I know for a fact that the Mossington, which is my preferred primary, has a highly unreliable spread. I've tested this, and what I have realized is that the spread is completely random inside the reticle. random spraed on shotgun is good, but it has to be slightly controlled so as to be useful. As is, you can take a shot at 10ft and do a bunch of damage, then take a shot at 5 feet and to nothing...i have done fractional damage on dead-center shots to the chest and/or head, and gotten full damage whenthe enemy is on the edge of the reticle. It is ridiculous that i can't even rely on my shotgun at point-blank range because there is always the chance that all of the pellets will go around the target.

i don't use the heavy shotgun, but i wouldn't be surprised if it suffered this same problem.

now, here is a possible solution to make the shotgun more reliable. draw an invisible half the size of the reticle and put it in the center, make it grow and shrink with the rest of the circle. now, make at least 1/2 or 2/3 of the pellets always go inside that circle, and the rest go inside the reticle as a whole. this way, i can actually get direct hits when i am supposed to, and not get kills on grazing shots.

feedback? alternative suggestions?

I agree and approve.

Particularly after seeing a guy get lucky and manage to headshot-snipe me from 10m with a Mossington. Literally every pellet went into my face, it was brutal. And knowing (also from experience being shot at) that it works the other way around at times as well doesn't make the gun seem any better. And your suggestion seems like a pretty reasonable method of fixing it - tighten the spread of PART of the blast, but leave the rest full-spread.

I'd say 1/2 the pellets go in the smaller spread-area, and the rest are randomised within the entire circle. That way you might get more than half in the smaller spread, but you definitely won't have less.

yeah 1/2 would be the best balance wise...but 2/3 would make me a killing machine...

I've experienced this too, but it just means that 1/2 times at point-blank range I have to shoot twice, which isn't any different from other games. Heck, I have a better luck with the Mossington online than the shotguns from MAG, CoD, BF:BC & BC2, Borderlands, SOCOM:C...

The shotguns from MAG are pretty damn powerful comparing it to any other game. I remember when they nerfed down the range for it and still it can take down targets from a longer distance compared to other shotguns in games.
The Mossington is one of my preferred guns to use in certain circumstances, the first shot almost always is a 1 hit very close to the target; but the distance factor for the pellet spread does limit it. the Hammer Time can't beat the Mossington up close unless the Mossington's 1st shot goes bad.
The Brink wiki says that the pellet damage for the Mossington is 22, while the Hammertime is 16, the Mossington usually wins the crowd since it can be used with mediums and is more controllable.

Honestly... I dont use the shotguns much... but I assumed this was the way it is. If not... then yes I agree it should be 1/2 the pellets go center up to an "effective" range and the rest are more scattered and random.

I think the shotguns are fine. Did you take in consideration that it is used by a soldier with armor piercing perk and maybe a big dmg buff from the engi, i have experienced that with those upgrades the shotguns are very powerfull and nasty in close quarter combat, i wouldn't buff em at no means. if you make the spread of the pellets predictable the guy on the other end of the barrel will have no chance to survive anymore. As a result the cry for a nerf will start.

this isn't about power at all, only spread. i don't care if they change the power, but shotguns are currently only usable by luck, with absolutely no skill required, or used for that matter. by making half the pellets go into the center of the reticle, which by the way is a sizeable area compared to the rest of the reticle, especially when moving, the shotguns then require a degree of skill, instead of pure luck. look, i don't want al my pellets to go into one place or all go around a target at 5m. i want half of the pellets to go into the center, which at point blank means i will actually land a hit (even if it is a minimum of half damage), with the rest being random.

Wait until you get to use the Hjammerdeim. It's crap as a self-defense weapon, only good for crowd control.

Wat? It's great for those corridor/corner surprise 1v1s... BLAM BLAM

If you're lucky and some of the pellets hit.

PS3 Hjammerdeim is apparently better than PC version by as much as the PC version's AI is better than ours. Or you're no good with the gun. I can fairly consistently two-shot people with it coming around a corner, but I'll admit it's more reliable and fun as a crowd control weapon. Control your rate of fire carefully and you can keep 3 - 4 players down for a good few seconds while also doing pretty good damage.

After finally settling on the Hjammerdiem as my heavy weapon, I am finding this too. It's got a crazy random spread so sometimes you find your self needing to shoot three times to at least at a pellet on the bad guy.

Did a ~5 meter test, five meters, and the spread was about a whole meter apart on the wall. That means you gain a fifth of the distance in spread, at 50 meters, in some of the more extreme combat situations in the game you'd have a 10 meter spread.

Yesterday I found the Mossington to be waaaaaay more accurate while ADS than firing from the hip. It seemed to me that I was firing slugs rather than a spread of pellets. Granted, the range is still a joke, but it worked a lot better.

Really good reason not to be using it at that range then. If you turn a corner and there's someone RIGHT THERE, and you mash the fire button aiming at the lower part of their chest, the kick will usually result in the second blast headshotting and incapacitating the guy. Worst-case, he's knocked down and heavily wounded.

Shotguns are always close-range weapons.

Brink's Heavy weapons are always close-range weapons.

I believe that qualifies Hjammerdeim as ultra-close-range right there. Use it, as with all Heavies, for suppression, but be less surprised than usual when it slaughters everyone in front of you if you're in one of the more tightly confined areas, or well-placed to take advantage. Also, it's better at suppression than the MGs because of the knockdown.