After much thought surrounding how to balance weapons and the like, it dawned upon me that the ammo carriers are a little weird.
For example, the Heavy Carrier almost a must for the Demo class, and it gives, what, 8 primary magazines? I doubt most players will ever exhaust that much ammo in a life.
When playing Marksman, if I need to push an objective, running out of pistol ammo is a reality, especially if using the cheaper options.
And when playing Gunner, if I manage to burn through 200 rounds, the enemy team must be getting destroyed, because I know I'm not that good.
So I propose an alternative carrier system to the one implemented now:
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No Carrier: Provides 2 items slots. 0 Supply cost.
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Light Carrier: Provides 3 items slots. 1 Supply cost.
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Heavy Carrier: Provides 4 items slots 3 Supply cost.
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All Carriers only provide 2 Primary and Secondary magazines by default.
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All Carriers only provide 1 MAAWS/RPG Rocket or Underbarrel Grenade by default.
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2 New items: Extra Primary Magazines x2 and Extra Secondary Magazines x2(3?). These could also be combined. Costs 1/2 Supply each.
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Empty item slots can be filled with extra magazines when scavenging.
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New Demo item: Extra Explosive Munitions x1. Gives extra rockets/underbarrel grenades. Costs 3/2 Supply, with multiple "purchases" costing incrementally more (to prevent people from having 5 rockets etc). Could cap it a 3/4 rockets/grenades as well.
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Lethal Grenades now cost incrementally more per "purchase".
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It would also be nice to see Rockets being incompatible with Underbarrel Grenade launchers (when choosing loadout, pickups are OK).
Though this is a little messy, the aim is to have a system where scavenging is something that might actually be needed in PVP, while allowing fine tuning the balance of loadouts based on the map and strategy.
It doesn't change how most classes will play out, however it will give better options for using sidearms, which can be important for classes like Marksman and Gunner, as you cannot often scavenge extra magazines for pistols and it would push Demo into making more decisions around how they choose to equip themselves.
I have intentionally neglected the Underbarrel Smoke, as it's often overshadowed by the Smoke Artillery, though I think it's mostly fine as is.
I understand that this complicates things for new players, though I also believe other gameplay aspects are much more complicated than this, gunplay is already intentionally unforgiving after all.
Cheers!
