P.P.S Shotguns and Burst HMG are OP

Shotguns also have the issue of the basic being just as useful as the proto... So everyone can use the cheap stuff to farm easily in pubs & keep their costs low... Seen people running basic shotguns on proto suits...

Headshots, which aren't exactly hard at shotgun range, even though most couldn't hit a barn door if it was right infront of them... You can also 1 shot a lot of squishier suits with it.

P.P.S Shotguns and Burst HMG are OP

Umm people who complain about the shotgun are generally not very good players...its a very easy weapon to counter, considering it doesn't shoot past 10 meters, and is about as effective as an ACR or duvolle in CQC.

The burst HMG, however....

Rattati PLEASE don't look at cloaking as sacrosanct. It was an interesting experiment, but we were enjoying Dust before it came along. It breaks the game too much and requires everyone to adapt to it--the definition of imbalance. Would a petition be useful?

TBH the problem is cloaking. It's fun for scouts. For everyone else theres no game plan for it. I can be doing everything right and get shot in the back, try to fight back, get shot again and die. The only thing for it is to stick in tight groups. Grouping is good in general but to have no freedom to move around on your own because you KNOW you'll be shot in the back severely limits players' behaviors. Were all just herding around in little groups for safety. Cloak has made Dust more predictable and frustrating for most of the players.

Remove cloaking and buff scouts in other ways. More speed and base HP, and interesting racial bonuses to replace the cloak bonus. Speed, scanning, scout bonuses, and the extra equipment slot are more than enough to make scouts stand apart from assaults.

Rattati PLEASE don't look at cloaking as sacrosanct. It was an interesting experiment, but we were enjoying Dust before it came along. It breaks the game too much and requires everyone to adapt to it--the definition of imbalance. Would a petition be useful?

As a shotty scout myself, I'm a little biased toward the cloak, but in real honesty we should really consider a longer decloak to weapon swap delay before considering removing the cloak.

Is it possible to remove R2 functionality (the weapon switch button) while the cloak is active? This would mean the player must tap R1 in order to regain use of the weapon and weapon switch mechanic.

Also, we can't safely blame the current "herding" behavior on cloak or scouts.
There was far less herding and far more cloaking in 1.8 and 1.8A than now.
The blobs began in earnest 1.8B.

Yeah because players have wisened up by now. 1.8 and 1.8A was a holocaust of assassination.

Actually now that you mention it that's a better idea than just removing cloak. Give it a 6/5/4 second delay and a slightly more noticeable decloaking sound. Balance that with lower fitting costs and more dampening (5/10/15)

This would make cloaking a tool for traversing the map in secret, gathering intel, and getting into position for a sneak attack, but would make more difficult for scouts the sudden death strikes against players on the fringe of groups or on their own. They could still sneak up behind you but there's more of a chance your squad mate could alert you or that you would turn and have a chance to respond before 3/4 of your HP is gone.

Actually now that you mention it that's a better idea than just removing cloak. Give it a 6/5/4 second delay and a slightly more noticeable decloaking sound. Balance that with lower fitting costs and more dampening (5/10/15)

This would make cloaking a tool for traversing the map in secret, gathering intel, and getting into position for a sneak attack, but would make more difficult for scouts the sudden death strikes against players on the fringe of groups or on their own. They could still sneak up behind you but there's more of a chance your squad mate could alert you or that you would turn and have a chance to respond before 3/4 of your HP is gone.

This is kind of an odd thought, but it came to mind regardless when you mentioned deactivation delay. With times like that you could probably fit in the system hacking animation--which gave me the idea that codebreaker modules would function as system processing modules that would let you decloak faster (hacking your dropsuit, or solving system permutations from keeping your suit from frying ) Minmatar hack speed role bonuses would apply here meaning they are able to decloak the fastest of the scouts if they have the proper codebreaker modules equipped. Yes, this is kind of zany.

The thing that would have to be addressed is what is they delay for cloak naturally running out (not manually deactivating. I would certainly suggest a very shorter time as your not stun locked into the animation. Although savvy player could make use of this shorter decloak time for a quicker weapon draw.

@843-Vika


The delay I am talking about applies to all scouts. What I am spit balling is the idea that Min scouts would be able manually decloak the fastest. I apologize if that didn't make sense in my post.

P.P.S Shotguns and Burst HMG are OP

Shotguns also have the issue of the basic being just as useful as the proto... So everyone can use the cheap stuff to farm easily in pubs & keep their costs low... Seen people running basic shotguns on proto suits... they still 2 shot a heavy... Perhaps ammo cap should increase between basic - proto.

Wow a dev has actually said something i agree with. The funny thing is that i am a burst hmg user. Having a blast right now with 3 damage mods prof 5 and a burst hmg mowing over even most other sentinels in my way. I somewhat feel bad.. Right up till some scout decloaks behind me and firest off 3 rounds into my head before i can even turn around. Right up till then though i feel a little bad.

1. Ammunition is low enough as is. Perhaps a pellet increase upon tier, after reducing the basic varient's first and go up from there? If not, then drastic increases in damage could be implemented, after the basic varient has it's reduced to a margin, making advanced and prototype varients significantly more powerful and worthwhile than the former,and again, go up from there.

2. Reduced and then increased upon tier pellets could be interesting, but my concern with that it could possibly screw around with hit detection and performance, even though it doesn't have hit detection issues currently (for me anyway), it's just that the reticule completely lies to you, implying that it's suppose to spread, but in actuality it's dead frickin' center, like the Hmg use to be, and is likely the same issue with the accuracy simply being too accurate. The accuracy could be reduced by about 0.10, like the Hmg was to actually give it spread, which increased its performance very significantly (I believe that was the amount anyway, 0.10, don't take my word for it).

3. You won't two shot a severely tanked heavy btw (unless their caldari, poor bastards...), which is likely at least or over 1400ehp with 2 shots from a basic shotgun, but it probably would need 3-5 shots in total to do so. That's the only time when an advanced or prototype shotgun comes in handy, otherwise, having a standard shotgun allows you to improve upon your fitting with the more room, and depending on their fit, makes them immensely more dangerous.

4. The breach is amazing, but having only the two shots hinders the user greatly. Even if you're sacrificing your combat abilities for increased fire power, it really puts you on the spot, and can easily get you killed in the most inopportune of situations. I think having 4 shots would be generous, but a minimum of 3 would nice, and likely increase its use a bit.

TBH the problem is cloaking. It's fun for scouts. For everyone else theres no game plan for it. I can be doing everything right and get shot in the back, try to fight back, get shot again and die. The only thing for it is to stick in tight groups. Grouping is good in general but to have no freedom to move around on your own because you KNOW you'll be shot in the back severely limits players' behaviors. Were all just herding around in little groups for safety. Cloak has made Dust more predictable and frustrating for most of the players.

Remove cloaking and buff scouts in other ways. More speed and base HP, and interesting racial bonuses to replace the cloak bonus. Speed, scanning, scout bonuses, and the extra equipment slot are more than enough to make scouts stand apart from assaults.

Rattati PLEASE don't look at cloaking as sacrosanct. It was an interesting experiment, but we were enjoying Dust before it came along. It breaks the game too much and requires everyone to adapt to it--the definition of imbalance. Would a petition be useful?

Actually now that you mention it that's a better idea than just removing cloak. Give it a 6/5/4 second delay and a slightly more noticeable decloaking sound. Balance that with lower fitting costs and more dampening (5/10/15)

This would make cloaking a tool for traversing the map in secret, gathering intel, and getting into position for a sneak attack, but would make more difficult for scouts the sudden death strikes against players on the fringe of groups or on their own. They could still sneak up behind you but there's more of a chance your squad mate could alert you or that you would turn and have a chance to respond before 3/4 of your HP is gone.

@843-Vika


The delay I am talking about applies to all scouts. What I am spit balling is the idea that Min scouts would be able manually decloak the fastest. I apologize if that didn't make sense in my post.

You're shitting us, right?

The Shotgun is a tool for pubs. It can't compete against dropsuits with enough HP to tank 2 shots.

You're shitting me right?

Shotgun scouts pull numbers better than burst HMG's in PC's.

But it's not the shotty, it's the cloak.

If it's the cloak then AR scouts should be doing the same. It's the ability to use a 1-2 hit kill weapon straight out of cloak. If it was only the cloak then you would have the same problem with all the weapons. If they nerf the shotgun the problem will be with NK now that there use is on the rise and is also a 1-2 hit kill weapon. Funny you don't see no post about cloaked scouts and AR's

Apples and Oranges.

Unless you're shooting a Scout, killing from behind takes awhile with the AR. When hit, targets have ample time to run or rotate and return fire. Targets have less time to respond when hit in the back with a Shotgun, which is news well-received for the 300HP Scout pulling the trigger.

That said, overperformance is overperformance. I'm in agreement with Zatara that cloak is playing a bigger part in shotgun performance than the shotgun itself; performance statistics -- should they exist -- will likely point to poor shotgun performance prior 1.8.

If we were somehow able to implement a very brief delay between decloak and attack, I suspect we'd see an immediate decline in shotgun usage, performance and complaints. And by "brief" I mean one second ... not six seconds (facepalm).

I use a needle in PC too, but only the 100% ones.

But when a person is involved in PC and takes it serious it's not FOTM, it's a shift in meta, there is a difference. A lot of the things considered FOTM in pubs don't translate to PC very well. It's another issue in my opinion with CCP being overly concerned about solo players in pubs when balancing.