After two threads discussing the weapon balance issues of the game I'd thought I'd bring up the problem with automatics. Automatics in FO 3 were actually great weapons due to the way DR worked ( That is until you reached the end game beasties that took an arsenal to take down ) In FONV they are not only terribly inaccurate they also fail terribly against anything with DT.

Service Rifle - you can actually get a cowboy repeater before you get this weapon, this weapon should've been automatic or at least the same semi-auto fire rate as the Marksman carbine. If the developers wanted to fix this weapon without changing the way it works i would increase the base damage and increase semi auto fire rate, would make it an excellent weapon against squishier targets.

Assault Carbine - Inaccurate, fails against DT. increase base damage to 20, and reduce spread.

Marksman Carbine - Great gun, still would like to see the damage per shot increased like all assault weapons

Mini gun/ unique mini gun - Aside from being horribly inaccurate they waste an absurd amount of ammo, fail against DT and are still bugged (Audio wise).

As far as the SMG's go their damage output and damage per shot is balanced but the spread is stupid and game breaking look at the 12.7mm smg with 4 spread, it's a freaking shotgun.

agreed, spread kicks in too early on all autos. first round should always be accurate.. also the crappy auto aim on the console version annoys me to no end... what auto aim?you mean vats?no i mean aim assist rubbish,heat seeking bullets that seem to go for the legs or chest when using a lazer wep and your aiming for the head with 100 skill for that wep class,used to annoy me somthin feirce in fo3 when an enemy would crouch behind a peice of cover only to leave his head exposed yet the auto aim would kick in and you fire 30rounds into a rock never hitting the head.only bring up lazers cause its much easier to spot.FIX THAT.otherwise ill be forced to go on a three day rant on why auto aim is queer and call of duty is for people with two lazy eyes.

Turn off autoaim.

Or, if Gamebryo is capable, make burst projectiles and those weapon consume multiple rounds, for example:

Service Rifle, Assault Carbine and Marksman Carbine shoots in 3 shot burst (as one animation object), triple their current damage and consume 3 rounds.

Minigun fires 5 shot burst (as one animation object), five time current damage and consume 5 rounds.

Or, give them minor DT by pass as sustain fire is likely to weaken armour.

But imo automatic weapon are now perfectly feasible option since creatures have their DT fixed.

The Minigun serves up Giant Radscorpions for breakfast if you load it with 5mm Armor Piercing ammunition. In fact, never before have I had an easier time absolutely making a fool out of a Giant Radscorpion than with a minugun with AP ammo. Holding down the trigger for 3 to 4 seconds utterly destroyed it ... a cracked sheild next to its health bar and legs flying off were all I got a chance to see. Deathlcaws and Supermutant Brutes also enjoyed a short lifespan when they got with a reasonable range to use the Minigun. I burned through a metric ton of cheap ammo doing it, but it was quite effective.

I've never loaded the Assault Carbine with AP ammo. I imagine the results would be less impressive with the above, but respectable. If the suggestion is to raise damage per shot for weapons to be able to beat DT, what exactly is 5mm armor piercing ammunition for?

The Service Rifle I've really rarely used so I cannot speak for it, and the Marksman Carbine is a nice weapon however and have not had an issue dealing damage to targets. Both do have 5.56 AP and 5.56 HP ammo available to them though, which should help to even the odds some.

I was just trying to note how much ammo it takes or how hard autonatics have against dt in comparison to single shot weapons like lever action rifles. My suggestion is to make these weapons more accurate and effective killers. While I think the marksman carbine and all american are neat leveraction weapons and heavy revolvers blow them out of the water.

If anything
Energy Weapons should be the priority when fixing this game's balance.
And the Sniper Rifle, that thing is WAY too overpowered.

It's forced....and it's also in Fallout: New Vegas forced again on console and PC like always

"Fix"?
They're broken or something?

Not really broken but they suffer from the fact that DAM is much more valuable than DPS is. Balance is pretty terrible in FNV but its not going to be fixed. The game would need a complete overhaul.

If there are changes I would like DAM focused weapons to be reduced in power rather than DPS focused weapons increased in power. At least that way the game would be more of a challenge.

Fortunately for the smaller calibers fired by automatic weapons, they offered AP to make up for the lower damage per shot. I think if the damage per shot were increased, then you'd end up either making the AP ammo useless or having them overpowered when used with AP ammo. I'd say it's probably a slightly more tactical issue where you need to use the right ammo against the right target instead of a Trail Carbine just blowing graqefruit-sized holes in everything or the Brush Gun doing such an over-abundance of damage that even Hollow Point ammo does respectable damage against armor. Of course you pay for that firepower by finding less of it and paying a lot more per bullet, but you have a nice 'one-size fits all' situation when it comes to slinging the lead.

I used the Marksman Carbine when I had a Trail Carbine handy not because it was the equal or superior in damage to any of the level-action rifles, but because it has a low recoil, high semi-auto fire rate and loads cheap ammunition that comes in AP and HP varieties. It was a nice, versatile target shooting weapon that I got a lot of mileage from. I used an Assault Rifle When I had a Brush Gun handy because the ammo is cheaper and easier to find for the Assault Carbine and it was good to use against lower profile targets. It's also fun to just hold down the trigger sometimes.

In general though the balance with guns hasn't struck me as glaringly off anywhere. There are probably a few cases where some things should be tweaked, but my personal experience varies some from yours.

Well... The way I figured: Use high DAM weapons for high DT enemies, use high DPS weapons for low DT enemies.
Don't really see why they need to change it.
It's simple enough.

It's like EW originally was meant to be designed.
Laser weapons were meant to have lower damage but be more accurate, have faster rate of fire, and lower ammo consumption while Plasma was meant to be the opposite.
So Plasma weapons were meant to be used for high DT enemies while laser weapons were meant to be used for mid-DT enemies or lower.

As far as I can see Guns follow the same pattern and see no reason as to why it should be changed. :shrug:

No its not.

Not on the console, I turned it off.

Why must every weapon be good for every situation? aside from the most heavily armored enemies in the game an automatic is fully capable for going up against most enemies.

The minigun or the Light Machine gun will chew through Legion or NCR troops, never mind fiends, power gangers and the largely unarmored animals of the wasteland. The 10mm SMG with hand loaded rounds will turn Cazador's into swiss cheese
Weapons still deal a minimum of 20% through DT and 5mm Armor piercing rounds for the minigun can be bought in abundance which is why it can rip a Giant Radscorpion to shreds fairly quickly.

Not everything has 20+ DT. The stuff you really want to use full auto weapons on (hi Cazador!) just happens to have zero DT.

:goodjob:

It's funny how so many people say guns are overpowered and yet they want to make the lower damage guns even more powerful. The problem isn't these guns are underpowered, the problem is the other guns are WAY overpowered. There are too many weapons that can 1 and 2 hit the baddies even on very hard.

There are a few heavy-hitters in the rifle department that may be better with a slight rounding down on the damage, yes. But as to the topic of the thread, the weapons I mentioned above ... I personally feel that they do not need to change. Ammo types are part of the damage equation with many of the automatic weapons and I don't believe that was factored in on the original post.

As far as lowering damage to make the game more challenging, well, that's a divided opinion. Unloading a lot more bullets into a target to kill it might just be more frustrating than rewarding to some. It may just be that some enemies need to be more deadly overall, not just be able to swallow more lead and keep smiling.

Yeah that's what happens when you drop a Stoner AR-15 in the sand and don't clean it out first before firing.

lol m16 has been known to be a unreliable weapon since vietnam/Kinda sad us soldiers would drop their ar's for ak's -_-

Well the M4s and M16s US soldiers are issued today are much more reliable than the ones that were first designed. Besides, the AK lacks accuracy. If you want an accurate weapon that's based on the AKM model, you need to look up the AN-94. Now that's a beautiful weapon. That and the H&K M416 which is based heavily on the AR-15 model.

isnt m416 a upgraded hybrid of the m16 m4?.But anyways why go mediocre go with the scar l :P.I hope they give us like a big fifty machine gun /like the one from fallout 2 slow rof but accurate/total ass ownage.DUDe an94 is freaking brilliant never ealized 2 shot burst was actually a irl function*always believed it was a BFBC bs modification>2 shot burst is amazing for any kind of penetration no jokes intended

The M416 is basically a modified M4 carbine that you can treat like an AK-47 without gumming up the works.

Oh and yeah, the AN-94 is a sick weapon. Firing two round bursts with the perceived recoil of only one makes the AN-94 insanely accurate...

I wouldnt mind a 3 shot assualt rifle or a 2 shot.Be kinda awesome accurate fast rof /or a low rof but high dge /accurate bar .i would scream in joy tbh lol

The service rifle works well if you use it the same waay the ncr troops use it.

Kneel down and aim and pop off alot of shots. The ammo is cheap and light so you can afford to fling 30 shots per badguy and kneeling the baddies generaly dont hit you.

its not an automatic so much as a semi auto but it is useful.

If you want better you need to wait for something like the assult carbine or the light machine gun..I use the machine gun as a replacement fort that gun AND my 10 mm sub because its better at range and close in and fires a metric arseload of bullets if I want it to. or short bursts of 2-3.

Vs armor.. thats what ap ammo is for.

I always felt that people who complain about auto weapons newer bothered to use either AP or HP ammo.
10mm SMG is my favourite close quarters weapon and while I was ignoring at first 9mm SMG due to its low damage per shot I later regretted it. Especially with all upgrades it is actually pretty good gun. One must however play to the strengths of these guns. And strength lies in high rate of fire not surprisingly. These are not weapons for long range sniping obviously.
LMG is also worth mentioning, that gun compete with minigun easily. It even uses more powerful ammo and have lower requirements.

As for service rifle, it is not auto weapon, so no reason to discus it as one. Yes its outlook is bit misleading and I suspect this was intended to be auto weapon when it was designed but got reworked for balance reasons later. Its not bad weapon as it stands however. Have decent accuracy compared to Varmint rifle and much higher rate of fire and magazine capacity. Its actually good all around gun for early game.