review All Augments Ranked: Smoky

[LOLKILLERTOTHEDEATH 1,921]

Smoky is the first turret to have gotten it's HD skin along with unique and new augments. Coming in at a grand total of 13 augments, a natural question to ask is "But how do they compare?" Read ahead to find out about how Smoky's augments compare with each other!

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Note: For convenience, I've included three parameters, price, fun factor and rating. While my rating of the augments is based sheerly on the fun factor and performance, price is undoubtedly an important consideration for most tankers. The lowest score is a 0 (for augments only in containers), followed by 5 (for augments which cost 245,000 crystals), followed by a 7 (for augments costing 149,000 crystals) and lastly by a 10 (for augments costing 96,000 crystals). The scores aren't necessarily as important as the ranking though.

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13. Explosive Rounds

This is an augment I had high hopes for. However, it's ultimately a letdown. Explosive rounds, as the name suggests, allows Smoky to inflict splash damage (1 meter being the range of maximum damage, 4 meters being the range of mid damage, and 7 meters being the range of minimum damage). The Mid splash damage receives a hefty boost of 90%, while the minimum splash damage goes up 10%. So what makes this augment utterly worthless? It manages to perform decently, but when you shoot the floor (to inflict splash damage to a target behind a prop), your round will bounce and fly up. This is a HUGE problem because it means you cannot use the splash damage as it could be with Thunder, for example. Thus, the only time you're likely inflicting splash damage is when you're landing hits directly on tanks. Combine this with the relatively small splash radius, and you might as well use Thunder (Please, for the love of god, use Thunder instead!). This combined with the relatively small radius render the augment useless.

 

Performance: 0/10 (on a scale from 1-10)

Fun Factor: 0/10 - As it turns out, having your shot fly randomly into the sky while trying to use the ground to cause splash damage isn't fun. Neither are small explosions.

Price: 0/10

Verdict: This augment is suitable only for collection purposes.

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12. Rubberized Rounds

Admit it. You saw it coming, and I saw it coming, and every player who saw the name of this augment saw it coming. This augment is yet another useless collector's item. Rubberized rounds for Smoky takes away 25% of your projectile speed and allows you to bounce your shot twice while also lowering the minimum ricochet angle to 5 degrees. This feature is completely useless. In combat, you will rarely have to (or manage to) hit an enemy by bouncing shots of a wall (unless you are using Ricochet). In Smoky's case, you're much more likely to engage in head-on combat, as opposed to hiding behind walls trying to find the optimal position to hit an enemy behind a wall. In situations where there's no wall or prop to bounce your shots off, you'll lose 25% of your projectile speed, which makes a difference. If you get this augment, let it collect dust for eternity because even using no augment is better than using Rubberized rounds. The only reason it's above Explosive rounds is that at least it isn't a complete failure when it comes to bouncing shots off objects.

Performance: 1/10 (on a scale from 1-10)

Fun Factor: 0/10 - As the wise Rick from Rick and Morty said, "This just sounds like stock smoky with extra steps."

Price: 0/10

Verdict: This augment is suitable only for collection purposes.

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11. High Precision Aiming System

This augment might as well be called "wannabe Thunder Subcaliber rounds", because that's pretty much what it is. This augment boosts minimum damage and critical hit damage by 20% while increasing reload time by 40% and reducing projectile speed by 25%. What makes this augment such a waste is that even though the damage buffs make it seem like a hard hitter, it isn't. Your minimum damage with it (at Mk8) is 504, and the maximum damage (at Mk8) is 975, which means you'll be landing hits dealing 740 damage most of the time. However, the reloading speed is significantly greater. When you combine this with the 25% slower projectiles, you're going to spend a lot of time frustrated at either a) the fact that you missed, b) the longer reload time, or c) someone just stole your kill. Overall, the augment is worse than using Smoky without any augments and an absolute waste of 245,000 crystals. Just spend that amount on mines, and you'll likely be better off.

Performance: 3/10 (on a scale from 1-10)

Fun Factor: 2/10 - There's no fun in this augment. It's a wannabe subcaliber (for Thunder), which is, mind you, the worst augment for Thunder.

Price: 7/10

Verdict: This augment is suitable only for collection purposes.

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10. Supercumulative Rounds

This is an augment I frequently see, and so I was somewhat surprised at just how underwhelming it was. Though it's nowhere near as bad as the last three, this one isn't particularly impressive either. Super cumulative rounds give you a 50% boost on critical hits while lowering their chance by 60%. Essentially, at Mk8, this takes your chance of landing a critical hit down to 9.08%, while your damage goes to 1200 (a meager 400 damage increase). If you consider the damage's expected value on a critical hit (in this case, obtained by multiplying the critical hit chance by the damage), you get 181.6 without this augment and 108.96 while using this augment. Therefore, you're going to deal more damage without this augment via critical hits cumulatively. Now, numbers aside, you inflict far, far fewer critical hits, and when you do get one in, the 400 extra damage isn't as deadly as the 50% boost makes you suspect. You're more likely than not using Smoky practically without any critical hits whatsoever. Thus, even though the damage buff seems excellent, it's quite underwhelming.

Performance: 4/10 (on a scale from 1-10)

Fun Factor: 2.5/10 - You're practically using Smoky with assault rounds most of the time (minus the extra speed and impact force). Just use Assault rounds instead.

Price: 5/10

Verdict: This augment is suitable only for collection purposes.

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9. Sorted Ammunition

This augment ensures that you can land a critical hit every four shots. The catch being, the four shots must hit a target, so it's not possible for you to shoot into the sky and then keep firing critical hits. This makes the augment balanced but essentially doesn't do much for you. You get better predictability (if you're the sort of master tactician who can easily keep track of such things), but the augment isn't particularly impressive. When testing it out in MM, the augment doesn't command power or respect. It's pretty much just stock smoky, but with predictable critical hits. Since you cannot affect when the critical hits are going to happen, you're not likely to benefit too much from using this augment.

Performance: 5/10 (on a scale from 1-10)

Fun Factor: 4/10 - Nothing really powerful here, move along!

Price: 0/10

Verdict: This augment is a welcome addition to any garage.

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8. Armour-Piercing Rounds

Had you asked me about this augment before 29th January 2021, I would undoubtedly have praised it for being powerful. Back then, the AP effect was applied for 5 seconds, and critical hit damage was reduced by 15%. Since then, the AP effect is applied for 3 seconds, and you lose 25% damage on critical hits. Thus, it is the shortest time for which a turret augment can apply the AP effect. At Mk8, you'll most likely be able to get in two shots before it expires, which can certainly be deadly. Still, more often than not, your enemy can take cover, wait until the AP effect expires. At this point, you're a while away from your next critical hit and most certainly going to have some difficulty in terminating your target. The augment is undoubtedly very helpful when it comes to modes such as Siege (albeit not as deadly as Railgun), but in general, your kills will wind up being stolen, and you'll be left with nothing to show for the damage you inflicted.

Performance: 6/10 (on a scale from 1-10)

Fun Factor: 6/10 - Would be decent if not for the extremely small AP period and 25% damage reduction on critical hits

Price: 0/10

Verdict: This augment is a welcome addition to any garage.

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7. Paralyzing Rounds

Yes, I know what you're going to say, "LOLKILLER, I WILL KILL YOU TO DEATH. THIS AUGMENT IS STUPIDLY POWERFUL. STUN AUGMENTS FOR TURRETS SHOULDN'T EXIST," and I'd agree with the latter, but the augment is relatively weak and team-oriented. The augment allows you to stun targets for 3 seconds (but they don't drop any flag or ball they are carrying), but in return for the benefit, you lose 50% of your critical damage and 50% of your critical chance. This means you deal 400 damage at Mk8 with critical hits, which is less than the regular shot's lowest damage. On the other hand, your critical hit rate is reduced to 11.35%. Due to this, you very, VERY rarely land critical hits, and even less so at the right time. More often than not, you're firing regular shots and not stunning anything. Even when you do stun enemies, it's only for 3 seconds, and you will struggle to kill them unless you're using a powerful drone. Effectively, your kill will be stolen. Is it possible to stun an enemy meters away from your goal post in Rugby? Yes. Is it likely to happen? No. You'll most likely stun the 5000 GS Legend ranked player who just spawned. Well, that, or my luck's just bad.

Performance: 6.5/10 (on a scale from 1-10)

Fun Factor: 6/10 - Nothing funnier than seeing critical hits which deal less damage than your normal shots

Price: 0/10

Verdict: This augment is a welcome addition to any garage.

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6. Incendiary Rounds

Since everyone and their dog has Heat immunity, this augment's power has been somewhat diminished. Incendiary rounds will ignite the target to 50% of the maximum temperature while disabling excess damage from critical hits and lowering critical hit damage by 25%. In essence, your critical hits are swapped out for a burning effect. Unlike Hammer's dragon breath, the effect tends to last for a longer time, which means that you can use it to determine where your enemy is while also whittling down their health behind cover, assuming they take cover after a critical hit. The benefit of this augment is that it allows you to deal damage to enemies in two modes. Firstly, your regular shot damage (which can be stopped by using protection modules, double armor, and Defender/Crisis. Then there's the heating damage, which cannot be blocked by using protection modules for instance. If your enemies don't have Heat immunity, you're going to find this augment to be quite powerful, but due to how common Heat immunity is, you're unlikely to get as much use out of this.

Performance: 7/10 (on a scale from 1-10)

Fun Factor: 7/10 - A little heat never hurt anyone (except for the tank you just hit)

Price: 5/10

Verdict: This augment is a welcome addition to any garage.

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5. Assault Rounds

No, I didn't think I'd be doing this either, yet here I am. Assault rounds is a fantastic augment, more so after the latest update. This augment increases projectile speed by 200%, impact force by 35%, and removes critical hits. At first glance, that sounds silly. Why would you want rounds to hit harder? There's Magnum, Gauss, and Railgun, which certainly hit harder than Smoky. The answer to that particular question is that smoky's quick reload means you can discombobulate targets. If you use this augment properly, your enemy will be left perpetually trying to readjust their position to aim at you (unless they have heavyweight construction, in which case you're out of luck). This means that you can keep slapping them around in any way you see fit. Of course, this is only an elementary application of the augment. In fact, you can use the augment to force your targets to drive into walls with mastery. The ability to make players completely change their path can ruin someone's attempt to capture a flag or score a goal. The extra speed means that this is your go-to augment for long-range shots in massive maps, such as Berlin or Dusseldorf. What's more, is that this augment is the cheapest and has good bang for your buck.

Performance: 8/10 (on a scale from 1-10)

Fun Factor: 9/10 - Use this with Viking's OD and slap some tanks over entire continents

Price: 10/10

Verdict: This augment is a must-have for Smoky fans.

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4. Cryo Rounds

"But LOLKILLER blah blah, they gave cold immunity away for 7 hulls. That ought to make this augment useless," you say. "Not quite," I say. Cryo Rounds lower your target's temperature by 100% of the minimum temperature while disabling critical hits and excess damage from critical hits. This augment is powerful because you can follow up a critical hit with an assortment of tactics to best utilize it. If need be, you can use it offensively to slow down a tank to whittle down their health and finish them off. You can also use it to slow someone down temporarily to escape or slow down an enemy with a flag or ball. These sorts of potential strategies are what really bring this augment together for me. Needless to say, the whole effect is somewhat underrated. A single critical hit will render your enemy immobile for a few seconds, which opens up plenty of opportunities. Moreover, despite the large amount of cold immunity for hulls being given out, it's still very much viable for you to use the augment because Cold immunity isn't used by most players.   

Performance: 9/10 (on a scale from 1-10)

Fun Factor: 8/10 - cold go brrr

Price: 5/10

Verdict: This augment is a must-have for Smoky fans.

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3. Adrenaline

This is arguably one of the least used augments for Smoky, yet it is most definitely one of the very best. When you're low on health, you automatically deal between 0 and 33% more damage (depending on how low you are). Overall, this augment is undoubtedly one for a more aggressive playstyle because, really, you want to have less health to maximize your utility from it. Using this augment, if you get the average boost in damage of 16.5%, then you're looking at between 489.3 and 757.25 damage on regular hits and 932 damage on critical hits. This means your average shot deals 673.275 damage, and your critical hits deal 132 damage more than usual. If you get the whole 33% bonus, you'll be dealing between 558.6 and 864.5 damage on regular hits and 1064 damage on critical hits. This means your average shot deals 711.55 damage, much higher than the average damage of 535 and 1064 damage on critical hits, which is a pretty decent boost from the stock 800 at Mk8. The extra damage may not seem particularly significant, but it can definitely stack up and turn smoky into a hard hitter. The playstyle here is quite different, though, because you want to take as much damage as possible while staying alive to maximize the damage you inflict on enemies.

Performance: 9.5/10 (on a scale from 1-10)

Fun Factor: 9/10 - As joker once said, "HIT ME!"

Price: 5/10

Verdict: This augment is a must-have for Smoky fans.

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2. EMP Rounds

These rounds apply the EMP effect to enemies on critical hits while reducing your critical hit damage by 15%. This augment is definitely not anywhere near the likes of EMP salvo for Gauss or Railgun's new EMP augment, but as go Smoky augments, it's one of the best. Once your enemy is not using supplies, you'll generally find it quite an easy task to take them out, making the augment universally helpful, whether you seek its power for defense or offense. The ability to remove supplies from players is, as some might put it, game-breaking. Smoky being a turret that doesn't have shot effects or a massive explosion, it's quite likely that the person who's lost their supplies might not pick up on it (if they are sufficiently distracted). Of course, when their supplies are down, you can easily take them out (unlike certain augments where your kill is almost always stolen *cough cough* Railgun AP *cough cough*). Of course, dealing with players using EMP immunity will put you at a disadvantage. However, the damage reduction of 15% on critical hits isn't huge, so you can still continue to use the augment unless almost every enemy uses EMP immunity. 

Performance: 9.5/10 (on a scale from 1-10)

Fun Factor: 7/10 - Just not really that fun to use I guess

Price: 0/10

Verdict: This augment is a must-have for Smoky fans.

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1. Autocannon

No, I'm not undermining the danger that EMP or paralyzing rounds present. No, I'm not being paid to tell you this so that people don't feel so irritated about EMP immunity or Paralyzing rounds. I'm telling you this because it's the truth. Autocannon is hands down, the best augment you can get for Smoky. Autocannon makes Smoky's reload time a short 0.5 seconds while reducing regular shot damage by 75% and impact force by 66%. What makes this augment so dangerous is that you can deal lots of damage very quickly, and moreover, continuously, not giving your enemy even a second of respite as you relentlessly fire a barrage of shots. The quick reload also means that it's possible to repeatedly make your enemy miss any shot they take, which is also certainly extremely helpful. In theory, it is also possible to get a critical hit after 3 or so shots (though this doesn't happen often). Since the critical hit chance rate or damage is unchanged, you generally can get a lot more critical hits (which is really what this augment is based around). Essentially, it allows you to inflict damage continuously, thus rendering repair kits in a battle next to useless. "But how can you say it's better than EMP rounds or paralyzing rounds?" I hear (and if I don't, just take a minute to say it). Well, EMP rounds are dangerous, but you can only apply the EMP effect to a single tank. Even then, EMP immunity can render it completely useless. As for paralyzing rounds, yes, it is very deadly at the right times, but you very, VERY rarely get critical hits in the first place. I've had instances using Viking's overdrive where I haven't gotten a single critical hit to put it into perspective. It doesn't happen often enough for it to be truly deadly. Slap on stun immunity, and you might as well use a peashooter. With Autocannon, there's no such thing as damage immunity, so regardless of what your enemies use, you'll always have some amount of power.

Performance: 10/10 (on a scale from 1-10)

Fun Factor: 9.5/10 - There's just something about Autocannon's reload speed that makes you feel absolutely awesome

Price: 5/10

Verdict: There's a reason this augment is number 1. That reason is that it's the best. Buy it!

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So there you have it! Every single augment for Smoky ranked in the order of how good it is! I certainly hope you've enjoyed reading this review. If you have any suggestions for what you'd like me to include in later guides, or want to share your ratings, feel free to do so in the comments!

[Person_Random 4,991]

Want to get the lowdown on alterations? LOLKILLERTOTHEDEATH is back with his definitive augment review - this time, he analyzes all of Smoky's 13 augments. Find out if your new container drop is a collectable or a must-have on the battlefield here!

[Spy 14,701]

Armour-Piercing Rounds deserves a higher place in my honest opinion. Nice article regardless! :)

[SporkZilla 1,775]

Assault Rounds is my default augment on all of my accounts now

It's the closest thing to old Smoky / instant-hit sneaky shots, and I don't think giving up critical hits is a bad trade for fewer misses and more impact force

Autocannon is an abomination; I'll never use it

Edited March 13, 2021 by SporkZilla

[LOLKILLERTOTHEDEATH 1,921]

16 hours ago, Spy said:

Armour-Piercing Rounds deserves a higher place in my honest opinion. Nice article regardless! :)

I'd definitely have placed it a lot higher if not for the recent nerf. Thank you!

9 hours ago, SporkZilla said:

Assault Rounds is my default augment on all of my accounts now

It's the closest thing to old Smoky / instant-hit sneaky shots, and I don't think giving up critical hits is a bad trade for fewer misses and more impact force

Autocannon is an abomination; I'll never use it

Good choice! It's quite a powerful augment.

[Akame 4,580]

Personally, explosive rounds is far better than rubberized which has literally 0 use in real games, and it's still a buff from stock, as for emp, ap, and stun, tbh they aint as special since its a crit based factor, main thing to notice is that in mainly like 1v1 scenarios, you get these status effects in the late area where it may not make much of a difference. Some of these are mant to be used for flanking counterattacking.

My personal fav is Assault rounds, same reasoning as sporkszilla, plus I'm not a fan of critical shots, I like consistency.

A good breakdown on many of those augments there, if only there were youtubers who made similar videos including information like this to explain and educate the playerbase.

[chinufire1 119]

This was an enjoyable read and agree with most of it, I have tried assault rounds and I don't feel that much of difference regarding impact force as it doesn't make the enemy miss their shots especially in 1vs1 situations plus not having critical shots.  @LSHTV If you are looking for yt video content here is something to think about?

[superior1KING 68]

I knew those autocannons would be at the top, I had a few interactions with them as well and it was not good 

[Legends_Live_Forever 332]

54 minutes ago, superior1KING said:

I knew those autocannons would be at the top, I had a few interactions with them as well and it was not good 

Hehe yea i have used it. It's great to annoy and get kills, but I try to find time to switch back to normal smoky since it makes the critical hit much more valuable. Plus, I do that because of the advice from a tanker and maybe it could help others who are getting bored with the autocannon alt and wanna change it up (not too likely but hey why not).

[Spy 14,701]

On 3/13/2021 at 11:48 AM, LOLKILLERTOTHEDEATH said:

I'd definitely have placed it a lot higher if not for the recent nerf. Thank you!

It makes sense, but it's still very useful.

The choice of placing Autocannon at the top of the list is also very interesting; It is indeed a very powerful augment, but I don't like it. Smoky is not easy to use without this augment, you need to hit your shots and also shot the corner of the enemy tanks to make them miss. However, with this augment all you have to do is "spray and pray". 

[Tanker-Arthur 2,971]

I have some feedback:


Whenever you guys do one of these Augment comparisons, if you want, I would very much like to see where the Default Version of the turret compares with the Augments.

 

 

Otherwise, it's a great article :)
(although I do disagree on some of the rankings)

[LOLKILLERTOTHEDEATH 1,921]

45 minutes ago, Tanker-Arthur said:

I have some feedback:


Whenever you guys do one of these Augment comparisons, if you want, I would very much like to see where the Default Version of the turret compares with the Augments.

 

 

Otherwise, it's a great article :)
(although I do disagree on some of the rankings)

Thank you! That is an excellent suggestion, and I'll be sure to incorporate it into my next article!

[wild001 1,422]

On 3/6/2021 at 10:51 PM, LOLKILLERTOTHEDEATH said:

The augment allows you to stun targets for 3 seconds (but they don't drop any flag or ball they are carrying)

since last update, enemy will drop flag once hit by the stun round. I have this augment and it is true.

any way, great article, I have mostly all of smoky augment (except rubber and explosive ones), thanks to ultra weekend container and challenge.

I use cryo round since first batch of smoky argument, especially in CTF, to slow flager.
now I use Paralyzing Rounds instead in assault mode since now it can make people drop flag (super OP now) it is quite easy to land 5 shot to stun in open areas

in general, I agree with autocannon and Incendiary Rounds, in pure damage output, they are the best in TDM for damage output, while Incendiary Rounds for distance shots and autocannon for close and medium fight.

smoky is best on mobile version, since you can have auto-aim and auto-fire turn on, which make you almost never miss a shot and always firing even enemy in sight for half a sec, there is no way to achieve that precision and speed and accuracy in PC version with human eye sight and hands.

[LOLKILLERTOTHEDEATH 1,921]

6 minutes ago, wild001 said:

since last update, enemy will drop flag once hit by the stun round. I have this augment and it is true.

any way, great article, I have mostly all of smoky augment (except rubber and explosive ones), thanks to ultra weekend container and challenge.

I use cryo round since first batch of smoky argument, especially in CTF, to slow flager.
now I use Paralyzing Rounds instead in assault mode since now it can make people drop flag (super OP now) it is quite easy to land 5 shot to stun in open areas

in general, I agree with autocannon and Incendiary Rounds, in pure damage output, they are the best in TDM for damage output, while Incendiary Rounds for distance shots and autocannon for close and medium fight.

smoky is best on mobile version, since you can have auto-aim and auto-fire turn on, which make you almost never miss a shot and always firing even enemy in sight for half a sec, there is no way to achieve that precision and speed and accuracy in PC version with human eye sight and hands.

Thanks! Yeah, smoky's been changed since the time of writing. I think Paralyzing rounds would now be ranked higher.

[SporkZilla 1,775]

1 hour ago, LOLKILLERTOTHEDEATH said:

Smoky's been changed since the time of writing. I think Paralyzing rounds would now be ranked higher

I think Assault Rounds would now be ranked lower because you now have to give up defeating Dolphin modules and the extra damage (and range) of critical hits to get the faster rounds and the increase in impact force

It's still my favourite Smoky augment, but it has been nerfed

I think it needs to have a sub-critical hit that defeats Dolphin modules, but only does the damage of a normal shot (and the same range decrease)

Autocannon can get in the sea. Cursed be they that use it.

Edited April 5, 2021 by SporkZilla

[LOLKILLERTOTHEDEATH 1,921]

18 minutes ago, SporkZilla said:

I think Assault Rounds would now be ranked lower because you now have to give up defeating Dolphin modules and the extra damage (and range) of critical hits to get the faster rounds and the increase in impact force

It's still my favourite Smoky augment, but it has been nerfed

I think it needs to have a sub-critical hit that defeats Dolphin modules, but only does the damage of a normal shot (and the same range decrease)

Autocannon can get in the sea. Cursed be they that use it.

Yes, an unfortunate consequence of the critical hit update. I doubt they'll go ahead and change anything about it though. To be honest, Autocannon is a lot of fun to use.

[BestSmoky 6]

Thanks for the tips. I really appreciate it. 

[Volturo 181]

Nice rankings! I agree with most of these. Thanks for taking the time to analyze all of these alterations with such depth.

[chinufire1 119]

This could not be anymore accurate, autocannon totally deserves the No.1 spot. Ever since the last update I have been using it with hornets' overdrive and you can wipe out an entire team in any condition (as long as they don't have AP immunity), for those of you who don't have it make sure to buy it today during to 30% sales.  Each ranking has good justified and I like the rating at the end for those who want a brief review of all the augments.