Equalizer has no downside? - Games

[quote]Hey man. In a day or so (maybe today?) we are going to release information on an item that will seem very familiar to you. Here's the story. First things first. Please don't spoil the website release. I'd ask you to keep this in confidence until after the reveal. The community really enjoys discovering the new updates as we release them and we don't necessarily want this information public beforehand if we can avoid it. The WAR update has been under development for quite a while. Early on we reviewed community suggestions for Soldier weapons and tried several of them out. The Great Equalizer turned out to be really fun. So much fun, in fact, that we decided to make it the official Soldier unlock -- with a few tweaks. [b]We found that the weapon didn't need a drawback. Having low health was drawback enough. Trying to kill someone when you've only got 5 health isn't easy and it was rewarding to pull it off.[/b] We also found that giving the Soldier a movement speed increase that scaled along with the damage increase made the weapon more reliable and exciting. Seeing a Soldier rush at you with the Equalizer is a fearful thing indeed. [b]At the moment the Equalizer is a flat upgrade to the shovel. Down the road we might do some balance adjustment to make the shovel a more competitive choice.[/b] Originally we thought that "The Equalizer" would only be a prototype name, but our writers decided they liked the way it clearly described the weapon's functionality. The final weapon description is: The Equalizer Level 10 Pickaxe Damage and move speed increase as the user becomes injured. We chose a Pickaxe appearance since we wanted to do something that looked very distinct. It was important that other players realize the danger they were in when a Soldier equipped with the Equalizer approached. This weapon also has the Soldier's associated kill taunt. When you taunt with the Equalizer he will toss the weapon aside, remove one of his chest grenades, and blow himself and any enemies nearby sky high. (The taunt anim plays at a slow speed like other kill taunts, so it isn't trivial to pull it off. The damage radius is very tight as well.) SO THEN. The reason I'm telling you all of this is that we want to credit you with the design of the item (on the forums) and award you -- some time after the update is released -- with a special unique community version of the Equalizer. This version will have a community rarity and particle effect on it. The name might be weird -- initially it will say "Community The Equalizer" but Robin is implementing a system that lets us custom name individual items. At that point we could change it to be "The Great Equalizer" and there would only be one in existence -> yours. Once that system goes in if we forget to update your item's name just let me know. I read all the incoming email and we'll get it fixed up. I'll try not to forget, though. :P Thanks for contributing to the community. Designing items is challenging. It's really impossible to know a good idea until you playtest it. We've played hundreds of hours of TF2 with the Equalizer and we think it's a lot of fun. Congratulations! Brandon "GreenMarine" Reinhart Valve Software[/quote] [url=http://forums.steampowered.com/forums/showthread.php?p=12559753#post12559753]Source[/url] That's the only con that Valve considered. Also shovel buff!

[QUOTE=Mexican;19383549]It does have a downside, but it's still pretty much an upgrade in every sense.[/QUOTE] This. It has downsides, but the upsides make it so much more useful than the shovel. The 2 downsides the shovel has, still can't beat the upgrade it recieves. Sure you have to be at low health for it to be useful, but you're almost always at low health when you resort to melee. Sure you can't be ubered while using it, nor healed. But you don't want to be healed, and people who whip out their melee weapon when ubered (aside from eyelander), are douchebags and not worth wasting ubers on anyway, unless they're not all out of ammo on the other weapons.. Seriously, I will fucking abort a uber on you if you use a melee weapon. I will rather change my uber to someone else with a real weapon, or I will rather retreat and leave you to die if you whip out you melee when I'm ubering you unless you have a pretty goddamn good reason to to it. /medic rant Anyway... the shovel doing more damage than the equalizer when your at max health is not enough of a downside, neither is not being able to be healed. Making it unable to krit would not be a huge buff for the shovel, but at least it would be a start.

The downside is that you can be one-shotted by pretty much any weapon while using it.

Yeah, one downside might be the fact that smart people realize immediately you're low on health and quickly shoot you. But if you surprise them, they just need to have quicker reflexes. Oh, and no healing to you.

[QUOTE=NotPigeon;19383754]Melee weapons crit way too often in general.[/QUOTE] To encourage melee duels

[QUOTE=NeoDement;19383733]It's bad if you like to taunt after your melee kills. Which I do :([/QUOTE] Dude: fuck me: ahahaha me: wait me: SHIT SHIT SHIT

Removing krits would not be all that different, but at least it would give the regular shove a slight upgrade. The pickaxe does roughly the same damage as a crit when you're at low health. That's it's special attribute, that you can create your own crits. Therefor it would be fair that it could no longer just randomly crit when you're at normal health. While the shovel still could.

[QUOTE=Shugo;19383685]It's just you. It's the same as people complaining that the wrench crits far too often; it doesn't. It's just your imagination.[/QUOTE] [img]http://www.steampowered.com/status/tf2/public_graphs/ofattackscritical.png[/img] Engineers sentries rack up kills and shoot a lot, which buffs up the engi's crit chance in general.

[QUOTE=ashxu;19387073]To encourage melee duels[/QUOTE] If anything, it discourages them. Like hell I'm gonna engage in a melee fight when there's a significant chance it'll be over before I get a single hit in. Getting into a melee fight with a Spy is asking to be facestabbed. Getting into a melee fight with anything but a Spy or Scout is asking to get one-shotted with a crit (unless you're a Soldier/Heavy).

[QUOTE=Simski;19387214]Removing krits would not be all that different, but at least it would give the regular shove a slight upgrade. The pickaxe does roughly the same damage as a crit when you're at low health. That's it's special attribute, that you can create your own crits. Therefor it would be fair that it could no longer just randomly crit when you're at normal health. While the shovel still could.[/QUOTE] No, crits should be removed for ALL weapons.

[QUOTE=AltimorV3;19387505]No, crits should be removed for ALL weapons.[/QUOTE] That's just a matter of opinion. While it's one I'd probabaly enjoy it myself... many others would dislike that change.

[QUOTE=xpod1;19387094]Dude: fuck me: ahahaha me: wait me: SHIT SHIT SHIT[/QUOTE] Or before the round, you know when you all just bunch up at the gates and taunt "HA, FEAR MY SHOVEL MAN-RAGE" "...fuck fuck fuck fuck ABORT" [editline]12:32AM[/editline] [QUOTE=Simski;19387694]That's just a matter of opinion. While it's one I'd probabaly enjoy it myself... many others would dislike that change.[/QUOTE] Yeah, I think they should go. There's enough ways of enforcing mini-crits and regular crits now to make it fair.

[QUOTE=NeoDement;19387835][editline]12:32AM[/editline] Yeah, I think they should go. There's enough ways of enforcing mini-crits and regular crits now to make it fair.[/QUOTE] Yeah but this is Valve we're talking about. For example: [b]Why did they make the random drop system?[/b] So that new people had a chance of receiving the chance to play with the weapons that would otherwise take alot of effort to gain. [b]Why do we have random crits?[/b] So that even a newbie can sometimes beat a professional, and to give avarage/pro players that extra feeling of fun when they recieve a lucky crit. I do of course not like random crits that much because I feel I am skilled enough that I don't have to rely on luck... my luck has always been shit anyway, haha. However with Valve's attitude towards players, I could see why they might wish to keep the random crits.

The main downside of the equalizer is that Medics will hate you, forever. Medics are not people you want to hate you.

[QUOTE=Empty_Shadow;19388035]The main downside of the equalizer is that Medics will hate you, forever. Medics are not people you want to hate you.[/QUOTE] True... There have been a few times I have been on low health, standing next to a medic, spamming the heal button... Only to be greeted by the following sentence in the text chat: "I can't heal you stupid, you're holding the equalizer" :v:

[QUOTE=Simski;19388100]True... There have been a few times I have been on low health, standing next to a medic, spamming the heal button... Only to be greeted by the following sentence in the text chat: "I can't heal you stupid, you're holding the equalizer" :v:[/QUOTE] I have that bound to a key.

Like other people said, the only downside is you need to be hurt for it to be effective, but in my opinion, all melee weapons (except the obvious; the knife, axetinguisher, and ubersaw) tend to be desperation weapons. Your clip ran out? Enemies closing in? Break out the melee weapon. Because of this, chances are you'd be hurt in the first place by the time you decide to pull out the Equalizer, meaning for all intents and purposes, it IS a straight upgrade over the shovel. [editline]09:20PM[/editline] [QUOTE=Simski;19387944] [b]Why do we have random crits?[/b] So that even a newbie can sometimes beat a professional, and to give avarage/pro players that extra feeling of fun when they recieve a lucky crit. I do of course not like random crits that much because I feel I am skilled enough that I don't have to rely on luck... my luck has always been shit anyway, haha. However with Valve's attitude towards players, I could see why they might wish to keep the random crits.[/QUOTE] Keep in mind Valve put in a system that makes a player more likely to score a crit if they've been getting multiple kills.

You kinda feel like a dick when using it if you have too much health, is that a downside? :(

Remove random crits on it.

You can survive the taunt with overheal :D

If they buff the shovel, why don' they buff the bonesaw/axe? You should at least get a little health per hit with the bonesaw

[QUOTE=Helelos;19402512]If they buff the shovel, why don' they buff the bonesaw/[b]axe[/b]? You should at least get a little health per hit with the bonesaw[/QUOTE] There's no reason to buff the axe, the Axtinguisher isn't a direct upgrade. Edit: What she said. vvvv

[QUOTE=Helelos;19402512]If they buff the shovel, why don' they buff the axe?[/QUOTE] The axe is perfectly fine. It does normal damage and crits, while the axtinguisher does less damage and doesn't crit except on enemies on fire or when kritz'd.

[QUOTE=IAmAnooB;19402102]You can survive the taunt with overheal :D[/QUOTE] Gunboats too, but c'mon. It's a rarity.

No downside? I can't use the fucking thing AT ALL.

[QUOTE=Keychain;19409301]The axe is perfectly fine. It does normal damage and crits, while the axtinguisher does less damage and doesn't crit except on enemies on fire or when kritz'd.[/QUOTE] The problem I have with this argument is that if you're close enough to melee, you're close enough to light them up, and while they have some more warning it's not like they won't notice you axing them (a question). I just can't think of a reason why you'd take the possibility of random crits over guaranteed and easily obtained crits unless you're fighting another Pyro.

Negative side = you have to be at low health to do any decent damage. In which case, you could easily be killed.

[QUOTE=NotPigeon;19410272]The problem I have with this argument is that if you're close enough to melee, you're close enough to light them up, and while they have some more warning it's not like they won't notice you axing them (a question). I just can't think of a reason why you'd take the possibility of random crits over guaranteed and easily obtained crits unless you're fighting another Pyro.[/QUOTE] And even then, you'd be better off shotgunning them since a Pyro works best up close. A smart Pyro AB's a meleer away from them, unless crits are off. Then go for it.

[QUOTE=AltimorV3;19387505]No, crits should be removed for ALL weapons.[/QUOTE] I absolutely loath no crit servers, though it is definitely a matter of opinion.

No crits is only good for PUGs and serious business games. Otherwise, crits can be an extension of ones skill.