Let's have a mature discussion about the Sniper and Balance.

Now before I start, I am not ranting about how I just lost to a good sniper, which coincidentally, I did I hope to have a change of heart after this thread so I will carefully read each argument and respond in a mature manner.

I am here to discuss the possibility that there is a slim chance that the Sniper may be a bit over powered. Let's face facts, the Sniper has a one shot kill move that can come from just about anywhere on the map and can completely halt a bot rush or any kind of rush for that matter. He is designed to destroy both a defensive attempt and an offensive rush and he certainly has the tools to do it. The issue I (may) have is that he can control the entire match with complete safety most of the time. The only reasonable counter to the Sniper is the Assault because he can directly counter every tool the sniper has. The sad part with this is, the Assault is Sniper's ONLY counter (please prove me wrong). Every other class besides Assault (who is definitely NOT OP) has numerous counters which I will list here:

Support:
Gunner, has the firepower to murder him and his firebase
Assault, can outdamage AND outrange the support. different story with firebase involved...
SNIPER!!!!!: Sniper can give any support a very hard time. The only map where snipers don't completely tie down a support is Ammo Mule imo. They can do very heavy damage to the Firebase and on many maps, don't need to find a good angle to do it. It is available most everywhere. Not only that but Airstrikes simply don't work and you can't get close enough to shotty them a lot of the time. This is where i want you guys to help me.

Assassin:
Support: has the potential to shut down anything the Sin has to offer outside of Juice rushes.
Tank: We all know this by now.
Snipers???: Seems to me that well placed traps and grapples can stop any attempt at assassination...
Assault: Charge, Gun,Bomb. Two potential ring out/OHKO moves that are somewhat abusable. Assault is up there with the Support. Sin needs buffs! (i use support so no bias)

Tank:
Gunner: I don't enjoy this one. It seems the tank really can't get a break. Gunner easily outdamages him and the Gunner simply can't be taken down with Tank jets when a Support is healing. A good Gunner will trump a good tank any day.
Support:It may just be me but I have absolutely no problems with Tank. It's all about picking your battles and battling a Tank head on isn't typically the battle you want to fight. When a firebase is involved, the tank needs to adjust tremendously and shotty really does quite a dent in the armor when you are around buddies.
Sniper!!!!: While it is way harder for a Sniper to kill you with Tank than Gunner, there is still no real way you can kill him. He can out damage your railgun and all its good for is pressure. You can stop a Sniper from sniping you but it won't stop him from doing his job most of the time. Also, you are still a HUGE target to body shot to death.

Gunner:
SNIPER!!!I shouldn't have to explain but it will probably ruin my credibility if I don't. SNIPER RAPES GUNNER! This is easily the worst of the hard counters in the game. Gunner has 1 tool to deal with Snipers and its horribly unreliable. I'm talking mortars, these things have the power to destroy Snipers yet they are simply too unreliable to use in a situation where Sniper has aimbot like precision. It is WAY to easy for a sniper to headshot these guys and no gunner is going to launch the 2 mortars needed to kill a Sniper running Armor without eating a bullet to the dome. Gunner would be a much more useful class if he didn't have to deal with this terrible matchup as much.
Assaults: I like this matchup TBO, I like it because it is challenging but still winnable. Gunner has more firepower than Assault, no question about that. Now this sides with the assault only because he has more tools to deal with a Gunner than vice versa. This matchup IS winnable but it is just way easier for an assault to deal with a gunner than it is for a Gunner to kill an Assault.


Assault: He is the jack of all trades, I can't think of one matchup where he truly has trouble that he can't get out of. This is what makes him one of the most useful players on a team. He beats Supports in most situations and murders Sins in general. He has no real bad matchups and has a handful of good ones. He is good but not game breaking at all.

SNIPER: here is where the problem is, the reason i typed all that up was to point out my opinion that the Sniper has no real bad matchups in this game. The assault has the tools to beat a Sniper but it is still a struggle to get the job done and when it all comes down to the real fight, Sniper still has a range-proof OHKO move. It is difficult to headshot an assault but it can be done and I've seen many snipers do it consistently. I feel that instead of bashing the Sniper with the nerf hammer, we should improve the other character's abilities to beat it. If that means giving some classes some new tools then so be it. The game can use more depth.

Well that's done, and it was probably just a waste of time but maybe it got my point across. Feel free to debate some of the points I made because I am open to criticism.

My main argument here is that I have given the Sniper a lot of thought I have come to the conclusion that it could be in every class' best effort to nerf or change him. I think it is wrong that the only 100% reliable counter to a Sniper is another, better, sniper.

Please discuss and criticize. I want to change heart...

Sniper has no true BAD matchup. But the difference between his "mediocre" match ups and other classes "poor matchups" is relatively close.

Sniper is compartively imbalanced, but not inheirantly overpowered. The class has the highest potential skill ceiling with assault probably being the second highest. He also however has the highest skill FLOOR.

When it comes down to it, the issue is that its difficult to ever pin down a sniper. They may not have any true escape mechanisms, but ice traps recharge faster than the counters to the ice trap.

Ultimately though the issue with the sniper comes more down to map design than anything. Most maps in other shooters tend to have a handful of viable sniper locations chosen based on enemy traffic, long visibility ranges, and difficulty to counter attack. However the maps also tend to have alternative paths that can be taken that are often safe from sniper fire.

In MNC there is no such thing as a "safer" pathway. You can try and keep an eye out for which path the enemy sniper is watching, and avoid that one, but there is no path designed to actually be difficult for a sniper to watch. Every path is POTENTIALLY able to be covered by a sniper. And many of the locations to get to a sniper are extremely safe via proximity to teammates or simply difficulty to get to unnoticed.

Simply put, the maps provide the key things needed for a sniper TOO well. Often times in shooters you can't get all 3 things you want. The location might be safe, and give good visibility, but not provide decent traffic. Or it could give good visibility and good traffic but not be as safe.

I can understand that, I just feel like something should be done to prevent the Sniper from being able to do such crazy things. Some people really have the ability to do pull off such amazing feats with the sniper and it can really shut down an entire team. We've all seen it happen and many of us pull our hair out trying to get around it. While it is impossible to find someone with perfect accuracy, there are many who can still abuse the Sniper's unbelievable skill ceiling.

Also it opens up the issue of, what can be done to make the sniper less efficient without completely nullifying the class' usefulness? You can't just simply nerf the class because he is built broken. You can't nerf OHK headshots because you can't make it less OHK. In this regard, the sniper will always have the highest skill ceiling. All we can do is make it harder for people to achieve this. How is the correct question.

And no, I am not saying that the the Sniper breaks this game.

I don't think the sniper should have AOE, he should be about precision.
Passive 3 should boost his damage on hit for bots extremely high, 1sk + a bit blackjacks high.

As a random idea.

I'm not that keen for it because I really have no issues with snipers, more a lore thing.

Balance aside, a good sniper makes the game suck. When you can't stick your head out anywhere for fear of losing it, that's not good times. We'd be better off without him.


As far as balance, the biggest 2 problems are these, IMO:

1. Ridiculously high rate of fire for a sniper rifle. Lets him just spam body shots or spray and pray for headshots. Takes away from the idea that a sniper rifle should be a precision weapon.

2. You'd think that a sniper would be vulnerable at medium range, but that isn't the case. Most of the weapons that are normally good at medium range fail miserably against his tiny hitbox. A great example is when a good sniper sits near the forward ejector on Spunk Arena. He's right there, but it's stupidly hard to actually do anything to him.

Let's have a mature discussion about the search button.

Buffing other classes to deal with the Sniper, would likely result in an undesirable power creep.
If there is an issue with the Sniper, I think it's best to nerf the Sniper

Power creep?

Not sure if you're simply being biased or you're an inexperienced player.

Support can easily deal with gunners at close range. Against snipers, place firebase in a spot (there are many) where they can't shoot it without coming close.

As assassin, you can easily wreck any sniper that's by himself regardless of traps. You can also lunge + grapple support for kill then run away before firebase takes you out due to damage mitigation of grapple.

Tank has favorable matchup vs most classes except sniper. Gunners are ridiculously easy at both long and short range. Supports are cake unless you seriously mess up.

Sniper has trouble dealing with decent assaults and assassins. Both can kill him without being in his LOS and are extremely mobile.

I was first skeptical before opening this thread, but after reading your post, I actually kind of agree. I mainly play assault, and when playing assault snipers don't generally bother me as the assault is a good counter to sniper. His mobility makes him hard to hit, and his bombs are great at killing them, while his GL is good at annoying them.

However, when playing any other class (bar assassin) I do feel rather helpless against snipers. That being said, most of them are pretty bad, and if you jump around they usually miss.

But like the assassin, when you come up against a truly great one the game becomes significantly "unfun". With RoF and superb aim, they can generally put a down buzz on any game. You can stay out of line-of-sight, but that severely restricts you. I actually tend to just quit and find another server.

As pointed out, most maps favour the sniper conditions too much. You almost always find them sniping from relative safety and with the ability to find cover just a few feet away should a mortar or GL land on their head.

Again, these snipers are rather uncommon. But once we start to see more and more higher skilled players appearing, then I think we'll find the sniper is a tad OP. At the current level of skill (in the vast majority of matches) the classes are fairly balanced.

The problem is that the Sniper is the only class with a OHK weapon that works at any range without cooldown.

An Assassin has to be extremely careful when she uses her grapple. Every assassination attempt can go horribly wrong in the last second. After a grapple there is a medium cooldown, assassination spam is not an option.

An Assault has to be pretty close to get a reliable headcrab or charge 3 somebody off the map. Both have a cooldown and a failed charge will put you into a dangerously close range to your opponent.

Gunners are very dangerous at close and medium distance but they are slow and have a huge hitbox. A Gunner on a leash is a problem but so are any two good teammates who cover each other's back. Try to take on an Assault team. Yup, that's not pretty either.

Support's airstrike has the same problem as the headcrab. To use it reliably you have to be close and your target can even escape under a walkway. Rather long cooldown even on level 3.

Tank. Devastating at close range, vulnerable at medium range, not a real threat long range for most classes. Charge + Death Blossom is almost a OHK for most classes. Still, both skills have a cooldown and leave the Tank vulnerable for a short time.



Finally the Sniper: Every shot is a potential OHK with quickscoping, the RoF is ridiculous, there is no cooldown and range limit. To add insult to injury there is penetration and area of effect damage with passive 3 on everything he shoots at. You know, just in case you try to stay behind your bots for cover.

The Sniper also doesn't have to put himself into danger by getting close to his victim. Nope, he sits in the middle of his traps on a hard to reach position close to cover and has the most powerful AoE weapon (Flak) and an incredible powerful grapple for such a stick figure. The SMG can take care of the frozen, skill depleted and shrapnel torn opponent easily.

And just for added lulz the Sniper has the smallest hitbox next to the Assassin which lets him avoid a large percentage of the bullets or grenades. He's also very fast and can jump over Assault charges.


Now let's take a look at the other classes with powerful long range weapons:
Gunner's mortar:
- can be dodged, is hard to aim at a distance, useless crosshair, can't OHK, can't be used in tight spaces.
+ good AoE damage.
Only dangerous if you are caught by surprise.

Tank's railgun:
- no OHKs, crosshair slightly off, no scope, smallish clip.
+ pretty precise and can be spammed.
Powerful but most classes can escape in time.

Assault's grenades:
- can be dodged, no OHK, you have to find the perfect distance for the powerful air explosion, very hard to hit moving targets in open spaces.
+ good for tight spaces, spammable.
If you die to the Grenade Launcher you simply didn't see the writing on the wall or you were already low on health - unless you were in the sweet spot and took at least two midair explosion straight to the face.


Sniper rifle:
- small clip
+ 100% accuracy when (quick)scoped, scope allows for perfect hits at long range (unlike mortar), OHK chance, hitscan (can't be dodged), spammable, AoE damage, penetrating shots, can be used while standing behind cover with 90% of the hitbox, no Uber long reloading time, adds an additional $50 for every headshot.
In my opinion overpowered. You can kill what you can see, with proper training in a single shot and you get even $50 extra. If you can't hit well: spray and pray. Enemy penetration, high RoF and AoE will do the rest for you in tight spaces.

Confirmed: In a future DLC gunner will be able to drink blood to gain massive power.

Well said Jessop. I forgot about the extra cash they gain, and being in relative safety they can also build up the kill streaks for extra cash (though any good player should be able to stay alive more often than not).

I still think they have quite a high skill floor, which means quite a lot of them are useless and not much of a threat. But we'll see more and more decent ones as the weeks go by.

Sniper also has the best area of denial. A good sniper can shut down HUGE portions of the map.

Lulz, I just have the perfect drink for him.

But back to topic:

Thanks for reminding me. Snipers always tell you to stay out of the line of sight. I'd really like to see how you are supposed to stay out of his LoS when there are two Snipers.
He also has traps and powerful close range weapons to make an assassination a lot more work. I have less trouble with most Tanks.

Trololol could you have posted a more bias post under the disguise of a balanced arguement jessop?

You forgot to mention that snipers also get a warm hat that others dont.

What kind of Snipers are you dealing with?
Like, I don't think it's even imaginable that a player could counter a good Sniper with rebounded grenades and shurikens.
One kill, or maybe forcing him to change position every so often... but... reliably counter?

This is coming from a Sniper main.

Anyway, my opinion on the Sniper is this:
- The Sniper is currently too effective in close combat at higher level play due to quickscoping.
- The Sniper currently has unparalleled killing potential within the game. As Snipers get better, their ability to decimate players at a rate far greater than any other class (within reason) with no limit on jurisdiction, will be prominent.
- Snipers currently can use rapid fire body shots to quickly kill defenseless pros at a long range, with limited aiming skill required (often relying on luck), and with limited chance of the enemy pro being able to immediately pose as a threat to the Sniper. Snipers should be encouraged to make their shots count.
- Any threat to a Sniper can often be very much forseen and reacted to by a skilled Sniper - especially at range. The Sniper is no more vulnerable at close ranges than other low armour classes.

That said
- The Sniper is an amazing class with a multitude of uses and additional quirks that can be used to great effect in matches, and these quirks should be considered just as important as the Sniper Rifle in determining the 'gameplay direction' of the Sniper class.
- While the Sniper should not dominate at all ranges, he should not be pathetic at close ranges, and he should be effective at moderate ranges.
- Sniper skills such as quickscoping should not be removed from the game, but instead properly restricted such that, while they will reward Snipers who practice them, they will not be in a position to be a dominating tactic.
- The Sniper's ability to farm bots and juice frequently is a positive quirk to the class that makes their gameplay more interesting and dynamic, and should not be nerfed at all.
- The Sniper's maneuverability should not be dropped, as it will greatly limit the class' viability in highly skilled play, and make him greatly vulnerable to spam tactics.
- The Sniper should not be nerfed in ways that make the class less fun to play, or more annoying to play - such as using Recoil and Scope Removal (or Bolt Action) as methods to 'indirectly' reduce the Sniper's rate of fire. Snipers should be able to continue aiming at targets between shots if they wish to,
- Any nerf to the Sniper should not increase difficulty (as this just serves as a temporary fix until Snipers get more and more skilled), but should instead limit the class' abilities in itself.

I play Sniper heavily, and so while I do acknowledge that he is too powerful, and should be nerfed, I do not want to see crippling nerfs that make him unusable in high level play, or annoying little pseudofixes that make him less fun.
I don't want him to be restricted to a "long range only" play style (though he should not be as effective at closer ranges as he is now), and I don't want to see him restricted to a "player killer only" niche.
The Sniper should be as flexible as he is now.

I might be biased because I play every class except Sniper and Tank, mostly Assault and Assassin atm.
However, I bring arguments to the table while all you have is hollow sarcasm. Please feel free to counter the points I made.

Really? We're doing this AGAIN? It's like watching a never ending car crash... Ok then...

Honestly I think we should all /thread here. That's all this is isn't it? It's a rage thread. Had that guy been a gunner or tank, you would have made a "Let's have a mature disc-blabla TANK/GUNNER IS OP!" thread just the same.

But hey, that would be too easy wouldn't it... augh.

So yeah, let's go:

First, what kind of crazy *** match ups are these? Were you just determined to crowbar "sniper" in every match up regardless of other issues?

Quod erat demonstrandom...

...Why are assault or gunner marked as counters?

Gunner is only your counter if you're stupid and run up to his face, at which point he's EVERYONE's counter. Even the Tank loses a head-on. That said, if you play it smart, there's no reason why you can't kill gunners. You both have as much a chance of killing each other, comes down to who plays it better.

And why Assault? Assault can't kill your firebase if you're healing it, and his only shot is to outrange you, which everyone can do. He certainly can't outdamage your firebase... Again, play it smart, get him within your range and you'll be sending him back to respawn pretty fast.

And why Snipers? ANYONE can outrange you. You shouldn't be in a position where you can be outranged to begin with. If you are, anyone can kill you. Sniper just does it faster.

The "soft counter" is Tank, not any of the above.

Why support? Support is just another player on the battlefield for the assassin. They both can kill each other, so it comes down to who plays it better.

Why Snipers of all things?? Assassin is the sniper's counter... Not the other way around... This was so obviously crowbared in that it's not even funny. Assassins are invisible, can lunge over traps, smoke bomb wherever they want, and lunge+grapple will always insta-kill the sniper, regardless of their armor or weather it's a front or back grapple. Hell, even the shurikens can be used to force the sniper of his perch for good measure. Absolutely worse case scenario, of a far more skilled sniper, you can simply avoid him and you'll never even deal with each other. Snipers are bad assassin's counters.

Also the Assault's best counter to the assassin is neither of those, but his jetpack and high jump capacity. Charge and bomb do help though.

This is what you have Charge for. And the Railgun at longer distances. And why you don't just run up to their faces. Going head-on against a gunner is suicide with ANY class.

It's a soft counter, but Tank has the advantage on the matchup against support. If a Tank is not giving you problems as a support, he's either being largely outplayed, or he's crap. Product Grenade deals with sentry doing jackshit, and a charge later you're looking at the respawn screen. Or just product grenade your sentry, then jetgun/death blossom it, then deal with the support. Support only has one serious problem for tank, and that's ground zeroing.

Yes, the Sniper is the Tank's counter, but not nearly as straight forward as you're trying to to make it. First of all, if the Sniper doesn't get a headshot, the Tank can win every single time (can, depending on skill). I don't have patience to re-do all the maths (done so in another thread here or in the SPUF), but if it comes down to body shot trade off, the Tank wins. In fact, without headshots, EVERY class already outdamages the sniper. It's not an issue.
Here's the thing though, you can avoid a Sniper almost entirely and it will barely affect you. If he goes after you, then he's playing your game, and should he survive, you have only yourself to blame.

Yes, the Sniper is Gunner's counter. It's, again, not nearly as "hard" a counter as you're making it out to be. Mortar is a 2 shot kill, and it's only unreliable if you can't aim it. Best of all, you can shoot it from behind cover, and "to" behind cover. So not only can you arch it from a place where the sniper can't shoot you, but you can also often arch it onto the sniper taking cover. Beautiful thing mortars. At close range it requires the Sniper an insane level of skill to beat the matchup. I rarely have issues dealing with Snipers as Gunner.

As for Assault... Lol? Seriously? The only reason assault has any kind of chance vs. the Gunner is Bomb. Avoid that, and he either uses his little charge to piss off, or he's dead before he can hit the trigger.

And this is the part where I just laugh.

"Assault - Has no counters... BUT IS BALANCED!!... Sniper - Is OP BECAUSE HE HAS NO COUNTERS!!!" ....What?

Also, the sniper has two soft counters (Assassin and Assault), and is basically the exact opposite of the Support - He depends on his range. While support gets increasingly more powerful the closer you get to him, the sniper gets increasingly dangerous the further you move from him. The closer you are, the more the fight tilts in your favor. This doesn't mean that there's nothing the sniper can do, but the same is valid for every class in almost any situation. This only means that the "handicap" changes to the non-sniper's advantage the closer they are.

Snipers aren't OP. Bad players are UP.

There are Two ways to go here

Nerf Sniper: Requires 2 small changes


1) Take away full ROOT effect from freeze traps, and instead have them slow you down LONGER, but allow jumping, while still putting skills on cooldown to stop SKILL BASED CHARGES from negating them.

As it is right now, in the hands of a great sniper, freeze traps might as well be spammable instant kill mines, hes not going to miss the head shot when you are in it. And this is one thing that makes him so damned powerful at close range, when his class dynamic says he should not be. they should be used to allow him to retreat, not to give him a kill.

At least being able to jump and move a bit, will stop the instant head shot from being a "given" and allow you a chance to keep pushing or fall back.. Its not right that you hit a freeze trap and have to sit there as the sniper casually rolls around the corner to put one in your dome.. thats not a power a sniper should have.. he shouldn't be able to FORCE a player stationary..

2) AOE damage from exploding rounds, no longer deals damage to players.. Its damage to bots remains the same.

They should not be able to fire wildly into a crowd of bots (enemy or friendly) and kill the tank walking them. That is not a SNIPER type thing to do, thats what a gunner should be doing.. snipers should need to aim their shots. You leave their penetrating rounds the way they are, that makes perfect sense.. if you can pick a player out of the crowd you deserve to hit them. And leave the exploding damage against bots.. that makes sense, he needs to be able to clear a group in a single magazine.. But those two should not overlap.

If you do those two things, he will be far less annoying... without loosing anything that makes him a "Sniper". The only way to bring sniper online with other pros, is to make changes like those.. changes that don't effect this actual meta game, but instead simply make his game more skill required and less GIVENS..

less: spam into bots and if pro is there free kill, or freeze pro in place cant miss headshots.


Buff Snipers Counter Class: Buff Assassin or Assault

If you wanted to go the other route, you would have to pick his counter class.. I would vote for Assassin not assault.. Assassin is by nature of this role, the more suited counter.. so you would need to give the assassin, some skill that makes him immune to Roots or Slows..

1) Smoke Bomb now removes assassins from any root or slow effects (this would effect gunner slow from deploy though.. which kinda blows), and makes the assassin immune from those effects for 5 seconds..

Thats the most balanced way I can think of, as it would require a "starter" (smokebomb) which could potentially give the sniper a heads up that its coming.. And the assassin would have to decided to use it offensively or defensively (before or after an ice trap) and if he goes with defensive, than he better pray the ice trap isn't close to the sniper, beacause a fast sniper could still get the head shot off), and the sin would also be giving up his easy escape skill if it all goes to hell close range..

Its that or immunity to ice mines while cloaked, but that seems really one sided.

Here is a suggestion: give me customisable zoomFOV in exchange for lower rate of fire - I'd headshot anyone through sheer will no matter how crazy your dodging is.

Said it multiple times, will say it again: if there was an easy fix (without pissing good snipers off) we would have seen one by now or I would have presented one myself (to be as pretentious as the other kids who try to outdo Scathis)

Yes Sniper is powerful, is he more powerful than any other skilled player doing his job with his class? Definitely not.

Most of these people tend to forget that each character fits into a certain role and is not necessarily meant to kill thousands of people (like the Sniper).

If you take the roles of the individual pros into the equation and assume (for argument's sake) that they all do their job perfectly you will soon figure out that there is balance to be had.

If that doesn't work: get yourself a blasted Sniper on your team and then it's the good old: may the better Sniper win, and he shall.