Zetheros
Developer
Hey Exanimates,
We should be really close to releasing a beta with a first batch of changes to weapons, so we wanted to use this diary to explain some of the changes in detail, what to expect and how to help with feedback. The changes are extensive, and they cover many things in response to a lot of feedback over a long period of time. All the new mechanics seem like a clear improvement, but a fair amount of tweaking and adjusting values may be needed to get it all working at its best.
At the core of most changes is a much more detailed description of how weapons do damage. Previously weapons all had the same basic stats and parameters, a sort of point of maximum damage with a falloff covered most of it. Now there are many weapon types, and even types of weapon parts, each with specific values and behaviours, and even sounds. We now know the exact placement and nature of each part thanks to weapons being assembled in the parts from factories. This all affects how physics and collisions are interpreted, but the damage calculations have also changed.
So what does this mean in practice? The difference between weapons should be more pronounced, in how they work and how you use them. The general behaviour and interaction with physics should be more realistic. Some weapons will be less forgiving, but we've tried to balance that in various ways. Those moments that made you think "that weapon really shouldn't do that" should be a thing of the past.
Slash damage received a major rework. This always had issues, there have been some bandaid improvements, but a good slash model has proved tricky to do. The new slash damage system is based on hewing and cutting, and both are properly driven by physics now. Hewing is what happens on higher impact blows, such as a solid hit with an axe or the centre of percussion of a sword, cutting occurs on more grazing hits, such as when slicing across the body with a sword. Hewing has higher potential, and scales fairly well even with duller weapons if there's enough force behind it. Cutting doesn't require much force, but is very dependent on the sharpness of the weapon.
This means big heavy weapons can deliver some nasty chops even if they're not all that sharp, and swords still have that slicing potential, but do need to do some work and don't just cut on contact. Axes are now hybrid slash-crush weapons, making them more effective against armour, and devastating against less armour thanks to these new mechanics.
Besides generally balancing and tweaking the new damage systems there's a lot more we can do now to highlight the differences between weapons, not just different weapon types, but different examples of the same weapon with changes in shape etc.
A big driving force for reworking the entire weapon system was to allow weapons to be flipped, gripped differently, or both. This is part of an effort to make core gameplay and itemisation more fun and interesting, that started with procedural items, and certainly doesn't end here. We're including the most obvious weapon flips in this first beta to test the mechanics, but this is something we'll keep adding to over time as we introduce new ways to use weapons and new animations. This makes the difference between parts of weapons and damage types a more important gameplay element, so that's something to keep in mind.
Hopefully that gives you a decent idea of what to expect and what we're trying to achieve. We'll be listening to your feedback and suggestions as usual. There's a lot of weapons and some pretty complex mechanics here, so this will really help us tune it all properly.
Have a great week!
-the BM team
We should be really close to releasing a beta with a first batch of changes to weapons, so we wanted to use this diary to explain some of the changes in detail, what to expect and how to help with feedback. The changes are extensive, and they cover many things in response to a lot of feedback over a long period of time. All the new mechanics seem like a clear improvement, but a fair amount of tweaking and adjusting values may be needed to get it all working at its best.
At the core of most changes is a much more detailed description of how weapons do damage. Previously weapons all had the same basic stats and parameters, a sort of point of maximum damage with a falloff covered most of it. Now there are many weapon types, and even types of weapon parts, each with specific values and behaviours, and even sounds. We now know the exact placement and nature of each part thanks to weapons being assembled in the parts from factories. This all affects how physics and collisions are interpreted, but the damage calculations have also changed.
So what does this mean in practice? The difference between weapons should be more pronounced, in how they work and how you use them. The general behaviour and interaction with physics should be more realistic. Some weapons will be less forgiving, but we've tried to balance that in various ways. Those moments that made you think "that weapon really shouldn't do that" should be a thing of the past.
Slash damage received a major rework. This always had issues, there have been some bandaid improvements, but a good slash model has proved tricky to do. The new slash damage system is based on hewing and cutting, and both are properly driven by physics now. Hewing is what happens on higher impact blows, such as a solid hit with an axe or the centre of percussion of a sword, cutting occurs on more grazing hits, such as when slicing across the body with a sword. Hewing has higher potential, and scales fairly well even with duller weapons if there's enough force behind it. Cutting doesn't require much force, but is very dependent on the sharpness of the weapon.
This means big heavy weapons can deliver some nasty chops even if they're not all that sharp, and swords still have that slicing potential, but do need to do some work and don't just cut on contact. Axes are now hybrid slash-crush weapons, making them more effective against armour, and devastating against less armour thanks to these new mechanics.
Besides generally balancing and tweaking the new damage systems there's a lot more we can do now to highlight the differences between weapons, not just different weapon types, but different examples of the same weapon with changes in shape etc.
A big driving force for reworking the entire weapon system was to allow weapons to be flipped, gripped differently, or both. This is part of an effort to make core gameplay and itemisation more fun and interesting, that started with procedural items, and certainly doesn't end here. We're including the most obvious weapon flips in this first beta to test the mechanics, but this is something we'll keep adding to over time as we introduce new ways to use weapons and new animations. This makes the difference between parts of weapons and damage types a more important gameplay element, so that's something to keep in mind.
Hopefully that gives you a decent idea of what to expect and what we're trying to achieve. We'll be listening to your feedback and suggestions as usual. There's a lot of weapons and some pretty complex mechanics here, so this will really help us tune it all properly.
Have a great week!
-the BM team
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