I am loving this game, and I have been a fan of the Subnautica franchise for years. I count Subnautica and Below Zero (and now Subnautica 2) as my absolute favorite games.
That being said, the damage in this game sorely needs a rebalance. Take the epicurean, for instance. It hits the player like a truck, taking 30 damage points in one hit! But then, it doesn’t attack the Tadpole whatsoever? Contrast that with something like the hammerhead, that only does 15 damage to the player, but also does that exact same damage to an unprotected Tadpole?!? Or the Needler, shooting uranium-tipped teeth at me… Sounds like a horribly dangerous weapon, but only does 1-2 HP of damage! The only creature that is moderately balanced at this time (IMHO) is the Marrowbreach.
I also noticed that, at this point in time, none of the electric attacks really do anything to the battery of a vehicle at all. Something like the crabsquid’s EMP blast should be strongly considered.
Another thing that might be beneficial would be a protective dive suit upgrade to reduce the damage taken by the player by half.
Below are a list of the damages that I have personally experienced in-game:
Bullethead:
Player: 1 HP
Vehicle: 1 HP
Vehicle w/ Strike Armor: 1 HP
Collector Leviathan:
Player: 100 HP
Vehicle: 40 HP
Vehicle w/ Strike Armor: 20 HP
Epicurean:
Player: 30 HP
Vehicle: None?
Vehicle w/ Strike Armor: None?
Foureye:
Player: 5 HP
Vehicle: 0 HP
Vehicle w/ Strike Armor: 0 HP
Hammerhead:
Player: 15 HP
Vehicle: 17 HP
Vehicle w/ Strike Armor: 8 HP
Marrowbreach:
Player: 23 HP
Vehicle: 16 HP
Vehicle w/ Strike Armor: 8 HP
Needler Mango:
Player: 3 HP
Vehicle: 3 HP
Vehicle w/ Strike Armor: 1.5 HP
Nibbler Mango:
Player: 12 HP
Vehicle: 0 HP
Vehicle w/ Strike Armor: 0 HP
Note: can somehow attack you inside Tadpole?
Surge Jelly:
Player: 8 HP
Vehicle: 8 HP
Vehicle w/ Strike Armor: 8 HP
If I could snap my fingers and make this more balanced, I would have the following damage multipliers:
Player: 4x
Regular tadpole: 2x
Tadpole with Strike Armor: 1x
So take the Hammerhead for example. It would do:
Player: 32 HP
Vehicle: 16 HP
Vehicle w/ Strike Armor: 8 HP
Thank you for taking the time to read this, and thank you for an incredible game franchise. I look forward to hundreds more hours spent together!