Heavy Weapons (Vulcan / LMGs) still feel orphaned – can we Heavy Weapons (Vulcan / LMGs) get them closer to the rest of the meta?
:Hey Sleepers,I’ve been thinking a lot about weapon balance lately, and specifically about heavy weapons (Vulcan GAU family and similar LMGs).Right now they feel pretty orphaned. They have a cool fantasy and the “crowd control / suppression” description, but in practice the drawbacks (spin-up dropping your own shield, low shield damage, high durability loss, movement penalty, poor accuracy) are so big that they rarely feel like a real choice. Most of the time you’re just better off bringing a disruptor, scattergun, or going melee.I’m not asking for them to become the new top-tier meta weapons. What I’d love to see is the differences between weapon archetypes become small enough that we actually have multiple viable styles instead of one clear optimal path. A healthy game usually has several “metas” coexisting, where the choice is more about playstyle and situation than “this is just better”.A few possible directions that could help without breaking anything:Give them a bit more meaningful stagger / poise damage so the suppression fantasy actually works
Slightly better shield damage or a small modifier so they’re not completely outclassed by disruptors at their own job
Reduce the self-shield drop on spin-up (or make it start only when bullets actually fly)
Maybe a small durability adjustment, since high RoF already punishes them hard
I know Funcom has a lot on their plate and they’ve already shown they’re willing to listen on bigger systems (Deep Desert, PvE spaces, etc.). Heavy weapons just feel like one of those things that got left behind after launch and never really caught up.Would love to hear if others feel the same, or if you’ve found ways to make them work that I’m missing.Thanks