Wasteland Wasteland 3 Pre-Release Thread [GO TO NEW THREAD]

[Roguey]

except with heavy weapons since it counted per-shot and HW were crap to begin with.

Though the pro-est of pro metagaming strats is to put combat shooting on a character with enough points to max out heavy weapons so you can obliterate the opposition in the final maps with The 3.

 

[IHaveHugeNick]

I liked jamming, no idea why there was so much whining about it.

 

[Lahey]

It's a good enough concept, but was poorly implemented. They took no consideration to weapon type, resulting in things like some revolvers jamming at higher rates than some assault rifles and other nonsense. I don't expect Fargo to hire a military consultant but this is elementary stuff.

Ideally jam rates would reflect real-world performance and act as a vector for balance i.e revolvers don't jam but have other benefits, as opposed to the universal top-down approach taken in WL2. It's not something that works when tacked on purely for the sake of being present, which harks back to what you said about poorly thought out features adding bloat instead of complexity. A well done jamming mechanic could work, but it needs devs who A. have a passing knowledge of guns and B. treat it as an inherent feature of semi and automatic class balance rather than an afterthought.

 

[Roguey]

I liked jamming, no idea why there was so much whining about it.

People were dumb/ignorant and not putting all their points into weapon skills at character creation and not putting jam reducing mods on their guns asap. I never had a jamming problem.

 

[Roguey]

revolvers don't jam

This isn't true.

 

[Lahey]

You're right, poor maintenance and improper use over a long period of time can result in a jam, but I doubt InXile wants to implement a gun-cleaning minigame.

 

[Roguey]

You're right, poor maintenance and improper use over a long period of time can result in a jam, but I doubt InXile wants to implement a gun-cleaning minigame.

All of this is abstracted through weapon skills, which represent your ability to use and maintain your guns.

 

[Lahey]

Except weapon skills only affect accuracy, crit chance, and perk selection, not jamming rates.

 

[IHaveHugeNick]

I liked jamming, no idea why there was so much whining about it.

People were dumb/ignorant and not putting all their points into weapon skills at character creation and not putting jam reducing mods on their guns asap. I never had a jamming problem.

I never even bothered with anti-jamming weapon mods. Granted, I had two melee guys in my party, so combined with NPCs getting jammed all the time, it was actually a beneficial feature for me 99% of the time.

Anyways, I don't necessarily want the combat simplified, but far too often you end up having dead rounds, where your guys don't really do anything of note. 2 guys jam, 2 guys miss, 2 guys need to reload, someone maybe has a short range weapon and there's no enemy in range...minutes keep passing and yet you've accomplished nothing.

Larian-style environmental destrution and the ability combos are cool, but another thing is how smooth the combat is in their games despite being turn-based. You're always doing something.

 

[Roguey]

Except weapon skills only affect accuracy, crit chance, and perk selection, not jamming rates.

It affects jam rates, the User Interface just doesn't say it.

 

[Lahey]

Sauce?

 

[Lahey]

 

[sser]

Did someone mention Wasteland 2 combat?

 

[Abu Antar]

Never has a game's RNG frustrated me so. I don't know how many 90% chance to hit attacks I missed.

 

[Ezeekiel]

D:OS2 is not the right game to be looking at at all when it comes to combat inspirations.

JA2, esp. with 1.13 fits much, much better.

In fact, they should have taken that game into consideration for their wl2 inspiration in the first place.
You have a small group of guys who need to engage with the populace etc army SF style, train up the local militias, benefit off the local resources from settlements and so on. Much better formula to use for a modern wasteland game given the themes.
Also environmental destruction (of buildings/walls at least) would be nice to make the maps feel less static.

 

[Roguey]

You can destroy cover in Wasteland 2.

Destructible buildings and such would be horrid with Unity's performance.

 

[Ezeekiel]

You can destroy cover in Wasteland 2.

Destructible buildings and such would be horrid with Unity's performance.

Ah yes, conveniently placed chest-high objects in otherwise rather empty maps. Somehow JA2 did better in that regard as well.

Should have just made WL2 as a mod in JA2 engine :D

 

[Roguey]

Fargo also didn't want to make a hardcore strategy game. As Brother None put it

Trying to make a game that is both a Jagged Alliance 2-level tactical combat game AND a fully-featured, deep RPG with a complex skill system, tons of dialog and C&C would be a horrible example of feature bloat even if you had an AAA budget. I find WL2's combat challenging and more tactical than most turn-based RPGs I know of, but beating JA2 was never a goal.

But if you expect the ultimate improvement upon Jagged Alliance 2's execution of turn-based combat to come from a full-fledged, deep RPG, you're delusional.

 

[FeelTheRads]

Turned out expecting anything was delusional lul

 

[JarlFrank]

WL2's combat was too hardcore it's own good. 7 party members, weapon jamming, dealing with ammo scarcity. I don't know, it's like they didn't want to compromise and abandon all the oldschool sensibilities that got the game funded in a first place. There comes a point in a turn-based game where adding more features doesn't add complexity, it's just adds bloat. I wouldn't mind if they trimmed the fat down a little bit with the 3rd game.

Did we play different WL2s? I want to play that hypothetical game with insanely complex tactical turn based combat that you're talking about. WL2's combat was, in practice, about on par with Shadowrun Returns, except with no magic and worse encounter design. Ammo scarcity wasn't a problem in my playthrough at all since I had every character use a different gun. Most combats involved me getting into tactical positions behind cover, then shooting or melee attacking the enemies until they were dead, only occasionally changing positions. That doesn't sound like bloat at all. It could've had a little more complexity to it for my taste, really. It definitely wasn't anywhere near, say, JA2 or 7.62 High Calibre.

 

[Haplo]

In fact, it was much worse then Shadowrun Returns. SRR had systems that, while simplistic, made far more sense overall and offered way more tactical options. Apart from the already mentioned magic, also drones, ducts, weapons with AP drain effects, marking skills to increase accuracy, adept abilities. And the area design simply cannot be compared.

 

[Roguey]

None of that is appropriate for Wasteland.

 

[Glop_dweller]

None of that is appropriate for Wasteland.

Stun grenades are appropriate to Wasteland, as are gas grenades; both could do AP damage, and the latter poison damage.

 

[Haplo]

So is encounter/area design.

I think drones are not out of the question either.

 

[Roguey]

They redid the encounters with the DC what more do you want?

None of that is appropriate for Wasteland.

Stun grenades are appropriate to Wasteland, as are gas grenades; both could do AP damage, and the latter poison damage.

I suppose it should also be noted that Tides of Numenera had all kinds of wacky things you could do in combat that no one cares about even though they only had a dozen fights to tune.