How is it ok that a weapon can be a jack of all trades? Don't just ignore the balance issue by just dismissing it as what AR's are conventionally suppose to be; just because something is a convention does not make it good for games, nor balanced.

We are beta testers, we are suppose to test the game and give feedback about things like balance. You are suggesting that we ignore a balance issue and just "adapt or die"?
Would you have wanted the overpowered swarm launchers from many builds ago that could kill multiple infantry units with just 1 press of R1 to have remain untouched, and just expected people to "adapt or die"? Same for the unreachable tower camping dropships that were impossible to lock on with swarms? How about the precision strike spam fueled by boosting, should be people have just "adapted" to them instead of voicing their complaints?
Our job is not to just accept problems, our job is to report the problems so that the game will improve and become actually enjoyable.

I noticed that a lot of ppl say that AR is the only midrange weapon and that's why it's popular. To be fair it's also the most powerful short range weapon outparsing shottys and HMG in how it performs up close. This latter part is what makes AR so unbalanced.

True, but its a limit to how close you can go. If anyone who isn't another heavy gets too close to an HMG user, then they can circle him like a maypole... nothing raises the blood pressure more than being totally helpless like that.

That's the thing. I am a Heavy as well, and have had a Scout melee me to death in this fashion. With 135 being standard melee damage, it took quite a while. Felt like trying to kill a Rifter in a Tornado without webs... There is a sweet spot where the HMG is amazing, but most of the time people are too far away and in AR's prime range, or too close and in maypole range. I just wish heavy had the same turn speed as everyone else, or maybe a high slot module that increases turn speed and weapon damage, kinda like a Gyro-stabilizer in EVE.