To me, the problem more spawns from the capping classes TTK. As a CSM I find that the bolter has become more and more useless as time goes on. Its TTK raises, despite my ability to shoot with it has stayed the same. As the rank average increases, its damage inevitably goes down due to toughness. Doesn't help that, in general, headshot detection is pretty god awful. There have been many scenarios were someones fully capable of running down a corridor into a bolter and lives...despite being hit along the way. This, even more so, with the amount of HoT and AoE heals for each race.
Tried swooping hawk and avenger, point blank enemy hitting all of my shots almost depletes my clip, and for bolters.....there are no words to describe the place they are in. In the end, with bad servers having lag which one will find your self dead the second after getting hit, you might wonder, wtf did just hit me, and then you get the kill screen which says "Nothing" but he hit you for this amount of damage. Melee seems to be able to cope with this.....i think...fuck it, i dont know what to think anymore.
There is definitely a meta revolving around melee in eternal crusade, your making all valid points but it seems to come from the perspective that melee is a secondary last ditch effort and not a primary system in 40k and Eternal Crusade. Which it is. #1- Melee makes up 40% of Eternal Crusade combat, or more, period. #2- Melee weapons differ greatly in tiers, meaning that a stronger weapon basically means a win. #3- Melee vs ranged will almost always win when it comes down to it. Ranged doesnt beat melee, distance does. #4- Defensive bash and dodge roll is not a counter to melee, it only delays the inevitable. So whats the solution to these problems? There technically isnt one. Ranged<Melee when they can get into melee combat. The only solution is to start playing with friends who play melee and are willing to keep enemies in melee busy. Unlike other shooters where melee is just a last ditch resort after you empty a clip, its a core mechanic in EC, and being a good melee combatant is actually a team effort. Lots of people just rush into melee combat not even thinking about what they are doing, leaving their ranged allies to fend for themselves against melee units on the enemies team. If you have friends or teammates who can lock down or distract a melee user, you have plenty of time to finish them off with gunfire. I hope this information is helpful. I know it sucks to experience the steamrolling effect that melee has on the unprepared but I truly believe its not melee that is the problem, its people preconceptions of what this 40k shooter game is and what role melee plays in it.
This is what happens all night as a tactical/traitor to me. Playing Devastator has its moments of fun and if you die in melee you can excuse it as "Ok hey melee is my hard counter because at range im really good". As a Tactical/Traitor your ranged isnt as good as a dev but you take a dirtnap just as easily in melee. Right now Tac/Traitor feels like youre playing as a guardsman in a match where everyone else is a space marine. Guardsman fanboys rejoice! youre in the game!
I see what your saying and its all very valid. I would only like to point that the tactical has more loadout diversity than the devastator and a much higher mobility and reaction time. Plus it is the objective capture class and therefore critical to a squads setup. Personally I wreck enemies as a plasma gun tactical carrying a melta bomb for destroying vehicles and 2 ammo restocks so i can keep my devastators stocked full of ammo as we progress.
Ive been with this game since we first started seeing gameplay, and ive been a 40k fan for a little over 10 years. My "perspective" is based on what is mechanically fun and balanced. Except right now melee are able to walk up to a tactical across and open field and eat the bolter fire and still come out ahead. Which is a huge problem. We dont need dodge rolls and defensive bashes in the game if theyre purely designed to be inferior and just delay the enemy from killing you. With friendly fire it means that most people wont come to your aid while you rip out your hair trying to survive and delay this assault because its easier to wait for him to kill you and then blast him so they dont get flagged for TK. Spoken like a true melee player. Its not me thats overpowered, its everyone else thats unprepared and delusional about how things SHOULD be! Youre not speaking to people who think this is COD or Battlefield, youre talking to 40k fans, because thats the vast majority of EC players. Its people that downplay the massive balance issues and problems with melee that make it look like its actually OK.
Part of the game's combat is to work as a team. When you stand alone you fight alone and you die alone. You brace a tiny little combat knife against weapons that are twice if not more stronger. You won't win the fight unless you get very lucky, the purpose behind the combat knife is to present a viable survivable option when you get engaged so your teammates can react and save you, or you can wind up a charged attack and hit an enemy in the back after they lost their armor in the duel they just won so you can pick your buddy back up. Tacticals have the word literally etched into their name, Tactical. Melee archetypes are specialized fighters that will excel in melee combat. A tactical shouldn't be standing in an area alone, they should be with their squad moving into the objective and pushing for it as a team. Teamwork is the most OP thing in any video game these days, because a solo soldier will always get killed by 2-6 people.
