Looter shooter mechanics were a mistake

[quxxo]

Anyone else not finding mechanics related to loot fun? I'd prefer if they made loot static, like in New Vegas. The problem I have with those mechanics, is that I have to open inventory every 10 minutes and upgrade my equipment just to keep up with the difficulty. Second problem is that it's immersion breaking. Why does this clone of my pistol that I found on this random enemy deal more damage than mine? Damage should be bound to caliber of the weapon, kind of like in tabletop Cyberpunk. 5mm pistol should deal 5mm damage.
Same issue with the armor system. If you want to have good stats, then you will look like a clown. I'm not sure what the good solution would be for this though, because if you made it realistic neo-militarism would be the best, always. I'm not sure how this works in the PnP cyberpunk.

 

[maniman303]

Agreed. I can live with generated weapons, but clothes are a joke. A bra with higher stats than bulletproof jacket? It's a mess, also the promoted "style" means nothing in this game. There's no bonuses for wearing matching clothes etc.

 

[quxxo]

Agreed. I can live with generated weapons, but clothes are a joke. A bra with higher stats than bulletproof jacket? It's a mess, also the promoted "style" means nothing in this game. There's no bonuses for wearing matching clothes etc.

If they had some sort of "respect" system that rewarded you for wearing stylish clothes, then this would be the best solution. Military clothing gives you high armor, but low street respect. Stylish clothing gives you high respect, but low armor.

 

[Atalvyr]

A bra with higher stats than bulletproof jacket?

Before release we had a thread many pages long with people complaining that if the bra did not have stats like a bulletproof jacket, CDPR would be taking away their freedom to wear what they want, as they would have to look at stats as well when choosing clothing.

Now we have tank tops with the same armor as flak jackets and a different set of people are now mad.

 

[MojoBreaker]

like every Korean MMORPG , males look like from WARHAMMER 40K fully geared and females look like from latest strip club have same stats as male gear xD

 

[warbaby2]

Before release we had a thread many pages long with people complaining that if the bra did not have stats like a bulletproof jacket, CDPR would be taking away their freedom to wear what they want, as they would have to look at stats as well when choosing clothing.

Now we have tank tops with the same armor as flak jackets and a different set of people are now mad.

Still doesn't account for, say the fact that you basically either have to hold off on looting iconic gear till endgame or spec 18 points into tech to keep most of the really good gear viable... it's not about "who is mad", it's about sensical game design.

 

[JacoBee]

I have to open inventory every 10 minutes and upgrade my equipment just to keep up with the difficulty.

No you dont, even on hardest difficulty you dont need the best armor and weapons to keep up.

I enjoy this, there is a reason to kill, search, loot stuff. With fixed and placed loot, there is no reason to look for stuff, when you know there is that one best piece in game somewhere and chance you will find that one is slim, so most people will just use google and loot it. And it ruins new playthroughs too.
Getting to point when you have best gun in game on LVL 30 is worst thing that can happen. "Oh here is anoter 20 levels of gameplay, but i dont need to loot at all, because i already have best gun"

Same issue with the armor system. If you want to have good stats, then you will look like a clown

No, thats BS. Instead of maximizing armor, you can wear whatever you want and you can boost armor by mods, cyberwear, skills and stuff.
The idea of any clothing can be best armor in game is ideal. Because you can wear whatever you want and still have armor.
You dont have to, but you can. And with that im glad we are not forced to wear proper visual armor to have armor.
And if you really want best armor, well there is a reason for those 4 levels in Cyberpunk universe (Substance over style etc) You have to choose what you want and you can, ideal for all sides...

Post automatically merged: Dec 18, 2020

Before release we had a thread many pages long with people complaining that if the bra did not have stats like a bulletproof jacket, CDPR would be taking away their freedom to wear what they want, as they would have to look at stats as well when choosing clothing.

Now we have tank tops with the same armor as flak jackets and a different set of people are now mad.

Nah, most people are actually fine with it. There are multiple ways to boost armor.

 

[DavidN]

I enjoy the looting as well as crafting in games like these. Since I am also a fashion player (preferring what looks good rather than stats), the ability to upgrade my favorite tank top, shorts, sunglasses, etc. is an element I welcome.

That said, the crafting mechanic as well as inventory management really, REALLY needs improvement. It's both immersive breaking as well as breaking the action if you have to pause the game, go into your inventory, assign a flash bang grenade to your quick slot, exit, throw the grenade, then go back into the menu to switch out for frag grenades.

Having just a single health item or throwable is fine, but making it switchable using the left or right d-pad would make combat more versatile, quicker, and immersive.

Same goes for food. Pausing the entire game to eat food out of the vending machines that are EVERYWHERE is such a pain, there is zero motivation to purchase or eat food. Have a quick slot or even a button assigned to "eat" similar to the cellphone would make eating and drinking something you could do. I actually WANT to be able to walk around Night City, munch on a burger and drink a beer.

Then crafting..... I spend a LOT of time (probably 10 of my 60 hours of game play thus far) hanging out in V's stash room managing inventory, crafting and managing inventory. The menu and inventory is cumbersome and the layout is difficult to manage. Moreso when you loot everything in sight during a job because you have to collect every beer can just to upgrade your armor.

 

[JacoBee]

-You can change grenades directly thru Quick-access menu. Just choose grenade and switch to whatevery one you want. I think its O on pc? Y on xbox.
-When you buy food/drink from machine there is option to pick up or eat/drink, it showes always on my screen. Dont remamber the button. Y i think

About layout i wouldnt worry, W3 had complete visual overhaul in this department via patch too

 

[quxxo]

No you dont, even on hardest difficulty you dont need the best armor and weapons to keep up.
All those posts on reddit saying "this how i look, i look like clown to have best armor". No you dont have to. Instead of maximizing armor, you can wear whatever you want and you can boost armor by mods, cyberwear, skills and stuff.

I enjoy this, there is a reason to kill, search, loot stuff. With fixed loot, it makes zero reason to look for stuff, when you know there is that one best piece in game somwhere. Im glad its this way, its not "looter shooter" mechanic. Its normal for most RPG's and im glad they went this way. Getting to point where you have best gun in game on LVL 30 is worst thing that can happen. "Oh here is anoter 20 levels of gameplay, but i dont need to loot at all, because i already have best gun"

The idea of any clothing can be best armor in game is ideal. Because you can wear whatever you want and still have armor.
You dont have to, but you can. And with that im glad we are not forced to wear proper visual armor to have armor.

And if you really want best armor, well there is a reason for those 4 levels in Cyberpunk universe (Substance over style etc) You have to choose what you prefer.

It's a pointless time waster. Oh yeah I pick this weapon up and this is the same weapon as mine, but the numbers go up. No new model, no new animations, it's the same weapon you've already seen. I'd rather conserve my F key.

 

[igrvks]

For me the biggest question is why did they even go the looter-shooter route since it really does not matter that much if your gear is "keeping up" with progress. I'm 50 hours in, level in high 30's, play on hard difficulty and I still have a pair of black pants equipped I picked up during the Arasaka heist opening mission.

 

[Hexipoo]

like every Korean MMORPG , males look like from WARHAMMER 40K fully geared and females look like from latest strip club have same stats as male gear xD

Go look at the PnP source material.

 

[warbaby2]

For me the biggest question is why did they even go the looter-shooter route since it really does not matter that much if your gear is "keeping up" with progress. I'm 50 hours in, level in high 30's, play on hard difficulty and I still have a pair of black pants equipped I picked up during the Arasaka heist opening mission.

Because people try higher then intended content and get oneshotted... Just kidding, I dunno.

 

[Arcafonk]

I enjoy this, there is a reason to kill, search, loot stuff. With fixed and placed loot, there is no reason to look for stuff, when you know there is that one best piece in game somewhere and chance you will find that one is slim, so most people will just use google and loot it. And it ruins new playthroughs too.

Not sure it's the best solution myself.

Fixed stat loot also gives power to :
a - sellers economy
b - cyberware
c- fashionistas
d- crafters

aka, everything you have controled choice, instead of RNG.
RNG in this game is on the loot instead on event. Personnal tastes about RNG is when it's used only for events, ala DnD encounter table.

Clicking "loot-loot-loot" everywhere like today also enpowers the arcady blind clicks.

Getting to point when you have best gun in game on LVL 30 is worst thing that can happen. "Oh here is anoter 20 levels of gameplay, but i dont need to loot at all, because i already have best gun"

Thematicly, if that happens in your exemple, it is just that past level 30, you're not a tramp anymore.
RDR2 looting system is fine : it enforces realism without breaking the fun.

RDR2 have only 2 "experience scales" : money & local rep. Cyberpunk have more scales (rep/money/xp) and the base is allready rotten.

It's AC Greece vs RDR2. They choose AC Greece (2 scales) and it's a bad decision imo, mainly because they have also antinomic systems aka craft and economy.

In RDR2, you actually HAVE to go shopping.
In AC Greece or whatever game that use this system, you actually HAVE to go shopping, but just to sell junk stuff. So it doesn't matter if your sellers sells A or B, only what matters is prices (and another problem : in each shop it's same price, and that noodle shop can buy you military rocket launcher without blinking an eye). In the end, with those games you'll have soon games that will have selling button in their pause menu.

It's anti-immersion.
Plus current economy is super broken. Firearmes sells for 1% the price, buy for 100%, why would you want to grind 5h to buy a firearm that expires in 1h top ?

There's many thing to do here too. For firearms, I would have kept the selling price as of today, but put the buying at 2X sellings prices. Keep the rep level to prevent unlocking 600 eddies rockets launchers for lvl 1's.
Then look all the players willing to buy stuff at weapons sellers again, then dismount weapons to boost their own weapons.

Crafting & weapon economy solved 2 in 1.

Armor shops are not "that" broken. Their price are okay, and the "clown effect" can be solved with AC Creed solutions (that system is meh but hey, I just give easy solutions here).

On top of that, I would also remove restaurant to buy anaything, make drug store to buy only drugs at a price +20%, armor shop to buy only armor price + 20%, weapon shop to buy anything but +20% price on weapons, software shops to buy drugs & software, with +20% on soft, rippers to buy you cyberware or drugs, etc.
(ie actually giving the player a goal to see THIS or THAT shop instead of founding any random one : this is narative focus instead of arcadey focus. Giving goals to exploration is one of the numerous ways CP can find to solve one of the many problems it have).

No, thats BS. Instead of maximizing armor, you can wear whatever you want and you can boost armor by mods, cyberwear, skills and stuff.
The idea of any clothing can be best armor in game is ideal. Because you can wear whatever you want and still have armor.
You dont have to, but you can. And with that im glad we are not forced to wear proper visual armor to have armor.
And if you really want best armor, well there is a reason for those 4 levels in Cyberpunk universe (Substance over style etc) You have to choose what you want and you can, ideal for all sides...

Expect it's Style over Substance....
AC Greece had one solution for armors, to stay in the current model. That was using stats from armor A and 3D model of armor B, plus a "do not show helmet" button.

You still have that stupid model coming from grinding games like Diablo showing gamedesign problems for weapons. With firearms, it is dissonant as hell (can't use AC Greece model because of ROF, scopes & silencers).

But at least esthetics (style) is saved.

Nah, most people are actually fine with it. There are multiple ways to boost armor.

There is multiple ways to boost armor, sure. There is also multiple ennemies leveling as the player does (which makes the question "what's the point for levels"). And current balance of challenge is based on that. If you don't use best suff all the time, you make certain points of the game very difficult (like brawling quests).

 

[maniman303]

Before release we had a thread many pages long with people complaining that if the bra did not have stats like a bulletproof jacket, CDPR would be taking away their freedom to wear what they want, as they would have to look at stats as well when choosing clothing.

Now we have tank tops with the same armor as flak jackets and a different set of people are now mad.

So just strip armor from clothes and place it in cyberwear, and add small bonuses to clothes, divided by their style. Voila, everyone is happy and solution is elegant and clean. The actual solution is just lazy. Even witcher 3 with similar system had unique, different than "just armor" bonuses at different armors. Like the bear school armor etc.

 

[BeeMavrick]

Id rather turn my uncommon into a rare or epic and find a vendor who could turn those to legendary, a specialist. Im fine with my armor being low because I boosted my health and stamina. I dont even use the armor mods, I just keep forgetting to add them.

 

[flippimonkey]

Yeah it all seems to be a waste. I think to make up for the lack of a solid crafting system and economic simulation. Gotta make a bunch of components or a bunch of money so the system floods it with trash loot. Not to be mistaken for junk loot.

 

[Arcafonk]

What if :
- each armor and gun had fixed damage / armor value per tier (common < uncommon < rare < epic < legendary)
- each armor and gun had damage / armor values also depending on V's (or wearer's) level.
- the only thing that would vary (through upgrading) between guns and armor would be numbers of mod slots
- you can only fit common mods on common gear, etc up to legendary mods on legendary gear.
- mods can be removed with a Tech level 13 perk.

 

[Hexipoo]

Shoulda gone with FarCry mechanics with their tiered weapon system.

 

[PepeSmug]

Looter shooter mechanics (leveled loot) were indeed a mistake, an abomination, a violation against nature.

Damage should always scale according to the level of the user, not the weapon. This is a proven system, in games both with and without crafting. It's more realistic, more convenient, more fun, more conducive to roleplay.

The only context where leveled loot "makes sense" is horrible online games where you pay money to grind faster for better gear. So in other words, this mechanic has no business in a single-player game, let alone a narrative driven action adventure title.

Frankly, this issue is enough for me to never touch the game again after finishing my initial playthrough. New Vegas ENB just got improved SSAO, I think I'll do another run of that instead.