Specialists lategame.

[Egorkor]

DISCLAIMER: Yes, I know about the no-guns in suggestions rule, but I'm going to try anyway since useless specs lategame are a separate problem, and the lategame buffed aliens are okay, yet they sometimes become a problem too. Hopefully this will solve one and help counter the other to make people less salty. If it gets denied, well again, I had to try.


Summary (a quick, 2-3 sentence summary):
As of now, most specialists are becoming useless toward the lategame whereas aliens evolve and become more dangerous and almost uncounterable starting with elite. Marines should get something to at least have a chance to counter that, I believe. Instead of buffing the entirety of marines, specs could get something to fight the evolved aliens better and stand a small chance.

Benefits (How this will benefit the server and game as a whole):
Provides a somewhat of a counter to the elite and ancient aliens, mainly spitters and crushers.

Details (Description of how you think this would work, the benefits, etc):
At around the 2hr30 or 3hr mark, when the first elite and ancient aliens appear or the alien team already has some, cargo should be able to order an "Advanced Weaponry Crate" or something like that, which would contain one advanced specialist weapon. The crate'd cost at around as much points as the sentry costs, I'm not sure completely because I've never seen the prices in cargo, but that shouldn't be too cheap or TOO MUCH, ABSOLUTELY UNIMAGIBLY expensive. For a crate to be ordered, a marine spec'd have to turn in his specialist equipment first, which would unlock the ability to order an upgraded weapon crate based on what weapon you turned in, i.e. you put the SADAR into that vendor and an advanced SADAR crate is unlocked to be ordered.
Alternatively, the weapon in a crate'd be replaced by a "special coin crate" which'd let you vend an upgraded weapon from the existing spec vendors, but I like the orderable crate more.
Alternatively, for the weapons to be unlocked, the research team has to dissect one elite/ancient alien of any caste to prove they're dangerous to the USCM and as such they should send in better supplies.

1) M56 Smartgun > M57D "Dirty" Smartgun. In lore, it fires the bullets that irradiate you, but since that's not gonna work in our case, I propose it to be using either a:
-three regular bullets, one AP and one inced bullet per 5 shots.
or
-one regular, one inced and one AP bullet per a 3-round burst.
or
-one regular, one inced, one AP bullet per shot out of a 3-round volley.
The ammo'd also be increased to 100 and powerpack ammo to 500 with two powerpacks being in the crate, or remain unchanged. You'd still retain the ability to use regular powerpacks since you pretty much lose your previous gun for good.

2) B18 armor either gets a > M4X armor which'd make you more resistant to tackles or knockdowns as a whole by reducing the knockdown timer similar to preds', immune to neurotox spits, and'd offer an even greater melee and bullet protection. The helmet'd be able to block 6 huggers.
or
> M90 Minigun, basically a renamed Ol' Painless. I ain't got anything to say here, up to you to figure out how a B18 guy with a minigun is going to do on the field.

3) M83 SADAR > M83AM SADAR AMAG, basically the thermobaric SADAR we have ingame. Able to fire four shots without reloading with a small cooldown, able to use the regular SADAR rockets, either has to be reloaded with one rocket at a time or all 4 at once. Has two modes switchable with alt-click, one rocket per shot just like the usual SADAR or the automatic mode, as described above.

4) M42 Sniper Rifle > M44 Sledgehammer or WY-102 Railgun. I'm not a sniper user, so I'll leave it to people who use them to post in this thread and propose how they want their thang upgraded. I'd figure it'd either be bigger damage and an almost guaranteed armor penetration or ignoring friendlies thing akin to the smartgun's.

5) Grenade Launcher > ?. No idea here, literally none. It's somewhat fine as is, there's no need to upgrade it since nobody ever uses it I guess, and if they use it they either suck with it or do wonders and don't need anything better.

Now, of course alien players are gonna bitch about how that's gonna be OP, and I do somewhat agree, so nerfs would also have to be applied, I reckon. These are optional nerfs, and though I'd rather not see them implemented since the goal of this thread is to provide a counter, not an another nerfed marine toy, for the sake of being fair I'll put here what I came up with, subject to change depending on what/if people propose down in the thread.

M57-D: Works with a separate powerpack, the regular ones are not applicable to it, additional ones have to be ordered at the same cost as the regular ones as to not stress out cargo more.

M4X: Remove the tricord injectors, make the bullet protection remain the same or reduce it, buff melee protection slightly and not greatly as originally proposed. Near-cooldown/neurotox immunity remains the same, since one of the biggest problems lategame is spitspam.

M90 Minugun aka Ol' Painless: Never used it, dunno whether it's actually any good and has to be nerfed. Ammo has to be orderable via cargo, naturally but that's all I can think of for now.

M44 Sledgehammer/W-Y 102 Railgun: Doesn't come with an anti-FF thing, because snipers should get shat on constantly.

M83AM SADAR AMAG: Longer reload time because you have to load all 4 rockets separately, or load in all 4 rockets at once but it's naturally taking longer than reloading the usual SADAR. If you fire a rocket in the one-shot mode, you have to reload before being able to use the 4-shot mode.

GL: ???.
Implementation (Optional, if you have an idea how to implement it): Coding, spriting.


Thread's open to feedback as I've said, provided it won't get instadenied, I'll try to monitor and update the OP as needed.

[Sargeantmuffinman]

We are not giving you there other SADAR.

Ever....

And we are also not giving you Ol'Painless due to what it has become now.

[Egorkor]

it can get the buffed ammo then, I don't really care since I can get shite done with the current one (no boasting). however, AP rockets are going to be useless against elite crushers, since they'll just run off to heal and the other marines will not be able to hurt them. that being said, SADAR still needs attention in terms of lategame too, albeit small.

[Egorkor]

We are not giving you there other SADAR.

Ever....

And we are also not giving you Ol'Painless due to what it has become now.

we can still get the ole ol' painless and rename it, right? right????

[Sargeantmuffinman]

we can still get the ole ol' painless and rename it, right? right????

It can fire about 30 bullets on burst fire with only 30 degrees spread...

[lucashunter608]

I like this idea, will give a +1 because mariums are too weak in the middle of the game

[Toroic]

My understanding is that ancient xenos were intentionally made OP to help end the round and encourage early marine aggression.

Super spec weapons seems to negate that.

[Joe4444]

My understanding is that ancient xenos were intentionally made OP to help end the round and encourage early marine aggression.

Super spec weapons seems to negate that.

The first one makes sense yes but the early marine aggression? we get shouted at for "meta rushing" if we attack in the first hour of the game.I think it should give them a buffed weapon but not that buffed.Also put a timelock on it for the first hour the of game.+1

[Toroic]

The first one makes sense yes but the early marine aggression? we get shouted at for "meta rushing" if we attack in the first hour of the game.I think it should give them a buffed weapon but not that buffed.Also put a timelock on it for the first hour the of game.+1

early attacks is something I'm actually ok with, it forces xenos to be smart about fortifications and their early T3 distribution. I'm talking about a 30 min 1-2 squad attack.

[Sarah_U.]

My only thought on SADAR and specialists is this: If you fucked up early-game and don't have a SADAR / Sniper / B18 / Smartgun... Shame on you. Protect your specialists and just watch **ing Pryotr single-handedly rekt the entire hive with this **ing SADAR.

Lategame xenos should be strong and early agression promoted, but see'ing 2 SADAR is enough to know the aliens are not gonna last if they can't pick them off- Which will barrely ever happen when the Specialist is good and keep some marines close by.

[forwardslashN]

I'm going to rework some of the spec weapons soon, at least a few of them, but new weapons aren't really on the horizon right now. Denied for now.