Is Quickscoping a Random Event?

So this post is about quick scoping and no scoping. I was inspired to write it after watching the following video and then reading/participating in the comments. The video isn’t really that interesting unless you enjoy listening to someone complain constantly about how crap MW2 is, but here it is for context:

Recently I’ve put my lack up success in Modern Warfare 2 and pretty much every other FPS down to my awful aiming. It’s as good an excuse as any and is something that only I can have an effect on. So I’ve been looking at how the more successful players aim in game and in most cases they make it so that the enemy is within the onscreen crosshairs before ADS (aiming down sight). This means that they already have a bead on the enemy and they are not chasing them across the screen with their sights. But what has that got to do with quickscoping and no scoping?

Bear with me because in order to fully explain this it may take some time. On screen (unless you’re playing hardcore) you have the cross hairs – four little white blocks towards the centre of the screen:

The Crosshairs can be seen in the centre of the screen around the number 1

When the Call of Duty series started, one thing that they did well was to increase the realism of firing your gun. So no longer did your bullets go in a straight line from the barrel of the gun to the horizon.

No more Laser Guns

Instead, when you fire without ADS (aiming down sight) your bullet will follow a trajectory from a random point within the crosshair area to replicate muzzle sway:

The Hit Area

If your taget is across the map then your chances of getting a non-ADS kill (or even a hit) are greatly reduced. But in the event that your enemy fills the “hit” area then you will hit them – not accurately, but a hit nonetheless. And as Bruce Lee said “A hit is a hit!”. If you are lucky your hip fire will strike them in a critical area scoring a multiplier before they are able to return the favour. The ONLY way to accurately hit your target is to ADS, or scope in if you are using a scoped weapon:

ADS - the best way to fly

The crosshair accuracy increases if you crouch or go prone – in most cases it will noticeably contract. Accuracy is reduced when you are moving which you can see on screen as the distance between the crosshair points expands.

So now we’ve got that out of the way, let’s get on to no-scoping, and quick-scoping (NS and QS from here on). I don’t have a problem with people who no-scope or quick-scope, but I do think that on the whole those who say it is all about skillz and being 1337 are teeny tiny bit delusional. People who NS and QS in MW2 utilise two things in their “skill” whether they realise it or not – luck, and the helping hand of auto aim. When your crosshairs are filled by your target, or they occupy a large proportion of it then your chances of hitting that target are increased. When you scope in, the auto aim “snaps” you towards the target if one is close to the center of the crosshair. Combine with that the fact that the sniper rifles do a lot of damage and you increase your chances of getting a kill even further.

To illustrate the random spread of fire when no scoping have a look at this quick clip from Hutch:

As you can see, the guy he’s trying to shoot is in the middle of the crosshairs, but due to the random spray element the bullets are missing him….. Which neatly brings us on to the whole Sniper Rifle hitmarker complaining that people – mostly quick and no scopers – are complaining about. I’ll allow YouTube comments from the first video to explain how I feel about hitmarkers with the Sniper Rifle (I posted before about getting hitmarkers when using the silencer).

I missed off the ‘t’ in ‘event’ in the last reply…. Anyway – that’s pretty much how I feel about quickscoping. If it was total skill then the quick scoper would not get hitmarkers and their shots would be upper body/head. But that is not the case because they are effectively in between hip firing and ADS. If you watch any QS videos you’ll see that in most cases the scope doesn’t even come up far enough to see the enemy in it….is that aiming?

One thing you’ll notice is that QS and NS posters on YouTube will generally post montage clips of their 1337 skillz. Invariably they show every hit getting “One Shot Kill” or “Headshot” – but these are montage clips, meaning they are the best bits. If you watch videos from QSs who post full matches they you will see them miss, sometimes a lot.

But generally they put it down to lag, or Infinity Ward messing up – but it’s not. Try aiming, that’ll fix the problem in a heartbeat. I particularly like the commentaries that go: “So….um…..yeah. I’m sniping and….. oh my god look at this! A hitmarker?!…..and then he kills me. Infinity Ward, you need to fix this, like, immediately as this is the single thing that makes me want to quit playing this game right now, along with noobtube noobs, commando noobs, Assualt Rifle noobs, SMG noobs, pistol noobs, shotgun noobs, rocket noobs, thermal noobs, grenade noobs, semtex noobs, claymore noobs, C4 noobs, hardscope noobs, turret noobs, prone noobs, jumping noobs, camping noobs, running noobs, chopper gunner noobs, AC130 noobs, last stand noobs, martyrdom noobs and nooby noobs. So……um…..yeah”

In my opinion and experience, is Quickscoping governed by random chance? Yes, yes it is. I’m fully prepared to be proven otherwise, but so far I have not found one person who can consistently get upper body or head shots while no or quick scoping. Even so called Quick Scope tutorials are vague at best on how to do it. My own no scope and quick scope tests indicate the bullet spread remains random compared to actually aiming.

Peas and loaves.

Find me on PSN – evaDlivE