Aother shotgun nerf=another NC MAX nerf

Nope. I'm shocked the mattock got changed at all? It was by far (opinion) the least used NC MAX AI arm.

So... when we're getting our machine guns?

So in other words, make shotguns completely useless?

Kinda okay with that, and I've used the shotguns...a lot.

Doesn't speak well for game balance.

They should have made shotguns more viable weapons at range. Tightening the spread and come of fire would remove the 'spamming' aspect they talked about, while making them more balanced at range.

They'd have to reduce the overall damage to increase the range, though. Which would lend itself to the question of why use a shotgun over a normal weapon? Shotguns are extremely hard to fit into the game without being Overpowered or Underpowered...there's very little gray area for them to operate in without being outshined.

Secondly, I just realize they have two figures for pellet counts on the guns?
What does the second number mean?

But what if the firing noise was replaced by a sick guitar solo?

Also the nerfs to NC MAXes with zero change to our useless shield and bugged Falcons really just says it all.

One thing is unrelated to the other.

Shield is far from useless, I've seen it used to GREAT effect countering lock down directly. You where an enemy is going to be firing from a single angle? Walk up to him while draining his clip and taking now damage then side step and blow away a stationary target. I've seen some solid players time it before a missile impact and negate it. I would like to see it cover the entire frontal arc, without foot shots being a thing.

I didn't know falcons were bugged? But I haven't seen an NC MAX using anything but Ravens since they were introduced.

Second number is spread. Lower is better, as well as correlated with lower raw damage output.

Increasing range AUTOMATICALLY reduces damage, they're shotguns dude. That's an absolute, unchangeable function of the weapon class. Slugs have dramatic damage dropoff as well, though I don't have the raw numbers.

A senseless nerf to 100% of our AI options as well as no fix to Falcon velocity yet is just needed to offset how much more expensive the MAX is to pull now! Good god SOE if this makes it live...

Falcons are supposed to be faster than Comets, but in practice they're about 1/2 the speed.

Charging up to a lockdown would be much better. Even max rank shield wont do much against two mutilators - it'll drop and you'll already be hurt because so much bleeds through.

If you make it that far without every medic/LA/HA throwing C4 at you because you're so slow.

Aegis is about as useful as something that magnifies the chief weakness of a class while eliminating the chief benefit can be expect to be.

Ahhhh, I see, I was just making sure they didn't actually lower the pellet count in some bizarre fashion as another post had implied.

I would assume if they were increasing the range of the weapon intentionally they would increase the threshold before fallout begins, which is why I said they'd need to lower the damage to accomodate it. Like they did the Mercies. Now they do the same damage at all ranges!

They actually lowered minimum damage across the board as well. So it'd be like if instead of mercies getting 125 or whatever flat out, they got 112 with a minimum of 90.

Also they could be fired for 2 seconds before they were out of commission for 4 seconds.

Why do people constantly use MAX vs MAX situations for NC AI MAX balance? Using small arms AI against a MAX is stupid anyway, you'd be a lot better off using explosives.

That's like saying the PA isn't strong enough because it can't kill an ESF fast enough.

If NC maxes end up taking 3 shots to kill, VS/TR maxes will be almost as good at CQ and much, much better at range. They'll be hands down the worst AI maxes. I don't mind though, I just hope it's the first step in giving all maxes a severe nerfbat beating.

Right, because MAXes never have to fight each other. Still, in singular case you encounter another MAX as NC just switch to explosives. Have your engineer put a couple C4 on you and detonate them when you get close enough to the enemy. That's the only thing you're good for anyway. 350 infantry resources well spent.

It's pellet spread, in degrees.

Yeah, shotguns are ineffective. They just kill instantly in close quarters. Which is where most cap points are. And most infantry areas that aren't dominated by vehicles. And choosing AI over AV against an armoured suit is smart.

NC AI MAXs don't have any "conventional firearms".

It's bad enough that the Fracture is so much better and ZOE (and Lockdown and ZOE with Bursters), but now NC AI MAXs won't even be better than TR and VS AI MAX at 0m with any upgrades?

How is that rational or balanced?

That is some bonkers nerfage.


That means that some NC AI weapon won't out-DPS TR and VS weapons even with extended mags at 0m.


How can the "advantage" of NC MAX shotgun weapons be that they are WORSE IN EVERY SITUATION?

This is nonsense though (even ignoring that the Fracture is insanely good at AI and AV).

Currently (before these nerfs) the TTK of TR and VS weapons is fractionally slower under 8m (and 8m is very close) and better past 8m). The DPS is even worse due to the NC MAXs small clips and long reload.


These changes means (unless TR and VS AI weapons are HEAVILY NERFED - and some AV weapons AI power - certainly the Fracture) that TR and VS AI MAXs will just always at any range have lower TTKs and higher DPS than supposedly "short range but deadly" NC AI MAX weapons.

How is that "balanced"?

Yeah, 20 times faster TTK at close quarters is nonsense.