Weapon Rebalance mod v3.17, All things having to do with equipment! Options

[ShadoWarrior]

Weapon Rebalance mod v3.17

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Full details of exactly what's been changed are listed in the history text file I've included within the ZIP archive.

This is a work in progress! As time permits (when I'm not busy playing the game or reading the forum) I'll be adding more changes. If you feel there is an item which is "out of whack" and should be modded, please let me know, either in this thread or by PM. Savegames created after using this mod should not be expected to work without the mod.

New items in mod: 84
New techs in mod: 18
Tweaks in mod: hundreds
Your fun factor: priceless

RECENT CHANGELOG -
new in v3.17:
changed: new main and system menu art
changed: added numerical values to the Glossary for the exact effects of most weapon accessories and wearable psi devices
changed: gauss rifles, gauss autocannons, and needlers now generate a very small amount of noise when fired
fixed: nailgun magazine size correctly set to 20
fixed: all bullets and shotgun cartridges have had their noise/light/thermal values changed from 0 to 1 so that weapon noise & light now operate properly

[Saintaw]

Thanks SW!

Question:

added: Recoil Compensator accuracy is now 1.05 (old value 0.85)
added: Silencer is now light 0 & noise 0 (old value light 1 & noise 0)

Does this mean that:

a- Recoil compensator will now increase your acuracy instead of decreasing it?
b- Silencer now acts as a flash supressor?(ingame)

[PlacidDragon]

That is what i see it as, yes (if i have understood the numbers correctly). The recoil compensator now gives better than standard (1.0 i imagine) accuracy from the first shot, and the silencer will now kill the light completely, acting as a flash supressor (in addition to killing the sound of course).

[ShadoWarrior]

Does this mean that:

a- Recoil compensator will now increase your acuracy instead of decreasing it?
b- Silencer now acts as a flash supressor?(ingame)

A. Yes. Instead of a 15% penalty you now have a 5% bonus. The bonus is based upon my "gut" feel for how much more accurate I am using one in real life (over an uncompensated firearm). If anyone has good hard statistics, please feel free to let me know. (BTW, in real life I've only used recoil compensators on high-powered rifles. The main use in the game is with automatic weapons, which is quite a different thing.)

B. Yes. The silencer is also a flash suppressor. My next release of this mod will adjust the "cost" (manufacture time) for both the flash suppresor and silencer to better balance things (since with my mod no one would ever desire to make just a flash suppressor).

[Saintaw]

Great, thanks again!

[Huggy_Monster]

is it difficult to mod weapons and stuff? i mean can anyone pick it up if they put bit time to it?


I do like the changes a lot, tho few things i would done differently myself, each person has there own tastes right.

[ShadoWarrior]

is it difficult to mod weapons and stuff? i mean can anyone pick it up if they put bit time to it?

Yes, you can do it.

I do like the changes a lot, tho few things i would done differently myself

Such as? (And thanks.)

[Gastrian]

Is it possible to remove the rocket training requirement from under-barrel grenade launchers? I know its not much of a problem for rifles as you should have trooper training but for close range shotguns it can pose an annoyance as you'd rarely take the mechanic or trooper options for close range soldiers.

[Huggy_Monster]

i like the general concept of changes they all good and go in the right direction, if was me tho i just be little more subtle with some changes, such as laser sniper range of say 150 or 140 ish, accuracy 80 maybe 85, laser rifle more like 250 damage, small things really.


What program is needed to edit the vfs files anyway?

cant say i would get deep into modding but i wouldnt mind adding my own personal taste

[ShadoWarrior]

Is it possible to remove the rocket training requirement from under-barrel grenade launchers? I know its not much of a problem for rifles as you should have trooper training but for close range shotguns it can pose an annoyance as you'd rarely take the mechanic or trooper options for close range soldiers.

Possible, of course. Advisable? No. Successful use of GLs does require some training (trust me on this). Plus there's an issue of game balance: if you can use GLs without training, why would anyone bother trying to get Rocket Training?

And I know of no shotguns in real life that mount GLs. The fact that you can mount any under-barrel device on shotguns and machineguns in Aftershock is (IMO) a serious design flaw in the game (and leads to "exploits" such as shotguns w/ GLs). Pistols have a similar problem with their visor slot: just because you can mount a thermal imager on a rifle doesn't mean you should be able to on a pistol. Each weapon should have its own list of acceptable mods.

[mailor]

Hmmm I like the explosive modifications, but I won't use the mod, because I think laser weapons are overpowered.

[ShadoWarrior]

i like the general concept of changes they all good and go in the right direction, if was me tho i just be little more subtle with some changes, such as laser sniper range of say 150 or 140 ish, accuracy 80 maybe 85, laser rifle more like 250 damage, small things really.

The laser sniper range is 180 to make it a worthwhile choice even if you have conventional sniper rifles like the MSG90 (range 120). Otherwise the laser sniper's range isn't good enough to make it competitive against the higher damage of other sniper weapons.

The accuracy is tied to the weapon's max range. When modding, as you increase a weapon's range you must also increase accuracy to maintain the same value at a given distance (if a weapon has X% accuracy at 40m and max range of 50m, you must increase accuracy if you increase its max range to 60m to get the same X% accuracy at 40m). I have not yet figured out the formula for this. The values have been done by trial and error until they come out about right in-game.

The laser rifle damage is 280 because it should be better than the Reticulan laser rifles you begin the game with (which are 250).

What program is needed to edit the vfs files anyway?

cant say i would get deep into modding but i wouldnt mind adding my own personal taste

Sigget's vfs tool, and a decent text editor with a good search capability. If you want to compare a mod versus the game's unmodded files, you'll also need a good file comparison utility. (It's built into the Total Commander directory util if you have that.)

[ShadoWarrior]

Hmmm I like the explosive modifications, but I won't use the mod, because I think laser weapons are overpowered.

Overpowered? How? Compared to what? I use the mod myself and all my troops are equipped with XM8s, MSG90s, M60s, and SPAS 15s. Bullets hit harder than lasers (still), and the ammo takes up less space.

[Gastrian]

The whole composing section is unbalanced. I find standard human tech with some well chosen add-ons are better than the more "advanced" weapons. My snipers almost exclusively use the MSG90 with sniper scopes over the laser sniper rifles and thats with the accelerators not working.

My troopers are all armed with XM8's with gyrostabilisers, movement sensors and when they work, accelerators. Its a similar story with the M60E3 machine gun. I only take energy weapons for dealing with starghosts or sonic guns for capture mission. For every other mission I don't bother with Plasma or laser technology. I find a SPAS12 with a gyrostabiliser is powerful enough to deal with anything up to a wargot soldier so I don't even bother with a Plasma shotgun

[ShadoWarrior]

The whole composing section is unbalanced. I find standard human tech with some well chosen add-ons are better than the more "advanced" weapons.

I agree. If you have specific suggestions on an item by item basis, please make them and I'll see about adding them to the mod.