THE COLD WARThis immersion idea will have everyone extremely paranoid and looking over their shoulder if the infiltrators actually infiltrated enemy ranks . For even deeper immersion infiltrators should be given a new device which allows them to take on the default uniform of any enemy faction (possibly any other class) for a limited time (unless upgraded like the hunter cloak). The infiltrator still should be able to cloak and do everything else normally while disguised and the enemy faction sees them as friendly . They should only be able to be detected if lit by that special flashlight or shot which should reveal their true form for an instance. To raise the stakes a bit the faction that they actually belong to should not be able to tell the difference which means the spy would have to be in contact with their squad (team speak, chat etc.) in order to avoid being shelled . For an added bonus they should reduce some kind of perk (like reduce enemy accuracy) if they are within a certain radius of the enemy.
We already have spies. And we don't need more friendly-fire excuses. Let alone on NC. As well, making it a requirement to be revealed only by Darklights, or friendly-fire just ensures friendly infils can't use their cloaks near allies, and Friendly-fire will be for every encounter of allies.
I can see this sort of discussion happening all the time in-game : StealthyMcStealth : What?! How did you know I wasn't NC?! NC player : Wait you weren't NC? Or StealthyMcStealth : Oh so I'm ded- YOU STUPID POS TEAMMATE WHY YOU TK ME ALL TEH TIME! Teammate : lol ur on the enemy team. 4th faction much? Now, to kind of balance it off : you don't start with cloak and firing a weapon makes it impossible to activate for 5 seconds, and you can only take shape of one class, so if let's say you copy someone's look, you look exactly like him and sound like him. Maybe even after one or a few kills the disguise becomes bloody or bugged so you have to re-equip it at a terminal It's pretty hard to balance around an ability that makes you literally indistinguishable and even make your prey feel secure. Cool idea, but a pain to balance. But what would be baller is an undercover saboteur, much less about killing and instead sabotaging vehicles, hacking vehicles, entering spawns to temporarily increase respawn time for 20 seconds (cooldown of 2 mins) the ability to bypass any faction barrier and maybe even massively increase hacking time of things he hacks so back-hacking exposes you for much longer.
It is true that this idea is nothing more than a cosmetic alteration for immersion purposes but the fact that you would be able to physically pose as one of your enemies may open up new immersion potential.
Also this cosmetic alteration probably would not hurt performance (that much ) because the player is simply switching into one of the default characters.
Have you ever played NC? If it's not fourth-factioneers team-killing, it's mistaken ID, or simply careless fire with the RNG shotguns. As well, quite literally posing as an Enemy, makes it even worse for new players; Quite literally they could be firing at allies panicked, or shot dead to reduce the risk. Which in off itself also means any standard-model using Character is 50% more likely to be TK'd just to ensure they aren't a spy. Let alone at long range, where IFF isn't always there.
