New Beta Server

[Purity_the_Kitty]

Anything with the word Thermo or Thermal in it will waste the heck out of anything in a couple of seconds. Player, Goliath, Levi, whatever. :p

Tips:
- Combat Mortar shots REMOVE ALL SHIELDS from anything in the blast. Permanently.
- Disruptor primary always deals full damage to drivers in an open vehicle - mantas, scorpions, and hellbenders beware.
- Disruptor secondary beats Thermal Projector up close. I'll keep teaching you that until you remember to either back off or get BBQ'd.

Note - Toxic's got Arkon Shields on right now. I'm not a big fan of it, but with the way these guys play, I think it's mostly necessary.

One more thing for Toxic - try using an equipment editor to make players start with the Thermal Projector and a Laserbomb. Laserbombs en masse are a riot. :p

[DW_e_aLpHa]

-- weapons just dont get along with those regular ONS vehicles. - -- Needs some balance.. Theres that freaking lasser gun that seems to kill everything in seconds.. and add it a long distance zoom in . with the acuracy of the LG .. oh come on. what chance the terrain vehicles have against that one? with it's normal speed movement .. Thats not right .. Last night in Dreamus II .. there was this bug .. :::::
some weapon was leaving behind this litlle green particles everywhere..wich lasted the 2 rounds of the game even after one round ended.. THat was getting me really slow frames whenever I got near the areas infested with those.. Thats just ugly!..

[DW_Ifondlesweaters]

I agree with E. The Thermal Projector melts the Goliath in about 3 secs. Anyway we can either beef up the resistance of some of the vehicles, or simpler yet, tone down the thermo weapons (Blasters and Projector). The Disruptor is also a little overpowered. I can stand on the opposing side's entrance to the middle node in Dreamus2 and just let loose with the Disruptor and its genocide baby. I ordered all the bots on our team to hold that ground so they would launch attacks on anything that moved and I would Disrupt the whole scene, finishing them off, while installing Laserbombs in the mine shaft whenever I could.

Anyways, even toning them down a little would still leave the Arkon weapons powerful enough to give you a little chub when your evaporate the skin off an enemy.

[DW_Ifondlesweaters]

Now, who's up for some TAM with these crazy pieces?

:violent1:

[DW_Hornet]

Double damage and thermal projector = pwnage.

[Purity_the_Kitty]

The only one that needs toned down is the Thermal Projector. Do that and turn off Arkon Shields, and it's nicely balanced. The other weapons aren't that much more powerful than the existing ones.

All of my bot testing, btw, was done WITHOUT extra shields on. Thermals are overpowered, everything else is fine.

Personally? I'd recommend outright removing the Thermal Projector and adding in a new weapon. Something with a bit more multipurpose Shock Rifle-ish flavour. Anyone have a gun they'd like to see in?

Note: Nerfing the Thermal WILL require a new anti-vehicle weapon to be added, because there's nothing comparable to Avrils or Shocks. Mass Drivers are just too bloody slow...maybe increase the speed and ammo of those a little? Say, 20 shots and about 75% of the current recharge time?

[DW_Ifondlesweaters]

The Thermal Projector is the hottest (pun alert) weapon in the Arkon pack - you can't toss it. It's way sweet to hit a head shot with the TP. It just doesn't need to destroy everything it touches instantly. It would be nice if the power of the beam and its damage started out relatively weak and increased exponentially the longer it was coninuously held on its target. But that might be too complicated. It just seems like a way to balance the weapon and keep it packing some heat.

[Purity_the_Kitty]

That could be done. I'm not familiar with coding UT weapons, but I know someone who is could handle that relatively easily. Heck, if someone could point me to a UT mutating tutorial, I could learn it this weekend and create a new weapon based on the TP.

[killrob]

That was pretty cool for a change, but I have to agree with Alpha I like weapons that respond when I hit the fire button.
I'm standeing there watching Sweaters run up on me with a weapon(dont know the names yet) and I had what I thought to be a rocket launcher but it took like 3 seconds to start shooting, now true once it did damage was being inflicted at an extrodinary rate, so TAM? Mabey just with the ray gun(shots the red beam that can give you headshots if you just swing it around enough.
Very cool though Toxic! Course 32 players running around with the altfire on the bio looking gun and no one is going to be able to see anything except the little blue circles that pop up around you when your getting hit.
And I noticed that if you do not already have the correct ONSPlus version in your cache the beta server will not let you on! ( it says that the server refuses to send it)

[Purity_the_Kitty]

Alright, here's the skinny on some of those weapons that "don't respond". In fact, here's a complete weapons list with some tips on how to use them effectively.

1/1) Laserbomb: Slap it on the side of common passway, or better yet, just dive into an enemy formation and alt-fire for the suicide bomb. I don't find these all that effective defensively since they're not THAT hard to see, and can be shot. Better to blow yourself up. You can only carry one of these.
1/2) Disintegrator Grenade: Throw it into a bunch of guys, the damage to nodes isn't that high. You see dead people. Hold the fire button for more distance. Primary bounces and explodes after 3sec, secondary is impact-triggered. You can carry 3.
1/3) Thermo Grenade: Redeemer grenade, fired as above. THIS is good to toss at a node, but will also take out a tank or most of a levi in a pinch.

2) Thermo-Blasters: POWERFUL, but relatively inaccurate and munch ammo quickly. They do slowly recharge themselves, though, so you'll never be without a weapon for long. Keep the crosshairs over someone until you see a red box, and you'll get homing shots for as long as you keep them in.

3) Disintegrator: Unlimited Ammo! It recharges reasonably quickly, but the damage is based on the current charge of the weapon. Hold secondary to charge up a shot, but your speed is proportional to how long you charge up. If you charge from 100 to 0, you can't move...but IIRC this takes out a powercore in one shot. Have fun with this weapon, it's more powerful than it looks.

4) Thermal Projector: The overpowered gun. MASSIVE damage over time, secondary zooms, primary melts people. Simple to use, just...kill people with it. Headshots do double damage - kill someone with that to get a headshot award as normal.

5/1) Plasma Rifle: Plasma. Lots of it. Hold down the altfire to charge up for more plasma goodness. Not much to this weapon, just treat it like a super link gun primary.

5/2) Link Gun: It's the Link Gun. You should know what this is for!!!

6) Fusion Gatling Gun: THE most powerful weapon EVER developed...but it takes 3 full seconds to get the barrels spinning up. Anticipate this. Altfire locks the barrels spinning - you'll be slowed down with the barrels spinning (suspensor unit or something I guess) but you'll be able to quickly get the gun firing. The power is worth the wait...work on your steath skills and you'll be vaporizing people like I was the other night.

7/1) Combat Mortar: Damage over time - that little shocky bubble remains in play for a few seconds, hitting people for minor damage. The bigger effect is the fact that as soon as it hits, all shields on the target are removed, and the initial blast does pretty good damage. Secondary fire is pretty cool for scouting out areas, too, especially if you wonder how many guys are on the other side of a hill.

7/2) Disruptor: Lots of ammo to play with makes this a reliable weapon unlike most of the others, which deplete themselves quickly. Primary fire shoots out an explosive ball of doom, which forces the gun to recharge briefly. Secondary fire spews green fire EVERYWHERE, making it impossible to see. At close range, the secondary fire just obliterates people. The best use I've found for the primary fire, aside from general-purpose blasting, is knocking people out of mantas/scorps/hellbenders, because it does full damage to people inside.

8) Missile Launcher: All-purpose death dealer. Great damage, great fire rate, and the secondary fire is an aiming laser. It locks onto players/vehicles, but the missile will ALWAYS go where the laser is pointing, locked on or not, so you can do some pretty cool trick shots with the laser.

9) Mass Driver: King of snipes. Stupidly slow fire rate, but lots of zoom and headshots just kill people.

Super) Orbital Cannon Uplink: Ion Painter on Crack. This thing will basically ion-strike a target for about TEN SECONDS STRAIGHT. Doesn't matter what it was, it's gone. Good for making a node inaccessible - if you can grab one and hit their primary at the start of a game before they start building it, you just bought yourself a LOT of free build time.