6 replies to this topic

[Chris StarShade]

Ages ago I posted an obdata file containing my personally modified upgraded gauss weapons. Reading the UFOpedia from TFTD, it claimed gauss weapons were a terran adaptation of plasma weapons to make them waterproof and eleriumless. However, the gauss weapons in-game had only the strength of laser weapons from previous games while the aliens' sonic weapons were vastly more powerful.

To the point that the heavy gauss gun was a good 5 points less damage than the sonic pistol. I believed this to be unacceptable and so modded the weapons accordingly. This is the only "hack" I ever use in TFTD, and considering the game text I half-consider this a bug fix.

Someone else, I believe the editor of XCOMUTIL did something similar, but made his gauss guns clipless. I disagree with THAT idea...

Nevertheless, what do you think? Should gauss weapons be stronger than they are in the unmodified game, or are they just as strong as they are supposed to be?

[Sorrow]

Heavy Gauss doing 5 points less damage than Sonic Pistol? I agree that they should be more powerful. More like the Rifle being damage equivalent of sonic pistol and heavy being equivalent of Sonic Rifle.

[Zombie]

The Gauss weapons are weak for a reason: to make the game harder. They aren't meant to be a long-term weapon like the lasers were in Enemy Unknown either. Just a short-term stepping stone between conventional weapons and the sonic line. The damage modifiers reduce the effectiveness of this class of weapons against most aliens even further than the listed average so even if you increase the damage it will have less of an effect than anticipated. It certainly wouldn't match the power of a sonic weapon even with a lower damage rating.

- Zombie

[Chris StarShade]

Yeah, let's give the aliens ungodly good weapons but the weapons we are going to trick the player into developing on the theory they are this game's "laser weapons equivalent" will be weaker than weak.

In the end, even these improved gauss weapons are supposed to be made obsolete to the sonic weapons, but they at least give you a fighting chance. I am not sure I would bother with the old-style gauss weapons, might as well just give everyone gas cannons until you can get your hands on the aliens' sonics and only research the gauss weapons for gauss cannon sales.

[NKF]

One thing the plain vanilla Gauss weapons do excel at is that they are a major improvement over most of your starting assault AP weaponry such as the Jet Harpoons and Hydrojets with AP. I dare say you're better off with Gauss pistols than either of those two weapons. They can also be researched and be made available for use in the field a lot faster than most of the sonic weapons.

Unfortunately, the Gauss Weapons only really do well up to the rifle. The Heavy Gauss, Gauss Coelacanth (bugged) and craft weapon are really less than stellar except perhaps for economic reasons.

I've started equating the Heavy Laser as a Heavy Cannon/AP replacement (not a Heavy Plasma equivalent). After looking at the stats, I'm pretty sure that this has happened in TFTD as well, with the HG replacing the Gas Cannon/AP. It cannot match the sonic family for raw power.

- NKF

[fudgedragon]

What I've always believed that the heavy laser was meant to replace the Heavy Cannon/AP. Its the heavy plasma that doesn't fit, due to the damage it does and the speed I've always coincided it a Heavy Plasma Rife.

Given the many parallels between UFO and Terror from the Deep you would assume this to be true there as well, accept the took the basic plasma weapons, removed their auto-fire, and ramped up the tu usage a bit to create the sonics. Putting the sonics from terror from the deep in a sort of class of their own. This isn't really the fault of sonic or guass but instead of the massive resistances to anything not sonic that most terror from the deep aliens have.

[BlankSlate]

It would be interesting if at least one alien was resistant against sonic but not gauss, then you might have a reason to keep a couple around just in case. In UFO you had the sectopods which were weak against lasers.