SUPPORT CLASS OVERPOWERED

The thing with the air strike is that if they did something to nerf it (increase the time before the explosion or reduce the damage) it would lose its effectiveness. It would wind up being a more powerful version of the assault's bomb but without remote detonation. If they did something like increase the cool down or decrease the number you can throw at once it would cut back on the spamming but also hurt the support's ability to aid a push.

OK, here's the thing, the topic creator couldn't make a decent argument here because they were just spewing anger on a keyboard, but after playing this game almost everyday since it released I have to chime in and say he's still right. I'm going to try to make a much more cogent argument than the original poster, though it'll probably get a bit long, so bear with me.

The problem lies in the sheer versatility of roles that the support has and that he does all of them, not just decently but REALLY well. The only thing he can't do is long range but if nothing else, it has to do with his stated role. He's supposed to be support, but he does assault far better than he really should AND still pulls off the support role on top of this.

If you look at the game from a long view, it becomes clear that the six classes roughly form mirrors of functionality, where you have Tank & gunner (High HP but slow at short and long ranges), Assassin & Sniper (low HP but nimble at long to short ranges), and Assault & Support (Medium HP and Mid ranged, though Support favors closer and Assault favors longer) as opposites of each other. For the first two pairings I think that when two players of their opposite class face off against each other, it's pretty even, and it just matters on how you play it and react. When it comes to Support versus Assault though, in contests of players of roughly equal skill, support almost always wins. I'll try to explain how, but this seems to be the area that makes the support a problem, in him versus his "mirror" class.

First, the support's air strike is massively better than the Assault's remote mine. It does more damage and he can use it more rapidly because as it's upgraded he get's multiple bombs. There are very few areas that are safe from it and a smart support won't throw it at folks who are smart enough to use upper cover, but throw it at the edges and let the splash damage kill them, which is usually still enough for the kill. The assault's mine can be used more tactically but it really comes down to the speed here, and even if they both have gold ability endorsements, the Support is producing 3 strikes for every one mine, at at much higher damage. It's simply a LOT better.

Next, the support doesn't have to aim. Not just in one, but two ways. If he can lure an assault (or many classes really) into a trap of being near his turret past a blind angle, the combination of the turret and his hurt gun's lock on kills most Pros REALLY fast. IF that turret's at level 3, it's range is quite high and it decimates most players before they get a chance to react. Now I know this just seems like good strategy for supports to use, and it is, but they get a huge advantage here over EVERY other class, they don't have to aim either weapon. This lets them concentrate on hopping around like the trix rabbit in the cereal aisle and they become freaking hard as hell to hit and put down. Not only that, but against an assault, again his roughly equal class) he doesn't even need the turret.

If in a one on one, the support can just hop up to the Assault using the hurt gun and jump around like crazy and there's nothing the assault can do except get lucky (and score enough crits from a spammed rifle). Unless the person playing the assault is a fricking mind reader, the random jumps make leading shots highly unlikely, and the bits of damage from the rifle that will occur are negated by the hurt/heal gun stealing the hp from the assault. Nothing the assault can do can remove the threat and increase range except to have more speed upgrades/endorsements or use the charge to run away. This seems rather counter to the nature of the ability. Even then though, you'll take at least half your health bar if you have no armor endorsements in the time it takes to turn around and blast away, and that's IF it's not on cool-down. Using the charge as a way to disrupt the attack is really tricky since unless it's rank 3, it won't "stick" to him and the crazy hopping makes it a ridiculous low chance to hit on with a rank one or two charge. Not only that, but the charge rarely kills the Support, it only knocks him away (unless it's aimed at an edge), since the support has rather high HP. The support can easily just keep coming, and kill the assault who can't escape the beam AND will have a ridiculous time hitting the jumping gearhead.

Then there's the fact that the support doesn't need to think about what sponsors they want that much. A few of the endorsements don't really seem like they're all that important for the character. Reload speed, or clip size: almost pointless as the main weapon doesn't need ammo or reloads. Accuracy too is negligible since all it takes is for one lock on with the hurt/heal gun and then boom, no need. These all matter for the shotgun, but the shotgun is already great at close range and to use it more often over the hurt/heal gun it pretty rare. All of these endorsements being somewhat voided prevents the support player from having to sacrifice or create different builds. This is a minor quibble, but the support is just simpler to play over time because of it.

Then there's the sheer broken problem of a support with the juice endorsement. Since supports gain juice from healing and overhealing their allies and turrets, They just get so many more opportunities to juice up. The sheer fact that they can juice up faster really should be the biggest tell in their unbalanced nature. For every other class, they have to make kills or pay money, a support can just protect the base, then boom, they're juiced, go on the offensive and wreck the other team for a second, die, heal the base, repeat. While it's nice that they get something for playing base defense, it's too much considering they really don't have to work for it the way other classes do.

Now, I don't think the support is too powerful by much, in any one area, and I could be fine if any one of these seemed really good but he sucked in other ways, but he just doesn't suck in any way to make up for his large variety of strengths. He defintely needs some nerfing.

Besides it should just tell the devs something that it's pretty common to see that the team with the most active supports it usually the team that wins the match. No other class has as much an impact on the outcome of the match, and it's not really through their function (supporting the team), it's through their sheer power.

As someone who loves his assault, I smoke most supports in one-on-ones. If they get close enough to use the shotgun or even the hurt ray then you're doing something wrong. Fly around and rain death, drop bombs like on Hiroshima, and for god's sake don't go anywhere near him (and don't follow him anywhere since it'll probably be straight to his turret).

The hurt ray itself isn't so much dangerous as it is annoying: it'll take three seconds longer to kill the bugger. At that range the assault rifle deals serious damage, so unless you've found the one support who is using speed endorsements you've got an easy kill. The shotgun is another matter, but it has much less range so you really have to let him shoot you with it.

The only serious threats that the support brings to bear against a good assault are the firebase (if you don't see it ahead of time), the air strikes (experienced support players seem to know all the right places and times to throw these things), and if he sneaks up on you with the shotgun.

ok?

Um fixed your error and your starting to lose me.

This mirror stuff sounds bad... Anyways i find the Support outside his base will lose to an Assault or both die. with both classes out in the middle of the field the Support has 0 ranged abilities, forcing him to find cover and pull the Assault to him. If the Assault is dumb enough to go right around the corner then he should die.
If the Assault is smart he will look for another path and see if the Support has his firebase out yet. If so he should back off and not fall for this clear trap. if not then he can keep his range advantage from a new vantage point. Meaning the Support will have to backtrack to the start or look for new cover.

The bomb is the assaults trap power. you set it down and wait for someone to walk over it. It sends them flying and you now have some damage on them and a quick DoT. its not hard to figure out how to use this. The airstike cant hit anything unless they are otherwise occupied or not paying attention.

I went over the trap already. A trapped Assault is a dumb Assault. The Supports jump is the lowest in the game. Aiming for his chest means when he jumps your still hitting his feet. The Heal/Hurt Gun's DPS is so low its sad. Someone who can aim (guessing by your trix rabbit comment you cant) can easily take a Support down. Another option is to charge grab. He jumps, just before he lands you charge, TADA you got him and he goes flying either off the edge or far away which means assault rifle time for the easy kill.

Went over this as the other option... this was an overly long unneeded. it just wasted my time to read and reply to it.

I never have to think about my builds unless i am feeling like trying a new strategy. I even change the Supports up...

Ok i agree the Support gets juice alot faster then any other class IF the stuff he is focusing on needs healing. The Support's only way to get alot of kills with out playing defensive is to Jucie up and run. Once the Jucie is over he is dead and has to go back to healing for another 2 minutes to get another 2 to 3 kills.

fixed it again for you. i dont agree.

A team full of gunners almost never loses either. right now people are overly using the support, the day this came out they were over using the Assassin. next week it will be gunners then tanks ect. People will find the class they like the most then it will balance out more.

First, sorry about the italics issues. I'm new to the board and wrote that tired (1 am where I was) so I wasn't too discriminating.

2ndly, I love the obvious assumption that I don't know how to play. Wow, talk about going into an argument/discussion/debate biased. You're of course free to your own opinion, but from the comments it doesn't seem like your mind was very open to an opposing viewpoint.

I play assault and support mainly (along with the Tank a fair bit), and a lot of what I was talking about with the support in this match up is what I do as the Support, not as the Assault. If I lock on with the heal gun and jump randomly changing directions with each jump, I almost never get hit by the assault's rifle and he goes down. Maybe I've only played against unskilled players, it could be the case.

I suppose I guess maybe the issue is that it just doesn't take much actual skill to be good with the class. It does with all of the others, but I don't have to try nearly as hard when I play support and if I do, my kill/death ratio is ridiculous. You may have plenty of your own strategies to deal with supports, and they might work perfectly, but you also might not have fought any decent supports.

I still feel that the artillery strike is a bit overpowered though. It seems to me that this one ability changes the class from "support" into a straight up threat in a way that is counter to the idea of the class. Or at least the name of the class. It has got to be some of if not the highest burst damage in the game (and the way it wrecks money balls, sheesh) not counting juiced up attacks.

That's really what your whole case is about: your feelings.

There's no good data or analysis of said missing data. If the support class was so overpowered, you could just make a team entirely of supports and get a 15k 20a 0d or whatever every time.

Then you could post those numbers and people would take you seriously. But for now, just try to get better at the game and stop griping in the hopes devs will program around your deficiencies.

longest "qq l2p" i've read in a while.