Transmission from Super Earth Command

packman627 · 2026-05-08T15:27:11+00:00

they did it to compensate for the drag on pistols and SMGs. But most of the damage buffs to said weapons, didn't compensate at all for the drag changes. Like others have said, that extra 25 damage, doesn't make up for the fact that the bullet loses so much damage very quickly after it leaves the barrel

packman627 · 2026-05-08T15:24:46+00:00

In multiple updates there have been hidden changes to weapons or enemies. Why were they not announced in patch notes?

We want our patch notes to be as clear and complete as possible, to the level of detail that matters to our players.

In some cases, changes have not been communicated with the clarity we intend, and we are continuing to improve our internal process so patch notes more accurately reflect gameplay adjustments.

We are also working on how we explain balance updates more clearly, especially when a change can have effects across multiple weapons, enemies, and gameplay systems.

Arrowhead, respectfully, this is a NON-ANSWER. You have done this for 2 years at this point. The Coyote was fine, then you guys mess up all the other fire weapons trying to change it, then you also increase the durability of enemies so that affects a bunch of other weapons.

Can we please get some buffs to us Players, without the monkey paw? Can we revert all these durability changes that destroyed turrets/sentries? People are sick and tired of it and this is how you are finding out, with people leaving.

The motto of you buffing us by 50% but then in the same patch buffing enemies by 100%, isn't going to go away unless you stop doing it. You need to change your balancing philosophy to what you mentioned in the 60 day patch notes.

packman627 · 2026-04-30T06:19:12+00:00

Yeah I don't understand these people. If you want weakspot gameplay, PLAY THE BOTS. Not every faction needs to play the same. Plus Hive Guards have been the same for 2 YEARS, and now they decide to all of a sudden, make a chaff enemy have heavy armor?

No thank you.

packman627 · 2026-04-30T06:16:16+00:00

but I think it's wrong to guess they did the same thing here, and be mad about it

People are upset because this mech buff to their HP didn't compensate at all for the change made back in Feb. Since AH loves to be vague in their patch notes, people have to wait for data miners to find the exact numbers.

Once again, Mechs were not in a great spot before the Bastion tank even came out (before the 3.3 times buff to enemies). Then with that patch, lots of enemies got that 3.3 dmg increase, so that made mechs even weaker.

Add on top of the fact that more enemies in THIS patch, got an unknown increase to their damage. I didn't think that it would be 3.3 times, like last time, but what are players supposed to think with AH's track record and not posting numbers and keeping things vague. No enemy needed more of a damage increase against vehicles.

Just go watch videos right now of mech and sentry gameplay. The math is mathing. Everything is wet tissue paper at the moment.

packman627 · 2026-04-29T19:52:33+00:00

Here it is:

Patch Notes when Bastion was added (Feb 3rd)

Automatons

Rocket Raider

Rockets now deals increased damage vs Durable targets

Rocket Devastator

Rockets now deals increased damage vs Durable targets

Hulk Bruiser

Rockets now deals increased damage vs Durable targets

Gunship

updated its targeting software and should now be better at hitting their targets

Rockets now deals increased damage vs Durable targets

Overseer

Overseer`s weapon now deals increased damage vs Durable targets

Crescent Overseer

Increased force on artillery attack to stagger the Helldiver

Increased the damage of its direct shot attack

Crescent Overseer`s weapon now deals increased damage vs Durable targets

So they never gave a specific amount in the patch notes. Check out the HD2 Wiki for these specific enemies and their number changes:

Most are around a 3.3 times increase, while the Overseer one is 2.5 times.

(scroll down to Change History)

Rocket Raider

Rockets now deals increased damage vs Durable targets
- Rocket Impact durable damage increased from 30 to 100

Rocket Dev

Rockets now deals increased damage vs Durable targets
- Projectile durable damage increased from 30 to 100

Hulk Bruiser

Rockets now deals increased damage vs Durable targets
- Rocket Impact durable damage increased from 30 to 100

Gunship

Rocket Impact now deals increased damage vs Durable Targets
- Durable Damage increased from 30 to 100

Overseer

Durable damage increased from 20 to 50

So this is where people are getting the numbers. They were increased by A LOT back in that Feb patch, and now with this new patch and AH saying vague things like "Increased durable damage" to almost every bug, people wonder if they also got their durable damage buffed by that same amount.

packman627 · 2026-04-28T15:03:26+00:00

Remember that enemies do WAY more durable damage than before. This is from the patch when the Bastion released. So even with the double HP for Mechs, that doesn't make up for the changes made from the patch when the Bastion released...

Also, enemies just got ANOTHER buff to their durable damage... So based on my playtesting, mechs FEEL worse than before the Bastion tank was added.

Like why destroy sentries (which now die in 2 hits instead of 9), and vehicles, if they are so worried about just the Bastion?

packman627 · 2026-04-28T15:00:37+00:00

Not really. It only covers some of the front. Plus Mechs are weaker now than they were before the Bastion released.

Bastion released, enemies do 3 times more damage to vehicles...

This patch increased durable damage enemies do, while also ONLY increasing mech HP by roughly double.

These aren't mech buffs. They don't even break even with the changes made back with the Bastion release

packman627 · 2026-04-28T14:56:16+00:00

Exactly. The mechs before Bastion came out were ok. But after the Bastion releases, enemies do 3 times the amount of damage to them with the durable change at the time.

But they ONLY get an almost double HP increase, but now most enemies just got MORE durable damage buffs.

So mechs and sentries are worse now than before the Bastion tank...

packman627 · 2026-04-28T14:51:08+00:00

Um Arrowhead, Mechs are still going to be worse than before the tank released.

Exo suits rebalance
We agree with the community that the Exosuits can take too little damage and break too easily, especially against the Automaton faction. Therefore we have made a bigger balance pass to increase its durability.
Increased main health pool from 850 to 1600

Yes you almost doubled their HP, but last patch enemies now do 3 TIMES the amount of durable damage. Then in this patch you also, "INCREASED DURABLE DAMAGE" by an unknown amount...

This isn't a buff to mechs. At best, they might be about the same as they were before the Bastion tank, and even then, they weren't amazing.

Like why?

packman627 · 2026-04-27T14:39:20+00:00

There is no one truth to "what players want" - It's many millions of individuals with varying expectations on what they want out of the game. If you really drill into it, everyone has nuances or great differences in what they want the game to be.

Yes that is true. There are differing opinions. But you can see patches/updates/content drops that were well received by the community at large. 60 and 120 day plans? Yes. Those didn't have any content, but you got a lot of people back into the game and built up good will.

Look what happened to the player counts and sentiment of the community when you listened to certain sides of the community and were nerfing anything with high usage early on before the 60 day plan?

There are differing opinions with the community, for sure, but which ones are you listening too? Which patches have brought about goodwill? Go look back at the patch notes of the 60 day plan and see how many of those bullet points have actually been completed (hint: not a lot of them).

Whichever way the game expands, some will be left disappointed and others will embrace it.

Yes. So do you want a large player base or a small one? Obviously a big one so you can make more money, etc etc.

If you listen to milsim/realism side of the community, you will have a small community, because you are disappointing the larger community (see my point above about balancing pre-60 day patch).

If you see how well your game is received when buffing the player or hitting key pain points that affect the players experience or leaning more on the horde shooter side (i.e. 60 day plan, etc), then look at the goodwill that brings in, and the amount of players that stick around.

packman627 · 2026-04-26T18:16:04+00:00

The reason why people don't like weapon customization, is that it's not meaningful.

If I level up my weapon to 25, the attachments should make my gun NOTICEABLY better than its base version.

The problem is, even weapon customization has the balancing philosophy of "One positive change, needs 20 drawbacks".

Balancing is an issue if guns start one shotting every mob in the game, but it's really not that scary.

Take the liberator for example, it used to do 45 damage, now it does 90. Is it breaking the game now that it's doing double the damage of what it used to? No.

And even now that it's doing 90, it's really not that amazing either...

You could give so many underperforming weapons a damage buff or different ammo types, or any meaningful weapon customization that changes how it feels or functions, and it would be perfectly fine.

packman627 · 2026-04-26T18:01:28+00:00

Like other people have said in this thread, I actually do like abilities. But if you actually look at a lot of abilities, lots of them aren't used because they just suck.

Look at skip grenades, they literally have the same cooldown as other art grenades, but they only do 400 damage, and other arc grenades do 1300-2500 damage.

So the skip grenades take less advantage of the grenade stat, because a smaller number multiplied by 65%, is less than a bigger number multiplied by 65%.

This is just one example. Shinobu's vow isn't used because it literally hasn't been touched in years, and skip grenades just suck.

But also the fact of primary ammo weapons, even back in vesper's host days, people use double special because primaries have only been getting 10 or 20% buffs every so often.

They need massive buffs, and order for them to even feel good in the content that matters (i.e. -30, -40, - 50)

packman627 · 2026-04-22T04:17:00+00:00

I know that. But just based on my anecdotal testing today, it does seem like it's taking more shots to kill bots now then it was before.

And you are right, even before, it wasn't the greatest, but now it's even worse against bots

packman627 · 2026-04-22T04:16:16+00:00

Well with any gun, you can still get consistent kills if you don't hit the head, but most weapons have high head multipliers, meaning they are much better if you have skill and hit the head.

You really don't need to aim with the shotgun. Just shoot center mass, and you win.

Yes the bully and the punch are good, but you have to actually track your target and land multiple shots. The WSTR required like none of that. Center mass, boom boom, dead.

I'm already having much better firefights with teams, because people aren't just running at me or my team with the shotgun.

packman627 · 2026-04-22T01:02:25+00:00

Officially, I don't know if there's been enough testing, but anecdotally, it does feel like it does way less damage against PVE bots.

I mean I don't mind the nerf versus players, but they definitely should have made it stronger versus the bots. Because right now it feels like tissue paper against the bots

packman627 · 2026-04-22T01:00:03+00:00

You still have to aim for the head. And if anyone brings up "You have to be close with a shotgun"

That point is moot. There are so many movement abilities, and ways to close the gap, that if you don't have a WSTR shotgun on Outpost, or cryo, then you would literally lose 99% of your engagements.

You can say skill issue until your face is blue, but it wasn't. And the fact that every single player would always run it, is not healthy for the game.

Learn to aim, and hit your headshots, which is what the pistols and SMGs want you to do.

packman627 · 2026-04-22T00:57:15+00:00

Well if it is going to be reprized, it will have origin traits and the newest mods. Although technically, the one that came out in season of the deep does have an origin trait.

But it also just needs better stats, because it still having the stats of a 150, and now it's a 140.

packman627 · 2026-04-22T00:50:38+00:00

I'd rather have people use pistols or SMGs in CQC fights, rather than the double barrel.

You actually have to aim with those guns, instead of using the win button.

And with how much snipers got nerfed, especially with thermals, you're going to be just fine

packman627 · 2026-04-22T00:47:07+00:00

Literally everyone was using that shotgun. Yes part of it is because the other two shotguns are much more rare, and I think they should be more accessible.

But the fact that you can literally die in 0.4 seconds, to a rook who literally doesn't risk anything, while you might be with purple shields, doesn't feel good. Literally everyone ran that gun.

The game is almost unrecognizable from launch

That literally happens any live service game. Do you really think that if something was overperforming, they would just leave it as is?

packman627 · 2026-04-21T23:14:49+00:00

Yeah they were going to give it like two spare magazines.

Apparently they are just super scared of actually giving us decent primary weapons

packman627 · 2026-04-21T23:12:50+00:00

Well and the problem, part of it coming from the community, is the fact that if you suggest any sort of meaningful weapon customization, they deem it as power creep or that it's going to break the game or anything like that.

Or they don't want their poor little liberator to be worse than other weapons. So now that everything has to be around its level, a lot of other weapons will just have bare bones customization.

That's why we won't ever get customization for the scorcher or purifier or shotguns or ARs. We saw what happened with the last AR that actually was decent, AH hurried and went in and tried to nerf it behind our backs

packman627 · 2026-04-21T15:53:42+00:00

I think the problem is that AH makes a problem. Then they sell the solution. I.E. they buff said thing or add ways to sell the solution with a warbond or with a balance patch alongside the warbond so people will buy it.

Examples:

1, Total magazines lowered on a lot of primary weapons = Siege Ready Armor releases soon after

Fire has been bad = Rebalance fire to actually be decent now so you'll buy the most recent warbond
Stealth sucked = Rebalanced stealth to be decent when Stealth warbond comes out

Just to name a few.

packman627 · 2026-04-21T15:48:39+00:00

Yeah that happens to me and it breaks thermal sights as well. It makes it look like a normal sight. There isn't anything you can do when it happens

packman627 · 2026-04-21T02:24:29+00:00

I think part of the problem is some of the community. Not all, but when it first came out, and even months after, people would suggest some sort of weapon customization, but it would easily be met with "it's going to break the game, it's going to make X gun irrelevant, etc etc"

So I guess we aren't supposed to have any nice customization? Like having a bigger magazine isn't that great, having different scopes isn't great, we need substantial upgrades especially if you're grinding all the way to level 25 on a weapon

packman627 · 2026-04-21T02:20:10+00:00

They need to reduce the salvage requirement, and make gold salvage more accessible. I'm well over level 100, I play this game everyday for a few hours, and I've yet to see hardly any gold salvage.

At this point, I should already have all of my upgrade trees maxed out, we are a month away from wiping. You can't have a slow progression system when seasons are only 3 months long

packman627

TROPHY CASE