One small thing: since taking down a tank is so difficult, tankers are forbidden from bragging about their K/D ratio.
If it has a crew of 5 every kill they get is only 1/5th of a kill, when I kill the tank that's 5 kills for me...
Why not have "Assists" instead of splitting the kill between the operators? But "Armour kills" sounds a lot more interesting though.
Aye, perhaps some kind of kill markings on vehicles to show off particularly veteran crews. I like the idea of having a load of Ork, Chaos and Eldar heads painted on the side showing my prowess for all to see. Visuals are another issue, one that I am quite interested in. I think that there should be a substantial amount of variation between an experienced tanker and and green one. Different marks of tank, battle honours, additional armour plates. They should be uniform looking enough to present a solid force to the enemy however still make each tank kill feel unique.
I think that rather than limiting the number of tanks we instead make any type of vehicle require a specific set of character skills. Thus we reduce vehicle spam as not all players will be capable of pulling out one. I also don't think we'll get a cash shop in EC as the game isn't F2P. Maybe we'll get unlockables through achievements and such. While on the subject of vehicle skins, don't go the PS2 route. Don't add stupidly flashy vehicles with underglows. It break inmersion.
Yeah, I was thinking more along the lines of Forge Worlds predator variants. The trouble with requiring specific skills is that the game is horizontally leveled. There's no upwards progression so how would you unlock the right to drive a tank? Even then you face the same problem as with Terminator Armour in that if everyone eventually unlocks it then you can spam them. I think they said how they were going to do termie armour but I can't remember. Also seeing as it is a class game where characters can switch between classes problems develop with which class you would use to unlock it etc. That isn't to say that Tank numbers should be limited. Perhaps the locations where you could spawn them are highly limited. Allowing for intense Tank battles around them and tanks support is valuable because it takes a lot of effort to get the tanks to where you need them. Or, on the other hand, give the war council the ability to allow large numbers of tanks to be spawned in a particular area by spending resource points. Just some ideas though, there may be a better way of doing it.
To be perfectly honest, I wouldn't mind "Vehicle Operator" being a class/skill tree that you have to invest in, just like "Assault Marine" or "Devastator". Though just what the return on that investment would be (other than the obvious privilege of driving heavier vehicles) I'm not sure. Manning the main gun should be available earlier than the ability to draw and drive your own, while secondary guns should be available to anyone who will fit in the seat. This way, anybody has an opportunity to experience any vehicle in some way, even if they can't draw their own or man the main gun. If there aren't "hard classes", then I would like to see loadout restrictions on the driver and gun seats. For starters, if you would take up two passenger seats, you're not going to fit into one gun seat! (looking at you, Terminators and Assault Marines) This serves two purposes: it gives people a reason to get in a passenger seat rather than grabbing their own vehicle (they get to keep their loadout), and it limits how much damage the crew of a destroyed tank can do after bailing. This will especially be important if sponsons and pintle guns are going to push our tanks to 5+ seats, otherwise every single vehicle would double as an APC! I also agree with granting an assist to the entire crew (but not passengers) when any one of them gets a kill. After all, they all have to work together to make the vehicle operate at the level it does, and sometimes there ends up being a niche seat like tail-gunner that doesn't see much action, but when it does you really want to have one. The driver should get a larger bonus than anyone else though, to compensate him for keeping the vehicle alive instead of getting kills for himself. If statistics like KDA are tracked, "driver assists" should probably have their own sub-category specifically to give drivers something to be proud of.
