Ammo capacity - opinons?

[The Ultimate DooMer]

Currently, my Ultimate ZDoom episode has a reduced ammo capacity, which is half the usual amount (100, 25, 25, 150, doubling up to 200, 50, 50, 300 eventually). I did this to create more tactical and interesting gameplay (as running round with 400 bullets and 100 shells in a DooM 1 episode is a bit easy), but from my experiences of it so far, it also slows gameplay down and makes the maps take longer to complete.

So, I was wondering:

1. What do you think about playing with such a restriction on ammo?

2. Do you prefer a tactical low-ammo game (more interesting), or a no-nonsense high-ammo blast? (more fun)

3. Do you think I should: move the backpack forward from E4M5 to E4M2 (as the first 2 maps work well with it, given the monsters I'm using at that early stage), increase the capacity to something like 150, 35, 25, 200 (doubling to 300, 70, 50, 400) or leave it as it is?

[Nanami]

Kind of depends on the player. If they can conserve ammo well, it won't matter much to them if they can only hold 40 or 4,000,000 of something. And it depends on your ammo placement. On my newest level, the ammo is extremely tight for UV. I beat the level with no more than 4 bullets (there was ammo for shotgun, chaingun, and rocket launcher). One of my beta testers actually had to punch a Baron when he ran out of ammo. Just so long as you don't give the player great gobs of ammo, you shouldn't have to worry about the ammunition maximum.

[Captain Red]

Hmmm... What I like to do is to beef of the rocket launcher but bring down the max ammo to about10. not only is it more realistic, but I makes the rocket launcher a bit more special. The default Rocket launcher is about as useful as the super shotgun for both small gropes of light enemies and single, bigger opponents. But it should be more powerful, and able to take down larger enemies with one square shot.

[Fletcher`]

I use reduced ammo mods all the time. A good idea, by CtRP, reduce the maximum rockets to around 10 (20 if mini missiles) but give them an overall greater damage.

I got a tech question for anybody who can answer this:

In dehacked, does the projectile's velocity affect damage? (IE rocket with speed is doubled, with damage halved,)

[myk]

Damage is unaffected by speed.

[Fletcher`]

Huh, that's strange. I guess it only seems that way. It makes those cybie missiles harder to dodge, (and for some reason hurt more!)

[Scuba Steve]

on an unrelated note: Anybody know why when you up the speed of projectiles in DeHackEd, they veer off to the right?

[Nanami]

I have no idea why. But it's a good question. I've noticed that if you make projectilts move really fast, they don't seem to have any sort of aim at all.

Hey, drunk missles from ROTT! Except those actually heat-seeked to an extent... Oh well, completely plastered missles!

[EDIT]Speaking of weird projectile things with DeHacked, I once made the BFG into a laser-mine gun. I sped up the firing rate so you could instantly drop a mine instead of waiting a second or so, then made the BFG blast look like an Arachnotron blast instead of a huge sphere. I made the speed be 0 so it levitated in the air, then made it shootable and have 1 health. That way, a mine floated in the air and if it was shot, a BFG blast went off. It was cool except that it caused the game to crash all the time. =/ Ah well.[/EDIT]

[Amaster]

Reduced ammo would be cool if the damage capability were increased (for both players and demons) and no auto aim were used(x axis, y axis aiming would still be allowed)

[dsm]

I prefer the capability to carry a large ammount of ammo. But the maps should be designed so that ammo is sparse in some areas with a few areas where you can stock up so you get full ammo, before you enter "little ammo" areas where you have to make every shot count.

[DooMer 4ever]

dsm said:

I prefer the capability to carry a large ammount of ammo. But the maps should be designed so that ammo is sparse in some areas with a few areas where you can stock up so you get full ammo, before you enter "little ammo" areas where you have to make every shot count.

Heh, dsm always says the same things I was going to post :) Only the idea with less rockets but more effective sounds good to me.

[Ichor]

That's what I'm doing in my maps for Hexen. I increased the maximum mana to 300 (instead of the usual 200) for basically the same reasons. I also added large mana types for more of a variety of ammo types and so that I can put one or two of the big ones to replenish your ammo instead of a dozen or so small ones.

As for the rockets, greatly increased damage with a capacity of 10 rockets (20 with a backpack). And have you thought about adding a recoil to the rocket launcher?

[magikal]

Ultimate DooMer said:

2. Do you prefer a tactical low-ammo game (more interesting), or a no-nonsense high-ammo blast? (more fun)

My preference is for a high-ammo tactical game, both fun and interesting.(Techno e.g.)
I think one of the main aspects of Doom that makes it the best FPS out there is it's rhythm and flow, it can be almost non-stop and you have to make decisions on-the-fly. That's where, for me, most FPS fall down. The gameplay is too fragmented, it's stop-start all the time.