rebalance infiltrators

In some cases, yes. However, Chuckles over here is complaining about the entire class in general and his expanded list includes things like Battle Rifles as well so I think we can discount him entirely as being a trifle touched in the head.

Far from it, any class can be just as deadly if played to their strengths, and the infiltrator in the hands of a random scrub is worse than useless. Also I'm going to seriously contest than any infantry class is more annoying to deal with than vehicles or aircraft.

This balances out the fact that their range is soft-capped by low bullet speed and high player speed and hard-capped by physical game restrictions, forcing most snipers to engage at a distance where they are usually not only easily seen but also easily returned fire upon.

Except for the fact that for that shot to be an instant kill they need to actually hit you, which at the ranges increase towards their maximum becomes much harder to do seeing as how it is 100% possible in-game for a player to dodge a killing shot accidentally after it has already been fired. It is not uncommon for players to avoid my shots by doing completely mundane actions at ranges less than 100m away.

I wouldn't bet on that. Maybe if it protected against HS from all damage sources it would get used to defend against chainshotting Heavy Assaults. But if all it did was protect against bolter headshots I guarantee it would see less use than the Universal Smoke Grenade perk.

People use bolt actions because of the allure the sniper class has in general. 5-6 years ago when NW5 made players immune to getting one-shot past maybe 50-60m and snipers were legitimate hot garbage there were still people using bolt actions.

Also I can still remember what happened when DBG considered for one second the idea of giving infiltrators access to carbines (a weapon class, which if I recall correctly requires not only recoil control but significant uncloaked exposure time) so lets not fool ourselves with this idea that bolt actions are so much deadlier than any other weapon class. If we switched the weapons for light assault and infiltrator for 24 hours I think we all know which class would be complained about more.

As stated above if they are far enough away that you can't retaliate they are far enough away that small, random movements completely trivialize them unless they can see into the future. If they are close enough to guarantee a hit they are close enough for you to retaliate against. Also 3 out of the 4 non-infil classes in the game have access to a weapon that can kill an infiltrator in 2 shots, so 'can't do anything' is less of an argument now.

Opinions are not facts and should not be presented as such, especially when said opinion is presented as being shared by a majority with no evidence.

I would have no problem with it. Understand the only snipers you would be killing with this scope are the ones you already have no trouble killing via other means

At the distances you would have to be at to make an aimbot work with bullet ballistics taken into account I would argue that the class with 100+ round magazines and an overshield makes for the better aimbot magnet. BASRs are simply better hackusation fuel.

Along with That_One_Kan_Guy's comment, Infiltrators lure themselves into a false sense of security when played by trash players who are typically noobs. What do I mean by this? THEY. SIT. STILL. The worst thing you could do as in an Infil is sit still. Battle Rifles can 2 hit kill an Infil if they aim at the head. That's pretty good. Infiltrators have a ton of noobs on them that sit still, but even people who are good with them do it. Here's an example.

I was playing at a base and I was sitting on a Flash, destroying a base that was being built at one of those build-your-own bases on Indar. A Heavy Assault gets on with me and we are blowing up stuff. An Infiltrator with a sniper, out of nowhere, snipes the Heavy Assault off of my ride. I am like "Crap." and I try to back up, and he snipes me off too. A Medic comes and revives us both. I, being an Infiltrator with a sniper rifle, wait for the Infiltrator to uncloak and stand still to steady up a shot. He does it, I shoot, I make the kill.

Now I know what you may be thinking. "Ugh that doesn't prove your point. You were using a BASR to kill ANOTHER INFILTRATOR ugh." You are right; I did use a Bolt Action Sniper Rifle to kill an Infiltrator. The thing is, if I was an HA with good aim, I could have done the same thing, but I coulda killed him even after he cloaked. I didn't say the range in my story. He was only about 100m away or so. I have been sniping countless times from pretty close, and I usually die, not to another Infiltrator, but to a Heavy Assault or Light Assault who starts shooting at me. They hit me enough times to break me shield (3-4 usually) and they just keep spraying until they hit me more and kill me. Infiltrators as snipers are perfectly fine, and I know that if a Light Assault had a sniper, you would cower in fear for the places they could get to.

INFILTRATE'ors are BALANCED and always have been on the weaker side of Performance

What ISN'T balanced and never was, is SMG-filtrators

Once flashlights are working again, use them. Too many people talk about infils yet fail to use the easiest way to detect them. I'm not saying that they aren't annoying. In fact, they are so annoying that I take special pleasure in killing infils any chance I get. But that is a challenge, which is what some of us play the game for. If this game was easy it would get boring.

Off to kill infils, flashlight or not, once the servers come back online...

Just because you dont like something doesnt mean you get to dictate that something. You cant just say "I dont like coffee and I hate coffee drinkers so make coffee cost more, so less drink it!" no thanks pal.

Second "they are overpowered cause ratios" they cant kill armor for crap, they arent as good at plain destroying crap like heavy assaults, cant repair or heal like medics, I dont see them flying around with c4.
They are simply made to assassinate infantry and disrupt and apparently you dont like dying in a game of endless war and death.

All of your argument is, is "Infiltrators be hard for me yall! they be so dang hard for me!! So now I want to remove a class that many love.
If I had the cortium blueprint I would build a salt mining operation beside you and make enough to afford a big bio lab of my own.

I wrote my points in the 4 pages of this thread. I don't expect you to share my thoughts but you should read more carefully before write silly sentences. I understand you guys love the infiltrators but is overplayed and toxic is such huge numbers.

Everytime you start to shoot to a third target in outdoor content you got oneshotted, knifed , smged by something you couldn't check before and there is no real counter for it.

I personally love the harasser , but I'm perfectly aware how toxic he can be for the gameplay.

Re-balance? Infiltrators have a hard enough time as it is, if anything they need a buff.

No, you made no real points other than "I die to infiltrators and cant handle the game".
If you dont want to lose sometimes, then go play single games, set it to easy and mod it so you are invincible and king of all you see.
If you play online games, people arent going to remove stuff you dont like because you cant handle it and feel its toxic.
Toxic is you crapping on other peoples classes to prop up your own.
I dont play the infiltrator, so no I dont love them, I play heavy assault and I kill infiltrators all the time. If anything light assault is what hurts because they get places I cant and such. I dont ask for them to be nerfed, I say good on them. I should be more careful.
This is you rearing your leg back and kicking your soft fragile toes into a concrete wall then yelling for concrete to be banned from the world.
stop taking away others peoples classes and fun. If you hate them outdoors get in a harrasser and drive, or hitch a ride.
When the first warriors got spears, ugg and muggg hated it and said spears should be banned because ugg and mugg like run up to peoples and smash with rock.
Maybe ugg and muggg the problem.

Ok boss... come to play on Miller... and let's see if you kill infiltrators "all the time". At least on Miller (no esperience on other servers) the situation is out of control with half of population playing as infiltrator.

Darklight will still illuminate the infil... flashlight effect working or not... As long as the equipment attachment slot is turned on.

So, I was thinking about this thread for a few days. Snipers are a skill based class, and as time goes on, people will get better at them. To me, there is little more satisfying than finding someone holding still for a moment to aim and turning them into a cert payout with one pull of the trigger. But the other day, I witnessed something rather unusual. The NC were making a push out of Howling Pass, and rather than heavies, medics, engineers or MAXs leading the charge, it was ALL infiltrators. Like hundreds of them. The bushwhacking from SMGs, knives and AI mines was constant, and I can only assume this is a result of the nerfing their MAXs have taken.

I'm not going to be the one to call for nerfing something based on the skill of its users, but... maybe this is a situation that should at least be considered?

If some faction had an unproportional amount of infiltrators, they wouldn't get anything done. Infiltrators aren't very good at capturing the objective with their team and having a ton of infils would exhaust any angle people can still flank from, not to mention skyrocket the use of darklights. Falling repeatedly for same tricks is just plainly idiotic.

It would be really cool if we could have some conclusive evidence that X or Y aspect of infiltrators are actually over-performing before discussing nerfs.

That seems really dumb. Hoofing it over open ground with a fragile infantry class which will not be able to deal with the inevitable counter-push of vehicles (which are a staple of ANY push into/out of Howling pass). Also "hundreds of infiltrators", nope, no, naw, don't believe you. Literally a single HE lightning would counter ALL of them with ZERO fear of retaliation. They'd have no ressing and no spawns + beacons are easy pickings.

So... yeah, evidence plz (not just of it happening but that it is _EFFECTIVE_).

I find fighting infils in small fights incredibly annoying. So I stay away from anything smaller than a 12v12. Infils don't need a nerf.

It takes about 10 minutes of playtime to realise that infiltrators are not balanced. The combination of OHK weapons at every range, legal wallhacks, invisibility, 1k HP and a Resist Shield when cloaked is stronger than any other infantry class by miles. People arguing that infiltrators aren't overpowered must be stuck playing as Stalkers, because that's about the only time infiltrators aren't too powerful.

The OHK weapons are optimized for long range, excluding the CQC snipers, which are specifically made for close range. However, you have to hit the head or else you are probably dead. Hey, I made a funny. Legal wall hacks? What the heck are you talking about? You can cloak, but you are are visible while moving and standing up. You have to have a trained eye to see them, or you can just hear them cloak and uncloak and look in their general direction. 1k HP? Everyone knows that an Infiltrator only has 400 HP and 500 shield, equating 900 in all. They don't have 1,000 HP. And a resist shield? Now I know you are either making a troll post or just using sarcasm to prove a point.

Snipers are easy to use at any range, all it needs is you to click on the head once. A CQC sniper rechambers quick enough that you can easily kill in 2 bodyshots as well.

Legal wallhacks, yes. What else would you call motion detection tools? You put down a motion spotter and now you get to see every enemy in the base at no cost and no downside. You get perfect information on everyone and don't run any risk of getting flanked.

Of course infiltrator cloak is visible and you can hear the cloak sounds, but nevertheless it's another ability on top of all the things they already have.

Have you played this game before? Every single competent infiltrator runs Nano Armor Cloak. Nano Armor Cloak grants the infiltrator a passive 100 HP (yes, that means they have 1k HP at all times) and grants a 35% damage reduction when cloaked. So effectively infiltrators activate a Resist Shield whenever they cloak.

You not knowing this suggests to me that you have no clue about infiltrator balance at all. It is painfully obvious to anyone with actual knowledge that the combination of the infiltrator's abilities makes them way stronger than any other infantry class.

Not every single infiltrator runs Nano Armor Cloaking, for the sole reason that it lasts shorter. Also, you do realize that WHEN YOU ARE CLOAKED YOU CAN NOT SHOOT? It doesn't matter if you have 35% damage reduction when cloaked; that just means that when you get shot- and you will- you will take 35% less damage. You can't fire back, so it isn't like a Resist Shield.

Legal Wall hacks? The motion detection is a positive to the Infiltrators. The Recon dart blinks every few split seconds, and it only gives you an update of their position, while the motion spotter gives real time information, lasts longer, but can be destroyed easier than a Recon Dart and you can only place it at your feet. The motion detection bonus of being an Infiltrator is not necessarily or essential to the game, such as a Heavy Assault being essential to the game or a Medic. You don't need a big dude to tank bullets and blow stuff up because you have a Light Assault with a C4, and you don't need a Medic if you simply just don't die. Yet, these things are added nonetheless because this game is class based and every class needs something to do. I literally thought you were kidding when you posted the first post, but now I know you are serious. My question to you is, have you played the game?

The part about a CQC sniper is ridiculous because you still have to have good enough aim to hit them once or twice or three times if you can't pull it off fast enough and are too far away. You have to rechamber a shot and hit it, while you are most likely being shot back at with an automatic weapon, most likely, that will screw you up.

You said this: You not knowing this suggests to me that you have no clue about infiltrator balance at all. It is painfully obvious to anyone with actual knowledge that the combination of the infiltrator's abilities makes them way stronger than any other infantry class. You did not have to be a total jerk to prove your point, even though you couldn't even do that, because everything you just said was "painfully obvious" that its only based on your own assumptions. Not every infil plays with Nano Armor. You can't assume that all shots are hits, because they aren't. Sure, from ALMOST every distance, you can hit their head and kill them. You can't do it from extreme ranges except for with the railjack, which will kill Infiltrators from any range if you hit the head. That basic point right there that you said, that they have a weapon that can hit from every range, basically ignores that fact that its only a OHK if you hit the head, which is harder to do the closer you get. Sure, its a bigger target, but they shoot back and kill you if you miss. The times that I have missed in close range with a sniper, I have only been able to rechamber and hit them in the head with the default NC sniper rifle after I have been taken down into the red zone with my health.

You can't make assumptions, because we are all humans and make mistakes. What you have said is mostly theoretical, but can't really be pulled off easily. Infiltrators are a class about reconnaissance and headshots, just as a Medic is about reviving the fallen players and an Engineer is about repairing everything and supplying ammo to fighters. Sure, every class is about headshots, but it is even more critical to an Infiltrator. That isn't an easy feat without practice, but at the point where you can easily pull of headshots as an Infiltrator, you can do it on other classes too. At that point you are just a skilled player.

It's very late, so I'm gonna restrict my answer to only your last paragraph.

As with any class there is a skill floor that a player has to reach to become effective with the class. But infiltrator, as opposed to other classes, offers very big crutches that do a lot of the heavy lifting for you. Again, motion intel + invisibility + OHK weapons give you every advantage you can ever need. You see the enemy coming on your minimap while they don't see you, and then you kill them in one shot. Of course aiming at the head every time isn't trivial, BUT since you also have constant knowledge of the enemy's position you can take as much time as you need to line up your shot and position yourself so that you can instantly fall back, should you miss. The reward for playing infiltrator is simply way too high for the extremely low risk one has to take.

As to the Nano Armor Cloak, any infiltrator that plays within an actual base should be running Nano Armor Cloak. That some people don't run it isn't an excuse for how overpowered it is. The passive 100 HP bring your health into line with every other class. And the damage resistance when cloaked is incredibly powerful (contrary to what you suggest), as it allows you to back out of an engagement while not just going invisible, but while also ignoring 35% of incoming damage.

Again, combine all these little things together and seriously tell me that that isn't too strong.

Invisibility, perfect map awareness, the ability to be ready for any opponent and have all the time you need, the ability to kill in one shot, the ability to retreat while invisible and while having a Resist Shield, etc.

I don't think anyone can seriously say this.

And I haven't even touched on such things as Clientside, which will make it seem as though infiltrators can fire before they even uncloaked. But I think even without this, I should have gotten my point across well enough.