[Discussion] VS Infinite ammo weapons.

Id like to see a fairly civil more compacted thread on these weapons instead of 15 NERF VS PLOX threads every couple days, hopefully this will house a discussion on them without needed endless threads, for awhile at least.

Ill list off the current infinite ammo guns on the live servers and basic info on them. Since i dont own any directive guns except the skorpios (love it), id rather hear someone who does explain more in detail the pros and cons of these weapons.

First off, Bovinegoose

Actually called the betelgeuse named after the brightest star in the Orion constellation is an infinite ammo LMG with a 50 round capacity (citation needed), 0.75 ADS, and is otherwise identical to the standard issue Orion, with i think altered horizontal jitter statistics

The main issue i have seen nc and tr have with this gun thats actually a rational thought is the fact it cools down while other weapons are out (medpacks, rocket launchers, secondaries), assuming its not overheated.

On an LMG, aside from the cooling down with other items out, endless ammo doesnt seem like a major advantage in my opinion except to maybe lone wolves most of the time, since they would generally be within tange of engineers or terminals. It would be advantageous with trigger discipline assaulting a sundy or a point in some form, however most of the time high capacity LMGs (100-200 round magazines) would not need to reload in situations youd storm a sundy or point by yourself and not with support anyway

Second, the phaseshift. First off i love this weapon. If i could only use one sniper for the rest of my life in this game, itd be this one. On the infiltrator infinite ammo works as you have the lowest chance of finding ammo as a sniper, and generally need to run to a sundy/terminal/to friendlies or hope the enemy is being competent, but everyone hates this gun for some reason, sadly


The Eclipse also works on the LA as the flanker aspect of it puts it in a similar position of an infiltrator. Not sure how well its working after the buff.

The darkstar has the same issue i think the beetlejuice has, which is as a medic youll be with friendlies anyway and have ease of access to ammo. not sure how its doing after the buff.

I am going to make this thread very simple.

The Betelgeuse is king at farming tons and tons of bad players. The second you have to face a person who can aim you are put at a disadvantage. When you are required to play serious, for whatever reason, the Orion becomes a better weapon.

i can assume it has something to do with attachments, but please explain a bit more indepth or youre just as bad as that inevitable nc saying

"betel op ******* balance nerf plox buff ravens"

/sigh

Foregrip plain and simple. You are giving up accuracy for farming ability. When need to be serious it normally involves needing to not miss. While you may be able to kill the same number of people back to back (for the most part) with the BG as you can with the Orion it will be easier to do with the Orion because of the extra accuracy.

Tldr; Accuracy vs Farming power

I haven't faced the Betelgeuse too much (if I have, I didn't know it). But I think much of the hate against it is the same with the Orion. Orion is just nasty when it comes to LMGs. Its in a DPS category NC do not have access to (1787.5), and is near identical to the TR's weapon save for the .75 ADS. The only trade off is it has less rounds in the mag.

I don't have anything really against the Orion. As the TR get basically the same weapon with a 100rnd drum. My biggest issue is NC does NOT have access to a 1787 dps LMG. We get up to 1667 and that's it.

Now you say the Betelgeuse's benefit is only apparent when lonewolfing it. Well the Gauss SAW's only benefit (compared to the other starter LMGs) is when you have Heavy coordination. You see the SAW is the best LMG in the game.. But only IF there is 2-3 heavies firing at the same doorway, at the same time when guarding a point. (Two to Three 200 dmg weapon unloading on to someone, dropping them before they can react, it takes 4-5 TR or VS to do the same thing)

In my two years of playing on Connery, I've only see TWO outfits capable of that level of coordination. Recursion and Hav0c.

So therein lies the issue, the 'best LMG' in the game isn't because its situation doesn't come up too often for the majority of players who use it. Most people are doing the casual grouping, cert farming, or lonewolfing deal. That makes infinite ammo seem more ideal. I know it isn't, but that's the perception.

What could curb that perception, at least from a NC point of view is turning the EM1, one of our most underutilized weapons, into a 1787.5 dps weapon like the Orion or Carv. This could be done by turning it into a 750rpm weapon.

Personally I'd like to see it turn into a 200dmg weapon at 536rpm with a 50rnd mag. Or even a 167 dmg weapon at 642rpm, with a 75rnd mag. In either case it would be similar to the Carv, but less DPM. I can justify that by giving it a slightly higher velocity.

As for the TR perception. I'm not sure what to say. They have an identical weapon minus the .75 ADS. I can only think they are jumping on the anti-VS bandwagon alongside the NC.

I used to run with the typical forward grip on the Orion until I got the Auraxium for it. Unlocked the Betelgeuse just two days ago.

Without a forward grip, the Orion/Betelgeuse is truly difficult to control. It can be mastered obviously, and it can be utterly devastating when you have mastered it (though, this isn't much different to most other weapons), but the truth is simply that the Betelgeuse can't match the Orion for user-accuracy if the Orion has a forward grip. Possibly a case of higher skill floor, same skill ceiling.

As far as heat mechanics go, the Directive weapons punish users for missed shots, particularly where there are a large number of targets, but make it substantially easier to combat enemies that attack in a steady stream. It gives an interesting advantage to those who burst-fire at medium and long ranges, because their effective magazines are somewhat larger than normal due to how short the delay is before cooling. Thankfully from a balance perspective, none of the VS Directive weapons are 167 or 200-damage weapons, because weapons like those with heat mechanics would utterly dominate at range. The unlimited ammunition, despite what I may have said in a previous thread (changed my mind since I now own a heat weapon), is actually particularly useful to the VS due to their middling RoF, small magazine pattern. I found the Orion to be exceptionally thirsty for ammunition having just come from playing NC, and during the hunt for the Betelgeuse my SVA-88 and NS-15M ran dry on a regular basis. The Solstice's ammo pool is infuriating, as is the Pulsar's. I never ran out of ammunition on NC, and only rarely on TR.

This is pretty simple to the casual player. What sounds better:
Average damage, good rate of fire, good recoil, good accuracy, unlimited ammo, good agility
Good damage, bad rate of fire, bad recoil, bad accuracy, average capacity, average agility
Average damage, good rate of fire, average recoil, average accuracy, good capacity, average agility

When I hear a TR or NC player whine about the Orion, the first thought that pops into my head is "noob". For anyone that can aim, I feel that the TR's MSW-R and the NC's LA1 Anchor are superior weapons. I've used them all. I personally prefer having the choice of Soft Point Ammo over the .75 movement.

The Orion's .75 movement is only a difference of .25 compared to other LMGs. If you can hit someone strafing without an Overshield and LMG competently, then that extra .25 movement shouldn't be an issue. Head to head, against a player with equal skill and aim, the other faction's LMG equivalents have the advantage of SPA and from my experience, usually win the 1v1.

The extra 0.25 is 50% improved movement when aiming.

50% is a big percentage.

Half of the top ten threads right now are complaints about Vanu stats and in every one there are Vanu players saying "nah, it's not that bad, I feel like other races have good guns because I die every now and again.

But the statistics continue to show Vanu dominance in nearly every area.

I believe the whole "whine tsunami" directed at the Betelgeuse stems mostly from it's relative popularity when compared to other Directive LMGs. I main TR and thus have no relevant observations about the Butcher, but I rarely ever see the GODSAW, whereas the Betelgeuse pops up fairly often.

Another factor is rather self-explanatory - it's a Directive weapon which means it is mostly wielded by BRs 85+ aka. experienced players. Even if their aim and muscle memory isn't all that great, they still have a broad knowledge of general gameplay techniques and mechanics.

Then there's the 0.75 ADS and as much as people like to downplay it's value - it's huge (comparable to SPA in my opinion). If the VS HA is running the default NMG he can ADAD duel effectively and only pop his Overshield when he feels things are going south for him. For TR/NC Heavies this is not an option when using an LMG unless they are hipfiring it (which ***** their accuracy). I believe no LMG should have this trait, BUT - I'm willing to let it slide (not that it matters...) for the VS because mobility is supposed to be one of their leading traits and this makes for an annoying, yet bearable advantage.

Lastly - infinite ammo. It's a nice perk to have and fun to toy with, but it's far from gamebreaking.

Edit: I made my response all about the Betelgeuse and completely forgot about all the other weapons... Coffee time...

I hardly consider the heat mechanic a good trade off for plain old weapon performance. The average person will get more mileage out of the Orion than the battlemoose. Heat seems to be a flavor mechanic that actually doesn't do much in real gameplay. Attachment options and base stats like accuracy, ROF, and damage seem to dictate whether or not a gun is "good," regardless of small traits like heat and reload speed.

Add in the Anchor and MSW-R to the Orion, but this exactly.

There's a reason why in the farmers league everyone used only those three weapons on HA, and that's because it combines the highest DPS possible with the highest accuracy possible on an LMG.

Also, I've had the Betelgeuse for several months now and the Eclipse for the last month and I keep going back to the non-heat weapons because accuracy in this game is king, especially when the VS's faction trait is to have the lowest damage per magazine across all factions.

im sad no ones brought up the phaseshift

i had a presentation and everything

So what?

This is good, why should all factions be the same. May as well all have NS weapons and how boring would that be?

As NC we have 200 damage tiered weapons, something VS and TR do not

You're also leaving out the bit that when it comes to needing to use full mag capacity, the Orion reloads rather quickly, while full heat cooldown (NOT overheated) on the goose is slightly longer, and an overheat is a STAGGERING 7 seconds before you can shoot again.

For maximum bullets downrange, HEAT mechanics actually limit sustained damage down-range.

It's advantage comes from bursts and cooldown periods.

Isn't the Anchor doing better on a per user basis anyways?

That's probably a somewhat skewed stat due to all VS & TR noobs using the Orion/Carv...

but even if you look only at BR80 I think Anchor is still a top performer.

Someone who gives a ****, link stats pl0x

because it's underperforming compared to every other BASR.

It's got the power and velocity of the faster chamber BASR's, but with a damn 1-2 second charge up, and a delay on the semi-mode.

False!

It is a semi auto technically and it has a 0.45 second charge up which is 50% or more faster than a bolt rechambering!

It has no artificial semi auto delay!

It doesn't shoot until LMB release, rather than LMB click. That's a delay.

a half second delay for "BASR" charged shot is also a mechanic unique to it, and forces you to decloak early, as well as start firing before needing to fire instead of, again, aiming and tapping LMB

Also, it's statistically factual that players do worse with it, regardless of how you do. On avg it's not over-performing. Not even close. So it has no perceived OPness

Not to forget the practical 2 shot mag. 2 charge-ups without waiting for the entire and long cooldown(Feels like 2x Railjack) and you have to reload. As if the gun wasnt crap enough with the shot delay. Shame, cause I like the weapon model best of all the guns.