Fun statistcis about CQC LMG

Just looked into http://stats.dasanfall.com/ps2/ and found something interesting.
Number of players who have more than 10,000 kills on each CQC LMG.

Weapon : Player numbers / Highest kills
Orion : 100 / 43,906
Betelgeuse : 103 / 64,794
MSW-R : 52 / 57,510
Anchor : 73 / 62,524

Bonus
Cyclone : 14 / 25,000
SVA-88 : 53 / 100,000(of course its from GylleBMF)
* Gold variations not included.

Auraxium
Betelgeuse : 103 / 64,794
Butcher : 6 / 16,483
GODSAW : 10 / 30,135

Welp, a little typo on title

This is not surprising at all and perfectly illustrates part of the retention issue and loop-sided experience pools we got in this game right now.

VS, for *SOME REASON* manage to retain considerably more players overall, so they have by far the largest pool of players who hit BR100 and stay there, the largest pool of players who just so happen to use some weapon over others primarily.

But hey there are no issue with this and other's just need to get better, right?

It's not just these weapons, btw. Take all weapons into comparison and see the extremely loop-sided stats they present. The fact that VS has the highest score in almost every stat out there is not an accident of "VS players just so happen to be better than NC and TR overall, that's all, nothing to see here!"

There is nothing in PS2 I respect less than a blind and deaf VS player who will mindlessly defend this situation no matter what.

My reply got a tad long, although the questions you ask invited a detailed response - sorry for the book.

My social engineering theory behind the reason why VS has the highest overall BR players is thus:

• When first getting into gaming, most children / younger gamers tend to instantly gravitate towards the "Good guy" faction, they want to play the hero, the people that are portrayed as the heroes. In Planetside 2, that's the NC - most of the cover art for PS2 involves the NC winning. This overall faction feel has lead to a high population of younger, less mature players (The NC use their vehicle horns more then twice as often as the other two factions combined, and overall instances of TKing are much higher as well.) Ever play World of Warcraft? This was the alliance, they got stomped in PVP, and the only players in voicechat sounded young, and high / squeaky voices were everywhere.

• When maturing, your typical high school age student will have become bored with the "Good guy" faction, and will want to move on to the "Bad guy" faction, very obviously the TR - overall skill levels are higher then that of the NC's playerbase, but most players are still generally immature, and the faction itself tends to attract... for lack of a better term, jerks and asshats. It's not a coincidence that Buzzcut Psycho played here - I know plenty of good folks that play in the TR, but I see a great deal more malice vs friendlies in the TR then I do in the NC - NC TKing tends to be random asshattery, TR TKing usually appears targetted. (Again, my own experience - not saying this is everyone's)

• Once a gamer has outgrown both stages, they look for other options - things not cut from the same cloth as what they have already played time and time again - Unique mechanics, however ineffective, will be more attractive then the other factions' counterparts due to the simple fact that they are new. That faction, in planetside 2, is the VS.

Having played all three factions to BR100, and after an embarrassing amount of time spent in game, most of what I see supports the above. There are many exceptions to the this, all three factions contain large numbers of players from every age group, but I believe my statements are generally accurate for the majority of the population in game.

The VS having the best leadership (Based on what I see on Emerald) seems to support this as well, and even one or two highly reactive platoons playing during alerts can turn the tide for an entire server, making one faction preferable over the other two, in terms of having easy wins. Having a playerbase with the most gaming veterans, the VS will naturally have the best overall leadership.

As for weapon performance, please cite specific examples on what you believe the VS has that's overpowered, at this point. For every well-performing item the VS has, other factions have another item that performs the same general duty to a very significant degree better then the VS. (The TR has the prowler, which absolutely murders other MBT's in both AV and AI in a 1/2 configuration, the NC has amazing long MAX range AV, and the VS has ... good LMGs? I believe everything else has been nerfed, by this point. Please correct me if i'm wrong, are there any other areas where the VS has an item that's blatantly overperforming vs the TR and NC both?)

For everything the VS has that you claim is overpowered, I can point to another item in the TR / NC that's just as overpowered as it's VS counterpart for the same job, if not moreso. I encourage you to post stats, I will respond similarly, and we can throw bile around on the forums for days... Or, we can recognize that the game was intended to have aysmmetrical balance in the performance of each empire, and that the devs are now attempting to balance a game in a manner that was not intended, nor taken account in the original design of the majority of the items being argued about. They may succeed, but the process is going to be painful, since the playerbase seems to demand identical performance, while still maintaining faction identity... an impossible task, to say the least.

Interesting stuff. Thanks for sharing.

I'm beginning to believe the preponderance of Orion/Betelgeuse usage in-game relates primarily to their effectiveness in the environments in which most of the battles in Planetside 2 take place. Inside capture point buildings, where weapons with a mixture of mobility, above-average TTK and a similar margin for error (i.e. higher RoF lower damage, instead of reverse) are both most effective and most desirable.

Of course there are other factors involved too, but that stands out for me.

*sigh*

You guys do realize the Orion and Betelgeuse are already slated to be nerfed into inferior MSW-R's right? (just missing a couple attachments really... most notably Soft Point Ammo which ups it's damage a tier)

Also: Betelgeuse is an inferior Orion for 1v1 or just pure kill power... the reason it's showing such high numbers is it's INCREDIBLY useful when able to farm lemmings that charge into their death without end and just enough pause between attempts to allow recharge. There are THOUSANDS of lemmings in PS2 which allows would be farmers of said lemmings with the best possible armament for the situation. As soon as good players enter a fight, most Betel users swap out to Orion.

Incidentally, I don't even think the nerf is REALLY going to impact either much... since 90% of LMG usage is popping up from behind crouchable cover and shooting into kill zones, and the strafe speed difference only comes into play when moving from 1 camp spot to the next and getting into a quick skirmish fight with someone else doing the same.

I bet we'll STILL get complaints about Orion OP despite being a statistically inferior MSW-R (barely, by points of a number, and of course a whole dmg tier with SPA, but still).

This will leave VS's sole ES advantage down to the Lancer (which Ravens out perform per user by a large margin)

Oh and Magriders "OP" hill climb (despite leaving VS with the weakest front line tank) and the Scythe's "OP" hitbox (despite being slowest ESF)

Drawbacks don't matter, they're still OP, amirite?

The main problem I see is honestly in the level of coordination Emerald VS brings to the map meta (FWIW: My VS is on Connery, my TR and NC both on Emerald)

I don't see the same discrepancy in alerts on Connery as I do on Emerald.

I know offhand that JustHereForOrion has 100,000 Kills with the Orion http://stats.dasanfall.com/ps2/player/JustHereForOrion

But I think the interesting question about this is why do VS have such long duration player retention? Many of the people on that list (myself included for both Orion and SVA) play all three factions and don't see any real performance boost in switching factions, yet tend to spend more time on VS.

Well... why do you spend more time on VS?

I main VS as well, despite the fact that my performance on both NC and TR is somewhat better. Simplistically, it comes down to this (for all the nitpickers - obvious generalisations are obvious...) :

• NC guns are great, and I love the Vanguard. But there's little to no coordination on NC, it's filled with TK'ing scrubs, and the average player (at least, in my experience and from external appearance) is about as intelligent as a half-painted-blue pineapple. During alerts, NC zerg straight for the nearest biolab, and do not leave it until the alert is over. NC can, and do, lose a defence, with the pop 80-20 in their favour through sheer stupidity (e.g. chasing random solo'fils around, shooting at the sky for no reason, standing in spawns ************ their sniperrifle etc. instead of charging the point!). Not fun to play with. Also, squeakers everywhere!!!

• TR guns are great, even though I find they feel a bit weak - mostly because of RoF (I know they aren't, it just feels that way to me). Can't get used to the Prowler.... hangover from the PS1's breadbox-hatred, I guess! The TR, however - again only in my experience - are full of tiny, elitist tryhard outfits, all of whom hate each other, and none of whom cooperate. Also, tons and tons of airsperg - most of whom won't even land to recap a base from a single infil... they just buzz around the base, screaming in yellchat, while one dude caps it out from under 5 of 'em. Again, not fun to play with. Also, goddamn laggy cheaty ******' Russians!

• VS guns (with a few truly outstanding exceptions) seem mediocre on average, but they feel good and they're easy to control, which makes up for a LOT! Quite enjoy the Maggie, even if it plays more like a fat Harasser than an actual tank. That said..... the people are great. Active platoon leaders everywhere, communication on leaderchat, interoutfit cooperation, organised strategies and tactical responses. All in all, just cool dudes to hang out with. <--- This is why I main VS, and only play the other two to keep an eye on their abilities, e.g. practicing recoil control on NC or bullethose aim on TR.

For me (as someone who started out getting to BR 95 TR) it was all about finding a group of players with similar mindsets / goals, etc. I play VS because of the people I play(ed) with. If you were to give me a choice of where to play based on my preference of gear/equipment it would probably be TR>NC>VS. If you were to give me a choice as to where to play based on the community it would be VS>TR>NC.

Community easily wins out over gear (and I know VS have the Orion) but outside of that, I found myself missing stuff from the other factions I played first rather than being generally excited about VS equipment.

Like I said, most of the people I played with do just as well no matter what faction they are on, but playing for VS (on Emerald at least) ends up being less frustrating when dealing with other members in the community than TR or NC.

So I played on VS more because I met a group of people with a similar mindset about the game that I couldn't find on the other two factions (despite looking to them both before joining the spandex).

*edit* as an afterthought, while every faction has its good and its bad players and everyone in between. I end up frustrated with most with the actions of my teammates while playing NC and the least while playing VS. (Not to say I don't get TK'ed or people will run in front or things like that, but the VS seem to do less "stupid things" over the course of an extended period of time. See also NC use their horns 2x. as much as any other faction)

Instant explanation for VS retention rates?


Say what you will, but this is the most correct answer.

Two primary issues with your post.

***

Firstly, the idea that the factions get new members in any way like you described and the reasoning for the success of the Vanu.

I have played WoW, actually. It may have just been my server, but from a game that has a primary demographic of 12-16 year old players (Last I looked at least) the numbers of younger players is very evenly distributed, and there is a surprising number of older folks. That or I got lucky. In my experience, the people more into PVE content roll Alliance, and people who are more into PVP roll Horde - thanks mostly to the race bonuses being tailored almost exclusively to give the useful PVP abilities to Horde and PVE options to Alliance.

I also noted that the majority of the younger players on my server rolled Horde, reasons being, Blood Elves - by far the singe most popular race in the whole game - and the lore marking them as the outcasts from the "establishment" (Alliance) who "just want to be able to live in a world that hates them" - and they are good, very, VERY good, at ignoring the multitude of reasons for why that is. The Alliance on the other hand are the mentioned establishment who are all almost exclusively natives of the world the game primarily takes place on and are fighting a defensive war with an aggressive and bestial Horde who are quite literally out to enact genocide on them.

That, and most Hordelings I've seen on places like YT are younger folks who screetch "Horde for life!" and other moronic BS like that.

What's my point?

My point is that I don't think you know how to judge a population's demographic to save your life, and your examples from the Emerald server, with perhaps the most imbalanced situation in the game atm, is about as biased as they get - you even cite a TR leader who quit years ago as if he's somehow relevant to anything, today or ever.

Getting back to your statement about the PS2 populations.

I agree that NC get the vast majority of players in general and likely a bigger share of the younger folks thanks to foolishly loop-sided PR from SOE/DBG almost exclusively touting them as the noble heroes etc. However, while this hampers the faction in many ways, it's not universal enough that your assessment will be in any way correct. NC leaders have enough, more than enough, potential members, their primary issue is filtering out the one's who are almost anti-cooperation and behave much like the unruly, disorganized rabble of rebels and seditionists the lore makes them out to be.

As for TR, in my experience the majority of TR players are older folks, early 20 to late 30's and 40's. Got a 40 year old in my outfit, team-works like a pro. Most TR either don't care about the lore, or are attracted to the positive sides of TR's background - a lot of people actually enjoy playing as the loyalists for the establishment, in defense of the people, etc. There are quite a few team-work oriented players as well who really like the militaristic nature of the TR, I've always enjoyed for myself how so many TR players behave in the manner that the lore would suggest. There is not at all many players who genuinely view the TR as "bad guys" and STILL play for them. There are loads that constantly crack jokes about it though. How many NC joke about being rampaging terrorists in comparison, how many Vanu joke about being cultist alien-worshiping technophiles?

Vanu are the "other" the weird ones, the outsiders, the alien tech using, religiously minded scary people who may or may not even be humans anymore. This obviously caters to a lot of players, though I'm not terribly interested myself. In the beginning of the game's lifespan VS were always complaining about being the least populated faction and so on, and much of their frustrations were justified at the time. As time went on event after event after event have led to them being the faction that most people have joined. The majority of NC and TR players who have not simply quit when these events rolled by or stuck it out joined Vanu. The ZOEpocalypse came about, loads of people left. Many joined VS. Rest grit their teeth and soldiered on. PPA storm had a similar effect. Of all the people who left during these two periods for instance, how many do you think were VS? Few, if any. I'm confident some quit the VS and joined the other factions because they did not want to be associated with that BS, but those would be a small minority.

TR had a similar period when the Striker was absurd, remember that? So many joined TR for that. Most dropped off after it was nerfed. Many VS also left the VS or left the game when the fun was over as well, but clearly not nearly as many as those who left TR - current population trends would support that belief of mine.

What's my point with this?

The point is, the VS had the most "outlandish" lore and position of the 3 factions, and as a result of that their population was universally low in the early days of PS2's life. That quickly changed however as event after event came about and more people congregated in VS. Over time, a smaller but more hardened pop who were absolutely require to better their tactics back when the game was still highly populated grew bigger and bigger, and while the universal population dwindled across the board VS clearly retained the vast majority of players willing to stick around until they hit BR 100, and then keep staying around long after that. This trend has continued to the present day.

It has far less to do with age demographics and their choices, and far, FAR more to do with in-game realities and the turbulent history of how this game has progressed. VS has been dominant for a long while and stays dominant. VS players thus win far more on average than NC and TR, they have a greater reason to stay. NC lose players all the time - but are constantly reinforced by getting the brunt of the new joiners that trickle in week by week. TR lose players as well, but has little to go for it to retain players. TR has neither the constant winning streaks of the VS and the ever aging outfits good at recruiting as many new players as possible and keep them around in the massive forces that win day in and day out. When you win dozens of alerts on a weekly basis, you stick around, when you have potent weaponry that give you many options, you stick around.

TR has none of that, the winning is sporadic and highly cherished as a result, the weapons are far less varied and to this day lack potency compared to the VS and especially NC arsenals. Players who don't end up finding a small niche they like or join a good outfit end up dropping out of the game completely. There is a very new outfit on Cobalt TR that has spam-invited hundreds of new and inexperienced players and offered them NOTHING, no good leadership, no direction, no purpose, no training, no hope, NOTHING AT ALL.

As a result it's member list is already a tragic tale of sub-BR15 players - many of them even BR1 - being invited to the outfit only to quit PS2 on the same day. This is a massive loss to the faction, these are numbers that can't be easily regained. A very good example of just how dire the situation is for the TR as a faction - retention levels are far lover than VS, higher than NC, but the overall numbers don't match either the NC or the VS. On my server, NC and VS usually quarrel about who has the biggest pop. TR arrives last. If you are lucky, you catch us when we "only" lack 2-3%, if not it's a higher difference - and Cobalt is one of the more healthy servers that remain. Emerald, last I looked, has a tiny and leadership-bereft TR population. When was the last time they won an alert? How many did they win this month? What do you suppose they can look forward to when the situation is so hopeless?

The VS supremacy across the servers of this game is not just down to their gear, it's down primarily to demographics and the mentalities of the player-base. VS has leadership comparable to the best TR can show with, useful and reliable weapons, and numbers to match the NC even on a good day. This is a very powerful combination, and it shows. Lots of people are frankly growing tired of even fighting VS as a whole for many reasons, so VS even has that going for them - this only makes their position even more favored.

***

My second issue with your post is easier to put out and shorter to cover.

You claim I've said that VS weapons or gear are OP. I have said no such thing in here, I dare you to cite where I did.

What I have said is, I quote:

"It's not just these weapons, btw. Take all weapons into comparison and see the extremely loop-sided stats they present."

I realize now that using the term "stats" was foolish, I am not talking about the numbers on individual weapons, I'm talking about performance statistics and how they are favorable for the VS.

This goes without saying. The faction that dominates and wins the most naturally will have better overall performance compared to the opposition. The only exception would be a scenario where VS manage to outnumber the opposition and move those numbers so effectively that they compensate for the fact that their players routinely die loads more to their opponents and covers that loop-sided engagement tendencies by outmaneuvering them and hitting the objective more often.

This is not the case. VS has the numbers they need, the weapon performance they need, the needed leadership and the favorable performance in most battles. NC and TR that routinely defeat VS in out-right battles often do so because they are above the average is set for your average VS player. This average is higher than the NC and TR average because again, the VS has a far higher average Battle Rank than the opposition. The NC and TR BR100's are outnumbered by the VS counterpart, and this holds true all the way down the battle ranks - a natural effect of having far higher retention rates.

As for individual weapons and gear for VS, I was not even talking about that, but let's consider a few.

Your MBT is a highly mobile weapon able to swiftly get around obstacles and on top of locations that others have issue getting to. Thanks to the vehicle physics in this game I routinely get to watch with amazement as my own MBT - supposedly a TRACKED VEHICLE - has issues traversing a 60 to 70 degree hill when I have speed on my side. Magriders perform this task with no problems. That's a huge benefit. The turret is fixed, this has it's draw-backs but benefits as well - with the front towards the enemy your strongest armor is the only thing return fire can hit. You can play peek-a-boo games with enemy armor with ease because your tank can STRAFE without serious affecting your aim.

On top of this tank you have a very stable platform to fire a secondary weapon from. Among them is the Saron, a highly versatile weapon able to mag-dump at close ranges or snipe out to longer ranges with pin-point accuracy, high projectile speeds and a swift reset of the COF, allowing pretty good ROF to boot.

Your ESF is the most agile and easy to maneuver of the 3, with the best hover stability and the second best frontal profile. The L-PPA is the best AI nosegun in the game able to rain down the pain from an impressive distance compared to the alternatives.

Your MAX has the most slim profile of the 3, the least audible walking sounds and the most accurate weapons, making for domination at medium ranges, and if in CQB with a TR MAX, CQB as well.. NC has both TR and VS beat at extreme CQB performance, but the VS MAX beat both at medium range, leaving the TR with a MAX that excels as nothing, unless you want to root yourself in place and start counting the seconds until you get a C4 stick on your head or a Deci missile to the face. You MAX is reliable and deadly, and always a viable option. Your AV MAX weapons is a powerful close-range plasma ball launcher or a chargeable plasma cannon that get very high velocity, thus high accuracy, good alpha and also good ability to be spammed in closer encounters. Raven's got you beat obviously, but I'm not even going to go into details about Fractures.

Your weapon selection is varied and competent.

Your pistol arsenal rivals that of the NC with select 167, 200, 250 and burst alternatives, just like the NC. Now that you both have burst pistols TR don't even get to have that as a unique option, while NC and VS both have damage tiers above 167, a tier TR only has one gun for, besides that it's 143 or lower. The fact that very few VS players respect your pistol arsenal tells me how entitled and spoiled many of you are.

Your Carbine and Assault Rifle options are competent, but don't compare to the NC selection of either of these. Either way, there is more versatility here than the TR selection, up until the creation of the Cougar the TR did not even have a single Carbine above 143 damage, and it's no surprise that it became an instant favorite for many TR - and with a 35 round magazine and stats somewhat sub-par compared to NC options, it's basically an NC-lite weapon. VS is more blessed in the variety compartment, both your Carbines and Assault Rifles are functional and reliable, though this is easily your weakest area overall.

SMG's are better than the TR options, you have a gun comparable to the Armistice in your first-gen gun, and the Sirius beats the Hailstorm hands-down. NC has us both beat here, but VS SMG's are still competent and reliable.

LMG's are... well, a well-known issue. Needless to say Orion, SVA and your auraxium LMG leaves you lacking for nothing in the CQB department - just so happen to be the area where most infantry fighting takes place in this game. VS keep complaining about the rest of your LMG's. Having used them I'd say they compare to most of the TR counterparts, and I find it both sand and amusing that you manage to cry about what effectively boils down to "our guns perform comparably to TR weapons."

Your empire specific heavy weapon is unique and has a special role. It's a powerful suppression tool able to hit people beyond corners and seriously mess up anyone getting close to the area you bombard with it. Compared to the NC and TR version, NC has a powerful shotgun - fancy, but it's another shotgun. TR get a different bullet-hose, a glorious gun I love but a bullet-hose all the same. VS get a unique tool. NC and TR get more of the same.

Finally, your empire specific launcher, the Lancer. Spammable towards close range targets, can be charged to hit distant armor and aircraft alike with a powerful alpha hit that no-one will see coming before it's to late, making it a highly versatile tool, able to vaporize entire tank battalion when used with some numbers behind it. Another highly useful piece of gear.

Everything else is NS specific that everyone has available.

***

Finally, what I'm getting at with all this is that the Vanu has two things going for them that no other faction has. You got both the competent arsenal of useful gear - similar to NC but not TR. You got a large player-base of high-retention people with lots of experience and ability behind them, whom have very good leadership - something the TR has on some servers, but not all, and the NC lack in a general degree.

These two combined make for a large number of players working together more often than not with a powerful arsenal. There is no one single thing that makes the Vanu so potent - it's all of the small things combined that makes for a large effect.

There is little to nothing that can be done to fix this as far as I'm concerned. The NC could universally upgrade their leadership potential from a handful of good outfits with a relatively small player-base overall to dozens of larger outfits that work together, and the TR could get their arsenal improved and diversified to the point where it's less more-of-the-same and more unique and interesting tools to do battle with - and then get a massive influx of new members who get proper training help and guidance, as well as new and capable leadership on the servers that need that.

This is not likely to actually happen, IMHO. The 0.75 removal from some LMG's will make it much easier to kill VS and sruvive in CQB, but it won't affect the overall picture much. The damage is done, the populations have shifted, the people who want to win no matter what are happy in the VS faction where they can be warm and comfy knowing that their win ratio is extremely unlikely to ever change, where they can talk down to people who are not VS all day long and pat themselves on the back for how awesome and supremely skilled they are.

This will not change. NC has had years to get their leadership in order. Not happening. TR is fading away, slowly but surely, the odds that the faction will be able to fix itself across the board is slim. Good for me I enjoy a challenge, but it's still looking dire.

Far as I'm concerned, things will remain as they are until PS2 is officially ended. And unless something fundamentally changes, the Vanu has the ultimate blame for it's inevitable death.

Wow, never seen a post like this ever in my forumside, which is sincere and written in that length.

It took almost 1 hour to read this for me but it was worth that time.

Never know what PS2 was before Oct, 2013 when I began this game and it just informed me of.

Whilst, as you say, the behaviours you saw in each faction can be found throughout the game regardless of allegiance, it's interesting to hear why you stick with VS.

I actually started as VS, and "mained" it for a long time. I really enjoyed using the Lancer, Eridani, and a few of the more niche bits of gear they have to offer, and overall just liked the energy weapon aesthetic and their underlying philosophy. Then I made a joke TR character with a silly name, mainly to try out the weapons I thought I got killed by the most.

Before I knew it I'd aurax'ed a few weapons and realized I was having more fun with the Red's gear, and I've been there ever since. I have some good friends over on Vanu though, and do still have fun playing as them, so hop over there from time to time. Like you I find the TR community, on my server at least, a bit more fractured.

As for NC... I do really like some of their weapons, but I think 90% of them sound stupid, and I generally dislike the blocky aesthetic. The Merc and the Gauss Rifle have to be the sweetest starting weaps in-game!

(This is a three part post, I went on too long to fit it all into one. I think I addressed all of your major statements.)

I should have been more specific in my original statement - My experience regarding WoW which is relevant to this particular point, is from WoW's first several years, specifically on Thunderhorn. In the beginning, the population between horde vs alliance was distributed in the general fashion that I described. Blood elves had not been released yet, but you are correct in that the populations have since been balanced, mostly due to the easy availability of faction / race change options.

There is no call to be insulting, I offered a balanced perspective, coming from my 3000+ hour experience in planetside, spread over all three factions, along with over two decades spending an average of 6 hours a day playing Ultima Online, Everquest, WoW, etc - spanning from the start of the MMO genre, until today. I made no claim of complete accuracy, and stated multiple times that these were my own experiences, and that yours may have been different, which they apparently have been.

Yes, I cited Buzzcut Psycho, due to the fact that at the height of his outfit's power, the TR were dominating alerts in general to an equal or greater degree then the VS is now - he was well known, and despite the fact that he was an absolute ***, his leadership allowed the TR to win much more frequently, and TR population soared over that of the VS. When Buzz left, that changed. The point is, the TR had the population to win, and with the leadership he offered, they did so - same as the VS are now. This is relevant to the discussion, and to my point.

I'm glad we can agree on this one point, for the most part, although I believe you are understating the significance of the generally less mature demograph that makes up the NC (The NC's habit of using twice as many vehicle horns as the NC / VS combined demonstrates the general immaturity i'm trying to express - to be able to generate a statistic that high, the population numbers have to be fairly biased in favor of younger players. The NC leadership does indeed have more then enough potential members, but whenever I play my connery NC character, the most common statement I hear is a variation of, "Get OUT of the biolab, DEFEND THE POINTS! Get to base X!" ... Over and over, to a horde of farmers that let the rest of the NC fight a hopeless battle against greater numbers, when their own population refuses to cooperate. The ones who are "Anti cooperation", I believe, are just younger children who are immature, and prefer to further their own goals, rather then that of the faction. I could be wrong, but that sounds like a kid playing a video game over "rebel seditionists"

I see vastly more NC yell, " 'MURICA, F*CK YAH" then I see the VS yell anything regarding alien technophelia. If anything, the VS talk about spandex butts more then anything else, (Which is, of course, the less mature segment of the VS, which has plenty of kids to go along with the veteran gamers.)

The TR and NC broadcast their lore outright. The TR have a militaristic theme and russian voice packs, the NC have hardrock as their theme and big, potent guns - the VS have something unfamiliar and alien-ey, but to draw "religious minded scary people" from that...? I had to go read up on the Planetside 2 lore to find out what they were all about. That's a big part of my point, they are unfamiliar, and therefore hold the promise of unique gameplay, which is what attracted me to them in the first place. It did indeed take them a while to pick up additional population, in part - this was due to their strangeness.

Yep, I have never claimed that ZOE was fine, anything that grants sustained mobility (especially greater then an infantry unit, to a super-armored infantry unit) is a bad idea - it was known on test before it was released, it should not have been pushed to live as it was. The current version of the ZOE is a nerf-me button, as it reduces weapon damage past 10-15 meters (for most weapons), but that's another discussion entirely. The PPA was actually buffed several times due to non-use, it was in an OP, yet unused state for literally 18+ months - it took the nerfing of the Saron's AI to trigger the PPA storm. The bug of allowing PPA rounds to penetrate amp station shields, combined with asstons of spare ammo and a massive magazine exacerbated this - it shouldnt have taken them as long as it did to nerf.

Still, it's not as bad as the vulcan was initially, the Vulcan had well over double the AV and AI kills as anything either of the other two factions had for a long while before it was nerfed. My point is essentially this: You point to the PPA and ZOE, blaming them for driving people away from other factions, and to the VS - the TR had the same general thing in the Vulcan (and for a time, the Striker, as you mentioned) and earlier - the NC has ravens now, which are nearly as irritating vs armor as the PPA was vs infantry. All three factions have had their share of overpowered toys, this is not the exclusive domain of the VS. (The PPA is just as useless as striker was at it's worst, at least the striker is being fixed. Yes, this is my opinion, yours may be different, but the numbers seem to support that.)

Yes, this is what I attempted to explain with my original statement of the following.

Pretty, shiney colors attract attention - effectiveness is an excellent way to attract players to a given faction, making it flashy and shiney and new is another. The VS have effective toys, yes - they also look cool - attracting players can be as simple as that. Novelties that are also effective help a great deal. I know quite a few players (myself included) that started in the TR, and eventually created VS characters as well. (I still play all three factions, VS - Emerald, TR - Emerald (Not my fault, my VS / TR got crammed together in the server merge -_- ) and my NC is on Connery )

When I logged on my TR the other day (Emerald) The population was: VS had 28%, NC had 38, TR had 34%, the VS lost the alert that followed with 25% territory control. This has been a theme recently, around 2-3 days a week. As a server with generally high population, this is a switch from the norm, people are playing other factions more frequently recently, partially due to the uselessness of the PPA. The TR has actually won fairly frequently on Emerald, at least during evening, high-pop alerts. The spam-inviting Cobalt TR outfit sounds like a standard zerg outfit, that's been my general experience on all three factions, I had to go read up / learn things for myself - it's one of the major failings of the game, very little is intuitive, and what is intuitive typically has a number of hidden mechanics that are explained exactly nowhere, save for ancient patch notes and outdated wiki articles.

In the past several weeks especially, the TR has been steadily climbing - winning more alerts then usual, and gaining population as well. In the past week, the TR has won more alerts then the VS has. The situation is anything but hopeless for the TR, but the NC ... well, I believe I beat that particular point to death. Platoon leading the zerg is like herding cats, platoon leading NC zerg is like herding cats made of jello, greased with industrial lubricant.

To a degree, I agree with you - weapons that are OP, and left that way for long enough, tend to bias other factions against them for long after an offending item has been nerfed. It was this way with the Striker and Vulcan for over a year, and it still is that way for the ZOE / PPA, despite the two having the absolute lowest use statistics, and nearly bottom-of-the-barrel performance statistics out there. Even the NC, to a degree, with the Airhammer / Vanguard shield, cause ... faction irritation. Faction Morale matters, and right now, everyone seems to be unhappy with everyone else

I did nothing of the sort, although your implication that you think things are overpowered is everywhere. I might be misreading your statements, but if so, this is mutual. Read my quote below. This is not a statement, this is a request. If you don't think that the VS has anything that's overpowered, then what are your complaints? (I seem to recall that you mentioned that .75 ADS is overpowered, which is not the specific domain of the VS, but it is a point of contention, the center of which is on VS LMGs.

I went on to say this,

This is rhetorical, meant to follow any claims you may or may not make - this was an effort to illustrate that while the VS does have a good arsenal, others have other units that do the same job, superior to their counterparts within the VS. I am not putting words in your mouth here, please return the favor.

Ok. Lets look at stats.

Pistols up first:



Looks like the NC win overall, with the TR close behind. They both beat out the VS to a significant degree, looks like the VS have the worst pistols overall, we use a NS more over our default pistol that everyone gets upon creating an account, that should say something about the selection. With the addition of the Spiker (which I personally prefer, overall) - at least we have a competitive option, although it hasn't caught on yet - the charge mechanic is too visible, and charges too slowly to be used as panic fire, but the burst mode is fairly nice (And the weapon model is excellent.)

"Entitled and spoiled" ... yes, because VS want gear that works to a servicable degree in every category (Hey, much like the TR are requesting long-range AV options, imagine that.) The Beamer is a fairly good starter option these days, but the TR and NC have outright ES upgrades. You don't have to resort to name calling to get your point across, the thought you put into this implies that you are open to discussion, but your frequent resort to disparaging remarks and outright dismissal of my (and others) statements appears petty.

NC wins overall pistols.

Carbines and Assault rifles (respectively) next:






You weren't kidding when you mentioned that the TR had the best overall Assault Rifle selection in one of your posts the other day, A whopping eighteen thousand average kills, almost 1200 higher then the NC, and nearly 4000 higher then the VS - this is a massive contrast, which the TR very clearly wins.

For Carbines, it's a close match, the NC wins overall, and the TR is still above the VS, although potentially due to the VS using slightly fewer of them, to a comparable ratio.

NC wins overall carbines, TR wins assault rifles (For which the VS are left in the dust, to a high degree)

Sniper Rifles up next:



The NC are clear winners here, by a massive degree, well over double that of the next highest. The next two of which belong to the TR. I credit the NC's top spot to the default bolt action they have, and the TR appear to simply snipe more often then the VS. Clear winners here are the NC.


Next up: ES LMG



What can I say about this? The TR wins by over double that of the combined competition, the difference here is absolutely huge. As you stated as part of your post (which I didnt quote, here) - The Lasher is indeed a suppression weapon, although it's much less useful in practice, due to giving up the ability to 1v1 effectively (and it's general lack of effectiveness without large groups in play) - The Chaingun is a potent weapon (With the addition of the BRRT) the Lasher is a situational tool.

Max AV up next:




Yep, Ravens are in a rather potent state right now, the VS is doing fairly well (I'd say I approve of where the VS max is, in terms of AV capability) and the TR max needs mid to longrange AV fixed - Fractures were once in a state comparable to the PPA, I saw them being pulled in biolabs quite frequently, as they were much more useful vs Infantry then chainguns, due to alpha strike capability. Pounders are in a similar state right now, although not to that degree - they are more useful in an AI role then they are in AV, mainly due to the need to get close to a vehicle to be reliable - When a max can flank, deploy lockdown, and open up with Pounders unopposed, targets rarely escape, but those conditions are rare to the point where Pounders don't have an effective AV role within their intended range, short of spamming through spawn room shields, or flanking / ambushes.

Clear winner here is the NC.


Max AI up next:




Looks like you are generally correct in terms of Max AI, which favors the VS to the same general ratio as the Carbine chart favors TR Carbines - Numbers are slightly higher for avg kills / Avg Uniques. Here is one of the very few places that i'd say nodrop projectiles matter, due to the complete lack of scopes / sites for MAX units, since it's easier to fire from the hip vs long range targets. The complete lack of damage dropoff for Blueshifts make them my personal favorite, although Qasars are quite good for a default gun. I attribute the lack of TR chaingun effectiveness (compared to Qasars) to the fact that many TR are pulling pounders for AI work, there are simply less chainguns, while there are overall a comparable number of maxes.

Next up, SMGs



The NC holds the top two slots for SMGs to an extreme degree, the Sirius is close behind, and the Armistice follows along further behind - you are correct in stating that the TR has the worst overall SMG, but the VS has a middle-of-the-road option compared to the top two slots, which are beasts in comparison.

Next up: Harrassers



This one actually surprised me, I wasn't aware that Marauders were in this good of a state - I fully expected to see Canisters firmly at the top of the list. The Vulcan-H is once again outperforming everything else by a large margin (although not to the degree it once was) - The enforcer is slightly better vs Vehicles, and the Marauder is doing quite well vs infantry, but the Vulcan-H destroys everything it shoots. You'll note that the TR has two weapons at the top of the list, with the Saron trailing behind for top slots, and the PPA is firmly at the bottom of the list for ES options.

Next up: MBT Primaries



Why yes, the Magrider is quite manuverable, and it does climb hills fairly well. It's also the slowest vehicle in the game to a significant degree. Magriders have significant problems with 60-70 degree angles, in most terrain - Even with Rival / max Magrun, mags have to shimmy and boost up significant inclines - it's easier to maneuver on slightly rough terrain, but I climb hills better in my flash then I do my magrider. For this benefit, just look how effective the magrider's main cannon is! At a full 3100 average kills behind the Prowler, it's a full third behind in performance, and it's slower, with a non-mobile turret for it's trouble. For any sort of real maneuverability / hill climbing potential, magburn is required - The Prowler, at least, has options.

Anchor is a tremendous DPS increase (although the deploy delay needs to be fixed), to the point where I am able to destroy an armored, deployed Sunderer under active repair by multiple engineers, before a light assault can make it the 75-100 meters to my anchored tank. This is an impossible proposition for either the Magrider or the Vanguard, and I see it (or perform it) daily. At the start of any surprise engagement, the ambusher has a brief window to do as much damage as possible before their appearence is reacted to - For prowlers, that window of time is usually enough to destroy a target and escape (Even as a 1/2 MBT), where other tanks are still lining up their second or third shot.

Next up: MBT secondaries, sorted two different ways.

By vehicle kills per hour


By Average Kills


From this, the conclusions I draw are this: The VS pulls the Saron for general use, it's the most popular pick, due to the reasons you mentioned. It's pinpoint accurate at range, or spammable for close quarters. When the VS wants to kill vehicles, however, it pulls the NS Halberd. You'll note that the PPA is still bottom-of-the-barrel, to the point where it's not worth pulling, to a greater degree then the striker... and the Striker is being buffed. (That's fine with me, one thing at a time, but I hope the PPA is looked at soon). I will agree that the VS has the best versatile ES secondary, but not by the same margin as the as the TR's primary gun supremecy.

Squish together the average kills of the FPC and the Saron, and you get 10564 average kills, versus the Prowler's 9415 kills for just the pilot with an AP. A 2/2 magrider has roughly 10% better performance then a lone 1/2 prowler pilot. I would say that this outweighs any advantage the Magrider has with hill-climbing. ANY tank has perfectly smooth firing while moving, when doing so from third person - the fact that the Magrider can do so while zoomed in is a convenience, for which it pays the price of severely reduced awareness, due to a locked turret.

ESFs up next:

Yes, among noseguns, the L-PPA is indeed the best current AI nosegun, which is still outperformed by the TR Mosquito's Hellfire Rocketpods, which are weilded by a third more people, for less time then the L-PPA... for which you must give up a standard nosegun's AA / AV capability. It's a good tool ,yes - but the TR rocketpods outperform it in all possible roles. The Scythe is indeed rather agile, but I encourage you to try out each of the three ESFs in the VR - the Scythe is the only one that drops like a rock when aiming at the ground, even with a hover airframe. Neither the Mosquito, nor the Reaver have this issue. The Mosquito is also the fastest stock ESF, allowing it superior chasing / flee speed compared to the competition. It also presents the narrowest profile when attempting to hit with ground-based AA.

Next, Rocket launchers - sorted in two different ways.

Average Vehicle kills per hour


From the above, we can see that yes, the lancer is effective. It's quite good at killing Vehicles from a large distance, namely, over 500 meters and over. A single Lancer has a TTK vs front MBT (Prowler, specifically) of approximately 40 seconds (If you want the math on that, let me know, it's in my forum history, I posted a full DPS analysis in another thread.) Assuming 3-charge shots only, which each do the same damage as a lock-on rocket. Single shots do 111 damage, versus 4000 MBT health - It's a complete waste of ammunition, and usually results in a bolt-action round to the face before the second magazine is emptied, due to the tracer spam hanging in the air.

It is NOT a versatile tool, that's the default rocket launcher (see the below chart) - It is a niche tool designed for facing vehicles exclusively, and it's near the very bottom of the list against air units, for which even the current version of the striker beats by nearly double. The Lancer is good when you can catch armor at 500-700 meters (which increases it's TTK to over 50 seconds, at max damage degradation - I have the math on that too, if you wish to see it. I think I posted that in another thread somewhere.) - the Phoenix beats the Lancer when it comes to overall kills, potentially because it is a versatile tool that's good against both armor and infantry, it's fired at that many more target types.

Rocket Launcher Average Kills Overall

Finally, LMGs


Firstly, I will say that the Orion should not have been the default option for the VS - it might have been fine up until this point, but with all the nerfing, and the general superiority of HA's on the battlefield... well, as I stated earlier, anything that grants significantly superior mobility at all times, to the same type of unit, shouldn't really exist. If anything, the bonus should be smaller (Cut it to .625 on test, see general impressions) or remove .75 ADS from all LMGs universally, and buff the rest of the stats to compensate.

My only complaint on the proposed changes, is that they make the Orion inferior to the MSW-R, when comparing stats on test. At this point, I would suggest making the Orion a carbon copy of the MSW-R instead, with the standard slower round velocity, no-drop projectiles, and minimally superior recoil control (I don't agree with the remaining "faction benefits" of the VS, but this would keep it more or less consistant with what was done with other small arms)

After that ordeal of a comparison and writeup... I would say that the TR are the clear winners here overall - they have the highest general performance when taken as a whole, save for the gap in their long-range AV performance (Which is partially filled by Anchored AP prowlers, those reach out easily as far as ravens, but are less mobile.) The single major exception to TR stat-superiority, is LMGs. Thanks to HA's ruling the infantry battlefield overall, this does make it a serious issue, but it makes any potential adjustments that much more severe - as it stands, the single, primary thing propping up global VS performance (in terms of gear, at least) is their LMGs. Kick those out from under them in the wrong manner, and the VS will have more serious issues then either the TR or NC, in terms of reliance on their weapons and armor.

I have a potential solution, one that worked for WoW to balance population after the initial post-release disparity between Alliance and Horde: Server transfers and Faction changes. This is something that players have been asking for since PS2's beta - Allowing for a straight, paid server-transfer (perhaps regulated as to destination, based on overall population numbers on the desired server) should theoretically balance populations over time. Faction changes could be restricted to the desired faction's weapon set. A Teir 2 SMG for the VS would turn into a Tier 2 SMG for the TR, etc, with a full certification point refund on gear upgrades only, minus... say, 10-20% or so, to discourage frequent faction swaps. A 2-3 month cooldown on faction / server swaps could be imposed, to prevent players from switching to the flavor of the month.


I believe I have addressed all of your major statements, apologies if I missed any - this did, after all, get quite long. (If anyone actually gets all the way through my post without falling asleep, i'll be surprised)

I'd welcome any thoughts you may have, although perhaps with a tad fewer insults and personal attacks - your point of view is interesting, as is your perspective - although they are hard to take seriously when you resort to such things.

-Stormsinger

An interesting theory i have a different one from my experience tho mainly as TR

You pretty much hit the nail on the head with the NC

Now this is where our experiences differ.

The Vanu from my experience reatain a different type of person usually the 19-28ish crowd but the well more Try hard for lack of a better term theese are players that often theory craft use any little advantage they can i often see Vanu use more hidden tactics that are borderline exploit but in general good players and nice people and very good wall climbers.

The TR have what i would call the old dogs alot every faction has kids but most of the players i have played with are the older with family 30 somethings some a bit younger but the most common aspect is that most the TR ive played with are very chill they will sometimes argue in command but thats not unique to any faction but overall a more relaxed player and it shows the typical TR will lose more gunfights than other factions however they tend to be smarter on a strategic level than the NC and it shows in the alerts.

I offer only 1 thing in the prowlers defence..........its not ideal but its all we got if i could i would trade prowler effectiveness down to increase the effectiveness of fractures/striker because ide rather be able to instantly pop on a max and try and defend a base then hope theres enough time to go get a prowler to defend a base beucase likely your not going to make it in time to do anything especially on esamir where you will likely be forced to pull one from the warpgate.