Oh my...auto scouts seem to be awful

I know what everything else you listed is and they are completely irrelevant, maybe you should practice some reading comprehension?

Maybe you should try and understand how weapon stats work.

they were around since release, long before SMG were implemented. that was the only automatic option back then for infiltrators.

The SOAS-20 on TR just... looks wrong. It has a barrel long enough to make daddy RAMS .50 proud. But it fires sideways. It doesn't look the part of a close-mid weapon for an infiltrator. Should be shorter

Gameplay wise it jumps around so much for me, where killing someone with one magazine is full of luck. SMG's are just flat better. Argument that this weapon is better then the PDW over range is moot since you won't be hitting anyone with reliable accuracy when using the SOAS-20.

But that's just me.

Reduce bloom per shot from 0.05 -> 0.01
Lower horizontal recoil from 0.2/0.225 -> 0.2/0.2

This change would make the auto-scout rifle be able to an dump entire magazine on target, provided the user can compensate for drop and travel time. The recoil adjustment would allow for more stable fire and reduce the randomness of horizontal recoil.

but that would make ppl who can aim even more superior to filthy casuals. do you want empty servers because this is how you get empty servers

It's REALLY good if you aim for the head while you have support (at colse/mid range). <3 my Artemis!

I also love ALL of the auto scouts, especially the stalker. Midrange Assasins best friend. Reliable, versatile, accurate. What do you want more from a full auto infil weapon?

I use mine with forward grip, comp and 2x yellow dot. If I see you first you are dead.

At least the VS one is really silent with silencer.
Although i prefer the NC variant because of the gun model and sound (!) .

Lol. Auto scouts are awesome. If you wanna skip over some of the best that infils have available go right ahead.

It used to be much worse, with carbine damage tier, even less ammo, and - afaik - worse recoil. Right now it's a very weak AR with bad recoil stats, which is arguably how it should be with infiltrators.

Little recoil, only one tier dmg drop off.

Buff velocity to AR level and they would be legit good.

Neither can I

This was back when we had community clash and I used the Artemis against Sturmgrenadier.

It relies more on accuracy than bullet spam.

Granted they're quite situational, but aiming down sights with at least a forward grip (some run compensator, not my thing personally) I've found you can nail targets out to ranges an SMG would just fail at (yes, even the PDW).

I see them as the closest thing to an assault rifle the cloaker has access to. Just gotta be careful not to over-extend with that magazine size.

They are pretty bad stats-wise. If you compare them to carbines (their closest relatives I'd say) then you basically find that they combine all the worst stats of the entire carbine family into one single weapon, except they are even worse than the worst traits of the worst carbines in some areas...

- DPS is equal to the lowest tier of carbines
- Recoil is close to the "worst recoil" tier of carbines. Depending on your factions carbines it is somewhere between medium-high.
- Magazine capacity is laughable - the least of any automatic weapon in the game

- Same COF/spread as any carbine (or any 143 gun in the game for that matter)
- No significant drop-off/range benefit
- Bottom tier mobility
- Bottom tier moving accuracy
- Worse hipfire than any carbine or AR. Better than some LMGs by a small margin (yay?!)

Basically the weapons only benefit is being an automatic weapon that is available to infil. Were it usable to other classes there would never be any situation where it would be even remotely close to being useful to them.

That said, the fact that it IS an automatic weapon available to infils actually makes this one of the better allrounder weapons of an infils arsenal - but I think that this speaks more to the lack of weapons (and good weapons) that the infil has available.

I understand that it is reasonable to not give infils Assault rifles or LMGs. The class is about presicion, mobility and stealth, not brute killing Power. It is disappointing to see however that the auto-scouts don't seem to actually get any of these characteristics. A small bonus to COF Bloom nudge it just a little above the average carbine or AR would define it as a presicion weapon, or the 0.75x ADS mobility trait seems reasonable for this sort of weapon. At least a velocity that is on par With other long-range presicion weapons in the carbine or AR class. It needs some small thing that it actually does better than the worst examples of all the other weapon classes...

-Stigma

Just make it identical to the A-tross but keep the 24 ammo count. High damage and low RPM that favors longer ranges.

That would amount to a MASSIVE upgrade.
I mean, by all means... I'd certainly love to use something like that, but I'd settle for less drastic changes.

-Stigma

Scout Rifles are less powerful than carbines because Infiltrators are meant to flank using the cloaking device. Scout Rifles are not weapons for face to face fights, they are designed to be mid-range weapons for flanking, if you compare them with a carbine then you're doing it wrong.
Then the clip size is not amazing but it's perfect to kill 1 target before reloading, and that's how Scout Rifles are meant to be used. Of course the automatic rifles require a little bit of trigger discipline, you can't just spray bullets around. You gotta focus on single targets, and take them by surprise one by one. I've auraxiumed the SOAS-20 and the HSR-1 I know what I talk about it: if you use Scout Rifles like the carbine of your Engineer then you will die hundreds of times.

My suggestion is basically what Mustarde already showed in his videos: remove suppressor, go for compensator and play aggressively.

The only remark is that semi-auto are not so great: semi auto sniper rifles fill the same nich, have almost the same stats (just worse hipfire accuracy) but they deal something like 2,5x more damage (compare HSR-1 with KSR-35 for Terran).