Any questions about NC cert you can ask me.

Try using HEAT on air vehicles, I had more success with it TBH. I agree tho, one hit with AP round on a Lib will take it down by 90%, HEAT will probably do less damage.

 

Vanguard is a f'ckin beast. Hey prowler wanna go face to face? f'ck u, time to die. I don't even have to strafe or position myself.

Got some engies repairing me? haha I don't run I just stay there shooting.

Hay 3 tanks are shooting me. Guess what, pop my shield and run. Np np.

I feel like with a Vanguard I can shut off my brain after playing a Mag for so long. Magriders are so brain intensive with all the strafing, dodging, hiding, flanking, retreating etc.

I like the Vanguard, just saying.



Btw Hawk I agree the Gauss Saw is a bad choice for default NC weapon.

I tried the EM1 but I still like the anchor for some reason. Recoil seems less. I like to hipfire too.

 

The last major patch was an overall indirect buff to NC infantry because they suffered the most from nanoweave and lack of hipfire(lower damage output when factoring in nanoweave and HA shields, worst hipfire, worst ADAD and reaction to flinch). There was also a bug on some NC weapons that caused them to have higher spread bloom and attachment penalties were accidentally applied twice.

In general, almost all NC weapons are basically the Pulsar-C / Flare, with slight ROF, bullet velocity, magazine capacity and attachment variations. Reload times are mostly terrible. When playing against GOOD players <60m or when severely outnumbered by bad ones, the NS weapons are often the best choice because both parties will be ADAD and taking advantage of the client side hit detection so the 0.75 ADS multiplier reigns supreme. A little known mechanic is that recoil and spread don't start to recover until you have waited the time it takes for that weapon to fire another bullet so you will need an extra tenth of a second or so inbetween your bursts due to the lower RPM of the NC weapons. It's all or nothing how the game calculates these intervals so if you're just a hair short and have very low FPS on top of that so your computer is stacking more input between computation cycles, you will quickly find yourself on target yet hitting nothing. I often die right after switching from a TR/VS char to NC by shooting a little too soon after moving and bursting on uneven terrain that spikes the spread.

All burst weapons - worthless because they don't significantly change the first bullet multipliers to be more useful at range while increasing recoil at closer ranges due to the first bullet multiplier coming every 3rd instead of the 6-9 shot bursts one would use closer while controlling the recoil.

Heavy -
SAW - this weapon gets better the larger the fight gets. It is best when you can stay still slightly off the front line or with high ground and mow people down at range with the highest killing capacity before reload in the game. It also has a perfect accuracy first bullet that combined with the nanoweave change allows you to reliably triple tap headshot stationary people at long range. The weaknesses are the worst ADAD cof, worst bloom per shot / flinch from shot, worst equip time, worst recoil recovery time, and highest vertical recoil in the game. It is a great specialty weapon for holding positions when you have meat shields in front of you and it's usefulness stops there. Most people should probably aim for the stomach so that the 3rd/4th shot hits the head.

NS-lmg - Softpoint and laser for ADADing against good people or swarms of bads who can't hit someone ADADA.

EM1 - easiest to use general purpose and least bloom per shot amongst NC options. It's a worse SVA-88 with more bullets, slower ROF, slightly better hipfire with adv laser, less horizontal recoil. ADV laser sight with softpoint. The weapons max horizontal recoil was lowered in the last patch so the first shot kick is now more reliable, making this a better choice than the EM6.

EM6 - This weapon used to be the best general purpose, but due to the LMG hipfire nerf and the compensator hurting the hipfire further, its hipfire isn't reliable and it's outperformed by the SAW at the roles it's still good at. No reason to use this.

Anchor - pure CQB, but since you have the Jackhammer and Cyclone available to you, why bother.

GD-22s - all purpose, inferior to EM1 and NS.

Jackhammer - if using the 3 shot burst, aim for the stomach. Most people don't use nanoweave anymore so it has more than enough pellets to kill when centered, and at longer ranges the recoil kicks the latter shells into their face that ignores nanoweave. Useful to about 20m popping in and out of cover. As with all shotguns, make it a point to be the aggressor to take advantage of the client side hit detection.

Carbines -
AC-X11 - minisaw with better hipfire. Buggy attachments fixed in the last patch so foregrip + compensator + LA roof camping = win. The bullet speed is slow, however, despite all of the other long range characteristics. It's more like a UMP in Battlefield.
Default - Slightly higher ROF Pulsar-C.
GD7-F - best carbine at launch, then nerfed, then buggy, now fixed. Best CQ option with laser, softpoint, high ROF. NC equiv of a serpent/vx. Keep in mind that laser sights no longer work while jumping, so the hipfire while floating with a LA is much worse than the SMG.
Others - nothing special that the above or the NS-11C aren't a better choice for since they're all small compromises inbetween.

SMG - Cyclone best SMG in the game due to reliable low horizontal recoil and high damage output.
Blitz - meh. Only better than the Cyclone if tossing an EMP grenade into stacked baddies but in that situation you could just Cyclone then 1 shot headshot with Commy/Underboss.

Assault Rifles-
Carnage and GR-22 for 0.75 ADADA. Carnage for more range and less horizontal recoil and kick, GR-22 for pure hipfire cqb. Since the GR-22 only adds 50RPM to benefit CQB, the Carnage is a more reliable and useful weapon, similar to the TR Lynx/Jaguar situation.

Reaper DMR - medic version of the minisaw/UMP AC-X11. Oddly the fastest reload of NC AR's and it doesn't have the low bullet velocity of the carbine. Like the SAW, worst hipfire, bloom, and movement penalties in the game but it has a great niche role taking advantage of high ground while behind and rezzing meat shields.


Vehicles:
Vanguard - Most people use AP exclusively because they only pull them for AV duty and vehicles have much lower resistance vs AP rounds than the HEAT(37% more damage with AP than HEAT). You would need 24 seconds to kill a Mag/Prowler with HEAT solo vs 13 with AP by swapping into the gunner seat and finishing him off on fire with the Enforcer. The gap is narrowed when you have a dedicated gunner, but when you start including surprise/large scale rear shots and repairs, the gap between the two gets very large again. Vanguard = great at AV small scale, terrible at AI. The biggest weakness to the Vanguard is its very, very slow acceleration and lack of AI weapons that severely hinder its ability to avoid C4, aircraft, and incoming rockets/turret. The acceleration problem and lengthy body makes peek shooting impractical since the enemy can shoot your nose and retreat behind their own cover before you get your shot off, and peek shooting also negates the advantages of the Enforcer. The most effective strategy is usually to find an opening to charge along a path that prevents enemy retreat while popping the shield and continuing forward to a second set of cover *not retreating to the old cover since turning and acceleration is too slow and you die to infantry*. The Vanguard also has the highest front armor, so try to keep the enemy within a 45 degree cone of your nose. The shield is an I-win button in small fights where the other target has no retreat path/cover and allows a pair of Vanguards to protect each other from diving libs by surviving the buster/dalton combo while the other kills it. The Enforcer is better than the halberd in most cases because of the higher damage output and faster velocity and it received a small buff in the last patch while the Halberd got a small nerf. The best skill to have with a Vanguard is to have a crosshair on your monitor so you can shoot in 3rd person while moving so the turret isn't bouncing all over the place. If you really want to maximize the effectiveness of the Vanguard, you should group with repair sundies and play aggressively with the Sundy drivers making it a point to move in and out of the line of fire for the Vanguards who pop their shields and protecting the group from air and infantry.

 

They both kill a lib in 2 shots, and the AP round is faster with less drop so easier to hit. You probably had more success with HEAT because you are used to leading with the slower higher gravity Mag rounds.

 

Yup and I've been suffering from this a lot. Still cant adjust, I mean it would take a several shots just to get back into it so HEAT so far does it for me. I play Vanguard as more focused towards AI and having a gunner is a huge plus when going against armor.
Considering the shield, Vanguard with a gunner can take out any tank even with HEAT rounds.

 

A lot better said then I put

 

Btw Mav is a rocket scientist. so he kinda knows what he is talking about