I have an idea.... Could be crazy
What if they all get an improvement in damage (especially the pistol)
but you cannot repair them. Once they break, you can only scrap them for bits. I also think making them is too achievable, and I wouldn't mind it being more resource intense. Maybe even requiring forged iron, as it's not hard to find if you get your hands on a wrench early. Even if it's just 1-5. You're making a gun for survival, you may consider it a priority.
I do not mind the feeling of imbalance because if you always feel beaten down, coupled with the AI pathing, it becomes unfun in a fat hurry. Giving a fresh spawn a fighting chance ain't all bad. We've seen how us long timers balance it ourselves for challenge. I think what's tough is that because the game is
so customizable and
so open ended it's created a void where if choice was lacking and we just had a game we booted up and played without the choice to play with options it would all be mods. I can assure you the mods making the game
more difficult would be less popular but the overhaul ones like Darkness Falls and Undead Legacy would prevail and their difficulty would be accepted.
I think a massive part of why people gripe is because you can tune literally everything so you find little thorns where it doesn't fit well for
you and it becomes a focus. I like sniping. If I could I'd be a zombie sniper all day. It doesn't work well for me in this game twofold: they don't spawn far enough for it to matter, and if they did, it's not like I can shoot through walls where they are and I wanna be. So I opt for alternative means. This isn't a game for sniping, so why complain?
I can't say I'll complain if it's nerfed, I'll adjust (I wasn't using it much to begin with, ironically), but I don't know I get why people are married to it. Don't we move on to the AK pretty quick anyway? I feel like it's silly to poke at early stage weapons when the goal is to graduate to something better. Even if you have a
good early stage weapon, wouldn't that mean you have to choose whether or not you spec into it anyway? I feel like people want a harder game without changing their difficulty to something harder when they have the option.
I think a more serious nerf is needed. It reloads so fast that the magazine capacity isn't really an issue. The lowered magazine is enough to take care of any group of mobs I found in the world, and I just reload after every couple zombies anyway. I had a quality 6 pipe machine gun that was better than quality 4 AK-47s I'd found so I was still using it until I found a quality 5 M60.
I'm thinking lower damage and accuracy, because hey, it's a pipe and not a rifled steel barrel. Right now there's little reason to use the hunting rifle (I sure don't) because the machine gun does about as much damage, is about as accurate, and isn't single-shot. Actually improving the reload speed on the hunting rifle, pistol, and shotgun would be nice to make them actually useful.
Did you use it because it had better stats or because you were better with it?
I've always defaulted to the basic pistol, personally. I've liked stealth builds from the jump and when I spec into handguns I have several options. When I'm late game, the SMG works a treat with a silencer for me. For hoards, magnums and SMG. I'm good with that setup. I might have an auto shotgun by that point, but not only are my points/books in what I carry, my ammo I
make is not tailored to the higher damage weapon on paper because my skills compensate. Maybe I'm reading too deep. Cheers mate.