Given the lack of Overclock in N4, I was looking at this and reminded as to why it's a pretty poor program.
I'm fairly certain they wanted to move away from that, given the change to the way Flash Pulse interacted with Fireteams. The thought was they wanted to move the game away from defense (barring a few specific pieces like the Kamau msr and fireteam).
Agreed that there were definitely several intentional nerfs to massed flash pulse bots as a defensive layer.
In a way I can understand why they did it due to removing Flash ammo and letting it be regular Stun ammo, but on the other hand I never really found the flash pulse spam to be much of a gameplay issue and they've removed Stun ammo as an option on most things that had it.
The question is more if it's a balance issue, I think. It's also hit Umbra's ability to defend themselves; previously a Legate in a core was actually pretty tough to gunfight due to flash pulse.
They were touching on that through accidental FAQs in N3 before, and the removal of B bonus from Fireteams didn't exactly affect only Umbras.
It was probably the most egregious example, as they were clearly given Flash Pulses for defense when their profiles dropped, and now they've kind of walked back on the intent of that idea while leaving the equipment. You're right it doesn't affect only Umbras, but since those are expensive units who were given Flash Pulses as a tool (presumably as a poor substitute for smoke grenades in a faction that wasn't supposed to have them). If smoke grenades didn't gain Fireteam bonuses it would sting much less. The analogy isn't 1-1, since smoke grenades don't usually inhibit the other model's ability to attack other troopers, but at the same time units that are good in CC dropping smoke on themselves is often functionally "you've lost your one chance to deal with this unit this turn." Their FAQs on the issue during N3 seemed pretty wrongheaded, like they were running on factually incorrect interpretations of the rules.
I’m not going to comment on rightness or wrongness of how flash pulses “should” work, but there are several high CC, high WIP, short range troopers that got them as backup weapons that are in a weird spot now.
Probably due to playtesting N4 :p There were a few units I think that gained Flash Pulse as a means of longer range ARO in the transition from N3 to N4 as well (like... Shikami). It's a bit interesting how the soft-disable of stun was scaled back so hard just as people started figuring how to use it effectively while they've scaled up a few of the hard-disables like stronger E/M becoming the old E/M2, I think more E/M sources in general, easier access to guided spam, stronger Oblivion, etc. They even snuck in a way to remove Stunned for Doctors...
I disagree, considering in the case of the Flash Pulse in Fireteams change they said "because it's not a BS Weapon" as a justification, when it explicitly was. I get the feeling that there was someone who was throwing their weight around at CB, whether an employee or not, who had strong opinions about Flash Pulses as a defensive tool.
Were they though? If you said massed flash pulses I'd agree, but the actual bots if anything got better at it. They effectively got DA ammo and a point drop, and were rarely boosted to B2 anyway. Now they just pass their pts savings and orders onto Tac aware TAGS. Linked flash pulses got a Nerf, sure.
I always figured Enhanced Reaction should have provided Total Reaction rather than B2 in ARO. Especially with the limitation to supportware being on EVO only, you aren't going to see it being spammed on a ton of combat remotes. The main place it would really matter would be on the combat remotes like Bulleteer, Tsyklon, Rui Shi, etc but as it is now, it's objectively better to just use Assisted Fire and put them into suppression rather than waste time on Enhanced Reaction. This would provide a better choice, giving you a reason to spend orders to swap programs between active and reactive turns. The biggest problem with this would be when those units join fireteams. No one wants to deal with the B5, Total reaction Dakini HMG buffed by an Apsara. So they'd either have to bake in some limitations to it's use in a fireteam, or they'd have to decide that a B5 remote hitting on 15-16's in the reactive turn isn't that much worse than the B4 TR bot with assisted fire hitting on 14's as well. Given that they both require the supportware order, but the fireteam requires a much larger investment, it's arguable. The largest issue I see would be Sixth Sense provided by the team removes a lot of the standard options for dealing with Total Reaction remotes.
Agreed, that's would make me use it and I'm aware of a lot of REMs that would like this. Would also reduce the value in the cheap-skates order REMs as ARO pieces and still do interesting things to FO REMs. Fireteam burst bonus in the reactive turn may not be combined with "bonuses or MODs" to burst. Being able to use the weapon's full burst from Total Reaction is arguably a bonus and it doesn't explicitly say it can be combined with Fireteam bonuses. A B4 Dakini with +3 BS from Core is bad enough, though :p
A B4 Dakini with +3 BS from a Core would just be the same as a Q-drone with assisted fire (Q-drone specifically to account for the Dakini's mimetism). It's a little worse if it's being buffed by the Apsara, but at that point you're paying for the extra setup.
Right, but I don't think it was OP either. You had to take an EVO and set up the program (typically meaning you start the game with only 2 cmd tokens assuming you go second and strip orders too). And it wasn't double as effective as B1, it's defeatable. It'd be stronger now off with Stun on the flasbots (and persistent supportware). But then stun is less permanent too so who knows. Can't see enhanced reaction getting a lot of use tho. Maybe in vanilla.
I've been vaguely pondering it on the Long Ya - going up to B2 with a panzerfaust and flammenspear seems cool, though I don't know that it is jaw-droppingly awesome or anything.
