Ranger Archive
Thread: Opinions on weapon skill choice?
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Adraelden
Mon Sep 13, 2004 4:07 pm
#1
Howdy all. I am dropping my bh/pistoleer for master ranger, and wanted to poll all of you for your opinions on the weapon skills. I know rifle is a preferred profession of rangers, and I was wondering if there is much success with the pistoleer profession. I am only currently 1-1-1-1 pistols, so still new at it. My hangup is that I like the speed of pistols, and the fact that you get KD as well as close range combat. Anyways, if you can help me out with any opinions/advice, it would be most appreciated. Thanks.
~Adraelden
Fodder650
Mon Sep 13, 2004 4:10 pm
#2
http://forums.station.sony.com/swg/board/message?board.id=ranger&message.id=64130
All your questions answered in one nice sticky
Rooks
Mon Sep 13, 2004 4:10 pm
#3
JB MAT is a Master Ranger/MAster Pistoleer and he is awesome at it.
I am a former Master Pistoleer and it can be fun. Just realize with Pistols that 11/13 specials are broken and you will be fine.
MerchantCatt
Mon Sep 13, 2004 5:57 pm
#4
Adraelden wrote:
Howdy all. I am dropping my bh/pistoleer for master ranger, and wanted to poll all of you for your opinions on the weapon skills. I know rifle is a preferred profession of rangers, and I was wondering if there is much success with the pistoleer profession. I am only currently 1-1-1-1 pistols, so still new at it. My hangup is that I like the speed of pistols, and the fact that you get KD as well as close range combat. Anyways, if you can help me out with any opinions/advice, it would be most appreciated. Thanks.
~Adraelden
I was a pistoleer for along time. I've mastered that profession more than once. I thought I"d never have a melee profession after trying pikeman and hating it. Then I tried TKA and now I can't see myself without having at least one character with it. I like pistols over all of the ranged weapons though, so if you're stuck on ranged only I'd stay with pistoleer.
Kalaf
Tue Sep 14, 2004 5:29 am
#5
I like my rifles. Just wish they would work right. By right I mean it would be so nice to have a rifle that actually did more damage then a pistol. Or how about had actual LONG RANGE attack ability? I personally think if I can get a lock on the target at 80m or even 100m I should be able to kill it from there with my rifle. But what do I know I just shot expert in the Army for 6 years
Kalaf
darmokVtS
Tue Sep 14, 2004 6:59 am
#6
Uhm... You need to dump a *ton* of credits on a pistol (krayted de-10) that can reach damagevalues of a non-lootenhanced t21 with a good damageslice. And don't forget the armorpiercing factor, it is quite important.
Adifi
Tue Sep 14, 2004 7:30 am
#7
Kalaf wrote:I like my rifles. Just wish they would work right. By right I mean it would be so nice to have a rifle that actually did more damage then a pistol. Or how about had actual LONG RANGE attack ability? I personally think if I can get a lock on the target at 80m or even 100m I should be able to kill it from there with my rifle. But what do I know I just shot expert in the Army for 6 yearsKalaf
Nice to have a rifle that did more damage than a pistol ??? What rifle you using then ? A rifled pea shooter ? Rifles has one of the higest damage outputs in the game , certainly more than pistoleer. T21 with heavy ap ? Try to beat that with rep blaster, or de-10, or - you wont. As for the range thing, this is a game not real life, if rifles had 40m more attacking range than any other ranged proffession how long would it be before the nerf bat came flying... Everyone would be a rifleman if they could attack from 100m. 100m attack range, burstrun, kiting and you never loose to anyone or anything.
I had a great stint as a rifleman, its a cool proffession with some really nice fast damage. Pistols is quite good fun too though, pistolwhip1 is a good KD attack - seems to work quite often. Pistolwhip2 howver has no kd :/ Like has already been mentioned, pistoleer is pretty broke :/
ImperialCmdr
Tue Sep 14, 2004 10:41 am
#8
I think the 100m for rifles could work and not be overpowered, you'd just need it to be that you had to be prone to get that range. Kiting wouldnt be so much problem as it takes ages to stand up again - who knew everyone in SWG had such bad knees
Rhu
Tue Sep 14, 2004 11:57 am
#9
Kalaf wrote:
I like my rifles. Just wish they would work right. By right I mean it would be so nice to have a rifle that actually did more damage then a pistol. Or how about had actual LONG RANGE attack ability? I personally think if I can get a lock on the target at 80m or even 100m I should be able to kill it from there with my rifle. But what do I know I just shot expert in the Army for 6 years
Kalaf
You're thinking in a real world, projectile weapon sense. Star Wars is a fantasy world where energy weapons are defined by crazy old wizards as "clumsy or random."
TalKurgan
Tue Sep 14, 2004 1:19 pm
#10
If you like using tactics and working for your kills, go with pistoleer. And talk to JB. He'llhave youout there soloing enraged rancors with no armor or buffs. You may actually get through the combat revamp/balance.
If you aren't all that interested in how you kill things, or if you are prone to tactical lapses (like me), then go with rifleman. Rifleman is inexpensive, rifleman tactics are simple, and rifleman complements ranger nicely.
(Inexpensive) 12-pt mastercrafted T-21s that are 170-400/7.4 are really common and not very expensive, so you don't mind when one gets a speed slice and you don't mind when they break. DXR-6s are more expensive, but you only need the base models (no in-dash 6 CD changer or AC required) Keep them powered up. I can always buy another crate of rifles andI hate cloning (256 MB RAM - ouchie), so it's an easy choice between wrecking my weapon and being eaten by a gaping spider...
(Inexpensive) Don't worry about doctor buffs or armor. Play it right and you won't even be attacked. HAM costs are pretty high, so you'll end up damaging yourself more than any critter you're hunting. Novice Medic and a crate of Stim Bs mitigates that.(I know Stim-Bs cost money, buy I spent 150k on two full crates of 400x32 stimsover six months ago and I'm not even halfway through one crate.) Ok, I also drink a lot of brandy, but I can *hic* quit whenever I want. And its still pretty cheap compared to spending 9-12k on buffs every three hours. Plus, you may be able to work out a trade with a chef. Your favorite doc might not always be there.
(Tactics are simple) /prone; /headshot3; !; !; !; !; !; !; !; /stand; /pause 2; /healdamage self (I don't think that many headshots are really necessary.)
(RIfleman complements ranger) Terrain Negotiation at ranger levels increases your crawl speed. This is handy for rifleman, since being prone helps to keep you from being attacked and since you're usually working at a long enough distance that your target may wander out of range on you. Conceal is different from rifle concealment chance, so that's a wash, but trust me on the crawling thing.
Coprolite
Tue Sep 14, 2004 1:21 pm
#11
As a former masterpistoleer, i feel your pain :-) But I dropped Master rifleman for Tk a couple of weeks back. Id say that from a pure harvest approach, IN MY OPINION, that rifle is superior. With concealshot, and camo, most things will never get close enough to you for pistol kd. Thats if your doing things right, like stay back from lair at least 50m, the bigger the critter the more distance I would give it, shoot individuals that are away from rest of herd and avoid using aoe on groupd stuff.
As a Tk, my big problem is corpses disapering before I can harvest, especial against higher ham creatures. Example, last night Im on dant merrily punching pickets, with 4-8 surrounding me at one time, and using all my high damage specials, by the time iv killed 5, 3 more have spawnd, by the time Iv killed all the aggro, 3 corpses have vaped and bye bye 300 units of herb. Arrgh.
Using rifle, I could kill several or one, and walk up harvest, then return to my sweet spot and shoot more.
thats just my opinion, plenty of other guys here that have differnt and equally sucesssful ways of doing it.
Coprolite
As a Tk, my big problem is corpses disapering before I can harvest, especial against higher ham creatures. Example, last night Im on dant merrily punching pickets, with 4-8 surrounding me at one time, and using all my high damage specials, by the time iv killed 5, 3 more have spawnd, by the time Iv killed all the aggro, 3 corpses have vaped and bye bye 300 units of herb. Arrgh.
Using rifle, I could kill several or one, and walk up harvest, then return to my sweet spot and shoot more.
thats just my opinion, plenty of other guys here that have differnt and equally sucesssful ways of doing it.
Coprolite
JBMat
Tue Sep 14, 2004 3:25 pm
#12
Pistols are good because -
1. Speed. And I can say that after the CB, pistols will still be fast. Rifles will be slower.
2. Choice. Carry a Blaster, an FW, a DX10 and maybe a Striker. You have now covered the major resistances, and can go around them. Blasters are AP btw, and bleeds work regardless of resistance.
3. Yeah, a rifleperson can hide and shoot. We can too, but why bother? HS2, HS1, stopping shot, peace. wait for it, aggro, bodyshot, Pdart. Lookit, he stopped. Move and shoot, we can do it, rifles can't. Use terrain too, remember, move and shoot, shoot and move.
4. Damage is increased with powerups. While they do shorten the weapon life, the average pistol is cheaper than the average rifle.
5. Harvesting. No droids, you are there in the critters face. Use a droid as a tank. Get a killer probot and drop prey faster.
Mastering Pistols gives decent bennies. Granted, the specials are not the greatest. I rely on Healthshots, stopping shot, body shot, double tap, and MeleeDefense1, which all work. I am accurate as all hell. Coupled with traps, I can do an entire lair of gurrecks and with some luck, never get touched.
I did rifles, through Master Marksman. I hated waiting on the second shot. Granted, they are better now, but I hate lying around waiting on something to die so I can send a droid in.
JB
evfields
Tue Sep 14, 2004 4:01 pm
#13
Wow! I think JB may just get me going pistoleer/ranger on a 3rd character I don't have time for, as if I had time for my two 
I'm pikeman right now, pikeman/ranger, but I'm worried about the effectiveness. Pikeman takes alot of damage compared to the other melee professions and puts less out compared to the other melee.
On my first BE/CH character I'm pistoleer and love it. Up close I never miss, shoot fast, and do reasonable damage. It just seems that rifleman get a million accuracy by master, T21's, hit speed cap by master....
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