Sinboto Simmons wrote: I use Mass Drivers, in case someone didn't know, no damage mods just skill and proficiency (for the pg skill more than anything really) anyway I've been seeing an increase of complainants about the Mass Driver lately and I ask why?
The Mass Drivers are hardly amazingly powerfull in the killing regard being a support weapon, and ya know....the nerffs, so the only problem I see here is damage mod stacking, but that's not what this thread is about.
What's your opinion on Mass Drivers?
Allow me to quote my other thread:
Quote:As I'm sure you know (but I'm going to say it anyway) the radius of any circle is measured from the center to the circumference (the outer edge). Anyone care to venture a guess at just the area a MD round's blast covers? The total area covered in a blast is affected drastically by even slight changes in the radius of the blast, allow me to show you by breakin it down for you using a normal proto MD and math. (Area of a circle = pi x radius^2):
Freedom Mass Driver Radius: 4.4m
Mass Driver Operations 5 Skill Bonus: 1.1m
Total Radius: 5.5m
Formula to find the area: Area = 3.14 x 5.5^2
Area of a Freedom MD blast: 78.5m
Distance across a MD blast: 11m
How about that Boundless?
Radius after Operation 5 Skill bonus: 8.25
Area of a Boundless Assault MD blast: 213.72m
Distance across the blast: 16.5m
Now I have no issue with Mass Drivers as they are when you first skill into them. Their damage is just right, though their splash range may be a bit much. The issue comes with damage mod stacking. As you know, the higher the DPR the greater the impact of damage mods. When able to spread all that damage over such a great area, it's just too much. The ony way to fix the weapon and still keep it viable would be to change the proficiency bonus and somehow prevent damage mod stacking, or reduce the splash radius and RoF and give it back the smoke cloud it used to produce in Chromosome along with it's old ability to severely throw off people's aim by large amounts.
Once again, I have no qualms with MD's as they are without the damage bonuses. They are fun and exciting to use and a wonderful support weapon. They do however need to be tweaked.