Heh, I took a short break from my engineer to get a temporary marksman toon up to level 10 to try out phase grenade and a calldown (napalm strike), mainly for research purposes for my engineer, but also just because I wanted to try sniper stance. Back on the horse with my engineer tonight, probably.
Verdict on sniper stance -- I like it.
Nice with an assault rifle, but sniper rifles still suck even in sniper mode. Possibly worth putting extra points into to increase the range and accuracy bonus. Too bad my engineer can't get it, it would be much more useful than an unsynergized tactical stance or rapid fire.
Phase grenade was pretty meh, I was looking for damage but I guess it's mainly intended to phase. Need more practice with it to really get a feel for it, I think. Starting to think that throwing grenades in combat is generally not as useful as just shooting. Even though a lot of the point of grenades is the elemental attack bonus, which doesn't work through shields, they nevertheless seem better suited to softening things up before a battle, due to the difficulty of landing them accurately while in a furball. They might work better in a party environment though, where someone else is holding the aggro. Though I've yet to try concussive crash and molotov cocktail out with my engineer, I'm thinking she might prefer to save her energy for those, as they seem likely to be considerably more accurate.
The calldown was ok but 40s is too long a recharge. I figure 30s on an engineer calldown is about right (though it could stand to be shorter still.) This is in some ways better than grenades because it seems more intended to be used as the opening shot in a battle, when you have time to throw the thing accurately, and if you do throw it while in a furball you're more likely to hit something with it, even if you just bomb your own position.
Verdict on sniper stance -- I like it.
Nice with an assault rifle, but sniper rifles still suck even in sniper mode. Possibly worth putting extra points into to increase the range and accuracy bonus. Too bad my engineer can't get it, it would be much more useful than an unsynergized tactical stance or rapid fire.Phase grenade was pretty meh, I was looking for damage but I guess it's mainly intended to phase. Need more practice with it to really get a feel for it, I think. Starting to think that throwing grenades in combat is generally not as useful as just shooting. Even though a lot of the point of grenades is the elemental attack bonus, which doesn't work through shields, they nevertheless seem better suited to softening things up before a battle, due to the difficulty of landing them accurately while in a furball. They might work better in a party environment though, where someone else is holding the aggro. Though I've yet to try concussive crash and molotov cocktail out with my engineer, I'm thinking she might prefer to save her energy for those, as they seem likely to be considerably more accurate.
The calldown was ok but 40s is too long a recharge. I figure 30s on an engineer calldown is about right (though it could stand to be shorter still.) This is in some ways better than grenades because it seems more intended to be used as the opening shot in a battle, when you have time to throw the thing accurately, and if you do throw it while in a furball you're more likely to hit something with it, even if you just bomb your own position.