Knife balance discussion

[Rectal Exambot]

I have never had issues with left click.

[eeny]

I have never had issues with left click.

General consensus is that left click sucks and will get you killed.

[Bad King Urgrain]

Knife for v15, as it stands:
- Insta-kills if you hit a player who has less than 60 health ("Wounded" or worse)
- Deals 50 damage otherwise
- No DNA left on knife (corpse will still have the standard stuff)

[JoTheShmo]

Knife for v15, as it stands:
- Insta-kills if you hit a player who has less than 60 health ("Wounded" or worse)
- Deals 50 damage otherwise
- No DNA left on knife (corpse will still have the standard stuff)

[Sly]

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[Charles445]

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WHY BKU WHY

[JoTheShmo]

I understand why it needs to be nerfed, but I was always fond of the "Get traitor, buy knife, knife closest person within 10 seconds of round start" 'tactic'...

[Darkest_97]

I think 50 is a little low. But now im never using the knife again.

[JoshJosh117]

I have considered this, but the problem I saw is that people could just "throw" while standing right next to someone.

So there would have to be a minimum distance, which is a little clunky.

So then you throw a knife at someone, it hurts them, but you can't use it to hit them again like you could if you hadn't thrown it. I don't understand the idea here...

[Citizen_001]

Ajunk will be pleased.

[Bad King Urgrain]

So then you throw a knife at someone, it hurts them, but you can't use it to hit them again like you could if you hadn't thrown it. I don't understand the idea here...

I was posting that in response to a suggestion of making a throw instakill and only reducing stab damage. That clearly won't work because people already throw from extremely short range, so leaving that instakill would mean the knife would be just as effective as it always was.

I think 50 is a little low. But now im never using the knife again.

The exact damage doesn't really matter, the point is that it's two stabs.

[FF|NedStar]

While I haven't done any play testing with this, I strongly disagree how it is now.
Of course I ought to get some play testing done before complaining but by the sounds of things, shooting is the better option then trying to knife them. A shotgun still instant kills on close range if you aim around the head area while a knife would only wound em to 50.
Deagle/Scout/Shotgun still instant kills when shot in the head, while this undoubtedly takes more skill then knifing, it seems silly to make the knife which is a close range only weapon have the same efficiency as any other weapon.

While I'm aware that this nerf is mostly done towards making it more fun rather then having anything to do with the balance. It should be up to the player to avoid people if they are afraid of getting stabbed, that you could only use the knife once due to the item limit made sure that you couldn't spam easy kills with it.
Leaving a DNA trace on it was more then enough penalty in most cases, a lone Detective is generally not a good idea and the traitor isn't always able to pick up the DNA scanner.

Maybe I'm blowing the whole thing way out of proportion and it might actually still have its uses, I however never considered the knife overpowered or greatly "unfun".
On the other hand I also have a Katana (custom weapon that spawns by random drops) for a good couple of months and it behaves much like the knife does now. While its a very useful weapon close range and on a target not facing you, in any other situation the user will shoot you if you hit them, leaving you either dead or badly wounded.

[Bad King Urgrain]

Shooting someone with a shotgun will still result in a lot of noise, unlike the knife.

How could you avoid getting stabbed when someone could pull out a knife and kill you in an instant? You couldn't, that's the whole point.

The limit prevents spamming easy kills, but that's still 3-4 free kills if all traitors get one. That's plenty to kill every detective, making the DNA ineffective as a balancing tool. If a traitor knifes and doesn't pick up the scanner, he is not very good. All he has to do is hold E right after knifing.

The fact that it even needed all these limits and downsides just to keep it from being excessively good and completely overused doesn't exactly speak for the knife. And of course, it was still a guaranteed buy for many traitors even with those downsides.

If this change turns the knife into a situational thing, only used against wounded players for example, then that's great. Means there is balancing room to power up other equipment that is more fun for everyone involved

[Charles445]

We'll see how it goes.

[Meta-Stick]

"No DNA left on knife." What exactly does this mean? I always scanned the body, but there a was a knife sticking out. Does the knife not have DNA, but the body still does? Just curious.

[Bad King Urgrain]

Previously, for a knife kill:
- The body had the killer's DNA on it, which would time out. The timer would be relatively long because the killer is very close when knifing.
- The knife in the body had the killer's DNA on it, which was permanent.

Now, the body still has it, but the knife itself no longer does.

[JoTheShmo]

If you simply drop a knife (like with Q) does it still contain DNA?
Also if you miss the throw and someone else picks it up, does it still have DNA?

[Silverstream]

Just for clarity-sake:
1. - If I "slash" my knife at an innocent, the knife will be used up and 50 damage will be dealt to the player. The knife disappears and cannot be used
     again.

2. - If I "throw" my knife at an innocent, the knife will deal 50 damage however the knife will disappear and will not be shown protruding out
 of the innocents body if the player is still alive. Otherwise, it is shown and no DNA can be acquired from either the body or knife.

3. - Knives still cannot be bought more than once during a round by a traitor.


Are the above 3 points correct in terms of the new TTT revision?

[Fuffe]

- Insta-kills if you hit a player who has less than 60 health ("Wounded" or worse)

The issue will be that you have to be sure when the player is below "Wounded". It's not extremely obvious if "Hurt" means the player has less or more than 60 HP, so I'd reccomend making it obvious for traitors who they can knife for instant kill. If they have a knife in their inventory, when looking at a player maybe it could say if the player can be knifed or not.

[Bad King Urgrain]

If you simply drop a knife (like with Q) does it still contain DNA?

Yes, I suppose I could prevent that for consistency.

Also if you miss the throw and someone else picks it up, does it still have DNA?

No, only theirs.

Just for clarity-sake:
1. - If I "slash" my knife at an innocent, the knife will be used up and 50 damage will be dealt to the player. The knife disappears and cannot be used again.

No, you deal damage and keep the knife. You can kill a healthy victim with a single knife, it just takes the two stabs instead of one.

2. - If I "throw" my knife at an innocent, the knife will deal 50 damage however the knife will disappear and will not be shown protruding out of the innocents body if the player is still alive. Otherwise, it is shown and no DNA can be acquired from either the body or knife.

It will hit the player, damage him, and drop to the ground.

If it kills the player, the body will have DNA (unless, I suppose, you were far enough away, but that would be quite a throw). I thought I just explicitly posted this?

3. - Knives still cannot be bought more than once during a round by a traitor.

Currently, yes. This may well change in the future.

The issue will be that you have to be sure when the player is below "Wounded". It's not extremely obvious if "Hurt" means the player has less or more than 60 HP, so I'd reccomend making it obvious for traitors who they can knife for instant kill. If they have a knife in their inventory, when looking at a player maybe it could say if the player can be knifed or not.

If a player shows as "Wounded", "Badly Wounded", or "Near Death", he is knife-able. There's really not much ambiguity.

I can quite easily add a little crosshair hint though, so why not.