I'm not asking to one shot a scout as long as the scout has to give up something to get brick tanked. Speed takes a penalty but they can still run pretty fast and are hard to detect.

I pay 47k ISK for my Charge Sniper Rifle (the same as a Duvolle Assault Rifle or other very good light weapon) but a Duvolle Tactical Assault Rifle (or other top of the line light weapon) can be bought for 77k ISK. My Thales (the top of the line sniper rifle) can't be purchased, only salvaged (very rarely).

That tanked scout can pop me once with a shotgun in the back of the head and I'm off to the clone vats. Is it fair to ask that I get the same opportunity?

The very, very, very last thing Dust needs right now is more passive, campy gameplay.

But you must admit Thor.....sniping is pretty useless as it stands and could use a buff..pretty bigtime...I used to be able to go 40ish-0 and now im lucky if i get to 15.

Yes.

Manus Peak is not a map designed to go well with shotguns or cloaks.
The research facility doesn't work brilliantly with tanks.
Forge guns don't work in CQC maps like that either.

Combat rifles are ungodly powerful regardless of the map design though, yeah. But snipers aren't quite alone in having map design impede them.

Uh...
I'm a little dubious about being able to go 40-0 being used as a benchmark for balance.

Manus Peak, the research facility and the forge gun limitations are there, yes.

But those maps and sockets were not deliberately made to hinder shotguns, cloaks, tanks or forge guns.

I have a few questions for you, Munch.

1) Should snipers have direct LOS on consoles?
2) How many shots do you think it should take for a scout, assault, logistics, and sentinel dropsuit?
3) What do you think of redline sniping?

Test out increased headshot damage. (this rewards skillful players and not those 500m away in the red line)

and / or

Slighty increased base sniper rifle damage. (to fix the required amount of shots against proto suits)

Why would I ask that sniper rifles be given attention? Where to start..

Sniping isn't good enough for PC. The rifles don't do enough damage at range to make it worth running a Sniper over let's say a slayer actively pushing or defending.

This is a push for Sniping to be more than what it currently is in end game DUST 514. Which is essentially non-factor unless using a Thale's at which point it's viable but not broken. Thanks to that huge long list of things I've named that keep the Sniper from being something desirable.

You shouldn't need things you can't purchase (OFFICER WEAPONS) to be considered worth putting on a team for competitive end game play.

When putting together a bunch of mercenaries to form a team it's NEVER desired or essential that a team fields a sniper. I'm not asking to make the role essential, just less undesirable than it currently is.

WHAT HAVE BEEN THE SNIPER NERFS?? (some of these are active others are passive)

Armor Plates got buffed so stacking health is super easy. (combined with)
Proficiency Skill +15% damage versus armor only (instead of flat damage to both shields and armor) (combined with)
Damage Mod Decrease getting 12% damage from 3 of these mods instead of 24% (combined with)
Gallente Map Packs designed to be unfriendly for snipers (combined with)
No Adjustment to the Sniper Rifle in an unbelievable amount of time to keep the weapon up to date. (combined with)
Sniping in a Heavy Suit for a 10% bonus to sniper rifle damage. It feels almost forced. (combined with)
Stealth Removal of Sniping Locations without warning or patch notes (combined with)
Easymode Attack Drop Ships for high rate of fire splash damage anywhere you want it. (combined with)
Cloaks and 1500hp Heavies pick one miss a lot more than normal or waste your time chipping away (combined with)
Reduced AV Grenades in both damage + amount carried. Used to be decent drop ship defense (combined with)
Increased Drop Ship Health so much so that you can't even carry enough AV grenades to kill one! (combined with)
Fog of War /ON to no longer see what your squad sees. Waste time scanning over teammates(combined with)
Z-fighting enemies render invisible against certain surfaces, what a huge waste of time (combined with)
Removal of Mountains forcing snipers to relocate to more ground level or obvious positions. (combined with)

I can keep coming up with stuff to show you how the game has changed, and not in favor of sniping. I'm probably missing a few easy ones I could have pointed out.

TL;DR

(Sniping hasn't been touched or modified since the release of this ever evolving game, the role has gotten progressively worse over time. Developers don't dare comment on the subject. Good players should be rewarded for skill making flavor of the month classes / builds more tolerable, and the sniper more useful in planetary conquest. This is something that is a long time coming many of us feel.)

What am I supposed to do with that besides hide in the redline?!?

only if you come out of the redline...

Test out increased headshot damage. (this rewards skillful players and not those 500m away in the red line)

and / or

Slighty increased base sniper rifle damage. (to fix the required amount of shots against proto suits)

Why would I ask that sniper rifles be given attention? Where to start..

Sniping isn't good enough for PC. The rifles don't do enough damage at range to make it worth running a Sniper over let's say a slayer actively pushing or defending.

This is a push for Sniping to be more than what it currently is in end game DUST 514. Which is essentially non-factor unless using a Thale's at which point it's viable but not broken. Thanks to that huge long list of things I've named that keep the Sniper from being something desirable.

You shouldn't need things you can't purchase (OFFICER WEAPONS) to be considered worth putting on a team for competitive end game play.

When putting together a bunch of mercenaries to form a team it's NEVER desired or essential that a team fields a sniper. I'm not asking to make the role essential, just less undesirable than it currently is.

WHAT HAVE BEEN THE SNIPER NERFS?? (some of these are active others are passive)

Armor Plates got buffed so stacking health is super easy. (combined with)
Proficiency Skill +15% damage versus armor only (instead of flat damage to both shields and armor) (combined with)
Damage Mod Decrease getting 12% damage from 3 of these mods instead of 24% (combined with)
Gallente Map Packs designed to be unfriendly for snipers (combined with)
No Adjustment to the Sniper Rifle in an unbelievable amount of time to keep the weapon up to date. (combined with)
Sniping in a Heavy Suit for a 10% bonus to sniper rifle damage. It feels almost forced. (combined with)
Stealth Removal of Sniping Locations without warning or patch notes (combined with)
Easymode Attack Drop Ships for high rate of fire splash damage anywhere you want it. (combined with)
Cloaks and 1500hp Heavies pick one miss a lot more than normal or waste your time chipping away (combined with)
Reduced AV Grenades in both damage + amount carried. Used to be decent drop ship defense (combined with)
Increased Drop Ship Health so much so that you can't even carry enough AV grenades to kill one! (combined with)
Fog of War /ON to no longer see what your squad sees. Waste time scanning over teammates(combined with)
Z-fighting enemies render invisible against certain surfaces, what a huge waste of time (combined with)
Removal of Mountains forcing snipers to relocate to more ground level or obvious positions. (combined with)

I can keep coming up with stuff to show you how the game has changed, and not in favor of sniping. I'm probably missing a few easy ones I could have pointed out.

TL;DR

(Sniping hasn't been touched or modified since the release of this ever evolving game, the role has gotten progressively worse over time. Developers don't dare comment on the subject. Good players should be rewarded for skill making flavor of the month classes / builds more tolerable, and the sniper more useful in planetary conquest. This is something that is a long time coming many of us feel.)

Since you put a lot of thought into this, I'll give a real response. Sniping with your squad is rewarded less that hiding on a hill and getting easy kills due to the relative safety afforded by the redline. If you want to make sniping a worthwhile role cut the optimal down to 80, the effective down to 175 and the absolute to 300. This makes the sniper rifle a "tactical marksman" role, requiring you to be a part of the fight in order to get kills.

Once the range is fixed, you can buff the damage or RoF drastically to make up for the lack of redline safety.

Tactical marksman can then be used for ranged point defense or for clearing targets on an objective while the squad moves in, giving them an actual use on the field of battle.

-snip-

I doubt you even snipe.

-snip-

^^ This whole thing alludes to quick scoping ^^ and that's complete garbage best left in Call of Duty for crappy players.

Just stop.

Red Line Snipers

1. Not combat effective (generally very low kill counts)

2. If they concern you, counter them. (ADS, Tank, Sniper, OB)

3. Most of them are bad, the best sniping locations are outside of the red line

You shouldn't get worked up defending the player base who refuses to counter snipers, or are too hapless and will consistently stand still so a sniper 500+ meters away can take an easy shot at them.

WOW! You guys are just plain SAD! I killed 30 guys last night from MCC roof. Most were 1-2 shotted. Its not CCP's fault that you cant pop someone in the head. You should NOT be able to 1 shot a 1900hp heavy. STOP TRYING! Go for the EASY prey....cloaked scouts. DOOOOOOOONG

Baal made his points without attacking you, Gitaxis. Why can't you do the same?


@Baal - I don't think an optimal of 80m is remotely reasonable. The sniper needs a lot more range than that - it's outranged by a laser rifle at that point. An optimal of 600m just encourages redline sniping but if the optimal -and- absolute were 300m that would start to force people out of the redline. At that point, you can start buffing the sniper without needing to worry about the problem of redline sniper spam.

80m is far too short though. Far, far too short.