Sniper rifle pointless?

[Wizard_Hat]

hi

the sniper rifle seems to be bugged, or i using it wrong. because i'm pretty sure that 6 shots at 95% each most if not all should hit however none did I've tried multiple tactics every time the percentage is really high and it always misses no matter,the closes i got was a suppression. I really confused if i'm just miss using them or its a bug that everyone has seen.

thanks for any help

[Commissar Pancakes]

Probably not a but, and more just a really bad luck of the draw with RNG. Unless it wasn't reporting the correct percentage.

Was there anything that might have blocked the shot?

[Wizard_Hat]

no clean shots all at 95% i emptied two clips and the closes i got was a suppression, is there like a minimum range or something because i only like 15 tiles away?

[Lidhuin]

This seems related to the issue that sometimes at certain angles, every shot seems to be miss.

As far as I know, it's been very difficult to find out why, but as an example, I've had soldiers fire 8 shots at 95% accuracy and miss every single one, then re-positioned a third soldier who promptly hit. It happens more often than you'd expect streaks of 5% misses.

[NaytchSG]

This seems related to the issue that sometimes at certain angles, every shot seems to be miss.

As far as I know, it's been very difficult to find out why, but as an example, I've had soldiers fire 8 shots at 95% accuracy and miss every single one, then re-positioned a third soldier who promptly hit. It happens more often than you'd expect streaks of 5% misses.

Is that why my Buzzard-equipped rooftop scout is a terrible shot when he is on the second or third level? His accuracy has been abysmal when above his target.

[Chris]

Are you shooting at a heavily armoured enemy and playing on Veteran?

[Wizard_Hat]

no only sebillians from straight ahead on obstacles 10 shots all miss move another guy in the square in front with a normal rifle on burst hit every shot this is why i know it the sniper rifle was the reason that wasn't hitting not the angle.

[Wizard_Hat]

"typo" no obstacles

[NaytchSG]

Are you shooting at a heavily armoured enemy and playing on Veteran?

I was playing normal level, city terror site against what looked like un-armored Caesians. He was armed with a regular ballistic rifle on both a one-story building and then a two story building. Did manage to suppress them, but no hits against three different targets. I only had the one suit of buzzard armor (just bought the game last week) and then restarted a campaign on the experimental branch after I lost SA.

oops, just saw Wizard_Hat's reply...

I will chalk it up to rng unless I see more evidence as my game progresses.

[Planetus]

I've seen an aweful lot of 95% accuracy shots miss completely in long chains. I haven't been too careful to observe about the angle, but it seems more common on higher-armor enemies (and no this isn't veteran, but it seems to me that armor should provoke Resist, not Miss). Almost all of these were with no obstacles, as I typically avoid shooting past those with anything other than a machine gun.

[MrPyro]

I've seen an aweful lot of 95% accuracy shots miss completely in long chains. I haven't been too careful to observe about the angle, but it seems more common on higher-armor enemies (and no this isn't veteran, but it seems to me that armor should provoke Resist, not Miss). Almost all of these were with no obstacles, as I typically avoid shooting past those with anything other than a machine gun.

Armour does provoke Resist, not Miss. However, as damage indicators are disabled on Veteran (and Resist is a damage indicator) it can be difficult to tell between actual misses and resisted shots on that level, which is why Chris is asking that question.

[Lidhuin]

Armour does provoke Resist, not Miss. However, as damage indicators are disabled on Veteran (and Resist is a damage indicator) it can be difficult to tell between actual misses and resisted shots on that level, which is why Chris is asking that question.

Which definitely explained instances against androns, but non-combatant sebillians (is there even such a thing? They're all bred for battle!) still frequently seem to go through instances of many shots that miss from the same target.

It happens often enough that something seems off. And each time I've had it happen, it's fairly consistent:

If my guy misses his first shot, he will very rarely, if ever, hit his subsequent shots (assuming 95% accuracy). I suppose I haven't tried it out with MGs (which have a delicious 10 shots) and if it is an angle issue, then it should always miss from the same position and angle.

So I'm going to try to have two guys with pistols and one with an MG get close to an alien. If both guys with pistols miss all their 95% shots from the same position and angle, I'm going to see if my MG guy misses all his shots from the same position and angle. (This is turning out to be mildly impossible. To get the situation set up is hard enough, but to keep my men alive to test it out is slightly harder still).

Edited April 3, 2014 by Lidhuin

[Max_Caine]

If you want to set up that kind of a test, then open up weapons_gc.xml in a text editor, then edit the damage value for each alien weapon (which is in it's own commented section) to do 1 point of damage. It would also be worthwhile setting up the debugger as well so you can see what the underlying values are.

[kabill]

For what it's worth, I did an RNG test the other day (because people keep posting about this).

I'm not going to go into details (don't have time at the moment), but after testing a few hudred shots with different weapons/fire modes/distances I couldn't find any statistically significant differences between the displayed hit chance and the number of hits actually scored. The most extreme deviation I found was scoring 78 hits out of 100 with a 86% chance to hit (point-blank AR using snap shots). But even this wasn't statistically significant at the 0.05 level (just).

Admittedly, I largely wasn't testing 95% shots (which seem to be what most of the complaints are about) so there could be some issue there. It's also possible that there's some kind of angling issue or something, as I only really took shots from a few different positions. But, in general at least, the RNG seems to be working as intended.

[Lidhuin]

If you want to set up that kind of a test, then open up weapons_gc.xml in a text editor, then edit the damage value for each alien weapon (which is in it's own commented section) to do 1 point of damage. It would also be worthwhile setting up the debugger as well so you can see what the underlying values are.

Thanks, I'll give that a shot.

I'm not too familiar with the debugger, but if I find some odd examples, I'll make some saves and pass them on to someone who is.

I do have one more question. Do the non-combatants (caesans, sebillians) have any resist value? i.e. if I am playing on veteran, do I need to account for resist shots not showing up if I am shooting at unarmoured targets?

[kabill]

No, non-coms should have no armour.

[Gauddlike]

No aliens have armour apart from Androns.

You don't necessarily need to test by shooting aliens though.

You can always shoot at your own troops to see if the problems show up.

Much easier to find volunteers that way.

[Commissar Pancakes]

You can always shoot at your own troops to see if the problems show up.

Much easier to find volunteers that way.

Oy! Stop trying to steal my job!

[Gauddlike]

Sorry, forgot to point out that whoever is doing the shooting needs to have the rank of Commissar.