Leaders Don't Need Big Guns

In Hitman's 3 August developer journal post, PFS asked me to "Stop trying to find shit" in reference to the carbine comment in Hitman's post, possibly eluding that there are either new weapons in FAS, or an old idea is resurfacing where those with the Leadership skill will receive a carbine of a rifle instead of the one they originally selected. When asked if that was because I was to close to finding something, or if I was waisting my time, he replied with an enigmatic "yes".

As to PFC's answer "yes", there can be three possible out comes. The fist, most obviously is that yes, I am trying to find information, when there is none to be had. The second, somewhat likely is that there are new carbine weapons in FAS. Going though the developer and Alpha Tester journals, you can see many post about the inclusion of new weapons and it wouldn't be hard for a new carbine weapon or two to be among them.

The last, least possible, but most intriguing answer is the revival of an old idea: those with the Leadership skill receive a carbine assault rifle in place of the standard assault rifle. This concept came about during the development of 2.6 and was nixed with many other ideas, such as female player models as well as some unique weapons like the WA2000. The carbine weapons were to be similar to their full sized brothers, but have less recoil (possibly less accuracy as well; not much information was given out about them).

For obvious reasons, this would be the least likely scenario to PFC's response. Carbine weapons given to those only with leadership would go against FAS's approach to skills. Using Stealth as an example, the skill dose not give you a suppressor on the M9, but allows for kills with the suppressor to not be displayed to the other team. Leadership granting a carbine equivalent weapon would be similar to the Stealth skill giving the M9 a suppressor. Also, a lot of work and time is going into FAS models; having a good half dozen only be assessable to players who pick a skill would seem to some as a waste of resources that could go into models that everyone would get to see. Lastly, if the carbines were to have different stats than their bigger brothers, such as damage, recoil, and the like, they all would need to be balanced and play tested.

This is all not to say that it is impossible. The carbines with leadership could only be for a few selected assault rifles, not every assault rifle. They could have the same stats as their bigger brothers. Lastly, they could be modified models of existing assault rifles, not completely new independent weapons (such as an AK47 or G3 with a collapsing stock). Finally, it would give those who chose leadership a unique perk, as the skill in past RCs has been very lacking.