I didnt saw from the new beef anything, of cours ei am such a monster i wouldnt really see the difference. But i admit that new /low lvl player must have problems in lvling.
1 vs 8 in a dg is not really a good way to lvl.
I would suggest another solution to this problem.
The main problem looks for, that low lvl player cannot lvl that easy anymore.
And if thats getting frustrated people wont play very loong.
So why not introduce another xp system for the player.
Its starts in that way that low lvl players do get more xp ( or maxxed xp) from lower lvl AIs till they are lvl 2k or so (might need a non linear progress or that).
Instead of beefing and nerfing the AIs constantly.
If someone is passes the 2k lvl they will start getting the xp now that u would get from an AI.
Everyone who hits 2k in lvl should gained enough experience to handle with beefed AIs.
Any comments voomy/ jeff to that approach?

I did a little testing yesterday (as in: before Jeff nerfed them):
Level 800 SD in a sup, exc, 2 zeus vulture with an excom, eclipse blockade, venusian motor, venusian vitality, sement radar and some laser volies. Maxed subskills, AT 20

I was able to kill picks, BGs and forgones fairly easily as long as I managed to fight them one by one, which thanks to my speed, wasn't hard. Forgones were especially fun to kill because due to their sniper skill, they sat still, allowing me to just dodge their pulses while flying circles around them. Only died once when 3 vultures decided to hunt me

Level 800 Sniper in a Qa, zeus, greener juju with a catapult, excom, eclipse blockade, venu motor, argonium charger, combined capacitor 8, halved antimatter, sonic radar/zeteny radar. Max subskills, AT 20

Even though I've never played sniper, picks, BGs and forgones weren't much of a problem. The Catapult's crits gave me enough time to kill the AI before it'd reach me, unless it was a bad spawn. In that case, I just decided to kite the AI, which was a lot easier than I thought it was.



In both of those tests, I saw no sign of the AI being completly overpowered and unkillable by lower level players. The battles had a length which I perceived as fitting and the level of difficulty wasn't very bad either.


I disagree. Not being able to level to 1500 or 2000 in a few days is not a necessarily a bad thing. The reasons for people getting frustrated is usually quite the opposite: they got the best gear, enough levels and have killed everything at least once. A game starts to get boring as soon as it's not challenging anymore.

Long story short: I think perilous AI should be challenging, BUT I have to admit that the difficulty curve isn't as smooth as it should be. With my sniper, it took me 3-4 shots with a Catapult and with my SD, a few seconds with an excom to kill a rosemary, which usually is the AI you level on before entering perilous/when entering perilous the first time.

@ s_m_w

My main concern is with the shield/resistance buff to Picks. It's fine for you to feel that they are currently well balanced, but when an endgame player who's used to waltzing through any dg not containing GB's or Platties suddenly has to spend several minutes gnawing away at a few level 1300 AI, that is an indication that something is wrong. I would suggest that you don't have a broad enough perspective on the matter.

SMW, level 800 with max sub skills? and gears of tech20? why dont u try calculating your sp again ? cause all that gear will take atleast 1300 levels...

Not to mention that you tested classes that arent getting shot usually.

Indeed; snipers have always been able to do most content, given enough boredom/time to finish it. SD's are similar; given skill, almost any level of SD can do any level of stuff.

The classes that really suffer are those that improve more via in game skills and classes, such as zerkers, gunners, and engineers. You should test those out, instead.

I done a few dg's with my shm, mf and engineer the only thing that would kill me insanely were the mfing 3 forgones not the omega platforms... If that is what the devs intended, it works!

Forgones if anything are the most broken of them all, but I like these improvments overall

I don't agree though that AI that were once doable, are now unable to do them. It will just extremely annoy some people as posted before in this topic.

Most of the gear is not tech 20 as you may have noticed, but you are right, it's closer to being over 800 (836 to be exact) than under and considering I decided to ignore misc skills, such as station management, trade skills, Zens etc, my test results might be a little bit off. What level of skill and gear should a player have to be able to level in perilous?


Something that'd help a lot would be feedback on the difficulty on certain AI, before and after the beef (preferably the non-nerfed beef), i.e. average time to kill a DG with that AI, perceived difficulty for your class etc. The more info we have, the better we can balance everything

@ s_m_w

viewtopic.php?f=4&t=43126

I haven't added to it since yesterday, but I believe this is what you are looking for. So far, Picks have stood out to me as unacceptably hardier, while I've also heard that MF 3 Forgones are doing way too much damage (haven't run into them yet).

excellent

the keyword here is ITS NOT FUN

GAMES NEED TO BE FUN OR PLAYERS DONT PLAY THEM.

SIMPLE. (change the level of the AI to suit the strength, and there is no problem. THE SOLUTION IS STARING YOU IN THE FACE, THE OBVIOUS SOLUTION IS THE BEST ONE. DOIT, dont pretend that the original problem isnt still there)

[color=ff0000]As for my engineer I used to predominantly do BgrGrns in dgs, took me around 3-5 minutes per lvl using BFDs and a charge, now I lose a few BFDs or get bored because it takes too long and just sit around watching trade slaves mine...[/color]