First off, the new water shader looks amazing. Props to the graphics team, they did a great job! That said, I feel like the underwater fog is a liiiittle too thick. The water darkens too quickly, so you can't see a whole lot of what's underwater from the surface (or even when you're underwater). Granted this is just based on how it looks on Indar, if it's shallower in Oshur, it probably won't be an issue. With regard to water mechanics: The buoyancy physics on vehicles feel really good, they're very immersive. Underwater movement on foot feels appropriately sluggish, but it needs some work. Infantry should fall slower underwater.. Because of that thing called buoyancy. It should apply at least a little bit to infantry. Infantry shouldn't take fall damage underwater. It just doesn't make sense. Infantry should jump higher (and slower). Again, buoyancy dictates this should be the case. Infantry should be able to swim up to the surface to get back into vehicles. It feels like we should be able to, otherwise bailing out of a "boat-type" vehicle means abandoning it forever, and that kinda sucks when some of them are pretty expensive (Chimera in particular). I'm not suggesting we need full-fledged swimming mechanics. Just something as basic as holding down spacebar to slowly go straight up would be fine. Maybe the water plane could impart a bit of fall damage. Or maybe not, we're wearing armor and stuff after all. *shrug* Jumpjets should be less effective underwater. Jumpjets currently give LA's a huge mobility advantage underwater. Maybe they should have some mobility advantage, but currently they are just way too good at underwater combat compared to everyone else. TL;DR: The "you move slower while submerged" thing should apply equally to walking, running, jumping, falling, impulse forces, and using jumpjets. It would feel so much better. I feel like the Hunter QCX (pocket crossbow) should be able to fire underwater, since it's not a firearm (the Seeker should not, though). Not sure if we need the Amaterasu to shoot frisbees underwater. Maybe. It is kinda funny. What else... Oh yeah, explosions. Explosions should deal more damage to infantry and have a larger radius when things detonate underwater. Because that's how it works in real life. Shrapnel doesn't travel as far underwater, but the shockwave does, because water doesn't compress. This could be a pain to code, though. This all could be a pain to code. I really appreciate the dev team and all the hard work you guys are putting in to bring something truly new and exciting to Planetside 2. You're all doing a great job, and I'm super hyped to see where things go from here!
Slower infantry underwater, this continent will be "more" crowded than Hossin ;-) Underwater explosion with shockwave to harm infantry more, one more reason to ignore Oshur. I predict: big fail, if they copy the physics 1:1 to oshur and only slowdown infantry.
An underwater flare gun would be nice. As you mentioned, the deeper waters are dark, even more so at night. And I don't mean the patriot flare guns, I mean a real flare gun able to light underwater with some buoyancy, so the burning flare only drops slowly. Or don't implement it and let me point my harpoon at you in the dark... Oh yeah, I think the water underwater is still to crystal clear, the deeper you go. There are 300 meter spots and deeper on Indar right now, the water down there should be dim, even more dim when vehicles drive by and toss all that seabed floor up.
Cordium harvest will be an issue without the Wasp. But the wasp needs some serious upgrades. More diversity in underwater weapons please. LMG, Ar we have, Spear gun etc. Some abilities need to function. No ammo deploy means you have to think when you use your weapon. Need vehicle Objectives, besides killing infantry. Say Several capture points that are floating. Balance will be needed due to vanu OP hover mechanics on this map. This is a prime reason of an oshur only vehicle pool. More AI Anti air at some bases.. you cap a point it becomes active on your side. Air is much stronger on this map so some static AA is needed, and not just generic stuff either.