Wartime and weapons, oh my!

Well, I’ve been brainstorming a lot about ways in which our ground combat could be diversified. Please feel free to throw your opinion out for these "changes", but try to keep your criticism constructive, please. I feel like currently there’s only a few truly "viable" or winning tactics in PK, and the mud has been fairly stagnant in terms of what those are for a while, so here are some ways I think we could mix things up.

First of all:
War is DANGEROUS, war entails collateral damage. Accidental hospitalizations / perms should be commonplace in a warzone. However, "murder X perm" is not accidental, nor is backing someone up against a wall (e.g. their home) and sniping/grenading them to death. It is highly unlikely an ambulance can drive up and save your life if I’ve just shot you in the head, whether at point blank range or at a distance with a sniper rifle. You’d have much better chances as the victim of a terrorist bombing or incinerator razing, however. It’s very important to keep the RPC’s hand in things, but to rule on actions and not restore people who are "in the wrong place at the wrong time" because let’s face it, if you are in a warzone you should at least have 5000 credits and if you aren’t involved you should be actively trying to hide. This restores an element of danger that hasn’t really been present.

I think it’d be a very good idea to restrict "lethal" (purposeful playerkilling) shots to headshots (and explosives/aoe damage), but give the pbase several more tools to perform those kind of attacks. This way there is actually discretion between shooting to kill and trying to capture someone alive, which means more chances for roleplaying your evil mass murderer or goody two shoes that refuses to actually kill anyone. Ideally, there should be incentive for capturing your opponents alive (information!), but it should be a little bit harder to do that than just riddling them with bullets, cuffing them and aiding them an hour later. You shouldn’t be able to gather up a lot of live captures if you head out of the base with a group of 4 guys with flamethrowers.

With that in mind, let’s hand out some more diverse weapon types based on the same template, that way we can pick and choose for the job. These could all use the same basic items for creation that the blasters in game now use, with perhaps 1 or 2 unique in game items (e.g. rifle scopes, cooling units) for each type. Some weapon types could be ruled illegal by in game governments, enabling illegal trade, smuggling, and "realistic" armament differences between government forces and other less "legitimate" groups. Different types of weapons and combinations of players wielding them would make for very interesting play. Once this array of choices is in place, it enables us to create and attach various feats / skills to the different weapons in order to specialize and customize our characters.

Ranged Weapons
[list:a62aneip][*:a62aneip]
Pistols – Here’s our bread and butter SWU blaster. A self-defense weapon that’s a favorite of smugglers, pirates, rebels, sport shooters, the more lightly built races, and Alderaanian princesses. Dual wielded. Medium damage, medium ROF, low ammo per clip, 1 room snipe range.[/*:m:a62aneip]
[*:a62aneip]
Carbine – Typical standard issue military weapons, the workhorse of almost any armed force in Star Wars. These should be the most common weapon type carried by players excepting blaster pistols. The E-11 Blaster carried by Stormtroopers is the most well-known example. 2H. Medium-high damage, low ROF, high ammo per clip, 2 room snipe.[/*:m:a62aneip]
[*:a62aneip]
Rifle – A marksman’s weapon. Think assassins, rangers, Tusken raiders or Republic Outriders. Should be utilized with scouts, probe droids, cameras, or anything else smart players can use to see things that are outside scan distance.
2H. High damage, low ROF, medium ammo per clip, 3+ room snipe[/*:m:a62aneip]
[*:a62aneip]
Repeater – A heavy weapon capable of laying down suppressive fire at close range. Carried by those strong enough and bold enough to fight on the front lines. We all know about the repeater trap. Let’s keep the damage output down, but utilize this as a source of constant, continuous damage on a target in the same room.
2H. Low damage, high ROF, high ammo per clip, no snipe[/*:m:a62aneip]
[*:a62aneip]
Incinerator – A specialist’s heavy weapon, an incinerator is capable of wreaking havoc on an area. Woe to anyone – soldier, jedi, or civilian caught in the blaze without proper protection. These should be heavy as hell, hard to use properly, entail a lot of risk for your teammates if caught in the fire, but devastating to an area or enemy group. Force wielders would not be able to parry incinerator fire, but a player wielding an incinerator would typically be very vulnerable to melee reprisal.
2H. Low damage, high ROF, AOE attack, must reload often. Napalm code would be great for this.
[/*:m:a62aneip]
[*:a62aneip]Lightsaber – Should remain pretty much exactly as they are. They rock and are the trump card. However, a forcer shouldn’t be everything like they are now. Forcers should be supplementary to a main military force and shouldn’t be the main determining factor in who wins a fight. They should be touchable with enough military craft and might.
[/*:m:a62aneip]
[*:a62aneip]Force pikes – 2handed. Able to parry sabers but less damage output than blades. This is critical because it offers some basic defense from forcers. A guy with force skills will still jam you in a 1 on 1 but his odds might not be so good when it becomes 3 or 4 on 1 forcer. However, let that forcer tank while a guy with a repeater smacks all those force pikers around and you have a real rumble.
[/*:m:a62aneip]
[*:a62aneip]Vibro-blades – Dual wielded. More damage, no saber resist without cortosis. Consider attaching random flesh wounds to attacks to simulate the ripping and tearing of flesh that a vibroblade would really perform. These should remain similar to how they are.[/*:m:a62aneip][/list:u:a62aneip]

Additional Equipment Notes

Explosives – Will now perm or send people to the hospitals. Remotely detonated explosives should be in play as an alternative to mines/grenades with counter-balances (level / feat requirements, 1 explosive per room, etc)

Jetpacks – Can be worn in combat with penalties, but can be used to avoid melee weapons and potentially mines/grenades. However, blaster fire will have a good percentage chance to cause the jetpack to misfire or detonate, damaging the player wearing it and maybe even his group or the room. Think Boba Fett vs. the Sarlaac.

Armor
Two resistances (one per piece of armor) will be standard, but players will have to choose out of several possible useful resistances now.

Tentative list of resists: Energy, pierce, fire, blast

Ex.
An Imperial Incinerator Trooper rolls with energy resist and fire resist.
A Jedi has a slash resist robe and an blast resist hood.
A bounty hunter might prefer energy and pierce resists for one job, but select different resists for different situations.
A diplomat fears assassination and packs pierce and blast resists.

Equipment, weapons and armor especially should be encumbering enough to where no player is able to pack all gear at all times without severe penalties (Mv, dex). Serious thought should be given to restricting certain resists (specifically explosive or "blast" resist and fire resists) to the upper armor classes.

—

Finally, some random skills and feats I ponderstormed.

Smuggling/Espionage
Quickdraw – Draws a pistol and fires one aimed shot at an opponent. Should be very hard to hit a headshot with this, but better percentage chances to hit an arm or a leg to assist in disabling an opponent.

Silent aim – Aim without echoing

Slowdraw (Slide) – Draws weapon without echoing (1handed only)

Bolt – Your flee does not echo a direction to the world.

Force
Danger sense – Forcers get a warning message if they’re being targetted with an aim

Combat
Snipe – Should have an optional arg for aim location or optional feat for that purpose. Aimed shots should take at least 15-20 seconds to line up, perhaps longer for headshots.

Leadership
Retreat – Your group flees a certain direction together after an appropriate action time.

Volley – Your group snipes simultaneously at a target of your choosing

There’s a ton more where this came from, so if you all are interested I will continue to post my ideas as they flesh out. Again, feel free to share -constructive criticism-. Thanks for your time.

Hunting
Bounties – Public bounties should come with a description of the target (inform code) if the bounty’s placer is able to provie one.

Warrants – If a bounty is issued by a clan and the target’s home is on a planet controlled by that clan, bounty hunters should be able to draw warrants for that person’s home.

Tracking – Rather than the tracking system we have in place that magically homes in on anyone in your zone, my proposed track would rely on a physical marker being planted and would function as follows: Hunter A spots Target B in the plaza. Hunter A sneaks up and plants a tracking beacon on Target B either physically or through the use of a launcher. Hunter A is then able to track Target B’s location relative to his own as long as that beacon remains in place. If the target detects the beacon they may remove it with an action that takes a suitable amount of time.

I can’t really see one thing I wouldn’t like to see implemented out of what you’ve said save for volley.

And I’d be down with volley if a higher chance to miss is imposed.

No delay timer on retreat, maybe one for one or two seconds after the retreat for the one who initiated it.

I’ll re-read what you’ve posted to see if I’ve missed anything and I think you should keep tossing your ideas out. A shame we can’t have an endless reservoir of coders, though.

A lot of these suggestions sound pretty cool. I do have a couple of things to say, though (of course).

First of all, I don’t think any of this will help get people fighting on the ground. There just aren’t enough good reasons to be caught in a ground fight when you’re dealing with the main conflict. You can’t (easily) cap a planet from the ground. The Empire won’t risk people if all they have to do is blockade/fire on people in space and likewise, the other guys won’t willfully trap themselves on a planet long enough to be blockaded in. Big changes need to be made to the balance of combat in that regard before anything else.

Concerning perming, I don’t entirely understand what you’d like to be changed, it almost sounds like you’d be easier to perm with those changes.

As far as weapons, I’ve said it before and I’m sure I’ll be saying it a while… We’ve got a very nice balance right now. Changing that could lead to some ugly situations. But I do like some of the suggestions.

Pistols, I think, should be a smuggler’s bread and butter, and I’d love to see smugglers become more effective with them.

Flamethrowers have always been awful and I’m concerned about any attempt to implement them because they were so similar to disruptors it ain’t even funny.

On Forcers, I don’t really see the need. Force-pikes as you’d like them changed would only make a person even less effective. They aren’t that badass, I promise you. I’ve fought a few this TL while woefully unprepared and I’ve done better against them than any repeater ambush posse.

For jetpacks, they already work(ed?) that way. I’ve seen people use them to escape melee combat. Sly little bastards…

Anyways, all this was typed from my trusty Nokia so forgive typos and incoherent ramblings. Much <3.

EDIT: I just thought of one thing I’d like to see gone from PK forever… shotgun PKers. You see it sometimes, two or more guys make a group, the lead guy just runs around aimlessly while everyone behind him spams "Murder <target>" in hopes that they’ll randomly enter the room and net the guy. That sort of thing is kinda lame.

[quote:2zbgidoe]First of all, I don’t think any of this will help get people fighting on the ground. There just aren’t enough good reasons to be caught in a ground fight when you’re dealing with the main conflict. You can’t (easily) cap a planet from the ground. The Empire won’t risk people if all they have to do is blockade/fire on people in space and likewise, the other guys won’t willfully trap themselves on a planet long enough to be blockaded in. Big changes need to be made to the balance of combat in that regard before anything else.[/quote:2zbgidoe]

A few points.

[quote:2zbgidoe]The Empire won’t risk people if all they have to do is blockade/fire on people in space and likewise, the other guys won’t willfully trap themselves on a planet long enough to be blockaded in. Big changes need to be made to the balance of combat in that regard before anything else.[/quote:2zbgidoe]

How can you be so sure that they won’t be willing to "risk people" if these new changes are implemented?

What if the target is already on the ground and they can’t be permed in space?

Why wouldn’t they stay groundside if they knew that someone was in orbit ready to blast them?

What sort of changes need to be made to the space system? It seems fairly logical to me that a starship wouldn’t stand much of a chance running a blockade.

[quote:2zbgidoe]First of all, I don’t think any of this will help get people fighting on the ground.[/quote:2zbgidoe]

The whole point of these ideas was to get more people pumped to do ground combat. So, if anything, provided they are scrutinized well enough to make them balanced before they are implemented, more people would be tempted to make a ground combat character if there are more ways than one to win a fight on the ground.

Eh, I’m not sure why I worded it that way when I said they wouldn’t risk ground people. The reality of it is it’s very low risk for an Imperial combatant. Strength in numbers and they can easily escape by launching. Anyone trying to fight the Empire is pretty well snookered if there’s a ship in orbit. At this particular point in the era there isn’t much that can be done to fix that but I really think having a reliable way to cap a planet from the ground would go a ways to helping.

All I’m saying is personally, if it’s not a level playing field, I’m going to avoid getting caught on it.

PS, I don’t think there’s any shortage of ground combat chars right now. The sides might be a little skewed at the moment and ground combat might not look too appealing, but that’s kinda the point of era 2!

PPS, Some sort of "capship in orbit Early Warning System" would be nice. I’d rather fight every Stormtrooper and Sith in the Empire than launch into a blockade.

I think you should be able to type something like "look orbit" to see what’s floating in orbit. Maybe just ship types, and no names.

The shame is that planets on LotJ are pin-sized and don’t block line of sight or the ability to fly directly through them. Makes it somewhat less-than-strategic when it comings to laying and combating blockades, but that’s probably a topic for another thread.

If conditions were more favorable for it, melee combat would be more common. It’s far more forgiving than space combat, that’s for sure.

I that like… sarcasm or are you being serious? I can’t even tell anymore with you. =p

Maybe it’s what he aims for. <!– s:P –><img src="{SMILIES_PATH}/icon_razz.gif" alt="" title="Razz" /><!– s:P –>

But yeah, look orbit would be great. You have to figure; they’re effink huge things, you should be able to look up and see them.

&lt;33333

Look orbit would be awesome. I know this thread’s sort of gone from a discussion of ground combat to everybody saying how awesome look orbit would be, I just wanted to throw my two cents in. Only being able to see ships in orbit and their types but not their names makes sense. As would limiting the size of ships you can see, I think. An ISD would be easier to spot than a Y-Wing. Though I’ve always thought you should be able to see whether or not there’s a battle going on in space, I’m not sure if that could be factored in or not. Maybe you can see explosions if anything’s been fired in the past 10 seconds or something?

[quote:36jhg81m]look space
[color=#00FFFF:36jhg81m]In orbit of Coruscant:[/color:36jhg81m]
[color=#00FF40:36jhg81m]Victory-Class Star Destroyer
Victory-Class Star Destroyer
Victory-Class Star Destroyer
CR-90 Corellian Corvette
Quartermaster-Class Supply Carrier[/color:36jhg81m]
[color=#FF0000:36jhg81m]A handful small explosions litter the sky[/color:36jhg81m][/quote:36jhg81m]

Or…. something…

I agree with almost all of this. The only bad thing about it is: Almost none of it will get implemented, maybe a few bits and pieces, but that’s it. <!– s:( –><img src="{SMILIES_PATH}/icon_sad.gif" alt="" title="Sad" /><!– s:( –>

[quote:1vh1u8ey]I agree with almost all of this. The only bad thing about it is: Almost none of it will get implemented, maybe a few bits and pieces, but that’s it. <!– s:( –><img src="{SMILIES_PATH}/icon_sad.gif" alt="" title="Sad" /><!– s:( –>[/quote:1vh1u8ey]

There’s that award winning, MUD advancing attitude.

Most of the stuff in this thread sounded silly but I like the idea of some sort of ability to see what’s in orbit. Even if it’s just…

look orbit:
You see nothing/a single large vessel/a handful of large vessels.