Let's talk specialists and immersion

Honestly I can’t tell the difference between the characters when I’m playing, so the look of the character doesn’t really effect me all that much.

occasionally though when I do catch a glimpse, and I see those ugly faces looking right back at me, it’s is pretty horrifying.

all I really see is the outline. And what I found useful in previous BF games, was I could just about tell what class the opponent or team mate was. As such when dying I could switch class to compliment  or counter who I was playing with/against.

now, I don’t find that so easy and that’s a shame because I felt that that ability to identify player class really help make good decisions for playing the objectives.

Customising your character is kinda cool though, but I do find the combinations a bit childish, and definitely not as cool as some of the more classsic hardline looks you used to get. But given I can’t tell in game anyway it’s not really relevant. 

I’m not totally against the introduction of new gadgets, but I’d have preferred they were introduced as new classes or subclasses. This is only because I think more control over what load outs were possible would allow map designers to better control the flow of the game. 

currently, it’s a total free for all, so the map flow is none deterministic, whether that’s a good or bad thing long term, is hard to say. What I can say about gadgets however is the wingsuit is straight up dumb. I’m mean I literally hate it. It’s just so stupid. 

id settle for customisable characters and a broader set of balanced load outs. 

😂😂😂

I think one - overlooked; I don't recall seeing anyone comment on it -  issue with the new gadgets is that without "clone" characters, it would be very difficult to work out what a player can do in terms of specialisation.

In Battle Royale and small-scale Hero Shooters, this isn't so much of an issue as in BR you don't often encounter 40+ other players within a 100m diameter circle, and Hero Shooters like Overwatch are on a much smaller scale. It doesn't help that the character balance is such that seeing a Dozer is rather uncommon while seeing a McKay is like having smelly breath in the morning.

I do wonder how the players would deal with having fewer clues about the "abilities" of a player if they couldn't immediately identify it through the character appearance. While the solution DICE arrived at is obviously lacking in terms of muh immershun, it's often useful. See a Boris? Look for a drone. See a Falck? Ask for healing. See an Angel? Get your armour and full resupply. See a generic soldier? Yeah...

---

@filthy_vegans wrote:

I do wonder how the players would deal with having fewer clues about the "abilities" of a player if they couldn't immediately identify it through the character appearance. 

---

Considering this can already be an issue with some characters given similar body times and some of the cosmetics that are a touch more generic at range, I don't think it's a huge problem.

Easy solution, even if they have to keep the core of the specialist system - De-emphasize the hell outta specialist abilities so that needing to identify specific specialists to know how to counter them isn't a thing to begin with. But that's also been my proposal for the specialist system overall since I don't see it being any better received if the keep the current direction, and don't see how they can ever hope to achieve any kind of "balance" given how impactful specialist skills can be on the battlefield and how it's impossible to predict/balance around the expectation that players will be frequently swapping specialists or even using their abilities (vs. just playing Angel and feeding themselves ammo/armor as if everyone else doesn't exist).

But I guess we may have to wait another month to hear about what DICE has been thinking of for the specialist system. Still can't believe they're a month late on their own self-imposed deadline to kick that off, and without a pee.

@Lancelot_du_LacIt turned more into a murder confession after they gutted Portal to try and salvage their hero shooter.  In any case,  their marketing sold people on an OG battlefield experience and delivered an Apex Legends abortion. 

Keep hearing this comment about 'Freedom' What freedom do the specialist actually bring apart carrying a gadget or too, they're not reshaping the battlfield in anyway imo 

Unless you are miked up, squaded up with everyone running a specific loadout the free for all doesn't improve the gameplay experiance 

There's something to be said for games like Insurgency Sandstorm with it's credits for loadout and it's limited kits, you can't have a dozen snipers or a dozen RPG weilding engineers running around, games are more balanced. 

---

@JediMastaWyn wrote:

Keep hearing this comment about 'Freedom' What freedom do the specialist actually bring apart carrying a gadget or too, they're not reshaping the battlfield in anyway imo 

Unless you are miked up, squaded up with everyone running a specific loadout the free for all doesn't improve the gameplay experiance 

There's something to be said for games like Insurgency Sandstorm with it's credits for loadout and it's limited kits, you can't have a dozen snipers or a dozen RPG weilding engineers running around, games are more balanced. 

---

The freedom to run all over the map which disconnects you from your squad. Making VoIP useless and squad play too. But its more like the gadgets. Grappling hook, Wingusit, Sentry Gun, Drone.. all of these are cancer to the game and its gameplay.

Specialists are a disease to Battlefield. They dont belong here, they dont encourage squad teamwork, they are lonewolf wannabies made for HZ and nothing more. Battlefield is supposed to be gritty and have normal soldiers, fighting a war, working as a team with what you bring to the table. 

Considering BF2042 was supposed to be a BR/HZ game, that is why the specialists are here, then they decided to make it a BF game but kept the specialists. Biggest mistake made right there and they should have been binned at that moment. 

Its about being a no name soldier, thrown into the chaos of war. Not this semi superhero bullpoo they are pulling