Planetside 2 Catch-All

Reddit seems to be blowing up about the cert refunds from SC bought duplicate weapons, so if you bought something for 700SC you got 1400 certs. Suddenly there's thousands or tens of thousands of certs out there for some people. I wonder why they couldn't refund them back like for like, so there would be a load of SC instead.

I received ~1000 or so, but I don't remember buying any duplicate items. Some users received upwards of 25k+ certs. There are a lot of upset people on the forums who are basically saying they made the game pay to win in a round about way. The game didn't seem more play to win tonight when I played. Skill and platoon coordination still give a larger advantage than a few thousand certs.

Mattherson has been a blast since the merge. On Monday the TR used an early morning event on Amerish to ghost cap Indar. After trying to remove the cap separately the NC/VS teamed up (an informal truce that was largely honored) and forced all the TR into Copper Ravine. As the point was about to to cap and remove the lock, the hex crashed (or someone crashed the hex). Everyone in the hex (90% of the continent) was disconnected.

By the time people could relog the TR had pushed to Scarred Mesa held the point for a long time against a combined NC and VS force. Eventually they lost the continent cap. Then the VS made a sucessful play for Indar, managing to keep both the NC and TR contained during another event on Amerish. So we'll see if the NC and TR team up tomorrow to remove our cap.

Bought the new shotgun with my refund certs. Seems as effective as the Phobos pre-nerf, which is going to make a lot of people rage. It's a max killing machine if you can get in close, since the maxes can't hit you up close.

I could see with that amount of certs you could easily afford a *lot* of weapon attachments and ability unlock/ranks. While it wouldn't make or break, I think it will give you an edge. I'm just wondering if there's some Sony rule that SC spent within a certain game has to stay within that game, if it was all converted back to SC then someone could move it elsewhere.

Boooo!

I got no free certs! (Not that I expected any).

I have to admit, I'm very surprised about the refund as certs... Seems like it's setting a bad precedent. The numbers of certs people have received seem to have broken the "cert" economy.

Like Scratched, they really need to explain why they couldn't refund as SC...

Yea so I've played casual since beta and collected 6700 certs. I spent $15-$20 on overlapping items between my vanu and NC character due to 3x and 4x sales. This resulted in me receiving 12k free certs on both characters. So I almost got double the number I've gathered playing as my time allows. I was...suprised.

The biggest issue I see is that it appears all characters on an account got this refund. I'm wondering if I had a bunch of level 1 alts created prior to this if they all would have ended up with free certs too despite not buying items with them. There's a lot of brand new characters on the leaderboard now with 5k+ certs.

Hockosi wrote:

Yea so I've played casual since beta and collected 6700 certs. I spent $15-$20 on overlapping items between my vanu and NC character due to 3x and 4x sales. This resulted in me receiving 12k free certs on both characters. So I almost got double the number I've gathered playing as my time allows. I was...suprised.

The biggest issue I see is that it appears all characters on an account got this refund. I'm wondering if I had a bunch of level 1 alts created prior to this if they all would have ended up with free certs too despite not buying items with them. There's a lot of brand new characters on the leaderboard now with 5k+ certs.

Sweet jesus...

It's hard to see how they can try to fix this without inflating the hell out of the 'cert economy' (give everyone a gift, a boost for a time, etc), and if you're going to do a rollback you need to have a better suggestion for the refunds. In the big scheme of things, chances are the amount of people affected by this gift is low as a proportion of players, so I'd have to say I think the overall best idea is to just go with it.

As a player who only ever used one character on one server, and with PS2 being the first F2P game that prised money from my wallet I'm feeling a bit miffed, but it was something the had to do something with.

I would rather have seen an accountwide SC & cert refund and reset all items to unbought. The only tricky part would be making sure that people were awarded extra SC to make up the difference for items bought during sales.

They pretty much said it's final now: http://forums.station.sony.com/ps2/i...

There weren't any mistakes made in how they did refunds (no one got more certs than they should) and it's only a really small proportion of the playerbase.

That's that I guess.

Scratched wrote:

They pretty much said it's final now: http://forums.station.sony.com/ps2/i...

There weren't any mistakes made in how they did refunds (no one got more certs than they should) and it's only a really small proportion of the playerbase.

That's that I guess.

That's fine, but why did it have to be certs? That's the overriding question in my mind...

AP Erebus wrote:

That's fine, but why did it have to be certs? That's the overriding question in my mind...

It couldn't have been anything else, from a business perspective. If there's one thing we've learned from the cable/telecom companies (spit), you never ever ever EVER refund money, ever. You always "give" a coupon/discount/incentive to buy more product. So according to The Rules, you can't refund money, that's right out; you can't give Station Cash, since that's money-equivalent. Certs are the only thing that have no direct equivalent in cold, hard, revenue stream. It's the only thing that doesn't cost them a dime, or potential-dime.

AP Erebus wrote:

That's fine, but why did it have to be certs? That's the overriding question in my mind...

Ferengi Rules of Acquisition #1: Once you have their money ... never give it back.

LtWarhound wrote:
AP Erebus wrote:

That's fine, but why did it have to be certs? That's the overriding question in my mind...

Ferengi Rules of Acquisition #1: Once you have their money ... never give it back.

But they can't cash out those SC for money... I dunno, just seems weird to me.

Not sure when it happened but the Viper (default Lightning cannon) seems to have gotten a buff at some point. It now takes out infantry in a single hit and a MAX in a couple hits, which is actually pretty good since you get 6 shots. It's like a Fury grenade launcher with more ammo and better damage against vehicles.

Tried out the new "high damage" pump action shottie in VR today and did some testing. While everything comes down to personal preference, I wouldn't recommend buying it over the existing pump for a couple reasons.

The regular pump fires 10 pellets and the new version shoots 11. The default seems to be superior in most respects with a better firing rate and shot spread. Against infantry you probably won't tell the difference, firing 11 pellets instead of 10 means you can miss the target with one extra pellet and still one-shot infantry at close range. But a better firing rate would allow you to simply shoot twice and the higher spread makes you more likely to miss in the first place. Against a MAX the default shottie will almost but not quite take them out in 7 shots, leaving them with a tiny sliver of health. The higher damage shottie will take them out in 7 shots. But both of these tests assume that ALL the pellets hit, and only in the chest. Head damage applies a 1.5x modifier to shotguns so that may make up the difference. When firing all 7 shots the lower rate of fire is pretty harsh, so again the default comes out ahead.

Also discovered something handy about lock on A2A missiles. They changed the trigger mechanics so that you can simply hold down the button and the rocket will fire the instant the lockon finishes. I used to click madly to get the shot off as quickly as possible but now you no longer need to. This also works with the Annihilator and Striker, but not with the anti-ground and anti-air lockon rocket launchers. This is because those launchers can be dumb-fired, so clicking before you have a green lock would waste the shot most of the time.

Speaking of A2A missiles, I recently unlocked them for my Scythe, and I have been pretty underwhelmed with the damage they've been doing against enemies. Even with the turbo laser A2A primary weapon, I still had trouble taking out enemies before they could get away or before they could lure me back into enemy territory. Yesterday I picked up dual photon pods and the PPA, and I was killing all sorts of sh*t with them. I only had some difficulty with mosquitos and reavers, but not much more than I was having with my A2A loadout.

EriktheRed wrote:

Speaking of A2A missiles, I recently unlocked them for my Scythe, and I have been pretty underwhelmed with the damage they've been doing against enemies. Even with the turbo laser A2A primary weapon, I still had trouble taking out enemies before they could get away or before they could lure me back into enemy territory. Yesterday I picked up dual photon pods and the PPA, and I was killing all sorts of sh*t with them. I only had some difficulty with mosquitos and reavers, but not much more than I was having with my A2A loadout.

The A2A missiles are really only good for taking out the ESF fighters. Then they do a LOT of damage (~50%). They are also almost impossible to avoid, which makes them handy for a lock then fire and run strategy.

AP Erebus wrote:
EriktheRed wrote:

Speaking of A2A missiles, I recently unlocked them for my Scythe, and I have been pretty underwhelmed with the damage they've been doing against enemies. Even with the turbo laser A2A primary weapon, I still had trouble taking out enemies before they could get away or before they could lure me back into enemy territory. Yesterday I picked up dual photon pods and the PPA, and I was killing all sorts of sh*t with them. I only had some difficulty with mosquitos and reavers, but not much more than I was having with my A2A loadout.

The A2A missiles are really only good for taking out the ESF fighters. Then they do a LOT of damage (~50%). They are also almost impossible to avoid, which makes them handy for a lock then fire and run strategy.

I feel like I hardly ever get kills when I use them against ESFs. Maybe I'll give them another go later.

I love going on a good run and feeling like I actually contributed to the result of a specific defense, like today at Dahaka?. I got in my scythe, nailed a vanguard from behind, killed myself in the process. Got in a Magrider, helped destroy a Lightning, repaired, shot some invaders in the courtyard, helped destroy a Vanguard I think, destroyed a deployed sundy at the cost of my Magrider, all without a gunner.
I do love fighting the NC in the NW Indar desert at night, although they do deploy a lot of flak.
Maybe the devs intended it, but I would prefer to use Vehicle Stealth instead of Composite Armor, but going after ground targets necessitates flak protection.
It would also be very helpful if enemies would render before I fly over them.

AP Erebus wrote:
EriktheRed wrote:

Speaking of A2A missiles, I recently unlocked them for my Scythe, and I have been pretty underwhelmed with the damage they've been doing against enemies. Even with the turbo laser A2A primary weapon, I still had trouble taking out enemies before they could get away or before they could lure me back into enemy territory. Yesterday I picked up dual photon pods and the PPA, and I was killing all sorts of sh*t with them. I only had some difficulty with mosquitos and reavers, but not much more than I was having with my A2A loadout.

The A2A missiles are really only good for taking out the ESF fighters. Then they do a LOT of damage (~50%). They are also almost impossible to avoid, which makes them handy for a lock then fire and run strategy.

Here are some tips.

Primary Weapons:
- Saron Laser: The general purpose weapon, it's actually pretty good though the other two empire equivalents are arguably better. One benefit it has over them is lack of projectile drop. You can use this to harass vehicles and large aircraft from VERY far away. It's not very good for dogfighting ESFs because the low firing rate makes it hard to land enough hits. It's not half bad at attacking infantry either.
- Hailstorm: The rotary cannon holds less rounds but fires much faster in a wide cone. Each round does a bit more damage than the Saron. Good for dogfighting, but surprisingly good at attacking other targets too. The wider spread creates a shotgun effect against infantry and the high DPS makes for a good backstab against tanks. I once snuck up on a pair of vanguards and destroyed them by firing into their rear armour through a tree. The downside is a vastly smaller ammo capacity compared to the Saron.
- PPA: The beach ball cannon is fun to use but a very specialized weapon. Each "orb" does about the same damage as three hits from a Saron, and the gun fires quite slowly. It's main use is for strafing pesky infantry because the splash damage makes it much easier to hit them. Direct hits are especially deadly, you only need a handful to take down a MAX and infantry will go down in 2. Damage against vehicles is negligible though tank rear armour remains vulnerable. When upgraded the cannon has a ludicrously high magazine capacity which offers good staying power. Ever since the ESF bullet nerf it's the only ESF weapon capable of destroying a Phalanx turret without reloading. The total ammo capacity remains fairly low to balance out the higher per-shot damage. You CAN use these for dogfighting but the lack of projectile inheritance makes it hard to chase targets, a mossie on afterburners can actually outrun the shots.

Cannon Upgrades:
- Zoom optics can be useful, but a bunch of patches ago they changed the game so that your vehicle pitch sensitivity was lessened while in scope. This makes it a little easier to make fine adjustments, but impossible to dogfight with zoom active. Hence the only one I use nowadays is a high magnification for the Saron which makes it easier to attack targets from far away.
- You also have the option of getting IR or thermal optics. IR is highly useful because it highlights all valid targets and makes it much easier to see at night. However it does have some limitations, aircraft IR was heavily nerfed and now has a short range. It also lights up everything including the terrain and objects like trees, infantry can be lost in the ground cover quite easily.
- Thermal works like IR but ignores terrain. This gives it higher contrast when looking for targets, but it also has an even shorter range. You might prefer this but try it out in VR first because it's quite expensive.
- Cannons can choose between a reload speed upgrade and a magazine capacity upgrade. Magazine upgrades are definitely the way to go, reload less often > reload faster. Increasing your capacity also GREATLY increases the DPS of the rotary cannon, a fully upgraded rotary can destroy an ESF in a single burst.

Secondary Weapons:
- Photon Rockets: Rockets are a great general purpose weapon. You can use them to destroy ground targets with ease and they perform fairly well against air targets as well. The Vanu version fires 14 rockets in pairs, this makes the damage a bit more "chunky" and makes it harder to lead a target. No tank can survive more than 4 shots in the back, and most can't survive all 7 shots to the side or top armour, so avoid attacking from the front as much as possible. Rockets do great against infantry but the amount of shots required will increase dramatically with distance. MAXs are especially resistant to splash damage and you need direct hits to threaten them. Always try to get as close as possible before firing, but the closer you get the faster you should be going to remain safe. It's possible to dogfight with these at very close range even though the damage isn't as high as you might expect, but it still beats your cannon if you don't have a rotary. They make for a good first strike if your target is unaware and flying straight.

- Photon A2A: Air to air missiles are great for dogfighting but they do have limitations. Up close it can be very difficult to get a lock so you should use your missiles as an opening shot to start a fight, or to chase down a fleeing enemy. It takes 3 hits to down an ESF or 9 hits for a libby, but you shouldn't rely on the missiles alone. Missiles have a maximum lockon distance of 400m, but you should hit afterburners and get as close as possible before firing. It's not impossible to outrun the missiles or steer them into terrain. Amusingly they can lock onto drop pods.

- Afterburner Fuel Tanks: Everyone starts with these and all they do is increase your afterburner fuel by 80%. They are not especially useful because they don't seem to increase your fuel regeneration at all. The added fuel is still not enough to entirely disengage from a fight, especially if your opponent has missiles, but can be handy for hit and run attacks and escaping to friendly airspace.

Missile Upgrades:
- Photon rockets only get an increase in reloading speed. Since the reload time is considerable this upgrade is very good, but expensive.
- A2A missiles can pick from reload speed, lockon distance, and lockon speed. Increased distance allows you to lockon from 450m instead of 400. This isn't helpful against ESFs because they can easily escape the missile at that range. It can be useful to engage liberators or galaxies beyond the range of their defensive guns. Lockon speed is the best upgrade in my opinion because getting a lock can be very difficult and anything to make that easier trumps the other upgrades. It takes 3 seconds to lock onto an ESF and 1.5 to lock onto a libby or galaxy with stealth adding up to 1 more second. At max rank you can reduce this time by 20%.

I'll follow up later with some tips and tricks.

Thanks for that post, I'm waiting for an ESF daily deal to get some secondary for my scythe, so I've been wondering where to put my SC.

I will say that the best pilots I know use afterburners with an upgraded front gun. The added fuel with racer(3) will let you escape all but the best pilots if you find yourself losing. Good pilots will avoid A2A easily. The ability to close distance quickly and unload a full shot (max mag capacity) into an enemy esf is very valuable. Libs go down in three mags to an upgraded secondary.

You guys fly mosquitos right? Each of the ESFs handles a bit differently, though I'm only familiar with the Scythe. I forget the exact traits but I think it went something like:

Mossie: Top speed and top afterburner speed
Reaver: Vertical thrust and afterburner acceleration
Scythe: Airbrakes and hover power

Continuing on with the tips.

Scythe Upgrades:
- Scout Radar: Radar allows you to spot things on the minimap within a certain radius. Normally things only show up if they make noise by shooting, or they get really close to you. Radar is really handy in a sort of AWACS capacity because you can hover over an infantry fight and spot everything for your teammates, even cloakers. However it requires you to give up flares which can make survival problematic. It's best put to use searching for scattered infantry lurking around your territory backcapping things.
- Decoy Flares: Flares block enemy lockon attempts for 5 seconds and also negate any missiles that are already tracking you. Highly useful for obvious reasons. When facing enemy ESFs flares only buy you time. If you pop flares you should immediately attempt to escape to friendly skies or turn around and fight. Otherwise they will just delay 5 seconds and keep shooting. For best results pop them right after a solid lock warning.
- Fire suppression: When a vehicle or aircraft gets reduced to very low health (about 10-15%) the vehicle will start to burn and the engine will operate at reduced power. The reduced thrust makes emergency landings problematic, you tend to bottom out and hit the ground a little too hard. Fire suppression puts out the flames and also regenerates your vehicle up to about 30% health. This upgrade is very useful because it essentially gives your ESF more total health, and it's dirt cheap in terms of certs. Against flak turrets and MAXs this upgrade helps a lot where flares have no effect. If you are just starting out with any vehicle drop 30 certs and get one rank of this.
- Ejection Seat: This seat makes it much easier to bail out. It basically works like bailing out of a Galaxy. You will fall straight down and not inherit any of your vehicles momentum. Fall damage is also eliminated completely. It can be handy if you plan to use your ESF as a taxi, but for the most part it's not worth giving up flares.

One problem with this system is that there is no warning that tells you your vehicle is on fire, an alarm will sound when you get to low health but doesn't exactly match the critical point. The only foolproof way of checking for fire is to switch to the third person cam. If you pop the suppressor too early it has no effect.

- Composite Armour: At max rank composite plating will give you a 30% reduction against flak damage and 10% against infantry bullet weapons. This makes you MUCH harder for phalanx turrets and MAXs to shoot you down. With composite on a dual burster MAX wouldn't be able to destroy you even if all of his shots hit. Highly useful.
- Vehicle Stealth: Stealth prevents you from showing up on radar and also increased missile lockon times by .25-1 second. In my experience the stealth isn't as great as it sounds because anyone can just look up in the sky and see you long before you get close enough to even show up on the minimap to begin with. ESFs also make quite a bit of noise, especially with burners on. Being able to fight another aircraft without the enemy knowing your exact location is probably the best use for it. The lockon time bonus is also great against aircraft or infantry because it can increase the timer to 4 seconds. When you add time spent reloading the total "damage cycle" becomes almost 10 seconds and greatly reduces the effectiveness of the missiles.
- Nanite Auto Repair: Nanite repair was recently buffed and is now very powerful, I use it on all my vehicles. It allows your vehicle to regenerate health over time which is a HUGE advantage. The regeneration is fairly slow but ESFs tend to have a lot of downtime between fights anyhow. It makes you almost impossible to kill through attrition because minor damage will no longer add up. You no longer have to land and get out to fix every little ding and scratch. This also makes it possible to pilot a vehicle as something other than an engineer.

- Dogfighting Frame: This frame increases your roll speed and rudder power. The stronger rudder allows you to use it when leading a target laterally instead of rolling on your side and using pitch alone. The roll speed increase is significant as well, you can use it to tilt back and forth 180 degrees and fly in a serpentine curve. Stock fighters won't be able to keep up.
- Hover Stability Frame: Hover stability increases your vertical thrust, airbrake and hover power. Vertical thrust and brakes are pretty straightforward, it makes it MUCH MUCH easier to land your ESF. Hover power decreases your "fall" speed which allows you to linger over a ground target for longer without drifting into the ground. Something it doesn't mention is that it also makes it much easier for your ESF to gain altitude in a climb.
- Racer Frame: At rank 3 this upgrade increases your engine and afterburner speed by 20kph. Useful for getting around the map and into/out of fights. Upgraded afterburners will allow you to outrun most lockon missiles.

Other misc quirks I have noticed:
- Scythes do not have any landing gear which is a blessing and a curse. It's by far the easiest ESF to land safely because if you manage to pancake onto the ground flat and level you can avoid damage most of the time. But without landing struts it tends to drift around in whatever direction the fighter is tilted, so try to keep the fighter level before jumping out. Engine fires greatly weaken the "hover cushion" so watch out for that.
- Scythes are by far the best at running people over. People standing at cliff edges are my favourite but it's also possible to swipe people people off of tower landing pads. Mossies are too cigar shaped to to it well.
- Because they don't have landing gear it's actually possible to bellyslide a scythe across flat ground. Most dirt roads will work, and Amerish has a lot of frozen water which is perfect for this. You will take damage from any minor bumps (and instantly die if you hit something bigger), but it's a great way of sneaking up on people. You can even steer like a toboggan by digging your wings into the ground on either side!
- Scythes have the best default hover power. As long as it doesn't tilt too much a Scythe can't actually fall fast enough to damage itself. Sometimes I land on a tower and come back to find my Scythe just chilling on the ground, having slipped off the landing pad.
- Sunderers have equal armour protection on all sides, unless they have blockade armour in which case the rear armour is slightly better. (to make it easier to flee presumably). So go ahead and attack them from any angle.
- The best direction to attack infantry and MAXs on the ground is straight down. Direct hits are very hard to get, and splash damage has some pretty harsh falloff. The closer to vertical you fire your rockets the less likely it is that they will fly past and hit the ground behind your target.
- If you ram the very very tip of a Liberator's wing or tail you can send them spinning out of control.
- An ESF ramming a libby or galaxy will be destroyed. Galaxies can run over either of them for negligible damage.
- Mosquitos have this annoying built in missile protection. Because they are so long and thin A2A missiles have an annoying tendency to miss them by inches and then orbit around them horizontally like a moon. It usually recovers and hits them eventually but it can give them more time to pop flares.
- Scythes are the only (stock?) aircraft that can fly upside down without losing altitude.

I need to try this.

Terrain hugging masterclass. Also this is why fire suppression is useful.

Reavers are actually pretty good at ramming infantry because their lower wings form a bit of a cowcatcher. Scythes are still a little wider, but since the wings are level with the cockpit it's harder to judge how low you need to fly.. Mossies are too cigar shaped to do this well.

The jump out-jump back in your ESF trick is actually not that hard to pull off. It works because when you exit an ESF you always appear on the left side. I've seen videos of people doing this by accident but the guy in the video above figured out how to do it on purpose. You need three things.

1. Dogfighting airframe or just a stock ESF with no frame. This doesn't work with hover power or racer because they seem to unbalance the ESF.
2. A key bound to "roll right"
3. An "exit aircraft" key that isn't E

This doesn't work with the ejection seat for obvious reasons, so what you do is:

1. Fly straight and level. You can also pitch upwards up to 40 degrees. This doesn't work if you pitch down at all.
2. A speed of 100-200kph seems to work. Afterburners do NOT work because you will retain the afterburner inertia while your ESF will immediately slow down the instant you jump out.
3. As you fly hit the button for Roll Right, this will cause your ESF to perform a perfect aileron roll. At the exact moment when your ESF is tilted 90 degrees to the right hit the eject.

What SHOULD happen is you will fly through the air with your ESF performing two rolls underneath you before gravity catches up and you drift close enough to get back in. (don't expect it to work every time!) Spam your E key madly or you might miss the split second window of opportunity. This is why you rebind your exit key, you don't want to enter with E and immediately eject again. You have about 4-5 seconds of hang time before you collide with or fall past your ESF.

This is easiest to do with a mosquito or scythe because you can jump out at 200kph and the ESF will perform exactly 2 complete rolls before you land right on top of the cockpit and get back in. With a reaver at 200kph it will reach 1.75 rolls and then you will clip the right wingtip as it rotates around, resulting in death, being bumped away by the wing, destruction of the fighter or any combination thereof. It's possible to avoid this by flying at a lower speed but it's harder to set up, especially during combat.

Game Update 07 happened today. Lots of AWESOME changes! No doubt bringing with it dozens and dozens of new bugs! And my performance is almost certainly back in the dumps again.

Full notes, will skip the trimming this time because it's all pretty relevant.

New in the Depot

NS-44 Commissioner - The awe-inspiring stopping power of the accurate NS-44 Commissioner revolver can put down even mid-range targets with a few well placed shots. Cowboy up and grab one today!
NS-357 Underboss - Chambered for the powerful .357 magnum cartridge, the snub-nosed Underboss revolver features a faster rate of fire and more controllable recoil than its bigger NS-44 brother. The only question left is did you fire five shots or six?
Both of these new pistols have statistically identical black and gold tinted versions available in the Depot.
New Helmets for Heavy Assault and MAX:
New Conglomerate: GD Titan 113 Helmet
Terran Republic: Bravo MHS Helmet
Vanu Sovereignty: Protos Helmet

New Features:

New Weapon Stats are now available! Damage Range, Reload time, and every thing else you need to know about your weapons is now at your fingertips.
Want to see how that Desert Scrub will look on your Sunderer or Character? Now you can with our preview feature!

Infantry Updates

Active Heavy Assault Shields and flak armor will no longer stack.
Jump Jet audio has been increased in volume.
Grenades are now thrown directly at the aim point. The arc has been slightly modified to work with this change.
Tanks mines have been increased in size.
Removed the forced weapon swap after deploying an object.
Lock-on rocket launchers can no longer lock on to turrets.
The repair tool targeting now functions similar to the heal tool.
All extra VS damage scaling at range has been removed. VS minimum damage now matches the damage scaling of the other two factions.
VS Semi-automatic sniper rifles are an exception to the above. The details for these weapons are listed below
Healing an ally damaged by friendly fire will no longer grant XP

Weapon Specific Changes:

Battle rifles will now more consistently recoil to the right.
Added the High Velocity Ammunition attachment.

TR M3 Pounder HEG
Magazine Size: 2 changed to 4
Projectile Speed: 70 m/s changed to 100 m/s
Projectile Gravity: 2 changed to 10
Direct Damage: 375 changed to 325
Short Reload: 1.25 seconds changed to 1.75 seconds
Long Reload: 1.5 seconds changed to 2 seconds

TR MRC3 Mercy
Projectile Velocity: 450 m/s changed to 550 m/s
Max Damage: 143 changed to 125
Short Reload Time: 2.4 seconds changed to 2.6 Seconds

TR M6 Onslaught
Rounds Per Minute: 475 changed to 490
Short Reload Time: 2.4 seconds changed to 2.2 Seconds
Long Reload Time: 3.0 seconds changed to 2.8 Seconds
Minimum Damage: 112 changed to 100
Minimum Damage Range: 65 meters changed to 50 meters
Projectile Velocity: 450 m/s changed to 440 m/s

VS Beamer VS3
Short Reload: 1.7 seconds changed to 1.45 seconds
Long Reload: 2.0 seconds changed to 1.75 seconds
Aimed Accuracy: 0.4 degrees changed to 0.3 degrees

VS Manticore SX40
Aimed Accuracy: 0.4 degrees changed to 0.3 degrees

NC Warden, TR AMR-66, Eidolon VE33
Vertical Recoil: 1.0 changed to 0.6
Horizontal Recoil: 0.25 min, 0.35 max changed to 0.18 min, 0.22 max
Recoil Recovery: 5 degrees per second changed to 15 degrees per second
Aimed accuracy loss per shot: 0.125 changed to 0.1
Hip accuracy loss per shot: 0.25 changed to 0.2
Equip Time: 0.5 seconds changed to 0.85 seconds
Short Reload: 2.3 seconds changed to 2.5 seconds
Long Reload: 3.4 seconds changed to 3.5 seconds
Damage scale start: 10 meters changed to 8 meters
Damage scale end: 85 meters changed to 65 meters

NC AF-18 Stalker, TR SOAS-20, VS Artemis
Minimum Damage: 112 at 65 meters changed to 125 at 65 meters
First Shot Recoil: 2.5 changed to 1.5
Recoil Recovery: 15 degrees per second changed to 18 degrees per second
Magazine size: 20 changed to 24
Total Ammunition: 120 changed to 240
Short Reload: 2.25 seconds changed to 2 seconds (long reload remains same at 3 seconds)
Aimed Accuracy: 0.15 crouched moving, 0.25 stand moving changed to 0.2 crouched moving, 0.3 stand moving
Horizontal Recoil: 0.1 min, 0.3 max changed to 0.2 min, 0.225 max
Equip Time: 0.5 seconds changed to 0.75 seconds

NC AF-6 Shadow, TR HSR-1, VS Nyx VX31
Rounds Per Minute: 260 changed to 255
Vertical Recoil: 1.5 changed to 1.0
Recoil Recovery: 6 degrees per second changed to 8 degrees per second
Short Reload: 2.32 seconds changed to 2.0 seconds (long reload remains same at 2.9 seconds)
Damage Scale Start: 10 meters changed to 15 meters
Damage Scale End: 85 meters changed to 65 meters
Aimed accuracy loss per shot: 0.125 changed to 0.3
Hip accuracy loss per shot: 0.25 changed to 0.6
Equip Time: 0.5 seconds changed to 0.85 seconds
Magazine size: 10 changed to 12
Total Ammunition: 70 changed to 72

NC NCM2 Falcon
Reload: 2.5 seconds changed to 2.4 seconds
Max Projectile Velocity: 80 changed to 100
Projectile Gravity: 1.5 changed to 0.5
Direct Damage: 750 changed to 675

VS Comet VM2
Projectile Velocity: 60 changed to 90
Magazine Size: 1 changed to 2
Direct Damage: 550 changed to 350
Short Reload: 1.5 seconds (Short reload previously didn't exist. Long reload remains the same at 1.7 seconds)

M2 Mutilator
Projectile Velocity: 400 m/s changed to 500 m/s
Long Reload: 3.5 Seconds changed to 3.4 Seconds
Short Reload: 2.975 Seconds changed to 2.8 Seconds
All VS MAX Anti-Infantry weapons except for the Nebula VM20
Increased starting accuracy by 0.1 degrees in all movement states.

VS Blueshift VM5
Rounds Per Minute: 350 changed to 365
Projectile Velocity: 400 m/s changed to 500 m/s
Now does 143 maximum and minimum damage.

VS Nebula VM20
Rounds Per Minute: 400 changed to 425
Accuracy loss per shot: 0.06 changed to 0.05
Short Reload Time: 2.1 seconds changed to 2.15 Seconds
Long Reload Time: 2.8 seconds changed to 2.6 Seconds
Minimum Damage @ 50 meters: 112
Projectile Velocity: 450 m/s changed to 430 m/s

VS Cosmos VM3
Projectile Velocity: 400 m/s changed to 500 m/s
Long Reload: 3.3 Seconds changed to 3.2 Seconds
Short Reload: 2.475 Seconds changed to 2.4 Seconds

VS Lasher X2
New model with new firing and reload animations.

TR T7 Mini-Chaingun
Aimed Accuracy: 0.3375 crouch moving, 0.9 stand moving changed to 0.2 crouch moving, 0.35 stand moving
Hip accuracy: Reduced by 0.5 in all movement states.
Short Reload: 3.4 seconds changed to 4.15 seconds
Long Reload: 4.0 seconds changed to 5.0 seconds
VS VA39 Spectre
Projectile Velocity: 500 m/s changed to 570 m/s
Damage scale start: 10 meters changed to 8 meters
Minimum Damage: 250 to 260
VS VA23 Phantome
Projectile Velocity: 500 m/s changed to 525 m/s
Damage scale start: 10 meters changed to 8 meters
Minimum Damage: 250 to 260

Bug Fixes

Fixed health and shield bars intermittently displaying as empty when wearing nanoweave.
Fixed reticule flicker when compensators are equipped on LMGs and slug ammunition is equipped on shotguns.
Fixed 3rd Person animation issues with the Phobos VX86
Fixed an issue that caused 1st and 3rd person animations to break for the Lancer if it was reloaded under the right conditions
Fixed issue that removed access to the VMS or DMO scopes when logging out with them equipped on the Eridani SX5 or SMG-46 Armistice
Fixed visual firing inconsistencies in 3rd person for the Lancer
Purchasing the TMS 4x Scope will no grant access to the correct scope
Fixed 1st person reload animation issue for NS-11 C
Fix for flickering OG-4 scope cross hairs
Healing an ally damaged by friendly fire will no longer grant XP
Addressed problems with the AV MANA Turret not displaying 3rd person projectiles accurately once at least one level of the turret’s cool down cert was purchased

Vehicle Updates

Increased Magrider base strafe acceleration rate.
Increases top speed to 20 KPH (up from 15)
Takes 2 seconds to reach 20 KPH (down from taking 3 seconds to reach 15)
This should also cause the Magrider to not slow down as drastically when strafing over small inclines.
Damage received when a vehicle flips over and hits the ground reduced. The vehicle will still take increased damage and eventually be destroyed, but this should allow a chance for the vehicle to right itself or passengers to bail out before it explodes.
Added option to toggle off inverting steering controls when a tank goes into reverse.
Improved Flash Handling
Should be easier to control while in reverse
Traction should be improved at higher speeds
Bug Fixes
Fixed issue that would not allow the S12 Renegade to be equipped while being trialed
Proximity Repair system should now properly award support XP to the owner if they are not in the driver seat

UI Updates

Strategic Communication Improvements
Removed blinking map regions
Capture progress is now displayed on the map
Ally activity displayed on the map
Influence pie charts have been replaced with population percentages
Changed the visualization of enemy activity – activity level coloring is now a gradient of red instead of spectrum of different colors
Disabled generator/spawn display for facilities
Secondary objective timer display added to HUD indicators
Facility icons now visible at all zoom levels on the map
Map legend added
Service Ribbons can now be earned for capturing and defending bases
Improved Item Preview
Preview is now full screen
Items can now be previewed on multiple classes
Loadout Screen Improvements
Locked gear and weapons can now be viewed and unlocked from the loadout screen
Quick camo selector added to main Class/Vehicle screens – Allows you to quickly select and apply permanent camos to all classes/weapons/vehicles
Removed the old class and vehicle landing pages
The currently equipped consumable can now be resupplied directly from the main Class screen
Medals are now displayed in the loadout from the main Class screen
Added a class/vehicle cert button to main Class screen
Specific weapon attachment slots can now be selected from the main Class screen and weapon selection screen
Item descriptions added to the weapon selection screen
Better Weapon Stats shown on weapon selection screen
Replaced stat bars with numbers
Added damage-range degradation graph
More weapon stats displayed
Muzzle velocity
Ammunition
Hip Accuracy
Aim Accuracy
Iron Sight Zoom
Indirect Damage
New HUD indicator for Ammo Packs
Added a Bundles category to the Depot
Added invert reverse steering option for track vehicles
Bug Fixes
Loadouts should now unlock properly if players earned enough XP at once to skip the battle rank that unlocked it
The Squad listing in the social window should now display additional squads when scrolling down
Spawn beacon timers should display correctly on the deploy UI
Spawn beacon timer no longer tied to facility spawn timers
Spawn beacon should not get into a state where it constantly resets

Facilities Updates

Increased facility secondary objective (generators and SCUs) XP rewards:
Overload: Raised from 100xp to 250xp
Stabilization: Raised from 100xp to 250xp
Objective Kill: Raised from 100xp to 500xp
Bug Fixes
Turret shadows should rotate with the turret appropriately
Vehicles in VR should now respawn more reliably

That is a pure sh*t-ton of changes. Really excited to try them out.

http://forums.station.sony.com/ps2/i...
They've already issues another patch... this one has one of the most interesting changes:

All capture times have now been standardized:
- Small Outposts take 4 minutes
- Large Outposts take 7 minutes
- Facilities take 10 minutes
- Influence bonus during capture has been removed
- Bonus for number of players on the point has been removed

Hotfix goes live at 6am. Or in another 3.5 hours from whenever this post is datestamped.

I wouldn't bother playing until then, the hotfix adresses some major issues.

I've only got to play with the new update for a little while, but so far these are great changes. I especially like the new capture time UI and ally presence UI on the map.

My only quibble is that it sounds like my jetpack is exploding every time I try to fly as a light assault. It took me a long time to figure out that the explosion noises were coming from me.

Other than that they also completely rebalanced the TR and VS MAX weapons as well as the NC anti-armour one. The antivehicle weapons do less damage but fire more shots (6 for the Pounder, 4 for the Comet), which makes it easier to fight infantry with them. They have a damage reduction at short range which helps with the self-damage. At close range a Comet will take out infantry in 3 hits, 2 at long range. It's pretty damn deadly now because it doesn't have any projectile drop. Having two of them and alternating fire helps deal with the recoil and reminds me a lot of the original Comet weapon from PS1. Against another MAX it will take 10 shots up close and 8 at long range.

I haven't done much testing on the non-VS weapons but here is my take on the new ones:

Quasar: The stock version. Does 167 per hit for a 6-hit kill at close range. 50 shots per reload. It's decent, but I think the other three are better because they specialize at something.
Cosmos: I own two of these, they have slightly worse accuracy but holds 75 shots per magazine and has more in reserve.
Nebula: This version does 143 damage for a 7-hit kill, but it shoots MUCH faster than the Quasar. It used to be a clone of the TR Cycler weapon but it definitely feels different now. It's good for short range engagements on moving targets. Try using two at the same time, the sound is glorious.
Blueshift: The Blueshift is the high accuracy version for long range engagements. It only does 143 damage, but damage doesn't degrade over distance so it remains highly effective. It has accuracy almost twice as good as the Cosmos. The downside is it's very limited ammo, 40 shots per reload.

I currently have dual Cosmos and one Quasar. But I think in the future I will get the Nebula and Blueshift as well for platoon play where I can count on having support around to help me out. Even after the accuracy nerf I still prefer the Cosmos over the Quasar because I can last without ammo for a long time.

Speaking of platoons, here I am with VDRS at the TR Indar warpgate trolling all of the aircraft trying to leave.
IMAGE(http://cloud-2.steampowered.com/ugc/867217316783131442/702BC921AEFF647ECFCD4C9EC74D1D395AEDCEA5/)

Lastly they added some new revolvers to the game. THESE THINGS ARE COOL HOLY CRAP. 3-hit kills, tons o recoil, 6 shots and can't be silenced. They pack a big punch! You can get a .357 snubnose version and a long barelled .44. They differ in damage (450 or 375), reloading speeds and recoil. The barrel jumps a lot with every shot so you have to feather the trigger a bit or you can't see!

The gun also has the most badass reloading animation EVER. One really cool thing about it is that if you only fire three shots before reloading the gun only pops one side of the cylinder for a shorter animation. (not shown here)
IMAGE(http://cloud.steampowered.com/ugc/867217316783175108/7BB752E04A2FB9EC469269E7373EDA813942BB0E/)
IMAGE(http://cloud.steampowered.com/ugc/867217316783157177/58169E2B974E1ABB987AEF3CA5B143A88DDAF37D/)
IMAGE(http://cloud-2.steampowered.com/ugc/867217316783168967/4877ABC3E94D58915322A6AF68D722F5282E24AE/)
IMAGE(http://cloud-2.steampowered.com/ugc/867217316783143988/B1DF09F4A325150E5E29A7752ED0D8295EF53AAC/)

Played through an alert today and got some time in with the new update. There were a lot of changes they didn't mention in the patch notes. For instance phalanx turrets now all have shields set up behind them to protect people repairing the turret.

I took a bunch of screenshots. Here is what playing as a max looks like now. The weapons are now spaced much closer together.
IMAGE(http://cloud-2.steampowered.com/ugc/867217316783146840/B23419264CF362E97BB8E9416C3E6CFA3E7DF825/)

They also completely redid all of the infantry textures. Camouflage covers a LOT more than it used to, especially helmets. Vanu used to be black, grey, purple and teal. They totally got rid of the grey and added more black. The difference is pretty stark.

New engineer without armour. I'm very glad they got rid of the grey underwear Vanu soldiers used to wear outside of their tights.
IMAGE(http://cloud-2.steampowered.com/ugc/867217316783185328/5411ED0912A1814629048D8711CDDE9302F74176/)

And here is a picture of me with my armour and camo on. The new camo covers almost everything, except Vanu have this annoying black bare patch on their chests that used to be purple. Other than that the coverage is almost 95% to the point where it's becoming hard to identify people by faction. I like my alpha squad camo because it's bright purple and I never get shot at by friendlies.
IMAGE(http://cloud-2.steampowered.com/ugc/867217316783184038/C98B472709A64942E90B8CEFA61A765439C397E8/)

It's now much easier for infiltrators to blend in. Though the Vanu one gets the short stick for having a bright silver helmet, I hope they change that.
IMAGE(http://cloud-2.steampowered.com/ugc/867217316783182569/64F7F3FD9609E565BA25F99F2848D8A0B8535225/)

They did change the MAX pretty drastically. For comparison here is mine from a couple of patches ago. Since then they did modify the MAX so that it picked up a LOT more colour.
IMAGE(http://cloud-2.steampowered.com/ugc/903238683504818484/BE67A1FEEF1E672096E62EE4A2E75B72B2E458CC/)

And here is the new look, post patch. You'll notice it lost a lot of it's teal trim, which I do miss.
IMAGE(http://cloud-2.steampowered.com/ugc/867217316783126619/2C67E217562E8D09E51FE55E42002B64787E0AF8/)

But it's pretty obvious why they took the teal out. When you add camo now it covers about 90% of the MAX, with the rest being mostly black.
IMAGE(http://cloud-2.steampowered.com/ugc/867217316783125269/A1BE388E39C124748E59A3EA9FA7A6252D19517A/)