Sniper Weapon [Split from Balance changes for 019]

[Skybax]

I still want a sniper weapon, that 1-shots and has a zoom mode. We have just about every other type of gun/weapon besides a sniper.
Right click to zoom (just like Sensor, possibly must have sensor to use the sniper) and then left click for fire. Zooming makes you go slower. Maybe prevent it from being fired unless you are first zoomed, which would make it ineffective at close ranges.
Yes.

[Quartz]

I still want a sniper weapon, that 1-shots and has a zoom mode. We have just about every other type of gun/weapon besides a sniper.
Right click to zoom (just like Sensor, possibly must have sensor to use the sniper) and then left click for fire. Zooming makes you go slower. Maybe prevent it from being fired unless you are first zoomed, which would make it ineffective at close ranges.
Yes.

Look, much as I love the idea, how the crap do you implement zoom into a top-down shooter? Like, if anyone has any actual *intuitive* idea on how to do this, go right on ahead. I'd love a sniper.

[Skybax]

Look, much as I love the idea, how the crap do you implement zoom into a top-down shooter? Like, if anyone has any actual *intuitive* idea on how to do this, go right on ahead. I'd love a sniper.

Imagine Sensor with a toggle, or maybe allow the screen to move with the reticle for a bit so you could look far away.

Sniper weapon is interesting, although I'm not really seeing it as practical. Most maps with a decent amount of walls and objects would make it very difficult to line up a straight shot. That and the the fast-paced movement of ships would would make for a very difficult weapon.

I'm sure it could be done with practice, but I think at least I would just elect to use the weapon for its zoom advantages (spy on the enemies from a safe distance) and not bother with trying to use it to kill enemies. I think I'd have more luck just charging into a battle with phasers blazing.

More importantly, I'm not sure I can really get behind the idea of getting killed at long-range with no defenses. Warding off cloakers is tough as it is, but I can use sensor or try to watch for particle displacement as ways of defending myself. With sniper, there's pretty much nothing I can do except hide behind some walls - which is pretty discouraging. Maybe - laser dot? To give a little warning?

That said, I think a medium-range sniper-esque weapon - where you can zoom to the extent of sensor, then fire a laser from a distance - might work well. Give the laser a charge time to prevent someone from exploiting the zoom, though. You could also increase the "life-time" (as raptor put it) of the laser beam... this would allow you to shoot a laser down a long hallway maybe you'll get lucky?

[Skybax]

Sniper weapon is interesting, although I'm not really seeing it as practical. Most maps with a decent amount of walls and objects would make it very difficult to line up a straight shot. That and the the fast-paced movement of ships would would make for a very difficult weapon.

I'm sure it could be done with practice, but I think at least I would just elect to use the weapon for its zoom advantages (spy on the enemies from a safe distance) and not bother with trying to use it to kill enemies. I think I'd have more luck just charging into a battle with phasers blazing.

More importantly, I'm not sure I can really get behind the idea of getting killed at long-range with no defenses. Warding off cloakers is tough as it is, but I can use sensor or try to watch for particle displacement as ways of defending myself. With sniper, there's pretty much nothing I can do except hide behind some walls - which is pretty discouraging. Maybe - laser dot? To give a little warning?

That said, I think a medium-range sniper-esque weapon - where you can zoom to the extent of sensor, then fire a laser from a distance - might work well. Give the laser a charge time to prevent someone from exploiting the zoom, though. You could also increase the "life-time" (as raptor put it) of the laser beam... this would allow you to shoot a laser down a long hallway maybe you'll get lucky?

Almost every map has some sort of corridor or open area, or at least a small space that you could snipe through. And yes, it could also be used to spy, but only just as much as Sensor would let you do x)
Well, shield would still defend against it, but ideally, you shouldn't often be still enough for a sniper to get an easy shot on you. A laser line could be a good warning though, although that might totally nerf the sniper as it would be super easy to see lol... laser lines only work well in 3D games where you can already be pointing at someone (and see them) before you zoom in for the shot.

I agree with you idea that the sniper should only go as far as Sensor would allow. I don't think it should have a charge time, though, as that would make it too difficult. Just have it drain all of your energy with each shot. Long life is good

[bobdaduck]

When you zoom with sniper the game should have a neat hover effect and switch to 3d third person behind your ship

Almost every map has some sort of corridor or open area, or at least a small space that you could snipe through.

Oh, I'm not denying that it would be possible. I just think that finding an optimal position that (a) protects you from enemy fire and (b) offers targets at a range that couldn't be simply reached with a phaser stream would be very tricky. Think about trying to do this while under pressure of time, scores, and threat of nearby enemies. Maintaining this position would be even harder.

I think the majority of sniper users would struggle to find a promising location quickly, and would just settle for using it as a medium-ranged high-powered rifle, which defeats its purpose.

Well, shield would still defend against it, but ideally, you shouldn't often be still enough for a sniper to get an easy shot on you. A laser line could be a good warning though, although that might totally nerf the sniper as it would be super easy to see lol... laser lines only work well in 3D games where you can already be pointing at someone (and see them) before you zoom in for the shot.

To be clear, I meant a laser dot, not a whole laser line tracing from the shooter to the victim. Ideally a dot would be a good compromise - reasonably difficult to see, but give some kind of protection to the victim. That said, after thinking about this some more I'm not sure this is the optimal solution.

I agree with you idea that the sniper should only go as far as Sensor would allow. I don't think it should have a charge time, though, as that would make it too difficult. Just have it drain all of your energy with each shot. Long life is good

That would work too! Just some kind of feature that prevents it from becoming too powerful of a weapon.

[bobdaduck]

Can we disengage the screen being focused on your ship? That would make zoom work smoothly. You press fire, and the screen drifts off your ship towards your cursor (to a limit). Then when you release fire it fires the sniper round/laser/railgun. This keeps it from being a duplicate sensor, makes you more vulnerable for using a high power weapon, and works fluid/intuitively.


...There is no way the devs will ever add this.

[Skybax]

Can we disengage the screen being focused on your ship? That would make zoom work smoothly. You press fire, and the screen drifts off your ship towards your cursor (to a limit). Then when you release fire it fires the sniper round/laser/railgun. This keeps it from being a duplicate sensor, makes you more vulnerable for using a high power weapon, and works fluid/intuitively.

That's actually a really good idea lol

I still worry that with this advantage we'd be more inclined to use it for its zoom and less for its weaponry capabilities. Being able actually physically slide my screen over would allow me to look past walls and obstacles, peering into the enemy base or traps ahead without being in much danger.

For breaching an enemy base, I could use sniper to look at the positions of enemies, turrets, and mines, switch to a more mobile weapon and charge.

For playing in Rabbit or Nexus I could pan around to find the flags. So much for hiding spots.

This just sounds like a weapon that would get exploited and weaken its primary purpose.

To be constructive, might I suggest a reduced view when enabling zoom? Think fading shadows blocking out sides of the screen save for a chunk in the middle where you have your weapon aimed.

I'll be honest, I'm not really a fan of the sniper concept in general, but that's mostly just personal tastes. Objectively, I think a medium-ranged weapon as we discussed before is much more practical, and carries less risk of exploitation.

Maybe bullets could go over a certain amount of walls

[kaen]

...There is no way the devs will ever add this.

For a couple of reasons:

• It's completely different from any weapon currently in the game, and definitely breaks the traditional "multiplayer Asteroids" feel of the game.
• "Lasers" (or any instantaneous weapon) don't abide by the traditional physics of bitfighter where projectiles gradually move across the map. With adequate skill, you can dodge any projectile fired at you (currently). This also has totally different network behavior, because an instantaneous weapon won't be visible until it has already hit you. Projectiles with finite velocity just behave much better over a network, and this helps keep bitfighter feeling fast and resilient to lag.
• There is a TNL concept of "scope" which limits the objects that are sent to the clients, saving bandwidth and also preventing cheaters from knowing e.g. where the enemy flag carrier is at all times. Normally your scope is set to the viewport plus a small margin to account for network latency so that objects don't magically pop in when there's a lot of lag. This sniper business requires expanding your scope on-demand, causing a spike in the amount of bandwidth your connection consumes. In order to implement this scope expansion efficiently, we'd have to write an entirely new clause in the scoping algorithm. Moreover, a cheater could abuse this expanded scope to learn the location of objects/players well beyond the "fair" scope.
• "Zooming" and "sniper rifles" just plain ol' do not make any sense in a top-down 2D game.

[kaen]

I split this from the old thread because this isn't a balance change, it's a feature request.

[bobdaduck]

A weapon to make sensor useful would be nice.

It seems to only exist to counter cloak and to enable spybugs, which was more of an after the fact anyway.

[Skybax]

The scope sounds like way too much work. To make it less abuseable, it should probably just use Sensor itself to see farther.

Also, even real sniper weapons aren't "instantaneous"
They're just really fast.
Like, at least four times faster than normal phaser speed.

Maybe bullets could go over a certain amount of walls

Welp, that's terrifying.

Also, even real sniper weapons aren't "instantaneous"
They're just really fast.
Like, at least four times faster than normal phaser speed.

But for the sake of argument, that's virtually instantaneous. You won't be able to tell a major difference with your naked eye.

[Skybax]

But for the sake of argument, that's virtually instantaneous. You won't be able to tell a major difference with your naked eye.

Are you sure phaserSpeed times 4 is too fast for the naked eye to see..?

I'd think you'd be able to see it, it would just be really hard to avoid unless you were already moving really fast. But it would still technically be "avoidable" to stick with the game physics of moving shots. And it would have a small amount of lag (so you couldn't just click on a ship and it would go boom, if it was moving you might have to click a bit ahead of it)


But mainly just a weapon that goes long range in an open area and takes away a lot of energy, is what I'm suggesting.

Maybe not? I guess I'm exaggerating a bit. But yeah, I just meant that you're probably screwed if a phaser of that velocity hits you.