Why are the NC so bad?

Sometimes when I listen to some people talk or read what some people write I am reminded of a story a professor of mine once told me. Suffice it to say:

There isn't much substance here to work with, so I'm just gonna bulletpoint some key concepts for ya'.

• The statistical probability of all NC players being stupid/unintelligent, unskilled, and/or uncooperative and this holding true for only the NC across all servers all over the world and remains untrue for all TR and VS players borders on incomprehensibly small.
• There is absolutely no evidence of this at all, while evidence of the contrary is readily available.
• I presume you get this information from the % team damage chart, as far as I'm aware this was the only source of friendly-fire data ever given to the public. However note the obvious fact that the data lists team damage and not team kills. It should stand to reason that the faction with the highest damage weapons would do more damage per accidental shot.
• Mjolnir is pretty much worse than a Vulcan unless sub ten meters against an unmoving target. But regardless, the point you are trying to make is a fallacy. The balance between the Enforcer and Gatekeeper is irrelevant to the balance of the Mjolnir and Vulcan. And how convenient it is that you forget why the GK is in such a sorry state, hmm?
• Nanoweave increases the shots to kill of all weapons and takes a larger chunk of damage out of higher damage weapons. Regardless, even if the STK values across all damage types were identical, weapons with higher damage have lower RoFs and therefore suffer a greater increase in TTK as more time is required to pass by before the fatal shot can be fired. Iridar has a nice table for this:

• Recoil varies. The TR don't magically have universally better or worse recoil than the NC or vise versa. However it's better to have a higher RoF given high recoil as the pattern will be smoother and much more consistent as opposed to a punctuated "stepping" pattern of recoil such as on the SAW. This allows for easier and better recoil control.
• Bloom per shot values are directly tied to damage tiers. The higher the damage per shot the higher the bloom. The NC have the most high damage weapons and have exclusive access to the 0.07 bloom per shot value. You may think higher RoF, lower bloom weapons may bloom more overtime but they don't, as can be demonstrated with the CoF formula; [y = i + xb], where y = final CoF, i = starting CoF, x = consecutive shots fired, and b = bloom per shot.
• Projectile velocities are relatively equal. The VS actually tend to have higher velocities on automatics than both the TR and the NC. Regardless, the differences are generally not significant and will not have a major impact until well outside of a weapon's effective range.
• Low RoF require more skill than high RoF weapons. The NC has more low RoF guns than high RoFs, comparatively the TR has the inverse. If either faction was to require more skill it would be the NC.
• Broadly speaking most infantry weapons are roughly balanced. Some specific weapons are not, such as all S variants being worse than standard versions, as well as outliers such as the Charger being a downgraded NS-11C.
• Highest alpha, lowest DPS. Without the shield it will lose. Been nerf'd like three or four times.

Your bias is blinding you to obvious truths you simply do not wish to see. Half of this stuff isn't even subjective but based purely in math.

Well that's the thing, the boombox has a niche, it performs extremely well in that nice. You can one clip a tank from the rear and 2 clip a sunderer, the downside is you have to be really close. Sure the vulcan is cool, but its nowhere near as OP as it used to be, and I can say the only reason people think it's OP is because every TR is using it. The thing is TR use it only because their gatekeeper is garbage, and the vulcan is the only weapon that can actually be effective from close to medium ranges. The downside of the vulcan is it's painful reload. The boombox, is great, just when you use it correctly. For the rest you can go with the enforcer, which is a great overall weapon, something the TR don't really have since the gatekeeper nerf.

Well yeah dude, stalker infils...

When dodging bullets I meant it's easier to do so and mid-long ranges since velocity is so low. Also if you try armistice with soft point ammo, the bullets literally hover in the air, and you can dodge them from pretty close.

I am an average (sometimes less than average) player, so I reason that yeah, if I can use NC weapons and get the same streaks as on my other faction alts, then things must be somewhat balanced.

Also that spawn argument might've had more meaning before the spawn rework, instant spawn means killing people doesn't matter as much. Also victories aren't made by killing the most people, they're done by capping territory, which requires usually structured assault. So if NC don't win continent alerts, it's because they aren't coordinating for whatever reason. Let's wait till maximum pressure to confirm this, but if NC kill just as many people as TR and VS, but fail to cap continents, it'll prove there's something wrong with NC command.

The jackhammer, the cyclone, the anchor, the mustang, the titan AP, the Gauss saw, the em6, the fortuna, the default bolt action honestly the NC have just as an impressive arsenal then any other faction. There's really nothing to complain about. Simply equip a weapon that fits your playstyle, try to use it in it's niche and you're good, If NC weapons were so ****, shouldn't we see every NC with an NS weapon instead? Also the ttk is pretty balanced after nanoeve, the devs aren't that stupid, dude. Besides everyone goes for headshots anyways and nanoeve doesn't apply to those.

some basic math:

NC6 Gauss saw ROF= 500 rpm/8.33rps
10m 85m
200 x 0.80 = 160 167 x 0.80 = 133.6

1000/160 = 6.25 - so 7stk 1000/133.6 = 7.5 - so 8stk

7/8.33 = 0.84s 8/8.33 = 0.96s

T9 Carv ROF= 750rpm/12.5rps
10m 65m
143 x 0.80 = 114.4 112 x 0.8 = 89.6

1000/114.4 = 8.7 - so 9stk 1000/89.6 = 11.2 - so 12stk

9/12.5 = 0.72s 12/12.5 = 0.96s

Orion VS54

Same as T9 Carv

So yeah, you're right there is a slightly lower ttk on this example. However, when we take a look at accuracy, horizontal recoil for TR is almost double what NC get (0.5 for NC, 0.9 for TR, 0.8 for VS)

VS get 2.25 FSM, NC get 1.65, TR get 2. So yeah, I guess for this specific situation, VS and TR get a 0.12s advantage up close, as a trade off for worse accuracy and damage drops off way before NC. So NC do worse up close, better at range, big surprise. Honestly, not the end of the world latency cause more outstanding issues. Here's another example:

AF-19 Mercenary ROF= 600rpm/10rps
10m 70m
167 x 0.80 = 133.6 125 x 0.80 = 100

1000/133.6 = 7.5 - 8stk 1000/100 = 10

8/10 = 0.80s 10/10 = 1.0s

Trac 5 ROF = 750rpm/12.5rps
10m 60m
143 x 0.80 = 114.4 112 x 0.80 = 89.6

1000/114.4 = 8.7 - 9stk 1000/89.6 = 11.2 - 12stk

9/12.5 = 0.72s 12/12.5 = 0.96s

Solstice VE3 ROF = 698rpm/11.63rps
10m 60m
143 x 0.80 = 114.4 112 x 0.80 = 89.6

1000/114.4 = 8.7 - 9stk 1000/89.6 = 11.2 - 12stk

9/11.63 = 0.77s 12/11.63 = 1.03s

So once again, pretty similar ttk, and the TR and VS get way worse recoil and FSM. (2.8 FSM for VS, 2.35 for TR and only 1.75 for NC). This really means that the mediocre difference between ttk is made up by VS and TR weapons being more likely to miss, therefore needing to burst fire more than NC, which would effectively close the gap, even make NC weapons have lower ttk than other factions. I'm not gonna do all the weapons one by one, but it seems like the devs do know how to balance weapons, even with nanoeve. Which I'll add doesn't surprise me, since I play about the same on all factions.

A small tip for NC would be to stay further away, trying to avoid the 10m mark, because NC weapons shine at range. But honestly, going for headshots anyways, there's very little difference in ttk up close. So yeah, I conclude that for some reason, NC just draws in too many idiots that can't organize themselves to conquer a continent.

I might be a TRspy, but as I said, I play on all factions, all servers excluding soltech, so I have little bias. I've just constated that NC seem to be dimmer of intellect than other factions, a thing I can't explain. They just never seem to be able to coordinate anything, much less a relevant offensive.

The mjolnir and the vulcan both have different niches, me comparing the gatekeeper and enforcer is the same thing. Also who cares the old state of the gatekeeper, is that really an excuse to make it unusable now?

Recoil varies between weapons, so does damage and ROF, NC have access to plenty of high ROF weapons (gd-7f, blitz-gd10 for example) and as I pointed out somewhere in the thread, the ttk remains almost the same, very minimal differences.

You are actually wrong, TR weapons and VS weapons have more horizontal tolerance and overall worse recoil than NC. The first shot multipliers on VS and TR are way more then what NC weapons get in general.

For the Gauss saw

Hip

Aim

Crouch

Still:

3.5

0

Move:

4

0.2

Stand

Still:

4

0

Move:

4.5

0.4

Bloom per Shot:

0.14

0.07

Recoil

[?]

Vertical:

0.55

Horizontal, Min/Max:

0.175/0.175

Horizontal Tolerance:

0.525

Angle Min/Max:

0°/0°

Bias:

← = →

Recoil Decrease:

12

First Shot Recoil Multiplier:

1.65x

The carv

Hip

Aim

Crouch

Still:

3.5

0.1

Move:

4

0.2

Stand

Still:

4

0.1

Move:

4.5

0.4

Bloom per Shot:

0.1

0.05

Recoil

[?]

Vertical:

0.4

Horizontal, Min/Max:

0.21375/0.21375

Horizontal Tolerance:

0.9

Angle Min/Max:

0°/0°

Bias:

← = →

Recoil Decrease:

12

First Shot Recoil Multiplier:

2x

The orion

Hip

Aim

Crouch

Still:

2.25

0.1

Move:

2.75

0.2

Stand

Still:

2.5

0.1

Move:

3.25

0.4

Bloom per Shot:

0.1

0.04

Recoil

[?]

Vertical:

0.4

Horizontal, Min/Max:

0.22/0.22

Horizontal Tolerance:

0.8

Angle Min/Max:

0°/0°

Bias:

← = →

Recoil Decrease:

13

First Shot Recoil Multiplier:

2.25x

Taken from https://planetside.fandom.com/wiki/Light_Machine_Guns

So yeah you can see just from this that overall NC have the least punishing recoil. Also important to note is that NC weapons have a longer effective range than TR and VS weapons in general. TR and NC require about the same skillcap, both factions have their ups and downs, but slower firing weapons don't always necessitate more skill, since they are in most cases easier to control. High ROF weapons can be really hard to use especially at the 30m + range, so burst firing is essential to ensure the shots land on target. Remember even with the damage percentage of nanoeve, high damage weapons deal more damage, and since they are more accurate to handle at range then fast firing weapons, it confirms the fact that each weapon has it's niche, and once used properly in that niche. the player has the potential to deal serious damage. For NC, that niche tends to be past the 60m mark, where other factions die off. Also remeber they deal more damage and nanoeve doesn't work on headshots, so guys can go up close with their 200 damage Gauss saws and tear infantry. The weapons are't bad, the players are...and I won't even mention the jackhammer.

I actually had this stuff in a spreadsheet at one point when all I did was fly. Between work, other hobbies, and this game dying, I haven't had in installed since 2018. But it's easy. Go in to the testing grounds for each faction with the appropriate frame, then write the numbers down.

Edit: You're right in that the Scythe can just keep pointed at the Reaver. Even if the Reaver could rotate fast enough to keep the Scythe from holding a bead, he can only pitch and stay on target as fast as the Scythe could. But you're also dealing with reaction times. If you're close enough, the Reaver can rotate around the Scythe at a rate where maximum pitch is needed to stay on target. If the Scythe isn't 100% on his game, he won't start pitching soon enough and he'll always be playing catch up.

I don't claim to be good enough to pull this stuff off against decent pilots, not even in my prime, which I'm far from. My opinion comes from hours and hours of dueling the best pilots and listening to their opinions. I thought the Reaver was a crappy flying barn door for years until I started really talking to and dueling better players. And the general consensus is the Reaver has the most potential. It can do everything a Scythe and Mossy can, but its vertical speed and afterburners open up a couple extra doors.

You should talk to those guys before using their names to prove a point. I've never talked to Silkens. LT is a little too salty for me, but he mostly Flys TR because that's where his unit is. Scanners agrees the Scythe is easy mode. And Tactics much prefers the Reaver to the Mossy, he just sticks with TR out of habit from old flying buddies.

Seriously, grab a Scythe and fight Tactics in a Mossy. Then duel him in a Reaver. It'll change your mind.

I was just looking at some stats from the past hour for ceres
Vs kills 1206 deaths 1050 population 52
Tr kills 1262 deaths 1170 popultion 58
Nc kills 349 deaths 756 population 35
These no NC outfits in the top 5 list
Theres no Nc players in the top 20 list

We do need help

Maxes nerfed to hell did not help, tanks being scaled down and taking more damage from behind, allows them to no longer control the lanes. They still have fun toys but nothing like they used to be.

Everybody has a bias. Why it seems to you that the NC are all dumber is a conformation bias. Because you think something is true you automatically pick up on everything that supports this belief and ignore everything which contradicts it without even realizing it.

They don't have separate niches, they're meant to do the same thing in the same way but have different mechanics. The Mjolnir just happens to suffer with range much more significantly negating the slight DPS advantage.

Gatekeeper doesn't need to be trash but it's another addition to the pile. It made its own bed and now developer incompetence has done its work.

An important thing to remember with TTK values is that they are almost always significantly longer in practice than in theory. A minor difference like 0.2s is going to be accentuated greatly.

Again, this is mostly only based on damage models. Shorter ranged weapons have more horizontal recoil and longer range weapons tend to have more vertical recoil. The NC as always has an excess of longer ranged damage models.

The SAW is an extreme and an outlier. A single weapon cannot demonstrate a general trend and especially when it is far from the average norm. The Promise has a horizontal tolerance of 5.0, which is several times greater than the next highest tolerance. Likewise it's not a fair comparison because it does not reflect any other values in the game.

The NC generally require more skill than the TR. That's not really a controversial position to take, higher RoF weapons allow for much more forgiving full-auto, are more accurate when firing more than a few shots at a time, and generally handle much better especially so in shorter ranges.

A SAW has an incredible effective range, but only if stationary and tap-firing or firing two-bullet bursts. This makes the user sniper bait to say the least.

With nanoweave a higher damage shot loses more damage overall. But again, the main detraction of nanoweave is the greater time between a default TTK and an extra few shots to kill. As above, any minor theoretical differences in TTK are going be multiplied in practice.

Most weapons aren't bad, generally they just aren't good for what is actually important. The Jackhammer is trash, go ahead and mention it.

Ah, too bad. That would have been handy! Well, there goes all hope of me not having to provide the burden of proof for someone else's claim for once.

Likewise though, I haven't played in a while either. I could easily launch it but I don't even feel like looking at the game these days. Been nothing but unfun overpops for the last few games and that's put me off for a while. I don't really want to know enough to bother nor do I really want to test a claim I didn't make. I'll settle for the common knowledge that the Reaver's vertical thrust is higher and leave it at that. You're the first person to ever suggest the difference is particularly noticeable as far as I'm aware.

Hmm. Still just comes down to the Reaver being piloted by a significantly better player than the Scythe in order to win. As I said before, if the Reaver had the same noseguns as the Scythe it wouldn't be the veteran's choice, even less so than now I think.

I've flown along side him since 2013 bruh. We both go back to the Dipnoi days.
Do you want a direct quote from him? I can get him on record about it and screenshot it. (he'll also probably tell you that I'm the Slowest learner he's ever played with, a Point I wouldn't disagree with)

It's seriously, seriously disingenuous to claim that the Reaver is "FINE" just because the best remaining Reaver "god" (according to everyone else I talk to I guess .... which is weird to me b/c I've managed to kill him on his TR main a couple of times so maybe I was only getting super duper lucky??) ....Ugh... Tangent aside, ... it's disingenuous to claim the Reaver is ANY better than it was in 2013 just b/c 1 guy out of the entire server can consistently handle some 1v3 against Scythe n00bs from WildCards or 1v2 some PiGs in our giant floating Refrigerator shaped helicopter that just happens to have 8% better Burst damage while it's targeting profiles that are atleast 20% slimmer than it on ALL SIDES.


Look all I want, is some REFERENCES. Give me some leads at least to some NC that still are loyal to Connery and actually still FLY more than they sit in infantry farms b/c I haven't found Any names lately that are in the air enough to even build the smallest of squads around. Provo is the only Gent I can think of and I always get the cold shoulder from him. Give me a Discord, give me an outfit that's IN THE PUBLIC invitation pool. 9 out of 10 reavers I see in the air don't even squad together or survive their first 1v1 when I'm watching them (even after I've desperately rushed in to try to even up the odds that are stacked against them)

Why just the other day I even saw a couple A2G podders/hornets who died multiple times trying to 1v1 a Cobra Lighting. Don't tell me the NC airgame is salvageable at this point.

Go ask him then. I actually fired the game up after this thread. It got me itching to fly. I saw him flying around today but I didn't say hi.

I'm also not entirely against buffing the Reaver. I think base fuel capacity could use a buff, as that aircraft sucks balls without fuel pods.

And like I said earlier, I think the Scythe could use a few nerfs. Damage and possibly also vertical speed. Or maybe max pitch rate? That would let it keep its long range superiority but make it weaker up close.

But I don't think Mossy vs Reaver balance is in a bad spot. At least not in skynight configuration.

These are all well thought posts, but guys, apply Occam's Razor and clearly the truth is:

NC are a bunch of PBR swilling rednecks playing smash up derby in their Vanguards and firin' off their machineguns in random directions while blastin' FREEBIRD on their beat-up boom-boxes.

I know. I am from Montana.

FREEEEEEEEEEEEEEBIRD.

From Vanu's perspective the Vanguard's problem is the crew. NC's soldiers should learn how to use Vanguard's 2/2 mode not 1/2. If I see Vanguard without top gunner I can harass/kill him with my Lightning, or just try to kill him in direct contact with my Magrider if I have a top gunner (Saron or Aphelion for example). By the way VS use their Magriders in 2/2 mode more often than other factions user their 2/2 MBTs.

Most times I see 1/2 Vanguards. Does this mean NC's high level of self-confidence ? Naiveness ? Noobness?
What prevents you from using the Halberd as the second gun and wait for a gunner?

I think Vanguard's pilots mostly think they have the greatest "damage per round" and the greatest "shielded health" vehicle in the game so they can kill enemies by just rushing toward being solo.
If you're NC and you act the same as above then probably you think that Vanguard is awful.

MAn how stupid or should I say NC, do you have be to say vanguard is awful

yeah, only NCs say that Vanguard is awful

Oh boy.

All MBTs benefit from having a gunner and most of the time they do have one at least at once point in the vehicle's life. Any 2/2 with an AV topgun will beat any other 1/2 tank.

The Vanguard itself has exactly one advantage, and that's soaking damage from the front while the shield is active and the tank is at full heath. Otherwise it's slow and fat and has the lowest DPS and that's all there is to it.

If you recall the Magrider thread you'll find yourself preaching to the choir. Given that I'm literally the one than demonstrated Magriders are most commonly used 2/2 both overall and comparatively.

I think the problem is that most people don't want to gun for a vehicle that won't net them immediate rewards and would sooner hop into a harasser instead.

I think the Vanguard is awful because it is, not because I purposefully outnumber myself like an idiot would. Again, even a 1/2 barrage Prowler would probably still lose to a 2/2 AV tank.

The most people "would sooner hop into a harasser instead" - that is the Vanguard's problem as I see it.

Yesterday @Miller I've killed few 1/2 Vanguards with a single Stealth Lightning before I met "Motopehota" (BR~100) vanguard with top gunner.
I couldn't kill him neither with Lightning (that is obvious) nor with 2/2 Magrider. For me it proves that there are no problems with Vanguard, there are problems with the crew and it's skills.

And yes, Vanguard is massive but not as slow as it often spoken.

P.S. I'm not a boy to you.

Ah yes, anecdotal circumstantial evidence. A rare delicacy.

I imagine he drove towards you and hit the shield at full health. There isn't much more he could have ever done.

How slow is a Vanguard? Well, how long is a piece of string?

Clearly not my type. Our personalities just aren't compatible, baby. It would never work out, what would your parents say?

Lol. You can not maintain a discussion with different opinions. You always go to the discussion of personalities.
Go and cry about how your vanguard is awful instead of thinking of vanguard countermeasure experience of other faction.
Baby.

That is literally what a discussion is. You've given me nothing to really respond to other than to say a single personal experience doesn't mean anything, and that simply saying the Vanguard is "not as slow as it often spoken" likewise means absolutely nothing.

How long is a piece of string? Well it depends on the string. How much faster or slower is the Vanguard actually compared to what people sometimes say? Well I guess it depends on what is being said specifically and not just some broad overall claim.

As per usual an obvious joke has gone over your head.

I think we're missing out on the most important aspect, namely, the colour blue. This is often a corporate colour and it reminds all the soldiers of lost bonus checks and positions they'll never reach. Naturally this is devastating for moral. Worse still, their blocky design reminds them of all the lego they didn't get to play with because their parents pushed them into a career while too young.

Meanwhile, TR have all the dakka they ever could desire and VS have the best personal trainers and life coaches.