So I was in IRC 'yesterday'/very early this morning while the forums were down, and got information about how speed (and probably reload) mods work. I then woke up much later and looked here, but was disappointed to see nobody had posted anything. So, I decided to! (information courtesy of DaEezT)
First, all discussions like this should start with the basics, so that's where I'll begin (I would have just appended this to Fingerzam's very nice post on the AoMr discussion topic, but I couldn't find it). A normal turn spent on firing costs 1000 energy, Son of a Gun subtracts 200 energy from this per level, Finesse subtracts 100 energy from this per level, speed mods subtract 100 energy per mod, and the Dualgunner multiplier applies after all of these subtractions occur, but since both guns fire at the speed of the active (moddable) gun, this malus isn't a problem for long. With that out of the way, we now have the question: what do we do with our guns?
There are two main things that affect this. First, there aren't any diminishing returns; all of the speed bonuses stack on each other, and there aren't any stepdown functions to decrease the effect of any one component, which basically means that, if you were allowed and had the luck for it, you could put 3 levels of SoG, 2 levels of Fin, and 3 speed mods together for a total energy cost of -100 energy (1000 - 600 - 200 - 300). Those who have good memories and read everything on the board that shows up will recall that any energy usage less than 0 is supposed to crash the game, but that's where the second part (which also effects good usage of such things) comes in: there's a failsafe that causes any action that, after applying the bonuses, costs less than 100 energy to cost exactly 100 energy. This means that a player who has 3 levels of SoG, 2 levels of Fin, and 3 speed mods has effectively wasted either 2 modslots, 2 levels in maxing Finesse, or 1 level in SoG 3, because that extra 200 energy gained by that combination simply doesn't apply thanks to the failsafe. You can do it, but there won't be any actual change in speed, thus there's no point in doing so.
So, you say, you still haven't told us what we should be doing with our guns. That's fair, but bear with me here, because this isn't going to be over soon. Thing is, Finesse 2 still is best to take for two reasons: Whizkid, and if you ever plan on using two pistols. Three speed mods are great for reducing your speed to the absolute minimum energy possible, but that single modslot you have left over isn't necessarily going to get you as far as having one speed mod and three damage mods (plus the opportunity to put on more damage mods thanks to the bug Blade reported) plus getting that lowest possible speed anyway and the ability to add on, say, reloader or magazine mods if you can and want to. Also, if you use two pistols, while the game will round down to a single turn, unless you get a second level of Dualgunner, with SoG 3, DG 1, and three speed mods you'll be using 140 energy, not 100. There is rounding, but from what I've read it's implied that the game keeps track of the real energy cost and not the rounded cost in terms of how many turns you spend, meaning that (not taking reloading into account) you'd be able to fire only 7 and 1/7 shots rather than the 10 you get with a single pistol and the same traits/mods in the same 1000 energy. Finesse 1 cures that, and the second level of Finesse was argued above for the purpose of Whizkid. So, in short, you only really need to take one speed mod, and the other two modslots can be applied towards damage, reload, or magazine mods.
There's also the issue of two pistols vs. one pistol. Thanks to the fact that SoG gives no damage bonus (see
here), Dualgunner seems even more necessary. It is possible that someone might use traits to make up for the lack of additional mods (eg. Reloader) with an SoG 3 build + 1D3S pistol, though, which is where I'll be examining the difference, starting with the basic question, "Which is better: SoG 3 + a 1D3S pistol, or SoG2 + DG 1 + a 1D3S pistol + a normal pistol?"
A character with SoG 3 and a 1D3S pistol is firing a 2d5 pistol for 100 energy (1000 - 600 - 300), while the character with SoG 2, DG 1, and the same sort of modded pistol plus an extra normal pistol will be firing a 2d5 and a 2d4 pistol for 420 energy ([1000 - 400 - 300] * 1.4). This is a dramatic difference in speed (it's more than 4 times faster to use a single pistol in this case), but reloading and actual damage should be examined before conclusions are drawn: the SoG 2, DG 1, 1D3S + normal pistol user gets an average damage of 11 HP for every time he shoots ([2 + 10 + 2 + 8]/2) and 66 damage on average from unloading both clips, for a total cost of 2520 energy; the SoG 3, 1D3S single pistol user, on the other hand, gets an average damage of 6 HP per shot ([2 + 10]/2), a total average damage of 36 HP for unloading one clip, and (taking reload time into account, which costs 1200 energy normally as I recall) is able to unload a full clip, reload, and unload again for a total cost of 2400 energy, and doing 72 damage in this time. Interestingly enough, the dualgunner does more damage per turn right up until the 6th pair of bullets; firing 5 pairs of bullets costs 2100 energy exactly, and at this point the dualgunner has done 55 HP of damage, while the single gun user has only had enough time to unload once, reload, and unload half of his clip, which given an average damage of 6 HP means he's only done 54 HP of damage (6*9).
So, you say, obviously the single gunner has a lot going for him. Not so fast; we need to take Finesse into account, and we haven't even seen what it's like when we take a third level of SoG. Remember that the dualgunner had the upper hand damage-wise right up until he fired the last pair of bullets. So, here we go further into the answer for whether it's smart to ditch the second pistol. When that same dualgunner takes his 3rd level of SoG, his energy usage per shot goes down from 420 to 140 energy ([1000 - 600 - 300]*1.4), which not only puts him nearly on-par with the single gunner speed-wise but also increases the effect of the extra damage he has over the single gunner, as now the DG penalty has been nearly erased while the damage is still the same. Even if the single gunner takes a level of SoB to match (and it's not even clear that SoB's damage bonus is working), the way it pans out is that the dualgunner's average DPT (damage per turn) is 7.857 (66/[840/100 {since 100 energy = one turn}]), whereas the single gunner's average DPT is only 7 ([6+1]*6/[600/100]).
This of course doesn't answer the big question of whether it ever makes sense to ditch the second gun. There's probably some math that can be done to the end of figuring out when the damage added on by the second pistol is negligible, but it's taken me long enough to write this blasted thing anyway; what's more important is that, once you max out on speed upgrades through traits and mods, the penalty is either null and void or near enough to gone that it doesn't hurt, and that there is a significant benefit to taking it over simply using a single pistol.
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Topic: Angel of Marksmanship discussion; now with modding goodness! (Read 2893 times)