handguns and mechs cause medium sized enemies to flinch when they're like half your level) and it seems different weapons have different flinch levels (such as Hishou not knocking back Kamatoze while Rising Strike does).

I'd say it is pretty relevent to what we're seeing. Who knows? You might just need a rediculously high percent weapon to make it work on them.


EDIT:


On 2007-09-06 10:51, panzer_unit wrote:
EDIT: delete Rising Strike? wtf. That's really pro, or just insane.


Missed that.

Yeah, I'm big on high damage/time and low PP/damage arts in general, so Rising Strike is one of my lowest rated arts just from that. The only saber PA I ever use is Gravity Strike because it's 18 hits for 40 PP, 12 of which are high powered, versus the 8 hits for 32 PP, 4 of which are high powered. I'd much rather rush in, kill everything, and take a bit of damage than play defensively.

<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: Pillan on 2007-09-06 11:11 ]</font>

[Kuya]

On 2007-09-06 10:19, panzer_unit wrote:
I'm still a gunner... just not right now. I've got a lot of good light element melee weapons, so I'm all the way fighter while HIVE S2 is hot.

EDIT: Lasers can be way better than okay. Supposing you're not playing at work you can virus and then stick around with a laser to keep the midbosses pinned down while the rest of your team goes on full offensive for huge damage. I wonder if it works on SEED Vitace too?

<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: panzer_unit on 2007-09-06 10:21 ]</font>


Playing outside of work is more of an issue. I spend time with my wife and dogs when I get home. Hard to play at home to group anymore http://www.pso-world.com/images/phpbb/icons/smiles/icon_frown.gif Gah - bullets are not fun to level lol

[panzer_unit]

On 2007-09-06 10:56, Pillan wrote:
I'm pretty sure there is an HP percent relationship to flinching effects in general (e.g., twin handguns and mechs cause medium sized enemies to flinch when they're like half your level) and it seems different weapons have different flinch levels (such as Hishou not knocking back Kamatoze while Rising Strike does).

I'd say it is pretty relevent to what we're seeing. Who knows? You might just need a rediculously high percent weapon to make it work on them.


I'd wonder if there are hidden SE levels for physical effects, the same as per-move damage modifiers as you go through a PA combo.

Gameplay-wise I'd hazard a guess that if there's variability to the effect, it's based on level comparison rather than ATP or damage done. You could do nothing but tons of damage and it's okay, it's when you _don't_ do tons of damage that you want physical effects to be reliable. Protransers, Newman Fortefighters, etc.

[Pillan]

On 2007-09-06 11:15, panzer_unit wrote:
Gameplay-wise I'd hazard a guess that if there's variability to the effect, it's based on level comparison rather than ATP or damage done. You could do nothing but tons of damage and it's okay, it's when you _don't_ do tons of damage that you want physical effects to be reliable. Protransers, Newman Fortefighters, etc.


Well, I'm too lazy to go through all the work of finding out whether it's relative damage or relative level that increases the power of effects, but I wouldn't rule out relative damage just because it screws over PTs and Newman hunters. I mean, look at the class bonus system: aside from the partial classes, class bonuses just make the most powerful class and race combination even more powerful.

ST isn't trying very hard at all to balance bad combinations.

[Kion]

Mayalle Prism is a guntecher's take on grenade mob control. Using it yesterday I found the application was slightly different. Mayalee prism lines up enemies linearly and knocks them all in the same direction. so you can pretty easily pin any on-coming enemies, or two mini bosses.

With the dilla grena last night i realized that i could line them up and apply the knock down consistantly to both of them (something they were too far apart with to do with grenades). Also I realized that mayalee hit is amazing for keeping gaozorans down as like the dillas, it hits just as they're getting up again. On a kubara laser, it's great and you can keep firing almost indefinately. I'm hoping to find other applications like hitting two ginna betes.

Laser in general i think is a really underestimated weapon. The ATP on it is huge and the elemental % maybe small but it gets a boost from the players own ATP. So
gun ATP + fortegunner ATP x 116% in addition to the numbers of enemies hit makes for massive damage. Too bad fortegunners can't figure this out becasue they filled up their PA space with twin hangduns. Think of the damage with elemental boosts from level 31 PA's and an S rank cannon.

Edit: if any FG's get twin penetration, i'm going to have to smack them.

<font size=-1>[ This Message was edited by: Kion on 2007-09-06 19:01 ]</font>

[guise709]

well hunter type classes are the most popular and so to help balance the rest of the community and help convince them to become gunners they are making rangers stronger and more appealing i guess. this way some people will shift over to ranger type classes.

[biggabertha]

I found that Grenade Launchers begin their work too slowly for these enemies on S2. The're not bad at S or anything lower but S2, one block and your timing's gone; nevermind getting a direct hit or being stunned.

Mayalee Prism works wonders when my PS2 loads it on these enemies, especially solo but it's just a shame that being a Protranser, the Laser Cannoc I use runs out after three dozen shots or so. Not a lot of damage so that's where my Virus Traps, Laia and Star Atomizers come in handy.

I've also noticed Bogga Zuppa not working as well as it used to on A or S rank difficulty. Anga Dugrega seemed to work fifty-fifty or less and the same thing with Tornado Break. Dus Robado though, seemed to knock them down flat though but maybe because the weapon itself is accurate. I only managed to pull off the full combo three times on two Muktrands though, getting knocked out of it early is an understatement.

I'd like to think there's an SE for knockbacks, knock ups, blowback/whatever etc. and I'd really like it if in the expansion that those of us with maximum level skills will have the best knockbacks, knock ups, blowback/whatever etc.

Nice to know that my Fortegunner-to-be whom will have all the Prism arts will be appreciated by those in the know.