Deadeye Rifle Balancing

Just wanted to make a quick comment...

It's my understanding that rifle is lower DPS than pistol/pistol for the Deadeye. This seems a bit odd since the rifle is part of the elite tree by design. That said, I was looking over my chosen build and comments on P/P DE and Ankle Shots seems to be lacking. For P/P builds it can add another 10% damage (assuming you aren't the only one adding cripple in raids since it's often a side-effect of other talents) and it specifically states 'pistol and harpoon attacks' which leads me to believe it was initially intended for all ranged weapons (sand SB since SB isn't a DPS weapon for Thief) but never updated to reflect Rifle shots as well.

Perhaps if ANet actually updated Ankle Shots to include Rifle this would help round things out a bit. Thoughts?

Also, as a note, I am not a min/max player, just adding thoughts on something that seems to be a relatively simple fix to an overlooked talent.

@Yakubyogami.7586 said:Perhaps if ANet actually updated Ankle Shots to include Rifle this would help round things out a bit. Thoughts?

That's a good suggestion.

The problem with rifle is that you usually have to keep still/kneel in one spot to do decent damage... in a game where keeping still in one spot for longer than half a second usually leads to major trouble.The second problem is the literal "pew pew piung piang" noises it makes, but that's not really part of the actual problem with the rifle... at least in effectiveness.

@Ayumi A Spender.5172 said:The problem with rifle is that you usually have to keep still/kneel in one spot to do decent damage... in a game where keeping still in one spot for longer than half a second usually leads to major trouble.

Something SW:toR had for their Operative (Rifle spec) was a shield that popped up when kneeling. I forgot if it was reflect or % reduction or whatever but it still helped to balance the turret-like disadvantages. I could see the little mark symbol that pops up when we set it possibly remaining and acting as a sort of shield. Maybe perma-protection or periodic aegis (similar to Guardian)?

It wouldn't make DE OPed at all since it's self-only and if you get snagged by an Elite or higher when kneeling you still have to either move or die (33% won't help a ton against those) but it can smooth out HP loss issues.

Maybe it's a trade off for rifle having 1500 range instead of 900 like pistols. Also, how do you raid with Deadeye I wonder?

while rifle does indeed deal less damage in general it has WAAAAAY more rangeand you can also sit in stealth for 10 or so seconds and absolutely demolish someone in one shot.

so it is really a choice between sustained damage while being closer to your enemy and in more danger,or deal a bit less sustained damage but from a distance where most classes cant damage you back and also giving you a cheesy oneshot option.

@Faaris.8013 said:Maybe it's a trade off for rifle having 1500 range instead of 900 like pistols.

And bingo was his name-o. Rifle should not be inherently superior to anything just because it is part of an elite spec: they are not meant to be straight upgrades but sidegrades.

@Oglaf.1074 said:

@Faaris.8013 said:Maybe it's a trade off for rifle having 1500 range instead of 900 like pistols.

and yet a rifle is 2 handed which should do more damage, all 2 handed weapons do.

@sorudo.9054 said:

@Oglaf.1074 said:

@Faaris.8013 said:Maybe it's a trade off for rifle having 1500 range instead of 900 like pistols.

No, they shouldn't.*

*other than the fact that they have a higher damage range, stat-wise.

@Yakubyogami.7586 said:Just wanted to make a quick comment...

It's my understanding that rifle is lower DPS than pistol/pistol for the Deadeye. This seems a bit odd since the rifle is part of the elite tree by design. That said, I was looking over my chosen build and comments on P/P DE and Ankle Shots seems to be lacking. For P/P builds it can add another 10% damage (assuming you aren't the only one adding cripple in raids since it's often a side-effect of other talents) and it specifically states 'pistol and harpoon attacks' which leads me to believe it was initially intended for all ranged weapons (sand SB since SB isn't a DPS weapon for Thief) but never updated to reflect Rifle shots as well.

Perhaps if ANet actually updated Ankle Shots to include Rifle this would help round things out a bit. Thoughts?

Also, as a note, I am not a min/max player, just adding thoughts on something that seems to be a relatively simple fix to an overlooked talent.

You are wrong. Rifle does way more damage than pistol pistol ever does. You are complaining about the difference in DPS, when they are 2 types of weapons. Deadeye Rifle was intended to be a spike, nuke weapon, of which it does that very well.

It was never intended to be DPS heavy, and most likely wasn't even intended for pve. Your complaint is valid, but you are looking at the weapon in the wrong way.