I also happen to be stuck in that boss in chapter 4 for a while for the same reason. I really like going fast in this game. I was trying to fight speed with speed, and it wasnt working. I knew if i tried with something else like machineguns it might be easier to deal with. But i stuck with my fast melee build only doing minor adjustments until i found a strategy that worked well enough. At the end i really enjoyed the fight once i knew how to do it my own, very fast paced fight, very exigent but also very rewarding to beat this way.
the boss is very vulnerable after some of her attacks and i think thats where fast melee builds shines. Peper with missiles and midrange weapon stay within 100-200m range wait for an opening and strike with melee i prefer dual melee builds like pilebunker and laser lance
Been stuck on this boss since yesterday, I am terrible at dodging the big laser and swipes. Light build running laser lance, Zimmerman, dual plasma missiles on the back. Had been trying the pile bunker and lance combo with but landing that initial hit is tricky.
I loved using the pilebunker against this boss specifically just because it destroys like half of its health and make the war of attrition less of an issue
I think Armored Core 6 is a good example of how some players will happily optimize the fun out of any game they play. Developers can't give options because players will take the path of least resistance and go for that even if they don't want to.
People lack agency and autonomy in games as in life, they want to be guided and teached everything, and not put any effort in making decisions and studying the mechanics, engaging with the core loop of the game. It's easier to use a cheese build than to learn how to proper balance and build a mech and pilot it.
Devs can still give options, they just need to keep working on balance, and players need to understand that decent balance is not easy to achieve and takes time.
Yep, I haven't played AC6 but am a heavy proponent of devs protecting the players from themselves. I don't want the balance of the game to fall apart if you optimize because optimization is fun and I don't like having to place arbitrary restrictions on myself, the game should do that for me. The best example of this is Slay the Spire imo, as it might be one of the few games where learning to play optimally makes the game MORE fun not less. It's definitely harder to do that outside a roguelike context though.
I agree for the most part, I was one of the unlucky ones who, as I was messing around with different customizations for my mech, found this one. I almost instantly noticed that it trivialized most encounters in the game and decided to not use that build again. Though every time i open up the assembly, trying to find a solution to my current situation, the thought of that build instantly ruins it for me. When a massive part of the game is combining parts for your situation, and you KNOW what combination will solve the issue, just having to ignore that feels like shit. I had the same issue with elden ring, where i was collecting all these neat items and spells and weapons, while i know most of them are not worth using. The way I approach both scenarios is the same; pretend the strongest option doesn't exist, which may cause me more annoyance than if I were to just use it and blow through the game
It's funny that in his Elden Ring video Dunkey does in fact use that exact powerful spell that deletes Mohg and continues to complain how it's too easy with it. I also have a friend who watches guides and walk-throughs before even attempting FS bosses, he doesn't even explore the lands and experiment with different weapons. He said these two games weren't as fun as they should, because he killed most bosses easily, that they weren't challenging enough to feel like an achievement. Then it was him who played ER with double katanas and Bloodborne with Ludwig's greatsword because he, himself chose to look up best weapon (= easiest to kill with) instead of what was fun to him, personally. I remember him explaining to me how my choice of Amygdala Arm and Bloodletter wasn't the best whilst admitting they look so sick, and how I too should go with Ludwig's Greatsword instead... It almost seems sometimes ppl can't be self conscious about how they're actively breaking a game's and their own definition of fun when they do this.
Sounds like he hasn’t realized that different people have fun in different ways. He has fun following an optimal route and optimizing it, you have fun exploring/doing fashion souls. Sounds obnoxious, hopefully he realizes what’s going on.
@TheGallantDrake you're missing the part where the friend admits to not enjoying the games due to the lack of difficulty he has inflicted upon himself. He makes it evident that he does, in fact, not experience "fun" in this way.
I stumbled upon the dual gatling build when i was bashing my head against Balteus. On NG + I've been running dual shotguns. To solve another problem, I ran dual bazookas and a pile bunker on my back. Just about anything in this game becomes "OP" when you wrap your head around optimizing your mech.
Right? Fast Dual Melee will delete pretty much everything in the game Does that make the game too easy? No.....That just makes you the type of player that chooses to play like that 🤷 Hes a 100% on point about Mohg vs Azure/Hidden Tear tbh....yes, you CAN do that but thats entirely your choice
@@scrotymcboogerballs6452 Then I guess I am just shit, because I tried defeating last boss in my alba frame with pulse blade//moonlight swappin around, songbirds, shotgun and some rockets and I just couldn't suvive for both phases or power thru, I would get staggered from any hit on this frame, swapped to heavy frame with meta weapons and the boss went down on first try
Dual pulse guns and dual pulse missiles will wipe every arena fight in 30seconds to 1 minute, but not great in most fights outside of that. Any time ive gotten stuck dying more than two or 3 times in a fight I keep switching weapons until something works better there so far always seems to be some specific combo that melts a boss even if its next to useless elsewhere
@kubekzpiciem nah, you arent shit lol Some of these bosses are fuckin legit hard and take a lot of practice to find the right openings and dodge windows....you can beat everything with every build, you just have to keep practicing
I think most issues couldve been fixed if they worked in a debt system like previous games, since gatling and grenades cost a lot there would be a big trade off to using them, but right now you just get a little less money. Luckily the director did mention that want an opportunity to explore debt again so hopefully we can see that soon
I disagree. That just shows a lack of patience imo. Edit: wait if we’re talking about either Balteus then I do agree. But if we’re talking about the helicopter then my original comment still stands.
This is less a testament to difficulty and more so because the average gamer is dense as shit and won't make proper use of all the tools they're given. The game is just decently challenging but also easily cheesable (use double stun needles and double zimmermans and you've got a boss skip setup)
They used to have ai chips u could put in you mech and let them fight by themselves. You could even make 2 mech you built fight each other with their ai and spectate.
there's the arena fights where it's basically a 1v1 against CPU's, even gives you their template when you win. I actually used a few as templates but I do hope they add more as some are pretty interesting
@axis8396 I've notice that as well. Very cool blueprint to try different ways and understand other styles. Also if you don't have all the parts it tell how much it cost to build it too
Even ignoring overpowered builds the biggest issue with the games difficulty is that the non-boss segments are complete cakewalks 9/10 times. So the games difficulty comes at you in sudden sharp spikes rather than a consistant experience that i felt elden ring and had
And I think this actually contributes to the problem at hand. I didn’t specifically look for overpowered builds but my melee lightweight build is not working good enough for some of the bosses. I switched a few times, still couldn’t figure it out, so I try to look up how to make my builds more effective. And most videos I found were using one of the overpowered builds. Realistically speaking, when people can’t figure things out on their own they go to the internet. And just like most things in nature, the path of least resistance is the one that will become most commonly used. These overpowered builds are universally acknowledged as so not because people specifically want to find something overpowered, but simply because that it is the most direct, effective, accessible and universally applicable solution to what’s supposed to be a puzzle. If the answer to all bosses are “dual zimmerman/songbird” then it’s inevitable that people will adopt such builds and have their experiences ruined.
Except you’re able to change your ac and restart at a checkpoint. Making difficulty spikes optional. Even going for a ranks, nearly all missions can be a ranked easily with little skill using tank legs and duel needles plus javelins.
This is one of the things that’s kind of deterring me from wanting to get it, those cakewalk levels seem like such a breeze I feel like I’d only ever have fun during bosses. While they are bound to be great, I want it to be continuously engaging
Fellow Lightweight enjoyer, I literally can't go back to bipedal after experiencing those crazy boost jumps. Also insane how a lot of stuff just miss when you're simply strafing or jumping with a lightweight
Same. I don't mind switching to an overpowered build if that's what it takes to beat a specific section of the game and access new content, but with more practice (and better parts) I imagine I can make jump builds work. At the end of the day, I want the mech to feel like something I'd actually want to pilot for the fun of it.
Bro i've been using a 385 boost build with the dual burst pistols and dual sweet 16 on the back for the S ranks and any other build i try is just not nearly as fun. Its so ridiculously fast and deals insane damage as well
the funniest part of dunkey's review is while he is discrediting AC6 for his "unbeatable wheelchair miniguns" build and saying again how you had to respect the Elden Ring encounters There's a freaking clip of a Comet Azur shredding the ice dragon on the fog you encounter in the Mountain
Dunkey had some bad takes. If he took the time to make a good build in elden ring he would probably not feel like every enemy deserves respect lol. Very easy to trivialize most encounters in elden ring. It still doesn’t mean every encounter is simple but anyways I’m rambling. These games are usually as hard as you make them, if you’re a familiar with fromsoft games and a good gamer.
it's an issue of scale. you can't destroy every encounter in elden ring with comet azur, whereas you can in AC6. Additionally, it is MUCH easier to create a busted build in AC6 than it is in elden ring. If a game has 1 SUPER OP build but you can't get it until end game or NG+ and requires so many different parts working in inventive ways, it would be much more balanced than a game that has an equally busted build that you can get early game by equipping a single item.
tbf it's a very experiential sort of thing, in ER his build was balanced so he had to respect the encounters, which added a lot of tension and fun to the game. In AC6 his build was OP so he mindlessly rolled the game and didn't have a lot of the same fun he had with ER.
I accidently discovered the OP Songbirds. But i figured everyone discovered these, you get them fairly early on, they look cool and sound cool and i am someone who likes to play with new toys so i immediately noticed how powerful they felt. But i never knew they would outperform so many of the weapons what would be coming later, i like heavy rocket launchers and boomsticks, and many of the later, heavy and girthy shoulder rocket launchers feel underwhelming. The Spread Bazooka was disappointing, so was the weird javelin (rocket that leaves a trail that explodes) and the container rocket that reaches a destination and shoots dozens of tiny rockets randomly. but i tested all of them myself, when someone goes online and finds the dual weilding gatlin wheelchair that trivializes 80% of the game that is entirely their fault. smh
Luckily for me i enjoy both building new mechs and S ranking. Song birds plus gatling worked for like one S rank but its so expensive i never use it. Its just one more build on the pile of stuff i've made that also works really well depending on the mission.
@@Pontif11 thats how the game should be enjoyed imo. i love tinkering with mechs and trying out new weapons. i am always excited when i unlock new shiny stuff. and some weapons perform differently to accomodate different playstyles. and many of the "good" weapons are also heavy and energy hungry, so the fault might not be 100% on the weapon balance but more so on how easy it is to equip a ton of good weapons and stuff with medium leg and generator power. but even so i dont think its a "problem", its liberating to be able to experiment and mix stuff PS: the true "culprit" of the weapon imbalance might be that generators are too good on average and legs carry too much weight, but that might be wrong
@@chrizzlyx i'm certainly getting a lot out of it. It would probably help if there was a reward for S ranking. I'm only doing it out of intrinsic motivation for the mech building. Maybe tying mech parts or OS chips to it would have helped.
Yeah, it is pretty easy to take a look at the stat screen and see what's good and what's not with a few moments (hours) of tinkering. I think Ratatoskr is underestimating how generous and transparent the game really is about what weapons are good and what weapons are worse.
I think they need to buff some of the other weapons to a certain level so that they can sort out where exactly those gatlings guns need to be. One example is the napalm launchers (which feel good to use imo) but are weak in pvp and versus flying bosses as well as certain ACs (there is also the speed to consider, so does the AOE of the napalm need to be larger? probably... most likely).
I think a lot of people see the Gatling guns and think to slap them on a tank, i made my own version of the broken tank build pretty early on, but found it trivialized the game and was no fun so i switched back to my old mech. I had almost ten builds saved by the time i beat the game for the first time, after playing the tutorials i found it really fun to experiment with any new stuff i would find and i think a lot of people played the game similarly because thats how From presents it, arena is just unlocking new fun builds to try as well. If you can't have fun with a build why bother playing it, people that say it's too easy or too hard are just playing the game wrong and i hope they can pick it up again and give some other builds a chance, the funny thing is its not even like elden ring where you are actually stuck in a build unless you respec and farm upgrades, its so easy in ac and thats what i love about it, the variety is so good and because of that i would say its better balanced than anything, you literally get to pick your difficulty and can switch it anytime till the flow hits. Also the broken builds helped me a few times on the ch4 boss because my game crashed after i beat it two times while the cutscene was playing :P Maybe you could argue that they should be put further towards the end of the game but i'm sure some people made the op build and had a blast with it
I also went with a more agile build pretty much the entire time I've been playing, but I do like that the game rewards you for refining your own mech and style. I will say going through my 2nd and now my 3rd time is much easier because I've fine tuned my mech over time. Blind playthroughs are that much nicer when you figure things out on your own
Figuring out atuff on your own is key. I also made a double batling double song bird build playing blind, they are easy weapons to get early. I thought it was neat but i didn't really use it again. It wasn't because i felt i needed to limit myself but because the fun is in making new mechs that i tweak into being just as broken. I want to figure out the broken lightweight bipeds, reversejoints, tetras and tanks so i won't stick with the first thing that works. Additionally, i love S ranking missions so those hulking monsters with gatlings or grenade spam are usually too expensive to run so i rarely pull them out.
This problem is often fixed for me in roguelikes. You can get overpowered builds, but it is unlikely and requires you to really understand synergies and plan ahead when picking up equipment/relics/etc during a run. Because it still feels more fun to get that power within constraints, if I could always just pick the same powerful build it wouldn't be very satisfying. And many powerful builds also have strong counters from enemies to force you to plan ahead.
A randomised roguelike mod or dlc update for AC6 would be pretty sweet Force you to use whatever you have available so each run unique with new favourite mechs
Tbh I actually did discover the heavy stuff on my own, specifically cause I've always enjoyed big weapons better than small weapons, like in Monster Hunter I choose Greatsword 9 times out of 10 for most hunts, and so I leaned into making a tank build as my first major build, but even given that, I do switch my build up from time to time, doing a small build or choosing specific weapons and being a medium build, if you just stick to one build the whole game, of course it's boring cause you're not engaging with one of it's major functions
I played through the entire game with dual Zimmerman shotguns and chicken legs, but didn’t touch the internet until after I’d already beaten the game. I still struggled significantly with end game bosses. But when playing through NG+ I had that realization that there was no reason to change my build, because it dealt with everything. Would really like to see other weapons and non-tank legs improved. Or at least a weakness to tank builds which can still move like a lightweight
@@devinthorn8182 I have beaten that mission with Dual Zims. I did switch to Bad Cook for the S rank. But bro, if your counter to the Zimmerman's is that you'll have trouble on a singular mission on your third playthrough, perhaps they are incredibly broken. And no, you don't need to fight the ones guarding the optional weapon, you can just instantly open the chest and leave
@@devinthorn8182 yes it does. Firing both at the same time insta staggers them but if you bring songbirds you can straight up instakill any wheels by firing both at the same time. Made s-ranking the escort strider mission trivial
@@devinthorn8182 Zimms and Stun Needles both instantly stagger and/or straight up kill the wheels. I even made it harder on myself by using a biped most of the game
I also went in blind and found the dual ZImmerman tactic naturally. I could see their attack power being cut 15%, or 25% longer reload, or 35% more weight, or given a pause like bazookas but shorter. They’re one of the only weapons that can deal 900+ burst damage without needing to pause to fire on bipeds. That said, they’ve shown me a lot of love. An AC6 without Zimmermans to keep me safe sounds scary, but I’d be into it. But to say it’s too easy with ZImmermans is so silly. One of my favorite things to do in AC games is to make otherwise useless seeming weapons shine by producing unique circumstances in the build. When I get bored with Zimmermans, I change my build. I’ve spent dozens of hours practicing with other builds for that reason, and I’d feel like an idiot getting mad about that, because once they’re nerfed, that’s what I’ll be having to do anyway.
Ah yes, the FromSoft game discourse cycle is in full swing. "Game too hard" "Game actually too easy" "Game fair but hard because designers have brain". Happens every time. Good video.
It's extremely funny because that's just games in general honestly. There's been so many games I have had a terrible time with because I missed a mechanic, and then there have been "hard" games that I flew through because I stumbled on to some over powered stuff
It think what happens most of time is newbies complain about the games being too hard while the souls/core veterans will complain about the lack of challenge. That's why I feel Lies of P did something special because that seems to be equally hard for both groups but interestingly enough the newbies can beat the game as well. I wonder how many old FromSoft fans realise that DeS and DS1 wouldn't have been nearly as hard if they played those after their newer games. I played DS3 first than DS2 then Sekiro and finally DS1 and the iconic OnS fight was almost comically easy for me at that point with a black knight greatsword. Then From makes an optional boss that's brutally hard like Malenia so even souls veterans will have a challenge and many people ends up hating her. It feels like some people cannot be satisfied.
The dual gattling build is literally given to you for one of the training missions, so saying that people have to go out of their way to find out about it is dishonest
Dunkey just took a miniscule clip out of context (using weapons you don't even get at that point and then coming back to the first boss) to make the game look bad, he always does this and he gets away with it because his audience is just 12 year olds who are there to parrot his jokes and if he gets called out he'll just say his previous statement was a joke.
I feel like a big part of the issue is just how weak some weapons are; especially the smgs and assault rifles. This can easily funnel you into only using chain guns because experimenting with kinetic weapons is very disappointing
@@IndorilNerevar yes the Zimmermans are considered overpowered as well. That doesn’t take away from the fact the amount of useless guns they’ve introduced into the game
@@huu6941 Zimmerman's are NOT overpowered. Learn to play around them. I have found it pretty easy to outplay anyone rocking dual Zim's. A lot of the weapons in the game become useless if you adjust your play style accordingly.
@@mysteriousmusikno? Stop it. If you cant outplay it, it doesnt stop it from being overpowered. I can outplay most meta builds with double nebula, so what? I can still be stunlocked with shotguns and needles very easily
I think the problem here is two fold. 1. Using Comet Azur to cheese bosses in Elden Ring is a bit different, as, given how cryptic that game can be, I would wager there's no way to accidently fall into the proper set up to do so without specifically looking it up. Even if you did come by it by playing the game on your own, it's still a specific build path that would be the pay off of hours of specific set up and build choices. And still wouldn't work if Mohg's AI decided to walk out of it on a whim. Meanwhile, Armored Core 6 pushes you towards this by design. In that heavier parts take less damage, and heavier weapons deal more damage, the logical conclusion folks are coming to is to put the big heavy guns on the big heavy legs. I have 3 friends whom are new to Armored Core, and through the missions they learned that they die less and kill more by gravitating towards a build like this. The game's systems offers tons of checks to other builds, like stagger, weight limits and ammo conservation, but this bypasses them. Magic in Elden Ring at least leaves you squishy. 2. The idea that there's a "The Strongest" weapons or build is contrary to what, I imagine, most people want out of the game. We look at all the parts, and they're stats, and assume they're balanced in a way that there will be equal pros and cons among them all. Not entirely 1 to 1 equal, but also not such that one build path completely outshines the others and strips the game of difficulty. The point of the game being to build your machine to face the challenges of it, there being a one size fits all murder machine that conquers all those challenges sort of makes the idea moot. You can in fact challenge yourself and stick to a certain frame, but I believe the complaints being lodged is that we shouldn't have to figuratively tie one hand behind our back to continue experiencing the challenge. The parts aren't even labeled in a way that would let you know they're the best, so anyone who started using them like any other parts would naturally think the game is easy.
Beautiful comment. I feel that this design choice is a strength and a weakness in Armored Core , and is a far bigger issue than in Soulsborne because in those games you have to commit to a build and everything can be extremely good (Colossal+jump attacks can literally break endgame bosses in ER). Overall this is not a big problem, but it shows the conflicting ideas AC6 has when it comes to some weapons and builds being pretty bad, even for just PvE.
well, no. there are several late game bosses that will absolutely abuse a heavy tank build like that. two I can think of are arqeubus balteus and the first ibis series boss. both those bosses fly around extremely fast and have attacks you simply can’t tank too much of. But most players won’t find arquebus balteus on their first run.
Elaborating a little on your point: The majority of builds in AC6 involve parts that you're handed for routinely completing missions, and bought with currency you can get by spamming repeat runs of whatever mission you personally find easiest. This means that the amount of gameplay skill required for set building is very very low. This is wildly different than a game like Elden Ring where there are absolutely broken things in the game, but it's going to be a huge undertaking to track them down and get your hands on them, and you often won't even know they exist to realize you should be looking for them. AC6 just adds stuff to the shopping list (for the most part). These scenarios really do not compare.
@@cameronphares2482bro both of those bosses went down like butter with a tank build. Songbirds and mini guns trivialize them and all bosses in the game. I can attest to that.
Agreed. I'd add, that the way the game's designed, you hardly need to even build toward the OP weapons. The gatling guns aren't nearly as heavy as youd think and impose no firing restrictions to lightweight builds, and even when overloading, there's a no brainer OS chip that just lets you sortie *anyway*. I loaded up my lightweight frame (wanting to do something akin to Leena's Gun Sniper from Zoids), and it just.. works. No major drawbacks. Hardly had to change a thing. And as for Zimmermans, theyre extremely light and energy efficient, so any build can use them with ease. In fact, this is the build I went for naturally, as I wanted a quick CQB shotgun+blade build of some sort since the game was announced. Just happened to be way too OP unfortunately. Point being is, these aren't even really "builds" like a Comet Azur build is. Just a weapon choice.
That is a community problem i've found kind of recurrent through many souls games. Like for example the battle against Gwyn in Ds1 people often complaint about how cheesable the fight is using parrys, but like, how do you know it? There's no way the first time you play it you knew it, cuz there's like no other fight where you can use parrys, so its kinda strange. Good video btw
"Cheesing with parries" in Dark Souls is a moronic combination of words. It takes skill to parry in those games. I suck at parrying, so that wouldn't help me at all.
Well but it is not the same thing a 12 year old game than a 12 days old game. It is understandable that people figured out everything about DS1 already. Gwyn being parriable is a meme at this point. And I also agree that if the strategy is to parry him, that's not cheesing since cheesing is supposed to be something very easy to do, like the Comet Azure combo in ER.
To be fair, players are going to gravitate towards what works. Im saying that in a sense that i don’t think most people actively run cheese builds, but they might’ve stumbled upon a cheese setup. I’s wager that everyone did try using songbirds, zimmerman, gattling guns and pile bunkers, since these items are not hidden at all and it looks pretty cool. I remember fighting Snail Balteus with a bazooka and a stun baton and after the fourth try i literally just asked myself… Why the fuck am I doing this, i could just use the pile bunker and win here. This was before i even knew the pile bunker was OP, i just happened to be running an explosive melee oriented build. Point is many times people stumble onto broken items like black knight weapons in ds1 and it just became a bit pointless to fight a difficult boss and not use it regardless if you know that the weapon is op or not. It’s not really the fault of the player, its the fault if the game. Game design is the only variable here since most players will gravitate towards what works for them.
I didn't discover the "broken builds" until dying a significant number of times, nearly edging out a win to a certain mid Ch 4 boss, before deciding to look up ideas for how to beat it. But I usually go back to playing other style of builds, I find a lighter weight build more fun. Or the Dafeng load out, thats also pretty fun.
In Ironpineapple's video Fromsoftware said that "what they try to do during development is create this kind of default archetype mech or several archetypes that you can clear the whole game with... as long as player are willing to engage with the system and observe the enemy's attack pattern and really get into the nitty-gritty of the combat. we've tried to make that possible for them" it sad that player could just easily look up for these archtypes on the internet while figuring out what work best through your own engagement with the combat system is truly what make this game so fromsolf
Anyone looking for the "best build" is someone either not having fun with the game or doesn't know how to have fun. The most fun of the game is customizing your mech and trying each weapon and seeing what works and what doesn't.
That wasn't just "FromSoftware" that said that quote. That was Armored Core 6's director himself. Kinda amazing how he understands the community so well
Considering how Dunkey plays fighting games, it seems to me he's the type of player who looks for the path of least resistance. He has fun playing that way, so more power to him. It only becomes a problem when he berates a game because he refuses to innovate his gameplay slightly when a large part of the experience revolves around experimentation and customization. As you've said, the critique speaks more to his inability to tear himself away from an OP strat than the game providing the tools to have a challenging, fun experience. Again, why does Elden Ring get GOTY when I can one shot 90% of the bosses, but Armored Core stinks and is easy because Tank is stronk? There's no consistency.
Self-imposed challenges aren't as compelling as a challenge thrusted upon by a game. If a game that centers around experimentation and building new mechs to overcome new challenges gives you a build that's so completely broken that it completely renders that aspect irrelevant, that's not the fault of the player. It isn't as big of a problem in Elden Ring because that game is so massive in scope that you'd have to actively seek out components to a broken build and there's a lot more investment and commitment into achieving the optimal build. The stun needle is given to you for free, and the Zimmermans are, for some reason, dirt cheap. The game has a balance issue, that much cannot be denied.
@@gracecalis5421It is 100% the fault of the player for using something broken and then complaining about it. Sure the balance is an issue but no game will ever be fully balanced, not even fighting games
@@gracecalis5421 Those are absolutely fair points, and I do think the distinction is notable. However, I do believe the game's ease is being blown way out of proportion in the arguments this video is responding to, so much so that it merits reminding that practically every masterpiece ever released on the gaming market that contains an ounce of customization has some massive, game-breaking element that exists, and usually they aren't even difficult to find. I think the primary issue is how natural it is to begin using the OP items in AC. Those are generally not the arguments I'm seeing levied against the game though, as I agree with you... they should be toned down or way off the path of standard progression. It's just not *nearly* as game-breaking as people are making it out to be in my opinion.
@@Walamonga1313 No it is not, it's the fault of the COMBAT DESIGNER of the game. This is a problem that could have revealed itself in testing. If they allowed it, that is the game saying they are fine with the player using something that is, as you just described it: BROKEN. That's not the players fault. They didn't make the game man. Don't hate the player kind of goes without saying here.
The amount of people who agree with Dunkey when he's always just so obviously missing the point in games is genuinely insane he's got a whole little cult of personality around him lmao 😭
The game is probably difficult for the majority of people (until they find op builds and hard lock), but some of us still found it easy without that. Hes not wrong about it being easy, his reasons just arent that great. Of course built in crutches are gonna make it easier and average players will gravitate towards that for some reason, despite deliberately choosing to play a "hard" game. But I for example played the first chapter with bad OS upgrades, a terrible build and a broken right bumper. I beat Balteus in 6 or 7 tries. I'm sorry, but if that's not too easy then idk what is.
People complaining about using an overpowered build ruins the game are the same people that can't think and rely on doing what others tell them to do. You can beat every single boss in the game without ever touching songbirds or the gatling guns.
I wanted to play AC6 in one way, as a build based off Gundam aerial from WFM. I found that most enemies were easy to beat but some of the bosses were hard due to my mech not being well formatted against them, but I didn't want to swap parts out and beat them using what others had said was op like the Gatling's, songbirds and zimms. That's where I think most of the challenge came from, which is similar to Elden ring as I made a Guts build which was super fun to play but difficult and when I replayed Elden ring I played a mage and defeated everything with ease. Asmongold has it right. Fromsoft games are as easy as you want to make them, if you want to use the best weapons in the game of course it wont be as hard. Which is why I always have an idea of what I'm going to play in a Fromsoft game so I don't end up just using the so called meta weapons or build.
I think the issue is that boss battles are too hard, basic enemies are too easy, and loadouts are too diverse in terms of power level. Some loadouts are so dominant for so long that you don't toy with the loadout system.
I beat sea spider 2nd try with a light weight dual shotgun pile driver. I think ac6 has a good balance so far of some bosses punishing thicc weapons platforms
I coincidentally used Tetrepod Legs for the first time on this mission, and almost first tried it, beat it on the 2nd try. Hovering greatly helped. Then I went back with lightweight bipeds. Got slapped around multiple times. Got close, but still haven't beat it with my high risk biped builds.
I think it’s easier than previous AC titles, but thst may well just be experience talking. It is certainly a good challenge, though, and plenty of people are clearly struggling. And yeah, its not a universally agreed upon complaint. There are plenty of enemies that will bend you over and go in dry if you try that ‘OP’ build.
As Dark Souls games kept coming out, Dark Souls veterans kept insisting that they were getting easier. Meanwhile, in Dark Souls 3 newcomers were regularly getting filtered by the tutorial boss. I don't think AC6 is easier. I melted White Glint's face off with my very own dual gatling build not that long ago. It might be easier compared to the first couple gens of Armored Core but I refuse to play with that horrible control scheme so I wouldn't know. I do think AC6 is somewhat simpler, though, and that might be what you're actually thinking of. You're confusing simplicity for difficulty. They made AC6 simpler to control, but they put the difficulty elsewhere, in my opinion.
I'm not sure that it's outright "easier" than previous AC titles, but it is without question much less punishing than previous AC titles, particularly with regard to how money is handled. You'd have to work pretty hard to go into debt in AC6. You can replay missions at will and get full pay every time. You don't get penalized for dying. You can sell anything you own back to the shop for full price. It is incredibly forgiving compared to early AC games. And I'm 100% fine with that.
For reference I looked up no guides, but I enjoyed the mech building so much that I got stuck in it for hours. I found that zimmerman shotguns would 1 shot any normal enemy I was fighting, rarely missed, and had a very considerable range. I used them against bosses and at first felt proud that I had built something that could beat the boss. That feeling slowly wore off as I realized that I could stagger even "boss" AC's by double shotgunning them. It wasn't that I had made a smart build, it was that I had made a broken one. I tried PVP and realized that almost everyone I played against had a Zimmerman shotgun or gatling guns. I tried a gatling gun and zimmerman build to see how I was getting smoked by them. Once I picked up on the range of gatling guns I bursted AC's down and Pile Bunkered them. The game became easy and repetitious. I decided to switch off these weapons because they were ruining the fun and after I did I enjoyed the game more. However I ran into Michigan, this fight is an insane gauntlet. I don't want to resort to a broken build again, however it feels like Elden Ring all over again where if I want to win I have to use some broken gimmick because the odds feel so incredibly stacked against me. Atleast in Elden Ring I didn't have as much accessibility to broken builds due to the RPG mechanics. If I was a faith build I could try to pivot to a Intelligence build and use comet azur, but I'd have to respec, the weapons I was currently using would be useless, and i'd have to rebuild an entire build from scratch in order to actually use it. Since Armored Core encourages you to switch up your build to beat harder enemies it pushes you to find the best weapons. Which means balance is incredibly important to make sure that different builds are being used and feel like valid options for bosses.
100% agree. I stumbled upon tank Gatling + songbirds mostly without looking anything up, but it didn’t stop me from experimenting. It also didn’t always work, for me at least, but it’s definitely kinda busted. Edit: After having beaten the game, yeah it's not that the game is too easy or too hard, it's that the weapon balance is kinda bad. Probably going to hold off on doing New Game+ until a balance patch is rolled out.
I ended up using the Songbirds because I always make a fast, lightweight mechs with two big shoulder mounted cannons in these games. I didn't start out using them, obviously and I tried various other options but ended up going back to them in the end, mainly due to their ammo supply and reload time feeling nice. Only now, after playing a ton and beating the game, am I learning that they are supposedly big OP cheese weapons.
Tbh i think the songbirds are Not that strong. As they really are not as effective against other ACs. Compared to bosses with a large hitbox like smart cleaner and sea spider.
Well at their designated role they are not great, they are good at breaking stamina which most bosses after chapter 3 will dodge most of the shots. If you instead use them as finisher they only have 140 direct hit adjustment compared to 215 of stun needles or needle launcher.
I only tried the songbirds because I was trying different builds to fight the sea spider too but I ended up loving it with the hoverlegs as I liked raining down fire like a AC130 then rushing in for a melee attack. I was hitting my head against the wall to find something that worked for me but I've seen plenty of other people do different builds that beat Sea spider so I thought I was lucky. Found out later people saying that's the cheese build for sea spider. Like I wouldn't have known unless I looked for it or asked other people how they took on the boss.
they are ultra effective. If you have a Melee AC, Basically missing is a rarity, because you are up in their face. You will miss with your songbird more times at mid to long range, then melee range. That's the real issue I think. It is too easy to land shots with melee builds. Slap on the right things and it becomes even stronger. @@robbe3334
I suffered for hours vs Balteus before quitting out to buy parts. It was first day so the pulse rifle was not common knowledge. I am an AC veteran that prefers to melee but kept getting smashed by impossible to dodge cannons at close range due to misunderstanding the tight timing. Got the pulse gun and tried again. No luck, it could get it to stagger but there would be nothing else to use for damage. I quit out and tried the early "auto win builds" because I wanted to unlock more parts and enjoy the rest of the game before returning later. A few failed brute force creations later I saw a video. I saw ONGBAL obliterate Balteus with MY ORIGINAL BUILD that could barely stagger the boss. Rebuilt my AC and OS tuning. It was still not easy but it was possible. Armed with knowedge of how, I got good. Very satisfying payoff. As a melee build I tried to find a good stagger weapon to match my laser blade. The Zimmerman was found to not only stagger better than available alternatives, but could shoot->melee->shoot again. During the Sea Spider I found all missiles to be very ineffective. Stagger friendly replacement found, Songbirds. It couldnt be any other weapon because all other cannons are too heavy/energy draining to equip. Beyond that, Songbirds/stunneedle are used because why use a laser/plasma cannon that has less ammo, higher weight/energy cost, drains energy to fire, requires a weaker generator, has a massive windup before launching. Continue through game. Very satisfying combat due to how engaging melee is. Struggled hard vs Cel-240. Felt satisfied in killing it. It then revived and killed me twice during its immortal phase. Not knowing how long it was immortal or if something else was needed I copy built a brute force gatling needle tank. I was invested in the story, lore, and parts. I reached a point I knew it was possible to beat within the next 3 hours, but chose to progress. Did the same thing for Ayre because I couldnt stand being heartbroken for so long. slightly regret this Did Allmind dirty because AHAHAHAHAHA GET REKT. No regret at all, my god that dude's salt fuels me to cheese him because it would annoy him more. I would say the difficulty is definitely in a good place for most of the game and you can fully tune it with your AC. People should play and enjoy it. Copy builds for inspiration, not to force the entire game. I never would have thought to try the BAD COOK until I ran out of ammo vs the 80 or so MT meat shields of Michigan. I heard people had a hard time fighting 3 ACs at the same time. I danced around with 4 missiles on the jumpiest boost monster I could make.
4:50 Yeah because figuring out tank legs with strong weapons dps check bosses is SUCH a complex thought lol. I figured that out against Baltheus almost immediately...
I ran double shotguns through most of my play through, insanely effective, but only at close range so there was still the challenge of staying close to the enemy
Wanna know a fun way to improve your build even more? Unlock hangar weapons and pit two shotguns on your shoulders. That way you can fire both shotguns, switch to the ones in your shoulders, and fire those while your other shotguns are reloading. I love how shotgun swapping is a viable build in even a mecha game.
Yeah, similar build here. Went with double Zimmerman + Lance + flex on an agile bipedal mech and it was mostly easy but also super fun and rewarding. The penultimate boss of the Liberator ending humbled me though lol
@@TheLastDaysOfSorrowrecently found out zimmermans are the weapon people use for boss speedruns or no hit boss clears. Feels dirty to use them now lel
That power imbalance shouldn't be I the game on the first place, and the game literally makes you buy and equip the double needles in the ice worm fight, so most people who play the game would have reached the double needle build by themselves.
forcing people to play sub-optimally to have a fun experience is not going to work out for a large portion of players. Many find the process of improving a build enjoyable in and of itself, plus more importantly it makes the difficulty of a game unengaging if you know you could just choose not to experience it.
I agree with what you say here, but I do think there is a lack of 'mid-powered' weapons in AC6 (not to say that there are none). In Elden Ring there are definitely S++ tier weapons and builds, but there are also many other things like a straight sword + shield build utilising square off and guard counters - certainly a strong build, but still one which requires the player to engage with a bosses moveset, and which facilitates the dance which you described when speaking about Mohg. When I build an AC, I often find myself straying too far either in the direction of being able to circumvent a bosses moveset through my sheer damage and stagger damage potential, or in the opposite direction where I feel very weak. Maybe it's just me being bad and/or just getting used to the eye-watering damage potential of the S tier builds, but I feel that AC6 needs more B tier weapons and less D tier ones. This comment was brought to you courtesy of the Please Buff Assault Rifles Association
I made it to the chapter 4 boss before I found how good dual zimmerman shotguns are. I discovered this because I was stuck on the CEL 240 and looked up a video where I saw someone using them, some missiles, and the starter pulse blade. I tried that build out on the fight, after a few attempts I got used to the play style, and proceeded to use it for select fights. It wasn't until I started S ranking missions that I discovered just how good that build was for everything other than maybe the Cleaner from Infiltrate Grid 086 and when you face it again near the end of the Liberator ending. And you know what? That build is OP as hell and it's so much fun! The movement feels amazing, getting fast staggers on enemies feels good and a lot of enemies move around enough it's not some permanent stun lock, I'm still engaging with the fight and if I get out of position I still die almost immediately so it creates that rush of being a proper glass cannon. I am worried Zimmerman will get nerfed so I made sure to get all my S ranks done. It's a shame they didn't go the regulation route like they did with 4th Gen because it allows people like me to still play the game I want while providing balance updates for the people that want them.
zimmermans absolutely rock the cleaner though? just shoot its chimney until it goes down, then shoot its face when its down. easy clap in the liberator ending it died in like 30 seconds.
I don't think weapons really need balance changes for pve maybe besides buffing some of the very weak ones. Wish they would do some balancing for pvp though, I'm sick of having every game filled with dual zimmermans or missile spammers.
"It's a shame they didn't go the regulation route like they did with 4th Gen" You know the game is only a week old right? It hasn't even had time to HAVE additional regulations or balance patches yet. However, on the title screen if you look at the bottom right you'll see that the game is listed as being on "Regulation ver.1.01", which means the game is running on a regulation system too.
One thing I think that is extremely missed is that on the first playthrough of Armored Core 6. You have no real customization options. Many of the builds that synergize well or create fun goofy mechanics can't be done until new game+ or even new game++. You start the game with a great melee weapon and everything else you have is dog water. The next melee weapon you get is the Laser Blade which is hot garbage. And while you unlock Weapon Bay from OS tuning Laser Blade is again trash. This results in people looking elseware for something that isn’t melee. They either look for missiles or they look for bullets. The problem with missiles is there is only a handful 1 or 2 and both are single shots, while back missiles are not good enough yet to be anything but “well at least it does more damage.” As a result, that only really leaves the player with machine guns. Which leads them to the gatling guns, and songbirds, and eventually stun needles. The game does not allow you until new game+ to say, “hey I have all these parts let’s make something different.” As a result, first time playthrough are boring garbage. “I’m here for parts and OS chips so I can have fun next time.” All the fun melee, sniper, plasma, rockets, and infinite flight builds didn’t come out until I beat the game once. It wasn’t until ALLMIND said again “welcome back Raven updating MIA status.” That I could start taking the pile of parts I had and build something. Another issue is that all those parts cost money! You can’t try and buy because you only have a short video, so the only way to find out if a weapon or part is good for your idea is to grind out millions of cash to buy all the parts you need. Which of course makes people play the wheelchair gatling gun even more. Parts should have been much cheaper as all parts are buyable if you just replay the last mission. 1 part minimum per replay, instead I got cores here in the 2 million and I must replay this mission 20+ times to buy it. The game is all about customization, but things are so heavily gated in the game or grindy that it makes customization DOA. Every player is thinking about “I have to beat this story mission, then I have to grind out this other mission for money, so I can buy this part that may or may not work for my build.” It’s extremely bad.
I don't think everyone purposefully goes out looking for optimal builds. Like I didn't know the Zimmerman shotguns were OP (to the extent of being used in boss clear speedruns) I chose them because big shotguns I could fit on my light mech were cool. In Elden Ring if I chose a melee class I'll level up my weapons and whatnot throughout the game. But if I find a cool OP spell I don't switch suddenly to a mage class. You likely had ignored all of the mage content up until that point. Never buying any spells, or doing anything mage related. No leveled up staffs. You might not even have access to respeccing, it it's something you want to even bother with for one spell. So you take your ultra great sword and continue along. In AC6 it's different though. Respeccing is a switch of an arm part away. You don't gotta use precious smithing stones to level up the new weapon, go to rennala, look up a meta guide on how to get infinite mana for a few seconds (as I doubt the player would think of it themselves). In AC6 you can just buy the gatlings and put them on without knowing, as had Dunkey. You end up optimizing the fun out of the game after that. Other weapons become unfun, not out of choice, but because there's a nagging in your brain going, "This weapon has way lower DPS than the gatlings," or, "This weapon has barely any ACS strain compared to the Zimmermans." Whenever I tried other weapons it made the game feel slower. (Or, in the case of handguns, run out of ammo unless I skipped all but required enemies). Dual assault rifles taking four or more magazines of ammo total to ACS strain an enemy, when dual zimmermans can do it in one shot.
@@morgannyan2738 Armoured Core is all about the freedom to play the way you want, there's no reason not to experiment when you can just sell for full price. If someone doesn't want to do that, I don't think there's anything the devs can do short of completely nerfing the overpowered builds, which isn't a good idea.
@@morgannyan2738 some games force u to play in the "fun way" or proper way by being punishing like "doom eternal" , souls series. other games nudge you to play better via style meter or mission grading/ranking system like Armored core6, ultrakill , DmC etc. also ac6 lets u full refund on gears which is a big indicator and motivation booster to experiment
You can’t get S rank using the “overpowered” miniguns build because of the amount of ammo it uses. The game also encourages not taking any damage for S rank - something heavy builds using miniguns are poor at because of lower mobility.
If you're stuck in a boss and are tired and want to progress, just brute force it with tank and big guns. Otherwise, try other builds and have fun and have a tank+big gun build only for when you want to advance.
I did that for almost all of my first boss encounters just to get the progress and the achievement/trophy. Later, I retry It with different lighter builds as that's my preference. Practice with different parts over and over and study the bosses movements and attack patterns. It's less pressuring to me that way because I already went over those roadblocks. At that point, it's just a matter of dissecting what went wrong initially and discovering all the bosses vulnerabilities.
Same arguement for CoD 4 and the M16. It was the such a good gun and you had so many people arguing it ruined game variety in multi and was OP, meanwhile I regularly went 20+ kills using a Scorpion with an ACOG on it or running around with the golden Dragunov. You aren't required to use the meta builds in games and they may be the best but there is always fun to be had on the less walked path too.
I think you spot on with this and honestly after liststing to dunks take he came off like someone else had been guiding him. I say this because after beating the game 3 times and working on my s missions I know why I picked what I picked, and I remembered trying out the mini gun when it unlocks, and a single mini gun just sucks. I ripped it off my mech and said never again. The song and dual gats only become strong when paired in that build.
tbf i think some people just don't like the feeling of artifically making the game harder for themself. that makes the experience feel cheaper if you have to handicap yourself to have a challenge
@@thomasallister3446 I guess by definition not looking up the strongest setups online and using them is intentionally handicapping yourself, but that argument is still completely ridiculous. The normal intended experience is not using an optimal setup you found online with anything less optimal being a challenge run, and if anything you are making the experience artificially easier and cheaper by doing that.
The game is literally about customizing your mech to help you beat tough encounters. If you have to deliberately make your mech worse in order to have fun in a game about customizing mechs then that game has a problem. It call all be fixed with 1 patch. I don’t understand why people are taking this so personally when it’s literally a completely valid criticism. The game literally does everything in its power to encourage you to buy weapons and try them out, they should’ve done a better job balancing out builds that completely trivialize the experience.
Right now in the middle of NG+. I actually discovered what was powerful on my own. The only thing I looked up before I completed my first playthrough was the moonlight blade. I mostly used a medium weight bipedal mech and I enjoyed it a lot. Found the Zimmermans effective on my own and I saw it was kinda trivializing some encounters, so I started to just keep trying out new stuff every mission. I mean you earn credits after a mission and probably earned enough for at least 1 new thing to try out and so I kept doing that. Right now I mostly like using a linear rifle with some upclose weapon, a right shoulder missile launcher and a left bay melee weapon. My main criticism of the game is that I find the encounters and objectives in between AC duels and boss battles to be very lacking and undemanding. But I will say when I get into that "zone" or "flow" blasting through fodder MTs while zipping around, using only the necessary shots, not just mindlessly firing and efficiently flying through the battlefield it feels very satisfying, so maybe it was From's intention for the game to be more of a power fantasy once you get the hang of piloting your AC and then ramp up the difficulty with the AC duels and boss encounters. That still doesn't make me dislike the game any, its just something there that I wish was different. Or how even in this NG+, I wish there was even more modifiers for this second time around for the same missions, like adding more of those HCs or LCs in missions to complement the fodder MTs.
That's crazy, I'm in the middle of NG+, I use a linear rifle and a close range weapon, my r shoulder has missiles or a launcher, and my L bay is a melee weapon. We're problem solvers! :D
As a longtime viewer of Dunkey at one point, I feel like he’s been making just the strangest most contrarian takes just for the sake of it as of recent years
@@tiagozilliosoares7988he said that armored core 6 was nowhere near the quality of elden ring and dark souls, while also saying it was more of a guilty pleasure game. In his review he framed it as a bad game that he had fun with, and not a good game.
I definitely agree, during my run I struggled with some bosses/situations I made a bunch of mechs over my playthrough I have about 10 main designs currently but around mech 6/7 I found the shotgun and eventually had a double trigger build with those, and tore through the first playthrough. I ended up feeling trapped in my build. I was still having fun but I was struggling with other builds, but in NG+/++ I found new builds, experimenting with PvP and trying to get S Ranks I've finally found a way to enjoy other builds and playstyles again. Fightingcowboys mech build videos have been a real eye opener now that I've started looking at content for the game. (Something like his old school light weight sniper build is a blast)
Let’s also remember that Dunkey’s main complaint of Elden Ring was that the enemy balance as you played through the game felt like it was all over the place. That didn’t stop him from playing through the game at least 4 times because he still found it enjoyable. Balance seems to be a sticking point for him, but that doesn’t mean he thinks the game was bad.
He just has higher standards for balance because he comes from league of legends where everyone is expected to gravitate towards the strongest thing as the standard rule. It's not the correct perspective for single player, where you may want to play worse things for fun.
Thank you. This observation entirely nullifies Ratatoskrs argument. Leaving the difficulty and balance in the hands of player restraint to NOT use the most powerful gear is, of course, going to mar the progression for a lot, if not most players. This is a valid complaint consistent with FromSofts recent design ethos and Ratatoskr somehow is completely missing the point here.
@@nathanielholzgrafe5274 To be fair Ratatoskr said the balance should be improved if it can be, he was just disputing the idea that it's a universal problem as he didn't experience it and he thinks most people don't end up with an overpowered build naturally. Most people playing non-pvp games don't optimize it for meta and instead just does what seems cool.
My lightweight AC struggled slightly until chapter 3, after that I was easily able to shred almost everything with little effort and it had no impact on my enjoyment, it’s unbelievably satisfying to know you made a build that good all on your own
I used the Gatling-tread-Songbird combo, and yes it made large parts of the game fairly easy, but I at least was hard countered by the chapter 4 main boss and had to change my type. Furthermore now that I've beaten the newgame++ I can say confidently that it is no stronger than a well made mech of any other type.
Honestly the strength of the build is not in it's maximum effectiveness vs other builds, but that it is extremely easy to master. Tank legs give massive amounts of AP and stability allowing you to ignore attacks that would otherwise stunlock your build. Dual gatling guns are just hold triggers. There's no timing, charging or reloading required to use them. Shoulder weapons can be fired with no penalty from tank legs. The strategy is literally hold triggers until stunlock and then fire songbirds for fatty damage, while letting the high AP and stability carry you through attacks that would obliterate poor movement. You can achieve the same if not better results with other builds, but they will not be as easy and will require good piloting to get those results.
@@davidburke4101they do overheat, so you do actually have to pay attention to them. i thing everything with no reload animation has an overheat function. even the flamethrower, the thing made to spit fire, overheats after a while (tho it’s a long while)
I'd say it's more of a "you can pay attention to overheating" and less of a "you *have* to pay attention to overheating". It's an optimization sure but it's by no means "required"
I dunno, I arrived at gatlings + dual stun needles/songbirds without looking up guides, and when I beat the game for the first time, I went on Reddit to ask if people also thought this combo kind of makes everything else useless, and most people agreed. This was last month, I think. I also specifically remember struggling quite a bit with the final boss of the "bad" ending (trying not to spoil it here), trying a bunch of different builds, and finally defaulting back to gatlings/stun needles in the end and beating the fight in 2 minutes. However, what I'll also say is that a) if you play NG+ and NG++ as the game intends to, you'll run into at least a handful of missions where it's NOT the most viable build - good luck making it through Intercept the Redguns without running out of ammo, for example. And you can pretty much forget S-ranking the whole game if you're not willing to change up your build a bunch.
When I first bought the game, I knew I wanted to play either a lightweight mech or a dual gatling gun heavy build. I beat all of the arena fights with gatlings+songbirds and fell back on this build if I got stuck on a boss. However, I was very proud to beat the Ibis series boss in Chapter 4 with my Submachine guns and songbirds build on my light bipedal legs. It definitely made it my favorite boss in the game and I've been playing the NG+ almost exclusively with a lightweight mech.
I do still appreciate dunkeys review style where he tells you exactly how he felt while playing and not what he expects people to want to hear. Even when he makes missteps, he’s one of the most reliable when it comes to honesty.
I don't think its really a misstep to have a differing opinion. But I get how relegating an entire game as being 'easy' when choosing the easiest option is probably problematic to constructive discourse around its merits.
That doesn't make him a reviewer, that just makes him a person. I think the main value in his videos is that he's very funny. I watch him for entertainment, not for serious takes on games.
If only they balanced the OP weapons with the classic debt system. A lot of the older gens also have OP builds but isn't economical. Hope they fix this in the next entry.
If they implement that "debt" system it should be a togglable feature cause im happy its gone cause not all mechanics are good mechanics and they don't always make it more fun sometimes it just makes it more tedious.
@@Horde334 It's good if implemented correctly. Example: "Wanna use OP weapons, here is the bill for the ammo cost." It's a way to deter people from abusing OP weapons while still being available in the game. In AC6, there was never a moment where I feel like I'm saving for something and finally excited to buy a part I want. Everything felt basically free. And I didn't even farm for credits, I just progressed normally.
Compared to last armored cores, armored core 6 was laughably easy. But it makes up for it with a much much better pvp portion. I do wish they would bring back online co-op missions though
While I didn't have big issues with all these bosses the community kept mentioning as mega filters I still felt like my build was lacking and that I was doing something wrong. My main issue was that I had that double grenade launcher on my left shoulder and the bazooka in my left hand which make you stop when firing and then I remembered the Tetrapod legs from the tutorial and how they absorb heavy weapon recoil. So I tried these out and decided to equip a second gatling gun since I was already using one on my initial biped because I like high fire rate weapons and immediately the game became a lot easier. It was not really what I would like to use since I think the four legs look kinda stupid but it was just so effective. The "problem" to me with AC6 compared to Elden Ring and the other games is that I can play them with my preferred play style and still be comfortable with them and have a nice challenge at the same time. I am always using either a big sword or normal sword, no buff items, no magic or ranged weapons and even when I was fighting Malenia for 2.5 hrs I felt like I could do it and wasn't compromising myself all that much. However, Armored Core's main gameplay loop seems to be about using the right tool for the right situation so it is easy to fall into that hole of feeling like the player is not adapting well enough when using certain builds and it is just as easy to settle for an OP build once you find them.
You can just pick your favorite shit and grt good with it in ac 6 too. I've cleared the game with a fast pistol and melee build, with a more tanky brawler biped, a super tank treads build, and a quad lega build. You can dp whatever the fick you want and make ot work IF YOU ARE GOOD. The issue is people thinking they're badass with builds they haven't put much thought or time into, and then getting pissed when it seems to fail them. The issue is the player.
@@Darklinkftw12 "You can do whatever you want if you spend enough time and effort" applies to everything. Not claiming otherwise. If you are dedicated enough and strictly want to play a certain way then of course you can pick what you want and train with it. I do exactly that for the souls games. Though, I feel in the case of Armored Core it is a bit more intended to find the right thing to deal with an obstacle instead of bashing your head against it. That is why I felt discouraged to do my own thing for a good chunk of the game. But I know you are talking in a more general sense and I do agree with what you are saying.
You are supposed to optimise your build, that's why there's a giant wall of stats for every part. Even if you don't read them, a smooth brain can figure out stagger is the aim for harder enemies and so you can just sort parts by impact and direct damage and... would you look at that! Zimmerman shotguns, songbirds, Stun Needle are all high on that list! Gatling guns also do quite good direct damage for a gun on top of looking awesome so they'll get used as well. Now, through the most primative understanding of the game, the caveman has optimised the fun out of it due to poor weapon balance combined with a system that rewards bursts of high impact and direct damage, over sustained rifle fire from afar
on NG I use double zimmer+stun needle. It's OP as hell but I get bored when I do NG+. Now I use double flamethrower with gatling drone and burn all like a psycho. XD now it's more fun to use weird build, because I already now the boss moveset.
Everyone talks about optimizing the fun out of the game but nobody talks about optimizing fun into the game. I used dual Zimmerman+dual stun needles and had a blast. Used it for almost all of NG++ and don't regret it a bit. Was way more fun than anything I used before that point.
@@jeff3221 Self imposed challenges have been a thing in souls games since the beginning. If you want a harder experience just go for an unoptimal build, just like SL1 challenge runs in dark souls. Here's a whole video about player decided difficulty all the way back in ds2. ruclips.net/video/MM2dDF4B9a4/видео.html Fromsoft does this to make their games accessible (except for sekiro) as this design pattern allows players that want an easy time to choose a clearly best option like using op magic in elden ring or in this game running tank dual gats/dual shotguns. Those that want a harder challenge can use weaker weapons to better test their skill and learn even more about the gameplay mechanics. It's very clearly why this is in the game to draw more people into this niche genre but still allowing difficulty for players that want a more rewarding tough experience. You're not being forced to optimize anything if you don't want to just like in almost all of FromSoft's previous games. Fromsoft has even said in interviews before this game that difficulty depends on customization so if you want a more difficult experience the only one stopping you is yourself.
If the game gives the player a braindead broken build, it's easy. It isn't even a build you have to work towards. Zimmermans are only 100k each more or less, and you get a stun needle for free.
@@gracecalis5421 Only if most players actually use said broken build, which they don't, judging by Steam reviews, Reddit posts, etc. Every modern FromSoft game has had broken builds, with the exception of Sekiro. While I'll concede AC6 is on the easier side compared to other FromSoft games, it's still difficult if you haven't discovered a cheap build and actually have to learn to play the game as a standard biped with a rifle, sword, and missiles.
@@deadeyedun So it's only difficult if the player self-imposes or for some reason doesn't come across the build. It doesn't take hours of research and going through forums to end up with dual miniguns/dual zimmermans paired with dual stun needles.
@@gracecalis5421 Yeah it's more difficult if the player plays the game normally without using the Internet to determine the meta builds? Is that what you're asking me? Everything is easier when you get help from Discord and RUclips lmao
It's a shame that so many people spoiled their experience by just looking up the most "meta" builds in a game where the fun is had in the exploration and testing element of builds. If I make something broken, the game doesn't feel cheapened. I feel like I figured something out, it's not the same as looking up exactly what someone else did. It's no longer your achievement. This has all the same energy of people who complained Elden Ring was too easy or they didn't feel any accomplishment from beating it, then you find out they only did the laser insta death combo, or were carried by their max RL friends they whole time. In video games, the achievement is worth what you pay, and if you aren't willing to pay anything, then how can you expect to feel an actual sense of accomplishment when you finish it? It boggles the mind. Some weapons should be down-tuned a bit I think, but as a whole especially my first run through, it was a proper challenge, because I didn't look anything up. I used my own builds through NG, NG+, and NG++. I even S ranked all the missions with my own builds, because I was just having fun testing, rebuilding, and testing again. There is definitely something different between figuring things out for yourself, and tapping into the collective consciousness of literally everyone playing so they can effectively play the game for you. More people should at least TRY to figure it out on their own, I think they'd eventually have a lot more fun. If you get hardstuck, sure, get a little help. But it shouldn't be your first, last, and middle option.
By the end of my 3 playthroughs I had several AC’s designed for certain types of missions because I went for S rank on all of them. They were all light/ medium weight and were all overpowered, for the type of mission I designed them for. I had my anti AC melee build that let me full kill an AC before they got their first heals off, my floaty missile barrage that was helpful on defensive missions and armored enemies, or just strong adds. Close duel shotguns and bubbles that destroyed anything with a shield, and I could go on, my point is there’s a lot that could carry you through the game but having a purpose built machine was immensely more satisfying and effective. Even if you pursue “over powered” builds there’s still challenge and fun to be had optimizing your play style.
I just think difficulty works differently than in Souls. It's not just about skills but choosing the right tool for the job. Of course if you just look up the most broken builds online then the latter aspect is negated.
You don't have to look up the most broken builds in this game to easily gravitate to dual zimmermans and dual launchers. It is absolutely the best combo for PvE because enemies have virtually zero answer to it. It's broken, needs fixing, and does make the game worse than it can be. I don't understand why people are making these strawmen arguments. Nobody had to look up the fact stun launchers destroy bosses, the game itself puts a spotlight on this during the Ice Worm fight, and it never recovers unless the player SPECIFICALLY tells themselves not to use it. That's not a small thing.
So, if it's all about finding the right tool for the job, doesn't it lessen the experience if it turns out 90% of the time the answer is to just use a sledgehammer? And you don't need a "most op builds" guide for this. It's a straightforward build that many people will figure out on their own.
You only need to try out gatling guns for 15sec to realize how busted they are, at which point you'll never be incentivized to remove them which is a failure in design. The design philosophy of having to tune your mech for each encounter does NOT work unless you have a VERY balanced game.
I went in blind and found a dual rensetsu single fire build early on and it carried me through the entire game. It's still one of my favorite games this year
You’ve always got the best outlooks! Yeah so similarly here, I have avoided kinda “build guides” but have seen some videos where people discussed what they were using… and on my own, after the initial couple levels where I had the starting mech load out, I got some money together and bought some stuff. I thought “man that would be cool to kinda be like Balteus just all rockets! So I got two (8)s on my back and four’s in hand… and I found myself absolutely mopping up with the setup! Except for some specific light ACs that are just exceptionally difficult, it melts! But because of that, I’ve started to veer from it and trying new things cause it is kinda “too good” most of the time! And just like you said it’s self-inflicted… like my very first elden ring playthrough I was using summons and RoB/moonveil and all that… but as I got more comfortable, I realized that I was hindering my own experience and went back to my roots!!! Wretch clubs bonk etc.! And now I’m one of those naked weirdos that just wants a single big sword and to go ham on some nerds! My idea going into this game was the same… “I’m gonna build an ultra light mech with just one bit bonk!” And immediately realized that’s not realistic and I’m bringing the wrong mindset into this game with me!
I think one of the main problems I see is that because armored core has much less weapons than something like Eldin Ring you are more likely to stumble into one of these builds. I played just picking what felt right and I ended up against the final boss with a pile driver a gatling gun a bazooka and some missiles. I did not look anything up and the build that the game led me to after trying all the parts was somewhat similar to the optimal builds. My thoughts on the difficulty are that in the main story bosses is it a perfect challenge that required many tries, but in the regular gameplay and ac fights it is just honing it as fast as possible and it isn't hard at all. I think that's what fromsoftware was going for and it is enough for me. I do not think the gatling gun is overpowered but the bazookas definetly are after I switched out my gatling gun for a third bazooka.
I finished up the final achievement in this game today with largely with a build that I fine-tuned - similar to yours, but with a bit more weight. Aggressive, high speed with a focus on melee: two 6x front missile launchers, a Zimmerman on my right, and the BU-TT/A Pulse Blade on my left. ( BG23ZG7R8W4S , for those on PC!) Double Zimmerman was something I only resorted to when something was giving me serious trouble, and even then it didn't work for everything - I had to get a bit inventive for some other missions. Particularly, for a certain NG++ mission, I ended up running this funky "interceptor tank" build with laser rifles, probably the only time I've seriously used them. Sometimes I swapped the Pulse Blade for the Laser Dagger or the Ashmead. For me, a lot of the game's difficulty went away once I got skilled with what I was using as much as having good weapons. I went from taking over two hours against the Chapter 4 boss with a worse version of that build, to *accidentally* S-Ranking it when I was doing a log hunt. Gatling Songbird Tank is a strong build, yes, but I've found it still has shortcomings I can't deal with very well. Still, it plays well into AC6's mechanics, particularly exploiting Staggers and Direct Hits. It was fun cheesing some Arena fights, but it's not my style. If anything, I'd rather see laser and plasma weapons tuned up, particularly giving them more Impact. The only energy weapons I've seen that do a remotely OK amount of Impact are either melee weapons (practically their own category), plasma launchers, or laser drones - even spoiler weapons do jack shit - and they all share the same flaw of being high on energy load, forcing you into heavier builds.
i’ve been loving the challenge in AC6, like you i went immediately for the lightweight reverse joints because they appealed to me, and the reason i haven’t touched the tank treads because i don’t like the look of them
I played it blind and came to the dual gatlin gun + songbird build by myself because I just kept thinking about how to kill stuff asap and it sort of naturally came together. Great video and I completely agree.
It's not just the gats and songbirds, I made a lightweight build that trivializes the game just as much as Dunkey's wheelchair and in fact makes everything go even faster because I do about the same level of damage and also have far better movement. The weapon balance isn't just 2 weapons being overpowered, it's (from my experience) half of the entire arsenal in the game being a one tool does all mega weapon that can kill anything in the game with ease. I have 14 different ACs I made in my data, and they all vary from all the different leg types to flamethrowers, different melee builds and lasers and all you can think of, but the strategy never changes in any of the levels, you fight every AC the same way outside of multiplayer and the high impact effect of almost everything in the game sets up bosses to just sit there and eat any combo you have cooked up, which often takes at least half their health bar even with non meta weapons. Honestly the only boss that forces you to play differently is the big furnace thing in chapter 2 because you need to hit the furnaces on it to do anything, but it's not much of an issue because almost everyone who got to it beat it on their first try because it's attacks were so telegraphed and easy to avoid. To get across how little resistance the game really puts up, I made an AC that used all it's weight limit on heavy parts with bipedal legs to look like a Gundam, the only weapons I could put on it were a stun baton and a pistol. I thought it would be useless in any real mission, but I found that the stun baton has an alternate attack that absolutely destroys the stagger meter of everything in the game, and because stagger is such a ridiculously powerful and abuse-able effect in the game, I was able to go in and combo everything to death with ease using an AC that on paper should be totally useless. Hell, within like a week of release some guy uploaded a challenge run of him playing through the game with his fists, which sounds like a huge handicap, until you watch the video and see that they don't have a cooldown and he can stunlock every enemy and boss in the game by going in unarmed. AC6 is easy because it is filled to the brim with inherently powerful mechanics that can be exploited by almost any build you can come up with and it's not a glitch or bug, it's the core aspect of the combat.
I don’t fully agree with either you or Dunkey here, I’m somewhere in the middle, but I think it’s disingenuous to say that most people who used double Gatling and song birds or even the funny little tank treads looked them up and didn’t find them on their own because of what they are. You get access to most of these parts fairly early on and they have a eye catching coolness/funniness factor to them. People see that you can use dual Gatling guns, and get to try it in a training mission, and they want to do it because it’s really cool. Songbirds are one of the first shoulder mounted explosive launcher style weapons you get so people put them on because they want a big rocket type projectile there and then discover how good they are. People see the little tank treads, think they’re funny, read the description and think they’re even funnier, try them out and then realise how good they are. I didn’t do double Gatling songbirds because I thought melee weapons were cool and I wanted a sword and pile bunker but I started using the Gatling gun because it was cool and same with the songbird. I think they’re very easily discoverable OP things that people would have already gravitated towards, same with Zimmermann because shotguns are cool. Most people found out about comet Azur by looking it up because it’s not so readily available and most players gravitate towards a melee build rather than magic because they think swords or whatever melee weapon you like is cool
The difficulty is all over the place for me because I'm too stubborn to replay missions for money with the goal of buying new weapons. I think I need to upgrade my gear at this point...
@@wolfiewoo3371 Ya, I don't doubt it. It's not a principled stance; I'm just banging my head against the wall like when I encounter a hard boss in a souls game.
"Oh this person doesn't hate any part of this game? What an insincere and non-credible fanboy." I in turn wonder if that person in specific even owns the game, or just watches videos with his "universally agreed upon" facts. I honestly haven't managed to make heavy builds work for my playstyle at all, so can't say if such a brute force build would make things boring or not, but... since I'm really not in the business of making my games boring deliberately, I'll gladly not even do that. Infact I often make up my own fun in games on top of the other awesomeness. For example, it was fun replaying some of the easier money making missions with no weapons, just punching and kicking. :D Why do we live in such a gaming culture these days that people seem to seek out things to hate and then call people insincere fanboys who have seeked out things to like and managed to love a game all throughout?
@@SeveRUS67 Not finding anything that bothers you or anything that you don't like isn't really a claim that it's flawless for everyone else. "A lot of problems", you say? What makes them universal flaws, instead of things you don't like?
I'm someone who heard vague build advice from looking up advice at first, but ultimately just went and built stuff on my own. For Balteus I heard shotguns were good in general, and I took that information and tried to piece together why. I noticed the kinetic impact values, and built my mech around being able to just hammer him with the starter shotties, then switch to the pulse guns to delete the shield. It eventually worked, and I've been approaching each boss like that, treating it as a challenge to solve through my building of ACs. Today I unlocked the Zimmermans, and I remembered the seeing the songbirds shit talked, too. I tried them out together, and saw how ludicrously powerful they are, but the thing is i would have found this on my own, since the reason I liked the shotguns to begin with was the kinetic impact, and I'm just someone who likes to try out all the new toys I've gotten. And the thing about AC from the very first game is that it's like real weaponry, in that there are weapons that are just flat out better than their predecessors, and you're rewarded for juggling the act of balancing every aspect of your mech. In that regard, I've found the Zimmerman + Songbird build more rewarding, than anything. I've got a rather heavy, reverse joint, AC, where the jumping makes up for the lower AP and Boost, and I love just bulldozing everything in the campaign, because it's something I built from my own conclusions, and the songbird zim combo I was going to find on my own anyway. My specific build honestly kind of reminds me of my Greatsword builds in Monster Hunter, where I'm weighing all my options for armor to get things like Focus and Quick Sheath on the same set, and I think if a player is willing to experiment with the mechanics, they should be rewarded with stronger builds when combining the right parts. If you want the game to be even harder just do a challenge run, like Mega Man buster only runs. If you can't then it's a you problem
i'm so glad i came into the game with a clear idea of what i wanted to do in mind, same as you I stuck to medium and light parts because i wanted that gundam fantasy of zipping around at breakneck speeds and firing upon enemies blindspots with weaker guns, to that end i decided pistols would be great since in prior games they were the weakest guns used for backup when ammo ran dry, but they ended up being powerhouses limited only by their ammo capacity. ultimately the game is only as hard as you make it, embracing speed made the game a challenge in places but that was the experience I expected and desired. AC6 deserves praise for having gameplay styles that make the game more accessible for less mechanically skilled players without having a simple difficulty slider
During my playthrough i came across the gatling gun, zimmer shotgun and or the songbirds in game. I found these to be extremely powerful compared to other weapons, my build did not change for the entire duration of the game except adjustments to my AC outside of weapons (I did not use tank treads because i dislike them). I had experiment with other weapons but i had not found a good build to stick to so i was "stuck" to using these weapons. The game was still fairly hard and i was "stuck" on a few later game bosses. I still think the game is near flawless with its execution and thoroughly enjoyed the game. However i would like fromsoft to do something about these weapons for at least PVP because they are an extreme nuisance and a hindrance to enjoying pvp, especially tank treads
I mentioned this elsewhere, but the design of the game will funnel a lot of players into finding the OP weapons on their own. Theyre available early on, easy to equip to nearly every build, there's no penalty for buying and trying weapons out, and you can swap builds mid mission. I think it's actually quite likely someone will stumble on at least one of these 3 weapons in their time playing.
I felt the game really encourages you to experiment with different builds and that's exactly what I did trying to beat Baltheus the first time. So you learn fast that you have to constantly upgrade your AC and the game encourages that even more by allowing you to get your money back selling parts at purchase cost. I for one played over 80 hours and loved the game the wole time.
i discovered the double Gatling lightweight tank double songbird set up on my own because i was just trying to make Guntank from the gundam series, i realized it was insanely strong and found it funny that it became known as the strongest build in the game
I played a random build I liked until I found someone in an online match destroying me in seconds with dual heavy shotguns. Tried them on and never (not even once) got rid of them after. Rarely needed a second try for any boss / arena fight. Made me truly sad because I enjoyed getting stuck and beating bosses before (tutorial boss for example felt great to beat) but if you have the solution to a problem it is so hard pretending to not have it in using a worse built. I waited the whole game for them to throw a boss or enemy at me with wich I can’t deal close range and finally needed to adjust my built but it never happens once. That’s my experience. Still loved the story tho.
Watching the start of the video I was hoping this would be a discussion about the difficulty gap between normal/"trash" mobs and bosses. I think it's a thing that could be addressed as unlike souls games or any other games really I don't think I ever died to anything other than a boss fight while playing.
Really? You never died to an MT, or the PCA shield guys? What about that one mission in chapter 1 with the room full of cloaked guys sniping you with lasers? I even died to energy turrets in a few missions. Oh yeah, what about trying to grab the Moonlight sword surrounded by like 5 wheel guys? I died several times trying to grab it.
@@beegest_yoshiI wouldn't consider them Mini-Bosses, more like Elite Enemies. Mini-Bosses are fights that have Health Bars but you wouldn't necessarily consider actual Boss encounters. For example, Sulla in chapter 1 is a Mini-boss. Mobile Defense Platform is a Boss. Iguazu in chapter 4 is a Mini-boss. The AI Defense protocol in that same mission is a Boss. Or more easily, does the encounter let you resupply, like before Balteus in chapter 1 or the PCA Airship in chapter 3.
@@netapel2625 oh okay, I agree with you. I still think that the smaller mobs should pose more of a challenge, I personally want less one shot mini MTs and more of the slightly tanky MTs and PCA bots like those in the depth 2 mission before the enforcer
that's because this isn't a souls game. it's a sim where you play as the elite pilot of an ace custom mecha. if you've ever watched a mecha anime, you probably remember that goons usually aren't terribly threatening right? and to this end: you don't complain about the hollow-like zombies in elden ring being no threat even in large groups right? do you complain that dante can easily trash puppets in dmc? is it a problem that mario can stomp goombas to death with one button? if you're dying to trash mobs in any of those games that'd be a reflection on you as a player. that's the kind of shit that makes people cry "game journalist" at you. mobs in most games but especially AC are supposed to be mostly easy, and even then there's the armored heavy mt's, quad mt's, and LC's that all take way more punishment and can absolutely kill you if you don't show them some modicum of respect(at least for me as a close range player)
I just want more mission and enemy variety. They have a great rock, paper, scissor thing going with kinetic, energy, and explosive damage types that isn't really being taken advantage of. I'm taking my time with the game so I'm only now in chapter 3 but I was thinking how cool it would be to have a level where the goal is to navigate an obstacle course to beat the timer. I might actually be incentivized to get that dich weight perk from the os chips. I'm loving this game and i just want more of it!
Agreed on most points; I'd say that the obstacle course thing does describe the escape sequence in the mission where you have to escape the Coral surge in the mine. More would be fun though, for sure.
New game + and newgame++ give you alt missions and new missions, I think the game has just the right amount of missions to be fuffiling. It's not mega long like elden ring or something, but pvp will always make me come back to it every now and again.
The roshambo isn't from the weapon damage types, it's from Speed/Armor and Close/Long range status. Close range quick mechs can usually beat long range quick mechs and even long range armor mechs sometimes. Long range quick mechs can absolutely zone a close range armor mech to death but would suck against a long range armor mech. This game's combat is range control and speed vs tank.
I did end up figuring out that the gatling gun and songbirds and stun needle launcher was pretty op. Because i was using all 3 on my quad build with a pilebunker and most things just died very fast. I think tankier setups are a little bit too strong imo. The only boss i had some trouble with was C spider and the ibis coral mech fight and both of them i just switched up timings slightly and i killed them easy. I also think there too much of a reward if you stance break enemies. Which is why explosives just excel in pve especially songbirds. The reason stance breaking worked in sekiro was because it was tied to enemy health and bosses/mini bosses had multiple bars. I know this isn't really a souls game but its hard to not make comparisons to other fromsoft tiles. I still love the game a lot, i think its fantastic and there's still more mechanical skill involved than elden ring depending on the builds (tap, hold, mash.. etc. and not to mention the weapon swapping, boost kicking, using the armors,). I did end up changing over to lighter mech so i don't end up abusing the heavy weapons and the game felt a lot more fun. If there ends up being more AC games in the future, i'm sure they'll tune the games to be even more perfect. I'm normally uninterested in mech games but AC6 pulled me in seemingly out of no where.
I didn't know the songbirds were 'op' when I used them. I just ended up using them organically because I wasn't getting enough mileage out of missile launchers in enclosed spaces and wanted to try something else, and that was the next thing that I tried. I was like "grenade launchers? I guess I can try that", and so I did. Didn't know anything was 'OP" until like, just now. I just thought they were good but still weak since they'd miss a lot.
The key thing that makes this less of a problem is how, like you said, even though certain builds are the strongest, they don't render the other dozens of builds obsolete. It's very easy to just use whatever build you think is fun despite there being better options because the vast majority of builds in this game are adequate and about as good as each other
Great video! I found the dual gat +songbird combo without hearing about it online, and it did trivialize the game to some extend. But to be honest I loved it anyway, I seriously enjoyed the playstyle and never got bored. I think nerfs are in order but even being in the demographic of people who discovered an almost game-breakingly overpowered build on their own I have no complaints
My build I made while in Ch3 was a lightweight Quad Shotties build that became a Tetrapod Dual Gatling Dual shotties build. It tears through Arena, bosses, and enemy ACs. But it loses in encounters where range is better to have, and lacks splash damage from the songbirds.
I really hope the regulation system from For Answer remains in use for 6. The ability to just swap to a regulation to see how OP something really was, or how hard things used to be with a given fight? Priceless.
My friend and I played the game with pretty different mechs. He landed on 2xZimmerman w/ 2x Worm Needle, I landed on a 2xLinear Harris, Laser Sword and Duckett. His build made it so after chapter 4 of his first playthrough he never died to a boss again, first try against every boss straight through to the end of his 3rd run. Meanwhile, my mid-long distance semi-auto shooter would have me getting trounced by bosses for a bit before I manage to figure it out. Hearing how effective what my friend was up to only made me less interested in trying out his build because I want us to be doing different things and sharing with each other instead of a race to find a meta then stick to that. Plus, my build annihilates his in a 1v1 4 out of 5 times, so there’s a difference between ‘boss killer’ and ‘overpowered’.
I completed my three play throughs with mostly a laser shotgun, a blade, plasma missles and a laser cannon on reverse joint legs and nachtreiher arms It was great. Now I can use zimmermans and somgbirds to get everything to s rank
I had the exact same experience during my first playthrough of AC6 (sticking with a lightweight build) and I loved the game-- a lot more than I was expecting. I honestly feel a little bad for the people who deprived themselves of the kind of experience AC6 gave me.
ratatoskr again coming in with the great opinions actually backed up with an easy to understand and entertaining explanation. I found you from before totk and idk why i wasnt subbed. I am now tho. Keep at it man
I LITERALLY found a build that jelled with me and it lets me have fun with everything while giving challange. I have the pile driver for fun usages, i have funnles for suppression, i have a cannon for stagger and fun and i have a rail gun for more mid range fire power. It's fun, tight, and still requires me to actually BE GOOD at the game.
Many games have things the player can use to make the game easier. Elden Ring's mimic tear and summons did make the game a whole lot more manageable for many. That's just how it is a lot of the time. The game gives you options and it's up to the player to use those options the way they see fit. You can use a busted build or you can experiment with the many other parts and see what happens. The latter is what makes AC6 fun, experimenting and finding out what works for you. My first play through, I was using a medium weight build with lasers. With my 2nd run, I'm being more aggressive with a light weight shotgun build and changing to that style made the game a whole lot more fun. Be it this lightweight shotgun build or the wheelchair tank, it's up to the player to find fun in these games. Especially when the game gives you so many options. The game does give you weapons to fight certain bosses too, like how the bubble gun is good for shields.
I think its easy, but i dont think its too easy. It can be hard and it can be easy if you want, and even when its easy its still fun. Breezing through the game with double gatling guns is still really fun.
Игры
The video shows a few seconds of the Ch 4 boss. Forgot to put a spoiler warning.
I also happen to be stuck in that boss in chapter 4 for a while for the same reason. I really like going fast in this game. I was trying to fight speed with speed, and it wasnt working. I knew if i tried with something else like machineguns it might be easier to deal with. But i stuck with my fast melee build only doing minor adjustments until i found a strategy that worked well enough. At the end i really enjoyed the fight once i knew how to do it my own, very fast paced fight, very exigent but also very rewarding to beat this way.
the boss is very vulnerable after some of her attacks and i think thats where fast melee builds shines. Peper with missiles and midrange weapon stay within 100-200m range wait for an opening and strike with melee i prefer dual melee builds like pilebunker and laser lance
Been stuck on this boss since yesterday, I am terrible at dodging the big laser and swipes. Light build running laser lance, Zimmerman, dual plasma missiles on the back. Had been trying the pile bunker and lance combo with but landing that initial hit is tricky.
I loved using the pilebunker against this boss specifically just because it destroys like half of its health and make the war of attrition less of an issue
Word of advice, Shock Needle canon all the way whenever he stands still
I think Armored Core 6 is a good example of how some players will happily optimize the fun out of any game they play. Developers can't give options because players will take the path of least resistance and go for that even if they don't want to.
People lack agency and autonomy in games as in life, they want to be guided and teached everything, and not put any effort in making decisions and studying the mechanics, engaging with the core loop of the game. It's easier to use a cheese build than to learn how to proper balance and build a mech and pilot it.
Devs can still give options, they just need to keep working on balance, and players need to understand that decent balance is not easy to achieve and takes time.
Yep, I haven't played AC6 but am a heavy proponent of devs protecting the players from themselves. I don't want the balance of the game to fall apart if you optimize because optimization is fun and I don't like having to place arbitrary restrictions on myself, the game should do that for me. The best example of this is Slay the Spire imo, as it might be one of the few games where learning to play optimally makes the game MORE fun not less. It's definitely harder to do that outside a roguelike context though.
Optimizing my build is what made the souls games fun. My builds aren’t meta, but they’re effective, so I felt rewarded for making the right decisions.
I agree for the most part, I was one of the unlucky ones who, as I was messing around with different customizations for my mech, found this one. I almost instantly noticed that it trivialized most encounters in the game and decided to not use that build again.
Though every time i open up the assembly, trying to find a solution to my current situation, the thought of that build instantly ruins it for me. When a massive part of the game is combining parts for your situation, and you KNOW what combination will solve the issue, just having to ignore that feels like shit.
I had the same issue with elden ring, where i was collecting all these neat items and spells and weapons, while i know most of them are not worth using. The way I approach both scenarios is the same; pretend the strongest option doesn't exist, which may cause me more annoyance than if I were to just use it and blow through the game
It's funny that in his Elden Ring video Dunkey does in fact use that exact powerful spell that deletes Mohg and continues to complain how it's too easy with it. I also have a friend who watches guides and walk-throughs before even attempting FS bosses, he doesn't even explore the lands and experiment with different weapons. He said these two games weren't as fun as they should, because he killed most bosses easily, that they weren't challenging enough to feel like an achievement. Then it was him who played ER with double katanas and Bloodborne with Ludwig's greatsword because he, himself chose to look up best weapon (= easiest to kill with) instead of what was fun to him, personally. I remember him explaining to me how my choice of Amygdala Arm and Bloodletter wasn't the best whilst admitting they look so sick, and how I too should go with Ludwig's Greatsword instead... It almost seems sometimes ppl can't be self conscious about how they're actively breaking a game's and their own definition of fun when they do this.
Sounds like he hasn’t realized that different people have fun in different ways. He has fun following an optimal route and optimizing it, you have fun exploring/doing fashion souls. Sounds obnoxious, hopefully he realizes what’s going on.
Thats funny because even with the most optimized way of playing I would still die alot and still struggle to beat these kinds of games.
Imagine saying Ludwig sword is better than the bloodletter lol 😆
Dunkey never did that tho
@TheGallantDrake you're missing the part where the friend admits to not enjoying the games due to the lack of difficulty he has inflicted upon himself. He makes it evident that he does, in fact, not experience "fun" in this way.
I stumbled upon the dual gatling build when i was bashing my head against Balteus. On NG + I've been running dual shotguns. To solve another problem, I ran dual bazookas and a pile bunker on my back. Just about anything in this game becomes "OP" when you wrap your head around optimizing your mech.
Right?
Fast Dual Melee will delete pretty much everything in the game
Does that make the game too easy?
No.....That just makes you the type of player that chooses to play like that 🤷
Hes a 100% on point about Mohg vs Azure/Hidden Tear tbh....yes, you CAN do that but thats entirely your choice
@@scrotymcboogerballs6452 Then I guess I am just shit, because I tried defeating last boss in my alba frame with pulse blade//moonlight swappin around, songbirds, shotgun and some rockets and I just couldn't suvive for both phases or power thru, I would get staggered from any hit on this frame, swapped to heavy frame with meta weapons and the boss went down on first try
Dual pulse guns and dual pulse missiles will wipe every arena fight in 30seconds to 1 minute, but not great in most fights outside of that. Any time ive gotten stuck dying more than two or 3 times in a fight I keep switching weapons until something works better there so far always seems to be some specific combo that melts a boss even if its next to useless elsewhere
@kubekzpiciem nah, you arent shit lol
Some of these bosses are fuckin legit hard and take a lot of practice to find the right openings and dodge windows....you can beat everything with every build, you just have to keep practicing
You know you only get the miniguns after you beat Balteus right? You were struggling with Balteus on ng+?
I think most issues couldve been fixed if they worked in a debt system like previous games, since gatling and grenades cost a lot there would be a big trade off to using them, but right now you just get a little less money. Luckily the director did mention that want an opportunity to explore debt again so hopefully we can see that soon
I think the amount of people quitting from the first boss shows its not too easy
I disagree. That just shows a lack of patience imo.
Edit: wait if we’re talking about either Balteus then I do agree. But if we’re talking about the helicopter then my original comment still stands.
Why not both?
This is less a testament to difficulty and more so because the average gamer is dense as shit and won't make proper use of all the tools they're given. The game is just decently challenging but also easily cheesable (use double stun needles and double zimmermans and you've got a boss skip setup)
I find it funny people are when the game literally has the weapons that just shred it’s barrier but hey some people don’t read.
I haven't stepped back to it after rage-swapping to Remnant II. I'll give it a go soon, after watching and reading for tips
The fun part is creating new builds and trying them out. Saving the data and tweaking the build. They should add a shadow mode to fight builds.
That's actually a great 💡
They need to add some sort of co-op
They used to have ai chips u could put in you mech and let them fight by themselves. You could even make 2 mech you built fight each other with their ai and spectate.
there's the arena fights where it's basically a 1v1 against CPU's, even gives you their template when you win. I actually used a few as templates but I do hope they add more as some are pretty interesting
@axis8396 I've notice that as well. Very cool blueprint to try different ways and understand other styles. Also if you don't have all the parts it tell how much it cost to build it too
Even ignoring overpowered builds the biggest issue with the games difficulty is that the non-boss segments are complete cakewalks 9/10 times. So the games difficulty comes at you in sudden sharp spikes rather than a consistant experience that i felt elden ring and had
Exactly my thoughts
And I think this actually contributes to the problem at hand. I didn’t specifically look for overpowered builds but my melee lightweight build is not working good enough for some of the bosses. I switched a few times, still couldn’t figure it out, so I try to look up how to make my builds more effective. And most videos I found were using one of the overpowered builds. Realistically speaking, when people can’t figure things out on their own they go to the internet. And just like most things in nature, the path of least resistance is the one that will become most commonly used. These overpowered builds are universally acknowledged as so not because people specifically want to find something overpowered, but simply because that it is the most direct, effective, accessible and universally applicable solution to what’s supposed to be a puzzle. If the answer to all bosses are “dual zimmerman/songbird” then it’s inevitable that people will adopt such builds and have their experiences ruined.
Except you’re able to change your ac and restart at a checkpoint. Making difficulty spikes optional. Even going for a ranks, nearly all missions can be a ranked easily with little skill using tank legs and duel needles plus javelins.
the escord the helicopter mission in ng+ chapter 1 had me teared up for at least an hour
This is one of the things that’s kind of deterring me from wanting to get it, those cakewalk levels seem like such a breeze I feel like I’d only ever have fun during bosses. While they are bound to be great, I want it to be continuously engaging
Fellow Lightweight enjoyer, I literally can't go back to bipedal after experiencing those crazy boost jumps.
Also insane how a lot of stuff just miss when you're simply strafing or jumping with a lightweight
Same. I don't mind switching to an overpowered build if that's what it takes to beat a specific section of the game and access new content, but with more practice (and better parts) I imagine I can make jump builds work. At the end of the day, I want the mech to feel like something I'd actually want to pilot for the fun of it.
Bro i've been using a 385 boost build with the dual burst pistols and dual sweet 16 on the back for the S ranks and any other build i try is just not nearly as fun. Its so ridiculously fast and deals insane damage as well
the funniest part of dunkey's review
is while he is discrediting AC6 for his "unbeatable wheelchair miniguns" build and saying again how you had to respect the Elden Ring encounters
There's a freaking clip of a Comet Azur shredding the ice dragon on the fog you encounter in the Mountain
Dunkey had some bad takes. If he took the time to make a good build in elden ring he would probably not feel like every enemy deserves respect lol. Very easy to trivialize most encounters in elden ring. It still doesn’t mean every encounter is simple but anyways I’m rambling. These games are usually as hard as you make them, if you’re a familiar with fromsoft games and a good gamer.
Also mimic tear exists basically trivializing bosses.
it's an issue of scale. you can't destroy every encounter in elden ring with comet azur, whereas you can in AC6. Additionally, it is MUCH easier to create a busted build in AC6 than it is in elden ring.
If a game has 1 SUPER OP build but you can't get it until end game or NG+ and requires so many different parts working in inventive ways, it would be much more balanced than a game that has an equally busted build that you can get early game by equipping a single item.
tbf it's a very experiential sort of thing, in ER his build was balanced so he had to respect the encounters, which added a lot of tension and fun to the game. In AC6 his build was OP so he mindlessly rolled the game and didn't have a lot of the same fun he had with ER.
Comet azur is so powerful it also kills my enjoyment of the game everytime i see it being used
I accidently discovered the OP Songbirds. But i figured everyone discovered these, you get them fairly early on, they look cool and sound cool and i am someone who likes to play with new toys so i immediately noticed how powerful they felt. But i never knew they would outperform so many of the weapons what would be coming later, i like heavy rocket launchers and boomsticks, and many of the later, heavy and girthy shoulder rocket launchers feel underwhelming. The Spread Bazooka was disappointing, so was the weird javelin (rocket that leaves a trail that explodes) and the container rocket that reaches a destination and shoots dozens of tiny rockets randomly. but i tested all of them myself, when someone goes online and finds the dual weilding gatlin wheelchair that trivializes 80% of the game that is entirely their fault. smh
Luckily for me i enjoy both building new mechs and S ranking. Song birds plus gatling worked for like one S rank but its so expensive i never use it. Its just one more build on the pile of stuff i've made that also works really well depending on the mission.
@@Pontif11 thats how the game should be enjoyed imo. i love tinkering with mechs and trying out new weapons. i am always excited when i unlock new shiny stuff. and some weapons perform differently to accomodate different playstyles. and many of the "good" weapons are also heavy and energy hungry, so the fault might not be 100% on the weapon balance but more so on how easy it is to equip a ton of good weapons and stuff with medium leg and generator power. but even so i dont think its a "problem", its liberating to be able to experiment and mix stuff
PS: the true "culprit" of the weapon imbalance might be that generators are too good on average and legs carry too much weight, but that might be wrong
@@chrizzlyx i'm certainly getting a lot out of it. It would probably help if there was a reward for S ranking. I'm only doing it out of intrinsic motivation for the mech building. Maybe tying mech parts or OS chips to it would have helped.
Yeah, it is pretty easy to take a look at the stat screen and see what's good and what's not with a few moments (hours) of tinkering. I think Ratatoskr is underestimating how generous and transparent the game really is about what weapons are good and what weapons are worse.
I think they need to buff some of the other weapons to a certain level so that they can sort out where exactly those gatlings guns need to be. One example is the napalm launchers (which feel good to use imo) but are weak in pvp and versus flying bosses as well as certain ACs (there is also the speed to consider, so does the AOE of the napalm need to be larger? probably... most likely).
I think a lot of people see the Gatling guns and think to slap them on a tank, i made my own version of the broken tank build pretty early on, but found it trivialized the game and was no fun so i switched back to my old mech. I had almost ten builds saved by the time i beat the game for the first time, after playing the tutorials i found it really fun to experiment with any new stuff i would find and i think a lot of people played the game similarly because thats how From presents it, arena is just unlocking new fun builds to try as well. If you can't have fun with a build why bother playing it, people that say it's too easy or too hard are just playing the game wrong and i hope they can pick it up again and give some other builds a chance, the funny thing is its not even like elden ring where you are actually stuck in a build unless you respec and farm upgrades, its so easy in ac and thats what i love about it, the variety is so good and because of that i would say its better balanced than anything, you literally get to pick your difficulty and can switch it anytime till the flow hits. Also the broken builds helped me a few times on the ch4 boss because my game crashed after i beat it two times while the cutscene was playing :P Maybe you could argue that they should be put further towards the end of the game but i'm sure some people made the op build and had a blast with it
I did it to cosplay functionally as guntank
@@kazze01megabased
With my heavy tank build i can beat every mech in the arena without moving 😂 not fun at all and definitely needs a nerf
Spring chicken gang rise up
The funny thing is that the gatling guns and songbirds are not even among the best and most overpowered options, lmao.
I also went with a more agile build pretty much the entire time I've been playing, but I do like that the game rewards you for refining your own mech and style. I will say going through my 2nd and now my 3rd time is much easier because I've fine tuned my mech over time. Blind playthroughs are that much nicer when you figure things out on your own
Figuring out atuff on your own is key. I also made a double batling double song bird build playing blind, they are easy weapons to get early. I thought it was neat but i didn't really use it again. It wasn't because i felt i needed to limit myself but because the fun is in making new mechs that i tweak into being just as broken. I want to figure out the broken lightweight bipeds, reversejoints, tetras and tanks so i won't stick with the first thing that works.
Additionally, i love S ranking missions so those hulking monsters with gatlings or grenade spam are usually too expensive to run so i rarely pull them out.
This problem is often fixed for me in roguelikes. You can get overpowered builds, but it is unlikely and requires you to really understand synergies and plan ahead when picking up equipment/relics/etc during a run. Because it still feels more fun to get that power within constraints, if I could always just pick the same powerful build it wouldn't be very satisfying. And many powerful builds also have strong counters from enemies to force you to plan ahead.
A randomised roguelike mod or dlc update for AC6 would be pretty sweet
Force you to use whatever you have available so each run unique with new favourite mechs
That would be so sick , can somebody please do this !!!@@kaidrazarc8000
My man is talking about rogue lites like they're actual games and has never touched ToME or CCDA lmao
Tbh I actually did discover the heavy stuff on my own, specifically cause I've always enjoyed big weapons better than small weapons, like in Monster Hunter I choose Greatsword 9 times out of 10 for most hunts, and so I leaned into making a tank build as my first major build, but even given that, I do switch my build up from time to time, doing a small build or choosing specific weapons and being a medium build, if you just stick to one build the whole game, of course it's boring cause you're not engaging with one of it's major functions
I played through the entire game with dual Zimmerman shotguns and chicken legs, but didn’t touch the internet until after I’d already beaten the game. I still struggled significantly with end game bosses. But when playing through NG+ I had that realization that there was no reason to change my build, because it dealt with everything. Would really like to see other weapons and non-tank legs improved. Or at least a weakness to tank builds which can still move like a lightweight
Dual zimmermans does not deal with the wheel enemies guarding moonlight or during protect stryder lol
@@devinthorn8182 I have beaten that mission with Dual Zims. I did switch to Bad Cook for the S rank. But bro, if your counter to the Zimmerman's is that you'll have trouble on a singular mission on your third playthrough, perhaps they are incredibly broken.
And no, you don't need to fight the ones guarding the optional weapon, you can just instantly open the chest and leave
@@devinthorn8182 yes it does. Firing both at the same time insta staggers them but if you bring songbirds you can straight up instakill any wheels by firing both at the same time. Made s-ranking the escort strider mission trivial
@@devinthorn8182 Zimms and Stun Needles both instantly stagger and/or straight up kill the wheels. I even made it harder on myself by using a biped most of the game
I also went in blind and found the dual ZImmerman tactic naturally. I could see their attack power being cut 15%, or 25% longer reload, or 35% more weight, or given a pause like bazookas but shorter. They’re one of the only weapons that can deal 900+ burst damage without needing to pause to fire on bipeds.
That said, they’ve shown me a lot of love. An AC6 without Zimmermans to keep me safe sounds scary, but I’d be into it.
But to say it’s too easy with ZImmermans is so silly. One of my favorite things to do in AC games is to make otherwise useless seeming weapons shine by producing unique circumstances in the build. When I get bored with Zimmermans, I change my build. I’ve spent dozens of hours practicing with other builds for that reason, and I’d feel like an idiot getting mad about that, because once they’re nerfed, that’s what I’ll be having to do anyway.
Ah yes, the FromSoft game discourse cycle is in full swing. "Game too hard" "Game actually too easy" "Game fair but hard because designers have brain". Happens every time.
Good video.
Gamers never fail to disappoint
It's extremely funny because that's just games in general honestly.
There's been so many games I have had a terrible time with because I missed a mechanic, and then there have been "hard" games that I flew through because I stumbled on to some over powered stuff
It think what happens most of time is newbies complain about the games being too hard while the souls/core veterans will complain about the lack of challenge. That's why I feel Lies of P did something special because that seems to be equally hard for both groups but interestingly enough the newbies can beat the game as well.
I wonder how many old FromSoft fans realise that DeS and DS1 wouldn't have been nearly as hard if they played those after their newer games. I played DS3 first than DS2 then Sekiro and finally DS1 and the iconic OnS fight was almost comically easy for me at that point with a black knight greatsword.
Then From makes an optional boss that's brutally hard like Malenia so even souls veterans will have a challenge and many people ends up hating her. It feels like some people cannot be satisfied.
The dual gattling build is literally given to you for one of the training missions, so saying that people have to go out of their way to find out about it is dishonest
Dunkey just took a miniscule clip out of context (using weapons you don't even get at that point and then coming back to the first boss) to make the game look bad, he always does this and he gets away with it because his audience is just 12 year olds who are there to parrot his jokes and if he gets called out he'll just say his previous statement was a joke.
be careful or his autistic fanbase will parrot the same joke to you a million times
I feel like a big part of the issue is just how weak some weapons are; especially the smgs and assault rifles. This can easily funnel you into only using chain guns because experimenting with kinetic weapons is very disappointing
Shotguns are kinetic and effective
@@IndorilNerevar yes the Zimmermans are considered overpowered as well. That doesn’t take away from the fact the amount of useless guns they’ve introduced into the game
@@huu6941 Zimmerman's are NOT overpowered. Learn to play around them. I have found it pretty easy to outplay anyone rocking dual Zim's. A lot of the weapons in the game become useless if you adjust your play style accordingly.
@@mysteriousmusikno? Stop it. If you cant outplay it, it doesnt stop it from being overpowered. I can outplay most meta builds with double nebula, so what? I can still be stunlocked with shotguns and needles very easily
@rotonek2887 Sounds like a skill issue. Not a problem for me, I outplay them consistently.
I think the problem here is two fold.
1. Using Comet Azur to cheese bosses in Elden Ring is a bit different, as, given how cryptic that game can be, I would wager there's no way to accidently fall into the proper set up to do so without specifically looking it up. Even if you did come by it by playing the game on your own, it's still a specific build path that would be the pay off of hours of specific set up and build choices. And still wouldn't work if Mohg's AI decided to walk out of it on a whim.
Meanwhile, Armored Core 6 pushes you towards this by design. In that heavier parts take less damage, and heavier weapons deal more damage, the logical conclusion folks are coming to is to put the big heavy guns on the big heavy legs. I have 3 friends whom are new to Armored Core, and through the missions they learned that they die less and kill more by gravitating towards a build like this. The game's systems offers tons of checks to other builds, like stagger, weight limits and ammo conservation, but this bypasses them. Magic in Elden Ring at least leaves you squishy.
2. The idea that there's a "The Strongest" weapons or build is contrary to what, I imagine, most people want out of the game. We look at all the parts, and they're stats, and assume they're balanced in a way that there will be equal pros and cons among them all. Not entirely 1 to 1 equal, but also not such that one build path completely outshines the others and strips the game of difficulty. The point of the game being to build your machine to face the challenges of it, there being a one size fits all murder machine that conquers all those challenges sort of makes the idea moot. You can in fact challenge yourself and stick to a certain frame, but I believe the complaints being lodged is that we shouldn't have to figuratively tie one hand behind our back to continue experiencing the challenge. The parts aren't even labeled in a way that would let you know they're the best, so anyone who started using them like any other parts would naturally think the game is easy.
Beautiful comment. I feel that this design choice is a strength and a weakness in Armored Core , and is a far bigger issue than in Soulsborne because in those games you have to commit to a build and everything can be extremely good (Colossal+jump attacks can literally break endgame bosses in ER).
Overall this is not a big problem, but it shows the conflicting ideas AC6 has when it comes to some weapons and builds being pretty bad, even for just PvE.
well, no. there are several late game bosses that will absolutely abuse a heavy tank build like that.
two I can think of are arqeubus balteus and the first ibis series boss.
both those bosses fly around extremely fast and have attacks you simply can’t tank too much of.
But most players won’t find arquebus balteus on their first run.
Elaborating a little on your point: The majority of builds in AC6 involve parts that you're handed for routinely completing missions, and bought with currency you can get by spamming repeat runs of whatever mission you personally find easiest. This means that the amount of gameplay skill required for set building is very very low. This is wildly different than a game like Elden Ring where there are absolutely broken things in the game, but it's going to be a huge undertaking to track them down and get your hands on them, and you often won't even know they exist to realize you should be looking for them. AC6 just adds stuff to the shopping list (for the most part). These scenarios really do not compare.
@@cameronphares2482bro both of those bosses went down like butter with a tank build. Songbirds and mini guns trivialize them and all bosses in the game. I can attest to that.
Agreed.
I'd add, that the way the game's designed, you hardly need to even build toward the OP weapons. The gatling guns aren't nearly as heavy as youd think and impose no firing restrictions to lightweight builds, and even when overloading, there's a no brainer OS chip that just lets you sortie *anyway*. I loaded up my lightweight frame (wanting to do something akin to Leena's Gun Sniper from Zoids), and it just.. works. No major drawbacks. Hardly had to change a thing.
And as for Zimmermans, theyre extremely light and energy efficient, so any build can use them with ease. In fact, this is the build I went for naturally, as I wanted a quick CQB shotgun+blade build of some sort since the game was announced. Just happened to be way too OP unfortunately.
Point being is, these aren't even really "builds" like a Comet Azur build is. Just a weapon choice.
That is a community problem i've found kind of recurrent through many souls games. Like for example the battle against Gwyn in Ds1 people often complaint about how cheesable the fight is using parrys, but like, how do you know it? There's no way the first time you play it you knew it, cuz there's like no other fight where you can use parrys, so its kinda strange. Good video btw
"Cheesing with parries" in Dark Souls is a moronic combination of words. It takes skill to parry in those games. I suck at parrying, so that wouldn't help me at all.
Well but it is not the same thing a 12 year old game than a 12 days old game. It is understandable that people figured out everything about DS1 already. Gwyn being parriable is a meme at this point. And I also agree that if the strategy is to parry him, that's not cheesing since cheesing is supposed to be something very easy to do, like the Comet Azure combo in ER.
To be fair, players are going to gravitate towards what works. Im saying that in a sense that i don’t think most people actively run cheese builds, but they might’ve stumbled upon a cheese setup. I’s wager that everyone did try using songbirds, zimmerman, gattling guns and pile bunkers, since these items are not hidden at all and it looks pretty cool. I remember fighting Snail Balteus with a bazooka and a stun baton and after the fourth try i literally just asked myself… Why the fuck am I doing this, i could just use the pile bunker and win here. This was before i even knew the pile bunker was OP, i just happened to be running an explosive melee oriented build. Point is many times people stumble onto broken items like black knight weapons in ds1 and it just became a bit pointless to fight a difficult boss and not use it regardless if you know that the weapon is op or not. It’s not really the fault of the player, its the fault if the game. Game design is the only variable here since most players will gravitate towards what works for them.
I didn't discover the "broken builds" until dying a significant number of times, nearly edging out a win to a certain mid Ch 4 boss, before deciding to look up ideas for how to beat it. But I usually go back to playing other style of builds, I find a lighter weight build more fun. Or the Dafeng load out, thats also pretty fun.
Which boss?
@@TheDsLeet the spoiler one
In Ironpineapple's video Fromsoftware said that "what they try to do during development is create this kind of default archetype mech or several archetypes that you can clear the whole game with... as long as player are willing to engage with the system and observe the enemy's attack pattern and really get into the nitty-gritty of the combat. we've tried to make that possible for them" it sad that player could just easily look up for these archtypes on the internet while figuring out what work best through your own engagement with the combat system is truly what make this game so fromsolf
Anyone looking for the "best build" is someone either not having fun with the game or doesn't know how to have fun. The most fun of the game is customizing your mech and trying each weapon and seeing what works and what doesn't.
It’s not about the journey for some people, they just want to race to the finish line and move onto the next thing to consume.
@@ronthorn3Peple have become Pac-Man
Nope, there is nothing fun about dying 10 times to Balteus, unless you don't really value your time on earth that is.@@alenezi989a3
That wasn't just "FromSoftware" that said that quote. That was Armored Core 6's director himself. Kinda amazing how he understands the community so well
Considering how Dunkey plays fighting games, it seems to me he's the type of player who looks for the path of least resistance. He has fun playing that way, so more power to him.
It only becomes a problem when he berates a game because he refuses to innovate his gameplay slightly when a large part of the experience revolves around experimentation and customization. As you've said, the critique speaks more to his inability to tear himself away from an OP strat than the game providing the tools to have a challenging, fun experience.
Again, why does Elden Ring get GOTY when I can one shot 90% of the bosses, but Armored Core stinks and is easy because Tank is stronk? There's no consistency.
Self-imposed challenges aren't as compelling as a challenge thrusted upon by a game. If a game that centers around experimentation and building new mechs to overcome new challenges gives you a build that's so completely broken that it completely renders that aspect irrelevant, that's not the fault of the player. It isn't as big of a problem in Elden Ring because that game is so massive in scope that you'd have to actively seek out components to a broken build and there's a lot more investment and commitment into achieving the optimal build. The stun needle is given to you for free, and the Zimmermans are, for some reason, dirt cheap.
The game has a balance issue, that much cannot be denied.
@@gracecalis5421It is 100% the fault of the player for using something broken and then complaining about it. Sure the balance is an issue but no game will ever be fully balanced, not even fighting games
@@gracecalis5421 Those are absolutely fair points, and I do think the distinction is notable. However, I do believe the game's ease is being blown way out of proportion in the arguments this video is responding to, so much so that it merits reminding that practically every masterpiece ever released on the gaming market that contains an ounce of customization has some massive, game-breaking element that exists, and usually they aren't even difficult to find.
I think the primary issue is how natural it is to begin using the OP items in AC. Those are generally not the arguments I'm seeing levied against the game though, as I agree with you... they should be toned down or way off the path of standard progression. It's just not *nearly* as game-breaking as people are making it out to be in my opinion.
Your last paragraph is so dumb
@@Walamonga1313 No it is not, it's the fault of the COMBAT DESIGNER of the game. This is a problem that could have revealed itself in testing. If they allowed it, that is the game saying they are fine with the player using something that is, as you just described it: BROKEN. That's not the players fault. They didn't make the game man. Don't hate the player kind of goes without saying here.
The amount of people who agree with Dunkey when he's always just so obviously missing the point in games is genuinely insane he's got a whole little cult of personality around him lmao 😭
That's what happens when meme culture is more important to people than their own ideas.
Just like from soft and their rabid fanbase
I never take dunkeys reviews for serious more like humerous. It just his opinion and nothing more or less.
The game is probably difficult for the majority of people (until they find op builds and hard lock), but some of us still found it easy without that. Hes not wrong about it being easy, his reasons just arent that great. Of course built in crutches are gonna make it easier and average players will gravitate towards that for some reason, despite deliberately choosing to play a "hard" game.
But I for example played the first chapter with bad OS upgrades, a terrible build and a broken right bumper. I beat Balteus in 6 or 7 tries. I'm sorry, but if that's not too easy then idk what is.
People complaining about using an overpowered build ruins the game are the same people that can't think and rely on doing what others tell them to do. You can beat every single boss in the game without ever touching songbirds or the gatling guns.
I wanted to play AC6 in one way, as a build based off Gundam aerial from WFM. I found that most enemies were easy to beat but some of the bosses were hard due to my mech not being well formatted against them, but I didn't want to swap parts out and beat them using what others had said was op like the Gatling's, songbirds and zimms. That's where I think most of the challenge came from, which is similar to Elden ring as I made a Guts build which was super fun to play but difficult and when I replayed Elden ring I played a mage and defeated everything with ease. Asmongold has it right. Fromsoft games are as easy as you want to make them, if you want to use the best weapons in the game of course it wont be as hard. Which is why I always have an idea of what I'm going to play in a Fromsoft game so I don't end up just using the so called meta weapons or build.
Seeing the trouble I went through with the SEA spider, I disagree, died like 30 times.
I think the issue is that boss battles are too hard, basic enemies are too easy, and loadouts are too diverse in terms of power level. Some loadouts are so dominant for so long that you don't toy with the loadout system.
@@sauceinmyface9302 I disagree with the loadout part, I think the only thing that limits it, is the ammount of money you get and yourself
I beat sea spider 2nd try with a light weight dual shotgun pile driver.
I think ac6 has a good balance so far of some bosses punishing thicc weapons platforms
@@uncletzeentch2282 Sorry, not limits, but there's not much of a reason to use different loadouts once you find the one.
I coincidentally used Tetrepod Legs for the first time on this mission, and almost first tried it, beat it on the 2nd try. Hovering greatly helped.
Then I went back with lightweight bipeds. Got slapped around multiple times. Got close, but still haven't beat it with my high risk biped builds.
I think it’s easier than previous AC titles, but thst may well just be experience talking. It is certainly a good challenge, though, and plenty of people are clearly struggling. And yeah, its not a universally agreed upon complaint. There are plenty of enemies that will bend you over and go in dry if you try that ‘OP’ build.
For real older AC games are way harder for many different reasons XD
As Dark Souls games kept coming out, Dark Souls veterans kept insisting that they were getting easier. Meanwhile, in Dark Souls 3 newcomers were regularly getting filtered by the tutorial boss.
I don't think AC6 is easier. I melted White Glint's face off with my very own dual gatling build not that long ago. It might be easier compared to the first couple gens of Armored Core but I refuse to play with that horrible control scheme so I wouldn't know. I do think AC6 is somewhat simpler, though, and that might be what you're actually thinking of. You're confusing simplicity for difficulty. They made AC6 simpler to control, but they put the difficulty elsewhere, in my opinion.
I'm not sure that it's outright "easier" than previous AC titles, but it is without question much less punishing than previous AC titles, particularly with regard to how money is handled.
You'd have to work pretty hard to go into debt in AC6. You can replay missions at will and get full pay every time. You don't get penalized for dying. You can sell anything you own back to the shop for full price. It is incredibly forgiving compared to early AC games.
And I'm 100% fine with that.
I think so. The 360 gen games were easy. Campaigns felt like shoe ins for wat were multiplayer focused games.
@@ShjadeNexayre o yea. I would separate those things. Grinding vs difficulty in combat encounters.
I discovered that build on my own but then it immediately didn't work against the trash compactor boss guy.
For reference I looked up no guides, but I enjoyed the mech building so much that I got stuck in it for hours. I found that zimmerman shotguns would 1 shot any normal enemy I was fighting, rarely missed, and had a very considerable range. I used them against bosses and at first felt proud that I had built something that could beat the boss. That feeling slowly wore off as I realized that I could stagger even "boss" AC's by double shotgunning them. It wasn't that I had made a smart build, it was that I had made a broken one. I tried PVP and realized that almost everyone I played against had a Zimmerman shotgun or gatling guns.
I tried a gatling gun and zimmerman build to see how I was getting smoked by them. Once I picked up on the range of gatling guns I bursted AC's down and Pile Bunkered them. The game became easy and repetitious. I decided to switch off these weapons because they were ruining the fun and after I did I enjoyed the game more. However I ran into Michigan, this fight is an insane gauntlet. I don't want to resort to a broken build again, however it feels like Elden Ring all over again where if I want to win I have to use some broken gimmick because the odds feel so incredibly stacked against me.
Atleast in Elden Ring I didn't have as much accessibility to broken builds due to the RPG mechanics. If I was a faith build I could try to pivot to a Intelligence build and use comet azur, but I'd have to respec, the weapons I was currently using would be useless, and i'd have to rebuild an entire build from scratch in order to actually use it. Since Armored Core encourages you to switch up your build to beat harder enemies it pushes you to find the best weapons. Which means balance is incredibly important to make sure that different builds are being used and feel like valid options for bosses.
100% agree. I stumbled upon tank Gatling + songbirds mostly without looking anything up, but it didn’t stop me from experimenting. It also didn’t always work, for me at least, but it’s definitely kinda busted. Edit: After having beaten the game, yeah it's not that the game is too easy or too hard, it's that the weapon balance is kinda bad. Probably going to hold off on doing New Game+ until a balance patch is rolled out.
what did it not work on for you? I s-ranked the whole game with it.
what are songbirds again?
@@jaydeejay4166dual grenade launcher
for me I stumbled on tank dual gatling and stun shooters (the weapon you get at the worm boss)
I built it as a “guntank” cosplay from Gundam. My only problems with it was that it was heavy and costed a lot in the ammunition department
I ended up using the Songbirds because I always make a fast, lightweight mechs with two big shoulder mounted cannons in these games. I didn't start out using them, obviously and I tried various other options but ended up going back to them in the end, mainly due to their ammo supply and reload time feeling nice. Only now, after playing a ton and beating the game, am I learning that they are supposedly big OP cheese weapons.
Tbh i think the songbirds are Not that strong. As they really are not as effective against other ACs. Compared to bosses with a large hitbox like smart cleaner and sea spider.
Well at their designated role they are not great, they are good at breaking stamina which most bosses after chapter 3 will dodge most of the shots. If you instead use them as finisher they only have 140 direct hit adjustment compared to 215 of stun needles or needle launcher.
I've tried the songbirds + Gatling. it's honestly not that fun, and it hardly makes other builds obsolete.
I only tried the songbirds because I was trying different builds to fight the sea spider too but I ended up loving it with the hoverlegs as I liked raining down fire like a AC130 then rushing in for a melee attack. I was hitting my head against the wall to find something that worked for me but I've seen plenty of other people do different builds that beat Sea spider so I thought I was lucky. Found out later people saying that's the cheese build for sea spider. Like I wouldn't have known unless I looked for it or asked other people how they took on the boss.
they are ultra effective. If you have a Melee AC, Basically missing is a rarity, because you are up in their face.
You will miss with your songbird more times at mid to long range, then melee range. That's the real issue I think.
It is too easy to land shots with melee builds. Slap on the right things and it becomes even stronger. @@robbe3334
I suffered for hours vs Balteus before quitting out to buy parts. It was first day so the pulse rifle was not common knowledge. I am an AC veteran that prefers to melee but kept getting smashed by impossible to dodge cannons at close range due to misunderstanding the tight timing.
Got the pulse gun and tried again. No luck, it could get it to stagger but there would be nothing else to use for damage.
I quit out and tried the early "auto win builds" because I wanted to unlock more parts and enjoy the rest of the game before returning later.
A few failed brute force creations later I saw a video.
I saw ONGBAL obliterate Balteus with MY ORIGINAL BUILD that could barely stagger the boss. Rebuilt my AC and OS tuning. It was still not easy but it was possible. Armed with knowedge of how, I got good.
Very satisfying payoff.
As a melee build I tried to find a good stagger weapon to match my laser blade. The Zimmerman was found to not only stagger better than available alternatives, but could shoot->melee->shoot again.
During the Sea Spider I found all missiles to be very ineffective. Stagger friendly replacement found, Songbirds. It couldnt be any other weapon because all other cannons are too heavy/energy draining to equip. Beyond that, Songbirds/stunneedle are used because why use a laser/plasma cannon that has less ammo, higher weight/energy cost, drains energy to fire, requires a weaker generator, has a massive windup before launching.
Continue through game. Very satisfying combat due to how engaging melee is.
Struggled hard vs Cel-240. Felt satisfied in killing it. It then revived and killed me twice during its immortal phase. Not knowing how long it was immortal or if something else was needed I copy built a brute force gatling needle tank. I was invested in the story, lore, and parts. I reached a point I knew it was possible to beat within the next 3 hours, but chose to progress.
Did the same thing for Ayre because I couldnt stand being heartbroken for so long. slightly regret this
Did Allmind dirty because AHAHAHAHAHA GET REKT. No regret at all, my god that dude's salt fuels me to cheese him because it would annoy him more.
I would say the difficulty is definitely in a good place for most of the game and you can fully tune it with your AC.
People should play and enjoy it. Copy builds for inspiration, not to force the entire game.
I never would have thought to try the BAD COOK until I ran out of ammo vs the 80 or so MT meat shields of Michigan.
I heard people had a hard time fighting 3 ACs at the same time. I danced around with 4 missiles on the jumpiest boost monster I could make.
4:50 Yeah because figuring out tank legs with strong weapons dps check bosses is SUCH a complex thought lol. I figured that out against Baltheus almost immediately...
I ran double shotguns through most of my play through, insanely effective, but only at close range so there was still the challenge of staying close to the enemy
Wanna know a fun way to improve your build even more? Unlock hangar weapons and pit two shotguns on your shoulders. That way you can fire both shotguns, switch to the ones in your shoulders, and fire those while your other shotguns are reloading. I love how shotgun swapping is a viable build in even a mecha game.
Dual zimmerman shotguns made the game almost too easy lel. Stagger them instantly, then melee, then repeat.
Yeah, similar build here. Went with double Zimmerman + Lance + flex on an agile bipedal mech and it was mostly easy but also super fun and rewarding.
The penultimate boss of the Liberator ending humbled me though lol
@@TheLastDaysOfSorrowrecently found out zimmermans are the weapon people use for boss speedruns or no hit boss clears. Feels dirty to use them now lel
@@TheMagicalWizardPyroIt's not your fault FromSoft couldn't be fucked to balance them. Use them guilt-free
I really don't get people that go into building an overpower character and complain that the character is overpowered
That power imbalance shouldn't be I the game on the first place, and the game literally makes you buy and equip the double needles in the ice worm fight, so most people who play the game would have reached the double needle build by themselves.
forcing people to play sub-optimally to have a fun experience is not going to work out for a large portion of players. Many find the process of improving a build enjoyable in and of itself, plus more importantly it makes the difficulty of a game unengaging if you know you could just choose not to experience it.
@@Nutt_lemmings No? The game gives you one needle for free, but buying the second one is completely out of your own volition.
That's true, but there probably shouldn't be something so strong that it trivialises the game to begin with.
@@pangilli18801 is all you need.
I agree with what you say here, but I do think there is a lack of 'mid-powered' weapons in AC6 (not to say that there are none). In Elden Ring there are definitely S++ tier weapons and builds, but there are also many other things like a straight sword + shield build utilising square off and guard counters - certainly a strong build, but still one which requires the player to engage with a bosses moveset, and which facilitates the dance which you described when speaking about Mohg. When I build an AC, I often find myself straying too far either in the direction of being able to circumvent a bosses moveset through my sheer damage and stagger damage potential, or in the opposite direction where I feel very weak. Maybe it's just me being bad and/or just getting used to the eye-watering damage potential of the S tier builds, but I feel that AC6 needs more B tier weapons and less D tier ones.
This comment was brought to you courtesy of the Please Buff Assault Rifles Association
The thing is, that you’re absolutely right
Not much else to add. Correct.
I made it to the chapter 4 boss before I found how good dual zimmerman shotguns are. I discovered this because I was stuck on the CEL 240 and looked up a video where I saw someone using them, some missiles, and the starter pulse blade. I tried that build out on the fight, after a few attempts I got used to the play style, and proceeded to use it for select fights. It wasn't until I started S ranking missions that I discovered just how good that build was for everything other than maybe the Cleaner from Infiltrate Grid 086 and when you face it again near the end of the Liberator ending.
And you know what? That build is OP as hell and it's so much fun! The movement feels amazing, getting fast staggers on enemies feels good and a lot of enemies move around enough it's not some permanent stun lock, I'm still engaging with the fight and if I get out of position I still die almost immediately so it creates that rush of being a proper glass cannon. I am worried Zimmerman will get nerfed so I made sure to get all my S ranks done.
It's a shame they didn't go the regulation route like they did with 4th Gen because it allows people like me to still play the game I want while providing balance updates for the people that want them.
They do have regulations. I think its at 1.01
zimmermans absolutely rock the cleaner though? just shoot its chimney until it goes down, then shoot its face when its down. easy clap in the liberator ending it died in like 30 seconds.
I dont play online so i just wont update if that happens lol
I don't think weapons really need balance changes for pve maybe besides buffing some of the very weak ones. Wish they would do some balancing for pvp though, I'm sick of having every game filled with dual zimmermans or missile spammers.
"It's a shame they didn't go the regulation route like they did with 4th Gen"
You know the game is only a week old right? It hasn't even had time to HAVE additional regulations or balance patches yet. However, on the title screen if you look at the bottom right you'll see that the game is listed as being on "Regulation ver.1.01", which means the game is running on a regulation system too.
One thing I think that is extremely missed is that on the first playthrough of Armored Core 6. You have no real customization options. Many of the builds that synergize well or create fun goofy mechanics can't be done until new game+ or even new game++. You start the game with a great melee weapon and everything else you have is dog water. The next melee weapon you get is the Laser Blade which is hot garbage. And while you unlock Weapon Bay from OS tuning Laser Blade is again trash. This results in people looking elseware for something that isn’t melee. They either look for missiles or they look for bullets. The problem with missiles is there is only a handful 1 or 2 and both are single shots, while back missiles are not good enough yet to be anything but “well at least it does more damage.” As a result, that only really leaves the player with machine guns. Which leads them to the gatling guns, and songbirds, and eventually stun needles.
The game does not allow you until new game+ to say, “hey I have all these parts let’s make something different.” As a result, first time playthrough are boring garbage. “I’m here for parts and OS chips so I can have fun next time.” All the fun melee, sniper, plasma, rockets, and infinite flight builds didn’t come out until I beat the game once. It wasn’t until ALLMIND said again “welcome back Raven updating MIA status.” That I could start taking the pile of parts I had and build something.
Another issue is that all those parts cost money! You can’t try and buy because you only have a short video, so the only way to find out if a weapon or part is good for your idea is to grind out millions of cash to buy all the parts you need. Which of course makes people play the wheelchair gatling gun even more. Parts should have been much cheaper as all parts are buyable if you just replay the last mission. 1 part minimum per replay, instead I got cores here in the 2 million and I must replay this mission 20+ times to buy it.
The game is all about customization, but things are so heavily gated in the game or grindy that it makes customization DOA. Every player is thinking about “I have to beat this story mission, then I have to grind out this other mission for money, so I can buy this part that may or may not work for my build.” It’s extremely bad.
I don't think everyone purposefully goes out looking for optimal builds. Like I didn't know the Zimmerman shotguns were OP (to the extent of being used in boss clear speedruns) I chose them because big shotguns I could fit on my light mech were cool.
In Elden Ring if I chose a melee class I'll level up my weapons and whatnot throughout the game. But if I find a cool OP spell I don't switch suddenly to a mage class. You likely had ignored all of the mage content up until that point. Never buying any spells, or doing anything mage related. No leveled up staffs. You might not even have access to respeccing, it it's something you want to even bother with for one spell. So you take your ultra great sword and continue along. In AC6 it's different though. Respeccing is a switch of an arm part away. You don't gotta use precious smithing stones to level up the new weapon, go to rennala, look up a meta guide on how to get infinite mana for a few seconds (as I doubt the player would think of it themselves). In AC6 you can just buy the gatlings and put them on without knowing, as had Dunkey.
You end up optimizing the fun out of the game after that. Other weapons become unfun, not out of choice, but because there's a nagging in your brain going, "This weapon has way lower DPS than the gatlings," or, "This weapon has barely any ACS strain compared to the Zimmermans." Whenever I tried other weapons it made the game feel slower. (Or, in the case of handguns, run out of ammo unless I skipped all but required enemies). Dual assault rifles taking four or more magazines of ammo total to ACS strain an enemy, when dual zimmermans can do it in one shot.
Honestly if you can't tear yourself away from an overpowered build and consider it a negative, that sounds more like a you problem.
isnt it the game designers job to nudge the player into a balanced playstyle?
@@morgannyan2738 There's only so much devs can do. The rest is up to the players
@@morgannyan2738 Armoured Core is all about the freedom to play the way you want, there's no reason not to experiment when you can just sell for full price. If someone doesn't want to do that, I don't think there's anything the devs can do short of completely nerfing the overpowered builds, which isn't a good idea.
@@morgannyan2738
some games force u to play in the "fun way" or proper way by being punishing like "doom eternal" , souls series.
other games nudge you to play better via style meter or mission grading/ranking system like
Armored core6, ultrakill , DmC etc.
also ac6 lets u full refund on gears which is a big indicator and motivation booster to experiment
You can’t get S rank using the “overpowered” miniguns build because of the amount of ammo it uses. The game also encourages not taking any damage for S rank - something heavy builds using miniguns are poor at because of lower mobility.
If you're stuck in a boss and are tired and want to progress, just brute force it with tank and big guns. Otherwise, try other builds and have fun and have a tank+big gun build only for when you want to advance.
What I'm doing now, loll
This is what i do lmao. If I'm stuck then I'll pull out double stun needle or double zimmerman, or both.
I did that for almost all of my first boss encounters just to get the progress and the achievement/trophy. Later, I retry It with different lighter builds as that's my preference. Practice with different parts over and over and study the bosses movements and attack patterns. It's less pressuring to me that way because I already went over those roadblocks. At that point, it's just a matter of dissecting what went wrong initially and discovering all the bosses vulnerabilities.
That’s what I do 😂
Same arguement for CoD 4 and the M16. It was the such a good gun and you had so many people arguing it ruined game variety in multi and was OP, meanwhile I regularly went 20+ kills using a Scorpion with an ACOG on it or running around with the golden Dragunov. You aren't required to use the meta builds in games and they may be the best but there is always fun to be had on the less walked path too.
I think you spot on with this and honestly after liststing to dunks take he came off like someone else had been guiding him. I say this because after beating the game 3 times and working on my s missions I know why I picked what I picked, and I remembered trying out the mini gun when it unlocks, and a single mini gun just sucks. I ripped it off my mech and said never again. The song and dual gats only become strong when paired in that build.
Im soo glad that i didnt see a single video or forum on AC before completing the true ending
People consciously choosing OP options be like "i chose easy mode and now the game is too easy. 😢"
tbf i think some people just don't like the feeling of artifically making the game harder for themself. that makes the experience feel cheaper if you have to handicap yourself to have a challenge
@@thomasallister3446 I guess by definition not looking up the strongest setups online and using them is intentionally handicapping yourself, but that argument is still completely ridiculous. The normal intended experience is not using an optimal setup you found online with anything less optimal being a challenge run, and if anything you are making the experience artificially easier and cheaper by doing that.
The game is literally about customizing your mech to help you beat tough encounters. If you have to deliberately make your mech worse in order to have fun in a game about customizing mechs then that game has a problem. It call all be fixed with 1 patch. I don’t understand why people are taking this so personally when it’s literally a completely valid criticism. The game literally does everything in its power to encourage you to buy weapons and try them out, they should’ve done a better job balancing out builds that completely trivialize the experience.
@@invaderzod8092yep, they gotta nerf the four horsemen of the apocalypse. Zimmerman, songbirds, gatling and needle.
@@beegest_yoshi for real it would be a completely different game if they do that imo a better one.
I swear we had this exact discussion when comet azure/Rivers of Blood was discovered
Right now in the middle of NG+. I actually discovered what was powerful on my own. The only thing I looked up before I completed my first playthrough was the moonlight blade. I mostly used a medium weight bipedal mech and I enjoyed it a lot. Found the Zimmermans effective on my own and I saw it was kinda trivializing some encounters, so I started to just keep trying out new stuff every mission. I mean you earn credits after a mission and probably earned enough for at least 1 new thing to try out and so I kept doing that. Right now I mostly like using a linear rifle with some upclose weapon, a right shoulder missile launcher and a left bay melee weapon.
My main criticism of the game is that I find the encounters and objectives in between AC duels and boss battles to be very lacking and undemanding. But I will say when I get into that "zone" or "flow" blasting through fodder MTs while zipping around, using only the necessary shots, not just mindlessly firing and efficiently flying through the battlefield it feels very satisfying, so maybe it was From's intention for the game to be more of a power fantasy once you get the hang of piloting your AC and then ramp up the difficulty with the AC duels and boss encounters.
That still doesn't make me dislike the game any, its just something there that I wish was different. Or how even in this NG+, I wish there was even more modifiers for this second time around for the same missions, like adding more of those HCs or LCs in missions to complement the fodder MTs.
That's crazy, I'm in the middle of NG+, I use a linear rifle and a close range weapon, my r shoulder has missiles or a launcher, and my L bay is a melee weapon.
We're problem solvers! :D
@@Frederic_104 it just works
As a longtime viewer of Dunkey at one point, I feel like he’s been making just the strangest most contrarian takes just for the sake of it as of recent years
Same ttbh
You're saying a game that is all about combat and he happens upon a broken build and destroy everything is the most strange and contrarian take? Lmao
donkey is clearly overrated
@@tiagozilliosoares7988he said that armored core 6 was nowhere near the quality of elden ring and dark souls, while also saying it was more of a guilty pleasure game. In his review he framed it as a bad game that he had fun with, and not a good game.
@@jakestaheli8532he's full of shit
I definitely agree, during my run I struggled with some bosses/situations I made a bunch of mechs over my playthrough I have about 10 main designs currently but around mech 6/7 I found the shotgun and eventually had a double trigger build with those, and tore through the first playthrough. I ended up feeling trapped in my build. I was still having fun but I was struggling with other builds, but in NG+/++ I found new builds, experimenting with PvP and trying to get S Ranks I've finally found a way to enjoy other builds and playstyles again. Fightingcowboys mech build videos have been a real eye opener now that I've started looking at content for the game. (Something like his old school light weight sniper build is a blast)
Let’s also remember that Dunkey’s main complaint of Elden Ring was that the enemy balance as you played through the game felt like it was all over the place. That didn’t stop him from playing through the game at least 4 times because he still found it enjoyable. Balance seems to be a sticking point for him, but that doesn’t mean he thinks the game was bad.
He just has higher standards for balance because he comes from league of legends where everyone is expected to gravitate towards the strongest thing as the standard rule. It's not the correct perspective for single player, where you may want to play worse things for fun.
Thank you. This observation entirely nullifies Ratatoskrs argument. Leaving the difficulty and balance in the hands of player restraint to NOT use the most powerful gear is, of course, going to mar the progression for a lot, if not most players. This is a valid complaint consistent with FromSofts recent design ethos and Ratatoskr somehow is completely missing the point here.
@@nathanielholzgrafe5274 To be fair Ratatoskr said the balance should be improved if it can be, he was just disputing the idea that it's a universal problem as he didn't experience it and he thinks most people don't end up with an overpowered build naturally. Most people playing non-pvp games don't optimize it for meta and instead just does what seems cool.
My lightweight AC struggled slightly until chapter 3, after that I was easily able to shred almost everything with little effort and it had no impact on my enjoyment, it’s unbelievably satisfying to know you made a build that good all on your own
Lightweight is godlike but most people want to turn off their brain when they play.
I used the Gatling-tread-Songbird combo, and yes it made large parts of the game fairly easy, but I at least was hard countered by the chapter 4 main boss and had to change my type. Furthermore now that I've beaten the newgame++ I can say confidently that it is no stronger than a well made mech of any other type.
She is countered by the other OP combo Hand Missiles and VE-60SNA(Stun Needle)
which boss is this? the enforcer?
Honestly the strength of the build is not in it's maximum effectiveness vs other builds, but that it is extremely easy to master. Tank legs give massive amounts of AP and stability allowing you to ignore attacks that would otherwise stunlock your build. Dual gatling guns are just hold triggers. There's no timing, charging or reloading required to use them. Shoulder weapons can be fired with no penalty from tank legs. The strategy is literally hold triggers until stunlock and then fire songbirds for fatty damage, while letting the high AP and stability carry you through attacks that would obliterate poor movement.
You can achieve the same if not better results with other builds, but they will not be as easy and will require good piloting to get those results.
@@davidburke4101they do overheat, so you do actually have to pay attention to them. i thing everything with no reload animation has an overheat function. even the flamethrower, the thing made to spit fire, overheats after a while (tho it’s a long while)
I'd say it's more of a "you can pay attention to overheating" and less of a "you *have* to pay attention to overheating". It's an optimization sure but it's by no means "required"
Thats the great thing with build based games. The difficulty level will often scale with your build.
The game gives you broken builds almost for free. You don't have to work for the parts, you don't have to put in effort, time or skill.
@@tjl4688then dont use them
I dunno, I arrived at gatlings + dual stun needles/songbirds without looking up guides, and when I beat the game for the first time, I went on Reddit to ask if people also thought this combo kind of makes everything else useless, and most people agreed. This was last month, I think. I also specifically remember struggling quite a bit with the final boss of the "bad" ending (trying not to spoil it here), trying a bunch of different builds, and finally defaulting back to gatlings/stun needles in the end and beating the fight in 2 minutes.
However, what I'll also say is that a) if you play NG+ and NG++ as the game intends to, you'll run into at least a handful of missions where it's NOT the most viable build - good luck making it through Intercept the Redguns without running out of ammo, for example. And you can pretty much forget S-ranking the whole game if you're not willing to change up your build a bunch.
When I first bought the game, I knew I wanted to play either a lightweight mech or a dual gatling gun heavy build. I beat all of the arena fights with gatlings+songbirds and fell back on this build if I got stuck on a boss. However, I was very proud to beat the Ibis series boss in Chapter 4 with my Submachine guns and songbirds build on my light bipedal legs. It definitely made it my favorite boss in the game and I've been playing the NG+ almost exclusively with a lightweight mech.
I do still appreciate dunkeys review style where he tells you exactly how he felt while playing and not what he expects people to want to hear. Even when he makes missteps, he’s one of the most reliable when it comes to honesty.
Dunkey is also a comedy channel, he may be mostly genuine but he's also playing it up for the lols
I don't think its really a misstep to have a differing opinion. But I get how relegating an entire game as being 'easy' when choosing the easiest option is probably problematic to constructive discourse around its merits.
@@peridiusoverlord Opinions can be wrong.
@@peridiusoverlordThis. Its akin to using Mimic Tear to cheese Elden Ring and then calling it too easy and unengaging.
That doesn't make him a reviewer, that just makes him a person. I think the main value in his videos is that he's very funny. I watch him for entertainment, not for serious takes on games.
If only they balanced the OP weapons with the classic debt system. A lot of the older gens also have OP builds but isn't economical. Hope they fix this in the next entry.
If they implement that "debt" system it should be a togglable feature cause im happy its gone cause not all mechanics are good mechanics and they don't always make it more fun sometimes it just makes it more tedious.
@@Horde334 It's good if implemented correctly. Example:
"Wanna use OP weapons, here is the bill for the ammo cost." It's a way to deter people from abusing OP weapons while still being available in the game.
In AC6, there was never a moment where I feel like I'm saving for something and finally excited to buy a part I want. Everything felt basically free. And I didn't even farm for credits, I just progressed normally.
Compared to last armored cores, armored core 6 was laughably easy. But it makes up for it with a much much better pvp portion. I do wish they would bring back online co-op missions though
While I didn't have big issues with all these bosses the community kept mentioning as mega filters I still felt like my build was lacking and that I was doing something wrong. My main issue was that I had that double grenade launcher on my left shoulder and the bazooka in my left hand which make you stop when firing and then I remembered the Tetrapod legs from the tutorial and how they absorb heavy weapon recoil. So I tried these out and decided to equip a second gatling gun since I was already using one on my initial biped because I like high fire rate weapons and immediately the game became a lot easier. It was not really what I would like to use since I think the four legs look kinda stupid but it was just so effective.
The "problem" to me with AC6 compared to Elden Ring and the other games is that I can play them with my preferred play style and still be comfortable with them and have a nice challenge at the same time. I am always using either a big sword or normal sword, no buff items, no magic or ranged weapons and even when I was fighting Malenia for 2.5 hrs I felt like I could do it and wasn't compromising myself all that much.
However, Armored Core's main gameplay loop seems to be about using the right tool for the right situation so it is easy to fall into that hole of feeling like the player is not adapting well enough when using certain builds and it is just as easy to settle for an OP build once you find them.
You can just pick your favorite shit and grt good with it in ac 6 too. I've cleared the game with a fast pistol and melee build, with a more tanky brawler biped, a super tank treads build, and a quad lega build. You can dp whatever the fick you want and make ot work IF YOU ARE GOOD. The issue is people thinking they're badass with builds they haven't put much thought or time into, and then getting pissed when it seems to fail them. The issue is the player.
@@Darklinkftw12 "You can do whatever you want if you spend enough time and effort" applies to everything. Not claiming otherwise. If you are dedicated enough and strictly want to play a certain way then of course you can pick what you want and train with it. I do exactly that for the souls games. Though, I feel in the case of Armored Core it is a bit more intended to find the right thing to deal with an obstacle instead of bashing your head against it. That is why I felt discouraged to do my own thing for a good chunk of the game.
But I know you are talking in a more general sense and I do agree with what you are saying.
"Given the chance, players will optimize the fun out of the game" seems to be in full effect with AC6.
You are supposed to optimise your build, that's why there's a giant wall of stats for every part. Even if you don't read them, a smooth brain can figure out stagger is the aim for harder enemies and so you can just sort parts by impact and direct damage and... would you look at that! Zimmerman shotguns, songbirds, Stun Needle are all high on that list! Gatling guns also do quite good direct damage for a gun on top of looking awesome so they'll get used as well. Now, through the most primative understanding of the game, the caveman has optimised the fun out of it due to poor weapon balance combined with a system that rewards bursts of high impact and direct damage, over sustained rifle fire from afar
on NG I use double zimmer+stun needle. It's OP as hell but I get bored when I do NG+.
Now I use double flamethrower with gatling drone and burn all like a psycho. XD
now it's more fun to use weird build, because I already now the boss moveset.
Everyone talks about optimizing the fun out of the game but nobody talks about optimizing fun into the game. I used dual Zimmerman+dual stun needles and had a blast. Used it for almost all of NG++ and don't regret it a bit. Was way more fun than anything I used before that point.
@@jeff3221 Self imposed challenges have been a thing in souls games since the beginning. If you want a harder experience just go for an unoptimal build, just like SL1 challenge runs in dark souls.
Here's a whole video about player decided difficulty all the way back in ds2.
ruclips.net/video/MM2dDF4B9a4/видео.html
Fromsoft does this to make their games accessible (except for sekiro) as this design pattern allows players that want an easy time to choose a clearly best option like using op magic in elden ring or in this game running tank dual gats/dual shotguns. Those that want a harder challenge can use weaker weapons to better test their skill and learn even more about the gameplay mechanics.
It's very clearly why this is in the game to draw more people into this niche genre but still allowing difficulty for players that want a more rewarding tough experience. You're not being forced to optimize anything if you don't want to just like in almost all of FromSoft's previous games.
Fromsoft has even said in interviews before this game that difficulty depends on customization so if you want a more difficult experience the only one stopping you is yourself.
Why is AC so easy when I use the most braindead broken build and have played every FromSoftware title released in the last 15 years? 😢
If the game gives the player a braindead broken build, it's easy. It isn't even a build you have to work towards. Zimmermans are only 100k each more or less, and you get a stun needle for free.
@@gracecalis5421 Only if most players actually use said broken build, which they don't, judging by Steam reviews, Reddit posts, etc. Every modern FromSoft game has had broken builds, with the exception of Sekiro. While I'll concede AC6 is on the easier side compared to other FromSoft games, it's still difficult if you haven't discovered a cheap build and actually have to learn to play the game as a standard biped with a rifle, sword, and missiles.
@@deadeyedun So it's only difficult if the player self-imposes or for some reason doesn't come across the build. It doesn't take hours of research and going through forums to end up with dual miniguns/dual zimmermans paired with dual stun needles.
@@gracecalis5421 Yeah it's more difficult if the player plays the game normally without using the Internet to determine the meta builds? Is that what you're asking me? Everything is easier when you get help from Discord and RUclips lmao
Since when fixing poor balancing is player's problem and not dev's?
It's a shame that so many people spoiled their experience by just looking up the most "meta" builds in a game where the fun is had in the exploration and testing element of builds.
If I make something broken, the game doesn't feel cheapened. I feel like I figured something out, it's not the same as looking up exactly what someone else did. It's no longer your achievement. This has all the same energy of people who complained Elden Ring was too easy or they didn't feel any accomplishment from beating it, then you find out they only did the laser insta death combo, or were carried by their max RL friends they whole time.
In video games, the achievement is worth what you pay, and if you aren't willing to pay anything, then how can you expect to feel an actual sense of accomplishment when you finish it? It boggles the mind.
Some weapons should be down-tuned a bit I think, but as a whole especially my first run through, it was a proper challenge, because I didn't look anything up. I used my own builds through NG, NG+, and NG++. I even S ranked all the missions with my own builds, because I was just having fun testing, rebuilding, and testing again.
There is definitely something different between figuring things out for yourself, and tapping into the collective consciousness of literally everyone playing so they can effectively play the game for you. More people should at least TRY to figure it out on their own, I think they'd eventually have a lot more fun. If you get hardstuck, sure, get a little help. But it shouldn't be your first, last, and middle option.
By the end of my 3 playthroughs I had several AC’s designed for certain types of missions because I went for S rank on all of them. They were all light/ medium weight and were all overpowered, for the type of mission I designed them for. I had my anti AC melee build that let me full kill an AC before they got their first heals off, my floaty missile barrage that was helpful on defensive missions and armored enemies, or just strong adds. Close duel shotguns and bubbles that destroyed anything with a shield, and I could go on, my point is there’s a lot that could carry you through the game but having a purpose built machine was immensely more satisfying and effective. Even if you pursue “over powered” builds there’s still challenge and fun to be had optimizing your play style.
I just think difficulty works differently than in Souls. It's not just about skills but choosing the right tool for the job. Of course if you just look up the most broken builds online then the latter aspect is negated.
Seems the jobs i encounter all equally get dealt with with grenade launchers and melee. I barely even really need a right arm gun
You don't have to look up the most broken builds in this game to easily gravitate to dual zimmermans and dual launchers. It is absolutely the best combo for PvE because enemies have virtually zero answer to it. It's broken, needs fixing, and does make the game worse than it can be. I don't understand why people are making these strawmen arguments. Nobody had to look up the fact stun launchers destroy bosses, the game itself puts a spotlight on this during the Ice Worm fight, and it never recovers unless the player SPECIFICALLY tells themselves not to use it. That's not a small thing.
@@Krystalmythlmao why does it need fixing 😂😂 the PvE is single player just unequip them LOL! There, I fixed it for you!! 😂😂😭
So, if it's all about finding the right tool for the job, doesn't it lessen the experience if it turns out 90% of the time the answer is to just use a sledgehammer?
And you don't need a "most op builds" guide for this. It's a straightforward build that many people will figure out on their own.
You only need to try out gatling guns for 15sec to realize how busted they are, at which point you'll never be incentivized to remove them which is a failure in design. The design philosophy of having to tune your mech for each encounter does NOT work unless you have a VERY balanced game.
I went in blind and found a dual rensetsu single fire build early on and it carried me through the entire game. It's still one of my favorite games this year
"self inflicted problem" - nice
I love when someone says "This is universally agreed upon" *in an attempt to convince someone*.
You’ve always got the best outlooks!
Yeah so similarly here, I have avoided kinda “build guides” but have seen some videos where people discussed what they were using… and on my own, after the initial couple levels where I had the starting mech load out, I got some money together and bought some stuff. I thought “man that would be cool to kinda be like Balteus just all rockets! So I got two (8)s on my back and four’s in hand… and I found myself absolutely mopping up with the setup! Except for some specific light ACs that are just exceptionally difficult, it melts! But because of that, I’ve started to veer from it and trying new things cause it is kinda “too good” most of the time!
And just like you said it’s self-inflicted… like my very first elden ring playthrough I was using summons and RoB/moonveil and all that… but as I got more comfortable, I realized that I was hindering my own experience and went back to my roots!!! Wretch clubs bonk etc.! And now I’m one of those naked weirdos that just wants a single big sword and to go ham on some nerds! My idea going into this game was the same… “I’m gonna build an ultra light mech with just one bit bonk!” And immediately realized that’s not realistic and I’m bringing the wrong mindset into this game with me!
Facts.
I think one of the main problems I see is that because armored core has much less weapons than something like Eldin Ring you are more likely to stumble into one of these builds. I played just picking what felt right and I ended up against the final boss with a pile driver a gatling gun a bazooka and some missiles. I did not look anything up and the build that the game led me to after trying all the parts was somewhat similar to the optimal builds. My thoughts on the difficulty are that in the main story bosses is it a perfect challenge that required many tries, but in the regular gameplay and ac fights it is just honing it as fast as possible and it isn't hard at all. I think that's what fromsoftware was going for and it is enough for me. I do not think the gatling gun is overpowered but the bazookas definetly are after I switched out my gatling gun for a third bazooka.
"Much less weapons"
Here here. Looking up strats online is like changing a difficulty slider.
I finished up the final achievement in this game today with largely with a build that I fine-tuned - similar to yours, but with a bit more weight. Aggressive, high speed with a focus on melee: two 6x front missile launchers, a Zimmerman on my right, and the BU-TT/A Pulse Blade on my left. ( BG23ZG7R8W4S , for those on PC!) Double Zimmerman was something I only resorted to when something was giving me serious trouble, and even then it didn't work for everything - I had to get a bit inventive for some other missions. Particularly, for a certain NG++ mission, I ended up running this funky "interceptor tank" build with laser rifles, probably the only time I've seriously used them. Sometimes I swapped the Pulse Blade for the Laser Dagger or the Ashmead.
For me, a lot of the game's difficulty went away once I got skilled with what I was using as much as having good weapons. I went from taking over two hours against the Chapter 4 boss with a worse version of that build, to *accidentally* S-Ranking it when I was doing a log hunt.
Gatling Songbird Tank is a strong build, yes, but I've found it still has shortcomings I can't deal with very well. Still, it plays well into AC6's mechanics, particularly exploiting Staggers and Direct Hits. It was fun cheesing some Arena fights, but it's not my style.
If anything, I'd rather see laser and plasma weapons tuned up, particularly giving them more Impact. The only energy weapons I've seen that do a remotely OK amount of Impact are either melee weapons (practically their own category), plasma launchers, or laser drones - even spoiler weapons do jack shit - and they all share the same flaw of being high on energy load, forcing you into heavier builds.
i’ve been loving the challenge in AC6, like you i went immediately for the lightweight reverse joints because they appealed to me, and the reason i haven’t touched the tank treads because i don’t like the look of them
I played it blind and came to the dual gatlin gun + songbird build by myself because I just kept thinking about how to kill stuff asap and it sort of naturally came together. Great video and I completely agree.
It's not just the gats and songbirds, I made a lightweight build that trivializes the game just as much as Dunkey's wheelchair and in fact makes everything go even faster because I do about the same level of damage and also have far better movement. The weapon balance isn't just 2 weapons being overpowered, it's (from my experience) half of the entire arsenal in the game being a one tool does all mega weapon that can kill anything in the game with ease. I have 14 different ACs I made in my data, and they all vary from all the different leg types to flamethrowers, different melee builds and lasers and all you can think of, but the strategy never changes in any of the levels, you fight every AC the same way outside of multiplayer and the high impact effect of almost everything in the game sets up bosses to just sit there and eat any combo you have cooked up, which often takes at least half their health bar even with non meta weapons. Honestly the only boss that forces you to play differently is the big furnace thing in chapter 2 because you need to hit the furnaces on it to do anything, but it's not much of an issue because almost everyone who got to it beat it on their first try because it's attacks were so telegraphed and easy to avoid. To get across how little resistance the game really puts up, I made an AC that used all it's weight limit on heavy parts with bipedal legs to look like a Gundam, the only weapons I could put on it were a stun baton and a pistol. I thought it would be useless in any real mission, but I found that the stun baton has an alternate attack that absolutely destroys the stagger meter of everything in the game, and because stagger is such a ridiculously powerful and abuse-able effect in the game, I was able to go in and combo everything to death with ease using an AC that on paper should be totally useless. Hell, within like a week of release some guy uploaded a challenge run of him playing through the game with his fists, which sounds like a huge handicap, until you watch the video and see that they don't have a cooldown and he can stunlock every enemy and boss in the game by going in unarmed. AC6 is easy because it is filled to the brim with inherently powerful mechanics that can be exploited by almost any build you can come up with and it's not a glitch or bug, it's the core aspect of the combat.
I don’t fully agree with either you or Dunkey here, I’m somewhere in the middle, but I think it’s disingenuous to say that most people who used double Gatling and song birds or even the funny little tank treads looked them up and didn’t find them on their own because of what they are. You get access to most of these parts fairly early on and they have a eye catching coolness/funniness factor to them. People see that you can use dual Gatling guns, and get to try it in a training mission, and they want to do it because it’s really cool. Songbirds are one of the first shoulder mounted explosive launcher style weapons you get so people put them on because they want a big rocket type projectile there and then discover how good they are. People see the little tank treads, think they’re funny, read the description and think they’re even funnier, try them out and then realise how good they are. I didn’t do double Gatling songbirds because I thought melee weapons were cool and I wanted a sword and pile bunker but I started using the Gatling gun because it was cool and same with the songbird. I think they’re very easily discoverable OP things that people would have already gravitated towards, same with Zimmermann because shotguns are cool. Most people found out about comet Azur by looking it up because it’s not so readily available and most players gravitate towards a melee build rather than magic because they think swords or whatever melee weapon you like is cool
The difficulty is all over the place for me because I'm too stubborn to replay missions for money with the goal of buying new weapons. I think I need to upgrade my gear at this point...
Replay missions. It's fun to find secrets and money too
@@wolfiewoo3371 Ya, I don't doubt it. It's not a principled stance; I'm just banging my head against the wall like when I encounter a hard boss in a souls game.
@@ratoftoska7497 That can be fun too in its own way
"Oh this person doesn't hate any part of this game? What an insincere and non-credible fanboy."
I in turn wonder if that person in specific even owns the game, or just watches videos with his "universally agreed upon" facts.
I honestly haven't managed to make heavy builds work for my playstyle at all, so can't say if such a brute force build would make things boring or not, but... since I'm really not in the business of making my games boring deliberately, I'll gladly not even do that. Infact I often make up my own fun in games on top of the other awesomeness. For example, it was fun replaying some of the easier money making missions with no weapons, just punching and kicking. :D
Why do we live in such a gaming culture these days that people seem to seek out things to hate and then call people insincere fanboys who have seeked out things to like and managed to love a game all throughout?
It's OK to love a game with flaws. It's not OK to call a thing you love flawless when there are certainly a lot of problems.
@@SeveRUS67 Not finding anything that bothers you or anything that you don't like isn't really a claim that it's flawless for everyone else.
"A lot of problems", you say? What makes them universal flaws, instead of things you don't like?
I'm someone who heard vague build advice from looking up advice at first, but ultimately just went and built stuff on my own. For Balteus I heard shotguns were good in general, and I took that information and tried to piece together why. I noticed the kinetic impact values, and built my mech around being able to just hammer him with the starter shotties, then switch to the pulse guns to delete the shield. It eventually worked, and I've been approaching each boss like that, treating it as a challenge to solve through my building of ACs.
Today I unlocked the Zimmermans, and I remembered the seeing the songbirds shit talked, too. I tried them out together, and saw how ludicrously powerful they are, but the thing is i would have found this on my own, since the reason I liked the shotguns to begin with was the kinetic impact, and I'm just someone who likes to try out all the new toys I've gotten.
And the thing about AC from the very first game is that it's like real weaponry, in that there are weapons that are just flat out better than their predecessors, and you're rewarded for juggling the act of balancing every aspect of your mech. In that regard, I've found the Zimmerman + Songbird build more rewarding, than anything. I've got a rather heavy, reverse joint, AC, where the jumping makes up for the lower AP and Boost, and I love just bulldozing everything in the campaign, because it's something I built from my own conclusions, and the songbird zim combo I was going to find on my own anyway.
My specific build honestly kind of reminds me of my Greatsword builds in Monster Hunter, where I'm weighing all my options for armor to get things like Focus and Quick Sheath on the same set, and I think if a player is willing to experiment with the mechanics, they should be rewarded with stronger builds when combining the right parts.
If you want the game to be even harder just do a challenge run, like Mega Man buster only runs. If you can't then it's a you problem
i'm so glad i came into the game with a clear idea of what i wanted to do in mind, same as you I stuck to medium and light parts because i wanted that gundam fantasy of zipping around at breakneck speeds and firing upon enemies blindspots with weaker guns, to that end i decided pistols would be great since in prior games they were the weakest guns used for backup when ammo ran dry, but they ended up being powerhouses limited only by their ammo capacity.
ultimately the game is only as hard as you make it, embracing speed made the game a challenge in places but that was the experience I expected and desired. AC6 deserves praise for having gameplay styles that make the game more accessible for less mechanically skilled players without having a simple difficulty slider
During my playthrough i came across the gatling gun, zimmer shotgun and or the songbirds in game. I found these to be extremely powerful compared to other weapons, my build did not change for the entire duration of the game except adjustments to my AC outside of weapons (I did not use tank treads because i dislike them). I had experiment with other weapons but i had not found a good build to stick to so i was "stuck" to using these weapons. The game was still fairly hard and i was "stuck" on a few later game bosses.
I still think the game is near flawless with its execution and thoroughly enjoyed the game. However i would like fromsoft to do something about these weapons for at least PVP because they are an extreme nuisance and a hindrance to enjoying pvp, especially tank treads
A fix to bullet velocity and optimized damage ranges would solve this issue
If you have a light reversejoint AC you can easily outrun most bullets and rockets tank players throw at you.
I mentioned this elsewhere, but the design of the game will funnel a lot of players into finding the OP weapons on their own.
Theyre available early on, easy to equip to nearly every build, there's no penalty for buying and trying weapons out, and you can swap builds mid mission. I think it's actually quite likely someone will stumble on at least one of these 3 weapons in their time playing.
I felt the game really encourages you to experiment with different builds and that's exactly what I did trying to beat Baltheus the first time. So you learn fast that you have to constantly upgrade your AC and the game encourages that even more by allowing you to get your money back selling parts at purchase cost. I for one played over 80 hours and loved the game the wole time.
i discovered the double Gatling lightweight tank double songbird set up on my own because i was just trying to make Guntank from the gundam series, i realized it was insanely strong and found it funny that it became known as the strongest build in the game
Dunkey took the easy mode build. And never got to NG+, it looked like since its much harder
I played a random build I liked until I found someone in an online match destroying me in seconds with dual heavy shotguns. Tried them on and never (not even once) got rid of them after. Rarely needed a second try for any boss / arena fight.
Made me truly sad because I enjoyed getting stuck and beating bosses before (tutorial boss for example felt great to beat) but if you have the solution to a problem it is so hard pretending to not have it in using a worse built.
I waited the whole game for them to throw a boss or enemy at me with wich I can’t deal close range and finally needed to adjust my built but it never happens once.
That’s my experience. Still loved the story tho.
Watching the start of the video I was hoping this would be a discussion about the difficulty gap between normal/"trash" mobs and bosses. I think it's a thing that could be addressed as unlike souls games or any other games really I don't think I ever died to anything other than a boss fight while playing.
Really? You never died to an MT, or the PCA shield guys? What about that one mission in chapter 1 with the room full of cloaked guys sniping you with lasers? I even died to energy turrets in a few missions. Oh yeah, what about trying to grab the Moonlight sword surrounded by like 5 wheel guys? I died several times trying to grab it.
@@tonystarrk4859trash mobs are the small MTs that die to one shot. PCA officers and the other tougher ones are considered mini bosses I think.
@@beegest_yoshiI wouldn't consider them Mini-Bosses, more like Elite Enemies.
Mini-Bosses are fights that have Health Bars but you wouldn't necessarily consider actual Boss encounters.
For example, Sulla in chapter 1 is a Mini-boss.
Mobile Defense Platform is a Boss.
Iguazu in chapter 4 is a Mini-boss.
The AI Defense protocol in that same mission is a Boss.
Or more easily, does the encounter let you resupply, like before Balteus in chapter 1 or the PCA Airship in chapter 3.
@@netapel2625 oh okay, I agree with you. I still think that the smaller mobs should pose more of a challenge, I personally want less one shot mini MTs and more of the slightly tanky MTs and PCA bots like those in the depth 2 mission before the enforcer
that's because this isn't a souls game. it's a sim where you play as the elite pilot of an ace custom mecha. if you've ever watched a mecha anime, you probably remember that goons usually aren't terribly threatening right?
and to this end: you don't complain about the hollow-like zombies in elden ring being no threat even in large groups right? do you complain that dante can easily trash puppets in dmc? is it a problem that mario can stomp goombas to death with one button? if you're dying to trash mobs in any of those games that'd be a reflection on you as a player. that's the kind of shit that makes people cry "game journalist" at you. mobs in most games but especially AC are supposed to be mostly easy, and even then there's the armored heavy mt's, quad mt's, and LC's that all take way more punishment and can absolutely kill you if you don't show them some modicum of respect(at least for me as a close range player)
I just want more mission and enemy variety. They have a great rock, paper, scissor thing going with kinetic, energy, and explosive damage types that isn't really being taken advantage of. I'm taking my time with the game so I'm only now in chapter 3 but I was thinking how cool it would be to have a level where the goal is to navigate an obstacle course to beat the timer. I might actually be incentivized to get that dich weight perk from the os chips. I'm loving this game and i just want more of it!
Agreed on most points; I'd say that the obstacle course thing does describe the escape sequence in the mission where you have to escape the Coral surge in the mine. More would be fun though, for sure.
New game + and newgame++ give you alt missions and new missions, I think the game has just the right amount of missions to be fuffiling. It's not mega long like elden ring or something, but pvp will always make me come back to it every now and again.
they have those later on, and there's plenty of enemy variety too. trust me just keep playing you're not even halfway done yet
The pvp is really neat, again I would love to have more of it. I guess I've been spoiled by live service games 😆
The roshambo isn't from the weapon damage types, it's from Speed/Armor and Close/Long range status.
Close range quick mechs can usually beat long range quick mechs and even long range armor mechs sometimes. Long range quick mechs can absolutely zone a close range armor mech to death but would suck against a long range armor mech.
This game's combat is range control and speed vs tank.
I did end up figuring out that the gatling gun and songbirds and stun needle launcher was pretty op. Because i was using all 3 on my quad build with a pilebunker and most things just died very fast. I think tankier setups are a little bit too strong imo. The only boss i had some trouble with was C spider and the ibis coral mech fight and both of them i just switched up timings slightly and i killed them easy. I also think there too much of a reward if you stance break enemies. Which is why explosives just excel in pve especially songbirds. The reason stance breaking worked in sekiro was because it was tied to enemy health and bosses/mini bosses had multiple bars. I know this isn't really a souls game but its hard to not make comparisons to other fromsoft tiles.
I still love the game a lot, i think its fantastic and there's still more mechanical skill involved than elden ring depending on the builds (tap, hold, mash.. etc. and not to mention the weapon swapping, boost kicking, using the armors,). I did end up changing over to lighter mech so i don't end up abusing the heavy weapons and the game felt a lot more fun. If there ends up being more AC games in the future, i'm sure they'll tune the games to be even more perfect. I'm normally uninterested in mech games but AC6 pulled me in seemingly out of no where.
I didn't know the songbirds were 'op' when I used them. I just ended up using them organically because I wasn't getting enough mileage out of missile launchers in enclosed spaces and wanted to try something else, and that was the next thing that I tried. I was like "grenade launchers? I guess I can try that", and so I did. Didn't know anything was 'OP" until like, just now. I just thought they were good but still weak since they'd miss a lot.
The key thing that makes this less of a problem is how, like you said, even though certain builds are the strongest, they don't render the other dozens of builds obsolete. It's very easy to just use whatever build you think is fun despite there being better options because the vast majority of builds in this game are adequate and about as good as each other
Great video! I found the dual gat +songbird combo without hearing about it online, and it did trivialize the game to some extend. But to be honest I loved it anyway, I seriously enjoyed the playstyle and never got bored. I think nerfs are in order but even being in the demographic of people who discovered an almost game-breakingly overpowered build on their own I have no complaints
My build I made while in Ch3 was a lightweight Quad Shotties build that became a Tetrapod Dual Gatling Dual shotties build. It tears through Arena, bosses, and enemy ACs. But it loses in encounters where range is better to have, and lacks splash damage from the songbirds.
I really hope the regulation system from For Answer remains in use for 6. The ability to just swap to a regulation to see how OP something really was, or how hard things used to be with a given fight? Priceless.
My friend and I played the game with pretty different mechs. He landed on 2xZimmerman w/ 2x Worm Needle, I landed on a 2xLinear Harris, Laser Sword and Duckett. His build made it so after chapter 4 of his first playthrough he never died to a boss again, first try against every boss straight through to the end of his 3rd run.
Meanwhile, my mid-long distance semi-auto shooter would have me getting trounced by bosses for a bit before I manage to figure it out. Hearing how effective what my friend was up to only made me less interested in trying out his build because I want us to be doing different things and sharing with each other instead of a race to find a meta then stick to that.
Plus, my build annihilates his in a 1v1 4 out of 5 times, so there’s a difference between ‘boss killer’ and ‘overpowered’.
I completed my three play throughs with mostly a laser shotgun, a blade, plasma missles and a laser cannon on reverse joint legs and nachtreiher arms
It was great.
Now I can use zimmermans and somgbirds to get everything to s rank
I had the exact same experience during my first playthrough of AC6 (sticking with a lightweight build) and I loved the game-- a lot more than I was expecting. I honestly feel a little bad for the people who deprived themselves of the kind of experience AC6 gave me.
ratatoskr again coming in with the great opinions actually backed up with an easy to understand and entertaining explanation. I found you from before totk and idk why i wasnt subbed. I am now tho. Keep at it man
I LITERALLY found a build that jelled with me and it lets me have fun with everything while giving challange. I have the pile driver for fun usages, i have funnles for suppression, i have a cannon for stagger and fun and i have a rail gun for more mid range fire power. It's fun, tight, and still requires me to actually BE GOOD at the game.
Many games have things the player can use to make the game easier. Elden Ring's mimic tear and summons did make the game a whole lot more manageable for many. That's just how it is a lot of the time.
The game gives you options and it's up to the player to use those options the way they see fit. You can use a busted build or you can experiment with the many other parts and see what happens. The latter is what makes AC6 fun, experimenting and finding out what works for you. My first play through, I was using a medium weight build with lasers. With my 2nd run, I'm being more aggressive with a light weight shotgun build and changing to that style made the game a whole lot more fun.
Be it this lightweight shotgun build or the wheelchair tank, it's up to the player to find fun in these games.
Especially when the game gives you so many options. The game does give you weapons to fight certain bosses too,
like how the bubble gun is good for shields.
I think its easy, but i dont think its too easy. It can be hard and it can be easy if you want, and even when its easy its still fun. Breezing through the game with double gatling guns is still really fun.