Patch: June 22nd, biplane buff, miscellaneous improvements

[lamster]

This patch contains some significant buffs for the biplane. The consensus among high-level players is that the old biplane was never an ideal choice at the highest levels, and league and ladder play have supported that conclusion. Neither is the biplane generally overpowered among newer players, nor heavily played by any player segment. These buffs may very well be too extreme -- in that case they'll be partially rolled back in short order. Please post your balance feedback once you've had a chance to test out the changes.

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June 22nd, 2010

Updated graphics for tbd_asteroids

Miranda's Reverse no longer temporarily disables Repair Drone
Miranda's Reverse and Time Anchor now reduce Repair Drone's recharge rate by 50% (time between repairs is doubled for the 1.35 seconds following Reverse/TimeAnchor activation)

Biplane (All Forms) reduced afterburner energy usage by 5%
Biplane (Dogfighter) secondary weapon increased range from 80 to 90, added piercing (second hit deals 80%, third 50%), increased damage from 27 to 28
Biplane (Recoilless) secondary weapon increased range from 80 to 90, added piercing (second hit deals 70%, third 40%)
Biplane (Heavy Cannon) primary weapon increased piercing second hit damage from 50% to 67%

Improved "Offline Mode"
* Plane configurations are saved between sessions
* All downloaded maps (not just official maps) are available for play
* FFA and TDM games end after 7 minutes

Added friend count to friends list window

Added account creation date to Hangar Deck

Added "Local Time" and "Altitude Time (GMT)" to bottom of in-game scoreboard (hold TAB to view)

Adjusted "Mouse Navigation" trigger to prevent accidentally entering mouse mode when switching to Altitude from another application

Servers that are running an outdated version are automatically filtered from the server list

Fixed a few bugs

[Evan20000]

These patches are amazing. O_O

[tgleaf]

Originally Posted by lamster

Added friend count to friends list window

Added "Local Time" and "Altitude Time (GMT)" to bottom of in-game scoreboard (hold TAB to view)

Thank you, thank you, thank you!

[Greekjr14]

This is now one of my favorite patches ever thank you thank you thank you!

[thatdarnedbob]

Yeah, the buffs to Dogfighter and Recoilless especially are great. This gives the Biplane a large advantage in the safe, short range, crowd control department. Though since I usually fly DF loopy or one of those two setups, I may be biased in liking it. :P

[ufo]

will a trickster bounce shot buff ever be implimented? or will it remain a wishful thought because not enough vets play trickster/know how to bounce shots effectively.

[XX1]

Hmm, well i don't think the TA's repair droned worked at first until i waited like two seconds or so then it started repairing. I think that the Trickster, Laser, and TA should have the same repair time to be fair for the setups. if you have to Anchor multiple times to get away from your enemies, the repair wont really start taking much effect until you really ran away from them.

not so sure about the Biplane buff.

-XX2

[[Y]]

Oh Jesus christ why did I ace now I won't be able to play buffed HC D:

still, +9001 to Lam and Karl for this patch

[lamster]

Trickster/Laser/TA do have the same repair time now: upon activation of Reverse or TA, the drone's recharge rate will be reduced by 50% for the next 1.35 seconds. So if you were 0.2 seconds from your next repair tick going off, and you hit TA or reverse, it will now take 0.4 seconds for the repair to go off. By default, repairs occur every 1 second -- with constant reverse/TA spam they should take 2 seconds. Let me know what you think after more testing.

[Distraction]

Another update?

[wolf'j'max]

Thank you thank you thank you! Best patch ever!

[nobodyhome]

tbd_asteroids: looks ugly imho, but i'll probably get used to it pretty fast. the bigger problem is that hitting the ceiling = megahurtz! no good.

[lamster]

Oops - will fix ceiling damage in the next patch.

[XX1]

Originally Posted by lamster

Trickster/Laser/TA do have the same repair time now: upon activation of Reverse or TA, the drone's recharge rate will be reduced by 50% for the next 1.35 seconds. So if you were 0.2 seconds from your next repair tick going off, and you hit TA or reverse, it will now take 0.4 seconds for the repair to go off. By default, repairs occur every 1 second -- with constant reverse/TA spam they should take 2 seconds. Let me know what you think after more testing.

Ok thank you for that TA repair knowledge now. i will continue using repair but, i feel that heavy armor will work better now for the TA because of the long repair wait.

-XX2

[Evan20000]

I'm still a HA purest. I think that this patch is amazing. Bip seems to fit right in with the games I've played since the patch.

[Kuja900]

I really got to give props to the devs, to not only see such quick response to the community's suggestions but to see some of my own ideas on the list I am just lost for words.

[DryBone]

<3 the patches
bip's buff was the best xD

[sonicking917]

Not listed in the updates is that offline mode also gives you custom layouts 11-15 that you get from going Ace.

[Esoteric]

Nice stuff.

Will need to get some solid play in to see how biplane is looking but I think we can safely say it is more viable than before.

[Radium]

Originally Posted by lamster

Oops - will fix ceiling damage in the next patch.

Was having fun throwing people into the ceiling in ladder today with my remote

[innerlyte]

Just curious -- why the asteroids update? The graphics look so-so, but more importantly, the rock spacing has now changed, which will likely affect the play on that map.

[Greekjr14]

just tried out biplane in some ladder games and i must say biplane has finally got what it deserves

[mlopes]

Damn, and I will be unable to try it for about the next 3 hours.

Thanks for the buff, we, biplane fans were really needing this.

EDIT: I managed to try it for 5 minutes. In the only server were I could log, the 20 minute ball football, I got 3x the kills the rest of my team had, I got 3 golden bars at least twice in 5 minutes, all this without farming and in a map where loopy spam makes sure no one stays alive for long.

Biplane now is sweeeeeeeeet <3<3<3<3<3

[sonicking917]

I agree, my main is Biplane, I feel this is a great buff to it. So far it doesn't seem OP, but I have yet to try it in TDM or FFA yet, though...

[A Nipple]

Originally Posted by Kuja900

I really got to give props to the devs, to not only see such quick response to the community's suggestions but to see some of my own ideas on the list I am just lost for words.

lol kuja my idea damit!! =P but tbh all kudos is really owed to devs =] gj

nipnip

p.s. bip!!! so sexy!

[Greekjr14]

Originally Posted by A Nipple

p.s. bip!!! so sexy!

Psshhhh biplane was always sexy, it just needed some war paint to show how great it is, if you know what I mean

[Kuja900]

Hey so uhm who gave asteroids cancer? It seriously looks like all the rocks grew tumors, I do not find it at all visually appealing .

[Kuja900]

Originally Posted by A Nipple

lol kuja my idea damit!! =P but tbh all kudos is really owed to devs =] gj

nipnip

p.s. bip!!! so sexy!

Originally Posted by A Nipple

I was just discussing planes and balances with kuja and it mentioned how the only OP plane it thinks is the anchor.

ahem mr nip!

[A Nipple]

Originally Posted by kuja900

ahem mr nip!

8d .

[Zombi]

Yay!! I love the bip and randa changes and asteroids looks much better now so great work :P

P.S. thx for this awesome support

[eth]

Thanks for the patch!

I want to try and give some constructive criticism regarding the biplane buff:

Biplane viability in TBD 5v5(or anywhere) wasn't really related to killing power, but more utility. Biplane was a damn strong killer before this buff, but even if it is now slightly better at killing, it still has zero utility. The bomber has about equal killing power, but since the bomber can use its DPS to lock down areas of the map, it will always be the better choice. In the usual standoffs in TBD, biplane becomes useless in comparison to other planes, and that's the real problem imo. The afterburner buff is a nice touch for bombrunning, but even so.. I don't think it's enough to make it a plane you would want to pick for your comp.

My suggestion would be giving it some sort of utility and decreasing its killing power as necessary. Maybe replace the long range gun with a smoke cloud for AoE damage reduction and buff the short range gun significantly. I don't know. But I know that if you want to make biplane viable in competitive TBD 5v5, it has to have some sort of utility. Short range DPS just isn't worth it, no matter how good.

End note: this just relates to dogfighter and recoilless - not sure how HC plays out - before it used to be just a weak bomber, maybe it's a better choice now.

[A Nipple]

Originally Posted by eth

Thanks for the patch!

I want to try and give some constructive criticism regarding the biplane buff:

Biplane viability in TBD 5v5(or anywhere) wasn't really related to killing power, but more utility. Biplane was a damn strong killer before this buff, but even if it is now slightly better at killing, it still has zero utility. The bomber has about equal killing power, but since the bomber can use its DPS to lock down areas of the map, it will always be the better choice. In the usual standoffs in TBD, biplane becomes useless in comparison to other planes, and that's the real problem imo. The afterburner buff is a nice touch for bombrunning, but even so.. I don't think it's enough to make it a plane you would want to pick for your comp.

My suggestion would be giving it some sort of utility and decreasing its killing power as necessary. Maybe replace the long range gun with a smoke cloud for AoE damage reduction and buff the short range gun significantly. I don't know. But I know that if you want to make biplane viable in competitive TBD 5v5, it has to have some sort of utility. Short range DPS just isn't worth it, no matter how good.

End note: this just relates to dogfighter and recoilless - not sure how HC plays out - before it used to be just a weak bomber, maybe it's a better choice now.

I had an idea that the bip gun aims a little bit like the bomber tail gun fire?!

[B0T 2]

Roids new name is now: cheeseroids

[tyr]

Thats why I think these changes can be interesting eth
A bit more range (and since the rage is so small, this small increase is actually pretty significant) gives more flexibility and a shorter approach time and pierce actually can be pretty interesting during pushes or something.
I totally agree with what you said but I think we have to try it pretty extensively in ladder matches or something before stating that it is still useless.
I invite any skilled biplane players to try and play biplane in ladder to try everything.

[gemigemi]

Originally Posted by lamster

Added friend count to friends list window

Added account creation date to Hangar Deck

Added "Local Time" and "Altitude Time (GMT)" to bottom of in-game scoreboard (hold TAB to view)

Awesome stuff! It's all about the little things.

[Seadog]

Finger licking good

[Jayfourke]

New Asteroids is absolutely terrible. I keep panicking and avoiding the background asteroids. I know I'll get used to it, but frankly the old background was much nicer.

Bip buffs are nice though, thanks for those.

[A Nipple]

Originally Posted by Jayfourke

New Asteroids is absolutely terrible. I keep panicking and avoiding the background asteroids. I know I'll get used to it, but frankly the old background was much nicer.

Bip buffs are nice though, thanks for those.

I think its mostly a matter of us 'veterans' getting used to the change in asteroids, for me the scale is that part I am getting used to. But the only part i dont get is u die when u hit the top =S I dont think theres one other map with this, thats only thing I would change!

nip

[wolf'j'max]

Originally Posted by tyr

Thats why I think these changes can be interesting eth
A bit more range (and since the rage is so small, this small increase is actually pretty significant) gives more flexibility and a shorter approach time and pierce actually can be pretty interesting during pushes or something.
I totally agree with what you said but I think we have to try it pretty extensively in ladder matches or something before stating that it is still useless.
I invite any skilled biplane players to try and play biplane in ladder to try everything.

will do, mlopes should too ^_^ (nobo and dio get back to biplane already >.>)

edit: not that i consider myself as a 'really skilled' biplane player, i think i am decent.

[Kuja900]

The biplane used to have a niche in competitive play as a bomb runner before the community metagamed out of it, I think thats a niche it could fill again. Perhaps some kind of unique feature like an advantage against emp (turning or thrust) or something else mobility related to help it regain this role would help its viability.