I am really confused right now, bulletdrop/sniping.

It works alright now, I wrote down some ranges and how I have to aim.

I am not sure if its helpfull for anyone because maybe resolutions change this, but heres how I get a headshot with the M77-B and the x12 Scope:
300 Meter, 1,5 mildots and aiming at the upper half of the enemys face.
At 260 meter, 1,5 mildots and aim at the shoulders/neck.
220-240 Meter, 1 mildot and aim straight at the head.
210 Meter, 0,5-0,8 mildots.
200 Meter 0,5 mildots and aim at the top of the head.

And for 425 Meter, 2,5 mildots aim at the head. For longer ranges I have to find suitable testsubjects (muhaha).


When I am already here, I would have another question. Which SMG should I buy first, I am TR right now, but am also interested in VS options. I need something for capturing points and close quarter combat. I looked through the TR options, but it seems they all cost 1000?
Oh, and what do I get for upgrading the mine? 2 Mines?

Edit: Oh, and btw now that I know the ranges, I am pretty sure it was bugged when I emptied my whole magazine and didn't hit, what I described in the beginning.

You get 2 mines for upgrading. Can't help with anything else though.

Yeah, all SMGs cost 1,000 certs. Kind of a pain. I'd suggest the Armistice. High RoF and DPS means you can do reasonably well by just mag dumping at a player. It's worth giving the NS-7 PDW a try, as well. It actually has crappy DPS, so headshots are mandatory in CQC, but it has very mild recoil, and it does much better than other SMGs at medium range, thanks to its unusually long max damage range. People tend to love it or hate it. Interestingly, the proportions seem about the same across all skill levels.

As for VS options, I'd probably go with the Sirius (or PDW, again, if you liked it). It has a very user-friendly combination of high RoF (not as high as the Armistice) and large magazine.

Yep, you get 2 mines for upgrading.

Yeah sorry about that. I typo'd The Tiers in my original post -_- ! .

When the game came out we just had the XM98 (T1), the V10 (T2) came out next to much fanfare. I remember being a nooblet and reading posts on how the V10 back in the day was the best option for long range sniping. Then I remember there was a bit of drama about the Parallax (T3) coming out. Its getting foggy thinking back so far, but the drama was caused because T3 was pretty much a flat upgrade... (albeit a minor one) to the other rifles. This eventually led to the revamp happening in the first place. I am glad SOE/DBG did the revamp because the changes to the ghost, SAS-R (super awesome sniper rifle) and T-SAR just make me so happy not having to hold breath any longer for CQC. That was so bloody annoying.... The whole idea of a tiered weapons treadmill for sniper rifles just was kinda morally wrong too. Not to mention the inevitable power creep and pendulum swing of nerfs that would eventually have to occur.

I do wish that a true long range sniper rifles did exist for those wanting to use them. We have this beautiful large scale MMO FPS but snipers are forced to work within these artificial ranges. From the very limited gimmicky / adventitious moments I have been sniping I know that ESF's actually can be a serious threat to snipers and Long Range Sniping isn't as "risk free" as many on these forums would like to think. I also know for some people its not about the killstreaks, and its more about the fun of trying to hit a tiny dot at an very extreme distance. Essentially its about the challenge to improve ones aim and learn the drop. I can sympathize with that because the drop is what really makes me love using the crossbow.

OP you have my sympathy for being unable to explore sniping in Planetside 2 in the way you initially had envisioned. I really hate to be that person that dashes someones initial intentions. Its unfortunate that the reliable render distance is 300 meters on infantry and that DBG has to work within these technical limitations. It would be really neat to have more playstyle options for sniping.

Adjusting for bullet drop is a common problem for those knew to sniping in different fps games. You just have to keep practicing and it will slowly become more clear to you what mildot will likely hit your target.

Or go VS and throw the bullet drop idea out the window XD

Now that infantry supposedly render at longer ranges when holding a long-range weapon, I could imagine a super long-range BASR with insane velocity (Railjack speed or higher, without the trigger delay) but inverse damage drop, making it so the OHK range starts at 250m, instead of ending there. It's kind of clumsy, but it would be a simple way to make the gun effective at 400m+ without making it a direct upgrade to the T3 guns.

Sadly the majority of VS BASR's do actually have bullet drop. (GHOST/ XM98 / V10 / Parallax/ Parsec VX3-A) The semi auto snipers do not have drop. (Phantom / Spectre) Interestingly the Phaseshift is classified as a semi auto, and has no drop but technically you can charge it up for a OHK. Hybridness for the win :3

Ah, no problem. The renderdistances are annoying, but yesterday I got one 588 meter kill which made me very happy
First I was shooting at enemy Snipers, which I did often hit, atleast 15 times or so. Sadly that doesn't OHK, so they always did go Invis and healed up. Then finally I got an enemy engineer, I hit him, he goes to cover. Luckily for me no cover that protects him from my position 580 Meter away on higher ground And I finnally get the Kill with a second shot!

First I was not sure if it would render infantry at those distances, because I saw only tanks, and quite a lot of them. But probably there were just no infantry, because it would have been useless with that many tanks and open fields.

So yeah, I am mostly happy with PS2, even though there are many things I wish were handled better^^ Making the only Sniperrifle that can OHK Infiltrators at every distance faction specific :/...

Another question^^ I tried to calculate the Bulletdrop, and if I calculate with gravityfactor of 7 my calculations are still way off. BUT if I calculate with a bulletspeed of x2, it seems to be pretty accurate. From sniping at 580 Meter with a rifle that should have a bulletspeed of 550meter/sec, it also does seem as if bullets travel atleast with x2 speed. Anyone know anything about that?

2 things I wish were in the game: A Headshot indicator for Sniperrifles when you don't kill your enemy^^
And more importantly, a real longrange sniperrifle that has the inverse damage, so it only OHK on 400 meter+. On that note, it wouldn't even need to have better velocity then the current ones, that could make it too good.

And yeah, its not about killstreaks, its about the challenge It just feels unrewarding if you headshot someone on that distance and he doesn't die. It felt really good when I did headshot someone at around 300m while he was moving.

All VS bolt action rifles have bullet drop. Not most, not a majority, all of them. Bolt actions were normalized because in beta VS bolt actions were a joke. They had no bullet drop, and so were penalized in damage fall off, meaning our effective range--despite the lack of drop--was pathetic.

So, shortly after beta, all bolt actions were normalized. Along with that normalization VS bolt actions rifles were given drop and made the same as all the other bolt action rifles.

There are some subtle differences for faction flavor, but if you're a crack shot sniper on VS, then you'll be a crack shot sniper for TR and NC also when using bolt action rifles.

Now, no VS semi-auto rifles have drop. All VS semi-automatic rifles, including battle rifles and scout rifles, are drop free.

I wonder if this works the opposite way. The NC Bolt Driver is pretty garbage but if you can get really good with that then none of the other NC rifles should be a problem.

I'm making a VS character soon so I'll see how it goes.

Oh I see your stuck on the word "majority"... right.

Let me rephrase and explain my intention behind saying "majority is to avoid the slippery slope of the phase-shift which exists and can OHK. I also pretty much stated every single BASR... (GHOST/ XM98 / V10 / Parallax/ Parsec VX3-A) Did you misread or are you just being picky? Oh! i see your just adding more confusion to the thread. How crafty

Just being precise. There isn't really a slippery slope with the Phase Shift; it's not a bolt action, but semi-automatic, and it can only one hit kill another Infiltrator inside 200 meters on a full charge.

This actually simplifies it. VS bolt actions are almost identical to TR bolt actions. VS semi-auto rifles are the ones without bullet drop. It's just a simple dichotomy.

https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1NdCO_M6AUdpI_-xn46YpAxwgoRwXcqDLybqwRH64P64/edit?pli=1#gid=0

One thing to note is each Tier of BASR has a different Bullet Velocity, so this will be your biggest fight when you are using the T1 and T2 BASR's is that they have low Velocity bullets. I do not understand why the BASR's can't equip High Velocity ammunition, because you should want to get the highest velocity rounds as possible with your gun so you can get your bullets to the target as fast as possible...

You will need to practice ALOT to get good with the T1 and T2 BASR's to snipe well with them, but when you do your HSR should go up pretty well. the Railjack is a special case though. It's the only T4 BASR (The Phaseshift is technically a BASR, but at the same time is not, and we will not speak of the TRAP-M1, because it is a useless piece of trash that should be blown up with 400 kilo's of LA C4) It has the highest bullet velocity of any BASR, at 850 M/s, meaning this gun has the highest Infantry bullet velocity in the game. But, it has one major drawback and at the same time, best sniping feature in the game. It takes about 200 ms between when you hit the LMB and when the rail bolt actually fires. Giving you a 200 ms leeway to aim at your target if he is on the move.

I am trying not to beat myself up. I have been trying to get used to 300 to 400 meter head shots, and most of the time I miss them or I hit the chest due to stupid breathing mechanic. It's hard though to not say I suck when I miss that much.

A little bit late answer but I would really suggest to trash x12 scope on T1 BASR. Whenever I pull my XM98 (which I do rarely - I'm in agonising process of auraxiuming MKV right now) I put x8 scope max.
Pros of x8: better correletaion to OHK range, less visual sway (sway value is constant across all scopes, but higher magnification makes player to see bigger sway while using higher magnification scopes).
Cons of x8: ummm, none?
TBH I put x10 max on my Parallax (T3 BASR) on very odd occasions, usually its either standart (which is x6) or x8.
About SMG - I would suggest either G1 (which is Armistice in TR's case, or how its called by comunity - the Farmistice) or NS7 PDW which is an exelent mid range SMG. You will lose in CQC with NS7 vs CQC oriented weapons, but past 20 or so meters you will be on equal footing or better. (I suggest to OP to go to youtube and watch Wrel's videos on SMG's (3 videos - one for each faction) although I would highly suggest to go to VR and try G1 SMG's with ALS (Advanced Laser Sight) and with EM (Extended Magazines) since ALS/EM choise is a personal preference - most people tend to use EM on G1 SMG's, on the other had I had a massive blast using my Eridani (G1 VS SMG) with ALS).

So, about a year ago, I made this chart. I used gravity values and assumed a soldier is exactly 2 meters high to chart bullet rise/drop. It only goes out to 300m (the max infantry render distance at the time), and is VS specific, but the tiered sniper rifles and the 1.35x BASR should have the same damage value.
It includes data in 5 meter intervals for: rise/drop in meters, damage done (headshots and bodyshots), markers and max range for OHKO headshot kills, as well as time to target. The rise/drop data should still be the same as long as they haven't changed the gravity values (I think it was 11.25?)
Link here.