LaserGun

The LaserGun is a Weapon that appears identical to a Thunderbolt but fires projectiles similar to those found in an Enforcer's rifle. This Weapon is selected by pressing impulse 9. This Weapon was made by N-Tropy on July 27, 1996.

The original "All Weapons" cheat has been changed to another impulse key, either 13 in the original modification or 17 in the Smart Weapon Patch.

Unlike the Enforcer's Weapon, however, the LaserGun projectile does not make a sound when it collides with a surface.

Note that neither modification includes any support for death messages, meaning the player will instead get the name of the target and the name of the attacker with no spacing.

Strategy
Designed to be the Weapon held by the Enforcer, it will fire energy bolts and consume Cells. If the player is using the Smart Weapon Patch variant, they will find that Enforcers now drop this Weapon on death. Combined with the fact that there tend to be a lot of Enforcers in idBase levels (except E1M1: the Slipgate Complex, which will not provide any Cell ammo and thus the player cannot use said Weapon) and the fact that each LaserGun gives the player 15 Cells on top of the Backpack that drops an additional 5, players will find that they start with a surplus of Ammo before it drops off after the initial idBase level of each Episode.

Designed as a slightly weaker variant of the standard Thunderbolt, it will cost two Cells per every shot, yet cause 10 less damage than two Cells if fired by the standard Thunderbolt. This means that it is generally useful for concentrated bursts (and more controlled Ammo consumption than the Thunderbolt itself), but is not as good for causing a fast amount of damage to a stronger foe such as the Shambler.

Note that the Knight and Death Knight has very shiny armor that can reflect the beams of light fired by this Weapon. While not invulnerable, it will take a lot more shots to take down this opponent than normal if they player attempts to use a LaserGun.

While this Weapon does fire slower than the standard Thunderbolt, it still is about as fast as a Super Nailgun, meaning it still can be quite applicable for rapid fire purposes. Of course, due to the loss of 10 damage per shot over the Thunderbolt, it is not ideal to use this Weapon if they player has that as well.

Advantages

 * Allows the player a quick Thunderbolt, especially since the vanilla Thunderbolt often came late in each Episode.
 * On top of the Weapon, the player gets 15 Cells from the Weapon alone, providing quadruple (if the Backpack is included) for every dead Enforcer over the vanilla game.
 * This Weapon is about as accurate as a Nailgun, allowing for much better Ammo conservation than the standard Thunderbolt.

Disadvantages

 * Beyond Ammo conservation, serves no purpose if a Thunderbolt is also held.
 * Knights and Death Knights are highly resistant, meaning it will be a massive waste of Ammo to use this on them.

Updates
The Smart Weapon Patch, made on September 1, 1996, included an updated version of the LaserGun modification with various changes made by SoniC.


 * Made Enforcers drop the LaserGun on death. The original modification just included the custom entity; the only place it could be found is a level with said custom entity such as Entering N-Tropy's First Level (by hand no less).
 * Added the reflection mechanic involving Knights and Death Knights.
 * The rate of fire has been slowed significantly.
 * Fixed a powerful exploit with the original version where the player could endlessly spam the attack, regardless of how much Ammo they had, as long as they did not release their hand off the trigger.