Make bolt action rifles have the same total ammunition reserves as semi automatic rifles

Suggestions Weapons
1

Bolt action rifles are quite fun to use in between all the more meta automatic weapons you could use instead on lower BRs, but one downside to primarily using bolt actions is that they have pretty low total ammo reserves, usually only with ~4 reloads per rifle (around 20 rounds) without any ammo bags. In real life though, riflemen typically carried around 50-60 rounds for their rifles. In addition, all semi automatic rifles, even the BR2 ones, have 40, 45, or 46 reserve rounds, which is more than double the ammunition a single soldier can expend. Due to this, I propose that bolt action rifles are given the same ammunition reserves as semi automatic rifles. Balance will not be largely affected by this change, as bolt action rifles will still have the same upsides and downsides compared to semi automatic rifles.

Should bolt-action rifles get the same amount of reserve ammunition as semi-auto rifles?
  • Yes
  • No
0 voters
5 Likes
2

Buffing the lowest tiers of weapons, within a game where SMGs and semi-auto rifles are superior, and buffing them specifically in a way that doesn’t directly touch weapon balance is actually quite fair.

I find that running out of ammo on BA rifles is a lot more painfull, but I can keep on firing for longer with any comparable semi-auto and be more effective… Maybe that’s skill talking though, where I can work with the short 1HK window of semi-auto rifles, otherwise that ammo pool will be used for double tapping downed people.

I recently toyed with the idea on another post, though that was with the intent that all semi-auto rifles be also given a minor damage boost to make them just sliggtly more satisfying to use…

1 Like
3

Its quite fair indeed - however I would go even further and give them MORE ammo than semi auto rifles, realistically speaking not having magazines translates into not having to carry the extra weight of those magazines.

But realism aside - if boltactions get an ammo buff, you wont need to carry extra ammo pouches. So if you want to have a few soldiers in your squad even in high BRs that carry extra explosives and grenades, giving them them bolt actions would be a way to do so without sacrificing too much ammo capacity.

3 Likes
4

Actually what I was thinking, too.

There’d suddenly be a very good reason to bring BAs into BR III, or even BR IV (nothing competes with SF-rifle spam, though), instead of upgrading ASAP.

2 Likes
5

Wasn’t like the minimum amount of ammunition soldiers got issued was around 50 rounds (give or take) anyway? Giving bolt actions 50 spare rounds by default would technically be more historically accurate than 25 spare rounds

2 Likes
6

Depends on the nation.

UK soldiers typically carried 10 loaded in the gun, 40 rounds in spare clips, and 60 rounds in Bren mags, with a total standard ammunition load of 100-110.

Of course, soldiers are a cunning lot, and they’ll carry about as ammunition as they can fiesably get their hands on and comfortably carry with them. Going up to 100 and beyond for personal use, which was far from unheard of (and still carrying seperate spares for the Bren gunner).

That being said, I’m more than happy for the universal standard to be 40 for all rifles, anything extra requiring ammo bags.

2 Likes
7

Did every british rifleman really carry 2 bren mags? That is interesting info i didn’t know about. Maybe that could be worked into some special mechanic where you get 2 extra mags instead of 1 when requesting bren ammo from bots

2 Likes
8

Indeed, every member of a infantry section carried at least two spares for the Bren gunner (this is how the Brits avoided having dedicated ammunition bearers for their section MG, unlike the Germans who needed people dedicated for that job).

I don’t know about a special mechanic, this is already my head canon for why I can request spare mags from my troops in the first place. :laughing:

1 Like
9

Use ammo pouch. Semi autos have more because they usually take two hits to down from body shot, compared to rifles only one without vitality.

Removing the point to use it seems like a bad idea… even going as far to suggest bolt action in land of select fires.

10

I shouldn’t have to use an ammo pouch to have a usable amount of ammunition for my rifles, with as pointed out that most riflemen on average had around the same ammunition as SAs do in game. And the differences between SAs and BAs aren’t just damage, you completely forgot to mention the fact that semi autos fire at 350 RPM which is usually around 6 to 7 times faster than bolt actions, which makes them leagues better at CQC. Just changing the reserve ammo for BAs won’t affect balance.

2 Likes
11

The amount they have is perfectly reasonable equating to around 11 kills per soldier if you can hit your shots no? with 4 default in a squad that’s not ineffective

I agree, however it is removing the point to use ammo pouch which does what you want.

12

If you’re just using that soldier because the rest of your squad died, sure. If you want to primarily use a BA though, especially if you don’t have the best aim, you’ll run out of ammo quickly.

I don’t see any problem with this, when this would be about the default amount of rounds each soldier carried.

2 Likes
13

Carrying even more ammo than standard shouldn’t be… Standard…? Who is it that needs extra ammo…?

Snipers, assaulters, MG gunners, riflemen with SF rifles. In other words, specialists, people with high combat potential with their dedicated weapon who benefit disproportionally from being able to use their weapon for longer.

A rifleman with a standard bolt-action rifle, though…? He’s not a specialist, BAs don’t have high-combat potential in the same ways as the above example. If people feel like ammo bags are the best thing they could have for a regular rifleman, well then the devs have not made a very flexible class of soldier, which frankly they certainly should be (they are in BR III and IV, after all).

Then you could bring in extra health packs for survivability, or tools to repair friendly tanks you’re escorting (or both!). Pick up a grenade bag and use riflemen as psuedo shock-troops, very WW1, (grenade a room, grenade a room twice for good luck, then charge in with bayonets for King and Country).

This would actually be a way more compelling and interesting battlefield dynamic than what BR I and II currently have, simply by giving more leeway into what direction you want to go with your riflemen (by not making “simply having more ammo” so obviously the best option).

I have a friend, we play a lot together (BR III, but he only has BAs), he struggles with aiming, ammo bags for his riflemen are mandatory.

Frankly, I feel the same pull but for the opposite reason, I can actually land my shots fairly well, this means though that I feel the lack of ammo even more. Using semi-auto rifles have rewarded my good aim, I can do more with 50 rounds of semi-auto than I ever could with 25-30 of bolt-action shots. (CQC is unbeatable too, compared to BAs).

I made a whole-sale switch of all my guys from bolt-actions to semi-autos quite some time ago, I have not regreted it since. Oh, and I never use ammo bags on semi-auto rifles, not needed the same way as on BAs.

2 Likes
14

I agree that they should have more ammo…I’m guessing thier thinking is because they hit way harder.

15

25 total 5 in gun 20 in reserve without pouches.
Which is fine.

I dont even remember when I last time killed someone with 1 shot only with memeguerra.
Most of the time it requires 2 hits / kill so the ammo is quite even.

5+20 for BA sure aint much but with large ammo pouch u get the ~50 that is more than enough.
Problem with granting that 50 without pouch to BA’s is that you are now free to use the pouch slot to anything else.
So we are essentially looking at 9x3 grenade artillery units.

16

I mean, increasing the base amount of ammo means the ammo pouch is gonna provide EVEN MORE ammo. You could run snipers and not need to rely on an ammo box nearby if you wanna shoot for a while

17

More ammo for everything!

The fact that equipping 2 primary weapons can sometimes net more ammo is completely ridiculous.

That perk alone is probably the main reason why the devs give very little base ammo. Also the “feature” of partisan having a surplus of ammo while also having magic ammo being another reason.

So for those two reason, I doubt we will see any meaningful change to base ammo.