Comment on new HC1 Cougar as of 04/10

This is from another thread:




I'm still not able to log in because of the crash, but with this Cougar iteration I've lost hope that the devs will get it right for release.

Firstly they are using the same old approach to balance TR weapons which got us into the current misery in the first place.
Severely crippling TR Weapons for a few extra rounds in the magazine.
It simply isn't worth that much (vs Razor: less velocity, worse hipfire, recoil?..) the longer reload already compensates it.

Secondly, like with the first Cougar, we already have a better version of this weapon, this time it is called the T5 AMC.
It has a little bit higher DPS at close and range, better hip accuracy and 50 m/sec higher velocity.

What we still don't have is a weapon that fills the gaping hole, not hole but canyon, between the Trac-5 and T5 AMC. A whopping 16% dps difference among other things like recoil etc.
A weapon which actually adds variety to the TR must be somewhere in between.

Let me write down the stats for you this time:
600 rpm
Same Damage as above
490 m/sec (so the NC is happy that they are still faster)
32/192 (matching the 2x Burst and a little bit TR flavor )

The T5-AMC's ADS cone of fire is horrendous, the Cougar's is as tight as the Pulsar C.

In fact the Cougar basically is the Pulsar C with a few trade offs to differentiate the two. The Pulsar C is not a bad gun at all.

What the TR don't have right now is a Long Range carbine. Full stop. The T5-AMC does not fill this role because it's starting cone of fire is simply too big and its bullet damage drops off way too fast and to such tiny numbers that it cannot even hope to compete with the Pulsar C or the Razor.

The Cougar is exactly what we need as the TR right now. A Carbine that can engage people at the kind of range a Pulsar C or Razor can.

What you are saying is to buff the T5. I don't want to discuss the T5 in here too much, but bringing in another weapon as a replacement for an old one should be a no go. Different weapons should have clearly different roles.

Buffing the T5 into a mid-range role and leaving the Cougar in the long-range could be a way to go, but the concerns I've mentioned about the Cougar still need to be adressed. We are just giving up too much for a few extra bullets, again.

The T5 fills the niche the X-11 does for the NC. This new gun fills the niche the Razor does for the NC that we never had filled.

The Cougar is the Pulsar C with a few extra bullets and faster muzzle velocity in return for a slight RPM loss and earlier damage drop off. So more accurate at range, but less damaging and maybe a wash when it comes to kill damage in the clip.

I think it'll come down to the first shot multiplier on how comparable the two guns are but I don't know what the Cougars FSM is so I can't really say. If it's low enough that we can actually use the 2x burst it'll be an amazing gun. It's certainly not bad even without it though, the Pulsar C is one of the best Carbines in the game and having a slightly worse version of it is still really good.

The T5 is a great midrange gun. I wouldn't want it changed, it's absolutely perfect for perching in Base fights and Biolabs.

The places you'd use an X-11 are the same as a T5-AMC. They're both good mid range perching guns that reward headshots.

They're not very similar stat wise, but the playstyle for them is.

The T5 is clearly long-range in the devs eyes, because of the high bullet velocity of 570.
Furthermore it has not enough dps to be midrange in my opinion. 700 rpm would be midrange, 648 is not. The X11 has 500 rpm with 200 bullet damage, which puts it where I think midrange is. 167*600rpm is also in the same territory btw.

And comparing velocities to Vanu weapons is also a little bit unfair, because the Vanu get worse velocity on all guns for having no bullet drop.

Got aurax with both and this is something I can't understand at all.

And no bullet drop is a worthless trait because it's really not hard to compensate for it so they'd be losing out there if that really was the trade off.

The T5 may 'meant' to be the long range option, but it's not. It's a really good Mid Range option that you can pop heads with because its recoil and spread is pretty manageable at mid range (So you get more headshots and can boost your DPS that way), but the spread is too large at long range and the damage drop off way too soon to be of any use there.

Now the stats for the Cougar compared to the Razor are worse with what we know, but we don't know one important one that might change it. Having a FSM lower than 1.5x would be a real plus for the Cougar, especially with the 2x Burst option. If it's FSM is 1.5x though then it absolutely is just a ****tier Razor and that's kind of ********.

They're both guns that excel at mid-range, passable at long range and vastly outclassed by other options for hipfire?

I mean sure the X-11 is better at long range than the T5 and ... well just generally better in everything but its pitiful ammo capacity, but they two still both occupy the niche of "Badass Mid-Range gun" with the AC X-11 being a bit more badass because of its longer effective range.

No. AC-X11 has lower TTK by way too significant a margin to compare the two. It is a burst damage weapon, the T5 is a sustained damage pea shooter weapon.

You can drop targets way faster with the AC-X11, making it much more viable at closer ranges where the T5 just doesn't cut it.

ACX11 is like trac 5 with more damage drop off. It's more effective than AMC in close range but is nothing like as good at range apart from the occasional single shot snipe on a stationary target.

My point was they're both good Mid-Range guns filling an otherwise unfulfilled niche for the NC and TR, not that they were the same because they ain't.

I dunno, maybe the X-11 is more of a Close/Mid gun while the T5 remains a Mid Range "I could just be using an NS-11C and I wouldn't notice the difference much" gun.

Either way neither are a long range gun. The NC got the Razor to fill that role and right now the TR got nothing.

Ok let me say something about the T5. I think it's a good long-range gun, as far as long range goes for carbines.
Like Paperlamp said it's more about sustained damage. If you slap on all the long range attachments you can down enemies with long sustained bursts of up to 10 rounds.

You thinking the Pulsar and Razor are so much better in that role is probably more of a placebo effect because of the higher bullet damage. I for myself don't like the Razor at all because of the recoil pattern and would go with the T5 for long range engagements anytime.

Now back to discussing the Cougar please

At any rate you seem to be quite poor at evaluating guns in this game.

TR and VS weapons with 167 damage per round go up to 577 rpm. 600 rpm for 167 dpr is NC only, as is the 500rpm/200dpr tier.

The Cougar should have the 577 ROF of the Pulsar C, and not the 550 of the Razor which has more accuracy. The Cougar is just a Pulsar C minus no bullet drop, minus ROF, minus reload speed, all for 5 extra rounds?

And some bullet velocity, but not much. As said, I'm pretty sure the Cougar is going to have a lower FSM than the Razor/Pulsar C but it's hard to see when the PTS just crashes when you try get on.

The most important question about the new cougar. Did they add a 0.75 ads speed multiplier to it, or is it like before latest update, no more lynx ads speed and not on cougar too?

I honestly didn't expect that "The T5-AMC isn't very good sniping carbine but is still a great gun in the Mid range" was going to be a controversial opinion.