Grenades are fine, mostly because of the Flux destroying Shields, the Locus Destroys Armor. Plus anyone getting a proto nade is probably giving up a proto module or equipment.

If flux grenades actually killed you I would agree with this.
But they don't, which is why everyone is using Locus because they do EXTREME damage to armor, one shotting any medium frame armor suit, and still do enough damage to shields to negate the need for fluxes.
Fluxes need to turn into a reverse Locus Grenade, doing 135/70, while the Locus Grenade does 70/135.

Just curious, what type of grenade do you use Lance?

depends what suit the other team spams the most. If I see more caldari suits than any other, i switch to flux, if not locus nades.

I believe forge guns actually do just 100% to shields.

There are two hybrid weapons in this game, railguns and blasters. Blasters are the ones that give 110% against shields.

Yeah, for MD users. Armor tankers get the short stic. It's harder for Armor tankers to avoid because of the speed penalties and when hit they get dealt A TON of damage. Shield users can avoid them a lot more eloquently and when hit they get dealt a lot less damage.

I just think that Armor tankers are too heavily penalized.

One thing I find odd is that in the devblog on weapon types and the weapon ranges, they said explosive weapons do 120% more against armor, not 130%. Perhaps there is a bug if its doing 130%.

Shield tankers could make the same argument when I hit them with my scrambler pistol. All suits have counters and weak spots.

I think this is what makes Mass Drivers OP. They do an incredible amount of damage to armor. And the more armor you stack, the easier you are to hit because you are so slow. They keep Armor users down and make running shields way more preferable. They do less damage to shields, correct me if I'm wrong, I believe it is 80% of their damage. This is why everyone who runs shield tanks usually does not complain, because they are being dealt a lot less damage than armor tankers.


For instance, if an explosive does 150 base damage. That would mean they only do 120 damage to shields. Though that same 150 would do 195 damage to Armor.

Two problems with what you've said:

1) your percentages are wrong - mass drivers do 80% damage to shields (your were correct on this) but only do 120% damage to armor (see this link)
2) you are forgetting that even armor tanked suits have shields, which mitigate damage unless some other outside force acts on it (and if you have to use a flux grenades, to be able to make your weapon so effective, it's not really OP, is it?).

Now, let's apply this to a real world application instead of random damage numbers. I have a Gallente Logi alt I like to use. With the alt's mediocre skills, I run an advanced suit that has 134 HP in shields, and 300 HP in armor. Let's pretend I've fit a standard Mass Driver on my suit, and I run into the exact same suit, worn by a merc with the exact same skill points I have, but he has a standard Assault Rifle. With no SP spend on extra damage for either weapon, each weapon is at it's base:

1) Standard Mass Driver: 242 damage (direct), 116 (splash), 60 rounds/minute, clip size is 6, and reload is 4 seconds
2) Standard Assault Rifle: 34 damage (direct), no splash, 750 rounds/minute, clip size is 60, and relaad is 3 seconds

Now, assuming both me and my mirror are complete morons, and we are standing completely still, and we are landing our shots perfectly, what will happen?

Here is our damage per second factoring in reload times:

1) MD (36 shots per minute @ 242 damage per shot divided by 60 seconds): 145.2 DPS
2) AR: (461 shots per minute @ 34 damage per shot divided by 60 seconds): 261.5 DPS

First thing we notice, is that the DPS of the MD is significantly lower than the AR (but keep in mind that the % of damage applied is different for each weapon.

So how this actually apply in the above scenario?

MD shot 1: 134 damage to shields - accounting for 20% reduction in damage, this takes the first 167.6 HP of damage from the first round, and the rest is applied to the armor. The remaining 74.4 is applied to the armor with a 20% bonus, making this shot effectively 89.2 HP of damage to armor. This leaves my enemy at 210.7 HP or armor

At the same time, my enemy is firing his AR at me. In the 1 second it took me to do the above damage, he places 7.68 bullets on me (let's round this down to 7 given you can't hit with a partial bullet). It will take 121 points of damage to knock out my shields of 134 due to the 10% bonus to shield damage he gets, leaving him 117 points of damage to apply to my armor at a 10% penalty. Effectively, he just did another 105 points of damage to my armor reducing me to 195 HP of armor left.

After 1 second of direct fire, my enemy is in a better position than I am with my Mass Driver. At this rate, the Mass Driver and Assault Rifle are pretty much a draw. We can't calculate further because I don't know the flight times of the round from the MD and the AR, so you can't gauge how many more rounds from the AR will hit me before my next round hits my enemy.

I am not a Mass Driver user, and do prefer the AR (I'm not too proud to admit it). To me, though, the mass driver is not OP vs armor in this scenario, and people that say otherwise are probably forgetting other factors (like flux grenades, that guy over there that you didn't notice that is hitting you outside his AR optimal scratching you for more damage, etc). Both weapons are pretty close to the same effectiveness, and given that the mass driver is meant to be an area denial tool, the lower DPS is expected.

If you factor in flux grenades, you will need to remember a couple of things - 1) the grenade takes time to throw, and if both mercs have nerves of steel, the AR using is getting shots off while the flux is in the air, and while the the MD user attempts to bring the MD to bear after throwing the flux (you all have played enough to know that there is a delay after throwing a grenade before you can use a weapon again). Since again I don't know the time it takes to throw a grenade and then bring a weapon to bear, I can't calculate this. Also this will vary widely with the enemy and their amount of shields.

I am happy to work up the numbers for other weapons if you all like using this same scenario, but I think I have effectively shown that the MD is not OP (at least in this situation), and is in fact in line slightly less effective than the AR given its role of area denial.

EDIT: Posting this in a separate thread to be sure it gets attention.

I ponder you variable queries; does a scrambler pistol damage one behind defenses, does a scrambler bolt do damage when it misses it's target, can it kill multiple with one bolt.

There are no question marks, because there is nothing to question about them; a scrambler pistol has none of these advantages that the Mass Driver brings forth. These truths, I reveal to you.

1) A MD doesn't hit you if you take cover.
2) No, a scrambler doesn't do damage if you miss...but it does more when you hit.
3) No, a scrambler can't kill more than 1 people with one bullet...but neither can a MD.

An MD does more damage to armor than I do...but I do more damage with a direct headshot hit. He on the other hand does more if he misses thanks to splash damage. I can shoot faster than a MD.

In short, there are enough disadvantages to make the mass driver balanced. Learn to counter it.

Lawl!!!! Okay I wasn't gonna comment but for you I will. read the weapons description. It's also good to use in open areas as well. And it's a breaching weapon as well. You breach by going in cqc. Nuff said.

OK, if the MD is area denial only...why does it so well in a open field or on the run?

Also, one real problem I have with the MD is that it does better in CQC then a Shotgun. Look at the demoman from tf2. He can do a lot of DMG but a scout with a shotgun(or any class really) will ruin him at close range.

there is a counter to everything , stop being lazy and find it

I'll tell you what I'm told when I complain about swarms: htfu

Says the guy who has no idea what the counter to MD's is.

there is a counter to everything , stop being lazy and find it