Gatekeeper 2 weeks later

Gatekeeper should of been designed around the Halberd, so its a side grade like the Saron and Enforcer are.

Instead TR got an upgrade to the Halberd and are now wondering why the NC and VS are slightly upset, especially when the Halberd does more damage over distance then the Saron. So TR complaining about never having a long range Empire specific tank weapon, well neither do the VS/NC at the moment

It's a direct upgrade in terms of AV killing power, yes. But it sacrifices any AI potential for that degree of specialisation. At least with the halberd it's kind of a 'jack of all trades' weapon that deals decently against vehicles and fairly well against infantry with the ability to OHK.

I think it's a fair trade - sacrificing AI potential to become solely focused on AV capabilities. And since it is highly specialised, it should be good at what it is specialised in: long range AV. Now, if it also had pre-nerf PPA level AI capabilities, then there definitely would be a problem!

I think the Enforcer benefits from staying power in a fight, while the Saron is slightly more versatile than the Enforcer and GK - with its ability to dump its magazine in <1 second, it dramatically increases its survivability in cqc combat.

So do the Saron and Enforcer

Saron takes half a clip direct hitting to kill infantry
Enforcer takes 2 direct hits from what I remember

The problem is the Gatekeeper is better at range then the Saron, Enforcer AND Halberd, all are bad against infantry apart from the Halberd.

Saron and Enforcer have better points than the Halberd but worse in others (not just against infantry BUT also against vehicles).

Well that's the thing...
While the Saron takes 3 shots and the Enforcer takes 2 shots, the GK takes 4-5 shots of direct hits, which is noticeably worse than its counterparts. That is a fair trade.

I don't see how it is a problem if the GK is good at it's intended purpose. After all, it has given up almost everything else to be good at long range AV combat.

I quote:

KPU - Kills per Unique, i.e Kills / Uniques. For normal-high usage weapons, this is a performance stat and not a usage stat, as the average KPU is calculated on a per period basis (one day)

The key is 'this is a performance stat'.

KPH can look ok with large numbers of users when in actual fact it isn't. Probably the best demonstration of this is the original PPA which we can still see in the stats (previous to 30/10/2014). From a KPH perspective, it was fine - in line with Canister and Marauder. From a KPU perspective, it wasn't - outperforming both comfortably. Can't speak personally for the Gatekeeper yet but I can tell you from experience - the PPA was indeed OP, no matter how many times VS said the KPH was absolutely fine.

Still I get NC max destroying my tank / sunderer with guided missiles ftom such a distance that they are like 2x2 pixels on my screen. Now I'm abroad on business trip but at home on my desktop I have a folder of screenshots of Ravens hitting my from where it's impossible to retaliate.
I have at least 1 screen of Ravens hitting my from 1 base away.
Now that Tr can do the same everyone is crying.

Some other options at a possible solution to the gatekeeper problem:

A.) Give the enforcer no drop and decrease the damage a bit, thus turning it into a gatekeeper clone and letting it keep on par with the saron.

B.) Make the gatekeeper unable to damage infantry, or damage infantry even less. It does take quite a few shots to kill infantry, but it's still point and click and it's hard to mess that up. As a max or other infantry, it's impossible to use AV weapons in a lot of scenarios when you have a rocker-sniper machine gun pinning you down. Let the gatekeeper specialize in long range AV fighting, or long range infantry fighting, but not both.

C.) Give the Saron and the gatekeeper bullet drop, making long range tank battles more like actual tank battles and less like a point-and-click-athon.

I don't know about the rest of you, but I really miss the days of halberd battles on the harassers. When all three factions had the halberd as the best weapon on the harassers, and they all had them equipped. There was nothing like the exhiliration of seeing who could land their shots first... of knowing that all those silly .2% reload speed buffs you spent massive amount of certs on finally mattered, but not enough to compensate if the other person had no buffs and was landing shots. When downright skill was the balancing factor between two harasser crews and the decider of who would live to see another engagement. The thrill of trying to land shots on a smoking harasser, swerving and fleeing away to try and get back to its main support column. The thrill of swerving yourself to try and get back to your main support coloumn, half dead and with a harasser hot on your heels. OHK'ing an infantry at distance and going "OHHHH SNAP" because it required a decent amount of skill to do. That was seriously the heyday of harasser combat. And the lightning even had a proper place then and was a formidable opponent to your harasser crew, and killing one was a joyous victory.

Then the vulcan got super buffed and everything went to ****. Now we have the gatekeeper, which on top of the vulcan makes the TR absolutely no fun to fight against. You can show me all the fancy graphs in the world, but I can't show you the quantitative graph of enjoyability to play against because I haven't been plotting the points. But if I were, there'd be a bunch of drops and no incline.

I am all for faction specific weapons, but the harasser was just more fun without them. If we're going to have faction specific stuff, it should add to the enjoyment of gameplay, not take away. I think that's the underlying problem with these posts. The TR are going "We finally got good weapons and you want them taken away! Look at the data! We're even so shut it". While at the same time those new weapons "may" be statistically even, but they aren't fun to fight against and take away from the gameplay value for everyone else. You have to imagine that it's not enjoyable getting hit no matter where you go now in a vehicle, and that the point and click design makes it have constant damage which is really unfun to play against because no amount of driving skill can save you from point and click. Can't escape the vulcan, and can't really escape the gatekeeper now either. If you see one, there's a high chance that your vehicle is doomed and you're out a bunch of nanites. That's not fun gameplay.

The issue is not the long-range nature of the weapon, it's the long range nature of the weapon combined with the velocity, which is closer to the Lancer and the Vortex then it is the Saron or the Enforcer. (Saron / Enforcer have 300m/s velocity) - You will notice that neither of the other empires have extreme velocity on vehicle mounted weapons. The original iteration of the Saron had higher velocity and a charge mechanic, and it was still deemed to be overpowered, thus, it was changed. I have no issues with the TR having a long range ES AV secondary, but having nearly double the velocity of literally ever other ES secondary is unacceptable.

The Lancer and Vortex exchange high charge time and a complete lack of splash for their high velocity - only direct hits matter, and both of the above are quite bad at killing infantry due to low damage versus anything but vehicles. Neither a heavy or a max can chase you down at 110KPH, as a harasser can, and neither of the above have enough splash and damage potential to score 6+ kills per stock 1.75 second reload (Which is, by the way, significantly faster then even a max reload-certed Saron, which can only go down to 2.55 second reload, from 3.

I have already written at extreme length on the topic, to the point where I posted graphs depicting the exact maximum damage potential of the Saron vs the Gatekeeper (The Saron wins at sub 25 meters, the Gatekeeper wins at every other range) If you would like to read a balanced analysis and a few stats, take a look at my post history.

I play all three factions, to the point where i have a BR100 of each - so far, i've made ~15k certs with the Gatekeeper, which is significantly superior to any run I had with the prenerf PPA. To illustrate current performance - picture a prenerf PPA, remove the initial CoF, cut the reload speed in half, quadruple the projectile velocity, make the projectiles invisible, and allow it to damage vehicles, then cut the magazine by 20-30 rounds.

You now have the current Gatekeeper.

Here a collection of some of my favorite stats about the Gatekeeper. It is a statistic of a new weapon, so keep in mind that:

- Since it's new, people might not have fully certed it yet.
- Also not learned how to use its full potential

- The MBT Stats are Problematic, since the Driver can take kills that the Gatekeeper gunner prepared.

All this whiner want a nerf to put the ms at the same level of other long range weapon.

But it's not fair 300 ms come with better alpha.
enforcer is 8 shoot but in real with auto recharge is more 10.
Saron is 6 shoot who can unload all in cqc in less then one second.
With better splash or better alpha damage.

Gk is just low projectile no alpha if you remove ms you need to balance the weapon in same way.
So Dbg hear this guy and make a freaky alpha unload like saron and enforcer with only 300 ms.
Give us the tool to kill in one volley coupled with main canon, let the whiner assume her tears.

****** ARGUMENT SPOTTED

Gk have something near no splash, lancer and vortex have a load mechanic and can unload repeat low damage frequently like the gk do ... why people never use this mode perhaps is stupid to alert the target and better to put a big alpha ????

I refresh your mind with one charge lancer keep a 600 ms.

All this argument are **** gk is a lancer/vortex stuck in minimal charge mode.
Mount on a vehicule, but lancer have no cost and can pull from anywhere and with ammo pack better dps.
Vortex have less dps but with two you outperformed gk.

It's just now you just discovered how long range av with high ms can be really painfull because to safe and to easy to use.

But now how you can argument sincerely a gk nerf without nerfing lancer and vortex !!!!!!!!
All argument you can use can be applied to lancer and vortex it's so harsh....

This forum is really funny now .

Indeed, and there's also the fact that Fractures / Strikers are still underperfoming compared to the competition - the TR already had excellent long range MBT performance - the prowler has the best AI / damage output potential of all ground vehicles. It needed an ES long range AV secondary, but nothing like the performance of the current version. The TR needs long range MAX based AV and a striker buff, it needed infantry based AV, it's vehicle based AV was already quite good.

• Cut the Gatekeeper's velocity to 380 (Which still gives it a huge advantage over literally other ES AV options, by 80m/s, not an insignificant number.) - Give this velocity to the Fracture, making it 300m/s (up from the current 180)
• Make the Prowler / Harasser version magazine size match, else it's extremely difficult to balance.
• Make the Cert options match the Saron / Enforcer - if the Gatekeeper can upgrade stock magazine size, the competition should be able to as well, even if the scaling is minor. (8 Shot Saron might be problematic, limit mag dump option by reducing maximum RPM if necessary)
• Reduce splash radius - this is an AV weapon, not an AI weapon - AV and AI should be separate options. If the TR wants to do anti infantry work, bring a marauder - it's stats are already quite good. If necessary, do the same to the Saron, and fix the PPA, as the VS currently have no viable ES AI secondary option.
• Increase gatekeeper reload time to 2.5-2.75 seconds, which is still an advantage over the Saron.

There's also the issue that the Anchor bug is currently limiting prowler performance, it occasionally simply locks them in place permanently, not allowing undeploy - this is artificially limiting its stats, as prowlers are frequently exploding sooner then they otherwise would have. Even so, the MBT Gatekeeper is still on top of the current kill stats.

Just came from Miller - Just amazing aleart starts and everybody naaa we don´t fight the VS and lets log off. TR and NC numbers dropped to under 30 %.

VS wins 40 to 50 % of all alearts. It does not matter what stats you Show them the Betelgeuse and Orion the TOP KILLERS on all Servers of all weapons seem to be fine. Now the TR get something they can compete with and AN ARMY of VS WHINERS come to the Forum.

I really have to ask my selve does VS pay North Koreans as Propaganda ARMY in the FORUMS.

i don't want to be rude but if we have the choice to tune down gk and up striker and fracture to be inline with lancer and vortex.
You just have something worse is really more annoying to have plenty of ha from all side continously harras you mag with 0 cost then gk.
Gk need some ressource and can be stop, ha are always ready.
Do that and you can have a torrent of tears.
Is like removing my whip for a spiked mace but now this come from a vanu.


So we can resume you can make a carboncopy of enforcer/saron with gk (becaus high ms/low damage profile is too powerful on vehicule ) and improve striker fracture to be in inline with lancer/vortex in therm of easy shoot with high ms.
Winter is coming.

I fail to see how Orion weapon use is relevant to the discussion at hand about the Gate Keeper and how it is an upgrade for AV work to the Halberd, whilst the Halberd is considered an upgrade to the Saron (at range) for both AV work and AI.

If you want to whine about 0.75 ADS feel free to, just in the correct thread, or is the Orions killing your MBT's? Which considering they don't do any damage to MBT's, kind of makes you look some what well I'll let you insert a word of your choice here.

Compete? Compete, you say? I invite you to take a look at the following, something you should remember with fondness.

Here's when the PPA was nerfed.



See how the numbers dropped from insane, to beneath everything else? Look at the ratio here, 5663 average daily kills compared to the Marauder's 1435 and Canister's 1395. The PPA was overperforming, it was flat out unfair, thus, it was nerfed.



Now, let's look at the current ES AI performance. Note the dates, this is only over the last month, so it's all quite current.



The canister is cleaning house, no surprise, eh? It's not completely unreasonable, i'd say that when not comparing it to anything else, it's performance is reasonable, as is the Marauder - the PPA is a bit low, especially considering that as it's on the most mobile platform, you'd expect it's numbers to be highest.



Now that you've seen the current ES AI options, let's look at the Gatekeeper, compared to the supposed anti infantry options.




A whopping 5124 average daily kills, compared to the Marauder's 512 and the Canister's 840. I'm not including the PPA in this, as we've already established it's inferiority in the previous graph.


Does this graph look familiar? Compare it to the above, where the PPA is depicted pre nerf - looks similar, yes? Currently, the Gatekeeper is performing ON PAR to where the PPA was at it's absolute height - The gatekeeper's intended target is Vehicles, not infantry, at least the PPA was working in the domain for which it was intended - the gatekeeper is not.


To be fair, here's the current AV over the same time frame.



I believe there was a stealth adjustment to the Gatekeeper here, at the point I have highlighted (Sept 7th) the day after release. I am guessing this is due to a bug fix involving all the extra stuff that wasn't intended for release (Conquest mode was available on Indar, for example), but as there have been no tooltip changes, I can't say for sure. Either way - keep in mind the following:

At it's height, the PPA had an average 5663 infantry kills per day. This was an Anti Infantry weapon.
Currently, the Gatekeeper 5061. This is intended to be an ANTI VEHICLE weapon. Do you see a problem? The Gatekeeper is competing on par to the most hated anti infantry weapon to face... and it's supposed to be anti vehicle.

Do you think this will last? I do not. I just hope the nerf isn't as heavy handed as the PPA's was, as it is currently unusable.


All stats from From http://ps2oraclestats.com/monthlystats/
Yes, the Betelgeuse could use a nerf, but the Orion only has a 23% higher number of daily average kills compared to the T9 Carv.

Orion VS54 - 51610
T9 CARV - 40044

Orion wins by 23%


Compare that to the Prowler's AP primary vs the Magrider's AP primary
Prowler: 10458
Magrider: 7185

Prowler wins by 32%


How about ES sidearms for VS / TR?
Repeater: 8321
Beamer: 6914

Repeater wins by 17% (The top sidearm used by the VS is the Commissioner, which beats the Beamer kill numbers by almost 2000)


How about ES heavy weapons?
Chaingun: 11380
Lasher: 6871

Chaingun wins by 40%


How about SMGs?
AF-4 Cyclone 17578
Sirius SX12 14915
Armistice - 11975

Cyclone wins over the Sirius by 16%, and a whopping 32% over the Armistice.


I could go on. Take a look through the Oracle's various stats for each weapon category - the TR outpaces the VS in almost every category, although in many cases, not by all that much.


For example, take a look at MAX AV:



In terms of sheer kill numbers, did you know that Pounders are making almost four times the infantry kills as Ravens? They are however making a quarter the vehicle kills. Did you know that Fractures are actually performing better then Vortexes? Just... not versus vehicles - this needs to change.


From what I can see, the TR have a not insignificant advantage in almost EVERY category except for long range MAX AV, and to an extent, Strikers (Which are performing better now then they have been, but still aren't quite good enough.)


What in the name of Vanu's sweaty elbow are you complaining about, that you want to keep your AV PPA? I'm not seeing a problem with anything else, save for perhaps SMG performance and long range MAX AV - everything else looks pretty dang good to me.

Your pointless TR victim complex misdirection is not going to save this weapon from the nerf bat mate. You can point at the BJ, the Orion, the Raven max and anything else, while they might also be overperforming, they aren't the topic of this thread. I'd love to see ravens toned down too, I'd even like to see the BJ nerfed so I can get the motivation to work on some other VS LMG auraxiums but for now, in this thread, we're talking about something else that's more broken than the rest of whatever you're trying to misdirect attention to, the gatekeeper.

Mark my words, we will get this weapon nerfed and we'll hopefully get it done sooner rather than later because right now, the armour game against the TR is just not worth getting involved with. I'm just avoiding TR entirely because it saves me from the possibility of putting my monitor through the window next to me in sheer rage. You hear this? I'd rather face a enforcer/AP vanguard with maxed shield than step foot in a fight where I'll possibly encounter gatekeepers, it's that bad.

This weapon is broken in it's current state, the stats show this, the torrent of threads posted in this forum show this. The only people defending it are people that are busy abusing the hell out of it, or people with mild intellectual difficulties.

Your stats are cherry picked and fairly annoying because of this i mean really KILLS? really thats your go to for your argument straight kills. This does show one thing about the weapon its pulled in droves its uniques are much higher than its counterparts and because of this of course its going to have more kills.

The thing is the Gatekeeper on KPH and vehicle KPH the most relevant way to measure this weapon is just fine especially after the ninja patch. What we have with all thees threads is the same thing we had with the Vulcan even tho the Vulcan preformed basically the same as its counterparts and less than one of them by a fair margin because it was pulled in droves people only dying to it theres this illusion of absurd OP coming from it.

Just look at it
MBT KPH
http://ps2oraclestats.com/?stat=kph&weapon1=802874&weapon2=3704&weapon3=3442
MBT VKPH
http://ps2oraclestats.com/?stat=vkph&weapon1=802874&weapon2=3704&weapon3=3442
Harasser KPH
http://ps2oraclestats.com/?stat=kph&weapon1=802875&weapon2=6126&weapon3=6123
Harrasser VKPH
http://ps2oraclestats.com/?stat=vkph&weapon1=802875&weapon2=6123&weapon3=6126

It's funny because;

-It's not statistically over-performing against comparable counterparts; but it's too damn easy to use.

...is quite literally, the exact reason the VS's PPA was annihilated to the sorry state it exists in now.
But no, I'd like to know more about how the gatekeeper isn't over performing, it's just easy to use.

The stats dont show this in the least they show 2 things first that its performance is fine within a few points of its counterparts and 2 theres a **** ton of them being pulled. You are going to be obliterated by this weapon not because its overpowered but because theres a ton of them. I learned from the dozens of nerf Vulcan threads that people onyl care about their experience against a weapon and not its overall performance because even tho the Vulcan preformed basically the same as the saron and 4 full VKPH less than the enforcer nobody ever said Enforcer OP no it was still nerf Vulcan thread one after another why because we pulled a **** ton of them.

Been fixed as far as I know, didn't have any trouble yesterday when i lockdown'd many times. Haven't seen any deployed moving sundies either.