Flash Cannons

[Ultraken]

"Run away!  Run awaaaaaayy!" 

Making the Flash Cannon less useless might be okay, but extensive, game-changing re-balance would need to wait for a subsequent update.

On the other hand, it's all just ODF files.  If people are willing to come up with values that the community can agree on, I could include it in the package.  Getting the community to agree is the hard part. 

[lucky_foot]

Note to Mod:

We need a topic split. Kerfuffle and Flash Cannons.

[Ultraken]

The fundamental problem with the Flash Cannon is that I didn't take network play into consideration when implementing it.  It casts a beam every frame, flooding the network layer with so many ordnance creation events that most of them get dropped, crippling the weapon on the remote side.  Fixing it would take some major engineering.

[Ultraken]

I guess "major" is relative. 

[Dx]

Well we had the FC working by switching to the tracer code instead of beam, not exactly the same but close enough.

[Firestorm29]

I myself wondered how much work it'd take to change the way the beam code worked?

Instead of a stream of hits, have the PC send a couple flags stating when the beam is starting to hit a target then a few flags to state when it misses or stops hitting a target. Then it takes the time cooked and formulates the damage afterwards. This would help keep the way the weapon works the same.

I say a couple flags as it would prevent the weapon from either not hitting at all or doing constant damage from the start or stop flags being missed.

[TheJamsh]

I dont know if this helps or not (most likely not)

Does BZ1 have the arc stream weapon (or a concoction of it?). This weapon works brilliantly in multiplayer, if you can somehow remove the 'lock to the ground' part of the code, it may work just like a beam. (or at least appear to, i know the stream doesnt really, and strafing with the thing activated is downright ugly, but it wont get any better).

FS29: if that was possible, it probably would have been implemented

[ssuser]

Arc Weapons in BZ1 use the blast and beam code - Bolt Buddy works like blast cannons, and the arc mines are like the flash cannon - in fact there was a discussion about this either here or at BZC not so long ago, IIRC.

The flash cannon problem is going to take some doing to get around. Most people are by now used to other strategies, so it might be best to leave this as a relatively low priority item for now.

[Red Devil]

Might be better to include that tweak now, otherwise, it might turn out to be the guy who stands up in the rowboat after everyone's settled.

[Firestorm29]

FS29: if that was possible, it probably would have been implemented

I'm not too sure about that. There's more than one way to implement a fix with programming and maybe what they came up with was too much work to make it worth trying? I mean they changed the weapon's stats so there was probably a problem known with the weapon.

Though a question about a rumor I heard once, was the nerf to the flash cannon in 1.4 to make it how it was intended to work in Single Player normally? The rumor goes that the weapon was made really strong to allow it to work in multiplayer as it was intended operate and when it was found the weapon wasn't used much online they nerfed it so it would worked as intended in single player since it wasn't used much online.

I can't recall many HEAT.net BZers making use of the Flash Cannon.

[General BlackDragon]

I dont know if this helps or not (most likely not)

Does BZ1 have the arc stream weapon (or a concoction of it?). This weapon works brilliantly in multiplayer, if you can somehow remove the 'lock to the ground' part of the code, it may work just like a beam. (or at least appear to, i know the stream doesnt really, and strafing with the thing activated is downright ugly, but it wont get any better).

FS29: if that was possible, it probably would have been implemented

I proposed the same idea for the 1.3 patch long ago, so that I could recreate the BZ1 beamclass, but GSH shot it down.

[ssuser]

Firestorm, even in single player the Flash Cannon is now worthless - very short range, too much ammo use, and not enough damage. That is one of the reasons why I made new flash cannons for Hell's Fire Valley, for example. Even as a turret weapon with the turret parked next to a supply it just doesn't cut it. If you want Flash Cannons as weapons in an IA map you have to tweak the odf for them to be any good.

[Ultraken]

Rebalancing things is outside the scope of my initial efforts, but getting the Flash Cannon working reasonably well in single player would be a good starting point for a later followup.

[Firestorm29]

Firestorm, even in single player the Flash Cannon is now worthless - very short range, too much ammo use, and not enough damage. That is one of the reasons why I made new flash cannons for Hell's Fire Valley, for example. Even as a turret weapon with the turret parked next to a supply it just doesn't cut it. If you want Flash Cannons as weapons in an IA map you have to tweak the odf for them to be any good.

Is this map availible on BZScrap? I'd like to see what your modded flash cannon was like.

The reason I'm focusing so hard on trying to figure out how to get the multiplayer version to work is mainly because the single player version just needs maybe an .odf tweak to get the numbers at a decent sweet spot, where as the multiplayer version may not be such a simple fix.

But here's the real humdinger: How to we know when we actually hit that sweet spot?

[sabrebattletank]

But here's the real humdinger: How to we know when we actually hit that sweet spot?

Oh, you'll know. You'll just know.