Fellow Ex-Gunners Of Icarus Lend Me Your Ears!

[Veyka]

I would personally be very wary of giving any classes statistical bonuses (I can see nothing but balance issues arising), we have the tool limits to define each class, imo the best way to go about it would be to rejig the ammo system to make having multiple ammo types even more attractive (How you would do this, I don't know, but I am not a game designer )

The thing is though that you will most likely (baring a major change) need more than 1 gunner, at the moment a gunner is very viable (if not essential) on any ships with heavy guns, the only light gun I can think of that really likes two ammo types is the light mortar (flack is good with heavy and burst, but you can use heavy with a buffed gun to make up for the one less shot, with a bonus in terms of better accuracy).

[RearAdmiralZill]

I think giving gunners a passive buff is the way to go, but I wouldn't give them anything that buffs damage, directly or indirecly, because that would either be too insignificant or too strong and ruin the game balance.
There is one thing that would make the gunners have a real advantage over engineers:

-give gunners more firing arc with all weapons, maybe a 20-25% more?

This would be something really really useful, that potentially allows for a much greater offensive capability but still depends on the gunner skill to be used effectively.
What do you think?

This too would indirectly increase the damage of guns because they can fire on you from more extreme angles. It would also break any chances of dodging in the game, leaving us less options when considering maneuverability. We learned this with when the artemis arc was buffed and became OP, and god forbid a gatling gun gets any more arc than it has already...

The buff could be something minor or only apply to vertical firing arc. I still think that a direct buff to damage or rate of fire would be far more dangerous for game balance.

Oh I'm against any kind of class buffs regardless of what it does for the same reason you are. It throws balance out the window unless properly accounted for, which then makes the buffs a mute point.

I'm firmly on the side of gunners being 100% useful on my boat over a third engineer as is. The only thing I could think of is more ammo types, but every gun benefits from two or more in varying situations. I'll make my list again if you insist...

[Chrinus]

I believe that passive boosts are not the way to go to help this class out. The classes are defined simply by the tool slots, and it should be kept that way. Perhaps mechanics are the issue here? I know the ammo system currently requires far too much coddling and wasted time.

There's no logic I can find as to why we need to babysit a weapon to put new ammo in. You should be able to load whatever ammo you want into the gun, let the reload begin, and walk off (the ammo IS technically in the hopper at this point, right?) to be useful somewhere else. Just like when you begin a reload state, you should be able to help do other things or fire other weapons. A small change like this will add great utility to a gunner (able to carry the ammo of multiple weapons at once) without even needing new tools, passive boosts, or anything else that breaks the pattern of class differentiation we have. Will it be enough? I'm not sure, but it's a step.

Also correct me if I'm wrong here, I remember the 'load em and run' actually being in the early game. If so, why was it removed?

[naufrago]

Not sure if it's been suggested before, but maybe allow gunners (or everyone) to switch out ammo instantly, with maybe a 3 second cd before it can be fired again. Switching ammo wouldn't trigger a reload, in this case. Probably doesn't make a huge amount of sense from a lore perspective, but it would let gunners switch between ammo types a little more effectively. It would let them choose the most effective ammo more quickly, which could increase their desirability.

Alternatively, maybe let gunners choose which ammo gets loaded into a gun by default. By that I mean, gunner chooses an ammo type for a gun and reloads it. The 'normal' ammo on that gun for everyone else becomes the special ammo. When it reloads, it reloads with the ammo the gunner chose. Or, instead of replacing the normal ammo, the special ammo could become an option for anyone using it (1 would be normal ammo, 2 would be the special ammo someone else loaded into it, 3-5 would be whatever ammo you're carrying).

[N-Sunderland]

Not sure if it's been suggested before, but maybe allow gunners (or everyone) to switch out ammo instantly, with maybe a 3 second cd before it can be fired again. Switching ammo wouldn't trigger a reload, in this case. Probably doesn't make a huge amount of sense from a lore perspective, but it would let gunners switch between ammo types a little more effectively. It would let them choose the most effective ammo more quickly, which could increase their desirability.

Ammo switching used to not start a reload, and that was really an unbalanced mess... Granted, that was due in no small part to Heavy Duty Springs, and there wasn't a three second delay or anything like that.

[Parkourwalrus]

Not sure if it's been suggested before, but maybe allow gunners (or everyone) to switch out ammo instantly, with maybe a 3 second cd before it can be fired again. Switching ammo wouldn't trigger a reload, in this case. Probably doesn't make a huge amount of sense from a lore perspective, but it would let gunners switch between ammo types a little more effectively. It would let them choose the most effective ammo more quickly, which could increase their desirability.

Alternatively, maybe let gunners choose which ammo gets loaded into a gun by default. By that I mean, gunner chooses an ammo type for a gun and reloads it. The 'normal' ammo on that gun for everyone else becomes the special ammo. When it reloads, it reloads with the ammo the gunner chose. Or, instead of replacing the normal ammo, the special ammo could become an option for anyone using it (1 would be normal ammo, 2 would be the special ammo someone else loaded into it, 3-5 would be whatever ammo you're carrying).

It wold be a mess if there was no choice for normal ammo. Lochanagar on a flamer/gat squid. When the engies brought heatsink because of banshees. Trolololololol...

[Sammy B. T.]

But wouldn't vertical arc just make carronades Op again?

When was the carronade OP?

[Shinkurex]

When the carronade had a downward arc, it was fairly easy for a competent pilot to balloon lock you and stay out of arc of your weapons. This is still possible, but harder to accomplish

[Sammy B. T.]

I can understand the contention that that fact makes it OP yet I disagree with it, however I will quite on this tangent as it off topic.

[Seamus S]

The problem with gunners isn't the gunners, it's the ammunition.  In the current game, the type of ~gun~ determines the damage type dealt to an enemy ship. A gun is simply a mechanism for delivering ammunition. The ~ammunition~ types themselves should determine the damage type. (Flechette, shatter, piercing, etc.)  This would make gunners FAR more valuable to a ship's crew because they could use one gun to strip armor, hurt hull, bust components, whatever.  Gunners are undervalued because of an inherent flaw in the GOI meta. Until that flaw is addressed, we will always have this issue.

Another thing that might boost gunner value would be a gunner tool that allows the gunner to shift the base firing arc of a weapon by like 10 degrees to the left or right. THey'd give up one ammo type in exchange for a much easier chance of getting multiple guns to bear on a single ship.

[Shinkurex]

The problem with gunners isn't the gunners, it's the ammunition.  In the current game, the type of ~gun~ determines the damage type dealt to an enemy ship. A gun is simply a mechanism for delivering ammunition. The ~ammunition~ types themselves should determine the damage type. (Flechette, shatter, piercing, etc.)  This would make gunners FAR more valuable to a ship's crew because they could use one gun to strip armor, hurt hull, bust components, whatever.  Gunners are undervalued because of an inherent flaw in the GOI meta. Until that flaw is addressed, we will always have this issue.

There was another thread that discussed something like this, and the more I thought about it, the more I shuddered. Imagine a gat/gat pyra, one loaded with piercing, one with explosive. or even a hwacha with piercing.... sounds like a nightmare to balance.

[N-Sunderland]

Even worse... Imagine a double merc ship with a piercing merc and an explosive merc. That's gatflak from almost 3 kilometres away.

[HamsterIV]

Even worse... Imagine a double merc ship with a piercing merc and an explosive merc. That's gatflak from almost 3 kilometres away.

I may have wet myself a little.

[Captain Smollett]

The real buff to gunners will happen when guns really need to have more than one ammo type to operate optimally. 

Someone mentioned nerfing heavy clip in another thread, others have talked about adding more ammo types.  I'll add in buffing incendiary more and bringing back the old Lochnagar.  All of these together might make a gunner not just useful but essential.

[RearAdmiralZill]

Every gun can currently benefit from 2 or more ammo.