The sniper thread to end all sniper threads. There is no TLDR. This is aimed more at the devs than the forums, but please do take the time to read and comment. These are a number of thoughts, observations and objections gathered from a number of snipers within the Planetside 2 community. Here we will make the case that there should be no cap on sniper range, and why that is perfectly fine. Before we put the case to you, let me remind you that infiltrators as it stands are the least used class in a platoon. During ops we normally run with one to a squad. As an infantry class and as a support class I'd say we are limited at not being 'vital' at either for the cost of being 'helpful' somewhere in between. We are not the majority of PS2 players. Those who are however, love this class and play it religiously. They make up a percentage of your community. Which is why I am very pleased to see the reaction to the changes I have seen. Literally 2 out of 5 posts after the balance post 2 was put up were about the bolt actions and 99% of them were against it. We would also like to thank the very mature players that bothered to stick up for us even though they do not play our class themselves. Very noble of you kind sirs, it is much appreciated. Two of the reasons you listed for this cap revolve around PS2 not being the average FPS and not limited to certain restrictions that justify a OHK on a bolt action sniper rifle in other FPSers. Those restrictions being : A) Small scale levels with limited sniper lanes. We would instantly point to the Lattice system, which is literally a lane. But if I take 20 mins out of my play time to climb a hill that gets me a sight on my enemy from the flanks or behind, well done me. That's what a massive sandbox FPS should be. Its too the credit of PS2, not a disadvantage because one unaware player doesn't get a second chance. A cap simply doesn't fit in with the geographical layout of Planetside 2. Take for example a sniper friendly base, such as Searro Listening Post on Esamir. Any sniper will know the C point there is in a building to the south overlooking the tower, a sniper friendly position, as are its surrounding hills. The distance from the building to the landing pads is over 200m. The distance from the cliffs down onto broken arch road and tarwich for example is well over 150m. Most of the sniper spots we parkoured and grafted to find and perfect are also over 200m. This game simply isn't well designed to cater for sniping at such close ranges, and the impact that cap will have on play style we will get to in a moment. B) Some type of visual mechanic that calls out the sniper’s location. Not to mention: 1) An unsilenced weapon shows on the mini map 2) A silenced weapon makes an unmistakably unique sound 3) As does the cloak 4) And recon darts 5) Recon darts now also show as clearly on the mini map as an allies 6) Proximity radar (which shows cloaked infiltrators) and can be used on an ESF 7) The ability to spot an uncloaked infiltrator 8) The tracer from every shot fired 9) That one light assault that always somehow manages to turns up and stand right next to you - I'd say there are more ways to spot a sniper than for the sniper to remain totally undetected, after about br5 when you know what to look and listen for. You then go on to say: "giving snipers a 360° one-shot kill with unlimited range against all other players is not something we want to introduce into the game. Dying to a sniper that you never had a chance to see is a poor gameplay experience for everyone on the receiving end." Firstly, Its not unlimited range. It's render distance. The same distance targets render for tank spammers and lolpodders. Again, you seem to think that 360 environment is a problem in PS2, not to mention that 85% of the fights are held within bases or spawn points and sundy placements that are known to players. So shall we not allow galaxy's to fly over an uncapped base to set up a pre-cap or attack the enemy from behind? Shall we Ban sundies from flanking? PS2 is not your average FPS. THAT'S WHY WE PLAY IT. Sniping in PS2, is, at best, an anti infantry measure. I spend my sniper time normally away from my outfit or in a public platoon, because I know how little I am doing for my team by camping on a hill. Its effectiveness on the battlefield is not pointless, it plays a role, but its not going to solely decide a fight. The option is there if you want it and so it should remain. Having the OHK ability at any range will not mean the team with the most snipers wins, and on average, being sniped is hardly in the top 5 most annoying, game-play ruining ways to be killed. On average we get a lot less kills than other classes and our kill streaks take triple the time other classes do. I personally feel I am a good infiltrator. You know how I got good? BY BEING BAD. I learnt the hard way, and I'm proud of it. It's a GOOD thing that you could get killed from 300m from a sniper you can't spot. Next time you'll be more careful. Most bases and targets at long range have more than enough cover to take anti sniper counter measures, certainly more than you can against an ESF with thermal rocket pods for example, we have a limited line of sight regardless of the 360 threat. (Which also applies to us by the way) Whenever I come across a BR2 infiltrator that I shoot more than once, I send tell. (Don't cloak then not move/Always keep your head down and scope whilst cloaked/Always aim above the head to begin with) I do this because I was that BR2 once. In a few months, they'll be the one pitying the noobs with the glorious pearls of sniper knowledge. Point being, dying to those OHK's HELPED me more that it hindered me. IT MADE ME A BETTER PLAYER. Now let's look at the 'gaming experience' of the person SNIPING, as there are two sides to the coin. I shot somebody in the face yesterday at Searro Listening whilst doing some testing. The guy next to me shot the same target afterwards in the foot. He got the kill. I shot 8 targets in the head and got barely a kill assist on three of them. When I pressed tab I see that an infantry player I spotted twice as a heavy and a MAX racked up over 30 kills in the battle, I barely managed ten. The ability to OHK at long range makes me effective at being anti-infantry, without it I'm just a hillbilly. I spotted a sniper who tried to change his postion at 200+ metres. A headshot on a moving cloaked infiltrator - with these changes - didn't get the kill. Not even a kill assist actually. Sniping at those ranges mean the targets are behind the front lines and can heal up. A HEADSHOT. ON A MOVING INFILTRATOR. WHILST CLOAKED. AT 200+. NOT EVEN A KILL ASSIST. So let's not duck the issue, someone getting killed by me and is made to wait 10 seconds to respawn is apparently judged to be more annoying than me making the best shots I can in the game and not getting 30xp for them. I don't think you have quite thought this one through SOE. Of course the counter argument would be to move within 150m. This is where the problems of the cap just become hilarious. Lets consider the two points you made about snipers being hard to spot. If you put a suppressor on a sniper rifle bullet drop is effected noticeably at around 150m, and becomes harder to compensate for further. If you go through with this cap, ALL SNIPERS WILL USE A SUPPRESSOR AND THEREFORE BE HARDER TO SPOT, THUS DEBUNKING YOUR OWN INTENTION. To me, players that run around quickscoping or using sniper rifles as shotguns are the cheesiest snipers out there. This system will reward and encourage them. But its not just the sniper rifles. Its the entire ARSENAL of the infiltrator that is being ruined by this. The SAS-R and Impetus (and their faction specific counterparts) are iron sight sniper rifles. They are effective within 100m. It takes an infiltrator about 30 seconds to move 50 meters. These rifles and play style will become as unloved and unused as the scout rifles with a cap, because players will prefer the 1 shot ability with the sniper rifle. If I shoot a target at 300m in the head with a BASR I should get a kill. Because a kill gives me XP. XP gives me certs. I get these for doing something that required some amount of skill and its harder to shoot someone over 200m away than it is within 150m. Nobody likes being killed. For example, I'm a distinctly average pilot. When it comes to a dogfight, I know I'm outmatched by most players. I don't cry, or whine, or ask these pilots to be nerfed. They are more skilled than me, and I appreciate, even respect that. But when they are on the ground, and I have my rifle and the right opportunity, I'm the skilled one. The roles are reversed, if they make a mistake, I take them out, the same way I make mistakes and pay for them in the skies. There is also now talk of vehicle hacking and I want to say outright that WE DO NOT WANT THIS. We are a stealth class. Why would we cert into a cloak to get in a tank and drive around. It defies logic, as there is no way the tank will not be indicated to have been hacked. You have made a few buffs to the EMP grenades but not nearly enough. Make them stall vehicles for a number of seconds, and effect ALL classes abilities, medic tools, engi turrets, red dot sights, and MAX ability. That gives the infiltrator a non lethal AV option and makes them a useful support class to a squad trying to take out another squad. Flash and concussions affect all classes, not just heavies and infiltrators. We've also just given you a counter to ZOE and the limitations of an infiltrators support capabilities within a platoon or squad. You're welcome. PS2 has been praised for listening to its community. Every day forum side fills with calls for nerfs and objects to what it finds to be OP. I cannot remember seeing a SINGLE post about BASR's OHK being OP. It seems that on this issue, you are not listening. Please listen to us now. Congratulations on the update and we hope these balance changes can be worked on with the support and thoughts of the community, instead of being forced on them. We ask at least for you to TRY the no cap restriction and see if the reaction is anything like the one we have seen in response to the cap. Regards, the Snipers Union. (We're watching you...)
Perhaps the limit on ohk should be raised to say 250. If someone can get a headshot on me from that range he deserves the kill.
Right. I don't think it has registered to many of you, but while this change MAY occur on the Live Servers, 150m has not been set to stone; it will be subject to tuning based on the "data" they obtain. Now, for those who may think that I am in agreement to the changes: I'm impartial to the matter, despite it being a change that will affect what type of gameplay will be at my disposal as an Infiltrator (you can confirm that yourselves). The reasons already given from both sides, you've heard them all (if not, I'd suggest sifting through the 4-5 pages of this discussion board); I'm not going to bother repeating any. Personally, I'm curious to see how this will affect the overall gaming experience of the community. Have to first see if SOE will carry these changes (if they ever do with the amount of noise some are making). And if they do, then we'll have to make our own observations and put to the test all of the assumptions thus far, since they all are equally plausible. Some assumptions being thrown around may prove to be false; some may carry some truth, who knows.
"There is also now talk of vehicle hacking and I want to say outright that WE DO NOT WANT THIS. We are a stealth class. Why would we cert into a cloak to get in a tank and drive around. It defies logic, as there is no way the tank will not be indicated to have been hacked." Somehow I don't think you speak for the majority of infiltrators when you say you don't want vehicle hacking, it is another tool at your disposal with no real drawback. you should welcome it, instead of pushing it away based on an unrelated change to your class.
DEAR SOE: Yesterday I myself was KILLED by another player. Frankly, I find this to be unacceptable and if you do not fire your ENTIRE development team IMMEDIATELY I will uninstall the game and will be VERY UPSET!!!
To be fair Flap this person has a point, the automatic scout rifles are also very good on infiltrators.
Actually, he has never played Planetside 1 where infiltrators with hacking skill were stealing tanks from people... Some of which also used said vehicles against the enemies before dying spectacularly. And then... There is the C4/Fury/Flash Suicide runs which sort of defeat the logic of being stealthy beyond the being cloaked and then blowing up a vehicle that didn't see them. On the flipside, however... The infiltrator would have to decloak (In Planetside, they didn't need to decloak to hack a vehicle out from under you, and they also didn't have a time limit on the cloak field either. In fact, Cloakers didn't de-cloak unless they were dead in Planetside 1) But also, hackers couldn't hack turrets to use them. At most, they hacked them to make the turrets auto-shoot vehicles. But given turrets don't do auto-shoot enemy vehicles in this game...
1 Week ago no sniper could ever get a 0HK because EVERYONE had NW5. Now, after Developers consider redesigning an 18 month old feature around snipers being whiny to allow snipers to get 0HKs, they start crying. If developers are reading this thread the lesson they should learn is that until you let snipers pull the trigger and 0HK everyone in a Hex they're going to whine. Spend your time trying to help players who will appreciate the effort.
And shorten it. Whenever I find myself making a long suggestion, separation and coloring of the What, Why, and How into headers are good ideas. What comes first, this is your nuttshell/TL;DR and it needs to be to the point, not a story. The objective / end result, not the reason or justification. If the What is short enough that I could read it without getting bored and hitting the back button, it will either have piqued my interest (for or against), or not interested enough to go on. Why comes second, piqued interest, now explain yourself. The nuttshell/TL;DR version. If it requires a story, make it a very short story. How is where your details get explained. But I'm still not interested in story time.
I've always sniped in every single shooter game I've played. Except in PS2 because the machanic is just not fun. It's boring to be sniping and it's boring to be sniped. They're not nerfed nearly enough
If you notice that several of your posts have been removed, please take this as a sign not continue with off topic attacks. Thank you!
Actually, from what I understand, the hacking thing (along with terminal hacks) just falls under the asset denial banner. I mean, you don't have to stay in the tank, all you have to do is take it somewhere away from the enemy and destroy it. This can be as simple as just driving it off a bridge or cliff. *Noobs opinion*
First off it's O as in the letter O, not the number 0 as in Zero when referring to OHK (One Hit Kill). More more importantly, up until the Nanoweave changes, snipers WERE getting OHK on "everyone in a Hex"... even though not really because there were massive rendering issues interfering with that... Then why is the second post, that offers to contribution to the subject still up? It's on the topic of posting format, not the upcoming OHK distance cap change.
Seeing as how you apparently garnered your thoughts from a number of snipers in the community, who all think it's silly to limit your one hit kill range, I'll put things in a different light as a relatively accomplished sniper myself. I think 150 meters is too far to see just how far that is I'll quote a post from another thread: If nanoweave would tank headshots from snipers then this is a perfectly reasonable range in which snipers would attempt to kill the man. Now though, with nothing stopping our one hit kills except a "limited"(really it's pretty damn far) range, I think it needs to be closer, like 80-90 meters. At the current expected range of 150 meters you will easily be able to kill an enemy while they can do nothing to you except scope in and spray/fire one bullet at a time at you. All that really accomplished is the enemy painting a slow moving target on it's head while at the same time flashing a bright light at you to tell you where he is. You can go on and on about how aircraft, vehicles, cover, maxes, and zig zagging are counters to us as is, but more than half of those things cost resources and isn't something anyone can reliably solo unless they themselves are in the vehicle or max. Hell, we can even hide from those things more reliably than the other classes can kill them. Finding cover and zig zagging makes you out of the fight more or less. You're so busy hiding from the infiltrator trying to pop your head off that you are essentially waiting in that spot to be killed by a heavy, and you are so busy looking silly moving back and forth that you notice the enemy a bit too late and you're dead before you take down his shields. As far as countering snipers with snipers go, can you honestly say that someone who pulls the class just to kill another sniper will be very effective at it? I mean first of all they probably won't have a good sense of how high up they should aim, and you are going to be busy cloaking, uncloacking just to kill a man with a shot you're already lined up, then cloaking again and moving to another part of whatever rock you are standing on. The enemy will be sitting there trying to get a near impossible bead on you, and when he finally does take a shot, and most likely miss, you'll be on alert that there is a sniper around, and you'll probably be able to find him and kill him. Flanking is something that will happen once you've made enough noise, but how hard is it to look around after every kill you've made to see if there is a guy trying to make a beeline on your location? I think SOE is being too generous with us right now. We are able to kill anyone in one shot while there isn't a good counter to it, except the sniper's own hubris. 150 meters is just too far to allow for a one shot kill that you can't defend against.
I don't usually post around but I do read a fair bit.. and I just want to say that I think SOE's removal of DramaticExit's post was uncalled for, particularly while allowing the L2P garbage to stay. As for the topic, I fully support the OP. I'm fine with the way Sniper rifles work, even though I typically play Engineer or Heavy, with Infiltrator only now and then. Suggesting that somebody should simply use another weapon is incredibly self centered and boring. Sniping adds to the game, not takes away from it. If people are getting hit over 150 meters with a bolt action round then it is frankly there own fault, and is something that should be learned by most anyone within their first few weeks of playing.
He is offering some pretty good advice. A message is good, but how you convey it even moreso. And his advice isn't offered as an insult.
This is such an asinine post. Why do I have to use SMGs? Sure, my KPM and my cert gain would be higher, but it's boring as ****. I might as well just play another class if I want to run with a spray gun. As an infiltrator, sniper rifle are one of our main weapons, and they are designed to be effective long-range while sacrificing short-range viability. Now SOE is killing that long-range game-play.
You would have got SO many more likes if you hadn't said the bit about not wanting hacking. :/ Everyone wants hacking, man. It's like the only thing we should have had from PS1 from the start...
