Weapon Design Feedback

[Kings_Rook]

plays Jaws theme

hoo boy, here we go. I’m going try to be as constructive as possible, but I don’t have a lot of practice.

To start with, the PX assault rifle:

First off it looks cool, which is a big thing for a game. Reminds me of the gun from Alien. And it looks futuristic without being a giant box which is even better.

Based on other concept art I’m guessing that the two circles on the front are attachment points for accessories. Looks heavy for its purpose but okay.

The handgrip looks uncomfortable to hold to be honest, and the buttstock looks to be pretty short and low.

A design question I have is why the chamber starts so far forward in front of the magazine. If you started the chamber right at the front of the magazine you’d get that more barrel length in for the same weapon length which be a more accurate gun.

The big problems are the magazine, the ejection port, the safety and the charging handle.

The safety: where is it?

The charging handle: ditto.

The magazine is a simple fix: just some clear plastic over the hole. Dirt getting into the mechanism is a bad thing after all.

The ejection port is, to be blunt, fatal to the design. That bar has got to go. It is blocking the casing from ejecting. Neither hole is big enough for an empty casing to get through, let alone a dud round that’d need to be cleared.

Onto the sniper rifle:

basic design looks good so far.

But where are the the safety and the charging handle?

Also the lack of a bottom on the finger guard is a safety issue. something could easily snag in there and pull the trigger accidentally. Buttstock looks short again.

:edit: also where is the ejection port?

The shotgun:

Yay boomstick. Hey I can see the safety.

Wondering why there is the circle accessory attachment in the middle of the gun.

The buttstock is short and low. this is a very big deal on a shotgun as they kick very hard.

The ejection port is a big problem. It is too small both in height and length to eject a spent shell. When fired shotgun shells get half an inch to an inch longer as the crimped plastic at the front unfolds. The port is also misaligned high with regards to the barrel.

If you still want those vertical shells on the model, moving them onto the buttstock would be the way to go.

:edit: oh yeah the pump action. That white metal band at the back of the action would prevent the action from cycling fully

I think that is enough for now.

[Dexmach]

I do like the 3 weapos but the best in my opinion is the sniper rifle, just because of its materials.
I dont really see that plastic shotgun destroying aliens, but if was made by steel…

[Haxone]

You know your stuff !

To be frank I wouldn’t have notice as gun noob but now that you’ve said I feel like I need personaly need those fix ! Haha

Good job @Kings_Rook, took some time and worked well !

[Vathar]

@Dexmach

I do like the 3 weapos but the best in my opinion is the sniper rifle, just because of its materials.

Materials look good on the sniper rifle, but I think @Kings_Rook was understating it when he mentioned the stock was too short. Looks like you’d have your hand very close to your shoulder and your elbow bent to an uncomfortable point just to use that thing. Also, I don’t see anything practical for the left hand to grip.

[Kings_Rook]

@Vathar

I think @Kings_Rook was understating it when he mentioned the stock was too short.

What can I say, I learned my understatement skills from the Brits.

Anyways you’d be correct in that the sniper rifle (and, in fact, all the other weapons seen so far) have buttstocks too short to use effectively. Either by good luck or good design, the length of stock that works the best for most people in the world is one about the length of the M16A1’s. Don’t have a measurement at the moment though. Need to do some more research.

:edit: bit of research later and the A1 stock has a 12.875 inch Length of Pull, ie from the back of the buttplate to middle of the trigger

@Dexmach those shotgun images aren’t textured. This one is

:edit: no I don’t know why there is a flashlight in the magazine tube

@Haxone Thank you, but I have a very long way to go with my gun knowledge. I know just enough to know how little I know.

[Truefell]

That scope on a shotgun though. Maybe we finally getting a realistic shotgun behaviour in a game?)

[Gunlord500]

One thing about the short stocks, a lot of armor in the game seems to have big thick pauldrons (blush). The shorter stocks for the weapons may be an accounting for that, since if you have thick pauldrons the stock doesn’t need to be as long to steady against your shoulder.

[Kings_Rook]

The thing is, the pauldrons are actually on the shoulders themselves, not where you brace a weapon. The stock of the weapon is supposed to be right up next to the head so you can get a cheek weld on the stock for aiming down the sights, and those locations have standard armour thicknesses, which the A1 stock takes into account

NJ assault with pauldrons

CAF soldier firing rifle (note how far from the shoulder the rifle is)

[Gunlord500]

Yeah, but look at some of the heavy armor–in this case, while the pauldrons are on the shoulder, there are vents/ammo straps covering the upper chest/intersection of the neck and shoulder, where the stock is supposed to be held. :o

[Kings_Rook]

that is a flaw in the design of the heavy armour. all those things prevent you from maintaining a steady mount on the weapon. Probably why the heavies carrying their weapons like they do

Also armies base their weapons purchasing decisions on what the majority of the military will be using, and then buy specialist weapons for the specialists, ie assault rifles for the infantry, sniper rifles for the snipers, and PDWs for the aviators.

In game that’d be standard stock designs for assaults, techs, snipers, etc and handlebars for the heavy

[Kings_Rook]

plays jaws theme again

[Kings_Rook]

Right, here we go again. Today the latest dev blog dropped and it is on the weapons the Phoenix Project uses. See here. Most of the images are already on the roadmap, so I’ll skip over the ones I’ve covered already.

which brings us to this:

okay, it is a grenade launcher.

One: close that drum. That is inviting dirt to get in and jam the mechanism. Also the drum serves as the firing chamber on a multiple grenade launcher, so right now, the casings of the grenades have to absorb the explosion on firing, and they aren’t designed to do that. Firing one round would be highly likely to set off the other rounds.

Two: that barrel is too short. It wouldn’t provide enough length to direct the gases so that the grenade can accelerate to a high enough speed to get anywhere. Barrel length should be about a foot.

Three: the rifling is very problematic. Grenade launchers are smoothbore weapons, for the kind of grenades shown. There are grenade launchers that can use rifled grenades but those are a completely different design to the kind used in the military. Specifically the ones shown are low velocity grenades which do not gain any accuracy from the spin imparted by the rifling. They are too slow.

Four: the handlebar carrying and firing method is a no go. Because the grenades used are the low velocity kind you need to be able to aim, which cannot be done easily, if at all, from hip fire

Now for those wondering about the high-velocity 40mm grenades used in automatic grenade launchers, those need to be housed in an actual chamber with very thick walls. Think scaled up HMG, and I do mean scaled up. The guns alone weigh 70+ pounds, empty, and have such strong recoil they have to be mounted on a tripod or vehicle. Even with an exosuit, you wouldn’t be able to carry and fire that on its own.

My suggestion is to go with something like a Milkor MGL style weapon.

Next up: pistol

Oh boy.

One: the biggy. Thank you to Johannes on the discord for pointing this out first. YOU CANNOT LOAD THE THING. The entire pistol grip is wrong. The magazine for the rounds has to go through the trigger to get to the chamber. This is a non-starter.

Also, the angle of the grip is all wrong. While that angle may work for revolvers, it doesn’t work for pistols, again because the magazine is in the grip. Looking at the baseplate of the magazine you can see it is coming in at a very steep angle. Rounds cannot be fed from that angle. It also ends up wasting space in the magazine.

For comparison, a Glock which has a very steep grip for a real world pistol

The Good News:

Integrated light and lasers: yes, very good. Very good indeed
Picatinny rail on the top: even better. pistol mounted reflex sights are enormous force multipliers. I was actually planning on suggesting this feature

Onwards to the “Machine gun” concept art. They are labelled as the heavy cannon on the roadmap

Number 1 shares a lot of the issues I’ve brought up with the grenade launcher, and would have the same issues with carrying and firing as the automatic grenade launchers if the ammo is anything to go by.

Next the stun batons

Yup, they are good. No issues.

No, really. Stun weapons only need a battery, a capacitor, a current regulator, and either a path to ground or a pair of prongs to complete a circuit to work. The first three are always in the handle. the last two are on the end.

It be good.

Last but not least, the PDW

It is a P90 with the details messed with. Oh dear.

Stock is too short, trigger is too far back. In armour I don’t know that you can even get your arms to bend in the necessary ways to shoulder the weapon. In order to fire it comfortably you’d need to hold the weapon away from your body, which would greatly lower your accuracy.

Picatinny rail is too long. Where is the magazine? Fore grip is too long for this design.

I think that covers things for now.

[Vathar]

I won’t speak ill of weapon designers without knowing more about their challengers, but I have to say these aren’t the best weapon designs ever.

This article might be of interest for those who enjoy that topic :

Creating Highly Detailed Weapons for Games

[Vathar]

@Kings_Rook

It is a P90 with the details messed with. Oh dear.

Looks like somebody was so thrilled at the idea of designing a bullpup weapon that they forgot that you still need to put a firing mechanism in it. This thing isn’t compact, it’s tiny! If you think about it as a P90, you’d barely have space to put your magazine above the barrel, and I’d discard the idea of putting it in the stock as it doesn’t really have one worth mentioning.

Number 2 “machinegun” also looks rifle sized by the way.

Last (minor) point about the stun batons, I’m not overly fan of the sweeping guard that’s only really useful if you engage in serious melee against a similarly armed opponent. Number 5 (with finger slots) is my least favorite as this could lead to its fair share of broken fingers!

[Kings_Rook]

@Vathar

Number 2 “machinegun” also looks rifle sized by the way.

the weapon as a whole does, but the size of the barrel. Also rifle sized does not mean rifle weight

Last (minor) point about the stun batons, I’m not overly fan of the sweeping guard that’s only really useful if you engage in serious melee against a similarly armed opponent. Number 5 (with finger slots) is my least favorite as this could lead to its fair share of broken fingers!

true enough

[Madxav]

@Kings_Rook Good commentary. I just have a couple of things to point out. Let’s remember that this isn’t ARMA, and there has to be a balance between what looks realistic and what looks good from the distance in an isometric view. This are design choices made for the game.

For example, to the complaint of the stocks being too small, we have to remember that this guns are bigger than real guns so they can look good in the game, and they don’t have to clip through the armor of the soldiers using it (some pauldrons are pretty big and all weapons have to be usable by all units). For the same reason of making the gun look good in the game from the distance in an isometric view we have many details of the weapons exaggerated so they can be visible making them look better in-game. Similar decisions were made in other similar games like the Firaxis XCOMs.

This is the equivalent of seeing a movie or game with a guy caring a sword on his back. Totally unpractical, and in some cases completely unrealistic, but it looks good.

Finally, even if they are not completely realistic, I really like this weapons. I believe the design team has done a great job here. They feel very authentic and fit very well the world of Phoenix Point. With that said some details could be added or changed to make them look more authentic (Like the missing safety in some weapons).

PD: New Jericho looks so freaking cool with this color pattern!

[Gunlord500]

Yeah, I agree with most of King Rook’s critiques, though with just a couple reservations:

1: About the grenade launcher, you’re right that they would want to cover up the drum ammunition, but on the other hand, from a gameplay perspective, an “open” magazine with the cylindrical grenades clearly visible makes it more obvious that the weapon is a grenade launcher.

2: About the pistols not being able to load from their magazines from that angle, perhaps these are laser pistols, which wouldn’t need to load as would just have a battery/power source, assumedly? But if this is basic Phoenix equipment then yeah, definitely change the grips and magazine locations.

3: About the stun batons, the crabbies do have melee combat of their own, so in that case a guard might make sense :o

[Vathar]

@Gunlord500

3: About the stun batons, the crabbies do have melee combat of their own, so in that case a guard might make sense :o

It’s a trade-off. A simple stun baton fits anywhere, can be gripped from most positions in a blink, while a sweeping guard forces you to grab it properly and restricts your movements to some extent, probably wouldn’t help much against a giant crab’s pincer, and is somewhat redundant considering PP troops wear protective armor including gloves (although I’m surprised the NJ trooper featured above this post doesn’t have full gloves).

Tbh, this is nitpicking for most designs, the only real no go is the one with finger slots, because that is downright impractical and dangerous.

[Vathar]

This highlights that military organizations have changed, but armor design hasn’t changed that drastically, for a simple reason, its purpose has remained the same since people went to war armed.

Since human morphology hasn’t changed noticeably since antiquity, you still need to protect the same body parts. Threats evolve (from antique weaponry to modern warfare) and new materials are used, but priorities remain the same (ie. you’re likely to worry about your soldier’s head before their left ring finger)

Same thing about rifle’s pull. It still depends on the average man’s arm length.

Bear in mind that I don’t overly care about ultra realistic weapon design, and won’t cancel my pre-order if the sidearm’s grip is angled to sharply to let the magazine feed the chamber properly, but it does pass the time on these forums. @Kings_Rook’s feedback could also be valuable for the artist who drew this should he wish to read it.

Lastly, as previous XCOM’s have graced us with weapons such as the Devastator Cannon (XCOM:Apocalypse) that looks like a somewhat hairy swine’s snout, I’d say everything is possible.

(Thankfully, that was an alien design, but if the entropy launcher’s marked me forever by its sheer nastiness in game, the sheer hairiness of the devastator gun has been imprinted so deeply in my brain that I don’t think I will ever forget it_