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This is my last impressions post with Soldier as we are on the last day of the playtest because I testing it in parallel with the War Of Immortals Class Playtest and the level 5 fieldtest of Soldier doesn't give particular thing to test. It's just a power increase.
As I completed the Plaguestone speedrun this time I skipped to the 4th chapter of the first AoE book to playtest the 4th level.
This fieldtest will focus into Soldier only. For other classes I will post my impressions in their respective forums.
Party composition
A human Animist
A half-orc Exemplar
A half-elf Soldier (from SF2 Fieldtest)
A hobgoblin Alchemist
Build
At this level my build completely changed my gameplay thanks to the Feat Punishing Salvo which made it possible to use the Stellar Cannon instead of the Rotolaser.
However, some strange things bothered me with the way this weapon (and advanced weapons in general, which even needs to have its name changed to avoid confusing it with proficiency). Why make the weapon consume more than one ammunition per shot instead of simply reducing the magazine size? I understand that it is to increase the cost of ammo, but honestly it seems more complicated than useful, just say that you need level 4 ammo.
The other thing that I think could have been cool here that wasn't done is instead of using a generic ammo and having the damage type defined by the weapon, it would have been much cooler if the damage type was defined by the ammo. This way we could have different types of warheads with different types of damage, it would be much more interesting and versatile and it is something that would make much more sense for a heavy AoE weapon like Stellar Cannon.
Impressions
Now with a weapon where there is no difference between giving an AoE or a normal attack, the Soldier's experience became much more interesting, as I always ended up suppressing a target.
However, I don't know if I played correctly due to the changes posted here on the forum. I interpreted it as me being able to do an AoE + one normal shot per round with the weapon due to the Punishing Salvo.
This basically made the Soldier a variant of the earth Kineticist, giving a 2d10 AoE with suppress effect on hit + a 2d10 attack with MAP-5 and reload every 4 shots (an earth Kineticist of this level gives 1d8+1d10 of tremor + 2d8 blast without MAP). Which in practice made it very efficient in both debuff and damage.
It was a very rewarding experience, I felt like I was being a DPR and a defensive debuffer at the same time and when necessary I switched weapons to my Elven Curve Blade to fight in melee, when an enemy approached the backline ( only happened once).
This added to the fact that it has a much greater range than the Rotolaser, especially when attacking in an area, made the experience much more pleasant. In practice, the class improved from water to wine!
This makes me think that perhaps the Rotolaser needs to be revised, because in practice it is weaker, heavier, the AoE uses much more ammunition (you can at most do 2 AoE without reloading if you choose not to shoot normally with it), with shorter range and a more complicated and shorter AoE to use.
My conclusion
It was fun and interesting to play Soldier.
The suppressed is a very interesting and very flavoful debuff, the class reminds me a lot of the archetype of a Space Marine from Warhammer 2K or especially a Marine from Starcraft.
However, its execution leaves a lot to be desired in terms of versatility. Being able to suppress with a 2-handed melee weapon makes sense, but the fact that these weapons are strength-based imposes a pretty nasty MAD. Furthermore, there is very little support in feats for this type of build, as almost everything is focused on AoE guns.
I wonder if it wouldn't be better if the class was based on strength instead of Con and put a Brutal in the use of big guns, that would probably completely change the experience.
It would also be nice to add things like Clear the Way, Hammer Quake, Unbalancing Sweep and Whirlwind Strike the class and make the targets hit also suffer the suppression effect similar to what happens with AoE guns.