Rest in Peace, Shotguns.

According to the PTS Patch Notes here, Shotguns have been "Adjusted" to lean more towards skillful aim, but to also increase their max range. In exchange, the player must be more accurate, as more pellets must land on target to secure a kill.


Unfortunately, these changes are nothing but a swift, vengeful kick to the balls of every shotgun in the game, and have done jack **** to address the issues surrounding shotguns on either the giving or receiving end.

In exchange for an enormous amount of damage, shotguns are getting pathetic pellet spread buffs(in the realm of .25, less then even the smart choke provides) and completely pointless ADS recoil buffs. They are no less burst-y in optimal circumstances, they are no better ranged, they are just as random and they are just as spray-able as before. The only difference now, is that they will require 1-2 more shots per target on average, amplifying the already existing problem of how Shotgun's TTK is massively penalized whenever you require another shot.


I honestly don't have a lot more to say here. I spent a long time trying to understand Shotguns in PS2, and it's clear that my suggestions have been completely ignored and people who have no idea what they are doing have made these balance changes. Normally, I'm fairly level headed and logical, but right now I'm just pissed off.

Thoughts?

"The intention behind the following changes are to increase the value of skillful aim while slightly extending the effective range of these weapons."

Yeah! Because they didn't require enough aim as it is!

With the pelletspread still being what it is I don't see how the better damage falloff and lack of COF bloom is going to help much. Especially since shotguns now require even more pinpoint perfect accuracy to blow someone to pieces as you already have reduced the damage per shot with more than a full pellet (180 damage), meaning that at any point in time you are essentially missing a pellet and having RNG throw a pellet off-target is even more punishing as you'll be missing 280 damage in one shot! meaning the only way you'll be anywhere close to current shotgun performance is if you 100% aim at the perfect center of your opponent every. single. time.

If you wanted to nerf shotguns say so, but don't go parading it around as a buff.

Edit:

Maybe it's time to share our discussion with the public, although fat lot of good it'll do us I guess.

uncontrollable recoil...

woah that is HORRIBLE.
from 730 max damage per shot to 600...
you're looking at 3 shot kills the majority of the time now.
(3 shot kills with shotguns have a longer TTK than the majority of SMGs/LMGs/ARs and carbines in cqc)

currently a 2 shot kill requires 8 pellets to land with this change it requires 10.
at 6 pellets per shot, if even 1-2 pellets miss from either shot you won't kill in 2 shots.

but woo atleast now you can spray your shotgun wildly at targets 20m away...(useless)




atleast the auto shotties got buffed slightly...

I have not had the chance to test these changes out yet, but on my NC I am largely a Shotgun user... I can tell you right now, I'm very much excited for these changes. Increase skill while increasing range? That's exactly what they've needed.

Last Month : R.I.P GaussSAW
This(Next?) month : R.I.P JackHammer

Why only NC?

you want more range, use slugs or an SMG.
shotguns should be lethal in cqc, and that has been severely nerfed here.
its gone from an 8 pellet kill to a 10 pellet kill, in 2 shots you have 12 pellets,
so 2 shot kills will be far less likely than they used to be.
at 3 shots you have a longer TTK than most other weapons.
horrible change, admittedly pts isnt working so i cant try it out.
but even on paper, nerfing the 2 shot kill potential is a really really bad move.

Shotguns are about close range damage dealing. carbines, SMGs, assualt rifles and LMGs already fill the role of ranged combat, all they really needed to do is remove the CoF and adjust the pellet spread to be more accurate at closer range, but not so accurate as to be effective at range.

shotguns are bad enough already this change basically makes them into bolt action rifles with less damage.

devs need to stop listening to shotgun crybabies who haven't even picked up a planetside 2 shotgun and actually realized that shotguns in other games are OP and shotguns in PS2 are UP.

if a shotgun user gets into close range with you you should die if you don't get supported by allies or the shotgun user is uninjured when he attacked you.

shotguns by their design in the real world are not 'accurate skillful weapons' they are the kind you use in close range where the spread pattern can hit a man sized target or hit multiple man sized targets close to each other.

people who ask for 'skillful shotguns' are people that have good twitch aim and don't like loosing to people that may have slower and/or less precise aim but better tactics.

Happy I got my auraxium shotgun sorted out last month because this would have killed my drive to finish that directive line.

LMG/AR nerfs didn't hit live servers. So, maybe, SG buffonerfs won't too.

But I'd better aurax my Jackhammer as quickly as possible... just in case

actually the jackhammer change could be really really good, a change from 9 rounds to 15, and 0 bloom could be lethal,
it all depends on the impact of the pretty darn heavy damage nerf.
currently you can fire 3 burstmode shots (4 with extended) with this change you will be able to fire 5 (6 with extended)
and 0 bloom on burst mode could be amazing, i'm hoping PTS will come back up to test it.

but yeah the other shotgun changes are horrible

Read closely - it will lose one pellet (from 6 to 5), will have increased recoil (bad for bursting/ADSing) and have "Hipfire recoil recovery rate from 15 to 8" (bad for hipfiring). Equip time is increased also.

Maybe it's all that bad only on paper... need to test it, when PTS goes up.

So, the range of damage between min to max has contracted at both ends, meaning more pellets will hit at longer range (if you can aim) and do more damage (84, not 50). But recoil is going to be significantly increased, meaning the apparent advantage of longer range is affected by needing lower rate of fire to accomodate recoil reset?

But max damage will be lower at close range where you are maybe more likely to hipfire although you can expect more pellets to hit (again, if you are on target)? I didn't pick up the effect on hipfire CoF and I may be using shotty wrong but I rarely ADS inside of 10m.

Am I getting this right?

It looks like the biggest over-nerf since zoe. Explain the recoil angle from 0 to 12/12.. does not sound like balance to me, straight up bias.

The shotgun was my only chance against the aimboter's in cqc, now that is gone.

Pump shotties got nerfed a long time ago, and they became mostly useless to me overnight.

DBG must be selling aim-bot cheats, because that is who they are catering to.

Shotguns are dominant on a map basis. Changing their stats will not fix them. Light assault complicates this. The skill in a shotgun is entirely getting to be close enough to utilize its effective range. If you're going to adjust them it needs to be in a way that makes it harder to close the gap. E.G shotguns in real life weigh about the same as a AR. Make the player move slower while wielding one.

So a TTK nerf pretty much across the board, making them less effective than most machine guns. Only longer ranges the TTK will be buffed from nearly impossible to an abysmal TTK regardless. What a nerf.

Shotguns have a lesser equipped time than practically any other infantry class weapon. Dominating is hardly the case, as their TTK is only slightly better, CURRENTLY, than common weapons. Distance is a real killer to the effectiveness and even at short range the RNG might screw with you. Closing the distance also brings high risks, as you are often closer to enemy infantry, increasing the number of weapons that can fire effectively on you.

Dominating isn't the word I would use. High risk high gain more likely.

I kinda want to, but honestly not only would I hardly know where to start, I've also lost most of my will to do so.

Call me a Debbie downer, but I really doubt it'll change anything. Maybe later after work I'll take it to Reddit?

Perhaps they are doing this to address Friendly Fire issues.

Also, I think Wrel was inspired by the Airhammer buff-nerf model and wanted it transfered to all shotguns.

yep its getting a damage nerf, and a pellet nerf (pretty nasty damage nerf)
it will be a really bad change for the single fire mode, but the burst mode will still easily be oneshot.
and yep, recoil nerf sucks, but we can control recoil,
a 0 cof on the burst mode excites me
plus we're going from 3 shots of burstmode to 6 shots.

as you said though, it will need to be tested on PTS.

I tested shotguns on PTS... and you have zero idea what the hell you're talking about. They are effectively superior now... more skill for more range. They maintain a 2 body shot kill at close ranges, and you are even able to kill targets out to 20-30m with about 8 shells. This is MASSIVE. On my NC I'm primarily a shotgun user and this is the best change they've done since the 2013 nerf.