How to fix snipe attacks

Im just going to keep this short and sweet. Snipe attacks are AWESOME in very specific, unique circumstances, but for 98% of the game, they're useless and most people skip taking them because of that.

So...to fix them...

Change the way sniper attacks are fired. Either two clicks or one that is held down to activate, then let go to finish. Upon initial click the power is "triggered" which activates the power and animation, getting you to "focus" on your target. The second is the "release" which actually fires the power. If tech allows, make it one click that is simply "held" unto you wish to fire.

How would this help? Make the base cast time 1 second, with a maximum of 4 seconds. The longer you "focus" your snipe, the greater the damage, accuracy, and end cost up to their current levels. So snipes could become part of a regular attack chain as a moderate damage 1 second attack, heavy damage 2 second attack, extreme damage 3 second attack, and superior damage 4 second attack. As it increases in power it also increases in endurance costs. Suddenly they can be used in the middle of battles as another regular attack without losing their very special function as long ranged, superior damage attacks when the situation warrants.

Place an on screen marker letting the user know the degree of focus he's achieved, and walla, you have snipes suddenly become a useful power which becomes far less skippable.

According to Arcanaville, the game cannot currently determine how long you've pressed a button, so the tech won't allow charging up like that.

However, the tech does exist to charge up powers, in the form of either combos or Assassin's Focus.

So your idea would work fine if a snipe attack got something like "Sniper's Focus"; taking the Snipe attack would get you two buttons: One that's the attack, and one that charges the attack. Give Sniper's Focus a 1 second recharge, it could stack up to three times.

Using the Snipe without Sniper's Focus would provide a Moderate damage attack.
Using the Snipe with one stack of Sniper's Focus would provide a Heavy damage attack.
Etc.

I think they could just modify Snipes in the same way that Assassin's Strikes were modified.

Now, there's no way to base the activation on "Hidden" status, like AS now does, but I think you could manage it using the same "combat" flag that causes Stealth Suppression.

Out of combat (pulling, etc) Snipers use the long interrupt period and deal Superior/Extreme damage.

IN combat they just use their non-interrupt activation time (Generally 1.3ish seconds) for a more moderate amount of damage.

@Oathbound & @Oathbound Too

There is no 'combat flag' that suppresses stealth, the power itself has conditions that cause it to partially suppress.

If you want a similar effect for snipes as Assassin's Strike, you have to have a power to determine conditions to use 1 version of the attack over another.

However, anything that gets rid of the interrupt times makes the Snipe Invention Sets entirely pointless.

And just today, I learned that, with Manticore 5 slotted (skipping the acc/int/range enhancement) the interrupt reduction is sufficient that at peak disintegration range, I can disintegrate, hit snipe, and not get interrupted by the return attack.

If my toggle idea were to be incorporated with inventions, making the toggle like Rest (which has, I think a 4sec interrupt period before it applies any effects) and any -interrupt would lower the chance of the toggle being disrupted.

I think you as usual have over compacted things mr leo this guy from another thread has the right idea

Quote:

Originally Posted by Roderick This isn't so much a suggestion, as me asking for opinions from other players. If Stalker Snipes were given the Assassin Strike treatment (Range, Accuracy, Endurance, Recharge left the same, shorter non-interruptable animation with similar damage to the current version with a chance to crit when used unhidden, and long version with an actual Assassin strike when hidden), would they become worth using? I'd say that the Assassin Strike (Assassin Shot?) would have to do more damage than a crit, but less than a melee Assassin Strike, for the sake of balance. Personally, I think this would make them worth taking, especially since they'd become useable in combat as a filler attack. It's just too bad that, without Hide, there's no way I can think of to give this change to Blasters, Defenders and Corruptors too.

Where as you seam to have a fixation of trying to get multiple uses for the same things. I hate to bring it up but "weapon skins being one" what a dumb idea. Any way back on topic if they did this as the person i quoted here states would really improve things

I'm still using snipe and I like sniping even in combat. Of course it depends on situation. Perhaps a good fix don't have to be too complicated. Give a change for critical or remove the 5% miss change. That could help a lot. What do you think?

I'm not sure how following the suggestion for stalker snipes would help any other archetype, since a key part of it is to make them chance to crit from hide, and no other archetype gets hide.

I suppose if you made it a "does double damage if fired when not in combat" or something, but Im pretty sure the minute you click an attack you're tagged in combat, so I don't know how that would work, and it would have to be double damage to warrant the 4 second charge, unless you're using it for a pull, in which case they work just fine right now and a "fix" isn't necessary. Since pulling is all but unneeded in the game now, I think that the entire concept behind that being the main use for snipes is what I was trying to address.

As of right, sniper blast takes 4.33 seconds, 3 of which are interrupt time and does just 40 points more base damage than the 2 second, non interrupt-able power burst. Blazing bolt is even worse, with 4.66 cast time and less than 40 more points base damage than blaze. These attacks are skipped because they aren't useable in normal combat by the majority of players, and when they are useful, the damage they do isn't balanced around the time they take, but instead the range they offer. This game has evolved though, and pulling isn't really useful for the majority of players. So how do you fix that without destroying sniper attacks for those who DO use them the way they are currently designed?

Perhaps they could make a mechanic that lets a snipe work this way.

Cast/interrupt time + dmg = your distance from target. In other words, the snipe cast and interrupt time depends on the distance from your target (base 2.5 seconds cast- 1 second interrupt, max 4.5 seconds cast - 3 second interrupt) and for every 25 feet you are from your target it gives a tic of DoT or a 15% chance to crit.

So if I fired blazing bolt at a target who is 150 feet away I would have a 4.5 second cast time with 3 seconds interruptable, and do 217 base damage followed by 6 tics of moderate DoT or a 90% chance to crit. If I fired it at an enemy 50 feet away it would have a 2.5 second cast time, 1.5 second interruptable, and do 217 base damage with 2 tics of moderate DoT or a 30% chance to crit, etc.

This way snipes become useful in any situation, including but not limited to pulling. At close range they become a hard hitting attack with a solid but useable cast time, and at distance they become an extremely damaging attack, finally worth the incredible cast time, interrupt time, and end cost.

If it aint broke dont fix it.

Snipe is fine, With Io's it can be used in most situations, either as first strike or to kill a runner.

I do like the idea of the two power snipe... Power 1 being the "focus" part, where you click and it puts you in your "about to snipe" stance, and adds 1 stack to a "Sniping" status, similar to Street Justice, with a maximum of X stacks. When the Snipe attack activates, it has damage/acc/range/etc based on how many stacks of Sniping you have. Taking damage or moving automatically dumps all Sniping stacks to 0. As for the Interrupt issue, just have the Sniping sub power read all Interrupt modifiers as Recharge modifiers instead, allowing existing interrupt modifiers to retain their usefulness. Invisible math can be your friend. So can keybinds.

snipe1.txt
JOY4 "powexec_abort$$forward 0$$powexec_auto Sniping$$powexec_name Aim$$bind_load_file C:\snipe2.txt"

snipe2.txt
JOY4 "+down$$-down$$powexec_abort$$powexec_name Sniper Attack$$bind_load_file C:\snipe1.txt"

Imho snipe is OK as it is.
All you need is some knock back power and snipe becomes a wonderful part of your attack chain.
enemy gets close (happens)-> kb->snipe (reduce interrupt time is your friend here)-> kill

@Redcap

Snipes in the real world are useful because range is a defense, and because the targets can't always tell where the sniper is.

Range is not a very good defense in CoH, and that's not going to change.

Marking the sniper is the problem. Right now enemies immediately know where the sniper is and aggro on them. The only alternative is to have no aggro...but that's not a very realistic possibility.

The way to fix snipes is to fix the AI behavior so that NPCs have a third mode in-between aggroed and not-aggroed. Call it 'roaming' mode. In that mode they look around and fan out in all directions looking for players, but are not yet aggroed on a player. This lets a sniper sit back and snipe until the roamers get close to him and establish aggro. Not very useful in a team (unless the team waits while the sniper does his work) or during a firefight...but that's a realistic assessment of snipers anyway.

Of course that isn't going to happen either. AI behavior is server-intensive, and for years the devs have resisted improving it in any way.

I only scanned this topic, but a few things that popped into my mind here... So if I talk about something that's already be shot down, I apologize.

I love the idea of the Snipe being a two-power power. Thinking outside the box always helps with problems like this. I think it would be really interesting if the Sniper power came with a Toggle and a Clickie. The toggle would gradually improve your accuracy/to-hit and when you're ready, you hit the Clickie to fire. Obviously the buff would have to have some kind of limit where it would only work for the Sniper attack. Also, firing would have to detoggle the aiming power.

You would also be able to use the Clickie without the toggle, but obviously the accuracy/to-hit would be significantly lower... but it would fire without the typical 'wind-up' we have now. This should allow the player to control how they use the power...

Another thing, even if the above changes don't happen or aren't possible... I'd *love* to see some sort of AoE fear or placate attached to the attack.