Fellas, are primary snipers bad, dumb, and useless? :p

[Sziklamester]

The sniper sway should go. The damage is not bad but need a little bit more and snipers should be more accurate and deal more crit damage overall to consider them useful. Vulkar with the zoom can reach a very good crit damage but the base damage on snipers not better than shotties and sniper should do their job well since these are not assault rifles so not group killers. Also should be silent weapons or option to make the silent without a mod. That is just annoying these weapons cannot be used for stealh affinity farm because always a group near and hear what you did.

Puncthrough also need to them to be better but othewise they don't need too much touch to be useful.

[-.Vergil.-]

Basically, most players just like OverPowered and Area Damage Weapons. We had few months ago Tonkors everywhere (before self damage), now we have a lot of Simulors. Only few weapons still was and is used by players (like Soma for example).

My personal choice? Melee at first (mainly Nikana Prime), but I also love Rapid Fire & Fast Reload AkLex Prime and Vectis.

Vectis is the best (or at least one of the best) sniper rifle in game. Huge damage, easy to build and there's one secret glitch to increase reload speed / fire rate without any mods. :) Vectis is just a hand cannon - big gun with big damage for big boys against big guys. :V

Basically there's one problem with sniper rifles. As long range support weapon they aren't that much good in close combat (as you should know, we're mostly fight in rooms, but they can be good if you learn how to use them) and for sure they aren't a good crowd control weapons. But with PoE, this will change a lot - range support will be useful there.

[Warlord1400]

Snipers are easily one of the worst weapons classes. They are outclassed by bows, even. All I want is..

1. Innate punch-through

2. More crit chance/damage, base damage, and status

3. Don't lose combo counter on missed shots

4. Reload speed & ammo economy

With these things, even just a little bit of it(10%), snipers will go from cult following to popular monsters. I won't deny the effectiveness of snipers right now, but the gap in quality is way too big to ignore.

[helghastgunner]

3 hours ago, Fallen_Echo said:

Yeah and i forgot reload too.

Reload: 1s

Status chance: 30%

High mag snipers:

Reload: 2s

 

This could surely bring some appreciation to most snipers.

The lanka could get a unique treatment where you overcharge the barrel with extra 10 ammo to create a hitscan long-range thunder strike (x5 damage) with a small guaranteed electric proccing aoe of 2m and with this added im sure sniper would finally leave those dusty fodder shelves.

Sounds good

Interesting idea for Lanka as well

[DatDarkOne]

As a lover of both bows and snipers, I can't help but to like this suggestion below.  It fixed most of the issues with all snipers in general especially in regards to bows.  Even though I love my snipers as well, they are really outshined in their own class by the Daikyu.  

On ‎9‎/‎25‎/‎2017 at 8:48 AM, Azamagon said:

*cracks knuckles*

Let's look at this properly

Bows' advantages, when compared to Sniper Rifles:

• Silent
• Reliable critical hits (massively important for HvT-focused weaponry)
• Body ragdoll (can kill multiple enemies in a line)
• Innate punchthrough on fully charged shots
• Quick reload (Vectis series is comparably good though)
• No scope, thus also low zoom and no visual obstruction, well suited for most combat ranges of Warframe
• No aiming sway
• No reduced hipfire accuracy
• While they have chargetimes, they are fast, and benefit doubly from RoF mods

Bows' disadvantages, when compared to Sniper Rifles:

• Arcing projectiles
• Have to reload between each shot
• No "combo" damage
• No "scope" bonus
• No zoom, thus ill suited for long range combat
• Need to charge shots for optimal performance (even if the chargetimes are generally quick)

Sniper Rifles' advantages, when compared to Bows:

• Hitscan (exception for Lanka, but it's plenty fast anyway)
• Have multiple shots available before requiring a reload (Base Vectis as an exception)
• Can build up higher damage via their "combo" mechanic (although the window for this is VERY brief, and is crippled by very lengthy reloads)
• Have some bonuses for aiming (only really noticeable effects on Lanka and Rubico though)
• Scopes allow for longrange shots at variable distances (though only a small advantage, and is crippled by aimsway anyway)
• No chargetimes (Lanka as exception)

Sniper Rifles' disadvantages, when compared to Bows:

• Alarming sound
• Unreliable critical hits (This means you can end up requiring ~5 bullets to kill ONE HvT target, instead of just 1 bullet, thus occassionally removing their magazine advantage...)
• No body ragdoll
• Innate punchthrough only on 2 weapon series (Snipetron and Lanka)
• Long reloads (Vectis and arguably Lanka as exceptions, however, the Vectis weapons have tiny magazine sizes and the Lanka has to charge its shots)
• Scopes, thus poorly suited for shortrange combat
• Aiming sway
• Reduced hipfire accuracy

 

So yeah, if you look at the overall picture, Snipers are downright HORRIBLE weapons due to having very severe disadvantages and having mostly weak advantages. Not to mention, many of their advantages are severely crippled by their disadvantages anyway (and thus rendered somewhat moot). A great example would be their long range zoom capabilities (a weak advantage) countered by their aim sway (a really crippling disadvantages).

Thus, with those things in mind, this is what I'd propose as buffs and changes for Snipers:

• Reliable critchances with Point Strike alone, i.e. base 40+% crit chance (at least for all the "upgrade" variants, like Primes/Wraiths etc)
• Innate punchthrough on all Snipers (even if just a tiny bit)
• Shortened reloads (I mean, they have small magazines anyway, no need to doubledip in their disadvantages)
• Scopesway removed
• Hipfire accuracy made near perfect again
• Scopebonuses removed (to compensate for the other buffs)
• Combomechanic removed (to further compensate for the other buffs)

Now, with these changes, how would Bows and Snipers compare?

Bows' advantages, when compared to Sniper Rifles:

• Silent
• Body ragdoll (can kill multiple enemies in a line)
• Quick reload (Vectis series is comparably good though)
• No scope, thus also low zoom and no visual obstruction, well suited for most combat ranges of Warframe
• While they have chargetimes, they are fast, and benefit doubly from RoF mods

Bows' disadvantages, when compared to Sniper Rifles:

• Arcing projectile
• Have to reload between each shot
• No zoom, thus ill suited for long range combat
• Need to charge shots for optimal performance (even if the chargetimes are generally quick)

Sniper Rifles' advantages, when compared to Bows:

• Hitscan (exception for Lanka, but it's plenty fast anyway)
• Have multiple shots available before requiring a reload (Base Vectis as an exception)
• Scopes allow for longrange shots at variable distances (though only a small advantage)
• No chargetimes (Lanka as exception)

Sniper Rifles' disadvantages, when compared to Bows:

• Alarming sound
• No body ragdoll
• Mediumlong reloads
• Scopes, thus poorly suited for shortrange combat

For numerical examples, look here: https://forums.warframe.com/topic/790295-some-love-for-the-semiauto-rifles-and-snipers/

NOW they would look more fair to compare, don't you agreed?
Bows would remain better suited for stealth and smaller areas (more "agile", so to speak), while Snipers would definitely be better for medium+long distances and have quicker follow-up shots before their reload kicks in.

 

[JayKallis02]

This is a horde type game and maps are a bit too tightly packed for the snipers to be effective. Aoe weps are faster and more efficient...though i hope to see more snipers after poe is released.

[(PSN)Chel-El]

 

[Belligerent_Engine]

My Tigris Prime doesn't feel bad, dumb and useless...

[nickelshark]

The proposed changes they are looking to bring to snipers look pretty promising.