Flak cannon curiosity

[Ahura]

I cannot recall where, but the pattern that the shrapnels fly out is of a happy face. I think this is for 2k3, but not sure about UT3 though.

[FeedBackTest]

There's really no reason to use the alt fire anyway. It's only 100 dmg with minimal splash - a full hit of primary fire is 180 dmg, and the ROF is the same.

I quite agree with this. The splash radius and damage is ridiculous in UT3, as well as the arc so it's most of the time 100 or 0 with it so rather use the primary most of the time. Not to forget that they don't always register even if you manage to do a direct hit (-_-)

Anybody know how many fragments are shot out of the gun with the primary fire? We tried counting them, but... heh XD

We tryed a few time me and a friend and at medium range it seemed to do 20 per chunk.

[Vzur]

I liked the other thread better. This one lacks sincerity, with it's whole "What? Already dead? I'm not the first to beat on this horse, here?!" bit. but yeah. Hate the new high trajectory on the flak shells, it makes no sense. The only reason more people don't complain is because it's been nerfed into uselessness, so it's easy not to care that much.

[smalldog]

It is strange as to why the alt fire goes straight up like that. What's worst though, is how the primary fire is "delayed". You press the fire button and about .5 second later it fires.

It makes it a lot harder to time the shots with the other player's jumps...I have almost stopped using the primary fire. Why did they have to fix something that wasnt broken? Close combat is hard enough without trying to allow for weapon lag too, imho. Hopefully someone will "fix" it with a mod.

[Xyx]

I'm curious why the Flak cannon's trajectory just keeps getting higher and higher with every iteration of UT.

Because the flak shell's speed keeps getting lower and lower with every iteration, and Epic apparently believes that you should get the same distance (rather than height) without aiming up. Shame, though. I used to like the shell. Now I don't see the point.

[EpicFragMagnet]

I was quite sure that they removed that feature not long ago.

And that actually brings up a good point! I'd be willing to bet that they made the shell's trajectory so high to save the console users the hassle of having to aim up for each shot!

If that's the case, then I agree with you Kardinal. That's somewhat lazy.

PS: I noticed the dire lack of weapon throwing too. What the hell is that all about, Epic?

[Kardinal]

Can we even play with the console gamers in the first place?

I thought it was them just being lazy and not differentiating between consolers and pc'ers by giving everyone the same package.

[JUNGLIST MOVEMENT]

yeah, do have to look at my feet when i shoot

epic nerfed so many things to keep the entire ut-pc gaming community from horribly owning console users back to the stone age (or earlier)
how would you button map weapon throwing on a controller?

[EpicFragMagnet]

i had a knack for planting shells into the other guys face.. but now they just see it pass over them. i even saw someone duck to avoid my shell once...
i guess it takes a little getting used to

But that's what I'm getting at here: It really shouldn't take any getting used to. Why mess with something that worked so well in the previous versions? I mean, both the first and second iterations of UT had somewhat low slung trajectories for the flak shell. Why change it now, just as they're getting things polished to a shine?

[JUNGLIST MOVEMENT]

While it does save on having to look up to lob nades at people most of the time, I think that looking up a little isn't as troublesome as having to look at your toes whenever you want to toss one a little closer than the regular trajectory allows.

Now I know what you probably think at this point. If the enemy's that close you may just as well use the buckshot rather than the shell - but I honestly find it easier to predict just where my shots are going to go. I just hate it when my aiming is just perfect, and yet the bullets all just had to go off to the right side of the shot cone out of pure coincidence. That, and I have a severely hard time placing point blank shots with the UT3 flak cannon's primary fire for some bizarre reason.

Is it just me who finds this just a wee bit troublesome? I'd like to hear the point of view of the other players out there, if anything to shut myself up and stop griping whenever someone takes me down before I can get a bead on them.

i had a knack for planting shells into the other guys face.. but now they just see it pass over them. i even saw someone duck to avoid my shell once...
i guess it takes a little getting used to

[Mr Evil]

...Anybody know how many fragments are shot out of the gun with the primary fire? We tried counting them, but... heh XD

Fire, pause, type playersonly at the console, unpause, then you can walk around and count them easily. Or you can export the source code via the editor and look for the answer in there (it's nine).

[EpicFragMagnet]

It's just over 200 as you say. A friend of mine and I were doing some number crunching to find the damage values of all the weapons (or at least, those we could without killing each other instantaneously) and the primary flak shot at point blank dealt 203 damage. Pretty impressive, although I think I've only ever done it about 6 or 7 times since I started playing.

Making it harder to perform is a good thing though, at least in my opinion - especially when you're dealing that amount of damage.

Anybody know how many fragments are shot out of the gun with the primary fire? We tried counting them, but... heh XD

[Mr Evil]

There's really no reason to use the alt fire anyway. It's only 100 dmg with minimal splash - a full hit of primary fire is 180 dmg, and the ROF is the same.

I believe the maximum damage is a little over 200 if you take into account the damage bonus for hitting dead centre. However, that falls off rapidly with distance, whereas the damage from a shell remains good at any range. There's also extra damage from chunks thrown up by the shell exploding (although if you get a direct hit with the shell then the chunks can't hit directly because they move the wrong way).

[booshack]

There's really no reason to use the alt fire anyway. It's only 100 dmg with minimal splash - a full hit of primary fire is 180 dmg, and the ROF is the same.

[VerteX]

i didn't know that