When the weapon tuning started, I thought it made sense that some weapons needed tuning individually. Railgun too easy to use? Change it. Sniper have too much aim assist? Reduce it. SMG too OP? Reduce its viable range. Sweet.



What happened in addition to that was the tuning of most weapons in the sandbox with the intention of making their value dependent on a new loadout, and that's where I think most people were no longer on board. The magnum is a beautiful starting weapon that 343i has crafted. It's a consistent, skill-based weapon that works like it's supposed to and fulfills its purpose as a starting weapon. It would still be better to pick up a rifle on the map if you could (because the rifles were all worth using and had their pros and cons against one another). It was great.



Now, with the tuned weapons, that weapon's been thrown to the side in favor of weapons that many consider to be more unreliable and reduce the consistency element that should be held so dearly in a competitive landscape. In addition to changing the loadouts, the tuning made it so that even if we keep the tuning and go back to mag starts, I imagine the BR and GF mag will often go without being picked up, even though they may have before (especially the BR).



I don't know who asked for this current situation, or if anyone did, but I sincerely hope that 343i views this response from the community and understands that they already had it right, in my opinion.



I run a player improvement program with many members in it since starting (over 100 players and coaches over time), and I've never seen such a large portion of them agree so commonly about something that needs to be addressed more than this. Participation and motivation has dropped since these changes occur, and for the sake of the enjoyment of the game (rather than the program, even), we hope 343i makes the right call here and goes back to the beautiful settings we had before weapon tuning.



Also, Oddball is fabulous and I'm glad it's here, and hope to see it with mag starts.



Happy holidays, all. <3