A few visual quality of life improvements and some other things.
Tibbs
Join Date: 2013-02-10 Member: 182965Members, Reinforced - Supporter
Join Date: 2013-02-10 Member: 182965Members, Reinforced - Supporter
* A way to see how much extra ammo you have remaining for the flamethrower, if I am not mistaken you can currently only see how much your have left in the canister that is currently being used, not the other spare ones.
* Show how many hand grenades you have left on you, it doesn't show whether you have one or two at the moment. I also don't think that it shows the type of grenade that you have on you.
* Unused grenades from marines that die should fall on the floor in the same way as mines, so that they can be picked up and used again.
* Mines/grenades/welders should automatically be picked up if you walk over them and you don't have already have one equipped. It should be done in such a way that it won't take focus from the weapon you are currently using.
* The pistol should become undroppable, it is the only item for its slot and in no scenario does it make sense to drop it, in the same way that the axe cannot be dropped. This way it cannot accidentally be dropped.
* Something odd with the scoreboard: If you are on a high population server with most people in the readyroom and a few people join both aliens and marines then the "Ready room" portion of the scoreboard will overlap and be displayed on top of the alien/marine scoreboards, partially obscuring them.
* On the marine scoreboard: Instead of listing the equipped items with text, such as "Shotgun/JP": Why not use icons of the currently equipped items? You would of course exclude the stuff that everyone would have on them, such as the pistol and the axe.
* The scoreboard really needs a visual and functionality overhaul in general, redo it from scratch.
Edit: Thought of another one, but this one is very debatable and up to personal preference: Make your primary weapon undroppable unless it is being switched out for another primary weapon, either a new weapon from the armory or switching with a dropped weapon on the floor from a dead marine. Taking it one step further you could do the same with all items, making it so that you would only be able to drop your equipment when dying, but I dunno...
* Show how many hand grenades you have left on you, it doesn't show whether you have one or two at the moment. I also don't think that it shows the type of grenade that you have on you.
* Unused grenades from marines that die should fall on the floor in the same way as mines, so that they can be picked up and used again.
* Mines/grenades/welders should automatically be picked up if you walk over them and you don't have already have one equipped. It should be done in such a way that it won't take focus from the weapon you are currently using.
* The pistol should become undroppable, it is the only item for its slot and in no scenario does it make sense to drop it, in the same way that the axe cannot be dropped. This way it cannot accidentally be dropped.
* Something odd with the scoreboard: If you are on a high population server with most people in the readyroom and a few people join both aliens and marines then the "Ready room" portion of the scoreboard will overlap and be displayed on top of the alien/marine scoreboards, partially obscuring them.
* On the marine scoreboard: Instead of listing the equipped items with text, such as "Shotgun/JP": Why not use icons of the currently equipped items? You would of course exclude the stuff that everyone would have on them, such as the pistol and the axe.
* The scoreboard really needs a visual and functionality overhaul in general, redo it from scratch.
Edit: Thought of another one, but this one is very debatable and up to personal preference: Make your primary weapon undroppable unless it is being switched out for another primary weapon, either a new weapon from the armory or switching with a dropped weapon on the floor from a dead marine. Taking it one step further you could do the same with all items, making it so that you would only be able to drop your equipment when dying, but I dunno...
Comments
The one thing I would kinda consider is weight, e.g. someone wants to drop their primary to sprint or something, but you mentioned that was a personal pref anyway, so no issues there.
Maybe people would want to keep axe over welder? These seem like solid ideas.
I'm not sure what is a part of NS2+, but if some of this stuff is in the mod then it might make it into vanilla NS2 sooner rather than later.
I had not thought about the weight issue, is dropping your weapons to run back to base a bit quicker something that people actually do? Is that a game mechanic that should be encouraged? What is the point of varying marine run speed anyway? Sounds a bit gimmicky, as well as being a hidden mechanic, but then again I haven't thought about it much.
From a purely damage point of view, how is the welder and axe different? I suppose the welder is more of a slow damage over time thing, whereas the axe will do more burst-like damage. Is there supposed to be a tradeof between utility and damage when picking between the two? Or is the welder supposed to be a straight upgrade? From my limited experience people always seem to choose the welder. The fact that the welder is available straight away from the armory at a very cheap price leads me to believe that it is something that everyone is supposed to have, and that the axe is less about usefulness and more about "funsies". Then again, the game is supposed to be fun, so what the hell.
One thing I had not thought about is the scenario that goes against my very last point: If two marines need to be welded but only one of them has a welder then you would drop your welder so that the other person could weld you. Unless a self-welding mechanic of some sort is introduced, but that doesn't make sense visually and would be tricky to balance, it would also remove a bit of the teamplay aspect of the game.
I also think that consistency matters quite a bit, if some things can be dropped but others can not then it can be a bit confusing and odd looking. It is also worth remembering that you will always need to have one last undroppable thing on you, for that last ditch melee attack with unlimited ammo, be that the axe or the welder. If you are unarmed then a new view model and animation would need to be created for that, which is a lot of work for little gain.
People often drop their primary weapon to run faster to a shotgun that is despawning.
Axe is better at killing structures than welder - so you often see people dropping the welder and then proceeds to axe a harvester, then pick up the welder when done.
There already IS a self-welding mechanic.
As for the pistol not being droppable, the only issue I have with that is in the extreme niche case, where your pistol is empty you find a pistol on the ground (for what ever unlikely reason) and you pick it up == free bullets. + The consistency part, it would indeed be pretty confusing.
Dropping the welder to axe a structure to death makes sense, but it feels odd to drop equipment to become stronger, I dunno. I think this is something that is more obvious to experienced players, rather than typical pubbers, as I haven't seen it happening much.
What I meant about the self-weld mechanic is the old "look straight down and weld yourself back up to full" from the old days. Getting full armor from welding teammates and buildings isn't always possible, since as soon as their armor is full yours stop filling up, if I recall correctly. Not an important point though, it is fine as it is.
As far as the pistol goes I'm a bit torn, will have to ponder it further.
its also used to encourage looking after people using said heavy weapons. A solo GL is slow and needs his friends.
As for "drop equipment to become stronger" its more of use what you need at the time. Each weapon used has its advantages and disadvantages, the axe is better vs structures while the welder can, well, weld. (its also easier to kill with if it comes down to that). That said it is considered generally better to shoot the harvester and ask for ammo... but to each their own.
Best way to notice weapon weight is to try and run with axe out, you go just that tiny bit faster. Or see how far you can get with mines before caving your keyboard in. :P
You can with friendly fire on. Damage a friendly structure like a powernode, weld it back up.
Great!