So this idea more or less sprung into my mind and I thought I’d share it. It may suck (as most of my ideas tend to) but a bad idea sometimes can trigger someone else to have a good one. So lets just throw shit at the wall and see what sticks!
ABILITY:
The idea I had is similar to the ammo packs and health pack dropped by existing mercs. Instead, what this merc’s ability would be is that he/she would drop armor (or armour since this game is set in the UK). The armor that is dropped would be a one time use HP booster. It would add XP to the mercs health bar on top of the default max HP. this HP is depleted first before the mercs actual HP. The difference being that the armor does not regenerate. Once it’s gone it’s gone.
Now, there’s obviously the concern that you could make any merc into a take this way, but I think there’s a way it could be balanced. First, the armor gained from these drops would have a set maximum across all mercs. It wouldn’t matter if you were playing Proxy or Rhino, you’d still get (say 30) HP. This could be topped off if you lost some of your armor HP, but it could not go above the set maximum. Another way to balance it would be that it takes time for you to equip the armor. You would have to stand over it and hold the use key to actually “put on” the armor. This would prevent tactics such as having this merc constantly throwing armor packs onto a merc to make them tank damage from the enemy. Finally, the number of packs this merc could carry, the time it takes to “put on”, and how long the cooldown would be would be balancing points. Another could potentially be a slight reduction in movement speed depending on how much of the armor is left.
CLASS:
I’m not really sure which class this merc would be. I don’t think they’d be recon, medic, or engineer. However, depending on if the “rules” for engineers change, he/she could potentially be an engineer. I think the most fitting would be either fire support or straight up assault. If fire support, I think an ammo station would make more sense than ammo packs, but really it’s six in one, half a dozen in the other. It also potentially could just be that their only ability is to give out armor as a fire support merc, since that in and of itself is pretty big.
WEAPONS:
I think rifles should be the primary weapon type for this merc. In particular, I’d really love to see a new rifle that bases it’s design off the FAMAS. It’s a very iconic weapon and I think it would look right at home in Dirty Bomb. As for it’s stats I’d expect it to be fast firing but lower damage than fully automatic rifles like the M4A1 and Timik-47. Their other primary weapons would be the Stark AR and M4A1.
For secondaries, I think the Simeon .357, M9, and Selbstadt .40 would fit well. Of course you could really argue for any semiauto pistol.
For melee, it’d probably be similar to most mercs. I don’t the the Kukri would fit though.
CHARACTERISTICS:
Because of the new rifle I suggested, I, of course, think this merc should be French. I know we have Aimee coming out, who is French, but there’s nothing saying we cant have another. Besides, we already have 5 American mercs on the payroll. If not directly from France in origin, he/she could come from another area with French influence such as one of their various territories in the Caribbean, around Madagascar, or in Polynesia.
As for their attitude, that’d be up for discussion. I really can’t argue for or against any particular personality. However, depending on what Aimee’s attitude is, perhaps uptight and a touch elitist wouldn’t be unfitting.
And finally health/running speed (since I didn’t think this quite fit anywhere else): If he/she is going to be a fire support or assault merc, they’d be slower but have more health since that seems to be the general trend of these merc classes. In addition, given their ability being giving armor, which is known for being restrictive on the wearer, them being tankier and slower would make sense.