worldrevolution said:
In response to Click's comment about Escalation dividing the player count.. I still don't have the Inter..whatever DLC and the player account for the most part seems the same as it always was. Most in sabo, dom and acqui oddly split now, and no one in the new one. While I'd love to try the new mode out..I don't see why I have to spend $10 when I'm still getting plenty of content out of MAG. When this last map came out did everyone at first play only that non-stop? In that case I might be left out when Escalation comes out. But for some reason I think Sabo will always be the go to I need a quick game of MAG.
In other news I finally got to feel just how OP shotguns are. Yeah..not fun. I also disagree that LMGs are that amazing as of now, at least not as good compared to the old school OPLMG days. They seem fine in that I still need to pump someone full of 5-7 rounds while a shotgun can just instagib. If anything the heavy machine guns seem pretty damn strong now.
edit: also just broke the 120 hour mark. nothing to compared to some here..i know :lol
Interdiction was played a lot when it first came out. Everyone wanted to see how the game mode was and a good chunk of the MAG active playerbase back then actually bought and played it. There would be at least 300-400 players from each PMC playing Inter. during the first few weeks of its release and it didn't seem like it was hurting the other game modes. After a while, once people figured out the game mode really wasn't that fun to play, a lot of people stopped playing it and went back to their game mode(s) of choice.
For about a month or so, there wasn't enough people playing Interdiction, which resulted in Raven having an unfair advantage because they held the 2 contracts that gave a decreased reuse timer on all leadership abilities. Nobody played Inter. so the contracts never changed factions. I eventually uninstalled Interdiction so I could use the Directives feature, which gave +100% XP bonus. Even with so many people playing Interdiction back then, the other game modes didn't suffer much at all in terms of playercount. Now, there is a good amount of players playing Interdiction again because of the crazy XP bonus Zipper is giving to players that finish a round of Inter. Not sure if I'll reinstall it...
The upcoming Escalation DLC is going to be really cool. I spoke about
how the game mode works and how to properly play it before. If Zipper makes a few tweaks and additions like giving us a good way to notify each PMC who's holding what letter, it will most likely be as popular as Sabotage is. The queue time is minimal because it's just 1 platoon from each PMC, not the 2 platoons required for Acquisition and 4 platoons for Domination. Like I said, Escalation is going to be like Sabotage but with a "King of the Hill" type of game mode mixed into one game mode. It's Sabotage with 3 PMCs then turns into KotH and it keeps switching back and forth unless there is 1 dominant PMC in the game. I can't wait until we use Clan Deploy for Escalation. It's going to be so fun queuing up with 16 players (2 squads) or more of my clan and owning Raven and Valor clans all night. Or having multiple clans work together and determine which PMC has the best clans overall.
IMO, the LMGs are almost as OP'd as they were back in the day. I say almost because the effective range isn't as crazy as it used to be and the reload time (even with skills upgraded) was lengthened. I used to be able to snipe snipers with the LMG, lol. Now, I can hit them sometimes but they seem to be able to get away and hide better for some reason. However, medium to close range, the LMG is as deadly as ever. It's super accurate again with all of the skill and weapon upgrades. I can easily take out 6 or more players simultaneously with it again like I used to be able to before they nerfed it. With the added damage to all weapons, sometimes 2-3 shots with the LMG (not even MMG) will drop someone especially if it's a headshot. Also, because the Assault Rifles and SMGs were also buffed, the degree in which LMGs are overpowered is not as bad as it used to be. Honestly, if got rid of the reduced recoil skill for LMGs and kept it for only Assault Rifles, I believe LMGs / MMGs would be more balanced.
I know I've been complaining about weapon balance in 2.0, but all I want Zipper to do is make MINOR changes to these weapon categories. Take away reduced recoil skill for LMGs. Decrease the effective range of shotguns. Get rid of the refire rate skills for sniper rifles. Remove the refire rate skills for SMGs because they fire fast enough without skill upgrades. Actually, remove all refire rate skills for all guns. They got noticeable increase in damage so refire rate skills are not needed. That's all I want... not for these weapon categories to be nerfed to hell again.
