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I don't have a fancy logo for this, or really fancy anything for this, largely because this is a pretty small mod I assembled in like three days, but I figured I'd go ahead and release it in case anyone else is interested.
So, what is Cult's Arsenal? Well, really, it's quite simple. One of my biggest (and only) complaints about Heretic's weaponset is the Ethereal Crossbow has never made any single bit of sense to me. If it was a regular bow I probably wouldn't have any qualms about it, but it makes no sense to me for a crossbow to function as an equivalent to the shotgun. So rather than just complaining about it, I decided, "what the hell, let's fix it! And while I'm at it, I'll tweak some other stuff too." And that's exactly what I did.
Designed to be run on ZDoom 2.8.1 or its GZDoom equivalent; however, the mod does not currently have an updated GLDEFS lump, so the replaced projectiles WILL NOT have dynamic lights in OpenGL.
This mod is not compatible with any Heretic mod that modifies ammunition pickups or weapons, or uses TID 879, and is additionally not compatible with any version of Zandronum earlier than 3.0, due to the use of Named Scripts.
Note: This list is by no means comprehensive. I have a more thorough list in the docs folder of the PK3 (that'd be CHANGELOG.txt).
Ethereal Crossbow no longer fires groups of arrows, but instead fires single arrows with more unpredictable damage and much more accuracy. In other words, it's a sniping weapon now.
The Wand has been changed from a hitscan weapon to a projectile weapon, firing GoldWandFX1 instead. Additionally, it has a shotgun blast-like tomed functionality. (It's a bit harder to use un-tomed, but makes a good backup weapon when tomed.)
The Staff has had its animation sped up, as... honestly it looked really sluggish and kind of stupid.
Dreadopp's medium-sized ammo pickups (which can be found in Realm667's Item Store under the "other" category) have been added into the mix, and will sometimes replace small and large ammo pickups. (It's balanced such that the overall amount of ammo (on average) is the same, but it ends up with more ammo early on and less later on.)
Xaser's Arbalest of the Ancients has also been added, having a 1 in 3 chance to replace any given Crossbow on any map except your starting map (or any crossbow spawned by the level at least ten seconds after map load, regardless of which map it is). It uses and fires three arrows, resulting in three times the power; that means it's good for stopping power, but should generally be saved for meatier targets due to the ammo consumption. It's less accurate, though, making it better for close quarters, or sniping groups.
The Phoenix Rod is a bit more usable, as its unpowered projectiles are slightly faster, and its powered projectiles are twice as fast, thus doubling its pitiful range.
Spoiler: FAQ
Q: Are the sparkles behind the arrows really necessary?
A: No, they're not strictly necessary, but I added them in anyway because a) it looks cool and b) it makes tracking the arrows a lot easier.
Q: Is this mod multiplayer-compatible?
A: Yep. It's not, however, compatible with Zandro 2.1.x, due to the use of named scripts (because lazy); however, it should still be compatible with 3.x.
Q: Can you make this compatible with <x>?
A: Probably. The better question is if I will, which depends entirely on what it is.
Q: I don't like the new crossbow functionality!
A: That's perfectly fine. You can just use regular Heretic instead.
Q: I got an Arbalest on the first level! Is that supposed to happen?
A: No, it's not, unless you manually set CA_ArbalestSpawnable to 1. If this happens, let me know and I'll look into it. (This can also happen if you started a new game after an existing without resetting CA_ArbalestSpawnable, or without closing your current ZDoom session. This is purely because CVars are used. Is there a more efficient approach? Probably. Problem is, I'm too lazy.)
Q: Where did you get the resources for this?
A: The Arbalest was made by Xaser and Neoworm, and can be found on Realm 667, under the Heretic/Hexen section of the Armoury. The medium-sized ammo pickups, however, are by Dreadopp, and can be found under the Other section of the Item Store (on the second page, to be precise). Most of the new code is mine, including the firing state for the Arbalest. (You can see a full credits list if you pop open the PK3 with either an archive utility such as 7Zip or with SLADE, and open up CREDITS.txt. If you look in the docs folder, you can also find a handful of other informational files, including the changelog, a weapons list (complete with explanations of their functionality), and a to-do list of stuff I have yet to do.)
Q: On the topic of to-do lists, can I suggest something for this mod?
A: Absolutely. I'd like to revamp the entire arsenal, but I'm not really sure what to do for all of them (as one look at TODO.txt will tell you), so I am absolutely open to suggestions on what to do. (There's also the previously-discussed subject of the Arbalest spawning.)
Q: Are donuts delicious?
A: Yes, very delicious. Especially Krispy Kremes.... mmmmmm...
Thank you for this modification! I gave it a whip n' whirl in the good ole Serpent Rider incident, and E1M1-M2 went smoothly! The medium drops came in handy with frequent use of the Golden Wand, while the projectile addition was a NICE touch!! Great job on it, along with it's powered up version. It opts you to get a little close for maximum damage output. The staff is more reliable, responsive and was actually a staple for the first half of E1M1. The character is a vigilant fighter with the ruse of an old man frantically batting away the denizens of darkness with his trust staff! This puppy powered up is even more formidable and does it's job in close-quarter situations. While I didn't get the new Crossbow on the first run, I was prized with the Arbalest instead.. This thing is a powerhouse; again in close-quarter elbow-to-knee combat it will prove worthy in a pinch and to hammer down on HP-abundant adversaries. From a distance, all shall fall under it's might. 3 arrows for the ride puts it in the same tier of the Super Shotgun of Doom. If anyone is looking for a good mod that focuses on balance and makes subjective improvements to the game that have a satisfying overall experience throughout the journey - this is the mod for you. Give it a go in Heretic Treasure Chest, or if you're in for an awakening, give Hordes of Chaos a shot!
RUNSABER wrote:Thank you for this modification! I gave it a whip n' whirl in the good ole Serpent Rider incident, and E1M1-M2 went smoothly! The medium drops came in handy with frequent use of the Golden Wand, while the projectile addition was a NICE touch!! Great job on it, along with it's powered up version. It opts you to get a little close for maximum damage output. The staff is more reliable, responsive and was actually a staple for the first half of E1M1. The character is a vigilant fighter with the ruse of an old man frantically batting away the denizens of darkness with his trust staff! This puppy powered up is even more formidable and does it's job in close-quarter situations. While I didn't get the new Crossbow on the first run, I was prized with the Arbalest instead.. This thing is a powerhouse; again in close-quarter elbow-to-knee combat it will prove worthy in a pinch and to hammer down on HP-abundant adversaries. From a distance, all shall fall under it's might. 3 arrows for the ride puts it in the same tier of the Super Shotgun of Doom. If anyone is looking for a good mod that focuses on balance and makes subjective improvements to the game that have a satisfying overall experience throughout the journey - this is the mod for you. Give it a go in Heretic Treasure Chest, or if you're in for an awakening, give Hordes of Chaos a shot!
Thanks for the feedback!
To be honest, I was a little skeptical about the changes I made to the wand, but I'm glad to hear it's good. As for the staff, pretty much my number one complaint about it was how laughably slow the animation was, so I'm definitely happy to hear my tweaks made it more usable. And all I did was cut the frame durations in half. ^_^;
And yeah, I need to work on the whole "getting the Arbalest" thing. Problem is I'm not sure how to handle it in a way that won't break non-traditional Heretic map packs, but I might look into trying some ACS shenanigans to make it work.
So, after more than 10 months of this mod collecting dust, I've finally updated it again! I was in the mood tonight, so five hours later we have what I consider a partial update. This update includes the following:
Slightly increased speed on the Wand's projectiles so hitting things is a little easier.
Increased the speeds of the Phoenix Rod's projectiles- namely, the untomed projectile by 25%, and the tomed projectile by a whopping 100%; the latter's a temporary measure to make a tomed Phoenix Rod actually useful, as I'll be completely replacing that functionality in the next version.
Addressed the issue of Arbalest spawning; thanks to some ACS trickery, the weapon now will no longer spawn on the first map, and will instead spawn with a 33% chance on any following map. Additionally, you can set CA_ArbalestSpawnable to 1 if you want it to enter the spawn pool immediately.
As a direct consequence of the above change, however, the mod is no longer compatible with Zandronum 2.x.
I only consider this a partial update (if anything, part 1 of a bigger update), hence the .5. The following version, v2, will include a good pile of other stuff, including a couple extra health pickups, a replacement for the Firemace, a replacement for the Phoenix Rod's tomed attack, proper GLDEFS, and potentially an update for the Hellstaff.
Go figure, almost 13 months later I come back with a partial update. This update is fairly minor, but does fundamentally alter the way the Arbalest spawns, as well as some balancing things regarding the mid-sized ammo pickups. In a nutshell:
- After taking some notes from how MetaDoom handles it, I updated the Arbalest spawning again. It still can spawn in the first level from Crossbows that are spawned in after loading, but now is no longer dependent on CVAR shenanigans. Let me know if this thing's still acting flaky- I think I have it functioning completely now, but it did act up before.
- The Wand's projectiles were sped up and got trails, since it occurred to me that they went from hitscans to slow projectiles that were considerably more difficult to hit with.
- I noticed the Crossbow and Arbalest have an extreme tendency towards extremely high damage, so I nerfed their maximum damage a bit. I also altered their powered forms, which don't have much higher maximum damage, but do more damage on average due to a higher minimum damage.
- Mid-sized ammo pickups have also been nerfed a bit, as they were a touch too prevalent in the earlygame.
- The staff was slowed down a bit with the addition of a 'pulling back' frame. Doesn't impact its DPS too much, as it's mainly an aesthetic change rather than a balance one; single hits are still the same speed.
This time for real, the Mace is getting redone for 2.0. I've decided to scrap the original Apotheosis plan, and will instead be giving the Firemace a rather hefty overhaul instead. The Dragon Claw will also be modified, with similar treatment to the Wand, and I'll potentially upgrade the Phoenix powered form too.
I tried loading up this mod with the latest versions of ZDoom and GZDoom And got an error message stating "Script error, "CultsArsenal_v1.7.pk3:actors/wand.txt" line 22: Sprite names must be exactly 4 characters" What is this about? is there any way I can troubleshoot this issue? Cult's Arsenal looks like a amazing mod and I don't wanna miss out
