Ok so I have an idea that some people might like & others might hate. So my idea go's like this, instead of having 3 types of Heavy Shield just have 1 or 2, this shield is not a personal shield but instead a deployable item, working much like the Combat Medic's Regeneration Field it becomes an item in the Heavy Assualt's inventory that they have to switch too & deploy, the Heavy Assualts shield would also be destroyed by gun fire, frag grenades, EMP's etc if hit, this means a team play element where Infiltrators can clear entire rooms of its shields would become increasingly viable giving infiltrators a greater team play role. I would personally call it the "Portable Shield Generator" or "PSG", the PSG would make a small bubble 3 character links wide abling to fit 5 stationary characters inside, once inside it will take 0.5 seconds for the PSG to take affect, once under its affect any friendlies gain a 40~50% damage resistance, maybe you could even make it so they gain more resistance depending how long they spend in the shield, starting at 10% & increasing upto 70% over a long ish period of time, each level of resistance taking even longer in the PSG's area of effect to achieve, as soon as you leave the range of the PSG your damage resistance is gone & you will have to start all over again. This sorts 2 problems, it means flanking enemies would kill the Heavy Assualt as quick as any other class, it means a heavy assualt now has to antisepate a fight & prepare for it instead of just activating a shield whenever they feel they need to win a fight, this also bring's a team play aspect to the Heavy Assualt's shield to bring it more in line with the medic, engineer & infiltrators deployable team play abilities. If you like the Idea or hate it go ahead & give me a thumbs up or leave me a comment below, remember though if your going to reply please make it constructive.
please I would apreciate if you would elaborate on "shield is fine as is", like I did state please make your replies contructive, simply saying you think its "fine" simply just states that you are happy with how it is performing yet no one is to know whether or not you main heavy & even if you dont whether you run solo or in a group. x
Just to add to the brainstorm A deployable nanites mini-wall shield, up to a bit above waist height (so you can crouch safely behind and have to stand-up to shoot over) that operates like the MANA turrets shields. So you and your allies can hide behind, move in and out of it (friendlies and foes alike). Bam, Heavy just became a support player. Resist Shield could be splashed to friendlies close to you in a short radius. Only strongest version applies in AoE. Then a third thingy,
I like your Idea of the deployable shield wall, I gues it would be like a deployable mini version of the Aegis shield & would be faction coloured, however if SOE was to do this I see them giving it to the Engineer as an alternative to the MANA turrets, however if they did it would be a sorely missed opertunity in my books, ty for the great feed back & idea's.
In fairness to the other guy, it's on you to prove the current shield isn't fine, since you're suggesting replacing it outright, rather than just adding a new option. I think your idea is interesting, but I wouldn't be in favor of replacing the current shield with it. Basically, tying the shield to a deployable would make the HA a purely defensive class. A change like this would benefit the guys trying to hold a room while simultaneously limiting the opponent's ability to force their way in. This would tend to create more stagnant fights and typically favor the attacker, since it makes it easier to hold the point rooms.
I'm pretty sure a model already exists in the game for deploy-able cover.... Okay I found it.... (Link to Reddit Thread) Frankly I really don't think the HA needs anything like this. Maybe a Light Assault who has no cover on the damn rooftops and is pretty much shunned from group play. Which ever class gets this would make them desirable for point holds. I understand your interest in having an actual tool for HA besides using the rocket launcher... I just really feel this game is already Heavyside 2. We don't need to encourage it. At the same time I understand its a shield, (or elaborate tripping device) which may not fit well with a flanking class. I just struggle to understand why LA's don't have a tool at all right now. I suppose that's another discussion to be had in a different thread. Regardless its glorious and I hope they implement it.
Well in my opnion the Heavy Assualt class as it is does not benefit anyone but the Heavy Assualt it's self, most people have the straight up opinion that a Heavy Assualt needs the shield because it is a front line breach & clear style character, however the same could be said about a Max, both a Max & a Heavy have enough Hp to soak up several peoples gunfire, both have weapons that can deter enemy air craft, both have guns designed to take out mutiple other classes, both have guns to fight against enemy ground vehicles, when a Heavy or Max walks into the room most other classes instantly are killed or put into a state of panic due to there enemy taking an large amount of time to die, it would seem to me that currently Max's & Heavies are both serving the exact same front line breach & clear role, the only difernce seems to be that you can simply turn tail & run from a Max where you can not from a Heavy. Now this is when you say how a skilled player can simply just shoot a Heavy Assualt in the head & kill them very quickly where the same can not be said about a Max, however a skilled Heavy could headshot another non Max infantry class in the head & kill them even quicker, this simply means that if you have two equally skilled soldiers on equal ground in each classes perfect situation the Heavy Assualt is allways going to win, this is because of its abaility to just shield up & soak up more damage then the other person can, maybe if the heavy Assualts shield only applied to the body like Nanoweave & didnt cover the head then I would see your arguement as valid & worth considering. In my personal opinion the Heavy Assualts shield is simply an uneeded bonus item that Heavies are given, the Heavy Shield is just not really necisary & surves no purpose but to get the user kills they would normally not have optained, I gave my carefully considered option for a "defencive" Heavy Shield instead of simply saying that they should take the shield away as it would upset allot of people simply to take away something rather then change, adapt & improve on the concept, the way I see it is that even without the Heavy Shield the Heavy Assualt class would still be a complteley viable & perfect breach & clear / supressive fire class, simply put Heavy Assualts would still have the best breach & clear tool in the game aka the concusion grenade, they would still have the best supressive fire weapon sks the LMG, they would also still have a weapon that can drop aircraft, blow up vehicles & kill Max's aka the rocket launcher, now this is where you say "but if it didnt have the shield the Heavy Assualt wouldnt live upto its name" well despite not having an extra shield on top of the shield you allready have you would still be carrying around the heaviest weapons so I say that you DO infact fit your name without the extra shield. The Idea I gave was one option of mainy that could be taken into consideration, I think there should be two or three types of heavy shield all serving a destinct role on the battlefield instead of the current ones that all serve the same purpose just with diferent names, if the Heavy Assualt was to pick between a shield designed for defence, a shield desgned for offence & a shield thats a jack of all trades but not as good in specific situations then the game would be allot more balanced, everyone knows that the most played class in the game is Heavy Assualt, the reasson for this is that it has the highest killing potential & is the most versitile class able to adapt to any & all situations, as it currently stands there is no real reasson to play other classes apart from the trivial things such as rezing people, let me just put it this way, if there was never any classes & planetside 2 & everyone was a Heavy Assualt the game would still play out perfectly smoovely, people would get Auto Repair on there vehicles & use the Regeneration Implant to get health back, people would simply just accept that when they die they die just like many other shooter games & life would go on, basses would be won & lost the only diferance would be to win a fight you would have to be the more skilled player or you would have to work as a team more covering each others back's instead of just thinking "oh someone died, no worries some medic will get him up" just for half a minuite later the person has to respawn because of the sheer lack of classes that are not Heavy Assualt. No matter who you are or what class you play mainly everyone cares about there kill death ratio, now this is where you say "oh I dont care about my K/D I just play the game", common lets be realistic here, no matter if you play an medic going around enjoying healing & rezing people no one likes having a negative K/D, why ? because its depressing, at the end of the day we are playing a shooter game, regardless whether or not the game is team based, solo based of based around your pet cat if we have a negative K/D thats like the game telling us in big bold letters that we are not a very good player, its depressing, we all know that, no matter how much we tell are selves it doesnt matter we all would feel better if we had a higher K/D, the largest portion of gamers play a shooter game to "shoot people" the idea of knowing that when you kill that little figure on a screen someone elese was the other side of it, simply put beacuase a Heavy Assualt is the most effective killer the largest portion of gamers are drawn to it becuase there is not a big enough lure on the end of the other classes hook to draw in a decent amount of population, maybe I am looking at this all wrong, maybe heavies dont need a nerf but instead all other classes need a buff, despite how you look at it no one can deny that SOMETHING needs to be done, this is where you say "oh but in real life the bulk of an army is front line soldiers with a few specialists", this however my friend is the core of the problem, more & more we are trying to replace thngs we find less fun with machines, so by that logic since a game is desgned to be fun we all might aswell all be heavies & have Engineer & Medic bots that can be summoned like glorified pets, this is because to most people other classes only serve to help heavies allmost like heavies are an elitist cult & on an entire diferent level of existance. I hope you can understand what I ment by all of this & if you are going to reply then please try make it contructive ok. x
I am happy with it is as I previously stated. I play all classes fairly equally with a slight bias to my Engi largely due to tanking, I don't play that much max. I occasionally run solo but usually play with at least 1 other person if not a platoon. The shield is fine, if it is that big of a deal just flank and fight the HA on your own terms and not your opponents. Is the HA shield really that OP when the LA and Infil can attack from any angle, an engineer never runs out of ammo, a medic can revive by the squads/platoons and always are at full health, etc. Every class has their advantage, players just need to learn how to use them.
If they mess with the HA shield then I'll play medic all day. AR are far and away the best guns in the game anyway.
If the both of the players have the same skill (headshots), the HA wont always win. In fact, I would argue that HA would be at a disadvantage due to the LMGs hipfire cof compared to a medic's AR.
