So, when you say that "all weapons types feel the same", you really mean that they feel the same because their different effective range isn't important in this game? If so, why are you so hyper-focussed on range? You're correct that range doesn't matter all that much in Colony Ship (the only instance I can remember is the fight in "first law of robotics" which is why I brought it up). It's similar to Fallout in that regard: the only instance where range matters in Fallout which I can think of is the assault on Sierra Army Depot because you could snipe the turrets. Otherwise, I never worried about range in Fallout. I guess you can use high range weapons to start combat from far away in Fallout, but I think this will make the game far too easy.
Also, I don't think that comparing Colony Ship to Jagged Alliance is a good idea because the two games are so different. Colony Ship strongly reminded me of Fallout when I played it. As we both are clearly familar with Fallout, how would you rate Fallout's combat compared to Colony Ship's? What ranged weapons in Fallout require a different play style?
The rival faction fight is completed by less than half of the players which completed the game. I'm surprised that you found it so easy. During my first play-through, I just picked one of the pre-made characters and rescuing Smiles was quite difficult which is why I brought it up. Regarding tactical depth: I suspect that you had a very strong build where diving deep into the combat just wasn't all that important. Colony Ship is very bad at explaining itself and this includes the combat system. I learned a lot about the nuances of the combat during my third playthrough where I was playing a lone wolf melee character with the "Juggernaught" feat.
I'm saying they feel the same because there is effectively no difference between bursting with an SMG, AR or shooting a shotgun. Or shooting a shotgun, or shooting a pistol. My opinion after playing the game and many like it, the differences between guns are almost purely cosmetic. Even something as trivial as ammo has less depth. In fallout we all know the economy is relatively easy, but the first time you get a minigun in fallout 1/2 you generally can't use it all the time. You will burn through your ammo and all your money. I primarily used burst weapons in CS(unless I had a really good pistol or shotgun or sniper) and not once in the game was I ever in danger of running out of 5.56 or 9mm.
I'm not comparing CS to JA2, I'm comparing it to Atom and Fallout. I'm only using JA2 as an example.
Also yes range, distance and cover are the biggest influences in tactical decisions. How you don't understand this is beyond me. Cover never seemed to matter much in CS, I was always able to flank or just outright shoot through cover.
Being completely honest, for around half the game I didn't know you could upgrade shields and cloaking devices ect. Really once I realized you could do that the game became a complete cakewalk. The shields combined with drugs combined with perks gave me too much survivability. The orange combat drugs also made fights easier, those drugs were super cheap and common. My biggest annoyance was enemies also constantly have shields and regen, making every fight take much longer then it should have.
Colony ship is on a similar level for tactical options to Fallout(like Atom). The major difference is that colony ship has a primitive cover system and obviously full party control. Fallout on the other hand doesn't have combat arena's and you're able to use locations for advantages and win fights you normally couldn't. In fallout, and Atom you can use range to start fights for your own advantage, it's possible for enemies to snipe you from far distances. CS may have more options but it's completely negated by using tiny battle arena's for all combat encounters. In fallout I could win fights earlier then normally possible using bottlenecks(bad ai to be fair) or range initiating fights and thinning out enemies before they reach me.
I used custom difficulty settings. My first playthrough(which lasted like 3 hours) I had it on hero and found it too easy.
Again I could lie and say I played it on underdog, there's essentially no difference from the settings I used aside from coping.
Crits are gay, if I had the option I would disable them completely for myself and the AI. Cope about this being a 'hard experience' if you need to. If I had the option I would have given myself even more skills points, given how retarded the skill system in this game is. How easy most fights in the game were I could have easily beaten it on underdog, and if I knew how easy the late game was I would have just played it on underdog. Doing a solo run is obviously harder, this game to put it bluntly is not good enough for me to ever replay.
