Going with what the "community" has told continually stated.

Everywhere I looked when concerning heavies it was always "the Devs stated the sentinel was/is
designed for defense. Play your role!" or some such variation of that.

So I posted a thread and asked why that was the case. Apparently some Dev said it so it became
gospel.

But that was Amarr heavy/Sentinel specific. That's where that's coming from.

I gave up on hoping for a different perspective on the Sentinel line.
The rest of the racial heavies though... We shouldn't let them get screwed over into a "defensive"
only sort of role.

Edit: See MM's post above. Some variation or another.

Think... know this is dangerous... this highlights an issue.... or at least a mentalitly in the suits.

The specialised suits, assault, logi, sentinal, commando... arent "equal" in regards to how restrictive they are.

The assault/Logi are very wide ranging. The sentinal/commando are pretty definitive in what they do.

You say the sentinal is defensive. Its design is based on that... then shouldnt logi be strictly support?

Liking what you say up to the heavy bit makes sense

the sentinal role (atm) seem to just overlap with the basic heavy... just with a lightly different slot layout... it really isnt complete yet and personally i think it should never have been released... however much im craving new suits lol

Basic heavies... just feel a bit.... lame... by which i actually mean lame as in crippled

Bear in mind that any point defense role in RL is never done in a way as to let the enemy approach to practically CQC range and then engage it. Every realistic point defense setup is designed to prevent the enemy from approaching in the first place. If the enemy gets close, then point defense has already failed. Typical RL anti-infantry point defense weapon is the LMG. Now, what attribute RL LMG has that DUST HMG so badly lacks? You guessed it - it's range. Without range, HMG in not suitable for point defense role, no matter how powerful it is at close range.

HMG, as it is now, is an offensive weapon (or at least, it should be). To be effective, heavy has to close the distance between him an the enemy. And this is where the heavy/sentinel suit simply isn't up to the job. The approx. 500 extra HP (on average) it has compared to the medium suits amounts to a second-and-a-half longer life expectancy when tanking the ever popular AR. That's maybe 7-8 meters of distance at heavy's running speed. If you take into account the difference in effective range of the HMG and AR, that simply isn't enough. Also, expecting from a heavy to run from cover to cover, outflank, outmaneuver or "surprise" the enemy is clearly not something a sentinel can do effectively, nor what it is designed for.

So, basically you have a weapon that is good for assaulting stuck to a dropsuit that is only good for defense. The only other option is the FG, but that's a whole different story. Maybe when other heavy weapon variants are released (amarr heavy pulse laser?), sentinels will get the weapon with which they can perform their "sentineling" properly.

If you did that why would anyone use the basic?
The sentinal could get a HP boost, turn slower, but have a dmg bonus... or something i dont know, really need the whole line up and sort them all out in one go, with racial heavy weapons etc

So CCP gave a Minmitar weapon, to an Amarr suit, then proceed to balance the gun to reflect it's a short range weapon designed for faster suits to close the gap...hahahahahahahahahahhaha

Yea that makes total sense!

Give the slowest race, a weapon that requires CQC! Just call heavies a camping class and be done with it.

*cough* Forge gun squads *cough*

... what?... no theyre a bad idea ... why would anyone say such a thing...

*kicks FG under the table*



Have you never had 6 Sentinals "sprinting" towards you with Nova Knives... thats scary... you seriously cant move from laughing

It's funny that all of the other dropsuits have changed how they're used over this games lifetime and yet this amazing strategy of of dropping heavies out of a dropship was very common in the Tester's Tournament which was Codex I believe and was also used by many people in just regular pub games before that.

Other suits have evolved and shifted focus whereas heavies are devolving and being viable in less and less strats

*cough* logi assaults *cough*

@ChromeBreaker, @Marston VC and friends. I don't understand your concerns. Except I do. But CCP/Shanghai has some concrete mindset that Logis can only be one thing. First they were great. I was topping kill boards for WP or was at worst in the top 4 during Beta. That was shut off because Nobody like losing top slot to no stinking Logi with barely any Kills or Deaths.

Next for me, the Heavies were great fun. My HMG Assault was perfect with Sharpshooter and its Skills near maxed. Shooting Reds at 60-70m was fantastic. Except, CCP/Shanghai says; That is a No-No. Little Mercs cannot have fun, run a Heavy and kick butt. Now they have to be defensive. Only. At 20m or less.

In Uprising Caldari Logis were The Beast. Now they aren't. And CCP/Shanghai will gut them again no doubt because a Logi cannot have so much Shield/Armor and that will mean less CPU/PG. The Devs are never happy until all the SP is spent, unable to be refunded and the Merc feels like they have been ripped off with a bucket of now useless Skills into a Suit that just flat doesn't work. Wow! Perfect! Somehow most forget that LogiBros need to get Kills to get WP. Now some are having to carry a Scanner and get nothing for their trouble except losing WP ... again.

Tanks can be Sniper Rail Tanks, Blaster Brawlers and Missile Monsters. Except CCP/Shanghai wants to completely gut them. And once more an entire group of Mercs will feel ripped off, upset because their SP is wasted, non-refundable and wondering why they have spent all this effort for naught. When they finally drop the new Vehicles they will be frail empty husks that will be like paper (per Dev description). They will only be useful in the very limited concepts that CCP/Shanghai has decided. No other uses will be allowed. Turn on the Modules, attack and Flee! Run away or Die! Yep, sounds like a QQ Kitten Tank. As designed by CCP/Shanghai. They even seem proud of the fact that modules will run out faster. Wow. Fun.

Well, Heavies ... Welcome To The Freaking CCP/Shanghai Club.

You will have no role except what CCP/Shanghai wants you to have.

Don't expect it to get better. It won't.

Someone said my name?

OP, I just described my personal playstyle with the heavy, obviously it's a naturally slower, more armoured dropsuit than the assault. Therefore one of its roles can be circling the point rather than head on assault.

I can envision so many battle tactics using them though that I don't think we have shoehorned the heavy into a single role.

I have seen 2 LLAVS with 3 heavies blast past footslogging old me, with me showing on the point 30 seconds after a brutal slaughter and heavies roaming the perimeter, similar to assault terminators from W40k. The commando is definitely a role that we want to expand on in that regard.

Similarly with dropships deployment, maybe even remote repping the heavies.

Then we have the missing racials, I play Gallente Assault and it's much different from Caldari. I can only presume that the heavy differences will be similar.