Armor Lock balance issues

Um what... I see what your saying and I think your friends are wrong.

What are they gonna do when a wraith/revenant/ghost/warthog comes charging full speed at you? Shoulder charge it with a pistol? More like Armour Lock and blow the vehicle up! Other than that though it really does not have much use.

 

The single change that I believe would make armor lock both more realistic and balanced, is one of two options. As a base, when you go into armor lock now, you can still recharge shields, assuming its been a few seconds since you've been hit.

1) When you go into armor lock your shield recharge timer gets reset, even if you're in the middle of regaining shields, until you get out of armor lock, because it seems like armor lock takes all the energy from your suit (aka your shield recharger) and puts it out as a shield

2) Or like #1, but your shields get totally dropped after going into armor lock.

 

I use it to get everyone's attention and get everyone shooting at me, while team mates come in and back me up when everyone's distracted. I also use it to survive explosions. Sometimes I use it as a sort of cover when I'm in the open, until enemies have to reload.

 

This.

There are many ways of using it. I don't think you need much more, cuz in all honestly, it's rightly balanced as it is.

 

Armor Lock would be the best AA with the most strategic depth if there was ANYTHING that could counter it. With no counter though, the only strategy to Armor Lock is to use it when you think you might die and call for help. The only strategy to counter it is to wait it out. If you back down, fearing his teammates coming to assist him, an armor locker can push you around the map. If you ignore him and do something else, he comes out of lock the instant you turn away. You have to wait, time your nades, and pray he doesn't have a mic.

If any gun common enough to be a persistent potential threat could counter Armor Lock (like a plasma pistol), it would have depth. If another AA existed that threatened Armor Lock (even if it was something stupid like a camo'd player's melees can hit through it), it would have depth. If maybe assassinations worked, it would have depth. It has none. And that is why it is the most unbalanced AA.

 

Time is it's counter, Ladnil.

While he was in armor lock, a thousand things could've happened, half of which are in favor of his opponent.

 

This is it. It is highly strategic and actually really well balanced in FFA games, but in Team Slayer it becomes unfairly overpowered. A team of people who know how to use it are suddenly immune to rockets, grenades, and dying 9/10 times. And slow moving projectile becomes useless. And it can be used to get an insta melee thing going (walk up, melee then then hold AL for just long enough to build up the EMP pulse, then let go and melee again for an kill.) Or it could be used, right when you are about to die, to get your team to run in and kill them and make you unkillable, its just overpowered. Its like giving everybody the option to have a rocket laucher at the start of the game.

 

That's a bit much, but I see your point..

 

When someone escapes me with sprint/evade/jetpack or tricks me with a hologram or active camo I think that guy's pretty good. When someone turns on armor lock and my perfectly placed grenade does nothing I think seriously wtf bungie. It just seems like bungie just decided they love this armor ability and gave it all these special properties to own people with like the emp effect and being able to destroy a vehicle going in for the splatter and deflecting grenades and rockets and removing plasma grenades and being able to turn instantly when coming out of armor lock.

 

I find it to be pretty balanced when taken in the context of the other armor abilities. All of its advantages mentioned here are true, but they are balanced by the advantages of the other AA. The jet pack get's the player in to space that players without it can't get to, the active camo makes a player less visible and messes with radar, etc. But now I'm just saying what they do, as the OP said.

The critical benefit of armor lock is obviously the invulnerability. I think this is balanced properly by the fact that the player can't do anything at all while armor locked. It's like phasing in Magic: The Gathering (I've just marked myself as uber-dork, haven't I?): The fact the item (player, in our case) is out of the game and untargetable is both an advantage and a disadvantage. Nobody can hurt the player at all, but the player can't hurt anybody at all and can't do anything to distract/harass/confuse the opponent at all. They're essentially out of the game.

I definitely find that I'm learning how to deal with armor lock when an opponent uses it. I think the concerns are mostly indicative of us all still figuring out how it fits in the game strategically. When they lock, they're out of the game; You have to immediately readjust your tactics temporarily. It's a total micro-tactic game at that point, because you need to ignore them while being aware of the fact that they can come out of armor lock at any time.

I've seen armor lock work against the user just as often as I've seen it work for the user.

I was under the impression that shield recharging is paused while in armor lock. If it's not (as was implied here) then I agree that that is a little unbalanced. Your shields shouldn't be recharging while you're invulnerable.

 

I don't think it suspends recharging, but a full lock isn't long enough for them to begin recharging if you go in as soon as they drop. I think if people actually worked as a team in TEAM Slayer there would be a lot less complaints about Armor Lock.

 

Shields definitely recharge when someone goes into Armor Lock.

 

LOL HAHAHAHAHA ROFL LMAO

You're funny.

Armor Lock exists solely to buy time for the guy using it. That was his entire objective when he locked. If time is supposed to be the counter, then you're saying that armor lock is countered by accomplishing its goal.

That's like saying that dying is a counter for rockets, because he'll run out of rockets if you let him kill you enough! The counter for needing the flag at home to score is to give the other team their flag back so they can score and your flag returns home! What's next? The counter for the drop shield is to put two clips of ammo into it so it pops?

 

Armor lock is an AA that needs to be used well to be effective. I would estimate over 70% of armor lock users don't use it well. They just lockdown the moment they are going to die, and pray that someone comes to their rescue.

Here's some ways it can actually be useful, and ways you can tell others.

1) Figure out where that bullet just came from. If you're in the open and get shot a single time, but don't know where you were shot from, you can armor lock, look around, find your enemy, pop out, and finally engage. If you are better with a DMR than he is, you have a pretty good chance of surviving.

2) Avoiding that grenade. Remember how 70% of people use armor lock right before they die? Well, if they used armor lock when that grenade was thrown at their feet, maybe they wouldn't have to armor lock now. In other words, if you're in a hall way or room, and a grenade gets thrown in, armor locking can save all your shields and some of your health.

3) Getting unstuck. Sometimes you get stuck from afar, other times a person rushes at you and gets beat down, but they manage to stick you at the last second. Either way, armor locking just saved your life (and can sometimes kill someone else.)

4) Making people think you don't have shields. This is one of the best uses of armor lock. When you armor lock, everyone automatically assumes that you're almost dead (thank you 70%!). When people assume you're almost dead, they tend to be less careful, and when they're less careful, you can kill them a lot easier.

5) Blowing up a charging vehicle. This one is self explanatory and just awesome.\

6) Surviving any fatal explosion or attack. Rocket incoming? No problem. Wraith plasma getting a little close? Don't worry about it. Sword guy about to cut you in half? Not an issue. Armor lock can be really fun here, and will save your life a lot.

7) Use it in between battles to make sure you don't die. Sometimes when you fight someone, they'll take out all your shields and some of your health. This leaves you very venerable to attack. If you armor lock, your safe from anyone who may stumble upon you, and also get your sheilds back assuming you have enough armor lock.

That's 7 examples, all off the top of my head. And that doesn't even include the EMP part.

 

Armor lock is mostly balanced. Though they should have so that, THE MOMENT the over-shield thing pops, you are now valnerable.. Right now there is a lag (of tenths of seconds) between where you have just gotten out of armor lock and when you are able to shoot where you should be vulnerable, but in actuality you are still invincible. They should get rid of this period, so assassinations are possible.. And that's all. Other wise it is perfectly fair - annoying as hell, especially when your teammates decides to play with themselves on the other-side of the map, while your being surrounded by baddies - but fair..

 

I don't see why people have a problem with it. It trades off invincability for no movement and no ability to attack. Considering most people use it before the shields recharge as well they come out just the way they went in.

It normally requires teamwork to work at all, or your just delaying your own death by a few seconds.

I guess your friends can't time grenades or finish an already weak player.

 

this lag isnt just a problem with armor lock, its the entire game. bulltrue someone with the shotty in instant before their sword connects, you get the bulltrue medal and the kill, but they somehow kill you as well. snipe someone in the head but they pull the trigger in instant after they die, their gun still fires and hits you.

and i dont see any problem with armor lock. 98% of the people who use it, even if they know how to use it right, are only hurting their team. i use it sometimes, but i always seem to contribute less to the team effort than when i use sprint or evade.

 

What he's getting at is that time is lost for the player locking armor. when you lock, you aren't gaining any time unless you lock for an amount of time that is less than the respawn time and you survive specifically because you locked.

When you're in armor lock, you're really in a worse situation than when you're dead if you think about it: You can't play and you can't get hurt, but everyone knows where you'll spawn, which way you'll be facing, and that you very likely won't be at full health. It's a desperate maneuver. the only advantage to armor lock is that it can be engaged at will (periodically) and it renders you invulnerable for the duration. Every single other aspect of armor lock is a detriment to the user. You could claim that it confuses the opponent causing him/her to die, but that isn't a function of armor lock as much as it is a function of the opponent not making the proper tactical adjustments.

 

You're treating it like a 1v1 situation.

Locking forces at least one enemy player to stand around looking at you, because at any moment you could unlock and shoot him in the back. It's a free I'm-going-to-die-let-me-halt-the-game-right-now button.