W2:DC Ranged Weapons Mod

[ss7877]

Hi all.
I offer the mod with the balance fixes of of heavy/energy weapons, shotguns and SMGs in Wasteland 2: the Director's Cut.
The purpose is to make these weapons sufficiently effective to use as a primary weapon from the beginning to the end-game.

https://www.nexusmods.com/wasteland2/mods/65

[Gillsing]

So energy weapons get increased damage vs non-conductive targets and heavy weapons use less ammo? I have plenty of 7.62 mm for the Minigun. What I would like to see is Rangers getting the ability to fire their heavy weapon on everyone around them, like the RSM heavy gunners do sometimes. That way a Ranger could put Bullet-Ridden on a lot of enemies, for the rest of their team to enjoy. Or maybe I wouldn't like to see that, in case it spends all the ammo in the weapon. 200 rounds in a Minigun. Handy when not having to reload in battle, but I wouldn't want to lose all that ammo in one go.

[ss7877]

If you want to use machine guns several times per game, all the rest of the time dragging excess weight and accumulating ammo, this is your right and your choice.

Mod is designed for those, who want to use machine guns as a main weapon from the very beginning of the game.

[Queegon]

I opted to add weapon mods for heavy weapons instead of changing their damage formulae.
Adding barrel and magazine mod slots works wonders while not being lore unfriendly.

For energy weapons' perks I'm using +25/50/75%. Seems fair.

[ss7877]

Originally posted by Queegon:

For energy weapons' perks I'm using +25/50/75%. Seems fair.

Not in Сalifornia.

[Queegon]

Originally posted by ss7877:

Originally posted by Queegon:

For energy weapons' perks I'm using +25/50/75%. Seems fair.

Not in Сalifornia.

How so? Half of the enemies are robots, the other half I use energy aimed strikes on anyway. Getting a fair balance of trinkets would be much better in my book. Right now the endgame is 1x Choice and 6x Engagement Rings.

Made changes to hourglass (+1 AP instead of Kiss Ass). Changes would be well deserved on luminox watch and the camera.

[ss7877]

ver 1.01
- Critical Update of XDELTA patch v0.9.4g (Correct damage calculation for Energy Weapons against Conductive Armor and other weapons, when Armor Penetration greater of equal Armor of target)
- Some balance changes of Energy Weapons tier 4.2-6.2 to reduce the efficiency gap between them and assault/sniper rifles tier 4.2-6.2

[ss7877]

Some love to Shotguns:

- Perk Obliterator received an additional effect "+1 Armor Penetration"
- Improved mod choke now has bonus "+6 maximum range" (old value "+2m maximum range")
- Computer-assisted choke now has bonus "+8 maximum range" (old value "+6m maximum range")

[red255]

look no matter what you change people will make noise.

are these changes reflected in game text or is it just in the readme file?

I don't think you can greatly fix the unbalance of the game. shotgun will still jam when an AR with mag will not. Shotgun still has only 10% to crit with 10 skill when other weapons have 30-100%

i think the shotgun is fine, its just the game doesn't have any late game low armor enemies or very much cover that can be destroyed making shotguns not very good considering the environment.

[ss7877]

Originally posted by red255:

look no matter what you change people will make noise.

are these changes reflected in game text or is it just in the readme file?

I don't think you can greatly fix the unbalance of the game. shotgun will still jam when an AR with mag will not. Shotgun still has only 10% to crit with 10 skill when other weapons have 30-100%

i think the shotgun is fine, its just the game doesn't have any late game low armor enemies or very much cover that can be destroyed making shotguns not very good considering the environment.

All changes reflected in game text.
Examples
https://steamuserimages-a.akamaihd.net/ugc/912416819142435043/BD93087DEBA2A4E22A08A22A61019CF606CA5B01/
https://steamuserimages-a.akamaihd.net/ugc/912416819142435281/2967210462AB9374CCEA521C563623E93086CB5A/

[ss7877]

v1.03

- Heavy Weapons now can use Magazine and Barrel mods
- Shotguns now can use UnderBarrel mods
- Perk Gunner (Assault Rifles) now works only with Assault Rifles (No more false hints about this perk effect for Sniper Rifles, Shtotguns, etc.)
- Some balance changes of Shotguns to reduce the efficiency gap between them and assault/sniper rifles (especially in California)

[ss7877]

v1.04

- "Armor-Piercing Bullets" - new lvl 8 perk for SMGs (+1 Armor Penetration)
- +1 Armor Penetration to some Machine Guns to reduce the efficiency gap between them and assault rifles
- Rebalance of Photon Cannon and FN-FAL to make these weapons more useful

[ss7877]

ver 1.05

- Critical Update of XDELTA patch v0.9.4h (No more extra damage from Critical Hits of enemies)
- Fixed combat log error, when COTC Riflemen was displayed as COTC Gunner [bug from inXile]
- Perk Zeroed (Handguns) received an additional effect "+1 Armor Penetration"
- Minigun and The 3 now have Armor Penetration 8 (old value = 7)
- Damage boost of Arctic Sniper

[Enhancement Talent]

The fundamental problem as I see it with energy weapons is they cannot crit. While they are effective against robots, it makes them borderline useless against anything else. I don't see how you'd change that without drastically changing how they operate. Heavy weapons probably wouldn't be too difficult to fix though if you gave them increased armor penetration or made it so they actively shredded armor with each barrage, increasing the lethality of subsequent shots.

Shotguns could use increases in crit chance and crit damage across the board, or be given bonus damage depending on how close you are.

[ss7877]

Originally posted by Tortoos:

The fundamental problem as I see it with energy weapons is they cannot crit. While they are effective against robots, it makes them borderline useless against anything else. I don't see how you'd change that without drastically changing how they operate. Heavy weapons probably wouldn't be too difficult to fix though if you gave them increased armor penetration or made it so they actively shredded armor with each barrage, increasing the lethality of subsequent shots.

Shotguns could use increases in crit chance and crit damage across the board, or be given bonus damage depending on how close you are.

With my fixes of perks and damage of top-tier energe weapons now they are sufficiently effective against all targets.

E.g. Ion Beamer with DMG 40-50/2 rounds per burst and Multiplier 2.4x/(0.6+1)x does 192-240 damage to robots and 128-160 damage to targets with non-conductive armor.

[Nekros]

So I extracted the zip into my Wasteland 2 Director's Cut folder and my game is not starting up now. Just infinite loading.