Why is the AS16 Nighthawk better than the Jackhammer?

Hi all, Ive just witnessed 1 guy with a Nighthawk shotgun take on 10 guys and kill each guy with quick succession, over and over again. The gun is capable of 1 hit kills against a HA with shield boost. Its rate of fire is insanely fast and it has a decent size mag. So I ask why is this gun far better as a shotgun than the faction NC shotgun "Jackhammer"? Surely this isnt working as intended?. Appreciate your thoughts

Automatic shotguns are incapable of OHKing anyone, who isn't half dead anyway. The NC equivalent of the Nighthawk is the Piston, which has identical stats.

You're misinformed about TTK, its capabilities, and exaggerating when you say '10 players' being taken out over and over. Take a deep breath and remember not to make threads while suffering from the effects of a ragequit.

I would upload the clip but for my terrible 0.10 upload speeds. Im not raging lol I was having a laugh with the guy using it. Im not exaggerating the OHK, I was playing heavy with the "auxiliary shield" boost and he did this multiple times. At one point he killed 5 people with 1 magazine. Hopefully the guy in question will show up and confirm all that. I've been playing since alpha and know my way around the game quite well. I dont ever post here and this is one actual reason to.

Regards

Just for reference btw since I bothered to look it up:

AS16 Nighthawk: 125x5 @ 5 meters [ 750 damage combined ] 260RPM
Jackhammer: 112x5 @ all ranges [560 damage combined] 225 RPM

The nighthawk is a far superier shotgun vs a Faction weapon. Cheers.

The automatic shotguns deal 750 damage per shot within 5m and with the 1.5x hs multiplier they can deal 1125 damage. Enough for a OHK on non-overshielded HA's.

This is actually weird since the automatic shotguns now deal more damage per shot, have higher ROF's and have similar magazine sizes as the semi-auto's. While the semi-auto's still have less damage falloff and pelletspread (4 versus 3) it makes the automatics far superior as that extra range and accuracy isnt enough to offset the difference.

Shotguns are in a weird place right now. Unless you somehow get within 3m and open up with a OHK HS you'll be needing to score 100% of your hits to stay a fraction ahead of normal weapons. You sacrifice all that range for practically no extra damage potential. Its like picking a sniper and then being only a fraction better than a Carbine at range but requiring more skill to OHK than current snipers.

If you sacrifice your range, you should get something in return. I think that shotguns should have a more noticeable advantages in CQC, if not damage then a slight concussion effect based on how many pellets hit at the same time. Also making shotguns more multifunctional by allowing the player to switch to solid slugs on the fly (say any time you ADS it automatically switches) would help make these weapons more useful.

lol they keep upvoting the one guys comment which is just an emotional blurb without reading the actual info.

That comparison doesn't make much sense, now does it? The Jackhammer is a scalpel (as far as shotguns go) and it does have the burst mode for close encounters. That aside, there is nothing wrong with an automatic shotgun being superior to a faction weapon in extreme CQC.

I fail to a problem as said faction has access to a carbon copy of the Nighthawk.

You fail to a problem the point I am making. A faction shotgun should be the best shotgun at CQC (where a shotgun should only ever be used) It makes no difference if there are carbon copys on all factions, they shouldnt be as effective as they are. Cheers.

The Jackhammer used to be better, but because only 1 faction has it it got nerfed a bit when all shotguns got changed.

Though a funny thing you can do is ASP the heavy assault Heavy weapon secondary, so you can have LMG + Jackhammer, or Jack + Jack if you want to be big dumb.

The Jackhammer is balanced for the HA thus 1) longer range 2) bigger mag 3) burst option means it can open fire sooner and move accurately while having no damage drop off + can optimise for CQC with burst mode. All useful traits for a class which does not have jump jets but do have added durability. The moment when you find the sweet spot and when to/not to fire you're going to be the one who's frustrating them as they try to get into their effective range.

Just ask Campagne what he thinks of the jackhammer. He has it listed on his google doc if I remember correctly.

"Why is the AS16 Nighthawk better than the Jackhammer?"

Short version: Because people whine on the forums.

Being faction specific people get ******** when they die to something that they can't use as well. Being ******** makes them remember it. Remembering it (and not other deaths) makes them think it happens all the time which leads them to think it's overpowered. Then they whine on the forums. And whine, and whine, and whine, and argue, and use crappy logic.

Then one day it reaches critical mass and you get a faction specific weapon nerfed until it is mediocre at best.

For jackhammer your only chance to win this duel is using burst fire mode.112x5=560dmg, 560x3 = 1680 which is enough to put down overshielded heavy. But this technically makes jackhammer a pump-action shotgun.

Nighthawk is so good because it have 125dmg per pellet while all other standart shotguns have 100dmg per pellet.
You need 1250dmg to finish nanoweave wearer. 125x6=750dmg which means 2 shots to kill, while 100x6=600dmg so you need 3 shots. (Baron 84x7=588dmg, even less).
This is why autoshotguns (nighthawk, piston, pandora) are the best shotguns in the game. Not only they have highest RPM, but at the same time highest damage per shot if all pellets hit. (in overshielded HA vs overshielded HA scenario you both need to hit your opp 3 times, but nighthawk shot faster)

They must be nerfed from 125dmg to 100dmg ages ago. These shotguns make achieving auraxium version of default shotgun pointless, since default one aswell as auraxium one perform worse than autoshotty. Even "HIGH CAPACITY" shotguns have LITERALLY less damage per magazine (12x600=7200dmg, 10x750=7500dmg), even special HEAVY Jackhammer losing against them in semi-auto mode.
Autoshotty = EASY mode weapon, for ****ters who can't aim or have potato PC, thats why on my main character i had 4k+ kills on it (2nd most popular weapon on this char). I just can't resist to NOT use it. Free real statpadding. Awesome ****** up game design right here.

Why? Because you say so?

Following that rationale the MCG should be the best LMG in the game; except - it isn't and that's fine, because just like the Jackhammer it has a niche, it's fun to use and remains competitive.

Ever since the HOT1/12 Shotgun Changes, the Jackhammer has been pretty much the worse primary infantry shotgun in the game.

Aside from the questionably in/frequent OHK of a pump-action the auto-shotguns are just flat out better in nearly every regard compared to every other shotgun. Due to the changes, the JH went from King of Shotguns to barely stronger than a Magscatter. (Only because the Jackhammer slightly fires faster and has triple the magazine size).

Currently instead of lethality the JH is best suited as a "long-range" shotgun, or high-capacity suppression shotgun. Needless to say both are pretty worthless niches. The burst mode of the JH is not great either, facing a sudden, huge spike in vertical recoil and going through six different rounds of RNG for pellet spread alone.

So why is an auto-shotgun better than the heavy specialty shotgun? Two fold: A) Auto-shotguns were over-buffed, B) The Jackhammer was made to fill a role closer to that of the other ES Heavy Weapons rather than that of a shotgun.

(As much as I'd like to say "because NC," I don't think that's entirely fair).

I disagree with this statement. A faction specific shotgun should have a special design where it is noticeably superior to its counterparts and fullfill a solid role without sacrificing its shotgun role. The JH seems to fullfill that role with its range relative to the other shotguns, but its not a useful ability considering what it trades in for it.

Shotguns trade range for CQC firepower, or that is what they are supposed to do (and fail for the most part in PS2 since the latest shotgun overhaul). The JH trades what CQC power it has for a tiny bit extra range, but any CQC carbine/LMG/SMG/whatever will outperform it at both range and CQC. The only niche the JH really has is its one-burst-kill which just makes it a pump-action over time (and with the burst time+downtime after a slower one at that), and the high-ROF carbines are better candidates as you can correct your aim or hose down multiple people without stopping.

I liked the previous incarnation of shotguns with the exception of the lack of reliability in their shots. They had similar damage per magazine as LMG's, a good headshot in CQC was devastating but difficult and their biggest drawbacks were that you didnt know if you were going to need 2 or 5 shots to kill someone within 10m and their lack of ranged potential compared to other CQC weapons. There's a reason that shotguns see so little use since forever: they just arent made for PS2. Most battles including pointrooms just dont happen within that shotgun range, and when they do you are almost guaranteed to have had a longer range battle first. Shotguns also force you out of cover and to beeline towards your opponent and unlike other CQC weapons cant be used at range with trigger discipline. Its such a shame that they do this to shotguns simply because there is a horrible bias towards them.

MCG isn't even remotely used like an LMG.
LMGS are about accuracy and headshots, trigger discipline and should never be hip fired,
MCG is all about chucking out ten million bullets in an endless stream, never letting go of the trigger and is king of hipfire weapons.

Try firing an LMG at a harasser and they'll laugh at you, fire the MCG at them and you'll chew them apart in 10 or so seconds!

If we're classing MCG as anything it's a really big angry hipfire SMG,
and in that arena it plays well, my favourite bullethose.
Jackhammer is just a bad shotgun, there is nothing setting it apart from the other shotguns.

The problem arrives when we consider that this bad shotgun is NC equivalent to Lasher an MCG,
truly unique weapons with actual purpose.

Jackhammer is still statistically my most used weapon (I have enough kills to aurax it 3 times over)
Despite barely touching it in recent years, my most used weapon became dead to me.
The patch that added the delay to the burst fire mode killed it.

They've recently given MCG a buff, I think it's time that "The King of Shotguns" got its crown back.
Make the standard fire mode auto, remove the burst fire delay between bursts.

Well, no - not exactly. It can bring a higher ROF to bear and that is it - it has no other DPS advantage over an LMG and using the Carv as an example, said advantage isn't all that impressive.

An SMG with a spin-up time; to me the strength of the MCG lies in its non-expanding COF which gives it decent ADS capabilities within 10-20 meters.

Following that rationale, the MCG is just an 800-845 RPM weapon with limited range and gimped DPS due to the spin-up.

In all honesty only the Lasher stands out as truly unique.

I'm not saying the Jackhammer is in a good place right now, what I'm arguing is that there is no requirement for it to be objectively better than an automatic shotgun; just as the MCG is not better than a Carv (or the Failstorm, to follow your classification).

you're comparing apples and oranges here.


First off, the jackhammer is the faction specific heavy gun. In terms of equivalence, the TR get a mini chain-gun, and the VS get the lasher. The jackhammer kills in 2 shots, has the best accuracy (pellet spread) for a shotgun, and a large mag. Just remember not to use the burst mode (which fires 3 shots instead of the 2 needed to kill someone and has a punishing re-fire time). It's good against MAXes, which was the point of these heavy guns in the first place, and fares pretty good up close, and past the typical range of shotguns thanks to it's tight pellet spread.


The nighthawk is a full auto shotgun, available not just to the heavy. It's a 2 shot kill, but fires faster than the semi auto shotguns (including the jackhammer) because...its full auto. It's very forgiving, however the magazine size is small and people usually fire a shot or two more than needed to kill someone. Each faction has a full auto shotgun (TR - nighthawk, NC - piston, VS - pandora) available for every class asides infil and MAX. You can pick up your full auto shotgun if you want (specs are identical across factions) and see for yourself.

The downside of the full auto is that pump actions will kill you faster up close (assuming all pellets land), and past that 5m range (like you saw in the stats) semi auto shotguns, and the heavy jackhammer will have faster ttk (thanks to lower damage drop-off) and a better chance of landing more pellets due to tighter pellet spread. Sure - you could equip slugs - which would ruin the point of a full auto shotgun, but the jackhammer would still be better in its niche.

To answer your question, the nighthawk is better than the jackhammer in certain scenarios, and was not meant to compete with it in the first place.