- last post: 01.01.0001 12:00 AM PDT
The idea of interacting with a drop ship sounds awesome, sort of like a reverse Firefight! the idea of buying or ordering weapons is intriguing to, but has a few weak points. for instance: a sniper gets a frenzy, or whatever the requirement would be, and buys a nice, big, scary weapon. of course the gun our lucky sniper buys is better than your basic spawn weapon, which ensures him an advantage over his opponents. now, consider the advantage our sniper has; after the other team kills him he pops right back up with another powerful weapon. if one team (or player) got a frenzy, then they would have a higher chance of getting another upon respawn. The player's K/D spread would shoot up and the winning team would get a ridiculous advantage over their opponents. If the weapons weren't good then the "shop" wouldn't be all that useful. after all, why buy a gun that is the same or worse than the one you have?
the concept would be great with a little tweaking. For instance: instead of kill based points, the point would be gained over time while the player was alive, and lost upon death. and instead of a weapon that could potentially unbalance the game, it could be a powerup or equipment that the player would automatically obtain and activate at will. if their were restrictions on when it could be used then the equipment would make the game more fun and interesting without unbalancing it unfairly.
The equipment idea I got from Halo 2. back then the good old Arbiter had his active camo, he would use till it ran out of juice and then let it recharge until he needed it again. This could really spice up gameplay in Reach's matchmaking if Bungie used a similar concept, with a larger variety of options (such as radar jammer, overshield and maybe a hand held shield generator like the jackal shield?!?!)
Your "perfect map" is a little contraversial. First I would like to point out that if Bungie could make a perfect map they probably would already have done so, unfortunately the challenge of balancing the spawns, creating an even enviroment that has no dominant position and structuring the spawn points so that neither team gains an advantage over the other is more complicated than we probably think. I still have to agree with you, if anyone could do it, bungie could. either way, bungie seems to have taken to fashioning maps to support gametypes, most maps focus on specific elements of the game. in a way, a "perfect map" would probably end up like the Assualt Rifle; a balance between all the important traits that fails to stand up against all other weapons. after all, the AR will always lose to the BR's better range, or the SMG's larger clip or the Needler's bigger punch. so perhaps a perfect map is as impossible as it sounds. Either way, Bungie is gonna do a great job and I doubt they will disapoint.
You have some awesome ideas, it is really great to here such interesting thoughts.