Specialist Weapons and Powergaming

[HalfdeadKiller]

I'd like to discuss specialist weapons, and how using at least the smartgun is considered powergaming. If using the smartgun or other things is considered powergaming, could we add a line under the powergaming section? Though, it seems kinda off to disallow marines using a dead specialists weapons. Aside from the RP reason of requiring training, why shouldn't a marine be able to take up the role of a smartgunner if theirs dies, and isn't revivable?

[spheretech]

Aliens don't need the protection of this metashield. I'd say it would be against rules to take a live spcs weapon but not dead, it would go to waste

[Dyne]

In real armies all soldiers would be trained to use any "special" weapon their squad carries because the initial operator might be taken out of action.
Specifically we are talking machinegun/anti tank missile launcher, possibly AA handheld launchers as well if the squad in question uses them.

The difficulty of a smartgun lies more in someone helping you with adjusting the harness, not the shooty part itself.
More then that, we already know that at least some officers are specifically smartgun-trained, as the CO's black box in the armory has a special smartgun set.

Overall artificially limiting "no smartgun for you, plebs" will just lead to other weapons be used more often, so I dont see any positive side in enacting and enforcing an additional rule.

[forwardslashN]

When it comes to the smart gun itself, I'm pretty sure they are fitted specifically to one operator. But aside from that, no idea if marines are trained in its use.

[spheretech]

even with 80 ppl on the server theres gonna be the 4 spc weapons, might aswell use them whoever has it

[Seehund]

"Working fluidly with this automatic tracking takes some training to master; the operator must be sensitive to the gun's movements and allow it to aim itself, although the weapon's motion can be overridden at any time by simply steering the barrel elsewhere. Despite the gun's automation, Smartgunners require a combination of strength, mental ability and reflexes to master their weapon."

They require specialized training.
Simply put, your standard Marine would not even be capable of properly MOVING the thing, knocking the barrel left and right while it tries to readjust itself.

I'd say it's mostly about balance, though - the smartgun is seriously powerful, and I'd daresay more adaptable than any spec weapon; makes sense there would only be five people capable of using it at any given time.
But then, I'm a strong supporter of the 'guard-your-specs' theory.

edit: IS THIS WHAT YOU WANTED

[HalfdeadKiller]

Not gonna lie, that font is incredibly hard to read in my opinion.

[username123]

For me it is just another dumb rule that the staff enforce with the excuse of "because it balances the game", all it does is that it prevents the marines to play the game, all guns are made to be used easily, it's just a machine gun with a special harness and ammo in a backpack that has an automatic system to reload the weapon, stop thinking that it is as hard to use as to operate an aircraft or a tank for christs sake.

[Dyne]

Jackserious, get a new font, this one is drunk.
And I disagree on the moving part.
Yes, a marine not spending hours with it will be worse, but so will be a marine who just picked that SADAR and sniper rifle.

Smartgun is by itself not any more powerfull then any other SPC weapon.

[Artouris]

I think it would. Almost all heavy weapons in real life require specialized training. I'm also more than sure not everyone would receive the training in the squad, due to the fact there are cheaper but less effective derivatives of such weapons. While they do make it easy to USE, it does not mean its easy to HANDLE, FIX, RELOAD, etc. TOW missiles and other types of guided missiles all require training on part of the operator despite the fact they are mostly easy to use nowadays. But theres a reason why you still have stuff like LAWs and RPGs, they are less effective but require less training and are less bulky. Snipers require sniper training to account for bullet drop, atmo pressure, wind speed, etc as well so the sniper would also count. While Machineguns would honestly require the least amount of specialized training, but the smartgun isn't you average machinegun either. The only thing that would probably be accessable to most people would be the grenade launcher but even that's pulling at it since its one thing to fire it, its another to fire it 100% accurately like any standard would ingame.

[username123]

I think it would. Almost all heavy weapons in real life require specialized training. I'm also more than sure not everyone would receive the training in the squad, due to the fact there are cheaper but less effective derivatives of such weapons. While they do make it easy to USE, it does not mean its easy to HANDLE, FIX, RELOAD, etc. TOW missiles and other types of guided missiles all require training on part of the operator despite the fact they are mostly easy to use nowadays. But theres a reason why you still have stuff like LAWs and RPGs, they are less effective but require less training and are less bulky. Snipers require sniper training to account for bullet drop, atmo pressure, wind speed, etc as well so the sniper would also count. While Machineguns would honestly require the least amount of specialized training, but the smartgun isn't you average machinegun either. The only thing that would probably be accessable to most people would be the grenade launcher but even that's pulling at it since its one thing to fire it, its another to fire it 100% accurately like any standard would ingame.

Yeah it requires 5 years of training in the millitary college to pull a trigger

"Working fluidly with this automatic tracking takes some training to master; the operator must be sensitive to the gun's movements and allow it to aim itself, although the weapon's motion can be overridden at any time by simply steering the barrel elsewhere. Despite the gun's automation, Smartgunners require a combination of strength, mental ability and reflexes to master their weapon."

They require specialized training.
Simply put, your standard Marine would not even be capable of properly MOVING the thing, knocking the barrel left and right while it tries to readjust itself.

I'd say it's mostly about balance, though - the smartgun is seriously powerful, and I'd daresay more adaptable than any spec weapon; makes sense there would only be five people capable of using it at any given time.
But then, I'm a strong supporter of the 'guard-your-specs' theory.

edit: IS THIS WHAT YOU WANTED

I preffer the other font over comic sans, ban yourself.

[Dyne]

The only thing that would probably be accessable to most people would be the grenade launcher but even that's pulling at it since its one thing to fire it, its another to fire it 100% accurately like any standard would ingame.

Actually using grenade launchers is harder IRL, as more ballistic calculation is involved.
Direct fire weapons are easy.

[monkeysfist101]

It's shown in A:CM that standards are trained in the use of smartguns, turret assembly, and power loader operation.

[Egorkor]

"Working fluidly with this automatic tracking takes some training to master; the operator must be sensitive to the gun's movements and allow it to aim itself, although the weapon's motion can be overridden at any time by simply steering the barrel elsewhere. Despite the gun's automation, Smartgunners require a combination of strength, mental ability and reflexes to master their weapon."

They require specialized training.
Simply put, your standard Marine would not even be capable of properly MOVING the thing, knocking the barrel left and right while it tries to readjust itself.

I'd say it's mostly about balance, though - the smartgun is seriously powerful, and I'd daresay more adaptable than any spec weapon; makes sense there would only be five people capable of using it at any given time.
But then, I'm a strong supporter of the 'guard-your-specs' theory.

edit: IS THIS WHAT YOU WANTED

considering how you can manually override it and how we don't have it autoaiming ingame, it's safe to assume that the users use it in the manual mode. which requires no training.

[Seehund]

considering how you can manually override it and how we don't have it autoaiming ingame, it's safe to assume that the users use it in the manual mode. which requires no training.

Nah, that's most likely a code limitation. Instead, the automatic aiming is represented by the barrel nudging away from friendlies and instead firing "over" them.

[coroneljones]

power loader operation.

Lets show this Marine that will never work in cargo how to operate a heavy cargo lifter


Criticism aside,The smartgun requires special training so out of the other spec gear its the only restricted one,atleast lorewise.

Why even call them "specialists" when "any marine can use their gear" Just give the gear to the squad lead and let them assign a "specialist" if thats the case would be my counter argument as to the whole "All marines can use spec gear" Arguments.

[monkeysfist101]

Jones, in the lore, there is no cargo. They actually prepare for the op and bring everything down on the first drop. The people operating the loaders were grunts, pilots, and a civvie. That aside, when the specialist is dead with no chance of cloning, their gear should be fair game.

[Feweh]

A lot of rules regarding limiting special weapons and equipment is to prevent mass players from stealing/playing with them or for balance reasons. (See cargo-loader)

This is just another one of them.

[Dyne]

A lot of rules regarding limiting special weapons and equipment is to prevent mass players from stealing/playing with them or for balance reasons. (See cargo-loader)

This is just another one of them.

Then make it a real written rule.

EDIT: Also doubt it can be massive. There are at most five smartguns in game, not counting the supply pod ERT.
Oh, wait, the supply pod is packed with smartguns MARINES CANT USE.
Makes perfect sense.

[username123]

Why even call them "specialists" when "any marine can use their gear" Just give the gear to the squad lead and let them assign a "specialist" if thats the case would be my counter argument as to the whole "All marines can use spec gear" Arguments.

For the same reason that there are in real life per example Swat operatives and soldiers, a regular trained soldier can use any weapon that a swat operative has in the arsenal, diference is that a soldier has less training and experience that a Swat operative, but it doesn't mean that only because a swat operative uses "special weapons" a soldier can't use the same equipment, that doesn't make sense.

[Egorkor]

now that I've got to my PC I can reply.
as people above have said it's 4 spec weapons for mainly 40-70 players, and then there's the people who go for spec just to take the flamer and /nothing/ else, people who are new and cannot use even the standard gear, let alone the spec one, people who die, be it a dumb way or not, or the people that go AFK and are not coming back. in all the cases, the spec gear lies untouched and it usually shifts the very balance this nonofficial rule's claimed to preserve.
I'd like it to be the way it used to be - marines could freely use any spec weaponry so long as the user is either dead or doesn't need it. basically, when he agrees that someone else has to use it.
either that, or add some fool-proof mechanics like timelock on the roles because the summer is nigh and we're gonna have a lot of noobs, chucklefucks, trolls and what not. and we all know what roles they're gonna take.

edit - oh yeah also the supply pods that come with the distress beacon. which is usualy called when everything's gone to shite and the specs are all dead, which leaves the marines with boxes fulla powerful guns but oh wew, lad you can't use it. tough luck.

[forwardslashN]

I really dislike seeing people steel specialist weapons from corpses when there is a chance they may be cloned. If they are braindead, then something like B18 armor isn't really a stretch to take.

[Egorkor]

if they're cloned, all they have to do is ask for it though.

[Ms.Degrasse]

Do you mind a little criticism?

"Rules and rules piling up, written in obscure places?
And you will end up perma-banning Ellen Ripley, Alan "Dutch" Schaefer and Michael R. Harrigan for powergaming."

Don't make another obscure rule, written in places most players wiill not access, on stuff like this.
PUT IT ON THE CODE!
It's EASY to write in an ID-LOGIN on the SmartGuns, updated on the first user who fires them.
(Pick the code from the PDAs.)
And make them beep a "DNA-CHECK FAILED!" if someone else pick them up and try to use them.
(That will be basically a ID-CHECK done with the first variable.)
- BINGO!

Smartgun will be a one user only weapon as intended.

Don't forget the fact that Space Station 13 is know more as being a SANDBOXING game, than anything else.
If something seems possible, people WILL try it.

Players getting PM-ed by admins or banned everytime they ignore an obscure rule that isn't on wiki or on an easy-to-access place isn't good in any sense.

[Egorkor]

restricting something via coding is even more shite than putting it under a rule.