The one thing I have noted while playing Heavy Assault more often is that the shield doesn't change basic game skills and concepts like flanking and aiming and knowing when to pull back. You don't survive long without doing that. If anything, reliance on it makes your playstyle more stupid in the hopes that stupid works (Adrenaline Shield is specifically designed that like), while "proper use" of it offers some leeway in terms of survival. "Proper use" is what SOE appears to be pushing towards - you're about to enter a room, in which you expect to encounter the enemy, so you start the shield up to mitigate being demolished in an instant just because there's a lot of them. That said, I admit to never using my shield so I may not truly understand how it works. I turn it on as an amusement in between combat. Yesterday, it started up gray rather than faction-flavor.
There are plenty of people who can't aim, and the TTK will depend on situation/range. "Dodging" generally involves jumping off to the side, I kind of assumed that was a given - I think experienced players eventually just kind of reflexively do it upon taking damage. I kill plenty of people who start firing first in CQC because they don't follow that quick move to the side / re-aim fast enough. Resist Shield is only 30% less damage, rank 5 nano is 20% and is up all the time(which now becomes even more important for surviving long enough to activate shield). I think nanomesh will be worth using.
Depending on the situation the LA is by far the strongest class in the game. Amp stations, Biolab interiors, towers, etc. Basically in any fight that has a lot of room for vertical movement the LA will destroy the other classes if played correctly.
As far as I know, resist shield is 45% resistance, unclude headshot. HA don't need a nerf, but RL primary need one. Just add a 0.5 sec delay before fire with the RL.
C4 is a melee weapon (and heavy can carry it), and the engineer turret is extremely cumbersome and about to be nerfed. Heavy Assault is the best choice for AV work, provided you don't like dying.
Rocket primaries, like shotguns, AI mines, and other random one hit kill deaths are pretty much this game's biggest detractors. I have no idea how so many anti-fun weapons and mechanics are still in the game almost a year and a half later.
The problem that everyone complaining they can't beat HAs have is that they're playing as if they were HAs themselves, at this point I'd say, pick HA, lol. If you flank them and you can actually aim, you can kill them before they can react.
I don't know man, the heavy assault is avaiable to all 3 factions and are main front infantry units, without them game would be pretty much stale and unatractive in terms of infantry combat, gunfights, what like you would use 20medics to attack? game wouldnt work, infantry would be completely irrevant. the real question is WHY NOT USE MAX aka The bear rap1st unit?
If people can't aim enough that jumping off to the side lets you live when the get the drop on you then they probably can't aim well enough to win with or without a shield. If the delay is short enough that you can get your shield up before the TTK kills you then yes NW and Ad will still be effective - but then nothing will have changed from now. So there won't have been a nerf, or even change, effectively. However if the delay is long enough to actually stop the shield being used reactively (which is supposedly their intention) then the Resist shield becomes 100% the only choice (as with those that can't aim that badly, you'll be safe enough with Resist reactively). Which leaves only two possible outcomes. 1. It stays the same as now (because the delay isn't big enough to have any effect on reactionary use). 2. Resist becomes the only shield worth using. The whole shield idea needs a complete re-think if they actually want to change them.
Because in Planetside 2, there are two certainties; Death, and expenditure of ammunition. By playing engineer or medic I can neutralise 50% of this problem.
Meh I've been playing more medic and more engineer lately and I don't get the crying honestly. Medic's guns are awesome, while they don't have the ammo pool of the LMGs they are just great all around, and the self heal is great for sustaining in long battles as long as I can keep finding ammo. The only thing stops me from playing medic even more are Max units and the rocket launcher/AV grenades are the best way to handle them. Engineer is very nice as well, some of the carbines are just as good as ARs for most areas of fighting. Biggest issue is of course self healing, I love grabbing the mines, I don't usually use the turrets though, wish I could switch those out for something more mobile. Infiltrators still getting the hang off, though those EMP grenades... Need to cert up LA next I guess.
Why does so many people play HA all the time then? Because another class is better? LAs are not a weak class but far from living up to its name as an assault class, as HA does.
LAs could get something else instead. Why does that even upset you? I mean you probably play HA yourself and probably not happy that it will get nerfed, if they gave something to LA that made it equally as good as HA then a HA nerf wouldn't be needed at all, and if you don't play HA, then I am sorry that I thought you did. There will always be a need for Medic, Engineer, Infiltrator, MAX and HA but will there always be a need for LA? in an organized squad? other than placing spawn beacons.
cos infil scout rifle is way better than anything (imo) and the only reason i want to use heavy is to get in close in cqc with muh shotys, for AV i relied mostly on vehicle.
My point is if you make the LA the "default class", what have you changed? Absolutely nothing at all (except for who gets the nerf calls next - in fairness LA with RLs would be marginally insane balance-wise too). As for the shield nerf; I just don't understand it. If the Devs want to make all the shield non-reactionary that is entirely up to them, however just adding a delay to the NW and Ad shields will just make the Resist shield the only shield worth using (the other two simply don't function remotely as well as pre-emptive shields) meaning 100% of HAs will just run Resist Shield - which seems a pointless and retrograde step. If they want to nerf/change the shields they need to THINK about it, to make the NW and Ad shield useful as pre-emptive shields (probably by completely redesigning them as they are currently designed mostly as reactionary shields).
To be honest I think the Heavy Assault and Light Assualt classes both do exactly what is says on the tin. That's not to say things couldn't be changed, but for example nerfing 2 out of 3 HA shields to be pointless isn't going to make the HA more a "Heavy Assault" or indeed do anything at all to improve the Light Assault class. Some of the LA issues are just down to the game design too, in PS1's Core Combat the PS2 LA would have been unbelievably good, for example.
