People who complain about the Smart Pistol are misunderstanding the mechanics of Titanfall.
KD doesn't showcase much when controlling minions and dealing damage all effects your Titan timer. Talking about Attrition specifically, the Smart Pistol is a terrible anti-Pilot weapon and there are sidearms that are better.
The Smart Pistol is good however for spotting grenades, invisible enemies etc.
But if you die in Titanfall? It is not the end of the world. It doesn't even have the same scoring system as CoD.
Really the biggest issue with Titanfall is the many people who turn on the game expecting it to be like what CoD AW is -- CoD with more abilities, but ultimately the same general strategy -- kill more than you are killed.
I have never bothered to care about the Smart Pistol because it isn't OP, better than any other weapon to half-decent players and is actually almost impossible to kill far away enemies with. If anything, you should get a smart pistol and pick up another weapon ASAP from a fallen enemy because you cannot last very long with it.
What it DOES do however, is allow you to pick of minions efficiently if that's your strategy (to get your Titan ASAP) and happily allows players who don't have super good aim to be able to kill Pilots.
With the way the movement system is in Titanfall, to even kill a Pilot that is moving at top speed with the higher TTK makes it far more difficult than it is in CoD. Titanfall is a game of scale, and despite being 6v6, it is supposed to have people of varying skill fighting all at once.
Now here is the problem with Titanfall as a whole.
Unlike CoD, or even Halo -- if you are half-decent, a team slightly worse than you will NEVER win. There is almost no room for randomisation in a game of Attrition. A player who is not carrying a 40mm can't win regardless, and that weapon requires half-decent aim. Because deaths in a game of Attrition is 1/75 of the score needed to win the game, dying doesn't really matter if it means you spot where the enemy is. And because of the way the map works (firing a non-sup wep shows EVERYONE exactly where you are), those who get a pilot kill and aren't really good are going to be killed and it will be insignificant.
Case in point, if you go 130 Attrition Points but die 10 times, your KD is pants but providing you used 4 Titans, your AP ratio is 130/60 --
The Smart Pistol, which is actually garbage with out enhanced targetting, is useless long range. This means that you are not using a supressor and if you are not a good player enough in which another weapon is actually a better choice, that pilot kill is insignificant.
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In CTF, it is almost impossible to be useful as Flag Carriers will move too fast in a route (which means you can't defend or attack) - a shotgun is much better for CQB
In Pilot Hunter, same thing applies to Attrition. LOL actually using Smart Pistol in Pilot Hunter since minion kills don't score points.
In Hard Point, it's also the same thing.
There is a reason why Respawn actually gave the Smart Pistol bonus Rodeo damage. Outside of Attrition, and unless you are scoring minion kills enough to off-set what a death is worth to the other team, it isn't helping anyone. If you are good with Arc Grenades, you will refill them between each Titan anyway and there is no real benefit to killing extra minions with a SP.