As I'm sure many of you have noticed that quite a few people aren't too happy with the Flaylock, but I don't think there are really sure as to why. Here is what we know, the Flaylock is a burst damage weapon with AoE abilities, low clip size, reasonable reload speed, low spare ammo, bullet travel time and bullet falloff, now on paper that sounds like a pretty well balanced weapon.

But if you look pass the gun and look at the finer details of the game we can see the real balance issue, the skill tree. The slandered FL has a base damage of 218 and a splash of 195, with a radius of 1m and a reload of 2.5, now it's proto version has Dam of 239.8 and a splash of 214.5, a radius of 2m with the same reload speed as before, in my opinion, this is one of the only proto guns that is actually worth paying for. So, now that's out of the way, the problem comes from the skill that affects the FL's damage, FL proficiency.
Now their is our culprit, at level 5 it gives the FL a 15% buff to damage, which looks like 250.7 base and 224.25 splash for the slandered, while the proto looks like 275.7 and a splash of 246.6, now if we add two Complex mods and the 20% bonus from armor damage, and well it just becomes a nightmare. But the worst part of all this is, that the FL doesn't have any real drawbacks for using it, only inconveniences, I'm not sure how, but I do know FL needs weakness other than range, which is the common problem for most weapons, putting the FL "ahead of the game".

So, lets brainstorm on ideas on how to balance the FL, maybe it needs a CPU/PG requirement, maybe it needs a slower rate of fire, or maybe it needs more bullet travel time, let's figure something out?

Nerf the splash damage down to 70-80dmg (it's a sidearm not a go to gun, also the gun should not be superior to it's primary relative The Mass Driver) ROF is too fast maybe slow it down 75% or at least 60%. Put it up there with other sidearms as far as CPU/PG req. make it shoot once than reload after each shot. A combo of a few of these or all of them would work.

Nerf the splash damage down to 70-80dmg (it's a sidearm not a go to gun, also the gun should not be superior to it's primary relative The Mass Driver) ROF is too fast maybe slow it down 75% or at least 60%. Put it up there with other sidearms as far as CPU/PG req. make it shoot once than reload after each shot. A combo of a few of these or all of them would work.

Nerf the splash damage down to 70-80dmg (it's a sidearm not a go to gun, also the gun should not be superior to it's primary relative The Mass Driver) ROF is too fast maybe slow it down 75% or at least 60%. Put it up there with other sidearms as far as CPU/PG req. make it shoot once than reload after each shot. A combo of a few of these or all of them would work.

I'm sorry, I explained it wrong, the proficiency isn't the problem, it's how damage stacking works with the FL so well that's the problem, proficiency is only a part of it, the FL's damage is just too good for the amount of damage without damage buffs from mods/skills. Changing OP into splash damage sound like a pretty cool idea, but I'm not too on the reduced radius though, and by that, I mean how much of an impact it would have on the effectiveness of the FL it would have, the last thing I would like to see is, it not being effective in it area of expertise.

the increasing splash is EXACTLY the reason we are here now.

Either an 80% reduction in splash damage, or a mild reduction in splash radius will be necessary to bring this down from god status.

I vote for rewarding player skill myself.

You always here the same things over and over with this gun.

std sucks balls, adv is pretty balanced, and pro is lolz.

what changes between the tiers?

oh yeah.. splash radius.

You shouldn't be specing all out into Sidearms.

You should really at least look at the stats before making random statements that are wrong

I'm tired if seeing the same threads 10 times a day :/

Shield up!!!

Comon', now you're surely joking!

Removing 80% of splash damage on a gun that makes it very hard to get direct hits is RIDICULOUS!!

Direct DPS is 239.8
Splash is 214.5

Hmm....let me guess..you use a flaylock and are going around taking issue with nerfing it to hell because you rely on it.
Please don't be a **** and challenge my assertions solely because you're worried CCP will nerf your crutch.

people, if we cannot agree to what a decent nerf should be we need something that hasn't been brought up before.

I suggest the flaylocks have a 2 second delay before they blow up. this way they have to be used in certain situations and not just be the be all end all to sidearms.

This will prevent people from spamming it when you run up on them in 1v1, this will make them actually use a main weapon instead of using dual flaylocks.

I have spoken.

Says who? If you're willing to deal with the trade offs, why shouldn't you be allowed to only spec into sidearms? You get lesser range, smaller clip size, smaller total ammo, bullet travel time, arcs, etc...every sidearm has disadvantages.

In EVE nothing's stopping me from fitting cruise sized guns on my BS if I want to, it adds flexibility and variety to the game. In fact, one of my favorite setup is a BS with cruiser blasters (dual repper/injector domi of doom). There too I accept certain disadvantages in return for doing that.

Actually R'adeh, its direct damage or spalsh damage, not both. That's twice you've been wrong...

Maybe its you who should check your info

SIDEARMS should not be reliable killing weapons. They wouldn't be SIDEARMS they would be PRIMARY. You are using a SIDEARM as a PRIMARY! Should not be that effective to pull that off. Sidearm is supposed to be last resort. Primary bullets run out you use. Flaylock has more than enough to outshine most if not ALL primary weapons. It needs to be broke, the people that depend on it.. GET GOOD.

Says who? If you're willing to deal with the trade offs, why shouldn't you be allowed to only spec into sidearms? You get lesser range, smaller clip size, smaller total ammo, bullet travel time, arcs, etc...every sidearm has disadvantages.

In EVE nothing's stopping me from fitting cruise sized guns on my BS if I want to, it adds flexibility and variety to the game. In fact, one of my favorite setup is a BS with cruiser blasters (dual repper/injector domi of doom). There too I accept certain disadvantages in return for doing that.

And just so we're all clear. If you got what you wanted by limiting Logis to sidearms, guess what the majority of us would be using.

SIDEARMS should not be reliable killing weapons. They wouldn't be SIDEARMS they would be PRIMARY. You are using a SIDEARM as a PRIMARY! Should not be that effective to pull that off. Sidearm is supposed to be last resort. Primary bullets run out you use. Flaylock has more than enough to outshine most if not ALL primary weapons. It needs to be broke, the people that depend on it.. GET GOOD.

Right...so if you're right, OHKs are impossible with the flaylock

Actually R'adeh, its direct damage or spalsh damage, not both. That's twice you've been wrong...

Maybe its you who should check your info

Well from what I've gathered, the best solution I've found from other peoples feedback is to make it slower and reduce it's splash damage. But I'm not sure if that would fix the "be all, end all" sidearm problem.

Std flux grenade, there's my argument.

With 2 complex damage mods??