[Suggestion] No diversity for C4 Fairies - A solution.

Yes, there's a tl;dr at the end. But please, please bear with me and think of constructive criticism, and/or dring your dev friend to read this.

Light Assault: ES grenade pistol secondary

From looking at Forumside, it would seem that the Light Assault, also known as the c4 fairy, is a one-shot pony - the most common tactic for which the class is utilized seems to be the rapid delivery of explosive pizza to a vehicle, mainly from above. And the jet pack is the ideal method of hastening the delivery, lest the pizza arrive cold to the disgruntled customer.

Many people seem to argue that despite the often tremendous impact this tactic has on the flow of a battle, the fact that it is "the only significant use" of the class leads players to dismay over how the class is "limited in its primary function", which is "flanking".
I propose adding a new weapon type, which would be entirely unique to the Light Assault class, and could aid players interested in performing "flanking" maneuvers - and I think, in a way which does not render other weapons, classes etc. underpowered in comparison, except in the one function of: quickly getting into it behind enemy lines, causing all sorts of discord and chaos, and hopefully getting out alive (and with a long line of kills to their name).

Let's cut to the chase.
I propose to give the player a choice to replace their sidearm with a different weapon - the Grenade Pistol.
This pistol functions similar to an under-barrel grenade launcher, in that it throws little balls of pain at the enemy.
The pistol carries in it's loading mechanism a small amount of special grenades (more on those further), around 3-5, and the player can carry a not-very-insignificant amount of extra grenades on their person (ammo capacity subject to upgrades), starting at around 15.
The pistol would fire the grenades in a short-distance medium-curve arc, shorter and slightly flatter than a UBGL.
Let's talk about the grenades, though.
Having 15 frag grenades is akin to being a god among men. Let's not even think about 15 sticky grenades.
Thus the pistol grenades need to be balanced against the arms they would be arrayed against. The 15 grenades carried need to have a killing potential similar to an equivalent non-grenade pistol.

Every grenade pistol has access to the 'basic' grenade:
NS "standard" Pistol-Armed Infantry Nullifier (NS-PAIN)
So let's take a nerfed grenade. One that takes two body-shots to kill a single infantryman (or almost kill a shielded HA). But these are grenades. Thus, splash damage. The smaller size means less ordnance, so the splash should be roughly half the size of a standard grenade.
This would allow a skilled LA player to clear out a small force of unsuspecting enemies.

Now, we also want faction diversity. So let's think about empire-specific ammo, which a player of the matching faction can choose to use instead of the NS ammo:
NC - Scatterbombs.
These grenades are slightly heavier than their standard counterpart, but have a two-stage mechanism: the primary explosion is slightly weaker than standard, but the spread of the damage is larger, allowing to damage more targets at a time. The splash damage is also weaker than normal, but the cutoff is longer, so the damage is more uniform across the increased splash radius.

TR - Lightweight Shaped-Charge.
The TR grenades are lighter, so they can be fired more quickly - but the explosive charge is shaped for maximum penetration of light armor, shredding the soft flesh behind it.
The primary explosion damage is slightly stronger than standard, but the spread is much tighter, requiring more bullets to clear a room if it isn't absolutely packed. So the ammo is smaller and fires faster, letting the clip hold 1.5 times the ammo, which empties at the same speed a standard 'magazine' would.

VS - Phasic Antimatter Slug.
The VS scientists have finally come up with a good use of antimatter - throw it at the enemy, and hope you're far enough.
These grenades take a longer time to arm, and fly slower than a person sprints, but the gravitonic antimatter containment device negates gravity, effectively allowing the grenade to fly in a straight line until the containment fails. This means that the grenade has no drop, but can't travel as far - the battery on the containment device only lasts for one second.
Upon containment breach, the antimatter is discharged in all directions, causing a uniform explosion. The damage is uniform all over the spread radius, but there is no 'center' where damage is highest.
Also, the splash radius is a little bit smaller.
This means that instead of killing a single player in two hits, it would take three to reliably kill a player - but the damage will also be the same to anyone too close to the target - so three, four sitting ducks could potentially die at the same time if they remain within the radius for the duration of all three shots.
Additionally, the explosion when the grenade 'timeouts' if it did not hit anything is only half as strong as if it did. Furthermore, the high-tech ammunition is expensive and large, so the pistol can hold less in the magazine as well as less ammo total.


Other ideas towards this gun:
Sticky 'nades
Bouncy 'nades
Ye Olde Standard Smoke 'nades
And no, no AV nades. The grenades as I described them are perfectly viable as MAX-crushers, and you already have your Chilli-Cheese-Cluster-Crushers (C4) for AV work.

Tl;dr:
Grenade pistol to diversify LA roles, with ES variants.
NS - weak grenades.
NC - bigger splash grenades.
TR - Less splash, stronger grenades.
VS - No-Bulletdrop splash-only grenades.
Summary: more gun, more fun!
MOAR DAKKA PLZ

This would likely be too powerful if it replace the main weapon, never mind the pistol.

Im in favor of this idea. I like the idea that LA have more variety in their role other than pizza deliveries or maybe getting a lucky shot or two from the rooftops. I kind of invision a similar gun to the classic "China Lake" launcher. LA need something to make them other than grim reaper of vechs ^-^

Well put together.

I is LA.

I is already kill enemy. I don't need more kill more enemy.

I is need help team get objective.

No, seriously. As a long time Light Assault player, people always seem to think of guns or buffs when someone says LA need new stuff. Light Assaults already carry a good dose of killing potential, just as everyone else.

What LA truly needs is team synergy. And also, a way of getting a few extra certs.
After finally letting go a bit of LA in the last few months and getting to play more engie/infil, I was shown how much having a single performable action available (as in "flank enemies") is an obstacle to getting to a good SPM.
I mean, don't get me wrong, I'm not saying getting a ton of certs or score is the goal here, but that after I switched my main role, the growth in spm showed me how much more valuable I am for the team.

Everyone can do something for the team:
Medics heal and revive
Engies repair and restock
Infils give enemy location
HAs can keep their teammates safe by destroying or heavily damaging vehicles
(LA and Engie are also good at destroying vehicles, but HAs are the only ones who can do it consistently on the field, because they can replenish rockets from ammo packs)
MAXes are ugly. (JK, just technically not a class, more of a vehicle, in my opinion)

So, everyone can kill enemies AND do something else, consistently.
LAs can kill enemies. And destroy vehicles, but that's usually a one time trick. Then they're left scattered away from their team,
with not little, but less to contribute, compared to everyone else. Then they get killed eventually. Rinse and repeat.

So maybe that grenade laucher could help destroying vehicles, instead of damaging players?
Maybe it could slow vehicles down, helping other players take the vehicle down, while doing minor damage.
Or it could overheat the engine after a set period time (30s?), making the vehicle stop, then cooldown if it survives and work again
Then LA would truly be a variation of HA, like the name suggests.

Or maybe LA could have a tool that does something else for the team. (I have other ideas, but I'll leave them to my own thread, I've rambled enough).

TL;DR: LA needs a tool or something to help with team synergy, not new ways to kill people.

Edit: hey, we're name bros ,op!

Maybe other things to do would discourage LA's from being full-time C4 fairies. Probably not, but a man can dream...

i vote utility pouch for LA. 2 ranks, 500/1000 certs which raises the number of c-4 you can carry by 1 each time.

Then we're a 2 trick pony because our vehicular slaughter potential is doubled.

The horror...

first reaction

otherwise agree

Edit: Lame. **** you youtube for disabling other website playback

here

Pizza? You mean a block of cheese.

Hiya MuchachoBob! Namebros, indeed.
Anyway, you did just give me an idea. Hear this one out.

Everybody loves vehicles. Especially when they're exploding as you slowly walk away, not looking back.
But vehicular denial is only really easy to achieve by pizza delivery, and even that only once.
I propose a new method of pushing a team forward in spite of the presence of enemy armor:
The Disruptor Grenade.
This is a grenade fired from the LA grenade pistol, which functions similar to the anti-infantry EMP grenade - it causes minor damage, and major complications to a vehicles systems, disabling the HUD and lowering ROF for a short time on a vehicle - but careful, as it has virtually no effect on infantry, besides a mild sting and some loud noise.
These come in very limited supply - only 7 grenades, and the LA has to forgo their sidearm, in order to equip the grenade launcher.

Thoughts?

Well I see where you're going to with this idea, and I understand your motives, but I have to side with Muchachobob: LA are already much more than simple C4 fairies, the only problem is that for pilots, they're one of the few threats that have no real counter apart from being omniscient. I do play a lot of LA, in every faction, and it is really my favorite class, because of its killing potential. This said, LA are mostly loners right now, so what they need is something more "teamplay" oriented to grab the interest of more players. The best thing you can do for your team as a LA right now is planting spawn beacons, and that's it.

Maybe LA should have their own spawn beacon cert line, why not? But killing potential is enough for the moment. (It doesn't mean your idea was bad, only that it would be too much)

Thinking of non-weapon utilities for classes gave me a slightly insane, but possibly fun idea.
Maybe giving LA another weapon is not the right choice. Giving them a unique utility that relies on their mobility, but in a team-oriented manner? That's a whole different keg of beer.
Let's think. LA are very mobile. More so than any other class, outside of a vehicle. And no, giving LA a unique vehicle is not what I'm getting at.
I'm thinking - LA can get to where no other infantry can. How does that help the team, besides drawing the enemies attention away?
Here's how: let's give the LA the ability to boost others' mobility.
There are a few ways to do this.
The simplest would be to give them a deployable sphere thing, that generates a Haste field. Anyone within the field has their movement speed increased.
That's interesting, but ultimately not THAT useful.
Okay, maybe a low-grav field... Sounds awesome, but probably a nightmare to code and create and balance, and it could make a large battlefield absolutely nuts. Imagine a 96+ battle with lots of lo-grav bubbles. Yeah. CHAOS.
No, let's keep it a bit simpler.
Let's give the LA the ability to plant rappelling lines/rope ladders.
This way, a LA gets up somewhere high, such as a wall. There, they plant their line, which goes back down to the ground, allowing their team to follow them up the ladder, or get down safely. The line expires, of course, within a reasonable amount of time - but now, the LA helped create a whole new breaching point into a heavily-entrenched position. "Make my own road". This utility-slot, or class-tool (like the medic tool, or repair tool) has a very slow recharge, but used correctly can have a dramatic impact on the flow of a battle...
Of course, enemies can also use the line, and any nearby explosion burns it away...

A different idea would be to allow the LA to grab a friendly (or enemy?), and boost them both up by overcharging the jetpack - at the cost of waiting 3x the time it takes for a full recharge to be able to use the jetpack again.
So you need to quickly send a medic into a hotspot? Grab the guy, get there, and now you have dramatically increased the effective life of a squad.
Or this could be used as C4 fairy countermeasures- grab an engie, boost them up to the sunderer that is burning. Boost an infiltrator to the enemy turrets.
Or grab an enemy, fly off a tower and let go - sending them to their deaths.
Maybe, even, by completely destroying the jetpack until resupply/respawn, carry a MAX unit a short distance to a hard-to-reach location...

I think that on one hand, the rappelling/grappling hook could be a great, and easy to implement addition to an LA's teamplay, creating a whole new level of squad tactics/strategy, and making battles a lot more interesting.
On the other hand, the jetpack boost, while probably harder to implement, especially considering the problem of cooperation, probably has more tactical utility, and is just damn cool

Expanding on the rappelling line, maybe also have a zip line - the LA places two nodes that are attached, and people could travel along the line rather quickly (but unable to shoot while zip lining...)

What do you guys think?

They're interesting ideas but I feel they actually destroy the LA's only advantage in combat. When these go in you're going to see every class up on the rooftops, including packs of HAs being revived by medics or even (God forbid) MAXs. At that point what use is the LA except to be a mule for other classes to get up there and fight them?

Essentially it takes the one thing that makes LA unique and gives it to everyone.

I dunno, LA is a really hard class to make work in a team because it was designed not to work as part of the team. By definition it operates where the rest of the team can't, that's what makes it fun.

Really my biggest complaint is that it can't be revived like the rest of the squad can. Which means every time I die I need to respawn somewhere and run back to where my squad is fighting, often getting caught up in something else along the way. I don't think it needs any fancy gadgets to help the team, it just needs some way of staying nearby.

That's why I'd like to see a new tool for the medic instead: a portable respawn unit. The medic deploys it and then everyone who wants to use it has to bind to it first by interacting with it. After that it shows up on your respawn screen when you die. It's destructible like the shield regen field and you can balance the spawning through timers or nanite costs or a limited number of spawns or whatever.

Very useful for LAs since they can bind themselves to this spawn unit and then go out and do their thing. When they die they respawn back into the heart of the squad, assuming the squad has managed to hold their position in the mean time. Useful for infiltrators too. Other classes are staying with the medics anyway.

Crossbow with explosive darts.

Yeah, I think something like that is what we need.

Rather add the function that you can throw your C4 instead of just drop it.

With fire modes for example.

I agree that LA needs something but we don't really need killing power (except maybe Battle Rifles, I would like battle rifles)

Muchachobob has it right that we need some team utiltiy which everyone else brings (except heavy who just brings lots of killing power)

Heres my suggestion:

~~Deployable Teleporters~~
First placement puts down the entrance. Second the exit. (there should be a notification of which one you are currently placing)
Teleporter is one way (no using it to instantly flee)
Teleporters have major limitations on where they can be placed (more so than turrets)
They are fairly fragile, being taken out fairly quickly (like a spitfire)
Entrances can be placed inside of a spawnroom (hopefully reducing spawncamping)
EXP is awarded for each use, and ribbons for a lot of uses.
Range is limited to X meters, the further from the entrance the exit is the longer the cooldown for the next person to use it is.
(Example: Within 100 meters all teleports are instant. 100-200 meters and theres a 5 second cooldown, 200-300 and its 10 seconds, 300-400 and its 15 seconds, 400-500 and its 20 seconds between teleports)
Upgrading it increases the range between entrance and exit (max 500 meters?) and lowers the cooldown between uses.

Basically take the TF2 teleporter and give it to the LA, which excels at getting to important and hard to reach locations.


Alternatively increase our standard speed by a bit and put our C4 in our tool slot opening up our utility slot for medkits and allowing LA to be our true lone-wolf selves.

That is easy to say but it is not really a class specific role as any class can use that. I feel LA need something to give them more of a team role.

Heavy Assaults = Firepower/AV
Engineer = Repair/Resupply
Medic = Heals/Revives
Infiltrator = Support/Scout
Light Assault = Can reach higher ground (thats really it) C4 Deliveries are usually a one of thing so giving them more supressive powers such as the grenade pistol would then give them a role of making a path difficult to traverse for the enemy.

You silly bugger! You posted my idea! hehe
I was gonna post a thread with that one. (I actualy typed the text for that about a year ago).

It only makes sense , LA's trait is mobility, the class should help the team become more mobile. And the teleporter is the best way to it. My only recomendation is that the max distance between exits should around 300 meters.

LA is not just a C4 delivery system. Many LA actually flank and kill infantry using JJs to get around.

Yes, they're purely a killing stuff class ... but so is the heavy assault. Maybe the "assault" bit in both the class names has something to do with that.

Also I see more and more LA's doing the medkit dance lately rather than carrying C4. Which seems wrong but then again, I consider how I often I actually use C4 and I could see the appeal in that. I just like being able to destroy the odd MAX or overextended vehicle too much to go medkit + battle hardened rather than regen + C4.