Accelerated Weapons

[plucx]

Let's share our tough about the accelerated weapons!
@Vitruviansquid @Irishguy117 @Novadea
 

1 hour ago, Vitruviansquid said:

My findings playing on Veteran are that accelerated weapons is a wayyyyyy worse research than warden armor and it's kind of a no-brainer to research Warden Armor as soon as possible after you bag your first aliens in that initial research team battle. Then, by the time you're done fielding your warden armor, you might as well skip accelerated weapons and go straight for laser weapons. 

I think the problem is that the niche that Accelerated Weapons are supposed to fill is itself very problematic and you can't meaningfully make the accelerated weapons tech feel good without reworking its niche. It seems pretty clear to me that accelerated weapons is designed as a stopgap so that you have some kind of weapons development you can opt to get before you incorporate the alien tech into your weapons and make laser weapons. But even playing in the hard mode, I'm not scared enough of Sectons, Sebilians, or Psyons, to feel that I need to upgun my soldiers to handle them. Of course, you can't make accelerated weapons necessary by nerfing ballistic weapons so badly that players come out the gate having no effectiveness against the early game enemies either. Besides, if I get accelerated weapons to prevent some loss of life in the early game, well Warden Armor is already ridiculously superb at doing that. In fact, Warden Armor is such a massive upgrade over Defender Armor, I would probably opt for the Warden Armor even if instead of researching accelerated weapons, I could directly research laser weapons at that place in the tech tree.

So here's what I'd propose for the subject of making Accelerated Weapons a more desirable research:

1. The new niche for Accelerated Weapons is a cheap and easily produced weapon that is more okay to lose on top of being soon to research and quick to research. Cut the research time for Accelerated Weapons in half. Eliminate the money cost for building Accelerated Weapons, just retain an alloy cost - then slash the alloy cost of Accelerated Weapons to something like 1 per pistol, 3 per bigger gun.

2. Retool the rule of armor destruction on death to be armor and weapon destruction. When your soldier dies, you lose his armor AND his weapon.

Consider now how much it costs to lose a soldier:

10k for the man

~47k for the warden armor

~131k for a laser rifle OR 41k for a post-buff accelerated rifle (currently, an accelerated rifle costs ~66k a pop)

or you can say about ~188k is the cost of losing an armored soldier armed with a laser rifle and ~98k for an armored soldier armed with an accelerated rifle. Even more woe to you if your soldier was carrying multiple laser weapons, like a laser shotgun and a laser pistol both. Of course, some players are not playing with any armor loss, so this is just one suggestion - the main idea is that Accelerated Weapons need some niche.

That said, I think the game might also benefit from a bigger discussion about the overwhelming power of Warden Armor, too.

Warden armor has no tradeoffs because it is lighter than Defender Armor and more protective. And it's fine for something you have to research and then buy to have no tradeoffs, but perhaps it also shouldn't be quite so good and cost effective (we're sitting here discussing how to make Accelerated Weapons a bit stronger of a choice, and the entire time, Warden armor is even cheaper to make than a current-patch accelerated rifle!). If the option for equipment destruction is still only applicable to the soldier's armor, I'd push for a balance pass that systematically makes armor be a bigger portion of the cost to equip a soldier.

 

18 hours ago, Novadea said:

I do have to agree with this statement partially, there're few more "trap" sciences that aren't worth it _at least for how I was playing_. If I'd start again now I'd totally skip a bunch of researches because they'll get obsolete the moment you have them produced.

[plucx]

Several players, (myself included) seems to find the accelerated weapons "Kinda" useless.

The Accelerated weapon feels like a weaker gauss weapons from TFTD, costly but will give you an edge while you farm other research.

In TFTD, Gauss also provided you with a backup weapon if your harvest went poorly, however it was not required.
The weapon was decent, but required more luck than using a sonic tier weapon to bring down an enemy.
However, the Gauss could carry itself through mid game well enough to make it to the endgame.

It's main advantages was to free your research for interceptors and armors, while costing very little resources. you could then sell the advanced weapons looted from the battlefield to improve your infrastructure.

However, at this time, the accelerated weapon (the equivalent of the gauss rifle), is sub-par to the laser while being expensive to make.
While i'm at 40% completion of the game, there seems to be more weapon research available.

However ...
I wondered how to make this asset still relevant, Here is my tought:
-Make the accelerated weapon replace all the basic rifle and guns.
-Like the interceptor research, having the research + the upgrade made in the workshop would provide you with the weapons in infinite quantities.

Why this could be a good idea (Imho)?
-It is very expensive and resource consuming to make the laser weapons and the accelerated weapons. Making both weapons in enough quantities is a big expense that has little return.
-Making the accelerated weapons infinite, could provide you with improved weapons for your other bases that can be filled with reserve soldiers, while making the game asset more useful and flexible.
-It would help managing several base inventories and make the defense of your other bases cheaper than using laser weapons and a bit easier than using conventional weapons. Making base defense more diverse and engaging and relevant. If you defend using soldiers it take less space than using laser/plasma defense ... but you got to have the grunts armed.
-If you send rookies into a mission, you can equip them with accelerated weapons and not care as much if you lose them.
-If the player lose a lot of advanced weapons in a mission, and he has researched the accelerated weapons, he can be back in the fight quickly using accelerated weapons while he build back his armory.
-It could give more real choices to the player. ie: if a player want to defend his bases using soldiers (quicker to move than building defenses), he can do it while knowing that later he can improve his guns slightly by upgrading the general armory with accelerated weapons.

Tell me what you think!

[plucx]

It seems that the damage type between the laser and accelerated is different? I will check this out.

[DaviddesJ]

There's threads on Steam complaining that laser weapons are worthless compared to accelerated weapons.

 

If people are making both arguments then maybe the balance is about right.

[DaviddesJ]

9 hours ago, plucx said:

However, at this time, the accelerated weapon (the equivalent of the gauss rifle), is sub-par to the laser while being expensive to make.

Note that laser weapons require Alenium, and accelerated weapons do not, so that's a big difference.

[doubleskulls]

It will be interesting to see if there is some definite case, but I think the problem is that there isn't 'clear water' between lasers and accelerated weapons. The differences are marginal, but mainly sit with the accelerated weapons in spite of it being earlier tech. The biggest pro for laser weapons is that you need them to get advanced lasers, which are clearly better than either, so arguable its 'cheaper' as you need to build the laser weapons but don't need the accelerated ones. I can see viable strategy to go accelerated (and get a 'free' tech for interceptor weapons too) so you can focus research elsewhere, and wait for lasers until you are close Alien Plasma Weapons research OR whether its better to go straight to lasers and skip accelerated altogether.  

[Shadeth]

I would understand if the devs don't want to make accelerated weapons free upgrades to all guns, if it might affect game balance too abruptly, but they should at the least, make them cheap to produce. Right now in my game, my finances are way too tight to be making guns that hardly do a few points more damage than what I got.  The Warden armor is nice and clearly worth making but these guns, I don't feel like they are.

[Skyfire]

47 minutes ago, Shadeth said:

Right now in my game, my finances are way too tight to be making guns that hardly do a few points more damage than what I got.

I have a feeling that the damage upgrade might be a bit more significant than it seems. If an enemy has 50 HP, then an upgrade from 49 damage to 50 damage per shot is an effective 100% damage increase rather than 2%. That is, it takes you from 2 shots to kill to one shot to kill. I have a feeling that there's some similar breakpoints getting hit with the accelerated weapons - even if it's only a few points of damage, there are two-shots turning into one-shots or three-shots turning into two-shots.

I might go through and run the numbers at some point - this is just intuition at the moment.

[doubleskulls]

The numbers are pretty marginal. Looking at 2 shot kills, 5 points of penetration is better than 6 more points of destruction until you get to armour 44, or 13 armour for a 3 shot kill. So for most of the game accelerated weapons are doing marginally more damage per shot, require reloading less frequently, Lasers do give the accuracy bonus, are better at terrain clearance and MGs have better range too. Lower weight is offset by having to carry additional ammo. Accelerated weapons use fewer resources (alenium) and less money to build. 

From a research perspective magnetic weapons also gives an upgrade for interceptor weapons, but is otherwise a dead end. Lasers are upgradeable later.

I think the research aspect probably tips the balance, therefore best strategy as things are is to decide which you want. If you want accelerator weapons then you can delay laser research a bit, or if you go lasers just skip alien magnetic weapons altogether.   

[Jek1138]

Maybe make a workshop project to convert alien mag weapons into accelerated weapons. 1:1 project that converts one alien rifle into a mag rifle/shotgun 2:1 for sniper and machine gun. 0 cost (cost is you can’t sell the alien weapon for cash) and a few hours per conversion. This will allow you to cheaply build up a stockpile of upgraded base weapons over time. The need for the initial alien weapon will prevent you from fully outfitting your squad early before much alien contact so the ballistic weapons will still see a few early deployments. 

[Alienkiller]

Very good that the Community bring in that Discussion again. We Beta-Testers had similar thougths too since we could test this Upgarde-Feature for normal Human-Weapons the first time.

I give you right, that the Alien-Weapons have an better Acceleration and the Ammo have an bigger Destruction to that of the Human Equivalent. But like the Description says, we can´t use them about an special Security-System which can´t be avoided. You only have the Chance to dismantle that Weapons for Ressources or to sell them for money, but therfore make an usage of the Ammo instead to upgrade your Standard-Ammunition.

[Loki45]

I'm not seeing how Laser weapons are more effective than accelerated weapons.  They look to do the same damage even if a different damage type.  With only slightly less weight and the low amount of ammunition it seems to me the accelerated weapons would be the better choice.  The fact that Laser weapons require Alenium as well really makes me averse to making them.  Is the different damage type the deciding factor?  Am I missing something?

[Alienkiller]

Nope Laser-Weapons aren´t useles. They seem so for someone which is new to Xenonauts 2. But they have their big Advantages against Accelerated Weapons. If you read the differences correctly and test them out, you will see it.

The Disadvantage of the normal Laser-Weapons are their low amount of Ammo against Standard-Weapons / Upgraded Standard Weapons. There I give you right, but the big Advantatges against Standard-Weapons are unbeatable, esp. in the End-Beginning-Phase and Mid-Gamephase as well as for Reserve-Xenonauts with bad Shooting-Skills or similar later on. And with the Laser-Upgrade you get a very big Surprisse.  

[Conductiv]

accelerated suffers from the dead end tech problem, as it doesn't seem to be needed to aquire its bigger brother gauss tech. accelerated does open up a aircraft upgrade for a high DPS gun upgrade that works very well on the tier 2 intercepters (as they can mount 2)

relative to basic lasers weapons accelerated is roughly equal in performance. but laser is more expensive and with a smaller mag, while gaining a more useful damage type (I have yet to see any alien resistant to any damage type, but terrain is definitly weak to thermal) and accuracy bonuses for novice troops. upgrade wise its also better as it give a aircraft upgrade with the lance (a longer range, moderate DPS option.), has advanced lasers that is a damage and utility upgrade and has 2 upgrades specific for the mars (while the mars is fun to use, its upgrades are very expensive for something that you can only field 2 of..at most...in the current EA, as such that utility is..meh )

the only real reason I see lasers being better would be the advanced lasers upgrade, as its a power increase between weapon tiers. in the end I used both basic lasers and accelerated weapons up to the moment I acquired gauss. used the mars laser cannon upgrade and the lance, while using accelerated cannons on most tier 2 fighters

[Alienkiller]

The Player can decide what he / she wanna use. But Accelerated Weapons are only a Stopgap with some small Reworks to Standard-Weapons, that you all have to remember.

Lasers and Upgraded Lasers have like the Comrade said longer Range, better Accuracy, are lighter and give the first big Upgrade-Abilitys to Support-Vehicles / Fighter-Crafts, Defenses and your Troops.

The Stopgap-Upgrade from your Standard-Weapons (Accelerated) is not bad for the Beginning and makes your existing Fighter-Cannons as well as Infantry Weapons a little bit more Dangerus. The big but is, that you can´t use better Armours (after the first Amour-Upgrade) then about the heavy Weight of the Ammo and Weapons itself.

So my best Experiance is to make an Mix from Accelerated and Laser-Weaponary / Upgraded Laser-Weaponary for the Infantry-Units, belongs how good you wanna save your experianced Soldiers with Protection. If you wanna everytime low experianced Solders as Reserve then use only Accelerated, if you wanna safe your experianced Soldiers, which are near to the Frontline (Heavy / Rifle f. e.) later on use better Armour and Lasers instead.

But like said, the Player have the Choise in that. I can only give the Experiance of several Years from Beta-Testing.

If there will come Reworks / Upgrades / Changes to the Standard- / Accelerated- and Gauss-Weapons with Ammo and similar, then evtl. an new Testing between the both Weapon-Types have to be done. But like it´s look now, you have to decide between light Armour and Accelerated Weapons or better Armour and Laser-Weapons to hold your Soldiers alive.

[doubleskulls]

From what I've seen, and unless the in-game stats are lying, accelerated weapons are marginally better than lasers. I think the primary trade off is about research, and whether you want to use a research to get accelerated weapons or are happy to skip them and have the slightly worse lasers instead. My next game I'm going to try skipping mag weapons research and go straight to lasers. I think it will be okay. The alternative is to take mag weapons, and delay laser research until you are close to getting plasma. This may be slightly better if you are going to build more labs so will get the research time down. 

[Alienkiller]

Mag-Weapons comes in the Mid-Game somewehre (Mid-Mid-Game to End-Mid-Game). They are the big Guns in the normal Weapon-Tier as the next Step to the Accelerated Weapons. Sadly you can´t upgrade / refit the existing Accelerated Weapons to them later.

You can play without Laser-Weapons, but it´s not adviseable. You can still use the Accelerated Weapons for the Infantry, Support-Vehicle, Fighters, Standard-Defences if you wish, but then don´t cry when you make your bloody lessons.

That´s only an good Advise from us Beta-Testers of the first Hour. You can use that Advice or make your own bloody lessons instead. Like said all Weapon-Techs have the existence-warrant at a special time.

Edited July 25, 2023 by Alienkiller