OpenXcom Forum

OpenXcom => Suggestions => Topic started by: CanadianBeaver on August 25, 2016, 09:17:32 am

Title: Reload one bullet
Post by: CanadianBeaver on August 25, 2016, 09:17:32 am
I am not sure, maybe this suggestion was offered, but it will be great, if weapons can be reloaded one by one bullet. For example, shotguns or grenade launchers should be reloaded in this manner.
Title: Re: Reload one bullet
Post by: Solarius Scorch on August 25, 2016, 09:50:37 am
Can you provide more info on how exactly this would work?
Title: Re: Reload one bullet
Post by: Meridian on August 25, 2016, 10:12:53 am
Aren't grenade lauchers for example in piratez already reloaded bullet by bullet?
Title: Re: Reload one bullet
Post by: Solarius Scorch on August 25, 2016, 10:22:06 am
Aren't grenade lauchers for example in piratez already reloaded bullet by bullet?

And the sawed-off is loaded in pairs, Doom-style. :)
Title: Re: Reload one bullet
Post by: CanadianBeaver on August 25, 2016, 04:20:58 pm
Cam you provide more info on how exactly this would work?

Yes, of course. Let's look on the MGL (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milkor_MGL). This weapon can be loaded by 6 grenades at one and the same time. One grenade should occupy single cell in the soldier's inventory. Loaded grenades can be different - incendiary, smoke, blast. Loading and unloading grenades should be possible one by one.

Shotguns. For example, this type of weapon can be loaded by 8 AMMO. Six ammo can occupy single cell in the soldier's inventory. When you load the shotgun, one bullet will be taken from inventory ammo (5 are remaining) and this bullet will be put into shotgun. Type of ammo can be different and capacity of ammo in inventory can be different and can occupy different cells. For example, standard six ammo in the single cell, 25 alloy ammo (this is different than standard) in the box of 2x2 cells. But standard and alloy ammo can be loaded into shotgun at one and same time (for example 3 standard and 3 alloy).

In additional, ammo can be joined in the inventory. For example, 3 ammo and 2 ammo can be joined into 5 ammo in one cell. But 4 ammo and 3 ammo can be joined with result of 6 and 1 ammo in the 2 cells, because only six ammo can occupy single cell in the soldier's inventory.
Title: Re: Reload one bullet
Post by: Meridian on August 25, 2016, 04:27:25 pm
FWIW, this would require a lot of work.
Title: Re: Reload one bullet
Post by: Solarius Scorch on August 25, 2016, 04:30:18 pm
All right, thanks for the explanation.

Now, can you please specify the UI behind this?
I imagine that if you have an empty or half-empty shotgun, and a number of shells in one slot, you can drag the pile of shells to the weapon and load as many of them as there are, or as many as you can fit.
Now questions:
- How do you unload the shells one by one?
- How many TUs per bullet?
- If you load 2 bullets from one slot and 3 bullets from another slot, does it cost the same amount of TUs as loading 5 bullets from one slot? Why?

Also please note that this would require grouping items of the same type in one slot, which is a huge change.

FWIW, this would require a lot of work.

And yes, this is the biggest question... What exactly is the purpose of this?
Title: Re: Reload one bullet
Post by: ivandogovich on August 25, 2016, 05:08:45 pm
I am not sure, maybe this suggestion was offered, but it will be great, if weapons can be reloaded one by one bullet. For example, shotguns or grenade launchers should be reloaded in this manner.

hmmm... after your explanation, I don't really see the reason why you would want this ability in the first place.  The micromanagement would be pretty intense, and your results may be fairly unsatisfactory.

Lets take a shotgun for example, and consider it has three types of ammunition:  Buck Shot, Heavy Slugs, and Incendiary Scatter Shot.

What order would you load these in?  and why?

Lets just say you loaded them in the order above and had 6 shots loaded:
    Shot, Slugs, Incendiary, Shot, Slugs, Incendiary
Now, the first target you find has low armor, so your Shot round works well. Nice.  The next one is vulnerable mainly to fire (lets say a Reaper).  Oops, I've got a slug loaded,  what do I do? Unload it to get to the Incendiary?  Fire it so the incendiary is up next?  What if the next target is best hit by the Slug for armor penetration? etc, etc.

Maybe its better just to have the single shot weapon, like M249/M203 grenade launchers and load the appropriate round before firing (adjusting TUs costs to allow this etc).

Tl:Dr  I don't believe your idea is practical in game play.
Title: Re: Reload one bullet
Post by: CanadianBeaver on August 25, 2016, 05:09:56 pm
FWIW, this would require a lot of work.

Sorry, but I do not think so. I can do it in one day, if the openXcom would be developed on C#.

It need just one boolean flag in the items definition (https://www.ufopaedia.org/index.php/Ruleset_Reference_(OpenXcom)#Items), for example - canbeloadedbystep=true|false(default - it is current behaviour), and an additional array for storing values of loaded ammo in the weapon class definition (in the source code). All other functionality has already been made.
Title: Re: Reload one bullet
Post by: ivandogovich on August 25, 2016, 05:24:55 pm
Sorry, but I do not think so. I can do it in one day, if the openXcom would be developed on C#.

Wow. And this from the person that doesn't like executable variants, and only wants to stay at the 1.0 Milestone??  Sometimes I wonder....

I mean I really like your methodical and organized approach to the mod that you have created.  It shows a great deal of creativity and vision. 

In other aspects, your disregard for voices of experience recommending for example: building for Nightlies, and what is easy to develop or not to develop kinda blows my mind.

Anyway, stepping away from this discussion now.
Title: Re: Reload one bullet
Post by: Meridian on August 25, 2016, 05:31:32 pm
Sorry, but I do not think so. I can do it in one day, if the openXcom would be developed on C#.

It need just one boolean flag in the items definition (https://www.ufopaedia.org/index.php/Ruleset_Reference_(OpenXcom)#Items), for example - canbeloadedbystep=true|false(default - it is current behaviour), and an additional array for storing values of loaded ammo in the weapon class definition (in the source code). All other functionality has already been made.

I don't want to offend you or underestimate your skills... but I respectfully disagree. First look at the OpenXcom code before making such statement.

The "items definition" don't even create any instances/objects as such. In geoscape, all you have is the number of those items, without the actual items. The instances are created in battlescape, live there for the duration of the battle and then get destroyed again... so you would lose the information about the remaining bullets in a clip after the battle.

I am not saying it cannot be done... it can.
I am also not saying it is difficult... it is easy.
I am only saying it would take a lot of time to make these changes on all related places.
Title: Re: Reload one bullet
Post by: CanadianBeaver on August 25, 2016, 05:52:15 pm
All right, thanks for the explanation.

Now, can you please specify the UI behind this?
I imagine that if you have an empty or half-empty shotgun, and a number of shells in one slot, you can drag the pile of shells to the weapon and load as many of them as there are, or as many as you can fit.

Just one bullet from pile of shells.

Now questions:
- How do you unload the shells one by one?

During combats - one by one. LIFO, last-in, first-out. After that player can combine this one bullet with pile of shells in the inventory or player can put it alone.

During equipping aircraft - all bullets in one possible slot, if they can be in one slot. If not - one by one. LIFO in both cases.
For example, the weapon has been loaded by 10 standard ammo and after that by 3 alloy ammo. One slot can contain 6 ammo, doesn't mater alloy or standard. Unloading at first time will unload 3 alloy ammo, second time - 6 standard ammo, and at the end 4 standard ammo.
Another example, the weapon has been loaded by 5 standard ammo and after that by 6 alloy ammo and after that by 4 standard ammo. One standard slot can contain 6 ammo, one alloy slot can contain 4 ammo. Unloading at first time will unload 4 standard ammo, second time - 4 alloy ammo, next try - 2 alloy ammo, and at the end 5 standard ammo.

- How many TUs per bullet?

15. And here we can think about another good idea in the game - different ammunition may have different time requirements for loading/unloading.

- If you load 2 bullets from one slot and 3 bullets from another slot, does it cost the same amount of TUs as loading 5 bullets from one slot?

Yes, it right.

Why?

Sorry?

Also please note that this would require grouping items of the same type in one slot, which is a huge change.

Two slot, one contains 2 bullets, another 3, maximum can be 6. Drag and drop 2 bullets to 3 bullets and calculate the result is a huge change?...
Title: Re: Reload one bullet
Post by: Meridian on August 25, 2016, 05:59:31 pm
15. And here we can think about another good idea in the game - different ammunition may have different time requirements for loading/unloading.

This is already implemented in OXCE.

Two slot, one contains 2 bullets, another 3, maximum can be 6. Drag and drop 2 bullets to 3 bullets and calculate the result is a huge change?...

No, it's a relatively small change.
Title: Re: Reload one bullet
Post by: CanadianBeaver on August 25, 2016, 06:27:02 pm
Wow. And this from the person that doesn't like executable variants, and only wants to stay at the 1.0 Milestone??  Sometimes I wonder....

I mean I really like your methodical and organized approach to the mod that you have created. It shows a great deal of creativity and vision.

Thank you very much. But, I am afraid that I do not clearly understand your point. Yes, I prefer the OpenXcom 1.0 because it is unchanged version. It gives opportunity to develop the modification that works after testing without adaptation each night. It is the standard practice in the software development, I guess. And I do not prefer executable variants because it is non canonical way, and Debian, and my filling, and my thinking, and much more... If you ask me - let it will be "my religion". Can I have "my own religion"?

In other aspects, your disregard for voices of experience recommending for example: building for Nightlies, and what is easy to develop or not to develop kinda blows my mind.

Sorry, but I think you are not right. If you are speaking about Awesome Guns modification, please look at the 1.2 release (https://github.com/CanadianBeaver/AwesomeGuns/releases/tag/1.2). Second point is - the compatible with nightly version has been increased. I have the problem with testing OpenXcom nightly, because there is no .dep package for Debian, but I am researching how to solve this problems. I look forward to when OpenXcom 2.0 will be done, but I am not sure if it will happen. Moreover, I will be very happy, if the official repository of OpenXcom nightly for Debian will be implemented.

Anyway, stepping away from this discussion now.

So do I. If you have something against "my software developing religion", we can discuss about tet-a-tet. Please feel free to text me.
Title: Re: Reload one bullet
Post by: Meridian on August 25, 2016, 06:39:12 pm
May I ask to whom exactly was the original suggestion from the first post in this thread addressed?
Title: Re: Reload one bullet
Post by: CanadianBeaver on August 25, 2016, 06:44:57 pm
The "items definition" don't even create any instances/objects as such. In geoscape, all you have is the number of those items, without the actual items. The instances are created in battlescape, live there for the duration of the battle and then get destroyed again... so you would lose the information about the remaining bullets in a clip after the battle.

For this case, I have another "great" suggestion - https://openxcom.org/forum/index.php/topic,4866.0.html
Title: Re: Reload one bullet
Post by: CanadianBeaver on August 25, 2016, 06:48:53 pm
May I ask to whom exactly was the original suggestion from the first post in this thread addressed?

I am speaking about OpenXcom. I think, that nobody do patches for 1.0 version, but I think it can be done in the next version. And I have no idea about other clones, like pirates and something else.
Title: Re: Reload one bullet
Post by: Meridian on August 25, 2016, 06:53:57 pm
I am speaking about OpenXcom. I think, that nobody do patches for 1.0 version, but I think it can be done in the next version. And I have no idea about other clones, like pirates and something else.

There are exactly two people, who have access to OpenXcom repository: SupSuper and Warboy.
If you want something done (only) there, you can probably just contact them directly... others can't help you beyond custom forks.

PS: nightly can also be considered a patch for 1.0 :)
PS2: btw. we share the same opinion about versions, milestones and patches... but I gave up trying, since I cannot influence it
Title: Re: Reload one bullet
Post by: CanadianBeaver on August 25, 2016, 07:19:56 pm
Lets take a shotgun for example, and consider it has three types of ammunition:  Buck Shot, Heavy Slugs, and Incendiary Scatter Shot.

Bottom line is one by one bullet reloading because it is real behavior for shotguns and grenade launchers (and rocket launchers (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/DP-64)). Different types of ammo is additional bonus.

One remark: unloading - LIFO, shooting - FIFO.
Title: Re: Reload one bullet
Post by: Starving Poet on August 25, 2016, 10:03:41 pm
Now I haven't fired a gun in a couple years, but don't all magazine / tube fed weapons fire and unload in LIFO order?
Title: Re: Reload one bullet
Post by: hellrazor on August 27, 2016, 04:03:48 am
Reloading single shot weapons or reload clips.
You always pay 15 TU for a reload, so why do i wanna reload only one bullet, if i can load a clip...
Title: Re: Reload one bullet
Post by: yrizoud on August 27, 2016, 01:56:28 pm
IMO, without forcing the player to choose how many to reload, weapons reloaded one shot at a time could automatically 'complete' the weapon, using an amount of time proportional to the number of shots. If all shots don't fit, leave the extra ones in the original "clip item".
Ex. If a shotgun has 6 "spaces" and you shot twice already, when you drag 6 shells from a pocket to reload, it takes 1/3 of the time of a full reload, and leaves 4 shells in that pocket.
This behavior would avoid awkward situations where you have a near-empty shotgun, and the game forces you to unload before you can replace with a full group of shells.
Title: Re: Reload one bullet
Post by: The_Funktasm on October 17, 2016, 06:38:22 am
This might be a nice idea for linked belt-fed weapons in particular. Say you have your Auto-cannon unit load another belt of ammo into their current ammo pool, or as was said before, shotgun shells offered in boxes and loaded one by one into a weapon. I think priority should go more into this working for utility of individual ammo sources more than variety of types in a single magazine. Maybe it's just me, but I see the primary value of a feature like this, being shotgun shells in various ammo counts being used to fill a wide variety of weapons in different maximum capacities.

Just my two cents.

Perhaps the best example I can give is you have three ammo types or sizes, and four guns that share those three as common ammo, yet they have individual ammo counts. So a Sawn-off Shotgun with two round capacity, and an Assault Shotgun with 12 round capacity can reload with the same ammo source. A 9mm ammo source could reload both a 12 round Glock and a 30 round MP5. Could be nice, depending.