Marine secondary fire: just a novelty?

Spooge

Not sure how much this has been discussed but what is the purpose of the secondary "rifle butt smash" for marines?
Are you supposed to hit skulks with it? How much damage does it do? Does that damage increase with upgrades?
Has anyone actually scored a kill with it?
Also, are there any plans for additional secondary fire actions in the future?

MaximumSquid

Spooge:

It's faster than switching to pistol or axe
If you pay attention to the damage done you might realize that they are 1 bash away from dieing and can go for it instead of another action

Most would be more curious to know why you cannot bash with other weapons

slayer20

I've killed plenty of skulks with the rifle butt. I believe it always deals 20 damage.

I would like to see the rifle butt added to the shotgun.

Calego

20 Damage flat, no upgrades effect it. It's the third most satisfying kill method (Welders then Parasite, then rifle butt). At the moment it's a good but underused though I can see how it could be useful.

I think at some point it stunned/knocked back skulks but that was buggy and deemed undesirable (anything that takes control away from the player is bad, stomp is bad enough).

Some interesting ideas were brought up here.

Spooge

Is there some reason why you can't use it with the shotgun? Was it an oversight or was it left out due to balance?

Kalabalana

Spooge wrote: »

Is there some reason why you can't use it with the shotgun? Was it an oversight or was it left out due to balance?

Neither I think.
They just wanted shotgun in, and after that moved on I believe.
Shotgun was in the game before lmg buck was

Shaker

The rifle butt used to stun. It was hilariously overpowered against skulks. It knocked back for awhile too. These were removed and the pretty useless but was left over.

DarkATi

Definitely not just a novelty. I have killed a few skulks with the LMG this way. It really is faster than switching weapons and can save your life in a skulk battle!

MrPink

It is useful but obviously only if you know you did 70+ damage to an uncarapaced skulk. I get most of my melee kills after I emptied my pistol, I switch to the axe and crouch. It's surprisingly effect, I can usually do 30 damage before a bite, and 60 damage after just 1 bite.

Zek

Might be useful if it had a reasonable range, particularly when aiming downwards at a skulk. It's incredibly difficult to actually land a blow with it as-is.

Tinker

Pretty much a novelty to me. I don't think I've ever used it in game and I never notice it's even there. Every once in a while I'll right click and think "oh yeah" then promptly forget. The only reason it's not been unbound and replaced with map is that aliens use the secondary attack button so much.

Blarney_Stone

Calego wrote: »

It's the third most satisfying kill method (Welders then Parasite, then rifle butt).

Heal spray kills are pretty satisfying too.

SeeVee

Spooge wrote: »

Not sure how much this has been discussed but what is the purpose of the secondary "rifle butt smash" for marines?
Are you supposed to hit skulks with it? How much damage does it do? Does that damage increase with upgrades?
Has anyone actually scored a kill with it?
Also, are there any plans for additional secondary fire actions in the future?

If I run out of ammo or cannot change mags in time and I know the enemy is about to die it is called the "bi-yatch slappa!"... When you kill someone that way it's like insulting them at the same time

john_wesley

The GL could use a melee attack.

DC_Darkling

I have not had a healspray kill yet. And I so tried.

That said, I had plenty riffle bash kills. faster then switching weapons.

Squeal_Like_A_Pig

We didn't want overlap between the different weapons, such as adding the same weapon stock smash to the shotgun as well, and had intended on doing secondary attacks for all the weapons. Unfortunately, in the grand scheme of everything, designing and implementing secondary attacks was just not a high priority, and has remained that way. But I think we'd still like to do something for all of the weapons at some point.

SquishpokePOOPFACE

Squeal_Like_A_Pig wrote: »

We didn't want overlap between the different weapons, such as adding the same weapon stock smash to the shotgun as well, and had intended on doing secondary attacks for all the weapons. Unfortunately, in the grand scheme of everything, designing and implementing secondary attacks was just not a high priority, and has remained that way. But I think we'd still like to do something for all of the weapons at some point.

Shock combo pls

Kamamura

Squeal_Like_A_Pig wrote: »

We didn't want overlap between the different weapons, such as adding the same weapon stock smash to the shotgun as well, and had intended on doing secondary attacks for all the weapons. Unfortunately, in the grand scheme of everything, designing and implementing secondary attacks was just not a high priority, and has remained that way. But I think we'd still like to do something for all of the weapons at some point.

Excellent, thank you for letting us know.

Neoken

john_wesley wrote: »

The GL could use a melee attack.

Or an alternative fire mode in which grenades explode on impact. That would be awesome.

SquishpokePOOPFACE

Neoken wrote: »

john_wesley wrote: »

The GL could use a melee attack.

Or an alternative fire mode in which grenades explode on impact. That would be awesome.

There was a UWE video long time ago that mentioned an idea they had: flamethrower canisters could be thrown as a fire-grenade. Sounds cool.

Ironsoul

rifle butt used to be useful but they nerfed it now you're stuffed most of the time should you run out of ammo.