The concept of the grapple gun is really cool. The fact that you lose a whole weapon slot for it is a significant downside already, but is a really nice trade off for the potential of this weapon in regards to landing on deck for capstans and general running amok.
However the problem is it has so many downsides that making realistic use of it is a pipe dream...
- It's range feels a little shorter than it should be, meaning trying to use it to traverse results in a lot of missed shots.
- It's ammunition is limited and it's reload is long, making the above problem of missed shots even more annoying.
- The little bounce on the end is nice to clear ledges and alike, but in the event you don't quite hit itin the right place to clear the jump/ hit the harpoon in the exact place you want, you get little time to react to compensate for it.
All of the above could be greatly improved with 1 change.
When you fire the grapple gun, you hold the fire button to keep the shot "tethered" on the rope to complete the grapple. Releasing the fire button at any point after the shot hits a player or terrain, or prematurely before the shot is reeled back in, releases the rope and spends the shot. Note: Swapping weapon before the shot is reeled back in also loses the shot.
This would mean that when you fire: -
- If you don't land the hit on a player or terrain, by holding the tether you reel the shot back in and don't spend your ammo. This maintains your ammo, so you can retry the shot if you miss/are out of range.
- If you land the hit on a player, you reel them in for as long as you hold the tether. If you do this between ships, this opens strats for pulling an enemy player into the water instead of necessarily pulling them all the way to your ship.
- If you land a hit on terrain, you reel yourself to your target for as long as you hold the tether. Once you reach your target, you get the hop same as now, but if you continue to hold the tether, you maintain hold of the rope and you do not fall, allowing you hang in place to decide your next move.
This would reduce a lot of the annoyance I've been having with the harpoon gun so it doesn't feel so clunky to use.
It also make it easier to cancel your own traversal aiming above when you want to go and timing it to "drop in", rather than being stuck being pulled in while you hold the grapple gun. You may be able to subvert this with swaps, but it should really be a base ability of the weapon.
Other small changes I would consider changing to make it a little more appealing would be:
- Allow me to hook onto the crows nest and the bowsprit, it would be generally be more useful for the crew of the ship. Anyone trying to infiltrate, it ia loud and given the range and difficulty of hitting the grapple gun is likely still fine.
- It might also be nice for a grapple to do 5 damage rather than 0 when grappling a player, just so you are still shy of a blunderbuss 1 shot, but allows a few weapons to reach breakpoints when following up with a blunder bomb or fire bomb for kills.
- If using my tethered idea, perhaps if you fire without holding the rope and hit a player this increases it to 20 damage and doesn't pull the player, just so you've got some potential kill power is you have no other choices.
Let me know what you think!
Cheers!
