Although one of the major assets of ranged weapons is the variety of useful ammo types you can use, there are a few that take it too far. Niche ammo types made for specific weapons end up cluttering the game, forcing more micromanagement. While that might be a way to make the parent weapons less viable, specificity isn't a proper way to balance things out.
I understand that this may seem heavy-handed, but please see beyond the "pruning" I'm doing here and understand that it's just to keep ammo less granular and easier to manage.
You'll notice there are a few weapons here that I left out, like the Snowball Cannon and Bone Glove. For those, I ignored them because they're using ammo that's 1) already throwable and 2) not purchased.
This is relatively simple:
Stake Launcher
-Now fires arrows, turning wooden ones into stakes
Candy Corn Rifle
-Now fires bullets, turning normal ones into candy corn
Stynger
-Now fires rockets, turning them into stynger bolts
Nail Gun
-Now fires rockets, turning them into nails
Jack O'Lantern Launcher
-Now fires any type of cannonball
-Damage reduced to 15 (to compensate for cannonballs' damage)
-Use time increased to 40 (1.5 shots/sec)
-No longer hits twice upon impact
Explosive Jack o'Lantern
-Classified as a cannonball
-Damage increased from 30 to 300
-Leaves napalm on the ground (similarly to Greek Fire attack)
3 Dec 2018: As per my own thoughts and several commenters, removed special ammo entirely and made these weapons the only ones able to fire them.
18 June 2020: Bunny Cannon can stay.
One last thing here - what about the balance? One thing that was nerfing a lot of these weapons was the specificity of their ammo, and now that they're universally compatible, they're theoretically stronger.
To that I'll answer that a lot of them (all of them except the Stynger) were already niche or outright bad weapons, and frankly they could use a little bit of a buff. There's one that really benefits here, the Candy Corn Rifle, which was previously a godawful choice because of its piercing causing invincibility frames. Now piercing is optional, since it works with any bullet, so if you're willing to bring cursed bullets or something it becomes a mid-ground between the Chain Gun and Megashark.
With the Stynger, Rocket I's cost 50 copper to the Stynger Bolts' 75 copper - it's really not a big change, and it won't make the Stynger overpowered or anything. This is just a tiny ripple in the pond, balance-wise.
Hmm its a good idea however why is the change in the Jack o'Lantern Launcher needed? Why can't it work like any other launcher? That change looks like it may be oversight left from when this suggestion effected cannons so with the bunny Cannon removed why not leave things as they were having Rockets follow the special effect. Also as an additional point it might be worth scaling the damage of the Stake Launcher to compensate for the loss of its high ammo damage as all normal arrows have lower total base damage than stakes do so this effectively lowers the weapons DPS substantially (remember ammo override effects maintain the damage of the ammo used, so it should be scaled based off the base ammo )
Since the Stake Launcher now turns wooden arrows into stakes (with the accompanying damage value), I figured a damage increase on that account isn't especially necessary. Although the weapon could use a buff overall, I've decided to leave that out of this thread.
On the Jack o'Lantern Launcher: God, I so desperately want handheld cannons. But since that is kind of a pipe dream, I'd be comfortable implementing an alternate suggestion in the post.
Since the Stake Launcher now turns wooden arrows into stakes (with the accompanying damage value), I figured a damage increase on that account isn't especially necessary. Although the weapon could use a buff overall, I've decided to leave that out of this thread.
On the Jack o'Lantern Launcher: God, I so desperately want handheld cannons. But since that is kind of a pipe dream, I'd be comfortable implementing an alternate suggestion in the post.
Oh you are aware there are no weapons in the game which work like that right? The only weapons with that effect were the Sharangra and Vulcan Repeater from the removed console content respectively. I Imagine it could be implemented but it would be strange as it would make the weapon considerably weaker if any other type of ammo was in the first slot making arrow arrangement necessary to use it and other bows effectively.
And yeah I can understand your want for cannons but at this point of the game I don't think that is going to happen... >_< If such a Thing were added I would argue it should have been its own thing called the Hand Cannon. At this point I think that is firmly in Mod Territory... We all have personal hopes like better weapon diversity at various points of progression or actually fleshed out summoner etc. , Sigh We can dream right?
Oh you are aware there are no weapons in the game which work like that right? The only weapons with that effect were the Sharangra and Vulcan Repeater from the removed console content respectively. I Imagine it could be implemented but it would be strange as it would make the weapon considerably weaker if any other type of ammo was in the first slot making arrow arrangement necessary to use it and other bows effectively.
If you mean the weapons that turn ammo into something else, lots of them do it (especially bows). The Bee's Knees, Molten Fury, Marrow and Ice Bow all do it with standard arrows; the Blood Rain and Shadowflame Bows do it with any arrows, while also preserving the raw damage value of the ammo. Shoooould be fully programmable (I think).
You're right that stakes do give a sizable bonus to the Stake Launcher's damage, and the next best arrow (Venom/Ichor IIRC, which are 17 base) is quite a bit weaker. To top that off, those arrow types are frequently more useful than the stakes themselves, which currently only do well against the early Pumpkin/Frost Moon waves and the grunts of the Martians. The Stake Launcher needs a buff in general; I just don't know if I want to throw that into the mix here.
Honestly, I really wished the whole ammo mechanic was designed differently in certain aspects. I think just having 4 inventory slots slapped ammo on them isn't really it. Like, in my current playthrough I'm using a megashark, I like to use ichor bullets to weaken foes and then using either cursed or crystal shards depending on the situation, sometimes I'll use exploding bullets when I'm in a tight spot and need to knock enemies out or nano bullets to make them turn around for a bit. That's already 5 different ammo types that I need to manage, and there's not even an easy way to alternate between ammo.
I'd love if ammo storage was more expansive and there was a way to quickly switch ammo types. I can't imagine how crazy it'd be if I were also using a bow and had to manage that, for example.
If you mean the weapons that turn ammo into something else, lots of them do it (especially bows). The Bee's Knees, Molten Fury, Marrow and Ice Bow all do it with standard arrows; the Blood Rain and Shadowflame Bows do it with any arrows, while also preserving the raw damage value of the ammo. Shoooould be fully programmable (I think).
You're right that stakes do give a sizable bonus to the Stake Launcher's damage, and the next best arrow (Venom/Ichor IIRC, which are 17 base) is quite a bit weaker. To top that off, those arrow types are frequently more useful than the stakes themselves, which currently only do well against the early Pumpkin/Frost Moon waves and the grunts of the Martians. The Stake Launcher needs a buff in general; I just don't know if I want to throw that into the mix here.
The point of distinction I had wanted to make as you noted is there are two ways PC weapons handle ammo overrides particularly among bows
"Type 1" Overides all suitable ammo but keeps the damage of the ammo used: Blood Rain Bow, Marrow, Ice Bow, Shadowflame Bow, Pulse Bow and Aerial Bane all work this way.
"Type 2" Overrides wooden arrows for Molten Fury, The Bees Knees, Hellwing Bow, & Eventide or overrides musket balls, silver & tungsten bullets into High Velocity bullets for the Uzi, Venus Magnum or Sniper Rifle but otherwise for both bows or guns they treat any suitable ammo as normal.
I had been partly trying to figure out exactly where these suggested changes fell as they sound like his suggestion seems intermediate between the two types with these weapons sounding like they are Type 1 in behavior but without accounting for the ammo base damage and I had thought accounting for the difference would be one way to buff the Stake Launcher.
Regardless there would already be one indirect buff for the suggestion as it is now namely due to how the Archery potion works i.e. boosting damage for weapons which use arrows but not effecting arrowlike weapons otherwise typed for archery bonuses. As the principal victim of this the Stake Launcher would finally get the bonuses from the potion buffing it while using the archery potion.
I had been partly trying to figure out exactly where these suggested changes fell as they sound like his suggestion seems intermediate between the two types with these weapons sounding like they are Type 1 in behavior but without accounting for the ammo base damage and I had thought accounting for the difference would be one way to buff the Stake Launcher.
Regardless there would already be one indirect buff for the suggestion as it is now namely due to how the Archery potion works i.e. boosting damage for weapons which use arrows but not effecting arrowlike weapons otherwise typed for archery bonuses. As the principal victim of this the Stake Launcher would finally get the bonuses from the potion buffing it while using the archery potion.
Sorry, I misunderstood. I had imagined it as a Type 2, with just wooden arrows being transmogrified. Archery Potion would be a great thing for the Stake Launcher to have as well. I'll update the OP to reflect that.
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