Pending Mutually Exclusive Perks

[pigeon]

Piggybacking off Zyp's idea:

I think it'd be really interesting for gameplay to have sets of conflicting perks that require you to choose one or the other to match your playstyle. Think infinity vs mending on a bow.

Here are some examples that I think could be used in game. Consider this also as a suggestion for each of these perks to be added individually. Also note that these suggestions are generally going to be on the more powerful side of what we currently have, and are balanced around not having every perk simultaneously active.

• Death station heal vs Death station ammo supply vs Remote death station detonation
  • These would be three mutually exclusive perks. You could either spec into your death station being a means of healing as a traitor, an on demand ammo resupply, or build into it as more of an offensive weapon by being able to blow it up remotely.
• Instant knife vs Vampiric knife
  • Instant knife would allow you to use the knife as a single use lethal weapo.
  • Vampiric knife would be the two shot weapon it is at base but would heal you for 50 hp per stab. You could use it repeatedly on healthy targets as a risky healing option, or take a safe 50 hp by stabbing a badly wounded target. This gives some utility to the knife to justify not running instant knife, and gives a traitor healing alternative to death station heal that would allow you to run a different death station perk and give a more active healing option.
• Triple Harpoon vs Force Harpoon vs 1,000 degree harpoon
  • Triple harpoon would be the three harpoon throw we all know and love. It allows the potential for harpoon multikills or repeated harpoon use if you can get kills with the secondary harpoons, and makes the harpoon more forgiving in general.
  • Force harpoon would create a discombob style physics impulse on the point of impact, allowing the harpoon to be used as a more deadly discombob. It increases the required planning to effectively use the harpoon, but allows for some interesting multikills while retaining the base ability to kill someone directly with the harpoon.
  • 1,000 degree knife would have harpoons immediately burn the corpse of the person killed by the harpoon. It retains the primary use case of the harpoon as a ranged oneshot weapon, but allows it to be stealthier. Perhaps it could also remove the death scream for killing someone as a way to lean into the stealthy harpoon playstyle.
• Barrel gun ammo vs Cluster barrel gun
  • Admittedly, these are probably too strong to include. But the ideas are still cool and it demonstrates the concept well
  • Barrel gun ammo would add a third shot to the barrel gun, effectively giving one more kill and encouraging players to use the normal barrel side of the barrel gun more.
  • Cluster barrel gun would cause the explosive barrel to spawn and ignite a secondary explosive barrel near the point where the original barrel explodes (or multiple smaller explosive props?). It would encourage players to use the explosive barrel side of the barrel gun, and would lean into the chaos of the explosive barrel.
• Manhack ammo vs Manhack damage & speed vs Incendiary manhacks vs Disorienting manhacks vs Radio manhacks
  • Manhack ammo would allow up to double the number of manhacks you get with one manhack gun, retaining its use as a tool that can mostly be ignored but creates distractions and deals chip damage to players. This upgrade would just allow you to do this more.
  • Manhack damage & Manhack speed would not be mutually exclusive from each other, but would be mutually exclusive from the other manhack upgrades. You'd be able to take these two upgrades to improve the lethality of your manhacks, turning them into more deadly weapons that demand attention and can possibly get kills on their own.
  • Incendiary manhacks would be a mix of increasing lethality and increasing their ability to distract. This would likely need to be balanced around reducing the number of manhacks you can fire down to 2 or 3. These would set people they hit on fire briefly, which would just deal extra damage and reduce the target's vision temporarily
  • Disorienting manhacks would be the ultimate distraction mid gunfight. This would also need to be balanced around reducing the number of manhacks you can fire down to 1 or 2. Upon hitting a player, it would turn the player's view angle similar to how the detective UMP works.
  • Radio manhacks is mostly a joke, but I think the idea is fun so I included it. These would just play random radio noises to throw people off.
• Newton Vacuum vs Invisible Newton
  • Newton vacuum would invert the effect of the newton launcher, pulling players towards you instead of pushing them away. It would also interact with newton jumper by pulling you in the direction you fire rather than pushing you away from the direction you fire. This would be useful in the sense that you wouldn't need to turn around to use the newton launcher to gain momentum.
  • Invisible Newton would remove the visual effect of the newton launcher shot, allowing it to be used more stealthily.
• Malfunction chain vs Explosives malfunction
  • Malfunction chain leans into the chaos of the malfunction pistol by creating entire gunfights rather than just a single shooter.
  • Explosives malfunction would prioritize forcing people to use grenades and jihads, upping the lethality of hitting someone with a malfunction pistol. It opens up the strategy of leaving a jihad somewhere for an inno to find, and then forcing them to use it. It would still work like a normal malfunction pistol, it would just prioritize swapping the player to a jihad, or a grenade if they don't have a jihad, or their primary if they don't have a grenade.
• Invisible bump mines vs Vacuum bump mines vs Rearming bump mines.
  • Invisible bump mines would be the stealthy option. It wouldn't actually be invisible, just invisible unless you're very close to them.
  • Vacuum bump mines would create a small physics impulse when the bump mine arms, pulling nearby players towards the bump mine. This would allow them to be used more aggressively.
  • Rearming bump mines would neither be stealthy nor difficult to avoid, but would allow them to be reused once or twice each, just giving more value to your credit.

These are all just loose ideas I've had rattling around in my head. They aren't particularly balanced, just meant to showcase how mutually exclusive perks could transform playstyles. These perks are all either too strong to be used together or not compatible. Obviously 10 high damage, high speed, incendiary, disorienting manhacks would be way too strong. But I think any of those upgrades individually could be fine and add depth to t rounds.