Understanding the weapons and balance

[RonGianti]

Captain Kwok said:
The last part of the Meson Blaster can be seen as adding 10 range to 30 for each tech level until a maximum range of 90.

Whoa. So, why use anything but the Meson Blaster?

Even the Wave Motion gun. The WAVE MOTION GUN can't hold a candle to the Meson Blaster!??!

That aint right

Is there any hope of weapons balance, even a modicum of weapons balance, coming to Stock?

[Suicide Junkie]

KwokStock is what you want.

Aaron's files are a bad translation of SE4's files, which were a bad translation of SE3's.

[Raapys]

Personally I find myself just using the Anti-Proton Beam. Instant impact counts for alot too, and it's got nice damage, range and accuracy. Suppose Kwok might have tweaked the weapons a little in Balance 0.93, can't remember how they were in stock.

[RonGianti]

Ok, I'm tired of reinventing the wheel

I'm attempting to write a script that will

1. Pull out the data from the weapon fields in Components.txt
2. Insert the data into an Excel Spreadsheet
3. Convert the SE5 formulas into Excel formulas
4. Allow the user to plug in a level for the weapons for comparison.

Any scripters out there want to show me how its done? I'm not a scripter, I just took a class for work on basic scripting.

If I could get this done, not only would we be able to get this data after each patch release, but everytime someone made a mod, they could check for weapons balance as well.

I realize that I will likely just be playing KwokStock and other mods, but if I make that jump, I won't go back to Stock and then I won't be motivated to do things like this or care about stock at all..

[Raapys]

Hopefully, Kwokstock will *be* stock in a future patch.

[Captain Kwok]

Raapys said:
Hopefully, Kwokstock will *be* stock in a future patch.

If that's something you're interested in seeing - then be sure to e-mail MM. He reacts best to user feedback.

[Shadowstar]

Is there a preferred email address to use or just the one from the site?

[Captain Kwok]

se5 at malfador dot com is probably the best route.

[Suicide Junkie]

RonGianti;

Be sure not to fall into the trap others have, when trying to make a formula for weapon value.

Damage/kt/s is a good statistic to look at, but range, damage type, ammo use, resource costs and more are all important in different situations. These are things you can't evaluate automatically, but must weigh in context to the game situation and enemy strategies.

[Captain Kwok]

For the Balance Mod I used a spreadsheet that factor in damage at point blank, optimal, and max range in addition to the usual size, reload rate, and damage amount. I also added factors to account for damage, seeker stats, and accuracy modifiers. I think for the most part it has worked out ok although I've had to make some little changes here and there.