"armor is working as intended"

Before I get into this, I will say that I do agree with 94% of what NWI said in their most recent post. In case you haven't seen it, you can check it out here.

However, this part has me rather confused and worried:

0_1557022803467_Capture.PNG

Now, I don't have much to say against the ammo carriers. The only real complaint I have is the lack of pistol ammo, as I loved using only sidearms in Ins2014, but that could be fixed with something like the addition of a pistol mag pouch. My idea was that it would use the same slot as the Gas Mask, so you'll get extra ammo while losing some stealthiness in smoke and immunity to chemical gas.

The statements NWI made about armor I wholeheartedly disagree with, to (most likely) no one's surprise at this point. I'll mention the main points first and explain later.

  1. Armor is absolutely not used as intended when it actually is used.

  2. These stats make it seem like most people avoid a certain armor type, so the people who do use all armor options wouldn't be a "majority" compared to the people that don't.

  3. Heavy Armor was better in the CTA and early Betas at stopping bullets. By that, I mean it could actually stop bullets. However, Heavy Armor wasn't unbalanced at all.

  4. Likewise, I'm not sure I would say Heavy Armor was the meta at that time. It definitely was in the Betas, but not the CTA as far as I can remember.

  5. The TTK back then was still technically longer than the current TTK, but the game was at least more balanced.

...I think that's it. So, to actually explain my points here:

  1. Right now, it makes the most sense to wear Light/Heavy armor if you're a class that stays back (like Marksman, Gunner, Commander/Observer, and maybe Demolitions). and skip armor with classes pushing into the frontline (Breacher, Rifleman, Advisor).

In theory, this is completely backward to how it should be.

It would make far more sense for the classes engaging in CQB to have armor while having the classes with a long-range focus ignore armor in favor of extra supply to upgrade their arsenal (with the possible exception of the Commander for survivability).

  1. These stats are really confusing for me.

Technically, 34% is a majority when you consider all the possible options to pick from on the survey. However, if 7% of players avoid Light Armor, 29% of players avoid taking Heavy Armor, and 28% of players taking no armor at all, then that would mean that about 64% of players avoid one of the armor options, so the 34% of players who do use all armor options aren't the majority.

  1. In the CTA and early Betas, Armor was better at actually stopping incoming projectiles from killing you. The TTK was still pretty fast, however.

Of note is the fact that Heavy Armor allowed players to survive an extra 5.56 shot, so it would take three shots to down a player with Heavy Armor, but 7.6x39 still needed just two shots to down a Heavy Armor target (this is all chest shots, obviously). For game balance purposes, this actually makes more sense. 7.62 rifles fire slower than the 5.56 rifles and are also harder to control, so they get better damage to compensate. As of right now, the M4A1 is better than every Insurgent assault rifle in the game because it has the same shots-to-kill with a higher firerate and better controllability.

However, Heavy Armor would only ever save you from an extra bullet. The only cases where it could stop more than one bullet was the Hi-Power pistol and, for some reason, the M24 lmao. The SVD and other similar calibers could still one-shot, and the Long Barrel helped improve consistency (although it could've been OP then, too; I'm not sure).

  1. Heavy Armor definitely wasn't the meta back in the CTA. Now, since there is an NDA, I won't mention the CTA much.

However, in the early Betas, the hitreg and damage in online servers were completely fucked. I have no idea what happened between the CTA and the first Beta, but goddamn hitreg and damage were fucked. Of course, if the TTK is already insanely high, then Heavy Armor made you even harder to kill.

In the same update that helped fix the hitreg, both armor types were nerfed so badly that the L106A1 could two-shot Heavy Armor in CQB, thereby making the M45 useless.

  1. Now, here's the problem. At this point, I'm not sure what NWI's going for. They could either go for a short TTK or a balanced damage model. I think you can do both, but right now it's not happening at all.

The Sept. 6th update essentially broke the game balance in favor of a lower TTK, but not in a good way at all. We Ins2014 vets loved the fast TTK, with 70% of kills being one-shots. With Sandstorm, however, not only is armor useless, but you can't one-shot anyone, either. It's a horrible compromise.

I've posted the current armor stats a thousand times, so rather than just copy-pasting them, I'll make the stats a bit more reader-friendly. Instead of listing exact weapons, I'll list weapon groups. Also, these stats are all at point-blank range, as there are a few differences with distance.

-> Light Armor protects you from two pistols and one battle rifle (for some reason).

-> Heavy Armor additionally protects you from three pistols, three submachineguns, and two battle rifles (so five pistols, three SMGs, three BRs in total).

-> Armor is essentially bypassed by three pistols, eleven assault rifles/carbines, one submachine gun, four light machineguns, two shotguns, one battle rifle, two bolt-action rifles, and one marksman rifle.

-> The guns capable of one-shotting a player with a torso shot who has no armor includes three light machineguns, two bolt-action rifles, three battle rifles, one marksman rifle, and two shotguns.

These stats have a few things I'd like to mention:

-> Light Armor only protects you from 25% of Sandstorm's handguns, even though that's what it's supposed to protect you from.

-> Heavy Armor helps against more handguns and pistol-caliber SMGs (which is what Light Armor should do).

-> Both Light & Heavy Armor help against battle rifles, even though Light definitely wouldn't do shit.

-> Neither armor type does anything to protect you from assault rifles and carbines, even though the description of Heavy Armor claims that it helps against intermediate calibers IIRC. Hell, IRL even Light Armor might stop a 7.62x39 round from killing you (not a 5.56 though lmao).

-> A Rifleman has to equip a battle rifle to have the ability to one-shot an unarmored player without a headshot.

I can't post the armor stats before the Sept 6th update, as that was a long time ago and I can't remember it 100%. Still, at least that damage model created a more balanced game (although Insurgent pistols were still some trash lmao).

There's no way in hell the current damage model is "working as intended".

last edited by MarksmanMax

its pretty spread out in my eyes.....seems to be working as intended....

@max80 Well, I think another issue is that a lot of players don't actually know the effectiveness of armor. I'd say a lot of people think armor is good because they can always survive a bullet with armor on, even though in reality you'd probably survive the same shot without any armor on at all.

This post is deleted!
last edited by Max80

Effectiveness of armor greatly improves with range, both in game and irl and it also should offer protection from shrapnel lowering kill range of explosives. That might introduce a hard to notice effect on game balance.

IRL the only reason not to take armor I can think of is either lack of availability or intention to avoid combat in general as in during a recon mission.

I haven't played the newest version enough to criticize the game directly and talk about stats, but I am having a blast one-shoting everything in sight with an SVD - something that I used to do with an M16 in the original game. But if an M16 one-shot everything, what point would there be to higher caliber weapons? Despite huge maps there's not enough long-range engagements to make improved ballistics matter.

So I guess I have to agree with some of your points. In Beta people were whining about TTK - but that was a hitreg, performance and aim issue for the most part imho. Thus in my head this sounds correct: BRs against heavy armor, heavy armor good against low calibers, minor defense against intermediate but mostly defense from long range, shrapnel and ricochets (shots through walls?), light armor only defense against small calibers and minor defense from intermediate at long ranges.

That way heavy armor will be for slow, deliberate strategy; keeping enemy at distance, shooting through walls with high calibers. Meanwhile light armor favors flanking and fast movement to close distance and thus remove heavy armors advantage of improved long range defense, and rushing through doors to eliminate the advantage of improved defense against ricochets through walls etc.

When it comes to no armor at all I think it should just be removed from the game. Light armor should be the default and heavy armor should be the only thing players can select for supply points. It would greatly simplify the game and the balance.

At this point all I hope is they don't fuck the mod support up as bad as they fucked up the gunplay.

If we can fix the gunplay with the mod support, this game will be good.

@Pakislav

"But if an M16 one-shot everything, what point would there be to higher caliber weapons?"

In my opinion, the intermediates should onetap with a torso hit at medium range. To onetap at longer range, it should have to be an upper torso hit.

Heavier calibres should onetap leg shots up close and anywhere on the torso at all at long range.

Anything with a bolt should be dirt cheap on supply cost. The upcoming .50 cals should be instagib even through walls.

Intermediates being 5.56/5.45/7.62x39, barrel length playing a role in what's defined as "medium range" or "long range".
Heavier calibres being 7.62x51/7.62x54, same thing with barrel length.

That's how you make everything lethal and everything worthwhile.

last edited by Whitby

Completely agreed with Whitby.
NWI won't listen to use though, so yeah maybe mods can save the atrocious gun gameplay.

After that all we need is the bots being fixed, so that they aren't the fucking T-1000 Terminator that don't react to being shot and their aiming is not either:
a) Olympic shooter with a reaction time of a housefly
b) I forgot my eyes at home and I was born retarded
but once again they have human like aim.

@Sgt-Kanyo omfg was on the phone while reading and just had to explain why I started pissing myself laughing in the middle of a conversation.

So true. The gunplay fuckup is issue #1, but I'm pretty sure not every single person in the middle east has downs syndrome, NWI need to work on the AI as immediate priority #2.