devtrackers.gg
The mortar is an awesome addition, but needs a rebalance to be worthwhile. Lighter shells, and more spawned per mortar.
I'm the type to get excited about meme weapons and abilities, and actually use them, often to failure but sometimes to epic success. My crossbow's at level 100, I'm a master at rolling C4s into buildings for squad wipes etc. I love the idea and part of the implementation of the mortar, but you're basically throwing your entire round by taking it right now.
The two biggest issues are shell weight (30!) and amount of shells.
WEIGHT
A weight of 30 is beyond insane.
C4 is I believe 35, and a frag is i believe 27. Both of these have vastly higher chances of being useful and outright killing than a single mortar shell.
I was expecting somewhere closer to 15, so that I could really stack up ten or a dozen, maybe even 15+ if I'm pure focusing, not carrying other throwables and minimum meds/ammo.
Right now, I can really only carry maybe four, which can be emptied through a mortar volley in a few seconds.
AMMO SPAWN AMOUNT
But that also brings us to our second issues, number of shells. How can it only come with 3!
Mortars should be minimum 5, and really more like 8 shells spawned per mortar. That way I can have a decent volley available, and finding a second one (they seem verrry rare) will lead to a nice armada. But if the weight stays at 30, we couldn't carry them regardless.
Unless the devs really want this to be used how most players use Panzers; just pick it up, throw it into the sky for sh*ts, and go back to a normal gun and never think about it again. I looove panzers and use them tactically for great effect, but most people don't, and no one will use Mortars tactically in their current state.
WHY?
Because mortars are insanely hard to do any actual damage with. I've already discussed ways with my squad where they can support my aiming, when we can use them etc but as it stands these things seem like the least useful weapon or tool in the entire game.
Let us spam these things! At least for a few volleys. That's the 'mortar fantasy'.
Not only are they extremely unlikely to hit, but they're also FULL of downsides. They take an entire weapon slot. Their ammo is sparse and extremely heavy. Their shots give away your position, and take a very long time to reach target so there's a very long time between shots if you actually have a spotter to help re-aim after the first. The explosion effect hasn't been tested but doesn't seem terribly big, maybe bigger than a grenade but not by much, plus we don't know if it goes through walls. You're a 100% sitting duck while firing. You can't even fire from anywhere, there's big restrictions on ground flatness and material type.
So TLDR: Mortars will never really hit much anyways, but with super heavy and super sparse ammo, it's not even worth trying.
External link →