“piercing weapons are overused over all other weapons in the game”
Option a) make the other weapons equally good/usable/worth it
Option b) nerf the only guns that allow players to tackle end game without needing 3/4 actions to kill just one enemy
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DOT weapons with acid/poison, paralysis weapons are not viable late game. The combat is setup up in such a way that turn economy starts going against the player really fast if you are not killing one enemy per 2 soldier activation. Late game by turn 2 you will have 10-12 crabs on top of you while being mind-controlled and bombarded since the maps are so tiny.
As for the dash my first impression is that it will make assaults useless since they can’t kill anything in one shot end-game. The dash+double shot was their thing. Need to see how it plays.
Acid is trash, no argument there but you are underestimating poison. An infiltrator can stack 120 poison in one round, the next round does 110 for free and 100 the next turn. On big units that you can’t kill in a single turn this is great!
Not the best choice for Arthons perhaps unless you hit them before they get close.
A shot from a paralyzing rifle can half an Athrons AP points for the rest of the mission, consider it crowd control by the time he crosses the map you have time to deal with other threats.
I do understand your points, and i know how those weapons can be used.
You will still get overwhelmed really fast because of number of enemies/size of map.
I have played a campaign with each faction, using their tech and tactics. Playing without the AP weapons is self-inflicted torture as it makes the combat way harder, and takes longer.
I still use specialty weapons on particular situations. But the bulk of combat is AP weapons.
Sniper rifles and shotguns are my bread and butter. The AP assault rifle has such poor accuracy that unless I’m close I find it too weak, and if I’m close I’m going full shotgun, well pre dash nerf that is. Now I don’t know.
The laser sniper rifle is SO accurate that I don’t mind the less damage since I can precisely blow off limbs and destroy weapons.
I’ve almost given up on assault rifles since they are all crap, AP or no.