Railjack Should Play Like A Pirate Ship

[DrBorris]

Alternate title: Railjack Combat Movement Should Be Slower _{Emphasis on the "combat" part}

 

Movement is currently only fun for the pilot. Being a gunner with a pilot darting around the map is not satisfying. Sure, pilot may be having fun flying their spaceship, but the Railjack is supposed to be a multi-crew gunship not a dogfighter. This is partially due to the “best” way to pilot being to go fast. Engine progression demands you go faster. Dodging projectiles demands you go faster. Getting out of a swarm demands you go faster. And I really think this “go faster” should be discussed more, Railjack needs to be a good experience for everyone. I cannot imagine the gunner experience ever being good if the optimal way to play is to have the Railjack zipping so fast it is impossible to track targets.

This “go faster” doesn’t only impact gunners, it also impacts engineers. The optimal way to pilot your Railjack is to not ever get hit. This means if you have a good pilot your engineer is only playing a clicker game in the forge. Roles should enhance each other, not remove reasons for their existence. A good gunner should need a good pilot. A good pilot should need good gunners. A good engineer should need a good pilot, etcetera.

This style of combat also has some pretty major negative impacts on how future content can be developed. Any type of objective that would ask the Railjack to sit still or be in close range with a threat goes against what the current systems encourage. If you get close to anything that deals damage you will have a major hull breach in seconds, same case if you have to sit still. For Railjack to remain “fun” for future content DE has to design everything around the submarine/bomber style of gameplay which is extremely restrictive. The Railjack should be more like Inaros than Banshee.

 

In the spoiler below is my armchair-developer take on trying to address what I discussed above. I am hiding it in the spoiler because I really don’t want it to become the point of this post, DE generally doesn’t take direct suggestions from the community, however they do take feedback. And that is what I hope this thread gets across, my feedback that the current state of Railjack has a fundamental flaw in its combat with the movement speed. How DE goes about fixing it I don’t much care.

Spoiler

The intent here is to create a more versatile foundation for further Railjack content.

• Railjack doesn’t ‘sink’ due to being shot, but rather taking on water.
  • Getting hit shouldn’t be the end of the world, not repairing should.
    • Multiply Railjack base health by 10
    • Minor hull breaches deal damage over time.
    • This will be the primary way your Railjack takes damage
      • Major Hull breaches only happen due to enemy sabotage (enemies board, plant a bomb, and it goes off. Yes, this is a mechanic that currently exists.) or due to some extreme source of enemy damage (ship-killer base canon). Major hull breaches give the “out of air” effect survivals have to all occupants on ship and have 5x the damage over time of minor hull breaches.  Bonus points if major Hull breaches look like this…
    • Instead of having a damage over time element for the Railjack, fires create a large damage over time field for Warframes abord the Railjack.
    • When your Railjack reaches zero health, it will still gain temporary invulnerability. To survive all hull breaches must be repaired, if not mission fail. When in this stage Railjack loses all functionality besides movement and forges.
• Movement is only fun for the pilot, let’s change that.
  • Bring back the shield/damage/engines tactical from the Tennocon demo, albeit with some changes.
    • Three options, not continuous. Not “half power to weapons and engines”, all or nothing.
    • “Defense,” “Offence,” and “Movement” modes
      • Defense: Turn on an infinite duration cloak. All movement and weapons are disabled.
      • Offense: 300% more damage to side turrets, 100% faster Ordinance Reload, movement speed reduced to 15%.
      • Movement: Disable Artillery.
    • Base movement speed and damage would need to be adjusted, obviously.

Make. A. Solo/Duo. Railjack. One of my earliest concerns was that if the Railjack was able to be operated solo, it would be a sub-par experience co-op. The current state of Railjack met that pessimistic prediction perfectly. Rather than make a ship where everyone was dependent on each other it is a system where everyone is their own hero. Trying to make a single piece of content (or a single ship in this case) to please everyone is a futile endeavor, if you try to please everyone you please no one. Having a dogfighting ship in space is great on its own, as I brought up multiple times it is fun being the pilot, but it is not something that meshes with the co-op focus of the Railjack.

 

[MagPrime]

I'm here for the piracy aspect.  

[Lazarow]

If this helps solo play then Im all in