Is shaft making a comeback?

[smokeyh2 1,512]

been playing a few games lately and its nice to see some shafts returning to the game

been a bit of an underdog for a while which is a shame because to me shaft is a great weapon

ok we know it has had a few updates done to it and they were not popular with players who used shaft

(me included)

 

i recently bought a m3 shaft in the sales and with a few micro upgrades this thing is a beast if you take your time

and think what your doing it is a great weapon to use in team matches

 

so guys break out your shaft and have fun

not the noob weapon many players would have you believe

[The_Smoky_Project 25]

Shaft was never a bad weapon. Even after the physics update it had tremendous use in support, now being able to be played on all of the hulls and not just the heavy ones. Now that it has a laser, it can be used as a suppressor, keeping tanks from going down certain paths. Even then, the laser doesn't occur immediately, so if you charge and shoot before being static for very long, you can still sneak in shots at people.

 

So always was a good weapon. People just never wanted to relearn the Shaft.

[ZRichard123 28]

Shaft with double damage m0 m1 m2 m3= kill any tank without double armour m0 m1 m2 m3, in one shot!

[FogOfWar_XXX 793]

The thing is shaft is easiest weapon in game.

I mean seriously.

 

Really?  Three Star and even you're making that comment.  I'm disgusted.  Come on.  This is the only tank where you have to carefully pick who and when to kill with.  Reload is hell, Turret speed is painful, and you'rea sitting duck with laser now.  real effective shafting is serious work.  Everyone else gets auto aim, we don't.  Angles of attack, degrees of arc, all compensated for in the others within reason, point close enough, you hit, period.  In fact, last night I was playing and a rail was trying to shoot someone on my left.  The tank was moving left to right, and they crossed my path.  At that very moment, the rail collided with a building as they were trying to turn their turret and turn their tank atthe same time.  Barrel is CLEARLY pointing to somewhere inbetween the two of us tanks on the opposing teams, NOT AT ME or the other person.  My team mate escapes the arc of the auto aim but I guess I was still in it, and boom, some glitched up looking rail trail at like a 8 or 10 degree angle hits me from their barrel.  I'll hear none of it.  Shaft is not an easy weapon to use.  Might be easy to grasp the control, but not the use of it.

 

I have also posted about this in Lets Discuss Shaft recently.  There does seem to be a resurgence of shafts lately, and I for one am very happy with that, but CTF is a bear when the team your against has 5 or 6 doing base defense.  If they drug it's damn near impossible.  I for one love it.  Makes the games much more mental and forces people to think and slowly pick paths and choose what to do.  No more electronic football.  I just hope the trend continues, it will change the game play ENTIRELY, and Shafts take the wind out of druggers big time, from Repair Boxes to DA, Shafts make the effectiveness of those two items for less viable.

 

Anyways, yeah for shafts everywhere.

[The_Smoky_Project 25]

Shaft requires no aim though.  So sure, long reload time.  But no aim required whatsoever.

Its not like it locks onto targets like other tanks. You do have to move your turret to aim right and you can't rely on the auto-aim to aim up and down for you, so if anything you have to aim the most with Shaft.

 

Also, while scoped, you are completely blind to everything that is 15 degrees outside your scope, so sneaking up on a scoped Shaft is extremely easy. This makes the Shaft's life very hard, as every scope should have a recipient.

 

If anything is to be considered the easiest turret in the game, its Isida. Only turret you can make points with without even needing to get in a fight.

[splitterpoint 10,986]

Shaft requires no aim though.  So sure, long reload time.  But no aim required whatsoever.

Lol

[dgslima82 143]

Its not like it locks onto targets like other tanks. You do have to move your turret to aim right and you can't rely on the auto-aim to aim up and down for you, so if anything you have to aim the most with Shaft.

 

Also, while scoped, you are completely blind to everything that is 15 degrees outside your scope, so sneaking up on a scoped Shaft is extremely easy. This makes the Shaft's life very hard, as every scope should have a recipient.

 

If anything is to be considered the easiest turret in the game, its Isida. Only turret you can make points with without even needing to get in a fight.

Well if you say that you really have no clue on what playing with Isida is like...

 

Most of the time you end up sacrificing yourself and not returning fire to the oponents because you are too busy healing your team while they are capturing flags or points, and you are the obvious target most of the time because everybody knows the Isida needs to die first so it cant heal the team.

And if you go against log range weapons or in long maps you'll probably die before even getting close enough to fire.

 

But hey, it's the "easiest turrert"...

[splitterpoint 10,986]

Isida is pretty hard to play with.

But if there are enough team mates around you, it's the easiest way to rack up score.

 

I usually sit behind people and use them as shield, in return I heal them.

That would be the ideal situation for an Isida IMO.

[Maf 32,305]

If anything is to be considered the easiest turret in the game, its Isida. Only turret you can make points with without even needing to get in a fight.

Not anymore. If you only heal one vulcan at base, which infinitely shoots one point at the base entrance, then maybe, but the true skilled Isidas have to do a lot of decisions in a short amount of time, such as whether to heal or kill, attack or defend, advance or stay in cover. Shaft has also become a skill-dependent weapon after the laser update, so it being easy to use is not the reason it's becoming more popular. Perhaps OP recently changed game mode preference by going, for example, from Polygon CP to Serpuhov CTF. Certain maps are more suited for Shaft, so obviously it will be more common there.

 

Still one of the least used guns in the game though, imho.

[splitterpoint 10,986]

Still one of the least used guns in the game though, imho.

Thus less protective paints. :ph34r:

This thing rocks.

[smokeyh2 1,512]

i have my m3 shaft fully upgraded for sniping damage

so i now have at my disposal on double damage 560 hp

basically i can one shot any unprotected hull in this game (m3 mammoths included)

what other turret can offer you that?

 

no excuses for not using it now and again

[eminem9870 605]

Removal of moon silence made big impact on the turrets popularity. People would snipe in moon silence. Until devs had to remove the map :(

[FX011 1]

iv seen a lot of shafts in m0-m1 games, always atleast 5 on each side lol

[FogOfWar_XXX 793]

Shaft requires no aim though.  So sure, long reload time.  But no aim required whatsoever.

 

You can see exactly where it will shoot... That's not aiming you are being told if its a hit or not.

Also, when scoped in games like Call of Duty it limits pretty much 100% of your view instead of the tiny amount Tanki does.  It still shows a lot of room.

 

And anyways, Shaft uses no skill unless you are using viking or lighter.  Even with those hulls thou its still very simple.

I was not going to respond, butthat second one, that's it, I couldn't take it.

 

What crack pipe are you smoking?  The aperture from the sight recticle moving out from the cross hairs is only useful when staring out into some vast open area.  You have no idea how many times I have been scoped in Serpuhov and a flag zooms right by me so fast I can't even let go of the space bar in time, entering from right to left, or vice versa.  Having to aim means just that, WE HAVE TO AIM.  Just because there is no bob on the barrel anymore doesn't mean we auto"magically" hit whatever it is we want.  M2 hulls and above move REALLY quick, and turret rotation of a shaft is not exceptional, in fact, it's painfully slow.  I'll hear none of it.  Tired of all the auto aimers saying we have some special magical wand for aiming.  WE AIM MAUNUALLY DAMN IT!  We do all that.  And picking off shots from a distance when you have a sliver of turret moving and juking and jiving everywhere is certainly not easy, and auto aimers get the benefit in those instances, so yeah, no, it's a task to say the least.

 

Simple?

 

Lets add this up:

 

1.  Observe the enemy team and look for the pattern they are using to move across the map.

2.  Once this is done find a place from which to get the best visibility while hiding yourself the best you can.

3.  DON'T SCOPE until there is a target because the stupid laser will give you away.

4.  At the first sign of target, start tracking and zooming and hope to hell you can get full charge on them before they zoom out of your range, otherwise loose a shot on someone without a full charge.

3b.  DO SCOPE and sit in wait hiding the beam at some angle and use this position to cover you team mates or surprise the enemy, but SWINGING the turret into the line of the enemy and fire before they can escape the beam they see coming towards them.

5.  Keep doing the above till the action changes and you have to reassess the pattern of play, reposition and procede to step 1 and repeat.

 

That's REAL shaft play, so I don't see what's so damn easy about all that and manually aiming your weapon.

 

Whatever though, this is just more of the same, shafts are used to this by now.  This is something to that I have found.  People who don't specialize in a turret tend to make the shaft their kicking bag.  Why, I don't know.  I just broke down and bought a thunder to complete certain mission types.  Not impressed, not that difficult to master, and yes, auto aim, so no, not feeling the other side and their constant sense of entitlement to some elite cast of players.  You got auto aim, mobility, and full range of vision, even have that cheaty thingy going on wit the camera from on high thing when playing between buildings.

Edited October 8, 2015 by FogOfWar_XXX

[robbie56 2,403]

The only battles I find are with Generalissimo's , and shafts are pretty popular I could say

[FX011 1]

from my experience as well, shaft is easy to use, compared to using other long range, mid range turrets. You can try to make it as complicated as you like but most of shaft gameplay revolves around camping and catching your target off guard.

 

You don't need to maneuver much or LoS break a unsuspected target. I switched to shaft from railgun and was surprised at how easy it was getting 40-50 kills in game with 1 digit deaths, only down side is not seeing what's around you during the scope which is remedied by staying aware of surrounding before and after each shot. I still prefer railgun since i get to play long, mid and close range without losing damage.

 

With other weapons, you know you're likely to be seen, gotta bait shots, bump, LoS break, impact force to knock their direction off and outmaneuver to survive and kill. 

Edited October 8, 2015 by FX011

[doduobird 315]

Shaft used to be one of my favorite weapons back before the laser update. Now it's just been collecting dust in my garage. What I really liked about shaft was the hidden element. What's fun is that your opponent doesn't know where you are. You can argue all you want about shaft but there is no doubt at all that it got nerfed really hard and it's effectiveness has been reduced by a ton. 

[duck100101 965]

I miss the old shaft before lazier, here's one of my old videos

 

[The_Smoky_Project 25]

Not anymore. If you only heal one vulcan at base, which infinitely shoots one point at the base entrance, then maybe, but the true skilled Isidas have to do a lot of decisions in a short amount of time, such as whether to heal or kill, attack or defend, advance or stay in cover.

This is true, of course. I would say this pertains to all weapons, though. Being able to use your gun effectively in a firefight is only half the battle. You should be generally smart when it comes to how to approach such things. I define "easiest" as something to be used by someone with limited skill or experience while still reaching adequate results.

 

Although, at lower ranks it seems all the Isidas do nothing but kill and forget the weapon can heal at all.

[canadarules 1,938]

I miss the old shaft before lazier, here's one of my old videos

 

 

 

lool

[Tap_Dancer 1,360]

Shaft was better without the laser :(

[MandolinMarc 874]

Shaft requires no aim though.  So sure, long reload time.  But no aim required whatsoever.

So what? Skill isn't about aim. And moreover, the point of every turret isn't simply to show off skill.

[MandolinMarc 874]

Shaft was better without the laser :(

While the laser update did significantly decrease the popularity of Shaft, that's because it was such a dramatic change that it required re-learning the weapon, which many didn't particularly want to do. But, I think the update has made it a much more interesting gun.

[dragonssk1 334]

Its a boring gun, in which is only suited for larger maps 

[fordmustang12345 3,910]

The thing is shaft is easiest weapon in game.

(RAGE) what the hell are u talking about shaft is the hardest turret in tanki u have to MANUAL AIM not auto aim like all the other turrets and with the damned laser people know were u are . It takes real skill to be good at shaft snipeing unlike railguners that think

there soo pro .its shaft that actually takes skill .freaking noobs :#

Edited October 9, 2015 by fordmustang12345