I like the M4.  In the right hands, the lower recoil makes it just as formidable as the AK.  But, let's face it.  The M203 is too #### overpowering.  I never use it in duels because of how unbalanced it is.  I do find it useful in flushing out campers, but there's nothing more frustrating than nailing somebody down to 5% health with multiple shots and have them launch a nade just as the last bullet kills him and take you out.  

The forced reload is a good idea but the problem is no delay before launching.  The damage is usually done.  A better solution would be one based off the actual weapon's usage.  The operator must take his hand off the regular trigger and move it to the m203's trigger.  This is a delay in itself, but it would also be very difficult to keep your aimpoint true during this transition.

I think they should be treated as almost seperate weapons.  Sure, the weapon change time shouldn't be as great as going from, for example, a m4 to a shotty, but there should be a delay (with an appropriate animation showing the new firing position) when going from the standard firing mode to the launcher.

This would remove the "last resort" bs that pisses everyone off.  Also the accuracy of the nade should be reduced.  I've never fired one but I'm sure they are much tougher to control than the one in SoF.

The M203 should be left in the game but, obviously, something needs to be tweaked.  Even though I think people are too quick to whine about the m203.  What about the stopping power of the AK?  Or the M590?

The weapon balance is excellent in this game so don't take this as bitching.  I just think the M4 has a bad rap (understandably) and could be made respectible again with some tweaking.

For example... look at this guy.  What are the odds he hit anywhere near intended?

Notice the weapon has fired.

ANYONE would have trouble keeping their eyes open once the BLOOP! and recoil took place.

I have a thought about what you are asking though...

Maybe you could black the screen for 1 sec after firing?

I have fred a real M203 and I can tell yuo...your gonna blink. If your trained with it it is VERY acurate. As far as the tweaking, a little more kick is in order too. Imagine a cylinder 40 mm in diameter, approximatly 1 inch thick, filled with gunpowder. That tends to rock you just a little when it goes off. This is a weapon that can throw a 40 mm rock approximatly 500 meters. Just a little bit of kick to it...

very accurate as in being able to hit someone in the head at 30 yds?  

Besides accounting for the arc, it seems like the m203's accuracy is almost perfect.  I'm sure if properly trained you could be accurate with it and maybe you learn to deal with the recoil but something doesn't add up.  In my experience (which is limited) a heavy recoil does two things... 1)  Because you know the boom is coming, you tend to tense up before firing which can be bad 2) you need to brace yourself to properly absorb a heavy recoil.  This would limit range of motion and the speed of target aquisition.

Is there a way to simulate something like this?  It seems that part of the problem with these large weapons (like the m60) is there's no hinderance due to it's size.  You run around as if the thing were as light as a feather.  I know this is only a semi realistic game (thankfully) but when this unreality creates an unbalanced (too powerful) weapon, there's a problem.

I wish I could select just the M4 and no M203. Making the M203 an option in weapon loadout would be fine and it could take the place of grenades. For balance issues the M203 grenades could then be set as powerful as normal hand grenades to keep the nade spamming to 2 per person maximum.

When people get killed ALL the weapons they carry should also drop. So if you kill a sniper in his spot but he had a chance to go uzi before dying you can still pick up his rifle and shoot his buddies in the back of the head.  

I also wish head shots were kills, regardless of weapon (except maybe a shotgun pellet from far away), and regardless of armor. Notification of headshot would bring me much joy.  

I agree with u on the notification of the headshots thing... Nothing was more satisfying in UT than when you blew someones head off with the sniper rifle or the ripper and the announcer guy went "HEADSHOT!"... It would be a great thing for SoF, maybe even double kills/killing sprees etc, although that might be something for the modders to consider.