The concept is fairly straight forward, the XM-series will introduce a specialized experimental conversion kits for each of the standard issue weapons in the USCM arsenal apart from the Mk2.
Mechanically, the kits themselves will act as an attachment that forcibly occupies one or more attachment slot on the weapon, limiting further customization. The trade off is that the functionality of the weapon will be dramatically changed by the use of a conversion kit, fundamentally altering the weapons’ function in normal gameplay.
For instance, the M39 SMG becomes a longer range carbine with lower rate of fire and more accuracy, and gains a unique UGL for launching flares or some shit. The M4RA DMR becomes a CQC breaching machine with higher rate of fire, lower damage, and an UBS. Lastly, the M37 shotgun goes from a obnoxiously slow, but high damage counter weapon to a slam fire, low damage, buck sprayer.
The goal of this is to grant players more utility in controlling their playstyle and loadout functionality, without adding more weapons to the marine arsenal, instead modifying existing ones under the guise of experimental weapon configurations. Purely lateral upgrades that cater to different feels.
at least remove the aids (blue fire and plasma was a mistake) sentry upgrades before introducing gun upgrades.
Would be cool for ERTs and stuff like zombie events, since you won’t have to actually balance them much that way.
Reducing the behavior of a gun down to a base classification term of “Assault rifle” or “DMR” or whatever is sort of counterproductive from a design standpoint when the goal is to fill a niche, because you’re broadening the definition of the role, when the actual range of variation between two different weapons under the same classification can be quite large. We’re not creating new guns here, we’re just changing how certain guns can function under a given condition, and granting them a different feel. It’s variety for the sake of preference, not for the sake of variety.
Edit:// I realize that this might sound extremely convoluted to someone without a design background. Basically, this is a developers sandbox to try out unique and interesting mechanics. Sauce it up. The best way to think of this is a really, really high quality attachment set.
In CM? The guns barely have any differences as it is, there’s hardly any room for more.
This is what underbarrel mk2 attachments aswell as the bipod and smartscope achieve. Specializing a gun further /=/ changing the gun’s role. If you turn L42 into MK2 with UBS then it directly competes with MK2 with UBS and either of them will become the meta while the other will become a noob trap. Its variety for variety’s sake TGMC style. Unfit for marines and only good as ERT/event/black market/other unique spawns.
Things that are unique to a gun in its functionality. I have a really cool idea for the slamfire shotgun for instance, where the ability to maximize the fire rate is dependent on user timing, and pumping too fast will jam the gun.
The R4T, and XM88 by extension, are prime examples of what I mean by unique features. Mechanics that make the gun more than a generic firearm, that increase the skill ceiling or allow for interesting playstyles. That’s the goal, not just changing numbers.
higher capacity magazines, lower damage, faster rate of fire, lower effective range, the ugl… i dunno what thwomp is exactly planning but there’s a ton of numbers to play around with and i think it’d be fun to shake up the weapon selection a bit
