With the new BP soldier, and after learning the way he holds his PF is not only intentional BUT historical, I came with a funny idea.
It would be rather funny imo, and the best part, historical.
Haha, if they’d just add a sprint attack for the shovel and give it the same chopping animation as the axe, that’d be perfect.
Right now killing people with the shovel feels like using an ice cream scoop machine to carve up flesh, straight out of Five Nights at Freddy’s.
Most AI melee attacks are just elbow strikes right now.
But the kill feed weirdly counts them as telescope kills and TNT detonator kills. Total nonsense.
But we already can do this, just like with all AT guns?
(Are you serious? We can??? Did I miss something hilarious since the beginning?)
I would rather have a hard downward strike with significant Force and speed with maybe a 0.2 second cooldown before being able to do it again. This makes using the shovel better, what would honestly be even better is if they had a tap/click attack and a hold to heavy. This way you can have a few new ones.
As for the shovel and other tools they would act depending on how they are used, so a shovel can still dig.
boom stick time, yes
What’s next, bayonet charging shotgun double barrels and firing both of them to kill a APC? 
new melee feature: throw knives 
but swing that Panzerfaust would also me amazing ^^
Kunai and shuriken for Japan, and we are in business.
The military entrenching shovel itself features steel hardness, sharpened blade edges, and overall structural strength engineered to match chopping tools. It inherently comes with chopping functionality, and its force-bearing structure as well as grip mechanics follow almost the same logic as an axe.
Yes, you can even melee with a Luftfaust if you like
