[Videos] This is how bad the Striker is nerfed

Pretty sad to see the Striker come to this, I guess its just another day in Nerfside 2. It baffles me how taking shots from a Gauss SAW leaves me severely wounded, when taking a Striker rocket to the face is like throwing a football to someone that fails to catch it and get bruised on the side.

I really don't get the developers mentality in weapon balance in the game, instead of nerfing ever god damn thing, why not buff weapons similar to its role to keep things in line within each other. I mean look the the Decimator, its equal / worse than the stock ES rocket lauchers, leaving buyers remorse amongst many players invested into it.

Looking forward to how many players are gonna leave the game if the HA nerf rumors are true. Maxes will be the dominant force than a temporary force multiplier it is now.

To test Functionality is to test balance. If they made an LMG or any other weapon that had zero recoil and it had a damage of 500 damage per bullet, they would test its "functionality" on the test server. But while its on test, they realize that it's balance compared to other weapons are off, so they modify it to bring it in line with other weapons instead of pushing it to Live to "see how it fares".

Hence as I stated. The Test server is used to test weapon balance as well as other things. You do not truly understand that.

There is some good news. While the Striker is pretty useless right now, it would be pretty easy to get it to a good place. I have done some work to explore what could be done to improve the launcher here

https://forums.station.sony.com/ps2/index.php?threads/proposed-striker-modification.202305/

I would ask if you are unhappy with the launcher to go over to this thread, review my proposal, and give some support if you like the idea.

No, the walker is actually way faster (25%) at 1000m/s. Consider how much of a "hitscan" that is, and imagine leading even more. That's the reality.

the new damage model is close to the explosive ammunition for the crossbow

Pretty sure I could beat the revamped Striker in a DPS race against a Flash with my chaingun.

It's not harder when you have 4x the velocity off a Decimator. Giving the Striker the ability to 2-shot infantry would take Rokcet Primary to a whole new level.

Also, with the current resists profiles, giving the Striker 300 damage per shot would literally give it 3x the DPS of the Decimator against tanks.

No, right now it's not really worth equipping over anything else. But you're askking for a Striker that makes every other rocket launcher in the game redundant. You're asking for a massively overpowered weapon.

Ii also known that this is a pointless discussion, because SOE will NEVEr give you a weapon with that kind of damage profile. So if you want to complain about how the Striker can't 2-clip a Vangguard from the front, then go ahead. Nobody will listen,.

¨No, not even close. League of Legends have a PTS with tens of thousands on of players on it, they still fail to properly balance new releases every single time due to all the unforeseen tactics and builds created when the majority gets to play.

They haven't made a 500 dmg LMG with no recoil, and they never will, so that's a pointless argument.

I do know what the Test server is there for. I have participated on Test servers of tons of games, and they NEVER do the fine-tuned balancing based on what goes on there, because it's impossible. The one who haave no knowledge of what he speaks is you.

any stats on vs MAX? lockon capability? able to shoot around corners aka curved rocket (coyote missile)

IIRC 9 shots to kill a MAX, Lockon is ~15m radius, and techincally you can hit air around corners if they are hiding within 15m of the edge.

Anyone remember this video from a couple of weeks ago?

Before the new and greatly improved scope was implemented, yes.

Really? The impression most people get from you is the test server is here to filter out ideas that might endanger your precious VS ESF airplay. Your post history certainly supports that premise.

Furthermore you are trying to say the Striker needs to be fine tuned. Thats laughable. The Striker needs attention because the version on test is even worse then the version on live. It's not even remotely ready to be issued to the live servers.

I think the DPS of the Striker should be about on par with the ML-7 (default dumbfire launcher). While the Striker's rocket velocity is twice or more (don't remember, but it's 180 m/s) than the ML-7, the ML-7 will still excel in close quarters environments where high burst damage is pretty much a necessity. From my experience, an exposure time of a few seconds will get you noticed and instantly killed by the very MBT you're trying to attack. Currently with the ML-7 you can peak out for a fraction of a second and deal about 2x the damage a of an entire Striker clip. In this case theoretical DPS doesn't matter as much as burst damage because nobody is going to stand out in the open to fire/reload for more than a second.

Also some people are arguing that the Striker is more forgiving because of its multiple rounds per mag. Sure with an ML-7 you can completely miss your target and waste a ton of potential damage, but in the end the overall DPS will even out as the next round hits its target. The Striker may have more chances to hit its target, but it'll also miss a number of shots equivalent to the damage loss of other single-shot launchers. Not to mention the lower damage more than cancels out whatever accuracy bonus the Striker has.

...or we could just allow Striker missiles to proxy lock ground vehicles so it has an actual unique niche instead of "high sustained damage, low burst damage".

Yeah, all my 5% gametime in an ESF is so precious to me.

But don't let that stop you from making personal attacks and miguided assumptions.

Your post history reveals 5 plus pages of you advocating against the Striker. It would be hard to make a misguided assumption with that much material. Making a connection as to why you are so prolific in posting against the Striker is not a personal attack. If you need clarification on the differences I can explain it to you.

Most people here are trying to improve the game. Maybe you should try it.

Watch the video again. It's clear that the Striker's low-velocity rockets and/or its insufficient coyote mechanic radius make it extremely difficult to lead a target that's moving quickly, regardless of the scope. A revised sight is nice, but it isn't going to magically make it significantly less difficult to lead an erratic, fast-moving target using slow-moving dumbfire rockets. After factoring in the ridiculous amount of rockets required to even down an ESF in the first place, the Striker's performance against air becomes even more laughable. It's unrealistic to expect more than two or three rockets per magazine to connect to a pilot that's paying any attention at all from any range, which severely negates the weapon's damage potential per magazine.

So it's weak like the Phoenix now, but instead of firing one shot at a time and steering the rocket, you can put out multiple rounds in a few seconds?

Honestly, I would like to see the damage increased from its current settings, but I really expected it to be much worse given the outcry here.

The Beamer kills a Flash faster than the Striker.

The Phoenix is balanced around the fact that it has a combination of insane alpha damage, which is invaluable against vehicles, and the ability to hit armored targets from potentially long distance accurately and relatively reliably. It's fantastic for putting pressure on fleeing armored targets, and it has the added utility of being able to snipe MAXes / engineer turrets. Its overall DPS is low, but I've had success using it on my BR51 NC alt in the limited experience I have with the weapon. Above all, it's simply not true to call the Phoenix "weak."