What do you think about the Riot shield?

[Leafbox_]

For some background info, i love the hostage gamemode, and i favor it as much as bomb defusal, even if hostage was slightly unbalanced before. Now, because CTs have riot shields, they definitely are a heck a lot stronger, but i think it's a little unbalanced too, because you can kill someone with a shield while also having their weapons thrown away if you hit them, which is kind of extreme, especially for a shield that is only made for protection.

Something else i found out about the shield is, that you can use it to distract enemies, at least in casual, and you can also use it as a protection on the back if your team needs to regroup, or if you are in a 1v1 with a T, you can flash your back a few times to increace your chances of winning.

I think it's a bit unbalanced, especially for such a cheap price. If anything, the price should be put higher, double the price is, in my opinion, better and more balanced. (to put that into perspective, 2200 is about as much as an XM shotgun, and a bit cheaper than most of the rifles.)

What do you think, community?

[MechARM_]

Atleast I can stay alive with the shield in 10v10 Negev Fest on Office Casual
:)

[Leafbox_]

Originally posted by MechARM_:

Atleast I can stay alive with the shield in 10v10 Negev Fest on Office Casual
:)

Yup, and they can't get away fast eneugh before you bash their head in with the shield.

[76561198984924337]

I played a couple of games with riot shield. What I saw was every ct getting a dam shield and all tt using negevs.

Towards the end of the game, you could see shotguns/negevs and shields. That's all.

This just killed all other weapons.

[Shiro♌]

It does ruin the game..
The shields shouldn't have been even added.

[NW/RL]

Cool addition but I don't see it becoming meta or even used somewhat often

[CoolINaturrBoy]

It kinda brings me memories from CS 1.6 days

[aK]

shields only work when crounch walking, many ways to counter it just in casual, in competitive it will make the game even more balanced. think y'all need to "git gud" instead of complaining.

[Shao]

Balistic shield increases the teamwork potential of CTs in Hostage since Ts already have a more powerful arsenal and positioning.

There's reasons to actually push smoke spam and be less of an AWP fest since the only reason why CTs could actually win any Hostage game for so long is because of outsniping and only outsniping, Ts pushing aggressively usually have the advantage over CTs as well.

In Defuse the Balistic shield is an unecessary thing to have since the situations are often even'd out by weapons and call outs, the objective is also turned on itself rather than in both cases if CTs have an hostage to rescue they still have to deal with the superior position of Ts spawn camping because nobody defends that part of the map usually.

The price is fine given how it makes the players extremely slow and they break quite easily to weapons that are typically used because those have good penetration.

Tactically speaking CTs still can get away with using weaker weapons with them because they can counter attack more easily opponents that mag dump, balancing the higher costs.

[monsef987]

they should add it to office comp since T always wins

[Leafbox_]

Originally posted by Shao:

Balistic shield increases the teamwork potential of CTs in Hostage since Ts already have a more powerful arsenal and positioning.

There's reasons to actually push smoke spam and be less of an AWP fest since the only reason why CTs could actually win any Hostage game for so long is because of outsniping and only outsniping, Ts pushing aggressively usually have the advantage over CTs as well.

In Defuse the Balistic shield is an unecessary thing to have since the situations are often even'd out by weapons and call outs, the objective is also turned on itself rather than in both cases if CTs have an hostage to rescue they still have to deal with the superior position of Ts spawn camping because nobody defends that part of the map usually.

The price is fine given how it makes the players extremely slow and they break quite easily to weapons that are typically used because those have good penetration.

Tactically speaking CTs still can get away with using weaker weapons with them because they can counter attack more easily opponents that mag dump, balancing the higher costs.

This is a very well thought out comment despite being a necro, so, I'm not even complaining.

There's a lot of things that makes Hostage mode unbalanced, yes, although to me, the shield is basically just a gimmick/a band-aid to a bigger problem, which is, in my opinion, the map layouts. The CTs have no ability of easily escaping, and well, the riot shield is useful to clear out a few areas, although I see it's uses only reserved to specific scenarios:

1. When a CT is going all in to a room that has camp corners (I.E the cardboard room in Office), they can either help another CT push or even take the room early game, although Negev spam on the legs basically counters that strat immediately when the room isn't just 2 meters long.
2. Mostly during escape situations, the shield is a good tool to make callouts with, for example, it's a good way to make a quick peek, and you could potentially trick a sniper into shooting your shield, although you can also just pull it out, peek and call.
Imo, it generally finds use when the one rescuing the hostages has to deal with a long hallway to get back to CT spawn, as there will probably be T's trying to hunt the rescuant (is that a real word?) last-second.
A third possible strat is to use the shield to protect players in general, sort of like a sword and a shield, or to help the guy who's rescuing the hostages to get forward, this relays back to the callout peeks.

I believe, despite the CTs having a better chance with a shield, I think the map layouts also kind of cheese these shields away, as a lot of hostage maps are long hallways where there's probably dozens of camp corners when you're trying to rescue, I believe for the CTs to finally have some sort of a balanced hand, there should be a map that allows the CTs to choose a better way to rescuing hostages, such as maybe advancing foward into a part of the map that only unlocks when they are attempting to rescue a hostage, and maybe having to wait at a place after that to rescue them, I don't know how easy it is to make something like that, but if it works, It would be a recipe for a genuinely balanced hostage *map* in my book. The riot shield is just a symptom of a bigger problem, as to say a tl;dr.

[Shao]

Originally posted by Leafbox_:

Originally posted by Shao:

Balistic shield increases the teamwork potential of CTs in Hostage since Ts already have a more powerful arsenal and positioning.

There's reasons to actually push smoke spam and be less of an AWP fest since the only reason why CTs could actually win any Hostage game for so long is because of outsniping and only outsniping, Ts pushing aggressively usually have the advantage over CTs as well.

In Defuse the Balistic shield is an unecessary thing to have since the situations are often even'd out by weapons and call outs, the objective is also turned on itself rather than in both cases if CTs have an hostage to rescue they still have to deal with the superior position of Ts spawn camping because nobody defends that part of the map usually.

The price is fine given how it makes the players extremely slow and they break quite easily to weapons that are typically used because those have good penetration.

Tactically speaking CTs still can get away with using weaker weapons with them because they can counter attack more easily opponents that mag dump, balancing the higher costs.

This is a very well thought out comment despite being a necro, so, I'm not even complaining.

There's a lot of things that makes Hostage mode unbalanced, yes, although to me, the shield is basically just a gimmick/a band-aid to a bigger problem, which is, in my opinion, the map layouts. The CTs have no ability of easily escaping, and well, the riot shield is useful to clear out a few areas, although I see it's uses only reserved to specific scenarios:

1. When a CT is going all in to a room that has camp corners (I.E the cardboard room in Office), they can either help another CT push or even take the room early game, although Negev spam on the legs basically counters that strat immediately when the room isn't just 2 meters long.
2. Mostly during escape situations, the shield is a good tool to make callouts with, for example, it's a good way to make a quick peek, and you could potentially trick a sniper into shooting your shield, although you can also just pull it out, peek and call.
Imo, it generally finds use when the one rescuing the hostages has to deal with a long hallway to get back to CT spawn, as there will probably be T's trying to hunt the rescuant (is that a real word?) last-second.
A third possible strat is to use the shield to protect players in general, sort of like a sword and a shield, or to help the guy who's rescuing the hostages to get forward, this relays back to the callout peeks.

I believe, despite the CTs having a better chance with a shield, I think the map layouts also kind of cheese these shields away, as a lot of hostage maps are long hallways where there's probably dozens of camp corners when you're trying to rescue, I believe for the CTs to finally have some sort of a balanced hand, there should be a map that allows the CTs to choose a better way to rescuing hostages, such as maybe advancing foward into a part of the map that only unlocks when they are attempting to rescue a hostage, and maybe having to wait at a place after that to rescue them, I don't know how easy it is to make something like that, but if it works, It would be a recipe for a genuinely balanced hostage *map* in my book. The riot shield is just a symptom of a bigger problem, as to say a tl;dr.

I didn't want to make another thread to share my thoughts so I went ahead, glad that flowed well.

The maps are definitely in need of changes. Like if they restricted Militia roof, it would really create more choke points rather than constantly having to deal with head glitching Ts because the map is hella fun when not everyone is camping with AWPs.

Needless to say, in my experience with coordinated plays the Shield is a game changer because it forces great trigger discipline from anyone against them because;

If someone decides to spray it, they're sacrifcing their weapon control and killing potential into the shield while a teammate behind shield user can counter and what not.

There's a lot of terrible angles that. Having a shield in the back can make a great deal of difference and it doesn't get damaged when on the users back.

Swapping shields around with other players while also having your back covered is pretty insane too, creating somekind of turtle shell that's not too vulnerable while one player can still go on about getting picks on careless enemies.

When we had Negev spam, shields still allowed us to safely peek and throw some Incendiaries in to get them out of the way while pushing further.

People switching to their pistols (Especially those people who don't buy a better one than the starting) in a panic Vs someone with a fully loaded whatever primary are likely to lose which is often funny to watch.

Finally I do enjoy the fact that speed is not really a priority in Hostage, sibce CTs can never get in position that benefits them, the shield speed is hardly a hinderance and even less when carrying an hostage since by default you're already at the lowest with the shield.

I've seen quite a lot of rounds being won becausr Ts couldn't easily kill CTs heading back to spawn or they'd be forced to spray the shield user which put them at a very bad advantage, if anything the Shield really encourages pistols to be bought since having a bad pistol is almost a guaranteed loss.

I'd say they are a good addition no less, players are simply slow to adopt it, it's the same as the AUG/SG553, I used those for a long time even when called a scrub but statistically speaking the SG553 before nerfs was literally an M4 that shot AK rounds at the cost of movement speed and people never wanted to pick it up or sucked with it so you didn't give good weapons away to the enemy.

Loving the AUG because buying it is like getting an M4 that had P250(before nerf) one tap potental.

Going off topic but I'm a dude that came back to CS after a long time, all the changes are refreshing, even if I don't like some of 'em.

[deinstitutionalization]

It's balanced. I think it is fun to play with or against in Casual, but I'm glad that you don't need to deal with it in Competitive since it would take the Casual gameplay away.