Buff The Sentinel Laser Rifle And Burst Pistol?

[Felandi]

That's exactly what I've been saying, but my vote has been on explosive damage for the knockdown effect.

 

Well, changing their base damage. Such as making one pure radiation and the other pure explosive certainly would make an interesting difference from the other sentinel weapons. Especially if the base damage is upped to level appropriate to damage 2.0. It would also mean that no blade/impact/puncture damage mods have to be applied. Saving up a mod slot for other pieces of utility.

 

The functionality of the guns aside. I checked the codex today. The burst pistol is clearly labeled as "Burst-Fire" on the trigger. The surprising part is that the laser rifle is listed as automatic fire. Yet, it clearly fires in bursts. No matter how much attack speed you place on it.

 

Something the developers might want to look at.

[Felandi]

Yes, I really hope DE considers this thread! Everytime I go the the Arsenal menu and look at the sentinel weapons selection, I wish the laser guns were balanced because their projectiles are far more interesting than bullets...

 

I agree. When I want to just tear things apart with no thought to the matter, I equip the Deth Rifle. Modded for pure damage and attack speed, along with appropriate elemental combos. (the shotgun weapon is powerful, but not my style. Kill steals too much.) When I want something different with different mechanics. I look at the burst pistol and laser rifle and just feel a bid sad. Especially the pistol, which could potentially do magical things with Lethal Torrent.

[Xana_Skullsunder]

Well, changing their base damage. Such as making one pure radiation and the other pure explosive certainly would make an interesting difference from the other sentinel weapons. Especially if the base damage is upped to level appropriate to damage 2.0. It would also mean that no blade/impact/puncture damage mods have to be applied. Saving up a mod slot for other pieces of utility.

 

The functionality of the guns aside. I checked the codex today. The burst pistol is clearly labeled as "Burst-Fire" on the trigger. The surprising part is that the laser rifle is listed as automatic fire. Yet, it clearly fires in bursts. No matter how much attack speed you place on it.

 

Something the developers might want to look at.

 

Lately, I've only see the burst pistol fire single shots. The laser rifle can fire some decently long bursts in the right situations, but you're right.

[Felandi]

Lately, I've only see the burst pistol fire single shots. The laser rifle can fire some decently long bursts in the right situations, but you're right.

 

Single shots, really? I got to give this a test. It used to fire about 8-10 shots in each small burst. It is plainly embarrassing if this is the case.

[KittyDarkling]

    I agree with giving both of these weapons quite a status chance buff. Even if Wyrm was an an aggressive sentinel, today isn't it more of a CC sentinel? where Dethcube is the aggressive kill stuff one?

 

    I think laser rifle should reflect the CC-ness of Wyrim so it becomes a more viable option then Deth machine gun, it should proc at least 3x as often as the Deth Machinegun or else there wont be much appeal to it.

 

    The burst laser pistol should show up the new and improved laser rifle at the sacrifice of -any- real damage output, potenialy stunlocking an enemy at a time if modded fully/properly. Also it needs to be silent! This is a stealth sentinel after all.

[Felandi]

    I agree with giving both of these weapons quite a status chance buff. Even if Wyrm was an an aggressive sentinel, today isn't it more of a CC sentinel? where Dethcube is the aggressive kill stuff one?

 

    I think laser rifle should reflect the CC-ness of Wyrim so it becomes a more viable option then Deth machine gun, it should proc at least 3x as often as the Deth Machinegun or else there wont be much appeal to it.

 

    The burst laser pistol should show up the new and improved laser rifle at the sacrifice of -any- real damage output, potenialy stunlocking an enemy at a time if modded fully/properly. Also it needs to be silent! This is a stealth sentinel after all.

 

While I personally prefer base damage, this line of thinking is entierly valid. A good view upon utility and crowd control. It is true that no current sentinel weapon has this in that capacity.

Just bear in mind, that a high status chance upon a sentinel weapon allows for sneaky effects, such as sticking viral upon it. Making enemy health trivial in many situations.

[Cortanis]

So DE Steve put out that post today and one of the things listed was rebalanceing grossly unbalanced weapons. I'm kind of hopeing this includes the rifle and pistol. If they don't, then I'm thinking it's really just time to sell both of them since they're pretty useless in their current states. Oddly, he also lists that the damage model for u11 is still being worked on. We may see them get a new life through that too.

[Felandi]

Well, naturally damage 2.0 is still being worked on. That is plainly obvious when you play the game. I like damage 2.0, but it clearly needs some polishing. Be it weapon damage and status chance to reflect the new environment, or simply tweaking the damage resistance and weaknesses of the enemies. =)

[Cortanis]

Yeah, but we're talking what appears to be major reworks almost in line with redoing the entire thing. Essentually, we're talking D2.5 or something of that sort. It's been rather clear that they nerfed a lot of guns into the ground with the D2.0 update now they're working on corrective surgery to the max. God I hope sentinel weapons get this sooooooooooo bad.

[Felandi]

I have given the burst pistol a test, placed it upon my worm and noted how it was attacking enemies. It indeed seems to fire a SINGLE bullet every two to three second. My instinct tells me this might be a simple display hug. Remember how the visibility of projectiles were changed for rifles and shotgun, especially if multi-shotted?

 

Either it is a visibility thing related to this change, or it is just plainly a bug that causes the burst pistol to fire 1 shot.

Edited December 6, 2013 by Felandi

[Felandi]

With patch 11.3.0 and it's hotfixes out, it is a good time to resume the look and voice desire to have these two, currently near-useless weapons altered up to the same tier as the other three sentinel weapons. That are all useful in their own way, simply based on your preference for weapon type.

 

What say ye, Tenno? The current elemental tweaks may seem bleak, but optimization will eventually occur. Hopefully for even our sentinel friends.

[PlebbyMilliner]

I did the same. I've recently recolored the frames, forma'd a few and kind of "reset" things to experiment with the new Damage system.

 

In short:

- The Burst Laser Pistol doesn't appear to fire in bursts. At no time on a defense mission did it appear to proc or kill anything. The only thing it's good for at this point is apply certain mod stats (cold, etc.)

- Gunslinger Fire Rate mod appeared to do very little to speed up the firing.

 

- The Laser Rifle does indeed fire in a long burst. It's more like a mag dump, then reload type of shooting. But the rifle does so little damage (~6 puncture with a lot of mods) that it's again, only useful to apply certain mod effects.

 

 

Going back to a time where the weapon was part of the sentinel (and not swappable) we need to look at these again. This is to make them useful, but also fit the theme of the sentinel they come with.

 

Shade's firing precept is called Revenge. It will only attack the target that attacks the owner. Shade is also a Stealth sentinel, until someone starts shooting at you. Something like a railgun, mini-rocket, or a "flak burst" would fit. Have it stun, electrify, etc. as a means to escape. It doesn't fire very often, but when it does, it packs a big punch.

A possible alternative would be a long-burst firing Grakata (maybe with a little but less damage). Somewhat like a suppressed subgun? How about a shorter firing Spectra (i.e. "Cutting Laser")

 

Wyrm's precept is Warrior. It's a close quarters crowd control type of sentinel. Pulsing Flamethrower (might get very messy graphically)? Mini-grenade launcher? Something AOE based DPS would work wonders. Leave off the stun since Crowd Disperse does that already.

[Lad_of_the_Lake]

I say give Wyrm either mini Penta's that fire every 3 or 4 seconds (maybe 35 dmg per with good AoE) or a Spectra beam that fires for 4 seconds, stops for 4, then fires again. It matches its style of a supporting offensive sentinel.

 

For Shade, I think the Toxic Darts of the Djinn would go better with it, as the only other silent alternative would be a throwing knife and sentinels don't really have arms so maybe a knife launcher? Idk sounds pretty cheesy but it could work.

 

Or give Shade the Stingers and have Djinn carry a mini-embolist that synergizes with Fatal Attraction, kind of like the Vortex/Ignis combo.