I've been putting alot of thought into skill combos and such. You know, Hack+Firebase. Yes, hack is great on its own, the firebase is a decent decoy/bot wrangler on its own, but combine the two and you get much more than the skills individually provide. This was the concept behind my Gunner grapple replacement: Mortar Marker. I was thinking it'd be a great complimentary skill that allowed you to rain death on turrets and such from quite the distance away. Increased skill levels would increase the effectiveness of the mortar when firing using a Mortar Marker. I considered a balancing aspect requiring you to deploy to take advantage of it too. So this train of thought got me to thinking that not alot of skills really compliment each other like the Hack+Firebase. Granted, that is the perfect combo so nothing is going to quite work like that, but still. Stuff like "Charge+Fly results in knockdown instead of knockback, determined by charge level." Thing Meteor Smash from Super Smash Brothers. Or "Flak does % more damage to targets trapped in a frost trap, % determined by average Flak/Trap level." Or "Using Smoke bomb while cloaked blinds targets longer, and gives a temporary slow effect similar to being hit with a gunner's deployed minigun" Or "Using Charge while deployed will deal full charge damage to any opponents directly behind you as well as setting them on fire." So along these lines, I started thinking about a class that is along the lines of these ideas, and works VERY well with other players. I call it COACH Weapons: Playbook: Attaches to a friendly pro like the support's Heal gun, but with a Tank's width of extra range. When attached to a pro, their rate of fire and reload speeds increase, and they get a slight buff to critical shot. Magnum Pistol: This revolver does good damage at close range in a relatively tight spread, but loses a great deal of damage at mid range to almost none at long range. Fast reload. Has a blade affixed to the end allowing coach to do extra right stick melee damage. (Thank you FF8 and Borderlands!) Skills Passive: Pro support aura. Increases armor and health regen in an aura around Coach, and persists for 10 seconds after they leave it. Level two: Increased Pro support effect. Level 3: Dual Wield magnums and further increased Pro Support aura effect. Reason for Passive: Coaches routinely yell "Walk it off" So the regen effect would be similar. They also motivate players to feats of skill and stamina, what better way to relate that to MNC than with damage resistance? Blue Skill: Skill buff. This skill will cause a pro to be in a "Buffed state" where their skills have increased/additional effects. A buffed snipers Ice traps might cause a slow effect for an additional 30 seconds if they survive being in the trap (from the sniper/other pros, of course!) or it might allow an assassin's cloak to be entirely invisible or be quieter, allowing her to get closer with it. A Tank's product grenade might fire two product grenades, or his deploy will grant him immunity from damage (but will negate the juice building effect) Increased skill levels of Skill Buff increase its duration. To use, attach to a pro using Playbook, then hit the skill button. Reason for Skill Buff: Have you been given special attention from the coach/teacher allowing you to focus better on the task at hand, or boosts your morale or other positive effect? Same reasoning here. Yellow Skill: Energy to Burn. This skill will increase your movement speed and jump height for a short duration. Afterwards, you are slowed to catch your breath. Level 1, small increase in speed/jump. Level 2: moderate increase. Level 3: Sizable increase, and reduced downtime afterwards. Reasoning: Most athletics coaches I knew of in High school were in damn fine shape themselves. This skill would let Coach get back up to the lines after a death, or increase escape capability, all while keeping in the "Coach" mold. Also, I think that at level 3 the coach should have the highest natural jump height (natural meaning non-skill asisted like the assassin) Red Skill: Inspirational Speech: Boosts the effects of the Pro Support Aura, and adds additional ones too. In addition to boosting armor/health further, Inspirational speech increases juice building rates for pros in the area of effect. In addition, the effect persists outside of the support aura for an additional 15 seconds. This skill would have a long recharge as it can really swing the tide of a battle, or break stalemates, or cause a push to turn into a charge for your team. Reasoning: You know about the inspirational speeches before a game that cause a team to rally together and pull out a win nobody thought they could get. Since there is no way to replicate that effect directly, we can implement it in mid game. Gives opportunity for some REAL FINE voice acting too!
I can't help but feel your new pro would be broken out of his mind. That said, I would totally play him. I really like the premise. The only thing I would change (other than balance issues) would be the weapons he has. His weapons just sound too similar to the support's weapons. Why not give him some sort of debuffing weapon, for getting away from pros, or stopping them from getting away from another pro? I realize that means he's pretty much defenseless on his own, but that may not be a bad thing.
That's the thing though. The support is deadly on his own. He doesn't demoralize the opponent, so the debuff wouldn't work as well. I borrowed heavily from how the support works for his Playbook weapon, but his secondary operates in a similar fashion to the SMG and Assault Rifle. That said, my attempt was to create a class that didn't do what other classes did, even if it does those unique things in a similar fashion. I also attempted to stay within the Sports theme of MNC. I also have to disagree that it would be an overpowered class, and should it EVER be implemented for ANY MNC game, I would assume that Uber would take the necessary steps to keep it in line with the other classes. That said, his power comes from other pros, and how he works with their abilities. For instance, he could be buffing the support so his hacks last longer or his firebase's fire rate is increased with skill buff, Buffing a gunner's fire rate by rolling with him and his playbook, He would have a difficult time dealing with bots/turrets, relying on the classes that can deal with them better to take care of them.
broken like a car after a wreck with a hummer. pluz, no way to get kills with him. unless you do like support and run around liberating enemy souls from their bodies with your shotgun diplomacy...
I think this is a very good and unique concept. The main reason that I think he would be unbalanced is that he would either buff pros too much, or not enough. Of course, Uber could just make sure he would be balanced with checks, but I think it would be very difficult. They could do it. The way you described the pistol made it sound like it would work similar to the shotgun but with more melee focus. I guess I just didn't see what you meant. I was thinking that it would make him more unique in that he couldn't actually damage opponents without another pro. But I can see where you're going with this.
Don't get me wrong, he CAN defend himself. His weapon would have to be effective against at least ONE class of opponent (probably pro/bot) or else he would have to get money for what the pro(s) he buffed did, otherwise having zero offensive ability would mean no income. I'm thinking the skill buff has the most potential to be abused, in all honesty. General stat buffs can be balanced according to the desired effect easily, while you have to consider a LOT more on how people are going to use a buffed skill. I would figure a balance would be one use of the skill, or a duration for skills that can last a long time (Deploy/Firebase) One use would be one ice trap, one bomb, one charge, one flak. one smoke bomb, you get the idea. I think this would increase the communication/teamwork aspect of the class. I would also want an obvious visual effect to both let enemies know and the buffed person know they are buffed. The Magnum Pistols were just an idea for a weapon, smallish since the Coach isn't a front-line fighter, with some range to it and good base accuracy since he doesn't have an offensive primary weapon. Dual wielded mags would have slightly less accuracy with double the shots and fire speed.
If you can't gain a kill streak or massacre bots then you can't compete with other classes who can gain $100 from a kill. Your only hope would be to follow somebody and pick up the scraps.
