Balance: pneumatic weapons

[kevin.granade]

How to Make a Recurve Bow

[Tamior]

How to Make a Crossbow

Now the question is, which one should be more accurate?

[John_Candlebury]

Judging from its description, size, and wild inaccuracy, our current heavy crossbow is apparently some sort of man portable siege weapon.

We could do with a windlass-pulled Arbalest, with a steel bow, for the upgraded crossbow option.

[Solusphere]

Slight tangent, but one weapon that I can very easily see a survivor making with scrap parts is a crossbow with a simple electric windlass system for faster draw speeds and less strength requirement. Could possibly be a Rail mod for existing crossbows which reduces reload times?

[darktoes]

When i suggested the improved crossbow i was thinking something along the lines of a compound crossbow, with the same design used on compound bows (I.E really long string doubled pack on pulleys.) If the survivor can manage half the stuff they can make, the recipe could be deduced from any old picture of a compound bow and basic fabrication/mechanic skills.

I’d expect it to have similar damage to the pneumatic bolt driver and similar reload time, but I’d still expect the bolt driver to be overall better due to the 8 rounds in it. This solves the problem of the massive jump in crossbow quality that certain people apparently have, though i still think the PBD should be balanced closer to most assault rifles since they’ll be its competitors at the point in the game where a PBD is craftable.

electric windlass thing (phone formatting no worky)

I like this idea a lot, if we could add a small UPS requirement to crossbows/the PBD in exchange for lower reload times if that mod is installed.

[kevin.granade]

When i suggested the improved crossbow i was thinking something along the lines of a compound crossbow,

At a minimum that requires a recipe in a book or learning via disassembly, that’s not the kind of thing you just figure out.

Also, I’m not clear on why a compound crossbow would be that much better, the whole idea of a compound is to have high draw but low sustain, your crossbow doesn’t care about that.

I like this idea a lot, if we could add a small UPS requirement to crossbows/the PBD in exchange for lower reload times if that mod is installed.

A PBD doesn’t have a string to pull with the windlass…

[darktoes]

Also, I’m not clear on why a compound crossbow would be that much better, the whole idea of a compound is to have high draw but low sustain, your crossbow doesn’t care about that.

While low sustain is a factor, compound bows are also more efficient and powerful. They have more rigid limbs and the pulley system spreads the weight further over your draw. Quick googling suggests compound bows are around 50% more powerful, gaining an extra 100fps or so over standard recurve bows, which also makes me wonder why the compound bow ingame is such a piece of junk. They clock in at around 300fps, the same as most crossbows.

From what I can find, it seems most compound crossbows are going to manage an impressive 400fps, the same extra 100fps that a compound bow has over a recurve, which is a fair bit of extra power. I’d expect one to be pretty powerful ingame, and I’d expect certain hunting or mechanical books to provide enough information to make one yourself, although the materials used are usually pretty high end. You could even modify a compound bow into a crossbow if you wanted to I suppose…

Most of those numbers are from high-end, modern, professionally made weapons though, so our handcrafted ones are going to be a bit weaker. Still, a compound crossbow is going to get a good 30-40% extra speed, thus damage, on a wooden crossbow, and the current compound bow should be much stronger, at least on par with the reflex recurve, if not stronger, albeit maybe not as quick to fire. I can’t find anything on reflex bow speed though, so they might be a little tiny bit faster than a recurve. Maybe.
(All numbers are, as mentioned, from quick googling. Though I do know from personal experience that compound bows are substantially more powerful than recurves.)

A PBD doesn’t have a string to pull with the windlass…

A windlass could still conceivably pull the pump handle, or you could just hook a small electric air compressor to it.

[Tamior]

While we are at it: is there any precedent in the code of a weapon with TWO ammo types at once (i.e. both bullets and UPS or something like that) as of yet?

[darktoes]

While we are at it: is there any precedent in the code of a weapon with TWO ammo types at once (i.e. both bullets and UPS or something like that) as of yet?

I think the Cataclysm++ mod has a ups powered bolt thrower, but i dunno if/how it actually works.

[Solusphere]

While we are at it: is there any precedent in the code of a weapon with TWO ammo types at once (i.e. both bullets and UPS or something like that) as of yet?

Plasma rifles, ferromagnetic rail rifles and heavy rail rifles all work this way, requiring both ammunition (hydrogen or steel rails/rebar rails) plus UPS power.

[Holiday]

[http://static.gosunoob.com/img/1/2016/04/dark-souls-3-dragonslayer-greatbow.jpg]

You don’t get to look like this with a rifle.

Now I kind of want to start a mod that gives more options for archery- or maybe a giant ballista for my deathmobile.

[TheWumpus]

It takes a long damned time to build a hundred psi with a bicycle pump.

Ok, so upping the reload time of PBD to something like that of a heavy crossbow. Agreed, not a bad idea.

Most people lack the knowledge to actually make those things.

This reinforces the notion this should not be auto-learn recipes.

We do not live in a situation where factory manufactured goods like ammo, carbon fiber arrows, and premade bows and crossbows of excellent quality are scarce

For a pneumatic weapon to have decent accuracy it needs to be manufactured to just as high, if not higher standard. So it’s not a argument for pneumatic weapons somehow becoming MORE viable in SHTF situation. Your simple-yet-reliable craft-able from scratch weapons are bows/crossbows. Pneumatic rifles-type weapon that is competitive with firearms is largely just as hard to manufacture as said firearms.

Maybe pneumatic weapons are OP. Y’know what? It’s a single player game. Don’t use them if they bother you. If you have to min-max no matter what and it upsets you, mod them out or blacklist them. I’ve never bothered to make the damned things because melee has always been king in this game, especially in the last few months because the aim system is currently undergoing a massive overhaul.

"Don’t balance stuff in SP game, don’t balance ranged since melee is generally more practical for general chaff."
Really?
The MAIN difference between a good procedurally generated game and a “meh” one (once both are functional) is game-balance, btw.

Right now it seems to me the main thrust of your argument is “Why would anyone bother training a skill that’s useful from the start of the game if there’s 2 items designed to be used late in the life of a character that seem to make that skill worthless and it has more readily available ammo than guns?”

1. Flavor. People like playing as archery characters. People like playing as samurai, or knights, or wilderness dwellers, or run and gun soldiers. People enjoy the stories which is the only thing this game has going for it once you know how to play it.

2. Yeah, ammo for “better” guns might be scarce but by the time most people are able to craft these things, assuming they’re not playing on some insanely low spawn rate, they have a few thousand rounds stacked up for at least a few weapons.

People who aren’t Kevin have been shoving “balance” at the expense of an enjoyable experience down everyone’s throats for the past year and a half. The vehicle “balance” broke vehicles so badly it was completely redacted. The CBM painkiller “balance” created massive amounts of confusion and immediately spawned a mod to remove it. Dirty clothing was a massive cluster. I understand you’re trying to help. I understand you want to improve the game. But when you’re trying to tell people that because TWO items out of HUNDREDS of weapons are “OP” and that it makes the game worse for it I have a really hard time taking the argument seriously, especially when every single point to the contrary is taken apart and dissected in such a way it appears like you’re not even willing to be convinced otherwise.

Yes there’s a lot of stuff that needs work still. How about instead of focusing on niggling little details that can be changed in less time than it took for this entire thread to happen you put your energy in to something that will actually improve the game on a large scale like NPC fixes or the quest chain or improving the horde mechanics?

Either way man you do you. You’re the only person who seems intent on going after these things. Take the time to tweak the .JSONs and play test it in your own private version and submit a PR when you’re happy with it. Or don’t. It’s not like it can’t just get reverted in 5 minutes from the old files if someone doesn’t like i

[Alec_White]

People who aren’t Kevin have been shoving “balance” at the expense of an enjoyable experience down everyone’s throats for the past year and a half.

That truism is just an opinion.

The CBM painkiller “balance” created massive amounts of confusion and immediately spawned a mod to remove it.

There’s no such thing in this game. You must be thinking of another unrelated game project.

Also , is clear that there is a large list of weapons and armor that are unbalance(same with consumables), and some other weapons and armor are just can be considered sidegrades. And given that there are no guidelines for balancing, except whatever Kevin opts to merge at the moment, there’s no sensible way to balance stuff but make noise or sneak a PR and hope that Kevin merges it.
This of course assumes that Kevin, as the owner of the project, uses no guidelines and moves entirely by feedback and what he thinks is the correct option at the time. Unless of course, he has some balancing guideline hidden somewhere from the general public.

So in my opinion, I think the best would be to propose a project to make said guidelines and rebalance everything. And before anyone goes all logicalrethoricdueling on me, yes, I’m asserting without any argument given that there are lots of imbalance stuff in the game.

Anyway, I said what I think, please continue about discussing ways and reasons to nerf something for the sake of realism.

[_k1]

Indeed… I honestly find long discussion on balance, on gameplay vs realism, is too complicate and doesn’t give much useful information in the end.

[Tearlach]

One thing that bothers me about the weapon is that each bolt do the same amount of damage, if it is using ONE pressurized container to fire the bolts it would stand to reason that each bolt after the first would have less pressure left to use and thus travel shorter distances and do less damage. The alternative would be a reload action between each shot to re-pressurize it. I don’t know how much pressure you need to fire the bolts fast enough to do damage equal to rifles (I believe this is where it is? I don’t use ranged weapons much in the game). And if you are hand-pumping that pressure reload speed should probably be afffected by your strength? Seeing as it will be harder and harder to force the air into the container.
This could also mean that more versions of the weapon could be made, utilizing different methods of achieving pressure with different drawbacks.

[kevin.granade]

My only problem with pumping to different levels is the ui getting complicated, and it doesn’t seem like something that should matter. If it’s a weapons-grade pneumatic gun you’re not going to pump it to a usable level in combat anyway, so you might as well take a few minutes to pump it “all the way” out of combat.

Right now we don’t have a way to handle multiple ammo types either, which would provide a way to handle the decreasing power witth successive shots feature you’re describing, but it’s something we do want to handle.

Side note, modern commercial guns may regulate pressure even at the top end to avoid variability, even if it means limiting peak power. Harder hitting isn’t that important if it makes you miss

[Tearlach]

Yeah, I’ve been looking at pressurized hobby guns and it seems that a lot of newer versions feature a system where there is a smaller tank that is pressurized to a lower degree than the co2 canister or primary tank.

Actually found a weapon firing 375 grain arrows. Which is about 24g? The manufacturer claims it can take down a bison at 30 feet. A white-tail deer at 70 feet.
Didn’t find any speccs on the internal tank(s) but it is refilled with a canister that has 14.72 cubic feet of capacity at a pressure of 2000 PSI. That can is supposedly enough for 8 shots, which fits very nicely with our little made-up gun. Now the question turns into firstly how difficult the manufacture of valves rated for this pressure is and secondly how to simulate the dual ammo system.
The first one is completely out of my depth.
As for the second one, the easiest path might be to have a special recipe which uses 8 arrows and the small pressurized fuel tank (unsure if the volume is enough, cubic feets make my head hurt.) to make a “magazine” for it, then making the reload action lengthy (screwing in the new can and loading up the arrows).
Limiting it to plastic arrows might also be a good idea as the pressure might not cope with steel arrows that well.

[kevin.granade]

As for the second one, the easiest path might be to have a special recipe which uses 8 arrows and the small pressurized fuel tank (unsure if the volume is enough, cubic feets make my head hurt.) to make a “magazine” for it, then making the reload action lengthy (screwing in the new can and loading up the arrows).

I thought about doing this, but it ends up full of holes:
“why can’t I top off the air tank?”
“why can’t I load a full tank and reload arrows as I go?”
“why can’t I reload it with only 7 arrows?”
These are things you should be able to do, but this kind of scheme prevents.

We should be able to support guns that consume two ammo types, we just haven’t done it yet.

[Tearlach]

Yeah, it is a kludge of a solution. Hopefully the new system for ammo isn’t too hard to implement and you get time to do it amidst every other thing that needs fixing and improving. At most I can edit jsons, so it is way above my skill level to contribute to something like that.
The question then turns into leaving it as-is until the systems are there to make it work as intended or rebalance other parts of it. My personal opinion is that it seems to outperform commercially available products produced within tolerances I do not believe a survivor would have the tools for. Game-wise it seems a bit too strong for the cheap and reusable ammo that it uses. But I am mainly playing melee characters and have not really used firearms that much so I’m far from the best judge of that.

[kevin.granade]

The quick fix is outlined here.
tl:dr: Increase reload time (per round) to one minute on the pneumatic bolt driver, possibly require a seperate pump item. I didn’t math at the pneumatic assault rifle, do something similar to it.
More involved fixes would be to limit damage output of these multi-shot weapons and reserve near-firearm performance for a single-shot pneumatic gun that takes upwards of 2 minutes to reload.