I like it that it’s tough being a sniper in ET. Nothing bores and bugs me more than getting shot in the head repeatedly by a cleverly-concealed sniper with an overpowered (and often unrealistic) sniper rifle.
That said, it’s boring sniping in ET. The time invested in getting a single kill is shocking when compared to what you’ll get simply dog-fighting with an MP40. Furthermore, sniping doesn’t really serve any useful purpose on the ET maps, save for taking out machine-gunners (and even this is arguable, since I routinely shmoe those types with the MP40 also).
So, here’s my idea for making snipers useful while maintaining the difficulty level of sniping in ET: NPC Commanding Officers.
According to map size, NPC officers would be placed at strategic points, sometimes in positions to encourage sniping, othertimes to encourage the use of stolen uniforms (i.e. behind a locked door). Defense for these officers would rely on positioning. A sniper target would be positioned so that for a sniper to get a clean shot he would have to expose himself in areas with high enemy player traffic, making it neccesary for a sniper to wait for the opportune moment to make the shot. Covert Ops targets would have enemy players spawning around them, making for a more than adequate defense.
For successfully eliminating an enemy officer, a player would receive a appropriate XP bonus, and the enemy team would suffer the results of a interrupted chain of command: less supplies. Less ammo for fields ops, medpacks for medics, tools for engineers, heavy weapons ammunition for soldiers, etc.
While the loss of one officer may not be horribly damaging to a team, losing all commanding officers would almost certainly spell defeat by severely limiting how much ammo, medkits and such a player could dispense.
