Shotgun Damage Dropoff Should Be Less Severe

[NikolaiLev]

Especially in the wake of the Drakgoon, which suffers no damage dropoff.  Shotguns seem to be a fairly mediocre choice right now.  They already suffer at range due to pellet spread.  And while no one wants to see the days when the Hek outsniped sniper rifles again, I feel it'd be fair to let shotguns perform better at range.

 

Right now, the damage dropoff seems to vary per shotgun, starting as soon as 10 (!) meters or so for the Boar Prime.  I think this should be extended for 40m minimum, with most shotguns averaging at 60m effective range.  When the dropoff does start, the damage mitigation should be more gradual; minimum damage should be at about twice or three times the effective range.

 

This would lead to shotguns being far better at midrange, but they'd still pale in comparison to assault rifles due to their pellet spread.

[VoidPunch]

40 meters is very long distance for a shot gun, most encounters are closer then 40m. A shotgun is a close quarters combat weapon, that is how they should be, up in your face. The damage output justifies the trade off. If you want to fire down enemies from 40+ meters away use a rifle or launcher

 

edit: Darkgoon is a flak cannon, a flak cannon is an anti-aircraft weapon which is why it doesn't have drop off. canon =/= shotgun even if it has the same ammo type.

Edited January 10, 2014 by HandsOfnArtist

[leonvision]

to be honest, i think the current distances are fine, if the falloff doesnt end at basically no damage. say, even after fallout it would do 25% damage of normal damage, it would atleast do something. granted it could potentially re-introduce shotgun sniping back into the game.

[Raydiayt]

40 meters is very long distance for a shot gun, most encounters are closer then 40m. A shotgun is a close quarters combat weapon, that is how they should be, up in your face. The damage output justifies the trade off. If you want to fire down enemies from 40+ meters away use a rifle or launcher

 

edit: Darkgoon is a flak cannon, a flak cannon is an anti-aircraft weapon which is why it doesn't have drop off. canon =/= shotgun even if it has the same ammo type.

 

Even so, it's painful to run into range when your teammate behind you manages to pick your enemy off before you even do so.

I'm not saying it should be removed, but the damage falloff should be a bit less. It's at the point where one might as well remove damage completely when over a certain range (lol. don't you even dare.)

[NikolaiLev]

40 meters is very long distance for a shot gun, most encounters are closer then 40m. A shotgun is a close quarters combat weapon, that is how they should be, up in your face. The damage output justifies the trade off. If you want to fire down enemies from 40+ meters away use a rifle or launcher

 

Consider that in the real world, effective ranges for shotguns are around 75m, longer if they use slug rounds.

40 meters really isn't that long.  Shotguns are meant to be close quarters weapons, yes, but come melee 2.0 there's going to be contention between shotguns and melee weapons.  Increasing their range will head this problem off at the pass.  Decreasing their damage output slightly to compensate would honestly not bother me.

It's also worth mentioning that shotguns have the disadvantage of not being able to take advantage of abilities that require precise shooting; they're hard pressed to hit a Banshee crit or a Saryn venom at anything beyond point blank.

Even so, it's painful to run into range when your teammate behind you manages to pick your enemy off before you even do so.

I'm not saying it should be removed, but the damage falloff should be a bit less. It's at the point where one might as well remove damage completely when over a certain range (lol. don't you even dare.)

 

Pretty much.  I'm not asking for the return of shotgun sniping, I just want the falloff to be less severe.

 

Hell, I'm fine with the dropoff ranges staying the same.  I'd just like the minimum damage to be higher, and the dropoff to be made less gradual.  That'd be nice, at least.

[lautalocos]

if they eliminate the damage drop off, they6 should increase the spread. not that much, but at least some.

[Farge]

This is why I like using Bronco Prime. It has a huge spread, but still performs a lot better at range than other shotguns (except for the flakker) because of the lack of damage falloff. It's too bad they said in a livestream that the falloff would be "fixed" in the future, because it would ruin the usefulness of the weapon, and once again give no reason to use it over the Brakk.

[Makemap]

Simple add "Seeking force" on Shotgun and don't use them until close enough range. = Massacre.

Can't wait till I start using Drakgoon. XD

Edited January 11, 2014 by Makemap

[NikolaiLev]

if they eliminate the damage drop off, they6 should increase the spread. not that much, but at least some.

 

I'm not asking for eliminating the dropoff.  Just reducing it.

[bobafetthotmail]

fully agree with OP.

 

Also reduce a bit the damn spread too as it's completely off-scale.

 

Nerf damage to compensate.

 

Shotguns should really stop competing with melee.

 

edit: Darkgoon is a flak cannon, a flak cannon is an anti-aircraft weapon which is why it doesn't have drop off. canon =/= shotgun even if it has the same ammo type.

Flak cannons were light artillery shooting shells with a timed fuze (later a proximity fuze) that blew up at a certain height (or on proximity to aircraft), filling a relatively large area with shrapnels, like an oversized frag grenade.

 

Can you explain why you are saying Drakgoon is a flak cannon? It's not lobbing fragmentation shells at aircraft.

[NikolaiLev]

 

 

Flak cannons were light artillery shooting shells with a timed fuze (later a proximity fuze) that blew up at a certain height (or on proximity to aircraft), filling a relatively large area with shrapnels, like an oversized frag grenade.

 

Can you explain why you are saying Drakgoon is a flak cannon? It's not lobbing fragmentation shells at aircraft.

 

Pretty much.  It's a super shotgun.

 

Make no mistake, I love the thing.  But it's not a flak cannon.  It has vague similarity to the Unreal Tournament flak cannon, but it lacks the grenade alt-fire.

 

DE should really just port UT weapons, including with their alt-fire.  It'd give Warframe much-needed diversity with its weapons.

 

That's neither here nor there, though.  I'd rather the Drakgoon keep its lack of damage dropoff, since it has travel time, and see shotguns get the aforementioned adjustment.

Edited January 11, 2014 by NikolaiLev

[TenkoTenko]

While shotguns should be close-range boomboom, they don't have to be salt and pepper shakers to anything beyond your Kestrel's reach.

[Fulmir]

If you need a long-range weapon then that's what your secondary is for...

[TenkoTenko]

If you need a long-range weapon then that's what your secondary is for...

No one asked for shotguns to be long-ranged. We just want to be able to defend ourselves with shotguns(which are actually weapons) against any enemies that are just outside the reach of our hands.

[WhisperByte]

edit: Darkgoon is a flak cannon, a flak cannon is an anti-aircraft weapon which is why it doesn't have drop off. canon =/= shotgun even if it has the same ammo type.

Drakgoon is a flak cannon in the same vein as Flak Cannon in UT. It's essentially a shotgun that shoots shrapnel. It has nothing to do with WW2 flak cannons (although I think their shells released lots of shrapnel in the air so maybe that's the connection)

[NikolaiLev]

Drakgoon is a flak cannon in the same vein as Flak Cannon in UT. It's essentially a shotgun that shoots shrapnel. It has nothing to do with WW2 flak cannons (although I think their shells released lots of shrapnel in the air so maybe that's the connection)

 

It's unfortunate that it doesn't have the grenade alt fire, though.

[Fulmir]

No one asked for shotguns to be long-ranged. We just want to be able to defend ourselves with shotguns(which are actually weapons) against any enemies that are just outside the reach of our hands.

Shotgun drop off range is like 30 meters or so, that's plenty of range and you're losing more damage on spread at that range than you are drop-off with most shotguns.

[LukeAura]

Just going to start quoting myself from other falloff threads, 
 

I said it before in the last shotgun spread vs fall off thread so I'll guess I'll make my point here. 
Alternative solutions to falloff other than increasing spread. 
1, decrease the total falloff reduction. I think the reduction at max for all shotguns is roughly the level at which Hek's 140 total damage hits 20. I haven't checked it in a while, forgive me, but as memory recalls it is somewhere around 1/7-1/10 of total damage. Which is more or less fine for a shotgun with tight spread and the longest fall off range, but for the others it makes them basically worthless once the falloff starts setting in due to their spread already reducing single target damage. 
2. Increase the distance over which falloff takes places. Falloff hits minimum damage after only 10 metres, which is way too short. It is totally fine for the first 10-20 metres, and then almost immediately drops to minimum. It could easily be started by making the falloff last over 20 metres instead of 10, and tweaking from there. 
3. Increase the distance before falloff takes place. Pretty much the same explanation as 2. Shotguns fall off from within short range, and by the time they hit medium range most are already useless. 
4. A combination of 1 through 3. I haven't been around since before falloff was introduced but it sounds like it was done once and never really touched after. Never tweaked or balanced. 
5. Make a unique falloff distance, minimum point, and duration for each shotgun. Tailor each shotgun to have its own starting point, fall off distance, and level of reduction. A close range shotgun like Boar could start falloff later than the Hek, but have it hit fast and hard, giving it an almost hard cap to its range. While a long range shotgun would fall off early, but take a little bit longer and lose less, meaning within short-medium range it wouldn't be quite as strong as a boar or Strun, but once it hits the falloff wall of short range shotguns then it would find itself holding up better.   
 

[Fulmir]

I think the point of disagreement here is that shotguns need to be all-range weapons. You're trading high close-range damage for poor long-range performance. There's nothing wrong with that. We have secondary weapons we can use to fill the gap at long ranges so there's no need for every weapon to perform well at every range.

Also do you have a source on that damage dropoff distance? In my experience it's way longer than 10 meters. More like 30 or more, which is effectively the distance across a normal sized room.

Edited January 13, 2014 by Fulmir

[LukeAura]

I think the point of disagreement here is that shotguns need to be all-range weapons. You're trading high close-range damage for poor long-range performance. There's nothing wrong with that. We have secondary weapons we can use to fill the gap at long ranges so there's no need for every weapon to perform well at every range.

Also do you have a source on that damage dropoff distance? In my experience it's way longer than 10 meters. More like 30 or more, which is effectively the distance across a normal sized room.

I got the numbers from someone else who is much more experienced at testing than myself. Bear in mind this was a couple months ago and they may have been stealth changed on us since then. 

 

[Fulmir]

I got the numbers from someone else who is much more experienced at testing than myself. Bear in mind this was a couple months ago and they may have been stealth changed on us since then. 

 

I meant something that shows with screenshots or video how the numbers were achieved. "This guy I know" no matter how trusted isn't much of a source, especially months after the fact.

[LukeAura]

I meant something that shows with screenshots or video how the numbers were achieved. "This guy I know" no matter how trusted isn't much of a source, especially months after the fact.

It's the latest info I've had, no patch notes have been made on the subject of shotgun falloff in the time between(Except the Brakk), so likely the information is as close as it gets. I'll go run some tests of my own again though when I have time. 

[NikolaiLev]

Shotgun drop off range is like 30 meters or so, that's plenty of range and you're losing more damage on spread at that range than you are drop-off with most shotguns.

 

It's not 30 meters.  And the fact you lose more damage on spread means there really shouldn't be a significant loss on damage.

[TenkoTenko]

Shotgun drop off range is like 30 meters or so, that's plenty of range and you're losing more damage on spread at that range than you are drop-off with most shotguns.

Dude I wish, I WISH that it started at 30 meters. If it was 30 meters there would be a lot less people complaining.

[NikolaiLev]

Dude I wish, I WISH that it started at 30 meters. If it was 30 meters there would be a lot less people complaining.

 

Heh, pretty much.