Crossbow - Allow bolts to pin specimens to parts of the map or even each other

[Benjamin]

I'm sure many of you think that the crossbow is good enough as it is due to its amazingly high damage, but hopefully this will get reduced somewhat in a future patch. What I'd like to see however, is something unique about such a weapon. It doesn't necessarily have to be a super powerful weapon to be popular, as long as it's fun to use and brings another element to the game. So here goes...

If a crossbow bolt hits the body of a specimen and kills it, the ragdoll should be launched with the bolt (with drop added to the bolt after contact, for added realism) allowing it to be pinned to parts of the map. As the crossbow has penetration, if it kills multiple specimens it should be able to pin them together.

This should only work on the smaller specimens, such as clots, stalkers, crawlers, and perhaps gorefasts. As with the way ragdolls work now, they should disappear in about the same time (for performance concerns, and the fact that you might not want walls full of dead specimens - or might you?). One nice benefit of being able to pin specimens is that you'd be able to find your used bolts more easily.

An additional (but more advanced) idea is to allow for specimens to be pinned to bigger specimens, slowing down said specimen until the pinned specimen disappears. For example, you could pin a clot onto an incoming scrake to slow it down for a little while, buying you more time to prepare to fight it.

I think the only time I've seen this in a game was in Painkiller, and I really liked it. What do you guys think of the idea?

 

[anthracy]

It sounds like it would be a cool addition to the game, the only problem is it might not be possible on this engine.

Or if it is possible, something not entirely needed. I'd rather have TWI spend time on wrapping up the final few content releases for the game and polishing off some bug fixes.

Save this idea for Killing Floor 2

 

[Temstar]

I think a crossbow bolt is too light to send specimens flying and pin them to walls, you need a gun that shoots whole tree trunks.

Speaking of which:
YouTube - Pain Killer - screwing around

Yahtzee refers to it as "the hugely satisfying penis extension gun that pins baddies to walls with entire trees"

 

[Sambopukka]

I think this is possible, there was a stakegun mutator for unreal tournament 2004 that allowed bodies to be pinned to walls, I don't think this would work with sticking bodies to other characters.

 

[Shambler]

Would be a pointless addition. The bodies disappear almost instantly anyway and it would never work considering you can retrieve bolts out of walls and there are only ever 3 left sticking around.

I admit it would look cool though.

 

[Nanostrike]

Would be a pointless addition. The bodies disappear almost instantly anyway and it would never work considering you can retrieve bolts out of walls and there are only ever 3 left sticking around.

I admit it would look cool though.

Not to mention the fact that the crossbow really, really doesn't need any buffs. It's already the equivalent of a 1-hit-kill Railgun.

 

[18Bravo]

Reminds me of using the crossbow in Half Life 2, though when you pinned something to the ceiling/floor/wall, it came with a rather sickening sound. This idea would take a bit of the overpower it supposably has, since you can get 3+ clots in 1 shot if they're lined up.

 

[Benjamin]

Guys, use your imagination. If something like this was implemented obviously the weapon would have to be rebalanced to account for it, and things such as ragdoll life would be altered to accomodate it.

I agree that it's not absolutely essential, but stuff like this would help to enhance the feel of the game (in the same way that the longer lasting corpses mutator does), and it would just generally make the weapon cooler. Of course, I don't think this is the only weapon that should have something cool about it, I think most should! It's just that I don't have any particular ideas for the other weapons for now.

At the moment most of the weapons pretty much only differ in power/recoil/reload speed, and it'd be nice to see something that makes them unique from each other. Naturally if it's something that would take a while to implement I'd rather they spend time on more important things, and leave it for KF2 like Anthracy said. No harm in pitching the idea though!

Anyway, thanks for your comments (those that are open-minded to imagine what it'd be like!).

I think a crossbow bolt is too light to send specimens flying and pin them to walls, you need a gun that shoots whole tree trunks.

Well as it is the bolts can pass through an infinite amount of enemies with zero drop, so they must be pretty heavy.

 

[[UIT] Akame]

The bodies disappear almost instantly anyway and it would never work considering you can retrieve bolts out of walls

This.

 

[Bio666]

I see no point for this idea.

You can pin the bodies, cool. BUT you have too kill it first. And if, like you said, xbow got reduce damage, it will be a pain in the a$$ to kill something. Why waste one more bolt to pin it?

 

[nath2009uk]

I just want blood to stay and weapons make dead bodies go flying alot more.

 

[Benjamin]

It is purely for aesthetic purposes, really. If you just put the pin-to-enemies idea aside and think about pin-to-walls, it's just something that I think would look cool. It wouldn't exactly give you an advantage with the weapon (since all it'd be doing is having ragdolls pinned to walls instead of just falling down dead), but it might just make it a bit more interesting. Of course, as I said before it's not the most important thing in the world, just something that might be cool if it doesn't take too long to implement.

This.

Read the post above yours?

You can pin the bodies, cool. BUT you have too kill it first. And if, like you said, xbow got reduce damage, it will be a pain in the a$$ to kill something. Why waste one more bolt to pin it?

You never line up enemies when using the crossbow?

 

[[UIT] Akame]

Read the post above yours?

Yes I did. You never addressed the fact that you can actually retrieve your bolts and how that would effect this idea and the fact that most dead specs get removed within a few seconds. Coupled with the fact that it really doesn't do anything in gameplay and the time it would take to implement, we will never see anything like this in KF.

 

[Benjamin]

You never addressed the fact that you can actually retrieve your bolts and how that would effect this idea and the fact that most dead specs get removed within a few seconds.

Because these issues are easily resolved perhaps? I don't know about retrieving the bolts, but the latter issue is (as I said) just a case of extending the ragdoll life if necessary. You need to figure out solutions rather than simply pointing out the (minor) problems.

Coupled with the fact that it really doesn't do anything in gameplay and the time it would take to implement, we will never see anything like this in KF.

Do the skins do anything for gameplay? Do the ragdolls do anything for gameplay? Do the voices do anything for gameplay (well actually they do but shh )? Aesthetics can be useful in giving the game a more fun appearance. And there's no saying it would necessarily take a long time to implement.

 

[HaTeMe]

I always liked being able to pin enemies to the wall, in any game. So yea it would be fun in KF too, but I doubt they ever gonna add it.

They wouldnt even have to reduce the damage, if a specimen is close to a wall and you shoot at it, it will get pinned on the wall and maybe the ragdoll would stay there as long until another ragdoll is pinned to another wall, or something. Pinning them to other specimens probably wouldnt work out tho.