Combat+ Add-on v4.0 addon - Quake 1.5 mod for Quake

WARNING: OLD VERSION OF COMBAT+! THE MOD CAN NOW BE FOUND AT: Quake Combat+ mod - Mod DB

[[[[Quake 1.5 Combat+ Add-on v4.0]]]]

by |Totalitarian|

Intended For Singleplayer Only. This add-on requires Quake 1.5 and you should download that first.

FULL FEATURE LIST -- All features from v1.0 to present.

ARSENAL:

<<<Super Shotgun (SSG)>>>

-The SSG can be fired *twice* between each reload animation (increased DPS but not damage).
-However the reload animation/delay is slightly longer (+0.25 seconds).
-Knockback for enemies and the player both is reduced by 25% since you'll often be firing twice in succession.
-Horizontal accuracy slightly increased (still not sensible to use at medium-long ranges, but improves range ever so slightly).
-Increased recoil slightly.
-Additionally, kick attack is now enabled during weapon reload animations (see below) -- it is extra proficient to combo kicking with the SSG now.

The intent is to make the SSG a true successor to Doom's SSG in terms of fun factor and shred potential. Given that Q1.5 and this add-on both increase difficulty substantially via new enemies and smarter overall AI (especially on nightmare mode) it permits this buff.

<<<Shotgun>>>

Pellets fired per shot increased from 6 to 7. This results in an approximate +17% damage increase per shot and yields exactly half the number of pellets per shot of the SSG. The intent is to make the Shotgun slightly more viable overall and also not left behind by the new SSG.

<<<Kick Attack>>>

Kicking is vastly improved with the following changes:

-Faster melee kick/transitioning to being able to shoot or kick again.
-You can kick during weapon animations, such as while the SSG is reloading. The kick is more viable to combo with other attacks.
-BUGFIX: No input buffering with kicking -- you won't accidentally be kicking twice in a row all the time if spamming.
-Reduced kick enemy knockback by 20%. It was too much (would send grunts flying). This nerf attempts to tone that down while still making kicking enemies into traps etc viable, and also make follow-up kicks or other close-range attacks easier by not sending enemies too far.
-Kick damage increased by 5.
-Kick range/reach increased by 25% (64 -> 80 units).

<<<Axe>>>

-Axe damage increased by 5.
-Axe range/reach increased by 25% (64 -> 80 units).
-Added a sound when hitting enemies with the axe (previously none). Satisfying and provides feedback whether you hit or miss.

<<<Chainsaw>>>

-Increased damage by approximately 10%.
-Chainsaw range/reach increased by 25% (64 -> 80 units).

<<<Nailgun>>>

-BUGFIX: tapping fire/shoot with the nailgun will no longer cause the weapon to muzzleflash and vibrate (animation), but not fire a nail. Now you can single-fire/burst fire the nail gun effectively with a single mouse press or short hold.
-Increased projectile speed significantly. The intent is to make this remain a useful weapon once the SNG is found. SNG is still far better as it deals much more damage (higher DPS and better ammo conservation), however the nailgun will be appealing for longer ranges, as well as good against fast or small enemies since it is harder to dodge. This also works well in tandem with the bugfix that enables single shot/burst fire marksmanship.
-Increased damage by 2. Nailgun = 11. SNG = 18.

<<<Super Nailgun>>>

-Sped up Super Nailgun spin-up time by 20% and slightly increased rate of fire once it enters full spin cycle.
-Super nailgun spin-up is now optional. 'set nospinup 1' in console to disable spin-up. 'set nospinup 0' to reenable spin-up. Alternatively toggle from Q1.5's in-game menu.
Vanilla rate of fire if disabled. However, if you keep the spinup delay enabled the fire rate is slightly faster once the barrel enters full spin cycle, so it's a trade-off.

Note: vanilla SNG behavior makes the normal nailgun redundant just like vanilla, whereas with spinup ON alongside Combat+ nailgun improvements the nailgun sees use to the very end. The choice is yours.

<<<Rocket Launcher>>>

-Removed Q1.5's massive bonus damage on direct impact. Deals the same damage as GL, as per vanilla.
-Increased base damage by 17% In the absence of the massive direct impact bonus, since Q1.5 and this add-on make the game somewhat harder (especially on nightmare).
-Gave rocket launcher recoil. Matches grenade launcher recoil.

<<<Grenade Launcher>>>

-Grenade Velocity increased by 20%. Makes the GL more enjoyable and versatile to use; viable at medium ranges or vs enemies with moderate elevation advantage on you, is more effective at bouncing off walls, and hopefully not almost entirely outclassed the moment a rocket launcher is found.
-Increased base damage by 17% to match RL.

<<<Lightning Gun>>>

-Cell consumption rate reduced by 35%.
-Picking up a lightning gun gives you 30 cells as opposed to 15.

The intent is to fix an obvious vanilla design flaw: to actually let you enjoy the lightning gun rather than it eating all your ammo in seconds (also alongside cell ammo being very rare outside of e4m7, especially in Q1.5).

<<<Proximity Grenade>>>

-Increased player proximity grenade throw velocity by 20% (matches grenade launcher).

<<<Ammo>>>

An attempt to address vanilla design, the following ammo capacity changes encourage smart pickup management, resolve balancing issues, and increase trigger happy time with the overly-limiting weapons (e.g Lighting gun, nail gun).

-Nails max ammo capacity increased by 50 (200 -> 250). Picking up a nailgun grants 50 nails (was 30). Nailbox pickups unchanged.
-Cells max ammo capacity increased by 20. (100 -> 120). Increased all cell pickup counts slightly (except backpacks of any kind).
-Shell counts and capacities remain unchanged.
-Rockets/Grenade ammo capacity reduced by 40. (100 -> 60).

<<<NEW: Berserk Pack>>>

It's back! Megahealth packs with the box model also grant berserk mode. This works mostly the same as in Doom except:

-Only grants up to x3 melee damage (axe & kick), not Doom's x10. However if paired with a quad damage it results in x12 melee damage and can gib enemies. Like doom, melee damage while in berserk is partially random per hit (at least x2 damage, at most x3).
-As in Doom, you retain berserk for the entire level. Unlike Doom however, you also lose it if you die or load game. Stay alive and don't save/load scum to reap the rewards!
-Megahealth with the heart model does not provide berserk. However there is a 40% chance the berserk megahealth will replace a heart.
-Can be disabled by setting 'megahealth 0', which will make all megahealths entirely vanilla. 'megahealth 1' to reenable.

ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE:

<<<Ogre & Death Knight>>>

Split in half behavior:
-Ogres & D Knights won't split in half to the first rocket or grenade. Low health required.
-Super shotgun is now included. Again low health is required. At least 10 of the 14 pellets fired have to hit to split, assuming default SSG damage values.
-Chance of a split after these conditions are met is reduced from 30% to 25% (Ogre) and 25% to 20% (Death Knight).

<<<Ogre>>>

Reduced Ogre grenade damage by 12.5%, since ogres are deadly accurate in Q1.5 (good) and their grenades are one of the strongest attacks in the game (40 damage).

<<<Scrag>>>

-Reduced Scrag's chance of teleporting while simply moving by 75%. Chance of teleporting while taking damage remains. This will make them LESS predictable. You could trigger a room of enemies and back off, the scrags would teleport into your hiding spot for easy thinning of the crowd. This makes that less abusable and they teleported too much anyways (especially on nightmare).
-Scrags won't teleport a miniscule distance (increased minimum distance from 77 to 128).
-Scrags won't teleport right next to the player: Added a 128 unit no teleport zone around the player.

<<<Fiend>>>

-Will jump at you when has a slight elevation advantage over you. Prevents them being helpless when on a ledge a little bit higher than you, and makes them scarier in general. Player having the high ground is still an easy kill.
-Increased the distance/speed of the fiend's jump attack by a random range of 0-25% per jump.
-Added further Z offset/displacement when initiating a jump in an attempt to reduce fiends getting stuck on geometry.
-Made fiend jump "motion blur" visual effect stand out slightly more.
Fiend Teleportation:
-Darkplaces engine bug workaround: if a fiend gets stuck on geometry it will teleport to a new nearby location.
-There is also a very low chance a fiend will teleport to a new location upon taking damage.

<<<Enforcer>>>

-Will not throw sticky proximity grenades at close range (Less than 200 units).
-Reduced the frequency that Enforcers fire proximity grenades slightly.
-Slowed down the animation speed of Enforcers firing prox grenades. Telegraphs and distinguishes well from their normal attack.
-Reduced velocity of their proxy grenades slightly.
-New behaviors seen rarely on lower difficulty modes, more often on higher: short strafe and laser barrage.

<<<Warlord>>>

-Warlords have a 2% chance of replacing Ogres (was 1%).
-Increased Warlord health by 30 (250 -> 280).
-Reduced Warlord grenade damage by 12.5%.

<<<Afrit>>>

-Afrit (Q1.5 flying enemy) begin high in the air to better serve their role as flying enemies as well as stay out the way of ground enemies.
-Set Afrit health back to SMC default.
-Adjusted Afrit spawn rates. e.g has a 7% chance to spawn alongside a shalrath (previously 0%).

<<<Spider>>>

-Removed spider's 25% resistance to shotguns and nailguns.
-Removed chance of replacing spawns/tarbabies.
-Has a 6% chance to replace a zombie (was 5%).
-Has a 2% chance to replace a knight (was 1%).

<<<Reiver>>>

-Rievers (also a Q1.5 flying enemy) often, but not always, begin somewhat higher in the air to better serve their role as flying enemies as well as stay out the way of ground enemies.
-Adjusted various spawn rates (you'll encounter slightly more).
-Increased Reiver health by 50 (=200, same as Ogre).

<<<Bosses>>>

-Increased Episode 2 Boss Health on Hard and Nightmare.
-Increased Episode 3 Boss Health on all difficulty modes.

<<<NIGHTMARE REFINERY>>>

Nightmare difficulty originally only made enemies attack more frequently, with two or three special cases e.g Vore projectiles were 40% faster on nightmare, enemies suffer pain animations less. Most notably, some melee-only enemies saw next no benefit on nightmare mode. Combat+ provides a more challenging experience primarily by approaching each AI type individually and boosting their particular weaknesses slightly. Additionally, a few nerfs are also applied to reduce unfair elements.
I was inspired to do it properly by the terrible 50hp nightmare difficulty in the recent Quake rerelease...good game design is a dying art.

-NERF: Ogres and Death Knights have increased duration between each ranged attack. They still attack more often than hard, but will frequently take longer breaks for movement or melee attacks between firing. However in the absence of being forced turrets they both feature new behaviour:
-BUFF: Death Knight projectiles gain +25% velocity (still really slow), and the animation that triggers this attack is faster so they're less of a sitting duck. Lastly, Death Knights gain a slight bonus to movement speed on nightmare, given that melee is their intended focus.
-BUFF: Ogres will sometimes multi-grenade spam very similarly to the Gunner enemy in Quake 2.
-BUFF: all enemies sometimes ignore friendly fire (= they attack eachother/infight less) on nightmare.
-BUFF: Increased all enemies yaw rotation speed by ~25%. This makes them turn to face you faster only when they haven't got a "lock-on". Enemies turn notably slow in Quake and it was rather abusable.
-BUFF: all enemies that can perform ranged attacks have a minor +10% ranged attack animation speed bonus. This works well in combination with their more frequent ranged attacks on nightmare, getting them back to moving (and attacking again!) faster.
-NERF: Grunts & Enforcers originally were turned into turrets that stand on the spot firing away on nightmare. Now they sometimes perform a short strafe between attacks to keep them mobile.
-BUFF: Nailgun Grunts sometimes fire 1 additional nail per attack, frequency scaling based on skill level.
-BUFF: Enforcers now fires a barrage of lasers (instead of always just two at a time), the frequency & intensity of which scales based on skill level.
-BUFF: Conditions for Enforcer's special "wounded" pain state scales based on difficulty (= happens less on higher difficulties).
-BUFF: Rotfish now gain +30% movement speed on nightmare (still really slow).
-BUFF: Knights run approximately 10% faster. This only applies when they're running at you sword to their side; when they swing their sword they move at normal speed.
-BUFF: Knights gain +16% health on nightmare (75 -> 87). Note knights originally saw next to no boost on nightmare mode. A minor buff of health and speed should be just what they need as melee-only fodder.
-BUFF: Scrags have a 20% chance to poison the player with their spikes. Poison deals 1 damage every 3 seconds for up to 15 seconds, so 5 damage in total on top of their standard 9 damage. Poison ignores armor and can be cured by grabbing a medkit or jumping in water.
-BUFF: fiends jump with additional speed & distance by a random range of 0-15% per jump on Nightmare and Hard, but note they also jump more often on nightmare as per vanilla.
-NERF: Shalrath vore missile gains +20% speed on nightmare difficulty (vanilla was +40%).
-BUFF: Shalrath's next jump to/from ceiling timer changed to a random range to make them even more unpredictable.
-BUFF: Shalrath frantic rush tactic's speed scales with skill level, up to approximately +20% on nightmare difficulty.
-BUFF: Spawns/Tarbabies have a bonus +1% chance to have a Reiver assist them on nightmare. Touching tarbabies themselves isn't an option as their design is very delicate, yet something needed to be done to make encounters with them different than on hard difficulty level, no matter how minor.
-NERF: Enforcers (type 2 - proximity grenade guy) will not throw multiple sticky proximity grenades in a row on Nightmare mode.
-BUFF: Enforcers (type 2 - proximity grenade guy) will often fire their laser weapon in a barrage of shots on nightmare.
-BUFF: Enforcers (type 2 AND type 1 vanilla) laser weapon gains +10% velocity on nightmare mode.

Zombies, Shamblers as well as most enemies added by Quake 1.5 were already handled just fine by Nightmare.

MISCELLANEOUS:

-Removed slow-mo on player death, since it was causing quickload slow-mo bug.
-Reduced the frequency in which dogs howl (was too often to an unbelievable extent).
-Removed screenshake when shamblers corpse hits the floor (it wasn't smooth)
-Reduced chance of enemies setting on fire to explosive weapons to 15% (was 40%). This is cool but it is merely a cosmetic death animation, and they get in the way while running around. 40% was too much.
-Running over an ammo pickup of any kind whilst firing your weapon will not reset firing animation and fire rate cycling (Vanilla bugfix).
-Fixed floating lamps in base maps (Q1.5 Source Release Fix).
-Fixed small wall torches shooting flames across the room (Q1.5 Source Release Fix).
-Pressing 'Fire' while dead will reload last quicksave, as in Q1.5 Beta (Q1.5 Source Release Fix).
-Fixed Death Knights that are split in half while in projectile animation not resetting their color (Q1.5 Fix).
-Extended the time enemy ammo drops remain before disappearing by 1 minute (was 2 mins).
-Config defaults: lowered corona intensity, enabled mouselook, and enabled a lightning gun visual effect by default.
-Added super nail gun spin-up option to Q1.5 in-game menu.

Already played the Quake campaign recently with Q1.5 Combat+? Play something worthy of the original Quake with the excellent Episode 5: DOPA by Machine Games, which is fully compatible with Q1.5.