Remove Boulder Drilling [984]

What would it be able to do if it was? I was thinking you would run it into walls like you would a warboat or longboat.

Edit: But i guess something that you could immobilize infront of a wall and "fire" could be useful as well.

 

This is why we're suggesting giving it other uses. Making it more effective as catapult ammo, and making it more resilient when dropped from high places would outweigh the downsides of it being useless when thrown at point blank range.

Yes a boulder costs 3-3.5x more than a single catapult shot, but making it more directional and powerful than a cata volley would suffice to keep it useful. A single boulder thrown from a cata maybe ripping through ~2 layers of stone? I dunno.

I just really hate the current state of boulders as a melee weapon/cheaper, more effective drill.

Heck, we have a DRILL... Shouldn't the drilling be done with that, not a big, stupid rock?

Instead of adding a new vehicle to make up for boulders, we could just make drills take longer to overheat against placed blocks. Or we could just nerf boulders and do nothing else, because, honestly... We have too many ways of breaking structures already!

Lets list a few, shall we?

-Bombs
-Bomb Arrows
-Fire Arrows
-Builders
-Catapults
-Bomb Ballistae
-Mines
-Kegs
-Boats, given the right situation
-Knight attacks (on wood structures)
-Drills

With all these methods, and many of them being so incredibly powerful/practical already, do we really need something that costs basically nothing, being twice as good as most of the things on this list?

Edit: Also, i saw a builder rekking @kedram all game yesterday, just by throwing boulders at him over and over. With just a little timing you can get past knight attacks and instagib them, even on flat ground. It's an absurdly powerful tool even for simply killing players.

 

...No.

Saying we have too many is the most bullshit thing I have ever heard. A game is won and lost in base design, and no base is resistant to everything, thats way matches end instead of going on forever.

Also, I just love how you say this, and give a way for a boulder to be used against bases anyway.

And now heres something I request of you;

Go use a Boulder, just once. You tell me how many bases you rek with it, then we can talk fairly about this, I have countered and used Boulders, and one gives good insight into the other.

Also a Builder rekking this @kedram don't prove the OPness of a weapon, as if he had any backup at all (Which is a necessity to winning.) said builder wouldn't have lived very long.

 

Mfw you think i'm that new. I've used boulders, extensively. That's why i'm complaining about them.

I'm just throwing as many suggestions as i can think of, because brainstorming is never a bad thing.

Also, The problem is that bases aren't resistant to ANYTHING. No matter how well you build, a single bomb ballista can rip it all down. Unless you build your walls 5+ thick, (which is a waste unless you're playing 2base TTH or some crazy modded CTF server) a single keg will break it open. We don't need to keep adding to the number of methods to rip a base down, tbh.

I don't understand why you're defending boulders like they're the only method in the game for taking out doors. I highly doubt the way they're used atm was an intended mechanic. It underpowers building even more than it already is, and it makes it so a single knight can turn the tide of a TTH game by sneaking to the back base with wallfloats/bombjumps and bouldering the base open, stripping the enemy team of all their research.

The fact that they're 2-3x more effective than mid-late game destruction methods (against doors at least), while costing absolutely nothing in terms of real resources, is absurd.

Not to mention, compared to similar methods, there's almost ZERO risk involved in using it.

With bomb ballistas, kegs, and so on, you run the risk of wasting large amounts of coins, or possibly having them be turned against your team.

When you kill a guy with a boulder, it's pretty much "oh well, you broke the boulder when you killed me, i'm just going to go make another and come back right away"

They're just too effective for their cost.

In CTF, a keg costs 120 gold, you can't put kegs in your inventory, and it will only go as far as breaking 4 layers of material, assuming bedrock bugs and enemies don't prevent it from reaching it's full potential. Kegs are also RISKY.

I've gotten through almost 10 sets of stone doors before my boulder broke. 10. 10! That's two and a half kegs! For a measly 30 stone! How in the world is that a balanced mechanic!?

If you stash it in your inventory, nobody will even know you had a boulder in the first place until you've already broken through 1 or 2 sets of doors. But kegs, you can see them coming for miles, and focus on that person to do something about it.

 

Boulder knights aren't the real problem though.

An archer can shove a boulder through doors no matter where they're placed. Unless you do that absolutely awful door design that @Darksteel suggested, which makes life incredibly hard for your team for no good reason.

Plus, you can bombjump while holding a boulder. Bases rarely have skydoors on both sides, so a knight could jump behind it and break the back doors instead.

Edit: Also, how is 35 stone a lot, when you compare it to the possible 1000 stone worth of damage a single boulder can do?

Edit 2: Even if you have skydoors, if the very first layer of them gets blown out, a boulder knight can climb up and drill through every single door behind that, because there will be a spot for them to stand.

Edit 3: Heck, a single well placed arrow from an archer could ladder a knight up to the doors long enough to bust them open as well. Skydoors just aren't a good enough counter to it. Nothing really is.

 

Hey, I don't see you coming up with any good ideas to stop them.

Here is the best counter, no dumb door designs, no nerfs. One knight defending a hall or flag stops the archer doing much. In big matches he won't be missed, and in small ones he shouldn't have too much to worry about.

And btw, your arrow climb excuse is just absolute crap, the chances of an archer doing his for you are so slim its hardly a threat.

Look, I don't care about Boulder archers, just boulder knights. A nerf that did nothing to Boulders except preventing archers from pocketing them and grappling with them is all the nerf the boulder needs.

I think now would be a good time to mention; I asked Geti about this once, he told me he had no plans to nerf the boulder. (make of that what you will.) ((I know it may seem dumb to bring this up, but if it were an unintended feature don't you think a game dev would have something to say about it being used on him?))

 

Well I always live a good discussion so I'm just going to give my to cents on the matter.
I'm actually at a neutral view as such, I do believe that whilst the boulder door destruction thing is a tad unrealistic, it shouldn't be nerfed. The most viable option I believe is raising the cost of stone needed. Even so this could be canged by the server owner I highly doubt anyone could be bothered with something so minute.

 

Yea, every time i even got a flag this builder was always there to just lightly tap a boulder against my skin killing me instantly.... This happened to me EVERY TIME. The proposed nerfs i have for the boulder is them not doing any damage at all up close but dropping them out of high up locations will either hurt or instagib given on how high the boulder is being thrown at. Also boulders i feel should not damage stone doors but only wood doors. i feel if they are changed to these specs it will give the boulders a less old buggy dinghy impression and more of a not over powered boulder feel. @Trumbles Just watch everyone here be like, NOE BOULDERS ARE DA BES :D. when in reality they are one of the most buggiest currently ingame items.

 

TL;DR

Why not just remove boulders entirely? It is either that or rework most of its mechanics.

On another note, creating a bartering ram like ones cops use would be kinda cool.

 

... new proposal, please hear me out.

We keep Stone door wreaking, but remove wooden door breaking. Think about it, Archers can't break wood doors, but knights can, this way Boulders can still be effective and knights still be a threat, but not archers, (as badly anyway.)

And PLEASE, no logical arguments about stone not breaking wood but breaking stone, this is just a proposal.

@Trumbles @Alpaca

 

Go back to topic. How are battering rams related to boulders in any way, eh?



That was a rhetorical question for those of you who didn't realise that.

 

while I thought about proposing that boulders just break as soon as you use them to 1 hit ko someone, I didn't bring it up because I knew there would be a ton of people complaining about how resource inefficient that is, and the annoying thing is, they would be right in some cases. A huge problem with the mechanics atm are that the amount of resources varies a huge amount on different maps and in different modes, so any serious nerfs would have to be tailored to a specific game mode.

For whoever it was that was complaining about boulders being too weak in pvp, I forget who, but anyway:
Ohhhhh so truuuuue, my boulder is sooo weeeeeeak it can only get me like 3 FREE ONE HIT KO's before breaking, so I can only own the faces of three skilled players without taking any damage before it breaks. Even worse, if I'm playing against pubbies, I can ooooooonly kill their ENTIRE team like twice before I get bored and throw it off a cliff or something. Sooooo unfair. Spending 30 stone should totally give me a weapon that allows me to insta gib their entire team regardless of proximity by just clicking, with like 5-10 chargeeeeees.

Tl;dr: If you think boulders are too weak, you're either getting some SERIOUS archer spam, or you're using it wrong.

 

... Okay, do you remember how we said that a boulder takes up all the inventory space?




Because the most they can carry is two in their hands if they are carrying a Boulder...

Anyway, I was mostly going for a solution to get rid of Archer Boulder users, as that seems to be the biggest issue. And as a user of the Boulder as a Knight (A proficient one too) I would hate to see all the time I invested into perfecting its use as a siege weapon go to waste just because they are able to break doors.

 

... Lol. Congrats. You're proficient at abusing a mechanic that is blatantly broken.

 

Shit, I never thought of that! You have opened my eyes and I'll never use boulders again.

Seriously though? Boulders breaking doors is intended, my coding skill ain't so great but there shouldn't be a reason for Boulders to break doors through some sort of error.