How Beneficial is No Bullet Drop?

This is for inquiry and discussion only, this is not a call for game changes.

I often see the VS's lack of bullet drop quoted as one of the advantages that the Vanu have, however I wondered to myself if it is really that much of a benefit, or even if it could possibly be a disadvantage, doing more harm than good.
To determine whether or not the lack of bullet drop is helpful or harmful, I will compare the acceptable vertical angles that you can shoot at and still hit your target at five different ranges: 50m, 100m, 250m, 500m, and 1000m, just for fun.

Here are the results. The x axis of the graph is meters in the horizontal direction, the y axis of the graph is meters in the vertical direction. The purple line represents a bullet with no bullet drop, the black line represents a bullet with bullet drop. This assumes the player shooting is 2m tall, and that he is shooting at another 2m tall player. For all graphs, I assumed that the muzzle velocity was 450 m/s.

50m:


In this graph the two lines are almost identical. The Equations tell us that to hit the enemy with bullet drop you must shoot between -2.22 degrees from the horizontal, to 0.069 degrees from the horizontal, a total angle of 2.29 degrees. Without bullet drop you must shoot between -2.29 degrees from the horizontal, to 0 degrees from the horizontal, a total angle of 2.29 degrees. For 50m, there is virtually no difference in the total angle in which you can shoot, and only a minor difference in the starting angles.

100m:


It is now possible to see the slight difference between the two lines. With bullet drop, you must shoot between -1.007 degrees from the horizontal, to 0.139 degrees from the horizontal, a total angle of 1.146 degrees. Without bullet drop, you must shoot between -1.146 degrees from the horizontal, and 0 degrees from the horizontal, a total angle of 1.146 degrees. Once again, regardless of bullet drop or no bullet drop, the total acceptable angle in which you can shoot and still hit your enemy is the exact same. The only difference between bullet drop and no bullet drop is the range of the acceptable angles.

250m:



Now the difference between the two is very clear. With bullet drop you must shoot between -0.111 degrees from the horizontal, and 0.347 degrees from the horizontal, a total angle of 0.458 degrees. Without bullet drop you must shoot between -0.458 degrees from the horizontal, and 0 degrees from the horizontal, a total angle of 0.458 degrees. For the third time, the total angles of both are the exact same, the only difference is the range of degrees.

500m:



Look at those arches! At this distance you're long range sniping. With bullet drop you must shoot between 0.465 degrees from the horizontal, and 0.694 degrees from the horizontal, a total angle of 0.229 degrees. Without bullet drop you must shoot between -0.229 degrees from the horizontal, and 0 degrees from the horizontal, a total angle of 0.229 degrees. It is clear by now that the total angle in which you can shoot will always be the same no matter if you have bullet drop or not.

1000m:



At this point I think you get it already. With bullet drop you must aim between 1.273 degrees from the horizontal and 1.388 degrees, a total angle of 0.115 degrees. Without bullet drop you must aim between -0.115 degrees from the horizontal and 0 degrees from the horizontal, a total angle of 0.115 degrees. This may look like a huge difference, but also remember that even over 1000m, the bullet only has to go as high as 6m above where it was fired from.

Conclusion:
The only advantage that having no bullet drop provides is that you do not have to arch your shots. There is no difference in the total acceptable angle in which you can shoot and land a hit. Having no bullet drop is an advantage, however only beyond 250m, which is about the distance from the tip of one biolab landing pad to the tip of the other biolab landing pad. The only guns that are made to work beyond 250m are sniper rifles. Bolt actions, even for the vanu, have bullet drop so the advantage is not applied there. Semi auto sniper rifles do get this advantage, however they have had their damage nerfed as a result. Having no bullet drop is an advantage, but it is rarely ever something that can actually be used and taken advantage of.

I hope you found this informative!

great work
imo they should just remove the "no bullet drop" trait from VS as its useless as nobody uses weapons that have no bullet drop at the distances it matters (like carbines at 500+m)

No drop give the VS two advantages.

We can use slug ammo.
We can use suppressors.

Other factions have a larger penalty fro both of these things. Outside this the drop thing is just what its suppsoed to be 'flavor'

No sense getting rid of it just because its not OP.

Finally someone did the actual math on this.

Be prepared to bring out your flameshield tho. NC and especially TR will try to make it seem like its the biggest advantage ever made in any FPS. And if that fails, they will throw in random lies and if that doesn't work, then they will bring out the heavy artillery: "L2P".

I thought VS trait was also little recoil and good accuracy?

No, VS have some of the higest first shot recoil of all the factions and "good accuracy" is just not limited to 1 faction. Otherwise VS would be incredible OP.

It's not like any of the faction traits matter anyway. All it leaves in the end is a bit of weapon feel and that's up to you if you like it or not.

I never understood this balance choice, it punishes burst firing which is typically a staple of accuracy. For what ever reason the devs decided to discourage this on the suppossed "accuracy" faction. Instead basically forcing us to use 10-15 round bursts to be more accurate due to the lower bloom.

Granted if I had my way planetside would be a lot different in general.

Fun fact: Infantry stop rendering at 300m.

Any calculations beyond that point don't really matter

No.

Recoil has flavors. I just said this in another post.
NC- high vertical
TR- high horizontal
VS High first shot multiplier.

People can bicker about which is worse, honestly they all have their ups and downs.

As for accuracy, no.

FTFY

No bullet drop is only good for slug ammunition and SASRs. It's hardly an advantage because exceptions are made for weapons that really matter, like MBT guns, BASRs, and ESF noseguns.

The Battle Rifles I use all have noticeable bullet drop apart from the Eidolon. My Eidolon hits where I point it, the others not so much. Biggest diff for me though is my XM98 actually can headshot anyone that the game renders at any distance. With my NC14 Bolt Driver, the angle I have to shoot puts the target actually below some sights so you cant actually see them. This is at extreme range but I can snipe all enemies that the game renders with my VS toon but not with my others.

Not a massive advantage but it helps. I wouldn't quote it as being a massively OP OMG nerf! Just a slight advantage at range.

^ This guy knows what he's talking about.

The calculations and graphs here are well and good but we have to remember that infantry render distance cuts off at 300m. I quite like the VS weapons myself, while the zero drop isn't a massive game changing OP faction trait (I'm sure it's disappointing reading this from a TR die hard) it does have good synergy when coupled up with that accuracy and low recoil of the VS armoury.

I like to think of the VS weapons as being very similar to the TR set with a couple of minor differences. The VS weapons reload faster and have smaller mags, which balances nicely as I find it much of a muchness between factions. What I really like about the VS is the accuracy, when you put that cross hair on your targets head and pull the trigger you know exactly where that round is going. I enjoy that split second you save on adjusting for bullet drop that VS weapons offer. If your aim is good you're achieving maximim dps from the moment you pull the trigger.

I've found it to be quite a big deal when comparing my effectiveness between nc and vs carbines. I'm quite fond of being able to use the Serpent to essentially snipe with while using ironsights across a reasonably long distance. Outdoors combat is slightly more tolerable for this class because of it.

nice job changing your signature!

I'd just like to point out that our recoil modifier was likely an intentional counter to our no drop advantage. Though, no doubt we do have enough exceptions that we can use to take advantage of it (like the pulsar C for example). The trick is that we don't get a 'free pass'. most the weapons capable of capitalizing on no-drop are rather unpopular outside that niche. (maybe unjustifiably so? Kinda makes me want to dust off my pulsar)

First shot recoil makes burst fire difficult, thus diminishing our ability to take advantage of no drop unless we specifically pull long-ranged variants.

Yeah... Or you could just stop holding down the trigger until the mag is empty when shooting at mid to long range targets. Every weapon in the game can be fired single shot you know.

Have a go at *tap tap tap* instead of *WAAAAAAAARRRRGGGHHHH* from time to time. You'll probably find yourself saving ammo AND dealing more damage in mid to long range situations.

Single shot, and burst are both effected by first shot multiplier.

I think it's pretty funny switching over to single fire on an AR or bursting with the LMG at targets shooting down from the lip of a biolab or causing a carefully pod-dropped sniper to leap to his death from a fumarole because he's getting randomly plinked.

It almost makes me want to put a 3.4x scope on an LMG and use it in its native outdoors ADS role. Almost.

Yes, but it doesn't have a 'pre shot' multiplier. If you're firing singles fast enough for recoil or bloom to have an effect on your accuracy then I feel the principles of semi automatic weapon use may be escaping you.