Heya everyone! So this will be a bit of a long post. As previously mentioned in my post about RPGs, I have been taking a gander around the NSO arsenal and noticed some missing spots. With this post I want to address the lack of a unique heavy gun. In my mind the NSO were meant to be a supportive faction, see the Chimera ride along feature or defector seraph shield. With that being said, given that heavy guns are meant to engage group of enemies, how can we marry the two concepts? One solution already existing as NS weapon is the Thumper. Basically AOE damage that can be augmented with various support versions and is also reflected in the Defector. Now it is unfortunately available to all factions and honestly at this point is considered a meme weapon given it's power had to be severely limited in terms of AOE and Damage to not completely let it steamroll CQC standoffs. Which is totally fine and reasonable in my opinion. As such let's get back to the drawing board. While locking at the various unique systems available to NSO, two features stand out: the self lock-on from siren/nest and seraph shield. I don't think I need into detail why a auto aim infantry weapon is a horrible idea, so let's skip straight to the next one. Presenting the Aegis hard light gauntlet. A heavy gun with a 6 shot Magazine. It fires high velocity hard light bolts similar to the heavy cross bow but with a very short projectile lifetime of just 30-50 meters. Damage wise it would also not be great and fall somewhere in the area of a light crossbow.It can only hip fire as ADS activates is primary function: projecting hard light barrier in front of the NSO, which moves with it. Think the aegis shield of the NC Max. The barrier consumes ammo over time (1-2 per second) during which it either absorbs all bullets or applies damage to the heavy but at a much reduced rate. Really needs to be figured out during testing.The weapon imposes a hard movement penalty while active and is terribly unwieldy making rapid change between covering against aerial, flaking and frontal assaults very inefficient.It also features a long reload of 3-4.5 seconds giving the shield only a very short uptime of 3-6 seconds and an almost as long if not longer downtime. Now let's talk background. Heavies are the point breakers and point holders. They charge to overwhelm enemies with obscene health and firepower. But as we all know, doorways and stairs can be a double edged sword be it for defenders and attackers alike. Pushing through such a chokehold can be an absolute chore even with max units, while once broken through defenders often don't have the space to regroup safely and prepare a pushout. Now introduce the Aegis, or rather a small well coordinated group equipped with 2-3 aegis heavies. On one hand they can break through a chokehold by providing cover for their team, while on the other side they can also create a mobile cover for their team to retreat behind and regroup.This makes them into a prime support for their team. Due to limited uptime and high skill ceiling, they also fit into the NSO reputation of being a high skill ceiling faction. And it means heavies are encouraged to use the rest of their arsenal and only deploy their aegis for key pushes. Finally they are purely focused on being a tool for dealing with large infantry groups, which is the point of heavy guns. Overall this is how I would fill the heavy gun slot for NSO. Not with another variant of an LMG or burst rifle, but a more defensive tool to carry their team. To see that it could work, just take a gander at the seraphim shield with a well coordinated team of engineers and heavies bubbling up next to the defector and keeping everything at bay. And now think having to coordinate multiple people to maintain the shield.
