Now generally, people dislike the idea of pay2win. To the point though, I'm happy that it's at least possible to win with any weapon (excluding 1 clip artillery weapons) despite low tier vs high tier is not a balanced match up. Interestingly, new players may get the idea that you can beat any gun using a BAR so they buy the BAR from the start. Honestly, BAR can be easy if the player doesn't spar very well.

There used to be this one gun that seemed like a GOD weapon. That was the Shipka before Cloyd's nerf. A freeze rate of a handgun,(current one) a rate of fire of an m4, the damage of an m4, the ability to shoot 2 bullets at once, an arguably huge clip size, a fast reload, and is roughly half priced of a BAR. That weapon I was glad it was nerfed. Whether I had a Shipka or not. Everyone would buy a Shipka so that you become nearly unbeatable. The issue here was that Shipka practically gives the enemy at the top area in spar no chance. The highly unbalanced and spammy Shipka was the destruction of skill in Era. BAR was also OP, but Shipka took much less skill to use. That has been resolved now. Shipka eventually got nerfed.

Is era's guns balanced? Not really. Is it possible to beat BAR with Starter Guns? Yes, it will take all the courage and concentration you can get but be prepared for a long match if your enemy knows what he is doing. If you know how to counter rushers, then best of luck into beating the BAR. Be glad that you know have a speed boost that can help turn the tides of battle.