Wanted to make a thread in advance and get discussion about class changes going before polls are put up.

Some ideas that have floated around the staff forum:

- Rippers can carry 2 LAWs and always spawn with 2.
- Nader gets a choice between 2 GL attachments. 1 is a poison grenade that creates an area of effect on the ground that does ticking damage for enemies standing it. Mostly for defending chokes. The other is a fire attachment that puts a ticking dot on the enemy similar to inferno projector/incin nades.
- Nader GL shoots a lot farther similar to the CTF GL.
- Sapper gets unlimited demos but they're on a longer cooldown.
- Explosive shotgun and incin removed from sapper but they get a PDW or Pistol.
- Sniper gets stealth coating that makes them invisible only on the radar and a sprint that lasts 2-3 seconds on a long reload.
- Sniper gets secondary ammo (10 shots?) that does less damage than a normal snipe but it prevents healing on that target for 3-5 seconds.
- Command class that has limited summon uses. Maybe a sergeant type class that has a chain sword and battle rifle.

I think we should really focus on the less used classes like Nader, Ripper, Sapper and Sniper. Overall I feel like LMG and AT are in a good place with their recent changes. Incin nades are really powerful for pushes and holding chokes. And AT only using 1 ammo per shot and a longer dual AP range is really good.

Post up any thoughts you might have about class changes.

revert nader to old nader, real old one that killed and had good range, no bouncey nades, prob give it deagle, get rid of concus nades or severely reduce thier damage, they are way OP, bring back old ripper with straight line old damage shots, poison nade and fire nade for nader might be neat. sniper could prob use some close in defence

- Rippers can carry 2 LAWs and always spawn with 2.

Seems fair, maybe we should allow Medics to carry 2 LAWs as well.

- Nader gets a choice between 2 GL attachments. 1 is a poison grenade that creates an area of effect on the ground that does ticking damage for enemies standing it. Mostly for defending chokes. The other is a fire attachment that puts a ticking dot on the enemy similar to inferno projector/incin nades.

Interesting, how much damage would the poison do, and would it be fast or slow damage? How long would both these attachments last on the ground?

- Nader GL shoots a lot farther similar to the CTF GL.

Seems fair.

- Sapper gets unlimited demos but they're on a longer cooldown.

Seems fair.

- Explosive shotgun and incin removed from sapper but they get a PDW or Pistol.

Should be a more powerful version of PDW, since the sg/incin were for clean up.

- Sniper gets stealth coating that makes them invisible only on the radar and a sprint that lasts 2-3 seconds on a long reload.

Make Sniper fun to play when Backs can't play. That's a great idea.

- Sniper gets secondary ammo (10 shots?) that does less damage than a normal snipe but it prevents healing on that target for 3-5 seconds.

Seems fair.

- Command class that has limited summon uses. Maybe a sergeant type class that has a chain sword and battle rifle.

Depends how many uses, also I'm pretty sure there is a bug with summoning in this game that allows you to multiple summon ppl as long they are standing close enough together, could be abused pretty hard.

For the poison one I was thinking like 2-3 hp per second while standing in it. The fire one is not a ground effect. It's just an attachment to the GL that when it hits you it puts a burning dot on you.

Command classes have always been talked about but tricky to implement. Could be fun and create longer battles. I'd say maybe 10 summons total. And I think you can put like a 5 second cooldown on the summon to prevent that bug and spamming summons.

The whole idea of these changes is to try and make them more in line with the Marine class so that we can move away from the typical 6 marine 2 medic setup. I think the only way to do that is to make the support classes really strong and restrict them to 1 type per team and 4 support classes total.

Balancing ripper is tough because it is a very strong class as it is but I think it's the maps that make it less than ideal.

Ripper
- That doesn't change anything about why people don't pick that class. Even with that .5 dmg buff it was still meh so adding an additional law won't make it better.
- Give perks to the class to give more utility in general similar to BF. One time use per death it can drop x amount of nades/ammo/laws. Some type of mechanic to run faster for a brief period but has a few sec delay to shoot immediately.

Command class
- lol. Didn't work well in SL with the 3 deaths so don't think it will work any better since you now forgive horrible flankers/bad positioning.

AT
- needs a 5-10hp buff with same class restriction as LMG. No one is playing AT with the ammo fix so you either need to buff the tankyness slightly or give it an additional range to contribute in fights.

Nader
- I don't mind those changes. Another idea was to utilize the motar from EOL with the incendiary and multiple GL drops as a specialty. Maybe 2 per use specialty and requires to go in the air for awhile to use so people can't camp inside a base getting any use from it.

Sapper
- Either give more specialty nades or give them a weapon to contribute from mid range that focuses more for utility.

Probably should look at other zones to find a weapon to give some of these classes in need of decent weapons instead of providing them with a blanket PDW/Eagle that are pretty mediocre.

I really wanted to implement a care package type of item for support classes before but people didn't really seem to think it was a good idea for some reason. I really think it would give incentive to run a class that can drop you ammo in stalemate games.

The idea I would like to talk the most about would be the summoning type class. I do like the idea of the sarge only having a chain fist and br because it balances the class having summoner.

I would also like to discuss maybe giving this class a one haywire grenade.

Regarding the summoner itself, as a long time ctf sl/med I have doubled and even triple summoned before. If you can toggle fast enough it can be done. Idk if this is something that can be prevented. I know the aforementioned limited time summoner can balance it a bit though, but yeah, I'd like to see what could be done with the prevention of multisummoning.

I think it's a class that might be messed with during squash matches but I don't see two evenly matches squads using it against each other.

-sniper

I dont ever play it, does it have the blue pdw that hellspawn made for it?

For the secondary ammo, rather than a heal prevention, maybe 5 special 1 hit shots with a longer minimum range than the regular ammo.

-Nader

No bouncey, but I like the idea of Nader having two launchers with varying distances.

- 2 laws

If ripper gets two laws I think med should also get two laws.

The problem with summons is that it enables passivity play style. Instead I think this solution is a lot better. One class(1 max restriction) can warp to players. The warp has to channel for 10 secs with their location revealed in order to warp. Maybe even a longer channel so this class is not rewarded for bouncing in fights they have already lost. The warp uses all of their energy and this class weapons requires energy to fight. You now have a high risk high reward champion.

If you give a class the ability to summon someone away in order to reduce deaths or maximize positioning then it will def be used by higher tier squads. You don't need to fight straight up when you can let the other squad push forward and summon another person off the bat to fight a 4v3 etc.

So a form of infiltrator?

I dont imagine a summoning class also having the best weapons given the ability. I know the class needs a decent weapon for anyone to want to play it but I definitely feel it shouldnt be as useful.

I like the warping class too, could make the class really useful for vision and solo flanks.

What sort of energy weapon would it be?

Also just combine Nader and Sapper already. We know everyone is just going to use Marines anyways.

Combine sniper and sapper, call it snapper

Combine Nader/Sapper -> Demolitionist Class

Ripper -> Needs some speed buffs on a timer w/ cooldown... 1-2 seconds of running while shooting on a cooldown maybe. Could be pretty broken though if you did that but just throwing ideas out there.

Sniper ->
-- Traps ... Set trap, teleport to it whenever. .. long cooldown
-- Speedy Rifle... Quick Rifle Shots for a limited time .. long cooldown
-- Enhanced Armor ... Take 30% less dmg for 10 seconds ... long cooldown

AT -> Additional range and / or bouncy bullets on physics. Survivability is fine.

Replace sapper with a class that has Drop Pack + Maser

add mining elements to game

srsly tho like the idea of debuffs w/ the healing and haywire grenade. would be nice to have some sort of long range one time use weapons to force ppl out of camping positions (bard ult lol)

Where is that Peacemaker class at???? Wink

I know people wanted peacemaker but it never had a chance to be tested. Would you add peacemaker on top of medic? And limit it to 1 per team? So 1 medic 1 peacemaker? Or 2 medics 1 peacemaker? Does peacemaker have its own medkit or is it just the healing gun thing?