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Old 2012-07-12, 08:00 AM   [Ignore Me] #48
MCYRook
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Re: Why I quit PS1


Originally Posted by Snipefrag View Post
There is very little difference in this case between 2/3 jammer nades and a Cr5 EMP
So why do we need the EMP then?

There is a difference, and it's in the effort/reward ratio and the speed.

To lay a sizable mine field and a few spits and motions, say at a base entrance, requires probably two full CE loadouts. The Engy grabs his loadout, runs out there, lays each piece of CE (being very vulnerable while doing so), runs back in to resupply, and lays the rest. Total time effort: something like 1-2 mins.

To clear all that stuff, you need much less time even with Jammers. You'd probably throw like half a dozen of them in this case. Total time effort: like 10-20 secs.

EMP blast, it's as quick and easy as pulling the CUD and clicking on "EMP". Total time effort: about 3 secs.

Now, the reward isn't the same for both sides. The CE guy can hope to get a juicy kill or two from his stuff, while the attacker guy just wants to get from A to B without being blown or shot to pieces by auto-attacking minions. Also, most people don't enjoy when they have to fight more CE than actual people, so that's a point as well to keep gameplay fun.

But still, EMP ist just pretty damn powerful. Because even if you can't expect to get many kills from CE, the least you would hope for is to delay your opponent somewhat. But with EMP, even the delay is almost neglegible. And as has been pointed out, the EMP is a hard counter to CE, but cannot be countered in return. Its only downside is its cooldown (which isn't long either, 20 mins) - and just as with OS, balancing very powerful things just with a lengthy cooldown is almost never a good design choice. Doesn't matter if many people have it or not, although that naturally makes it worse.
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