I've mostly been running Regen 1. I don't need the faster rates of higher tiers as an Infiltrator because I'm taking time out of the fight to recharge my Hunter cloak anyway. However there are a couple other options that seem viable, and I'd like to hear the community's results. Hold breath is an obvious choice for snipers, but it really only becomes useful at the highest ranks. Awareness seems like it could help snipers wearing nanoweave 5 return fire at anyone who tries to counter-snipe them. Counter-intelligence seems like it might be good for iron-sights snipers so as not to waste too much time cloaking/decloaking after each shot. Rangefinder seems like it would be useful for people who snipe with silencers, since bullet drop is more of a concern. Sensor Shield seems like it would be great for SMG infils or Stalkers Who has used what, and has it made a noticeable difference? Regen has really doubled my average lifespan because I can actually run away to fight another day without sacrificing precious nanites on kits that are better spent on proxy mines.
I gotta disagree with you. Hold breath is a good improvement on Rank 1. I don't really need the higher ranks as with rank one I never run into breathing problems when sniping. Awareness when Sniping? If you need that to locate other snipers (which entails letting them shoot you; bad idea) then you need to up your game. enemy snipers are easy to spot by their tracers and they should never be able to hit you anyways. I don't get what you mean about counter intelligence at all. It just tells you when you have been spotted. I don't find that implant useful at all. Rangefinder might be useful for snipers. But if you wanna get good you need to learn the bulletdrop. Especially if you are using a silencer which I can't recommend. Until then there are other ways to get the range by using the mildot system or personal markers. (like snipers do in real life; at least when they don't have time to use laser rangefinder) Sensor shield is imo an underpowered and overpriced (in energy use) implant. It only does its job when not sprinting and since even as a stalker you need to go from cover to cover quickly (cloak is heavily nerfed right now and easily visible) it's not that useful. I'd rather run grenade bandolier with emps and emp shield on SMG infil (and in fact I do) and I took away the sensor shield on my stalker too. Replaced it with regen I think. Currently I use longer range bolt actions and semis with hold breath 1. My SMG with EMPs and EMP shield. My scout rifles with battle hardened. (flinch kills semi autos) and regen on stalker.
I use battle hardened with the TSAR-42/Ghost/SAS-R Hold breath with the longer ranged sniper rifles Sensor shield for everything else. I don't really play stalker at all. If I did, regen might be useful, as well as EOD.
For my long range setup, I run Hold Breath III. Hold Breath 4 is un-needed for me, since I can dump all 5 rounds from the Parsec in one breath fairly easily with a tiny amount of in-game breath control (I'd use Hold Breath II, but I like redundancy, because I understand I can screw up, and if I do, it can cover for me xD). I typically run with Battle Hardened III (only because I've yet to luck out and get Battle Hardened 4) on my Ghost, although if I'm running with a squad of MAX Hunting Cloakers (if you've yet to do it, DO IT! It's really fun) I'll run with Enhanced Targeting. I don't think there's anything that makes a MAX more angry than a crew of cloakers dropping it from 150+m away, just close enough to dance around in front of it, but far enough away that they can do nothing about it xD. When Stalking, I run with Regen III. Since I run Stalker with mines instead of medkits, I find it insanely useful. Especially since I spend a lot of time whilst stalking in-hiding anyway. (Grabbing a few QCX/Explosive bolt users in that Anti-Max cloaker crew is also a blast, no pun intended). When I run close range loadouts, which isn't super often, I typically run Battle Hardened III, although I find Enhanced Targeting and Sensor Shield 4 situationally useful at times. -Stay Fr0sty
I'm running Regen 3 only. Everything else seems underwelming to me - reasons on each suggested implant: 1) Hold Breath - I really don't need it since when I'm sniping with BASR's I allign my shot while scoped and cloacked then hold my breath-decloack-shoot-recloack. 2) Awarness - long range snipers should either a) have a VERY good and VERY concealed spot or b) relocate after each shot. And while I have everything on my Infiltrator maxed out (not including the weapons) I never run Nano-armor. I go with either Ammo belt when I'm using sniper or scout rifles (currently in the process of Auraxiuming Nyx) or ASC when I run with SMG. So awarness would be a waste since I recloack often when sniping, never sit in one place if its not concealed and I and many other expirienced snipers (on Cobalt at least) go for headshots (especialy on enemy snipers). 3) Counter-Intelligence - you DO want to cloack between each shot with Ghost and TR/NC variants to exploit game render delay, so no point in running this implant. 4) Ragefinder is not accurate (yes it lies) and you really should learn to calculate drop by using mildots. 5) Sensor Shield - this one is viable.
regen 1 on my stalker and never looked back, Sensor shield would be great but imho regen is just too mandatory.
I run implants non stop on all classes. Long range hold breath 1 or 2 depends on how good the farm is SMG i run sensor shield 4 or regen 4 CqC snipe with ksr-35/vandal i run battle harden 3 I dont do stalker. -Kiwi 56RD
Interesting... my list of top implants are much different. Regeneration: as players wont need a higher quality to do the job. Low ranks are amazing for stalker play, however I usually bump up the quality when running with an SMG since you have far less downtime unless you create it yourself intentionally. Enhanced Targeting: Either with crossbow as a stalker, Blackhand seems to work well too, or even using my wraith flash against armored vehicles. Excellent for picking your targets ahead of time. Downside... no mines. Battle hardened: is usually my pick for Ghost, and it would have been for the Crossbow as well if i didn't need regeneration due to running mines. I find when using longer range weapons I don't desire Battle Hardened as much because the frequency of nearby explosions and disruptions decreases. EMP Shield: The ability to emmunize yourself to EMP can be hugely beneficial if your the type to run Bando like I do. I experimented with both SMGs, Xbow, and knifeplay and was pleased. EMP shield has very good tactical merits if your the type to jump in and mow down several targets. The downside being the benefits of it are purely based on your choices. From a stalker perspective: Your ability to kill multiple targets is less, and so anything that boosts your short term killing potential will rank highly. However the majority of ambushes will not require it. Essentially its like icing on the cake, and just makes ambushes a little sweeter. Sensor Shield: This is much more useful then EMP shield when running an SMG, but not as huge of a deal for a stalker who can just chillax at any time and reset the engagement. SMG user will get much more mileage out of using this to confuse enemies. Hold Breath: I find i usually just use rank 2, Im not a huge sniper in the traditional sense though. Counter Intelligence: When using my camo, and hide sniping in various locations I want to know when I have been spotted.I am trying to draw less attention to myself, using a silencer, pacing my shots. Enhanced targeting would not be equipped for this activity because voice callouts would draw too much attention. Usually I am right inside the enemy base with either a ghost or XM98 when doing this. Marker: Do scrim rules prevent the usage of motion spotters or RDD? Simple: EMP EVERYTHING anything in the blast radius will light up the mini map. Take that you HA elitist bastards. <3 I mean.... Makeshift Radar?
Mine only choice for implant is also quite different. Safe Landing. This allows me to just jump down without loosing health and using terrain. Makes things so much faster. I run this on every loadout and every class. Only if MAX would get this....
I actually sometimes run EMP shield with my stalker so a single EMP grenade doesn't pop me out of cloak. Otherwise I stick mainly to enhanced targeting, hold breath (while using phase shift or semi-autos) or no implant at all.
Heh, Impants. Personally, I run Hold breath 1 on my snipers, and enhanced targeting on everything else. Hold breath because it helps reduce the unreliable nature of the standard hold breath length, and enhanced targeting because it's never not useful. I've never really felt it necessary to run regen, as I always equip medkits instead of claymores.
1. Most of the time: regen 2 for all classes 2. smg-infiltrator: EMP shield (i dont want to take my own shields away) 3. safe landing: stalker at biolabs and tech plants and LA with the icarus jump jets (its do easy to die with them by accident)
