Hi guys,

We've been monitoring the TAR since the change. So far it is still one of the most used weapons with one of the highest kill counts. However it's no longer in a class of its own which is a good thing. We will keep an eye on it to see how things develop.

Thanks for the continued feedback!

CCP Wolfman

Hi guys,

We've been monitoring the TAR since the change. So far it is still one of the most used weapons with one of the highest kill counts. However it's no longer in a class of its own which is a good thing. We will keep an eye on it to see how things develop.

Thanks for the continued feedback!

CCP Wolfman

Hi guys,

We've been monitoring the TAR since the change. So far it is still one of the most used weapons with one of the highest kill counts. However it's no longer in a class of its own which is a good thing. We will keep an eye on it to see how things develop.

Thanks for the continued feedback!

CCP Wolfman

We've been monitoring the TAR since the change. So far it is still one of the most used weapons with one of the highest kill counts.

Thanks Wolfman. Appreciate your communicating what's going on to us all, it really does make a difference.

Just my $0.02 on the Duvolle TAR. I'm not sure if it's intentional or not, but I think DTAR has been relegated to PC battles only. The reason being I could never justify spending 4x the ISK for a proto variant that has only a very slight differentiation from advanced variant. Might be worth re-examining and perhaps upping the magazine size slightly (20+) to give people a more visible value proposition when compared to GLU-5.

id like to know why ANYONE would take a Breach AR over the current Tac

the Tac has just under 50% more damage twice the range and the same rate of fire (the breach is 400RPM just like the Tac)

I disagree on your Duvolle TAR comment. Increasing the clip size was always a bad thing for the weapon scaling - No other weapon, to my knowledge, received a higher clip size than the previous tier. It widens the gulf between proto and advanced gear too much.

No one is saying the TAR was fine as it was.... point of fact, it wasn't.

People were happily using the GEK and regular Duvolle in Chromosome, but all of a sudden, switched to TAC when Uprising launched.

Why?

Shall I tell you why? Seeing as you have already admitted to not using a TAC AR before uprising. *rollseyes*

In Chromosome the TAC AR had an enormous amount of recoil making the gun practically useless. Recoil was added as a fix (for the same issues encountered in Uprising - modded controller abuse etc.)

I'm finding the TAC now to be a useful weapon in the right circumstances, pick your targets well and work with a team..

Full disclosure up front - I am/was a TAC user, but unlike most, I agree that a nerf was needed. That being said, the gun was rendered instantly unplayable, as the nerfing went too far, and in the wrong direction.

So... 3 main things changed.... Clip Size, Rate of Fire, Hip Fire Spread.
Damage, recoil and range were unchanged.

Logically, it makes no sense to put the hip fire spread anywhere below that of an automatic AR. Automatic ARs have recoil and such, whereas the TAC is theoretically a single shot and therefore has less recoil. Also, as the TAC has a longer range, the angular deviation will only increase over distance. The fire will look like a cone... what may be a 1m wide cone 10m from the target will be a 1.2m cone 20m from the target, etc. Range naturally amplifies any deviation, so logically dropping accuracy below that of a regular AR (auto) is just silly.

Clip size.... 100% agree. Way too much damage available in that gun before a reload was needed.

Rate of Fire - Agree somewhat. My mouse finger allowed me to get way too many rounds per second, but a hard cap at 400 seems a bit low.


I was an AR user before, in Chromosome, but never picked up a TAC until Uprising. Why, you ask? Well, the answer is simple: range. The changes to sharpshooter meant that i was putting my sights over someone, but inflicting no damage to the range hard cap. It doesn't take people very long to realize that keeping range is key, and so people switched to the TAC to keep their RANGE. The Damage that people did was a nice bonus, but honestly secondary to keeping their Chromosome-level range.

EVE actually gives us a good balance example here... Javelin and Spike, two rail-gun ammos that fill two different needs.

Javelin - Higher damage shells, but much shorter range (-75% range reduction)
Spike - Lower damage shells, greatly expanded range (80% range bonus)

So... following this template, the automatic ARs, that have shorter range, should do more damage. Longer range TAC ARs should do less damage.

DPS is simply a product of RoF and raw damage scores. You can increase or decrease one stat to completely change the feel of the weapon. And unless you want to work tracking into the calculation (as there is with turrets in EVE), accuracy (i.e. hipfire spread) should remain constant.

So... here is my feedback following the TAC changes:

1 - Keep the clip size where it is for the Duvolle... but slightly higher (perhaps 20, or 22) for the GLU. It is a lower damage gun, and should therefore have more rounds.

2 - Drop the damage on TACs across the board - in the mid-70s is too high.... range should be mid 50s.... so drop a full 20 points per round. There should also be a larger gradient between the weapons... GLU should have 2-4 damage points less than the Duvolle, but have a couple extra rounds in the magazine. Duvolle should have higher damage, but fewer rounds.

3 - At the very least, return hip-fire accuracy to the same level as other ARs. Perhaps play with the accuracy of the various tiers.... GLU slightly more accurate, less damage. Duvolle less accurate, more damage.

4 - Rate of fire - Higher than the current 400, but less than the Breach's ~540. Perhaps a flat 500, hard capped to get rid of the "modded controllers", or people like me who use KB/M

Based on the above, the guns could look like this:

GLU
Damage - 54
Clip Size - 21
RoF - 510
Accuracy - 58

Duvolle
Damage - 58
Clip Size - 18
RoF - 510
Accuracy - 56.5


Anyway, that's my feedback. I'll be using either the Breach or the GEK in the mean time, but I do have to say... how you could nerf the crap out of the TAC but leave the scramblers alone is beyond me.

Also... you want game-breaking? How about the free murder taxis driving around? Where's the fix for that?

Anyway, that's my feedback. I'll be using either the Breach or the GEK in the mean time, but I do have to say... how you could nerf the crap out of the TAC but leave the scramblers alone is beyond me.

Hi guys,

We've been monitoring the TAR since the change. So far it is still one of the most used weapons with one of the highest kill counts. However it's no longer in a class of its own which is a good thing. We will keep an eye on it to see how things develop.

Thanks for the continued feedback!

CCP Wolfman

Also, what's to stop us from increasing clip size in the Duvolle regular to 72? To increase the reward over using a Gek?

18 is a good clip size for both TARs. If you conserve your shots and aim, you will put down your targets just fine.

Like I've said before... a fix for the TAR would have been to increase the range on the other ARs.

Before we change any AR-class weapon (this includes the Scrambler Rifles) CCP really needs to get us these other two racial AR types. Otherwise we are either setting up for nerfs later or completely speculating and probably resulting in the same thing.

All the other weapons have different variants for different uses... except the lolBreach for most of them. Why not the AR?

It's not having any diversity that's the issue is having so much diversity in a weapon line so adaptable.
There is no other weapon type (in my experience which includes all weapons save the HMG and Scram) with so much internal diversity. Compare the Freedom MD to the Boundless MD, they function on essentially the same baseline, much more so than a burst AR compared with a Tac AR. The LR has even less diversity in function than the MD, the sidearms are all pretty much one trick ponies (tho they're sidearms so that may be fine) the shotgun has a very specific engagement profile etc.

Under Chrome this was somewhat less problematic as the Light Weapon skills applied to everything so a Merc could invest minimally into several weapon lines and still have high level function by maxing the LW skills. Under Uprising with the newly split skills this is no longer the case and the tactical implications are significant. You now have the most general and adaptable weapon on the field also part of the most diverse and adaptable light weapon group in the game thus pushing the comparative value of SP invested into the AR line beyond that of the other LW types. Which is pretty much the definition of imbalance.

So far the only two remedies I've seen for this are either to divide the AR line into smaller sub groups or to increase the breadth of types/adaptability offered within the other lines. I'm honestly not sure I'm satisfied with either as a solution but regardless the issue still bears discussion.

0.02 ISK
Cross

I was putting numbers up to highlight true variation between guns. Better at some points, but trade-offs. Naturally, my numbers may not be the best suggestion in the world, but they were just there to illustrate a point.

The basic argument against the TAC was "I die too fast against TAC users".

If you die too quick, the natural fix is to decrease the damage you take... hence the DPS of the thing shooting you. Either drop the damage, or drop the ROF. Clip size is helpful, too, because reload times reduce damage over time (though over a longer term).

Proto gun - higher damage, but balanced by less accuracy and fewer rounds in the clip.
Adv gun - lower damage, but slightly more accurate, couple of extra rounds in the clip.

All the other weapons have different variants for different uses... except the lolBreach for most of them. Why not the AR?

The same could be said about all future content so it's not really practical advice.

That's the issue, the AR variants are all placeholders for the other racial weapons. That's why there's so much versatility in one weapon class.