I hear plenty of QQ for and against them, mostly against. But why?
It's usually because you're going 10-0 and then out of nowehere. "XXX NT-511 Sniper Rifle You" on the killfeed.
And if there's one thing we hate with a passion more than shotguns and lampposts, its pussies hiding in the hills relaxing and picking people off while drinking their coffee. Gotta hate them cowards. Face us on the ground like a man and settle this! Have at ya!
But wait! He doesn't want to why so?

That is because of current mechanics in-game. As-is, when you zoom in you have initial sway that will kick like a mule in any random direction (used to be fixed direction). You never actually zoom into the exact spot you did. Hooray, no quick scoping!
Oh wait, it looks like it only settles if you stay rock still, otherwise you you will aim like a drunk man.
But there's more! If you crouch onto your knees, you settle sway even more. Fair enough, rests those arms. Oh wait I have sniper operation 5....WHAT NO SWAY THIS IS NOT LEGIT. Must...resist...exploiting...game mechanics...
Basically by sitting in the hills with their George Foreman grill they actually are using the sniping mechanics properly, They are doing it right. But isn't that a little unfair, being forced to camp and munch bacon while picking people from silly distances? I mean, they cant even get you unless they countersnipe.
My point is, CCP has made it so with snipers that Camping >>>>> moving with team. if you grt pissed off for it, don't blame them, the game forces them to if they want to survive.
What we should be doing is suggesting how mechanics should be changed such that snipers will camp less, yet not make them useless over AR's.
My personal suggestion is increase recovery time/recoil but decrease sway while moving.
Post away down here.

I don't understand why there's so much whine about snipers. Seriously, harden up. Any sniper worth his kit can take out snipers on the opposing team, and when there are no snipers on the opposing team they have free reign to pick off players on the battlefield. This is entirely reasonable and how the mechanic was intended. This is the role of a sniper; to stay in a relatively safe position far away from the action and provide support for their team.

Snipers are very easily countered by anybody who knows what they're doing, and in fact in more recent times its becoming increasingly rare to see a sniper get the ~20-25 kills which was more common only a month ago. If you ask me, it's more efficient to get into a type 2 assault suit with a gek and an armour rep and go 40-10 than it is to snipe so for the love of god stop crying nerf and get a grip. When I snipe, I spend most of my time killing other snipers so that I can avoid being killed.

Red line sniping however, is a seperate issue. The red line should be altered so that there are no effective vantage points to encourage this sort of play and so that other classes do pose some modicum of threat. On the flip side though, I think that there should be more vantage points incorporated into the maps. Currently, there are only 3-4 really good spots on each map (sometimes less), making finding snipers a lot less of a challenge than what it could be.

lol, you mean the guy thats in the frontlines right? flux nading heavies so maybe he can take him out before his squad notices all while dodging perma steady scope sniper fire? that guy right?

you RARELY see an AR player going 40 and anything.

What's the whining about snipers?...

I barely ever seem them these days, much more prevalent in early beta and since open I've had perhaps 3 games where there was any noticeable presence.

I disagree, people care about realism. If they didn't there wouldn't be anyone yelling something is OP.

You claim that to be a better sniper, the sniper needs to be more engaged in the combat by being closer to the action, I disagree.....

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_MK4SEoBFXk

I have seen a LOT of good ideas in this thread

1. bullet drop.
duh ~

(We don't fire bullets, we fire kinetically charged flechettes. Learn the difference)

2. more focus on Intel gathering.
well ye but if we can see the target shouldn't we just shoot them ?
or act as a area denial system and any enemy who wants to poke there head out of specific bits of cover do so
at there own risk

(We already have this, it's called scan profiles)

3. semi close combat sniping
well this would be good for medium to long ranged engagements and allow people who don't attempt to flank there enemy and just take pot shots at them to learn a good lesson

(Tactical sniper rifle)

People do not care about realism. Nobody is asking for CCP to include the mercs taking a coffee break, or going to the bathroom before getting in their dropsuit, or taking a nap because they've just done 10 missions in a row. Realism doesn't matter. What matters is that the game is fun. People don't like things being imbalanced because it isn't fun. Not because, in fact, a forge gun in real life is supposed to do X and Y, but CCP only has it doing X. The only thing that matters is that Dust is a good, fun game.

And I did not claim that to be a "better sniper" the sniper needs to be closer to the action. I said that making sniper take skill would encourage snipers to get more involved in the action, because shooting from 500 m away from atop a mountain would get fewer kills due to hitting small, distant, moving targets would be much more difficult. It has nothing to do with the sniper himself being better. Instead, it has to do with improving Dust by making snipers an actual part of the game, rather than just non-contributors around the periphery.

And I didn't watch your video, as I assume it's dumb real world tryhard sniper nonsense that has nothing to do with video games.

We have a RAILGUN sniper rifles in Dust 514, that shoots bullets (charges) with 2500m\sec velocity... No bullet drop in current maps size. & max distance we can hit something, is like MCC from 750m. It's instahit system at where your dot is... for now.

Would like to see some bullet drop in the game.