Yesterday we had a massive armor rush from NC and I've seen people pulled lots of Pounder and Fracture MAXes to deal with them, including myself. That made me thinking. I've been in TR armor rushes, I've seen VS to use both Comets and Vortex MAXes. But when it come to attacking NC I haven't seen a single Falcon MAX, all of them were Ravens. Since release of Ravens they just disappeared. Why? Falcons don't outperform Ravens at close range? Does anyone still use them?
Most of the time, for NC maxes, you are better off at a distance, or unable to close the distance with vehicles it seems. But I'm no Max user, but I do find NC pulls barely any Maxes to begin with, as an NC But some use them yes, since I believe that's the starter NC anti-tank weapon, paired with a scatter-cannon.
Lolwut?! I can't seem to find a single fight, even in the 1-12v1-12 range that doesn't have 1 splatmax per 4 dudes when fighting NC! It's gotten to the point where I try to avoid NC fights as far as possible because there's just no dealing with them!
Ravens are just very good - they pack a punch and can (unlike other Max weapons) be guided AND you can still move around while guiding, you're not frozen ala Phoenix. Fun and effective.
Failcons are just not good enough over ravens to justify. Generally NC can get away with ravens in long range combat, fractures and vortexes don't work well in an AI situation, falcons on the other hand don't work well in Ai either, it's 2 per and you get one shot a second, not great when fighting a horde. Ravens can also make infantry miss due to screen shake and AoE them out.
Falcons have too low an accuracy compared to guided Ravens. Ravens in turn have far too high a DPS combined with it's accuracy, giving them immense power... If you can get a spot where you can stand safely long enough to fire everything and guide it to the target. I use Falcons for one thing: Sniping infantry. NC MAX's lack the consistency at range, even with slugs, and it takes far too much ammo to kill one dude with it at range especially for the low-mag NC MAX. Compare that to the nice and consistent ROF of the Falcons and it's accuracy at range vs camping opponents and it's a no-brainer, except ofcourse it's used against the wrong target.
Falcons mostly take too much time to reload, therefor make Ravens superior in every scenario, plus they are laser guided, so they are easier to use against infantry and vehicles​, ground or air, this makes falcons obsolete.
I thought Falcons dealt a lot more damage per shell. What I do as a MAX is carry a Ripsaw w/extmag on my left, and a Falcon on my right to dispose of Harassers and Sunderers. The explosive shells deal much more damage per shot than the Raven does, but due to the slow travel speed, it's only good against tanks and Sunderers, near point blank. Be careful though; anyone with half a brain will attempt to run you over if you hide behind your Aegis after launching shells.
I have tested them out in VR. It took 12.4 seconds to destroy a Prowler with Falcons and 13.9 seconds with Ravens. I know that Ravens are more accurate, but ain't Falcons supposed to be short range hit'n'cover weapon, when long exposure to the enemy tanks could be lethal?
ravens are simply the undisputed king of max AV for everything other than extremely close engagements. by contrast falcons are fairly bad at everything other than extremely close engagements, the downside of Pounders for TR is their awkward arc, the downside of comets is their slow velocity, falcons have both of these! i'll use my falcons when i'm trying to push back close vehicles, or plink at a sunderer a short distance away from my cover, in these situations you want to peak out, fire and duck back in to cover or you're dead, you're also more likely to encounter infantry and a direct hit from both falcons is an insta-kill. ravens aren't suitiable to these situations because you can't peak out, fire and then duck back into cover, you have to remain exposed while you guide the missile. tl:dr raven is the best of all max AV weapons for everything except extremely close fights, falcon shines at extremely close AV fights and isn't very practical at longer ranges.
Prowlers are usually sitting far away, and magriders are too agile to hit them reliably with falcons.
I actually like Falcons at close range (towers etc). Its like a RL primary that reloads super quick. You OHK infantry and can easily deal with enemy MAXes. I know Ravens are really good, but im surprised so many people (seemingly) ignore the Falcon MAX.
