I know this is probably beating a dead horse, but I’d still like to see a respectable knife class implemented(no, not the wonky sword guy we briefly saw in earlier builds). Think proxy type speed with some body armor(enabling merc to close the gap and flee in tight situations) with a 1 hit kill knife. This merc could have throwing knives as a secondary to give them a little range(these would only be 1 hit kill on headshots and would really only be good for medium range attacking), and the merc would, of course, not be allowed to carry a firearm of any sort to make sure it wasn’t too spammy. As an ability I think a special flashbang that detonated on impact would be nice…very short range, but would blind and deafen anyone within range temporarily…probably wouldn’t want to give them more than 1 of these at a time. Maybe give this class that cloaking ability we saw ages ago(only make it actually cloak them this time) with the stipulation being that if you got a backstab you kept the cloak(until it ran out anyways) but anything else instantly uncloaked you and you had to recharge it.
I dunno, I just always loved the covertops in earlier games and really miss that kind of play style. On that note, why not the old disguised routine instead of the cloak? I think it could be fun, and would add another layer of depth to the overall gameplay. Then again, it seems like most ppl playing right now are all about the guns so maybe I’m just too nostalgic hehe.
Knife Class
I think a melee class could work if you gave it two bars. One armour and one health. The health bar is relatively small (just a light bodytype), the armour is supposed to take the brunt of the damage and will recharge fast once a player isn’t hit.
Such a system would reward hit and run style of play. This means the melee weapon itself doesn’t require to be as lethal. The player could enter combat deal a few blows/stabs and bail out again to recharge the armour.
There’s a couple of MOBA characters that work through this mechanic. It’s the best way for balancing an assasin type playstyle.
You could even the start tweaking the armour/health ratio and have robust tank like melee classes and nimble ninja type classes.
oh realy??watch me!
makes some insane tricks with his melee weapons, leaving everyone in the room speechless
If friendly fire ever becomes a thing you can use melee weapons to turn opponents into human shields against their team-mates in a way that ranged weapons can’t.
how would a ranged weapon not be able to do that? you can still make enemies cross their lines of fire
Once aiming becomes less of a burden (you’re swinging a melee weapon) you get to be much more mobile.
you can wave your little pointed stick all you want but a shottie at 5 meters will stop you dancing
That’s true, but if you look at games like BO2, a knife class was completely effective, assuming you knew the maps and played it right. Basically, the knife class setup was so fast that, at medium or short range, if you missed that first shotgun blast(which happened more often than you might think because of how quickly the knifer was moving), you were done. He would close the gap and kill you before you could fire the second shot. I have seen a single knifer round a corner and take down 5 players before they knew what happened because he and his attacks were so quick(and quick killing-considering his other many weaknesses the knife HAS to be a 1 hit kill. Unless we’re talking about when cloaked/disguised, in which case I would say only 1hk on a backstab, just to be fair about it.
If you gave the class some extra armor so they could take a couple hits before going down at medium range(or made it so 2 shotgun shots were required to kill them for example), I don’t see any reason why they couldn’t be good. Especially if you added some sort of camo\disguise skill to that equation. Sure they’d still be dead meat at long range, but that’s just the tradeoff for being more effective at close range. Plus if they were disguised, for example, you might not even realize it was them until it was too late. Or if they had a decent cloak, you might not even see them at all at long range meaning they would be killed that way much less often(let’s assume in that scenario they’d have to be “spotted” somehow by the proper class in order to see them cloaked at long range). The disguises would work much better imho though. It goes back to who’s paying attention to what their teammates are doing(did nail just run past me twice from the same direction? or how did nail get up here? I just passed him down there a minute ago…), which is also good because it’s another way to foster teamwork-if you’re not paying attention to you team and communicating the knifer wins. If you are doing all those things then the knifer will have a very tough time of it, but again, that’s the trafeoff, and what makes it interesting.
Suppose the knifer had that flashbang I mentioned and it went off in front of you…you’d pretty much be dead 90% of the time unless your teammates in the area came to watch your back asap. He could also run through the smoke screens (very quickly) and sneak in kills that way as well.
I guess my point is that if it’s balanced properly, and has the right skills attached, it could be quite viable, not to mention very fun to play. 
You might not want him in comps, but in pub play, he’d be super popular I’m sure. I even made up a little sketch of what one might look and act like, but I’m a little too embarrassed to upload it just yet lol.
Anyways, thanks for all the feedback you guys are throwing in; I appreciate it, and I quite enjoy debating the pros and cons of it.
I don’t think a one-hit kill knife class is viable at all sadly. Too many small chokes in this map, it would be incredibly frustrating to play against. It doesn’t matter that you can kill them at a distance, this character would be a pure camp short corners, score multikills individual.
The knife classes since the Cod4 days have been ridiculously easy to use. If they were going to implement one (which I hope they don’t), it should be quite difficult to use/get kills with, and not some foolish BO2 “hit x for an automatic kill” because of an auto-lunge where anyone within a 60 degree fov dies (your crosshair doesn’t even have to be on the guy…).
Slightly off-topic;
I’d prefer if they went with unique melee weapons (no auto-lunge and uninterruptible animations please), similar to what CSGO does with knives;
- A hockey stick (Canadians), a boomerang (Aussies), Basebat bat (yanks), a baguette (French players - j/k), Golf club, etc…
Wouldn’t that start to make it look too ‘cartoony’ and silly, like TF2?