But why does Freeze have so much damage?! Since it can literally prevent tanks from escaping or fighting back, why does it also have so much more damage than Firebird, which can't do either, and almost same damage as Isida (actually slightly higher at M0 and M1) which can't do either AND can't multi-hit?

Not from 32,984,780,293 meters away Well I ditched this one a long time ago. I tried out Smoky some on two other accounts (and yes i did find it very OP), and then i made two other ones to try Railgun after deciding Smoky wasn't my playstyle.

That's not what happened. I play Railgun on two Staff Sergeant accounts; the Smokies in question were M0s and M1s; not too high above me. I usually do rek them by sniping them from long-range, however I always got frustrated when they suddenly land a crit on me and take out 50-60% of my HP from cross-map (and also screw up my aim). Even more annoying when they happened to be using a Double Damage and insta-kill me. At least for this time, it wasn't rank/equipment imbalance, it was Smoky itself.

That is just begging to be abused.

I have a topic on this: http://en.tankiforum.com/index.php?showtopic=374957

The main issue with the auto-aim system of not-instant-hit turrets is that it treats it like an instant-hit turret even though it isn't. So you only get the system working from aiming at where they currently are, and not when you're actually leading them, which is kind of annoying. Im wondering if this kind of thing might actually be an intentional nerf to these types of weapons though. There's this other game I know where they actually have a few weapons with deliberately screwed up targeting systems as a balancing mechanism.

Isn't Striker in most cases better than Thunder now? I mean, it doesn't have dropoff like Thunder does, and it also has an anti-heavy ability, which Thunder doesn't

Thunder is more long-range dedicated than Smoky though

In my opinion, Smoky should be utterly helpless beyond 70 meters. It should not even be allowed the POSSIBILITY to make a long-range danger back off.

YES PLEASE THIS FEATURE IS GREAT

I often feel that Smoky counters Railgun too much, especially because of that high mid-range DPS which usually kills light-hull Railguns before they can fire off a second shot, and the high impact force, which usually assures no second shot even if they survive. Those long-range snipes are Railgun's payback moments, which should NOT be spoiled by suddenly getting 50-60% of your HP (or instant-death, if Smoky is using double-damage) zapped off by a crit. I fully support Smoky countering Railgun at short and mid range but not at long range. I AGREE that Smoky becomes far less OP at M2 and M3 ranks, but at M0 and M1 it is too OP. Honestly the better way to go would just keep the crit damage high but make it not infinite range, instead of nerfing damage and preserving infinite range. Keeps it good at short and mid range. Makes it horrible at long range. Just like it should be.

There was a point after the second rebalance when Smoky's crit was changed to infinite range, but in return it only did like 100 damage more than a regular hit. I didn't see Smoky becoming bad at all during that time; it was still pretty good. That says something.

What role is this turret supposed to serve? All turrets are supposed to fill a certain role, which determines how it's balanced. Usually it's also a role that another turret can't fill.

and yeah i realized that the crit's damage becomes less of an improvement over regular damage with increasing M level. Would be nice if they did that to the lower-M versions too.

BUT THE THING IS THAT SMOKY SHOULD BE ABSOLUTE CRAP AT LONG RANGE. RIGHT NOW IT'S NOT ABSOLUTE CRAP. I HAVE ISSUES WITH THAT or something like that anyways

ASL mode at the moment seems to be quite biased towards the Blue team. Often they can simply equip Firebirds, Freezes, and Smokies, and just guard the usually single point. This is super effective because Red is forced to get up close and personal to Blue team to actually capture the flags. Furthermore, they can just equip Titans and Mammoths with Double Armor and block the way, or even the point, creating a very hard-to-pass blockad. The times that flags do slip through (granting Red 5 points) are usually more than made up by times that Blue got a kill (granting them 1 point) from successfully killing a Red flag carrier, spawnkilling Red players (which Blue can usually spare the manpower to do), or just some other random kills they get. In ADDITION, Blue also gets defender's advantage. They can camp/hide and wait at no disadvantage to themselves. Red cannot do this because they have to advance to score. The solution to this would be to make every ASL map have at least 2 points. This forces Blue to spread their forces out more to defend both, as opposed to simply being able to camp one, making each individual point easier to raid. This also means they will have less manpower to be able to spawncamp Red. What do you think?

At long range? No. The only turrets that do better damage at such ranges are specialized long-range weapons (Railgun, Shaft, Striker, Magnum) and the higher-range mid-range turrets (Thunder and Vulcan), most of which do a pretty bad job of defending themselves at mid and close range (and deservedly so). Smoky does not have this weakness nearly as much.

Smoky excels at mid-range and can still do pretty good at close range (can still do some good damage to specialized close-range turrets such as Firebird, Freeze, and Isida). That is GOOD. Smoky SHOULD suck at long range, since it is such a great mid-range and good short-range weapon. But it doesn't thanks to the crit being infinite-range and high-damage. Smoky's crit should either be short-range payback (high damage, normal dropoff), or long-range payback (normal damage, no dropoff). It shouldn't be allowed to be both. It doesn't matter to me which one it is, I just think Smoky's crit is too powerful right now and makes it too good at all ranges.

Smoky's infinite-range crit is OP. I feel like it should either have dropoff or not also deal so much more than regular damage.

Self-destructing should also reward for assists just like regular kills do.

You get containers for completing daily mission chains. Plus, compare what you get from completing a mission to the reward you get from a container. Containers are far more valuable than a single mission.