Weapon Gripe.

[Panzermeido]

Yeah, another one.

But I'll try to keep this one civil and with logic in it. Nothing new, though.

It's also somewhat long, but try to bear with me.

 

In this topic, I'm going to assume a few things:

1) that the game expects to you to progress and to face progressively harder enemies - thus, "just don't fight anything beyond level 30" isn't an argument.

2) that weapons from a certain point (that being beyond Lato, MK-1 Braton and Skana) aren't divided by "beginner-tier" and "end-tier", but (theoretically) should all be useful in both early game and endgame situations with respect to the level of the weapon and the installed mods.

3) that sufficiently leveled weapons and frames should (again, theoretically) allow taking on most of the game's challenge (bosses not included) in solo.

 

I'll start from the main point: Warframe's challenge and challenge curve is designed in a way that forces you to favour certain weapons over others. The first thing I'm most likely to hear is "Hek should be nerfed and things are fine ", but I think that it should be the other way around - piles of other weapons should be buffed, and I'll try to explain why do I think that.

 

The guns I'll be using to demonstrate my point are Hek, Gorgon, Braton and Snipetron.

 

Everybody agrees that by the end of the day, the game's main difficulty curve arises from the equation of

1) How much damage is dealt to the player

2) How much damage can the player withstand

3) How much damage must the player deal to stop receiving damage.

 

Weapons deal with the third point - they are the player's way to deal damage, but what makes them good - or bad - at that? Another equation, but with more points in it.

1) How much damage does a gun deal per shot

2) What's the rate of fire of the weapon and what's the concluding damage per second (or minute, depends of how you like it more)

3) How much ammo is spent to deal the DPS of the weapon

4) What is the gun's potential for delivering it's damage - magazine size, spare ammo count, reload speed and accuracy are crucial for this

5) What mods are available for the weapon.

6) How rare is the ammo for the weapon.

 

One could technically assume that by balancing those points in different combinations, every gun in the game can be balanced, fair and square. Right?

 

I'd say wrong.

 

The problem is, you see, what exactly are we dealing damage to.

 

The game provides you with, generally speaking, three types of enemies.

 

1) The goons, which are easy to kill and don't soak up too much damage - a weapon's damage per shot is the more important factor against those, as killing them fast is your primary objective, and doing it in a minimal amount of shots is very, very welcomed.

 

2) The soakers, hard-hitting and die-hard versions of the goons. You have almost no chance of killing those in one shot, so you're most likely to try taking them down with high DPS and with high damage dealing potential.

 

3) The how-do-I-hit-that, the small and hard to hit enemies with special roles - the Ospreys, the Crawlers, the I-hate-you-goddamn-Rollers. Those don't really have the health to withstand any major damage, so you're mostly interested in damage dealing potential against those.

 

The Hek can easily deal with all of those. High damage per shot, high DPS. Forced to reload a lot, but does it fast and deals so much damage in between, that you don't really care. Ammo is abundant.

 

The Gorgon can sorta deal with anything, but he has a drawback: he spends too much ammo per DPS; the included weakness, that being spin-up time, doesn't really balance anything in particular.

 

The Braton is insufficient. Damage per shot is average, damage per second is average, making the weapon viable against category 1 and 3, but hardly the tool against 2.

 

The Snipetron is very insufficient. Damage per shot is average-to-high, DPS is hellishly low, and, even though accurate, the reloading time and the small ammo count and availability makes it almost impossible to use. Only good against category 1, but doesn't excel at that. 

 

Now, what can be done, or, rather, what do I believe should be done by the devs?

 

First: count for damage dealing potential. Pre-OBT Snipetron was faster shooting and had both a faster reload and a larger clip, which made him a good and viable weapon against many, many enemies.

 

Second: count for mods. I started leveling up a Paris not long ago, and most of the mods that were there to make my weapon better still failed at it. This problem arises from not having specific mod types targeted at certain weapons - assault rifles/sniper rifles/machine guns being the most obvious.

 

Third: count for ammo. A simple system that forces the game to only drop ammo for weapons that are actually used by the tenno/squad of tenno, for example.

 

Last: count for damage potential. Both per shot and DPS. "How much damage can this gun deal potentially?", "How easy it is for the player to reach this damage?", "How much time must he spent to get it?".

 

That's all.

Thanks for your attention.

Edited April 17, 2013 by Panzermeido

[LoRDxDeMoN]

I'll agree that Snipetron ain't pulling its weight.

 

But Braton? Braton's pretty good now that they slightly buffed rifle mods.

[Tulzscha]

The Braton more than holds its own even against the other guns you buy later on - I have a lvl 19 supercharged one and it's my main go-to weapon, the DPS is insane with multishot and increased firing rate.

[Panzermeido]

I may be wrong about Braton, I haven't used it for quite a while, but the point still stands. Gorgon will deliver higher DPS (with the same mods included) and with better damage dealing potential through a larger clip without considerable repercussions. Braton can be shot with much more control, though.

[MonoLyth]

Agree to all points. (end here if you're not interested in epic post)

 

Motion to move Paris and Sniper(not)tron to new weapon category as they have their own ammo packs now anyway.

One shot = One kill module stacks a bonus to your base damage/critical chance for each kill you make with 1 shot, for the remainder of the mission. (Thinking small like 1%/lvl, I mean really after a few dozen kills pretty sure you can just about stop aiming for critical zones)

 

Gorgon can spin-up while you RMB to aim, becomes a try 'Long Arm' category. Still chews ammo with no business but ammo packs are retroactive of magazine size instead of 20 or magazine extended to a more Gatling weapon friendly 200 rounds with at least 6 reloads so 1200 in reserve. Ammo mods for 'Long Arms' become +15%/lvl so even if the retroactive ammo packs don't get added you should in theory have enough bullets with you by the time you leave or should I say skate,slip and roll out of combat (brass, there's no brass here it's case-less fool)

 

Braton and Burston + later cousins become 'Short Arms' as a sub-primary weapon slot added for the joy of utility. We all have been thinking it, these aren't rifles they are sub-machine guns at best with ammo mods at  +10%/lvl. I can't be the only one who think's Grineer troopers in those giant armoured suits look like toy soldiers with the pissy little 'guns'.

[Panzermeido]

Also, one thing I'd like to add post-facto - melee weapons, as opposed to ranged weapons, all have an additional risk in using them - they require forfeiting a position, often favourable, and closing in, forcing the player to take damage - it can be reduced by choosing an attack route that covers you from fire, but not always.

This is an important moment in balancing melee weapons - quite often, the risk is not worth it.

[Tahlen]

@ MonoLyth

 

Just think of the damage the "one shots" will do in endless defense missions, some enemies aren't meant to die in 1 second.

[MonoLyth]

@ MonoLyth

 

Just think of the damage the "one shots" will do in endless defense missions, some enemies aren't meant to die in 1 second.

Even with a very large damage boost, critical hit boost chances are those ones still will not die in 1 shot. It would be worth it seeing as the unfortunate snipers have been getting the raw deal for quite a while now, so why not let them get an actual role specific boost that allows them to play more effectively in their actual role?