Quotex's Ballistics Weapon Overhaul (In Ballistics We Trust)

[Quotex]

I've been playing the game for ~60 hours and have fallen in love with the realistic, look compared to the rather cartoony, fictional look that modern X-COM games have.

I've discovered, as probably many have before me, that the game has a lot of cut ballistic weapon assets.

So to train my abilities of modding the game I have decided to add these in along with the current ballistic weapons, along with making a few new assets and additions of myself.

NOTE: I am going for Realism over balance, so this mod maybe considered overpowered in early game play, I will later rebalance the aliens to counter this.

Some things i'm thinking on doing for my modpack:

May i AKSU a question?

2 new weapon classes to compliment, Submachine guns and Battle Rifles and 1 new side arm class, machine pistols.

Submachine guns have less range and stopping power, but are compact and have quicker handling.

Battle rifles on the other end have more range and stopping power, but are heavy, bulky and slow handling.

I will also be adding all cut content weapons, along with some home brewed variants.

AKM (Left, Icon is still a work in progress) will be added instead of the rather dated AK-47 (Right), but civilians will still carry these, so pick one up if you want the classic kalashnikov.

Planned changes

- The M16 (Assault Rifle) will be converted to fully automatic fire.

- The Beretta 92F (Pistol) will take up 2x2 instead of 2x3 inventory slots.

- The Mossberg 500 (Shotgun) will have an increased pellet count of 9, but each individual pellet does less damage.

- The Heckler & Koch G3SG/1 (Precision Rifle) will have a 10-round magazine in the icon.

Planned additions

Cut content including:

- M1911A1 (Colt1911)

- Makarov PM (Makarov)

- Colt Model 723 (M16 Short)

- SVD-M (SVD)

- PSG1 (PSG1, there will be some icon alterations)

- MG3 (MG42)

- HK21E (MG53)

- PKM (PK)

New content:

- M16A1 (Assault Rifle)

- G3A3 (Battle Rifle)

- G3A4 (Battle Rifle, Collapsible stock)

- G3KA4 (Battle Rifle, Shortened)

- AKM (Assault Rifle)

- AKMS (Assault Rifle, Folding Stock)

- AKMSU (Assault Rifle, Folding Stock & Shortened)

- Colt SMG 635 (Submachine Gun, Collapsible Stock)

- MP5A3 (Submachine Gun, Foldable Stock)

- MP5A4 (Submachine Gun, Fixed Stock)

- MP5SD3 (Submachine Gun, Collapsible Stock & Suppressed)

- MP5SD5 (Submachine Gun, Fixed Stock & Suppressed)

- Beretta 93R (Machine Pistol)

- MP5K (Machine Pistol)

Possible future additions:

- Assault Rifles (AUG, FNC, etc.)

- Sniper Rifles (Including the M40 for american Xenonauts)

- Light Machine guns (RPK, Lightened variants)

Which bullet is best bullet?

I've heard that this is Hard-coded into the game for every type except rockets, i am going to search for possible ways to work around this. For now, I will add multiple instances of the same guns, notifying the player in the Icons and/or Description names which ammo type or magazine that variant of the gun will take.

Since adding ammo variants as well as attachments to assault rifles would mean the entire loadout menu being just filled with assault rifles, i've decided to do these just for the other weapon classes (untill i find a way to work around the single ammo issue per gun issue)

Tracer Ammunition (Machine Guns)

Increased Accuracy and a mild incindiary damage bonus at the cost of kinetic and armor piercing power.

Slugs (Shotguns)

Increased range at the cost of spread and greater recoil.

Hollow Points (Pistols)

Does more kinetic damage at the cost of Armor-Piercing damage.

Armor Piercing Rounds (Sniper Rifles)

Does more damage against armored targets at the cost of overall kinetic damage done.

Size Matters, and so does weight.

I will be adding compact, light weight alternatives to current weapons. Pistols will take up less space, And Large 2x1 30-round magazines for the M16 Rifle will be introduced, the current weight of every ballistic weapon will be made (even) more accurate to their real life counter parts.

No cheat sheets!

Most of the stats will be removed from the descriptions (You will have to go out into the field and familiarize yourself with the weapons, though the descriptions will give away some clues)

Pimp my gun!

Lightweight foldable/collapsible stocks

Increased handling and decreased weight at the cost of a slight accuracy penalty, usefull for the soldiers that can't carry a lot of equipment.

Scopes

Increased accuracy over longer distances, but lose close range bonuses and increased weight and TU cost.

Suppressors

Increased reaction modifier due to concealment, but will make the gun bulkier, and less stopping power due to subsonic ammo.

Quick to draw, Quick to kill.

If possible, i'd like to explore the possibilities of reducing TU cost for items in the belt. This would make it more more logical to store weapons and magazines in there instead of using the backpack.

Stormtrooper accuracy no more.

Both sides will have a significant upgrade in accuracy and range, but covers will be made more effective. You really don't want to be caught in the open now.

Gun (Ga)lore

The real names of the weapons will be added along with an individual lore-like discription for each when you hover over them.

Future possibilities

As i go along with working on this modpack, i'd like to add the following features in the future.

- Ballistic weapons get more advanced as in-game years pass.

- Seperate Weapon Class Tabs for Easier sorting of large amounts of weapons.

Sorry for the wall of text, let me know what you think, I know guns mentioned in this post have been done in other mods, therefore i will try and make them differ more by giving them custom stats and icons that i made myself.

[drages]

Good to see more modders.. those are very nice ideas. i did not remember a mod about ballistic so detailed.. yeah they are some but most of them are very old.. we need more fresh blood!

If you need any help please ask.

As you said there is no way to make more then one bullet type. Default game does not have armour at aliens exept androns and its very low. For this reason, armour penetrating is not so usefull.

Making alien weapons much more acc will make them much more aggressive and it's a good thing.

The damage numbers of basic weapons are not so much so its hard to make different with those weapons. People work mostly on default weapons when they are making ballistics. Your mod would be much more unique if you add more ballistics for later game phases.

[Quotex]

Thanks for the kind words drages.

I will be editing the armor values of the current ingame units to be much more resilient against small caliber impacts.

Depending on the rank and race of the alien, they will be more armored appropriately, even more so for Androns. Sometimes, You will only be able to reliably take out high-ranking aliens with Automatic rifles, Long LMG bursts and Large Caliber Battle Rifles and Sniper Rifles. Slugs will also be needed to take down enemies in armor, as the small pellets don't deliver quite the punch that a large slug does.

I will be rebalancing the Damage values depending on how much kinetic energy a certain round produces (After all it is kinetic damage that is represented in the game)

Values that will also be taken into account is the bullet weight, muzzle velocity and the rifling of the barrels for the weapons (Each weapon has a maximum bullet weight that goes well with it before it starts losing a lot of accuracy due to instabilities, i will pick the bullets that work the best for each weapon) This way, 7.62 MGs won't do the same damage that 7.62 Sniper rifles do.

After all this is done, i'll probably have to take some of the damage into the Mitigation stat, to make sure that there aren't any overpowered rifles that could kill strong enemies with 1 shot (except for 50 cals of course, those are OP by default)

The alien weapons (and later other technologies) will also get buffs in damage, so you want to stay in cover as much as possible, covers themselves will be more effecive and get more hitpoints depending on how these new damage values will go.

And, i've also made some more progress with the weapon icons.

I have started working on an M16A2 (W.I.P., Early 80s ballistic tech upgrade, pictured left) and put the M16 (right) down to compare it. An M16A1 will also be available from the start, but does not feature the accurate 3-round burst mode, and instead fires fully automatic. The 30-round magazines will also take up twice the inventory space, and weigh more, but that's a minor inconvenience to how much the 10 rounds can save you in the battlefield.

Edited July 4, 2016 by Quotex

[Terran Ghost]

AKM (Left, Icon is still a work in progress) will be added instead of the rather dated AK-47 (Right), but civilians will still carry these, so pick one up if you want the classic kalashnikov.

Just wondering, is there any gameplay stat justification to keep both rifles as separate weapons ?

[Quotex]

Just wondering, is there any gameplay stat justification to keep both rifles as separate weapons ?

A̶s̶i̶d̶e̶ ̶f̶r̶o̶m̶ ̶t̶h̶e̶ ̶v̶i̶s̶u̶a̶l̶ ̶d̶i̶f̶f̶e̶r̶e̶n̶c̶e̶s̶,̶ ̶t̶h̶e̶ ̶s̶i̶g̶h̶t̶s̶ ̶a̶n̶d̶ ̶a̶d̶d̶e̶d̶ ̶c̶o̶m̶p̶e̶n̶s̶a̶t̶o̶r̶ ̶m̶a̶k̶e̶ ̶i̶t̶ ̶m̶o̶r̶e̶ ̶a̶c̶c̶u̶r̶a̶t̶e̶,̶ ̶a̶n̶d̶ ̶i̶t̶ ̶i̶s̶ ̶m̶a̶d̶e̶ ̶1̶ ̶k̶g̶ ̶l̶i̶g̶h̶t̶e̶r̶.̶

T̶h̶e̶ ̶r̶e̶a̶s̶o̶n̶ ̶i̶'̶m̶ ̶k̶e̶e̶p̶i̶n̶g̶ ̶t̶h̶e̶ ̶A̶K̶-̶4̶7̶ ̶i̶s̶ ̶m̶o̶r̶e̶ ̶a̶b̶o̶u̶t̶ ̶l̶o̶r̶e̶.̶ ̶T̶h̶e̶ ̶A̶K̶M̶ ̶w̶a̶s̶ ̶r̶e̶a̶l̶l̶y̶ ̶o̶n̶l̶y̶ ̶e̶q̶u̶i̶p̶e̶d̶ ̶b̶y̶ ̶t̶h̶e̶ ̶n̶a̶t̶i̶o̶n̶a̶l̶ ̶a̶r̶m̶e̶d̶ ̶f̶o̶r̶c̶e̶s̶,̶ ̶w̶h̶e̶r̶e̶ ̶a̶s̶ ̶l̶o̶c̶a̶l̶ ̶m̶i̶l̶i̶t̶i̶a̶s̶ ̶w̶o̶u̶l̶d̶ ̶s̶t̶i̶l̶l̶ ̶r̶e̶l̶y̶ ̶o̶n̶ ̶t̶h̶e̶ ̶o̶l̶d̶e̶r̶ ̶g̶u̶n̶s̶ ̶l̶e̶f̶t̶ ̶b̶e̶h̶i̶n̶d̶ ̶b̶y̶ ̶t̶h̶e̶ ̶a̶r̶m̶i̶e̶s̶ ̶d̶u̶r̶i̶n̶g̶ ̶c̶o̶n̶f̶l̶i̶c̶t̶.̶ ̶t̶h̶e̶ ̶A̶K̶-̶4̶7̶ ̶a̶l̶s̶o̶ ̶h̶a̶s̶ ̶a̶ ̶f̶a̶r̶ ̶g̶r̶e̶a̶t̶e̶r̶ ̶p̶r̶o̶d̶u̶c̶t̶i̶o̶n̶ ̶n̶u̶m̶b̶e̶r̶ ̶(̶7̶5̶ ̶m̶i̶l̶l̶i̶o̶n̶ ̶A̶K̶-̶4̶7̶s̶ ̶c̶o̶m̶p̶a̶r̶e̶d̶ ̶t̶o̶ ̶1̶0̶ ̶m̶i̶l̶l̶i̶o̶n̶ ̶A̶K̶M̶s̶)̶ ̶,̶ ̶w̶h̶i̶c̶h̶ ̶w̶o̶u̶l̶d̶ ̶m̶a̶k̶e̶ ̶i̶t̶ ̶m̶o̶r̶e̶ ̶c̶o̶m̶m̶o̶n̶ ̶i̶n̶ ̶g̶e̶n̶e̶r̶a̶l̶.̶

A̶n̶d̶ ̶g̶a̶m̶e̶p̶l̶a̶y̶ ̶w̶i̶s̶e̶,̶ ̶t̶h̶i̶s̶ ̶w̶i̶l̶l̶ ̶m̶a̶k̶e̶ ̶t̶h̶e̶ ̶l̶o̶c̶a̶l̶ ̶a̶r̶m̶e̶d̶ ̶f̶o̶r̶c̶e̶s̶ ̶s̶l̶i̶g̶h̶t̶l̶y̶ ̶w̶e̶a̶k̶e̶r̶ ̶a̶g̶a̶i̶n̶s̶t̶ ̶t̶h̶e̶ ̶a̶l̶i̶e̶n̶s̶.̶

EDIT: What i stated above is not entirely true as it will be corrected below, But I'm probably still going to keep the AK-47 around as a civilian weapon. Since i had plans for introducing some more civilian only weapons anyway, consider it a reminder of a civilian casualty if you decide to bring it back to the base.

Edited July 4, 2016 by Quotex

[drages]

You can change the weapon of the locals too. You are working with much details from real life.

There were a total ballistic overhaul mod years ago. Maybe you can go for full ballistic.. after you done tons of things to ballistics, the energy weapons will be so off.. As i said earlier, %90 moder who likes ballistics works on only default weapons which i dont think its a wise decision. I never saw a nice phase 2-3 ballistics with modern touch..

[Quotex]

So i've run into a crossroad at the moment.

I want to make every weapon scaled accurately when in the equipment menu (Pistols are too big/Rifles are too small, depending on which i'm going to use as a bench mark)

The Largest ballistic tech weapons are the Machineguns (mainly due to the large barrel lengths of 55cm/22 inches and up)

The biggest of them all being the FN MAG (126 cm)

So i have 2 options:

A. Take the realistic approach

Large weapons can only be carried in your xenonaut's hands, you can't put them in your backpack, so once they expire and you want to switch to a sidearm, you will need to drop them in the field .

Which shouldn't be a problem...yet (In the future i want to make it so that you will have to manufacture ballistic weaponry as well.)

B. Take the "Skyrim" approach

Enlarge the backpack to 6x5 or 6x4 slots (if this is even possible)

Personally i'd think the Realistic approach would work just fine, but i can see that it might be a hassle to remember to put your sidearms back and pick the primaries back up if you want to keep them. If done often it could even be quite costly.

Let me know which approach you think i should take.

[Terran Ghost]

The reason i'm keeping the AK-47 is more about lore. The AKM was really only equiped by the national armed forces, where as local militias would still rely on the older guns left behind by the armies during conflict. the AK-47 also has a far greater production number (75 million AK-47s compared to 10 million AKMs) , which would make it more common in general.

Sorry, but this statement is plain wrong. First of all, per official Soviet military designation system "AK-47" only refered to the rifle's experimental stages. The one adopted for service was officially named "7,62мм автомат Калашникова образца 1949 года", that translate to English roughly as "7,62mm caliber Kalashnikov automatic rifle, adoted in 1949".

However, "AK-47" became a public (mostly for non-professional circles) "call name" for ALL of AK\AKM direct clones - including the AK/AKS, AKM/AKMS, Type 56s and so on. So the figures of 75 millions "AK-47" rifles made refer to all of the AK\AKM direct clones - including the AK/AKS, AKM/AKMS, Type 56s, Misr, MPi-KM/MPi-KMS and some others, excluding the Rk.60/62 and the Galil series.

Aside from the visual differences, the sights and added compensator make it more accurate

And the reduced weight increase the kick, felt by the shooter. Per real world stats accuracy of original AK compared to the AKM do not differ significiantly from each other.

The problem with making huge assortment of traditional firearms is, in my opinion, that it is redundant per vanilla game mechanics - you are to develop and start issuing lasguns in their plase as soon as possible.

[Quotex]

Sorry, but this statement is plain wrong. First of all, per official Soviet military designation system "AK-47" only refered to the rifle's experimental stages. The one adopted for service was officially named "7,62мм автомат Калашникова образца 1949 года", that translate to English roughly as "7,62mm caliber Kalashnikov automatic rifle, adoted in 1949".

However, "AK-47" became a public (mostly for non-professional circles) "call name" for ALL of AK\AKM direct clones - including the AK/AKS, AKM/AKMS, Type 56s and so on. So the figures of 75 millions "AK-47" rifles made refer to all of the AK\AKM direct clones - including the AK/AKS, AKM/AKMS, Type 56s, Misr, MPi-KM/MPi-KMS and some others, excluding the Rk.60/62 and the Galil series.

And the reduced weight increase the kick, felt by the shooter. Per real world stats accuracy of original AK compared to the AKM do not differ significiantly from each other.

The problem with making huge assortment of traditional firearms is, in my opinion, that it is redundant per vanilla game mechanics - you are to develop and start issuing lasguns in their plase as soon as possible.

Thanks for the corrections, I have read some things wrong on wikipedia about the production numbers, and i realized this, but haven't had the time to edit them yet.

And is the designation like the M16 rifle's one? Which is refered by the military as the "Rifle, Caliber 5.56 mm, M16"?

You'll have to understand that I rely on the internet for all my information, as the country I live in (The Netherlands), has rather strict rules and restrictions on firearms. I try to make it as accurate as possible, but i can still miss stuff, so feedback is appreciated.

I understand that adding a large assortment of weapons is redundant, but i've thought about plans to either remove all other technology and make a "full ballistics mod" as drages mentioned. Or make it so that Researching takes longer and is less effective (The researched weapons would receive nerfed stats, because all the weapons are rather crude and experimental, but would later be replaced by the current-stat versions as time advances.)

Edited July 4, 2016 by Quotex

[drages]

As i know you can edit the backpack size, there were some very very old mods which mades the backpack smaller but i never saw a larger one. It would need a big work at lua files too..

Yes you can make the heavy weapons huge, its a unique idea. I can use this idea too for my miniguns..

If you plan to make the guns unlimited without manifacture, you can use replace by research. If you go ful for ballistic, you would need at least 2 set of guns for laser/plasma phases..

[Terran Ghost]

I understand that adding a large assortment of weapons is redundant, but i've thought about plans to either remove all other technology and make a "full ballistics mod"

Since there was already a "full ballistics mod" (Magnumnauts, if I remember correctly) it is certainly possible.

However, IMHO it should be noted that the original game didn't operated on basis of "have different models of firearms for every tactical niche (like assault rifles or LMG) with every model have their own pros and cons". Instead, the game operated on a system of "tiers". That means, once next tier is researched and manufactured, previous tier weapons becoming oboslete - next tier weapons are simply and outright better.

[drages]

Default game did not use many aspect it has, like resistances.. They are some combinations you can make with the weapon stats too.. ranges, special armour penetrating (a weapon can only have one damage type and it can penetrate resistance only of that damage), reactions, firing TU's, firing types...

Even those are still limited, there is many thing to do which the main game did not. Erasing all energy type weapons and making full ballistic will limit this too.. For this reason rather then making full of ballistic weapon game, energy weapons can have the love to make them creative too.

Its like making all call of duty game eras in one strategic game.. both for early and future aspects..

[Quotex]

Editing a backpack to make it bigger is possible.

I've made the backpack both larger, and smaller.

Larger in a way that it is now 13x13 instead of the Original 5x5.

But the slots are now smaller, and guns will take up more space, since everything will be in the backpack at the same scale.

For example, the old M16 used up 3x5 slots, where as the new one one takes up 3x12 slots.

The 20-round magazines will probably still take up 1x1 slot, but the 30-round magazines for the AK-47 and the M-16 might end up taking 1x2 slots, along with the additional weight penalty.

I will probably end up making the backpack smaller (like 15x10, so that with a length greater then ~17 inches will not fit into it and it's mainly used for other equipment like rockets and medpacks), but first i want to scale the weapons properly to go with the new grid layout.

Here's an early WIP preview of the new grid (still need to adjust a lot of the graphics and add more squares.

As for 3rd tier and up weapons, i will have to think on how to approach that, for now i'm going to focus on finishing the First (Ballistics) and 2nd (Improved Ballistics) tiers.

EDIT: I've also been thinking that Ammo Production could possibly be a thing. This would add a new factor to the game, Ammo production would take time, money and engineers. So you'd have to spent time producing ammo for your troops, you could end up with ammo shortages at the times when you need it.

It would also make higher tier weapons more costly to use, since not only would the ammo be far more expensive, it would also require certain alien materials to be produced.

Edited July 5, 2016 by Quotex

[drages]

Good job at making the backpack bigger.

About ammo manufacturing, the game is not well coded at that side. The calculation could be wrong time to time, so you can have more ammo after a battle for example. For this reason, there is no mod with manufactured ammo.

[Quotex]

Good job at making the backpack bigger.

About ammo manufacturing, the game is not well coded at that side. The calculation could be wrong time to time, so you can have more ammo after a battle for example. For this reason, there is no mod with manufactured ammo.

I didn't know this, i'll have to do some tests ingame to see how it will work out, if it turns out to have a lot of problems, i'll have to stick with infinite ammo.

[Terran Ghost]

I've also been thinking that Ammo Production could possibly be a thing. This would add a new factor to the game, Ammo production would take time, money and engineers

Well, if you are going for a "total ballistic mod" that going to be, honestly, unnecessary (for a player) complication and an illogical one, in case of, say, Soviet Army-standard munitions (since they are produced in factory environment by the magnitude of millions or even tens of millions per year).

[Quotex]

Well, if you are going for a "total ballistic mod" that going to be, honestly, unnecessary (for a player) complication and an illogical one, in case of, say, Soviet Army-standard munitions (since they are produced in factory environment by the magnitude of millions or even tens of millions per year).

Yeah, you're right, i might do it with Expirimental Anti-alien ammo types the Xenonaut project develops in later weapon tiers though. Maybe as a way to make some extra money, by selling the ammunition to nations. There isn't a purchase menu like there is for planes. Else I'd make it so that you'd have to buy the ammo.

EDIT: I am doing some research work on ballistics at the moment, and i wonder if the game has any support for custom damage and accuracy at a certain range, as far as i know it only starts dropping in accuracy and damage once you go outside of the effective range But i wonder if it's possible to insert custom damage and accuracy numbers for a specific range.

Edited July 6, 2016 by Quotex