[Bug] sprayWaypoints exploit

[Delian]

It's possible to use sprayWaypoints to bypass a weapon's range limits, because non-first waypoints can be set to outside the weapon's maxRange.

[Meridian]

You can bypass the limit even easier using force fire, no?
We can't limit where the projectile goes if it doesn't hit anything on the target tile.
It's safer to set the power reduction (to zero) after a certain distance.

[Meridian]

Or even without spray or force fire, like attached.

[Delian]

With force fire you can't precisely target something outside the weapon's maxRange (you have to position yourself just right, and even then it's up to luck), but with sprayWaypoints you can.

I don't understand what you mean with "limiting where the projectile goes if it doesn't hit anything on the target tile". I'm simply suggesting that, just like the first waypoint, non-first spray waypoints should also give an "Out of range" error if the user tries to set them to outside the weapon range.

The power range reduction doesn't help in cases where the weapons have maxRange=1, where the modder intended a weapon to be used in CQC range, because sprayWaypoints allow you to bypass CQC, since you can use them from 2 tiles away.

[Meridian]

I'm simply stating that even after this proposed fix, the various exploits are just as easy as before.

By "limiting where the projectile goes if it doesn't hit anything on the target tile" I mean that if I force fire on a tile in front of me, and there is nothing on that tile, the projectile will simply continue to the next tile and hit the unit on the next tile if there is any. I can't limit the projectile to stop at the edge of the first tile and disintegrate itself. Well, I can, but it would look incredibly stupid. Immersion-breaking as our players often like to say. Or unrealistic, as the other half says.

Why doesn't power range reduction help?
You can shoot, but it will not do any damage.

[Delian]

Ah. Yeah, I'm not suggesting that a projectile should just get cut off during flight.

Other exploits exist, sure, but this isn't about them. Also, my argument is that those other exploits are not as reliable as this one is.

With maxRange=1, players were supposed to stand in melee range, and meleeDodge was supposed to come in effect. Note that, in XPZ, weapons with maxRange=1 usually have powerRangeThreshold=2. I assume that's because, if powerRangeThreshold was 1, diagonal attack damage would be reduced.

[Meridian]

With force fire you can't precisely target something outside the weapon's maxRange (you have to position yourself just right, and even then it's up to luck), but with sprayWaypoints you can.

I tried to exploit this, but I was not able to.

The shots go nilly-willy in completely different directions.
See attached video.

The only tile I could successfully shoot at was 2 tiles directly in front of me... which can already be done by force-firing.