Before seeing this QL I thought they were using the characters in the other game as playable classes allowing a dozen or so types of enemies on the field. Not just five generic character classes. That's bit disappointing.
They initially tried Paladins Battlegrounds which did just use the Paladins champs, but it was a balance nightmare. As it turns out, most characters with wacky kits and guns don't actually do well in a single life medium range combat BR game against a champ that just has a sniper rifle for example. So then they started limiting who you could play (I think it randomly chose 8 champs for the pool each match), and from there it just didn't add as much anymore. While it may seem initially less interesting, the current class system of making your own kit and swapping weapons definitely works much better for gameplay.
@godpinch: Havent played it yet myself but has several friends who have and have been loving it, especially praising the depth. It definitely hit all of them similarly to how it sounds like it hit you, which as you said seems to be the complete opposite of how it hit Abbey.
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