Tacs' plasma gun under kraken rounds

[Sub_Zero]

I do not have problems with its performance against heavy armoured targets. Kraken rounds boost its efficiency and tacs are able to deplete a heavy armoured squad's health relatively fast. However when a super-heavy armoured target is fired upon, the damage seems less impressive. My proposition is to make kraken rounds also affect on super-heavy armoured targets.

Why? The reasoning is pretty simple here. Tactical marines are the only high infantry-based source of HI/SHI damage. Terminators have a pitiful damage type for a T3 elite ranged unit (I am looking at you, overpowered Chaos terminators), devastators have the worst lascannon (it is used to damage big targets like terminators as well, that is why I am mentioning that) and no other useful upgrades, that is pretty much it about ranged units. Snipers are no more a threat in later tiers.

So that is 20% more damage for 10 seconds against super-heavy armoured targets. Justifiable? I think so. Given how tanky super-heavy armoured units are, these 10 seconds won't change something drastically.

[Torpid]

I agree. Especially considering how much inferno damage and psychic damage and so on is getting spread around in the other races I see no reason at all why that very expensive plasma gun on tacs shouldn't be affected by kraken rounds. It just doesn't follow. If it is too good vs SHI surely it must be far too good vs HI since HI are most prevalent in T2 and tacs can get their gun right there right then and of course HI have less hp than SHI typically.

[Caeltos]

Now, I'm not sure on how it's applied precisely. But here's a speculation

Since piercing damage type only deals 30% damage against Super Heavy Infantry, and if the Kraken Rounds would apply a +20% modifier one it, it went up at a grand 0.36 damage modifier (a +6%) increase against Super Heavy Infantry.

So the damage would change as follows;
FROM - 4,374 (13,1222) in total

TO - 5,2488 (15,7464) in total

The perks of the Tacticals is that their flexible, rather than specialist-type unit, altho how much of that intended design by Relic manages to bare fruit in actual execution is somewhat faulty due to the fragile nature of the overall economical structure of the game, since weapon swapping is generally abit taxing on your power, specifically if you go with 1x and you go with ML and you go back and forth between plasmas/missiles. It should be encouraged abit more, but there needs be an economical balance between the two.

Your intended goal with the damage increase to effect against SHI is rather arbitary, and accomplishes really nothing with the intended goal which you propose. Unless tacticals gets a new damage modifier, but something to consider is that Rhino(Atm) and Ogryns are units that will be largely effected by changing this. Terminators (of all variants) won't really notice the dps increase, and will merely laugh at it. They are always however, vulnerable to the plasma damage variants, which are the intended counters.

In an essence - you want to kill Terminators, you don't rely on piercing_pvp damage modifiers. There are an overbundance of tools which all factions have that can deal with them.

[Cheah18]

Anyway to make the gear swap cheaper as with the re purchase of the LG's retinue? IE swapping back to plasma from a ML could be half price?

[Torpid]

I don't think he was referencing the bolters, I mean when you specialise tacs to deal with HI or SHI you get the plasma gun. In this case the plasma gun becomes the main source of dps from the tacs and the bolters are just a bonus. Kraken bolts affects the plasma gun vs HI yet it doesn't vs SHI. This seems like an arbitrary injustice. Why would it not affect SHI if it affects HI when HI are more vulnerable to it as it is? Ultimately the plasma gun IS the upgrade you go to if you want to deal with either HI or SHI so it should do more damage to SHI when used alongside kraken rounds.

I did consider the effect it would have on ogryns but if an SM spends 35 power on a plasma gun vs IG, well, that's a huge investment when there are so many better ogryn counters.

As for the Rhino. That thing can die in two plasma shots for all I care. It having SHI in t1 is just broken and there really ought to be a reason for it to get vehicle armour in T2 other than mass melee, plasma tacs being better vs it would be one such reason.

[Caeltos]

Anyway to make the gear swap cheaper as with the re purchase of the LG's retinue? IE swapping back to plasma from a ML could be half price?

Yes, very likely.

[Magus Magi]

I agree with the OP and Torpid on this. The limitation on Kraken rounds to only HI is a relic that makes no sense within the current context of the game. In a world of SS and CSM, the fact that kraken rounds is strangely useless against SHI is simply counter intuitive.

Moreover, I'd like to point out that giving the librarian a psychic damage ranged attack would also help with the problem articulated by Sub_Zero in his original post.

Frankly, I still don't understand the limitations built into tactical marine AND ESPECIALLY sternguard dps. Within the context of all the other ranged squads in this game, and the mechanics associated with them, I don't think I ever will. Enough about that though, Kraken rounds should effect SHI.

[Caeltos]

Again - if it did, it wouldn't make any any any difference at all. It has literally no effect.

[Ven]

i agree. SM is one of factions that lacks any kind of real ability to deal with SHI, especially in T1. rhinos seem really OP vs chaos and especially SM as they have very few damage types if any in T1 to deal with a rhino. ogryns can also be a pain to take down from range as SM aswell due to the over-reliance on err, one model (plasma gun model).

perhaps kraken rounds shouldnt effect the bolter models (vs SHI). but i think that maybe if the plasma gun was effected by kraken rounds vs SHI AND HI when using kraken rounds? would make plasma gun a much more desirable purchase. i think in my 600 hours of playing i've purchased the plasma gun once.

[Magus Magi]

Again - if it did, it wouldn't make any any any difference at all. It has literally no effect.

You said yourself it would be a 6% damage increase on the piercing damage. I'd take a 6% damage increase.

Moreover, we aren't asking you with regards to the bolter DPS, we're asking you to make it so that the plasma gun does +20% damage, with kraken rounds active, to super heavy infantry armor in the same way that it does to heavy infantry armor.

Unless that's been patched...?

[Sub_Zero]

Unless that's been patched...?

I highly doubt it. The effect it has on heavy infantry is easily noticeable, the plasma gun's shots remove good chunks of health.

Again - if it did, it wouldn't make any any any difference at all. It has literally no effect.

But in the patches' notes sometimes I notice some really small changes to the DPS of units like to LG's retinue or to spotters, very small DPS increases, it leads me to think that you are a person who treasures every bit of DPS in this game. But as others said I was not that concerned about ordinary models with standard models but about the plasma gun itself.

[Nurland]

Wouldn't mind it affecting SHI if it not deemed OP.

[Caeltos]

Unless that's been patched...?

I highly doubt it. The effect it has on heavy infantry is easily noticeable, the plasma gun's shots remove good chunks of health.

Again - if it did, it wouldn't make any any any difference at all. It has literally no effect.

But in the patches' notes sometimes I notice some really small changes to the DPS of units like to LG's retinue or to spotters, very small DPS increases, it leads me to think that you are a person who treasures every bit of DPS in this game. But as others said I was not that concerned about ordinary models with standard models but about the plasma gun itself.

Every DPS is important, sure - but the thing to consider is that we're talking about high value health targets that are SHI, which have ALOT of health. For say, a DPS increase of piercing_pvp is far more valueable then to momentarily improve dps ONLY UNDER an ability effect that is only a 6% increase versus the most durable units in the game.

[Sub_Zero]

A standard bolter does 14.5 to LI, 9.7 to HI and 4.5 to SHI. The ability boosts the damage to HI and this damage is 11 for 10 seconds. If kraken rounds work also on SHI then the DPS will be 5.1. The plasma gun does 40 to HI/SHI. If kraken rounds work on SHI then the DPS will be 48. This is the damage I am talking about. +8 dps to SHI for 10 seconds. How can that be deemed broken is beyond me.

Can you shortly formulate your point? I really fail to understand it.

[Ven]

but again cael we're not just talking about terminators. we're talking about rhinos, which are a pain to deal with in T1 as SM and chaos due to the lack of much if any damage types that specialise in doing more damage than the measily 0.3 piercing does to SHI. ogryns aswell, they're not exactly as durable as terminators and infact most of the time i struggle to believe that ogryns have SHI as they die so fast sometimes.

perhaps it wouldn't be useful vs terminators and yes you should look to your other tools to deal with them; but im more concerned about T1/early T2. a lot of races have power melee and such in T1, SM does not other than wargear on their commanders. it leads to them having a huge disadvantage vs rhinos or ogryns that were rushed out before the SM can get the resources to deal with them. kraken rounds would atleast be a soft counter and allow the SM to hold on until they got a hard counter. because right now; SM has a serious lack of "soft counters"

[Oddnerd]

I think it would be a good idea, not because piercing damage should be the crux of your plan to deal with late game units like terminators, but because SHI can be encountered as early as T1.

[Ven]

I think it would be a good idea, not because piercing damage should be the crux of your plan to deal with late game units like terminators, but because SHI can be encountered as early as T1.

exactly this. now that SHI is back in T1 in the form of the rhino, i think some minor changes like this needs to happen. SM stuggle against SHI in T1 with an over-reliance on devs to do the damage, but the BC counters devs.. so good luck with that.