Just played a match, where a heavy was about 30 yards out, and he was shooting at me with my trusty ScR, and all his shots landed I the dust around me, and the ones that hit probable did like 7 damage.

Herp-a-Derp.

snip

I ran Gatsun's at the end of a match right before downtime. Probably died 5 times, but it didn't matter because if the downtime happens before the match is over you don't lose anything :)

This is supposedly the best HMG in the game and I figured it would destroy players at slightly longer range than I usually use my other HMGs at....

Turned out I was wrong. I felt like I was downing players just as fast as normal. Man, I miss the HMG back in Chromosome. Such an amazing weapon.

I would not call a basic suit with a total cost of 20k isk for advanced geat and I get more kills with this than my proto gallente duvolle suit. And I would not call myself green as I have been playing since January.

If you are a vet and do poorly with the current HMG in pub matches, you are not very good at this. I would think a vet should know how to use the HMG properly by now. I read these threads as posted by new HMG players playing the heavy class wrong thinking they are a one man army.

Read my post before commenting on what I have written, I am trying to note down how I manage to run the HMG successfully and provide additional input instead of just saying that HMG sucks. I cannot shoot down AR users at 50 meters etc.

I have no experiences from PC and cannot comment on using the HMG in anything but pub matches, I have no interest in participating in PC matches, tried it twice with way to much lagging playing from Europe. I did participate in several corp matches pre Uprising using officer HMG, I had sharpshooter at 5 but stayed between buildings and never really needed the extra range.
Even then you would be insane for engaging ARs in open terrain, not to mention the laser rifles which could melt my proto heavy in a second before Uprising. My survival rate has improved as heavy in Uprising then before Uprising. Not to mention the price of the heavy which has dropped significantly, I remember suits costing 400k isk running a heavy.

I have killed proto players with my HMG and have been killed plenty of times by proto players. I am fully aware of its limitations, you must be crazy if you try to go against a good proto squad even with a boundless. I have seen many good proto squads whom do not try to engage my heavy 1v1 but flank me or spam grenades at me knowing I am slow. This is all fair in my book, the heavy cannot and should not be able to take on a whole squad alone. He can hold them back from entering a hallway with suppression while your team mates support with AR, grenades and mass drivers.

No descent proto AR player would willingly enter a cqc 1v1 vs a proto heavy. They either take the heavy down at a distance and flank him before opening fire. I see nothing wrong here.

The HMG dps is fine, the suit using it cannot compete with quick proto shield tanked suits.

Then please explain how it is that I consistently can win 1v1 in cqc vs AR users. I am big and slow and should be easy to hit with the aim assist and yet I win most of these encounters.
I can keep the button pressed and shooting for far longer time than the AR player have to reload and switch weapon unless it is a logi with no sidearm.

Here's a different outtake:
You say the HMG is worse than Chromosome. So, do HMG users want it returned to that previous state?
What exactly do you want the HMG to be?

Because if I remember, the top players in the world were HMGs back then.

It comes back to the old DUST QQ-ing of people complaining their OP setup was taken back to normalcy. Just like Barry Bonds would QQ if they took his steroids away.
MD and Flaylock users QQ-ed too, so did Lasers. Gosh forbid the people around you have a fighting chance...

Lance, I respect you as a Heavy proponent, but we both know that isn't true. Especially the SMG part. DPS is dependent on range and you're going to get obliterated by the HMG toe-to-toe. (Yes, provided the Heavy doesn't suck at aiming.)