So its not secret that I have been a big advocate for each Merc having their own unique primary or secondary weapon that no other Merc can use. While the majority of people either agree or at least don’t have a problem with it, Splash Damage have been honest and said the biggest problem is the work required to do this sort of thing and the amount of overlapping weapons you could end up with. Each weapon requires models, animations, skins, attachment compatibility, balance and feel. So I have to admit that even though I still see huge potential benefits to creating this stuff, I do still see the risk associated with it. That is why I have been trying to think of ways we could have a decent middle ground that would allow most of the benefits without most of the risks. I think the best possible system would be one that we have had in gaming for a very long time, from the early days of RPGs and most recently Call of Duty: Advanced Warfare. Elite weapons would allow Splash Damage to maintain the focused concept of each Merc, enforce the Mercs identity for the people playing and massively reduce the workload when compared to individual weapons.
One of the other current issues with Splash Damages design is that of “side grades” because the word is only a theory that I don’t believe can be considered real. The idea of multiple weapon selection for each Merc from a shared weapon pool means that not only would Splash Damage need to achieve something that no other developer ever has but even if they do manage it you end up in a situation where the words “side grade” end up following the definition of “irrelevant” due to your choice becoming meaningless. Introducing the idea of Elite Weapons will actually help mask some of the core problems with the current weapon selection system by allowing Elite Weapons to be actually better than the shared pool weapons and its own shared variant. Giving a Merc a slightly stronger version of lets say the SMG9 means they are less likely to stray from that weapon but at least they still have the choice to do so. This gives Splash Damage back the ability to balance a Merc more directly with their weapon vs possible weaker abilities and proficiency. Also this would mean you can have a larger variation between the shared pool weapons and make each one more focused for a certain task. This means that even though the shared weapon may be worse than elite SMG9, the task at hand and personal ability may still encourage a different weapon. Long weapon development could then switch from the idea of making a shared weapon and then making a better variation to making the elite weapon and then down mixing it into a shared version. This could increase shared pot constantly while new Mercs are introduced and you would have less reason to lock each Merc down to a certain number of weapons and allow them to use all weapons of a certain type/tier.
To make this appear like a real “elite” weapon I would follow the Advanced Warfare train of thought that would actually make small edits to the model and quite often the way iron sights look. slight pitch changes to audio could make that job much easier. You could make the weapon look different either by making it look different or just adding to the weapon from a back end special attachment slot. This would also allow you to directly share skins and just skin small additions that may even be achievable by substance style spraying.
The kinda advantages could be anything really… Larger clip size, lighter construction so you move faster, slightly less recoil and even 5-10% more damage. The idea is to make them better on paper and perceptibly but without making them better at all tasks. This is not a “side-grade”…
Second thing is what Potty said.