[Feedback] Heavies (onoes), skiing and knockback

Rawr.

Despite the 3084038430483047 threads on the subject I feel that I am leat enough to make my own. Because leat I am.

Anyways, I :heart: the heavies. That's all I ever play (except when I'm messing around with the grapple) but there's a few issues that could make them more enjoyable to play and more "heavy" instead of just "bigger and easier to MA."

First off, movement. It seems to me that heavies get very little horizontal thrust. Even with a good route, jetting seems to send you into orbit but makes you advance very little. Try running a route as medium and then as a heavy. Some difference is expected, but IMO this is too much. Even with a proper DJ and a nice slope, it's a lot harder to get any horizontal movement going, but you'll sure as hell be high up in the sky where everyone can see you (and MA you).

The second thing is knockback. As far as I can tell, heavies are as easy to knock around as lights. One disc, and you're off the stand/station/door/toilet, just like a light would be. IMO, knockback should be halved. Right now it's very easy to throw off HO with light armor or medium. Even good HO will have to at some point get to the entrance, and a single disc will make it impossible for the HO to do anything but get knocked around and die (and HoFs/HD can be cleared with a single disc/grenade). I'm not saying make the heavies like a freaking terminator, but they should be harder to stop.
Heavies are a lot weaker than they used to be; they die faster, and with the new shield pack it's a lot harder to stay alive under sustained fire (wether you're playing HO, HD or HoF). They shouldn't get stopped everytime someone sneezes in their general direction; it's bad enough they don't get enough forward momentum. I play HD a lot, especially on Isle and Winterlake and I find that all I need to keep HO at bay is the disc because of the huge knockback it provides, especially when coupled with a speed pack.
A little parenthesis here about the blaster; I love that gun, but due to the effectiveness of knocking back heavies, it is fairly inefficient when compared to the disc, unless you can BB the person, which in most cases won't happen as they are either knocking you around with disc/nades/mortar or you are knocking them around with disc/nades/mortar. I still use it because I'm too lazy to change my loadouts, but it doesn't have the stopping power of most other weapons, not to mention you sacrifice mobility and it's rate of fire, while good, is not that much higher from the disc.
Back to the topic; example: On winterlake, I have a totally awesome HO route. So, I was doing that, and as usual I'm getting shot by every player in sight (being heavy is like a having a bullseye on your ass). Some guy shot me in mid air with one (1) rocket from a rocket pod, and I didn't slow down or get thrown of course. No, I just stopped right there and fell straight down into the lake to my impending doom (btw, why the hell do heavies float?). I've had this happen several times with various weapons...
Also, when it comes to body blocking, I remember reading that a heavy hitting a light full speed would do a lot of damage or at least send the light flying. I have yet to see this. Either we sort of miss each other and sort of deflect at an angle, or we just get stopped on the spot ala t1 (and if I'm stationary I somehow get knocked back).

I'm just asking that the forward thrust perhaps be adjusted a bit and the weapon knockback reduced. This would make heavies a heck of a lot more efficient at their current roles (this includes HD and HoF for all you HO whiners).

:clap: this is what ive been saying for the past week :)
And you dont even need a disc to knockback a heavy. The light can just run straight into him and that pushes the heavy out of the way, and run off with the flag.

All your other points i agree with 100%

agreed on all points.

HoF doesn't seem to work at all with the low health of heavies and how easy it is to knock them around.

Negative. All this might be true but I think heavies are too mobile as it is. Reduced knockback, even better jetting, bleh.

I concur 100% on all points.

I don't know where this is going to end up.. but here is my .02:

Heavies seem to be plenty mobile to me... But it doesn't seem that people will be happy until they are as fast as lights. You have to draw the line.. You are in _Heavy_ Armor. And as such you are sacrificing speed for armor and weapon selection.

Heavies are still a very powerful force... On one pub in particular, one HO was owning the base on isle.. and when we did manage to kill him.. he was back in less than a minute.. he completely (and annoyingly) owned our base. Cats was unavailble for comment.

I think Heavy Armor is either near balence or slightly too powerful. Like many people who dismiss the new weapons as useless (Come duel me while I have a buckler) heavy offense should not be easy.. it should require skill and practice. The slow learning curve is what made Tribes an interesting game of skill in the first place.

I concur 100% on all points.

:signed:

I don't know where this is going to end up.. but here is my .02:

Heavies seem to be plenty mobile to me... But it doesn't seem that people will be happy until they are as fast as lights. You have to draw the line.. You are in _Heavy_ Armor. And as such you are sacrificing speed for armor and weapon selection.

Heavies are still a very powerful force... On one pub in particular, one HO was owning the base on isle.. and when we did manage to kill him.. he was back in less than a minute.. he completely (and annoyingly) owned our base. Cats was unavailble for comment.

I think Heavy Armor is either near balence or slightly too powerful. Like many people who dismiss the new weapons as useless (Come duel me while I have a buckler) heavy offense should not be easy.. it should require skill and practice. The slow learning curve is what made Tribes an interesting game of skill in the first place.


This is what I mean. I was debating getting screenshots last night of the near-endless stream of heavy armors just flying across the map and marching in our base. You have incredible amounst of armor. You have the biggest weapon in the game. I certainly would think a heavy armor would be very vulnerable going from base to base. They really aren't that vulnerable. They ski very quickly, they have phenominal jetting power (I always seem too amazed when I see a heavy armor jet off the roof of our base, fire mortars into it, hit the ground and jet around back up to the roof. That simply shouldn't be posssible).

Heavy armors blowing up your base shouldn't be a common occurance. It should require teamwork to protect the heavy. Frankly I've noticed T:V has removed all teamwork.

Heavies seem to be plenty mobile to me... But it doesn't seem that people will be happy until they are as fast as lights. You have to draw the line.. You are in _Heavy_ Armor. And as such you are sacrificing speed for armor and weapon selection.

Heavies have a heck of a hard time jetting forward. As of now, heavies are easy to kill and easy to stop. 2 mortars and they're history, and as was true in T1, a light or medium dueling a heavy usually spells doom for said heavy (or at least a lot of damage/annoyance unless the guy sucks). I wouldn't mind if they reduced the vertical thrust and gave some horizontal thrust instead. I'm not asking for something radical, just a little bit more forward thrust to be able to navigate terrain properly.
Trust me, I don't want to go back to the days of T1 where heavies were as fast as lights with 10x the firepower, but their movement as of now doesn't seem right. In T1 heavies had a harder time going up than forward, yet now it's the opposite. Finding a middle ground is what I'm asking for. Try disc jumping with a heavy and see what happens. Even on a good route with a nice slope, you jet hoping to keep some of your forward momentum only to find yourself somewhere high in the sky and not very far from where you left off.

Heavies are still a very powerful force... On one pub in particular, one HO was owning the base on isle.. and when we did manage to kill him.. he was back in less than a minute.. he completely (and annoyingly) owned our base. Cats was unavailble for comment.

The keyword here is pub. If one (1) HO is owning my base (especially on Isle), one HD can get the base back up and running and hold that HO off for the rest of the match. It may take a few tries, but it'll be done, especially if there's LD supporting you. I do it all the time, and I am by no means an exceptional player. You seem to want Heavies to be slaughtered by lights. In a duel, a light/medium will win most of the time, and yet you still want them to be easily defeated indoors where they should be kings?

I think Heavy Armor is either near balence or slightly too powerful. Like many people who dismiss the new weapons as useless (Come duel me while I have a buckler) heavy offense should not be easy.. it should require skill and practice. The slow learning curve is what made Tribes an interesting game of skill in the first place.

HO requires skill against any half decent defense, especially now.
If you have no HD, then by gods, don't be surprised your base is trashed. Just because you don't choose to counter HO doesn't mean HO is overpowered. Most people think HO is easy and that's because they never encounter opposition. They think that a bunch of turrets ought to be able to stop HO, and this should by no means be the case ever or we end up with another T2.

As of now, any light/medium can completely rock a heavy. They can knock them around all over the place, MA them with extreme ease (even I can do it, that's how easy it is), see them from far away before they get to the base and due to the heavy's difficulty in getting a good route going, they can usually be stopped or heavily damaged before even getting where they want to go. Add to this their decreased durability and the very Meh shield pack and you'll have a very hard time doing any damage against a proper defense.
What you've told me only shows me that you're ignoring heavies until they're knocking at your door. Take Cavern for example. Most of the time people complain about rape, and yet it takes 1 dedicated person in medium/light to completely screw up a heavy and make his route a waste of time.

Heavies are slower, less maneuverable and bigger targets than anything else, and their destructive power is not that high. All I'm asking is that their distinctive attributes be slightly beefed up so that they become more efficient at what they do.
These changes would bolster HO, yes, but they would also bolster HD and HoFs, thus making HO more needed in other areas (clearing the stand for example).

Negative. All this might be true but I think heavies are too mobile as it is. Reduced knockback, even better jetting, bleh.
Sigh.........members..... .

Heavies have a heck of a hard time jetting forward. As of now, heavies are easy to kill and easy to stop. 2 mortars and they're history, and as was true in T1, a light or medium dueling a heavy usually spells doom for said heavy (or at least a lot of damage/annoyance unless the guy sucks). I wouldn't mind if they reduced the vertical thrust and gave some horizontal thrust instead. I'm not asking for something radical, just a little bit more forward thrust to be able to navigate terrain properly.
Trust me, I don't want to go back to the days of T1 where heavies were as fast as lights with 10x the firepower, but their movement as of now doesn't seem right. In T1 heavies had a harder time going up than forward, yet now it's the opposite. Finding a middle ground is what I'm asking for. Try disc jumping with a heavy and see what happens. Even on a good route with a nice slope, you jet hoping to keep some of your forward momentum only to find yourself somewhere high in the sky and not very far from where you left off.



The keyword here is pub. If one (1) HO is owning my base (especially on Isle), one HD can get the base back up and running and hold that HO off for the rest of the match. It may take a few tries, but it'll be done, especially if there's LD supporting you. I do it all the time, and I am by no means an exceptional player. You seem to want Heavies to be slaughtered by lights. In a duel, a light/medium will win most of the time, and yet you still want them to be easily defeated indoors where they should be kings?



HO requires skill against any half decent defense, especially now.
If you have no HD, then by gods, don't be surprised your base is trashed. Just because you don't choose to counter HO doesn't mean HO is overpowered. Most people think HO is easy and that's because they never encounter opposition. They think that a bunch of turrets ought to be able to stop HO, and this should by no means be the case ever or we end up with another T2.

As of now, any light/medium can completely rock a heavy. They can knock them around all over the place, MA them with extreme ease (even I can do it, that's how easy it is), see them from far away before they get to the base and due to the heavy's difficulty in getting a good route going, they can usually be stopped or heavily damaged before even getting where they want to go. Add to this their decreased durability and the very Meh shield pack and you'll have a very hard time doing any damage against a proper defense.
What you've told me only shows me that you're ignoring heavies until they're knocking at your door. Take Cavern for example. Most of the time people complain about rape, and yet it takes 1 dedicated person in medium/light to completely screw up a heavy and make his route a waste of time.

Heavies are slower, less maneuverable and bigger targets than anything else, and their destructive power is not that high. All I'm asking is that their distinctive attributes be slightly beefed up so that they become more efficient at what they do.
These changes would bolster HO, yes, but they would also bolster HD and HoFs, thus making HO more needed in other areas (clearing the stand for example).


So say would you be opposed to increased jetting for heavies with a reduction of jetting energy?

I dont think people realize the problem with the knockback with heavies, its horrible, and it must be a mistake.

As for the horizontal movement of the heavy, id gladly give up some of my vertical movement for some horizontal. Thats how it was on T1, i remember on raindance crawling up the base then jumping up and jetting to get to the flag. And if i got knocked off id have to disc jump to get up there.

I rather be able to disc jump and then move better horizontally, then jet without disc jump and hardly move horizontally.

Ok with all the complaining about balance leaning towards defense in T2 and some fears of the same happening in T:V why is an unmoveable Heavy on the flag a good thing again?

So say would you be opposed to increased jetting for heavies with a reduction of jetting energy?

No need to reduce energy.
Reduce vertical thrust.
As Greywolf said, in T1 going up from a standstill was slow and you could feel gravity trying to pull you down. In T:V, I jet up and I shoot into the air at an incredible speed. For all their mobility, the T1 heavies felt heavy. These guys do not, they just feel challenged in the "moving forward" department.
It could get a bit tedious in T1 when you missed your target for some reason and had to DJ up there, so what I'm asking for is a middle ground. Decent vertical thrust and decent horizontal thrust.


EDIT:
Ok with all the complaining about balance leaning towards defense in T2 and some fears of the same happening in T:V why is an unmoveable Heavy on the flag a good thing again?

Nobody is saying unmovable, just reduced knockback. A heavy should move back from a disc, but he should not be sent flying like a light.
Besides, this also affects offense.

Ok with all the complaining about balance leaning towards defense in T2 and some fears of the same happening in T:V why is an unmoveable Heavy on the flag a good thing again?

Well on Isle you can grapple your heavy to the overhanging ledge and not have to worry at all :D

I hope that the devs understand that a lot of us here REALLY REALLY like using the heavy armor and that maybe some changes should be made to appease our wishes. Changes not just with the heavy but with the game in general. Using the heavy armor for offense is a huge part of tribes.

Please don't take this away from the game.

You guys won't be happy till Heavies can fly indefinatly and have the mass of 30 tons. When it comes down to competition.. there will be nothing but complaints vs heavies. (ala HO trains and base rape)

This game is not being made to appease one type of player by making HO dominant over all other combat positions!

I have faith in IGA to do the right thing in spite of your protests.

Orignially Posted By Uranium - 235
Frankly I've noticed T:V has removed all teamwork.

I don't agree with that statement at all. From my perspective it seems like alot of the advanced tactics from T1/T2 don't work the same in TV. As a result you don't have the teamwork your used too because nobody is "on the same page". Proof is this thread, and the billion other ones that have people saying heavies are too powerful, plus the other billion saying their too weak. Also you have people posting on D, and O balance with the post either saying too powerful for oneside or the other. I stick with my statement: "The game was designed with good balance, and changing anything now will have side effects that make things worse."

I have faith in IGA to do the right thing in spite of your protests.

Yeah with all the requests and majority being more about "What I want only for the position I play" I hope they don't get too eager to please everyone. From what I've played so far they seem to have a good vision for the MP.

You guys won't be happy till Heavies can fly indefinatly and have the mass of 30 tons. When it comes down to competition.. there will be nothing but complaints vs heavies. (ala HO trains and base rape)

This game is not being made to appease one type of player by making HO dominant over all other combat positions!

I have faith in IGA to do the right thing in spite of your protests.

Ill be happy, when i dont get shot back like a bullet when I bodyblock a light.
I being the heavy, the larger and heavier object getting thrown back like i was a paper ball. And the light gets the flag.

How is that not wrong?

The way T1 had it, AMAZINGLY people still capped. I mean HoFs were heavy(couldnt get kocked back like a paper ball) and cappers needed help to clear him, but they still capped. So that system cant be too bad can it?....


And also T2's D was too strong because there were 983245729385 turrets placed everywhere