BR energy cost and track difficulty

[Frances_Penfold]

Mostly a Pulse/Pure pilot myself but have recently dug deeper into WOHD/Fury.

I am really struck by how much the barrel roll energy cost affects the dynamics of WOHD gameplay, especially at phantom speeds.

The courses that I find most challenging (Sebenco Climb + Chenghou) are difficult because there are numerous barrel roll opportunities, and competitive play requires nonstop absorption of power-ups to keep up with elite A.I. or skilled human pilots online. Even then, there is constant jeopardy of a "contender eliminated" ending to a race.

It seems like WOHD would play profoundly different if the BR cost was even slightly different-- 5/10% or 20/25% vs. the default 15%.

On that note, I would be very interested in controlling BR cost as an option in online multiplayer. I think this could be particularly interested in weaponless matches, where maintenance of ship energy is the primary factor influencing use of BRs. No-cost BRs would really be something in weaponless play IMHO :)

[DISRUPTOR]

That's quite a good idea.

[AG-wolf]

I would definitely like SOME kind of tweak to the energy cost for BRs... in Pure/Pulse it seemed like the cost for a BR varied from team to team depending on their shield statistic, but even with someone like AGsystems with a low shield, you could still deal with multiple successful AND failed BRs and not be completely screwed. With HD, especially online, your shield energy depletes exponentially faster than Pure/Pulse, and one or two BRs could leave you with 5% energy. If they dropped the energy cost to say just 10%, or made it a finite amount which meant different shield capacities per each team would allow for more or less BRs...

[Frances_Penfold]

IIRC Wipeout Pure had a constant cost per BR, which meant that ships with good shield stats could barrel roll more than ships with poor shield stats.

Wipeout Pulse made the BR cost to be a *percentage* of the shield, so there was no intrinsic BR advantage for one ship over another.

WOHD seems to follow Pulse's approach but I agree with AG-wolf, holy crap that shield depletes fast when even doing a few BRs. Playing Sebenco Climb on phantom, you pretty much need to hit every weapons pad and absorb every pickup to actually be able to perform all (or even most) of the BRs. I don't recall this being such an issue with Pure/Pulse.