Has there been any admittance that the shooter flow in Odyssey is sub-par? Dumping an entire magazine of headshot's into someone with the Oppressor and barely getting their shields down is so pathetic, but the Executioner will drop their shields entirely in one body shot, and kill most enemies with another (Meaning only 2/3 of the magazine to kill an enemy, as opposed to needing two whole magazines from a rifle).. Does anyone honestly think that's well balanced?
I get the desire to make laser weapons good against shields, and kinetic weapons good against flesh, but between the reload speeds, weapon switch speeds, and total magazine capacities, it's just frustrating..
Just double the amount of enemies and give them half the health..?
This isn't an unsolvable issue, but if the dev's or rest of the community don't believe this kind of combat flow is just unfun, then I'll just admit I'm wasting my time on this game and move on to something else..
It's designed that way specifically just like the ships and requiring upgrades in order to become more efficient at combat. Every complaint you mentioned is an engineering upgrade you unlock. Also doubling AI is likely impossible in its current design as AI and pathfinding is one of the most CPU intensive things in the game.
My suggestions to improve the system would be to change the following:
1. Weapons attachments or improvements should be sold in the shop for coin, not engineered. If you want a scope, buy it, if you want better recoil, buy a recoil stabilizer or a longer barrel for further range etc. This would better correspond to the current design with ships and modules for purchase (then engineering those pieces later). upgrading weapons could instead unlock slots on a weapon to add more attachments. So lvl 1 rifle has one slot for what you choose, each lvl unlocks a new comp slot (like how suits work.) with a max of 5 attachments. Then you could engineer those comps for improved function: example scope magnification increase or magazine size etc.
2. Increase cross over damage (kinetic should penetrate shields better and vice versa while still allowing best damage for each weapon type to incentive team work and weapon diversity.
3. Total damage should cross between shields and health bars. Example: if X weapon shoots for X damage in a single shot it should translate from Shields health to physical health factoring in the weapon type penality amount if applicable. Bullet hits for X damage, if X damage is enough to kill both the shields bar and health bar it should one shot kill the target.
4. I'd increase weapon damage overall a bit to make it shorter time to kill by perhaps 25%-35%. We don't want combat too fast but a slight speed up would help.
5. I'd add in a cover state to the AI to create more stand off moments (like arma) and a bit more balance towards pure rushing behavior. Allow for combat to vary with fleeing moments and holding cover moments popping up from cover, shooting and or trying to flank the enemy or being flanked.
6. Add a basic revive function or medical system to the team on foot experience and update spawning rules to be less punishing (dying with a team and spawning on a space station since you were in a friends ship)
