Does anyone use iron sights?

Not too long ago, I trialed few NS weapons, namely the assault rifle, carbine and lmg. I played with them a bit, found them unbelievely accurate and easy to control.
So I got myself a NS-11A on my medic, slapped a 1x reflex sight on it and went on playing for a bit as this healing pistol wielding medium assault.

After a while I noticed that I can't aim with it as well as I could before and the control over it seemed worse too. So I tried to remove the reflex sight and suddenly I had the same experience with it as when I trialed it.
It might be just a placebo effect, it might be just a bad moment with reflex sight or the very distinct iron sight is just easier to aim with for me than with that red dot reflex sight, which can sometimes blend a bit with the target I aim at.

Nevertheless, it got me thinking, is there anybody who prefers iron sights over reflex sights?

Whatever Works Best™

Iron Sights work extremely well with 3D vision (like oculus rift or 3d glasses).

not a fan of any vs iron sight but thats just me

It really depends on the optimal range of the weapon and how clear or obstructive the iron sights are.

Take my standard weapons, the NS-7 PDW and the crossbow.
I use the iron sights on the PDW because they are simple and don't block my view much, also, the PDW is for close and medium range combat, so I don't miss having a scope.
I always use explosive bolts on the crossbow, which exacerbates the projectile drop and the iron sights are just too obstructive for that, so I have a reflex sight which gives me a better field of view with that particular weapon.

Yes, I have the same problem with Commisioner, I use reflex sight on it, because the iron sights are just too small and the weapon model obstructs my vision of target.

I started to play with iron sights on VS guns too, and I find the all right. I just don't like the shotgun iron sights. But NS are still better than VS ones.

I used to for all my VS weapons before reflexes got an overhaul, because I couldn't handle the misleading crosshairs. My accuracy stats dropped a disturbing 5% when I used reflexes compared to ironsights back then.

Now though, not so much. I am seriously considering using ironsights on the Betelgeuse, as an experiment. Something I noticed with VS ironsights in particular is it becomes remarkably easy to focus on a target's head - I can't explain how or why, but my headshots were more consistent with ironsights. I wasn't too keen on ironsights for other factions because they were too obscuring (though some TR weapons are alright, see TRAC-5 and MSW-R).

NS weapons do have some very nice ironsights, but I find it tricky to use them without also using a forward grip because they throw me off when trying to adjust for the horizontal pull. Mind you, that's just me.

I haven't looked at iron sights since the game first came out. I literally just slap my favorite 2x scope on everything I buy by default, across all factions. Before all the guns got 2x it used to be piss me off immensely have to switch between 2x and 1x. I don't even bother with 1xs any more. I should probably take the time to check out iron sights at some point, but I know what works best for me and muh brain.

I like the SABR-13 style sights on TR guns. The ones on Cycler and Trac though are awful.

I used irons on most NC weapons (as they have excellent irons) for years but ever since they fixed the reflex sights I've made the switch over to 1x RDS instead.

I used to use them almost exclusively before the change to reflex sights. Now I sometimes still use them but have mostly started using optic sights.

I just wish the Iron Sights in the game worked like they do IRL. The rear sights should be blurred out and not obstructing at all. But then they'd have to consider taking away COF while using them. Cause realistically there is no COF when you have a correct sight picture.. a round will always go where you aim at it if your sight picture is correct.

Just not in PS2.

Well in video games in general.

Firing a gun from the hip doesn't change the accuracy of the weapon, you just don't know exactly where you are pointing it.

Though realism should take a back seat to balance but I do get a bit annoyed that the same tropes/physics are kept in games because that is just what people are used it.

Just an FYI... CoF was added to FPS to simulate recoil. That was back in the Goldeneye and Doom days. When we started getting actual recoil effects, COF isn't really needed anymore. I expect there to be COF while hip firing. That doesn't bother me and does make sense as the weapon isn't as stable from that position. But braced against the shoulder and sighted in.. recoil should be the only thing that keeps you from hitting exactly where you want it. I would be alright if they increased recoil across the board to compensate.

It seems like it was more of an oversight to me. And in reality.. makes balancing a chore since you have two mechanics to work with in an already complex system. But here's a picture that should a good indication of what I'm talking about:



The red dot is the reflex sight aiming point, that's where the user is firing. The purple dot shows where the round actually went. I have never had someone tell me a good reason why what happened in this pic should have happened from a balance point of view.

This was taken from a video and the firer did actually kill the target surprisingly enough. But it was closer than it really should have been. Had the VS heavy pulled out his Orion and hip fired.. the TR soldier would have been toast... despite having the drop on his target. If you watched the video (and sadly I don't have the link), you'd see that he was ADS in wait for him to come into view.

Iron Sights might be a good candidate for removing COF while ADS though. You trade visibility for more accuracy. This might help out new players a bit as well (if we have any left trickling in). I remember when I first played the game and never could figure out why my shots weren't going where I was aiming them. It wasn't until we had the VR that I figured out it was just that they were spraying and everyone had the issue (I knew how to adjust recoil early on).

Or at least least get us (the camera) closer to the sights. Here's what it looks like:



When it should be closer to this:

i use ironsights exclusively on the NS-11A and Baron G5. because they look and feel better for me without scopes


but i am unfortunately forced to use ironsights on Vanu pistols even though i would love to have a reflex sight on them

So, it evolved to a discussion about CoF. Very well then.

A little bit of CoF will always be there. You never manufacture a gun so precisely, that the bullet would go in a straight line (excluding gravity and other effects).
The ADS CoF we have of course, is much higher that it should be and it shouldn't increase when you fire. Reallisticaly speaking inaccuracy should be handled by recoil. I agree with this.

But then I would ask whether the recoil behaves as it would in real life? You usually won't go full auto with your assault rifle, without CoF it would be possible to do in PS2. On the other hand, it's still just a game.

Well the COF makes the Iron Sights very hard to use, especially on non-NS weapons. The COF is literally causing a pattern beyond the back circle/square/triangle you are looking through. Even at very close ranges. This is why Reflex sights are so superior, and why Iron Sights are not used as much.

This is why I suggested to lower or eliminate COF from Iron Sights. I doubt we will see the camera changes to make them more visible. And I really doubt we'll see COF removed from ADS entirely. So this idea is a bit of a babystep.

I don't think even with COF removed from Iron Sights would cause a massive shift to them just because of the visibility with them. But it would be a nice perk for those who dislike reflex and zoom sights.

I just went to double check, what you are showing is actually the bloom of the weapon after about 40-50 shots of holding down M1 non stop. Which seems plenty fair. Fire in 4-10 round bursts and never have to deal with this issue.

If I remember correctly they only had about 70 shots when they initially started firing. So there wasn't 40 shots fired. Not even close. By the way, Bloom and COF are the same thing. My question is why not replace bloom with pure recoil? Let skill determine hits, not dice rolls.

I'm getting confused here. I didn't notice and I can't even imagine how would CoF made aiming harder for me, except that bullets don't fly where I point. But that is the same with reflex sights too, so honestly I have no idea what you are talking about here.

Oh I know, I played both of those games back in the day.

What bothers me is certain traits and expectations like this are still expected in today's games even though they could have advanced far beyond it. In some cases we have even regressed. For example there were games that shooting someone in different areas has different effects (shooting someone in the leg made them run slower) as opposed to today where you basically only have bodyshots and headshots. Players expect for visibility to be perfectly clear (a few games break this rule but not many). Gatling guns to be inaccurate (the reason they have multiple barrels so they can stay accurate during sustained fire). Ammo is almost never an issue. You get the idea.