It would be nice if the burster MAX did more damage at close range. Currently if an ESF pilot manges to sneak up on a burster MAX the MAX is dead (and that is fine). If the burster MAX anticipates the manoeuvre, the ESF still escapes easily. Before range reduction the burster MAX could place itself smartly to increase the time it could shoot on the ESF thereby actually managing to kill many ESFs if the burster MAX was smart and caught them early on their attack run. With the reduced range, there has in effect been introduced a cap on the damage a burster MAX can do and thus it is no longer dangerous for an ESF to go up against a burster MAX. Reintroduce the risc vs reward and increase close range damage of burster MAX.
I don't mind the range reduction. What I don't like is the cost of max units paired with the cone of fire blooming. You can't even consistently kill hovering ESF at mid range (~200m), since 2/3 of the flak will miss the target. Ofc you can wait a few seconds, but this makes the extended magazines almost worthless. Pulling a burster max from infantry terminal is a waste of resources and you won't see me using it unless I've switched from another max loadout to provide temp support for AA.
