Weapons and Splash

Falcon

Private Tester
This thread is a spin off of the thread So uh, Splash back up?, which had turned into a splash (and knockback) discussion. A more formal name for this thread would be: Suggestions to Combat the Possibility of an Overly Splash Filled Game.

Originally Daph's quote got me thinking about why much of the community believes splash is a bit excessive.
I meant that, should the final RL splash be reduced once again, the impulse would likely do the same. In that situation, I'd start lobbying for a new weapon to fill the role of trajectory-changer.
I believe the problem is in the lack of weapons Legions currently has. Currently, there are 4 weapons, 2 with splash and 2 without. Of the 4, only 3 of them are consistently used, especially in close to midrange combat. I am not including the Laser Rifle due to its overall lack of use in duel or duel-like combat. Although some can be successful with it, the Laser Rifle is very rarely used for this purpose. The three most common weapons used for combat purposes are the RL, GL, and CG. Two-thirds of which have splash. That means that two-thirds of the time (subject to differential use of weapons) players are being pelted with splash damage weapons. It is probably more often than this as every single class (hold the OR LRII) has at least one splash weapon, and some primarily use the CG for finishers. This can make the game feel splash heavy, and take away from the importance of certain skills, primarily movement. I suggest that more weapons be added to lessen the overall use of splash or splash dominant weapons. Some of these new weapons could have splash, but not as their main feature or damage potential. Here are some suggestions I had made back on the old IA forums...

*Note that I am an advocate for utility based weapons – weapons that hinder the enemy in more ways than HP (If damaging HP at all). I am also a bit bias towards the chasing position. Oh yeah, I suck at naming weapons.

EMP Disc Launcher – This weapon is a hit or miss, as in it either deals its full damage, or none at all. It shoots a metal disc/blade and if it comes within one meter (Or any small radius) of any player it explodes with an EMP (electromagnetic pulse). Note that it is not detonated by the ground or buildings. If it collides with the ground or buildings it is defused and becomes dormant causing no damage (basically fades away like a dead player). It would cause a small amount of damage, but also deal direct "damage" to the enemy's energy bar. Useful for slowing enemies, or picking them out of the sky. Possibly used for dueling to drop the enemies flight time. I see this as a nice alternative to splash.
Gauss Rifle – Burst fire. Shoots three quick rounds, and then has a short break before it can fire another three rounds. Hits for a nice amount of damage if all three rounds hit the target. Useful for targeting enemies in the air, at a moderate range.
Magno-Beam – Kind of like the lightning gun in quake. Short range, low damage, continuous beam. But it also drains a fair bit of energy.
Plasma Gun – Rapidly Shoots balls of plasma that travel fast in a linear motion. Dissipate after a medium distance to prevent spam.

Homingun has already commented on the idea of tweaking splash as a whole.
Homingun said:
Classic case of trying to fix what was not broken. Maybe we should be working on more important parts of the game.
Homingun said:
Keep in mind that pursuit of perfection and practicality don't necessarily coincide. On that note, reality and games don't either.
I have to agree with this philosophy as well. I believe that the game and devs should focus on adding more content before tweaking the damage multipliers. Of course equations need to be changed throughout the developing process to make sure there is healthy competition between players (and weapon usage), but the main focus should be on adding new content. On that note: great job with the new maps and the swift development, especially for a completely volunteer dev team!

Edited for clarity.
 

Mhi200

Member
EMP Disc Launcher – This weapon is a hit or miss, as in it either deals its full damage, or none at all. It shoots a metal disc/blade and if it comes within one meter (Or any small radius) of any player it explodes with an EMP (electromagnetic pulse). Note that it is not detonated by the ground or buildings. If it collides with the ground or buildings it is defused and becomes dormant causing no damage (basically fades away like a dead player). It would cause a small amount of damage, but also deal direct "damage" to the enemy's energy bar. Useful for slowing enemies, or picking them out of the sky. Possibly used for dueling to drop the enemies flight time. I see this as a nice alternative to splash.
Gauss Rifle – Burst fire. Shoots three quick rounds, and then has a short break before it can fire another three rounds. Hits for a nice amount of damage if all three rounds hit the target. Useful for targeting enemies in the air, at a moderate range.
Magno-Beam – Kind of like the lightning gun in quake. Short range, low damage, continuous beam. But it also drains a fair bit of energy.
Plasma Gun – Rapidly Shoots balls of plasma that travel fast in a linear motion. Dissipate after a medium distance to prevent spam.
EMP - Remember why the old RLII was changed? Proximity radius would have to be very small, or nonexistent.
Gauss - Good. Like it.
Magno - Wouldn't this be too easy to just spam whilst moving the screen about randomly?(Depends on the programming I guess)
Plasma - Isn't this just the cg/rl combined?
 

Redvan

Private Tester
EMP - Remember why the old RLII was changed? Proximity radius would have to be very small, or nonexistent.

RLII was changed because people didn't want the splashtasticness to be spread to the air, which, rightfully, should be reserved for MA shots. Falcon said the EMP DL is "hit or miss", implying there would be no manual det, thus, no splash in air (or on ground for that matter).

gotta say I'm kinda surprised the manual det RLII isn't brought back with how much people apparently rely on splash ;)
 

Volt Cruelerz

Legions Developer
EMP Disc Launcher: Not a big fan of this as it seems rather pointless. If you can get a hit normally, just hit with the RL...
Magno: No opinion
Plasma: Not a big fan of this one either... Its just kinda a combination of RL and CG...

Now, as for the gauss, I do like that idea and have wanted to at least see a burst weapon for some time. It might not work, but burst weapons are always my favorite weapons in normal FPS games, so hopefully it would carry over to Legions.
 

Daphinicus

Private Tester
RLII was changed because people didn't want the splashtasticness to be spread to the air, which, rightfully, should be reserved for MA shots. Falcon said the EMP DL is "hit or miss", implying there would be no manual det, thus, no splash in air (or on ground for that matter).

gotta say I'm kinda surprised the manual det RLII isn't brought back with how much people apparently rely on splash ;)

I always loved manual det; it made RL fights SUCH fun.

It was also painfully overpowered.

Now, a manual-det EMP? Daffy likes.
 

WildFire

Warrior of Linux
I quite like the mango weapon to be honest, but that's probably because I play quake all the time.
 

Falcon

Private Tester
Plasma: Not a big fan of this one either... Its just kinda a combination of RL and CG...
Plasma - Isn't this just the cg/rl combined?

Isn't the GL just a Rocket with an arc... Isn't the LR just a faster rocket without splash. The point is that all weapons are similar on one level or another. As long as the weapon is used and fills a certain niche, it becomes a viable idea. I personally see using the plasma gun much like how you descirbed, as a hyrbrid CG RL. But it has some trade-offs; Not viable for ground pound like the RL and not as fast as a projectile as the CG.

Falcon said the EMP DL is "hit or miss", implying there would be no manual det, thus, no splash in air (or on ground for that matter).
Now, a manual-det EMP? Daffy likes.

There seems to be a bit of confusion over the EMP Disc Launcher's "splash". By 'hit or miss' I meant that it either deals 100% of its effect (damage and energy) or none of its effect. There is no partial damage and no damage taper over distance. However there is also a small radial effect, being that if any enemy enter this short radius from the disc, the disc explodes. The disc could explode in the air, or near the ground, provided that an enemy is inside the short radius from the disc. As everyone seems to use the RL as a comparable - the EMP DL would be more easier to hit enemies in the air due to its radial effect, but harder to ground-pound with given that it disengages on the ground and has a smaller radial effect than the rocket's splash radius.

Currently, I envision it as an automatic detonation - hence the 'radial effect' I describe above. However a manual detonation idea would make this weapon more challenging to use, and possibly make it more balanced. Again, I think this is a nice alternative to splash, whether it be manual or automatic detonation.
 

Mhi200

Member
But the thing is the arc and the instant fire over long range make those weapons unique, while plasma is still a linear, non-instant projectile. CG is different to RL because one is rapidfire, fast bullets, while the other is single shot with splash.
Just my opinion.

redvan said:
RLII was changed because people didn't want the splashtasticness to be spread to the air, which, rightfully, should be reserved for MA shots. Falcon said the EMP DL is "hit or miss", implying there would be no manual det, thus, no splash in air (or on ground for that matter).
and if it comes within one meter (Or any small radius) of any player it explodes
 

light6767

New Member
shot gun
or a plasma energy scatter gun that would be very cool and i have talked to people in chat about it and they said they would like it

some more ideas
cannons that are mounted to the ground that people use like a turret
add a flame thrower for short range
gauss rifle
grenades
gas poison
 
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