OMG SNIPEZORZED!!!...So What?

[ObnoxiousFrog]

OK, this is my little, um, "discussion" about snipers. I personally feel that Sniping takes the "Greatest Waste of 3 Cert Points" award, beating out the VS AV MAX by a wide margin.

Now, the problem with sniping is that is serves very little practical purpose. At best, you keep some infantry pinned down. At worst, you give away your postion to anything and everything out there trying to own your sorry sniper ass.


Now, let's hit on the first point. OK, now you may be saying "i kept those guys pinned long enough so that they didn't get to the backdoor!" What you failed to notice were the 20-odd other people who you MISSED. Now, snipers en masse would be a formidable opponent. But, that rarely, if ever, happens. Most snipers are lone wolfs annoying the real combat troops by killing a few of them from a safe distance.

OK, now the second, and worst-case scenario. I killed plenty of snipers as a pilot, mainly because they think that their hilltop posiotion is impenetrable. Yet, when i shoot at them at their open slope, divoid of cover, they get mad. They flame me for doing my job and for defeating those who could pose a threat (OK, that my not apply in this situation) to my empire.


Discuss, flame, agree. I dunno, just talk about snipers and their role in a game of numbers.

[SumYungGui]

by and large, your possibly right. most sniping may be pointless. the most pointless though? I wouldn't go that far.

when I'm in my combat engi role snipers can be a REAL pain in the ass. go ahead, repair that phalanx. I DARE you. *pow*

boy I bet you'd like to place a few mines there wouldn't ya? *pow*

the vehicle terminal is destroyed, repair it!!! *pow pow*

or what about sitting on your bases battlements defending from an imcoming zerg....ok bad example. nobody friggin bothers with defense and for good reason.

[Sputty]

Snipers are for people who don't want to be in the middle of the battle. While their main job is to take out specific people, most of the time they're just for getting kills. Even in PS a good sniper can take out any infantry before being threatened. Anyway, snipers are fine IMO, and someone who used the sniper regularly agrees with me. The most useless cert is now the 3 cert ATV thing. Gah. WTF?!?!
Anyway, yeah.

[HawkEye]

yea i agree with sputty on that atv cert. but i think sniping is fine

[ghost018]

Sniping is entertaining. Sure, it's not the biggest help to your Empire if you're defending. But, it's always fun to shoot the enemy soldiers tossing plasma grenades on your friendly forces from the walls. I sometimes used my Bolt Driver to surge up to damaged enemy forces and get one hit kills at point-blank range when I had the cert. Not to mention killing a number of MAX units and even the occasional Mosquito with my rifle. So much for an Anti-Infantry weapon.

All in all if you have the ability, one can do a lot of damage with the Bolt Driver. Though to this day I've seen few that I would call able. The most important thing to remember when sniping is location. Choosing a position such as the top of a tower or hill is too obvious to the enemy. Furthermore, since the Bolt Driver has the tracer, one can learn a lot from the tactics used by the Snipers back in World War 2. Shoot and relocate. As stated above, you give away your position to the enemy every time you open fire. They'd like nothing more than the chance to sneak around your field of vision and blow you away, so don't give it to them.

ghost

[Harps]

lol i think snipping is fine .. it doesnt effect me really its just a nucence(when i get hit by 1 i just take cover behind a tree and heal/repair).. The problem with most snipers is their tunnel vision, they never check their flanks or right below them (when they are on a hill) Its so easy to sneak up on them and just wave and then knife em

[Lex]

Sniping.. I think is alot of fun. BUT I dont use my Sniper Cert just as a Sniper. I go with the Scout/Sniper routine. Way out alone in front of everything and every one. scoping bases and towers. checking for enemy activity. If i've got a chance of hitting a lone person Ok sure I'll take it but for the most part I'm silent. I watch the bases see how much activity is around try to help direct my outfit into the attack area. best area of approach. Notice I didnt say Infil suit any where in this. No I dont use Sniper cert with an Infil suit. dont see the point. Once you shoot they are going to know where your at. Make the first shot count even if it just hits them once. they will run and hide. letting you relocate for the second shot. or they will stand there like a deer in the headlights and they deserve to get hit that second time. Snipers are great for preattack on bases. finding those gun placements that are manned. or those bloody spitfire turrents and taking them out. drawing out the Combat Eng. after words to repair. watching placements of mines so on and so forth. I guess mostly I use my sniper as a Recon.

[Caspertoo]

Hmm the two examples of "sniper" action that I have seen are en masse sniper groups, usually during an attack. And single snipers just basically harassing enemy troops.

I have a infiltrator character and a pilot character (reev) and snipers affect both differently. Using my pilot, I love hunting down snipers, the bad ones perch ontop of a hill just looking around with that tunnel vision but the good ones will get behind cover, make it so they are hard to see and have decent Line of Sight. I enjoy killing both and do so regularly.

But with my infiltrator, snipers can be a real pain in the ass, I inch my way towards whatever target I am going after, almost get there, dash a bit forward and bang a sniper gets me. Pisses me off no doubt, and thus I LOVE knifing them to death.

Overall I'd dissagree that snipers are a waste of time, I think they are in the same category as infiltrators, not a large threat by themselves but they sortof act like fire support for the larger group.

The best examples of snipers that I've seen tend to have reinforced armor and carry two bolt drivers. This lets them fire off 2 shots within a 1/2 to 1 second of each other. impressive no doubt.

[Eukament]

Sniping is far from useless. Every soldier brought down is one less to worry about for a short time periode. Ive seen and been in a big group of snipers actually holding back a wave of TR (long time ago). They couldn't get through and were shot down so quickly that they had no way of reaching the base. Lancer and Snipers side by side can be very deadly. Thought I see less and less snipers around a base that is attacked these days.

[JetRaiden]

I used to time for a while. but I couldnt find alot of decent targets and I traded it for AV.

[Everay]

I AM A SNIPER, i admit it, yes i am, and im good at it, i suck fighting upclose, i cant kill a damned thing close up, but then, i got the sniper cert, and i fought on amerish with it the first day i got it, against barnies and Elmos, and i had some funny times, but then i got my first kill, and then, my second, and then the third, and the bodies piled up, snipers are effective on the battlefeild, thinking were not is insane, like the tower battle on Oshur i was at once, where i got 40 kills in ten minuets, or the bridge battle on Hossin where only a person using a scope could see the enemy on the other side decently ( its so damned foggy! ) where i got at least 50 kills, and i killed and practicaly whiped out most of the enemy infantry, enough to where my side crossed the bridge using heavy armor. goood times.

[JetRaiden]

I just think that aiming with it is harder then it should be. whenever I feel like sniping I play MOHAA Spearhead. its just annoying in tedious in PlanetSide. especially on moving targets.

[ObnoxiousFrog]

But what all of you are saying is the same thing:
Snipers are a pain in the ass. Thats it. Snipers, whose role it is to basically kill some people, usually never play a critical role in battle. MAX units and infantry kill people just fine, and kill more of them. Snipers are just a pain in the ass.


And OK, the ATV cert is absolute shit, along with anything not involving the Lasher in the new patch.

And Everay, bridges are the only place where snipers rise out of that "thorn in your side" categorey. With lots of people crammed into a tight space, snipers can be deadly. But once again, there are very few decent bridge battles, unlike the massive, multi-force assaults of beta.

[gospadin]

I disagree, in general, with your assessment of sniping.

I think it comes down to target selection and teamwork.

If done well, a large group of snipers can pin a group of enemies logn enough for the ground pounders to get close enough. Aim for the enemies with AV certs and decimators, to allow your maxes to get close enough. If there's nothing else to shoot at, take out their spitfires so your infantry don't get mowed down. If nothing else, recon, and inform your squad what they're up against.

gos

[Queensidecastle]

Yeah the 2 great things about sniping are the fact that it serves as a type of supression fire and severely restricts movent. Also it rocks for people with crappy computers



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[NCG JMan]

When I had my sniper cert, I loved it. I think they play an intricate role. If that person is a good sniper they just don't take anyone out, they take the key people out. For instance, your side has a lot of vehicles moving out of the base and the enemy has multiple AV guys. My first incentive is to keep the vehicles alive and look for the AV enemy. Then if I don't see any, I move onto other targets of opporunity.

The downside to sniping is the tracer. I think the sound is sufficient to track them down. I mean a sniper's main defense is his "stealthness". I think snipers shouldn't have the tracer, but that's my opinion. They would definitely become even more of a formitable opponent then. I am digressing.

In short I feel that the sniper is a force to be reckoned with if they know how to play their role well. Granted being a sniper isn't as exp rewarding as someone else, but the award of knowing you may just have changed the tide of the game by taking out their AV guys brings a grin (evil) to my face :devilwink

[SumYungGui]

my gripe with sniping is the CoF bloom when you move the gun. not the fact that it happens, I can agree with that if it prevents another AWP-whore fest over in this game. what I don't like is that you can stand up and do a fuggin line dance strafing left and right, and the cone will bloom LESS than if you dare to twitch your mouse a hair to line up the shot just right for the single shot.

that's just plain screwed.

[Jaged]

Frog, your logic is completely wrong. Think about it. All anyone does (besides support people) is kill enemies. Sniping is just a way of killing more enemies, faster. Thats right, faster. I get a shit load more kills as a sniper than any of my non-sniper squad mates. When I was a grunt, I can't remember how many times I was pinned down and rendered useless by enemy snipers. I mean how can you fight effectively when you know there is a sniper just waiting to get that final shot of. Sniping is not only a major thorn in the enemies side but it also greatly reduces the number of enemy soldiers on the field at any one time. Like I said, most skilled snipers get more kills than the average grunt. Someone else said that snipers have poor defense and are killed easily. That may be true, but we still stay alive significantly longer than the average grunt. In my opinion, snipers are one of the most effective one man forces on the battle field. We can bring the enemy to a panic by firing just a few shots. We can greatly reduce the number of enemies on the field at any one time. We make it impossible to stand still on the battle field for even a second (However, a skilled sniper does not need his targets to be still.) Explain again how sniping is the "Greatest Waste of 3 Cert Points"?

[ThundaHawkPS]

Sniping is fine. If you have any doubts as to the killing abilities of a bolt driver check my stats. 80% of those kills are from sniping alone (notice I don't use HA at all). It does require a good deal of practice but once you get the hang of leading/guessing/timing your shots you'll notice that enemies tend to behave differently (most tend to retreat if you hit the first shot, even if you don't kill them you've still removed an enemy from the fight with a single bullet).

[Happy lil Elf]

I snipe for the same reason I drive a Vanguard and a Lightning: I'm playing on an AMD 950. All three of those certs allow me to stay near the edges of huge battles and still accomplish something since driving a tank through a TR or even sometimes VS held territory is somewhat suicidal. Strikers and Lancers don't hurt too much when one person is shooting you, it's when there are six or seven that things start to get a bit hairy.

Do I get as many kills or accomplish as much as someone who is charging sown the backdoor in an AI MAX? Probably not. But Charging into a horde of enemies at 4fps is a bad idea and more frustrating than anything else.

P.S. WTB new processor, mobo, RAM and probably power supply. Oh and throw in a Raedon 9800 for me too /nod

[insaneferret]

sniping useless, i think not, as a solo sniper (and a rather good one i think) i can easily take down a 3-4 person group approaching a base, pop the heads of all the medics i see, guy repairing his vehicle, pop in the head, almost as good as killing the vehicle itself