About the balance issue...

I think that big nerf and buff in the game should be held off until the game is a little bit older. As it is right now the game is not broken, and we're not sure that these balance changes are needed (you can tell because of all of the arguements for and against them). If it turns out that 3 months from now the only teams you see are 5 tanks and an assault, then obviously something went wrong. But right now the game is in it's early stages and doesn't need any changes. Every class is pretty successful by themselves currently; I don't want to see that screwed up unless it was like that from the beginning (I'm not trying to suggest that the developers did a bad job or anything though).

The main thing about the patch is updating glitches/things that were supposed to work one way from the start but didn't (death blossom affected by ammo, no cloak during grapple, RoF affecting heal gun). The only actual gameplay change made to maintain balance I believe is the duration of hack for lvl 1 and 2, which is not unreasonable at all.

Oh, yeah, I know. I'm talking about all of the discussions about balance issues, and how many people want to change things when we're not even sure that they need to be changed. The changes in the new patch are perfectly fine. I just think that the devs shouldn't fix a system that doesn't currently need a fix.

I totally agree. You have this on every game though and usually the whining of the masses doesn't change anything.

Thankfully we have been blessed with developers who actually listen to their fans instead of ignoring us. I guess what I'm asking them to do right now is to ignore us, ironically, for a temporary period until we have a much better understanding on the balance of each character. Right now, I feel we as a community are putting too much focus on that. It splits us up and nothing gets accomplished with the way things are now. Of course, we can discuss certain issues we have with characters; I just suggest we hold off on all of the nerf and buff talk.

Sometimes all the yelling makes it easier for us to ignore the fans But seriously, we're not going to make any giant balance changes unless we feel it's needed. Game's only been out for a very short amount of time.

Sadly, there's a good amount of criticism that is neither "whining" nor "yelling."

And it really does feel disregarded.

I'm glad you all feel that way about changing characters. That's very reassuring.

But please don't ignore the genuine issues that some bring up. This is the stuff that matters right now.

Amaranth,

We are working on fixes and issues as well as new content, which takes time. And everyone has a different opinion on what should be changed about the game and not everyone will be happy with the decisions we make with the game. What specific issues do you feel is disregarded?

The only class issue that is clearly broken imho is the sniper trap thing. Assassins can't remove them and it's cheap as hell that snipers can overlay them. The result is that snipers don't have to worry about assassins (the only class that can kill them safely in the enemy base).

Id rather they fixed the ******* tank. You charge directly into someone. You go straight through them and off the map they just stand there. Assaults can pretty much insta kill you with the rifle, snipers smg can do pretty much the same. Assasains can face grapple then run away through your jet gun without dieing. Gunners? Your kidding right. Supports shotgun will kill a tank no problem before teh support dies. Basically, the tank is.... crap compared to everyone else. It doesnt help either, that laggy servers (which seem to be the norm) break the tank more than even the assasain for me.

This, the changes looked like they were just bug and exploit fixes.

Welcome to my world, minus the charging through people and laggy servers part, not much of an issue for me, might just be your connection.

In before "WELL TEH TANKZ JUST TAKEZ SKILLZ 2 UZE!!!"

This thread isn't about discussing issues you have with each class. Please stay on the topic of whether or not we really need a big change in the balance or not. Besides, the tank can still hold his own, even with the "disadvatages" he has. And assassins can jump over traps using smoke bombs.

But anyways, why do you feel that the game is so unbalanced that it needs a change so soon?

Edit: And I'm not talking about the new patch. Those are just fixes to glitches and exploits that weren't meant to be in the game.

Try playing tank every game for about 10 games. You'll see the problems

The game is great as it is & once the glitches are fixed in the update it will be
perfect. People tend to think certain classes are over/underpowered but I find
it's down to player skill ie. Some matches I get haunted by assassins, next match
I'll own them.
Don't fix what isn't broken.

Play tank or assasain then swap to gunner. You'll see this game is nowhere near balanced

I play the tank second most often. I don't see any severe problems (but I do have slight issues with the charge).

Perhaps the way you play as a character has an effect on what you feel needs changing. I play as both the tank and the assassin, and don't feel that they need fixing. But I mainly focus on destroying bots and turrets, which they excel at, while maybe you feel that the pro-combat skills of the classes are unbalanced. How exactly do you play as them?

The balance issues of Support and Assassin seem readily ignored, except when you guys are accused of something. It took a couple direct accusations that you were fixing the cloak glitch "for the sake of fixing it" to get a response and even then, it was to tell people not to assume that.

Combined with "jokes" like the above, it makes the attitude come off as dickish. Throw in the one someone made about cuing Assassins complaining about overpowering support, the lack of discourse is anything from irritating to frustrating. That you effectively had to be baited out to address the cloak "fix" at all not only reads as disregard like those "whiners" joked about, but seems like a poor use of time when the perfunctory explanation is that you can't be everywhere.

I'm not saying "I expect to get my way," but Assassin topics went on for pages with no response, until finally ban threats and closings happened. It's possible neither of those were avoidable, but it's also quite possible they were. Don't have anything to say (or nothing you're allowed to say)? At least say it. Got a reason? Well Hell, let's hear it. Waiting until things have come to a head seems like it only bred animosity between two factions of players, though. Some people were just being bitchy, and I get that. It seemed like there were plenty of people providing a solid breakdown, though, even when things otherwise, *ahem*, broke down.

Joking about it instead of talking about it sounds like we really are being ignored.

Rightly or wrongly, a lot of us thin there are serious play balance issues, and even beyond the bug fixes. And I'll honour the spirit of the thread by not getting bogged down in specifics (Use of the Assassin threads is mostly because that's where the action was happening), but these issues are obviously contested. Maybe there was some comment in the "over/under" threads, I don't know. But everything else you guys say is cited everywhere the issues are brought up (sourcing podcasts, quoting prior statements from other threads), and on this, we get a line about how the Assassin fix wasn't just for the sake of fixing it.

I'm also pretty sure stuff like Wall Walking has never really been touched, outside a claim that it was done by one of the Devs in the Justin.tv video. This isn't as hotly contested and hasn't degraded into a flame war as far as I know, but it does pop up. Probably because the act is incredibly frustrating. Along with camping on top of the spawn, which may or may not be intended.

I'm trying to be constructive rather than destructive, but when a company with a reputation for listening to and interacting with the fans replies only with barbs, it sounds a lot like disregard. And honestly, it shows you're obviously aware of balance issues when jokes about beefing the support further annoying assassins are made.

Maybe it doesn't get changed, ever. But right now, it looks like a gorilla in the room. And that's considering we already are met with things like "lrn2playnoob" simply for bringing up play issues.

tbh i think the classes are fine, i think its the maps are broken, for me, grenade 3 and ammomule are impossible to defend on because the bases are so vulnerable to everything and it becomes a rush to the enemy base and try to take down their moneyball before ours. especially on grenade 3, if an all offensive team manages to take the balcony overlooking your bot spawns your stuffed they are incredibly hard to uproot.

Thanks for making a thread that actually makes sense. There are small tweaks that can be addressed but overall, the game is balanced and no class is overpowered.