[WIP] The Trooper - 0.2.4.4 Released! [HITBOXES ARE FIXED]

[comet1337]

damn railgunner, can't stop the update train
like one new weapon every day since release

also the last salvo lags like hell
maybe not have it shoot 12 fastprojectiles that all spawn 8 trail actors every tic?

[TheRailgunner]

Honestly, the chainsaw replacement switches a bit slow compared to the others. I don't really know how much damage it does, I just tested it on imps and zombies. It seems as though it should have more range. Also, the effect it plays on the walls does not play on monsters, is this intentional?

Also, it'd be cool if you could use it as a hotkey for a quick melee, or some kind of Demonsteele styled melee.

"This party's getting crazy!" - Dante/Male Hae Lin

The sword deals a LOT of damage (20-30-40-40-30 over 5 frames) - it's capable of taking down a greater demon in a few swings. It also has considerable range (96-104, depending on the frame) compared to the fist (64).

I wanted the effect to accompany a slash decal - that is, to imply that the weapon is "phasing" through the wall somewhat. That said, I might apply it to monsters as well. A quick melee would be nice, but that means adding the Demon Blood Sword to every weapon - again, not much effort, but could be buggy. I'll probably have it do less damage than simply having the sword as your selected weapon. We shall see...

*makes note about quick melee*

damn railgunner, can't stop the update train
like one new weapon every day since release

also the last salvo lags like hell
maybe not have it shoot 12 fastprojectiles that all spawn 8 trail actors every tic?

As far as new weapons, I'm basically done once I replace the fist. After that, I'll probably give the weapons altfires (dragon's breath shells for the VSK7 Nightshade, slugs for the Sturmman M97, etc.)

It's incredibly hard to make the effect look good at the speed the projectiles need to move at - I can slow down the projectiles, increase their radius, and cut some of the trails, but then it kind of stops having that near-instant hit that railguns are known for. If I cut the number of projectiles, it doesn't go through nearly as many enemies and deals less damage to the player at close range (it's honestly supposed to kill you in one shot, even with a Megasphere). Using one projectile with +RIPPER would cause it to deal ludicrous damage to a theoretically infinite number of enemies, which would make it the single most powerful weapon in the game...and I don't want that, mostly because the Crimson Spectre's supposed to fill that role. I could just pray reeeeally hard and hope that PillowBlaster and Keksdose answer, but that's a long shot, especially given just how many resources I use from the both of them. Alternatively, I could get off my lazy ass and fix it, but I'm sort of an epiphany or two away from that.

Last Salvo lags like hell on my computer, too - and it's no toaster. I will fix the LS' projectile effect lag soon.

In conclusion...Fuck.

EDIT: Testing lighter versions of the LS' projectile right now, I'll let you guys know how it goes.

[Carbine Dioxide]

How about a bullet puff that explodes? That's the lazy way i'd go about it anyway.

Maybe you can just add a new gun in place of the chainsaw, and have the demon's blood be the fist.

On quick melee, it could do less damage, but on slot does more damage.

[TheRailgunner]

How about a bullet puff that explodes? That's the lazy way i'd go about it anyway.

Maybe you can just add a new gun in place of the chainsaw, and have the demon's blood be the fist.

On quick melee, it could do less damage, but on slot does more damage.

I'm still undecided on the Demon Blood Sword's place in the melee tree - I might switch them and add something interesting for the Chainsaw (given that it spawns rarely - but more than once - in most mapsets makes this a viable option), but that assumes I don't have "improved fists". That said...the extra gun does sound nice.

I've updated the mod with a less-resource intensive Last Salvo. It MAY lag, but so far I haven't really noticed anything in testing. I want to convey the power of certain weapons with FastProjectiles - the Surfeit Torment shoots a massive, explosive bullet, the Last Salvo does this on a much grander scale, etc. I can get away with the shotguns and rifles not having visible bullets.

EDIT: Demon Blood Sword now produces a red flame when swung. It also has a function besides looking cool - it basically tells you the sword's range.

[Carbine Dioxide]

Here's some shotgun shells, Captain J made the casings. I thought I'd throw these here because the pale red casing sprites and the bright red casing pickups bother me. Woah, I need to post a blue version of the casings too, cause double barreled messes.



I might make some more ammo sprites for other guns.

[TheRailgunner]

Here's some shotgun shells, Captain J made the casings. I thought I'd throw these here because the pale red casing sprites and the bright red casing pickups bother me. Woah, I need to post a blue version of the casings too, cause double barreled messes.



I might make some more ammo sprites for other guns.

I'll probably sort the color difference on one side or the other (either by making the shells darker or the casings brighter).

I'm implementing the knife I put sprites in for forever ago, which will replace the fists. It'll do a decent amount of damage, taking 1 second before it is ready again. Basically, it's the last resort of last resorts, and the Demon Blood Sword is preferable if you have it.

Still unsure about the quick-knife ability, I'll see where this goes for a bit before I do that.

EDIT: Knife update is online - all weapons are replaced! And now...for powerups, alt-fires, and...enemies, perhaps?

[Carbine Dioxide]

Maybe upping the saturation could help too with the casings.

[Jeimuzu73]

Not bad for a weapons mod. Next step is casings, reloading and maybe some balancing and alt-fire modes. My major gripe is that the recoil of many of your weapons is so strong that I almost got dizzy after firing.

[TheRailgunner]

Not bad for a weapons mod. Next step is casings, reloading and maybe some balancing and alt-fire modes. My major gripe is that the recoil of many of your weapons is so strong that I almost got dizzy after firing.

It already has casings, themselves imported from Helsturm. I more or less deliberately avoided reloading as a mechanic - for example, a complete reload animation exists for the Sokova 46 in Helsturm, and making one for the VSK7 wouldn't be too hard, but some of the reload animations would be ridiculous, such as the Sturmman M97, which is basically a pair of machine guns that fire shotgun shells. Balance is something I'll sort out as I go along - I'm not really worried about it. Alt-fires are pretty much in the planning stage, as some of the weapons I can't really imagine having alt-fires.

About the recoil, I was sort of worried about this, but on some weapons, it's really hard to balance power with ease of use...such as, again, the Sturmman M97. I honestly just don't want to part with the recoil mechanic, being one of very few I chose to hang on to from previous projects. I might have a look at how Blade of Agony implements its recoil scalar to come up with some sort of solution, but given the ubiquity of A_SetPitch/Angle among The Trooper's arsenal, it might not be the next update.

EDIT: Demon Blood Sword and knife now react to Berserk pickups. The Pulsar-D now spawns with 60 ammo instead of 24.

The knife is preferable for single, low-health targets, while the Demon Blood Sword is better against tight groups and stronger enemies, but weak against sparse groups because of its longer reaction time.

[TheRailgunner]

So, with the arsenal more or less complete, I've updated the mod with altfires:

*Surfeit Torment can be fired "automatically" with altfire.
*VSK7 Nightshade can fire explosive shells, which require, well, explosive shells.
*Sturmman M97 can now fire slugs.
*Last Salvo can fire a perforated slug that spreads in five distinct directions.
*Lost Guardian can fired automatically using altfire, like the weapon Pocket Infinity from Destiny.
*Crimson Spectre can drop antimatter cores as mines - just be sure to be far away from it when you shoot it/someone else does, because the mine can damage you.

The VSK7, M97, and Last Salvo require special ammo to use their altfires. Also, the Demon Blood Sword now swings in an arc, which allows it to cleave multiple enemies more consistently.

Finally, I replaced the darker shells with brighter ones, as well as adding custom shells for the alternate firing modes.

[Flyingcomputer]

Any chance there will be a cvar to lower the quality of the flares in the fuure, for those of us unfortunate to be playing on potatoes? The torments' seems to not affect me at all but the last salvo is almost impossible to play with as it freezes my game for a second or two with each shot, the lost guardian also used to lag the game a bit but whatever you changed with it, that's gone.

[TheRailgunner]

Any chance there will be a cvar to lower the quality of the flares in the fuure, for those of us unfortunate to be playing on potatoes? The torments' seems to not affect me at all but the last salvo is almost impossible to play with as it freezes my game for a second or two with each shot, the lost guardian also used to lag the game a bit but whatever you changed with it, that's gone.

Almost certainly - I did lower the amount of visible FastProjectiles the LastSalvo uses, but that only goes so far. I'll see what I can do - I haven't really done much with CVARs in the past, so it'll take a bit of feeling around to get the hang of using them.

Picking up a second Demon Blood Sword now grants the Berserk effect, as to not put those extra chainsaw spawns to waste. Berserk boxes now only heal 50 health to offset the ridiculousness that is the berserked Demon Blood Sword.

[Carbine Dioxide]

Shouldn't the M97 fire two slugs instead of one? One slug projectile is all I'm seeing right now.

[TheRailgunner]

Shouldn't the M97 fire two slugs instead of one? One slug projectile is all I'm seeing right now.

It fires 2, but they're close enough together to look like one. I've updated it so the two projectiles are more noticeably separate.

The Demon Blood Sword now has an altfire, which, after a longer delay, launches you forward with a more powerful strike. In addition, the Surfeit Torment's altfire is much more stable, but at the cost of projectile accuracy, much like The Last Word.

[Carbine Dioxide]

Are you able to get special ammo anywhere else besides a backpack?

I usually don't like ammo types, but the ones in this mod are very solid, although I'm not a big fan of the Salvo's alt fire.