Weaponsmith Archive
Thread: ** Request for Information for Dev's** Which weapons have Extreme HAM Costs....
I play both a weaponsmith and a bounty hunter(different accounts). Have also played pistoleer in the past(and dropped it fast when I realized how ultimately pointless a profession it was, other than for further improving a BH's pistol skills...)
90% of my deaths as a bounty hunter are because I can use up my entire action bar in 10 seconds of shooting specials. 10 seconds... Often due to lag I cant stim up fast enough. And then I get shot once and incapped.
Another pistol like this is the DX2 which has nasty costs(especially considerring how horrible its accuracy is).
Nearly all carbines need adjusting. Even with 30 carbine speed, its easy to tear through your action bar pretty fast.
So long as rifles use up lots of mind, riflemen are dependent on muon gold. The issue is more severe once they reach high levels and are shooting the rifles at 1shot/second... may not be as serious if speed caps are set dependent on weapon in the future...
Ok, I did a little experimenting with stocks and here is what I learned. For my test I utilized the same materials for both the normal and advanced stocks.
Default Stats for Advanced Stock
Min
I hate that . . . sorry
Min damage 1; Max damage 1; Speed +.823; Wound 2; Range mod +10; Ham 28
for the Normal stock same material
Min damage 1; Max damage 1; Speed +.822; Wound 0; Range mod +3; Ham 20
So as you can see what the advanced stock is supposed to grant over the normal stock is increased wound and accuracy at the cost of ham. Now I experimented 4 points into damage and 6 points into efficiency with a yield of a great success for every experiment. Here are the end results for the advanced stock
Min damage 16; Max damage 16; Speed +.651; Wound 5; Ham 14
for the normal stock
Min damage 8; Max damage 8; Speed +651; Wound 3; Ham 15
As you can see points experimented on the advanced for damge yield approximately twice the output of the same experimentation on the normal. I didn't experiment with the range mod but the result will probably be the same in that you will get double the output on the advanced over the normal. But where does this leave the Ham? It believe it is way too high on the stocks given that the speed penalty is very burdensome to the weapon for such a marginal increase in speed. Especially if you decide to increase the accuracy of the weapon. One possible solution might be to separate speed from the min/max damage and wound of the weapon into its own experimental category, or perhaps tie the ham and speed together on weapons. OMG, that is it - - - speed should be tied to HAM on all weapons since they are the limiting controls placed on weapons. The powers that be could increase the damage output on weaponry without fear of putting the weapons out of balance because the speed is separate from damage. Crafters could create balanced weapons with lowered speed and ham costs with moderate increases in damage and accuracy without feeling they are wasting their points on experimentation - if the results from experimentation were large enough and not just the 1 or 2 points that we have all complained about with various experimentation with respect to HAM at least.
T21 and Laser rifle!
They have very high HAM costs. The worse problem is that theyusenot-healablemind too. The resualt is, in some cases the user kills his mind faster than his enemy.
As a Rifleman and Weaponsmith thats all im sure about. 
I experimented up some new scopes all with great successes using the same materials for an advanced scope and a regular scope...
Starting stats on scopes
Adv: wound 5; range 11; hams 22/22/22
Regular: wound 2; range 10; hams 11/11/11
Fully experimented for ham yielded (with one point left over each time that was put in range out of 10 points)
Adv: wound 5; range 14; ham 3/3/3
Regular: wound 2; range 11; ham 1/1/1
alternately I was able to max out the range on the advanced at 40, and the regular at 24 with all points put into range.
It doesn't seem like scopes are the big problem but they don't help, it just seems that ham experimentation on the final product isn't very effective or worthwhile to me on the guns I've made.
It seems like the range should start out higher to me on the advanced /shrug. I'm still wondering why scopes have mid and zero range mods... a scope is used to increase your medium and long range accuracy, at point blank you wouldn't be able to use a scope so I can understand that it gets a 0 but why is it there at all and there is no max range mod??? This seems like a big oversite or a lack of understanding somewhere in the developement process... Anyway, I could see the range (majorly) or ham (minorly) being altered on the advanced scopes on experimentation effectiveness I guess.
I'm gonna have to throw the Bowcaster in the mix...its HAM is something like 30/30/50, If I use special Mind shots, my mind bar goes down quite rapidly. I'm at work so i don't know how this compairs to other weapons. I use the reg. scope with a HAM of 6/6/6, andonly experiement on damage.
Kurac
Master Weaponsmith - Kettemoor
DarkCipher, IMO it's gonna be impossible to really look at this from a weapon perspective until some other things are fixed. I agree with everyone here regarding HAM experimentation on stocks, scopes, and final assemblies, but that only tells part of the story.
Here's what I mean. Take a Laser Carbine or a Scatter pistol and chain a dozen or so LegShots or BodyShots. You'll have an empty action bar in no time flat. Now take something like a Light Lightning Cannon, and you can chain BH specials with it almost forever.
Different weapon types are using different formulas for HAM deductions when using their class specific specials. I've seen some tests on this, which I'll try to dig up, but the reason Carbine users are complaining so much isn't JUST because of the raw HAM costs displayed on their weapons. If you look at the amount actually deducted using a special move, different weapons seem to be using different calculations.
I'll see what I can do to put together more raw data on this, but if anyone else has any other info, please post it!
Dark I honestly cant answer that. All weapons have the costs associated with special used. So for Commando weapons for example the damage output is super high so the costs SHOULD be large. Same as the t-21. AlthoughI WOULD like to see the e11 brought in line with the laser rifle (Speaking from a rifleman point of view).
Aside from that perception of HAM costs is PURELY in the eyes of the wielder. Yes of COURSE someone who spams specials with a t-21 is going to complain about mind costs. Same with the commando who only uses rockets ALL THE TIME. This is why there are lower tier attacks that do not cost so much in the way of HAM. Not only that ... there IS the option of going into autofire mode and using specials only when needed.
This is a hard one Dark. Although the one who suggested that they talk to the correspondents of each class has a good idea.
I personally feel that the HAMS are acceptable in regards to power/ham cost.
and there IS a stat migration possibility too.
A lot of the Melee weapons have exorbitant HAM costs.
Unarmed - Vibro Knucklers are fine as they are. They are meant to add damage and speed, at the cost of higher HAM. Beleive me, the difference between using VKs and NOT using them is severe in terms of DPS. The high HAM costs are an adequate trade-off.
One Handed:
Ryyk Blades are not worth using or making. Curved Swords made with Advanced Sword Cores are BETTER in terms of RAW DPS than Ryyk Blades, yet the Ryyk Blades have a LOT more HAM cost. There is no real reason for a Fencer to use a Ryyk Blade over a CS.
Two handed:
The Heavy Axe, Two Handed Axe, Vibro Axe and Power Hammer all have ENORMOUS Health costs, and it's not like they have low Action or Mind costs to compensate. The Power Hammer especially has a Health cost in the one hundreds. Yes, the weapon hits for 455+ damage, but doing 25% of that damage to yourself with each hit is pretty preposterous.
The Two Handed Curved Sword has an insane Action cost. About 60-something, and this weapon can be taken down to 2.6-2.5 speed. Anyone who uses specials with a 2HCS can just say "Goodbye" to their Action pool.
Polearm:
All the Polearms have outrageous HAM costs. They all need to be lowered across the board.
In summary, a LOT of the Melee weapons tend to have HAM costs that are way too costly for Brawlers to use effectively. Given the utter disadvantage that a Brawler has in most situations (always getting hit and taking damage, ranged vs. melee disparity, bad range penalties, etc.) their weapons SHOULD have a much LOWER HAM than other weapons in general.
Also, there's a reason why you don't hear many complaints about Brawler HAM...there's about 10:1 Marksmen to Brawlers, and 10:1 Weaponsmiths who do guns over melee. So don't let the lack of opinions be an indicator of a lack of problem with HAM costs on Melee weapons.
All polearms, except for Wood Staves and Reinforced Combat Staves.
I wouldn't normally complain about this, since the LVA I use is fairly high damage in the first place, but since I fight up close I need armor too, and I really can't survive wearing armor AND usingspecials with high ham cost weapons.
LVA's aren'tespecially fast, either, plus theiraccuracyis horrendous(-50/-50/-50, but perhaps minewas poorly made?). So I really can't afford to try a special since I have a pretty good chance of missing anyway.