[Guide] How to Avoid Death by BASR and Other Sniper Avoidance Tips

You do not have to stop to heal, repair, or drop ammunition packs.

I used to run Engineer just to quickly increase experience so that I could acquire my SMG, I never had to hold still to perform any of these functions.

1. Inform a counter-sniper, or become one! (This will help you understand how to best avoid us.)
2. Inform a tank or other ground based vehicle.
3. Inform an aircraft of some sort.

If you're feeling exceptionally frustrated, flank us and get into a range where your weapons are far superior; It's possible, but this obviously isn't a lucrative choice. There's something else you can do, however, that causes an equivalent to death...just cause us to waste time.

Death is irrelevant in Planetside 2, it's simply the primary method of administering the punishment for poor performance in the case of your run and gun players. Sniping is a different playing style entirely, primarily long range sniping, due to the fact that by being a long ranged sniper...you are effectively reducing the risk of death. So, the punishment has to be administered in a different way...the time sinks incorporated into the system. We have time sinks incorporated into the system that have to be optimized through our performance in order to be a good sniper. It doesn't matter how many times you die in this game, what matters is what you do with the time you have...which is why those new graphs posted highlighted the score per minute of every weapon rather than the kill to death ratio of players with these weapons. Your death toll doesn't matter, someone that has a much higher death count than you could be a far better player because they might do much more with the time they have between deaths.

Snipers have to maximize their performance because of the time sinks that we possess. If we waste too much time, we have effectively suffered the same punishment that you do when you have died: time that could have been better spent scoring points and helping out our faction through the high priority targets taken out.

So, if a sniper attempts to take you out and misses...they have already messed up pretty badly. Now, if they continue to try and take you down and you're moving around and costing them even more time, you haven't the slightest idea how bad that is for our performance.

To us, missing a headshot and wasting time is just as morally frustrating as dying. It might not be as sadistically satisfying for you to simply waste our time, but I can promise you that if you make us waste a shot...we're pretty disheartened and are receiving the same type of punishment.

1. Getting into vehicles does not require you to slow down, I never slow down to get myself into a vehicle...
2. Interacting with terminals leaves you exposed to EVERYONE, not just snipers.

Aiming down sights and hipfiring requires you to slow down, but it doesn't require you to stop moving...be chaotic with your movement.

I doubt that highly.

This doesn't make sniping any easier, and unlike what most people believe...it's not an easy playing style. Run and gun oriented gameplay and sniping are both extremely challenging in their own way, balanced very differently but very challenging unto themselves. Besides, there's just going to be a lot of situations where it's more prudent to take up an SMG or close range rifle and get yourself in closer to the battle.

Also, keep in mind that there was apparently a hitbox registry error that allowed snipers to nail a headshot on a bodyshot during some running sequences; this is being fixed and rightly so. What this means is that the statements regarding being on the move are even more accurate as the difficulty of nailing moving headshots is increased.

When the game was released the render range was atrocious. I can't remember the exact range, but it was not 300m, maybe around 150m~200m, or worse if the fight was really heavy. I can remember fights at Eisa (when it was a fortress) where the render distance got cut down to around 15m. Grenades would appear from thin air all over the place.

Besides the render range testing they did on Connery (got a 600m BASR headshot during that test), 300m headshots is new territory.

I'm not sure if this is only me but i have to spam E heavily to get inside a vehicle and it requires me to stay still.

2- Yes it does. I was simply saying that "stop moving" isn't fully correct because there will come a time where you have to move.

those were technical limitations but the upper limit was always the rendering range. Outside of NW there was nothing stopping 2*MIN_DMG of bolt actions. Why do you think min_dmg was set to 550 and not to 400@some_very_distant_point?

wth? if infs can hack stuff on the move, how is this "stand still to enter" even possible? Either way you can pick any angle, there are no tank doors you have to use.

Technical limitations are still limitations that prevented 300m OSK's from being common at release. Again, if 300m OSK's go live, this will be the first time it's actually usable large scale. I don't have anything against it and will wait to see it live before I make a judgement.

Seems to be a problem related to me only, my apologies. What happens is that the "press E to enter" appears and i have to spam E a good 3-4 times until i finally get in

My only wonder is that if these snipers 1hit at 300meters (render range), what role will the new snipers fulfill?

Play infantry like it's DDR. Left, left, right, up, down, left, right, right, do it backwards now.

I remember that quote, and I liked it.

I like these one too.

...because frustration dictates emotion.

Games are supposed to be fun and challenging.

You're not supposed to be comfortable in a war game, you're supposed to feel in constant danger, on edge, paranoid.

What you're talking about are more geared towards SMG play than long ranged sniping...

You don't use Nano-Armor cloaking as a long ranged sniper because you're not expecting to be attacked, just Hunter Cloaking to conceal yourself from vehicles, aircraft, and counter-snipers.

Hmm...

I don't ever have a problem getting into vehicles. I do have to spam the E button, but I don't ever stop moving to do so...and often jump into Sunderers while they tear on by without even slowing down. Not sure what your problem is, but I do agree that they need to work on the interaction a bit better. I have problems with terminals while hacking rather than vehicles...I can be standing right in front of a damn terminal and nothing comes up to let me hack. I always got to play a panic stricken dancing game to effectively hack a target.

That aside, yes...there are times where you are obligated to stop moving, like terminals. These times, however, leave you extremely exposed to everyone so it's not really a vulnerability to snipers alone. You're equally vulnerable to anyone else who happens upon your poor corpse in waiting. Still...how many times have you died at a terminal?

I have once...even in the heat of enemy conflict in an enemy base after having hacked the enemy terminal. Don't ask me why my death rate is so low during these situations, but for some reason...I have awesome luck or something.

Fair enough.

I don't see a problem so long as the system is done correctly. If there is a problem, you work on the time sinks incorporated into the system...such as re-chambering, ammunition, etc. Increasing these makes the entire system more challenging by forcing us to maximize our efficiency even more.

That's similar to the problem I have with hacking, expressed earlier.

I have a feeling it's an issue with low end systems, I have a stock dell laptop so my framerate is pretty chaotic... Sometimes I'll cloak and the graphic won't activate but my energy will start depleting. Took a while before I realized this and learned to adapt to the lack of a visual identification of when I was and was not cloaked.

Sometimes, in more chaotic battles, I'm still spamming F in panic because of this.

The same role we always have played...the eradication of high priority targets. We will, however, be getting more function in the form of the Recon Drone coming out. Long ranged sniping is the only facet of our class that will be able to effectively utilize this tool with any practicality as we'll be literally piloting it and were we closer...that would just make us a sitting duck.

What the drone does...we don't yet know, exactly.

So, high priority target eradication and...whatever that thing does.

Weird, why would you run with a Medic or Engineer and NOT revive, heal, repair, or drop ammo? That's where they get their XP. If they're going to just be running and gunning it's better for them to roll a different class since the other classes are just much better at it than them. When I hear people yell out "I need repairs!" or "I need ammo!" the only thing I hear is the sound of sweet sweet certs flowing into my account. And when I see a body on the ground all I can think is "There is a beautiful bag of XP there on the ground that I need to collect!"

90% of them will be ammunition/time wasters (250~300m). 9% will be glorified long range spotters (200~249m). 1% will move to proper flanking positions and kill enemies (50~199m).

Huh, I guess this just supports the notion that the cloak and dagger routine is what the infiltrator should be based around instead of the "invisible sniper."

I suspect it will be.

It's not much different from prone, which is what most other games provide. The tracers give a pretty adequate directional indication of the sniper for whomever is willing to take them out on your faction; normally these are counter snipers who revel in the opportunity to take on another.

We love our sniper vs sniper battles.

That seems to be a common question, as I often see 3 medics that are too busy juking and circling in an empty room, to revive the corpses at their feet.

Repairs do require you to be stationary for a good deal of the time, as most of what you're repairing is stationary. The exception being tanks (who'll most likely run you over themselves) and MAXs who'll be sprinting towards a squad of enemies while spamming for repairs.

Ammo drops can be as tricky as turret deployment, as you can't just toss it out like you do in BF games. You actually have to scan around, waiting for the icon to turn green and let you deploy it. This is not really an issue inside facilities, but can be while outside, moving across uneven terrain.

you could snipe at 300m just fine, just not in the prime time at heavily crowded locations. On youtube there are months old clips with people sniped at the crown from TI alloys. It's roughly 300m, isn't it?

examples of very long range shots




just watch them and tell me with a straight face 300m sniping will be an issue. How many attempts there were?
Even with hold breath there is microsway that is enough to ruin your shot if the head is not much bigger than the width of the scope lines, even with the strongest scopes. You are literally hunting for a single pixel in a short window of relative stability with a delay of 0.5s. You would be better off running 100m and sniping from 200m or legging it 150m and sniping from 150m and that's what 95%+ infs do already. Bottom of the barrel spm is enough of a hint.

People talk about 300m headshots like its a new thing. It's not. But it was never really a "thing" to begin with because at 300m your target selection and ability to reliably hit targets is exceedingly low. And it will stay that way.

You all should be worrying about the snipers who have good aim and are 100m away from you. Those are the players you will be powerless against, as the lead time and ease of aiming at that range is much more reliable.

Let's be honest, there's nothing you can do to stop me, so you might as well just start sending me your tears to @themustarde on twitter. Thanks