I don't think many know how to take advantage of the damage profiles in the game.

I don't remotely see assault rifles as a problem generally.

Generally, I am fighting Caldari assaults with ARs. So I play the natural counter to them which is a Gallente suit with a scrambler rifle. Not only are they doing less than optimal damage to me, but with proficiency and damage mods on my scrambler, I am doing nearly DOUBLE damage to them. I can take a STD scrambler and drop a proto Caldari with a Duvolle in an instant because of this. Literally 3-5 hits.
I've gotten mail asking me "how did you vaporize 600 ehp instantly like that?"
The answer is simple. The fit is a Caldari Killer.

I like your thread, but what's to stop everyone from simply tanking out an Amarr suit, and say.... making shields resistant to hybrid and laser weapons, and making their armor resistant to projectile and explosives? If people hate the concept of dual tanking, that would only perpetuate the problem. As theoretically, that system can nearly eliminate almost all weaknesses.

I do like the efficiency indicator concept from EVE as well though. At the same time we have similar systems already in game right now. Right now, you ARE able to tell what suit someone has on when you aim at them, and you CAN see how effective the weapon you're using is.
What I would like is for damage mod percentage to be visibly added to the damage profile indicator when you aim at someone. So you can see, EXACTLY what your final damage tally is going to be when you shoot.

It's good to bear in mind, that we will be getting additional weapons in 1.5. These will come with their own profiles as well.

What I think would be good is a general hardener function for both shields and armor. Shields harden but don't recharge. Armor hardens, but slows you down.

Much better range.

We've already seen this before...

http://dust514.com/news/blog/2013/07/weapon-ranges-in-uprising-1.2-and-beyond/

It bugs me that you got a Pistol AND an SMG listed under "long range".

We'll see what happens assuming they come 1.5. I anticipate the AR is going to be least of people's problems.

I'm guessing they're using the breach rifle to balance a higher damage per shot but lower rate of fire weapon for CQC, and the rail rifle will function in a similar manner but with much better range.

ASR actualy has some major kick to it which throws off its AIm, which the AR is in dire need of. So no

But it doesn't!

How can you believe this so fervently? There is no recoil on it.

Recoil =/= dispersion.

I'm curious to the proportion of players that actually use both. Every one that I know agrees that recoil and dispersion is a non-factor.

Edit: And, again - if you nerf the AR in any way you have to nerf the ASR so that it fits within it's combat philosophy. Just saying. You can't have the cake and eat it to.

AR users must be scared if there's topics to bring down other rifles when they get nerfed. I'm licking my lips thinking about the delicious tears when the AR goes to being the jack of all trades and master of none, but the sweat is pretty sweet too. The nerf hammer cometh, and it cometh hard.

It's not going to get nerfed because everyone wanting it to be nerfed hasn't put forth any legitimate evidence as to why it should other than the fact that they die a lot.

Say again?

Also, the AR is a placeholder of the 4 racial rifles. Once the combat and rail rifle come out, the AR is going to need to be re-balanced with it's own weaknesses anyway. It's just a matter of time.

I have used both the AR/Tac and the ASCR/SCR.

The SCR/ASCR is a far superior weapon to the AR. Most people dont seem to realize that the AR once you have fully upgraded does have significantly reduced recoil/dispersion but the ASCR pretty much starts as where the AR finishes with its 1.5 mill SP points into sharpshooter. The sight is better on the ASCR than the AR. Optimal range is similar. ROF is slightly lower for the ASCR but it does 39.6 dmg per shot, DPS is 465.89 with no prof or dmg mods, AR is 467.50....this difference is hardly significant........accuracy for the ASCR is higher than the AR, reload time for the ASCR is higher than for the AR, mag size for the ASCR is 15 rounds more than for the AR.

Without even taking into account the different in shield vs armor the ASCR outshines the AR. If you start taking into account the dmg vs shields and armor then you will see the ASCR gets a larger increase to dmg vs shields than its gets a decrease on dmg vs armor (its does 2 less dmg per shot on armor than the AR but it does ~6 dmg more per shot against shields and proficiency only increases the difference in the dmg to shields it makes no change to the difference in dmg to armor). I have fired an entire mag of the ASCR it does not rise at all even when you empty the mag there is no recoil/rise for this weapon...the AR takes about 25-30 shots but it does start to climb significantly at this point so you either have to push your aim down or you have to stop for half a moment to readjust.

Basically ASCR is far more effective than the AR......why ppl use the AR......its because they choose to definitely not because it beats out the ASCR.

Finally, someone who actually used the weapons and understands what I've been trying to convey to people.

Starting to like the Imperfects more and more lately.

I have used both the AR/Tac and the ASCR/SCR.

The SCR/ASCR is a far superior weapon to the AR. Most people dont seem to realize that the AR once you have fully upgraded does have significantly reduced recoil/dispersion but the ASCR pretty much starts as where the AR finishes with its 1.5 mill SP points into sharpshooter. The sight is better on the ASCR than the AR. Optimal range is similar. ROF is slightly lower for the ASCR but it does 39.6 dmg per shot, DPS is 465.89 with no prof or dmg mods, AR is 467.50....this difference is hardly significant........accuracy for the ASCR is higher than the AR, reload time for the ASCR is higher than for the AR, mag size for the ASCR is 15 rounds more than for the AR.

Without even taking into account the different in shield vs armor the ASCR outshines the AR. If you start taking into account the dmg vs shields and armor then you will see the ASCR gets a larger increase to dmg vs shields than its gets a decrease on dmg vs armor (its does 2 less dmg per shot on armor than the AR but it does ~6 dmg more per shot against shields and proficiency only increases the difference in the dmg to shields it makes no change to the difference in dmg to armor). I have fired an entire mag of the ASCR it does not rise at all even when you empty the mag there is no recoil/rise for this weapon...the AR takes about 25-30 shots but it does start to climb significantly at this point so you either have to push your aim down or you have to stop for half a moment to readjust.

Basically ASCR is far more effective than the AR......why ppl use the AR......its because they choose to definitely not because it beats out the ASCR.

We were hated for our bravado on the forums....and the fact that we could back that up in game. Something people tend not to like. However a lot of imperfects (in regards to game play or game balance) have played FPS games competitively. As a result we know alot about weapon balancing and how it should be done effectively. Ppl just love to continue to hate us for our trolling in other areas and ignore us when we talk about correct weapon balance.

Eh, most of my hatred for you guys stemmed from the bravado aspect and less on the fact you were right. That and the fact that I am mutually hated by many of the members is somewhat amusing - I remember when Internal-Error was part of Hellstorm and someone said, "What the ****, Aeon is in here?"

Nothing like a little bit of bad publicity to get the gears going xD

Past the general forum banter you guys actually bring up a lot of really good points though - and I'm only just now starting to see this with how idiotic half of the forum goers are.

In that case welcome to the world of forum PvP.....in our minds the forums PvP was always more competitive and fun than the actual game was....especially as CCP continued to make stupid decisions. Sota was the perfect example of this. He joined our ranks so that we could increase our forum trolling and PvP because back when imperfects were actually around (we are in retirement now) our PvP could not be matched.

It has been getting better lately though, you have to admit. Slowly... But it is happening.

Yes is has a bit but then they also took steps backwards....like the strong AA.

That being said its truly going to end up being too little too late. PS4 is coming out....and they will have at least 1 FTP FPS game when PS4 launches and they will be getting 2 more FTP FPS games. And when those games hit they will probably already be where dust is headed (but Dust will likely take another year or more to get to that point).

I hear a lot of talk about recoil and dispersion but inevitably I always answer it the same way:

Recoil does not make the Assault Rifle overpowered. Any weapon is going to be accurate as the dickens when aiming down the sights and when you implement "dispersion" in a hit scan based system, it's almost entirely cosmetic and ultimately arbitrary. You're not firing rounds, you're firing a vector that intersects with another line and inevitably stops. This is not Battlefield 3, there are no bullet physics.

Dispersion is entirely client based and you can readily see this just based on observation, and it applies with almost all first person shooters - save those that have extensive game design around bullet physics like Battlefield 3 and the Sniper franchise. A good example of this is the "headshot glitch" in which they are able to fire at you because the rounds come from their camera, which is located in their head and not the weapon.

Recoil, on the other hand, is slightly more prominent. It usually doesn't kick in until you're about halfway through the magazine but either way you should be firing in bursts anyway and even if the recoil is ten times that of any other weapon you can manage it just by firing in smaller bursts. Tapping the R1 button reduces the recoil so significantly that a thread regarding the phenomenon actually made it on the "feedback/discussions weekly report" that CCP does, and it was functioning as intended. Because it is. All games do this.

The reason this is important information is because inevitably it falls back on the fact that it's a vector and there's no way to simulate dispersion without the dreaded "random bullet spread" effect. When you fire at a wall, you see the rounds impact in multiple areas - whereas another player will see the rounds land in a single location.

Now, I could go on and talk about all the game mechanics for hours but inevitably what's important is the disparity between the Assault Rifle and the Scrambler Rifle/Assault Scrambler Rifle. The design philosophy is that the Assault Rifle is meant for high damage, low range engagements - a stark contrast to, say, the Rail Rifle which is the exact opposite. The Scrambler Rifle is intended to come in at a close second in terms of range engagement.

If you compare the Assault Rifle and Scrambler Rifle variants, you'll notice that this is -mostly- true as the Assault Scrambler Rifle does have a higher effective range while retaining a similar optimal range, as indicated here:

http://i.imgur.com/krRr5EZ.png

The issue, however, is that both have roughly the same DPS. One has higher damage with lower fire rate, the other has lower damage with higher fire rate. If the Assault Rifle is intended to be a high damage weapon with low range, inevitably it falls back on how it compares to the Assault Scrambler Rifle's range. If both have the same DPS (which, they do) than the range is a buff against the Assault Rifle.

I've honestly been curious as to why the Assault Scrambler Rifle hasn't been used more frequently as it's a fierce weapon to compete against on the field even with Assault Rifle Proficiency 4, but I digress.

The Assault Rifle does not need a Recoil/Dispersion nerf. Range doesn't mean anything if you're not accurate enough to engage at those ranges and taking away from this will increase the disparity in a negative way. On the other hand, you can reduce the optimal range slighty (at the most by 10 meters) so that the range scales accordingly, but even then this is too much of a difference as the Assault Scrambler Rifle isn't intended to have the highest range. With which, you have to be careful how you proceed.

Reason being? If you reduce the range on the Assault Rifle, all of a sudden the Assault Scrambler Rifle is a much better alternative due to it's similar DPS output, negligible overheat mechanic and better performance at range. If you reduce the range on the Assault Rifle, you have to reduce the damage on the Assault Scrambler Rifle, otherwise there isn't enough diversity in the play style to matter - one is obviously better than the other.

Almost all of the issues presented, like Recoil/Dispersion, is entirely circumstantial. Sure, it does really good headshot damage but considering that the Scrambler Pistol does 400% of it's normal damage on a headshot, you can't use it as a legitimate argument because there are weapons that out perform the Assault Rifle for that reason.

. You can't have the cake and eat it to.

Then what the hell do you have the cake for?

Are you supposed to stare at the cake. When you get a damn cake, you eat the damn cake.

The point of the expression is that once you eat the cake, you no longer have the cake.

The problem is just what you say. If we change ranges then other stats will have to change. I say start slow and use little changes. This game needs diversity and the AR doesn't allow for it. The ranges need to be looked at and adjusted or we will never see anything but ARs.

The lack of diversity has less to do with the AR being unbalanced as it has to do with starter fits all having ARs and not every weapon has a militia variant.

We need all of the racial rifles in the game, too. We'll see a bunch more variety when all of the "ARs" are in the game.

The lack of diversity has less to do with the AR being unbalanced as it has to do with starter fits all having ARs and not every weapon has a militia variant.

We need all of the racial rifles in the game, too. We'll see a bunch more variety when all of the "ARs" are in the game.

I'm still surprised that more people don't use the Assault Scrambler Rifle. I have no skills in it what so ever and I can't over-heat the damned thing, so it's not like it's this huge drawback. Hell, the only drawback it has when compared to the AR is resource costs and that can be easily dispatched just by using an Amarr suit because they have higher resources than the others.