For the millionth time... (Deviation)

[TheComedian]

Funnily enough, some people seem to prone dive a lot and i've actually seen it employed very well, which is frustrating. Need to test it personally though. (CQB).

Dolphin diving is only useful at point blank range because you can't miss (unless you are wielding a pistol, in which case you will hit the door behind you).

[Mikemonster]

MMmm.. On Gaza skirmish there was a guy who was using the short AK who was surprisingly good at dolphin dive killing from 25m though. I might have been having a bad day but it was surprising.

[mattnett1]

I have never had an issue with Deviation.

You just need to be good. Also you should search youtube for PR Deviation. You can't sprint then bring the gun out like there is no more humans alive.

[Death006]

I just saw this thread while looking at some old loading music compilations, but since it's recent, I guess a lot of people still play PR. I wish I did, and sadly, the deviation system is why.

I'm not especially well versed in PR, I've played for the longest time, from initial releases (I still remember staying up and waiting for .4 to come out) but less so once the game began to punish people for even thinking about engaging in CQB or taking non-magnified optics.

But I know very little about the actual mechanics, so what I present below is pretty much 100% anecdotal. Feel free to correct me if my perceptions are in error to the gameplay mechanics. However, almost none of what I encounter in PR's shot deviation system is seen with my shooting experience IRL. (I'm not a dirt killing guy either, I shoot competitively, so I monitor my times and my accuracy religiously)

1. Semi Auto does not work well in CQB, nor does aiming down an RDO. Therefore, CQB fights are won by hipfiring, full auto AK's. This makes no sense. IRL, it's very difficult to shoot, even at CQB distances without using your sights, if not aiming through them, then aiming over them.

Firing from the hip or off the shoulder without indexing the weapon on target generally does not result in a 1st round hit, but rather in wasting precious time having to walk subsequent rounds on target.

IRL, a good shooter can have his weapon from high ready, to making positive, fight stopping hits (8" high center mass chest shots) in anywhere from .5-1.0 seconds at distances 25m and in. As long as it takes to bring the sights up to eye level. That's it. There's no 'settling in' to position, or controlling your breathing (if you're in shape that is, most soldiers are fairly used to their kit, and at the distances being discussed breathing is much less a factor than say, 200m)

See enemy, drive the gun while flipping off safe to semi, see red on vitals, squeeze trigger, reset, squeeze again, repeat until they stop. That's it. Not rocket science, but thanks to the deviation system, it's actually easier to pull off shots at 200m than 25m. That makes no sense.

Subsequent shots are also more easily controlled in semi auto, so rounds should be impacting fairly closely, not erratically, unless the soldier is a complete wet noodle and is not controlling the recoil on his weapon. Virtually NO ONE ever uses full auto, or burst, even in a CQB environment. It gets you no advantages over rapid, aimed, semi auto fire.


2. Moving on past CQB... Pretty well done, actually, lol. Yes, here, the deviation comes into it's own. You can't really simulate scope shadow, and adjusting your cheek weld to get it juuust so, all while trying to control breathing and nestle into a position to engage targets at distance, so the deviation system works well here. Magnified optics are king for this, and since RDO's suck at CQB, because CQB in general sucks, why ever take any red dot/ Eothingy? Anyways, for distance shooting, deviation is timed about right. You're talking about 2-3 seconds from standing to prone, to making a shot at 200m that'll actually get the enemy's attention.

Sometimes you hit, sometimes you don't, even good shooters have bad days. You figure a 4 MOA deviation with the gun/ammo combination means that most Americans are going to have at least an 8" cone at 200m. Other factions will likely have more (not much, just a little, since certain platforms are inherently less accurate than others) In general, PR's distance shooting mechanics are fine. It's frustratingly misleading to see your sights on target, but know you can't shoot yet, but as I understand it, that's a limitation of the engine and one that I can live with.

I'm not sure how to fix the CQB issue without breaking the long-distance mechanics. The bottom line is this- you can still cripple a player's ability to make that 100yard potshot off the cuff without making a cone of fire that's 10' wide at across the room distances. Perhaps if you killed the deviation delay for RDO-equipped guns, lowering it, like IRL, to no longer than it takes to shoulder, but at the cost of no magnification at distance, meaning ACOGs still win the distance fight. Make iron sights take .25-.30 seconds longer to settle.

Or how about this- RDO comes up, deviation instantly reduced to say... 36MOA, aka 36" at 100 yards, 72" at 200 hardly good enough to hit a man reliably, close enough to suppress, but not hit, which is what you'll have IRL if you try to make offhand shots at that distance quickly. But at 25 yards, this means just 9". Again, make iron sights the same, but just take .25sec longer to shoulder. That 9" at 25 yards is the perfectly attainable accuracy standard that I mentioned earlier, hell even an inch bigger, just to account for Pvt. Pyle.

Just to throw some more numbers at it, my typical time to shoulder an RDO equipped weapon and make a shot to a 36MOA standard, from a ready position, is under 1 second (For me, it's around .9 seconds-- based on hitting the 8" zone at 25 yards). The weapon can be shouldered/aimed on target in .5 seconds, so closer than 25 yards, the fight is over as fast as you get the gun up. First man on target wins, not the first guy to shoot from the hip on full auto.


Anyways, after this period of instant deviation reduction to a certain MOA degree, then the deviation can be slowly reduced at the same rate as magnified weapons up to the minimum dictated by shooting position, weapon/ammo combination. This way, RDO's and semi auto, aimed fire can dominate in CQB, but still be outgunned against distance shots made by shooters behind 4 powered glass.

My changes would be this:

-Lower deviation for red dots/iron sighted guns far beyond what it is now, to the point where shooting off the shoulder without aiming is reserved for literal contact shots, ie muzzle touching, or extreme panic.

-Fully auto fire should be another panic option, used solely for suppression, and not even for CQB. Guys who know a lot more than 11bangbang Spc Snuffy do all of their work with semi, there's a reason for that.

-Instant deviation reduction on RDO guns to 72MOA, as soon as a .5 second shouldering animation takes place. (Make an iron sighted shouldering animation take .7 seconds) Then, reduce the deviation to 36MOA across the next .5 seconds, and finally, to the minimum deviation possible given the shooting position and weapon at the same rate as a magnified optic after the 1 second mark.

-Keep deviation for magnified optic guns where it is. Getting a good checkweld and eliminating scope shadow isn't happening in CQB. And don't tell me about the Bindon aiming concept, an RDO will do the job better. Likewise, without magnification, RDO's will not be able to beat ACOGs/SUSATs at distance.


I don't usually make entirely random and lengthy posts at 11:30pm on forums I rarely frequent, but when I do, it's for games I love It's just that it's frustrating to not suck at shooting IRL, then be dropped into a realistic game where my soldier can't shoot for his life, literally. The current CQB system is broken and unrealistic as hell. Anyone who says otherwise is either not being honest, or does not have the real world shooting background/training to know how easily those shots are made.

[Mikemonster]

I thought room clearances were done on full auto? Never heard of the SAS selecting semi for hostage rescue.

I'm not a soldier, but does the current system present real-life results with CQB? I feel that at the moment the defending guy who is not scoped in is at a massive disadvantage compared to the guy who is crouched and aiming at the entry point (i.e. a door). This makes it quite hard to attack, and imho is how it should be.

Mind you, in real life I doubt combatants would run casually with their guns at their hips in a combat zone!

[Death006]

I thought room clearances were done on full auto? Never heard of the SAS selecting semi for hostage rescue.

I'm not a soldier, but does the current system present real-life results with CQB? I feel that at the moment the defending guy who is not scoped in is at a massive disadvantage compared to the guy who is crouched and aiming at the entry point (i.e. a door). This makes it quite hard to attack, and imho is how it should be.

Mind you, in real life I doubt combatants would run casually with their guns at their hips in a combat zone!

Even room clearing is done in semi, as there's no reason to send more rounds downrange than is needed. Full auto introduces the chance that rounds will go where you dont want them to. More so in a hostage situation-- every bullet has a lawyer riding on it as the saying goes. High speed units like SFODD, Devgru, (or whatever they're calling themselves this week) and I'd imagine the SAS know this and use it in training and practice more than anyone else. Watch some commonly available recruiting videos for Delta or similar units (not actors, the real guys being filmed in training) you'll never see them run full auto, even at across the room distances. Shooting semi is just as fast (for the purposes of getting hits), and the priority is getting fight-stopping hits on vital zones, not just 'anywhere goes' on the body. For that, you're going to have to aim quickly, aggressively driving against recoil and managing trigger reset.

The only people using full auto to clear rooms are inexperienced guerrillas who think that cyclic rates can overcome inferior training. (It doesn't) In the American military, full auto is reserved for belt feds and suppressive fire (and of course burning up ammo at the range).

And it is possible to get the upper hand on someone covering a doorway, but it's dependent on speed and violence of action, something the current deviation system will not allow. You basically have to move through the doorway extremely quickly, and get the #2 man in the stack in ASAP to cover your blind spot. Yes, one guy with an AK can tear a whole group of guys up-- IF they don't do it right, ie they take it slow and the #1 man spends a few seconds in the room before #2 gets past the door. If the defender is ready, he might get the first guy through the door in the plates, but he's not getting the next 3 guys behind him. That's why so much time in training is spent on getting everyone in as fast as possible.

Since speed is of the essence when engaging enemies in CQB, it means that the game's method of brutal deviation delays on even no-magnification guns will effectively make CQB unrealistic by default. There's a better way to do it, even acknowledging the engine is terribly lacking as a shooting simulator. If you take away the ability to get the gun in the fight quickly, with a degree of acceptable accuracy at distances of 25m or less, then you're basically saying that CQB is going to be unrealistic. No one is asking that 200m shots be made out of a sprint, but being able to get torso hits as soon as the sights are up at 15-25m is going to be essential. The delay works well with 4x scopes at distance, but applying it to non magnified weapon systems kills CQB.

[USMC scout sniper]

I gotta agree sometimes deviation can be really ridiculous. I've had times where literally, my bullets come out at a 45 degree angle.

[Mikemonster]

Good post Death, very well written and whilst I can't comment on the accuracy of your post you make some very good points. Thanks for explaining further.


Edit: I actually think in some cases the deviation helps in CQB in PR. If you're scoped in and moving forward you can get most shots on target. Unfortunately if you have a full auto gun you get even more shots on target. The spread of rounds is fairly small when you're scoped in with ironsights.

It helps because you don't need to aim directly at the target, instead you can wave the gun in general patterns and strafe them. But that's not possible with semi-auto so they tend to be massively disadvantaged (in some people's hands).

[Bringerof_D]

@death006: i strongly disagree with 1) i usually never switch off of semi auto unless i'm going into a place where i expect a LOT of guys. I'm not the best at CQB but i tend to survive close quarter engagements just fine with semi automatic. tap-tap, tap-tap. works great.

[Errant Pulse]

I can fire really fast on semi-auto and still be accurate.

[ShockUnitBlack]

Semi's better in most scenarios. I generally only use full-auto for clearing out bushes, when I need to get a nearby hostile's head down in order to move, and when I'm not expecting contact (if you get ambushed, your best bet is to just huck as many rounds as possible in the general direction of the firing while moving to cover; e.g. full-auto spray'n'pray.

Otherwise crouch and move left and right firing lots of rounds at your target. Deviation will do the rest (it's actually a good thing if you're not using a super-accurate weapon because your weapon will act similar a shotgun as opposed to a sniper rifle; its relative inaccuracy means something will hit, whereas a sniper rifle is so accurate you have to have a perfectly aimed shot to hit at all).

[Death006]

Semi's better in most scenarios. I generally only use full-auto for clearing out bushes, when I need to get a nearby hostile's head down in order to move, and when I'm not expecting contact (if you get ambushed, your best bet is to just huck as many rounds as possible in the general direction of the firing while moving to cover; e.g. full-auto spray'n'pray.

Otherwise crouch and move left and right firing lots of rounds at your target. Deviation will do the rest (it's actually a good thing if you're not using a super-accurate weapon because your weapon will act similar a shotgun as opposed to a sniper rifle; its relative inaccuracy means something will hit, whereas a sniper rifle is so accurate you have to have a perfectly aimed shot to hit at all).

Yeah, thats my problem with it. Skill, ie getting your dot on enemy's vitals, isn't rewarded at all. That's just wrong.

[PFunk]

Semi's better in most scenarios.

I've watched uploaded videos of clan matches with SRF, from the SRF POV, and since we all know they're pretty damned good you can bet they know whats most effective. In any meeting engagement during these matches it was always an eruption of full auto fire, followed by bad guys dead.

Granted all their clan matches seem to be on maps with nothing but AKs, but still. I think that semi in CQB or short range is only good for handling unaware enemies or ones who've freaked out and screwed up their deviation cool down.

Basically if you have a full auto weapon you can actually use the deviation to work for you since you spray an area and the bullets go everywhere so you create a cone of death around your sights, rather than try and hit a target with exacting aim. This is particularly true on the BLUFOR side with the Tavor and the C7 since they have apparently very high cyclic rates but low recoil so you can pretty much destroy in the under 20m range.

My rule of thumb as a rifleman is to always walk around with full auto on because if I need to panic fire I need it asap. If I feel the need for single shot then I can switch in that moment when you inevitably pause to let deviation settle.

I might add that hit boxes are often retarded so trying to hit a target running 90 degrees across your front in single shot mode is pretty much a waste of time/roll of the dice if you don't have the chance to shoot more than 2 or 3 aimed shots at him.

[Dev1200]

I think a reduction of per-shot deviation, while stationary, would be good for assault rifles. However, per-shot deviation should be added to LMGs. This way, people would fire in bursts instead of just rambo-auto setting


Use recoil as a deterrent for people using assault rifles like deployed LMG's. A slight increase to blufor weaponry recoil would be sufficient for this.

[L4gi]

Full auto ftw. Semi is only good at long distances. I sometimes use full auto to distances up to 150m.

[ShockUnitBlack]

Semi's good in that you're not going to spray out your entire clip and be standing there looking like an idiot reloading when the rest of the enemy squad comes a'knockin'.

[Murphy]

Keep on auto, learn to fire single shots (some weapons have such a high rof that you inevitably end up firing 2/3 rounds at times). Now you can engage targets at range as well as in CQB on full auto, never having to worry that you will be face to face with someone and have your weapon on semi.

If you're walking around with semi you're asking for an enemy to come around the next corner and empty his clip while you pop 2-3 rounds in his general direction hoping to be alive when he runs out of ammo.

[Buren06]

I think overall deviation levels are fine, even necessary. However, I strongly believe there should be an audio or visual indicator of deviation. The first thing that comes to mind is heavy breath - make the intensity of your breath indicate your deviation level, and when you can't hear your breath at all your set to 0. I don't know it this is possible on the engine or not.

IRL it's not as if you have to guess - your sight is on the target or its not.

It took me YEARS to get a feel for the deviation, and I still screw it up sometimes. Some sort of easily noticeable cue would be a godsend.

[PFunk]

The short range deviation is a real ***** sometimes. I was playing an AR last night and I was the last man standing in some retarded suicide charge on a flag (bad idea SL) and I'm running around trying to kill stuff alone and some MEC guy shoots at me. I have the AR so I move to a low wall and set up and he's running right at me. I have my gun deployed, I don't have the luxury of waiting 5 seconds and I just unload in bursts. Well apparently my deviation was so high at this point that at 15 meteres not only did I not hid a damned thing, but I kept my deviation so high that I continued to not hit anything over about 4 seconds of constant burst firing.

He hides around the corner, I go to undeployed and standing up with sight up rounding the corner while standing I shoot him, with better accuracy I might add than when I had bipod deployed.

Does the above story make any sense? I feel like short range deviation, especially on AR, is nuts. I know it should have deviation before it settles but the first 2 seconds it feels like I'm being featured in one of those "Dumb girl fires gun" videos.

That moment really pissed me off last night. I'd have been better off having a pistol that an AR when that guy was charging right at me. Apparently 800 rounds per minute have a tendency to avoid man sized targets at 10 meters when you haven't been camped there for more than 2 seconds.

[Agemman]

in some retarded suicide charge on a flag (bad idea SL)

Did I lead that squad?

On another note I have to say I like the deviation as it is mostly. It gives me something to blame when I die.