Scouting Done Right!

[Guardian548]

So in FireFall the role of the Scout class was greatly underrated. As a primarily scout type player this lead me to being quite mad. Sure players asked scouts to help all the time with things that they knew they needed help with but the scout got very little reward from it. Health was something you never had and you were only good past 300 yards where their bullets couldn't hit you.

If we can get a stronger role for scouts then I think it could lead to a far richer environment. Have scouts actually do what our class should. Armed primarily with a sniper rifle give us tasks and rewards for exploring new terrain, providing over watch during THUMPER operations and eliminating targets from a distance.

If we can set it up so that each class can be contracted for things of their class type it would provide a richer experience for every class, higher levels of skill and reliance of each other as a community to accomplish difficult or impossible tasks that we couldn't do alone.

Tell me what you think and any ideas you got?

 

[zdoofop]

only one omniframe for no, so only one class

 

[Vladplaya]

Or not have classes and just give multiple tools for our frame that we set up for desired gameplay. So if you want to be quick and run around with a long range focused weapon most of your time, that's cool, but I don't think every situation should be tailored to make you efficient and useful all the time. Sometimes snipers are just not very effective and simply not needed, that's why you should be ready to adjust your gameplay, customize your frame and fill in needed niches. This give diverse options for gameplay and keeps everyone useful and busy.

 

[zdoofop]

Or not have classes and just give multiple tools for our frame that we set up for desired gameplay. So if you want to be quick and run around with a long range focused weapon most of your time, that's cool, but I don't think every situation should be tailored to make you efficient and useful all the time. Sometimes snipers are just not very effective and simply not needed, that's why you should be ready to adjust your gameplay, customize your frame and fill in needed niches. This give diverse options for gameplay and keeps everyone useful and busy.

I think tht's the idea

 

[Guardian548]

Hm, I didn't think of it that way. Also I wasn't saying to tailor the game to one way I was thinking more of have different nitches set up for players to fill, but going along with the sand-box theme it would make more sense to have a single frame customizable for many different situations. On the flip side though sometimes have a specialist is better than a jack-of-all-trades. If we go with a single frame then we will have to include a wider range of items so that players can customize to specialize. Lol rhyme

 

[Vladplaya]

@Guardian548 I think that's the plan, although the customization might be somewhat limited in the beginning because of the smaller budget. But yeah, ideally there should be enough diversity in content to have something for whole sorts of gameplay styles.

 

[TankHunter678]

Scouts in general are not armed with sniper rifles. Sniper teams are not Scout teams. Scout teams aka Recons are typically armed with a general purpose self defense weapon, but they in general are to avoid combat. Combat wise they are for providing targeting for Indirect Fire Support, GtG Missile strikes, and Air Strikes.

 

[Torgue_Joey]

@Guardian548 I think that's the plan, although the customization might be somewhat limited in the beginning because of the smaller budget. But yeah, ideally there should be enough diversity in content to have something for whole sorts of gameplay styles.

Yep, no classes. WE'RE ALL CLASSLESS ASSHOLE. jk jk.

Customization toward various class-like, hybrid or self created 'class' playstyle.

 

[Beemann]

I was actually thinking very explicitly about how to reward scouting and such the other day. Here's some stream of consciousness ideas for it

Okay so whether or not we have a full map of the area we should not know what's on that particular blob of land, meaning we know where hills and mountains and rivers are, but not resources or enemies. If you see an enemy/node/whatever, they're marked for you until they pass out of sight for X number of seconds. To mark them for everyone, you need a beacon for static emplacements, and you need to dump your intel back at base. For living things no beacon would be necessary, but maybe we could have flares or something so you wouldn't have to run back to base every time. If you die on the way out or on the way back to base, your clone or nearest market equivalent does not have that information, so it's lost. With this system, lightly armored and armed units will be important for surveying areas and marking spots. Maybe beacons could even give a resource buff or something. In return, scouts would get a resource reward of some sort. Maybe beacon'd resources would give them a kickback, or maybe they'd get rewards upon uploading data.

To keep the job relevant and keep things from getting too stale, resources should move around. Maybe there could even be a weather based thing that would occur every so often and make the outdoors more hazardous while preventing thumping and providing cover for enemy forces

 

[Cadbane]

Being there is no classes in this game as stated previously. Missions or Jobs or whatever we are calling them could be tailored to different play styles. This more or less means, you have to customize your frame to each mission. So the mission determines what type of "Class" or frame you have to build to complete. Maybe the missions could have a classification (icon next to it, Bird for Scout type, Elephant for Tanking type, ETC...) so you know how you should customize (or pick a LOAD OUT!) to do said mission. Barring it is a solo mission not a group one.

 

[Beemann]

Being there is no classes in this game as stated previously. Missions or Jobs or whatever we are calling them could be tailored to different play styles. This more or less means, you have to customize your frame to each mission. So the mission determines what type of "Class" or frame you have to build to complete. Maybe the missions could have a classification (icon next to it, Bird for Scout type, Elephant for Tanking type, ETC...) so you know how you should customize (or pick a LOAD OUT!) to do said mission. Barring it is a solo mission not a group one.

This sounds a lot like the Ares Mission way of doing things, which I'd personally advise against. I don't think map markers for missions creates a good environment for compelling and reactive gameplay. I remember running halfway across the map just for something to do that wasn't thumping only to have the marker disappear because someone else had done it just then. I can only imagine the frustration if you had to pick out and set up different loadouts for each set

I know it wasn't just me either, because when I left missions I'd see people turn around and head in the direction of the next closest marker

That's also why I try to make my suggestions more general than tailoring them to a mission structure. There will always be a need for surveyors, there will always be a need for combat, there will always be a need for thumping and crafting

 

[Cadbane]

This sounds a lot like the Ares Mission way of doing things, which I'd personally advise against. I don't think map markers for missions creates a good environment for compelling and reactive gameplay. I remember running halfway across the map just for something to do that wasn't thumping only to have the marker disappear because someone else had done it just then. I can only imagine the frustration if you had to pick out and set up different loadouts for each set

I know it wasn't just me either, because when I left missions I'd see people turn around and head in the direction of the next closest marker

That's also why I try to make my suggestions more general than tailoring them to a mission structure. There will always be a need for surveyors, there will always be a need for combat, there will always be a need for thumping and crafting

Clarification:
I didn't meant to define it as the Physical way you go about running to complete the mission, it was more of a way to set up a Mission "Type", so you had the feeling of doing a scouting or defense type mission.. How it starts, runs and completes is not what I was trying to describe.

 

[avalon1k]

The scout class could have a light weight frame with some stealth abilities, but not much in the way of defense.

 

[Pandagnome]

if i was a scout i would like to project a holographic mech so the enemy will be oooooh attack
but it would not get it and realise what a nincompoop it was and the scout has successfully got past one!

 

[Beemann]

Clarification:
I didn't meant to define it as the Physical way you go about running to complete the mission, it was more of a way to set up a Mission "Type", so you had the feeling of doing a scouting or defense type mission.. How it starts, runs and completes is not what I was trying to describe.

Fair enough. When you mentioned icons it gave me the impression that you wanted a bunch of marked quests on the map. My bad

 

[Omnires]

In games the Armored Core series as part of building your mecha you can pick what kind of radar system you want and what kind of targeting system you want. This made it so that was not only possible hide from enemies by being out of line of sight but if you knew the limits of the type of radar they are using you could sneak up on them. As different radars had different ranges, different scanning speeds, and different scanning patterns.

So in arena based team combat pvp it was a good idea to have at lest one person on your team with high power long range radar systems just do you'll know where the enemies are and so you can use this like decoys, flares, and stuff to avoid getting hit by long range missiles.

 

[HighCaliber]

Whatever they do a scout class needs to be more than light and fast. It should have some sort of scanning or target marking ability. Make the scout good at actually scouting and doing recon.

 

[DARKB1KE]

There was no scout class in FireFall.

 

[Pandagnome]

I wouldn't mind a digger class
for hiding underground like a mole

 

[Omnires]

There was no scout class in FireFall.

To many people, the Accord Recon frame was a scout / rifleman class. That later became specialized into being an anti-personal sniper (Raptor was better at killing groups of soft targets) or an anti-material sniper (Nighthawk was better at killing armored / hard targets). This also why some players, like myself, also played their recon frames like ninjas, because in real life ninjas were mostly recon forces.

This because the word "recon" is short for "reconnaissance" meaning information gathering, with include, but not limited to, things like scouting, surveillance, infiltration, sabotage, and data mining. This also means they have to be really good at communication. (Part of the reason why the Recon class of frames in FireFall was also the best hackers and acted as mission coordinators, Aero and Fade being two recon NPCs I can name off the top of my head who acted as an backup command center communications was down or cut.)

Recons / scouts are always part of a vanguard force, also sometimes called a "spear head". The first wave of fighters into any battlefield or war zone who's job it is to break the enemy lines and clear a path for the main fighting force, this include taking out traps, encampments, and other things might slow down or stop the main force from pushing forwards.

P.S.
Because in FireFall "ARES" was short for "Assault Reconnaissance Extraction Specialist" technically speaking all the players and frames are part of a recon unit.