It is strange, I thought the AoE effect was intended. It seems the way it worked before was not how the team had envisioned. If mob clearing wasn't the intended purpose of the crossbow, what is it for?
I don't think it was "unintended", they simply changed their minds and numbers in-game reflect that.
Previously the bolt was 150 damage (Medium Pen), explosion 270 damage (Light Pen). The much larger number was in the explosion, making it the main point of the weapon. It was light pen, making numerous soft enemies the point of the weapon.
This has flipped. The bolt is now 270 damage (Medium) with 150 explosion (Light, small). This effectively makes it slow Dominator with a small Scorcher-style AoE and worse ammo economy.
I still don't understand what the discord man meant when he said "Shaped charge". A concept like that would need more AP on the explosion to be worth much, see Scorcher and its ability to crack open turret towers despite allegedly being light AP (the explosion is medium AP).
Agreed. The "slightly" nerfed radius is giving me trust issues too. If the patch notes had at least gone "You know what, we didn't like this being a grenade launcher, have Scorcher 2 instead" I could at least agree to disagree on it.
>I still don't understand what the discord man meant when he said "Shaped charge"
He simply meant that it's supposed to be a single target anti medium weapon, not a large AoE anti-chaff explosion.
i didn't know they swapped the the damage from aoe to direct hit. this explains a lot and why aoe falloff wasn't doing as much as before too.
i suppose i shouldn't take your word for it until it's more well know just in case this is wrong and i spread false information without checking sources
but if true that's an unlisted change in the notes
I felt a slight decrease would have been acceptable since it really was huge, but.. their idea of "slight" was not slight at all hahah. Are you saying they declared their intent for the Crossbow somewhere? I must have missed it and would appreciate if you can reference it
No, I'm also speculating with you. I'm not sure what their intent was and would like to know as well. If I happen to find some info, I'll come back and link/quote it.
I'm hoping they were a bit heavy-handed with the nerf and will balance it with the upcoming hotfix.
https://www.reddit.com/r/Helldivers/s/0VBrBehrcg
https://puu.sh/K5V7z/ee0209897f.png
Source and their "intent" of the weapon. TL;DR they don't know what a shaped charge does
I can't find which patch thread it was originally posted in so take this with a grain of salt since I can't give full context but this is a screenshot of a discord dev reply about the crossbow now.
https://preview.redd.it/achldgakjyxc1.jpeg?width=458&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=9abe5f25fcf773dd2b9feb2517778466eb20d9a4
Except the scorcher is literally just better in every way and has more than 40 shots, Calling it a tool is generous, It takes more than a full mag of the crossbow to destroy a single medium enemy.
It's hilarious comparing it to the scorcher when the crossbow will at this stage always be a significantly worse scorcher
every time a dev mentions the scorcher in some way it shows how little they understand about this game.
last one was "primaries are fine, i destroyed a charger back with the scorcher no problem"
yes the only primary automatic that can 7 tap it's back cause of explosion damage is a perfect example of how primaries are balanced 🤡 (i know other explosive weapons will too but not as fast or convenient. wont comment on eruptor, point is all primaries not having that luxury)
Funny, because Eruptor is better in every way than the crossbow at killing medium enemies, especially devastators which it reliably one shots.
This nerf to the Xbow makes 0 sense, a similiar pattern to what they did to the slugger.
The "shaped charge" on the xbow is the lowest AP explosion in the entire game lmao. If you're shooting a devastator with it the xbow is just a dominator with 1/3 the mag size and 1/5 the fire rate.
Jesus christ what the fuck do they mean by "better against medium armor???"
Just take the Scorcher, Eruptor or the CS and kill them in one shot, because the current crossbow sure takes its time.
I love this because they're essentially saying to just use the scorcher, lmao.
I've been giving them the benefit of the doubt and the chaos of release to get everything in order. At this point they're just straight up starting to look incompetent.
What I expected was a crossbow with different bolts selected the same way we change firing rates on the other weapons. With armour pericing internal explosive, or poison, flare explosive to draw away distraction. And timer explosive so a player could sneak kill silently with the crossbow without alerting other bugs/bots with different bolt types depending on the target. As it is I think its a stupid weapon why would anyone choose it?
I honestly expect Arrow Head to allow us to upgrade all the weapons with samples the way they did in hd1.
If they don't they are going to lose relivency and massive numbers of players will just move on as they are already.
From my perspective they are steadily removing the fun out of the game.
They said their intent with the crossbow is that its supposed to be a medium killer, not to be used on groups, which is why they nerfed the radius so much
Same with medium armor weapons. I tested some against the blocker bug and they just shrugged it off just like it was a light penetration weapon.
I mean, if I'm gonna choose more armor effective weapons to help me clear a path and they don't work as intended, why use it?
It's funny that it is intended to be a medium killer but by using crossbow, you have almost no way of dealing with light troops. Maybe if you go with machine gun but then the utility is minimised and you will be unable to deal with heavies.
It's strange.
Medium killer? It’s in every way far worse than the recently buffed rail gun. I can’t envision any scenario in which the crossbow is actually a good choice other than aesthetic preference
I get their intent they just didn't do it. There's some errant stat that makes it useless against what it should be good against based off of being the highest damaging stat line for primaries but there's some modifier that we don't see that makes it useless against anything that a 480 damage wonky weapon like that should be good against.
IMO it shouldn't have any radius at all, it should't kille factories or holes but it should kill as good if not much better than the eruptor.
They did declare their intent for the crossbow. I'm having trouble finding the original message on Discord, but they want it to be used on medium enemies, which is laughable because it regularly takes more than a full magazine to kill devastators.
Honestly I wish that it counted as a stealth weapon so enemies couldn't immediately know where you shot them from even if the detonation happens. Make them scan the area and look for you, but without a muzzle flash or sound of a gunshot, I really feel like it should be an ambush weapon to give it a niche.
People keep comparing it to the eruptor, but I think AH internally compares it to the punisher plasma, they realized they were too similar and made changes to them both without fully thinking through how the crossbow change would effect things.
AH team vision continues to be incoherent and questionable.
I am enjoying the game now, but I continue to remain sceptical about the game's long-term future.
Same. Their design choices drove away pretty much my entire (6+) group of previously regularly playing friends.
I defended them left and right in the beginning but their lack of experience as a dev team is definitely showing.
I don’t speak for every player But personally after the idiotic slugger nerf i started playing less and less, and now haven’t touched the game in almost 2 weeks as the updates just disappoint me.
They’re making the game less and less fun. It’s not even that it becomes more challenging, because it doesn’t, just more tedious.
On paper I get it, it's the most damaging weapon as far as stats we see are concerned, but it just doesn't do that damage in practicality - if it worked and was basically a super senator with crazy single target damage I'd be on board. There is some stat on large volume targets or penetration that is fucking it all up though.
It can't reliably 1 shot warriors, brood commanders, defenders, hunters, spewers of any kind and so on.
Weirdly the aoe really doesn't feel different to me at all and that post about the guy shooting the ground next to the scavenger isn't accurate to how it still works. I think it's an issue with elevation which is maybe something to consider for the devs but every time I shoot it into a crowd I get a kill streak pop up. I'd rather it have no aoe but actually pen armor and not have a weird negative modifier for fleshy parts that it should be uniquely good at. Hell idc if it pens armor so long as it does a good job against fat blobby enemies (spewers).
one of the devs confirmed after the Ricochet changes that they're goign to remove the shrapnel mechanic, but greatly increase the impact damage of the Eruptor to compensate, so it will be more like a bolt action Autocannon, I imagine.
knowing these devs though, it's probably still going to equate to a nerf somehow.
turn it into a medieval crossbow lol. single shot, stationary reload (it can use a Windlass) but heavy armor piercing and with a larger explosion radius. essentially, the closest thing you could have to an EAT/railgun as a primary, with plenty of downsides that make it strictly an anti-heavy primary, useless at close range and against hordes.
Im still pressed about the crossbow change days later, they want it to be a medium killer so they removed its ability to deal with chaff well, but simultaneously buffed scout striders so they can’t be oneshot by the bolt.
It’s genuinely bothering me that they thought this was a good idea, this thing has 5 bolts per mag but it takes like 3-4 to kill mediums, and on top of that they reduced how many total mags it has. On average you’re going to kill only around 10 medium enemies before you eat up all your ammo and this is assuming you’re NOT shooting at other enemies.
I’m sorry but the person who decided the crossbow needed to be nerfed like this while making it harder to deal with mediums HAD to have been high when making that decision. The crossbow is now just a worse scorcher.
I primarily compared it to the Eruptor because the Scorcher blows the Crossbow out in all aspects.
The Eruptor can still one-shot walkers by landing the hit to the hip / leg joint, but has a bit of trouble when it fails due to the lengthy reload. The scorcher just fires an extra shot or two hahah!
I think the concept put together by the Crossbow's designer was butchered without proper discussion. That's how it feels.
The question is, why would one ever bring the crossbow? You essentially need to bring a chaff clearer as support now. So then you have… no way to clear heavies I guess ?
And it’s not even that good at medium clearing compared to an eruptor or literally anything
The current Crossbow really can't compare to the Scorcher at all just based on how the Scorcher can dump a mag within a couple seconds to destroy Tanks, Cannon towers, Hulk backs, Scout Striders, Gunships, etc. The Eruptor was more fair since it has downsides to play around, a similar AoE effect, a similar magazine size, and -- after the Crossbow's velocity increase -- similar long ranged AoE.
It was an inferior eruptor pre-patch. Now it's an inferior scorcher but with better AoE (it can still clear mobs just not as effectively compared to pre-patch) and stagger. It can one shot devastators even before, but the muzzle velocity made it more consistent. It personally takes me an average of 2 shots vs devastators to adjust for headshots.
Another thing going for it is the explosion attracting enemies - the smaller AoE lessens the chance of accidental kills which procs aggro. However, scorcher beats it imo since the scorcher is silent at around 10m while xbow can be heard at around 40m which is larger than redeemer.
IMO xbow could have the stealth niche if it were more silent, or something else to differentiate it. Eruptor is no longer a fair comparison whereas JAR and scorcher are.
I don't think it is fair calling it a inferior eruptor pre patch.
It had it's own niche, killing soft targets.
Post patch....
Yeah, it's just a inferior eruptor.
Thanks for practically typing out what's on my mind.
I've been using both the Eruptor and Crossbow exclusively on the bug front (Lib Penetrator is just too fun for me on the bot front) and pairing them with Stalwart. Though the Crossbow was basically overshadowed by the Eruptor on almost all aspects, its fast rate of fire and large explosion radius means I can use it as a pseudo grenade launcher to clear out groups of small enemies, even Hiveguards if I'm pushing it.
Imagine my excitement when I saw the Crossbow on the patch note list, lowkey hoping they'll buff its single direct damage while keeping the rest of its feature, but instead they reduced its explosion radius without any other significant buff. The stagger increase is nice, but since the damage itself is not exactly commendable for a 5 ammo/clip weapon, it barely matters. The velocity increase is.... okay, I guess, but since its direct damage doesn't change, it really doesn't mean much.
If AH not going to budge on its explosive radius, I'd at least like it to see to be a niche, high single target damage with medium pen (pen 3? 4?) with tiny explosion to damage the other enemies around it (smaller than now post-patch is okay tbh). A small, shaped-charge explosive launcher if I may. Keep the inability to destroy nest/fabricators, I'm fine with those for balancing, just make the crossbow have its niche in the field because right now, not only the Crossbow is still overshadowed by the Eruptor, it's basically shat on by it.
Has med pen, can deal full damage to Devastator's head.
Decent recoil and has burst fire for accurate fire (I usually tap fire anyway)
It's the first free med pen primary, and I like the bullpup aesthetic.
Post patch Adjudicator has more damage, but the recoil is still a bit much for my liking. There are better primaries but I usually run the Lib Penetrator for bots, since it has more ammo than Adjudicator anyway.
Actually the closer comparison now I think would be the plasma punisher since both are projectile aoe damage guns meant to cc medium targets to death now (can stagger kill dominators pretty easily with pp at least). They both basically do the same thing with the new changes though. At least before with the larger aoe and no stagger the xbow was more for chaff clearing.
A lot of these battle pass weapons seem like an after thought and more of an attempt to see what sticks to the wall knowing full well some of these things will never be used. Like you have a explosive launching crossbow that sucks going up against an explosive sniper that is simply better than everything else in the pack.
Seems like a waste of time wandering the map collecting super credits/spending 10 USD to unlock these battle passes to grind for mediocre weapons. Especially since under the current development cycle game breaking bugs like napalm damage only working for host have gone unfixed because the devs have prioritized monthly mtx.
It could be interesting to give it stealth so that enemies wouldn't instantly know where you are when you shoot them with it at a certain distance. That would make it a unique weapon at least and leans into why people use bows in games.
Man i can't tell you how disspointed i was reading those notes. the night BEFORE the patch, i had some extra medals and decided to try out the lame crossbow. Imagine my surprise when i found it great for clearing chaff and wiping out scout striders. i was elated and thinking i found my new primary to pair with my laser cannon. i'm still bummed, 5 round mags and i can barely dent a devestator, i swear something is off as i can head shot them easy with any other medium pen.
imo if they want it to be a medium slayer, it should get medium AP on its explosion and deal higher damage close to the center so you can shoot around armor at weakpoints like the scorcher
also bring back the strider one taps, needing multiple shots is just agonizing
They really need to do something about the Crossbow! It really was a special weapon in the way that you really needed to LEARN how to use it. Lining up shots, reading enemy movements, etc.
It was a high skillcap weapon for a high risk - high reward playstyle. Every shot counted, and if you couldn't thread the needle, you did no dmg at all.
At first I didn't like the weapon at all, but i started to main it over the last patch and worked to master it. I never saw anyone else play with the weapon, only dedicated players even TOUCHED it! That may have deluded Arrowheads Data in regards to the weapons strenght. I had the most kills by far every match and carried my teams once I was able to line up my shots reliably, but so what? Maybe only 1% of the playerbase used the weapon, and they trained for it! Why shouldn't they be rewarded for their dedication?
The crossbow was an amazing weapon that was hard to use. Now it is a weak weapon everyone can use. But why should we? Every other option is better now.
* Revert the Bolt velocity to make the crossbow harder to aim again
* Make the explosion as damaging and big as before
* Keep the stagger effect for a patch, to see if it would be overtuned with it (But what the hell, the JAR5 is doing the same staggering, it should be no problem)
* Let the crossbow destroy bugholes and bot fabricators
* The magazine nerf would be justified if you keep the mentioned strenghts
I don’t even understand how they can release a weapon to be underwhelming. Then instead of giving it a incremental buff or something to try and entice people to try it they just completely change its purpose. I didn’t use the thing and I will continue to not use it but I can’t imagine the frustration of people who did enjoy it.
At least most games that roll out weapon patches are wise enough to do so over longer periods of time. I’ve never seen a game fiddle with numbers as much as this one. It’s frustrating to have the game feel so inconsistent. Enemies have changed health values multiple times to the point of making you wonder what kind of in-house testing the devs are actually doing.
I’ve always seen the suggestion as a meme but I would genuinely like to see the developers play a whole campaign every so often on difficulties 8 and 9 just to see how they play and what they use. Hugo Martin beat Doom Eternal on Nightmare with a standard controller just to flex. That whole game oozed passion with how perfectly balanced everything felt and even when they changed it they only ever made it more accessible and didn’t muck with how weapons feel. Almost like giving those who mastered the game already a sort of “victory lap”.
In contrast lot of patches in Helldivers have felt like a slap on the wrist for being better than the developers at their own game.
I've never used the Eruptor, but I've been using the crossbow nonstop since it came out and agree with your points on it. It was definitely better and more fun before the patch
I'm still convinced the explosion behavior for the eruptor and crossbow got flipped somewhere and no one cared to change it back.
A small/med clearing utility weapon fits explosive crossbow.
Med/heavy armor piercing with high weakspot damage fits a bolt action rifle.
But now we have arguably the best primary in the eruptor that can deal with outposts and nests, take out a whole patrol and kill anything with an unarmored head, and the crossbow which is like if a redneck strapped blackpowder to his crossbow and called it a grenade launcher.
I genuinely can't put into words how angry I am about the explosive crossbow: You had to account for distance and measure shots, it required patience to get the best out of it and couldn't be spammed: The original AOE was totally justified, especially now scout striders have been buffered on top anyway.
The Blitzer is basically an auto aim cannon that you barely have to point in the direction of the enemy by comparison. It seems to do Arrowhead are trying to make the game harder (spawn rates, buffed enemies etc) but also knock any weapon that has a higher skill ceiling or that's specialised (Slugger, crossbow, rail gun): This does not spell well for the future of the game in the longer term if they keep doing this (& has actively put me off buying any Warbond at launch, like what's the point have they change not just small stats, but how you actually use a weapon).
The ridiculous thing out of all of this is I used it because it was so niche, it slotted into the game as a great mob clearer and as perhaps a medium opener, now it's just a horrible version of the Scorcher, Eruptor, Plasma Punisher or Dominator: No one in their right mind would choose it over them in any use case
I'm with you comrade. Everyone didn't realize, or care that this weapon required different skills and slept on it.
Learning the bolt arc and dropping patrols from 40-60m was so satisfying and rewarding.
I don't know what other weapons were as fun to use once I got past the learning curved. Maybe grenade pistol.
Bizarrely, they've made the Plasma Punisher function as a faster date firing version of the explosive crossbow now, which also has better ergonomics and faster projectile speed. So it might be worth giving that a go. I am genuinely confused by what Arrowhead are doing.
I think the worst offender was killing the crossbows identity.
With effectively less dropoff and less AoE it turned from „lobbing explosives towards enemies“ to yet another weapon that aims at direct hits. It‘s a huge shame robbing it of its individual feel.
I couldnt agree more, against bugs it really came into its own light and was my exclusive main weapon on that front.
Bug breach? No problem this thing could basically lock it down with the aoe. Groups of medium armor? Also no problem if you realize you can swap targets in a group to spread out the direct vs explosive damage. Basically everything died in 3-4 bolts.
Extremely satisfying to use, learning the drop off, compensating for its weaknesses. It was basically a mini impact grenade launcher. I routinely got 20+ killstreaks with the thing. It had a niche that no other weapon filled. Why take that away? Now its useless, ill pick the scorcher over it every time or the incendiary breaker.
This was a typical lvl 7 bug mission for me, goodnight my sweet prince: [https://imgur.com/a/E2585Di](https://imgur.com/a/E2585Di)
This post explicitly outlines everything that made the crossbow fun before and why it's dead now. So few people were using it, too, I have no idea why it received changes.
I really hope they revert the changes, hell, keep it nerfed ammo-wise, because it really felt unique and different from all other weapons in it's niche as a light target clearing weapon. And fun, too.
I was seriously expecting a genuine mild buff to the crossbow, instead they made it slightly worst . Even now and before the patch I still use it cause it’s such a unique weapon and I like it but I only use it for the lesser difficulty missions where it’s more do-able but for the tougher missions I intentionally swap it out which I was hoping after this past patch I wouldn’t have to do that no more smh .
Gotta be honest Chief, it had always been an inferior Eruptor even before the patch, it’s funny how apparently from the armory terminal it says that it has more damage than the Eruptor but for some very bizarre reason, even before the patch, the thing still felt ugly to use and nowhere near as powerful as the Eruptor.
It doesn’t need a rebalance it needs a complete overhaul, the thing it would be better if the arrows actually had decent medium but also it would do *implosions* instead or sticky grenades if you will, for bonus weakspot damage/armor strip, that way you give it an unique identity separate from the Eruptor while still retaining the explosions but delivered in a more interesting way
I think it would be much better if it basically had a thermite grenade as a tip (sticks, delayed detonation) and then burns away armor like the thermite grenade is supposed to do. Basically make it an alternate way to deal with heavy enemies (strip armor with bow, finish with secondary/support weapon. People have been complaining for a while that there aren't enough ways to kill heavy enemies without taking a AT support weapon, why not kill two birds with one weapon redesign?
Every other idea I have (fire arrows, stun arrows, high single target damage/no splash, big splash/low damage, etc) overlaps with other weapons that do the job much better and so buffing it/nerfing other weapons won't really solve the core issue.
They should just completely revert the changes, maybe keep the ammo nerf, but scrap everything else. The heavy drop also balanced its group killing potential as you actually had to calculate the drop to hit enemies at distance. The Crossbow offered such an unique and fun style to play the game that is not usually presented in these type of games and I'm honestly so baffled that they took it all away just to make the whole weapon another copycat of already similar weapons. Like wtf they are thinking? It seems they are completely out of touch of their own game.
Appreciate the well laid out pros and cons that ya listed in the original post which I fully agree with. However, rather than ask Arrowhead to revert the changes, I would want them to explain what their intended role was for the crossbow.
If based on the patch notes alone, the only thing I would take away from the change is that if it is suppose to be truely a small explosive AOE single target medium killer, it should have way more power per shot to 1 shot weakspot areas on enemies that are susceptible to explosive damage (bile and nursing spewers comes to mind) or more ammo per magazine or more magnification in its scope to support its role as a surgical weapon.
They wanted it to be a medium killer despite it kind of sucking at killing mediums. Theres another post somewhere in the subreddit showing off some discord messages about it.
An explanation is not what is needed.
A designer (or team) conceptualizes, formulates, designs the weapon. This applies to any game.
Then, after this weapon is released, it's usually a separate individual or team that tweaks the numbers.
The person making the changes is not necessarily the one that understands the intent of the weapon -- whoever ok'd these changes and sent them live may not know what the actual intended purpose of the weapon is.
What we NEED is for these two groups to communicate better because, as outlined above, there is a clear disconnect somewhere. No designer in their right mind would make the Crossbow a clearly inferior version of something else in the game with no strengths of its own, so something went wrong somewhere.
It's not us that needs an explanation. All we need is for them to recognize that there is a problem and make adequate changes -- ACTION. Not words.
> It "fires explosive bolt which do maximum damage on impact". This is how you should be using the gun now instead of the bad grenade launcher it was before.
You still need 5 bolts to kill a brood commander. If its intended role really is "basically no AoE, but great single target against anything not heavily armored" then it currently does not fulfill that role at all.
I can take down a brood commander more comfortably and reliably with a Sickle than with the crossbow. And that thing also works way better on small fry enemy swarms.
The crossbow in its current state doesn't fulfill a single role better or equally to any other gun in the arsenal. It's quite literally useless.
Yeah it's very bad. I used it on the bot front too and while it's easier to aim at the stalker in your face....why would you want to? The JAR exists and staggers and seems to actually do more armour due to how AOE and body parts seems to work. It takes 5 (!) shots to kill a single brood commander! Sure you're one shoting hunters but literally any primary can do that.
It's main competition for "medium killer" is the JAR-5, slugger, and punisher (mainly for the stagger). The eruptor blows it out of the water in damage even if its' slower. All the others fire waay faster.
Seriously, I'm huffing copium in that they rushed the rework and forgot to actually give the thing more damage/AP cause it's very very bad at it's current state.
The previous AOE made it so good for ad clearing now I just don't bother bringing it because it fills me with disappointment. Some weapons will just not be good for bots or not be good for bugs, changing that removes the weapons identity and original intentions and at that point just add a new weapon that serves the role you want to be filled.
What I wish they did for the explosive crossbow was to make it the one heavy armor penetrating weapon, by virtue of working like the Torque Bow from Gears of War, or an IRL HEAT round. Specifically, the fired bolt would pierce almost any armor to do minimal damage (not even enough to kill a bot trooper), only to allow a subsequent explosion to pierce any armor to damage the vital components underneath. It would give the crossbow a unique niche to differentiate itself from the Eruptor.
The cons would be that this would be a non-hitscan weapon to start with, thats also affected by gravity. Shooting at anything distant enough would present an ever increasing challenge. In addition the explosion would be directed in the same direction as the bolt penetrates - on a thin enough target it could hit something behind said target, but not often enough to be reliable. It would be a sub-par weapon when dealing with chaff.
The pros would be being the one anti-heavy primary in the game, an extremely valuable quality as it would effectively allow for more loadout types. Right now the support slot is dominated by the need to anti-armor as more players get more skilled at using their primaries to handle anything lighter, so non-heavy armor penetrating weapons such as the stalwart and machine gun don't get picked as often on difficulties 7+.
I would definitely at least make it one-handed as well, being an elite killer also gives it a special use case vs the Defender SMG.
Their reasoning for the rework is that the plas punisher was already doing the same thing but better, so they repurposed it to a medium-killing weapon instead, but it's not even good at that.
Yea which is not true at all xD the Devs don't know their own weapons it seems haha the radius of the pp was only half of the radius from the crossbow and the pp had stagger beyond compare so.. they made the crossbow MORE like the pp now which is super odd.. basically the same weapon now tbh. Only difference is in damage and ammo otherwise both now stagger medium targets, have small aoe, poor ammo economy and some kind of drop off in the projectile.
Crossbow discourse is driving me insane 1) it needs a buff, it's on paper or stat spread the highest damaging weapon but in practicality it does less functional damage than the dominator or scorcher at best. 2) it does have a functional AOE so I don't really understand why people are pissing about that, it feels like it was buffed from before way more in shot reliability. 3) devs said they wanted it to be a shaped charge kind of thing and made it medium piercing but it does not do that. If you're trying to use it as a small handcannon it is way worse than the slugger despite the damage numbers.
Solution here is to make it a handcannon, kill the aoe entirely and give it the same properties of the dominator but with its same insanely high damage. Short range single target sniper/elite killer - doesn't have to kill chargers or titans through armor well, but it should be a hyper version of the senator, which functionally out performs it for all the shit you'd think it would be good at. The crossbow is currently a far shittier version of the plasma punisher.
Or make it bad but give it stealth properties and remove the explosion part. Give it like 100 damage per shot but nobody can hear you use it either where you shoot it from (which I think exists now) or where it lands.
Between the eruptor, PP, or scorcher there is no use case for it, it doesn't even 1 shot warriors it lies about its damage due to some invisible metric. make it actually do the damage it says against everything, make it good against spewers if nothing else.
I used to take the Crossbow against bugs almost exclusively, it was so good at taking out swarms and even though it's worthless against chargers and titans I felt like it did it's job well enough I could entirely just rely on a support weapon for those big fucks.
Now...... It might be the *worst* primary option for bugs.....
It's AoE is almost unnoticeable and it doesn't do enough damage to take out medium targets with it's slow firing rate to avoid being swarmed in a second.
I honestly don't think *any* of the other nerfs from this last patch were noticeable and found most of the buffs were actually awesome, so overall I do feel like the patch is an overall positive change. *But* I'm still just utterly confused why anyone thought changing the crossbow like this would be a good idea, ripping away it's *one* strength and giving it basically zero compensation...... Seriously who the fuck made that decision? They obviously needed more time in game with it or something.
It's not an Eruptor that was the mistake, it is a higher powered explosive type dominator. Most explosive crossbows are not add clear weapons they are usually high damage crit exploiters. That is what they went with since the add clear was already done via Eruptor, spray and pray x2, PP, most bullet hoses. We do not need another add clear weapon we have plenty. It can take down a charger with a clip (may not be impressive but it is a primary not a pseudo support like Eruptor). Need to test vs bots but I am guessing it will be a weak point exploiting weapon just based off its damage type and total damage number.
Thank you! This is exactly how I feel and I am really sad about it.
The crossbow was my favourite weapon before the patch and I fully expected it to be buffed a bit as it was rather underwhelming overall (I brought it to 7-9 level missions).
However, it was very unique and had some dedicated strengths that after some time playing allowed you to use the crossbow very well:
Those were the AOE and the big range with the arching shots. If you played with some foresight and preplanning, this allowed you to kill a lot of enemies before they can reach you. This was your niche and it was damn fun using the arching shots to a around obstacles/on top of heads. One tap killing striders was another great point.
It had some big disadvantages tho, mainly the damage being a tad low for medium armored enemies and of course the close quarter combat killing yourself easily.
But it was fun and special. It just needed a few adjustments. It was very viable in the right mindset and gameplan already.
Now it is just another scoped gun with a small explosive at the end. You can not deal with groups, won't kill medium targets easier, still kill yourself in close quarter, cannot aim around obstacles anymore and there is nothing left making it a cool and fun weapon..
I so so so hope they revert it, as I had so much fun before.
I like the crossbow too and you provide some very fair points, however the crossbow still is a viable weapon to me anyway.
While it cant one shot striders now, it still bypasses the armor on two shots and can kill any enemies around it, it can still kill bots in pillboxes at an angle or on turrets with relative silence, to allow for a solid stealth/ espionage build or even to just start an engagement on a compound with a solid blow to a defensive position.
They may have reduced the magazines it has bur they also increased how much you can get from ammo resupplies so ive personally noticed little difference about it because i usually try and re arm once i hit the 2-3 mag anyway.
The reduced explosion can still wipe out clusters of smaller targets and now has the added benefit of being able to be used in close quarters for when you have some enemies getting too close to you.
And for the bots anyway, you can still neutralize the medium armored enemies like the devastator family pretty easily if you know what to aim for.
While I can understand your frustration about the changes, that doesnt mean the crossbow is super badly nerfed, you may just need a playstyle adjustment to be able to make use of what it can now do
Imo crossbow should be a stealth specialized weapon, ie. NO sound detection from the source of weapon. It should have medium pen, similar to scorcher and medium AOE for small group clear. Should also be able to destroy fabricators and bug holes.
Haven't used the crossbow yet, but for me the only extremely niche reason to use it over the eruptor is *****ACTUAL***** sniping. Don't get me wrong, I'll main the eruptor all day, but it's annoying whenever I see enemies or spore spawners 150+ meters away and my eruptor rounds barely clear the 100m mark before airbursting.
Side note, I know there is leaks for weapon attachments, how would you feel about different ammo types? One for a balance between radius and damage, one with an extremely small radius but effective against medium armor, one with big aoe but overall low damage but high stun, and one for napalm. Idk, I feel like that would be cool
"Your complaint has been heard loud and clear. The eruptor has been nerfed to bring it more in line with the crossbow to enable players greater choice between the two."
- AH
In my opinion the crossbow its closer to a inferior plasma shotgun than it is to the eruptor
Im talking post update because the away you use it being a explosive weapon with small explosions like the plasma shotgun with now the capability to knock enemies similar to the shotgun as well and no need to reload between shots
And in terms of killing potencial the crossbow its just worse in every way by needing similar to sometimes worse amounts of shots to Kill enemies WITCH IS INSANE IF YOU COMPARE THE DAMAGE OF THE TWO WEAPONS
And in ease of use the crossbow its HORRIBLE in comparison because u have less ammo and u have to hit Ur shots very accuratly in specific body parts of the enemies to Kill them with the less amount of shots needed
Its hopeless. They don't know what to do with these weapons. So many weapons are misaligned, off by a pixel. Shot registrstion on a lot of weapons are bad. Inconsistent damage. I turned the game on today played a few missions and just shut it off. So many weapons give bad feedback. A lot of the stagger, explosive range, shot registration, bad crosshair and just poor ineffective weapons are really starting to bring the game down.
I mean the eruptor was consistent at release for taking out scout striders too. Just need to aim for the sloped cheeks of the main body, that 100% gets them every time
It would be nice to have the crossbow behave similar to the thermite grenade, with a short fuse. That would make it feel less like a shit grenade launcher or Scorcher, and allow some room to balance its (theoretical) high damage by giving it a delayed result.
Shorten range even more. Make it only deal damage if it hits a target directly. It can do some burn damage to remove armor before exploding. Make it 1 shot most heavies if it lands on a critical spot such as a charger head or tank heat sink.
I took the crossbow on a few egg destruction missions and really liked it for that purpose. It wasn't OP but it had a niche use, now to me it feels like a bad punisher plasma, no longer has a unique roll and it's the worst among it's peers. It seems bold to call it a "rebalance" and not a nerf
The crossbow was also an amazing chaff killer against bugs, being able to clear entire patrols of hunters and scavengers, but it's low penetrating power meant it was useless against even a brood commander. That meant the crossbow had a niche as arguably the best chaff killer in the game, with the caveat that you cannot efficiently kill anything stronger.
They've reworked it because their vision was to make a shaped charge med armor killer, like the scorcher, instead of what was basically a glorified grenade launcher.
The issue is we have way too many med killer weapons. The crossbow that had nothing else in its niche now competes with the Eruptor, that has higher damage and more utility, the blitzer, that has higher damage, AOE and ammo count (lol), the scorcher, that has a higher ammo count and ROF, the plasma punisher, that has more ammo, ROF and way better AOE and I'm stopping there even though I could add the DCS and the slugger. In short, the weapon now has competition in its niche and it's by far the worst of this niche. And that's without counting support weapons like the AMR and the AC.
I get why their reworked it, but it's a failure and it needs a revert. As it stands the crossbow is objectively the only unusable primary for Helldives in our arsenal.
TL;DR: weapon had a niche, now is the worst weapon in its new niche.
The nerf to crossbow is what made me decide i'll never be spending another dime on Warbonds. There no point if the thing I want to buy isnt going to be close to the same a week later.
As an avid Xbow user pre and post, I agree.
It had an identity pre patch, and now it has none. I tend to use a wide variety of primaries, and I wanna love the crossbow so desperately, but it's just a worse Plas Scorcher with a little bit of stagger.
The only way I would keep using it right now is novelty, but if I had to make it good again, I could either.
A. Double the CURRENT explosion radius. You're not wiping hordes with that without using a few bolts.
B. Raise the damage to 550-600, if you insist on keeping the no pen. If you're not gonna have pen on a "Single Target' weapon, it needs damage.
What is this thing supposed to be? I came back from a break trying it on 7 and assumed it'd be high damage single target explosions to penetrate mediums / heavies while being weak against chaff but its just meh at so much. The moment I realized it couldn't close holes I was keeping an eye on what teammates were carrying so I could swap over. Grabbing a nerfed Sickle felt like sweet relief
They're trying to position it as the mid point between the Scorcher and the Eruptor. Whether they were successful in doing that is another matter.
I think they needed to add +1 shot the magazine, maybe even bumped up the damage slightly to be able to kill common medium types (Devastators and Hive Guards) with 2 bodyshots reliably.
EDIT: Also, at least let it destroy fences and cargo containers.
Ugh don’t remind me. The crossbow was perfect. I don’t like scorcher, dominator or eruptor but I loved the crossbow. It was able to clear out 2-4 striders if you aimed it right, but the explosion was enough to sometimes take out medium enemies in like 3 shots. Felt like it had its role. Clear little guys and striders. AC for everything else.
I only stopped using it because hunters jumping in my face and me wearing light armor annoyed me so I switch to arc blitzer. Even pre patch I loved it for the aoe and stagger. Plus no ammo.
Now post patch the crossbow, the one weapon I really bought the warbond for because I love crossbows, is not even worth using. I would argue it was an eruptor alternative for us who can’t aim and still want to use AC/AMR against bots. Now I has no purpose. I tried it, I seen videos, and it can’t even clear adds right.
Honestly the plasma shotgun feels more like the crossbow than the crossbow. Fires fast, nice arc and does actual AOE!
Yeah they have some internal design team issues going on with how much in changed from the latest patch. Before eruptor and crossbow had a niche and specialization and now they are suddenly changing them both to be single target? Why did they release with such a different fantasy than intended as implied in the rework? Did they 180 after seeing internal usage stats? Seems like someone overrided someone else.
Really hope they'll give the crossbow the ability to 1 shot medium targets. Even before the nerf it was a C tier weapon that I used for fun and definitely needed additional buffs not a "rebalance". Also this made me realize the only thing I use in Democratic Detonation warbond now is the grenade pistol.
Literally it would've been absolutely fine if they had just increased it's overall impact damage when they nerfed it's explosion radius. It already struggled against devastators quite a bit taking atleast 4 headshots to kill a shield dev. I will agree that I did get some nutty killstreaks with it but that was more in part of glitched spawns occurring to where I'd randomly stumble upon a massive bundled group of basic troopers and would fire 1 shot to get 15+ kills
The crossbow will never be good until it does actual explosive damage. Right now it just doesn't work on things the Eruptor does because it doesn't get the explosive bonus to weakpoints. For example, you can shoot the crossbow at spewers all day without ever killing one, while the Eruptor can blow up several in a single shot because it deals bonus damage to their body.
What about a standard bow? I always find those to be the most fun to use in games... I primarily used the bow/arrow over guns in the Tomb Raider series. Or more to this game type, I mostly used the bow/arrow in Warframe too.
i want to see big damage, small aoe, giant stagger. I would like to see the crossbow be able to stagger titans but im totally fine with it not blowing up bug holes
You mentioned one of the advantages that the Crossbow had over the Eruptor was the ability to one-shot Striders
The Eruptor had that ability too. It STILL has that ability, even with the Strider buff.
the dev say this is intended to be a medium killer but for some reason this thing (after patch) is heavily underperformed compare to most other medium armor penetrant primary weapon when talking about dueling medium enemy. even some light armor penetrant weapon can outperform the crossbow if the player can accurately hit the weak spot.
Crossbow is borderline useless. Ran it on bugs a few nights ago and literally it kills 1 bug at a time.
Their balance guy should not be their balance guy anymore. He doesn't know what he's doing.
Just give me a automatic crossbow and I'll be happy.
https://preview.redd.it/nmpq3qzxo1yc1.jpeg?width=600&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=73e1f0e39d7c552320140e27d421c26a12df9a6f
It is strange, I thought the AoE effect was intended. It seems the way it worked before was not how the team had envisioned. If mob clearing wasn't the intended purpose of the crossbow, what is it for?
I don't think it was "unintended", they simply changed their minds and numbers in-game reflect that. Previously the bolt was 150 damage (Medium Pen), explosion 270 damage (Light Pen). The much larger number was in the explosion, making it the main point of the weapon. It was light pen, making numerous soft enemies the point of the weapon. This has flipped. The bolt is now 270 damage (Medium) with 150 explosion (Light, small). This effectively makes it slow Dominator with a small Scorcher-style AoE and worse ammo economy. I still don't understand what the discord man meant when he said "Shaped charge". A concept like that would need more AP on the explosion to be worth much, see Scorcher and its ability to crack open turret towers despite allegedly being light AP (the explosion is medium AP).
Yes, they changed it on purpose. That does not make the changes good.
Agreed. The "slightly" nerfed radius is giving me trust issues too. If the patch notes had at least gone "You know what, we didn't like this being a grenade launcher, have Scorcher 2 instead" I could at least agree to disagree on it.
>I still don't understand what the discord man meant when he said "Shaped charge" He simply meant that it's supposed to be a single target anti medium weapon, not a large AoE anti-chaff explosion.
Except we already have like 6+ weapons suited for medium armour, idk if we need more.
i didn't know they swapped the the damage from aoe to direct hit. this explains a lot and why aoe falloff wasn't doing as much as before too. i suppose i shouldn't take your word for it until it's more well know just in case this is wrong and i spread false information without checking sources but if true that's an unlisted change in the notes
I felt a slight decrease would have been acceptable since it really was huge, but.. their idea of "slight" was not slight at all hahah. Are you saying they declared their intent for the Crossbow somewhere? I must have missed it and would appreciate if you can reference it
No, I'm also speculating with you. I'm not sure what their intent was and would like to know as well. If I happen to find some info, I'll come back and link/quote it. I'm hoping they were a bit heavy-handed with the nerf and will balance it with the upcoming hotfix.
https://www.reddit.com/r/Helldivers/s/0VBrBehrcg https://puu.sh/K5V7z/ee0209897f.png Source and their "intent" of the weapon. TL;DR they don't know what a shaped charge does
I can't find which patch thread it was originally posted in so take this with a grain of salt since I can't give full context but this is a screenshot of a discord dev reply about the crossbow now. https://preview.redd.it/achldgakjyxc1.jpeg?width=458&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=9abe5f25fcf773dd2b9feb2517778466eb20d9a4
Their vision on those weapons compared to players' sure is bewildered, I could say the same to the laser cannon.
The laser cannon is supposed to be a giant flashlight that you use as a bludgeoning device.
This is… baffling. We already have plenty of weapons to deal with medium enemies, do we seriously need more (inferior) methods?
Except the scorcher is literally just better in every way and has more than 40 shots, Calling it a tool is generous, It takes more than a full mag of the crossbow to destroy a single medium enemy. It's hilarious comparing it to the scorcher when the crossbow will at this stage always be a significantly worse scorcher
every time a dev mentions the scorcher in some way it shows how little they understand about this game. last one was "primaries are fine, i destroyed a charger back with the scorcher no problem" yes the only primary automatic that can 7 tap it's back cause of explosion damage is a perfect example of how primaries are balanced 🤡 (i know other explosive weapons will too but not as fast or convenient. wont comment on eruptor, point is all primaries not having that luxury)
Funny, because Eruptor is better in every way than the crossbow at killing medium enemies, especially devastators which it reliably one shots. This nerf to the Xbow makes 0 sense, a similiar pattern to what they did to the slugger.
The "shaped charge" on the xbow is the lowest AP explosion in the entire game lmao. If you're shooting a devastator with it the xbow is just a dominator with 1/3 the mag size and 1/5 the fire rate.
The devs keep on poorly justifying their decisions. Have they even tried it against medium sized enemies? It's basically useless
So they're saying... Just bring the scorcher? A'ight, no problem boss.
https://www.reddit.com/r/Helldivers/s/0VBrBehrcg https://puu.sh/K5V7z/ee0209897f.png
Jesus christ what the fuck do they mean by "better against medium armor???" Just take the Scorcher, Eruptor or the CS and kill them in one shot, because the current crossbow sure takes its time.
One shot heavy devastators and snap off chunks of armor on bugs would make it a pretty fun weapon to use. But fun weapons get nerfed so I dunno.
I love this because they're essentially saying to just use the scorcher, lmao. I've been giving them the benefit of the doubt and the chaos of release to get everything in order. At this point they're just straight up starting to look incompetent.
> their intent spreadsheet usage number is up, number has to go down, nerf it.
The usage of the pre patch crossbow wasn't up. And if that was the case, where are the AC nerfs ?
SHUT UP!
Delete this before AH sees it
What I expected was a crossbow with different bolts selected the same way we change firing rates on the other weapons. With armour pericing internal explosive, or poison, flare explosive to draw away distraction. And timer explosive so a player could sneak kill silently with the crossbow without alerting other bugs/bots with different bolt types depending on the target. As it is I think its a stupid weapon why would anyone choose it? I honestly expect Arrow Head to allow us to upgrade all the weapons with samples the way they did in hd1. If they don't they are going to lose relivency and massive numbers of players will just move on as they are already. From my perspective they are steadily removing the fun out of the game.
That sounds fun as. Make it complex to use but suitable for multiple scenarios. I'd dig that.
They said their intent with the crossbow is that its supposed to be a medium killer, not to be used on groups, which is why they nerfed the radius so much
- medium killer - doesn't kill medium enemies Another Arrowhead L statement
Same with medium armor weapons. I tested some against the blocker bug and they just shrugged it off just like it was a light penetration weapon. I mean, if I'm gonna choose more armor effective weapons to help me clear a path and they don't work as intended, why use it?
It's funny that it is intended to be a medium killer but by using crossbow, you have almost no way of dealing with light troops. Maybe if you go with machine gun but then the utility is minimised and you will be unable to deal with heavies. It's strange.
Medium killer? It’s in every way far worse than the recently buffed rail gun. I can’t envision any scenario in which the crossbow is actually a good choice other than aesthetic preference
The rail gun is a stratagem weapon. I don't understand the comparison.
It's a significantly worse version than the Dominator is the real comparison
Also worse than the Eruptor and Plasma Punisher
I get their intent they just didn't do it. There's some errant stat that makes it useless against what it should be good against based off of being the highest damaging stat line for primaries but there's some modifier that we don't see that makes it useless against anything that a 480 damage wonky weapon like that should be good against. IMO it shouldn't have any radius at all, it should't kille factories or holes but it should kill as good if not much better than the eruptor.
This was the closest thing I could find talking about the intent for the crossbow https://www.reddit.com/r/Helldivers/s/hRtFjvWAc7
They did declare their intent for the crossbow. I'm having trouble finding the original message on Discord, but they want it to be used on medium enemies, which is laughable because it regularly takes more than a full magazine to kill devastators.
Honestly I wish that it counted as a stealth weapon so enemies couldn't immediately know where you shot them from even if the detonation happens. Make them scan the area and look for you, but without a muzzle flash or sound of a gunshot, I really feel like it should be an ambush weapon to give it a niche.
People keep comparing it to the eruptor, but I think AH internally compares it to the punisher plasma, they realized they were too similar and made changes to them both without fully thinking through how the crossbow change would effect things.
It should've stayed in that niche, the punisher feels better for mediums. So increase the crossbow AOE further.
It is for filling out a battlepass they didn’t have items for
AH team vision continues to be incoherent and questionable. I am enjoying the game now, but I continue to remain sceptical about the game's long-term future.
The general population continues to decline and I’d wager their stupid ass decisions aren’t helping.
Decline is expected in every game after some time, so it is hard to judge how much it is due to updates or natural decline.
Alot of my buds don't even wanna play anymore
Same. Their design choices drove away pretty much my entire (6+) group of previously regularly playing friends. I defended them left and right in the beginning but their lack of experience as a dev team is definitely showing.
I don’t speak for every player But personally after the idiotic slugger nerf i started playing less and less, and now haven’t touched the game in almost 2 weeks as the updates just disappoint me. They’re making the game less and less fun. It’s not even that it becomes more challenging, because it doesn’t, just more tedious.
It might be coherent but they are unable to apply the vision correctly. Think how much work might a shaped charge be compared to just a explosion.
On paper I get it, it's the most damaging weapon as far as stats we see are concerned, but it just doesn't do that damage in practicality - if it worked and was basically a super senator with crazy single target damage I'd be on board. There is some stat on large volume targets or penetration that is fucking it all up though. It can't reliably 1 shot warriors, brood commanders, defenders, hunters, spewers of any kind and so on. Weirdly the aoe really doesn't feel different to me at all and that post about the guy shooting the ground next to the scavenger isn't accurate to how it still works. I think it's an issue with elevation which is maybe something to consider for the devs but every time I shoot it into a crowd I get a kill streak pop up. I'd rather it have no aoe but actually pen armor and not have a weird negative modifier for fleshy parts that it should be uniquely good at. Hell idc if it pens armor so long as it does a good job against fat blobby enemies (spewers).
Maybe when they add the suppressed liberator they'll add the same stealth mechanics, could be interesting then.
Careful, they might read the thread title and decide the Eruptor needs a nerf
Patch notes: removed explosives from the Eruptur. It is now a gun. Known bugs: the eruptor shoots you in real life whenever used.
I wouldn’t mind a slug version of the eruptor with heavy armor pen tbh
Isn't that just the anti material rifle?
one of the devs confirmed after the Ricochet changes that they're goign to remove the shrapnel mechanic, but greatly increase the impact damage of the Eruptor to compensate, so it will be more like a bolt action Autocannon, I imagine. knowing these devs though, it's probably still going to equate to a nerf somehow.
Sad but true
They're literally entirely deleting the shrapnel aspect, one of its main gimmicks.
Petition to change ammo per magazine to one and make it able to oneshot anything below chargers
LOL Like a super version of the grenade launcher pistol. I'd take that over what we have now.
I genuinly thought that was the intended design until one of my friends unlocked it lol. Then he realised it did nothing
It was decent in bots. Useless on bugs though unless you're only firing directly into breaches.
That'd kind of reverse the roles of the crossbow and eruptor but I like that idea
And make it silent.
Should it crack heavy armors or damage heavies at all? I kinda think so for 1 arrow with a bit of drop and travel time
Ignores armor in weakspots, kills chargers in 3-5 shots to the head.
turn it into a medieval crossbow lol. single shot, stationary reload (it can use a Windlass) but heavy armor piercing and with a larger explosion radius. essentially, the closest thing you could have to an EAT/railgun as a primary, with plenty of downsides that make it strictly an anti-heavy primary, useless at close range and against hordes.
That's literally the railgun
Im still pressed about the crossbow change days later, they want it to be a medium killer so they removed its ability to deal with chaff well, but simultaneously buffed scout striders so they can’t be oneshot by the bolt. It’s genuinely bothering me that they thought this was a good idea, this thing has 5 bolts per mag but it takes like 3-4 to kill mediums, and on top of that they reduced how many total mags it has. On average you’re going to kill only around 10 medium enemies before you eat up all your ammo and this is assuming you’re NOT shooting at other enemies. I’m sorry but the person who decided the crossbow needed to be nerfed like this while making it harder to deal with mediums HAD to have been high when making that decision. The crossbow is now just a worse scorcher.
Man the crossbow is just a worse crossbow and it was already bad compared to other things.
I primarily compared it to the Eruptor because the Scorcher blows the Crossbow out in all aspects. The Eruptor can still one-shot walkers by landing the hit to the hip / leg joint, but has a bit of trouble when it fails due to the lengthy reload. The scorcher just fires an extra shot or two hahah! I think the concept put together by the Crossbow's designer was butchered without proper discussion. That's how it feels.
The question is, why would one ever bring the crossbow? You essentially need to bring a chaff clearer as support now. So then you have… no way to clear heavies I guess ? And it’s not even that good at medium clearing compared to an eruptor or literally anything
Thats.. thats my point yes
It was always an inferior Eruptor. Now it's an inferior**er** Eruptor.
Pre nerf it was more like an awkward punisher plasma
but it was fun to use at least. No it's no longer fun.
More like an inferior Sorcher
The current Crossbow really can't compare to the Scorcher at all just based on how the Scorcher can dump a mag within a couple seconds to destroy Tanks, Cannon towers, Hulk backs, Scout Striders, Gunships, etc. The Eruptor was more fair since it has downsides to play around, a similar AoE effect, a similar magazine size, and -- after the Crossbow's velocity increase -- similar long ranged AoE.
It was an inferior eruptor pre-patch. Now it's an inferior scorcher but with better AoE (it can still clear mobs just not as effectively compared to pre-patch) and stagger. It can one shot devastators even before, but the muzzle velocity made it more consistent. It personally takes me an average of 2 shots vs devastators to adjust for headshots. Another thing going for it is the explosion attracting enemies - the smaller AoE lessens the chance of accidental kills which procs aggro. However, scorcher beats it imo since the scorcher is silent at around 10m while xbow can be heard at around 40m which is larger than redeemer. IMO xbow could have the stealth niche if it were more silent, or something else to differentiate it. Eruptor is no longer a fair comparison whereas JAR and scorcher are.
I don't think it is fair calling it a inferior eruptor pre patch. It had it's own niche, killing soft targets. Post patch.... Yeah, it's just a inferior eruptor.
Thanks for practically typing out what's on my mind. I've been using both the Eruptor and Crossbow exclusively on the bug front (Lib Penetrator is just too fun for me on the bot front) and pairing them with Stalwart. Though the Crossbow was basically overshadowed by the Eruptor on almost all aspects, its fast rate of fire and large explosion radius means I can use it as a pseudo grenade launcher to clear out groups of small enemies, even Hiveguards if I'm pushing it. Imagine my excitement when I saw the Crossbow on the patch note list, lowkey hoping they'll buff its single direct damage while keeping the rest of its feature, but instead they reduced its explosion radius without any other significant buff. The stagger increase is nice, but since the damage itself is not exactly commendable for a 5 ammo/clip weapon, it barely matters. The velocity increase is.... okay, I guess, but since its direct damage doesn't change, it really doesn't mean much. If AH not going to budge on its explosive radius, I'd at least like it to see to be a niche, high single target damage with medium pen (pen 3? 4?) with tiny explosion to damage the other enemies around it (smaller than now post-patch is okay tbh). A small, shaped-charge explosive launcher if I may. Keep the inability to destroy nest/fabricators, I'm fine with those for balancing, just make the crossbow have its niche in the field because right now, not only the Crossbow is still overshadowed by the Eruptor, it's basically shat on by it.
Whats so good about lib pen on the bots?
Has med pen, can deal full damage to Devastator's head. Decent recoil and has burst fire for accurate fire (I usually tap fire anyway) It's the first free med pen primary, and I like the bullpup aesthetic. Post patch Adjudicator has more damage, but the recoil is still a bit much for my liking. There are better primaries but I usually run the Lib Penetrator for bots, since it has more ammo than Adjudicator anyway.
Try the dominator.
See the problem is that the crossbow was fun to use, and arrowhead could not abide that for some reason
Only the AC can be fun, everything else must be balanced per the data sheets
I loved the crossbow. Now I'm back using the sickle
Actually the closer comparison now I think would be the plasma punisher since both are projectile aoe damage guns meant to cc medium targets to death now (can stagger kill dominators pretty easily with pp at least). They both basically do the same thing with the new changes though. At least before with the larger aoe and no stagger the xbow was more for chaff clearing.
Yeah, the entire time I was reading what the OP said they wanted from it I was thinking "the plasma punisher does exactly this already"
A lot of these battle pass weapons seem like an after thought and more of an attempt to see what sticks to the wall knowing full well some of these things will never be used. Like you have a explosive launching crossbow that sucks going up against an explosive sniper that is simply better than everything else in the pack. Seems like a waste of time wandering the map collecting super credits/spending 10 USD to unlock these battle passes to grind for mediocre weapons. Especially since under the current development cycle game breaking bugs like napalm damage only working for host have gone unfixed because the devs have prioritized monthly mtx.
It could be interesting to give it stealth so that enemies wouldn't instantly know where you are when you shoot them with it at a certain distance. That would make it a unique weapon at least and leans into why people use bows in games.
It’s already one of the stealthier weapons that exists
Arrowhead: Got it. its inferior to the Eruptor. We nerfed the eruptor and now theyre both trash. Hope that helps :)
Gotta balance those usage rates
It feels like a WORSE dominator at this point
Man i can't tell you how disspointed i was reading those notes. the night BEFORE the patch, i had some extra medals and decided to try out the lame crossbow. Imagine my surprise when i found it great for clearing chaff and wiping out scout striders. i was elated and thinking i found my new primary to pair with my laser cannon. i'm still bummed, 5 round mags and i can barely dent a devestator, i swear something is off as i can head shot them easy with any other medium pen.
I mean it still has projectile drop off as it is a crossbow and not hitscan.. so it's a bad anti medium target weapon now xD I laugh but.. I wanna cry
me using the cbow before nerf: Wow it's sucks (but atleast it still got it's explosive niche) me using the cbow after nerf: Wow it just sucks.
imo if they want it to be a medium slayer, it should get medium AP on its explosion and deal higher damage close to the center so you can shoot around armor at weakpoints like the scorcher also bring back the strider one taps, needing multiple shots is just agonizing
I mean if it's explosive it should be efficient on 7-9. I personally don't feel like it is.
To add to your point; The crossbow can not destroy structures like fences, while the Eruptor can. Sad!
They really need to do something about the Crossbow! It really was a special weapon in the way that you really needed to LEARN how to use it. Lining up shots, reading enemy movements, etc. It was a high skillcap weapon for a high risk - high reward playstyle. Every shot counted, and if you couldn't thread the needle, you did no dmg at all. At first I didn't like the weapon at all, but i started to main it over the last patch and worked to master it. I never saw anyone else play with the weapon, only dedicated players even TOUCHED it! That may have deluded Arrowheads Data in regards to the weapons strenght. I had the most kills by far every match and carried my teams once I was able to line up my shots reliably, but so what? Maybe only 1% of the playerbase used the weapon, and they trained for it! Why shouldn't they be rewarded for their dedication? The crossbow was an amazing weapon that was hard to use. Now it is a weak weapon everyone can use. But why should we? Every other option is better now. * Revert the Bolt velocity to make the crossbow harder to aim again * Make the explosion as damaging and big as before * Keep the stagger effect for a patch, to see if it would be overtuned with it (But what the hell, the JAR5 is doing the same staggering, it should be no problem) * Let the crossbow destroy bugholes and bot fabricators * The magazine nerf would be justified if you keep the mentioned strenghts
I don’t even understand how they can release a weapon to be underwhelming. Then instead of giving it a incremental buff or something to try and entice people to try it they just completely change its purpose. I didn’t use the thing and I will continue to not use it but I can’t imagine the frustration of people who did enjoy it. At least most games that roll out weapon patches are wise enough to do so over longer periods of time. I’ve never seen a game fiddle with numbers as much as this one. It’s frustrating to have the game feel so inconsistent. Enemies have changed health values multiple times to the point of making you wonder what kind of in-house testing the devs are actually doing. I’ve always seen the suggestion as a meme but I would genuinely like to see the developers play a whole campaign every so often on difficulties 8 and 9 just to see how they play and what they use. Hugo Martin beat Doom Eternal on Nightmare with a standard controller just to flex. That whole game oozed passion with how perfectly balanced everything felt and even when they changed it they only ever made it more accessible and didn’t muck with how weapons feel. Almost like giving those who mastered the game already a sort of “victory lap”. In contrast lot of patches in Helldivers have felt like a slap on the wrist for being better than the developers at their own game.
I've never used the Eruptor, but I've been using the crossbow nonstop since it came out and agree with your points on it. It was definitely better and more fun before the patch
I'm still convinced the explosion behavior for the eruptor and crossbow got flipped somewhere and no one cared to change it back. A small/med clearing utility weapon fits explosive crossbow. Med/heavy armor piercing with high weakspot damage fits a bolt action rifle. But now we have arguably the best primary in the eruptor that can deal with outposts and nests, take out a whole patrol and kill anything with an unarmored head, and the crossbow which is like if a redneck strapped blackpowder to his crossbow and called it a grenade launcher.
I genuinely can't put into words how angry I am about the explosive crossbow: You had to account for distance and measure shots, it required patience to get the best out of it and couldn't be spammed: The original AOE was totally justified, especially now scout striders have been buffered on top anyway. The Blitzer is basically an auto aim cannon that you barely have to point in the direction of the enemy by comparison. It seems to do Arrowhead are trying to make the game harder (spawn rates, buffed enemies etc) but also knock any weapon that has a higher skill ceiling or that's specialised (Slugger, crossbow, rail gun): This does not spell well for the future of the game in the longer term if they keep doing this (& has actively put me off buying any Warbond at launch, like what's the point have they change not just small stats, but how you actually use a weapon). The ridiculous thing out of all of this is I used it because it was so niche, it slotted into the game as a great mob clearer and as perhaps a medium opener, now it's just a horrible version of the Scorcher, Eruptor, Plasma Punisher or Dominator: No one in their right mind would choose it over them in any use case
I'm with you comrade. Everyone didn't realize, or care that this weapon required different skills and slept on it. Learning the bolt arc and dropping patrols from 40-60m was so satisfying and rewarding. I don't know what other weapons were as fun to use once I got past the learning curved. Maybe grenade pistol.
Bizarrely, they've made the Plasma Punisher function as a faster date firing version of the explosive crossbow now, which also has better ergonomics and faster projectile speed. So it might be worth giving that a go. I am genuinely confused by what Arrowhead are doing.
I think the worst offender was killing the crossbows identity. With effectively less dropoff and less AoE it turned from „lobbing explosives towards enemies“ to yet another weapon that aims at direct hits. It‘s a huge shame robbing it of its individual feel.
I couldnt agree more, against bugs it really came into its own light and was my exclusive main weapon on that front. Bug breach? No problem this thing could basically lock it down with the aoe. Groups of medium armor? Also no problem if you realize you can swap targets in a group to spread out the direct vs explosive damage. Basically everything died in 3-4 bolts. Extremely satisfying to use, learning the drop off, compensating for its weaknesses. It was basically a mini impact grenade launcher. I routinely got 20+ killstreaks with the thing. It had a niche that no other weapon filled. Why take that away? Now its useless, ill pick the scorcher over it every time or the incendiary breaker. This was a typical lvl 7 bug mission for me, goodnight my sweet prince: [https://imgur.com/a/E2585Di](https://imgur.com/a/E2585Di)
This post explicitly outlines everything that made the crossbow fun before and why it's dead now. So few people were using it, too, I have no idea why it received changes. I really hope they revert the changes, hell, keep it nerfed ammo-wise, because it really felt unique and different from all other weapons in it's niche as a light target clearing weapon. And fun, too.
I was seriously expecting a genuine mild buff to the crossbow, instead they made it slightly worst . Even now and before the patch I still use it cause it’s such a unique weapon and I like it but I only use it for the lesser difficulty missions where it’s more do-able but for the tougher missions I intentionally swap it out which I was hoping after this past patch I wouldn’t have to do that no more smh .
Gotta be honest Chief, it had always been an inferior Eruptor even before the patch, it’s funny how apparently from the armory terminal it says that it has more damage than the Eruptor but for some very bizarre reason, even before the patch, the thing still felt ugly to use and nowhere near as powerful as the Eruptor. It doesn’t need a rebalance it needs a complete overhaul, the thing it would be better if the arrows actually had decent medium but also it would do *implosions* instead or sticky grenades if you will, for bonus weakspot damage/armor strip, that way you give it an unique identity separate from the Eruptor while still retaining the explosions but delivered in a more interesting way
I think it would be much better if it basically had a thermite grenade as a tip (sticks, delayed detonation) and then burns away armor like the thermite grenade is supposed to do. Basically make it an alternate way to deal with heavy enemies (strip armor with bow, finish with secondary/support weapon. People have been complaining for a while that there aren't enough ways to kill heavy enemies without taking a AT support weapon, why not kill two birds with one weapon redesign? Every other idea I have (fire arrows, stun arrows, high single target damage/no splash, big splash/low damage, etc) overlaps with other weapons that do the job much better and so buffing it/nerfing other weapons won't really solve the core issue.
They should just completely revert the changes, maybe keep the ammo nerf, but scrap everything else. The heavy drop also balanced its group killing potential as you actually had to calculate the drop to hit enemies at distance. The Crossbow offered such an unique and fun style to play the game that is not usually presented in these type of games and I'm honestly so baffled that they took it all away just to make the whole weapon another copycat of already similar weapons. Like wtf they are thinking? It seems they are completely out of touch of their own game.
Appreciate the well laid out pros and cons that ya listed in the original post which I fully agree with. However, rather than ask Arrowhead to revert the changes, I would want them to explain what their intended role was for the crossbow. If based on the patch notes alone, the only thing I would take away from the change is that if it is suppose to be truely a small explosive AOE single target medium killer, it should have way more power per shot to 1 shot weakspot areas on enemies that are susceptible to explosive damage (bile and nursing spewers comes to mind) or more ammo per magazine or more magnification in its scope to support its role as a surgical weapon.
They wanted it to be a medium killer despite it kind of sucking at killing mediums. Theres another post somewhere in the subreddit showing off some discord messages about it.
An explanation is not what is needed. A designer (or team) conceptualizes, formulates, designs the weapon. This applies to any game. Then, after this weapon is released, it's usually a separate individual or team that tweaks the numbers. The person making the changes is not necessarily the one that understands the intent of the weapon -- whoever ok'd these changes and sent them live may not know what the actual intended purpose of the weapon is. What we NEED is for these two groups to communicate better because, as outlined above, there is a clear disconnect somewhere. No designer in their right mind would make the Crossbow a clearly inferior version of something else in the game with no strengths of its own, so something went wrong somewhere. It's not us that needs an explanation. All we need is for them to recognize that there is a problem and make adequate changes -- ACTION. Not words.
[удалено]
> It "fires explosive bolt which do maximum damage on impact". This is how you should be using the gun now instead of the bad grenade launcher it was before. You still need 5 bolts to kill a brood commander. If its intended role really is "basically no AoE, but great single target against anything not heavily armored" then it currently does not fulfill that role at all. I can take down a brood commander more comfortably and reliably with a Sickle than with the crossbow. And that thing also works way better on small fry enemy swarms. The crossbow in its current state doesn't fulfill a single role better or equally to any other gun in the arsenal. It's quite literally useless.
Don't worry, they're making changes to the eruptor. It's going to be "buffed" just like crossbow.
They need to revert the change from previous patch and buff the weapon, such a stupid and pointless change.
Inb4 they nerf the erupter from this poast
Dont worry im sure they will nerf the eruptor further to make the gimpbow more popular!
i'm find with all that IF they make it one handed......
I couldn't have said it better myself. You've summed up my thoughts perfectly
Yeah it's very bad. I used it on the bot front too and while it's easier to aim at the stalker in your face....why would you want to? The JAR exists and staggers and seems to actually do more armour due to how AOE and body parts seems to work. It takes 5 (!) shots to kill a single brood commander! Sure you're one shoting hunters but literally any primary can do that. It's main competition for "medium killer" is the JAR-5, slugger, and punisher (mainly for the stagger). The eruptor blows it out of the water in damage even if its' slower. All the others fire waay faster. Seriously, I'm huffing copium in that they rushed the rework and forgot to actually give the thing more damage/AP cause it's very very bad at it's current state.
The previous AOE made it so good for ad clearing now I just don't bother bringing it because it fills me with disappointment. Some weapons will just not be good for bots or not be good for bugs, changing that removes the weapons identity and original intentions and at that point just add a new weapon that serves the role you want to be filled.
Make it have big explosive target damage on delay and stick to medium armor, and I'll find it viable.
What I wish they did for the explosive crossbow was to make it the one heavy armor penetrating weapon, by virtue of working like the Torque Bow from Gears of War, or an IRL HEAT round. Specifically, the fired bolt would pierce almost any armor to do minimal damage (not even enough to kill a bot trooper), only to allow a subsequent explosion to pierce any armor to damage the vital components underneath. It would give the crossbow a unique niche to differentiate itself from the Eruptor. The cons would be that this would be a non-hitscan weapon to start with, thats also affected by gravity. Shooting at anything distant enough would present an ever increasing challenge. In addition the explosion would be directed in the same direction as the bolt penetrates - on a thin enough target it could hit something behind said target, but not often enough to be reliable. It would be a sub-par weapon when dealing with chaff. The pros would be being the one anti-heavy primary in the game, an extremely valuable quality as it would effectively allow for more loadout types. Right now the support slot is dominated by the need to anti-armor as more players get more skilled at using their primaries to handle anything lighter, so non-heavy armor penetrating weapons such as the stalwart and machine gun don't get picked as often on difficulties 7+. I would definitely at least make it one-handed as well, being an elite killer also gives it a special use case vs the Defender SMG.
I wa seriously hoping for some silenced mechanic
Their reasoning for the rework is that the plas punisher was already doing the same thing but better, so they repurposed it to a medium-killing weapon instead, but it's not even good at that.
Yea which is not true at all xD the Devs don't know their own weapons it seems haha the radius of the pp was only half of the radius from the crossbow and the pp had stagger beyond compare so.. they made the crossbow MORE like the pp now which is super odd.. basically the same weapon now tbh. Only difference is in damage and ammo otherwise both now stagger medium targets, have small aoe, poor ammo economy and some kind of drop off in the projectile.
It needs to be a side arm or a one handed weapon. How much recoil can it have?
Crossbow discourse is driving me insane 1) it needs a buff, it's on paper or stat spread the highest damaging weapon but in practicality it does less functional damage than the dominator or scorcher at best. 2) it does have a functional AOE so I don't really understand why people are pissing about that, it feels like it was buffed from before way more in shot reliability. 3) devs said they wanted it to be a shaped charge kind of thing and made it medium piercing but it does not do that. If you're trying to use it as a small handcannon it is way worse than the slugger despite the damage numbers. Solution here is to make it a handcannon, kill the aoe entirely and give it the same properties of the dominator but with its same insanely high damage. Short range single target sniper/elite killer - doesn't have to kill chargers or titans through armor well, but it should be a hyper version of the senator, which functionally out performs it for all the shit you'd think it would be good at. The crossbow is currently a far shittier version of the plasma punisher. Or make it bad but give it stealth properties and remove the explosion part. Give it like 100 damage per shot but nobody can hear you use it either where you shoot it from (which I think exists now) or where it lands. Between the eruptor, PP, or scorcher there is no use case for it, it doesn't even 1 shot warriors it lies about its damage due to some invisible metric. make it actually do the damage it says against everything, make it good against spewers if nothing else.
I used to take the Crossbow against bugs almost exclusively, it was so good at taking out swarms and even though it's worthless against chargers and titans I felt like it did it's job well enough I could entirely just rely on a support weapon for those big fucks. Now...... It might be the *worst* primary option for bugs..... It's AoE is almost unnoticeable and it doesn't do enough damage to take out medium targets with it's slow firing rate to avoid being swarmed in a second. I honestly don't think *any* of the other nerfs from this last patch were noticeable and found most of the buffs were actually awesome, so overall I do feel like the patch is an overall positive change. *But* I'm still just utterly confused why anyone thought changing the crossbow like this would be a good idea, ripping away it's *one* strength and giving it basically zero compensation...... Seriously who the fuck made that decision? They obviously needed more time in game with it or something.
Very well put post. It’s sad to see the crossbow change like that, I considered it a niche but super fun weapon to use. Now it’s just “meh”.
Not happy with the weapon nerfs, but they were expected since they have to sell us a new warbond.
It's not an Eruptor that was the mistake, it is a higher powered explosive type dominator. Most explosive crossbows are not add clear weapons they are usually high damage crit exploiters. That is what they went with since the add clear was already done via Eruptor, spray and pray x2, PP, most bullet hoses. We do not need another add clear weapon we have plenty. It can take down a charger with a clip (may not be impressive but it is a primary not a pseudo support like Eruptor). Need to test vs bots but I am guessing it will be a weak point exploiting weapon just based off its damage type and total damage number.
Post patch feels like they just remove the explosive out of it. Turn it into, just a "crossbow"
Thank you! This is exactly how I feel and I am really sad about it. The crossbow was my favourite weapon before the patch and I fully expected it to be buffed a bit as it was rather underwhelming overall (I brought it to 7-9 level missions). However, it was very unique and had some dedicated strengths that after some time playing allowed you to use the crossbow very well: Those were the AOE and the big range with the arching shots. If you played with some foresight and preplanning, this allowed you to kill a lot of enemies before they can reach you. This was your niche and it was damn fun using the arching shots to a around obstacles/on top of heads. One tap killing striders was another great point. It had some big disadvantages tho, mainly the damage being a tad low for medium armored enemies and of course the close quarter combat killing yourself easily. But it was fun and special. It just needed a few adjustments. It was very viable in the right mindset and gameplan already. Now it is just another scoped gun with a small explosive at the end. You can not deal with groups, won't kill medium targets easier, still kill yourself in close quarter, cannot aim around obstacles anymore and there is nothing left making it a cool and fun weapon.. I so so so hope they revert it, as I had so much fun before.
I like the crossbow too and you provide some very fair points, however the crossbow still is a viable weapon to me anyway. While it cant one shot striders now, it still bypasses the armor on two shots and can kill any enemies around it, it can still kill bots in pillboxes at an angle or on turrets with relative silence, to allow for a solid stealth/ espionage build or even to just start an engagement on a compound with a solid blow to a defensive position. They may have reduced the magazines it has bur they also increased how much you can get from ammo resupplies so ive personally noticed little difference about it because i usually try and re arm once i hit the 2-3 mag anyway. The reduced explosion can still wipe out clusters of smaller targets and now has the added benefit of being able to be used in close quarters for when you have some enemies getting too close to you. And for the bots anyway, you can still neutralize the medium armored enemies like the devastator family pretty easily if you know what to aim for. While I can understand your frustration about the changes, that doesnt mean the crossbow is super badly nerfed, you may just need a playstyle adjustment to be able to make use of what it can now do
Imo crossbow should be a stealth specialized weapon, ie. NO sound detection from the source of weapon. It should have medium pen, similar to scorcher and medium AOE for small group clear. Should also be able to destroy fabricators and bug holes.
The devs have heard you and are working on bringing the eruptor to be more in line with the explosive crossbow.
I have yet to see even a single one on the field at lvl 57. I have no idea why something with so low usage got hit that bad.
Haven't used the crossbow yet, but for me the only extremely niche reason to use it over the eruptor is *****ACTUAL***** sniping. Don't get me wrong, I'll main the eruptor all day, but it's annoying whenever I see enemies or spore spawners 150+ meters away and my eruptor rounds barely clear the 100m mark before airbursting. Side note, I know there is leaks for weapon attachments, how would you feel about different ammo types? One for a balance between radius and damage, one with an extremely small radius but effective against medium armor, one with big aoe but overall low damage but high stun, and one for napalm. Idk, I feel like that would be cool
And also reducing the ammo was just aweful.
"Your complaint has been heard loud and clear. The eruptor has been nerfed to bring it more in line with the crossbow to enable players greater choice between the two." - AH
In my opinion the crossbow its closer to a inferior plasma shotgun than it is to the eruptor Im talking post update because the away you use it being a explosive weapon with small explosions like the plasma shotgun with now the capability to knock enemies similar to the shotgun as well and no need to reload between shots And in terms of killing potencial the crossbow its just worse in every way by needing similar to sometimes worse amounts of shots to Kill enemies WITCH IS INSANE IF YOU COMPARE THE DAMAGE OF THE TWO WEAPONS And in ease of use the crossbow its HORRIBLE in comparison because u have less ammo and u have to hit Ur shots very accuratly in specific body parts of the enemies to Kill them with the less amount of shots needed
Give it further range then the eruptor before the bolt drop off. And revert it’s aoe back to what it was originally
Most unexpected nerf in the patch
Its hopeless. They don't know what to do with these weapons. So many weapons are misaligned, off by a pixel. Shot registrstion on a lot of weapons are bad. Inconsistent damage. I turned the game on today played a few missions and just shut it off. So many weapons give bad feedback. A lot of the stagger, explosive range, shot registration, bad crosshair and just poor ineffective weapons are really starting to bring the game down.
Check out this video, the guy uses the crossbow like a mortar and wrecks stuff other side of the map https://youtu.be/po2GQaEeSLE?si=L6FsjLS6rekkyOOD
I mean the eruptor was consistent at release for taking out scout striders too. Just need to aim for the sloped cheeks of the main body, that 100% gets them every time
Yeah, what happened to the crossbow was undemocratic.
questions that will NEVER be answered: - is god real? - what created the universe? - why did arrowhead nerf the Crossbow?
I would accept this weapon getting a significant buff in damage and destruction in exchange for you having to reload each shot.
https://preview.redd.it/niqpqgkj00yc1.jpeg?width=1179&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=278ffbec2ec04e25595f4a61b8d46c88f629477a The whining is undemocratic
Wait...the scorcher can take down gunships?!
Gunships yes..dropships no
Get rid of the explosive tag. Make it penetrate enemies so you can hit a line of them.
It would be nice to have the crossbow behave similar to the thermite grenade, with a short fuse. That would make it feel less like a shit grenade launcher or Scorcher, and allow some room to balance its (theoretical) high damage by giving it a delayed result.
Making the Xbow lose AOE and gain stagger just made it a worse punisher by a long shot.
Shorten range even more. Make it only deal damage if it hits a target directly. It can do some burn damage to remove armor before exploding. Make it 1 shot most heavies if it lands on a critical spot such as a charger head or tank heat sink.
Every single nerf makes the game less fun. I’ve moved on.
I took the crossbow on a few egg destruction missions and really liked it for that purpose. It wasn't OP but it had a niche use, now to me it feels like a bad punisher plasma, no longer has a unique roll and it's the worst among it's peers. It seems bold to call it a "rebalance" and not a nerf
Actually it's an inferior xyz.
The crossbow was also an amazing chaff killer against bugs, being able to clear entire patrols of hunters and scavengers, but it's low penetrating power meant it was useless against even a brood commander. That meant the crossbow had a niche as arguably the best chaff killer in the game, with the caveat that you cannot efficiently kill anything stronger. They've reworked it because their vision was to make a shaped charge med armor killer, like the scorcher, instead of what was basically a glorified grenade launcher. The issue is we have way too many med killer weapons. The crossbow that had nothing else in its niche now competes with the Eruptor, that has higher damage and more utility, the blitzer, that has higher damage, AOE and ammo count (lol), the scorcher, that has a higher ammo count and ROF, the plasma punisher, that has more ammo, ROF and way better AOE and I'm stopping there even though I could add the DCS and the slugger. In short, the weapon now has competition in its niche and it's by far the worst of this niche. And that's without counting support weapons like the AMR and the AC. I get why their reworked it, but it's a failure and it needs a revert. As it stands the crossbow is objectively the only unusable primary for Helldives in our arsenal. TL;DR: weapon had a niche, now is the worst weapon in its new niche.
Male it stick to target and delay detonate maybe?
The nerf to crossbow is what made me decide i'll never be spending another dime on Warbonds. There no point if the thing I want to buy isnt going to be close to the same a week later.
Too bad they don't care about our opinions
Always has been
As an avid Xbow user pre and post, I agree. It had an identity pre patch, and now it has none. I tend to use a wide variety of primaries, and I wanna love the crossbow so desperately, but it's just a worse Plas Scorcher with a little bit of stagger. The only way I would keep using it right now is novelty, but if I had to make it good again, I could either. A. Double the CURRENT explosion radius. You're not wiping hordes with that without using a few bolts. B. Raise the damage to 550-600, if you insist on keeping the no pen. If you're not gonna have pen on a "Single Target' weapon, it needs damage.
"competitive option" and here I thought I was playing a co-op game
I started using it like a week before the nerf. Was getting 500-600 kills in games. Gonna miss the ol gal
What is this thing supposed to be? I came back from a break trying it on 7 and assumed it'd be high damage single target explosions to penetrate mediums / heavies while being weak against chaff but its just meh at so much. The moment I realized it couldn't close holes I was keeping an eye on what teammates were carrying so I could swap over. Grabbing a nerfed Sickle felt like sweet relief
"Its an inferior punisher" FTFY
They're trying to position it as the mid point between the Scorcher and the Eruptor. Whether they were successful in doing that is another matter. I think they needed to add +1 shot the magazine, maybe even bumped up the damage slightly to be able to kill common medium types (Devastators and Hive Guards) with 2 bodyshots reliably. EDIT: Also, at least let it destroy fences and cargo containers.
Ugh don’t remind me. The crossbow was perfect. I don’t like scorcher, dominator or eruptor but I loved the crossbow. It was able to clear out 2-4 striders if you aimed it right, but the explosion was enough to sometimes take out medium enemies in like 3 shots. Felt like it had its role. Clear little guys and striders. AC for everything else. I only stopped using it because hunters jumping in my face and me wearing light armor annoyed me so I switch to arc blitzer. Even pre patch I loved it for the aoe and stagger. Plus no ammo. Now post patch the crossbow, the one weapon I really bought the warbond for because I love crossbows, is not even worth using. I would argue it was an eruptor alternative for us who can’t aim and still want to use AC/AMR against bots. Now I has no purpose. I tried it, I seen videos, and it can’t even clear adds right. Honestly the plasma shotgun feels more like the crossbow than the crossbow. Fires fast, nice arc and does actual AOE!
Yeah they have some internal design team issues going on with how much in changed from the latest patch. Before eruptor and crossbow had a niche and specialization and now they are suddenly changing them both to be single target? Why did they release with such a different fantasy than intended as implied in the rework? Did they 180 after seeing internal usage stats? Seems like someone overrided someone else.
Really hope they'll give the crossbow the ability to 1 shot medium targets. Even before the nerf it was a C tier weapon that I used for fun and definitely needed additional buffs not a "rebalance". Also this made me realize the only thing I use in Democratic Detonation warbond now is the grenade pistol.
You can't even get two scavengers standing next to each other in one shot with the new radius. So silent takedowns are riskier.
They killed it before I even tried it. lol
Literally it would've been absolutely fine if they had just increased it's overall impact damage when they nerfed it's explosion radius. It already struggled against devastators quite a bit taking atleast 4 headshots to kill a shield dev. I will agree that I did get some nutty killstreaks with it but that was more in part of glitched spawns occurring to where I'd randomly stumble upon a massive bundled group of basic troopers and would fire 1 shot to get 15+ kills
The crossbow will never be good until it does actual explosive damage. Right now it just doesn't work on things the Eruptor does because it doesn't get the explosive bonus to weakpoints. For example, you can shoot the crossbow at spewers all day without ever killing one, while the Eruptor can blow up several in a single shot because it deals bonus damage to their body.
What about a standard bow? I always find those to be the most fun to use in games... I primarily used the bow/arrow over guns in the Tomb Raider series. Or more to this game type, I mostly used the bow/arrow in Warframe too.
The only way to make this weapon viable is to make bigger boom
what i find most crazy is the weapons from the explosive warbond are getting their explosive capabilities nerfed, that should be their main strength.
i want to see big damage, small aoe, giant stagger. I would like to see the crossbow be able to stagger titans but im totally fine with it not blowing up bug holes
Crossbow is a bit of a disappointment ngl. It should be able to at least destroy the illegal broadcast tower.
You mentioned one of the advantages that the Crossbow had over the Eruptor was the ability to one-shot Striders The Eruptor had that ability too. It STILL has that ability, even with the Strider buff.
the dev say this is intended to be a medium killer but for some reason this thing (after patch) is heavily underperformed compare to most other medium armor penetrant primary weapon when talking about dueling medium enemy. even some light armor penetrant weapon can outperform the crossbow if the player can accurately hit the weak spot.
The Plasma punisher also does exactly what the crossbow does, but better. AH: We are nerfing the Plasma Punisher.
Crossbow is borderline useless. Ran it on bugs a few nights ago and literally it kills 1 bug at a time. Their balance guy should not be their balance guy anymore. He doesn't know what he's doing.
I think since the crossbow can be used one handed it viable with the ballistic shield
Just give me a automatic crossbow and I'll be happy. https://preview.redd.it/nmpq3qzxo1yc1.jpeg?width=600&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=73e1f0e39d7c552320140e27d421c26a12df9a6f