Bullets loaded in sniper rifles 1.8 times more damage

[axytho]

According to the config files, the 7.62x51 mm NATO cartridges for snipers do 90 damage.
Those used in standard infantry rifles like the FN FAL/M14/G3 and machine guns like the FN MAG do 50 damage, while the DMR does 58 damage.

I understand that different ammunition is used by snipers over the regular troops: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/7.62%C3%9 ... idge_types.

However, it seems a bit of a stretch to me that these cartridges will be so much more effective at penetrating armor. They are better at maintaining velocity and accuracy over longer ranges, and I'm happy that the developers took the time to create a seperate bullet to factor this in.

Nonetheless, I don't think that they should do significantly more damage than standard infantry rifles or machine guns. There is no good balancing reason for unrealistically high damage values for sniper rifles.

[Frontliner]

Snipers are borderlines useless even with the damage buff as you are horribly handicapped by deviation alone. Only on a few maps, against unskilled players or against irons can you expect to get some kills here and there before you will be discovered and killed.

[axytho]

Snipers are borderlines useless even with the damage buff as you are horribly handicapped by deviation alone. Only on a few maps, against unskilled players or against irons can you expect to get some kills here and there before you will be discovered and killed.

I completely agree that the only people snipers inconvenience are people who don't have medics to revive them, or who are forced to cross very large open spaces.

The point of the sniper is to observe and occasionally kill high priority targets. If you try engaging an 8 man squad from less than 500 meters you will die (obviously). I think that if you wait 8 seconds, all deviation goes away, but I have very little experience using sniper rifles myself so correct me if I'm wrong.

But even if snipers are borderline useless, there's no reason not to nerf them further by making their damage realistic. As long as they still have all their equipment and are capable of making people dead-dead by a single shot, they have a role to fill. If they want to be effective, they should work together with others. Every other role in PR has to do teamwork to be effective.

[FFG]

Keep in mind that Military's have many different rounds with different loads. The NZDF for instance uses different rounds with different grains and loads in their .308 snipers as they do in their maximi's. Just because its a .308 doesn't mean it has the same ballistics

[axytho]

I don't know about .308 but US/UK and most NATO snipers use the 175 grain variant of 7.62x51mm. The standard round is 150 grain.



As you can see, while the sniper round has 3% more energy, the standard round has 8% more muzzle velocity.

[Chernobog95]

I am layman involving ballistics, but I know that nowadays unlike decades ago that sniper rifles have own specific barrels rather than previously cherry picked best of the bunch from battle rifles or that one battle rifle being adapted for sniping role.

Anyway I am guessing since sniper rifles get barrel that get more treatment to reduce MOA then it should have longer retention of kinetic energy even if round are regular ones for battle rifles...

Also there should be attention to detail such as length of the barrel and if the barrel has regular rifling or octagonal with the latter being more efficient hence CZ 82 despite being considerably smaller pistol is just as powerful and accurate as CZ 75.

[axytho]

I am layman involving ballistics, but I know that nowadays unlike decades ago that sniper rifles have own specific barrels rather than previously cherry picked best of the bunch from battle rifles or that one battle rifle being adapted for sniping role.

Anyway I am guessing since sniper rifles get barrel that get more treatment to reduce MOA then it should have longer retention of kinetic energy even if round are regular ones for battle rifles...

Also there should be attention to detail such as length of the barrel and if the barrel has regular rifling or octagonal with the latter being more efficient hence CZ 82 despite being considerably smaller pistol is just as powerful and accurate as CZ 75.

They have longer retention of kinetic energy, this is modeled in game and I have no problem with a longer damage drop-off for snipers than for regular rifles: but my problem is that sniper do 90 damage from the moment the bullet leaves the barrel as opposed to the 50 damage from regular rifles.

I'm definitely not a ballistics expert either, but I think a bullet is a bullet. Once it leaves the barrel, how well it keeps its initial kinetic energy depends on the bullet itself. A longer barrel might grant some more initial kinetic energy but E= mv²/2 so in the end the kinetic energy in the bullet at the start will depend on:

The weight (which will remain constant for a given bullet, but sniper bullets are heavier than regular bullets)

The muzzle velocity (which is higher for regular bullets than for sniper bullets EVEN WHEN accounting for length, although length definitely has an impact on for example the shorter variants of the FAL)

Take the following examples: (these were taken from wikipedia)

M24 sniper: 175 grain bullet, 790 meters/second muzzle velocity, 3560 Joules (wikipedia)

M14 infantry rifle: 147 grain bullet, 850 meters/second, 3470 J (wikipedia)

FN FAL long version: 147 grain bullet, 840 meters/second, 3389 = 3470 * (84/85)² Joules (not 100% sure whether I'm allowed to use the kinetic energy formula here but this is for point blank)

FN FAL short version: 147 grain bullet, 810 meters/second, 3151= 3470 * (81/85)².

So in the worst case, using the shortest possible version of the FAL (436mm barrel), you will still only have 11% less energy than a sniper rifle with a barrel length of 610mm.



So TLDR: you could justify giving the sniper rifle a 10% damage buff, but not a 80% damage buff (assuming that I'm allowed to use the formulas that I used, people who know something about ballistics should give their opinion)

[axytho]

Bump?

Devs, what's your rationale behind the current damage, and would you consider changing it?

[AlonTavor]

The main rationale for Sniper/Marksman doing more damage was always "Balance", with the side excuse of "Marksman/Snipers would be more skilled to hit more vital areas".

[axytho]

The main rationale for Sniper/Marksman doing more damage was always "Balance", with the side excuse of "Marksman/Snipers would be more skilled to hit more vital areas".

(Thanks for replying!)

Well then, I suggest medics do 3x more damage from now on.

1) for balance reasons, because it's clear that community needs medics way more than it needs snipers. How often have heard a SL ask for snipers vs. ask for medics?

2) Because if snipers are skilled at hitting vital areas , surely a medic knows the vital areas of their enemy even better, given their medical skill?


In all seriousness, if a sniper in-game behaves like one in real life, and takes 20 seconds to set up and make sure he will shoot his opponent in the head, he doesn't need a damage bonus.

The damage bonus is only really needed for snipers trying to shoot people crossing a road, and in that case I'd argue that no matter how skilled a sniper is, he's not going to somehow be able to shoot the guy in the armpit. And if in-game, the person behind the monitor actually is skilled enough to shoot me in the head while I'm crossing the road, he's welcome to the kill.

[AlonTavor]

Or you can simply accept the fact that Sniper not being able to reliably one-shot stationary targets such as TOW operators is terrible from a gameplay standpoint.

This is not going to be changed.

[axytho]

Or you can simply accept the fact that Sniper not being able to reliably one-shot stationary targets such as TOW operators is terrible from a gameplay standpoint.

This is not going to be changed.

You develop the game, you choose how the damage values obviously.

But why is this terrible? It takes 3-4 people to get a TOW up in a timely manner. Why should a single person be able to instakill the TOW if he isn't even able to hit the guy's head?

If he can't kill the person on the tow, maybe he should use his spotter (who should be helping him and defending him) to laze the tow, or he can just warn the asset squads the tow is there.



My gameplay frustration is that this kit requires 0 teamwork, while in real life, is a crew-served weapon in almost every conventional army. The ideal of a sniper-spotter 2 man team never gets realized, because the sniper rifle is so powerful it doesn't need anyone to defend the person using it.