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How to fix Pano

Discussion in 'PanOceania' started by Zsolt, Jul 21, 2018.

  1. Kran

    Kran Member

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    The problem is not that PanO is good or bad at this or that. The main problem is that this faction is the base for the other ones, with the idea that the so-well-compensated BS bonus is enough. If PanO is really the hi-tech military faction, where are thoses unique weapons, technologies and above all strategies that represent the "hyperpower" ? Nowhere.
    The PanO gameplay is quite boring, everything we have, another faction have better - or more interesting, strategicly - we are the old jack-of-all-trades of Infinity. The meh bashed faction.
    The only little exeption is drones and more specificly Armbots : we have here something unique and effective but we have the worst way to keep it alive or effective in combat situation. Sorry to say that, but Machinists are not military ingineers, they are just some lazy techicians, just good enough to give their regular order and come after the slaughter to try to take objectives.

    This faction has no real gameplay, no way to impose anything to adversary exept a +5% chance to hit and some redondant MSV2 snipers. The HI superiority is a (bad) joke, considering the prohibitive price of armor and the discutable choices of available equipement, exept for some few cases. We have a bunch of HI which are totaly useless in interest terms ( I know that we can find here or there some fans of the less used pieces, for some subjective reasons and i respect that, but try to stay objective ) and purely chaotic concerning attributes ( try to explain the differences on the knight profiles ).

    So, how to fix PanO ? Simple : have a real invested designer work on it. To clarify the main purpose of the faction: advantages and drawbacks, and keep away all this sujective hate that we can see everywhere on these forums.
     
  2. Zsolt

    Zsolt Well-Known Member

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    Imo most of troop bloat in Pano comes from unnecessary redundancy. Like we have 3 Nisse like troops, for separate sectorials, two out of it doesn't even exist, and CB wants a Nisse like in most of our sectorials. So they add redundancy, and differentiate by making some of them worse. Just have a "Nisse", that's good (like current Nisse), and make it Vanilla, so they can be added to all sectorials (like the REMs. they are everywhere). There are core concepts you just need everywhere.
     
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  3. daboarder

    daboarder Force One Commander
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    Tuetons Eclipse grenades resolves multiple issues in both MO and vanilla.

    1) It gives Tuetons a niche distinct from Magisters, and furthermore allows them to operate complimentary with them buy having the Tueton Eclipse so that the Magisters can advance.
    2) It opens up MO to more than just the Hospitaller order in allowing the Spitfire armed knight orders a means to advance that isnt "Shoot them with the BS 14 HMG)
    3) It offers PanO a solution to the "lock out" problem where their only solution is to shoot their way around their opponent. Tueton Eclipse grenades would allow PanO players to have a reliable and non-fragile means of operating around the opponent rather than just through them
    4) It provides the spam of BS12 Combi-rifle profiles a reliable means of getting their BS12,13,14 combi-rifles into a range band where they dont just get shat on with -6 modifiers (-3 range, -3 cover)

    And the best bit, it doesnt give PanO access to the Smoke that everyone is so pants crappingly terrified of (And no i have no idea why)
     
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  4. Stiopa

    Stiopa Trust The Fuckhead

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    1) Hi-tech regular army; It's impossible to incorporate every toy into basic troops' kit when you have the largest army of the Sphere, so very few top of the line solutions (that's Aleph's thing), but cost-effective systems applied wide.

    2) Solving problems through technology; where other armies, like Nomads, might acquire a new skill, cross-train their troops, etc, PanO introduces new Auxbot, a piece of equipment, or specialized weapons. This should include Remote linkability; Pathfinders, Fugazis, Mulebots should find their way into few fireteams.

    3) Efficient Command&Control net; We're regular army, lacking warbands or disposable troops, but trained and prepared for switching command on the fly. More EO (Hexa sounds like a perfect choice), CoC (Rao, Father-Knight), NCO (hard to tell, but there should be a few), Advanced Command (Father-Knight? Aquila?) Strategos L1 choice.

    From the game design PoV these issues should be adressed:

    1) Less overlap between certain units. Right now some units are being squeezed out from lists by more efficient counterparts (Teutons, Santiagos for example), while others' design makes them compete in already crowded category (Father-Knights - who really bring nothing special to the table).

    2) BS (and stats in general) shouldn't be the defining trait of a unit or faction. I can't stress this enough. The reason is that while stats are great for balancing a unit, they shouldn't be the thing that gives it purpose. That purpose should be created by the combination of skills, equipment and weapons on the unit in question. Otherwise we end up with a boring unit, that can perform move+shoot very well... and that's it.

    3) Units should be actually designed. Look at Bolts and Locusts; the former is a toolbox, but one that doesn't know what it wants to be exactly. In the firebase role it doesn't outperform Fusiliers enough to be worth the price, in midfield operator role it's overpriced, without speed or skills that help the team to get there, with most of its heavy weapons suited for long range (look - firebase), and it fills the fireteam slot so no Fusilier link to back them up. Locusts, on the other hand, have no immediate competition and work quite well as a buff of NCA midfield game. Another example is Father-Knight - on paper its a nice unit, in game it simply doesn't bring anything useful to the table. Also, compare Black Friar loadouts; one is a generic MSV2 sniper, the other is a toolbox that actually fills a new role. For cross-faction examples, compare Bipandra to Lupe, and answer the question which brings something new to the table and fleshes out her sectorial. Also, compare Singh and Spector and answer the question "What the fuck???".

    4) Take real care when creating characters. They can have multiple different options without getting overboard. Also, they're AVA1, which acts as a natural limiter on how much power they bring to the table. And they should be unique and flavourful, to reflect their skill, experience, and how they've outgrown units they've started in. Rao is a case in point how not to do it; he's basically a Bagh-Mari with +1 WIP and Assault Pistol. Boooooooring.

    5) Look out for and adress rules fuckups. Seraph and its "iron ball" Auxbot. Singh. Enough said.
     
    #64 Stiopa, Jul 24, 2018
    Last edited: Jul 24, 2018
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  5. Zsolt

    Zsolt Well-Known Member

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    But what about neoterra? And ASA? It's still an AVA1 35 pts plaform. Our AVAs are bad.
     
  6. krossaks

    krossaks Well-Known Member

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    +1, i always wanted osme kind of sniffer picher weapon to do some sat-lock list based, unfortunatly only Yu Jing can do sort of this with the kanren sniffer minelayer at the moment.

    @Zsolt In fact Yu Jing and Pano have a lot of mirror porfiles from the first game generation, the Zhansi- Fusiler, Hac_Tao- Swiss Guard, Wu Mings- Orc troop, Aquila- HSien, Trauma Doc- Yu Jing Doc etc. But during the years, Yu Jing sectorials ( well now only one) allowed the faction to get different toys and in Pano the sectorials get new gameplay only with link option or aleph troops.

    Don't know i'm just a noob with Pano ( just startet acon 3 week ago) but by the moment it feel it could use some uinits to focus more on the high tech idea ( like the new tunguska motos do the same in nomads). don't know.
     
  7. daboarder

    daboarder Force One Commander
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    Asa has the guarda already and the support to build around it.

    As to NCA its the PanO sectorial least hurt by the problems mentioned above due to its larger ava access to TO and the uhlan.

    I wouldnt object however to an auxilia with an auxbot 2
     
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  8. Cartographer

    Cartographer Well-Known Member

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    A unit that comes with Auxbots that can be assigned to other REMs would be nice (the Tohaa shouldn't be the only pokemon faction), so you could stick a couple of HFT-toting bots with your Fugazi to really shore up your DZ, or add another bot to the Peacemaker to really lock down a chunk of the midfield.
     
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  9. Stiopa

    Stiopa Trust The Fuckhead

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    I think we all agree Auxbots are underdeveloped as a concept.
     
  10. Zsolt

    Zsolt Well-Known Member

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    I'd like to have Auxbot on my dudes, not on my REMs. Or both. But dudes preferred.
     
  11. Cartographer

    Cartographer Well-Known Member

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    I think Auxbots on literally anyone may be a bit too good; with REMs it is still potentially game-changing, giving EVO-hackers close-in defence as well as potentially pumping up Peacemakers and Bulleteers. Letting an Aquila or Joan walk past an ARO they don't want to take, unimpeded (for a 4 point investment) and/or giving them a way to avoid mines, Koalas, Mad Traps, e-maulers etc. seems broken.
     
  12. theradrussian

    theradrussian Well-Known Member

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    At this stage I think the knights of NI! Are more of a threat to the sphere than anything MO can throw down :P
     
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  13. MrNailbrain

    MrNailbrain Relentless Optimist

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    I'll actually take a stab at this, because I think that there's a difference between bland/redundant profiles and truly horrendous things. And the truly horrendous things are quite low in volume.

    My benchmarking is as follows:
    1) Is it a similar copy to another model that does the job better? If yes, it's fine just un-optimized.
    2) Is it just inconvenient (ie. the 0.5 SWC tax on FO Regulars...) If yes it's just annoying and should be fixed but it's not BAD per se.
    3) Is it just a forum-meme? (I'm not counting Bolts as bad because there are a lot of serious ways we have discussed to make them work, even @daboarder had a serious suggestion about hot-swapping between a Fusilier link and a Bolts link)

    First off, the Tech-Bee. This unit stinks of bad design, band-aid fixing a hole that PanO has wanted fixed for a long time. It's inconsistent with the rest of the game, doesn't actually fix the problem of Engineer AVA, and holds up future design space for new Engineers in the faction. Plus it's visually unappealing and inconsistent with the faction. Worst of all, she is actually GOOD for reasons entirely unrelated to her supposed role (helping engineers)! Talk about adding insult to injury.

    Kirpal Singh transcends benchmark 2 in that he actually doesn't work as designed, and CoC is TERRIBLE on an AD troop that is likely going to get killed. I'd love to see Rao get CoC and Singh get XO. I'd put both of them on the table way more often then.

    Teutons, for many reasons expounded on in many many threads. They don't fall into benchmark 1 because they are genuinely unique in PanO and genuinely terrible.

    That's really all I could come up with for now. If I've missed something egregious, I'd love to know what it is.

    Now, as for the list of bland, redundant, boring, un-optimized, overcosted, or otherwise uninspiring profiles (no explanations here, this is purely subjective based on my own experiences)
    Regular FO SWC Tax
    Specialist Sergeants unable to link
    Bipandra and Konstantinos
    Black Friar Sniper
    Bolts bloat
    Rao
    about half of the Father-Knight profiles
    ORCs
    Sepulchre Knights
    Seraph handcuff-bot
     
    #73 MrNailbrain, Jul 24, 2018
    Last edited: Jul 24, 2018
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  14. Zsolt

    Zsolt Well-Known Member

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    Peacemakers already have the auxbot. And everyone else has PH13+smoke dodge to deliver that 5-6pts chainrifle, so easy advancing templates are a thing.

    I may be missing something, but you can do the ARO trick with cautious movement. Move auxbot first, wait for aro, then you move your main piece. But unless the main piece finishes in total cover, it get's shot in the next order, so you didn't win anything. Also Aquila and the like are pretty good at winning shootings, so maybe they just shoot you instead of stealthing around.

    Also the same effect can be achieved by coordinated order, so I really don't see the brokenness.

    The game is full of ways to avoid mines and the like. Just take a look at Tohaa big pokemon, it's PH15 with Hyperdynamics and MOV6-4. Also mines are a speedbumps not counters to HI. And Pano knights are horrible at dodgeing, which is a shame, as they are pretty expensive. I don't see why it would be an issue to give knights a way to avoid mines that's better than PH13-14 dodge.
     
  15. Zsolt

    Zsolt Well-Known Member

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    If 1) and 2) is not bad, than what is bad? Getting hit by a bus? 1) means that new unit is just useless unnecessary bloat. Like a 20 points Fusilier is not bad, just unoptimized? We have 58 entries in army (didn't count other vanilla, have no idea what does this number mean), I don't think we need more of the same, just worse. Like Kamau MSR and Nisse MSR are nearly the same unit, and imo Nisse is just better (ARM3>ARM1, who cares about BTS). Black Friar MSR doesn't even have mimetism. These three units are too close, too redundant and they are in three different Sectorials for no reason (Friar somehow got into NCA). Someone earlier complained, that giving cool stuff to a sectorial bloats up vanilla, and it gets out of balance fast. First Vanilla Pano is worse power level wise than the sectorials, so it can do with some power level increase, second, we already have lot of unnecessary bloat, maybe remove some of that first.

    So if we have two units where the first is the same as the second just cheaper/better, than just remove the second unit and forget it ever existed.

    I fail to see why would it be a good idea to make my AD troop my LT. AD troops are in a dangerous position and have a tendency to kill themselves in the active turn. Why on earth would I make that my LT with executive order?

    What's unique in berserk? It's just a profile with random stuff with no synergy thrown at it.
     
  16. MrNailbrain

    MrNailbrain Relentless Optimist

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    The hypothetical 20-point Fusilier is a little too much hyperbole. There are no units in PanO that grossly out-point their stats, skills and equipment. It's 2-5 points in most cases. Now, your other examples. Nisse MSR isn't in any of our sectorials, and the Kamau is only going to be in Varuna. What happens if you need an MSV Sniper (a fairly common choice in this game!) in Neoterra, or MO? That's why the Friar exists. Yeah it's redundant in Vanilla, but it could be a lifesaver in MO. If the unit pisses you off that much by just existing, then don't take it in Vanilla! Take the Nisse or the Kamau.

    Re: Singh XO - did you not catch the part about Rao CoC? That's an interesting pair and a good bit of risk vs reward - extra order on your AD Rambo vs having to keep Rao safe (which is pretty easy in SAA to be honest).

    Re: Teutons - I'd argue that with CC21, Berserk and an EXPCCW they are unique as a true face-beater in CC. Nothing else in PanO hits like that, and that's unique. Now, is it valuable? At the moment I think no, it's not. But could it be valuable? If we get a serious source of Eclipse then yes. If the source of Eclipse *is* the Teuton then I'm suddenly all about them!
     
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  17. Cartographer

    Cartographer Well-Known Member

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    Because Neoterra is the home of the Vatican and the Black Friars are literally the Inquisition. Same reason Swiss Guard are in NCA, they are the Vatican guards.

    You clearly don't play Ariadna or USARF; Van Zant XO is a way of putting an ultra-aggressive model down and spending 10 orders on him on the turn he arrives. It can be devastating. You run the risk of LoL, and you take that risk for the 11% increase in activation, but that's why CoC exists (and it'd be godly on someone besides Singh).
     
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  18. derbrizon

    derbrizon Well-Known Member

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    This is why I'm curious that other knights aren't in nca. Spacepope isn't guarded JUST by swissguard is he? What about sepulchre? Or fatherknights? We get the guards and the inquisition in nca lol.

    As for overlapping vanilla: of course that's gonna happen! It is central to the vanilla design space problem. Its not a rral problem l, though. Pick the one to you have points for or is best... kinda like how chasseuer and scout aren't actually very difficult choices to make most days.

    Some points adjustment for a few skills/equip and most pano problem children would be right as rain. Orc can work - their link options are just too limited. The bolts can work, but you have to start playing like a Morat player to get it.

    I like a lot of what is pushed here: more multirifle (mrf bolt? That ought to be the same cost as c+msg, smh) more crazy BS modifiers and high BS. Seriously, for the cost, I am absolutely effing pumped to play Kamau. 20point mimetism bs13 is astonishingly good when it likely comes with cutter or croc men. Varuna LI is going to be extremely pano and extremely good - because modifiers and camo is the epitome of reactive turn strength.

    Which leads me again to: cb plz. More reactive turn tools and/or more order-intensive active turn overwhelming-odds attacks. The player needs to pay for these things, but I think it should be there and get the player excited to drop bombs in a way nobody else can.
     
  19. Cartographer

    Cartographer Well-Known Member

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    Space Pope loves all his children equally, that is why he doesn't play favourites and leaves security to the Swiss.:grinning:
     
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  20. barakiel

    barakiel Echo Bravo Master Sergeant

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    @derbrizon
    Yeah I've seen folks wonder why there aren't more NCA units in MO, and more MO units in NCA.

    I think the answer, of course, is trying to keep things distinct in terms of theme and playstyle.

    NCA is ultra-tech, highly professional, while being inept in Close Combat and not benefiting from from thinks like Impetuous point discounts or free Movement.
     
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