This may have been brought up, but why not have nation-specific blasters. Each nation has their specific color for the weapon. Sercos could have more powerful blasters while the itani ones are faster. I guess the UIT might have a double shot yellow one or something. Seems to be a rather cool idea.

With the current level system: Where would this weapon fit in? I don't see it as an endgame weapon, like the Megapositron, or the Axia Accelerated Positron, or the Neutron Mk3, reason being that it would probably imbalance gameplay.

I think (heh) ThinkHen is just generally speaking about blasters - not just one. Just that Serco would have blasters that Itani wouldn't have & vice versa. Which is something I agree with, although, like toshiro said, its easy to imbalance gameplay like that.

I agree it would be nice to see nation specific weaponry. Balance can work itself out later.

I suppose they could just change the colors of the N3. Leave the weapon stats the same, but change colors for Serco and Itani.

that would be cool....

Yea, just give nation specific names and colors to all the weapons and you've tripled the number of weapons in the game!

erm... not really...

I like the idea of more types of weapons, but I also like being able to identify what my enemy is shooting at me based on its color.

It wouldn't be "realistic" to change the color of some of the weapons...a stream of high energy positrons, neutrons, etc is going to be the same color (if it would even be visible) no matter where the shooter was born.

Ion or plasma cannons might be another story...what kind of ions/plasma are you shooting? Maybe Itani weapons appear blue because they use silver as the fuel/ammo while UIT ones are Lello because they use Sulphur or Chlorine (or any of the minerals only found in the VO universe.)

Don't change the colors of all the weapons. Maybe just those that it makes sense for...but make slightly stronger versions if you want to see them used in game.

Realism? Who's talking realism here? :P

Well like, you could have your:
Itani Defense Works Hymn of Eo Plasma Blaster Mk. I
Serco Weapons Bureau DX-B43s Destron Plasma Blaster Mk. I
Orion Industries ESG-T2 Plasma Blaster Mk. I

Which are all govplas just different colors. Serco's could be more red, Itani's could be more to the purple side, and the UIT could be more orange. That kind of thing.

OR you could balance the DPS, and change other factors.

Itani Defense cannon (S)
Delay: .05 s
Damage: 200
Velocity: 160 m/s
Energy: 5/shot

Serco Incursion Mega-blaster (L)
Delay: 1 s
Damage: 4000
Velocity: 120 m/s
Energy: 150/shot

Union Peacekeeper Blaster (S)
Delay: 0.2 s
Damage/projectile: 200
Velocity: 200m/s
Energy: 3/projectile
The UIT one would be a bit different, firing four shots at the edges of a 5° Cone each time it fired.

As for looks, Each nation's blaster would be the nation's color. The Serco's thing would look somewhat like a red guass cannon, the Itani's like a light blue positron blaster and the UIT's would be like 4 yellow positrons firing in flachette spread-formation.

The DPS is balanced right now, but I would like to increase the damage of the UIT one to 3 or 4 hundred considering how hard it would be to hit with it. What are everyone's thoughts on the ideas in this post?

-Calder

[EDIT] Forget the Damage change, I decreased the energy requirement so someone could load two of them. That would make up for the damage loss.

It wouldn't be "realistic" to change the color of some of the weapons...a stream of high energy positrons, neutrons, etc is going to be the same color (if it would even be visible) no matter where the shooter was born.

you just suggested your own realistic explination... :P

the beams we are shooting would be highly unlikely to have any 'color' of thier own, so obviously our hud is supplying a color difference for easy recognition based on the characteristics of the shot fired.

and here's how the weapons should break down IMO:

use the basic weapons we have now for the UIT's. dont change anything.

Add some damage + reduce energy cost /and/ remove some speed + increase refire time for the serco versions. add a bit to the cost.

remove some damage + increase energy cost /and/ add some speed + decrease refire time for the itani versions. once again, add a bit to the cost.

the exact amount of damage/energy and speed/refire would need to be determined by testing.. in general high speed/fast refire is more important than amount of damge and energy used so probably a 15% change in damage for each 5% change in speed would be a good place to start.

What you would end up with is a nice tradeoff..

UIT weapons would be pretty much middle of the road.. no bennies, no disadvantages.

Serco weapons would be hard hitting and more energy efficient but travel slower and take more time to charge between shots. (fits the hit em hard mentality)

Itani weapons would do less damage and cost more energy, but travel faster and fire more often.
(more of a 'peck them to death' weapon)

yea, and don't forget about the realism of sound in space.

But anyway

There should be some sort of discount for members of the faction (say, 500cr) to promote the weapon diversity while not making it exclusive.

How about giving the Serco weapons a very small proximity instead of the bonuses you suggested, Spellcast? Say, 2 meters or something. Exact numbers would have to be determined by testing.

@Spellcast: Your Itani/Serco weapons are practically the same as what I laid out. Come ON, the color can easily be explained, and CP is right. Turbo isn't realistic, sound isn't realistic, it's a lot easier to explain different color weapons than it is to explain sound in space. They don't HAVE to be the stuff we alreaday have like nuetrons, positrons and guass. They can look like them, but as far as the storyline goes, they can be completely different things.

@Toshiro: It's interesting, but a proximity weapon with infinite ammo would ultimately be unbalancing to combat. Light ships are good because they are light, and small, and having something that can just keep firing proximity rounds would further advantage heavies. (Yes, it is me saying that, :D)

-Calder

I don't care about the realism of blaster colour.

I just want them to be pur-dy.

The color really is trivial imo... I would much rather see each nation have its own classes of weaponry that are far different from the other nations. Perhaps each of these classes would tend toward a certain color, but that's really a secondary concern. I think Spellcast is on the right track.

Here's how I would divvy up the weapons:

UIT:
Ion Blasters
Flechette Cannons
Gatling Cannon/Turret

Yellowjackets, Geminis, Swarms

Serco:
Plasma Blasters
Charged Cannon
Gauss Cannons
Plasma Devastators

Flares, Jackhammers

Itani:
Phased Blasters
Neutron Blasters
Positron Blasters

Fireflies, Screamers

This way the UIT get the utilitarian rapid-firing weapons, the Serco get the big guns with slow refire, and the Itani get the high tech "sciencey" weapons.

Re: Person; there's one thing you are forgetting to take into consideration: the first-strike effect. A blaster that does 4,000 damage in one hit has a big edge over a blaster that does 200 damage per hit even though they have the same d.p.s. Imagine botting Oruns with a Incursion Mega-Blaster vs. a Defense Cannon. I like the ideas, but I guess my point is d.p.s. isn't everything.

I can't stand the idea that spellcast put forward, why should serco weapons have higher damage low speed and itani weapons have high speed and low damage, that makes no sense.

If you want to make a cool nation specific weapon make it be _earned_ though some sort of mission. The weapon its self could be the same stats for each nation, but could have a different color as suggested and a different name. This mission would only be available to said nation, and at a high faction standing, even perhaps only to those at Pillar of Society.

The actual specs are really meaningless anyway since everything needs to be rebalanced anyway. Especially with new ships coming into the frey like the trident, raptor, etc.

It's bad enough that the nation specific ships lock you into a fighting style, ie. Serco= Heavy Bomber, Itani=Midrange Attack & UIT=Lame Bubble. To do this to the weapons too would just be too much. But if that's how it has to be I think that the weapons style should fit well with the nation specific ship so that they compliment each other when used together.

Perhaps a special large port weapon similar to the AGT but with a different look, maybe like a neutron blaster style fire that chains. For Itani special flare that has multipule warheads that split up after fire, turning 3 salvos in 9 (with equal or a slightly higher damage then a similar 3 rocket). And for UIT, since they are not technically a fighter nation, avoiding the war and all, give them a special small port mining beam that has equal stats to the MkII mining beam or possibly better.

If anyone, I'd imagine Serco get the flares... dunno, it just seems like a weapon they'd come up with.

Spell, it's not the first strike affect that matters in PvP, and if you make the license requirements for the Serco weapon relatively high, (6/-/7) which makes sense anyway. By that time, Orun's definitely AREN'T your primary target! :D