Reduce or eliminate 'maximum range' from a lot of guns?

Started by Vastin, February 01, 2014, 12:07:53 PM

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Vastin

I'd suggest pulling the absolute 'maximum range' parameter off of (most) weapons, and replace it with an 'effective range' parameter, and let line of sight, or visual sight range be the primary limiter on engagement range. As far as I can tell, rim-world pretty much already has such parameters on its weapons in any case. An effective range stat would really just be there to help tell the AI how close it wants to stand to have any hope of really hitting.

Right now a lot of defensive arrangements are trivialized by the fact that some guns (esp snipers) have a much longer max range, and can safely fire without any fear of return fire. In real gun situations, this is rarely the case - most people can't effectively see or aim anywhere near as far as a bullet will actually travel. It's simply that their chances of hitting anything diminish much more rapidly than weapons designed for long range fire - and the impact of the bullet itself gradually diminishes.

It'd be nice if the Rimworld guns worked similarly. That sniper way off in the rocks? Problem. He's going to be way more accurate than you at that range, and do much better damage because his range modifiers are much better than yours - but you should still be able to shoot back if he's within sight range at all.

Not true for primitive or thrown weapons obviously. Anything with a meaningful ballistic arc should still have real maximum ranges on them as a rule. Some poor fool is going to have to run up and risk getting their dang fool head shot off if they want to deliver a grenade.

Hard range limits just don't make a lot of sense for modern weaponry. The human eye, manual dexterity, and the physical chaos of the air present far more limitations than the weapon itself.

Vastin

If you really wanted to add a serious layer of depth to the gun simulation, you could pull off the max ranges AND add an LOS simulation in its place, which is affected by factors like lighting, weather, and possibly even equipment.

Attack in the fog? Don't even bother to bring the m-24's, they'll be useless. Attack at night? Maybe almost as bad. You wont be able to see a target until they're in shotgun proximity. Rain & wind? Reduces vision and greatly increases range penalties. Dry lightning at night? Provides momentary illumination of targets at long range.

Building field spotlights to illuminate your kill zone? Good idea. Illuminated targets can be spotted at at longer ranges with reduced range penalties at night. Equip your soldiers guns with night scopes or goggles to improve their nighttime vision range so they can actually use the M-24 effectively at night while staying out of the enemy's sight.

Radio tech so that your colonists can share line of sight and fire at enemies not in their personal range? That's great - until a solar flare or EMP weapon fries all your power systems and leaves everyone in the dark again.

LOS is basically just a much more powerful mechanic than fixed range limits. It lets you do a LOT of things without really making the core system too much more complex (usually).

Whoops! Yes, these should be in suggestions. Sorry. ;P

Tynan

It's good game design practice to make different tools as different as possible - and as obviously different as possible. Wide variation creates wider variety in play experiences; 3 completely different guns are much more interesting to play with than a dozen guns that vary only in subtle ways. And it's even better when the differences are stark and obvious and undeniable, so players pick up on them immediately.

This is why RW guns have max ranges the way they do. If it were a realistic sim I'd agree with you, but it's not even close to being one, despite the use of real weapon names.

If we did what you're suggesting my guess is that nothing would fundamentally change. Snipers would still kick the crap our of your LMGs and pistoleers and so on at long range. You'd still have to go onto the field to get them (which is the reason they're in there - to get you out of your fort) It would just be less clear what was happening. You'd see your guys shooting back and get frustrated that their hits are like 1% chance and do 1/4 damage. And it would cost more CPU time for the AI to search for targets at longer ranges.

And as soon as an ammo mechanic was in, we'd have to change it back to the way it is, or your guys would constantly be wasting bullets plinking at distant targets they can't really hurt. Either that or write some AI routine which balances the competing priorities of conserving ammo and hitting a target, which would require a massive amount of world knowledge and future prediction to do properly, and thus isn't really feasible.

Bottom like: it's not a military sim; it's a story generator. The same way The Matrix didn't include exactly realistic gun physics (it, like all good movies, included only understandable and story-meaningful gun physics), RW doesn't model guns realistically.
Tynan Sylvester - @TynanSylvester - Tynan's Blog

Vastin

That's fine. The only problem I really have with it currently is that the long range weapons end up dominating completely. Even the R-4 energy rifle is useless compared to M-24's. Range is currently the dominant mechanic, and its difficult to create situations where one could imagine employing even an advanced combat shotgun profitably.

So yes, range creates a sharp distinction between weapons currently, but its a purely quantitative one that doesn't vary much with conditions. I'd like to think that my colonists should be equipped with a variety of weapons to cover different cases, but that's not true currently.

It could just be a balance issue though. <shrug>

I should moderate that statement somewhat - the mid-range m-16 is extremely powerful. It doesn't require closure to suicidal ranges with the enemy, and its quick aim rate combined with burst fire make it a workhorse. When I do decide I need a 'rush' these are the weapons of choice.

The use of anything shorter range than that is inadvisable regardless of the stats of the weapon. Even trying to close to ranges as short as 24 when your opponents are equipped with m-16/24's is usually suicidal, resulting in the unit often being incapped before they can reach firing position. You could have an insta-kill death ray of doom with a range of 24 and it'd still be of debatable value - you'd need improved armor, shields, or evasion to make closure viable, or have a very particular terrain configuration.

Tynan

Well, the intent, at least, is that it really depends on circumstances. I think people have trouble with the snipers because the snipers dominate in the conditions that players like to create to defeat every other threat - that is, a deadly Maginot line facing a blasted, open no-man's-land. The snipers just set up shop and plink your defenses to death.

If you just go around a corner, or go inside, they'll have to get closer to do anything. And they're easy to beat using automatic weapons at normal and short ranges. The automatics aim and fire first.

Anyway, this is all still getting worked out. Combat will change a lot as further completely different styles of weapon, defense, and adversary are added. Tanklike bruiser mechanoids, mortars, deadly cacti, swarming micromechanoids, energy shields. We'll worry about specific scenarios later, which this is all a bit less unfinished.
Tynan Sylvester - @TynanSylvester - Tynan's Blog

Vastin

Yeah, retreating inside is a rather risky proposition currently. If any of the enemy is equipped with a grenade, your going to regret life very quickly. I would thing that a lots of things would be on fire real soon. :)

I'm going to experiment with more defensive layouts certainly, but given the AI's predilection for lighting your walls on fire, I'm not sure that constructed hard fortifications are entirely valid at the moment. Will experiment and let you know. My m-16 squad does in fact use cornering mechanics to good effect - though even then I'm often surprised at just how fast they get chopped up in return.

Vastin

I'm definitely quibbling about little things currently - I really adore how its going so far to be perfectly clear. Very impressive.

Tynan

Tynan Sylvester - @TynanSylvester - Tynan's Blog

Woyzeck

In the last version, before my .NET Reflector trial ran out, I modified weapon ranges to something more closely resembling their real life 'effective ranges' (using a 1-tile to ten yards scale for most, excepting the pistol and shotgun for obvious reasons, and the longest-range guns scaled to keep under 60 tiles, as too much range broke the game, as it were), and found this played better. I also tweaked damage to bear more consistent relationships; M-16 remained at 7, for example, but the Enfield and Sniper rifle were changed to 28 and 32, respectively, and the shotgun was bumped up to 36 damage.

IIRC the breakdown was along the lines of:
Pistol: 20
Shotgun: 20
Uzi: 24
Enfield: 48
M-16: 36
R-4: 30
Sniper: 56

I also did some fiddling with aim time/cool down time, and swapped the accuracy ratings of the Sniper and Enfield to 9 and 8 respectively. The idea wasn't just to make things more realistic, but also to keep the lower-cost and more accessible weapons relevant as the game progressed. The Enfield remained useful as a supporting/marksman weapon that handled faster than the Sniper, and the Uzi remained useful as a hallway-sweeper.

This also of course made combat a bit deadlier overall, and kept raiders that dropped with lower-tier weapons dangerous. Early-game shoot-outs involving lots of Enfields were particularly fun.

Tynan

Good point - modding will be pretty fully supported in Alpha 2 so I look forward to checking out all the realistic guns mods.
Tynan Sylvester - @TynanSylvester - Tynan's Blog

ApexPredator

Quote from: Vastin on February 01, 2014, 12:07:53 PM

Right now a lot of defensive arrangements are trivialized by the fact that some guns (esp snipers) have a much longer max range, and can safely fire without any fear of return fire. In real gun situations, this is rarely the case - most people can't effectively see or aim anywhere near as far as a bullet will actually travel. It's simply that their chances of hitting anything diminish much more rapidly than weapons designed for long range fire - and the impact of the bullet itself gradually diminishes.

This is not true of real life situations. A mildly trained sniper with optics can easily hit a human size target at a range much farther than that target can see. If you have iron sights and are looking for a sniper you’re a dead man. That is why the military trains their troops to get into a hardened structure/cover if a sniper is thought to be in the area. A sniper is a force multiplier that changes the battlefield dynamic greatly if properly utilized and I am glad they are in the game (even if they are the greatest challenge so far). Snipers do have weaknesses that you need to learn to exploit. Either have your own counter snipers assigned or have a small team that can flank and close in to overwhelm them up close as snipers rate of fire is very slow. I hate to bring up this idea as it would make defense a bitch but if mortars were added that could greatly change how to defend a base and also be an anti-sniper weapon.

Tynan

I really do want to do mortars; I think they'd change the dynamic both offensively and defensively.
Tynan Sylvester - @TynanSylvester - Tynan's Blog

ApexPredator

Quote from: Vastin on February 01, 2014, 12:29:53 PM
That's fine. The only problem I really have with it currently is that the long range weapons end up dominating completely. Even the R-4 energy rifle is useless compared to M-24's. Range is currently the dominant mechanic, and its difficult to create situations where one could imagine employing even an advanced combat shotgun profitably.


I use both short range and M24s in my current story. I have created an open field with no cover, this means that raiders with short range must rush through the desert to get to my cover and when 15 show up they make it almost every invasion (against many turrets/LMG/and snipers). The prize the raiders get for making it to cover are close range shotgun blasts courtesy of a sick smiling farmer. I think there is a decent balance in weapons currently. I think it would be cool if you could change the fire of the M-16 from burst (3 rounds, current range) to single (increased range, slower fire, one bullet).

Trensicourt

Quote from: Tynan on February 01, 2014, 05:02:49 PM
I really do want to do mortars; I think they'd change the dynamic both offensively and defensively.

Can we have really long range and slow reload snipers? These long range snipers would be completely inaccurate against moving targets, but can incapacitate(or even instantly kill) a colonist. These long range snipers would reload so slow that it will be completely vulnerable for a while after it shoots something.

Or we can have no snipers. Just long range rifles.
WHAT IS RIM WORLD? A RAIDER DEATH BALL. LITERALLY.

ApexPredator


[/quote]

Can we have really long range and slow reload snipers? These long range snipers would be completely inaccurate against moving targets, but can incapacitate(or even instantly kill) a colonist. These long range snipers would reload so slow that it will be completely vulnerable for a while after it shoots something.

Or we can have no snipers. Just long range rifles.
[/quote]

People using the M24 already move and shoot pretty slow and I think their current +/- are fair. I think we are all using the generic term "sniper" for a col/raider using a long range rifle. Its not like there are any trained col/raiders that get a bonus to accuracy or get a cover bonus even in the open (however, that would be cool) like a "sniper" class.