- Yes
- No
Yes for revert change to only 69%
No for no
The proposed reduction to Select-Fire Rifle recoil control, from the originally promised 69% to 60% , is far more significant than it may initially appear.
A reduction from 69% to 60% may sound like a relatively small adjustment, but in practice it compounds with the existing recoil characteristics of these weapons. More importantly, this change is being made alongside the existing differences between weapons such as the Federov Rifle and Gewehr 43 DFE, which already create questionable balance between comparable weapons.
I’m going to quote and use Honkinator’s images and arguements earlier as a baseline.
Blockquote
The comparison between the Fed Rifle (25) and Gewehr 43 (DFE) is big. That additional 10 horizontal recoil is crazy. Either the DFE has to be buffed or the Fed Rifle has to be nerfed.
Blockquote
This is important because the Select-Fire Rifle nerf is not happening in mere isolation; some of these weapons already have substantial recoil differences, particularly in horizontal recoil. Reducing the overall recoil control to 60% therefore aggravates disparities that already exist rather than addressing them.
1. This does not actually solve the 9-man Select-Fire meta
If the main objective of this change is to discourage 9-man Select-Fire Rifle squads from being meta, reducing recoil control from 69% to 60% does not address the whole reason these squads are used as meta.
The main advantage of a 9-man squad is still nine bodies on the objective .
When capturing an objective, having nine soldiers instead of seven provides a visible advantage in capture speed, so even if the weapons become harder to control, a 9-man squad can still put more bodies onto an objective, take more casualties, and continue assisting the capture of the cap.
This means that the nerf allows the risk of producing the worst of both worlds: 9-man Select-Fire squads remain useful and the meta for objective play, while the weapons themselves become substantially less enjoyable and more difficult to use.
2. The nerf disproportionately affects average players
This is arguably the biggest problem with the proposed change.
Players who are already good with Select-Fire Rifles will be much better prepared to compensate for additional recoil, as they know how to control recoil, burst their weapons, position themselves, and compensate for weapon behaviour, whilst the average player, whom usually complain about SF Rifle recoil do not have the same level of mechanical proficiency.
And this is particularly important because recoil is already one of the most common complaints surrounding Select-Fire Rifles.
Increasing recoil further therefore does not necessarily remove the weapon from the meta, but instead, risking creating a larger divide between players who have already mastered these weapons and players who have not.
The result could be:
Experienced players: continue using Select-Fire Rifles because they can compensate for the recoil.
Average players: find the weapons excessively difficult to control and abandon them.
That is not necessarily healthy balancing. It can instead make the weapon less accessible without meaningfully changing its effectiveness in the hands of experienced players.
In other words, the nerf risks functioning less as a meta correction and more as a skill-floor increase
3. 69% is a much more reasonable compromise
I’m not arguing that Select-Fire Rifles should receive no nerf whatsoever, and if the developers believe that these weapons are currently too effective, then a nerf is completely reasonable to discuss.
The problem is the size of the nerf.
Going from the originally proposed 69% to 60% represents a massive additional reduction in recoil control. There is little reason to jump straight to such a severe value when a less disruptive option is available.
Keeping recoil control at 69% would still constitute a nerf compared with the current situation while avoiding the most severe consequences of the 60% value. It would also allow the developers to observe the effects of the change before pushing the nerf further.
If 69% genuinely proves to not work or prove insufficient after implementation, another adjustment can always be made later.
But once the recoil is pushed too far, it becomes much harder to distinguish between:
- reducing the effectiveness of Select-Fire Rifles,
- reducing the accessibility of Select-Fire Rifles, and
- simply making Select-Fire Rifles unpleasant to use.
Those are three very different outcomes.
So, in conclusion, the question should not simply be “Do Select-Fire Rifles need a nerf?”
The more important question is:
“Does reducing recoil control from 69% to 60% actually address the reason these squads are effective?”
If the answer is no, then the change risks being an ineffective meta adjustment that disproportionately punishes average players while experienced players continue using the same squads.
The 9-man advantage is based around manpower and objective presence, and making their weapons harder to control does not remove that advantage. It simply increases the burden placed on the player using them.
At the same time, weapons such as the Federov Rifle and Gewehr 43 DFE already have significant differences in recoil characteristics, meaning a blanket reduction can further exaggerate existing weapon disparities.
I’m not asking for Select-Fire Rifles to remain untouched. I’m asking for the nerf to be proportional to the problem it is actually trying to solve.
If the intended value is between the original 69% and the proposed 60%, then 69% is a much more reasonable starting point.
Implement the smaller nerf, observe the results, and adjust further if the data shows that Select-Fire Rifles are still disproportionately effective.
That would address the balance concern without unnecessarily turning already difficult-to-control weapons into a frustrating experience for the average player.
But yeah. Thats it. Thanks for reading.
