Apparently they nerfed SMG-5

[Greatest Olelko]

I don't know if those are only news for me, but they changed silenced value of SMG-5, which was like tha best stealth weapon. So i'm playing pvp with my friends and was wondering which gun is best to carry against other players and came to conclusion that quite shot is a confusing one and is much better to win pvp fight, but at the same time i didn't want to be unprepared for face-to-face situation. So while I was browsing game files to find the universal weapon i found out that smg_s_fire noise value is now "43" instead of previous 18, which makes it almost as loud as silenced M60 (m60_s_fire noise="47"). And M60 was always an alternative to SMG, where you had to make a choice between very good perks of machine gun perk books or more stealthy weapon. Of course M60 has worse accuracy, but in return SMG has much lesser damage so they kinda tied before, but now there's no reason for SMG, since machine gun's amazing perk books. Ama still use SMG just because i have other players shooting at me, but for pve playstyle it's just more fun to have endgame stealth weapon, so you can feel like an assassin quickly eliminating your enemies, while using parkour and not wait for crossbow's recharge, resulting in 2 hour clearing or tier 5 poi. What do you think?

[Ramethzer0]

2 hours ago, Greatest Olelko said:

I don't know if those are only news for me, but they changed silenced value of SMG-5, which was like tha best stealth weapon.

 

The SMG is by far not the best stealth weapon at all.  To the best of my knowledge, the best weapons I've used were the silenced sniper, the silenced 9mm, and the knife.   If you have to go inside a POI to hunt someone down, then any of the shotguns (double barrel and up) aren't a bad choice.

 

Edited October 30, 2023 by Ramethzer0 (see edit history)

[BFT2020]

Not to forget that if you are perking into the agility tree, it boosts the damage of the SMG a lot, both through Agility itself and Gunslinger.   Throw in Hidden strike and the SMG is going to be the better weapon if you max out those perks compared to an unperked M60

 

So:

• Maxed out Agility - Double damage for headshots
• Maxed out Gunslinger - 50% increase in damage
• Maxed out Hidden strike - 300% increase in damage for hidden strikes

So comparing Q1, Average stats between a perked out Agility and a perked out Fortitude player

• SMG - 225 headshot sneak damage with regular ball ammo
• M60 - 140 headshot damage or 175 (if they take the first perk of hidden strike that they can)

 

Throw in that both classes has a book series that gives them both sweet benefits, along with the Gunslinger perk having the gunslinger combo bonus in addition.

 

If you are playing a true stealth player, then you will be perking into Agility to boost sneak damage and the SMG wins hands down.  If you are not perking into stealth, then any weapon with higher damage output is going to be best regardless of sound level.

[Greatest Olelko]

6 minutes ago, BFT2020 said:

If you are not perking into stealth, then any weapon with higher damage output is going to be best regardless of sound level.

That's the thing tho, it doesn't really matter whether you perk into stealth or not if by shooting smg just once, even tho you'll most likely will kill one zombie with all of the sneak damage bonuses, you'll find yourself surrounded by others and if it's high-tier poi, youll have to run and parkour yourself out of mess and this is where m60 stamina and accuracy perks kick in. I mean I could sneak kill one zombie with my m60 and 1.5 sneak bonus just as well

5 hours ago, Ramethzer0 said:

 

The SMG is by far not the best stealth weapon at all.

 

I meant it's the most universal one, you don't need to wait for reload that often, you can shoot quick if something goes wrong, it uses cheapest ammo. Also only hunting rifle is suitable for stealth as it's suppressed noise level is 18 and other ones are 34, if im not mistaken, which is considerably lower than updated smg's, but still pretty loud

[Old Crow]

Not terribly surprising. As I understand it, Madmole doesn't like stealth.

[BFT2020]

2 hours ago, Greatest Olelko said:

That's the thing tho, it doesn't really matter whether you perk into stealth or not if by shooting smg just once, even tho you'll most likely will kill one zombie with all of the sneak damage bonuses, you'll find yourself surrounded by others and if it's high-tier poi, youll have to run and parkour yourself out of mess and this is where m60 stamina and accuracy perks kick in. I mean I could sneak kill one zombie with my m60 and 1.5 sneak bonus just as well

 

Or just use the bows, knives, or the 9mm pistol if you are trying to clear the room as silently as possible.  The SMG shouldn't be able to stealthy clear the POI the same as the pistol or the bow.  That is why the bows and knives have such a significant boost in hidden strike damage, as those are the weapons geared towards clearing out a POI stealthy.  I think the SMG was wrongly placed in that category in previous Alphas.

 

The SMG though does generate a lot less heat compared to the M60 when the silencer is added (1/3 less by my calculation) so if you are forced to fall back to a rapid fire weapon in a jam, then it has that going for it.  Less likely to have a screamer or wandering horde investigating the noise if you use the SMG as a backup rather than going in guns blazing with the M60.

[Ramethzer0]

4 hours ago, Greatest Olelko said:

That's the thing tho, it doesn't really matter whether you perk into stealth or not if by shooting smg just once, even tho you'll most likely will kill one zombie with all of the sneak damage bonuses, you'll find yourself surrounded by others and if it's high-tier poi, youll have to run and parkour yourself out of mess and this is where m60 stamina and accuracy perks kick in. I mean I could sneak kill one zombie with my m60 and 1.5 sneak bonus just as well

I meant it's the most universal one, you don't need to wait for reload that often, you can shoot quick if something goes wrong, it uses cheapest ammo. Also only hunting rifle is suitable for stealth as it's suppressed noise level is 18 and other ones are 34, if im not mistaken, which is considerably lower than updated smg's, but still pretty loud

 

I think you're a over-appreciating the function of noise level when it comes to stealth and PVP.  Without knowing your pattern in how you deal with or hunt other players nor your server settings, I'd also add in sometimes the silencer doesn't matter.   A head shot is still a head shot and in a one on one situation, you're good with just about any rifle or crossbow, silenced or otherwise.  The mods in your armour may or may not matter much either.

 

If you're up against multiple people, or are raiding a base, then in those situations they shouldn't matter much either, as you'll be ground pounding most of the time anyway.  Use what feels right to you.   I've been blasted at point blank range with a shotgun before because they caught me entirely flat footed.    I you're a total solo, then you don't want to ignore any one particular class of weapons.  Prepare yourself for the notion that the game isn't balanced around PVP.  However, on vanilla setting It's not hard to kill people, even fully geared ones.

Edited October 31, 2023 by Ramethzer0 (see edit history)

[avalonnn]

May also depend on difficulty level. On Adventurer, bows are a superb weapon and I can sometimes kill one Z without waking others. 

[Ramethzer0]

Re-reading your initial post I'm somewhat wondering if you're asking specifically about PVP, PVE, or both.   My answers were definitely leaning towards the PVP.