The Assault Scrambler might be a bit, because it was buffed when it didn't need one.
Rattati even said it was fine before. Rattati wrote:...The ASCR I have been playing with to understand its flaws, and I don't get why its not used, it destroys calscouts with hipfire, it has no recoil, the best scope, the most ammo and clipsize, and heat is not really a problem. But until players start using it, we need to make it incrementally better.
Though, he states exactly why it was buffed. The ASCR was not competitive enough to be used by players regularly. Compared to the ACR and ARR, it was still too tied to the Amarr Assault to be viable on the other Amarr classes. Keeping this in mind, the ASCR should not be nerfed.
People still consider it an OP weapon along with the Scrambler Rifle. The biggest pockets of people that are dissatisfied are the Caldari Assault's because they get destroyed by the Scrambler Rifle if they even try to get anywhere close to them, and Gallente Assaults because the ASCR is basically on par with the AR and actually has a tighter hipfire spread, lower recoil and faster reload.
The Caldari Assault's simply need a better bonus. A lot of people agree that shields are simply worse than armor, though many forget that Scrambler are to Shields what Rail Rifles, HMG's and every single explosive weapon is to armor. Maybe Shields do need a buff, but we won't know how much until the Caldari Assault's get a better bonus.
Better reloading is definitely the worst bonus out of all the Assaults. All the Commandos already get better reloading. There just isn't a reason to run Caldari Assault over Caldari Commando. Here's the solution:
-change reloading to 10% less spool time on every all hybrid rail weapons
It's the perfect bonus for Caldari Assaults and will help push them closer to the action.
The Caldari Assault's actually have a decent bonus. Less recoil and dispersion are extremely useful because it makes hipfire while moving extremely accurate. Getting head shots at thirty meters with an AR and level five Gallente Assault and level V sharpshooter is very practical.
Though the AR is just very mediocre. The AR is suppose to be the best rifle for point blank firefights, but is just not. At best it's tied with every other rifle in CQC. That's not fair because every other rifle has better range than the AR's. To be fair the BAR, TAR abd BrAR are good they are just pale imitations of the ARR, Scrambler Rifle and CR. Ultimately none of the variants fulfill the role of being the best rifle in CQC which is fine because that's the job of the standard AR.
Proposed Solution: add more damage in CQC:
-0-5m: increase damage by 20%
-5-10m: increase damage by 15%
-10-15m: increase damage by 10%
-15-20m: increase damage by 5%
Some might find these values ridiculous, but the AR needs to be the scariest rifle in close quarters and currently that is far from being the case. And within 20m I don't think these values are that outrageous.