Heavy Clip: What is it good for anyway?

[Mysterious Medic]

While I was thinking about the upcoming balance changes, it reminded me of the heavy clip change a while ago. Is heavy clip actually optimal at anything anymore? How the hwacha works means it can do mid-ish range without heavy clip anyway. It loses on heavy caronade to lochnagar or charged. Light caronades don't do much shatter damage anymore, and with heavy clip is not enough to destroy a balloon. On gatling you're better off using lesmok for range or greased for short range. The only thing I can think of is minotaur, and that gun isn't really good enough to utilize it either. At this point it's basically a dead ammo. I miss sniping components with caronade and I know they won't bring it back, but they need to change something to make it viable again. Maybe lessen it's clip reduction? I fear that if the lochnagar changes in dev app go through, loch will go the way of heavy clip and be only somewhat effective on one gun. Does anyone have any suggestions for making heavy clip useful again?

Edit: Not sure if this should be on Feedback and Suggestions, but I'm not really suggesting anything anyway, just starting a discussion.

[Daft Loon]

Heavyclip banshee has some use actually getting the max range out of that gun.

Heavyclip mines are no worse than standard mines.

[Omniraptor]

I have to disagree about heavy being better than charged on heavy carronade.

[Kamoba]

Heavy ammo in my opinion is not a good choice anymore...

Before I would give buff gungineer heavy clip on a Gatling to allow effective mid-range shooting while keeping good damage, choosing greased or lesmok only based on situations (IE Lesmok vs Squids.)

Now?..
When playing with pub crews it goes to the Hwacha gunner to replace their lesmok, or the heavy carronade gunner, which I advise then to use if they're struggling with Loch.

That's only in pub crews....
Which is a pretty crappy niche for an ammo in my opinion..
"Okay so we have this ammo which is not good at much, but it is a better choice for newbies in some situations."

While other ammos have a use of.
"This ammo is THIS, other ammos do not compare! Bow to the greased Gatling, cower in fear at charged merc, and tremble in awe at burst Artemis!"

While heavy ammo sits in the corner and cries.

[Erom Gary]

I sometimes use heavy clip on gatling. Not because of the increasing range, but preferrably I find it useful to keep a steady and consistent stream when firing it.

When firing a gatling with either greased or normal ammo, alot of the bullets will go missing and not hit the armor because of the jitter. Most of it will hit a gun/engine nearby shielding the armor, fly into balloon or completely miss the target.

I find it pretty effective onboard a squid due to the high speed, which makes firing a gatling much more difficult when using greased or normal ammo.   

[Fynx]

- Gatling: for sniping components and against junkers. Not so useful anymore, I'd bring greased or lesmok or inc, always. It can be used, though...
- Light carronade: for op sniping. Not op at all these days and you shouldn't bring it unless you have a gunner on the carro. Carronades are now either primary (buffed greased, so you can actually pop balloons) or support (incendiary).
- Hwacha: let's not talk about this, okay...
- Heavy Carronade: it's a good choice when your gun is damaged from lochnagar and the target is too far away for charged. More of sad necessity rather than 'good choice', but still...
- Minotaur: viable choice at medium/long range.
- Flare: sniping big guns, still okay-ish.

In short, out of 6 guns that were actually used with heavy clip, there is only one where is is really needed (mino) and two where it is kinda useful, but still less used than other ammos (heavy carro, flare) and two where it is almost obsolete plus one completely hopeless. Good day.

[Mysterious Medic]

Heavy ammo is kind of in a tough spot balancing wise. Previously the ammo was a dire necessity and one that you "needed" to use. Back forever ago the gat was too inaccurate to hit anything without it. More recently (still like a year ago) you needed it on caronades to snipe components and be able to pop balloons at its maximum range. Back then if you wanted to use hwacha at mid- or long range you needed to use it too. And guess what? It was really fun and not overpowered in any way on the hwacha. The only reason hwacha is the way it is now is because they felt they had to buff it when they nerf the heavy clip. IMO they should just keep the shatter the way it is now on the caronade and bring heavy clip back.

Regardless, this brings up the question: if an ammo is "needed" on a gun or increases its effectiveness exponentially like burst on hwacha or Artemis, is that overpowered?

[Atruejedi]

I always have my heavy carronade gunner bring heavy clip and lochnager ammo. Heavy for the initial shots to test maximum range, lochnager thereafter, and back to heavy whenever in combat (can't risk the gun being damaged and blowing itself up).

I also like heavy clip in the light carronade compared to greased if an engineer is likely to occasionally mount it (like on the side of a Goldfish).

Obviously the Minotaur benefits greatly from heavy clip.

Sometimes I'll have a gatling gunner bring heavy clip in certain positions... namely, bottom of a Junker that has an Artemis and a gatling (burst, heavy, greased [I gave up on lesmok for the gatling to prevent myself from using my close-range side at longer ranges]), or a Pyramidion gatling (lesmok, heavy, and greased). Heavy clip is lovely for targeting specific components but also great for hitting an enemy Junker's main deck accurately.

If I run a hwacha with a gunner (as opposed to a mallet-spanner-buffing engineer with burst), heavy is always the first clip when outside of combat. I personally wish it were a bit more necessary because, as we all know, hwacha is overpowered at medium-long range with burst.

I never bother with heavy in the banshee or flare gun..., but I understand the reasons people do... I just don't agree

I think heavy clip is great, but I wish the clip reduction was just a little less restrictive... instead of a 25% reduction, 20% would be sooo much nicer for that gatling gun

[Fynx]

I forgot to mention light flak and banshee obviously. Usefulness of heavy clip in those guns decreased the same way as in gatling.

I always have my heavy carronade gunner bring heavy clip and lochnager ammo. Heavy for the initial shots to test maximum range, lochnager thereafter, and back to heavy whenever in combat (can't risk the gun being damaged and blowing itself up).

The more standard approach is to get a quick initial pop with lochnagar, because it's when it's most needed, then switch to other ammos, but that's just a detail here.

If I run a hwacha with a gunner (as opposed to a mallet-spanner-buffing engineer with burst), heavy is always the first clip when outside of combat. I personally wish it were a bit more necessary because, as we all know, hwacha is overpowered at medium-long range with burst.

It's not like I condemn you or something, but if you do this, heavy flak is more effective right now.

I think heavy clip is great, but I wish the clip reduction was just a little less restrictive... instead of a 25% reduction, 20% would be sooo much nicer for that gatling gun

There were certain changes I suggested once upon a time: https://gunsoficarus.com/community/forum/index.php/topic,6874.msg118138.html#msg118138
Decide for yourself if it's reasonable or complete crap.

[BinaryDragon]

I think the point of heavy ammo is to reduce the spread of the guns. This means it will function well in guns with a big spread like banshee, minotaur, carronade and hawacha. At short range however, the ammo have no practical use

[Kamoba]

I think the point of heavy ammo is to reduce the spread of the guns. This means it will function well in guns with a big spread like banshee, minotaur, carronade and hawacha. At short range however, the ammo have no practical use

That's what it should be, but certain changes over the past year or so have made this less and less true... :-/

[Richard LeMoon]

With the reduction in hwacha speed, Heavy could be given its full to near full reduction back. Personally, I would add the Greased/Heasink effect of reducing the velocity a bit rather than reducing clip size. If you really want to reduce recoil, you slow down your muzzle velocity.

Maybe these stats:

Clip size: - 10% (from -25%)
Projectile speed: -10%
Recoil: -100%

This would make it a bit harder but more rewarding to hit at long range on a moving target. It would also make Heavy viable on a mine launcher, placing shots between Heatsink and Normal. Light Flak, Banshee, and Gatling would benefit more than they used to as well.

[Letus]

Have we been able to see how useful it is in Hwatcha yet now that Hwatcha is now slower at travel?  I haven't really seen it in action ...from gunner end... due to the chaos of Lochnagar, and with the speed, I'm assuming the idea of hwatcha anything hasn't changed: just get in their faces and burst.  So, no clue if heavy clip hwatcha sniping is viable again.

[Omniraptor]

Why would the muzzle speed change make heavy clip hwacha any more viable? The hwacha now has the same muzzle speed as the heavy flak, and heavy flak is difficult enough to hit even without jitter.

[Letus]

Why would the muzzle speed change make heavy clip hwacha any more viable? The hwacha now has the same muzzle speed as the heavy flak, and heavy flak is difficult enough to hit even without jitter.

Just did a couple shots against target ships (I know...wooooooo really not viable)

The medium placed ship with burst had about a 50% chance to disable all the components in one clip, where the heavy clip did.
...but when are we going to see hwatcha used at 500m+ engagements again? :V  At 1km, heavy clip is viable, but will require a little bit more lead than usual...
...but who uses hwatcha at 1km...

(like...the last time I did that was during that community VIP Saturday thing...and it was to knock out a lumberjack so we could bust closer..)