So Tacs at one point in time used to be OP if anyone remembers. Then they received the magical unknown called recoil. Then the OPness went away. Now a couple of things happened in Uprising that doubled the effectiveness of tacs. First off sharpshooter was removed. Now weapons actually fit their range profiles. Prior a normal assault rifle with sharpshooter easily made the Tac obsolete due to the normal Assault rifle having relatively the same range, and had little kick and so nobody used the Tac, but just normal AR's at range. in Uprising now Tacs are necessarily due to their extended range which is not extendable by skills. Now the Tac is useful. That is the first thing that was a bonus for the tac, and IMO was enough to make it a viable weapon.

The second thing that happened is the damage bonus. It makes sense that if it was unusable in last build that it needs a damage buff to make it usable. However due to the range actually mattering the damage buff became too much, and instead of being just a viable weapon, it is now borderline OP to put it very nicely. Not to mention the fire rate.

Solutions.

1 Nerf the range. Stupid that is what makes the weapon worth it

2 Nerf the damage. obviously this is what i think would work

3 Nerf the fire rate. Not bad but it still has ridiculous stopping power

4 Add more recoil. This would just make the weapon a CQC hip fire weapon then. Not the point of the weapon

Anyway a combo of 2 and 3 are probably a good route to go. What does you guys think?

I've never been quiet on my dislike of the Tac AR, but it fills a niche that many people love - the marksman. It's no sniper rifle, but it's able to take out reds at a great distance. The problem with the Tac AR is that it is still freaking amazing at CQC, and any failings that it might have are easily covered by making another fit with the same tier of the AR as it is governed by the exact same skill.

There is no trade off to skilling up the AR. You'll have a guaranteed great weapon at all ranges for the price of one skill. No other weapon is able to do that, and makes choices in what you want to do that much more limited.

This problem is then compounded by the Gallente Assault suit, which lets you fit high tier weapons without sacrificing any tank or damage output. This suit also is an armor tanker which is strong against lasers, the only weapon that can compete with the Tac AR for dealing damage at that range.

This puts all those small little advantages in the hands of the Tac AR, coming together to form the new OP (I hate that term too. please keep reading) weapon.

There does need to be a weapon to fill that role, It just shouldn't be in that skill tree.

My recommended course of action would be just to take the Tac AR out of the game. No nerfs to the point of being unplayable, just freaking nuke it and replace it with a new sniper rifle variant with a 25 round magazine and a decent rate of fire while extending the range slightly on the Gallente AR, ideally it's optimal should end where the LR starts. (possibly meaning bringing the LR's optimal in a little bit. but that's another thread)

This would accomplish a few things, namely it would give sniper rifle users the role of the designated marksman again. I can count on one hand how many times I've been shot by a sniper, let alone killed this build. Throw them a bone FFS. Less weapon diversity is the last thing this game needs.

secondly, it would balance out the roles of the various suits a little better. a low capacity weapon would put the Caldari assault in the running for owning the mid-long range game again with the suit specialty (reload bonus, for the uninformed), while letting the laser keep up with that role as it would be able to burn through Caldari shields (though the new variant would outrange the LR by a 10-20 meters), letting the designated marksman decide whether or not to close in and have a weapon that is still formidable in cqc though it doesn't fill that role as well as the AR or HMG.

As far as skill bonuses go, the new variant would still get helped by the sniper rifle op bonus of reduced sway as the rail rifle would have have to get settled in for a moment to balance having a longer range.

I'll just leave this here:
(please direct all +1's to Talos Alomar)

It used to be single shot, is it not anymore? I just assumed everybody using it was cheating with a modded controller

I think the Tac AR is salvageable, so this is where our ideas differ. It is not inherently a bad weapon and it just needs to be tweaked, not nuked.

The Gallente suit tac combo beating lazer rifles is a good example of a suit counter. If the gallente AR tac did not exist what beyond snipers and other lazer rifles could counter it? Nothing. That is good game building to counter a dominating suit.

However the problem with the tac is that they can put out more effective damage than vehicle turrets. The problem is not that they counter lazers with a great fit, but that they counter and kill EVERYTHING.

So somebody can hit the fire button 10x a second while aiming?

I'd give money to see that.

Seriously.

lower the fire rate but keep the range and damage,problem solved

Well...

The trade off on the TAC AR variant is wrong. That's the problem.
It should trade damage for range, the same way the Breach AR trades RoF for damage. Me and some friends were actually doing the math. It's possible to achieve around 140 damage with the TAC AR. That's almost a TAC Sniper damage. It's just stupid to be able to deal that much damage with an AR.

The weapon should get a major damage reduction, and keep it's range. I would suggest around 50 base damage. That would make it equal to the Breach AR, but the difference is the range. That would make the weapon more of a playstyle choice.

The weapon as it is now, destroys any chance to fight back, you can't do anything to kill someone with a TAC AR, because you have no range with a AR and the LR is too weak to counter de TAC AR. Your only chance would be, getting a sniper rifle. lol

Anyone that have fought in a battle against an enemy team where half it's members were using TAC Duv ARs will understand exactly what I'm talking about here.

tl:dr
TAC AR range is enough to be a viable weapon, remove the high damage from it. Make it around 50 base damage.

Live long and prosper.
Llan Heindell.

Well...

The trade off on the TAC AR variant is wrong. That's the problem.
It should trade damage for range, the same way the Breach AR trades RoF for damage. Me and some friends were actually doing the math. It's possible to achieve around 140 damage with the TAC AR. That's almost a TAC Sniper damage. It's just stupid to be able to deal that much damage with an AR.

The weapon should get a major damage reduction, and keep it's range. I would suggest around 50 base damage. That would make it equal to the Breach AR, but the difference is the range. That would make the weapon more of a playstyle choice.

The weapon as it is now, destroys any chance to fight back, you can't do anything to kill someone with a TAC AR, because you have no range with a AR and the LR is too weak to counter de TAC AR. Your only chance would be, getting a sniper rifle. lol

Anyone that have fought in a battle against an enemy team where half it's members were using TAC Duv ARs will understand exactly what I'm talking about here.

tl:dr
TAC AR range is enough to be a viable weapon, remove the high damage from it. Make it around 50 base damage.

Live long and prosper.
Llan Heindell.

You can easily click 10x a second with a mouse, which is what most people are using to achieve that kind of fire rate, not modded controllers.

Nerfing damage and leaving the recoil as is will kill its ability at range, not do much for it in CQC.

Lowering the RoF is the best way to help lower is CQC efficacy while still making it viable at range.

Increasing the range of ALL weapons (tac included) is desperately needed. Once the range of all weapons is around 15-20% more than it is now, the TAC will not be as OP as it looks, as most other guns will be better suited for the ideal 80m engagement range in this game and at 100-120m the TAC will be impossible to spam and hit its target.

The TAC is OP at range because every other weapon in this game is falling short of the ideal engagement range in this game of around 80m or so, where the TAC is currently shining.

Its pwning in CQC cause its fire rate is too high.

The raw damage will actually need to stay really high if its going to be worth a damn at 100m, otherwise it will end up just like it was in chromosome, a sad joke. It does need a DPS reduction, but by reducing the 'per second' part, and not the 'damage'.

This is just coming from someone who really wants the tac to be viable once they've fixed ranges.

Well...

The trade off on the TAC AR variant is wrong. That's the problem.
It should trade damage for range, the same way the Breach AR trades RoF for damage. Me and some friends were actually doing the math. It's possible to achieve around 140 damage with the TAC AR. That's almost a TAC Sniper damage. It's just stupid to be able to deal that much damage with an AR.

The weapon should get a major damage reduction, and keep it's range. I would suggest around 50 base damage. That would make it equal to the Breach AR, but the difference is the range. That would make the weapon more of a playstyle choice.

The weapon as it is now, destroys any chance to fight back, you can't do anything to kill someone with a TAC AR, because you have no range with a AR and the LR is too weak to counter de TAC AR. Your only chance would be, getting a sniper rifle. lol

Anyone that have fought in a battle against an enemy team where half it's members were using TAC Duv ARs will understand exactly what I'm talking about here.

tl:dr
TAC AR range is enough to be a viable weapon, remove the high damage from it. Make it around 50 base damage.

Live long and prosper.
Llan Heindell.

[quote=Llan Heindell]Well...

The only way to crank out 140 would be to fill all 5 caladari high slots with dmg modifiers. And even then I think you forgot to incorporate the deminishing returns on dmg modifiers. So I must respectfully say you don't know what your talking about.

use this... http://dust514.wikia.com/wiki/Stacking_Penalty

You can with the mouse.