@simkas: Again, the only thing that you are giving me is that it's good in reflex mode. It still alerts people when you miss, sends guards into an alert if they see him drop (versus the tranq which only causes them to wake the guy up) takes multiple non-headshots to down a single guard, blows its suppressor faster due to that previous fact, and has worse upgrades.
That's pretty lopsided.
Yeah, it's good in reflex mode, that's a pretty fucking huge deal. And why the hell does it matter that it alerts when you miss? Don't miss then and only get headshots with it, that's not an issue with the gun, that's only an issue with the player playing badly. The fact that it is rapid fire as opposed to the slow firing of the tranq pistol makes all those negatives kinda moot. It might not be useful in 100% of all situations, but neither is the tranq pistol.
Look, I'm not going to keep dragging this out, but when you argument against the weaknesses of the gun is "be better with the gun", you aren't going to convince anyone anymore. You can apply the same logic the other way: don't get seen and dragged into relfex mode, and then the Riot SMG has nothing. It doesn't matter how fast it fires if you take every guard down one by one from the shadows, but then we aren't talking about the weapons anymore at that point, are we?
I'm glad you like the Riot SMG. I still think it's useless, and you don't. I've got nothing left to convince you with, so I guess that's that.
Again, if you don't think it fits your playstyle, it does not make the gun itself garbage. That's the whole thing I'm trying to argue while you just seem to be stuck to "no it doesn't fit how I play thus it's a bad gun". It fits with the kind of playstyle that Dan and Drew are going with.
@simkas: Again, the only thing that you are giving me is that it's good in reflex mode. It still alerts people when you miss, sends guards into an alert if they see him drop (versus the tranq which only causes them to wake the guy up) takes multiple non-headshots to down a single guard, blows its suppressor faster due to that previous fact, and has worse upgrades.
That's pretty lopsided.
Yeah, it's good in reflex mode, that's a pretty fucking huge deal. And why the hell does it matter that it alerts when you miss? Don't miss then and only get headshots with it, that's not an issue with the gun, that's only an issue with the player playing badly. The fact that it is rapid fire as opposed to the slow firing of the tranq pistol makes all those negatives kinda moot. It might not be useful in 100% of all situations, but neither is the tranq pistol.
It still takes a bit of time to get a semi-auto tranq pistol and then even longer until you unlock weapon customization so you can put a silencer on it. And shooting guards in the leg and waiting for them to drop does not help at all if you're in reflex mode with the guards about to shoot at you. The Riot SMG is the only one gun that is capable of rapidly stunning multiple targets from range without alerting anyone that you can get early on. That fact alone makes it not garbage.
I'm glad you found a use for it. It absolutely did not fit my play style and I could never, ever see myself taking it over even the basic tranq gun offered at the start of the game. I had no issue with the single shot nature of the starting gun as I was rarely, if ever, spotted by more than one guard at once, rendering any advantage that the SMG offered in reflex mode moot.
As I found it useless from the start of the game and very quickly gained weaponry that outclassed it even further, my opinion remains unchanged.
If it doesn't fit your playstyle, it does not make it garbage. Let me give you an example of a situation where the SMG excelled at that wouldn't be possible with the tranq gun. You know the mission where you have to take out the 3 commanders? I waited for them to all arrive, get into that room where they start talking, barge in through the door, headshot all 3 of them with the SMG during reflex mode without alerting anyone around and then I could just carry them all out and extract them. It would simply not be possible to take them all out that way with the tranq pistol in that situation.
Yeah I dunno, I never used the Riot SMG, I just stuck with the pistol. That gun seems like hot garbage. I had a non-lethal assault rifle if things ever got hot.
Although eventually I got a silenced tranq sniper and basically never used anything else for the rest of the game.
The Riot SMG is hot garbage, tranqs are way better (no alert on a miss, can shoot torsos/arms/legs for timed knockouts), and there are far better options/upgrades for tranq guns (both pistol and sniper) over most stun weapons.
I went the entire game without ever touching a rubber bullet firing weapon after discovering how shitty the SMG was.
The riot SMG is not garbage at all. It can fire shots waaaaaaaay faster than the tranq pistol ever could and a single headshot with it will still knock an enemy out, so if there's a bunch of guards all standing next to each other, you can stun them all really easily without alerting anyone if you're not accurate. It's even better if you go into a room that has multiple guards and trigger reflex, you can stun them all without running the risk of an alert triggering if you're accurate. Some later guns outclass it but early on it can be extremely useful if you use it well.
You can get a semi-auto tranq pistol fairly quickly, and it is much easier to just tag three or four guards in the leg and watch them all drop at once then having to land successive headshots or spraying a crowd, especially since missed tranq shots do not raise the alert level like missed SMG shots do. Your suppressor durability also goes much father with tranqs, as one dart is all you ever need to drop a guard (given enough time), whereas you need multiple shots with the SMG if you don't nail them in the head. The only thing the SMG has going for it is the loadout cost, as you wind up using a lot of plants with the higher tier tranq guns.
Sorry, I'm sticking with my "garbage" opinion on this one. As Drew just found out, tranqs work great (and stun weapons do not) if you have an enemy running all over the place and can't get successive shots on him, as even one dart will eventually knock a guy out. Tranqs seem to do everything that stun weapons do, but more effectively and with more upsides/perks.
It still takes a bit of time to get a semi-auto tranq pistol and then even longer until you unlock weapon customization so you can put a silencer on it. And shooting guards in the leg and waiting for them to drop does not help at all if you're in reflex mode with the guards about to shoot at you. The Riot SMG is the only one gun that is capable of rapidly stunning multiple targets from range without alerting anyone that you can get early on. That fact alone makes it not garbage.
Yeah I dunno, I never used the Riot SMG, I just stuck with the pistol. That gun seems like hot garbage. I had a non-lethal assault rifle if things ever got hot.
Although eventually I got a silenced tranq sniper and basically never used anything else for the rest of the game.
The Riot SMG is hot garbage, tranqs are way better (no alert on a miss, can shoot torsos/arms/legs for timed knockouts), and there are far better options/upgrades for tranq guns (both pistol and sniper) over most stun weapons.
I went the entire game without ever touching a rubber bullet firing weapon after discovering how shitty the SMG was.
The riot SMG is not garbage at all. It can fire shots waaaaaaaay faster than the tranq pistol ever could and a single headshot with it will still knock an enemy out, so if there's a bunch of guards all standing next to each other, you can stun them all really easily without alerting anyone if you're not accurate. It's even better if you go into a room that has multiple guards and trigger reflex, you can stun them all without running the risk of an alert triggering if you're accurate. Some later guns outclass it but early on it can be extremely useful if you use it well.
@computerandy9: Do you really mean to say that VA is a small part of the experience?
It absolutely is. The people who do VA for games make like 2% of the overall game. The the rest of the game is the result of hard work of programmers, game designers, artists, level designers and all that. Voice actors are the absolute last people involved in game development that need to strike over their work conditions.
Something about that character style is really off-putting. It kinda looks like someone drew an anime character and then photoshopped real eyes and mouth on them from a photo.
Jason's "I didn't think anyone wouldn't know that" is exactly how I feel about 50% of the time watching these playthroughs haha.
For instance... obviously a "sleep" status is longer lasting than a "stun" status. It's been that way since MGS2. Zzz's for sleep and the stars for stun. I really hope Drew just learns to manage when to use the slam and when not to sooner rather than later. It's just silly.
Except that's not true at all. Choking a guard is a stun and that lasts way longer than a tranq hit.
simkas's comments