Oh God, how did I get sucked back into this...
BECAUSE YOU CAN'T DETECT A SINGLE SNIPER / RIFLE ROUND UNTIL IT'S TOO LATE.
You CAN hear / see / feel / get scared by a dozens of rounds per second hitting near you. During that entire time you are taking fire, you are suppressed because you KNOW you are getting shot at.
A sniper isn't going to suppress you if you don't know you're being shot at or don't know they're even there.
I'm in favor of simulating seeing/hearing/feeling any real effects from bullets passing by a target, just not in favor of anything that isn't an actual effect (i.e. a force) exerted from flying bullets.
I've seen plenty of snipers before they shoot me. I've even sat there and "laid down suppressive fire," actually, I was trying to hit them. Sometimes, once in a blue moon, I hit them. The MG34 seems to be better at releasing a controlled burst and the DP28 is extremely accurate for a fully automatic LMG in Ost Front, but generally I lose that confrontation.
I always see shooters in RO (at least in Danzig) unless they are using the clipping exploit, in which case I see their muzzle flash right before I hit the deck or admit defeat and start ragespamming bullets.
Obviously, bullet penetration will fix the clipping exploit. I won't have to suppress lean and peakers, I'll simply chew through the wall they're hiding behind and shoot them.
"You CAN hear / see / feel / get scared by a dozens of rounds per second hitting near you. During that entire time you are taking fire, you are suppressed because you KNOW you are getting shot at."
Dozens of rounds per second that don't hit you. And actually, the MG42 in fully automatic at 1200 RPM (where its set as a standard in Ost Front) is capable of 20 rounds per second (1200/60), or 1.75 dozens. Obviously, the DP28 at 500 RPM and the MG34 at 900 RPM will be capable of slightly more (34) and less than a dozen (28) respectively. Add this to the fact that the effective firing rate of a machinegun is much lower than the actual maximum firing rate unless you're planning on shooting 10 feet above your target. Obviously, I don't hold the fact that your figures were exaggerated against you, that analysis was for the sake of accuracy.
I realize that even the practical rate of fire of any fully automatic or semi-automatic weapon is significantly higher than the rate of fire on a bolt-action rifle even when the shooter is blazing through rounds.
That's besides the point. You claimed the effect was purely psychological. Knowing you are getting shot at, in my experience, is substantially less devastating than knowing you are about to get shot and killed. Particularly if the machinegunner was ignorantly throwing rounds just to reach his maximum fire rate (which is obviously not practical for getting anywhere near your target).
There is not as much real danger from random bullets as from a sniper rifle zeroed in on your precise location. Which is why when I see a sniper, I move, and why when I see a machinegunner, I aim. That is, if I'm behind cover. The first objective of anyone faced with a machinegunner is to GET OUT OF THE WAY or get behind cover. No one's being braindead, here. When's the last time you watched someone stand and look at a machinegunner out in the open?
Granted, if I feel the machinegunner is getting dangerously close to killing me, I will move. All of you seem to be under the impression that I like to eat machinegun fire, so there you are.
All the same I have a tendency not to run into machineguns because they tend to dominate that aspect of warfare. I tend not to bayonet charge a machinegun because I probably won't live a quarter of a second.
Anyway, if it makes you feel any better, I'm in favor of simulating seeing/hearing/feeling any real effects from bullets passing by a target, just not in favor of anything that isn't an actual effect (i.e. a force) exerted from flying bullets.