Bug? Weapon Pre-Igniter with Charge weapons.

[Jai]

I tried searching but didn't see anything on this topic.

Weapon Pre-Igniter only grants a single charge, making it an all but useless augment if you rely on even a single charge weapon for your initial volley. These weapons should come fully charged, particularly considering the rarity and price of the Pre-Igniter.

[5thHorseman]

I agree and never mix the two, though I think it's as intended.

[Jai]

I hope it's not as intended. The charge weapons are pretty well balanced without having a special handicap. They are versatile, and generally have a lower power requirement, but are less powerful or unreliable in various ways compared to their non-charge counterparts. The additional handicap of 'Making the Weapon Pre-Igniter simply not work with them' seems unnecessary, and was, I guess and hope, a programming oversight rather than an intentional nerf.

[project_mercy]

I don't know, it's a fine line. I mean, what about chain weapons? Do you start them fully chained up? That would make the pre-ignitor and the vulcan chaingun be an instant win. I guess you could say it's an instant win either way with the right guns, but some things just seem a bit TOO much.

[5thHorseman]

I don't know, it's a fine line. I mean, what about chain weapons? Do you start them fully chained up? That would make the pre-ignitor and the vulcan chaingun be an instant win. I guess you could say it's an instant win either way with the right guns, but some things just seem a bit TOO much.

Actually a pre-ignitor and a vulcan is a great combo anyway. Mitigates the Vulcan's downside by skipping that first 11 second chargeup.

[Jai]

Chain weapons are a different beast, in my opinion. In extreme cases like the Vulcan, I see what you mean by 'instant win,' if they started full charged but frankly, what about the Glaive Beam? What about a Burst laser mk III? That's basically instant win as well. That's the point of the Weapon Pre-Igniter. If you have strong enough weapons, you obliterate the opponent before they can act.

All things considered, I don't think it's important for Chain weapons to start fully 'chained' with the igniter. Unlike their Charge counterparts, starting ready to fire is already a significant advantage for Chain weapons. I would certainly be just fine with them starting fully chained, I just don't think it's as vital.

The really big difference is, it's all about that first volley. If you have chain weapons, you typically don't need to chain them to make them useful, the Vulcan being the rather unique exception. With Charge weapons, you often can't break the enemy shields with a single charge.

With the Weapon Pre-Igniter, it's all or nothing. It's a worthless augment if 3 of your weapons are ready but the 4th takes another 15 seconds to charge.

[Matthew]

Augments are not intended to be 100% valuable to 100% of builds. If you're using chain or charge weapons, the weapon pre-igniter isn't as useful and that's intentional... really that augment has always been ridiculously over powered.

[Jai]

I've played hundreds of games of FTL and gotten this augment...probably about 20-30 times tops? It's hard to say, but it's extremely rare, extremely expensive, and yes, not every build gets much out of it. The problem is, those builds are now much more common. Not only are there the existing weapons that didn't get much help from it, charge weapons are quite ubiquitous, coming standard on many of the new ships, being awarded in random events, and edging out regular weapons in many of the stores. That means the player doesn't necessarily have a reasonable 'choice' not to use charge weapons. It's just a hell of a lot of luck if they manage to get the Pre-Igniter and a full load-out of weapons that work well with it.

Bottom line is, I hate to pick up/see the rarest, most expensive augment in the game and regard it as useless because for some reason it just 'doesn't work' on the weapons I have. I don't think it's unreasonable to feel that way.

Again, if as a player I had a lot of choice over my weapons, I'd feel a bit differently, but you really don't have a lot of choice, particularly now with hard mode where you take what you can get and pray you make it through.

[Dirka]

Bottom line is, I hate to pick up/see the rarest, most expensive augment in the game and regard it as useless because for some reason it just 'doesn't work' on the weapons I have. I don't think it's unreasonable to feel that way.

Yeah, well, you know, that's just, like, your opinion, man.



Seriously though, I understand your frustration, but I think that this kind of cruelty is part of the appeal FTL has for most people, like taking hits at 95% evasion.

More on topic: the advantage of the Igniter is not nullified, just reduced by charge weapons, as it does shave off that first charge-time.

Anyway, this discussion should probably continued elsewhere, since Matthew was so kind as to point out that it is indeed an intended feature and not, in fact, a bug,