Two uncut killstreaks that I recorded while doing LA directives for my VS toon. ****** DISCLAIMER ******I fully admit that shotguns are incredibly frustrating to play against, especially on Light Assault. They are not overpowered, but too good within 2-3m of the enemy, and too bad beyond 8m. It's sort of a 'deadly roulette', where you bank everything not on your gunplay skill, but on your ability to get close to the enemy, which not rarely depends on luck. *****************************For best quality watch in 2160p!Make sure to watch the video on YouTube itself and to maximize the YouTube player first. I'm using Thanatos, the default shotgun. Ugh... Wish I hadn't. It's not terrible, and does its job well most of the time. My beef with it is lack of consistency when it comes to the number of shots needed to kill the enemy, which you can see a couple of times in presented videos. With high damage semi-auto weapons, such as sniper / scout rifles and Commissioner, you make the habit of counting shots. E.g., Commissioner is always a three body hit kill at close range. Well, this doesn't work with semi-auto shotguns. The number of shots to kill can scale from 1 to infinity, seemingly regardless of distance and user accuracy. Not to mention that close range semi auto weapons are not a great idea in itself. I've lost or traded with enemies due to being unable to nail an enemy that was dancing around or clipping through me. In good faith, I cannot recommend anyone to use this weapon for Directives. Full auto shotguns make a much more reliable CQC domination weapon. I probably could have done a better job choosing the music, but honestly I ran out of Vanu-themed music long ago. My other videos: Juggernaut, the Red Baron - collaboration with Juggernaut, an ESF dogfighting montage themed after WWI's Red Baron Light Assault Montages: Goodbye - AC-X11 LA CQC montage I fight for Vanu! - taking suppressed Pulsar C into CQC with music from Black Mesa I fight for Vanu 2: Solstice Tribute - sharing the joy of using this amazing weapon Armistice Day - making this video taught me to respect the power of SMGs Freedom has a price - AF-19 Mercenary tribute Weapon Spotlight: GD-7F - a tribute to sexiest carbine in the game Light Assault Irony - my first PlanetSide 2 video, features T5 AMC and mild humor Night Patrol - a slow-paced slug shotgun montage TS-4 Haymaker - slug shotgun montage Unconventional Gameplay: Aggressive Engineering - cheesing infantry kills with Tank Mines Pump Action Shotgun Slugs: Part 1, Part 2 - showcasing one of the most powerful, yet challenging loadouts Video Guides: Light Assault Basic Strategy Jet Pack Tips Full Auto Shotgun Highlight Light Assault Gameplay with voiced commentary
I don't think shotguns are a cheese weapon. They are designed for having an advantage in CQC and disadvantage in longer range. With a Carbine you can get almost similar TTK's in CQC as with shotguns, which means the only real advantages of shotguns are slightly better TTK and it's big magazine allowing it for multiple kills with one mag more easily. You also have to pick the fight, you show two nice killstreaks here with buildings where the LA has an incredible opportunity to get in close, hide or evade and has entrances and exits almost everywhere. If this was a different building (not a tower) the shotgun would suddenly wield much less power. I have always preferred the semi-auto shotguns over the automatics. With the automatics you are more assured of a kill... you are also more assured that you miss too much of a mag to be able to continue in the face of multiple enemies. Using the semi-auto's you only fire when you are sure you can hit, and that works perfectly for me at least. So I would say it comes down to personal taste rather than semi-auto's being better or worse than automatics.
OK since u got one "ok" I'll do the "not okey" : This videos are sad and shameful. Nothing else to add. You don't get to "disclaim" pulling shotguns. Doesn't work. You simply don't DO it. Not for directives or any other conceivable "reason" that could excuse it. Why why why would you do this? Shameful
Well, to continue to face multiple enemies you need first to kill your current enemy And you've seen yourself - accurately clicking for each shot with semi-auto doesn't guarantee a kill. And if you accurately click 3-4 shots to kill one target, you're gonna waste too much time, making TTK dangerously long. It's true that full auto shotguns waste a lot of ammo on overkills, but at least they do get those kills, and get them fast. And if you do find yourself against a group of unaware enemies, full auto shotgun can be rationed with trigger discipline, killing in the same double-tap when point blank. Disclaimer is to affirm that the goal of these videos is not to boast my huge, throbbing skill. I do that with other videos These killstreaks are to provide reference material and demonstrate my playstyle. I'm surprised to see such a reaction. Shotguns are not particularly fun to play against, but they're not OP. As Demigan pointed out, and as you can for yourself in the videos, semi-auto shotgun often has the same or longer TTK than a CQC carbine. My K/D with this shotgun is mere 0.085 higher than with a Solstice. I'd think the difference would be bigger if they were so ridiculously broken as you seem to imply. Why? I wanted to get auraxium armor before I embark on my path to Eclipse, and shotguns would not stand in my way.
True, I have used the automatics only on my brothers account and not as much, but I do experience that with semi-auto's the double-tap is much more likely to happen than with automatics which more often get the 3-4 shot kill. Also, I think my combat distance is much shorter on average than yours and I often hunt down more unaware enemies rather than highly active one's in point-control rooms, which means I can often go for the OHK shot rather than a Double tap, which probably gives me a big bias. Still, different playstyles different preferences and with it come different tips, each will be important to a different player. I might have made it completely clear, but I tried to give another perspective to yours as well, not to debunk yours. As a side note, seeing your playstyle here I give you every reason to love the standard and Icarus Jumpjets much more over the Drifters, which become almost useless in the way you fly around. If all your playthroughs are mostly like your video's, yes Automatics are the best for you. Most of the battles are 1v1 with a rare 2v1 thrown in (and a really sad X vs 1 where they don't get you). As said, I usually hunt down more unaware enemies, often these are gathered somewhere in small groups, holding my team back. There I feel I have much more use for semi-auto's due to better chances for OHK+Double Tap to conserve ammo and mow through the most of them rather than kill 2 in one clip and get stuck in a reload, needing to fall back or go knifing/C4. But if I start with my shotgun, I've already decided they are too spread out for C4 to begin with. How is it shameful? Is using a Vortek/Rotary so shameful in A2A combat? Is using a high rate of fire CQC Carbine suddenly shameful to use? How about using snipers for long-range where they are kings, is that shameful as well? Should I be using shotguns and CQC Carbines for long range, and long-range Carbines and Sniper rifles for CQC? A Shotgun has an advantage in CQC, but it's TTK is marginally smaller than that of Carbines (especially CQC), and even the shortest range CQC Carbine is much more lethal at 10+meters than any shotgun. So the Shotgun's disadvantages are numerous: it's power goes down astronomically at range, where it's next best CQC weapon is still highly effective, it's got a slight boost in TTK in that CQC range... which isn't a big advantage. "whee! If I aim well enough my TTK is less than 0,05 seconds faster than that of other CQC weapons! Which quickly becomes a longer TTK at range!". So the only real advantage that shotguns give... is a big, heavy magazine. It's got the most damage potential of any weapon (with the exception of HA weapons), and the fastest time to unload it in. But it can only achieve this in CQC. So what do we got? Slightly faster TTK, big magazine to be able to attack multiple enemies. Important detail: you need to get in very close quarters to use it.
It's an interesting point you bring up. So we can distinguish two shotgun playstyles: 1. Skirmisher, where the shotgun is used to dominate an enemy in direct confrontation. This is what full autos are good for, and this is what I expect from my shotgun - to carry me. I still try to flank as much as I can, but mostly it is to make sure I get close enough before blazing away. 2. Flanker, where the shotgun is used for its high damage per magazine, and the ability to dish it out quickly, killing several enemies before they can even react. The downside is that you need to be extremely close for it to work, and it needs to be a surprise attack. Something that LA is good for. You say it's what semi-auto shotguns are good for, but wouldn't pump action shotguns be better? The DPM is a bit lower, but it seems to be easier to OHK with a pump action than to double tap with semi-auto. It also cuts down on TTK, so there's less of a chance that an enemy will flick overshield and then bunny hop using medkits with a s**t eating grin. Pump action fires slower, so it will force you time your shots and conserve ammunition, and since it's likely to OHK - you have a bit more leeway in lining up shots. There's also a nice feature that each shot with a PA shotgun is as accurate as it can be, as the CoF has time to fully restore between shots, effectively nullufying one of the shotguns' biggest disadvantages - rapid CoF growth. High count of pellets per shots also means that you're very likely to do at least some damage to the target, so what PA shotgun can't kill in one shot, it can kill in two. It seems to me that PA shotguns are superior in flanking, while FA shotguns are superior in skirmishing. SA shotguns seem to be the universal middle ground, equally bad mediocre at both those roles. It's a second time that your insight shifts my perspective, I'm really grateful to you Demigan for these little moments of clarity To be honest, this is the only viable, objective-oriented anti-infantry LA playstyle that I know. I know Drifters can be great for C4 attacks, as seen in many montages by Paqu, Cruczi and other people. But I've yet to see anyone successfully use Drifters in infantry combat. I guess Drifters can be used as an insertion tool for deep flanking with a suppressed weapon, but I don't really believe in such maneuvers. So you're gonna kill a few guys behind enemy lines, big deal. It's not like the whole enemy line will collapse because of that. Myself I prefer to play an objective-oriented Light Assault. You see in both videos that I hang by the capture point building - not a coincidence, that is how I prefer to play. If there's no cap point or I can't get to it, I'll try to flank the front line to see what holds the advance of allied ground forces, and take it out if I can. If I can't - at least harass. Sure LA can be wildly effective in tower stomping, but unless that tower is actively contested by ground forces, this is just cheesy farm, not very different from what A2G ESFs do.
Here you touch a sore point of mine: I've barely ever used Pump Actions, as I loved the semi-auto's at first sight. I'm just 5 kills away from auraxiuming my Baron, and was intending to buy the Bruiser as my next shotgun. My unwillingness to buy the pump action after a few short trials was based on the fact that I feel more empowered with the double-tap capability, combined with the OHK ability. It's incredibly gratifying to kill 3 guys in OHK fashion and then 2 more with double taps (not that this situation is absolutely common for me but it happens occasionally), the speed with which this can be done compared to pump-actions is far greater and the relative short reload I really like as well. I'm on the brink of trying it out, thanks for the advice anyway. Thanks, I might blabber a lot but sometimes a little gold can be dug out I'll try to make a few video's of how I play, similar to the video you made lately with the thoughts and idea's in mind while playing. I often play with the goal of getting my teammates to the point, breaking standoffs and helping them get farther. I might be a bigger help in a lot of situations if I didn't go look for that and go for the point, but you gotta entertain yourself the way you like don't you? I use it as a "shotgun package". You gain some height, fly over the battlefield, select a small group (that's not easy to kill with C4) and just drop in the middle, then it's shotty time! Otherwise it's perfect for avoiding ground-contact, it makes it so much easier to get in close without being detected or getting distracted by a lot of 1v1 battles and end up almost in the next base. Alternatively it's wonderful for getting into good positions undetected. Radar towers, tree's that are normally inapproachable without being spotted, ridges, mountainsides, airpads, towers... they are all available and great for a Drifter. Just an hour or two ago I was playing hide-n-sneak with an outfit mate who had switched to Vanu. Near TI Alloys I was jumping from tree to tree, but they had thought I was wearing a normal jumpjet. While they were trying to avoid that tree I had actually followed their erratic exploits across the entire field, without them ever noticing, and TI alloys doesn't have a lot of cover normally. Really fun to actually hear them talk about "watchout, he could be nearby" and then talk about the area they are approaching, while I was actually flying mere meters behind, landing on a tree they were under at the time. Only their extreme paranoia prevented my success (and my Jaws theme) Ooh, never though about that... yeah. Now I feel bad for Tower stomping when the tower is as good as taken. On the other hand, everyone else is basically doing the same, including what defenders there are left.
No, I meant the other way around. I meant it's cheese to do tower stomping if you're the only one there. You're obviously not gonna take the tower by yourself, so in this case tower stomping is just grabbing kills on unaware players that don't expect an enemy so deep behind front lines. If there are other ground forces attacking the tower, then it's fair 'n' square. Killing defenders will disrupt them, while ground force storms from below.
If I'm the only one there, I'm taking infiltrator, hack a turret and kill off tanks and aircraft while they leave/rearm. Has way more impact and sucks resources and players to try and catch me. I might kill one guy at the terminal while I enter the tower, but I don't farm it. It doesn't help enough in the long run. Preventing a few people to spawn a tank has a load less impact on your allies than destroying the tank itself and preventing it ever reaching your friends.
I gotta say, you were right. I tried the Bruiser PA today, I had trialed the other before and had no kills with it so far. In one session I nearly got it gold medal, I killed around 4 MAX's with more than 80% health (and almost 5 more with less than 80%, it was a real bad day to be a MAX on Indar today). This is incredible as I've maybe pulled that off 3 or 4 times total in all my time with the 2 semi-auto's and the Baron. At first I got the same results why I hadn't picked up PA's in the first place. A misjudgement of the range, attracting too much attention or plain getting crapped upon by enemies at range. But as time progressed I realized I was constantly picking fights by jumping straight into the thick of enemy groups (Broken Arch and Tawrich Depot allow for easy Drifter Access). I found that half the time I got shot before I could even touch down, the other half I could get 4-5 kills despite being horrendously outnumbered. Needless to say, I started liking it more and more. Sometimes I still ran into trouble. One time I ran into a low BR I had killed easily several times already. I shot at him from 5m distance thinking it an easy kill, he survives and gets lucky (or more skilled ) and kills me before I can fire my second shot. On the Death screen he still has a sliver of his shield... Other times I shot multiple times at close distances with nada results against players as well. This was easily balanced with the times I had to twitch-shoot someone and survived a battle I would probably not have won with another shotgun, and the fact that in the incredible outnumbered battles I stupidly chose I could still get some kills ofcourse shows that this weapon can be almost godly if I pick my fights better. So again, you were right. With proper aim and positioning, it can be the Flanker weapon of choice over Semi-Auto's.
Yeah, that's the power of shotguns for you. That's why I call shotguns cheese - no matter how much you rambo or jump into a group of ten guys, so long as you're close enough, you're guaranteed some kills before you die. Not too different from suicide C4 attacks. Obviously, it's not the only way to play shotguns, not even a good way. But people still do that, and sometimes even get away with it.
Oh now I see. Because that's certainly totally different from jumping into a group of 10 guys with an smg. Because with the shotgun, you're almost guaranteed to take some enemies down with your shotgun, while with the smg, you're almost guarateed to take down some enemies with your smg, a subtle but important difference, which is really not all that subtle anymore when you are lying on the ground perforated by a load of buckshot. Indeed, the dead know the difference. And it gets only more obvious when you do the same with a cqc carabine, because shotgun and smg, they at least both start with an S, while carabine, that's a C, meaning 15 characters between them, and that's more than half an alphabet of difference! Ok, yeah, I know, 'Not even a whole alphabet!' you might say. But take a closer look at what we have among those 15: Danish Blue, Emmental, Feta, Gorgonzola, Halloumi, Jarlsberg, Khoa, Leerdamer, Mozarella, Parmesan, Quark, Roquefort - only 3 letters not easily associated with cheese, proving thast the difference from carabine to shotgun is 12/15=80% cheese! And if that doesn't make it evident, nothing else will, because that really is the best if not the only explanation why shotguns are cheese.
Even the highest DPS carbines have TTK of 0.42s. Most SMGs have around 0.48, and that's without taking nanoweave into account. At ranges I was talking about, semi-auto and full auto shotguns will kill in 2 shots most of the time, regardless of nanoweave, which will take around ~0.25s, depending on shotgun. PA shotguns will have TTK of 0. Not only shorter TTK is important in terms of actually killing people, it also cuts down on reaction time allowed for an enemy to start responding to your attack, be it dodging, returning fire, popping medkits or activating overshields. Also, those SMGs and carbines will have DPM enough to kill two targets at most, while shotguns can easily take out 3-5 players. All of that makes them much more effective suicide rush weapon.
Oh, yes, numbers! Pretty, pretty numbers. Numbers don't lie. Numbers tell the truth. But what truth do they tell ? The correct truth of course, but ... .. are they really saying I can't use gorilla tactics with my smg or carabine, jumping into my enemies to kill some of them like with a shotgun ? Damn, busted, I knew it. I knew right when I started jumpin my enemies shotgun style with my smgs and carabines, I knew they'll eventually come up and say something like that. No sir, you better stop what you are doing, because it is totally unpossible. No way, can't be done, so just stop doing it already! That means I have to hand back my precious pretty guns, my Fortuna and my Tempest too ? Because those nasty numbers say I can't possibly do what I did, all along the long long way to get them ? Sorry but, well, I know, numbers don't lie, and I certainly wouldn't dream of claiming your numbers do any different. But, well, maybe ... perhaps they just don't know any better ? Sure, the shotgun certainly lends itself even more to doing gunplay with quick feet instead of steady hands. But those fractions of a second are not what makes or breaks that style of playing.
I don't understand why you're being this way. I never said you "can't". I said "shotguns do that better". It's not black and white. You can do everything with everything. You can snipe with a pistol. Maybe you'll even kill someone. But a sniper rifle will do that job better. All there is to it. Fractions of a second decide life and death in combat. They are important, especially when it's difference of 0.2 second and not 0.05 seconds. Also, while shotguns may well be "gorilla" tactics, pretty sure you meant "guerrilla" tactics in regards to SMGs and carbines.
Yes, I am saying you can't use gorilla tactics with your carabine.... I am pretty sure the gorilla will just look at it, confused as to it's purpose... besides they don't need a carabine to climb ****, they're friggin gorillas they can just knock stuff down by flinging poop!
Actually, how many people can you kill with one SMG? about 3 if you are lucky? (more if you maximise headshot count etc, but that's just not going to happen) But a shotgun... Semi-auto or pump actions can for instance get 3 kills easily (rather than having to be lucky to achieve it) and kill more if you have the skill for it. Also, the lower TTK means you can't just kill one guy faster, but also before the others react. Humans keep switching from one mental task to the other while playing games, from looking for targets you switch to seeing one and engaging it, then as your health drops your mental state changes to "engage while looking for hiding spot" etc, or you see multiple enemies and change to "throw grenade". Whatever the case, when you are ambushed people abuse this system. They hear a shotgun shot, but it takes longer for them to realize that it can be hostile, due to the TTK being lower you also have more time in between kills to shoot the next one before they react with "look for what's happening" and then "engage enemy". And that's the point, shotguns have much more power in ambushes than SMG's. I mean, your whole argument could also have been "If I use guerrilla tactics with a pistol by jumping into my enemies I can get an advantage". Sure you can! But no-one expects you to kill as many people with a pistol as with a shotgun. Also the chance of failure is much bigger: A Pistol will require more skill due to higher TTK and punishments for missing due to the low magazine size.
Oh, you're probably right. I've probably been subject to the constand spewing of mindless shotgun hate too long already, so I'm a bit touchy when widespread ignorance on the issue gets spread even wider. But I know you're one of the good guys, and probably didn't really mean it like that, so I apologize if I overreacted. The problem is that too many of your readers do mean it exactly like that already. But what you really said was 'shotguns are cheese', to which I answered that it's not really the weapon, as you can play the same hated suicide rush playstyle just as well with an smg, or even with a good carabine that works for you. And that's not some pretty theorycrafting looking at some numbers and phantasizing how it certainly must all play out when in a clinical test environment. I've auraxed all my smgs and as many carabines as I could stomache by playing pretty much the same rush push kill and respawn style I use for my shotguns. And it works. Earned me a lot of facepalms by good players on TS trying to teach me better ways to use those weapons, but I simply prefer breaking through the enemies to go straight at the objective, instead of hanging back worrying about your k/d survival-game style. Does the shotgun perform better ? Sure, but not by the huge margin everyone is trying to make it look like. I mean, smg to shotgun like pistol to sniper rifle, or smg ? That's an almost totally braindead exaggeration. Under optimal conditions, you certainly can kill an extra dude or two. This however have to be very optimal conditions, where noone can be moving around too much, or be quick to react to the sound of a shotgun killing his neighbour. And after a few k of shotgun kills, you realize that this happens far too rarely to base your playing style on. But look what you've done, now I'm back on the forums trying to argue reasonably with people that mostly don't want to listen to reason anyway, and rather just vent and troll. So let's stop that, it's ok, shotguns are cheese, you only need a shotgun in your loadout and the kills will automagically roll in, every scrub could do it, they just don't because of their magnificent e-Honor, which is the reason you hardly ever see more than a couple of successful shotgunners, because no player in this game would ever dream of using anything overpowered to gain an advantage, never at all, it's just a couple of scrubs like me who ruin this perfect world for everyone. Right ? Ok, then please excuse me, I'll be back to being a cheese wielding scrub. Just btw, to me it's been Gorilla Tactics ever since I learned how gorilla librarians handle customer complaints. So you probably don't need to understand that either
You're right. I was wrong to call shotguns cheese because they're more effective in suicide rush. It was bad formulation on my part. It's not about playstyle, it's about counterplay. Shotguns are frustrating to play against, because counterplay to them is "don't let the enemy get close to you". But after shotgun user gets close, the enemy has much lower chances to survive. That's why I associated shotguns with suicide rush. Basically, shotgun user makes it his objective to get close by any means necessary, and then his victory is almost guaranteed just from the fact that he's using a shotgun. I'm not sure what to properly call this phenomenon, so I called it "cheese". The consistency with which shotgun user can get close before being spotted or killed is what separates great players from scrubs. Shotguns require the same amount of skill to use, it's just the different variety of skill - movement instead of aiming. Players know how to play their game - stick to cover, aim down sights, outshoot the enemy. And then the shotgun user comes and forces them to play their game - dance around close quarters, paranoid of your own shadow, and tiny mistake in movement costs the life. People don't like being forced to play that game, hence the shotgun hate. In my opinion, shotguns could use a rebalance across the board. Increase effective range to 10-15m, reduce effectiveness within 3m. That would bring them closer with other CQC weapons, like SMGs. They would still play differently, but loosen up a bit on movement, and tighten up on gunplay. Not sure about other people, but I'm always up for a civil discussion. I'm on eternal quest for truth And I know what you mean by Gorilla Tactics now.
