Firefall-Esque Weapon Discussion Thread

[BunnyHunny]

The only reason I haven't suggested it myself is because the weapon came with a lot of balancing issues because of its versatility. People would always mod it to adjust charge rate in ways that made the dps peak and often led to broken gameplay, especially against bosses.

Maxing the effectiveness (peak dps in this case) is the whole point of being able to modify stuff.

There might have been balancing issues with that weapon in versions from 3+ years ago, but not in any iteration afterwards.
Also it did not make sense to max charge speed anymore.

Earlier versions of the rifle restrict charging to scope-only, which I think is the better choice (So hipfiring just shoots a minimum-damage round) . If charging is allowed out-of-scope the weapon becomes useful at every single range against every single type of target because of the charging variable. My vote is to keep charging limited to scope.

Bad idea.
If it made sense to always charge the weapon almost completely (and always to a specific degree) and only shoot when aiming down sights, there is no real difference to a normal sniper rifle (except the charge rifle would force the player to stay scoped the entire time, while the sniper rifle only requires to scope in the moment of shooting).

Much better imo (which is what we had in later iterations):
Automatically charges ALWAYS, not only in scope (without losing the charge when switching between ads and hipfire).
Give the gun a decent hipfire accuracy (good enough to be able to hit targets on short to medium range).
Add 50%+ (relatively high) headshot multiplier to cause a difference in effectiveness between scoped and not scoped (headshots without ads should be hard to achieve unless the head is in very close range and/or gigantic).
Add the option to automatically fire at max rate by holding down the left mouse button.

Having the weapon always charge up increases the skill cap, because the first shot after a short pause deals much more damage and is an important shot to hit, also fast aim would be rewarded, since quickscoping is now useful (otherwise, the player always has time to aim for a second or so).
Also, the player has to decide, if (in the specific situation) it is more useful to shoot from the hip or to ads.
It also allows for more mobility because the player is not forced to ads for at least x seconds before shooting, and then keep ads in order to be able to deal damage.

 

[NightStroke]

Bad idea.
If it made sense to always charge the weapon almost completely (and always to a specific degree) and only shoot when aiming down sights, there is no real difference to a normal sniper rifle (except the charge rifle would force the player to stay scoped the entire time, while the sniper rifle only requires to scope in the moment of shooting).

Much better imo (which is what we had in later iterations):
Automatically charges ALWAYS, not only in scope (without losing the charge when switching between ads and hipfire).
Give the gun a decent hipfire accuracy (good enough to be able to hit targets on short to medium range).
Add 50%+ (relatively high) headshot multiplier to cause a difference in effectiveness between scoped and not scoped (headshots without ads should be hard to achieve unless the head is in very close range and/or gigantic).
Add the option to automatically fire at max rate by holding down the left mouse button.

Having the weapon always charge up increases the skill cap, because the first shot after a short pause deals much more damage and is an important shot to hit, also fast aim would be rewarded, since quickscoping is now useful (otherwise, the player always has time to aim for a second or so).
Also, the player has to decide, if (in the specific situation) it is more useful to shoot from the hip or to ads.
It also allows for more mobility because the player is not forced to ads for at least x seconds before shooting, and then keep ads in order to be able to deal damage.

There is a difference between a charge rifle that only charges ads and a BASR. While one has a constant damage and every shot must be used on every type of target, potentially consuming its short mag and long fire rate to deal wasted damage and time, the other has variable damage and is more efficient because it only needs to be charged enough to kill its specific target.

The charge rifle was my favorite weapon throughout firefall, from 0.5 to firefalls death. I understand why you like the later iterations of it; the weapon with charging no-scope made it more potent and more versatile than it already was. But don't you see why it's problematic?
1. Because of variable damage, the charge rifle has the advantage of efficiency and rate of fire. If someone misses a shot with the BASR, they have just wasted a valuable round and are punished by the BASR's rate of fire. If they use the BASR on a squishy enemy, they waste a round by doing unnecessarily extra damage. Someone who uses a charge rifle has choice. A missed shot is immediately followed up by another. No damage is wasted on smaller targets because damage can be lowered and rate of fire can be raised.

2. If you give the charge rifle the ability to charge while hip-firing, you make the weapon effective at every single distance. Both the BASR and the Charge rifle can wreck at close-range because of BASR quickscoping/potshots and the charge rifle just firing from the hip. At mid-range, the charge rifle is superior because you don't have to scope to be effective, because of decent accuracy and all the perks of not being in scope, which the BASR has to be. And of course both weapons are good at long range, which they are supposed to be. But the charge rifle can be strong at all ranges while the BASR cannot.

Since the charge rifle is better at any range and against any target, why would someone choose the BASR rather than the charge rifle, except for against bosses maybe? Why would someone need a secondary weapon at all, with your suggestions?

I'd say a good compromise is this:
1. The charge rifle, if LMB is held down, automatically fires rounds at the minimum charge and damage.(this was a change I wanted back in firefall, just forgot to bring it up)
2. Accuracy while hipfiring starts out perfect but the reticle blooms quickly with continuous firing
3. Probably the most important one: let the charge rifle charge outside of the scope, but to a limit. Outside of scope, make the maximum charge 1/3 or 1/2 of the total charge bar. When you scope in, the rifle continues charging. This way, the principles of the charge rifle are still maintained out-of-scope but sniping is the encouraged method for dealing damage, especially since the ideal dps is found in the latter half of the charge bar.

 

[BunnyHunny]

1. Because of variable damage, the charge rifle has the advantage of efficiency and rate of fire. If someone misses a shot with the BASR, they have just wasted a valuable round and are punished by the BASR's rate of fire. If they use the BASR on a squishy enemy, they waste a round by doing unnecessarily extra damage. Someone who uses a charge rifle has choice. A missed shot is immediately followed up by another. No damage is wasted on smaller targets because damage can be lowered and rate of fire can be raised.

Only if enemies die within something like less than 4 shots, it really matters when you have to "waste" damage on a low hp target.

A missed shot is NOT immediately followed up by another.
Not, if it makes sense to charge the rifle (at least to a certain degree) before every shot, which is what you proposed.

Assuming that a BASR shoots slower, but hits harder than an effectively used charge rifle...
Unless there are multiple enemies with such a low HP pool that you do not even need one full shot from a BASR, or a charged shot from a charge rifle, it does not really matter if you have a charge rifle or a BASR.
However, when shooting an enemy that can, just so, be killed with a certain number of shots from a BASR, a player using a charge rifle would have to waste shots.

Also, we are talking about a multiplayer game. Nobody forces a guy who uses a slow firing weapon with high damage to finish low HP enemies.
People who use AE weapons will probably not complain about "wasting" their AE dmg when shooting single targets either.

2. If you give the charge rifle the ability to charge while hip-firing, you make the weapon effective at every single distance. Both the BASR and the Charge rifle can wreck at close-range because of BASR quickscoping/potshots and the charge rifle just firing from the hip. At mid-range, the charge rifle is superior because you don't have to scope to be effective, because of decent accuracy and all the perks of not being in scope, which the BASR has to be. And of course both weapons are good at long range, which they are supposed to be. But the charge rifle can be strong at all ranges while the BASR cannot.

You just contradicted yourself.
"can wreck at close-range because of BASR quickscoping"
"But the charge rifle can be strong at all ranges while the BASR cannot."

A sniper rifle (if quick scoping is possible) works at any range. That is a fact.
A charge rifle that requires you to stay scoped for around a second, in order to be effective, would NOT be effective at short range (and a pain in the ass in general).
According to yourself, spamming it without charging every shot should not be very effective, therefore it would be far worse than a BASR at short range.

A slower firing weapon (probably the BASR) is more effective at long range than a faster shooting one, because it is easier to hit every shot with.

I am pretty sure that the point of a charge rifle is supposed to be that it is MORE versatile than a BASR and that it allows for more flexibility.
If it would only charge while scoped, with the charge being important, it would be far less versatile.

Since the charge rifle is better at any range and against any target, why would someone choose the BASR rather than the charge rifle, except for against bosses maybe? Why would someone need a secondary weapon at all, with your suggestions?

Why would it be better at all ranges?

And why would it be better against any kind of target?
The effectiveness of weapons against different targets would depend the size of the target, it has crit zones and how it moves.
It would completely depend on base damage, crit multiplier and projectile velocity of the weapons.
If the sniper rifle had a lower base DPS, but a far higher crit multiplier than the charge rifle (which should definitely be the case), both would have their use.

I'd say a good compromise is this:
1. The charge rifle, if LMB is held down, automatically fires rounds at the minimum charge and damage.(this was a change I wanted back in firefall, just forgot to bring it up)

Why minimum charge?
Just make it max rate of fire. That still allows for charge speed to increase your damage.

2. Accuracy while hipfiring starts out perfect but the reticle blooms quickly with continuous firing

Sounds reasonable. Should only be the case though, when held down, or at least be reduced when the player manually clicks for each shot (in order to reward the risk of oversampling).

3. Probably the most important one: let the charge rifle charge outside of the scope, but to a limit. Outside of scope, make the maximum charge 1/3 or 1/2 of the total charge bar. When you scope in, the rifle continues charging. This way, the principles of the charge rifle are still maintained out-of-scope but sniping is the encouraged method for dealing damage, especially since the ideal dps is found in the latter half of the charge bar.

Why are you trying to make the charge rifle a worse sniper rifle?

 

[NightStroke]

...

I don't want to hijack the thread, so if you want to discuss further lets take this to a personal message.

Essentially, what makes the charge rifle better at every range (if hipfire charging is allowed) is the ways either weapon has to work for close or mid ranges. The BASR has to quickscope(which takes skill) or potshot at very close range, meaning the player has to compromise position or have reduced mobility. A charge rifle that can charge out of scope has high accuracy can be used with any mobility (I could play like a firecat quite easily if I wanted to). And keep in mind that the BASR has a lower mag size so its shots are more "valuable". I'm not trying to make a charge rifle a worse BASR, I'm trying to suggest a way to keep the charge rifle and BASR as equally potent alternatives.

 

[BunnyHunny]

The weapon's primary fire never changed over the course of development.

Except in 1.5. And in 1.6.

My main proposed change is with the alternate fire. Originally, you held down the right mouse button and a beam of energy fired from the weapon to a short range, dealing high damage at the cost of high ammo consumption. The damage was almost never worth the ammo consumption though, and the alt-fire only saw use if you didn't have time to charge the weapon or whatnot.

Or, if you actually used it intelligently, you did so, while Dreadfield was active, because your alt fire could only reach enemies that would be within the aoe (--> no ammo consumption), anyway.

I'd like to see the alt-fire changed. It was called a laser lance previously, but I want to see an actual one. I'd like to see it be changed such that it maintains and fires a beam of energy-shorter ranged than before-but with more manageable ammo consumption(or draw on the Omniframe's power core). The damage would be about the same, but what this would do is literally gore enemies.

So... something like what the weapon actually did in 1.5, 1.6 and 1.7?

You'd only be able to fire it with an enemy in your crosshairs, but once fired, it would lock you and the enemy to each other for as long as the beam is maintained, dealing continuous damage. Neither of you would be able to take actions(bosses/Kaiju being the exceptions), but the user would be able to move.

If you want the lowest possible skill requirement for a weapon, thats what to do.
Add an auto aim, disable the enemy while being shot and prevent firing when not aiming at anything.

 

[BunnyHunny]

I really liked whole recluse weapon concept.
Left click for fast precise high damage bolt and right click for aoe gas cloud that had lifesteal.

The gas cloud did not have life steal.
All your damage had, thanks to a perk (and since 1.6 thanks to Heroism).

 

[AdmiralStryker]

Except in 1.5. And in 1.6.


Or, if you actually used it intelligently, you did so, while Dreadfield was active, because your alt fire could only reach enemies that would be within the aoe (--> no ammo consumption), anyway.



So... something like what the weapon actually did in 1.5, 1.6 and 1.7?


If you want the lowest possible skill requirement for a weapon, thats what to do.
Add an auto aim, disable the enemy while being shot and prevent firing when not aiming at anything.

I don't claim omniscience. I didn't play the game very much as it progressed past 1.5. I didn't realize that the gun had ben changed in such a way, and I apologize. I believe my description was sufficient to give the reader an idea of what I mean.

As for the alt-fire/Dreadfield, that's viable, but I found that often it did less damage than the primary fire with Dreadfield up. As I said, based on my experience.

As for your final comment, it's not auto-aim. Like the tesla rifle, the weapon does nothing but drain ammo unless you have your crosshairs ON a target. Once it's on, it stays locked-or maybe it should remain dependent on the user maintaining the lock. The enemy being shot is disabled(but I'm talking standard Tsi-Hu. Stronger enemies or more importantly Kaiju should NOT be disabled.), but you can still be fired at by other enemies. Use it in the wrong position, and you leave yourself terribly open.

I also want to emphasize the feedback-oriented nature of this. While criticism is nice, I'd like to hear what you would prefer. Use what I suggested as a template, or suggest something original. What do you think it should be?

 

[BunnyHunny]

The reason this post was made is gone.
Therefore... assess chaps!