[Suggestion] Heavy Assault is OP and needs a *big* change

Heavy Assault is far too powerful

• The heavy assault kills every single other form of infantry better than any other class
• The heavy assault kills maxes better than any other class
• The heavy assault can kill vehicles better than any class
• The heavy assault can kill aircraft better than any other class

The heavy assault is a one-size-fits-all class to be able to kill everything in the game without putting oneself at risk. Fighting shouldn't come down to what class you're playing, it should come down to skill. Pulling a max is excluded as a class here as it costs nanites, but even maxes have loud footsteps that prevent players from being caught off-guard by them, not to mention being 8 feet tall, so HAs still have some advantage there. Heavy Assaults are the same as other classes only with 700 additional health provided by the NMG or Adrenaline Shield, and this causes a balance issue in the game that most will refuse to acknowledge. The fact is, a lot of players benefit from this, as they play heavy assault. It means that they are always either on par with enemies or given a huge advantage, and no one who plays with that would want to give it up. This is, however, a large issue. It gets in the way of the game being a coordinated effort between the classes, because heavy assault fits far too many roles. Heavy Assault is what makes this game not be fun, because gaming experience is killed when players are given a strong disadvantage to other players, and playing against so many heavy assaults means that you can either give up and switch to heavy as well or expect to die to players significantly worse than you simply because they decided to play as this more powerful class. Enjoying this game shouldn't be limited to those who enjoy playing as a heavy assault, so the heavy assault's role as a walking death machine that can kill everything that isn't a heavy assault NEEDS to change.

There are 3 options for heavy assault roles that I see

1: Suppression

The Lasher is a great example of how a heavy assault primary should behave. It should be a gun that doesn't have a lot of killing potential on its own, but is great at holding enemy forces back simply because it works as a suppressing force, not necessarily a killing one. This role is perfect for the heavy assault class, so I think that heavy assault should be more focused on guns like these. The MCG could easily be altered to have a slower fire rate and less damage, and instead focus on splash damage like the lasher, but for the jackhammer the change would be harder. I suggest making it into an automatic gun that has a much larger clip and fires miniature frag grenades, sending shards in an explosive fashion and accomplishing the same splash damage effect as the other guns. By changing the guns to fit this role, they also keep their faction specific traits of TR having fast-firing, low damage capabilities, the VS having medium fire-rate, medium damage, and high-accuracy capability, and the NC being slow-firing and high damage.

2: Damage soaker

Rather than having an overshield, the heavy assault class should have a riot shield like the NC Maxes, only wide enough for allies to make use of as well as heavy assault. This shield would be capable of taking 2,000 damage (or two people's worth) and would regenerate 100 health per second. Alternatively, the heavies could have deployable, faction specific fields. The VS would have a field allowing players to cloak as with cloaking sunderers, and would show the same "cloaked" effect as the sunderers so you know it's there, just not where its inhabitants are. The NC would have a field that lets players have a resistance to 20% damage, and the TR would have a field letting inhabitants deal 10-20% more damage (not dependent on rank I simply haven't decided.) These fields wouldn't stack like medic shield regen fields do, because that would be unfair to Vanu. Additionally, all three options could be offered to all three factions. This decision is between opening new playstyles to more players or preserving faction diversity, and I believe improving the experiences of more people is better, so I think that these three shields should be available to all factions.

3: "Explosives Expert"

Heavy Assault already has the rocket launchers. The class has access to C4, AV grenades, regular grenades, and concussion grenades as well. Letting this class serve as an explosives expert would mean it would be a very effective class in larger battles and play a more helpful role in supporting other players. New grenade types could be given to the heavy assault, such as fun toys that delivers toxic gas creating an experience akin to a pain field that (SLIGHTLY, this should NOT be given more power than other grenades) hurts both enemies and friendlies, and the purpose this would serve would be that it aids in clearing rooms and gets heavies lots of small assists, and also serves as a smoke grenade. Also, the heavy could be given access to a rocket launcher alternative that is instead an NS grenade launcher, that would have a fire-rate and velocity like the bulldog only with obviously far less damage and a less sizable projectile


So in total, the heavy assault would look like this

Primary: Same as usual, MCG and Jackhammer are edited to suppress. May want to move Heavy Guns to be a launcher alt.
Secondary: Same as usual
Third Weapon Slot: Either launcher or NS Grenade launcher. Possibly Heavy Guns as well.
Ability: Deployable shield (One of 3 serving as the fourth weapon slot) as above or riot shield
Grenades: Access to Frag, AV, Conc, and Gas. (Possibly also sticky and flash grenades)
Utility: C4, Tank mines or proxy mines (But no access to utility pouch, keep that with engi), medkits, or resto kits.

If this change were to happen, I believe Planetside 2's largest issue would be solved.

Nerfing the heavy assault is an indirect nerf to Vanu.

And you felt this didn't belong in one of the other two thousand thread about HAs being OP?

hes pointing out the OP is in its Versatility not its shield which is only like 200 of the million other heavy OP threads.

Well it is the in the title

yeah i noticed a half second after postin thats why i changed up my response a bit

I wanted to make my own thread because I have my own suggestion for how to fix the Heavy Assault class in a way that will improve gameplay. I think the other two thousand threads are a good thing to bring up, though, because they illustrate how well-recognized this is as an issue that needs to be addressed. Hopefully the way I've laid out to address this is helpful in spurring developers' ideas.

I think changing up the skills and abilities they have so late in Planetside's lifespan, would destroy what seems, a lot of people enjoy about the game. The pop could drop faster then it already has been of those suggestions are met. Although i like your ideas personally, I feel like others will as always, deny them.

I don't really even care for heavies anymore, I can't take the class seriously. I only play it when there aren't any good Platoons going, it's the kill/destroy class, I guess. Which is what it was meant to be.

From my experience, playing the heavy.

Heavy v Heavy = Stoppage.

I've rarely been killed by anything other than another heavy or a full bared Max. (Or one of those cloakers >_>)

Maybe that's the silly solution? Fight heavies with heavies?

Maybe if they made the change as a part of a re-release it could increase pop. They could revamp some other mechanics like with the new victory points system and re-release with a game that feels very much different and very much better than the current PlanetSide 2.


Exactly, the "fight heavies with heavies" is what makes it such a large problem. Being forced to play heavy or die leads to 95% of infantry playstyles being inaccessible to those who don't want to be put at a disadvantage. It really is the downfall of this game.

I suggest this changes:
The heavies drawbacks (long reload) needs to be even longer and the pistol should be removed.

The heavy suited this way is still capable of attacking with the same force, but needs to think more about not overstreching his abilities...

Oh hey - an HA OP thread. 'Bout time we had another one for the collection (I main engineer by the way so I'm not being partisan)

So HA is verstile at killing things..........that's their job.
Engineers are explosives, resupply and repair experts..........that's their job.
Infiltrators are sniping and ambush experts...............thats their job
Medics are a bit more difficult to describe. Theoretically their job is healing and resurection but in effect they are mostly commandos with a powerful primary weapon plus the ability to heal/rez............ that (by custom and practice) is their job
LA sow confusion by getting into all sorts of inconvenient places and usually blowing up whoever or whatever is there. Again.................that (by custom and practice) is their job.
Max is a tanking (high health) suppression, breaching and point-holding weapon.....that's their job

So we all got jobs that don't overlap much (except maybe HA and Max a bit in terms of being killing machines).

I wouldn't disagree with the OP on one point though - HA (and Engie) are to me at least, the most fun classes to play as they can find something interesting to do regardless of what kind of fight they find themselves in. I think we would be better off finding more versatile, intersting things for the other classes to do, starting with the Medic (I've posted about this in the Class Discussion forum).

Heavies take a few extra bullets, light up and move slowly.

How is that op?

http://ps4eu.ps2.fisu.pw/player/?name=terranaxiom&show=statistics

there's my stats so you know i don't main heavy. I barely played HA on pc either.

I think all you guys who cry about the heavy are just 1v1mebro types who get owned by them.....which is a l2p issue.

We need to nerf the medic as it heals better than any other class..................

Imho the only change I would make is with lmgs: many of them are simply performing too well for a class that already has shield, rocket launchers and medikits.

I have no problem defeating heavies as a medic 1v1 already... Medic requires better aim but rewards it better as well with better weapons. The only time you should be losing to a heavy as a medic is if you let the fight happen at less than 10 meters, you are caught completely off guard, you are one of those awful med tool primary medics or you just don't have the aim required to play the 'combat' part of the class effectively. Aside from very close combat the only thing a heavy has over a medic is the ability to handle 2v1's and higher much more effectively. 1v1's however are much closer than most of the 'medic up' crybabies realize.

Medic is the best 1v1 class i reckon.

Press F/L1 to win with some strafing.

Just use a shotgun..heavies are no issue than.

Inb4 jackhammer

One class was designed to be the front line infantry combat specialist. This class is designed to combat other infantry head to head, and has tools to engage tanks at range, or up close. This is the Heavy Assault.

Two classes are designed to provide infantry support on the battlefield, via Ammo and Healing, support fire, and occasionally anti vehicle work. These are Medic and Engineer. Additionally, Engineers repair MAXes and vehicles, making them of especially high value for any infantry unit.

Two classes are designed to circumvent the standard flow of combat, either by sneaking through and engaging up close / attacking from unanticipated places (SMG infiltrator or LA), or by removing high value targets from afar (Sniper infiltrator.)

These are the classes, and it looks like a pretty fair division of labor to me. ONE class is designed to be a front line combatant, and I see absolutely no problem with this. Heavy Assaults are designed to be the most frequently encountered class - out of all classes, this is what you want your front lines filled with. LA's / Infiltrators flank, Medics and Engineers support from just behind the front lines, or from vehicles.

That said, new classes are potentially coming next year, they are on Daybreak's to-do list for early 2016, as was discussed in the recent reddit Q&A a few weeks ago. They didn't name specifics, but this may be one of the reasons they are holding off on LMG balance. That, and there's a new ES LMG coming for all factions once they are done 'hooking it up' within their system.