Can ya'll walk me through a specific instance of masterful Ganz tactics? I feel like I'm missing out something here. It's not that I think it's a terrible weapon - it's just that strategically, it has no edge over any of the other equipment.

WARNING: The lunatical ravings of a dementedly psychotic madman to follow.
This post is not to encourage anyone to adopt/attempt this style of play. Please do not argue that it is not what one is supposed to do, this is already known.

I mentioned earlier in this thread that I use the Ganz in a different manner then most people who hunker down and camp a ridge waiting for the unsuspecting people to wander into their sights. Now that someone has brought up the different uses of the Ganz, I'll take a few lines to expound a bit more on how I use it.

To take your last question/statement first, the one thing that the Ganz can do strategically that other support weapons can't (at least with any reliability) is gun down buggies which adds a minimal AV role to the weapon. There is nothing more fun the watching someone trying to zip past your squad's position at a middle flag going for a back flag and taking the Ganz to the side of buggy with the resulting explosion to ensue. Generally, if you're accurate (or lucky and the driver bumped a few things on the way) you can take down a FAV in one cooldown cycle of the Ganz. This is one example of where the heavier hitting rounds shine. Everytime I do this, it fills me with child-like glee. On the fun scale I put this above even EMP-locking a walker.


When I play support, my largest emphasis is making sure that my squaddies are topped off, and that I get battlefield information to them via IDS/Dystek. This means that I need to be inside the squad at all times (or try to be at least.) Which is why I run and gun the Ganz like I do. Most people might choose a different weapon for a situation such as this, and the Clark is gaining popularity (soon to be a Clark explosion after the patch.) But, I find that the Clark, while extremely good at what it does, lacks flexibility that the Ganz has, and I accept a slightly reduced capability at shorter ranges for a much greater capability at non-short ranges.

Many of the same arguments between the Voss and the Baur are the same for the LMGs and the Ganz. The Ganz will hit harder per round and over longer distances, but operates slower per round and overheats faster then the LMGs. I find that in CQC the Ganz has an edge (for me) in spike damage, and at longer ranges is more accurate and heavier hitting then the LMGs. The cost of the heavier rounds is a cost in player accuracy. You're going to have to get your rounds on target more accurately with the Ganz then the LMGs becuase you have fewer to play with. Also, like the Baur, the Ganz has a shorter clip then the LMGs and you will be reloading more often.


Trying to out gun an Assault or shotgunner in CQC with a Ganz is a tricky proposition, and against extremely skilled players (Hidus, Crux, sc1ence, Ultrablue, etc. level assault skill) most of the time they are going to take your lunch money and beat you up on the playground. There are some things you can do to help even out the proposition, however:

Stick like glue. When you spot a target close in, you've got to stop moving before you fire. Quite often you're caught out in the open with no cover, and it sucks to be you. Try and avoid that, and if you can get to cover to look for a different point of attack, that would be a good course of action, but if you are not close enough where you'll survive getting cover you are forced to do your best.

Zoom. You absolutely need to zoom in to guarantee your rounds land on target even against targets fairly close in. Crouch-zooming needs to be a spinal reflex that you work on and has to pretty much happen like clock work for this tactic to be effective. The good thing is that you have to wait for your reticle to settle, and by the time you've crouch-zoomed it's pretty much going to be at or near the lowest point without firing.

Don't Prone. When you prone your reticle expands to its maximum, and you're going to need several seconds for it to shrink back down. The difference in deviation between crouching and proning with the Ganz is extremely minimal. If you're not camping in a specific location for a while with the Ganz you should avoid going prone. The long wait of the reticle settling is not worth the extremely slight benefit in deviation at close ranges. This, of course, is completely different if you are attempting to make longer range shots where every bit of deviation counts.

Long widly uncontrolled bursts. All of the MGs act unlike most of the weapons in the game, where when you constantly fire your reticle shrinks to it's smallest point. So, after about three rounds your reticle is about as small as it's going to get. You need to sustain your bursts long enough to maintain minimum deviation. This is easy with a single target, you simply fire them up until they are dead or you overheat. The difficulty comes in when you have multiple contacts at close range. You then have to feather your fire to balance maintaining mimimum deviation keeping your heat meter low enough to be able to fire enough rounds to take them both/all out while mainting a high enough rate of fire to kill them before they kill you. You can also use the first few rounds to assist in shrinking the reticle if you don't start at a minimal position, but the disadvantage in doing this is two things. First, you are more likely to miss with your first rounds and giving your opponent more time uncontested. And, second, by spending a few rounds with lower probabilty of hits it removes those rounds from your overheat cycle as effective damage. This reduces the overall damage possible sustained during an overheat cycle. If you are dealing with a single target the second point isn't as much of a difficulty, but against multiple targets it is a pretty severe drawback.

Practice, practice, practice. Obviously the more time you spend on something the better you get a feel for how it is done, but using this style of play with the Ganz you're going to need an edge becuase you are literally starting in the hole with almost every encounter you get in all things being equal.

Manufacture an edge. I find that even a half second jump on your target can make the difference between life and death. You have to do pretty much everything you can to get that half second head start. This is the hardest area to explain because of the fluid nature of encounter starts, but keep it in mind that your chances of negating your disavantages rise exponentially if you can manage to get this. Not that this doesn't apply to all situations with pretty much any weapon, but it goes double for trying to beat Assaults at their game. And IDS placed at the beginning of an assault will help with this. If you're running ammo a lot you shouldn't have to worry about this, but you always want to have an IDS ready to drop at a moment's notice in your inventory. Once you've dropped one, make sure to resupply it as soon as you can so that you can place the next one when needed.


That all being said, using the Ganz in CQC does not detract in any way of its utility in other situations (such as overwatch,) but is simply one more thing you can add your bag of tricks. I just tend to find myself in situations where this skill is needed, and do not strive to be in situations where I use the gun in a more commonly used manner. The best thing about the Ganz is its flexibility in combat. It is hard hitting enough close-in that with some practice you can compete in that arena, it is accurate enough that at medium distances you can put enough rounds on target to be effective, and at long ranges the bullets start out with enough punch and maintain enough accuracy that you can be effective at removing targets even with the distance damage reduction. The Ganz does not truely excel in any one area, but with enough work it can be sufficient at most infantry removal tasks.