Commando Archive

I hate the Heavy Acid Rifle.

I hate it because it's a logical travesty. A rifle that shoots acid is ridiculous idea for a weapon because it makes no sense to load a "rifle" (that being a weapon designed to inflict damage via launching projectiles into a targetat high speeds) with "acid" (that being, from a weapons point of view, a substance that is designed to inflict damage by dissolving the target's armour and flesh, which is no way augmented by a high-speed delivery).

I hate it because it's an aesthetic travesty. It looks absolutely foolish, especially considering that that humungous barrel is only a tiny bit hollow. Why is it so thick? I don't know! But it looks like it would make a far better melee weapon than a ranged one!

I hate it because it's a practical travesty. The Heavy Acid Rifle is currently designed to behave as a strictly weaker flamethrower clone. The only reasonable explaination I can come up with for this is that maybe the devs actually plan on turning it into something useful or interesting a little more down the line, and are making it so that people don't both with it in the meantime (though they still had to do something with those four skill boxes). I mean, when even the GRAPHIC for shooting it is broken, you really have to wonder. If that's the case, mission accomplished! My HAR now decorates my room (though I'm glad it doesn't get much traffic. I'd be embarassed if a guest saw it and realized I owned one..).

My suggestion would be to get rid of it and give us something that's useful (and when I say useful, I mean useful knowing that we already have the best close-range weapon in the game and are satisfied with our close-range combat capabilities), makes sense from a logical point of view, and maybe even looks as cool as a flamethrower.

I know it will never happen. But I think the Acid rifle would be interesting if it did damage to the targets armor also. or put a dot on the armor.Of course it would have to be a very small dot, but it would fit with the Acid theme.

I also think the flamethrower and the acid rifle, should have some sort of container of fuel attached.

here is an idea or two - maybe the HAR should focus primarily on sub wounds - which would make it a real pain in the arse - yet different than the FT, i think that a ranged HAR is kinda lame - how far can you launch a volatile liquid? maybe it should specialize as an area attack weapon only - really hose em down with the slimy stuff. you didnt see the guys in aliens laughing when they got soaked with it. - "well why dont you put her in charge!!!!! lol, also - it definitely needs to have a serious facelift - being identical to the flame thrower makes you devs look like you didnt put very much effort into it - more like a rush job - lead by example fellas. just some thoughts

Giving it a slick unique look is always a good idea. Making it's normal attack an area attack would certainly make it an interesting tactical weapon.

Folks have asked to remove it and put a new weapon in it's place, one with range that didn't have limited uses. This is not a bad idea, but instead of removing the Heavy Acid Rifle, put it in the same branch as the Flamethrower. Give them the same abilities, that's fine, one acid, one fire. They are still different types of damage and would have different effects based on what type of armor it is used against. Then use the branch previously used by the acid rifle for a new weapon.

You'd make folks pleading for a new ranged weapon with unlimited ammo happy as well as those of us who still want to use the Heavy Acid Rifle as a choice weapon. It would give us more options is what it boils down to.

First thing I thought of when I read that Commando's wield heavy weapons was 'rocket launcher' and 'huge beam gun'. We have these but they disappointedly all have the same look for the most part. Not only that but they have limited uses and no way to recharge them after spending a bundle for them. Grenades are not a primary weapon, the Heavy Acid Rifle isn't up to par, and the Launcher Pistol gains no specials or improvements. That leaves the Flamethrower which any Commando with a lick of sense is going to then use. We wanted to be Commando's, not Pyro's.

I'd still love to see the HAR dumped completely in favor of an Imperial Heavy Repeater (machine gun style, maybe .05 attack speed and 7-15 damage per shot with little or no AP) or whatever that Shock Rifle is from Jedi Academy (long delay, high AP, high-damage, area attack. One of the specials could be the secondary fire mode where the area attack is ditched in favor of a hugely damaging beam that would also come with a really long cooldown time).

If we have to keep the HAR, though, I am completely against the DoT. As has been said, giving us a flamethrower with a different animation is just kind of dumb. It shows a lack of creativity and just gives us another fun-looking way to kill and be killed without giving us any other options in combat.

The rifle itself looks enough like a cannon already, why not make it one? Leave the special delays alone (make them be about 20s at AR1, but with speed mods enough to bring it to 12-ish sec at master commando), crank the weapon's base damage, and give it specials that capitalize on firing a really, really big bolt at one critter. The only problem with doing this, of course, is that the the HAR would take the role that expendables are currently filling.

As I said earlier nerf the whole f'ing tree and put in bad ass gun like a Heavy Blaster that would be armor peircing and docomparable damage to the HAR. Make it sound and shoot like an Machine gun. Maybe even add more than one gun to this new tree too include a Turret Cannon or something along those lines. To equal thingsout give it a very high speed but low accuracy (because we all now how worried they are about thing being even for all combat classes and commandos are just way too bad ass already).

I agree with the guy above who said that the concept of a gun that shoots acid is retarded. It doesnt fit into Star Wars very good either.I mean its supposed to be a hightech,futuristic setting and the HAR just doesn't fit.

I don't see how an acid rifle is any less high tech or futuristic than a flamethrower.

I Agree with Raptor2k1, HAR should not be a clone. HAR is a rifle infact and every high end rifle i have came across has a decent Range. Hence this beign the Heavy version of a normal rifle wouldnt it have a better punch and range. DoT is nice but not as sweet then going through armor

Make it more like the LLC, so its not only uniqe in the resist but in the ability!!

The acid rifle should be a long range weapon that hits hard and fast with maybe a splash damage (radious) special that takes away say 5 seconds from firing, that way its not a flame thrower, and should have APR1, so it'll always do decent damage long range, but if some tihngs acid resesistant you need a FT or launcher pistol.....

Based on the past performance of the devs they will in no way completely edit a tree and give us another weapon in place of the HAR. We can however point out that the latest patch is forcing a change in the way we battle. This change requires that the HAR becomes a true long range and effectively accurate weapon. The devs need to make the HAR a true rifle. It should have no less than AP 2. Is should not have a DoT because we already have a weapon that does that (whatwe haven't been hit in the head with the nerf bat enough already?). It should be effective at long range like the T21. It should have a much shorter cool down as you ascend the skill branch. If it does high damage and is quicker we would not need a DoT.

They called it a rifle. Is should act like a rifle. I have no idea what they were thinking with the graphics but that is the goofiest looking "rifle" I have ever seen. The animation is very poor and not very entertaining.....this is entertainment right?

Over all the HAR is underused IMHO forthree reasons:

First, itstinks as a weapon.

Second, there is no strategic use for it due in no small part to poor design.

Third, the graphics suck. What no green blast? No yellow stream? Little red blasts of color to make me go " Ewwww, that looks like it hurt"?

Hehe, given the weapon's graphic, you'd expect it to shoot a big blue beam of light or something like that. Oh well, one can always dream *cough cough* beam rifle.

It looks like it won't be put in the same slot as the Flamethower due to the problems it would cause with skill points and such for those who have ranked in both trees already.

I'm still looking for a DoT...or some improvement.