Nathan

The minigun heli in @WARDOGS is COOKED. One bullet of .308 FMJ out of a rotary cannon now deals 19 damage to the CHEST of a tier 1 armoured player. I need 7-8 bullets to kill a single soldier regularly, which isn't easy to do, especially if you don't want to be forced on mouseyaw/rifleaim as a control scheme. I literally LOSE 1v1s against infantry that just shoot back WHILE im on target now. We deal the same amount of damage - he just doesn't have to fly, control and navigate an ENTIRE HELICOPTER, just raises his rifle. This isn't a 25% damage nerf, it's more like 25% of the damage REMAINED after you took the rest away. (shoutout @SilkOCE for coming up with that analogy) You also take twice as much damage from all sources (UNANNOUNCED SHADOW PATCH) - a group of 2-3 people that simply spray back can kill you just by hitting 1 mag each, this is with AK/starter weapon FMJ. Heli costs twice as much to buy, a nerf targeting the already broken economy: my entire community consisting of pilot mains was telling me they never profited from helicopters already. I barely broke even in season 1. CIWS has been BUFFED like crazy: It now looks almost directly up, removing the entire skill of being able to stay in the cone above it (while you are INCREDIBLY exposed to other threats btw, so this was never overpowered) and you also need twice as many bullets to kill the operator as outlined before. So: maneuvering yourself for a kill shot is more dangerous, you take more damage in the leadup (and on the comedown), you have to hit more bullets, and the safety margin is smaller. You just lose. Even the newly introduced metal sheet roofs are EVERYWHERE all of a sudden and almost fully exclude helicopters from helping on a FOB. And it doesn't end there: It seems the entire helicopter can get fully killed by as little as 15 BULLETS from the new M2 browning, which is small and can hide everywhere. Visibility has been decreased for literally no reason by applying a film of dirt to the windshield. I would literally pay 5k per life just to buy a rag that can wipe it away. This is especially horrible in the rain, where rain+dirt just completely take your clarity of vision away. You CANNOT SEE in the rain. Overall, we are facing 5-6 changes that solely nerf the minigun helicopter, a helicopter that BARELY generated profit for the top 1% of pilots before this patch, and I suspect it's just because we can't figure out how to balance the havoc and the rocket heli - both of which just need to be vaulted until we have an actual vision for their place in the game. But taking away the ability to be effective in any capacity in the minigun helicopters (you will see this play out in the coming weeks, trust me) is not the play - it's the only heli that requires skill and is fun to improve at. And before you think I'm crying and blowing things out of proportion - I went 184-3 today in my first full game with the miniguns. I can just see issues before they play out, and I want this helicopter to be playable by others, not just the best 10 pilots. Keep in mind: The new HARDCOUNTER to helicopters, the Gepard, IS NOT EVEN PART OF THIS EQUATION YET. And it will completely shut down air entirely once that's out there, especially miniguns. I don't look forward to the next few weeks if this doesn't get a buff and might just ditch it entirely, which is sad. It's the funnest thing in the game for me.