Boom, Headshot

In the 15 March 2009 news post, Naota talks about the M24's as well as the M82's damage mechanics in FAS. The M24 "does around 340 damage to the head including the helmet mitigation amount" he begins. This high damage makes a head shot a guaranteed kill almost all the time, even when shooting though some objects in game. The lowest damage he has seen the M24 do was 74 damage after firing though a very large model. While many weapons have noticeable penetration fall off, the M24's "penetration falloff is also pretty lenient." Naota uses an anecdote that a head shot thorough a barrier of sheet metal did 304 damage.

The M82 is the M24 on steroids. "A single chest shot will do 96 damage to medium armour and instantly kill anyone wearing light," Naota states and continues, "head shots clock in around 890ish damage." Balancing this power, the M82 has some restrictions on it that make it harder to use than the other sniper rifles. Besides it's high credit cost, the M82 will "unscopes whenever you move, has huge kick and a slow ROF, and is notably inaccurate when standing." However, using the bipod negates many of these downsides as well as increasing it's rate of fire to that of the 3.0 SVD.