PugRebalance

This mod follows semantic versioning: new major versions require clients to update the mod, while new minor versions will make server-side changes only. Subversions are fixes that don't make material change to the content of the mod (formatting changes, server-side bugfixing). The main Northstar mod.json will remain at version 5.0.0 throughout this major version to allow compatibility between servers and clients.
A changelog file may be provided in the future to track changes between updates to this mod.

This version (v5.4.0) mirrors exactly the balancing in 5.2.0 with some additional minor structural changes. This is intended to be the "classic balance" so to speak, as it was before the December 2025 update. A future update will also include the new balance with a higher time-to-kill (TTK), as an all-in-one download.

botmm (AKA voltaic_gold) created a secondary mod designed to be used with this one that has experimental changes such as changes to the phase teleport, mantle speed modification, and more. Those changes are toggled via riffs in the lobby settings, under the "Beta Rebalance Changes" category.
I've included a version (v5.1.0) of the rebal_BETA within this package in order to add additional features and to ease use of our Discord bot to spin up instances of Northstar servers (via Vultr). For explanations of the various changes please check out the original page for it here: https://thunderstore.io/c/northstar/p/botmm/rebal_BETA/

Balance Changes in v5.4.0:

Assault Rifles

• Flatline
  • viewkick_air_scale_ads: 2 -> 1.2
• G2
  • viewkick_air_scale_ads: 3 -> 1.2
• Hemlok
  • viewkick_air_scale_ads: 2 -> 1.2
  • Starburst mod replaces Quick Swap:
    • 5 round burst
    • 25 round mag
    • Heavy recoil
  • Extended Mag attachment gives a flat +6 rounds
• R101
  • viewkick_air_scale_ads: 2 -> 1.2
  • viewkick_pitch_hardScale: 0.5 -> 0.3
  • viewkick_yaw_hardScale: 0.8 -> 0.6
• R201
  • viewkick_air_scale_ads: 2 -> 1.2
  • viewkick_pitch_hardScale: 0.5 -> 0.3
  • viewkick_yaw_hardScale: 0.8 -> 0.6
  • Other viewkick stats equalized with R101 (so, iron sights are the only difference).

SMGs

• Alternator
  • Near damage: 35 -> 40
  • Far damage 18 -> 28
  • Very far damage: 14 -> 18
  • Rate of fire: 10 -> 7
  • Default magazine: 20 -> 18
  • Extended magazine: 25 -> 22
  • Headshots disabled
  • viewkick_scale_firstshot_hipfire: 0.3 -> 0.6
• CAR
  • Very far damage: 10 -> 9
• R97
  • Spread-in-air: 1.5 -> 1.0
• Volt
  • Far damage: 15 -> 17

LMGs

• LSTAR
  • Near damage: 25 -> 30
  • Far damage: 18 -> 20
• Spitfire
  • Near damage: 35 -> 30
  • Very far damage: 20 -> 15

Grenadiers

• SMR
  • Damage vs Titans: 115 -> 150
  • Projectile speed: 3300 -> 3600

Anti-Titan Weapons

• Charge Rifle
  • Damage vs pilots: 300 -> 100

Ordnance

• Frag Grenades
  • Explosion damage: 200 -> 20
  • Can no longer be cooked
  • Impulse force: 500 -> 17500
  • Explosion impulse: 50000 -> 65000
  • Grenades now explode when within proximity of enemies
• Gravity Star
  • Duration: 2 -> 1.5
• Electric Smoke
  • Pull-out time: 0.3 -> 0.25
  • Projectile launch speed: 1100 -> 1200
  • Lifetime: 6 seconds
  • Damage delay: 1s -> 0.8s
• Satchels
  • Explosion damage to pilots: 125 -> 100

Abilities

• Grapple
  • Max length: 1100 -> 900
  • Air accel: 650 -> 350
  • detachSpeedLossMin: 460 -> 500
• Phase Shift
  • Holster, deploy, lower, raise, and toss times: 0.1 -> 0.01667
  • Health regen timer paused during Phase
• Pulse Blade
  • Completely replaced with a short-range teleport

Titans

• Ion
  • Laser Shot
    • Distance: 4000 -> 3200
• Tone
  • Sonar Pulse
    • Duration vs Pilots: 5s -> 1s

Additional Info

• View height: 60 -> 54 (to counter headglitching).
• Melee damage: 100 -> 0.
• Controller aim assist should be disabled (set the NoAimAssist riff to "Enabled").
  • Note: this is not foolproof - we have an additional client-side mod to more reliably disable aim assist available here: https://thunderstore.io/c/northstar/p/Aoloach/AimAssistDisable/
  • There is also a mod to control aim assist values with more granularity than on or off available here: htttps://thunderstore.io/c/northstar/p/rakostar/aimassisttweaker/ which I have linked here for convenience; currently (as of March 1, 2025) we are not using this with this version of the rebalance.
• Intended for use with the Competitive CTF game mode with Pilot health at 120%