Atlas Howitzer: Heavy gun

[Richard LeMoon]

This is basically the answer to the "Bring back the old Flak!" crowd. Not the old old flak. Just the one that was lost in the latest changes.

The Atlas would be a single barrel howitzer with a dual chamber rapid auto-loader. Basically, a giant revolver with only two chambers in the cylinder. The gun would only have one shot per clip, but would reload rapidly. As with mines or harpoon, Heatsink would not increase ammo capacity.

Here is a simple animation of possible loading mechanics.

The projectiles would be large, heavy, slow moving, high arcing, arming, with high hull damage.

The damage would be be distributed between Impact damage on primary with maybe 25% of total damage, and Explosive secondary with 75% of the damage after arming. There would also be a small push force like mines or Minotaur.

The arc and movement abilities would be similar to the Lumberjack, with a little more horizontal and a little less vertical.

[Atruejedi]

Do want.

Give.

[Skymonger]

I do like new weapons.

But what I'm wondering is what niche does it fill?
I used to come from a community that kept asking for new weapons, yet none would be implemented because there was already a weapon Ingame that did the exact same thing already. An assault rifle Ingame but wanting an SMG. A minigun but wanting a LMG. A Railgun but wanting a Sniperfile. Stuff like that.

You say it's for the "old flak crowd", and I get that, but what makes THIS gun worth the effort in redesigning models, textures, damages, and animations when the Heavy flak is already finished...ish?

[Richard LeMoon]

The 'niche' it fills is the high skill single shot kill weapon, which is something we no longer have. We have a bunch of bullet spam guns. Keep firing and something will connect somewhere at the right time.

To further separate the two, I would start by reducing the heavy Flak range and make it airburst at the end with a wide area of damage (like a... flak). With such low damage per shot, it is no longer a great long range option. It now has more in common with the mortar. This gun should be as the light flak is to the mortar for heavy guns. Or, more accurately, the Merc to the Gatling.

[Naoura]

I had a similar idea for a weapon but in a different light.

As before mentioned by another, a lot of the niche's are filled by the weapons that are already in game, either by light weapons and not being heavy weapons or heavy weapons and not needing them as light weapons. The gatlings strip the armor while the Flak takes care of the rest, or the Hwatcha paralyzes the enemy and the carronade sends them to the ground.

One of the weapon niche's that haven't been taken is the Obvious Kill Weapon, one that, on the surface, is extremely easy to attack with but in practice is very, very difficult to use.

So this brings me back to a weapon concept I had, the Dawn Star Field Howitzer. Piercing and explosive damage as both of its damage type, making it such an obvious weapon to want to use, but having no horizontal arc and significant vertical arc, making it difficult to use. It would require perfect coordination between the captain and the gunner, and ships such as the Goldfish or the Spire would be lethal with them. One round magazine, but with a lightning fast reload in comparison to other heavy weapons, as well as a somewhat predictable trajectory and an impressive range would make it tempting to take.

The catch to it, however, would be that every shot would damage it. Practically always loaded with Loch, so to say. Every shot is extremely dangerous to the enemy when they land, but it would need an engineer practically camping it to ensure that the rounds keep going out. Without the engi there to keep it up, your DPS goes down quick, as the gunner would constantly need to jump off and on the gun to repair it. However, this means that the engineer wouldn't be able to repair parts of the hull as reliably, just making another part of the ship that will constantly be damaged. I imagine that this weapon would be like the Loch Gat combo, where you can keep the rounds pouring out and onto a target if you have someone there to support the weapon. Sure, the Gunner can hop off to repair after every shot, but it would drop the DPS for the weapon pretty hard.

Perhaps the same could be done for your Atlas? Instad of piercing, impact, but with a higher amount of damage from impact and damage to the weapon after every shot. It would balance it out enough if you kept the reload pretty quick and the fire rate rapid, meanwhile needing support from two men.

[Richard LeMoon]

The 'self/ship damaging gun' idea has been tossed around before, along with things like adding fired stacks and recoil strong enough to move your own ship (like getting hit by a Minotaur).

The self-damage thing would get rather annoying for both the gunner and engies. Fire stacks would be the same. I could see ship-wide recoil being a thing, though. It would add an interesting dimension to the pilot/gunner dynamic. It could be faked with a secondary projectile that did not travel anywhere, and exploded like an invisible, non-damaging mine at the tip of the gun.

[Naoura]

Hadn't thought of the ship-wide recoil, and I agree, it'd be better overall, making a weapon with it a load easier than having the weapon self-damage.

However, the annoyance is part of what I had considered, making the weapon harder to use and requiring higher level players to properly manage it. The obnoxious cantankerousness of such a weapon would be balanced out with the hellish damage the weapon could output in such a shot amount of time. It's a scenario where you have to question whether or not you want to deal with attempting to fix the damnable thing as it's firing and keeping your DPS up, or else using it as a semi-sniper and trying to slowly wear away at the enemy.

But in technical feasability, I can see how it would work with the ship-wide recoil. Perhaps by adding a certain level of acceleration at the location of the weapon, an instant increase in acceleration just at that point. On a Gally it would make the poor ship spin if you didn't balance out the weapons, like having only one turner active and burning moonshine through it.

[Richard LeMoon]

Adding annoyance as a balance to damage is easy, but a big no no in game development. Lochnagar used to be fun because of what it did. You only used it once in a while, and were prepared for the damage. It was not a chore. Constant damage as default would be a chore (new Loch). People would use it because it was powerful, but it would not be fun.

On the other hand, ship recoil would be annoying for the pilot, which would be OK, since they are the ones deciding to take the gun. Also, it would be considered a skill check rather than a chore to keep the ship steady enough for consistent shots.

[Naoura]

Fair enough. I can definitely get behind that, but I can kind of see how it could be minimized with the pilot abusing Impact Bumpers or so, maybe accelerating at the moment of fire, which would encourage cooperation but could also throw the shot.

Would you still say make it semi-rapid fire rather than slow load like the Mercury? Make it difficult to use and requiring a good deal of skill to use properly?

[Richard LeMoon]

I would make it one shot with a relatively short reload, like the animation.

[Naoura]

That's what I was meaning. Quick reload with single round.

[Naoura]

Had a recent thought on it, and it brought up a question: Horizontal arc?

Field howitzers would have to be moved by their base to reorient and fire in a different direction. On Guns, it wouldn't have the same option, and would be relying on motorized turning. However, due to the force of each shot, it would be much, much safer to lock the weapon to a very, very thin to nonexistant horizontal arc.

That would require heavy synergy between captain and gunner. Thoughts, @Richard?

[Richard LeMoon]

If Muse went with a tiered guns system, where you have to be a certain level to get said gun, I would not be too opposed to a more restricted horizontal movement. If it is a general use gun, then you have to keep it more open.

The Lumberjack and Merc are both 15deg guns, covering a 30deg arc. The Hellhound carro is next at 25.  Flak and Hawacha are both 30. I was personally thinking of placing the Atlas at 20deg. If it were a tiered gun, maybe 15 or less. You do want to keep a nice balance between skill and frustration. I think ship recoil is still the best for this, requiring more pilot/gunner coordination than most other guns.

If there were some slower firing mechanic, you could borrow from the lens array and slow the gun down some just before it fires. This would be hard to do, though, considering it reloads after every shot. You would have to aim it, lock it down, then fire. Perhaps hold the trigger, and it fires a second later after the gun does its lockdown animation. This would be an interesting mechanic to explore, but I think it may stray too far into frustration territory. Perhaps if it was a secondary function. Hold right mouse to lock the gun to 10% speed, but do some sort of buff. That way, people get the choice of being frustrated or not.

[Naoura]

I'm really not sure how you could do the tiered weapon mechanic in the game. There... really isn't a way I can think of to do it without fundamentally changing the game. The captain brings the weapons aboard the ships, correct? That means that the captain, who would most likely be a higher level, would have control over what was brought aboard and what the gunner would have to use, as it is now. Tiering up the weapons... how? Make it so that the gunner simply can't use the weapon until he reaches a high enough level? Make the weapon change when the gunner uses it? I just don't see how to implement it properly in that case. The captain is the one in charge of what weapons he brings, meaning that the captain would need to pay attention to the skill level of his crew and change the loadout from there. I don't mean to be rude, but would you mind telling me how you want to tier the weapons? How to implement it and everything?

I like the locking down mechanic, but it might just be easier to simply keep it locked. More teamwork involved between captain and gunner, but I like the argument of letting you lock it down before firing. That'd give the gunner enough control over his own weapon, while still requiring skill to use properly. Perhaps a moment or two for the weapon to actually lock down?

For the buff over the lockdown, I would say firing speed. The wepon is locked into position, right? Meaning that it is stable and not needing a pause so as to not stress the motors and turntables that the weapon would be built on. Lock the weapon down, and it can fire a little faster, but it cannot change arc. The recoil mechanic would be the same, meaning that it would be marginally frustrating as the ship keeps getting kicked back a bit, but you would be able to send more rounds out a little bit faster before the ship needs to be made stable again, and the weapon needs to be aimed again. That would make it a mid-high level skill requirement, where lower level players can just use the primary fire at a slower rate, but with the same power, while a higher level player can lock down the weapon and attempt to barrage an area while the captain, of similar skill, tries to manage the recoil as best he can.

Problem with that would be Impact Bumpers. A Captain could probably just throw on the bumpers and hold position from cover, using the locked down Atlas to simply pour rounds into an area, adjusting the ship on the reloads so as to keep the rounds pointed at the enemy. I do think that that would make the ship a target for a faster, more maneuverable ship that would be difficult to hit by the Atlas, which might balance that a little. It really would be artillery, in that regard, needing to be set up behind a wall of quasi-infantry like Pyras or Junkers so that it could effectively shell an area. Not the most obvious effective use of firepower, since everyone wants to go for the hits, but it's the nonobvious power of the weapon, morale. No one wants to go into an area that has Atlas rounds pouring out of it, just like no one wants to be on a Galleon's broadside when they're running double Hwatcha. I've had heartattack moments on Paritan when I start to cross one of the streets and walk directly into those lions, same could be said for the Atlas.

[Richard LeMoon]

By tiered, I simply mean things you earn over time. Start with Quad Flak (current), earn Duel Flak (old version), finally earn Atlas to finish off the 'arming ship killer' tree. They are balanced with the other guns, but you just can't put them on your ship until you earn them, wither through levels or challenges. I lean towards challenges, since it allows lower level players to prove they can handle a gun before they put it on their ship.

The faster fire rate sounds fun. If you are good, you could even use it to your advantage on a Galleon, using the recoil to follow a ship going the right direction. Metal Gear style.

Impact bumpers don't stop a ship from moving, so would do nothing for this gun if it did have ship recoil. You would have to use Moonshine or Kero (or the 'Anchor' tool talked about some time ago).