New merc idea. Probably already in the pipeline this one but here’s a twist:
Akimbo, as the name suggests can dual-wield handguns. However, to make this merc truly unique, he or she (let’s make her a she) has a huge bag (or endless rows of holsters) with all possible handguns in the game.
Here’s how it works:
Her primary is a set of two handguns. She can only switch between the set of handguns and her melee. These handguns however, are randomly selected out of ALL the possible handguns in the game.
Her merc ability on cooldown is simply grabbing a new random gun and replacing it with one of the old ones. First her left, then her right, then her left again. Every time you hit ‘e’ the next hand puts away the old gun and grabs a new one.
This way Akimbo can cycle through the guns until she finds a set she likes or meets the situation best. Grabbing a new weapon is also faster than reloading which gives her an incentive to continuously keep reaching for new guns.
To still make reloading valid however, there’s the cooldown on her ability. I don’t know how the balance may work out but say she’s got a 30 second cooldown that stacks 3 times.
This way in order to play Akimbo really well you have to continuously pick between getting the combination you prefer by cycling towards a sweet spot or simply saving the cooldowns for faster reloads by grabbing new weapons.
Mind you, these weapons include pistols, uzis, revolvers but also sawed-off shotguns (if they appear elsewhere in the game of course). Also any attachments like silencers or whatever, they also appear at random.
Akimbo also lacks an ironsight feature. Instead she fires both guns independently between the left and right mouse button.
So basically, simple old concept. Pure-combat oriented merc but with a twist that requires constant deciscion-making.