Sorry that I haven't read the whole thread, but according to the OP:
By nerfilng rifle you mean nerfing the fun. I know that rifle is pretty much a death machine compared to the other weapons. But in any case rifle shouldn't be nerfed.
-Instead buff SMG and shotgun. So easy.

How SMG and shotgun could be buffed, is whole another thing.

Shotgun: Make reloading and shooting faster. Make a hit of shotgun stun the enemy for a second. Make hitting an enemy in less than 10 blocks distances instakill.

SMG: Increase damage to the head (-80?). Decrease reload time.

Yes.

"By nerfilng rifle you mean nerfing the fun."

If I had a nickle for every time I heard that halfassed phrase on Eve Online...

"I know that rifle is pretty much a death machine compared to the other weapons. But in any case rifle shouldn't be nerfed."

So basically, your translation is 'I know the rifle is overpowered but I lub it. Just make the other guns super powerful to that's fine rite?'

"Instead buff SMG and shotgun. So easy."

You know what would be easier? nerfing 1 weapon instead of trying to buff 2 weapons so that they're all equals.

"so don't go saying that the rifle is OP if you haven't even been playing the game from the start or near start...OR MAYBE. you just suck. FYI, you would've sucked way harder in pre.54 "

Nice strawman. Have you ever considered that people who are complaining about the rifle have been playing that long? I have.

By the way, just because someone hasn't played as long as you doesn't invalidate their opinion. If anything, newer people's opinions are more valid then yours. Since they've had less time to develop a bias and favoritism.

"Forgive me for being rude towards whoever I may refer to but if you're engaging a Rifle-user at long to medium range where the Rifle rules supreme then I say you're doing it wrong."

So...why is it then that the rifle is better at long and medium range, when it is also better at close range too?

Nigh on useless?

Are you high?

Actually, no. Are you?

All I was saying is that there seems to be no point in having a feature in a game if it is made intentionally useless. Nerfing rifle hip fire so that it is so unreliable that it is unusable doesn't solve anything.

You know what would be easier? nerfing 1 weapon instead of trying to buff 2 weapons so that they're all equals.

Well OK, you want easy. The rest of us want fun. If all three weapons were made equally effective without bringing the rifle down, then we'd have a good balance without all the weapons... you know... sucking. As I said before; much better to have three good guns in the game than three equally mediocre guns.

So...why is it then that the rifle is better at long and medium range, when it is also better at close range too?

It's not- at close range the winner is almost always the one that gets the jump on the other guy and shoots first, regardless of the weapon they have. The SMG sometimes can still win despite that, but a rifleman taking aim at a rapidly moving head at close range while taking a barrage of hits just doesn't happen that often. Against the shotgun I've seen many a rifleman not even have time to shoot before they went down, despite seeing their killer at roughly the same time.

"All I was saying is that there seems to be no point in having a feature in a game if it is made intentionally useless. Nerfing rifle hip fire so that it is so unreliable that it is unusable doesn't solve anything."

unreliable =/= unusable. Clearly you can't tell the difference. After playing so many WWII games, I can tell you that even a hip fired bolt action rifle is still very much a threat to people. Hell, in many of those games, the actual sniper rifles had no redicals and they're still usable hip fired.

So that's really just a load of honkey.

"Well OK, you want easy. The rest of us want fun. If all three weapons were made equally effective without bringing the rifle down, then we'd have a good balance without all the weapons... you know... sucking. As I said before; much better to have three good guns in the game than three equally mediocre guns. "

So you want three boring guns that are all basically the same? The only way to put the smg and the shotgun up on par with the rifle is to make them the same, instead of making them different.

Mediocre guns are always better because it means people make tactical decisions about what they want in their weapon. Because being able to pick one "safe" weapon that is good at everything is boring. Especially if all of the guns are "safe" and not really that much different from each other.

"It's not"

It is. Even if it's about getting the drop on someone, the fact the rifle can still compete evenly, and in most cases, better then the shotgun, at the shotgun's prime range, shows how unbalanced the rifle is. Even buffing the shotgun will still not fix this because it cannot be made superior at close range then a gun that is already almost perfect.

You're right- I can't tell the difference. Having no crosshair on sniper rifles has always been a stupid idea, and finding the SMG to be THAT bad at hip firing when it first came out sure as hell fitted into the unreliable=unusable category. Useless guns are useless, it's pretty simple, and not a matter of 'honkey', whatever the hell that's supposed to be.

And once again I have to ask you to read what I said again, because yet again you're not paying attention: I said make all weapons equally effective- how on earth does that suddenly mean they're all the same, and boring? Did I suggest that the SMG and shotgun have ten rounds to a clip? Did I suggest they both be semi-auto only? Did I suggest they both stick out the same length in front of the player model to risk giving away one's position? No, no I didn't, and I have no idea what led you to believe something so far-fetched.

For someone who's played so many WW2 games, I also can't figure out why your thinking is limited strictly to the idea that to be better, the other guns have to be just like the rifle. There are loads of different ways the SMG and Shotgun each can be beefed up without becoming rifle clones. There are literally thousands of games that have SMGs and shotguns of all descriptions with different performance stats, and it never just boils down to 'is it just like the rifle in Ace of Spades'

Also I just want to quote this, so that you can't later claim you never said it:

Mediocre guns are always better

Do you realise what you're even saying here? You'd get the same level of tactics with a well balanced variety of weapons anyway, only without the artificial limitations.

And I'm afraid I'm going to need to see some sort of video evidence before you can convince me the shotgun is inferior to the rifle within shotgun range. I normally hate the knee jerk reaction that a gamer doesn't like something just because they're bad at it, but unless you can provide video proof, I just can't help but think there's something you're doing very, very wrong in the game. I have no idea what, either.

I don't know how to tell you this but... if you're looking for a game that is decked out with several mediocre guns that are only useful within a very narrow field of play, and are all totally useless unless standing still and using the ironsights, then maybe you're just looking in the wrong place. I doubt AoS or anyone playing it will ever move towards having it like that, and yet there are games on the market that accommodate just such an eclectic taste. Perhaps one of those shooters would be better equipped to satisfy your gaming needs?

i read a part of your guys wall-of-text-war
if you want this game balanced you should look at my thread and tell me what you think about it
http://ace-spades.com/forums/topic.php?id=5480

Right, so you didn't finish reading our walls of text, and then suggest we go and read your wall of text. Go figure.

reads...

Well I sort of agree with where you're coming from, but considering you bumped your own thread six times, it looks like you just want your thread revived, when as DeathEnhanced explained, there was already a better thread about it.

as i stated in my thread also that the other thread only had about half suggestions and ideas as mine plus mine just got trolled by a HK member that just wanted to snipe
and hey i read alot of your walls of text but in reality only half actually had a point

Hi, guys.

my two cents

"Reduce the size of OUR HEADS!"

http://www.mediafire.com/imageview.php?quickkey=l5z78qyxwqywcqs&thumb=4

Oh really? You want to look like this... grotesque mosquito monstrosity?

Luna LMFAO
and to increase the funnyness put Orly? instead of Oh really?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WinHMCjyMZI

"You're right- I can't tell the difference. Having no crosshair on sniper rifles has always been a stupid idea"

No it isn't. The sniper rifle is not suppose to be a close range weapon. It should therefor suck at close range. If you don't want to get pwned when someone sneaks up on you, take better precautions not to let it happen.

"and finding the SMG to be THAT bad at hip firing when it first came out sure as hell fitted into the unreliable=unusable category."

Skills. Get them.

"Useless guns are useless, it's pretty simple, and not a matter of 'honkey', whatever the hell that's supposed to be."

If you can't improvise with a weapon when you're in a situation where it isn't going to do well. That's you're own fault. Just because it's more difficult to use a gun to do something it isn't suppose to doesn't mean it's useless.

So stop whining. Christ, if you were playing a REAL fps your ass would be pwned.

"I said make all weapons equally effective- how on earth does that suddenly mean they're all the same, and boring?"

Because if they're all good at everything. Then there isn't even a point in having different weapons. We might as well just go back to rifles only.

"I also can't figure out why your thinking is limited strictly to the idea that to be better, the other guns have to be just like the rifle"

That's because there's no way to make a gun better then one that already does everything perfectly.

There is literally NO flaw with the rifle. So making the other two guns will not make them balanced, because they still have flaws.

"Do you realise what you're even saying here? You'd get the same level of tactics with a well balanced variety of weapons anyway, only without the artificial limitations."

You can't balance weapons with a gun that is perfect. Well, unless you made them all perfect. I can see it now, shotguns with the range of a rifle!

There is no such thing as artificial limitations. Those limitations are very real, and by having real limitations to weapons, they give a sense of trade off.

"can provide video proof, I just can't help but think there's something you're doing very, very wrong in the game."

I don't even have to make a mistake for the shotgun to be outclassed, I've said it before, the rifle is the only gun in the game that can, consistently, and with great ease, perform headshots. In fact, it can perform MULTIPLE headshots within seconds of each other. At any range. Of course the shotgun can't compete with that because there is no guarantee you can kill someone with 1 shot from it.

"if you're looking for a game that is decked out with several mediocre guns that are only useful within a very narrow field of play, and are all totally useless unless standing still and using the ironsights"

Nice strawman.

OP is a troll and you have all been trolled. Congratulations

tl:dr
I think it needs to have a 7 round clip, and MUCH slower ROF. it fires way to fast.

All you people spouting shit about the rifle 'pre 0.54' are completely illogical. I played the game pre-0.54 and it was FINE. Everyone had the rifle so it was nice and balanced and came down to people shooting each other at various ranges.

However, AS STATED IN THE THREAD, the rifle now shares company with other guns, and thus, balances need to be implemented. It has nothing to do with how rifles were pre-0.54 because the grounds were even. Also, seniority does not imply privilege.

JosephAllen
The 2x3 wall is a standby for me, but it has its downsides. One, the blocks can be broken by other guns, rifle included (although obviously you can replace the blocks fast enough). Two, there is no reason the rifleman has for focusing on you as an SMG/Shotgun wielder once you step behind cover, or they can simply camp until you come out and then kill you. Three, the rifleman has grenades to negate your cover and force you out. Four, you are suggesting the solution of stopping a rifleman to be 'stop shooting him'. That kind of defeats the point, y'know, to kill him. If you step out of cover at ANY amount of health, the rifleman has the opportunity to one shot you reliably at ANY range. NO OTHER GUN can do this. This on top of doing 49 damage if it DOESN'T hit the head, which tops every other gun short of a close-range shotgun.

Pulchritude
Significantly reducing magazine capacity to 3-5 shots per reload would discourage the shot spam especially at long range; but a rate of fire or, now that I think of it, reload speed decrease, would also suffice. The loss in ammo is mainly to discourage spam fire (because you run out of ammo faster when spam firing).

Beret
The guns are not mediocre. The rifle just outclasses the other two weapons and, in comparison, the other guns appear mediocre. The SMG has its benefits and the shotgun was just recently implemented and will likely be buffed, but the Rifle has been the more powerful gun since the implementation of the SMG in any environment short of ambushes.

i think the rifle is just fine, i do think the smg needs more power and a litlle less recoil. The shotgun isnt really effective in a open world map, you get picked off before the enemy is in range.

@MoleMan: When I meant by "stop shooting at him", I meant that you shouldn't shoot at him at a range where he reigns supreme. Try to sneak closer before shooting.

I still can't understand why you think the Rifle is overpowered, so the next time I play, I'm going to go with the SMG/ Shotgun. Since I use the Rifle too much already then I'll go with something else just to see what the other side feels like.

EDIT: Honestly, even if we did mess with either the Rifle or the other guns. There will still be people complaining about imbalance, probably because of the difference in skill.

Like I said, wait for a new weapon.

no no no gentlemen, the true problem is that bloody shotgun :D

For crying out loud, this thread is still going? Oh well, into it then...

The sniper rifle is not suppose to be a close range weapon. It should therefor suck at close range. If you don't want to get pwned when someone sneaks up on you, take better precautions not to let it happen.

It's a rifle, Dude. If anything, the round should be MORE powerful at close range than at long distance once it's bullet velocity decreases. If a guy is moving around a lot up close, headshots on such a fast moving target are a lot harder than on heads popping up in the distance- especially when zoomed in. Any rifleman/woman that can keep their cool enough to compensate for that deserves the kill. especially if they pull it off while being bombarded with fire and the massive sound damage it brings.

If you can't improvise with a weapon when you're in a situation where it isn't going to do well. That's you're own fault. Just because it's more difficult to use a gun to do something it isn't suppose to doesn't mean it's useless.

There's a difference between 'more difficult' and 'downright useless'. A hip fire crosshair on a shotgun that is twice as big to indicate twice the spread could be considered more difficult to use, as you may only do half the damage to the same location. Changing the rifle hip fire so that the aim is so unpredictable that a player has no idea where their single shot will go is downright useless. If your point is to force players to only ever fire the rifle from the sights then that's fine, but you've left no point whatsoever to leave the backwards hip fire even in the game. Rendering existing features of a game useless does not improve a game. Increasing recoil, time between shots and/or halving the rifle's clip size are all changes that could be done without rendering any aspect of the rifle useless. Nerfing hip fire by comparison is just a reckless move that benefits nothing and nobody.

if [the weapons are] all good at everything. Then there isn't even a point in having different weapons. We might as well just go back to rifles only.

For the last time, will you actually read what was written? I said balanced, not 'good at everything.' They are two completely different concepts.

Talk about the pot calling the kettle black with your strawman call- I say the SMG had poor accuracy when it came out and you pull out the most bone-headed gaming argument in the book; that I just suck at the game. What a hypocrite you turned out to be, talking of strawman arguments, and without even addressing them either! And here's another line I just have to quote for posterity:

Christ, if you were playing a REAL fps your ass would be pwned.

Seriously? What are you, 10 years old? You're even spelling it with a 'p' to sound truly "1337"? What on earth am I even arguing with someone like you for?

Anyway... the rest of your overly repetitious post basically boils down to what seems to be the fundemental difference in how we both see the rifle. You think the rifle doesn't have any disadvantages at any range, whereas I do. Since I doubt either of us is going to budge an inch on that point, we may as well just agree to disagree and let this tired old thread be put to it's long overdue rest already.

And for pete's sake in future arguments can you put quotes in italic or something? Otherwise it really -is- just a wall of text.

Beret
Saying it is more powerful at close range may work in real life, but this isn't real life, this is a game. You shoot for balance, not realism, first. The gun being able to excel at all ranges without any significant drawback is the reason why it is overpowered. Shotguns are good at close range, half-decent at medium, and useless at long range. SMGs are decent-good at medium range, good at close range (not as good as shotgun) and somewhat good at long range. The Rifle is good at long range, medium range, and short range combat (because of headshots and doing half a person's health if they hit anything but the head).

The rifle should become more like a sniper and less like a semi-automatic. It is TOO powerful at all ranges. That is why it needs a nerf. It should be a long range gun and excel in it, but should be limited by something such as kickback or low ammo.

How about lowered ammo, to maybe 3-4 shots per clip (this encourages headshots rather than bodyshot spam) and 15-20 total shots, and significant kickback when not scoped, so if you miss the first shot in close range, you're at a significant disadvantage, and can't fire while moving effectively?

That means your average sniper can kill two people per clip without headshots, and up to 3-4 with headshots (I personally think 4 shots per clip is better) and encourages drawing a bead rather than spamming until you get 3 hits or a headshot.

Also I highly doubt any of your theories will be implemented for the simple fact that this is a rifle balance thread in Suggestions

>>It's a rifle, Dude. If anything, the round should be MORE powerful at close range than at long distance once it's bullet velocity decreases. If a guy is moving around a lot up close, headshots on such a fast moving target are a lot harder than on heads popping up in the distance- especially when zoomed in. Any rifleman/woman that can keep their cool enough to compensate for that deserves the kill. especially if they pull it off while being bombarded with fire and the massive sound damage it brings.

Oh boy. Let's talk about realism here. Realistically, it's not going to make a difference if you're shot a mile away or from five feet away. The bullet might decrease in speed slightly over that distance, but the vast majority of the energy will be intact. That is, if you're not wearing any armor (as in the case of the AoS) people, the bullet is probably going to punch straight through you and come out the other end. Furthermore, that would also apply to all other guns, so SMGs and shotguns would get damage ramp-up too.

On top of that, arguing that rifles should be good at close range for realism's sake is pretty naive. Let's say we have an MP40, the most-produced German SMG from WWII. There are SMGs with both a higher rate of fire and more accuracy than that from that era, but it's a pretty solid example, right? It fires around 500 rounds per minute, or 8-9 per second. Each of those bullets, in real life, would kill you just as easily as one fired from a semiautomatic rifle; they might be slightly weaker, but to say being shot in the chest with two rounds from an SMG is realistically about as lethal as being shot once with a semiautomatic rifle is insane. If the semi does 49 damage per hit, the SMG should, realistically, maybe do 35-40, if not more. Of course, it's unlikely any of the bullets would miss; an MP40, in real life, is accurate out to 300 feet, or 150 blocks in-game. If you're going to argue realism, the SMG would do 280-360 damage per second at close range in game. The rifle would do 49, since it fires at 60 rounds per minute in-game. Then again, some WWII SMGs fired as much as 900 rounds per minute with even more accuracy, so it could be as much as 525-600 damage per second.

That's aside from the practicality of the weapons. That is, rifles are longer and heavier than SMGs. Consequently, they are harder to move and more awkward to aim close-up, under severe time restrictions, and lots of pressure. Long story short, the SMG-user would be able to lift their weapon and aim much more rapidly than a rifle-user. SMGs are also shorter than rifles, so they can more easily be moved around indoors or in other tight areas.

End result is: SMG should, realistically, be anywhere from 6 to 11 times more damaging than the rifle in close range, and, realistically, should be fairly accurate out to the edge of the fog, since the fog only extends 115-125 squares, depending on the contrast of the object. If we did things realistically, the SMG would completely dominate the rifle at all ranges unless the fogless area became significantly bigger. In real life, armies abandoned semiautomatic rifles and moved towards SMGs and assault rifles because they're better at any range you would usually expect to fight in; rifles only have a niche advantage at very long distances. But that would be retarded and imbalanced, so instead, the SMG should completely dominate the rifle at close range, have an advantage at medium range, but lose at long range. I'm not even going to touch balancing the shotgun, because you'd get a similar story of "rifle loses horrendously at close range".

>>Increasing recoil, time between shots and/or halving the rifle's clip size are all changes that could be done without rendering any aspect of the rifle useless.

I support all of these.

Ye Gods, this thread just got serious.

Beret and Bertinator

Please don't change this into a realism thread (even if it is interesting); I want to focus it on balance.

Hanz
Suggestions can be for suggesting balances.

@MoleMan
Yes, but it's a RIFLE balance thread. The gun that's been in the game since the very beginning.
Any balance changes that can be suggested besides outright changing damage values will just be adding realism, which will in turn have to be added to the other two weapons.
The rifle is perfect as it is, as is the SMG. The shotgun could do with falloff, but otherwise it's fine. What was I saying? Oh yeah. The rifle is fine and anyone saying it needs balancing is a shit player who probably got dominated by a good player using the rifle and is butthurt he can't win.

Wow wow guys hold up- Moleman I'm actually with you 100%- Realism should never get in the way of fun and balance, and all too often such changes take away from a shooter experience. I'm not saying the rifle should actually be more powerful if the hit is up close at all, I was just saying that such a measure would make more sense than it going the other way around, i.e. shots sucking initially and only becoming powerful at long range.

To be honest BOTH measures of changing shot power are pretty stupid.

maybe the rifle could be replaced by a bow and arrow with a lot of bullet drop

if you want a rifle you can just use a skin or something

"If a guy is moving around a lot up close, headshots on such a fast moving target are a lot harder than on heads popping up in the distance"

This would be true if AoS heads were not 1/4 of the body. In a normal game, the head is not only 1/8 the body, but it also bobs up and down even as players move across flat terrain.

The effect, obviously, is that it takes much less skill to make a headshot.

"Changing the rifle hip fire so that the aim is so unpredictable that a player has no idea where their single shot will go is downright useless."

No, it is not. Any you a clearly a whiny noob for saying so. I have often killed people with submachine guns with hip fired bolt action rifles in close quarters, despite having much more inaccurate fire. Considering that the rifle can be scoped instantly, as opposed to other games, that isn't that much a disadvantage.

"Increasing recoil, time between shots and/or halving the rifle's clip size are all changes that could be done without rendering any aspect of the rifle useless."

I suggested all of those, in fact, much more over making hip fire more inaccurate. And you bitched that the rifle was perfect and didn't even need to be brought down at all.

"Any balance changes that can be suggested besides outright changing damage values will just be adding realism"

No it isn't. That's just stupid. Games are not suppose to be about realism. The guns are suppose to be balanced so that no gun completely outclasses the others. Which the rifle does. It has NOTHING to do about adding realism, using this excuse is just another way for people to defend their overpowered gun.

"The rifle is fine and anyone saying it needs balancing is a shit player who probably got dominated by a good player using the rifle and is butthurt he can't win."

Strawman AND ad hominem.

Frankly, as someone who has utterly decimated the entire enemy team with the rifle, at all ranges, and found it nearly impossible to accomplish even a fraction of that performance with a shotgun or smg, I call bullshit on you.

I could win using the rifle. But that isn't fun, since only getting one gun to really use is just dumb.

I'm assuming you haven't played any pre-0.53/0.54 version of AoS?