176 réponses à ce sujet

[Sgt Stryker]

robarcool wrote...

Sgt Stryker wrote...

 What if you're fighting primitives who don't even use mass accelerator weapons (Mass Effect's version of Ewoks, for instance)?

Well, then Shepard will be like a boss with million health points to them, for ME sheilds are probably too tough to be cracked with conventional weapons. So if I fight such enemies, I could very well walk past them without even getting a scratch lol!

The rachni and varren would like to have a word with you. In addtion, kinetic barriers do not respond to slow-moving melee attacks or toxic spit. I would imagine they also would not respond to natives throwing rocks and arrows, either. That's why kinetic barriers are not enough, and why characters should wear armored hardsuits in battle (ME2).

Modifié par Sgt Stryker, 19 novembre 2011 - 07:53 .

[Sgt Stryker]

Calinstel wrote...
Not to mention that ejecting a white hot TC into your buddy standing next to you can cause some inter-squad arguments and personnel damage. 

Especially if one of your buddies has an obnoxious, cleavage-revealing boob window on her alleged armor.

Oh look, another excellent argument for practical squadmate outfits!

[Schneidend]

Sgt Stryker wrote...

Right, but from an in-universe perspective, you're also vulnerable to enemy fire if you completely run out of thermal clips. Also, what if your enemy doesn't use thermal clips at all? What if you're fighting primitives who don't even use mass accelerator weapons (Mass Effect's version of Ewoks, for instance)? Granted, ME weapons never had infinite ammo to begin with, but with thermal clips you become combat ineffective that much faster.

Consider: According to lore, an M8 Avenger's ammo block can fire 4000 shots. According to gameplay, you only have enough thermal clips to fire 400 shots. Doesn't that seem like a bit of a waste?

You're talking about a theoretical, potential loss of combat effectiveness after running out of clips verus a definite loss of combat effectiveness at regular intervals of gun overheat. In the case of slight risk versus certain peril, slight risk always wins.

Also, non-clip mass effect weaponry has no defense whatsoever against long-term overheats from electronic warfare. Thermal clips counter this by simply reloading.

If you're fighting primitives, your space age ceramic-plated armor is going to make you virtually immune to their weapons, so that's a non-issue.

[Wulfram]

There's no regular intervals of gun overheat if you're firing sensibly. And the counter to the enemy overheating your gun is to switch guns.

[Schneidend]

Wulfram wrote...

There's no regular intervals of gun overheat if you're firing sensibly. And the counter to the enemy overheating your gun is to switch guns.

Not a good solution if you're using the gun you're using to fill a particular role in combat. Switching to his pistol doesn't really do a sniper on a high ledge much good. Switching to his shotgun doesn't do a soldier much good when he's facing a YMIR mech or two, or three.

[KingDan97]

Just to all those people claiming it would be "easy" to implement a "switch",(No, I didn't read through all 7 pages, but someone always acts like they know exactly how to make games, when they clearly don't) adding that would mean they'd need to scale the game twice. Every enemy, every encounter would need to be accounted for, from top to bottom.

To any with the delusion that "modders" will find a prototype mode with overheating like in ME2, that only existed because Bioware didn't clean that code out. In the case of ME3 that mode won't even have been made, and the only reason it was removed in the first place was because of how fundamentally broken it was.

[Sgt Stryker]

Actually you don't even need to be fighting primitives. You just need to fight someone who hasn't "upgraded" to thermal clips. In a long-term siege situation, I'm willing to bet that the force that doesn't use thermal clips would have a significant advantage.

In any case, I've said before and I'll say it again. The thermal clip system we have in-game is not indicative of the "actual" in-universe system. If anything, to be a true upgrade, thermal clips would have to: 1) have a larger heat capacity than they do in-game, perhaps an order of magnitude higher; 2) be an alternative, not a replacement, for the older fixed heat sink system; and 3) be able to cool down over time, just like the old heat sinks.

These things don't happen in-game for one simple reason: it's easier and cheaper to program the same ammo system that shooters have been using for more than a decade, than it is to come up with something unique and original. This isn't necessarily a bad thing, though, considering that Mass Effect is a game, and not a simulator.

[Wulfram]

Schneidend wrote...

Not a good solution if you're using the gun you're using to fill a particular role in combat. Switching to his pistol doesn't really do a sniper on a high ledge much good.

An ME1 Pistol would probably work fine.  Admittedly because they're stupidly overpowered.

Switching to his shotgun doesn't do a soldier much good when he's facing a YMIR mech or two, or three.

What does?  I'm not sure why a shotgun is a worse option than the others for that.

[Schneidend]

Wulfram wrote...

An ME1 Pistol would probably work fine.  Admittedly because they're stupidly overpowered.

On that, we can most certainly agree. Luckily, the shotguns were still cool enough that I could use them almost exclusively.

What does?  I'm not sure why a shotgun is a worse option than the others for that.

YMIR are too sturdy for anything but sustained damage to reliably kill them, imo. Maximizing sustained damage with a shotgun requires you to willingly expose yourself to a hail of gatling fire.

[The Spamming Troll]

Someone With Mass wrote...

ME1's gun system was hardly unique, because Halo did that about six-seven years before Mass Effect.

Not to mention that just because it's unique doesn't mean it's good.

your trying to tie together unique, with relelvant. yes halo, or whatever game before halo, did it first. but thats not what made ME1 weapons unique. also halos weapons needed to refill ammo so really its not even a valid reference in the first place. 

its just unfortunate, is all.

[Bluko]

robarcool wrote...

Well, one problem with ammo award per count is that it will give people almost zero incentive to move out of cover during a fight, except for vanguards of course. Why would anyone get out of cover if they are getting their regular supply of ammo right where they are crouching behind a crate? I don't say that I like moving around for clips, but ammo per kill will make the game a little too easy.
What I think is that they need to beef up the ammo drop dynamically based on player skill (something L4D does with the no. of Zombies) and a huge maximum ammo count. So, if you are skilled, you get somewhat less ammo and if you need help, you have more ammo to fill up your whole pool.

I didn't really move out of cover in ME2, at least not for the purpose of collecting ammo. I can't think of a single time where I ran out of ammunition with the AR or SMG (maybe once or twice on Insanity). And since most fighting is fairly close range it's not much of a concern since those weapons are generally more then ideal.

However the few instances where using a Sniper Rifle is a good idea you tend to burn through ammo pretty fast. Even with the Widow getting nothing but headshots you'll run out or get fairly low.  And then there's Shotguns which are just laughably bad unless you're pratically kissing the enemy. That works out alright for Vanguards, but makes them pretty useless for everyone else (well Soldiers anyways). So using them at any sort of range ends up being a complete waste. Although from what videos I've seen of ME3 the Shotgun range looks a bit better.


The ammo per kill would help Snipers a lot. I really dislike that Sniper rifles are a little more then a glorified secondary weapon in ME2, when they should be a fully capable primary weapon with just as much spare ammunition as the AR/SMGs. In ME1 as an Inflitrator I pretty much always used my Sniper except when Husks and stuff got too close forcing me over to the Pistol (oh how I miss adjustable zoom...)

It would also aid Shotgun users as they could actually stand to use their Shotguns at something other then point blank range. Also picking ammo from enemies in ME2 was often problematic since enemies either didn't drop at times or ammo would get stuck in the terrain. It's quite annoying to go pick up a clip only to find you need to dance over it first since it's partially glitched. (Another good reason to simply award the player ammo rather the let potential bugs continue to cause issues with manually pick ups.)

Also it would be something of benefit for those (such as myself) that like to kill all the enemies, rather then rush past the trigger points and break the spawns. 


Look ME2 is a camping game. Can you really say you aren't camping when you spend the vast majority of the time hiding behind cover? It is not a Run-n'-Gun shooter. You have to camp to a certain extent even with classes like Vanguard. If you want to move from cover you're totally free to do so. But using ammo as an incentive is just a poor excuse. Oh yes I totally want to run in the middle of the field to pick up ammo from fallen enemies while remaining enemies are perfectly clear to tear my shields to shreds. That totally makes sense in a cover based shooter.

It's the A.I. itself that should force you to move: either by lobbing grenades or firing rockets, or just advancing/flanking you. Then you actually have a legitimate reason to move to new cover. Also I find it much exciting to be forced to move because a Krogan/Varren is charging me from around a corner rather then because my gun is running out of bullets. But perhaps that's just me.

Also from footage I've seen of ME3 it's look like the enemy A.I. is far more aggressive so I doubt you'll be able to get away with camping one spot indefinetely. I see no reason to continue being a battlefield buzzard.

[Bluko]

KingDan97 wrote...

Just to all those people claiming it would be "easy" to implement a "switch",(No, I didn't read through all 7 pages, but someone always acts like they know exactly how to make games, when they clearly don't) adding that would mean they'd need to scale the game twice. Every enemy, every encounter would need to be accounted for, from top to bottom.

To any with the delusion that "modders" will find a prototype mode with overheating like in ME2, that only existed because Bioware didn't clean that code out. In the case of ME3 that mode won't even have been made, and the only reason it was removed in the first place was because of how fundamentally broken it was.

Well no obviously it would not be easy, and from a balance standpoint Overheating Mechanics for the player will likely either make the game very easy or very hard. (The A.I. doesn't need to be changed since it fires in bursts and already uses unlimited ammunition. You just need to remove the reload animation is basically all.)

Making the weapons operate on overheat basis would likely be time consuming no doubt. Still the only tricky thing really is making the rate of cooldown comparable to reloading. It should not be that hard to keep potential DPS the same.

But the fact remains Bioware has taken some time to at least experiment with game modes. Quite frankly editing material for an entire 40 hour game is likely as time consuming as tweaking weapons would be. And supposedly Story Mode is suppose to operate quite differently from the standard game so obviously they are willing to do such things as re-balance the entire game.

Modifié par Bluko, 19 novembre 2011 - 11:35 .

[JonathonPR]

I know ejecting a thermal clip is supposed to take around a second for an experienced solider but do they ever address how long it take to actually load new thermal clips into a gun. When you pick up new clips they don't go to a universal pool to draw from. They are assigned to a gun. It looks like there is a reserve in the gun of clips unused like in a stapler. The current ammo before reload is a measure of how many shots can be fired until current heat sinks are used up after which like a stapler the heat sinks move into position to absorb heat. The guns stop firing because they completely replaced the old cooling system with the new heat sinks that are designed to absorb heat but not easily cool down themselves.

This would result in a divide in weapons based on economics. The wealthy can afford higher end cooling systems that give the same rate of fire but allow full use of ammunition blocks and have effectively infinite ammo. Less wealthy individuals would rely on the cheaper ejectable heat sinks and hope to end a battle quickly. To save costs militaries would adopt the heat disposable system for their basic soldiers while the soldiers on long term missions would be issued the high end cooling system. Snipers would be able to suppress larger groups of targets over a longer period. Moving to a new location after a few shots.

My Sheppard is not a basic soldier.

[KingDan97]

Bluko wrote...

KingDan97 wrote...

Just to all those people claiming it would be "easy" to implement a "switch",(No, I didn't read through all 7 pages, but someone always acts like they know exactly how to make games, when they clearly don't) adding that would mean they'd need to scale the game twice. Every enemy, every encounter would need to be accounted for, from top to bottom.

To any with the delusion that "modders" will find a prototype mode with overheating like in ME2, that only existed because Bioware didn't clean that code out. In the case of ME3 that mode won't even have been made, and the only reason it was removed in the first place was because of how fundamentally broken it was.

Well no obviously it would not be easy, and from a balance standpoint Overheating Mechanics for the player will likely either make the game very easy or very hard. (The A.I. doesn't need to be changed since it fires in bursts and already uses unlimited ammunition. You just need to remove the reload animation is basically all.)

Making the weapons operate on overheat basis would likely be time consuming no doubt. Still the only tricky thing really is making the rate of cooldown comparable to reloading. It should not be that hard to keep potential DPS the same.

But the fact remains Bioware has taken some time to at least experiment with game modes. Quite frankly editing material for an entire 40 hour game is likely as time consuming as tweaking weapons would be. And supposedly Story Mode is suppose to operate quite differently from the standard game so obviously they are willing to do such things as re-balance the entire game.

Story mode is a new combat difficulty, that doesn't change much except for health levels if it's anything like ME2, but the cooldown mechanic would need to be scaled for each difficulty individually just like ammo drops are, and the time it takes to reload could never really be a fair trade-off for the time it takes to cooldown without making the cooldown obselete.

They can't make the option viable without significantly changing upgrades and possibly even skills to try and compensate. Story mode changes the strength of enemies, it's not a rebalancing of entire encounters. Each encounter needs to be checked based on gameplay mechanics as to whether it's viable, difficulty is not a gameplay mechanic, it's a variable, it deals with percentages not placements and within reason a difficulty is just upping percentages.

[KingDan97]

The Spamming Troll wrote...

Someone With Mass wrote...

ME1's gun system was hardly unique, because Halo did that about six-seven years before Mass Effect.

Not to mention that just because it's unique doesn't mean it's good.

your trying to tie together unique, with relelvant. yes halo, or whatever game before halo, did it first. but thats not what made ME1 weapons unique. also halos weapons needed to refill ammo so really its not even a valid reference in the first place. 

its just unfortunate, is all.

You've clearly never picked up a plasma pistol, sniper or energy rifle. You never had to reload, there was a limit to the total charge they held yes, but that doesn't change the fact that they were cooldown based weapons.

[DeathDragon185]

I hated the heat system for ME. I was glad that they changed it. It made the game more fun and that is what really matters. well that and the story.

[The Spamming Troll]

KingDan97 wrote...

The Spamming Troll wrote...

Someone With Mass wrote...

ME1's gun system was hardly unique, because Halo did that about six-seven years before Mass Effect.

Not to mention that just because it's unique doesn't mean it's good.

your trying to tie together unique, with relelvant. yes halo, or whatever game before halo, did it first. but thats not what made ME1 weapons unique. also halos weapons needed to refill ammo so really its not even a valid reference in the first place. 

its just unfortunate, is all.

You've clearly never picked up a plasma pistol, sniper or energy rifle. You never had to reload, there was a limit to the total charge they held yes, but that doesn't change the fact that they were cooldown based weapons.

what do you think im argueing, that ME1s or halos weapons dont cooldown? ofcorse both weapons are cooldown based, but thats there only similarity. picking up ammo or picking up a new weapons is the same thing, so saying halos weapons are exactly like ME1s weapons isnt true at all.

and if halo can make a balanced overheat weapon, how cant bioware?

[robarcool]

The most inconsistent thing I find about the thermal clip system is that you get fractional clips on picking up one. I mean if a gun can shoot 24 rounds before getting heated up, then shouldn't picking up thermal clips give you rounds in multiples of that? Usually, if I pick a thermal clip with an empty Vindicator, I get 34 rounds. That is just nonsensical from the pov of thermal clip logic. It basically translates to : You get a cold thermal clip and you get a partially heated thermal clip that can only take so much more heat before reaching the max tolerable temperature.

Modifié par robarcool, 20 novembre 2011 - 09:45 .

[Abraham_uk]

^ I don't really get the thermal clip logic. Could someone explain how it works?

[fdgvdddvdfdfbdfb]

It's ammo plain and simple. Same reason it never cools down. Calling them thermal clips was just a very ham-fisted retcon.

[Capt_Flashheart]

I remember when developers use to add features like this to their games all the time.

They were called "cheats" and you didn't need to use console commands to enable them.

[Abraham_uk]

Ahh good old cheats. On Goldeneye you had to earn them by doing silly challenges on the highest difficulty (that were virtually impossible) or enter cheat codes that didn't work half the time. I remember invincibility on Donkey Kong 64. It doesn't make Donkey Kong invincible.

Having said that, on Grand Theft Auto games cheats were funny. CARNAGE! Blow everything up and get the police chasing after you whilst you had infinite ammo. I think Saints Row thought to themselves. GTA + Cheats = Awesome and made a game that was essencially that.

Modifié par Abraham_uk, 29 novembre 2011 - 10:26 .

[CerberusWarrior]

The ME 1 gun ammo system was complete garbage . Its time for ME 1 fans to deal with the fact ME 3 is a Shooter and in shooter games you have ammo