Sick of nc overpop

as a noob and average ps2 player, I can see why NC is the most used faction.
I choosed TR as a complete planetside ignorant cause i like their colors and not being a big fan of "freedom pewpewrs" and "futuristic/science fiction warfare", but the more I knew the 3 factions the more I realized NC would better fit my (and probably average) taste.
I like shotguns and nc has jackhammer, wich maybe is not the best shotgun in the game (?) but it is, as any faction-specific heavy weapon, the most original concept in its weapon category (the others shotguns being cross-faction category-tied copycats pmuch, at least to my - and the average noob player's- eyes).
I don't like copycats weapons, i like them to be different, I like hard to learn mechanics, high damage dealing weapons that are difficult to use but rewarding when killing someone with em, pmuch unrealistic weapons, NC has SAW. TR has MCG, wich I use, but then here's all the stuff about its "spin up time" that I read here (after I bought it, sigh) taht basically kills pmuch every reason to prefer it versus other TR LMGs.
I like both heavy assault (cause they have the most different kind of weapons based on faction) and light assault (jetpack weeee) and as a HA I really would like to use the phoenix, just because it's a fun and original design for a rocket launcher, even if it has a limited damage per shot...comeon, a high-noise-guided missile that ppl can shoot at and can be fired from behind cover? thats great! TR's striker is and average concept, more boring than a standard lock-on rocket launcher IMHO...more dps does not make it more fun to use.
I'm not a big fan of camping, TR's Max and prowler have their skills focused on increase their DPS while stationary/camping, while NC has shields that pmuch help them getting right into the fight and use fun and -again- original skill concepts that are easy to use and surely harder to master than TR's ones.
if I were an NC or VS I'd have a clear idea of what class (HA) and weapons I would use. as a TR I must say I don't really like its faction weapons, so I don't even know if using HA with the MCG & grounder or LA with the copycat-factionshared-fast reload shotgun.

Please NC be overpopulate every time.. i play tr and vs, and i got some nice xp bonus when warpgated. Its a joy for a liberator

Seeing as how you just became a member January 29 2014 (some 13 days ago) I would suggest you just play NC for a little while and do everyone a favor and create that character on the closest server with the lowest NC population.

Why do I say this? Well, first, you cannot have invested very much time into any character yet let alone the game overall if you just became a member 2 weeks ago. Second, what you describe as your overall preference in play style- e.g. hard to learn mechanics, high damage weapons that are difficult to master- is pretty much the entire concept of NC and, in many ways, an exact contrast to TR. Finally, even if you end up playing NC more because the traits they have are more suited to your taste, you can still play your TR character as well.

Basically, if you only became a member two weeks ago, I would avoid pigeonholing yourself into only one faction because, well, why would you, and this will give you a much better idea of where you want to focus your time and attention.

du

dunno why it shows you that info, i started playing a lot on december, even if my main character has been made like more than 1 year ago xD it probably shows when i created my forums account.
https://players.planetside2.com/#!/5428013610466746129
btw I'd like to stick with TR because I really DON'T like freedom pewpewrz lol and faction concept is as much important as weapon concept to me xD I know that's not exactly "teh pr0 approach" but that's how I'm made I guess. eventually i'll end up liking the more "spray & pray" concept of TR weapons, or drop it and roll NC after they nerf something to make it less "for teh masses"

Ah, I forgot that forum accounts are separate from player accounts, my mistake- I guess a lot of my post is irrelevant then.

I have to say I disagree with the idea of just nerfing something to make the population migrate and the faction less appealing and still have yet to see any meaningful arguments that expose some kind of systematic imbalance in performance.

I have been on a bit of a hiatus lately for various real life reasons and have started playing my TR thanks to NC over population- even though I begrudge the merger that resulted in my main NC and TR being on the same server.

Honestly, I had a blast yesterday playing TR, especially after I unlocked the AMC as it fits my play style more than many of the other options. I'm looking forward to fleshing out that character, at least until the populations even out a bit (though, I do not want to alienate myself too much from my outfit as I really enjoy playing with them and have been for some time). Maybe I will make a post, after more experience, on TR selections that appeal to an NC fan since it seems there has been a rise in TR wanting NC style weapons.

I definitely feel for you, as it seems you prefer a playstyle specifically suited to NC. I started in Beta as VS because 1) science and 2) they were advertised in a way that made me think they would suit my preference as a bit of a sharpshooter. I switched to NC very shortly after release after testing the different factions and felt a little cheated out of the time, money, effort, and energy I had put into my VS (already BR 30 something by then) since it was quickly apparent my play style was suited best for NC. Personally, I have always very much preferred a lot of the elements from TR, especially the aesthetics. Although, some of the things I initially really disliked about NC have grown on me.

And I know I said then when we (then) NC were suffering from it that I would rather the game just be better rather than there be retribution.

Instead the Devs nerfed things about the VS and TR rather than just buffing the NC. Maybe at some point the Devs need to take the blame on this one for taking a nerf approach rather than a "What would be fun?" approach.

I know I'll keep asking for defense to be more involved and fun ... and a magnetic grappling hook (see: Just Cause 2) ... and and the Flash to go back to if landing on wheels to not take fall damage so we can do some really fun jumps.

Seriously, why doesn't this game have a Flash (or other vehicles) Death Race league as an Alert event already

Agreed. It probably doesn't need to be much either. Just the "impression" of a buff and the tide changes. So small things here and there like changing left-right kick to a single direction, slight reduction of reload time here, slightly increased mag size there etc etc.

Because I think (although I am definitely no expert) things are probably fairly close right now, so Quality-of-Life buffs is probably all the TR needs

If this is the case then I would think it far preferable to say, change some audio or make some of the models more unique (for everyone) since this seems to be the biggest TR complaint as of late- especially in the absence of any meaningful evidence that shows systematic imbalance in performance.

While good, I don't think that would fool anyone.

Lately on Mattherson the NC and VS have been more or less tied or swapping leads in pop while the TR have all but given up on fighting VS at all, going so far as to get warpgated within the first hour of an Indar territory and dumping multiple platoons into Helios Solar and Indar Ex at literally the exact same time that they were losing their tech plan unopposed.

Yeah, NC overpop is the problem, provided you ignore all the times it isn't.

Oh and all the examples so far of OP NC gear are deeply misguided - for something to be OP, it must be extremely good at what it does while demanding few or no tradeoffs in performance. Marauders/Vulcans were OP because they were extremely good at what they did at all ranges. ZOE was OP because it totally negated 90% of the traits designed to make the MAX managable to fight against, and giving it such mobility that the number of VS MAXes getting killed has gone up since ZOE was nerfed.

- The SAW, I shouldn't even need to say. My favorite gun in the game, but it's got a steep learning curve, longest reload out of any weapon in the game, and is terrible on the move.
- The Jackhammer is just a shotgun, when it comes down to it. I don't really like it because the whole "it's a shotgun that's good at 20m yeaaaaaaa" shtick doesn't really work with me because at 20m, a Mag Shot will outperform a Jackhammer 100% of the time. The reason Mattocks are so deadly is partly their range and partly that you're firing two at once.
- The GD-22S has SUBSTANTIALLY lower dps than its nearest equivalents, the Orion and MSW-R.
- The Vanguard shield is a necessary evil. The Vanguard effectively didn't have a shield for the first 8 months of the game and it was being doubled in performance by the Prowler and Magrider and was an absolute joke. It's crazy to think of the NC as the "Lightning Faction" but for a long time we were. If the shield were to go the Vanguard would basically have to be made so much more maneuverable and speedy as to have just as many people complaining. Oh, and it's STILL the worst performing MBT.
- Airhammer is obviously OP becaushahahahahaha I couldn't even finish that thought sorry


All that said, the best thing that can be said about NC guns is that they are - top to bottom - all fun and able to fill a niche. We've got great variety compared to the samey weapons of the TR and the anemic peashooters of the VS. I guess our variety is OP? Because I can't think of a gun we have that doesn't have very real downsides to using it, except maybe the Gauss Rifle.

edit - NC RULEZ! FREEDOM BABY! It's great right now to see the NC in good shape because I find TR/VS guns so unbelievably lackluster that I'd quit if I wasn't playing my NC primarily.

#SLUGLYFE
#SCREEEEEEEEE
#SCREEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE

#SNUGGLESLIEDMAXCRASHDIED

What do you mean fool anyone? A lot of the recent complaints coming from TR relate to these kinds of issues.

As for complaints relating to weapon balance, I have yet to see an evidence presented and the only pre- post- PU2 performance data I have seen from Merli0n generally show that TR still leads in the same categories they did pre-PU2, just not by margins as wide.

Weapon wise it seems most people agree with the metrics in that we are more balanced now than perhaps ever before.

Populations may be imbalanced but still not as much as they have been at other times in the past.

You do not solve population imbalance but imbalancing weapons.

Yeah I have to take back what I said about the Gauss SAW, it feels like I get owned by the Carv even more. I am not sure if is just me or if I am suffering from hit-registration issues associated with poor Intel multi-core CPU optimization but it is extremely frustrating to get the drop on somebody, and using proper aim at their upper-torso and head just get insta-killed:

https://forums.station.sony.com/ps2...n-please-finally-get-it-under-control.166430/

I think that maybe because the Gauss SAW is such a common weapon, and because I am getting killed by it so frequently I am attributing some sort of weapon imbalance to it, whereas it is probably the hit-registration issue.

And deaths to the Carv do seem quicker and more consistent.

Also, the data I referred to doesn't actually indicate gross weapon imbalance between the LMG's; I mean 70k vs 65 and 64k is pretty close. If the Gauss SAW had 100k kills to 65k then that would be obviously indicative of imbalance.

At least it's good to see that the NC aren't severely under-powered as they were before PU01-02. I think a few more subtle balance passes will get the game about as close as it can be to balanced.

Ahem, Ground Pounders.

Thanks for clearing that up, see my response above.

I apologize, see above.

The 1st WDS pre-season spanned 6 weeks, with 5 out of 6 weekly victories going to the TR. The VS won the last week not because the devs addressed any kind of underlying weapon imbalance but because they simply changed the scoring rules.

To be honest, WDS is about the most boring, stupidest thing. It is a glorified, sanctified ghost-cap. I want to fight. I don't want to ghost-cap with a zerg. The rewards are a joke. I have already reached the 2k point for the first week and I received 3x 1 hour 50% XP boosts? Where is my gold NS PDW-7? Someone did actually get one, where is mine? What did I do wrong to not get this weapon instead of single-use camo and 1 hour xp boosts?

I don't give a crap about WDS anymore, sadly the majority of open public platoons, INCLUDING MY OUTFIT, THE T42, are eager to win the entire thing it seems.

Last night, we were on Eisamir, and the TR were back-capping Eisa Tech and I was like "hey guys we're losing Eisa Tech", and the platoon basically ignored me, as they were going after a measly 25 WDS outpost North East of there. So I simply broke off from the platoon and went to Eisa Tech, where it was infinitely more interesting fighting the TR vs a stupid ghost-cap. And the TR won it anyhow, and then my platoon had to face them now that they had MBT and we didn't. It was a slaughter. That fight there took at least 3 hours and the VS only won because of population imbalance. I left the platoon after that fight and started looking for a continent with the most even population balance.

And obviously because of WDS, all of the continents had zero population balance, here is how it was:

Amerish: TR 45%, NC: 20%, VS:18%
Eisamir: TR: 15%, NC: 10%, VS: 65%
Indar: TR: 15%, NC: 50%, VS: 30%

So basically, each faction had their own zerg going around one particular continent for WDS points!

That's brilliant SOE! You basically have incentivized ghost-capping with a giant zerg! Yeah that's exactly what I want to do when I log on to PS2, drive from one stupid base to another, (or just sit in a full Sunderer and spam taunts which is what I usually end up doing).

LAME.

Yep, I take back what I said, see a few posts above.

Que?

As a loyal NC player, I kinda miss those bonuses.

Falcons got fixed, Reaper/X11 got tweaked so that their stats are in-line with others in their class, and the GD-22S and EM1 were given roles to excel in. Nothing insane, but a lot of NC are really happy because a lot of "NC" equipment is now a lot more viable and I think people are misinterpreting "oh man the NC are super happy and a lot of them are coming back" to mean "man they must have some OP *** gear now", when really it's "awwwww yeah my Reaper doesn't have worst-in-class everything but damage per round anymore and my GD-22S and 7F now have AR-LMG and carbine bloom/reload stats respectively instead of HMG and LMG, in that order"

Everybody probably feels like the defaults are deadly if they go by raw kills. Even if the average user is worse with them, they're just everywhere so you're going to die to them a lot. I feel like I see more GD-22S users by far than I do MSW-R or Pulsar LSW's around. I think the SAW is a bit more complicated because it has a higher skill ceiling than you'd normally expect from a default, so higher BR players do better with it. I hate going against an NC HA who knows how to use a SAW. Those fights are over so damn quick and from any range

Marauder could be used as mobile artillery because it didn't lose damage over time and had a very forgiving arc. The Vulcan was top of its class at the extremely niche role of "being the best at killing literally anything you can get in front of it". They were balanced around being on a completely different vehicle than the Harasser and were way, way too good. On the other side, you have the PPA which is balanced by the fact that most VS are apparently loathe to use a cheap no-drop 75 round mag full auto grenade launcher, and the C85 which was balanced around seeing what a weapon would be like if you took the Airhammer and removed everything that makes it viable.