Pulse Shields are stupid

[Camo Turkey 🦃]

Why put in a defense that almost requires you to bring a hard counter? Especially in the first chapter where parts are limited, it's annoying to get to the end of the level where your AC was doing great, then oh no here's a boss with pulse shields. Guess I'll just have to die and go to assembly and then bring the mandatory sword or pulse gun.

[New Dawn Sets]

It's the devs way of forcing the player to change up their AC, though this was probably the worst way to go about it.

[PocketYoda]

I like how they said AC6 is not like Dark Souls.. It freakin is.. what a wasted purchase.

[moulala2]

Balteus' shield does probably come too early, but pulse armor in general is easy enough to break with other weapons. I never take the pulse guns because they suck at anything other than pulse armor and haven't had an issue.

[Camo Turkey 🦃]

Yeah I don't get it. I've been out of Armored Core since AC2, so after 21 years I don't remember much except loving the game. But I don't remember being forced to use certain weapons...maybe I'm wrong. The whole first chapter seems like "Having trouble? Use laser sword." and it's making the boss fights feel really gimmicky and not very satisfying to beat.

[Crossbone]

As much fun as I am having with the game this is a legit complaint, I do not like how the game forces you to play a certain way. Balteus is a kick on the face outta nowhere, there is no real preparation to him sure there is the pulse gun but it's not something I really wanna use. It feels like not all builds are viable in some cases.

[hakabata]

Bubble Gun and Blade is not a mandatory. It's just one of valid options to beat Balteus.

[AkumaOuja]

Originally posted by Crossbone:

As much fun as I am having with the game this is a legit complaint, I do not like how the game forces you to play a certain way. Balteus is a kick on the face outta nowhere, there is no real preparation to him sure there is the pulse gun but it's not something I really wanna use. It feels like not all builds are viable in some cases.

Balteus is over tuned for his location in progression, which in general has obvious signs of FROMsoft trying to both shake the rust off as well as avoid overwhelming and scaring souls kiddies.

With that said, while he is a bit RNG dependent [his flame blades and when and how his shield will go back up in phase 2] he does try to reinforce that in AC, pressure and aggression are king, very few builds can sit back and passively engage. At any given point, you should be closing with Balteus and trying to engage at point blank range. Generally if you're physically crashing into him, you're on the right track. It greatly alleviates a lot of the problems with him as a boss fight. He is still overtuned, he's a non-AC boss and those are always kind of a mess, and most closely resembles WGIX which, while cool as ♥♥♥♥, was not a well designed fight, but he is considerably more managable if you're spamming assault boost to constantly crash into him and fighting him where he lives.

[New Dawn Sets]

Originally posted by hakabata:

Bubble Gun and Blade is not a mandatory. It's just one of valid options to beat Balteus.

Unless you really wanna force yourself to get beaten over and over again until you somehow hit him more than he hits you, it's mandatory.

[Camo Turkey 🦃]

I did stagger him a couple of times, running a quad leg double laser cannon build with laser rifle and grenade launcher. Just on the struggle bus evading the missile attacks while landing my impact shots. I guess my main complaint is that impact and stagger seem to be mandatory parts of building your AC. Not having impact weapons is fine for clearing out the whole level but when you finally run into a tough enemy it takes forever to kill them without stagger.

[Ismjason]

I beat balt without the pulse blade or bubble gun, I used a high stagger blitz attack build.

[Amalgamation]

Originally posted by Crossbone:

As much fun as I am having with the game this is a legit complaint, I do not like how the game forces you to play a certain way. Balteus is a kick on the face outta nowhere, there is no real preparation to him sure there is the pulse gun but it's not something I really wanna use. It feels like not all builds are viable in some cases.

yes? this is one of the very tool tips the game pulls you aside to state.

thats why youre able to completely change your build and retain check points during a mission. and yes, in EVERY game there will be certain tools or mechanics that out perform others at certain tasks.

i think if youre complaining about the core concept of a game and pretty much just fundamentals of game design, maybe its not for you.

[New Dawn Sets]

Originally posted by Amalgamation:

Originally posted by Crossbone:

As much fun as I am having with the game this is a legit complaint, I do not like how the game forces you to play a certain way. Balteus is a kick on the face outta nowhere, there is no real preparation to him sure there is the pulse gun but it's not something I really wanna use. It feels like not all builds are viable in some cases.

yes? this is one of the very tool tips the game pulls you aside to state.

thats why youre able to completely change your build and retain check points during a mission. and yes, in EVERY game there will be certain tools or mechanics that out perform others at certain tasks.

i think if youre complaining about the core concept of a game and pretty much just fundamentals of game design, maybe its not for you.

It's very much not how an AC game should play. For souls this is fine, but not this.

[hakabata]

Originally posted by New Dawn Sets:

Originally posted by hakabata:

Bubble Gun and Blade is not a mandatory. It's just one of valid options to beat Balteus.

Unless you really wanna force yourself to get beaten over and over again until you somehow hit him more than he hits you, it's mandatory.

I think duel shotguns or rocket launchers diplomacy are easier way to cheese Balteus. It's not mandatory at all.

[Amalgamation]

Originally posted by New Dawn Sets:

Originally posted by Amalgamation:

yes? this is one of the very tool tips the game pulls you aside to state.

thats why youre able to completely change your build and retain check points during a mission. and yes, in EVERY game there will be certain tools or mechanics that out perform others at certain tasks.

i think if youre complaining about the core concept of a game and pretty much just fundamentals of game design, maybe its not for you.

It's very much not how an AC game should play. For souls this is fine, but not this.

sorry - but i dont think youre the arbiter of how a game should play. even if youre familar with the franchise.

[moulala2]

Originally posted by New Dawn Sets:

Originally posted by Amalgamation:

yes? this is one of the very tool tips the game pulls you aside to state.

thats why youre able to completely change your build and retain check points during a mission. and yes, in EVERY game there will be certain tools or mechanics that out perform others at certain tasks.

i think if youre complaining about the core concept of a game and pretty much just fundamentals of game design, maybe its not for you.

It's very much not how an AC game should play. For souls this is fine, but not this.

I feel like people saying things like this haven't played AC or Souls games. Souls never pushes you towards a certain build, basically any weapon will do at least decent damage with upgrades. AC has had missions where you can't target the enemies without a bio sensor, or they put a giant giant gap you need to cross at the very start that a lot of builds won't be able to cross forcing you to go back to the garage.

This has never been a series where you can just slap together whatever you want and have it work, you always had to take the mission into account to some degree.