hahaha so much I could say on this topic
I think the basic argument tends to come down to this
Rifler: Of course rifles are 1337 compared to smgs, you guys just spray loads of bullets until you hit something. With a rifle you have to actually aim !!!!
SMGer: Thats bs noob. Rifles are accurate and so easy to aim, you might spary with an smg cos you suck but I aim with an smg at long range and close range and don't just spray. When I get a hit its more skillful because I got it with a less accurate gun
Thats kinda the surface argument n all you tend to hear on servers. Now heres the real argument
It dosnt really just come down to what weapon you use, its down to how you play with it and I don't just mean how accurate you are.
If you have a rifle and camp back as far away from the enemy as you can picking them off whilst they can't even see you its not greatly skilled because all you need to be is a good shot
If you have an smg n you just rush gunning as fast as you can at riflers its not really that skillful because you have such a better rate of fire.
The most skilled players are those who use a weapon to their disadvantage and still pwn, what do I mean ?
rifle rushing (thats me) and smg sniping
If you can run straight at a couple of guys with smgs holding your bolt action and they empty a clip at you whilst you sidestep, hop, flop and generally just aviod getting hit then pop them both with one shot each from your rifle theres not denying its pure class
Equally if your hidding in your room with your ppsh and you manage to headshot 2 riflers with 3 or 4 bullets before they manage to snipe you its pretty skillful
Thats the arguments i can see from both points of view looking
Now I am gonna come down heavily on the side of riflers
First off i want to point out when i talk about rifles I only really mean bolt action as I consider garands, carbines etc just as noobish as smgs. Secondly I want to point out that I am stating all that follows on the assumption that crosshairs are not being used as a bolt action rifler with crosshairs is almost as bad as an smger. Thirdly I am talking about playing to your disadvantage which means rushing an smger with your bolt action not sniping
First off accuracy. One big thing ppl seem to over look in this argument is with an smg or semiauto rifle if you miss a shot you can judge where your gun is pointing by where the bullet hits and this is one of the things that makes it far less skillful. You can be totally in accurate for your first shot and still have time to fire your second, third, fourth etc etc etc before the target has had time to move a great deal and so its trial and error rather than aiming
With a bolt action you pop off a shot and by the time you are ready for your second either you or your target has moved to the point that using your last shot as an indication on which to amend your aim isnt possible.
Movement
One of the most important skills (as important if not more so than accuracy) is the ability to dodge. In these situations the smger always has a huge advantage. Firstly their rate of fire far out does yours, secondly they can use previous shots for aim indication and correction and finally at this range the difference in smg and rifle accuracy really dosnt make alot of difference
An smger dosnt have to be to intense with the dodging as you can only fire at him/her slowly meaning theres a big break and the smger can just dodge left or right as you take the shot then has all of your reload time to stay in one spot and gun at you if he/she wants. When you are dodging bullets from an smg you have to move constantly for a far far longer period of time whilst the because the smger can use the hits of previous shots to constantly keep his/her aim on you, its kinda like trying to hit someone with a water ballon from about 2 meters whilst they spray a hosepipe at you and the first one to get wet looses
You can be tactically good but actually not very skillful and still get a good score. Say you have a hardcore camper you its an awful shot and takes 3 shots even to hit stationary targets. Whilst they might suck in terms of accuracy and be useless at hoping and flopping they will still rack up a good score if they are in good cover and constantly behind the enemy. This is why scrims are the only way to actually judge accuracy (scrim by my terms means any number of players who have seen each other and are enguaged in a close range fight)
In a scrim situation if only comes down to skill because neither player as a tactical advantage the only advantage that can be had is if one player has a superiour weapon. They are both there right infront of each other in plain view and it comes down to who is the better shot and whos the fastest on the trigger. This is why i bolt action rifle rush smgers because then you are at a defiante and very clear disadvantage and so when you win its actually means something.
So i guess what im saying is actually campers are not the most skillful by a longshot using smgs or rifles, rushers are not by a longshot if they use smgs, essentially anyone with an advantage sucks because they need that advantage to get their kill, The only true talent is rifle rush
This is proven (in my eyes) by the fact that most rifle rushers can also play better at most if they ever go back to camping because they propably did this before they started to rifle rush, they can play well with smgs in scrims not only because using a rifle has made them very accurate but has made them learn to hop n flop extreamly well
Bascially you put a rifle rusher in an siuation with any weapon and they will normally come out far better than most
Now once you have mastered that you naturally have to take it to the next level and this is where the really contraversial bit comes in, are you ready for this
anyone who fires a weapon is a noob !!!
"what" i hear you cry, "dont be stupid"
Well heres why, once you have rifle rushed so much that your an expert hopper and flopper you tend to find that not matter what weapon someone hasyou can aviod a good clip or to and so you can advance on them constantly whilst in a scrim. This means that you can get right in there face and so yes . . oh yes
YOU CAN BASH THEM
Honest to god you can go into a normal server with smgs n all n totally r@pe without even firing a shot
"well its only theory" i hear you say "you might put up a good argument but it will never actually work"
My best so for on an all weapons server whilst only using melee attack is 69 for 14 and i normally come outwith at least a 2 for one ratio ie if i get 40 kills i have 20 deaths and if because with rushing you are so agressive in terms of play, always advancing you also tend to end up at the top of the leader board in terms of kills 2
This is of course on public servers but once you have mastered the bash you can even pwn resonable players in clan matchs with bash. The only time i find i really have to fall back to using my bolt action now is if we are playing a really good smg clan because bashing them is still difficult but with the oldbolt action they still drop like flys
Anyway argument settled,
second most skilled = bolt action rushers
first = bashers who dont even use ammo, thats the real art of fps or fpb as they should be called