Id like to start by first specifying that this is my opinion. I aspire to balance videogames but this does not mean I am correct, ive always wanted to design game mechanics and make sure everything feels right, being inspired a lot by the game development choices of the halo games from early bungie, focusing more on fun than whatever the e-sport community has been focusing on. Ill start with a popular topic of discussion and work my way into something people dont talk about that I feel can heighten the game a lot.
Time To Kill
Time to kill a big discussion point and people are saying that its not fun when the other person is a bullet sponge and some people want the oneshots back and some people think this should oneshot but not this and armor is a big discussion point as well. I really feel like there is a good inbetween for this kind of thing and no one really talks about how to get there. You dont need everyone to have AP ammo and have everyone oneshot or at most twoshot with any gun to be competitive. You can have the lower TTK of the lower calibers right now and still have that feeling that "I shot first so they were pretty much dead from there." I feel that there shouldnt be many guns that oneshot mostly being bolt-actions. As much as I like how the PKM oneshots right now, im not so sure its the best choice for balance reasons, it has a hefty amount of recoil but im not sure if thats enough. That thing is a monster of a gun and its basically a full auto sniper rifle that youll usually only shoot one shot with. I feel that the TTK issue can be negated by the inclusion of more suppression mechanics but not in the way theyre implemented right now, which leads me into
Suppression and Health/Damage
which I feel can bridge the gap between low and high TTK. I think health should come back much slower, for one, and being damaged should automatically set you to a very high amount of suppression which can even make a garbage 9mm pistol feel effective against heavy armor, even if it takes four or even five shots to kill because the truth is, even with heavy armor on, taking a 9mm bullet isnt going to feel good and in the field im sure being shot at all is going to throw you into a panic. While you might initially read that and think "thats so stupid i dont want rng to decide if i win or not", the other alternatives are "my pistol doesnt work" and "it doesnt matter what gun i use because i oneshot anyway" and really both of those are bad in my opinion. Its not so much RNG either. Suppression can do things like mess with your audio and make it harder to take note of your surroundings, it could make your aim much more unreliable against the shooter and give a good edge to people with a lot more ammo, even boosting the effectiveness of SMGs which are generally completely outclassed by rifles in nearly every way other than a ton of ammo. It would also present a nerf to DMRs like the M14 or SVD unless they land those killing shots because theyd lack the suppression of missing a lot more. I also feel that taking damage (depending on how much) could possibly slow down the person being shot. I think someone in heavy armor might be able to tank a 9mm and keep moving but perhaps taking higher calliber bullets could slow down the person who takes them, boosting the reward of someone who can land their shots even if the shot doesnt immediately kill, you could also make this more specific like being shot in the legs may slow down the person who gets shot. Id even go so far as to say that being shot at all should move your aim around, and while you might again say "thats stupid" or "thats not fair" the alternative is that youd die immediately because they would have AP ammo and low TTK. You could also apply the aiming suppression effects to things like flashbangs to boost their effectiveness and generally make the whole thing stronger and more rewarding to use.
Sound
I think sound isnt being used enough here and can even provide incentive to use light or heavy armor. I feel weight should be tied to footstep noises to really reward someone for taking just a pistol or an smg with no armor or ammo carriers and things like that, this would also directly nerf support as a whole as carrying that LMG makes you pretty loud to move around and basically wont let you push up fast as even an inexperienced player can hear you coming, making the support role more of a SUPPORT role and not an offensive rifleman with a huge magazine and higher damage. I have also heard from many people that theres a lot of issues in PvP where people run around because the footstep noises are so quiet and it becomes incredibly run and gun where that stuff shouldnt matter. Im not sure the validity of these claims but its worth noting. Talking about PvP however...
PvP
I feel the number one problem with the PvP in this game is the forehead bullet dilemma. Ive played two matches of PvP in Sandstorm and probably 3 in Insurgency Source, and its not that im bad at shooters or anything, I do fine on other titles but Insurgencys slow combat and focus on positioning really only heightens the problem of a guy with 3 pixels of his head sticking out of a corner of a window with a oneshot semi-auto sniper whos capable of destroying 5 waves of your team without anyone even able to get a shot off at him. And this has happened to me multiple times. One player getting about 30 or 40 kills in a single around because the other team just cant see him at all. This is going to destroy the games pvp at anything except top-tier levels, its just not fun and its not realistic or fair because only veteran players are going to know where these exploitative spots are. Its generally just a bad time, I feel if the forehead problem can be eliminated, the game will see a significant boost for the PvP scene. I want to see less emphasis on oneshotting a dude with a sniper from a position he couldnt have possibly seen and more on actual gunplay and suppression.
Weapon Balance
Another big dilemma ive seen is that some guns are just better than other guns, im not going to talk about this too long since there are a lot of guns and I cant say ive even used every gun even with my extensive time with sandstorm but I would say that guns at the same prices should be sidegrades. If a gun is GENERALLY better than another gun, one should also be more expensive than the other. I think its quite silly when some guns are more expensive but worse than a gun at a lower cost.
Melee
I think everyone knows how ridiculous the melee in this game is, im not sure how much theyd be willing to look into it but really anything would be better than it is right now, including almost not having it. If I had to give my opinion on a good melee system in a first person shooter, I guess id say Battlefield One does it the most successfully so far, locking you into an animation (provided you actually get the kill) that generally makes the melee effective against one person but ultimately suicide in any two-man engagement.
And im not saying these are perfect but I would be confident in saying its a lot better than what is in the game currently.
Please, if you liked what I have to say give me a thumbs up or post a reply, id hate for my post to get lost. If you disagree please quote the section you disagree with and talk about why its bad and all of the specifics of that, I want to have a well organized discussion about all of this stuff.
Thanks for reading.