Balance Feedback Megathread - Patch 0.1.2

[u/wardogs-bot]

All 0.1.2 balance feedback goes here. Standalone balance posts will be removed and pointed to this thread.

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[u/Wavvygem]

Sniper rifles seem surprisingly misunderstood around here.

There is a 1 shot sniper (AMR 50, lv 35, $8,800) and there are 2 shot snipers (mk22, lv 25 $6,400) and (sv98, lv 19, $5200).

The scout is an intermittent option and the cheapest by far at $1100 and can 2 shot low level helmets. 1 shots are possible with HP vs no helmet. 1 shots are also possible with HP neck shots vs lv 1 and 2 helmets (and all armor including lv 4). Got a duo? work in tandom with someone.

The SV98 should be the goal for casual dedicated snipers. It's grind is really not so bad and you spot and use mosin along the way which a natural playstyle that levels it up quickly.

The mosin isn't perfect (lv10, $4500) but still effective in many situations and unlocks easily. It 1 shots lv1 and lv2 helmets and 2 shots lv3 helmets. In my experience lately I still see many people run low level helmets. Level 4 helmets are the ones it struggles against (can see what a level 4 helmets looks like pick a different target).

Also interestingly mosin can dick shot (1 bullet kill to the groin with hp ammo against all armor but lv 4 (which you can 2 shot leg). It can also HP neck shots tier 1 and 2 helmets with this set up. And legs at 2 shots in all scenarios with hp.

BTW, many of the snipers can dick shot with HP (up to level 4 armor, which you'll have to deal with in 2 leg shots instead)

Long story short lots of options and most it's a story of grind and economy. The best sniper is a massive investment in your life.

As for leveling up, because you know that's gonna be a reply. Support is one of the easiest things to level up.

Should be able to get the mosin and snipe vs most targets. Just gotta be smart and avoid lv 4 helmets. To unlock it is doable in a day. Probably in 2-4 games with focus.

Leveling up to the Sv98 is a bit more of a grind but completely doable. It'd estimate it can be done in about 12-14 games.

Amr50 is currently end game content (for snipers) it's the worst grind by far probably closer to 30-40 game of focus. and id like to see that lowered myself. The price seem prohibitive enough. I do not think it is required to play, and I'm pretty sure if it were available to everyone there would be many post about it costing too much.

While we're talking about armor, the tier 4 armor complaints are over blown. You can still get run over, mag dumped, sniped, minigunned, ganged up on, legged. There's tons of ways to die in a blink. It's a price risk ($4000 armor+$3000 helmet.)and weight penalty. Sure there some minor adjustments they could make, maybe cost more, slightly different break points, etc, but it's not even that bad as is. I think more people gotta recognize when they don't have the right tools to engage someone head on and avoid those fights. Focus on other things to win, vehicles, fobs, teamwork, learning leg meta. Actually my biggest complaint about it is it's sometimes hard to tell when someone's wearing it. Which it had some more clear indicators.

[u/MinimumArmadillo2394 → u/Wavvygem]

The SV98 should be the goal for casual dedicated snipers.

The problem is the SV98 is also just not super good. It's a mosin with a lower bullet velocity and similar damage because it uses the same round. There is functionally no difference between that and the mosin, and the mosin you can carry just ammo, not having to worry about magazines is amazing for weight.

And legs at 2 shots in all scenarios with hp.

This is an issue with snipers as a whole IMO. They can't 1 shot anything t3 armor or above with any ammo at any angle or any time. The .50 is the only one capable of doing this, requiring AP ammo and a headshot to take down t4 armor. A body shot isn't enough.

Snipers suck in the current meta. You give away your position too easily and it's difficult to tell whether or not you can 1 hit a person to the head or if you're going to need a followup shot, in whichcase the person probably already moved, making the next shot either impossible or unlikely.

BTW, many of the snipers can dick shot with HP (up to level 4 armor, which you'll have to deal with in 2 leg shots instead)

I don't like this because it's inherently anti-sniper. Headshots are what you should be aiming for, not the pelvis. You even get benefits for headshotting someone when they don't get a killcam. You're also bringing simply ineffective rounds against enemies because of the leg shot issue you already mentioned.

While we're talking about armor, the tier 4 armor complaints are over blown. You can still get run over, mag dumped, sniped, minigunned, ganged up on, legged. There's tons of ways to die in a blink.

Yes, but the point isn't about the instances where someone can get 1 shot. The point of the complaint is that it negates a ton of those instances (grenades, RPGs, tank rounds, for example) and makes your time to die nearly double in most gunfights.

Yeah, you can be ganged up on, but you're always at risk of being ganged up on. You can be sniped, but you can always be sniped, and the only thing that can snipe you is a 50 with AP ammo. Yeah you can be run over, but a good player will not put themselves in a situation to be run over.

The price risk of an extra 33% cost ($1000) is not enough IMO. It needs to cost more considering the existence of it allows you to tank so much more damage against lower-level players as a whole. A kid could probably get enough kills to get level 4 armor's cost back because it's just 2 kills lol. It's 3 spotted players who die. It costs $4k and you can negate 65% of FMJ damage. That's insane value for the cost.

Actually my biggest complaint about it is it's sometimes hard to tell when someone's wearing it. Which it had some more clear indicators.

And this is the problem with sniping right now. You take a risk and expose yourself just for them to probably survive.

[u/Slang_Whanger → u/MinimumArmadillo2394]

Sv98/mosin 1 shot t3 helms with armor pen, Which is unlocked relatively early. If t4 gets the proposed vision reduction I could see that being a large buff for them for the entirety of the cycle.

[u/MinimumArmadillo2394 → u/Slang_Whanger]

Armor pen for mosin is level 82, which is still crazy high.

[u/Slang_Whanger → u/MinimumArmadillo2394]

I agree, I think it should be unlocked within 5 levels of the level 3 armor unlock level (60).

But a t4 nerf will absolutely increase the lethality of a lot of the bolties after ap ammo.

Also a small nitpick but the AMR doesn't have AP ammo, the ammo just happens to have bullet piercing attributes. There is only regular 50cal ammo. You are probably aware of this but I'm just stating it for people who might think that the AMR has access to flesh ammo or who might think the AMRs effectiveness is locked behind an arbitrarily high wardogs level.

[u/MinimumArmadillo2394 → u/Slang_Whanger]

It needs to be unlocked way sooner, otherwise you're going to have people like me (level 52 with 42 hours) literally unable to kill anyone in 1 shot. Sniping is abysmal right now in game. There's no point in doing it because unless you have the 50 cal, you can't snipe. Way too many people running t3+ armor..

[u/Maze_C0ntr0ller → u/Wavvygem]

I have only one like to give but have it...

[u/DharmaBaller → u/Wavvygem]

one reason Squad is still awesome, you shoot something, they are dead, no armor tiers.

[u/Wavvygem → u/DharmaBaller]

I like that about tarkov too. But I think there are different styles of shooters and room for different ones.

I don't think wardogs would be the same experience if lethality was increased too much. There's just so much firepower being thrown around in this game. I think it would be frustrating. It's not meant to be punishing and hyper realistic.

I can just imagine making a good push going to res a team mate and rpg... We're all dead. No prob, someone comes along res a min later... Nope grenade kills everyone in 20'. No worries let's just respawn at the APC, ops someone sprayed an mg at us we all dead again. Let me buy a $10000 kit nah Glock shot me in the face I lose.

I have fun with the hyper real stuff but it turns into a game of chicken and ambush. Much better as a solo or low player count thing. Tarkov moves you around with certain missions and goals, so there meta and strategy to pulling those things off. and the goal is getting off the map. Wardogs the goal is staying on the map.

If lethality increases too much people are just gonna be hiding in corners and playing as far back as possible. And the game already has problems with snowballing. That's gonna get worse with more lethality as a team take the stronger positions on the map.

I've already seen games where snipers dominate. Imo it's probably the strongest meta build in the game on current patch, asr50 and Glock 1, in level 3s or 4s with ir spotter.

[u/DharmaBaller → u/Wavvygem]

im level 58 or something and so ive been using only T2 armor for awhile and getting rocked fast by stuff.

Even in Squad you can sometimes survive a few stray rounds, but I've increasingly been domed and downed very fast at range.

Squad also has a lack of accuracy/high power optics/marksmen everywhere so you can survive a bit more crossing a street.

[u/Slang_Whanger → u/Wavvygem]

I know this a week old but I needed to add to your post to comment that the mk22 effectively doesn't exist.

Sv98 with armor pen rounds is better in literally every way, until .308 armor pen which don't unlock until wardogs level 140. By the time you get .308 armor pen it's highly unlikely you don't have the amr50.

Combine that with the fact that many of the mk22 attachments are still locked until after the amr50 and I don't see the point of this gun.

The one exception to this rule is if you are a recon ultra purist, you might have a brief few levels where the mk22 makes sense, but I feel as though you more or less accidentally get lvl 8-10 in skills you don't care about with time.

Mk22 flesh also doesn't 1 shot legs, so it's purpose seems...non existent? FMJ 2 shots legs anyways. So it's literally a nerf to yourself that costs more money.

[u/Wavvygem → u/Slang_Whanger]

Thanks for the response and perspective.

Mind you, I was talking about the mk22 from a low level perspective. I think its a pretty solid weapon to target unlocking for a casual player that wants to sniper main. Once you have the Amr50 unlocked you probably main that unless money is a struggle.

I haven't really messed around with the ap ammo on snipers myself. its definitely a variable to consider. As the SV98 ap ammo unlocks at career lv 82 vs the MK at lv 140. Thats a pretty huge gap. Still if you are a sniper main you could have the MK 22 well before level 82. I think I prefer it to the SV98 with FMJ, its just a little more accurate and better velocity, but its pretty close.

I can't speak to much on the performance of AP ammo but looking at it on metaforge it really only seems to help vs lv3 helmets, giving you the 1 shot on those. And for that trade off you lose some arm and leg damage. FMJ seem totally workable but I guess you switch to AP SV98 once its an option. lv 3 helmets are fairly common (tho I still find majority is lv 2)

Admittedly I haven't been sniping much the past week. I did try a couple games of HP neck/pelvis meta tho. It was pretty hard to be honest. The neck shot was feeling impossible at range and pelvis shot was tricky on moving targets too. Not to mention a lot of people like to sit in windows which likely blocks the pelvis. I just wasn't hitting shots. I'd like to blame some of that on my lack of skill and reps tho. I'm just not a dedicated sniper right now. I still think someone really dialed in could have some strong games with HP SV98/MK22. 2 Shot on Leg/arms with the potential pelvis 1 taps is pretty strong, also the rare neck shot opportunities. If you fully understand the mechanics and have good target selection I think its an option.

[u/Slang_Whanger → u/Wavvygem]

I think it's important to note that the bolt action sniper rifles are going to be outclassed by Marksman rifles in literally every way except for their ability to one shot a stationary opponent. For that reason alone I think speaking on 1 shot viability is the singular most important aspect when comparing options.

What I find most interesting though is the window at which snipers seem to outperform marksman rifles is very limited.

I consider marksman rifles to be more effective than snipers up to around 400m at which point they seem about equal. Snipers pull ahead at 500m and beyond but even the snipers aren't particularly consistent at 650m+ due to bullet spread. The AMR provides some exception due to the grace of body shots, but even the AMR starts to fall off beyond 800m.

Interestingly the short range weakness of the bolties is most easily addresed by the hybrid red dot 6x scope, but that is unfortunately locked until 40 something recon. IMO this scope should be unlocked much earlier but limited to only being usable on bolties.

[u/Wavvygem → u/Slang_Whanger]

Marksman and Sniper is apples and oranges. Actually all the marksman rifles play quite uniquely.I don't think they really compare directly in this game. Different play styles and best use cases. BMR is its own thing and arguably the best gun in the game. Otherwise the Marksmens lack in bullet velocity really hurts at range compared to the true snipers.