Chikyuu Shoujo Arujuna wrote:
Books_DCDF wrote:
But really, you do need to try to link up with [GDC]SinnFein some time; he's the most skilled sniper I've seen (makes me feel like an apprentice), as well as the friendliest and most gracious player I've met online. If you are lucky enough to join up with him, watch him carefully and you'll learn a lot.
sorry for my english, i just wanted to say my opinion to this super-über-leet-sniper-thing.
you really think of somone to be the best sniper you've ever seen when this guy has a KPH with a sniperrifle off 33?
you are'nt much better Books_DCDF. Playing Kubra Dam only, KPH of ridicilous 24, but a K/D-Ratio of 5.75.
I mean, come on, camping with a sniperrifle doesn't require that much skill. I'm sure you guys are good at doing that, but that doesn't help your team in most cases.
In my eyes, a good sniper should be able to camp and take out the backup and defend a flag, but also to give cover where it is actually needed.
@topic my longest kill was on dalian plant, M95, I was on that crane in the southern docks looking over to the carrier, Black Hawk was about to take off, needed 2 shots, distance: 540 meter
I guess it comes down to an issue of philosophies, Chik, about the tactics of the game, and about the role of the sniper. What follows will be long, but it's an important thing to consider and is the basis for my defense against your criticisms.
Many people go on and on bitching about snipers and lamenting how they do little for their teams because they don't cap flags or aren't in the thick of the action. For them, the principal goal of the game seems to be accruing lots of points and flag captures, and they seem to be arguing that that is what wins games too. Let me state for the record, it isn't. In the right circumstances, capping flags can be of value in helping your team win, but ONLY in certain circumstances, and ONLY in a limited number of ways. First, it can eliminate--or cause--ticket bleed, but to my knowledge ticket bleed only occurs on maps where at least one flag is uncappable and it only occurs to the team with the uncappable flag; so long as the team without the uncappable flag maintains at least one base, they won't experience ticket bleed (feel free to correct me if I'm wrong on this). Second, capping flags can deny the enemy armor/vehicle/air assets that spawn at those bases and, in some cases, provide your team with those selfsame assets. But those assets only benefit your team if they're used and not left behind for a raiding enemy to grab and use to stir up chaos in your rear echelons. Finally, capping flags helps contain the enemy and pin them to a limited area, allowing your team to mass forces and more effectively wipe them out as they spawn/attempt to break out. All of these benefits, however, typically come at the cost of higher casualties; ask any knowledgeable military tactician and they'll tell you that in a battle between two equally armed and skilled forces, the attacker will almost always sustain 10-20% higher losses (that's probably why the attacking force in BF2 receives a 10% ticket bonus at the beginning of the game). And a successful attack usually requires a larger force be committed to the offensive, leaving fewer troops to defend the bases you've already secured. As a result, it becomes easier for roving enemies to slip behind your lines and retake flags (which wipes out any advantage you might have built up in trying to contain the enemy). So, in summary, if the teams are equally matched, the side that does nothing but constantly attack and try to cap flags will lose more often than not.
When I play BF2, I have one goal--to help my team win. And winning only occurs when you eliminate the enemy's total reserve of tickets before they eliminate your team's. From a tactical perspective, that means simply that your team has to kill more--and die less--than the enemy team. So it should be every team member's obligation and duty to achieve as high a kill-to-death ratio as possible while still performing their class roles to the best of their abilities; only in this way can your team win. But not everyone on the team can maintain a positive k/d ratio--some classes will inherently be killed more because of the nature of their role, some players care only about racking up kills and being in the center of the melee, and other players just aren't very good--so it's up to the rest of the team to make up for this deficit through careful, skilled play and adherence to class role. A skilled sniper can be particularly helpful in this regard. (Take Death_To_Bunnies, for example; his K/D ratio is an amazing 9.01 to 1, and he's by no means a "hide-in-one place and hope the enemy will pass by" type of sniper.) This will almost surely mean that the score-per-minute/hour (and hence, total game score) of certain players and classes will be lower, but they'll be helping their team win through smart play.
Now, to the role of the sniper. Like any class, the sniper has a number of advantages and disadvantages in the game; its the sniper's obligation to use those advantages to the betterment of the team, and to avoid situations that expose their disadvantages and put the team at risk.
Advantages: 1) a highly accurate weapon; 2) increased view distance and the ability to spot/target enemies at long range; 3) deadly traps (claymores) that can be set and left without the requirement of constant monitoring; 4) a silenced back-up weapon (the pistol); 5) effective camoflage that renders the sniper nearly invisible so long as they remain in the right environment and limit their movement.
Disadvantages: 1) A lower rate of fire than any other class; 2) a lower ammo load-out than any other class; 3) no body armor; 4) as a class, snipers tend to be feared and hated, which means the minute you're spotted/identified, you're almost sure to attract an artillery strike and/or a number of enemy troops/vehicles/air assets anxious to add you to their kill tally.
The listed advantages make it clear what the sniper can do to best benefit his team: 1) Provide precision fire on important or dangerous infantry targets [i.e., other snipers, squad leaders, medics, supply, etc.]. 2) Provide long-range interdiction fire on targets beyond the visual range of other classes. While this sort of fire ideally eliminates or wounds the target, at the very least it causes panic and confusion, and forces the enemy to focus their attention on something other than what they want to be doing--killing your teammates, capturing your territory, or defending their own. 3) Spotting enemy targets for your teammates. This is probably the sniper's most important duty, and it's the one that all-too-often is neglected. A sniper's most dangerous weapon is not his rifle, it's his radio. Alerting your team to the presence of enemies aids them in protecting themselves and helps bring down a lot more firepower on the target, increasing the likelihood that it will be taken out. This is especially true for enemy armor; a sniper can be--and often is-- the best source of target info for friendly pilots and tankers. 4) Booby-trapping flags and high traffic areas to eliminate enemies and disrupt their plans/tactics. Kill enemies this way once or twice and they become a lot more cautious and hesitant, giving your teammates valuable time to prepare or respond to threats. 5) Defend flags and assets from a position of high security that provides a good field of fire and excellent opportunity to place accurate shots on vulnerable attackers. 6) Take down or wound close-range targets without alerting the enemy to your presence. Again, this can sow panic and confusion among unsuspecting enemies, and leave them scrambling for cover and madly searching the surroundings for you rather than focusing on activities that hurt your team. In my opinion, a good sniper does all of these things, but he must do so while simultaneously avoiding being killed; if, after gaining experience with the kit, a sniper isn't maintaining at least a 3 to 1 k/d ratio, then I question the benefit he's providing to his team.
The listed disadvantages make it clear what the sniper must avoid in order to benefit his team: 1) Situations such as CQB that favor the ability to bring a high volume of fire in a short time. In such situations, more often than not the sniper will be killed, costing the team a ticket. 2) Situations that don't allow the sniper to fire with a high expectation of accuracy. You have a limited amount of ammo, and it's your duty to make the most of it by killing/wounding as many of the enemy as possible with each shot. 3) You have to avoid getting shot; you're easy to kill--which costs your team a ticket--and only one or two enemy rounds are needed to severely wound you, forcing you to seek medical aid (which usually takes you away from doing your job or forces the commander to spend a valuable asset that might better be used elsewhere--a supply drop--on you). 4) You have to avoid being seen. It's a lot more difficult for the sniper to perform his job effectively if the enemy knows where he is. As a result, the sniper has to move slowly and cautiously--movement attracts the eye--and only when and as the situation requires. Once spotted, the sniper has to use his best judgement on what to do--move to a position of safety so that he can continue performing his duties (the ideal option); move and hopefully lead the enemy into a trap; move and occupy as many of the enemy in a chase for as long as possible before being killed; or stay put and kill as many of the enemy as possible before they eventually eliminate him.
I've never seen you play, Chik, so I can only make educated assumptions about your approach to the game based upon an examination of your stats. And at a glance, it appears that you have an entirely different philosophy about how the class of sniper should be played; your high score-per-minute (2.02) and relatively low k/d ratio when equipped with a sniper rifle (2.48) suggest that you actively follow the attacking force and most commonly engage the enemy from relatively short-to-medium range (50-150 meters). This would be in keeping with the flow of action typical of the map you have by far the most time on (Karkand). Your different philosophy is further evidenced by your middling accuracy with the weapon (48.44%--most of the other higher ranked players are in the 50%+ range, and Mantisboy has an impressive 56.63%); it implies that you rely on a higher volume of fire or that you take a lot of lower-percentage shots on well-concealed or moving targets, and that you have to reload/resupply often (there's nothing wrong with this if you're in the company of supply troops, but if you're constantly relying on supply drops from the commander, you might want to consider if such drops might be better utilized elsewhere).
If this is the type of play that you enjoy or believe to be be representative of "the best", then that's fine; congratulations on being as successful as you've been in that capacity. However, in my opinion, and based upon the reasons I've carefully laid out in the preceding argument, I question whether you're serving your team as best you might. But [GDC]SinnFein and I don't typically enjoy such a play style, and more importantly we don't think it's the best way a sniper can serve as an asset on the team. And as a result, our kills-per-minute/per-hour are going to be lower than yours. But that doesn't mean we're not serving our teams; we're constantly calling out targets, taking down or wounding enemies, defending flags or stirring up confusion and chaos in the enemy ranks. You're right that camping in one location with a sniper rifle doesn't take much skill, but staying alive while you're doing that does. And I should point out that we don't just plant ourselves in one location and camp, unless it's in the best interest of the team based upon the situation. We're constantly shifting location, but usually to a limited extent (a 200-300 meter radius of operations) and always stealthily and cautiously (which means our movements are typically slower than yours might be). As well, if the situation requires, we'll do what's necessary including putting ourselves at increased risk for the benefit of the team. Anyone who's played with [GDC]SinnFein can testify to his effectiveness, or better yet, ask someone who's played against him like UTVols; his previous post about SinnFein on this thread is probably the most complimentary thing I've ever heard said about a sniper in BF2, and it goes a long way towards backing up my claim that Sinny's the best sniper I've ever seen.
Regarding your criticism about me spending most of my time on Kubra Dam--well, I do frequent that map more than others. But as =[4th]=SlayThem noted in an earlier post on this thread, "Kubra Dam is what all maps should be ... it's wonderful." I wholeheartedly concur--it's a masterful mix of terrain, distance, and air/vehicle/infantry combat that requires a Combined Arms approach and thoughtful strategizing in order to win, not just a run-and-gun mentality. Why wouldn't I love that map, or spend the majority of my time there? I'm 44 years old, Chik; I'm married, a father, and a respected professional with a lot of responsibility and stress in my life. One of the reasons I play BF2 is to burn off some of that stress, so it goes without saying that I'll try to enjoy myself as much as possible when I get the opportunity to play. For me, Kubra is the map that gives me the greatest sense of satisfaction and where I know I can serve my team to the greatest effect. But you neglected to point out that I also have significant time on Mashtuur, Sharqi, Karkand, and Dragon Valley, so I'm by no means lacking in diversity in my game play. I might note that just as I spend the vast majority of my time on Kubra, you spend the vast majority of your time on Karkand. Does that make your approach to the game inherently superior to mine? If so, you'll have to explain the reasoning behind your logic on that one.
I've wondered why you bothered to level your criticism at [GDC]SinnFein and me, Chik, and the most likely conclusion I came to was that it was because we ranked higher than you on the sniping rifle leaderboard (you're #10, right?) and, with all of the compliments that Sinny was receiving, you didn't feel you were getting the recognition you deserved. Well, I recognize and applaud skilled players, and your stats certainly suggest that you ARE skilled. So, congratulations and well done; I recognize you as a skilled sniper. But I've never played with you nor spoken with anyone who has, so I can't state with any degree of credibility that you're more skilled than Sinny. And based upon your statistics and the criteria I've listed above, I doubt that I would even if I had played with you; we're too different philosophically. So for the foreseeable future, the game's über sniper remains [GDC]SinnFein, at least in my opinion.
Now, on topic, mporlier noted that you can clearly see above 529 meters on Kubra Dam (and presumably on Dalian Plant as well), but is that in reference to large objects like buildings or vehicles or cranes, or are you referring to individual soldiers? It may just be my middle-of-the road video card (128 meg 6600GT) or the settings I'm using, but I can't see individuals beyond 420 meters, and friends who have high-end systems have told me they can't see individual soldiers beyond 510 meters. Is there a way to see a single soldier at greater distances, and if so, what equipment or settings must a person have to do so?
P.S. Aside from a few typos/spelling errors, your English isn't at all bad, Chik, especially for a non-native speaker. It's certainly better than my French, Spanish, or German (je ne me souvien pas Francais tres bien, und mein Deutsch ist nicht so gut, auch). Kudos on being a polyglot!
Last edited by Books_DCDF (2006-03-02 20:25:52)
