Pleased Giraffe combat is a tidbit unbalanced

from what i can see of the pleased giraffe combat rebalance, NPC mobs might be a bit more powerful than they should be.
creatures are fine, but NPC mobs are a great deal more dangerous, especially if they have a gun which is odd since player guns seem to have gotten hit with the nerfbat and are borderline non viable. methinks players need a buff to gun weaponry, while NPC mobs need a general nerf, player melee weaponry is fine and doesnt need a buff or a nerf its perfect where it is.

 

I noticed this too, guns are almost nonviable, especially where NPCs are concerned, as their armor kind of outclasses most if not all guns, not just in the new update, but since NPC armor was added.

 

I like the fact that you can't bumrush into an armed opponent (or multiple) and expect to win, hands down, everytime. Dungeons are actually... reasonably dangerous now, and conquering them requires a bit of forethought, like what your plan of attack is, what your escape route is, etcetera. It feels like you're not some omnipotent entity and that the enemy NPCs actually stand a chance when you step on their turf.

My only issue is that many populated dungeons inhibit the players ability to explore a world. I would greatly prefer if enemies at the dungeons entrance level (not the rest of the dungeon) did not attack the player when all they want to do is, say, uproot a Beakseed plant which is located within sight of an NPC.

 

The question is when does the next update that focuses on combat and balance get released? A lot of progression hinges on combat due to the dungeons needed to upgrade through the tiers.

 

Really? I find the game balance to be way better now, challenging and more fun just like terraria is. Starbound should NOT be a game where you can overpower anything easily, even mere common mobs.

 

how long before this update

 

As swat explained five minutes before your post...

 

Also, balance is a thing that's going to be happening preeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeetty much all the way up to 1.0, and probably beyond that too. (This is not a game that's ever really, truly "done", as CF has stated the desire to keep adding to it on a regular basis post-1.0.) Combat isn't going to be perfect after the Combat-focused update, it'll just be a way bigger step towards an acceptable balance.

We need to stop thinking of this game as pieces of complete, finished product tied together. It's not. Just because it's available doesn't mean it's final. Everything is subject to tweaking and reworking for a while, and changes in one element will affect the others.

 

I kind of like it the way it is now. I don't like going to old planets and one-shotting everything, the enemies might as well not even be there. I expect to be stronger, but not to the point where I don't even consider them a moderate threat.

 

that is good to hear, i had to actually use admin mode to get through some parts because i just couldnt keep up with the npc damage output.[DOUBLEPOST=1440669067][/DOUBLEPOST]

i agree fights with NPCs did get a bit one sided, an example being get impervium broadsword or almost any rocket launcher from a volcanic/dead/lava planet and you will win every fight ever. i still think that the NPCs could tone it down just a little bit especially apex snipers good lord those apex snipers.

Edit: btw when i mentioned the impervium broadsword and rocket launchers that was before pleased giraffe trying to do that now is certain death. (especially against apex snipers)[DOUBLEPOST=1440669551][/DOUBLEPOST]

my main problem was gun toting enemies, ranged NPCs seem to have gotten quite proficient at cross mapping you especially apex with sniper rifles, and since i cant fight back very well with guns due to them being seemingly nerfed, it turns into me spamming medkits as i rush them with my sword. you are correct though combat was rather heavily skewed in the player character's favor before this update.

 

I haven't met gun toting npcs yet(been exploring in a volcanic planet) but i have been fighting the mobs, and i can say that combat feels different, and some of the ranged weaponry combinations become quite handy.

The two handed sword remains the go to for sticky situations, due to its power and blocking ability, but its nice to know a similarly tiered spear does just as much damage. A nimble player may get more use out of the spear.

Knives seem interesting enough in that the target has a brief stun when hit, but even dual wielding them doesn't provide enough stun to make this an advantage. Compared to the delay of its one handed cousins, knives seem to fit a spray and pray mentality, swing those blades around and it the mobs runs into them, its their own fault.

I need to see more mobs, but from what I can tell the ranged attacks have been improved and attacks hit for more, one clearly doesn't want to take a clip of ranged fire on the chin. Next time i play ill have to see if i can find more npcs to bug.

 

Combat was worse before, wouldn't call it good now but it's getting there.

My main issue would be the ranged npcs. As a gunfighter, things get pretty painful if there's more than one or two gun-toting enemies involved in the battle. It gets better as I obtain ranged weaponry, like grenade launchers due to the fact that they deal splash damage accompanied with the high base damage. Killing all of them as fast as possible is essential unless you're able to take the time to run.

Piercing bullets on select firearms would be a nice bandaid (if they are in the game already, haven't found them yet).

 

well i have started playing starbound again (after probably 1 1/2 years?) and what i have noticed is that the value's are closer now. like.. i was still doing well with the critters on extreme difficulty with a T2 weapon.
The NPC's in extreme difficulty dungeons.. well.. they seem to me as a threat but it's not like i'm having trouble beating them.. yea sometimes i die.. but the second time i'm doing better in kiting and keep going.

 

I agree that NPCs are a bit too powerful right now. If you go to a planet with the previous tier of armor, while you can stand a chance against monsters (sometimes - don't get me started on the boss' damage boosts and how completely overpowered they are considering the armor you have to use against them), NPCs seem way too powerful.
Not only does every NPC seem to deal immense damage with both melee and ranged weapons at the same time (and they all have both), even weak ones (enough that I have to spam medkits to get anywhere near enemies with the current tier of armor), but you can't wait for them to reload either, because if they even do have energy, it replenishes too fast to do anything about. The main problem is that in solo play, most dungeons are filled with enemies that will either be equal in power or greater in power than you. 1a =/= 12a, which means you stand next to no chance against those 12 enemies that are equally equipped to you unless you exploit their AI to pull of hit and runs that wouldn't fool a dead tumbleweed in real life. Another problem is that enemies will instantly shoot DIRECTLY AT YOU the millisecond you get into their line of sight. They have perfect reaction time and near-perfect aim, which is a problem when dealing with a large number of them.

 

The one way to counter this is to increase the protection values granted by armor. However, you have to edit the packed.pak file directly for this. Indeed, the folders in the asset folder of the main directory are empty, which makes tweaking those values not quite as easy as they should be.

What sucks is that CF rebalanced the combat system during the Colonization update and will probably take like, several months or so before actually fixing the protection values of armor. They increased the energy granted, but greatly lowered the amount of Protection Value given by all armors and halved the health. I have the Avalie (Triage) mod and the 1.61 update had the updated numbers but used an older version of the Apex's values, resulting in Impervium Armor granting you near invincibility, yet current armor is, as you stated, nearly useless. So CF has to find a middle ground between the old PV of the old system and the current one if they don't want everyone and their mother using admin mode just to explore and progress through the game... so you should probably get used to admin mode or find a way to edit the packed.pak file to increase the PV of each race's armor as well as health.

 

Landing a "mostly harmless world" where everything is out to put my head on a pike reminds me of the early alpha days were temple guards sniped you from across the map killing you almost instantly. This happening in the dungeons.. They can see me I can't see them and the weapons are utterly useless at best. its infuriating to be swarmed by fifteen mobs and being constantly killed. the only reason why I'm surviving was me getting a stack of Fiber poison trees from a prior char before the update... Since that world is gone.

This update is lack luster at best, I like the systems but Holy hell.. This is in the realms of the update back before charcoal was added where worlds were spawning with little to no coal... I had my starting world only have 348 coal on it... TOTAL every layer. most of it at the bottom.. 48 was accessible from the top if you stripped it. Or when birds were things of pure one shoting death and the corpses killed you. I'm getting flashbacks here guys. I like the potential of things but this update is making things have a sour taste in my mouth where I'm rage quitting after dying five times in a row trying to explore the face of the planet..

 

You're gonna have to quickly move those patches from Nightly to Unstable and then to Stable because as ti stands now, combat with NPCs is just not worth the effort.