One aspect of spearhead that potentially chases away new players.

[errant siren]

The spawns need to be reasonably close to the probe for obvious reasons.

Because of that, gold spawn armor can't be given out or we would have gold flame bots dropping directly in on the probe and it would just be a literal dumpster fire.

Because of that, the standard play has become, "Grab the probe, run to the enemy spawn as a team, wipe them as they spawn in one by one and we get .2 second kill times, bot them out for the victory.

I see 2 potential ways to prevent this from becoming a seal clubbing epidemic.

1.) Neither team can see the others spawn on the mini map. (Dangerous because the spawn locations are so random that you may run through the enemy spawn on accident just trying to get to the next probe)

2.) Gold spawn armor is active but disappears if you travel outside a radius equal to half the distance to the probe. This could be sensible to implement in warp rush (half the distance to the nearest warp gate from spawn, or a flat number equal to a manually calculated avg for easier coding) and Deathmatch (no gold armor if you travel 100m from spawn. An extremely abused feature by players with high lvl highly mobile bots to bully newer players with slower bots.)

On a side note, Ive observed MANY(and been one myself) people become very angry when they think they are being attacked by someone in gold armor all the way on their own side of the map when it's actually the double damage buff they have. Changing the 2X buff to glow red or something instead of the same glow would solve that and help a lot of people with their blood pressure.

[solid atlas]

Oh I had no idea that the 2x damage buff gave the same gold glow

[scarlet marsh]

Honestly, I'm not a fan of Gold Spawn armor in any shape. Its abused like crazy in every other mode, so I'd rather see that just go away after a few seconds of spawning, or after moving 25-50m from the spawn point. Too many people running across the map with it, recon, and repulsor and then wiping out half a team to not be addressed.

I'd rather there be six random spawn points. No team owned spawn points. Each Team randomly spawns at a point that changes every 2-3 minutes.

I whole heartedly agree that the gold 2x buff needs to be a different color for the exact same reasons, and because you should be able to differentiate between a mostly invincible player from one who still takes normal damage.

[white ledge]

Spawn armor should drop the instant you use a weapon, or hostile gear. It makes sense to give something to freshly-spswned players to allow them to get clear of a camped spawn, but it's not necessary to give them any offensive advantage. You don't need to be able to fight off people that are camping the spawn, if camping the spawn is made harmless via the defensive buff allowing you to get clear anyways.

Either way, the biggest change I think spearhead needs by a country mile is respawning, like with TDM. It's a constantly-moving king of the hill match- fights are going to be frantic and brutal.

[earnest nova]

They can also put a 2x symbol by the nameplate🤷‍♂️

[bold kelp]

Having 1 spawn zone in Spearhead is SUCH A HORRIBLE IDEA. My team is getting spawn killed over and over constantly because the whole enemy team camps it and waits for us to respawn

[tidal jasper]

The lopsided spawns. One team always has high-ground and the other has low-ground. One team always has their spawn closer to the objective(high ground advantage apparently isn't enough).

[solid atlas]

Maybe not closer, but has an easier time getting there

[vestal terrace]

You could design the mode so that you have to bring the samples back to your own base. If you die on the way, the sample will be pinged on the minimap for everyone to collect, and after 5 successfully delivered samples in your own base you win.

I still don't understand how this is counted in this mode. First, you conquer, of course, then you stay there and only defend, or you stay directly in the field of the test to collect...