Beta weekend #2

This is pretty much just an update to my original post:

I just had the most fun playing a video game in a long time | EA Forums - 12463259

And like weekend #1, I had tons of fun of playing. It's been a week since the beta ended and I started seeing some official communication from EA regarding next steps, so I figured I would chime in and provide feedback while the beta is still somewhat fresh in my mind.

I wanted to point out things that I feel very passionate about / are important / would like to see in the future in bold font, but it's not letting me post like that, so those things will be enclosed in double quotes.

Quick edit: I just realized that I never gave any feedback on dragging your downed teammates: THIS IS THE BEST **bleep** EVER!

• Weapons:
  • Overall, I am very happy.
  • Handgun needs to be more powerful.
  • "DMRs need a serious buff - while the SVD was a 2 shotter, I could still get beamed by other gun types from more than 50 meters away. The E39, being a 3 shotter, could not even compete. DMR in close quarters doesn't stand a chance against any other weapon type. I would increase the fire rate and reduce recoil, before playing around with damage curves, to make them stand out at a distance."

• TTK:
  • Feels good across the board. "Don't listen to COD players and sweats. If anything, I would still make TTK faster than it is now. Someone did not take cover? Got caught in the open? That's your problem."

• Movement:
  • I still think the movement is good, if anything, "making it slower is welcome. I already saw that sliding and bunny hopping will be nerfed, so props for that."

• Maps:
  • Breakthrough / rush: honestly, I think the losses I suffered were mostly due to skill issue of the attacking team. When everyone is worried about K/D ratio and no one is using smokes... then it's a problem. "Perhaps it's time for some innovative approach to these two modes? Limiting amount of sniper rifles, but not recon classes, per team maybe? Some other incentives or mechanics?"
  • I think the map design for these two modes is great, plenty of points to push in from. "If there are going to be any massive changes, I would only maybe limit how much forward the defending team can come forward." Other than that, I think maps are great. At the end of the day, the attacking team MUST struggle a bit to push through, they can't just steamroll their way through.
  • "Rush needs to be at least 16v16. 12v12 didn't seem chaotic enough. Please see wishlist section as well."

• Vehicles:
  • Finally got to play with vehicles, not as much as I would like, but enough to get some first impressions. I've tried the IFV, tank, F16 and the Apache. First impression, for every vehicle, is that they feel sluggish. 2042 vehicles feel very fast and agile, so maybe it's a just a matter of getting used to. But overall, the experience is good.
  • Chase camera FOV - I don't know if this was me not adjusting the camera, but the chase view felt too close to the vehicle.
  • Apache:
    • Rolling the helicopter feels very sensitive, while yawing feels very slow in comparison.
    • Smart rockets feel counterintuitive a bit for me. It's not a fire and forget thing and then the rocket homes in on the vehicle, they kind of work like a TV missile, you have to keep the pointer on the vehicle, and since there's the fixed pointer, and the floating one, it was difficult to figure out which one is the one that guides the rockets.
    • "Please look in the wishlist section as well."
  • F16:
    • Oh man, my childhood fantasy of becoming an F16 pilot just came back :D.
    • Overall, I will have to spend more time flying this thing.
    • One thing I noticed is that the aircraft does not get repaired and rearmed when flying over the uncap, while it works for the Apache.
    • I noticed with the air-to-ground missile and the bomb, that when you 'aim' with RMB, it brings up the FLIR system. If I could fly the aircraft straight, without having to risk crashing by diving on my target and aim the bomb and the missile that way.... man, that'd be awesome.
    • Maybe the FLIR could be used to preaim the bomb? And then automatically release it when you fly over the area within a certain cone? SO MUCH potential here.
    • "Please look in the wishlist section as well."
  • Tank:
    • I think the tank could have a bit more survivability and/or firepower. Now, there were usually 5 engineers welding vehicles back together in the beta, but that doesn't count :D. Last time I felt that tanks had the upper hand against infantry was back in BF4, and it's been getting tougher and tougher ever since. I feel that I spontaneously blew up very often.
    • I know I just said that tanks could use more firepower/survivability, but the LMG damage from the gunner's turret felt much better than 2042 - more kills than hitmarkers.
    • Movement feels a bit slow/sluggish, turret kinda feels slow - again, maybe it's a skill issue and a matter of getting used to and putting more time behind the tank.
  • IFV:
    • Pretty much same points as tank, although it did feel more powerful against infantry as a driver and as a gunner.
    • "I could not understand how the painter works on the gunner station. Click once? Hold down the LMB and let go? Hold down LMB and keep holding? I could not figure it out. Maybe it's bugged?"

Please consider the entire wishlist section as bold.

• Wishlist:
  • Faction themed weapons: one thing I totally miss from BF4 and haven't seen in BF1, BFV, and BF2042, is faction based weapons. I know this game is not going to be US-RU-CN conflict, but locking western made weapons to NATO, and eastern made weapons to Pax Armata would be great. It has always felt weird using an AK as US, or MP44 as British in the WW1 and WW2 games and so on.
  • More optic options: having more optic options would be great, and having them faction based would be great as well. For example, you can pick the Russian monocle optic, which is 1x optic, but it's Western equivalent, which would be the Aimpoint lookalike, was a 1.5x.
  • One thing I would like to see in the attack helicopters and airplanes is having ground vehicles permanently highlighted. Modern aircraft have such advanced avionics that identifying targets is non-issue. However, when I am flying in the apache or the F16, it's very difficult to identify where the vehicles are, unless someone spots one for you. Having ground vehicles, and maybe even air vehicles, permanently highlighted, sort of like when you get a square on your HUD when someone SOFLAMs the target for you, would be amazing. That would truly make a difference, especially for the jets. In every BF installment, I always felt like jets were limited to air combat, because spotting vehicles on the ground has always been a challenge to me.
  • 32v32 rush mode on the bigger maps. I would nut if that would happen. Make it chaotic.
  • Shooting range for vehicles - learning how to fly offline would be great.

I think that's all..... overall, I'm stoked for this game.