subject says it all. With the "codewish" duvolle rifle doing 52 dmg to the Allotek Bursts 33 damage, why bother even getting them? It seems like any EVE corp that wants to make sure they're on the winning side is just going to ensure their mercs are in AUR gear. I can't imagine i'm the only person that wants to avoid this Pay to Win garbage. I understand you can't really make a F2P model of this type without giving players who pay money some incentive, that's why i'd rather pay for the game itself in some fashion. Its bad enough that game play is balanced toward the team with the most ISK rather than the most skill. I can be as skilled as i want but if the other team deploys two or three top-end HAV's my team doesn't really stand much of chance.

There are TWO guns that are wrong.

Codewish AR and Broadside HMG.

EVERY SINGLE OTHER AUR WEAPON VARIANT WORKS FAIRLY. These two, AND ONLY THESE TWO, give a measurable and provable advantage over the ISK equivalents.

EVERY SINGLE OTHER AUR WEAPON VARIANT gives you the same statline as the tier above their skill prerequisites (Advanced Prereq with Proto stats), but also has the higher-tier variant's PG/CPU cost. These two, and again, ONLY THESE TWO WEAPONS, have the lower-tier PG/CPU requirements as well. If I buy any Advanced AUR Shotgun, or a non-Tac Advanced AUR Assault Rifle, I'm getting the Prototype stats with only the Advanced skill prerequisites. I'm still having to fit the weapon as a Prototype weapon, because it's still a Prototype, just modified to be easier to use. The Codewish, and the Broadside HMG, both allow you to fit extra/better modules alongside the weapon than their ISK equivalents.

The Codewish is objectively better than the equivalent weapon you can buy with ISK, and is therefore pay-to-win. The Broadside is the same, for the same reason.

I've been using the 'codewish' lately, and it feels a bit pay-to-win still. I can fit some extra damage mods on my suit because of the lower CPU cost. Although it's an indirect damage boost, it's still a damage boost other rifles just can't get.

I guess if there was a droppable rifle with equivalent stats it might even things out a bit. vOv

That bug has a huge effect on in game performance of gear and should be kept in mind when providing feedback. The best testing protocol until this bug is fixed would be to compare the weapons you use "side-by-side" without fitting any damage enhancer mods. Sadly unless everyone does this the data will still be somewhat skewed due to things seeming weaker when others are using this bug. But at least if you're not exploiting the bug in your testing you can keep the user end data pure.

0.02 ISK
Cross

ps ~ Thanks to Mobium for bringing this up.