A brief look at the KillStreak weapons

[iRobot]

A look at all of the Killstreak weapons and why they are good or bad, from my point of view, and if any changes are needed.

KS1 – Look mom, I got 4 kills!

G28 Field Aerosol – The only killstreak that isn’t aimed at purely killing people. Its usefulness is highly diminished by group proximity healing and/or field combat defibrillators, to the point where I no longer consider this an acceptable use of KS1. If you are last alive and need extra health just to survive that little longer for your team to thaw, it’s simpler to just use a stim-pack. This needs a serious look at, as it’s not KS1 worthy in its current incarnation. My suggestion would be to give two.
Standout Maps: Anything big or with lots of hiding places – Highlander or Toys Story.
Rating out of 10: A poor poor 4.

RX Flamethrower – The crowd killer. This weapon is intended to block areas pure and simple. Due to the blinding effect it’s difficult to take a flamethrower user on face to face. Wide angle means it’s relatively easy to hit your target and also hit multiple people. The alt fire is kind of underwhelming and therefore not used – I think that needs looking at and making it more useful. This is currently the clear winner in terms of KS1 choices, for its primary alone and high range. I don’t feel any changes are needed to the primary of this weapon.
Standout Maps: Arena style maps, Goose/Rankin.
Rating out of 10: Respectable 8.

Golden Pistol – The gimmick choice of KS1. Pistols as a whole really don’t have reliable DPS to kill anyone which means that this weapon is either a last resort, or something to catch people unaware with – but that’s the issue, if you find yourself in a position where the enemy is unaware of you, it’s more sensible to just use another weapon such as a shotgun or an assault rifle, or even melee. More practical than G28 simply due to the fact you can kill people with it, but it’s damage is not on par with the flamethrower given the accuracy required. I feel like this should be silent (muh realism, it’s a Desert Eagle) to give it some kind of appeal.
Standout Maps: None.
Rating out of 10: Not so golden 3.

Dual Wield – This one kind of follows on from the above. Pistols are not really that great in the current balance ethos and dual wield just throws their accuracy down the pan. Difficult to balance as obviously it straight up doubles the DPS of any pistol, so the accuracy hit is required. I wouldn’t use it in its current design unless one of the pistols currently seemed favourable, as was previous with the GRS.
Standout Maps: Anything very small, where accuracy is less hindered.
Rating out of 10: Flat out sub-par 4.

Donation - Worthy choice if you feel you have players on your team who can make use of it. By design the weapon is donated to the player with net closest to 0, so they effectively kill one person every time they die. Therefore donating is kinda wasting a great weapon. The adrenaline you get as a reward has been nerfed to the point where it's difficult to consider this often.
Standout Maps: N/A - check your team.
Rating out of 10: 5

KS2 – 9 kills! I’m on fire baby! (Less frm, fag)

HAMR – A shadow of its former self. It feels like there has been a change recently and weapon sway is amplified greatly. Hipfire with this is now not an option unless you want to shoot your feet. Penalty damage while jumping/mid-air means you’re very limited on when you can actually use this safely. It’s a very hit or miss weapon, either you kill who you’re shooting in one or two shots or you die. Deploy function is archaic and not useful in a game where movement is key and you’re rarely in one place for long. Accuracy from sights is just as good as deploying if you’re aware of trajectory.
Standout Maps: Anything with height or chokepoints – Highlander or RiftCity.
Rating out of 10: A reasonable 6.

AT40 STREAK – Honestly, I didn’t feel this was any good when at KS3 so I haven’t wasted a KS2 on it yet. I’ll reserve judgement.
Standout Maps: N/A
Rating out of 10: N/A

HPV Lightning Gun – Death in a can. Basically an assault rifle without the excessive recoil and limited magazine. Alt fire is a one-shot on anyone who hasn’t boosted. 2nd choice as #1 KS2 currently, more than justifies it’s place in KS2. The only downside is the team damage due to its high tickrate and good damage. Someone walking into this on your team can kill you, fast. This is a good baseline for KS2 as it doesn’t change games completely but does feel better than the standard loadout weapons.
Standout Maps: Pretty much an all rounder, but avoid water.
Rating out of 10: Well deserved 9.

CAW Rocket Launcher – Jury still out on this one, its had more adjustments than anything recently. Primary fire seems underwhelming. Might kill one or two guys, but then that’s it. Alt fire has potential to be a great area denial, lacks the damage now to kill people effectively. I wouldn’t take this one anymore as primary fire has great potential to kill you rather than your target, and G5 is just as good at getting the job done.
Standout Maps: Anything open with height advantage or favourable terrain.
Rating out of 10: Meager 5.

M290 – A fine piece of kit. Pretty much every shot is a kill (from sights) if you catch them in front of it. Causes a lot of frustration and rage which is truly great. Perhaps a little too strong. Difficult to balance as if you nerf the damage then it’s no better than the single shotguns, and then suddenly becomes worst KS2. Potentially adjust the ammo reserve, but then that is nullified by getting ammo back whenever you kill someone, which is often with the M290. Maybe give a big movement penalty so you’re a walking turret, instead of map dominator.
Standout Maps: Anything with corners. Catching people in the face with a blast as they come round to investigate is crystallized satisfaction.
Rating out of 10: Top lel, 11.

MOP Airstrike Painter – Play the lottery much? This is a highly frustrating weapon, for both the user and the receiver. Some maps it will work perfectly, and kill anywhere between 1 and 5 of the other team. Some maps it will hit an invisible ceiling, play the animation, but do no damage. Some maps it will fire but you receive no animation. Some maps it will not fire at all. Get your raffle tickets out. Due to the randomness of this, I’d honestly consider this as KS1 worthy. Why would you take this in KS2 over a HPV or M290? Only if you’re bored. Move this to KS1.
Standout Maps: Anything with an outside area. Killbillybarn or Highlander.
Rating out of 10: 6 when it works, 0 when not. Therefore 3.

PeaceMaker Rockets – Donation fodder. You’d never claim this yourself if you had any sense. Good weapon to donate to the players who aren’t likely to reach KS1, let alone 2, themselves. Spam incarnate. I’d argue moving this to KS1 also, as KS2 seems stacked and this weapon isn’t really spectacular. Very boring by design, alt fire is just even more spam.
Standout Maps: Anything claustrophobic.
Rating out of 10: 5

[Skaldy]

Nice review, robot, thx.

KS1:
I can barely be bothered with any of them - I usually Donate.

KS2:
PM - massively inaccurate when holding fire - should be alongside Flamethrower in KS1.
Lightning - your location becomes obvious too.
M290 - reduce movement I reckon.

[Capaco]

KS1: like Skaldy, kinda useless for me, i donate or forget to use medical thingy when i choose it, i just forget it to use as its not in normal loadout as before.
G28: Put it back to normal loadout with a lower rate or maximum healing, like 3 hp/sec 80 max OR
u get 2 as robot said, but it seems too strong then so perhaps u can only use one per minute then

PM: to ks1 with lower damage, as it spams like hell. I liked the PM when i got it, but its sth between KS1 and 2. And im missing another choice of wep in Ks1, flames and pistol ok, sth else like the PM.

Airstrike: Not sure about it, does it insta kill ? If so i think its like the PM between KS1 and 2, a bit lower damage or range if its possible perhaps also, then ks1 is okay.

M290: seems too powerful.

Lightning ( glad its back <3) is good.

[Azarael]

A couple of points:

The HAMR fires more quickly, has a greater damage radius and reduces the damage you take when it's deployed.
Superweapons aren't resupplied on kill.

[iRobot]

A couple of points:

The HAMR fires more quickly, has a greater damage radius and reduces the damage you take when it's deployed.
Superweapons aren't resupplied on kill.

Your own personal opinion on each weapon, as the balancer?

[Azarael]

KS1

G28 Field Aerosol - I've implemented the requested change for this.
RX22A Flamethrower - I agree that the altfire is crap and I've applied a buff to the ground fires it makes.
Golden Pistol - I don't think complete silence is the way forward, if anything it should be buffed in some other way or cut.
Dual Wield - Not great at the moment. I've removed the accuracy penalty and if that's not enough I'll revert Dual Wielded weapons to firing in synch.

KS2

HAMR - Haven't used it much recently but felt it was great pre-patch. As previously noted, deploy mode has its place if you know what the benefits of it are.
AT40 STREAK - From personal usage I anticipate having to nerf this if anything. It seems plenty usable.
HVC-Mk9 Lightning Gun - I don't use this much but remember it being a solid weapon.
Shockwave LAW - It has instant kill damage and a much greater radius than the G5 - which has a slight nerf in the upcoming patch (arming delay).
M290 - OP due to massive reserve ammo. That'll be nerfed, and also reduced for some of the other KS weapons.
MOP - Total map-dependent problem weapon. There's no way to work out when it'll work or not without memorizing the maps it fails on.
MRL - Lacklustre at the moment but I remember all too well when it was OP. Not sure it should drop to KS1.

[iRobot]

Interesting that you'd so readily change them, shows there was definitely a discrepancy amongst the choices.

[Butcher]

My opinion:

KS1

G28 Field Aerosol - Not worth for KS1. Either to have two, or maybe leave to thaw option.
RX22A Flamethrower - Is nice. Problem is friendly fire and always there is someone in your team going in the fire.
Golden Pistol - I have not tried it.
Dual Wield - Not great, specially when you need to double reload (twice reload time) and also there are guns you cant use dual wield with. Maybe in this case shall double the rate of fire of the single gun.

KS2

HAMR - I like... Except the penalty when you shoot in the air... that sucks..
AT40 STREAK - Is ok on firepower but takes too much time to reload, You become too vulnerable.
HVC-Mk9 Lightning Gun - Its difficult to aim because you dont see the opponent in the middle of the lightning. Powerful on long distance .
Shockwave LAW - Tried it,Not my gun...I just killed myself with it
M290 - OP depending the user... instakill when the aiming is impeccable and using sights, not always the case for me... but Its my favorite because I am a fan of shotguns....
MOP - Map lottery and used to farm... There's no balance when someone uses this weapon. But definetely is not a KS1 (specially for the robot to farm kills)
MRL - Peacemaker has accuracy problem, you need to control the shooting to make it effective. Could be dropped to KS1 but maybe lower the damage per shot.

AND THE PLASMA ... where is my plasma gun?

[iRobot]

I forgot about that one, thanks for reminder.

Plasma Cannon - Great weapon with ample splash damage. 90 damage a shot means it's effective both 1v1 and 1vMany but care must be taken to avoid exploding due to overheating. Alt fire is great for peppering an area to prevent advance. Explosion is great as a last resort to kill a room of enemies if required. Worth it's KS2 slot, depending on map it's difficult to choose between this and the M290, which leads to...
Standout Maps: Anything with chokes / predictable paths due to projective travel speed.
Rating out of 10: A quality 8.5

[Azarael]

I'd like you to look more in-depth at the PeaceMaker and tell me what you think it needs to remain at KS2.