Tweet from Game Designer TwoThreeSix: "The Engineer is the Demolitionist"

[LZachariah]

I'm extremely excited to be able to contribute a little recon for the game to all of you! Anyone who's read my posts knows that my favorite part of this game is Combat Demolitions (ie, infantry weapons + explosives). Well, I was very curious when I read Higby's recent mention (in that awesome 6-page PC Gamer article) about how Infiltrators get a good spread of combat engineering-style gadgets (including, to quote Higby, "C4"). Well, I wanted to know, who has the best bombs? I'm not talking about entrenched weapons or force fields. I'm talking about shredding a motherfucker with a shaped charge, ball bearings, or an incendiary blast. I wondered, perhaps, do Engineers and Infiltrators get the same amount of explosives, and they're differentiated by the Engineer being able to build "other" things and the Infiltrator being able to cloak?

NOPE. I asked Higby, who forwarded to the question to TwoThreeSix, whom Higby said is the FPS Game and Balance Designer. So here is my conversation with them:

LZachariah: @mhigby So Higby, who has superior explosives, Infiltrator or Engineer?

MHigby: @LZachariah @twothreesix is the designer for FPS mechanics and class balance, lets see if we can convince him to pay attention to twitter...

TwoThreeSix: @LZachariah @mhigby The Engi is the demolitionist. It'll have the best and most amount of explosive tools.



I am so fucking excited. Yes, it's only a tiny tidbit, but it's about my absolutely favorite part of this game.

Happy to contribute!

~Zachariah

[Hamma]

Nice good find!

[LZachariah]

Thanks, Hamma! My pleasure!

[TRex]

If thats anything like the engineer from warhammer online, count me in . Spanner in one hand to melee em, drop a turret and blast em with a shotgun while throwing grenades for maximum mayhem.

[LZachariah]

I dunno if Engineers will have "grenades," those are more of an assault-style weapon. I could see Light Assault (and Heavy Assault) having grenades, and Engineers having more complex, tactical explosives, for instance:

Proximity-Triggered Antipersonnel Explosives (like Bouncing Betties and Claymores)

Remote-Detonated High-Yield Explosives (like C4)

Proximity-Triggered Anti-armor mines

EMP explosives (remote detonated or proximity)

And who knows what else! The fact the TwoThreeSix said that the Engineer gets the most and best explosives, I assume there will be more than just those three or four kinds that I listed (as we've already heard that Infiltrators get C4).

[Crator]

Love engineering class! Always have. Can't wait to hear more!

[DviddLeff]

I hope that infils will have smaller explosives that are effective, but cant take out a whole tank in one go; its easy enough in BF games to stick C4 on vehicles even without being invisible if there is enough cover around.

[SKYeXile]

lets hope this is a new guy and the balance guy from PS1 got shot....if they even had a balance guy.

[Raymac]

Nice work, Zach. It's great at this point that 1 sentence can be enough to get us excited about something. This really is the fun part of development for us fans. There's a whole world of possibilities and we aren't yet jaded by the reality of what's left out or what falls short of expectations.

I just love the word "demolitionist".

[LZachariah]

Many thanks, Raymac Definitely my pleasure

[Xyntech]

That's awesome. Infiltrators using explosives is such a great gameplay element, so it was good when we got confirmation that infiltrators will get something like C4.

I am glad that infiltrators aren't getting the "biggest and best" explosives though. That kind of shit shouldn't just be snuck in behind you while your back is turned.

Engineer sounds like it's going to be a lot of fun. I hope the medics are just as interesting.

[CutterJohn]

So long as they minimize the amount of automated defenses(including mines..).

[Zulthus]

Mines are fine.

[Xyntech]

I don't really see the problem with any automated system, as long as it is easy for someone like a cloaker to disable them relatively easily if the defenses are left unattended.

As long as they aren't overpowered, I just don't see them hurting gameplay. It's not like an AI turret is the same as some randomly spawning PvE mob. I think some people take the whole "Pure PvP" think a little to literally. Does Team Fortress 2 stop being a purely PvP game just because of the engineers sentry gun (ignoring bot players)? What about fire and forget missiles? That's a form of AI.

I personally would rather not see engi's setting up fields of turrets like in PS1, but a few automated guns here and there could add to the game more than it subtracted.

I guess this is a pretty divisive topic though.

Either way, pretty cool that engineers will be taking a more active role in destruction in addition to construction.

[Malorn]

You could make the same statement for BF3. Though Support has quite a lot of kaboom potential as well.