February 2019
disclaimer: All scenarios i am describing are/should be between high level players.. Winning games with 20kills and 4000damage is fine, but it shouldn't be happening between equally skilled players... the skill diversity is huge in every match that you have new players facing the likes of shroud, making the majority of comparisons useless in a competitive setting.
Point being, all changes suggested has high level play in mind.
Right now the game is awesome in so many ways but where it's being dragged down is with the amount of reloading currently happening.
The issue isn't the reloading itself but more due to the movement reduction you get from it as you are constantly being slowed down when you are chasing or fighting, basically we feel hamstringed for no good reason. It is also contributing heavily to the complaints of TTK being too long, simply because you cannot maneuver around to counter them running away or taking cover.
It is also ruining 1vX fights and any chance to survive against players/teams who are actually half decent (if they coordinate and know how to move and aim), so even if you have superior mechanics (movement,aim specifically) you are screwed simply because you can't counter their attack, meaning an already uphill battle becomes a nigh impossible task simply because you are either defenseless or forced into a crawl...
Allowing sprinting while reloading would allow for more fluid combat and upping the skill ceiling just a little bit more (without touching the skill floor).
Instead what we have right now is one solid choice which is to go unarmed and run away (and hope you get lucky enough that your opponent is "bad") and most likely end up dying anyway, or heal/reload and pretty much guarantee your own death.
I would ask the developers also consider another pass on the reload times as pistols and SMG's are pretty much useless because of this.