What is the fascination with classes?

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@ragnarok013 wrote:

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@Trokey66 wrote:

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@ragnarok013 wrote:
@PsubondClasses are one of the three bedrock pillars of Battlefield that makes Battlefield what it is since the very first Battlefield 20 years ago. Classes are an integral portion of the paper/rock/scissors balancing that made Battlefield balanced and predictable that 2042 completed eschewed. It is impossible to balance every permutation of hero/weapon/gadget that the community can come up with; it's far easier for DICE to balance weapons/gadgets around classes with their restrictions due to the aforementioned tradeoffs.

Classes prevent people from being a jack of all trades, it encourages weapon and gadget diversity because you have to choose between a specific weapon type and a specific role instead of everyone running the meta hero/weapon/gadget to be a lone wolf like you see in 2042 and Warzone. Overall it makes for a healthier more team oriented experience.

The real question is if one doesn't like Battlefield why play Battlefield and demand that the formula change to be something else when other games do what 2042 is copying much better?

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BF1's and BFV's Assualt class say hello 👋🏻 

I would even suggest BF4's Medic lifted their head at the mention of this.

Players have always run the 'meta hero (class)/weapon/gadget' regardless of how the classes are constructed.

Teamplay is in the hands of the players, those that want to teamplay will, those that want lone wolf meta, won't regardless of class/specialist.

You and I have been here long enough to remember all the 'insert class here' don't 'insert class role here' threads!  Specialists haven't changed that in and of themselves.

I am no fan of specialists personally and wouldn't be upset if classes returned in the next game but they are not as bad as people make out.

And as to clones (this bit isn't directed at you @ragnarok013 )

Clones of specialists - Bad

Clones of classes - Good

Makes sense......

Skins aren't spectacular but not to bad and faction skins would help but for me, not essential but one thing we can all agree on is the one liners.

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@Trokey66 I heavily disliked BF1/5 class structure however as much as people whined about the Hellriegel, Automatico, M1 Garand, or STG44 imagine if we had 2042's system where everyone could use them in BF1/5? Actionman from BF1/5 was a bad implementation of the class system IMO, I personally preferred BF2/3/4's class systems (and yes all 3 are different especially BF2's) but they were mostly balanced and overall a consistent vision compared to BF1/5 system that heavily favored Actionman. I didn't care for BC2's medic with an LMG but it wasn't that much different compared to the BF2/3/4 philosophy IMO.  There have always been classes that are more popular either due to kit or weapons (hello M-16A3) but the restrictions and a healthy weapon count for all classes really did help mitigate over saturation of weapons on the battlefield despite any particular weapon's popularity. As you recall DICE has historically had trouble balancing weapons and gadgets when they were restricted to classes, how can we expect DICE to balance every possible combination of weapons/specialists/gadgets now that everyone can use everything?

I understand the clone comment isn't directed at me but I will respond. In all other BF titles the classes are generic unnamed soldiers. Armies use uniforms for friend/foe identification so everyone naturally looks the same.  In 2042 Specialists are named people with backstories and unique looks and voice lines. Seeing 24 Boris Specialists running around (especially with zero faction differences is insane and makes no sense while seeing 24 of the same assault soldier just means he's an assault soldier and not the same exact guy "Jim the Sapper".  Games like RS6 and Overwatch don't allow you to have have more than one of the named hero on the Battlefield and those are also small player count modes so the clone wars isn't an issue with named characters for those types of games.  

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So by your own admission the class system can be can be, and sometimes is, flawed.

And I think this is the point here, certainly for me, that specialist are by no means perfect but compared to some previous games, are no worse than classes.

I don't buy the 'clone' issue because apart from BFV, every game gas been full of 'clones' to some degree or other.  Bf1 had no soldier customisation at all and BF4 was limited to coloured overlays.  Granted, each side is different to each other and this is an area the BF2042 does fall flat but is not game breaking for me.