With the reverted touch to infect change in Virus, and the bunch of weapon suggestions i’ve seen from in game and on forum, I thought I should give my own take on some existing weapons and the weapon system itself.
Virus of course always seems like a messy game balance wise but this is from my experience with the gamemode, so you’re welcome to leave your feedback or response on the changes.
Sonic Shotgun
Definite buff. I see this weapon always brought up, and imo, I see it as inferior to the double barrel. The secondary fire push back attack has changed between “useless” and “broken” throughout the updates, but I think a nice inbetween would be to increase the charge up or add a cooldown to the attack, but increase the range and effect. Of course don’t make the knockback stupid crazy, but add a delay to make it harder to camp and push away.
Onto the gun itself, the attack is okay, if you can hit your shots, but its damage always feels worse and amount of hits. My suggestion is to increase the spread of the gun (an easier hit) or the damage, to make it viable vs the double barrels 1-2 shot kill capability
Plasma Rifle
The charge beam can be broken but the main fire kinda sucks? In comparison to the Tommy Gun, the smaller clip really limits its use, and I think the charge beam should consume ammo (Maybe 5) alongside the guns max ammo being bumped up. Its a very long range campy gun with no up close use and minor long range use with the small clip.
Hand Cannon
I miss the old hand cannon. The new one is fine but the damage and accuracy can really screw you over. It spreads into multiple pellets (I think) and can sometimes not 1 shot the infected at all. My suggested change is remove the spread but change the damage to be able to only 1 shot the regular infected. Being able to miss a shot point blank really makes the gun feel like a blunderbuss more then a powerful hand cannon.
All Pistols
Add more variety on the pistols. There is minor differences but it mostly boils down to clip size and damage. From what i’ve seen, Sci-fi is the worst and Handgun is the best. My changes would be set a fixed rate for their max ammo (sometimes handgun can start with around 36 bullets, other rounds 72?) and make some more interesting. Maybe remove some types all together? A desert eagle type weapon, maybe double pistols? I couldn’t decide.
The Weapon System Itself
Its random, which is nice. I don’t think load-outs would fit virus, but come on, sometimes the weapon distribution can be so stacked. Some games you can get 3 guns, sonic shotgun, sci-fi pistol, and plasma rifle, and other rounds you can get 3 pistols, shotgun, and the tommy gun, hand-cannon. Some games you are at a complete disadvantage. Its wack. My suggestion would be a fixed amount of guns, always. 1 Rifle, two pistols, 1 shotgun, and the hand cannon.
That about covers my messy forum post suggestion. I’d love to see some more ideas for changes and feedback since i’m not exactly some virus elitist, so tell me what you think!