[WEAPON/BETA] Laser Sniper Rifle

[Ascadix]

UFOpaedia: -> Built arround a second-generation optical nucleus and equipped with sophisticated stabilizers, it delivers a high power shot  with an unsurpassed accuracy. However, it needs to cool between each shot and can't provide auto-shoot.


I wonder since I play XCom why lasers have such poor accuracy then they should be the most accurate weapons by their nature. (Only light, insensitive to EM and anti-G fields ). 

Here is a correction to this oddity, a precision laser rifle. 


Much more accurate than the base laser rifle, but can't auto-shoot.
Use removable power sources of different types, with different power and capacity.

3 "clips" are available through research:

• std battery - based on known human tech, a simple Lithium battery with low capacity and low power output.
  
• supercapacitors - an XCom technology embodying the potential of carbon-fullerene when used as power accumulator. Very high instant power delivery, but low capacity. It give only 2 shots per clip, but with the higest Laser beam output power.
  
• E115 power generator -  based on Alien power source technologie,slightly lower instant power than super-capacitor, but can provide more than 30 shots at medium power.
  

Rifle and amo graphics in theme with Chiko's new Gfx for originals laser weapon



No fully balanced yet ...

Please post any feedback here;
https://openxcom.org/forum/index.php?topic=1928.0

... and i plan to release it with a full clip/ammo for the other laser weapons in theme with Chiko's graphic

This mod is still in Alpha, but since the same idea as been release in other mod recently, it is probably a good idea ;-) , or at least an awaited one.


Changes:
v0.1.0  - 2014-03-09 : initial pre-release

[Fox105iwsp]

Cool, I'll give it a go ^_^

[Dioxine]

Judging from the stats, and the color, it's more like an Armageddon Rifle 2-shot clip makes it however *kinda* balanced.

[tuszek]

Good lokking stuff.
A bit op.
I think nothing should be more than 130 accurate. I mean, shitty shooters should not be put to sniping duty... Anyone crouching, taking aimed shot should be relatively good with that much. Aimed fire could take more tu. Like 75%. One can rarely shoot 3 snaps, so there is little incentive to do 2 snaps, rather one alvays would do 1 snap and 1 aimed if the snap miss. I think there should be a trade of of either 1 aimed or 2 snaps.

[yrizoud]

I agree, up to a point : If you manage to place your best shooter in advance in the right spot, it's very depressing to see a 96% shot miss... and in my tests, it happened a lot.
IMO,  135%-150% is a fine tradeoff for a gun that needs an accurate soldier to be reliable. I also like how when you get flying armors, you still get a tactical choice of placing a sniper on land (can crouch for >=100 accuracy) or in the air (many more possible firing angles, but accuracy <= 100 unless the soldier is REALLY good)

Other things : I find the ammo costs a lot of money for batteries (thousands of dollars ?) Same kind of problem with clips that require Elerium : In the base game, Elerium is very precious for building advanced armors and fueling the new ships. Since the Laser sniper is pretty specialized, you won't have many soldiers use it, so the "sharing" of clips isn't as efficient, firing a single shot will cost you a full clip (and so 1 Elerium)

[Ascadix]

Hello,

As said, balance is far from being done. 

So ...
- a little less accuracy .. 160 ? not much lower, since as said by Yrizoud, even good soldier with good weapons get lot of miss (too many for a specialized snipper weapon) at mid-long range.
- a little less power : maybe 60 - 105 - 80
- don't use precious elerium for such a specialized task, so maybe replace E115 power cell by an advanced XCom tech, sort of "fuel cell"

Maybe something around this:
- std batt : 60 dam / 10 shots /  cost 200~300 / weight 2
- super-capacitor: 105 dam / 2 shots / cost 200~300 / weight 1
- fuel-cell : 80 dam / 32 shots / cost / 300~400 / weight 2


And for the color, i want to keep it in sync with chiko's sprites , but i have some difficulties to get a "dark red" that looks fine with the battlescape palete and my  drawing soft, but i keep working on it.




Next release .. next week-end.

[Warboy1982]

try playing around with the minimum range and dropoff settings, enable ufoextender accuracy to see the in-game effects, and remember that a minimum range will have this effect REGARDLESS. maybe remove snap shot as a fire mode to prevent reaction fire. there are many ways you can tweak the performance of the weapon to represent a sniper rifle without having to give it 160% accuracy.

personally i'd go for somewhere around the 120 mark, so a soldier with 90 firing skill would see 108% accuracy while standing, and soldier skill would have a more appreciable effect. even with 60 skill you'd be seeing 72% accuracy, and to my mind that sounds about right for this type of weapon.

then i'd make the damage comparable to the heavy laser, and ditch the clips.

[Ascadix]

Hello,

Ok, i'll play more with accuracy/range/dropoff setting to see what they do.

Do you have some exemple/explanation for "aimRange" and other similar setting ? other than de short description in the wiki ?

Thanks

[SiceX]

Here's an italian tranlsation.

Code: [Select]

  - type: it
    strings:
      STR_LASER_SNIPER: Fucile di Precisione Laser    STR_LASER_SNIPER_CLIP: Batteria per Fucile di Precisione Laser
      STR_LASER_SNIPER_CLIP_2: Condensatore per Fucile di Precisione Laser
      STR_LASER_SNIPER_CLIP_3: Cella Energetica E115 per Fucile di Precisione Laser
      STR_LASER_SNIPER_UFOPEDIA: "Costruito con un nucleo ottico di seconda generazione ed equipaggiato con sofisticati stabilizzatori, questo fucile spara un potente colpo con incredibile precisione. Ad ogni modo, ha bisogno di raffreddarsi per ogni colpo e non è automatico."


[caleafterearth]

Hope you don't mind but I was working on a laser sniper rifle too. But I can't draw to save my life, so I stole yours. Lol I was also using the red laser weapons anyway! Awesome mod though! My version is more simple though.
Requires laser rifle, and alien alloys to research it, and alien alloys to build. Doesn't require ammo though. Its extremely powerful and accurate, but below 10 tiles you'll be lucky to hit anything! It also uses 75% of your TUs for aimed shots, so not a lot of moving n shooting.
I won't post my updated laser mod unless you're OK with me using the graphics though!

[Ascadix]

Hi all,

I haven't been very active for a few month due to some concerns at office.

@SiceX : thanks for translation, i will include it.

@caleafterearth : feel free to reuse my Gfx, a little "credit note" will make me happy :-)

For the time since my last post, i have worked on a little "laser mod" with those ideas:
- Gfx from Chico's work for the 3 standard laser weapons
- a laser snipper rifle
- power clips for all laser weapons
- all this without E115 nor alloy dependency (laser stay 100% human tech.)

For graphics, i can't manage to draw any good gfx with darker red, so i will stay on red.

For the snipper rifle, i have changed the grip to a gray one for better consistency with the 3 other laser weapons.

For clips, i have see that other similar mod have been released before mine .. so it seems to be a good idea :-)

I will try to pack actual state and post it this week, but it is still beta IMHO.

[niculinux]

Italian translation:

Code: [Select]

  - type: it-IT
    strings:
      STR_LASER_SNIPER: Fucile laser da cecchino
      STR_LASER_SNIPER_CLIP:   Batteria per fucile laser da cecchino
      STR_LASER_SNIPER_CLIP_2: Batteria estesa per fucile laser da cecchino
      STR_LASER_SNIPER_CLIP_3: Batteria per fucile laser da cecchino ad Elerium-115
      STR_LASER_SNIPER_UFOPEDIA: Costruito con un ottica a partire da un nucleo di seconda generazione è dotato di una sofisticata tecnologia di stabilizzaizone, offre un tiro a potenza elevata ad una precisione insuperabile. Tuttavia è necessario raffreddarlo dopo ogni colpo e non supporta il tiro automatico.
@Ascadix: seems that in the english translation there are some typos that needs to be fixed