[Incompetent]

Very bored, can't sleep, inevitably my thoughts turn to PS. I couldn't think of a witty title so i thought of an eye catching one. Probably going to be a long post. I'm going to split this post up into 3 sections, Machine Guns, Mortars and Emplacements.

Machine Guns
I think there should be three types, light, medium and heavy. The light machine gun would use basic 9mm ammunition, loaded from you characters inventory. It's CoF would be similar to that of the Cycler and it would have a 75-100 round magazine. The trick here is you have to lock it onto a slot in your armor, possibly with an alt fire, possibly just by equipping it. This wouldn't take to long, but long enough to keep it from being abused in CQB. Once the weapon is locked in you could only move at walking speeds and would have a horrendous CoF while you do. (CoF expansion from walking would take far longer to reduce then from firing.) It would have a slightly better CoF while crouched, but the main disadvantage is the movement penalties. Turning speed would be similar to non-VS MAXes. It would have very little damage drop off at range, with point blank damage somewhere between that of the Cycler and Pulsar. Light machine guns are intended for the attacker, to provide suppressive fire against entrances and to provide a solid base of fire, while MA weapons would be used for the actual assault. LMGs would take up 3x9 inventory spaces.

Heavy machine guns would work differently. Heavy MGs would use either 20 or 25mm rounds (either or, I can�t decide which would be better), loaded from the same boxes as vehicles, and would require a second person to load ammunition into it the same way you load a vehicles trunk. (With an inventory that could only hold a single spare box) A Heavy MG would take up a 3x9 space and would have to be placed on a 3x9 tripod, which could be deployed by the shooter or an assistant. Both would take a substantial period of time to deploy and would thus make it ideal for defense or siege warfare. The damage and COF stats would be taken from the vehicular versions, possibly with a slightly worse CoF. Note that the heavy MG is intended to work in a two man team, one person who fires and carries the weapon, while a second person carries the tripod and loads the weapon. The assistant gunner can feel free to blaze away with his weapon when his services aren't needed, he doesn�t have to just sit there and stare at the ammo box. A very determined individual could solo with it, but only with greatly reduced effectiveness.

Medium Machine guns are a hybrid of the Heavy and Light MGs, and can be used either way. Medium MGs would use the standard vehicular 12mm ammunition boxes. They would take slightly longer to lock into your armor then light machine guns, and it would take less time to deploy their tripod and to make it ready for combat. A Medium MG could be placed on a heavy MG tripod if the need arose but the reverse would not be true. Medium MGs could be loaded either by a second person, or from your own inventory, but reloading loading from your own inventory would take noticeably longer. Medium MGs would have a slightly worse CoF when used in the role of a light machine gun.

All three would be packaged into a single three-point cert. Rexo would be required, as would MA. (Although anyone with MA could deploy /carry the tripod/ammo) Having them overheat could also be a possibility, with heat gaining relatively slowly but taking a long time to dissipate. Mediums and Heavies would have quick change barrels to reset there heat (heat would be tied to the barrels though, so if you switch a hot barrel back on the weapon would still be hot), lights would not. If the barrel melts, the weapon is useless and you have to get a new one. If you deploy a medium or heavy machine gun, you can leave it to go rearm or whatnot, but if you deploy another machine gun and/or tripod your current one will self-destruct. Machine guns can be locked just like a vehicle, and while your using it equipment pane will replace the default vehicle pane. That�s done. Minor note, if a deployed tripod is not equipped with a MG in less then, say, 45 seconds, it deconstructs.

Mortars
Mortars would be a nice, cheap, 2 point cert, which would give you too types, light and heavy. Rexo would not be a prerequisite, but MA would be. They would be deployed (and can be locked) the same way a medium or heavy machine gun would be, you drop it, it deploys, you can feel free to move about.

Light mortars would be usable by a single person, with the weapon taking up a 3x9 rifle slot. It wouldn't take very long to deploy, and it would use it�s own light mortar ammunition, from an AV sized box which would hold about 10-20 rounds. They would come in standard plasma/frag/jammer varieties, and do about the same damage as grenades with a slightly larger radius. It would have a decent ROF, and a very high arc. It would have a maximum range maybe 4/500 meters, and a minimum of around 50 meters.

Heavy mortars would are intended to be moved/used by two people, one too carry the baseplate, one to carry the tube. It's ammo would come from the AV sized boxes, but it would only have 5-10 rounds, with the three standard varieties available of course. The baseplate would follow the same rules as MG tripods and the second can feel to walk off, but should probably stick around since ammo isn�t plentiful. It would do respectably higher damage then light mortar, and have significantly larger splash. It would have a slightly lower ROF then the light mortar, and a similar arc. It would have a maximum range of maybe 600/700 meters and a minimum of maybe 100 meters.

Now, the hard part is targeting. I have two different ideas. The first is that a squadmate can place a small deployable camera (CE required, ACE device, limit maybe 2) which he can point towards the target and give the mortar operator a small picture in picture on his screen with which to aim. (The mortar user could check the main map for approximate range/distance.) This would be tied to the platoon, and if there is more then one camera the individual mortar user could select from a list right next to the view window. The other is to add in a targeter, similar to the laspointer. When a target is painted, a compass heading shows up on the mortar user�s mini-map with the range to the target just below the mini-map, with graduated sights on the mortar to aim by. This would be tied to platoon as well. However the rangefinder would be slightly inaccurate, possibly around 30 meters in any direction. However the squadmate who painted the target cannot tell how far off the targeter was, and would have to correct by sight. The marks on the map would be color-coded and have the painter�s number on them, which would also be next to the range. Done for that, now to the end of that.

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