The 5 FPS Weapons Test Pilots Love Most
Hey! I'm PilotPrecise, aka Isaac, and I'm behind the scenes trying to balance, nerf and buff weapons across many different scenarios. We asked Test Pilots for a closer look into their load out selection. And in this article I want to share some thoughts on the weapons they're using most in avatar combat.
And while this is pretty much the current hitlist of OP weapons at the moment, I might become the guy that gets the abuse (lol)! Still, I'd love to read your own experience with FPS weapons. Let me know what you think on our forums or in Discord.
Before the Enceladus update, we had put a whole bunch of work into ship weapons, ignoring the FPS side. So for quite a long time, we had just an SMG and a hand gun. And we had been working with these space weapons with all these big energies and lasers and railguns and what not. And when it came time to come back to avatar combat, I started with where I have the most experience and love for playing: first person shooters. So it feels good to just get in and have that familiarity with the role of each weapon. Still, this is a work in progress. And we're continually modifying the use profile for each weapon.
[h3]And Now, to the Top 5 FPS Weapons:[/h3]
The Kingsguard, being our first assault rifle, set the standard that I balance all the other assault rifles around.
It's kind of supposed to be this stock, standard infantry rifle. So I’ve given it this very archetypical role. But it’s perhaps just a little less directly iconic since there’s two other assault rifles you can choose that kind of fit, also, as an infantry (single shot) rifle. They’re all definitely in that assault rifle category although their fire rates are a little bit lower, punchier and heavier.
Using these archetypical roles, we’re trying to reimagine them for what avatar combat would be like. There’s no sniper rifles, no LMGs and what not. But I try to give the flavor of utility and sense of power of those kind of weapons into something that might be carried into an assault rifle. They have multipurpose use but I'm working on extending that a little bit too.
The Autotac is our main SMG. And the SMG has always been our core primary weapon. We built it around the score asset so it was one of the first models we had to use. There was nothing else for it to be more or less powerful than.
But SMGs are so standard in shooters as a multipurpose gun. So it’s always going to be a safe bet to choose that in your loadout. Everything is tuned around “Does it feel good in combat?” And it just sort of sets our base line time to kill and everything else.
After we started making small adjustments around it, as we built out other weapons, it's become that perfect balance between lethal and convenient.
It's the most powerful avatar weapon. And it's putting out a lot of damage every time it fires. And all of that's just compensated by its short range.
I call this (our music composer) Casey's weapon because it carries his particular set of initials. And when I threw a numeric designator at the end of his initials, well, you’ve got yourself a model number: The CP-5!
The Duchess and the R Zero, oddly enough, are the only variants in this list that are actually weapon variants and not base weapons.
The Duchess came about after introducing a single shot hand cannon. But it was kinda disconcerting for people to see a revolver get reloaded that was a single shot. Because there’s the whole cylinder spinning and everything else in that reload sequence. So a simple fix was to make this variant a revolver itself. So I made it match the same hand cannon role if you had to do it with a few more bullets. I lowered the damage, adjusted the head shot, and now it feels like a three-round hand cannon where if you land all three shots then you’re pretty much guaranteed a kill.
So now it’s a secondary that’s got three shots on it and a fairly slow time to arm between each shot. It definitely feels heavy and powerful. The Duchess is hard for me not to recommend in all situations.
Again, along with the Duchess, the R Zero, oddly enough, is the only other variant on this list that's not a base weapon.
The R Zero’s intention is for it to be an anti-shield sidearm. So eventually, when we get the damage model working with damage types, that will help differentiate the R Zero from what is, technically, the R One, which is the main revolver. This is why I call it the R Zero. R for revolver. And the 'zero' came about because I was looking for something that would perform a charge particle, anti-shield type of role. So it would be like a slug thrower that had a little bit of tech applied to it and was just given that name as an antidote to a sort of thing.
[h3]How Do I Approach Balance[/h3]
When I'm considering rebalancing a weapon, I first think about that weapon's role. For example, JimJimFace (James) will often, when we’re digging through a hairy problem, help us resurface against the goal that we’re trying to solve. And it's the same thing with tuning and balancing. You can’t just take the first bit or first idea of what you want. You should take that at face value rather than as a directive. So you get feedback that some weapon is too powerful and does too much damage. First, I have to accept that the feedback is totally valid. And then start to dissect what the feedback is actually getting at. Because sometimes the solution will point to what is believed to be the problem but won’t necessarily be the actual problem. So usually what I’m thinking about is:
- what are the goals?
- what are the sort of final goals for the ideal form for this weapon to have?
- what’s this weapon supposed to be doing?
- and what is this weapon doing now that’s not letting it do whatever it’s role is?
There’s lot of bugs to find in terms of balance. And it’s very situational in helping us learn where we need to change our interface and flows. I’ll be in a fight and I’ll sense myself wanting a different weapon that I know we have. So getting familiar with the weapons and the roles they’re useful in is key to the process.
[h3]What's Next For FPS Weapons[/h3]
We're conveniently in the middle of an engine upgrade, so we have the project locked down. Working in assets that don’t touch code is the safest thing to be up to. So I'm working on audio to help further differentiate how each Avatar weapon feels.
I do this with an Ableton project that has each weapon kind of called out on its own line. I export out from that. I go to audition to clean everything up and trim it. But it all means I have reference for each sound all the way back to their master. Then switching back and forth between an AR and a Pistol always just sounds right. It’s dope. Every gun just feels more different now. We aren’t just working with stock samples. We’re going to sound real good.
What's an FPS weapon or attribute you'd like to see us introduce into Avatar combat?
And while this is pretty much the current hitlist of OP weapons at the moment, I might become the guy that gets the abuse (lol)! Still, I'd love to read your own experience with FPS weapons. Let me know what you think on our forums or in Discord.
Before the Enceladus update, we had put a whole bunch of work into ship weapons, ignoring the FPS side. So for quite a long time, we had just an SMG and a hand gun. And we had been working with these space weapons with all these big energies and lasers and railguns and what not. And when it came time to come back to avatar combat, I started with where I have the most experience and love for playing: first person shooters. So it feels good to just get in and have that familiarity with the role of each weapon. Still, this is a work in progress. And we're continually modifying the use profile for each weapon.
[h3]And Now, to the Top 5 FPS Weapons:[/h3]
The Kingsguard, being our first assault rifle, set the standard that I balance all the other assault rifles around.
It's kind of supposed to be this stock, standard infantry rifle. So I’ve given it this very archetypical role. But it’s perhaps just a little less directly iconic since there’s two other assault rifles you can choose that kind of fit, also, as an infantry (single shot) rifle. They’re all definitely in that assault rifle category although their fire rates are a little bit lower, punchier and heavier.
Using these archetypical roles, we’re trying to reimagine them for what avatar combat would be like. There’s no sniper rifles, no LMGs and what not. But I try to give the flavor of utility and sense of power of those kind of weapons into something that might be carried into an assault rifle. They have multipurpose use but I'm working on extending that a little bit too.
The Autotac is our main SMG. And the SMG has always been our core primary weapon. We built it around the score asset so it was one of the first models we had to use. There was nothing else for it to be more or less powerful than.
But SMGs are so standard in shooters as a multipurpose gun. So it’s always going to be a safe bet to choose that in your loadout. Everything is tuned around “Does it feel good in combat?” And it just sort of sets our base line time to kill and everything else.
After we started making small adjustments around it, as we built out other weapons, it's become that perfect balance between lethal and convenient.
It's the most powerful avatar weapon. And it's putting out a lot of damage every time it fires. And all of that's just compensated by its short range.
I call this (our music composer) Casey's weapon because it carries his particular set of initials. And when I threw a numeric designator at the end of his initials, well, you’ve got yourself a model number: The CP-5!
The Duchess and the R Zero, oddly enough, are the only variants in this list that are actually weapon variants and not base weapons.
The Duchess came about after introducing a single shot hand cannon. But it was kinda disconcerting for people to see a revolver get reloaded that was a single shot. Because there’s the whole cylinder spinning and everything else in that reload sequence. So a simple fix was to make this variant a revolver itself. So I made it match the same hand cannon role if you had to do it with a few more bullets. I lowered the damage, adjusted the head shot, and now it feels like a three-round hand cannon where if you land all three shots then you’re pretty much guaranteed a kill.
So now it’s a secondary that’s got three shots on it and a fairly slow time to arm between each shot. It definitely feels heavy and powerful. The Duchess is hard for me not to recommend in all situations.
Again, along with the Duchess, the R Zero, oddly enough, is the only other variant on this list that's not a base weapon.
The R Zero’s intention is for it to be an anti-shield sidearm. So eventually, when we get the damage model working with damage types, that will help differentiate the R Zero from what is, technically, the R One, which is the main revolver. This is why I call it the R Zero. R for revolver. And the 'zero' came about because I was looking for something that would perform a charge particle, anti-shield type of role. So it would be like a slug thrower that had a little bit of tech applied to it and was just given that name as an antidote to a sort of thing.
[h3]How Do I Approach Balance[/h3]
When I'm considering rebalancing a weapon, I first think about that weapon's role. For example, JimJimFace (James) will often, when we’re digging through a hairy problem, help us resurface against the goal that we’re trying to solve. And it's the same thing with tuning and balancing. You can’t just take the first bit or first idea of what you want. You should take that at face value rather than as a directive. So you get feedback that some weapon is too powerful and does too much damage. First, I have to accept that the feedback is totally valid. And then start to dissect what the feedback is actually getting at. Because sometimes the solution will point to what is believed to be the problem but won’t necessarily be the actual problem. So usually what I’m thinking about is:
- what are the goals?
- what are the sort of final goals for the ideal form for this weapon to have?
- what’s this weapon supposed to be doing?
- and what is this weapon doing now that’s not letting it do whatever it’s role is?
There’s lot of bugs to find in terms of balance. And it’s very situational in helping us learn where we need to change our interface and flows. I’ll be in a fight and I’ll sense myself wanting a different weapon that I know we have. So getting familiar with the weapons and the roles they’re useful in is key to the process.
[h3]What's Next For FPS Weapons[/h3]
We're conveniently in the middle of an engine upgrade, so we have the project locked down. Working in assets that don’t touch code is the safest thing to be up to. So I'm working on audio to help further differentiate how each Avatar weapon feels.
I do this with an Ableton project that has each weapon kind of called out on its own line. I export out from that. I go to audition to clean everything up and trim it. But it all means I have reference for each sound all the way back to their master. Then switching back and forth between an AR and a Pistol always just sounds right. It’s dope. Every gun just feels more different now. We aren’t just working with stock samples. We’re going to sound real good.
Let me read your think!
What's an FPS weapon or attribute you'd like to see us introduce into Avatar combat?
