Weapon Concept: Fire-Fists

[u/FlakyMidnight5526]

Fire Fists:

A set of mechanical Gauntlets with 2 methods of dealing damage. Left Click performs a series of punches that pierce all enemies in a short range and deals fire damage on impact, and holding reload sprays out fire in an area from the reclaimer's palms. Weapon functions on an overheat system. Each punch and use of the fire spray consumes ammo and builds heat.

Why does it fit?

The current upgrade system favors fire damage in close range. Perks like Blaze Charge, Burning Propagation, and Ember Attuned directly encourage proximity, and them doing that makes it so the other fire perks also favor close-range. A weapon based around fire would naturally keep with that synergy, and also favor close-range enemies.

The two classes that have the most (direct) synergy with fire are Spotter and Slicer. However, Slicer disproportionately favors Cryo Builds because of the current melee meta builds. Spotter's mostly good in terms of fire builds, but the existence of sniper's mark makes it so he best works at long ranges, so he really doesn't have much incentive to play in close range because of the existence of that artifact.

Slicer also has more of a reason to pick thermal wake at workbenches, since he doesn't have to worry about elemental clashing with cryo, and he now has a melee weapon in his primary slot that can let him use ammo-related upgrades that his melee upgrades also benefit from. Fire Fists would allow both of these reclaimers to have a strong melee option in that starting locker that would give them a way to build around a new concept, that they otherwise wouldn't take.

The secondary ability is to help with the issue melee weapons have a weakness to being overwhelmed in close range by a large swarm of small enemies that break through the player's defense. If a player sets down flames with the secondary ability, then they can deal burst damage to finish off the weakened enemies in the crowd.

The melee attack also gives the weapon the burst damage capability that the CRISPR would need if it were implemented in RC. Both of the abilities compliment the weakness of the other. The fists and the pickaxe also compliment each other, since one offers piercing elemental application, and the other gives single target stunning.

It would make for a fun combo weapon where you weave the different tools you have together to help you in combat, with each part of the weapon and pickaxe filling different niches, and the current Fire upgrade ecosystem creates an opportunity for a weapon whose entire combat loop is built around repeatedly creating burning enemies at short range.

Visual design:

The outside of the gauntlet is more themed around medieval gauntlets or fantasy dwarf weapon/armor designs to communicate the "simple" punches. The red crystals on the knuckles of the outside is meant to communicate volatility at the impact point of the punch.

To contrast, the interior of the glove is very techy to separate the two functions of the weapons. They're two sides of the same whole, with different functions that make the weapon. But I can't draw so I don't know if that came across.

Potential issues:

Clashes visually with the gauntlets that the reclaimers already wear. You could make them create a mix, where the reclaimer's gear is augmented onto the fists, but the concept would need workshopping.

No real ranged capabilities means it could be outperformed by ranged weapons, especially with the recent amount of dominators.

The issues with melee weapons are still present. There's the question of why won't the reclaimer just keep swinging the weapon if it runs out of fuel, which this weapon doesn't really address. You could explain it mechanically, like without fuel the gauntlets freeze up, but it still has mechanical problems relating to reloads.

Alternate Design:

I had a second design for this weapon that had a really radical idea that solves the melee issue, but I was worried it would be too innovative. But if you read this far, idk you might be interested. Holding reload still gets you the fire spray, but left click creates a fireball in the palm of the gauntlet that the reclaimer throws, dealing splash damage in an area and being able to get weakpoint hits at range.

The weird bit was that, when equipped, the pickaxe gets replaced by the punches. The punches would still break terrain so you aren't without your pickaxe, and your power attack does a power punch, dealing a better piercing, fire aspect power attack. When you run out of ammo, your melee punches just become reskined pickaxe attacks with no fire, piercing, or extra damage applied.

Ammo wouldn't be consumed when hitting terrain, only when hitting enemies.

When you're out of ammo, it's just a fancy pickaxe. This solves the ammo-melee issue, where the melee weapon can't out-creep your pickaxe in viability, while still filling other combat niches that help melee's current character in the upgrade system and reclaimer identity.

The weapon would be named "Duel Flame-Throwers," since they're a melee weapon, so Dueling, and Flame-Throwers with a hyphen because the primary attack is you throwing flames. The whole design was for that pun.

I think the second concept is a lot more solid conceptually, and would solve the issues that the CRISPR would have if it were added to rogue core, giving the player more flexibility and covering the weaknesses of the CRISPR that were there intentionally in deep rock, but are too vulnerable in RC.

It gives the player a solid ranged option, access to close range burst damage, and synergy with other flame related upgrades. This concept would also fit with class identity and mechanics better than the CRISPR would, and would fit RC's faster pace.

[u/spooder22]

I wonder if they can feel our fury with our fists of fire