See title. Anyway, I'm a HA shield crutchscrub who wants to veer off his addiction a little and try a support class, but I was curious if I could use my selfheal in combat and have it not be a futile waste, so my question is this: If I were to pop the medic selfheal like a heavies shield, would I be able to soak more bullets? If so, how many more would I be able to handle?
Yes, but not to the extent of the heavy. When activated, You have constant regen. This makes more of a difference with low RoF weapons than high RoF. The heavy shield literally gives you another hp bar, which offsets the damage by negating it, not mitigating it. Technically, you can win scraps 1v1, and it does happen because of it (guilty, but it's rare) just don't expect it to be AS effective as a heavy shield, unless you count resist shield. Remember, shields, AOL heal bars, and over shields regen. Actual green HP does not without an implant or a biolab
I habitually switch on the self-heal whenever I stumble into a 1v1 against a target of equal or higher risk. If your shields go down it certainly can make a difference between life or death.
I find shield regeneration fields to be a better combat survavibility booster. Sure it has many downsides - anchors you to a limited area, lights you up like a christmas tree, creates a huge light bulb zone "throw grenades here", etc. But when you're actually under fire and locked in a firefight, regenerating shields is better than regenerating health. Both effects aren't strong enough to noticeably offset time to kill, but both are useful if you can ADAD around to dodge most of the incoming fire, and especially if you can hide behind cover. The difference is that behind cover you can eat a med kit to restore health, but you can't eat a shield kit to restore shields. Like in this moment here, I survive because I had shield regeneration field deployed. Health regen wouldn't have saved me, because I took >500 damage from one bullet.
I find myself running and gunning with my medic quite often, but I may have to sink some certs into that and learn a more clutchy playstyle, thanks Iridar.
My ranged combat loadout on my medic uses the shield regen device. Combine it with nanoweave, a long range AR, and restro kits for tough fights and you become very tough to kill in ranged fights. That much regen and resistance all going on at once means even a HA will have trouble killing you at range.
When the HA shield nerf comes in there will no doubt be a bit more incentive to run Combat Medic for actual combat. HA will still be better protected (but not so much) and the AR will still be the same vs the LMG.
Oh geez, I hope so. I'm not that against there being a lot of heavies, but we do need more class variety, especially medics for their usefulness.
It's fine as it is. Way weaker than an Overshield, but it allows you to tank that extra bullet once every while. Medics are the Medium Assaults of this game - let them stay that way.
Dude...... stop letting your emotions get in your way of thinking. Medic self heal has the same potential issues the HA shields bring.
Not even close. Superior staying power in the long run when playing carefully, but only a miniscule advantage in a straight up firefight.
... or popped an insta-healing damage-absorbing Medkit. I don't see the AOE heal as overpowered in any way.
Restoration kit + aoe heal means rapid healing for seconds. Iridar's little shield demonstration could have gone in either direction, so his example is so-so. Sticking yourself with a resto kit and engaging the aoe heal isn't precisely an I-win button either, but the effective damage recovery is faster so there's a greater chance to negate more connecting shots in an exchange of fire. It's almost resist shield level durability, but not quite. However, likewise, your after battle recovery will be lengthened by low remaining energy reserves and the fact you have a restoration kit for "quick" healing instead of a medical kit for instant healing. On the bright side, restoration kits are dirt cheap to spam, but unfortunately and oddly more expensive to cert than medical kits. Moral of the story: it pays to experiment to find what One likes most.
Health disappears so quickly (versus shields) when you're shot, it makes almost no difference. I'd be surprised if the difference was more than a bullet or two.
Nerf nano-armor cloak; it saves you in situations where you may have died. Nerf jumpjets; it means LAs could get away in situations where they otherwise would have died. The problem with HA is not the overshield, it's that the overshield can be too potent. The way I think of it is that if the overshield only gave 1 point of shielding, it would be too weak for the HA. If overshield as it is is too powerful for the HA, then there should be some value in between the minimum (1) and the current value wherein it would be relatively balanced. As it is right now the medic heal makes very little difference in a firefight. Yes, there are definitely situations where it can save you, but it doesn't do it as often or as well as the HA overshield does. Every class has little advantages that allow them to get away or get kills in situations where they otherwise would've died or not got a kill. Medics have good guns and either their heal or shield. Infil has tons of tricks with his cloak, his recon, mines, etc. Engie at the very least has turrets, which although they're a lot more situational than the other classes when it comes to infantry combat, still mean SOMETHING. LA, of course, has jumpjets, and anyone who is remotely decent at LA can speak to how amazing they are at flanking and getting the jump on people. Classes having advantages that can save them or secure kills in situations where other classes can't is a healthy part of balance. The only issue with HA overshield is that it's incredibly potent and incredibly general use: its advantage is "straight-up combat" when straight-up combat is a very large part of the game.
