Chaosforge Forum
DoomRL => Discussion => Topic started by: Melon on July 08, 2009, 15:19
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Well, there is a hot discussion going on whether the shotgun are underpowered or not.
I myself think that they are too powerfull right now (as for the beta 4). But after seeing this video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z5uHt4AwYb4
It seems that shotguns have really high accurracy (I never though that high). Maybe we shouldn't concentrate on making the shotguns more powerfull, but more accurate, meaning, lesser spread.
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Hmm, if you want to talk about how real modern shotguns work.
There are a lot of variants of shotguns and that man on the video is using a sporting shotgun. The typical 'Doom' shotgun would be a shorter barrel Riot Shotgun.
Anyway it's true the shotgun spread in DoomRL is absurd. Double shotgun spread: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JuqYRoTac34 (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JuqYRoTac34)
Regarding power, that stuff only explodes because it's made of clay, in reality regular buckshot won't do much even against crappy kevlar.
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Two comments:
1) "Spread" you mentioned is what people expect from videogame shotguns - if we lessen/remove the spread we'll end up removing the quality that defines them
2) I admit I don't have time to look through the vid right now, but I guess there is the possibility that "accuracy" displayed in the movie comes from using solid slugs as oposed to buckshot :P
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Two comments:
1) "Spread" you mentioned is what people expect from videogame shotguns - if we lessen/remove the spread we'll end up removing the quality that defines them
2) I admit I don't have time to look through the vid right now, but I guess there is the possibility that "accuracy" displayed in the movie comes from using solid slugs as oposed to buckshot :P
The guy on the video throws nine clay disks into air (by throwing I mean his own hands!) and shoots them one at a time. One shot to destroy one disk.
As for the spread, with such insane spread, you really cannot do much harm. I know this game has nothing to do with reality, but come on! I think the spread should be lessened a little.
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Yeah, I suggested something like this. Holy shameless crosspost batman!
"Shotgun. If you pass a +1 accuracy roll, damage dropoff is reduced by 80%. This only applies to enemies that are on your green aiming line.
Combat Shotgun. If you pass a +3 accuracy roll, damage dropoff is nulled. This only applies to enemies that are on your green aiming line.
Double Shotgun. If you pass a -2 accuracy roll, damage dropoff is halved. This only applies to enemies that are on your green aiming line.
This makes shotguns a good alternative to the chaingun (Which they are, even at medium range in DooM 2), but keeps their AoE damage as low as it is right now.
However, this also makes Eagle Eye a staple trait for every single weapon (bar BFG), so I'd suggest removing it and making accuracy rise by 0.5 on levelup instead."
This upgrade should be applied to a 6d3 shotgun, of course. I'm fine with this or 8d3 shotguns.
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Yeah, I suggested something like this. Holy shameless crosspost batman!
"Shotgun. If you pass a +1 accuracy roll, damage dropoff is reduced by 80%. This only applies to enemies that are on your green aiming line.
Combat Shotgun. If you pass a +3 accuracy roll, damage dropoff is nulled. This only applies to enemies that are on your green aiming line.
Double Shotgun. If you pass a -2 accuracy roll, damage dropoff is halved. This only applies to enemies that are on your green aiming line.
This makes shotguns a good alternative to the chaingun (Which they are, even at medium range in DooM 2), but keeps their AoE damage as low as it is right now.
However, this also makes Eagle Eye a staple trait for every single weapon (bar BFG), so I'd suggest removing it and making accuracy rise by 0.5 on levelup instead."
This upgrade should be applied to a 6d3 shotgun, of course. I'm fine with this or 8d3 shotguns.
But we are talking here on the spread of a shotgun. Besides, when using a shotgun like in Doom with such a high spread, how the hell do you want it to be accurate? I would agree that a shotgun might do extra damage if the pellet hits the face or some unprotected part of the body. But this would be completely random. You are facing 5 daemons, spreaded.
You can direct spread at those fight daemons, because you are accurate? I do not think so. You can direct where the "pellet cloud" will "fly", but you cannot direct it like: i shoot the daemon in the head, it is its weakest point, part of the spread will hit the former commando in the groin and part of the spread will hit the Arch-ville in the abdomen.
My proposition: lesser the spread, make the damage higher (do not like that idea). But do not implement accuracy rolls, because this doesn't make sense to shotgun.
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Right now pellet cloud spreads like that for Combat Shotty (the higher the number - the higher the damage):
55443
8776655443
@9988776655443
8776655443
55443
Which is not so correct. It should be really some funnel-like barrel on shotgun to create such pattern. General part of pellets flies forward, in the direction of the shot, and only some of them are shifted from that direction. And the further from the center of the aim - the less pellets that flew in that direction. So pattern should be more like that:
33322
6666555544
@9999988888777
6666555544
33322
Same for other types of shotties, i suppose.
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33322
6666555544
@9999988888777
6666555544
33322
Same for other types of shotties, i suppose.
Completely agree on this. But there should be less spread imo.
555544
@9999988888777
555544
Either that or severely penalise outliers.
2333
2333445566
@9999998888877
2333445566
2333
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Ya, that's it. I agree on the last one; Spread factor should stay the same, but it should do more damage to the center and less damage to the ends. That would be perfect I think.
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The answer is clear: We need volunteers to take shotgun blasts to the chest at various ranges.
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Yes, i know i'm mad. Just play with the numbers on yellow.
Shotgun.xls (http://www.4shared.com/file/117146424/e376aebd/Shotgun.html)
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The answer is clear: We need volunteers to take shotgun blasts to the chest at various ranges.
Oh I wanna do that. My sister's a volunteer. Muhahaha >=D
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I've already tested shotguns to the chest irl. I believe it was on the news once!
But we are talking here on the spread of a shotgun. Besides, when using a shotgun like in Doom with such a high spread, how the hell do you want it to be accurate? I would agree that a shotgun might do extra damage if the pellet hits the face or some unprotected part of the body. But this would be completely random. You are facing 5 daemons, spreaded.
You can direct spread at those fight daemons, because you are accurate? I do not think so. You can direct where the "pellet cloud" will "fly", but you cannot direct it like: i shoot the daemon in the head, it is its weakest point, part of the spread will hit the former commando in the groin and part of the spread will hit the Arch-ville in the abdomen.
My proposition: lesser the spread, make the damage higher (do not like that idea). But do not implement accuracy rolls, because this doesn't make sense to shotgun.
Yeah, my idea is pretty similar to this one. I suggested that as long as you're aiming directly at the enemies (On the 9-7 line, in Blade's diagram) you have a decent chance to do full damage instead of suffering dropoff. And this is technically an accuracy thing (Shotgun sniping in DooM requires a bit of precision) so I made it an accuracy roll, thus making all weapons require accuracy checks. I didn't suggest being able to split up your shot exactly between 5 demons, unless they were all in a straight line.
Either that or severely penalise outliers.
2333
2333445566
@9999998888877
2333445566
2333
The idea of enemies on the side being damaged more if they're far away is weird. Maybe a unique shotgun (the jackhammer, maybe?) could work like this.
"Spread" you mentioned is what people expect from videogame shotguns - if we lessen/remove the spread we'll end up removing the quality that defines them
The man speaks truth. I strongly disagree with any change that reduces the spread down to 3 tiles wide (Unless it's the combat shotgun or something)
EDIT:
How combat shotguns currently work:
Also got the diagram for the current shotgun and doubleshotty?
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Also got the diagram for the current shotgun and doubleshotty?
Here you go:
-shotgun
******
**********
**************
@***************
**************
**********
******-combat shotgun
******
************
@***************
************
******-double shotgun
****
******
********
@********
********
******
****
Edit: Also something that occured to me when digging up the above - with recent change double shotguns gets armor applied effectively six times unless something changed in the way it works.
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Am I the only one who thinks all but the combat shotgun is extremely excessive?* The double shotgun's cone looks more like Doom's FOV than a double shotgun spread! o_O
*well, noone replied yet, but I hope I'm not the only one
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Either that or severely penalise outliers.
2333
2333445566
@9999998888877
2333445566
2333
The idea of enemies on the side being damaged more if they're far away is weird. Maybe a unique shotgun (the jackhammer, maybe?) could work like this.
Actually those numbers come from applying a gaussian distribution formula to the angle of exit and adding a range dissipation penalty. That's what the small spreadsheet i linked above does.
I perfected the range dissipation formula to calculate cumulative loss % over distance traveled, so now it looks a bit different:
Standard Deviation: 0,15 rad; Dissipation: 8% per square (shotgun)
2222222
233444333333
@988776655444333
233444333333
2222222
Standard Deviation: 0,3 rad; Dissipation: 16% per square (double shotgun)
22222
233333222
@8765443222
233333222
22222
Edit: I removed the ones to make the spread look cleaner.
P.S. - Yes, the spread is absolutely ludicrous, but like Malek said, it's what you expect in a video game. Shotguns wouldn't be fun if they didn't hit all over the place.
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Shotgun diagrams.
Ta. Alrighty, I'll change these to numbered diagrams quickly...
* is full 6d3/8d3/whatever damage, so basically a 10.
9 is 90% damage, 8 is 80% damage, etc.
I have 6d3 in mind for these, so the numbers are a bit higher than the other diagrams.
-shotgun
333222
6655443322
88777666554433
@**9998888777766
88777666554433
6655443322
333222-combat shotgun
665544
998887776666
@****99999888888
998887776666
665544-double shotgun
4433
665544
88776655
@*9988777
88776655
665544
4433
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If shotguns still did a lot of damage at range, as long as it was where I aimed directly, I'd probably use them a lot more often. (But then I wouldn't be taking advantage of their unique attribute.)
The new damage distribution seems like it would make shotguns not as great against crowds in one shot, though. (But then again, in my experience using them, I couldn't deal with crowds in the open with shotguns and had to hide behind cover like any other weapon.)
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One thing about shotguns is that the total damage they can deal to all targets ought to not go up as the targets get farther away. Think about it - each shotgun blast has only so many pellets, and it shouldn't matter if they land on one target right in front of your face or three targets farther away.
That said, damage should be normally distributed with total damage (across all squares) and damage spread increasing as range increases.
Alternatively, set up shotguns like real life shotguns, and simply have them shoot a bunch of lower damage projectiles at the same time.
Another thing that bugs me is being able to push monsters away with shotguns. Every action has an equal and opposite reaction, and besides which, its been shown that shotguns do not work that way in mythbusters.
One last thing - IRL shotguns can fire multiple types of ammo. Perhaps it might be worthwhile to add shotgun grenades or multiple types of shotgun ammo (R to special load any shotgun, brings up menu to select ammo types)