One fusion is in a good spot now. The rest are meh.

You ever use Murmur is PvP? I'd take it over almost any other

It's not that ridiculous tbh. Shotgun users are down, sidearms are up, which means that the other OSK (fusion rifles) have a bit of a vacuum to fill.

Check the link again. Out of the top 10 most used special weapons there's: 7 Sidearms 2 Snipers 1 Shotgun 0 Fusions And the overall fusion usage is 2%, lower than that of even shotguns after the nerf and even lower than machineguns (heavy weapon). That's not the definition of "being in a good spot".

That's a little skewed for a few reasons: - The stat simply looks a total kills (as %) compared to every other weapon in the Crucible. So an increase in even the number of primary kills is going to impact the number of kills that fusion rifles get. - Machine gun usage and kill count is rather constant regardless of the meta where in. It's really only competing against rocket launchers for choice so it will always be a popular choice for many players. - It's still early and player's are still trying stuff out and many are taking advantage of Sidearms ability to accumulate ammo. I wouldn't be surprised if this changed after the next hotfix and other Specials gain some ground on Sidearms. The basis of this thread is weapon usage, not effectiveness. So saying that they aren't in a good spot isn't entirely accurate if you're only looking at usage.

They're not in a good spot because the ammo changes have effective removed them from the game. The primary use of fusion rifles is to give a player a weapon that can quickly counter shotgun rushes, or shoulder charge. Especially if some one has a longer ranged primary. The ammo changes have removed shotguns from the game...and most of the need for fusion rifles with it. Not my definition of a "good spot".

I've never viewed a fusion rifle as a counter puncher. They can take care of rushers but I use them aggressively and as a pseudo primary when I have ammo, which hasn't been an issue in my experience so far. Maybe that's the problem really. If you only look to use it as a counter kills will be lower. Be aggressive with it.

Your point would be valid if all the factors you mentioned only affected Fusion Rifles, but they don't. They affect all other special weapons too. Furthermore, Fusion Rifles are never used competitively. Whenever there's a 3v3 tournament in which more than 50+ teams participate in (a total of 150 players) there's not even a single team (nevermind a single player) using a fusion rifle, which means not even the most skilled players can use them competitively and win. In addition to that, it's clear this game abides by rotating metas (rather than actual fixes) when it comes to "balancing", but the last time we had a Fusion Meta was since release 2014 (3 years ago), while shotguns and snipers have had more than 2 metas each. Usage %'s is one of the very few things that actually give objective information when it comes to weapon performance. Saying weapons are "good" or "bad" without referring to numbers and facts is merely subjective.

[quote]Your point would be valid if all the factors you mentioned only affected Fusion Rifles, but they don't. They affect all other special weapons too.[/quote] How does that make any of my arguments invalid? Shotguns saw about a 600% decrease in kills from a week before the update to a week after. That's six times the decrease in total kills compared to fusion rifles which saw their total decrease by only half. [quote]Furthermore, Fusion Rifles are never used competitively. Whenever there's a 3v3 tournament in which more than 50+ teams participate in (a total of 150 players) there's not even a single team (nevermind a single player) using a fusion rifle, which means not even the most skilled players can use them competitively and win.[/quote] This is a completely different argument. If your aim is to make them competitive with the top 1% of the top 1%, I'm curious what your suggestions are to making them competitive. [quote]Usage %'s is one of the very few things that actually give objective information when it comes to weapon performance. Saying weapons are "good" or "bad" without referring to numbers and facts is merely subjective.[/quote] It's useful no doubt. One of the few stats we get to look at that's public information. But that isn't enough to make any conclusive argument about a very niche weapon class. Players that have used fusion rifles for a long period can make objective conclusions based on their experience and can compare them to different periods. That means something. If you say, fusions are better today than they were when Taken King first came out I wouldn't dismiss that as your opinion. It's valid even if subjective because you have a ton of experience.

[quote]How does that make any of my arguments invalid? Shotguns saw about a 600% decrease in kills from a week before the update to a week after. That's six times the decrease in total kills compared to fusion rifles which saw their total decrease by only half.[/quote] You're just comparing how big a decrease in usage is with respect to another, but that doesn't specify any usage values. Fusions were used so little before this patch (around 4 times less than shotguns) that even after a massive shotgun % usage decrease, Fusions are still used less than Shotguns, and they went from being the 3rd most used special to the 4th after the patch. [quote]This is a completely different argument. If your aim is to make them competitive with the top 1% of the top 1%, I'm curious what your suggestions are to making them competitive. [/quote] A weapon is not in "a good spot" when you have to be God-Tier level with it to have a decent performance in a competitive environment. You can give a shotgun or a sniper to an average player, and chances are they will perform just as good if not better than an experienced fusion rifle user. This is not balanced because Fusions have way too many flaws with respect to Shotguns and Snipers. [quote]Players that have used fusion rifles for a long period can make objective conclusions based on their experience and can compare them to different periods. That means something. If you say, fusions are better today than they were when Taken King first came out I wouldn't dismiss that as your opinion. It's valid even if subjective because you have a ton of experience.[/quote] I'm ranked #1 for most Fusion Rifle Kills for both Xbox and PS4 (have around 83,000 kills with them) http://destinytracker.com/destiny/leaderboards/ps/KillsFusionRifle?grouped=true And I've played against Top Players like Luminosity48, SirDimetrious, Kjhovey, RealKraftyy, TrueVanguard while using Fusion Rifles, so I have a pretty good idea how they measure up against Sweaty Players. My conclusion is Fusions are not in a good place right now because: 1) Nobody uses them 2) Even when you have a lot of experience with them, they're not consistent in terms of accuracy. You can shoot someone with a perfect dead-centered shot and nothing will happen at times. 3) Most of the good fusions out there are very slow in terms of charge rate, and the faster ones suck due to requiring 6 bolts to kill in one shot. 4) Fusion archetype variety has been destroyed ever since they nerfed Accelerated Coils, since it allowed for the conversion of slow fusion types into faster ones.

[quote]You're just comparing how big a decrease in usage is with respect to another, but that doesn't specify any usage values. Fusions were used so little before this patch (around 4 times less than shotguns) that even after a massive shotgun % usage decrease, Fusions are still used less than Shotguns, and they went from being the 3rd most used special to the 4th after the patch. [/quote] Fusion rifles were and will always be a niche weapon type. My point was that they suffered significantly less in relative usage compared to shotguns. Is it surprising that Sidearms bumped them to fourth? No. That was going to happen the minute Bungie decide to remove Special ammo on death. [quote]A weapon is not in "a good spot" when you have to be God-Tier level with it to have a decent performance in a competitive environment. You can give a shotgun or a sniper to an average player, and chances are they will perform just as good if not better than an experienced fusion rifle user. This is not balanced because Fusions have way too many flaws with respect to Shotguns and Snipers. [/quote] Doubtful. I think you're giving the weapon type too much credit and not enough to the player's level of skill and experience. Now with respect to the flaws, my best guess is that you're talking about projectile travel time and how that leads to inconsistency. [quote]I'm ranked #1 for most Fusion Rifle Kills for both Xbox and PS4 (have around 83,000 kills with them)http://destinytracker.com/destiny/leaderboards/ps/KillsFusionRifle?grouped=trueAnd I've played against Top Players like Luminosity48, SirDimetrious, Kjhovey, RealKraftyy, TrueVanguard while using Fusion Rifles, so I have a pretty good idea how they measure up against Sweaty Players. [/quote] I know and I have a ton of respect for that which is why I said that if you're making a subjective point about fusion rifles, I'm listening and think it's as valid as objective usage statistics. You might have misread my previous point because it wasn't a challenge but more giving credit to you. So how did you stack up against the top 1%? [quote]My conclusion is Fusions are not in a good place right now because: 1) Nobody uses them2) Even when you have a lot of experience with them, they're not consistent in terms of accuracy. You can shoot someone with a perfect dead-centered shot and nothing will happen at times. 3) Most of the good fusions out there are very slow in terms of charge rate, and the faster ones suck due to requiring 6 bolts to kill in one shot. 4) Fusion archetype variety has been destroyed ever since they nerfed Accelerated Coils, since it allowed for the conversion of slow fusion types into faster ones.[/quote] All valid points. But what do you want them to be or how do you want them to behave compared to their current state? Is the answer simply making them hitscan?