[1 Dismissal] Energy guns use power packs

[AmoryBlaine]

We change the system for energy weapons so that they take power packs, rather than need to be stuffed into walls at the two available locations- the armory, and the Security office- to be charged. I find myself more often than not focusing on using the easier to acquire ballistic weapons and saving the lasers and energy carbines for shooting through things, purely because it is a waste otherwise. The powerpacks can be single-use, or take awhile to charge- I don't care. I just really dislike that we want to focus energy weapons, but then limit them in a way that makes their applications very few and far between the uses of the ballistics.

Edited March 1, 2019 by LordFowl

[KingOfThePing]

I talked about this with some others some time ago and I will leave this here:

 

Excerpt from the Mass Effect 2/3 Wiki:

[...] as such, detachable heat sinks, known as thermal clips, were adopted [...] by (organic) arms manufacturers. Ammunition may never be a concern with modern (non-ballistc) arms, but the availability of thermal clips is; weapons without thermal clips have nowhere to disperse their heat and are incapable of firing [...].

 

So yes, please rethink how laser-based weaponry works. It's a bit stupid. Please, please, please. +100

[ben10083]

Here are the problems with this:

1. Once we do this, we eliminate the major benefit of using energy weapons, leading to a drastic increase in ballistic use

2. Even easier to shut down Sec early, just take away the power packs

3. This will be complicated to do for borgs, since some hacked modules and the combat module use energy guns, this will effectively break them, and it will be difficult to find a solution for it if we insist on them also using power packs

4. There are actually many more places to charge your weapon, if I recall you can use regular chargers (reduced charging) and surface checkpoint and some places in command also have rechargers, so it is rather easy to get to a charger.

 

I feel that this addition will just make energy weapons become "Ballistics but fires lasers" and that, with regards of the sufficient amount of chargers spread around the station, that it would not be easier than heading to a charger.

-1

[Carver]

I don't like this, eliminates the weakness of energy weapons (inability to provide sustained fire via in-field reloads). I've seen it on servers before, and was fairly neutral at the time, but seeing arguments on the matter in the past has made me lean towards keeping them charge-only.

[AmoryBlaine]

5 hours ago, ben10083 said:

Here are the problems with this:

1. Once we do this, we eliminate the major benefit of using energy weapons, leading to a drastic increase in ballistic use

2. Even easier to shut down Sec early, just take away the power packs

3. This will be complicated to do for borgs, since some hacked modules and the combat module use energy guns, this will effectively break them, and it will be difficult to find a solution for it if we insist on them also using power packs

4. There are actually many more places to charge your weapon, if I recall you can use regular chargers (reduced charging) and surface checkpoint and some places in command also have rechargers, so it is rather easy to get to a charger.

 

I feel that this addition will just make energy weapons become "Ballistics but fires lasers" and that, with regards of the sufficient amount of chargers spread around the station, that it would not be easier than heading to a charger.

-1

What's the 'major benefit' to energy weapons?

How is it 'easier' to shut down Sec when currently that is done by throwing all the guns into space, or hiding them in lockers. I would prefer power packs be stolen so we need to talk with RnD or cargo to get more. 

 

I don't see this having an effect on modules. They themselves operate off the suit power, which is how it ought to be. This is for free standing weapons. 

 

I don't like charging the whole gun, it's stupid. Who designs weapons that require special charge units, provide low charge count, but are also designed for mobility? It makes zero sense for anyone to have designed these, and even less sense for a company to have bought them. They are good for one thing, and that is shooting carp. Every other instance I use them in, is just to weaken things or as a scare tactic. The powerhouse of Sec is the .45 because it's the only reliable weapon on station that can be reloaded on the go and can carry a large quantity of extra magazines to compensate for it's extremely low magazine capacity. 

 

If the only thing seperating ballistics from energy based weapons, in your mind, is the fact that energy weapons don't have a 'magazine', then that's an overall issue with the weapons, is it not? 

 

 

[Kaed]

The only benefit lasers have over ballistics is they can fire through transparent glass.  They currently cannot be reloaded in combat, which is somewhat of a problem because they are already fundamentally weaker in combat than ballistics, which:

-Often have a higher rate of fire, since most of them are automatic or semi automatic

-Deal way more damage

-Leave shrapnel and break bones/organs, both of which require surgery to fix as opposed to simply slapping on some salve or swallowing a dermaline pill. (and shrapnel can occur from a SINGLE BULLET on a FULLY ARMORED PERSON)

-Are capable of limb gibbing much easier than lasers.

-More armors provide laser than blunt resistance

So I don't really get this insistence that lasers will become too strong if you let people change out battery packs.  They're already so weak that people will always use ballistics if they can get their hands on them.  Security only uses lasers in combat because that's generally all they're equipped with, while the almost entire antagonist battery of weapons is ballistic.

Edited February 28, 2019 by Kaed

[AmoryBlaine]

@Kaed And for the energy weapons antags DO use, you get the captain's side arm, and the iceland rifle. Both of which have a means to replenish their ammo supply.

[Scheveningen]

Lasers can be nerfed in various other ways in the fashion that they are oppressively strong in order to fit in the matter of power packs/thermal clips as part of their core mechanics, whichever is more preferable in terms of flavor. The existing attributes of energy weapons can be addressed in dozens of separate ways.

As it stands, 3/4ths of the entire roster of energy weapons are not as preferable to use over a ballistic weapon in terms of lethality. The fact you must be forced to retreat after your energy weapon is empty or to immediately dispose of the weapon for a more reliable, ammunition-fed weapon makes energy weapons lose incredibly hard in terms of the versatility factor compared to that of ballistics.

Furthermore, most beam-type weapons (which compromise almost the entire scope of energy weapons) require precision clicking on the mob in particular due to their hit-scan nature and the changes that implemented pixel-based shooting. If you click in front or behind someone, you will miss most of the time, regardless of the accuracy buffs I implemented awhile back. Ballistics do not do this due to how bullet-to-object/mob collision works, and therefore you have much less pressure to directly click on someone because it is far less necessary.

Energy weapons that don't utilize projectile shooting have immense handicaps, and their lack of ability to conveniently reload on the fly makes the weapon a liability as soon as you're out of charge for it. This isn't EVO or anything, but laser rifles are not competitive with assault rifles for this reason, despite being in roughly the same weight class and having the same amount of shots (roughly). 

Balancing out inconsistencies with versatility and making every option in the game matter and still be viable is an important part of game design, in my opinion, because it allows for a wider variety of tactics to be used by the wider playerbase without certain weaknesses or strengths cancelling out the strengths of others.

Edited March 1, 2019 by Scheveningen

[LordFowl]

Energy weapons requiring direct charge as opposed to ammunition feeding is a conscientious choice to make the distinction between the weapons more impactful. What this thread screams out to me is not that energy weapons are too weak, but due to years of gun-nut powercreep ballistics have become too powerful and widespread.

Voting for dismissal, although the problem of ballistic powercreep may be looked into independently.

[AmoryBlaine]

2 minutes ago, LordFowl said:

conscientious choice to make the distinction between the weapons more impactful.

It's a really poor way to make a distinction. "These weapons are useful, these ones shoot through windows, but are not useful outside of this."

[Kaed]

 

Quote

Energy weapons requiring direct charge as opposed to ammunition feeding is a conscientious choice to make the distinction between the weapons more impactful. What this thread screams out to me is not that energy weapons are too weak, but due to years of gun-nut powercreep ballistics have become too powerful and widespread.

Voting for dismissal, although the problem of ballistic powercreep may be looked into independently.

It would be better to do something new and interesting with energy weapons than to take away what ballistics has now.  As a design philosophy adding features is generally preferable to removing existing ones, because the latter tends to make people more upset than getting something fresh to play with.  Ballistic weapons are in a place of realism with how dangerous they are, whereas lasers remain a joke largely because of stubborn mindsets like this that insist they should stay stagnant where they are rather than trying anything else.

What if instead of energy cartridges you swap out like ammo magazines, there is a sort of optional bulky side battery box that can be put on belts or back slots or something, and then plugged into a gun you are using to provide it with constant charge.  The battery box can carry any of the standard batteries you'd have in APCs, but only charges the gun about as fast as putting it in the charger, if not slower.  This would provide a sort of middle ground between 'having to run off and charge your gun' and 'having a way to reload while in combat'. 

And since it runs off a battery rather than the functionally unlimited energy of a powered station, eventually you do have to retreat to get your resources back.  It should be difficult and time consuming to take the battery out of the pack and put it back in, to prevent people from carrying a backpack of batteries and just swapping it out of the pack for more laser ammo in mid combat - there should eventually be a point where you have to retreat to recharge your stuff, but this way, you are able to somewhat compete with ballistics in battle, especially if science and mining have been working well to make the good batteries.

Edited March 1, 2019 by Kaed

[Crozarius]

On 01/03/2019 at 04:37, AmoryBlaine said:

I don't like charging the whole gun, it's stupid. Who designs weapons that require special charge units, provide low charge count, but are also designed for mobility? It makes zero sense for anyone to have designed these, and even less sense for a company to have bought them. They are good for one thing, and that is shooting carp. Every other instance I use them in, is just to weaken things or as a scare tactic. The powerhouse of Sec is the .45 because it's the only reliable weapon on station that can be reloaded on the go and can carry a large quantity of extra magazines to compensate for it's extremely low magazine capacity. 

I agree 100% The current implementation of lasers is comically impractical, and nobody would ever design, much less sell something like it.

 

Energy weapons are supposed to be powerful, advanced weapons. It makes no sense that they are outclassed in both damage and practicality by common ballistics on-par with 2019 firearms. Nobody would ever use an energy weapon for an aggressive action, period: how do you plan to recharge your gun after 8 shots? How does an Izweski Hegemony warrior recharge his gun in the middle of some Wasteland sand shithole with Traditionalists pouring lead on him?  It makes NO sense, yet energy weapons have been demonstrated in lore tonbe widely used in military action on extended engagements: do the soldiers have to keep running back and forth to recharge their guns?

 

Energy weapons deserve to be powerful.

 

A hearty +1 for this suggestion from me.

[PoZe]

On 28/02/2019 at 10:37, AmoryBlaine said:

What's the 'major benefit' to energy weapons?

 

1. Laser weapons are good against synthetic units. Most of IPCs(especially G1 and G2) have really low burn damage resist, practically no compared to organics.

2. Most armour in game, except adminbus armour have lower laser resist compared to ballistics. Like ERT has 50% bullet resist and 30% laser on their RIG, Merc have same values for voidsuit.

3. If target has fuel or phoron in them, you lit them on fir.

4. It let's you shoot through glass objects

5. Laser projectile is more likely to hit target at angles than bullets.

6. Lasers are hitscan unless you miss.

7. (Not as good point). Technically lasers have infinite ammo provided that you can re-charge them. But given that combat in ss13 matter with more short term damage than long term, that is not a good point.

Edited March 8, 2019 by PoZe

[PoZe]

Also we can always make new item in game. For antags it would be micro-nuclear reactor that can be attached to any energy weapon and work like advanced energy gun does. And another item would be universal recharger adapter, which will be made by RND. It will let you recharge gun from RIG or APC.

[AmoryBlaine]

Most of those points are rendered moot when you factor in ballistics are going to do the job as good, and give you wiggle room for failure. There is nothing good in keeping lasers as they are. It's a silly concept ICly, and a horrible balance for being able to damage X species, and shoot through windows. Why is that even a factor in this? A single species being easier to destroy maybe making up 5% of the characters played and the fact we can shoot through windows is why we can't have powerpack fed lasers?

 

Power packs ensure users that they aren't fucked the moment they run out of their 10-15 bolts.

[AmoryBlaine]

And no, we don't need some special antag weapon, they already have a recharging laser rifle. Why would they need more? And why is RnD suppose to be a weapons manufacturing plant for Sec? Why not just make laser weapons powerpack fed? What is the harm in it? Who does it hurt?

[Pratepresidenten]

I like the idea of energy packs. Makes sense to recharge a smaller pack instead of the entire gun. Should work like a clip, fits in the secbelt, takes up a fair chunk of space if its not in the secbelt, like the baton and taser.

I see a lot of objections against this becaus it would be OP due to reloading capability.  But is this really an issue if you give the clips enough juice to match what the rifles has now? 15 shots per rifle. Seeing the inconvenience of reloading, we can give each pack enough juice for 8 shots. Thats 16 shots in total. Each rifle gets two packs spawned in the armory. Not really OP at all.

You can steal the packs just as easily as the weapons themselves, but why steal the packs when you can just take the gun. More hassle to order new guns from cargo than get R&D to print new packs. The EMP downside is the same, you get hit, your gun drains, your packs drain.

I dont see this as a huge buff or nerf, its a rework. The main mechanics of the laser rifle stays about the same.