Shield is worthless. Full stop. Enemies can walk through it enough to hit you and the best that can be said about it is that it acts as a portable corner for you to reload behind. You know else does? Corners, they're all over the place, and I don't have to give up my charge to use them. Seriously, I've died in a lot of situations because I didn't have charge and I haven't been in a single one where I said, "oh boy good thing I had my shield there!" Max out your charge, ignore the rest. I use the shield on my slug mattock max because I use it at midrange and even THERE where being able to reload in the open is a boon, it's worse to have than charge. Up close? In brawling combat where our guns aren't **** at? Worthless.
Okay... Okay, okay, okay, OKAY.... Enough bad mouthing my sexy, sexy shield damnit! As a guy that only has it at rank 1 and has been able to play with it for maybe.... four or five hours now due to work. Here's what I've discovered about this sexy shield! Yes.. SEXY shield! Cause that's what it is! 1) YOU CAN RELOAD WITH IT.... Just not WHILE the shield is up! You can start your reload cycle and THEN turn the shield on! I got in a fight with a couple TR Max's earlier doing this. I lost of course since the odds were against me. But because I shielded myself while reloading my guns, I was able to at the LAST make an annoyance of myself before going down. 2) SPARTANS!!! PUT UP YOUR SHIELDS!!!! Err.. *cough* sorry. Flashback to a Biolab defense. Point being though. WE CAN MAKE SHIELD WALLS NOW PEOPLE... Pick a corridor, pair up with one or two other Max's with this shield, and just blockade the area! Most people won't mess with you since they don't want to waste the bullets, and your allies can use that as a buffer zone to poke their heads out and take pot shots at what ever enemy is advancing. Was doing this with people damn near every time I was playing. 3) IT CAN BLOCK ALMOST ANYTHING!!! That's right. YOu heard me! Rank... 1... shield... And I can block damn near anything thrown at me with it! Bullets, grenades, rockets, C4 blasts. Anything short of a vehicle ramming into me, or an infantry managing to wedge their gun into the space the shield doesn't protect, I can block! AND SO CAN YOU.... So stop saying you can't. 9 out of 10 Free Radicals agree that this is factual. Now admittedly, a C4 blast has to be IN FRONT of you for the shield to block it. There have been plenty of moments where I wasn't looking, someone tossed some C4 right under me, and set it off. Shield won't block the C4 if it's directly under you. But at the front of you.... it'll block that. Rockets? At rank 1 I can block at least 1 rocket before the shield goes down. Second rocket will drop the shield. So... In conclusion.... Shield... It doesn't suck. DOES. NOT. Y'all just ain't usin' it right! Especially that guy that claimed he went though 25 Max's figuring the shield out. YOU SHOULD KNOW ALL OF THIS IF YOU WENT THAT LONG WITH THE SHIELD. So... Quit whining. Be thankful the shield wasn't as horrid of a thing as I personally suspected it would be at first, and figure out how to use it RIGHT.
I appreciate your enthusiasm in trying to find a way to make the shield genuinely useful, but in none of those scenarios would you not be better off having charge. We'd be better served if those MAXes were mowing people down instead of creating some easily avoided line. Sure, it's fun, but we didn't even get the most effective MAX ability that kills your mobility. The shield would be fantastic if we had guns that worked well at range, so we could make use of the one single useful thing it presents us (portable cover while reloading) while we're slowly trudging our way to the enemies. Up close, circumventing the shield is but a quarter second of walking that they can safely engage in because we cannot do anything. You know what else is a good defense against C4? Being able to back up faster than a LA can jetpack forward. Ask any observant VS MAX if they've been C4'd lately.
About the legendary shield walls of old: I cant think of one instance where they were not accompanied by spears or swords for stabbing. Now, I am certing the shield and giving it a good try, because I like new toys. But I find it funny that after all the complaining about the NC MAX and their skeet shooting in biolabs, we get a faction ability that basically says "Stay indoors. And bring shotguns"
The shield is amazing when used correctly. It is very much a team based ability. Get yourself an engineer to follow behind you and you become invincible, get a 2nd max to cover you flank and you can push on entrenched enemies and root them out. Today we pushed the VS out of a control point using my MAX to soak up frontal damage while my squad mate used his shield to cover my flank which allowed a large number of NC infantry to run out of the teleport room without being mowed down. What's even better is, engineers at turrets. You can just walk right up to them and kill them without worrying.
I have a Rank 5 shield - I plan to use it mainly for AV work where I might be in a field with little cover. Have had holes torn through me from Vortex and Lancer between bases and turrets at Tech and Amp stations. Charge is largely useless in those situations but I can see how a shield does have an application there. Tested it briefly yesterday. Had 2 infantry shooting in front of me and damage was bleeding through. Watched a video around here somewhere that also saw the same phenomenon. If you're going to give me a shield, and I spend ~2000 certs getting it up to par, I don't want it to have holes in it and not provide sufficient cover from enemy directly in front of me with small arms.
Turrets will kill you with splash, Vortex and Lancer wont do much but force you to walk at a snail's pace to wherever you were going because as soon as you drop that shield you will die. Also, if they're dedicated enough they can just take your shield down and kill you, but that's not the most likely scenario.
Even people who love the shield and make posts full of caps lock can barely find a use for it. I've already been able to reload while not getting shot forever. It's called standing behind a wall. If you actually have a situation where you need this, then you're probably in an open field, which was a stupid decision in the first place. And putting up a giant glowing blue sign that tells the enemy "I have no escape from this spot" is even stupider. So what? How does this help anyone? You standing in a doorway getting shot in the face while not killing enemies and waiting to get c4ed is not a practical application of the shield. You're not accomplishing anything. If this were a useful tactic then engineers would have been blocking doors with turrets since release. In fact, that's even better because turrets don't put an expensive max suit at risk, they can be shot over easily, and they actually have collision. No it can't. It can't block anything to the side or back, it leaks damage, and it can break. In other words, it blocks some things, sometimes. And all you have to trade is 70% of your mobility and 100% of your damage. In conclusion it does suck. It is gimmicky and worthless and has very little if any practical application.
As it breaks reload animation, SOE will patch this soon. I think it should be imune to light arms, like engeneer's turret shield.
Reloading before shielding is the only saving grace of this ability. It's a major grace, and useful for that one aspect. If that is removed, then the shield itself needs a major overhaul.
OH!!! Oh oh oh oh! We're doing THIS again? Okay! No... Actually I wasn't out in the open, I was on some stairs trying to keep them from getting at some guys that were behind me. Really now, you honestly believed I'd throw myself out in the open with a Max? ........actually don't answer that. Point being, this is a situation where I was keeping someone distracted cause... yanno... tanking. Hmmmmmmmmm...... an interesting and valid point if this didn't make me think you never actually read everything I'd posted before. So did you? DID YOU??? No? Didn't think so. But I'm a nice guy, (or so I've been told) so I'll explain this to you again anyway. First of all. Now, are you paying attention or should I use some more caps to make sure? Okay! First of all, I'd already stated that when you got that blockade up in an area, it already deters people from wanting to move past you since the first thing they see if a Max or two with some shields up waiting for you to make a mistake. They don't know when or if those shields will come down and they start getting pumped full of cannon fire, or even if someone hiding behind the Max's will jump out and kill them while they're distracted by the "big blue sign" as you put it. This especially works when your blockading a spawn point, which is something that's been used quite a few times already by us NC. "Okay! We're spawned and ready to fi..... NC Max's? ****, they're in the way." As for the C4. It's simple enough to guess when someone is going to get smart and try to do that, all you have to do then is BACK. UP. The shield DOES block most of the blast. Or... Perish the thought.... Since most people don't want to try running at the Max's that are in a room with some C4 they dropped, you can just SHOOT the thing from a safe distance after and then retake your position! As for the turrets... Maybe you hadn't noticed before cocheese, but those things are at best, a weak form of cover that can be circumvented by someone with a steady enough hand and a Decimator. Or a LA.... Or just a really triggerhappy Max. Or even someone that found a flanking route. People aren't as inclined to do these things with a Max that basicly has a WALL they can put up when ever they want. Oh good job! You figured out things about the shield everyone ALREADY KNEW. The thing has chinks in it yes. They get you from the right angle, the shots aren't going to hit the shield, but hey! Guess what! That's just a simple matter of turning more in the direction of the guy that's getting through and then do you know what happens? Something magical happens.... Suddenly.... YOU STOP TAKING DAMAGE!!! And really, the sides and back? You serious? Your going to point out the obvious? And when I find that I can block rockets, C4, and grenades along with simple bullets. Uh... Yes... I CAN block almost anything, and I'm looking forward to finding out what else I can block with it. SO.... Do us favor. Actually put some effort in trying to use this thing. You, and everyone that spoke before you. Seriously. Your all making us look bad.
I... genuinely think/hope that was just something they decided to leave alone. The shield WILL loose alot of it's combat ability if they remove that. And... immune to smallarms......... interesting thought, but then again if they did that people would have a genuine reason to ***** that it is OP at that point. Turret shield is only immune to gun fire because it can't cover you as well as the new shield does.
honestly i was one of the people calling for "stop QQing!" but after 5 hours of play i've realized that the shield hardly absorbs any front damage, the rest hits you as normal, this needs fixing as i'm sure its a bug, iv'e thrown up the shield dozens of times and its only blocked maybe 2 of 10 shots of damage resistance, i really hope this is a bug, if not then i've wasted my certs!
I've killed a few NC MAXes with my mutilators today. I could keep shooting until their shield got depleted and i still had many bullets left. If they had charge they could get close faster and i'd be in trouble.
With the "half-way" this works now, better to prepare for worst. This seriously dont look like intended mechanics.
Thankfully, once is not forced to go into biolabs or towers. So you're right, I agree, let's roll back the nerf to scattercannons and in fact make them MORE powerful than before, because you're not forced to run into them. If you didn't want to run into them you could just only fight out in the open or stick to vehicles! Because simply NOT certing it will restore the 30% boost to bursters and upcoming NS gear that only the NC are missing out on. Amazing. Why hadn't I thought of it.
the shield is pretty bad *** but it will take a bit for people to really learn to use it effectively like all the abilities it has a learning curve the bash and reload while its up are defo needed improvements
