The only thing I can see wrong with my life is that I spend too much time on this game/ the forum (EVERYONE, you know this applies to you too). Other than that I'm having a smooth time, perhaps a little more money in the bank would be nice, but one can't have everything.... :)

Because of your original and astonishingly brilliant insights, and your backhanded and light-hearted humor, I have voted you top forumer: http://en.tankiforum.com/index.php?showtopic=357809&p=6369760 Let me ask you a question: Do you think the current rail alteration is better than the old railgun? If you got it for free would you be happy? As regards to the poster below, we don't control what turrets the developers design. So for the serious people it is always better to wait until actual turrets come out and then give suggestions on how to improve them, while for the idealists they can post their funny ideas here. It's just an informal place for players to share neat or original ideas while not necessarily having to go through the ramifications such an introduction would have on gameplay.

1. What I'm saying is that you are attacking the behavior of the Shaft. Sure, many bad shaft players camp and only care about k/d. But that says nothing about how powerful the turret is. Shafts use -double damage to take down enemies before they can get away -double armor to remain alive to kill said enemies -repair kit (same as above) 2. You say that the only reason Magnums can often kill Shafts is because the Shafts are camping,slow noobs? So why can't it be the other way around? Have you considered that the only Magnum's you've killed were clueless noobs? It's a type of cognitive bias you're using: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Self-serving_bias

See? You admit that Shafts are only considered weak because that most of them are noobs- why can't it be the same with you and Magnum?

Post it here: http://en.tankiforum.com/index.php?showtopic=356888 Thunder if you mainly play DM, Twins for everything else. Thunder's only asset here is its ability to kill-steal.

And keep in mind we aren't arguing that Shaft is weak or even balanced. We are only arguing that Magnum is worse, a relative argument (a second tier relative if you want to be technical, but then all game balance is.) You are actually arguing the objective side, that Shaft is far too strong and hard to kill and Magnum is far too weak and is not a large help to the team. The burden of proof is on you. Proving Shaft is strong has nothing to do with it- you have to prove that Magnum isn't stronger. And you can't just use anecdotal evidence (I kill Magnums all the time) because I'm sure Magnums kill Shafts all the time.

That's what me and friend @RIDDLER_8 have been saying: M3 and M4 need a 20% and 30% freezing speed buff, respectively. M0 could use a 20% freezing speed nerf. The M2 fire alteration is OP because the downside of it does not apply or enter into the picture much. Less energy reserve? Sure, might be a limiting factor on cramped maps like the old Polygon and HIghland where there are a lot of targets and not a lot of time to change targets. But with the larger maps, there is so much space that Firebirds easily re-fuel between each target they encounter. Then we can use this to figure out why Freeze is so weak- because when it actually runs into a person the chance of winning is not that high. The developers probably think it is balanced from their data. But it is skewed by the fact that Freeze users tend to gravitate towards smaller maps. It's the same reason Shaft has been nerfed so much- because Shafts always play on large maps and developers judge it by its performance there. With the onset of matchmaking the turrets at both ends of the spectrum need to be re-evaluated and buffed.

Read the whole thread. Good arguments for and against. I think the best option would just be to keep mines as they are, and make a "anti-armor mine" available in the garage for crystals or real money, with more damage and splash damage. Good for taking out larger groups of attackers Perhaps even a third type, an "electric mine" that activates others all others in the (40 m)vicinity but does not go away when the setter is killed. If the problem is campers than the solution is to nerf the weapons, not the mines.

We can't take low M-level comparisons since Firebird has very little afterburn of note. M4 is what we consider here, especially since the turrets and hulls turn a lot faster.

Sure. If a drugging Shaft can't kill a completely non-drugging Magnum then he is probably a noob. I agree. And it's irrelevant.

This is the issue I have with what you say. When you can "manhandle" drugging enemy Magnums using Shaft and not a single drug yourself, you know what it means? It means those Magnums are bad. That's ALL it means. They're just bad. Unskilled. Inexperienced. Inept. Blind. Slow. Dense. Clueless. Noob. Whatever you want to call it.

I don't disbelieve you, but if you can't get a higher score with Twins M2 then it is probably an issue with you and Twins (or any other turret that you've used), not that freeze is in any way strong. By all means, uses Freeze if that is what you like best- but the general consensus is that Firebird is balanced and Freeze is worse than firebird.

Perhaps they are using it to balance Dictator. Give the strongest overdrive to the weakest medium hull. Viking and Hunter at this point are better options.

Let's settle this once and for all: 1. Your math is wrong with protections, they halve the damage of the enemy turret, meaning Rail will do an average of 600 per shot, or 5 shots to kill a medium hull. BUT- when you cherry-pick protections (assuming everyone has them) to make your turret look weak that means you've already lost. 2. We count the first shot as happening instantly, or in Railgun's case, after the warm-up time of 1 second. We assume both parties are fully reloaded when making these sorts of calculations. So Rail M4 takes much less time than you think (warm-up, shoot, reload, shoot, reload, shoot) to kill a medium hull. 3. Railgun's damage doesn't decrease over distance. Smoky's goes down to a measly 10%. Make use of that, especially now that all maps have been revised for 10v10. 4. Of course a Smoky will beat a Railgun if they just stand and fire at each other. That is not how you play Railgun. By using peek-a-boo you ensure minimum damage to yourself while the high alpha damage of railgun hits the enemy. 5. Smoky's critical hit happens about once every 5 shots, not every 4 like in your calculations. 6. The chance of Railgun missing a shot is the same, but now the reload is faster so it costs less. 7. The math is also wrong in a couple minor places.

Actually that is the best option. Isida and Firebird have very similar ranges with one crucial difference: Isida's damage doesn't decrease over range while firebird's does. So when fighting firebirds, you want to be close enough to hit them but not too close, and you will assuredly win. Wolfenstein is less open than most maps- probably why your twins wasn't that effective. "Attack from back or side and freeze their turret solid" is a myth. I've used freeze for years. Even attacking tanks from the back, if they react fast they can still turn their turret all the way around- the key is to move both the turret and the hull. Heck, I've even done this against m0 freeze and we know how powerful that is. At higher ranks the freezing effect is only good for slowing down hulls stealing your flag.

I don't quite know why you can't kill firebirds- Isida outputs more damage per second. And then you make the claim that Freeze M2 is better than Twins M2- kind of lost me there.

Vulcan is one of those turrets that becomes much more potent with a healing isida buddy...but that does not change the base values. You also mentioned that Twins and Rico have "one too many tools in the chest"- well I think that that is just the reward for being a mid-range turret. Their alterations need a certain nerf though- they are almost straight buffs. I would not say Isida is less OP than freeze is UP. My opinions: Move Shaft down to "balanced" or specify that these rankings are for the General (star) Ranks, not Legend. -move Isida up to Rico and Twins level. -move Vulcan down and Striker up so they are all sitting nice and comfortable with Freeze.

The reason is that Freeze is only good for slowing down flag runners. It used to be that Freeze could be used to get the jump on any turret, from behind, and kill it this way. It was an interesting gameplay- you had to be stealthy, avoid open combat, sneak around to various drop zones, and such and such. The freeze effect is simply too weak. Freezes on light hulls are now easy kills for most turrets. In the extremely unlikely event that they get close to you they will not be able to circle you and avoid the fire from your turret. Freeze is just a Firebird without the afterburn on anything besides a flag-camper. Even then you often get taken out before the attack really comes- because you do not have the range to retaliate. Snagging peek-a-boo railguns before they vanish away is almost impossible now. And the map changes did not help. Yorkshire, Serpuchov, and Rio especially need much more players. Spaces are too open and it is practically impossible to take anyone by surprise since they do not have to keep track of many opposing players. Freeze on light hulls get knocked around by Smoky, Hammer, Rico, Twins, and Thunder. DPS is effectively 2/3 or even 1/2 of what the stats say since your cone is always swinging about. Freeze on medium hulls is restricted to defense gameplay without substantial drugging. And since you can't circle-strafe you might as well put Firebird on your Viking. Freeze on Heavy Hulls is simply not fast enough on the battle list maps unless you have a very good team (good luck with that.) Freeze was balanced if not a little overpowered for a brief time in the last major rebalance but the devs nerfed the freezing speed to death almost immediately after. Both Freeze and Vulcan need more than "mild tweaks". They need buffs that change the power set substantially.

The thing is that he's already seen you and has probably already landed shots on you, not to mention is driving backwards so that there are obstacles in the way to prevent you from hitting him. Shafts can't see that much in scope vision and they can't move at all. The only situation in which a Shaft is worse to face than a Magnum is when there are a lot of them, and they are spawnkilling you on an open map such as Monte Carlo. Then it would be better to face Magnums, simply because Magnums have lower damage output. But here you are cherry-picking the absolute worst scenario for a Magnum. Even I can avoid this when I use Magnum-wasp, and I am by no means a skilled Magnum player.

Snipers have a specific role in warfare both in and out of the computer screen. They do not lie along the spectrum of other roles such as sharpshooter, guard, and commando. This unique position gives them a whole host of advantages as well as disadvantages. For example, an inability to function without protection is balanced by a disproportionate influence on the battle. This is simply how snipers work. Easier said than done. A skilled Magnum user will not let you slam him sideways into a wall. And anyways they can just fire directly upward. Magnum can even win against melee guns such as firebird since it can lob a shot past them and the splash will affect the enemy but not the Magnum.

The top forumer is without a doubt this eloquent marvel. The forum is not dead...but it is certainly aging.

The problem is that TO is a browser-based game, pretty much the only claim to fame it has, and so hacking will always be a problem. In client games it is possible to "hack" and edit your own client, but as soon as the request gets run through the main servers, the information is filtered and any requests that do not align with the server's backup files are changed. When you shoot somebody, the data is first transferred to the server and then from there to their client; it is not going directly to their computer. TO is rather different. They don't really have that intermediate step, because you are allowed access to the main server as well as your own client; they effectively function as one. Therefore there is no validation process, when you edit the code it applies to everyone instead of the facade a client game will put up. You're hacking the local flash player which is cycling the input from TO servers. Honestly, the lag is already an issue, so I'm not sure if the loop-confirmation process is feasible when the computers are all running a few seconds apart. Obviously the feature is not allowed on purpose- but the game will forever be vulnerable this way.

Agreed. The limit of friends should increase per rank- legends get 500, recruits get 10, and everything else in-between. But IMO the lag is still the bigger issue to fix. You could just copy all their nicknames into a word or google doc.

You don't have to delete them, you can keep as much friends as you want (over 300) if they are active or semi-active in the game.

Okay, but wasn't McAfee the one that blocked the internet for a few days a few years ago because it detected "potential viruses"? Norton is a good first-layer to prevent you from wandering into dangerous sites in the first place.