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[Radagast]

The problem with adding another common pistol that's better than basic pistol is pistol's high scaling with SoG. Even a small upgrade translates in quite a noticeable difference later. For example combat pistol having initial 3d3 which is not much better than 2d4 becomes best single-shot pistol with 3d6 after P3 modding. And it also have super-high clip size, which is upgradable too...
I would like to use something other than what i got right on the start, but i don't think this can be easily balanced.

Agreed, you do have a point of course. It would need to be carefully thought of, to avoid upsetting the balance.
The way I see it, the only way to add another pistol, is to nerf the initial one. Also keep in mind that one could also play with the reload time AND/or accuracy and fire time on each pistol, to provide better variety/options without upsetting the balance much. Which means making them all useful, depending on playstyle and the time you find them in the game.

For example a possible scenario "could be" :

1. pistol (could be renamed to handgun btw, pistol is kinda plain):
Dmg: 1d7 or 2d3 instead of 2d4 (and/or could reduce it's accuracy by 1), clip size 6 as it is.

2. Colt/Glock. (or whatever you want to call it)
This could appear on later levels such as when the combat/double shotgun/rocket launcher appear.
Dmg: 2d4, clip size 8 or 10 instead of the 6 the initial pistol has.

This way you have a solid improvement to the normal pistol without making it overpowered such as the exotic/unique ones. This also makes the player save the mod packs for something better than the normal initial pistol which I find great since it happens with other initial weapons too. :)

3. Alternate Pistol - Desert Eagle (I'm not suggesting this just as a normal pistol. It could actually be an exotic one. :) )
Clip Size: 7, Dmg: 3d4, Acc: +5 , fire time: 1.1 sec, reload time: 1.8sec

You might think the above is overpowered due to it's damage. (better than combat pistol) But it's actually pretty balanced since the clip size is very low (well that's the bad thing with the desert eagle isn't it), and the fire time is slightly worse than the combat pistol.

Ofc feel free to suggest other stats, this is just a small idea after all with many possibilities.
I believe it can happen though, as long as it is carefully thought of, without upsetting overall balance much. :)

As for SoG I think it becomes ludicrously overpowered at high levels, so IMO to balance it, at least the 5th level of it should be removed as an option. 4 levels of SoG are imo more than enough for this game. And I know sharpshooter lovers will hate me for saying this, but it's one of the few skills that could easily get nerfed to 15% fire time reduction per point, instead of 20%. And it would still be good enough. :P

PS1 : Keep in mind that 1-2 of the assemblies would likely be affected too, so they could slightly change as well along with the pistol addition.

PS2: Damn someone beated me in posting specifics. :)

[SageAcrin]

I think the main reason there's no baseline, common Pistol upgrade is because Doom doesn't have one.

Combat Pistol basically fills that role, but the weapon set that's common is because it was common in Doom, is my impression.

The best idea I can think of to fix that would be to have an assembly that actually allows you to make fully moddable, normal Combat Pistols from normal Pistols. At that, it'd be a good replacement for Speedloader(Which, while not actively bad, is sorta...not much, I'd rather just load a normal pistol with a couple of Bulks.).

[grommile]

Rename the pistol "revolver", and I'd stop whining about it only accepting six bullets. (A semiauto pistol chambered in 10mm would have at least a ten-shot clip.)

[Nick]

Doom pistol MUST be weak. It's the part of the Doom universe %)

By the way, I've finished dual Ao100/AoShot today and already want to begin Ao100/AoMark. Let's see what pistols are for :)

[bwross]

On tact boots:  They're not the no brainer they used to be.  I've largely stopped making them, just settling for a set of A-mod steel speed boots for the early game.  The extra speed is of minimal benefit, I can live without the regen (repairing is good enough for boots), I get to keep the 1 point of protection on my feet (not great, but it is something if I need to run across some acid), there isn't the guarantee of the early A-mods from the Chained Court (so there's not the surplus there once was, making saving a second A mod much more tempting), and, of course, there's no dodging bonus now.  I don't think they need to be changed.  They're still good (the extra 5% speed is sometimes exactly what I need, so I have reasons to build them), but I also think about going with A-mod plasteel (or any other better boots I can get).  So I think the balance is quite good, although some people might still be tact boot junkies out of habit.

That said, and to move on to the subject of mods... one of the big problems with S and F mods is that many PCs can't make use of them.  Assemblies for the weapons that can't sue them helps a bit (I was surprised by PS/Plasmatic Shrapnel... I would have gone with an F assembly and the real life dragonsbreath rounds).  But what pretty much guarantees a mod is useful is if it has a good use on armour/boots... there isn't a Naked Angel challenge or badge yet, so, other than personal challenge, everyone likes wearing clothes.  Improving things along those lines would help a lot... suggestions like giving T and F mods the ability to boost resistances on armour is a good step in that direction.  For S mods and armour/boots, I'd suggest the possibility that they do sort of the inverse of what they do on guns by granting "stealth" to make you harder to hit.  Since mechanically that would mean dodging, that would allow people to build the old tactic boots by adding an S mod to them.

I think that pistols are just fine without a common upgrade.  The other benefits from traits and mods make up for it.  So much so, that that's another part of why I don't consider using MSc with guns... it's not much harder to build the twinky gun out of your starting pistol going masterless with just WK2, and then you still have the option to take DG for when you find the GCB.  It just wouldn't feel like I was using MSc (and I think that's largely going to be the case with MSc in the big dungeons... it might seem like that's the place MSc should shine, but you'd have it backwards, large dungeons are where MSc will obsolete itself, and that will always be the case), and if that's the case, I might as well go no-master.  The basic pistol development path is just that strong.  It's also nice to know that you can finish the game with the weapon you start with... one of the things that's always bothered me with CRPGs is the trope where the hero character starts the game with some sentimental weapon like their father's sword, and ends up tossing it a couple levels later like it was nothing. 

Not being able to really "use" MSv is part of it's problem, too.  The use of it is too passive to really give a feel that you've gained much over no-master.  Which is important, if you aren't actively using something then it's going to seem like that... I once started up a game and had a rough time of it until I leveled up and "discovered" that I was shooting things with a Bru3 Vampyre.  Another time, I fought the Shambler twins with MGK, and proceeded to forget the whole "Kata" bit, and took an embarrassing amount of plasma bolts.  So even if you do have a master, if you're not working it, it will never seem better than none.  But that's only part of the Survivalist's problems, because unlike Scavenger, it doesn't give any offense in the skills required to build it.  It also takes 6 specific traits... meaning that when you compare it to the somewhat similar Vampyre (in that both are good for being robust, with Badass and an ability to build overcharge as part of the trait), it comes up doubly weak (Vampyre has a lot of offense, and only requires 5 traits -- one of which is a wild card).  Now, I can see a reason for having the tanking marine option available, but at the very least, the requirements should be lowered.  I'm thinking -2 Iro and +1 wild card (ie require 5 traits like the other quick masters (which include MSc): Iro1, TaN2, Bad1, plus a fifth).  The wild card is important (instead of just dropping 1 level of Iro)... it gives people the option to still go with another Iro, or to go with a Bad, or to take an offensive trait (or two because the master is quick to get).  Another change might be to change the anti-requisite SoB to TH (or something else).  Survivalist could make a decent rapid-fire build (becoming the heavy weapon guy), but having no access to the rapid-fire trait tree at all is a bit too much (especially since MSc at least has limited access).  That's at least what I recommend as a start for reforming MSv.

As far as Juggler goes... splitting it into two levels is too much.  It can still be improved without going there.  The problem is largely that keybindings can be defined to give 'quick_command' access to any weapon, and that's not obvious to most people.  So my suggestion would be to rework the whole quick key system so that the player can assign specific weapons to be juggled by assigning them to one of the ten quick keys.  So instead of having "6" be "find me the most loaded chaingun", it would be "wield the specific weapon I've assigned to 6".  Only weapons that are assigned would be able to be juggled, and any command to wield one (swap, inventory, mouse wheel, whatever) would cause juggling.

[Evilpotatoe]

I think you're right about Tac boots, but acid protective boots still suck, and most other assembled boots don't seem much more useful. Those should be improved to encourage more boots diversity. New assemblies could be created too.
Simple examples could be A+T boots giving 10 or 15% dodge, and maybe regenerating, or boots making you run faster or longer (but +0% normal ms).
Those are not exceptionnal ideas, but seem like decent alternatives, so why not add such items ?

About rare mods, I like the idea of specific ones (like onyx working only on armors), they just need to be really useful (for most builds). I think S is fine as it is : it improves any ranged weapon's precision significantly, and also has a use for shotguns builds. And if you fiund a second, it stacks ! I rarely don't know what to do with.
F has serious issues, since it doesn't give anything, and wastes ammo more than it increases DPS.
I think the biggest problem is about MSc, which gives 99% F&S, and is mostly used in Ao100+... where it reaches it's cap too fast.

Pistols are rather balanced, but I hate the fact that bad weapons are balanced with an OP weapons-specific trait : It makes them useless in most non-pistol-build games (save Trigun)

Fully agree on MSv. I think the first step to make it useful would be to remove the SoB block. Examples of offensive buffs it could give : increased powerup duration (really suits the mastery theme imo), or zerk proc when you take too much damages (would be way weaker than Ber, but at least, might protect you in real times of need)

For juggler... I think 2 levels could be fine, it just has to be buffed & made more usef-friendly (I suggested reduced time to swap armor/boots & use items, somewhere)
1 level with limited number of bound weapons was my previous idea too, but I think there is issues it won't solve : how can we change those binds, in-game ? Do we need to quit & manually edit config ? Anyway, changing binds between games would be too confusing... so it'not a good idea. Btw, you could restrict to only basic bounds (i.e. standard weapons), but is that really interesting ?
Of course, it shouldn't be restricted to quick swapping, which is absolutely counter-intuitive.

[Nick]

9.9.9.7 is perfect. The only sad thing I can't torture that Former Commando who corner-shot two barrels I couldn't even see, throwing me into a pool of lava, and than used a phase device to reach another room, and stolen a red armor and than suddenly attacked me from an unexpected direction. I've wasted all my medikits. I've killed him but I'm sure death is not nearly enough. I want to attack him from a corner, grab his weapon, knock him down, tie him up and than slowly, painfully kill him. First, I want to pull his right index finger out. Than I want to put his right palm on a brick and hit it with another brick until... damn, he was a human upon a time. Hell with him, death was enough.

[LuckyDee]

....erm.... time to switch to decaf, Nick? ;)

[Klear]

Time to switch to n!. Then you can kill any enemy over and over and over again... plus you get tons of extra ammo!

[thelaptop]

... plus you get tons of extra ammo!

I wonder if we should nerf that farming... thing.

[SageAcrin]

Only if you nerf respawning.

Infinite respawns need infinite ammo to kill. :)

[Evilpotatoe]

I think it's good as it is.
A nerf could be, for exampe, to double all ammo stacks & drops size, but remove drops from respawned monsters...
The problem is it would make ammochain, nanomachic weapons... and melee xD even better than they currently are, which would probably be a really bad idea in terms of balance.
Also, challenges like AoMr or AoSh would become a real pain, and might even need some adjustments (like tripled ammo quantities...) to be playable.

While I agree that current ammo farming is quite easy, I think it's a good system atm, and many other more important aspects of the game remain to improve.
You'll always get some levels without ammo anyway. In my 1st full N! game, yesterday, I got a level filled with barons, imps and demons... without some correct ammo management, this hurts :)
Btw, I also had a few caves filled with cacos... and the "best" cave you can expect in terms of ammo is... an arachnotron one ^^.

[appuru]

I wonder if we should nerf that farming... thing.

This would just drive everyone to rely on nano/nuclear/melee stuff. In a situation where we *can't* use any of those and we're forced to deal with scarce ammo, it doesn't sound very fun or necessarily challenging, just frustrating.

Also, farming the ammo isn't "free", you still have to isolate an enemy of interest while making sure you're ready for any wandering enemies, or alternatively wipe out the entire floor while leaving a corpse or two intact. Even if a wandering imp can't kill you, he could still shoot a fireball and accidentally gib a corpse.

On tactical boots: they aren't great, but they're still quite good if you assemble them with WK2, so you can get a total of 25% movespeed with an additional A mod. I guess outside of WK2 it just doesn't feel useful to assemble them. Maybe allow the assembly on any boots, but with halved protections or something? Exotics should be excluded of course, otherwise you'd have A modded tactical phaseshift boots which would pretty much be free anti-grav boots.

[Nick]

I understand why respawned enemies give no exp., but why summoned are do the same? Summoning switches are dangerous and are never infinite, two or three packs are not that much.
And why I can't combine Ao100 and AoLT? It could be a light, but hard travel :)
BTW both AoMark and AoShot tastes great with Ao100. Dual challenges are outstanding. As well as all 6->7 changes are.

[Nick]

True spacemarines can do wonders with bare hands :)

Why I can't combine Ao100 and AoLT?