Profile of Vipper

You can' compare it with anything, cause there's no many explosive offmap which relies on a sound base cue to detect where it's gonna fall. The whole identity of the ability is that. It seems you want a little weaker single shot Railway artillery which is not what the ability is intending to do.

The ability was one of the most useful since release back in 2013 and was great till 2 years later they over-ninja-buffed it. No one asked for a buff and there we go, +400% increase on area lethality.

Now the ability is back to square one with an increase on AoE lethality based on original damage and an increase on cost. I don't mind certain offmaps been better at anti emplacements tbh, which is a change it could be tried but i think the current performance/cost is fine, specially if there are intended nerfs/adjustments to other offmaps as well.

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The patched ability currently can be used effectively against:
1) Emplacements
Compared to other abilities it will do little damage even if they are unbraced, (only advantage the sound warning, that might prevent using the brace if available)

2) Support weapons
In a normal game it will probably take out 1-2 (maybe even 3)of them out. Other abilities can do the same cheaper earlier. (only advantage the sound warning, that make it perform differently across the modes, since the other abilities also give little time for support weapon to move out of AOE)

3) ML20
Other abilities are cheaper and come earlier.

4) FRP
The ability is still OP if it is not detect due to sound, around the same with other abilities if detect slightly late and a waste of munition if detected early.

Instead of assuming what I suggest allow me to explain:
1) Add the smoke mechanism and adjust the ability with the rest of them.

2) Overplay the sound mechanism but reduce the effect. My idea of achieving is ability that works similar to what stuka dive bomber did in real life, and that was spread terror. The ability becomes cheap and comes earlier, does reduced damage and has a smaller kill radius that can take out a single support weapon or decrew a ML20. So its main advantage is that it force players to move their units while trying to detect where its going to drop, but even if they fail to do so the punishment is smaller.

this way one removes the frustration of using the ability (either doing too much or too little)

3) As a precision weapon it takes the role of taking out emplacements or other structures, serving as late doctrinal counter to them. For that imo it will need high damage on impact point and smaller kill radius and do enough damage even in enemy uses brace.

If one like less drastic solution I would suggest greatly increasing damage in the impact on point (800-600) so that a direct hit on target is noticeable and drop damage faster so that the kill radius remains about that same. That would allow the ability to useful even against targets that are not infantry.

Yeah, that was it. God knows what that _mp one is for then, seeing as TOW had its own version anyway. Reduced lethal radius, still 3 times larger infantry kill radius than on gustav.

According to elchino7 (if I understand correctly)the Kill radius of stuka in the Patch is 9.5 while according to you the kill radius of the Gustav is 5.6 and 8.1 so its hardly 3 times more.

Gustav might have less lethal radius per shot but has 3 shot and does 1x1.5 more damage to structures and vehicles it hits in the near radius.

If one consider the stuka dive bomb a specialized "team weapons killer" is not that impressive in that role compared to other types of attacks. One can probably score more kills with Stuka "fragmentation bombing" that comes at CP10 instead of 12 and cost 180 MU or even the "light artillery barrage".

So the only thing stuka has going for it is the noise instead of smoke mechanism, that as drChengele describe make little difference in small modes and can make a big difference in bigger modes. The ability is still strong vs a major or Forward assembly but only the player in the receiving end is not aware and does cancel the FRP and hit the retreat button.

Imo the ability needs adjustment or redesign.

They fulfil different roles. The whole powerlevel of the Stuka dive comes from the lack of flares and having to localise the location through sound. While it takes several time to drop from the moment you choose a location, your opponent has a smaller windows to react cause the sound starts to play way later.

I explained that apart from smoke they both are precision "artillery" delayed shots, suitable for stationary targets.

Stuka dive bomb has nothing to with IL-2 precision bombing (which is more similar to Stuka fragmentation bombing) and imo the closest thing to it, for comparison reasons is the Gustav.
If in your opinion it should be compared to another ability feel free to explain with which.

The real question should be: after "ninja-fixing", is it worth a ±40% buff on infantry lethality an increase of 40muni?

I fail to see any relevance to what happened many patches ago. Imo the questions is if the ability working in a good way or "cheese way", if it cost efficient and how it compares with similar abilities.

If the problem is the luck of smoke I would suggest once more to introduce smoke or a mini map warning and adjust the ability.


The patched ability will probably be unable to take out 3 zis gun even if they are close one next to other.

I don't understand why you are bringing railway arty into the discussion. They are different abilities with different strengths.

No they are not, they are almost identical , one is baptized "plane" the other "artillery", Stuka gets 1 hit, Gustav gets 3 that are actually stronger.

Lol some people dare asking buff best one click wipe ability with no counterplay...

Have you tested the ability in DBP? any thought on it?

There are a few very important differences though.
1) the il-2 drop is a plane drop, it moves in from off map
2) the plane can be shot down

I doubt that even if it shot down(?) it will fail to deliver the payload.

3) it will take longer depending on how long the distance is for the plane
4) there is the warning smoke

Stuka dived bomb always take very long to deliver payload and hit anything not stationary more luck then anything else.
(around 15 secs?)
And there is warning sound.

5) it's almost impossible to have 2-3 bombs on a tiger unless you manage to ram it at the exactly right moment and have the ram stun or manage to immobilise the vehicle in some other way

Actually that is map related and vehicle speed depended. Its actually very easy to hit Super heavy axis tank in map with corridors (usually urban)

Combined with "mark Target" both available in 1 commander and the result are devastating.

IL-2 and Stuka are different abilities in different faction and that is why I am comparing it with Gustav.

The stuka dive bomb was overperforming for its former price because it reliably always takes the same (rather low) time to land and there is no smoke warning, so it can be missed. The crit was quite crazy, due to the radius. Support weapons, like mgs and at guns had almost no chance to get out in time, even if you were fast to react.

It was OP, in the Patch it is UP.