JA2: Weapon comparison again
Erwin S. Andreasen
kill tanks instead of real people :) So far it's been great, even though I
am playing the same game over again, I've picked different MERCs, I am
attacking at night more, etc.
Anyway, in the previous game I used a lot of the 7.62 Nato weapons, but in
this game, I am beginning to have doubts about their usefulness.
The G3A3 I primarily used doesn't seem that good anymore, with cost of
7/11-3 (7 single shot, 11 for a burst of 3 shots). Even though it does more
damage... using a FA-MAS, which is 5/9-5 seems much better: it's cheaper to
fire 50% more bullets. It does do less damage, and use 5.65 caliber, but how
much does that really translate to in game terms?
I am finding that my custom Auto Weapons merc can kill most enemies at close
range with a burst from the FA-MAS. I have both the range-extender and the
-1 AC mod on it, making the cost for a burst a mere 7 points.
For 2 other MERCs i use C7s. I only have 2 of them so far. The C7 is 6/10-5
so it's one AP more expensive than the FA-MAS, though it has a much better
range. I suppose I should replace the FA-MAS when I get another C7, but I've
grown attached to the small rifle :)
Scope uses the FN-FAL for long-range shots and while fighting at night.
Modified for a single-shot cost of 4 it's AFAICS the best weapon for single
shots. Only 2 of my Mercs have AutoWeapons skill, so maybe I'll give the
other of them FN-FALs too when I get them, but it seems that most encounters
are at short range, where I'd rather be able to burst.
I'm not sure about the usefulness of Steyr. In single shot mode, it costs 7
pts to a fire. It does have a range of 50 squares... but I've found the
simple AK-74 better: 35 range which is good, and just 5 pts for a single
shot. Usually it only takes 2 or 3 shots with full aim to kill someone when
Scope is shooting.
The only other upgrade possibility I see is perhaps replacing Ivan's C7 with
a Minimi when I get one. Only one more AP for firing one more shot... but
the shot does do less damage.
It's all great fun, I don't know if I am the only one who likes such
micromanagement in games, but I love to consider who should get which
weapon, how to split the first aid kits I have, on which piece of armor I
should use that Compound 18, etc. Except Alpha Centauri, JA2 is the only
gamve I've played for so many hours at a time :)
--
==============================================================================
Erwin Andreasen Herlev, Denmark <e...@dde.dk> UNIX System Programmer
<URL:http://www.andreasen.org> <*> Goodbye, Richard!
==============================================================================
The Hansons
>I am finding that my custom Auto Weapons merc can kill most enemies at
close
>range with a burst from the FA-MAS. I have both the range-extender and the
>-1 AC mod on it, making the cost for a burst a mere 7 points.
I really liked the FA-MAS for close-up burst work, but I stopped using it
because I'd need
a longer ranged weapon every so often, and the FA-MAS didn't cut it for
that.
>For 2 other MERCs i use C7s. I only have 2 of them so far. The C7 is 6/10-5
>so it's one AP more expensive than the FA-MAS, though it has a much better
>range. I suppose I should replace the FA-MAS when I get another C7, but
I've
>grown attached to the small rifle :)
The C-7 is a great, all-around weapon with excellent burst fire.
>Scope uses the FN-FAL for long-range shots and while fighting at night.
>Modified for a single-shot cost of 4 it's AFAICS the best weapon for single
>shots. Only 2 of my Mercs have AutoWeapons skill, so maybe I'll give the
>other of them FN-FALs too when I get them, but it seems that most
encounters
>are at short range, where I'd rather be able to burst.
Agreed. Lynx and Scope and other 'snipers' are great. With the FN-FAL and
rod & spring, they
can get three aimed shots a turn. From Lynx and Scope, that'll put anyone
is a world of hurt.
>I'm not sure about the usefulness of Steyr. In single shot mode, it costs 7
>pts to a fire. It does have a range of 50 squares... but I've found the
>simple AK-74 better: 35 range which is good, and just 5 pts for a single
>shot. Usually it only takes 2 or 3 shots with full aim to kill someone when
>Scope is shooting.
The Steyr's range is overkill most of the time, and the burst fire of 3
shots is too
few for burst work. A cool looking gun, but not one of my favorites.
>The only other upgrade possibility I see is perhaps replacing Ivan's C7
with
>a Minimi when I get one. Only one more AP for firing one more shot... but
>the shot does do less damage.
A lot of people praise the Minimi but I much prefer the RPK-74. It has a
five round burst rather
than a six round burst, but that sixth bullet is usually so much overkill.
The RPK-74 does slightly better
damage (30 versus 28) and is the lightest weight light machine gun. With 6
bursts per clip, I'd rather have
it over the Minimi. Any thoughts?
>It's all great fun, I don't know if I am the only one who likes such
>micromanagement in games, but I love to consider who should get which
>weapon, how to split the first aid kits I have, on which piece of armor I
>should use that Compound 18, etc. Except Alpha Centauri, JA2 is the only
>gamve I've played for so many hours at a time :)
>
Agreed.
My teams usually end up with auto-weps folks having RPK-74s and C-7s and
single-shot folks wielding FN-FALs.
Later,
Hanson
Olaf
minimis to all of my autoweps guys, and C7s, and FALs to the rest of them.
Really, the FAL is superior to a C7, if you are never going to use the burst
mode of the C7.
olaf
Erwin S. Andreasen <e...@dde.dk> wrote in message news:slrn7t7boc.h8.erw@erw-
Alan Brooks
shared with the group...
[snip]
> My latest game (almost finished now) has been with a single merc, my customised
> Rambo. Yep, just one merc doing everything. It's ~Day 230, and he is most
> definitely a badass. I admit that this is on Novice level, and I did a lot of
> Reloading (unavoidable really), but boy has it been fun.
>
[snip]
A week or two ago I read a few people talking about trying the game with
a single merc, but hadn't heard of anyone's experiences with it. How has
it gone? Care to share any stories? And just out of curiosity, does
your one merc do everything, including repairs, any non-hospital healing,
delivery pickups, etc, w/o a cadre of cheap/free mercs? If so, consider
me humbled.
Alan
--
____________________________________
remove the numeral 7 from my email
address to respond
Josh Boardman
> I've started over at Experienced while in Meduna; I got bored of having to
> kill tanks instead of real people :) So far it's been great, even though I
> am playing the same game over again, I've picked different MERCs, I am
> attacking at night more, etc.
<snip>
Yep, I'm with you all the way here Erwin. I guess that technically, it *is*
micromanagement, but I can't get enough of it. Shuffling weapons around, picking
the right equipment and mercs for the right job, assigning duties within each team
("OK, you're the medic, you're the sniper, you're the scout..etc..." :-). Great
stuff!
My latest game (almost finished now) has been with a single merc, my customised
Rambo. Yep, just one merc doing everything. It's ~Day 230, and he is most
definitely a badass. I admit that this is on Novice level, and I did a lot of
Reloading (unavoidable really), but boy has it been fun.
As for favourite weapon, I'd have to say the modified M-14. It's great for a
single-man squad, since you can't do any BVR sniping (obviously) and so the long
range of an FN-FAL is of lesser importance. Also, it *looks* cool ; I prefer the
guns that look like old-fashioned rifles with a wooden stock and all that. I hate
the Steyr for this very reason. :-) Ugly thing.
I'll probably start my fourth game on Experienced later this week.....can you say
Addicted?
Old Wolf
------------
Hong Ooi
<j.boa...@auckland.ac.nz> wrote:
>As for favourite weapon, I'd have to say the modified M-14. It's great for a
>single-man squad, since you can't do any BVR sniping (obviously) and so the long
>range of an FN-FAL is of lesser importance.
OTOH, the FN-FAL only costs 5/9 AP per shot/burst. Even if you modify
the M14, it's still 6/11, isn't it?
>Also, it *looks* cool ; I prefer the
>guns that look like old-fashioned rifles with a wooden stock and all that. I hate
>the Steyr for this very reason. :-) Ugly thing.
Har. If it's good enough for the Australian army, it's good enough for
me. :)
--
Hong Ooi | "Do you realize how damn long it takes to load
hong...@maths.anu.edu.au | background images in Lynx?"
http://www.zip.com.au/~hong | -- KF
Canberra, Australia |
Josh Boardman
> A week or two ago I read a few people talking about trying the game with
> a single merc, but hadn't heard of anyone's experiences with it. How has
> it gone? Care to share any stories? And just out of curiosity, does
> your one merc do everything, including repairs, any non-hospital healing,
> delivery pickups, etc, w/o a cadre of cheap/free mercs? If so, consider
> me humbled.
I've had a great time playing with a single merc - although the emphasis of the game
shifts away from the "Squad Tactics" end of the scale, and more towards the "RPG"
end.
The early part of the game is a struggle; since you need to do *everything* yourself,
you can't afford to drop skills like MED and MECH down to zero. I boosted all of my
stats to 80+, and set everything else at 35. Of course, the very fact that you are
doing everything means that your skills go up *very* quickly : it took me a couple of
weeks to secure Drassen and the SAM site, and by that stage I was Level 5/6 with
major skill gains (MRKSM high 70s, MED low 50s, etc..).
I chose Night Ops and Stealthy, since I was modeling him on John Rambo. :-)
Ideally, I would have liked Knifing and AutoWeps as well, but he ended up tough
enough as it was.
Because of your limited carrying capacity, you have to plan your missions carefully.
Having already played through twice, I had a good idea of what to take on each
assault, but it's hard to find room for canteens, 1st aid, lockpicks, grenades,
wire-cutters, camo paint, silenced pistol, rifle, ammo, etc. :-) Later in the
game, when you need LAWs or something similar to destroy the tanks, it is even more
tricky.
I found that I was experimenting with different weapons a lot. Tried throwing knives
(very cool and surprisingly deadly - give 'em a go!), and the tranquilizer pistol -
both of which are extremely effective on those stealthy night sorties. Once you've
reached Level 9/10 you are virtually "uninterruptable" and can almost guarantee an
Interrupt on your opponents, so this makes things heaps easier.
Yes, I had to do all of the carrying and fetching myself, but to be honest, this
wasn't a big problem. Most everything you find can be chucked straight into the
trash if you want - money is never in short supply, since you have no contracts to
pay. [ As an aside, I considered playing this game with a hired merc instead (maybe
Scully or someone like that), but decided against it since I thought it might be hard
meeting contract deadlines in the first few weeks...]
For weapons, I generally settled on the M-14 as my standard sniper rifle for the few
daytime missions I did. My principle gun alternated between the MP5K and Mac-10 : I
still haven't decided which I prefer. The main piss-off with the Mac-10 is my damn
barrel extender falling off so often ;-( Eventually though, I found I was using
knives more and more often - they take up fewer inventory spaces, and are just as
effective once your merc is at such a high level (Stealth, lots of APs, can't be
interrupted, etc...)
Sheesh, that's enough for now. Better get back to work or else I'll lose my job and
it'll be no more games for me. ;-)
Old Wolf
-----------
Brian Trosko
: I've just started trying tranq darts in my current game because Tony had
: something like 20 of them one trip. So far I'm 0 for 3 (3 hits, minimal
: effect). Are the darts "fire and run away for a few turns until the
: tranq takes hold" or something?
Whoever you hit with a dart should drop the next time he gets to act.
K. Laisathit
Olaf <ol...@texas.net> wrote:
>The minimi also has less of burst penalty. This is a big advantage. I gave
>minimis to all of my autoweps guys, and C7s, and FALs to the rest of them.
>Really, the FAL is superior to a C7, if you are never going to use the burst
>mode of the C7.
IIRC, minimi and RPK74 have the same burst fire penalty. C7 has
slightly higher burst fire penalty, but OTOH, it's a lot easier
to come by. You could find C7 around Cambria, but for Minimi
you have to head south a bit. Yeah, for single shot fire, nothing
beats FAL, unless you're a heavy weapon guy using Rocket rifle.
Later...
K. Laisathit
Erwin S. Andreasen <e...@dde.dk> wrote:
>
>The G3A3 I primarily used doesn't seem that good anymore, with cost of
>7/11-3 (7 single shot, 11 for a burst of 3 shots). Even though it does more
>damage... using a FA-MAS, which is 5/9-5 seems much better: it's cheaper to
>fire 50% more bullets. It does do less damage, and use 5.65 caliber, but how
>much does that really translate to in game terms?
Ummm... G3A3 is 31/30 dmg/rng vs FA-MAS 30/25. In other words, the
damage difference is negligible. Due to how range penalty is calculated
though, G3A3 is actually more accurate for single shot fire. Anyhow,
FWIW, FA-MAS is end game weapon (you find it around the same time
FN-FAL starts showing up in volume) while G3A3 is a mid game one.
So, yeah, I'd say FA-MAS is a better weapon. The nail on the G3A3
coffin is the ammo though. When it starts showing up en masse, 7.62mm
NATO is hard to find. In general, I'd go with G41 which shows up at
the same time but use easier-to-find 5.65mm ammo. It get's replaced
by either C7/Minimi and FN-FAL when these become available.
>I'm not sure about the usefulness of Steyr. In single shot mode, it costs 7
>pts to a fire. It does have a range of 50 squares... but I've found the
>simple AK-74 better: 35 range which is good, and just 5 pts for a single
>shot. Usually it only takes 2 or 3 shots with full aim to kill someone when
>Scope is shooting.
Steyr is a compromise for those who like to do long range sniping
but don't want to go with AP13 true sniper rifle. Other than that,
Steyr isn't particularly useful (relative to weapons that show up at
around the same time, that is).
>It's all great fun, I don't know if I am the only one who likes such
>micromanagement in games, but I love to consider who should get which
>weapon, how to split the first aid kits I have, on which piece of armor I
>should use that Compound 18, etc. Except Alpha Centauri, JA2 is the only
>gamve I've played for so many hours at a time :)
Yep, that's part of the key for a good squad. Give the right weapon
to the right people.
Later...
Josh Boardman
> Josh Boardman wrote:
> > I found that I was experimenting with different weapons a lot. Tried throwing knives
> > (very cool and surprisingly deadly - give 'em a go!), and the tranquilizer pistol -
> > both of which are extremely effective on those stealthy night sorties.
>
> Ok, just what the heck is the trick with these? I've tried about a
> dozen times with Dmitri (expert throwing) and he does like -3 or -5
> damage with tossed knives. And yes, it was on surprised foes both head
> and body shots. Am I just not close enough?
I'm not always successful either. I seem to get the best results, as you say, on surprised
foes from about 4-7 squares away, *attacking from behind*. I don't think I've ever got an
instant kill from the front or side.
Unfortunately, you only seem to get either -108 damage (dead guy!) or -2, -3. It's all or
nothing.
And what about Throwing? Does it give you more range? Better accuracy? Fewer APs to make
the throw? All of these things? Anyone have any ideas?
> I've just started trying tranq darts in my current game because Tony had
> something like 20 of them one trip. So far I'm 0 for 3 (3 hits, minimal
> effect). Are the darts "fire and run away for a few turns until the
> tranq takes hold" or something?
Sometimes it drops them instantly. <ping>....<snick>...GROAN....<thump>. Sometimes, I've
had to use two darts to get a knock-out (a merc with good APS should be able to fire,
reload, fire.) Sometimes, they remain unsteadily on their feet , and then drop when it's
their turn.
Once they're down, they seem to stay down for at least 3 or 4 turns, maybe more.
One of my best moments (for the "adrenaline rush" factor) was taking down 2 guys at once
with 2 darts from a clump of long grass, and then scurrying out to finish them off with a
few well-placed cuts, and then diving back into cover before any other patrols wandered
past. [ This was in the sector just north of the Meduna SAM - really cool for creeping
around in camoflage ].
Old Wolf
----------
Alan Brooks
shared with the group...
[good lengthy post about a single-merc game snipped for space]
>
> Sheesh, that's enough for now. Better get back to work or else I'll lose my job and
> it'll be no more games for me. ;-)
>
Thanks for taking the time to answer that. I'll have to see if I can
muster the patience to try that myself :)
Roberto Ullfig
You said it; I've got two psychos on my squad (Buzz and Custom) and I've
been giving them SKSs (just started out trying the Dragunov) so that
they don't go burst-firing at the worst times. I also give them a SMG in
case they need to burst fire (esp for Buzz). Don't know how I am going
to equip them as time goes on.
--
Roberto Ullfig : ro...@suba.com
K. Laisathit
Roberto Ullfig <rul...@midway.uchicago.edu> wrote:
>> Yep, that's part of the key for a good squad. Give the right weapon
>> to the right people.
>>
>
>You said it; I've got two psychos on my squad (Buzz and Custom) and I've
>been giving them SKSs (just started out trying the Dragunov) so that
>they don't go burst-firing at the worst times. I also give them a SMG in
>case they need to burst fire (esp for Buzz). Don't know how I am going
>to equip them as time goes on.
Heh, you realize that psycho guys (and gals) get to-hit bonus when
they go psycho? =) Granted, it's bloody inconvenient when Buzz
switches to auto when she doesn't have enough AP to take cover
later if she goes auto.
Later...
Olaf
weapon.
olaf
Roberto Ullfig <rul...@midway.uchicago.edu> wrote in message
Brian C Robinson
: When Buzz goes psycho, she is usually lethal. I would give her an automatic
: weapon.
:
I don't know how many people know this, but Dynamo is psycho. He
kicks ass with the G11. "S O B!"
--
George Gilder: Moore's Law governs Silicon Valley, but moron's law
governs Washington, DC.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
Jagged Alliance 2 FAQ: http://pegasus.cc.ucf.edu/~bcr19374/ja2faq.htm
Jason Tcheng
: I don't know how many people know this, but Dynamo is psycho. He
: kicks ass with the G11. "S O B!"
Hey Brian, perhaps you should include a list of psychos in your next
edition of the FAQ. :)
thanks for your work.
Jason
--
---------------------------------------------------------------
Jason Tcheng <jgtc...@unixg.ubc.ca>
-= UBC Chemical Engineering =-
A friend is someone who knows your faults but likes you anyways.
Twilight
>
>You said it; I've got two psychos on my squad (Buzz and Custom) and I've
>been giving them SKSs (just started out trying the Dragunov) so that
>they don't go burst-firing at the worst times. I also give them a SMG in
>case they need to burst fire (esp for Buzz). Don't know how I am going
>to equip them as time goes on.
>
for the head the entire burst goes straight for the head :) . I
usually on carruone psycho tho..the custom..
"I can picture in my mind a world without war , a world without hate . And I can picture us attacking that world because they'd never expect it. " -Jack Handey
Brian C Robinson
: Brian C Robinson (bcr1...@pegasus.cc.ucf.edu) wrote:
: : I don't know how many people know this, but Dynamo is psycho. He
: : kicks ass with the G11. "S O B!"
: Hey Brian, perhaps you should include a list of psychos in your next
: edition of the FAQ. :)
:
I know... I haven't updated in a while. I actually have lots of
great information like the list of mercs with skills that madsci posted on
the group a while ago, lists of weapons and their range penalties, etc. I
just have to find time to put it all together. There's a hurricane coming
to FL this week, though, and I hear classes might be cancelled, so maybe I
will have some time.