CAUTION: There is math ahead! Proceed with caution young padawan! A lot of people keep complaining that the NC MAX got nerfed in GU11 due to the max and min damage decrease. I say, however, that this notion isn't actually true. First, let's start with some raw stats, shall we? NC MAX NCM1 Scattercannon and NC MAX AF-23 Grinder Maximum damage reduced from 134 to 130 Minimum damage reduced from 60 to 50 Maximum damage range increased from 5 to 8 meter NC MAX AF-34 Mattock Minimum damage reduced from 90 to 70 Maximum damage range increased from 8 to 10 meters Minimum damage range increased from 28 to 30 meters NC MAX AF-41 Hacksaw Maximum damage reduced from 134 to 125 Minimum damage reduced from 50 to 45 Maximum damage range increased from 8 to 10 meters (I'll be talking about Grinder MAXes for this post but the concepts apply to all of the NC MAX weapons) As can be seen with the stats shown, the max and min damages did indeed get decreased but, in addition, maximum and minimum ranges also got increased! What this translates to is that NC MAXes do marginally less damage between 0-5m, more damage between 5-20m, and less damage after 20+ meters. To begin with, NC MAXes will do less damage between 0-5m because, obviously, the max damage per shot was reduced. When translated in terms of practical gameplay, this means almost nothing. The NC MAX will still one shot (a "shot" = left shotgun + right shotgun fire) any enemy that is between 0-3m so long as a direct hit is made. One shots caused by simply grazing enemies will happen less often now at this range due to the lower damage per pellet. A direct hit will be necessary to kill at 0-3m. From 3-5m, the NC MAX will require two shots to kill an enemy. This is the same number of shots that was required prior to GU11. Similarly to the 0-3m scenario, merely grazing enemies will force NC MAXes to fire three shots in order to kill targets at this distance. Practically speaking, this means that accurate shots will have the same effects as pre-GU11 while wild "spray and pray" shots will be slightly less effective when compared to pre-GU11. Now, the field from 5-20m is an area in which the changes to the NC MAXes max range truly begin to shine. Since max damage is maintained to 8m now rather than 5m, the total damage done at Xm will be shifted to the right by +3m. What this means is that damage that used to be dealt at 15m pre-GU11 will now be dealt at 18m. But wait! Minimum damage was also decreased which means that you're wrong! Ah, but it's important to keep in mind that bullet velocity was not changed in GU11! Since bullet velocity was not changed, the rate at which damage is lost per meter remains the same. In fact, the minimum damage decrease doesn't even negatively impact the 5-20m range of the NC MAXes! If the MAX weapons used to do 60 minimum damage at, say, 15m, the new MAXes will now do that same damage at 18m! Unfortunately, the new minimum damage does negatively impact distances farther than the old minimum distance (a minimum distance is the critical distance at which bullet damage reaches it lowest possible damage value). Let's call the old minimum distance A and let's call the new minimum distance B since I don't know the exact distances at which minimum damage was achieved. A will be achieved prior to B since A is the culmination of B - 3m - Xm required for bullet damage to drop from 60 to 50. When combined with increased max damage distance of +3m, MAX damage will actually be higher all the way up to A +3m. After A +3m, MAX damage will begin to fall off far worse than it did before. Realistically speaking, however, you wouldn't use an NC MAX to attack players after 20m (which is the distance that I estimated A +3m to be after extensive testing in VR) anyway so the new damage drop is irrelevant. Practically speaking, this increased damage between 5-20m can be noticed in-game when accurate shots are hit. Before GU11, 7 grinder shots were needed in order to kill a target at 15m distance. With GU11 in place, only 5 grinder shots are necessary to kill the same opponent. This is under ideal condition in which neither the MAX nor the target are moving. Since both targets will most likely be moving in real combat, it can be deduced that NC MAXes should now be able to wound opponents more effectively between 15-20m when compared to GU11. From 8-15m, NC MAXes will have a higher damage with direct hits and slightly less damage with graze hits. From 5-8m, NC MAXes will have higher damage due to increased max damage range. TL;DR: Wow, that's a wall of text! No-one's gonna even read this
An NC player that remains objective? Impossible, you should be whining for buffs, why dont you insist on getting1 hit kill shotguns across all ranges like your fellow nc players?
It wasn't buffed: http://imgur.com/a/RwbM2/noscript The Mattock was significantly nerfed. For the rest, by the time the you get to the small bit where the loss of absolute damage is made up by extra damage carry..... pellet scatter is making it completely pointless. Which is what you're ignoring with your maths; pellet scatter. It's a bit like nerfing a Carbines damage per bullet and giving it soft point ammo instead, only a carbine doesn't have pellet scatter, and there is nothing the player can do to get around pellet scatter. It they'd nerfed absolute damage and reduced CoF they'd have been closer to their goal of "making aiming matter", but what they've done is just a nerf, because extra damage range cannot make up for pellet scatter at that range. Slugs are a little different and didn't get hit anything like as hard as pellets (apparently - I've still not see proper numbers for them).
I'll admit that I didn't do any calculations for either the Mattocks or the Hacksaws since I don't use them. As a result, those weapons may have been affected differently. That being said, however, I disagree with you about pellet scatter rendering the extra damage worthless at the point at which the extra damage kicks in. From the graphs you've provided, it would appear that the extra damage kicks in between 6-14m. At 10m, it is relatively easy for a NC MAX to two shot a single moving target. As a result, the increased damage increases the two shot range for accurate shots upward from 10m to slightly farther then 10m. In short, the amount of pellet scatter is a constant that can be applied to the damage changes. Overall, the pellet scatter caused by the CoF is not significant enough at 10m-12m to negate any damage gained from the GU11 changes. On a side note, I'd like to ask something about the graphs you've provided. From the graphs, it can be noted that the the grinder reaches its minimum damage at the same distance both pre-GU11 and post-GU11. If the initial bullet velocity is kept the same for both pre and post update, shouldn't the post update grinder reach its minimum later than the pre GU11 grinder? I'm basing this off of the assumption that damage = bullet momentum which should be a simple product of mass (constant) times bullet velocity @ x time with a cap set so that bullet damage does not drop off to zero at any point. Since bullet velocity is decreasing by a constant amount (due to gravity and friction), the only factor that was changed with the update was the minimum cap (from 60 to 50). As a result, the bullet should take longer to reach its minimum cap, shouldn't it?
I honestly saw ZERO change in my effectiveness with my NC MAX after the patch. Im still using my Mattocks too, and im still tearing through infantry just as easily as before. And ya know what? It was easy to see this coming based on the stats alone. A reduction of 4-9 points of damage on the scattercannons would never make a difference, infantry will still get insta-gibbed at close range. Everyone who cried that the NC MAX would be "useless" or have cried that is now useless... are just fools. Either they do not use the MAX often, or are just plain bad with it. I dont know why people are claiming our MAX's are terrible, because i seem to have no trouble cutting through hordes of infantry, even after GU11.
Ofcourse there is one thing to keep in mind, we were suppose to be nerfed 9 points instead of 4. So in exchange for 480 damage over a whole clip with two arms we gain 3 more meters in max damage. The original nerf was 1080 damage over whole clip both arms and no increase in max damage range. So I think SOE Developers tested and felt it would not compete with other maxes so we got this change instead, which just like Dethfield I still feel they operate great. Ofcourse that does not talk about the issues of shotguns being our only option for AI and ammo cap, just that I don't feel GU11 nerfed the max shotguns IMO. Edit: just wanted to add my numbers include extended clip on both arms, sorry.
I agree with both Dethfield and Lexan over the effectiveness of the NC MAXes. I use MAXes during any big base or tower fight and I still am able to murder 20+ infantry units before dying at distances of 0-13m. I do feel as if I'm very very slightly less effective if I barley graze enemies rather than hit them but, since that doesn't happen often, the MAX feels just as effective as before. As I said prior, the damage change from 0-5m is marginal, and the damage gained at 5-20m is, likewise, marginal. You won't notice it if you use MAXes regularly and are a good shot.
all that maths, and yet in GU10 it took a hacksaw 4 shots average to kill an infantry at 10m and GU11 it takes 5 shots average. (i tested it between live and PTS last week.) and extra shot may not seem like much, but when you factor in that we only have a six round magazine it works out as a 16% decrease in effectiveness. and they just keep on chipping away.
I've never seen an enemy max survive 20 shots to the face before at under 10m. Ever. That is no longer the case and I've seen enemy maxes take the damage no problem since the patch with Hacksaws and Scatter Cannons. I may actually finally go for slugs on those arms with all their limitations. If I can no longer reliably kill enemy maxes by unloading both arms into them then the damage loss in going to slugs is less of a concern. And their terrible accuracy at over 30m doesn't matter because you should only be using NC Max AI at under 30m. It's not a buff, it's a side-grade versus infantry (more effective at middle range, less at extreme range aka 30 meters) and a downgrade against enemy max units. The Mattock is less effected by the latter, but sometimes it failed to kill enemy maxes anyway even before GU11 thanks to the lower damage per pellet. Less negatively, for Bio Dome and Tower fights, the fact that you can kill enemies in the midrange (8 to 20m) a bit more reliable then before when using Mattocks is nice as that distance fits those arenas perfectly. On the other hand this is countered by the less damage to enemy maxes (which are common these days) so in the end everything normalizes out. So yes, it's a side grade. It is not a buff, and it can't be called an outright nerf thanks to the min and max range changes. TLR for GU11: 1) Go Mattock or Grinders w/Slug. 2) Hacksaws are still awful. They were at least good for max killing in GU10. Now that is questionable. 3) Infantry killing in the 8-15m range is better for all guns basically 4) Infantry killing at min damage range is a pointless exercise now...just run away or put up the shield 5) Max killing is harder now for non-mattocks It's not the end of the world or the obsolescence of the NC Max. At least not until GU12.
It takes two shots with the Hacksaws to kill at 10m if you fire semi-auto and it takes two or three shots to kill at 10m if you fire full auto. At 20m, the Hacksaws couldn't kill a target w/o extended mag before GU11 and now they still can't kill anything at 20m. Mattocks, on the other hand, can sometimes one shot enemies at 10m and can three or four shot enemies at 20m. And yes, the lower damage maximum does mean that killing enemy MAXes reliably is now a very difficult task. I was having trouble with it before since any misses would automatically spell doom for the NC MAX. Now you absolutely must hit all shots and get some head shots in on the enemy MAX if you hope to kill them in one clip w/o extended mag. Pretty difficult stuff to do considering the enemy moves around a lot. Also, any form of composite armor will negate the NC MAX's ability to kill other MAXes. They sacrifice being resistant to C4 OHK in exchange for resistance to NC MAX one clip kills at under 10m.
From all the people complaining about the NC max being nerfed, you'd think these things have turned to pure crap. I logged in earlier today though, and I still saw a few of them doing well at their most effective ranges. It doesn't seem like they're doing worse in game, but still was it needed anyways?
*****,so basically my beloved mattocks have been nerfed so hard since the GU11?? I hope this chart doesn't represent the slug damage,because it is the only reason I run my NC max....
Its apparently not so bad if you're using slugs, but then I haven't actually seen any offical numbers so YMMV.
no, GU10 it took 4 of the 6 shots in a hacksaw magazine to kill a single infantry at 10m, now it takes 5, thats nearly an entire magazine. we're hardly asking for one shot, just asking not to be made even worse at the only range we can play at. TTK is the same for all 3 maxes at 10m, the only difference is NC have far longer reloads and far less sustained fire. (and becomes useless at further ranges)
It does take 5 shots now with a single Hacksaw to kill at 10m if you fire full auto. If you fire semi-auto, however, it still takes 4 shots. The difference between the auto fire and the semi-auto is that the auto experiences greater bloom and has a larger CoF. Then again, who's gonna fire the Hacksaw as a semi-auto when it's the only auto shotgun the NC has for the MAX?
Well, I don't specifically get killed by NC MAXes since I play NC MAXes . In terms of killing, however, I've killed plenty of people up to 16ish meters away from me. Sure, it takes the entire clip to do so but hey, it works. It works now and it worked pre-GU11. You just have to aim at injured enemies since full health enemies will usually duck for cover when under such heavy MAX fire. Even if you're a TR or VS MAX (unless you ZOE), most enemies will have time to duck for cover at 16+ meters if they're not in the open. ...or you just take people by surprise. They never react fast enough!
Your math is wrong. Well, your assumptions are wrong. The min/max were both decreased, meaning the only time you deal more damage is where the maximum damage is increased. And actually, the Hacksaw's maximum damage decrease negates that change since the dropoff at 8-10m would still yield higher damage pre-nerf. So the only "buff" is for the Scattercannon/Grinder at 8-10m and the Mattock at 5-8m, and even then it's not going to make much of a difference in TTK.
