Weapons Not Needing Attachments

General Discussion
1

As it stands, most weapons need a certain set of attachments in order for the weapon to actually be a viable weapon, I point to the SMG, the M4RA and almost every pistol as just one of many examples of this.

Would there be any interest in buffing every weapon’s handling so that every firearm itself was perfectly functional without needing any attachments, and that attachments themselves should be reserved for items that effect a MAJOR impact on how the gun handles itself, a good example being how the bipod decreases your rate of fire, but massively increases it if you activate the bipod and are stationary.

(Alternative of making most attachments just a cosmetic addition)

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That is an interesting idea. I remember that the whole idea of attachements was claimed to make guns perform different roles.
While currently (and as far as I remember) it is a system to buff a weapon, not change its role.
I’m thinking of just wiping the slate clean with attachements, and generally make new ones, a mix between current system and old idea from a guy I forget his user name, famous spriter. Only few left basically unchanged, those being rail and grip flashlights, bayonet and mag harness.
I assume weapons now are balanced having in mind that every marine has access to basically every attachement. And it should be left that way, unless such attachement is special (like b8 scope)

Every single PFC vendor gun should have assigned basic role:
Pulse rifle - Sustained mid-range automatic fire, bread and butter of USCM. “Mid” and average in every way, average firerate, average damage, average walking speed, etc.
M4RA - Accurate “long range” semi-automatic fire.
M39 - Fast firing, short range, fast walking.
Shotgun - Short bursts of high damage, secondary effects depending on ammunition.

So starting with shotgun:
“Trench configuration” “attachement”, which shortens the barrel (and shell tube, so less ammo), but buffs fire-rate, maybe even make it “semi-automatic” in terms of gameplay, but you still have to peform unique action. Less accuracy and damage past buckshot range, projectiles are also way slower. Paired with bayonet should have enough damage to break nodes in one hit.
Obviously intended to be paired mostly with buckshot, but can be used with any other shell to deliver them faster at the cost of damage and accuracy. Gun is also lighter, so you can walk faster with it.
Designated point-man gun, you probably won’t be saving marines from warriors, lurkers, or runners, but the risk you have to take by being the first one to be jumped yourself is rewarded.
Imagine the cool heat shroud on the barrel, WWI vibes.

“Barrel rifling” (temporary name) “attachement”. The barrel becomes rifled, which makes the gun highly accurate when standing still, buckshot and flechette have thighter pattern and additional tile of effective range. Slug gets full screen effective range. It slows down more when wielded, wield delay is longer.
Designated back rank slugger, but can use any other shell from slighty further. More of a risk-reward, because if you aim good, you get all 4 projectiles on a target, if you don’t, you don’t get any at all. Stock comes with that “attachement” (cosmetic).

“Detachable box magazine” (temporary name) “attachement”. Simple as, you get more shells in a shotgun and box magazines are as quick to reload as any other gun. All of that in exchange for worse fire-rate, wield delay and walking speed.

Two fairly distinct roles for a shotgun that aren’t tailored to be used only with one shell type in mind. Third one just lets you spam whatever shell you have. True sidegrades if I do say so myself.

I’m less familiar with other guns and those concept are about as refined as thrid proposed one for shotgun.

Belt-fed pulse rifle, being a stationary king of standard non-AP bullets, because there would be no AP belts.
You won’t outshine M56D, or M2C. No UGL, but bipod.

Hyperburst pulse rifle. Kinda like AN-94 that has a two-round “hyperburst” that makes two bullets hit basically the same spot due to how fast they were fired. This, but somehow balanced, maybe overall less damage per bullet and slower firerate. Also no UGL.

Sniper M4A3, from semi-auto to bolt-action, scope (and only scope) has NVG. Slow moving, slow firerate, better damage, no falloff etc.

Might post more later.

I am aware that some of those proposals encroach on other “restricted” guns like MOU, or HPR. But they only exist because attachements are in this sorry state. You couldn’t really increase firerate of a normal shotgun and balance it with less ammo, so MOU had to be created, HPR had to be created to restrict some attachements otherwise available to normal Pulse Rifle and so that normal pulse rifle can’t get mags the size of HPR boxes.
All of that is solved with new “attachements/configurations”.

Attachments being a cosmetic is meh, nobody sees them but you, unless you drop it somewhere.

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what’s wrong with the m4ra in this regard? you don’t need anything for it. it has instant wield and great accuracy by default.

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Currently attachments aren’t that big a deal, and add to the game. They’re balanced by opportunity cost: you can’t take a MH for example without foregoing the massive stat boost of a RS, or RDS when scatter isn’t a problem.

Different attachment sets serve different purposes. RS + AG mk2 turns the weapon into quick swap w/ 0 scatter. MH + Fgrip/Vgrip makes it 0 scatter too, while keeping the valuable MH. Foregoing a UGL leads to far less utility- but taking the ugl + mh means you may need to unfold stock to reduce scatter.

I’d argue the main issue with the current system is that it isn’t obvious when certain attachments are necessary. But that’s not too big an issue. Knowledge checks keep people playing, since it’s always interesting to learn new things and interactions.

All attachments are not necessary or minimal thought is necessary. Even m39 works w just a Fgrip on full auto. It’s a fun system imo.

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this guy thinks hes chen

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I think attachies shouldn’t be seen as buffs, strictly speaking, but instead fundamentally alter the way you use the gun, and right now I’d say 2/3rds of the attachies actually do exactly that - change or specialize how a weapon is used, rather than just directly buffing it. (strong disagree with cabal that they are mostly buffs)

For the most part guns that are getting a ton of straight buff attachies are just guns that have really bad accuracy (pistols, m39) and the attachies all make that accuracy bearable.

I would argue its better to just make attachies freely available and infinite than dig too much into buffing guns to work without attachies. Frankly, people are always going to balance around the “best” case, e.g. an M39 with reflex, EB, grip, stock, and never a barebones m39.

When it comes to say, underbarrel flamer/shotgun, bipod, scope, gyro - these alter how you’re playing significantly and I don’t consider them buffs, especially because they represent an opportunity cost from an attachie that IS a direct buff (e.g underbarrel flamer instead of an angled grip)

So basically, I think the balance should be unrestricted infinite attachies and every gun is balanced around the assumption it will have attachies on it, rather than restricted attachies and every gun is balanced assuming there are no attachies on it (this is never how the balance actually plays out - everyone always assumed “oh but with an RDS and EB and…”)

As such the only weapons that should get a balance pass are ones that suck even with attachies, which in my opinion would be revolvers, smartpistol, vp78, M10 autopistol, and M4RA. These all either range from ‘ok’ to ‘really terrible’ even with all the attachies on them.

I would put M4A3, Type73, HPR, and M37 in the “maybe needs buffs” category. It’s worth thinking about anyway.

M39 imo is in a good place right now (as long as it has attachies).

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Lacks damage output.

It is strictly speaking a worse M41 (with the sole exception of chasing - which… why is the Designated Marksman Rifle a chase weapon???) - It has 10% worse DPS and 20% worse total damage potential, but that actually compounds with the low bullet count so every single miss impacts harder than it would with the M41.

You can mod an M41 to perform nearly the same role as an M4RA, but you can never make the M4RA as good as an M41.

It needs a damage buff, probably on the order of 15-20%. I would increase damage per hit by that and maybe decrease the magazine count (playtesting dependant) to keep the damage potential equivalent. The purpose of this is to make it a better M41 if you can reliably hit your shots (and you give up M41 utility). I also think it should be M41 movespeed, but a lot of people like it for chasing, and in any case, the higher move speed works with it being a ‘more skill required’ weapon.

For long range ‘sniping’, well balance and xeno complains such as they are, you’re not allowed to kill a xeno from beyond line of sight (I think this is incredibly stupid but it is consistently what people argue), so it’s simply not a balance consideration for the gun anymore, but if it were then it frankly needs a 200%+ damage per-hit (NOT DPS) buff MINIMUM to make it a viable marksman/mini-sniper rifle. This is the thing about long range sniping - you can’t do it with lots of small hits, you need alpha damage to actually kill/pick off low hp or crit xenos in the few moments you have a shot and that REQUIRES either 100+ dmg per hit or 100+ dmg within a timespan of 1-2 seconds - and right now this is what the XM88 does and if the M4RA did it, that kind of steps on the XM88’s entire existence.

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Reference I don’t understand hmm yes
Is it because Chen doesn’t use attachments?

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Attachments right now are mostly just stat boosts and overall improvements to your playstyle. For example, an AG is a strict improvement over a base MK2, if you aren’t using the UGL. An S6 is a strict upgrade if you want sustained accuracy, etc.
Very few of these fundamentally change the weapon and HOW you play.

Of the ‘old’ generation of attachments, the underbarrel weapon attachments are by far the ‘best’ ones gameplay wise- they offer a unique capability to the weapon. UGL turns you into a literal GL specialist with instant switching between HEDP and MK2 fire (making it even better than GL spec in switching for follow up), UBS makes you a stun + slow god with breaching capability, UBF gives massive backliner hunting capability, UBE gives… well, protection against the pyro.

Stuff like S6, EB, VG, etc… it’s like… +1 accuracy… +2 accurate range… -2 burst fire recoil… it’s very tame in comparison.

Now, something like the shotgun choke? That’s fucking epic. That’s what new attachments ought to be like. Converts your stun-PB gun into a fast firing rapid xeno deleter with extended range, turning into a completely different shotgun.

I’d very much rather all attachments follow that lead.

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The accuracy improving attachies function very importantly as opportunity costs and mitigation for the utility attachie downsides.

Using a bipod or BFA means you’ll probably want a reflex/RDS rather than a magharness
Using an underbarrel flamer or grenade launcher means losing accuracy/draw speed you could have had with a grip

The straight buff attachies serve a useful purpose as what you could have used and are willingly giving up for your utility gameplay changer attachie. Removing straight buff attachies has its own impact because they work together with the non-buff attachies.

I frankly think attachies are all basically fine, guns are all basically fine, and we should really just get over the idea of attachments being restricted and simply let everyone have any of whatever they want while only buffing the guns that suck even when you stick all the attachies on them.

Any other approach and I think it’s just going to be a balance mess.

Keep in mind that attachies as they currently are, exist as the culmination of like 10 years of incremental balance changes. Anything that comprehensively changes all their stats at once is NOT a good idea imo.

3 Likes
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All I want is a slam fire assembly for the shotgun so I can go SLAM KABOOF SLAM KABOOF SLAM KABOOF SLAM KABOOF on the benos

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That’s true but also, the stat buffing attachments serve a purpose in making a downside for taking certain attachments (ie: ag, mh, bayo, underbarrels).

The issue with buffing those to similar degrees of power is - what if those become too powerful? And what point would removing these attachments serve without suitable alternatives?
(ie: remove AG but add wield delay to underbarrels and remove wield delay from base gun - this would serve no purpose since now you have to rework every gun that takes ag and underbarrels)

Or remove RS, but lower scatter to 0 - now you can take MH without an issue, unless it adds scatter, which means you still need the Vgrip or Fgrip to take away that scatter… It’s a can of worms to rework the whole system, and not as easy as just axing it out. I personally greatly prefer the system where a base gun is considered gun + stat attachments, not gun without attachments. ( as said by @Wintermote )

While new attachments that change the role of a gun are always going to be accepted so long as they fit into gameplay (such as shotgun choke), I doubt a rework for the attachment system as a whole would be necessary unless it adds new elements of opportunity cost that are interesting, efficient, and good gameplay-wise. Or alternatively, creates a new and better system.

Still, removing an old and effective system for a new and effective system just means a net zero gain (or even net negative, considering the time and effort put into recreating it). It’s not worth it unless there’s a very good reason IMO, no point in reinventing the wheel unless the wheel being a wheel is a fundamental flaw/weakness in the design, or no obvious alternative areas exist where the game can be greatly improved.

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Just add more stock attachments to weapons similar to the pulse rifle grenade launcher. that way you can buff the base weapons without fucking with the existing attachment system.

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I think it would be interesting to buff weapons to not need attachments as much. It would be nice for latejoiners who may not get the attachments they want.

However, a counterpoint I would like to add is that attachments serve as a potential point of attrition for marines. It makes retrieving weapons from downed marines an important habit as melting the gun and its attachments creates an interesting mechanic for xenos to do.

2 Likes
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As long as every gun get’s a maghar pre instaled I am fine with this. By either changeing how attachemnts work or jsut givieing people them from a vendor might make req less painfull.

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Send Thwomp back to the thwomping mines, and we shall be granted boons beyond our wildest imagination

Screenshot 2025-03-14 at 8.06.05 PM
Screenshot 2025-03-14 at 8.06.05 PM810×720 126 KB

2 Likes
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This man cooked.

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hot take, other than some utilities, attachments should be removed and weapons buffed to just be good or viable across the board.

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It would be ideal.
With auto fire it was done.
Firerate go prrtt, sad.

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Easiest solution is just make all attachments available to all marines without having to beg req for it.

A lot of rounds all I need is basic attachments like a mag harn but I gotta line up with 20 other marines because the squad prep ones are taken in seconds.

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