Weapon suggestion : machine gun

[breversa]

Hello everyone !

As stated in my introduction post (see the "tranlastion" topic), I am deeply interested in weapons, military and tactics.

And as such, I have noticed that the already quite comprehensive UFO:AI armory lacks one major piece of equipment that has been found in every infantry formation since WW1 : a light or general purpose machine gun, comparable to the FN Minimi (M249 in the US army), M60, or WW2 german MG42 (but NOT Gatling gun !!!).

Such weapon would be capable of fast automatic fire, with a greater range and damage than the assault rifle (but not too much : they still use the same ammo in real life. +10-30% seems fine.), be belt-fed (100-250 rounds), but heavier than other shoulder weapons.

They may or may not be able to fire single shots, take more time to reload (and maybe fire as well), and, ideally, would take rather major penalities if fired while standing instead of crouching (or being prone if such feature gets in game in the future).

Skill used would of course be heavy weapons.

[XaverXN]

Sounds fine to me...

Going prone/lying down is something i have thought about as well, especially in those wide maps without much covering. Some aliens aim like hell, even when crouching  :x

The point I'm a bit worried about is having another heavy-weapons item. I always feel theres much more (good) weapons in it that in the other categories...

[breversa]

Oh, of course, I forgot to say that the machine gun should be available from the beginning, without any research !

I also understand your feeling about many heavy weapons already existing, but I'm pretty sure this one will find its use without making another one obsolete or redundant (after all, if it exists IRL, that means it serves a purpose not already filled by something else !).

[Surrealistik]

Already being implimented.

[breversa]

Really ?

How long ago ? I that a recent feature ?

[Voller]

I assume it is _being_ implemented, so they're not done yet.

[blondandy]

i think that they always aim for a point about 1m above the actors feet. then the hit calc adds guassian noise to the angle in two orthogonal directions.

this is one reason why crouching is so effective for reducing the probability of being hit. the point now being aimed at is about the head. so the fire often goes over the head. the chance of hitting is almost halved for long range shots (more distance for angular spread to take the rounds too high to hit).

my point is that implementing a third (prone) posture would need a load of work, as the current aiming system would make them even less likely to be hit than they should be.

having a prone posture would be very cool though. i am sure it would be loads of work (for coders and 3D artists).

I am bound to curse a lot as i forget to make them stand up, and they use 40TUs crawling on their belly for about 5 metres...    :x

surrealistk: do you mean a prone posture or a machine gun or both are being implemented?

[Surrealistik]

The machine gun is being implimented. The prone position is unlikely to make it in during the foreseeable future due to the work that would be involved in realizing it.

[breversa]

Ah, good news !

I'll finally be able to field  a "real" standard infantry squad... and see how they behave against the aliens !