Non-class based infantry

Yeah it seems a bit radical change, but this just crossed my mind. What if there would be no classes in Empires?

Instead there would be primary weapon selection which includes weapons like smg1, smg2, rifles, rpg and such. Then there would be grenade selection where you have all the grenades, mines and such. And then you'd choose from repair tool, body armor, mine detection and such.

Also skill would be universal. You could have repair upgrade, damage upgrade and defusal at the same time. It would be up to players to decide what benefits them the most.

This could be less crippled compared to the present class-based system that leaves you decide between a couple of presets.

Also it would bring some variety to the game. At the moment it's like rock-paper-scissors..

Of course there's nothing "wrong" with the class-based infantry.. I just think too many games use that without a second thought.

This is just an alternative.

Flame ahead.

 

Hrm. I'll take the Carbine, with the mortar secondary and a calculator as my special...

almost forgot digin and armor

 

the problem is, that you have to restrict some combination of abilities and weapons in a free system so you most likely end up with a pseudo class system. Means the class system is still their but concealed by a "weight system".

 

A weight system like it is in Firearms would work but tbh that would take a fuck load of effort to work.

 

You can't take the mowtar with out the RPG also because they are the same weapon.

 

He didn't specify that. He said primary and secondary

So yeah, i'm taking carbine and mortar. :D

 

Don't like it. On most maps we will see the same kind of super infantry. I like the current diversity.

 

A system like dystopia would be needed to get this to work.

Another way this could work without completely changing everything, is to keep the classes as a base, and have them be the most proficient with the tools that are part of their specalization (gren -> mowtar, roflmen -> hmg, etc.)
Kind of a RPG system you see in games like System Shock 2.

Problem with the latter is that it actually requires a RPG system to be remotely useful as a system. As sucking dick at using a rifle could mean theres no point in bothering with that weapon, on the flipside overpowered setups could still be possible.

Problem with this is that the weapons are based on defined classes, to be able to remove classes, you'd have to think the weapons through first.

And thinking about weapons pretty much means thinking the rock paper scissors mechanic through.
If you would do it with the current sets, you'd risk having roflmen with mowtar, or engis with scout capabilities (lol sneaky base) etc.

One of the possible ways I see this working is that you would go from 4 classes to pretty much 2 real classes: Roflmen or Grenadiers. With subclasses between tanking / support / recon / assault etc.
This could definitely work, but you'd risk most of the current things to become useless, like riflemen armor, scout binoculars.

So yes, limitations, and a good understanding of what these changes would manifest in. Most games that use a class neutral system (mostly RPG's) still end up having defined classes, they just give more freedom.

 

if this becomes the case, why not remove the smgs?
they're useless in all aspects as opposed to the ars.

 

even a weight design wouldn't work, because in that case you would have calcs weigh like 2 trillion pounds so they could only be carried by smgs.
and mortar+smg+sticky bomb and nothing else would be pretty OP.
so yea.
it's either pseudo classes, or normal classes.
and pseudo classes will only complicate things for newbies.

 

yay css

 

rifles would not come with pistols. /balance

 

I demand a mortar mine engineer so I can do anything anywhere anytime.

 

I meant secondary weapon would be the pistol. You'd have to choose between rpg and mortar.

Also, the skills could be categorized into anti-infantry skills, anti-vehicle skills and general skills. The thing is that you only have a couple of skills in most commander maps, so if you take anti-infantry skill, you can't have revive or repair upgrade so there would be not much difference than the fact that you wouldn't need to jump between classes over 9000 times in one game. Also, infantry wouldn't be so limited to do what the classes do. Engineer wouldn't be so much a slave and so on..

And @Empty: This is the exact thing why it would be good. We could have our own special class. Not everyone would certainly go mortar-mine-engineer.

But this really is a big change, so it would require a lot of work. That's the biggest problem in it.

 

as it is now infantry combat isn't rock paper scissors.. its gren > all

don't think so? lets 1v1

 

I still can't believe you think 1v1 on district has any similarity to an actual empires game. How about 1v1 on duststorm me rifle and you gren.