Should SOE remove the Annihilator and refund it's SC cost?

[Eduard Khil]

Can you post a poll:

Would you like SOE to remove the Annihilator and refund it's SC cost?

I just want to see how many people are on the same page.

I do not see options to make polls.

Thanks in advance.

[Hamma]

Usually I don't do this but I figured I'd humor you on this one :p

Added a poll to the thread.. I think I know the outcome. ;)

[Eduard Khil]

bump

[Rothnang]

All the people that are owning with this cheesy weapon aren't going to want it removed.

The giant problem with introducing things that are too convenient to be balanced is that people never want to have convenience removed. That's why we still see people asking for AMS Galaxies back despite the fact that removing them made the game a lot better.

[Aaron]

Knowing that the weapon can not be balanced properly, I'd say it should go. The situational choice between AV and AA was supposed to remain intact for balancing purposes.

[Ghoest9]

In this one case I sort of agree that shouldnt be here.

The dedicated AA and dedicated AV launchers are enough. Its ok to have to make choices sometimes.

[EVILPIG]

The Annihilator should never have been introduced. All lock-on weaponry at that. Especially A2A.

[SturmovikDrakon]

I'm with Evilpig, it should never have been introduced.

[Baneblade]

The Annihilator should be removed. I find I'm using it less now anyway.

[Sledgecrushr]

I only use the air lock on/dumbfire rocket anyways.

[Bravix]

Needs to go. AA or AV, choose. But not both at the same time.

[Koadster]

Now im glad I bought the G2A launcher, everyone raves about the Annihilator so ofcourse it got a nerf. the G2A launchers had faster lock on then the annihilator pre-nerf now its even more powerful :P

[Rumblepit]

you guys gonna cry about the swarm when they release that? fire and forget multi rockets...its gonna be aa and av aswell

[Aurmanite]

No one complained about the Striker in Planetside. I don't get how the Annihilator is different.

When people work together they become more powerful than the sum of their parts? What kind of shit design is that? amirite guyse?

[ghnurbles]

No need to remove it when it can be balanced.

[Hamma]

Pretty even as I suspected.. I was morbidly curious. :p

[cKerensky]

No one complained about the Striker in Planetside. I don't get how the Annihilator is different.

When people work together they become more powerful than the sum of their parts? What kind of shit design is that? amirite guyse?

A lot of people complained about the Striker. It gave TR an advantage that no other empire had (though the Phoenix counter-balanced this with it's own cheese).

[TheSaltySeagull]

No one complained about the Striker in Planetside. I don't get how the Annihilator is different.

When people work together they become more powerful than the sum of their parts? What kind of shit design is that? amirite guyse?

The striker was not fire and forget. You had to manually hover your cross hairs over your target to maintain the lock. But I do agree it is the closet weapon to the striker in ps2 which is why I use it. However if I had access to the old school striker with 5 round mags, dumb fire mode, and homing I would drop the annie instantly.

[TheSaltySeagull]

A lot of people complained about the Striker. It gave TR an advantage that no other empire had (though the Phoenix counter-balanced this with it's own cheese).

I played planetside on and off since its release and I never recalled any mass complaints about the striker or any of the ESAV. Most people considered them fairly balanced with each being unique and offering its own strengths and weaknesses. The only ES weapons that people ever really complained about balance wise was HA weapons.

[zauberkraft]

The worst thing about this shit is that i get locked over 6OOOm and ur constantly locked . No chance to do anything just hide hide hide

[Mox]

They dont have to remove it but to nerf it. Something like putting lock on range down to 100m.

[Rothnang]

When people work together they become more powerful than the sum of their parts? What kind of shit design is that? amirite guyse?

I don't think anyone has a problem with that idea, what people have a problem with is the fact that people are becoming more powerful by just pulling mass amounts of the same unit with the same weapon.


Infantry just does everything and has no substantial weakness. With enough HAs there is no unit in the game that can oppose you. all the support functions for the HAs are provided by other infantry, with the exception of respawns, which you need a Sunderer for - making it the only vehicle that still has real relevance in the game.

The only thing combat vehicles were ever good at was dominating infantry. Their only role in the game was keeping infantry from just running the whole show unopposed. Now that we've seen a long series of nerfs and buffs that have broken that effect of vehicles there is just nothing left that keeps people from just playing nothing but infantry.

Just yesterday they had an outfit on FNO that played with nothing but infantry, 120 people, nothing but infantry. Can you make an outfit that uses nothing but tanks and succeeds? Nope. How about nothing but aircraft? Hell no. Why should you be able to make an outfit that succeeds by fielding nothing but infantry?!

Yea, I get it, when vehicles could smack huge numbers of infantry down easily it was frustrating to play as infantry, but at least back then vehicles had a point to them, because you couldn't expect to win without bringing some of your own to counter the enemies'. Now you don't need vehicles for anything with the exception of the Sunderer, which is the only vehicle that has a support job for infantry that can't be done by more infantry.


Don't get me wrong here, I really really don't mind if infantry is the most important unit in the game because they are the guys who flip the bases. It just annoys me that the usefulness of vehicles was entirely based on being extreme predators of infantry, and now that they are pretty trivial to defeat for infantry armies that have no vehicles of their own they are just pointless curiosities on the battlefield. The only vehicles that still matter are the ones that enable their own infantry rather than destroying the enemies.

[Lafen]

Please remove the Bugs :)

[almalino]

I see no problem with annihilator. And I l play it only when I have both air and ground combat happening at the same time. It is VERY weak and slow to use.

Otherwise I use dedicated anti air or dumb fire ground rockets.

[Hmr85]

I would like to see the Annihilator removed. Fix the dedicated AA and AV rocket launchers imo.

[Rago]

I bought this not.Anyway i voted Yes.

[Tatwi]

I find it to be almost useless and would not mind getting my SC back. By the time it gets around to locking on, the thing it locked is impossible to hit - and that's considering it even had enough time/space to make the lock and then didn't fly off in the wrong direction.

If it wasn't broken and useless it would be fine. Should have a 90 day warranty so I can send this piece of shit back.

[Fenrys]

IMO there are already too many vehicles getting fielded, and not enough opportunities for infantry combat unspoiled by tanks and aircraft.

More ways to thin the herd is a Good Thing™.

[Graywolves]

Why not just make a maximum amount of lockons a vehicle can have at any given time?

I personally don't like it, but it'll give people a little extra time to react. Or for Annilihator teams to shoot at more stuff.

[Rothnang]

IMO there are already too many vehicles getting fielded, and not enough opportunities for infantry combat unspoiled by tanks and aircraft.


I don't understand why people with this attitude don't just go play CoD. If you have no interest in a combined arms game, you want to play infantry at all times, and you consider the fight spoiled if a vehicle shows up then what the fuck are you doing playing Planetside?

It's like if you played Skyrim and said "If only this game wasn't spoiled by all those Dragons, and I just hate swords!"

[Rolfski]

Like the Lasher, Skyguard and Burster Maxeas, these are team weapons. They completely stink on their own but dominate in team play which is exactly why they have their role: They promote people to play together so don't remove them.

[Rothnang]

Playing together shouldn't boil down to "Just spawn enough people with the same anti-everything weapon" it should boil down to "Create a diverse group of units that supplement each others strengths and weaknesses".

[Eliphas]

Playing together shouldn't boil down to "Just spawn enough people with the same anti-everything weapon" it should boil down to "Create a diverse group of units that supplement each others strengths and weaknesses".

This being true. A person should have to chose one class only and stick with it. But we are stuck with jack of all trades and master of none concept.

[HereticusXZ]

So what, a war taking place in the future and we don't want future weapons? Instead we want it to be like the Napoleonic Wars with pure infantry with single shot rifles just so we're all balanced?

It's a war for Auraxis, we use the weapons available to us, we develop counter strategies for the weapons used against us, Don't want lock-on rockets on your vehicle? Play smarter and cert into flares on your aircraft or IR Smoke on your tank, Pick and choose your battles instead of following the zerg into a bluntly obvious death trap. Don't complain that your banging your head on the wall and now you have a concussion.

I play with my outfits Tank Division, I enjoy the tank combat in Planetside2, we usually mandate IR smoke over the Prowlers Anchored Mode just because it keeps our tanks alive longer. Tanks also have cannons, there meant to be used at long range and not up close in melee so we usually stay outside of the enemies lock-on range so overall the Annihilator isn't a big problem for our outfits Prowlers because we play smart and get plenty of certs and kills because of it.

So why can't pilots play smart when no one has more maneuverability then a ESF when confronted by a opponent who is fielding lock-ons?

[Rothnang]

This being true. A person should have to chose one class only and stick with it. But we are stuck with jack of all trades and master of none concept.

I do agree that the game would be better if there were some choices in it that have to be made between mutually exclusive options, where you have to forego one thing to get another, but it doesn't have to be so extreme that you are locked into just one class.

I don't really think that restricting people to a certain role in any way is required to create a game where the combined arms concept relies on diversity. In a lot of ways the fact that HA with Annihilator is the ultimate unit currently is more restrictive than a system where you actually need different stuff, simply because working with an outfit most of the time requires you to play in ways that you don't enjoy all that much because there is just no need for your preferred units.

[cKerensky]

I played planetside on and off since its release and I never recalled any mass complaints about the striker or any of the ESAV. Most people considered them fairly balanced with each being unique and offering its own strengths and weaknesses. The only ES weapons that people ever really complained about balance wise was HA weapons.

I was *on* for quite some time after release.

At one point or another, all of the ES AT weapons got cry-babies ragging over them.

First it was the Lancer, the AV and AI sniper weapon. That got nerfed.
Then there was the striker. Specifically, MAX users complained about this (Vanu max jump jets? PULL!), but pilots did too. It received a lot of the same complains we're hearing now: It was too hard to pick out targets in the crowd.

Back when it was three shots, it was certainly complained about a lot, especially when you could dumb-fire the rockets, and then switch to lock on.
That got fixed, and then they increased the payload to 5 rockets, with less damage per hit. In effect, it was a nerf in some situations.

Then the last one people complained about was the Phoenix, and this one they never really changed. Man-portable artillery, they could sit behind rocks and pepper you, effectively making wall defences useless. It may not do a lot of damage, but enough of them will take you down.

[Eduard Khil]

Pretty even as I suspected.. I was morbidly curious. :p

Yup, have you done a check for bots moving the results?

If in fact the results haven't been tampered with, it is quite a bit obvious people are not looking for a challenging game with some form of complexity in it, a weapon like the annihilator is really bad for diversity in the game, people seem more focused on effortless gain than seeing balance, it is not as if we were asking for lock on removals, just adding a bit more complexity and situational armament.

I'd be careful if I were SOE, feedback like that turns games upside down.

[TheSaltySeagull]

I was *on* for quite some time after release.

At one point or another, all of the ES AT weapons got cry-babies ragging over them.

First it was the Lancer, the AV and AI sniper weapon. That got nerfed.
Then there was the striker. Specifically, MAX users complained about this (Vanu max jump jets? PULL!), but pilots did too. It received a lot of the same complains we're hearing now: It was too hard to pick out targets in the crowd.

Back when it was three shots, it was certainly complained about a lot, especially when you could dumb-fire the rockets, and then switch to lock on.
That got fixed, and then they increased the payload to 5 rockets, with less damage per hit. In effect, it was a nerf in some situations.

Then the last one people complained about was the Phoenix, and this one they never really changed. Man-portable artillery, they could sit behind rocks and pepper you, effectively making wall defences useless. It may not do a lot of damage, but enough of them will take you down.

The amount of complaints for ESAV at any time was minimal and the weapons received few balance tweaks over the course of the games life. Your statement that lots of people complained about strikers or any ESAV is simply false. The Jackhammer as a single weapon received more rage and attention then all ESAV weapons combined. Especially during the surgile days. The only people I have ever seen complain about the striker was MAX users because of the lock on. I never heard pilots complain about it because you could outrun the missiles in a mossie or reaver without even using AB. You didnt even need to do anything fancy you could literally fly in a straight line at max cruise speed and the rockets were too slow to hit you. You would have to just sit there and hover and let the rockets hit you. Which to be fair some hover spamming pilots did in fact do. But anybody that actually kept moving was safe from them.

I dont know what time frame you played the game but I never heard massive outcry against the striker or any ESAV. The closet to thing to it was people complaining about phoenix sniping. Which was annoying but hardly game breaking. But alas this is not about ps1 its about ps2 and honestly I dont see the problem with the annie or lock-on in general. If anything when driving a tank I am more concerned about infantry not rendering and thus getting blown up by invincible people than I am about getting locked on by an annie and its pathetic damage.

[maxkeiser]

Annihilator is fine as it is. Works well and gives competant ESF/lib pilots MORE than enough time to get away.

[Rat]

I voted no, just because not being able dumbfire it is a pretty big detrament when things get up close and personal, I own one and dont really use it that often, I use the decimator more often than not...the only time I really use it is when I know I am going to be at a long range for a extended period of time.

[Rothnang]

Annihilator is fine as it is. Works well and gives competant ESF/lib pilots MORE than enough time to get away.

If the whole battlefield gives you cause to leave you are no longer fighting.

[Graywolves]

If someone shoots me on foot I go behind a building and get my shields back up, maybe heal. Then use what I've learned and try to find a good flank or position to shoot from.

If someone hurts my tank I fall back and repair it. Then return to the fight and start shooting again.

When I fly a Liberator over a huge AA nest and make it behind cover for repairs, I might make a couple more probing flights to pinpoint their location, choose an optimal approach, and go kill them. I'm a pretty risky pilot though and don't feel like switching out my thermal so I hover like 50 meters above them, bomber gets a few kills and we die.

I only have like 1 or 2 levels of flak armor and no defensive measures on my Lib.


Even if there's 20+ guys dedicated to AA/AV nest. I guarantee you there's a viable approach to get the jump on them in a flyby.

If you immediately went on a direct approach for kills you have to realize that it's risky to do so. This is true in all parts of the game. Having tunnel vision as infantry or armor are just as deadly to you.

[Rothnang]

What good does it do you to do a flyby on an AA nest? You die, you get smacked with a timer, if you kill any of them the worst thing that happens is they might have to wait for a medic.

There is absolutely no proportionality to how much risk each side takes in a fight like that.

[Baneblade]

When the game stops recording death statistics, you will have a point. Until then, you don't.

[zulu]

I think something like the following could possibly work instead of just deleting the weapon. Range on the Annihilator (and to a lesser extent the straight AA lock-on) would be greatly reduced -- maybe 150m or 200m around the user. At the same time lock-on would be greatly reduced, as well -- so you've got a good chance of hitting an ESF that comes streaking in. Damage could also be increased a bit.

Bursters would have about twice that range. And then Skyguards would have about twice that. Skyguards would need to be buffed considerably. The best way would be to upgrade top armor, but I suppose that conflicts a bit with how the Skyguard is created right now. Would be better if it were its own vehicle.

But that would give HAs a specific air-defense role (defeat low-flying ESFs and Libs), Bursters a more generalized role, and Skyguards a role that hopefully counters all air assets (though it would need to be greatly buffed for it to fulfill that role right now).

So, in short, just reducing the Annihilator's range, as well as tweaking the range on other AA guns, might make aircraft play more fun and still give infantry and vehicles a variety of ways to counter air.

[Rothnang]

When the game stops recording death statistics, you will have a point. Until then, you don't.

Dude, that makes so little sense it's not even funny. You're saying having some little number logged somewhere that says you died once is what makes infantries infinite zero-cost respawning shenanigans balanced, but if they removed that number from the tracker then suddenly it would be a concern?

Yeaa, no, just no.

The fact that you care too much about your KDR doesn't in any way alter the fact that infinite respawn infantry has all the advantages in the game ever since they are able to keep their Sunderers alive without friendly vehicles to help out.

[Mordelicius]

Voted no.

Air units are still overpowered on account of a combination of 3 things:

Kills everything easily + Requires few resources + Accessible to everyone.

If they can make Air unit specializations:

- A2A - High flight ceilling, fast speed/acceleration, more health, less armor, very weak against ground units (including turrets), strong against air units
- A2G - Low flight ceiling, slow speed/acceleration, less health, more armor, strong against ground units, very weak against air units

As it is Air units are an all-killing machine. If you include its very high ambush rating, they are even more deadlier. Lastly, since the spotting nerf, they are even harder to spot moving at quick velocity.

[Baneblade]

Dude, that makes so little sense it's not even funny.

It's always funny.

You're saying having some little number logged somewhere that says you died once is what makes infantries infinite zero-cost respawning shenanigans balanced, but if they removed that number from the tracker then suddenly it would be a concern?

I'm saying your stance of 'infantry should just die, that's what they are there for' is fallacious when it will bend the statistics in your favor. You may not care about those numbers, but they do matter and saying yours must be improved while infantry's must be worsened simply because you are in a helicopter and they are on two feet? That's ridiculous. Should an infantry grunt win 1v1 against an ESF? No, but then I don't think the ESF should even be engaging the grunt.

The fact that you care too much about your KDR doesn't in any way alter the fact that infinite respawn infantry has all the advantages in the game ever since they are able to keep their Sunderers alive without friendly vehicles to help out.

What I care or do not care about is irrelevant. Actually, I spend most of my time in an MBT (which by your logic should win vs an ESF because it costs more) and regularly embarrass the shit out of pilots. As for the Sunderer being kept alive against your rocket spam? That's called teamwork, learn some.

[psijaka]

No.

The weapon may need balancing but this does not justify removing it from the game altogether.

[Mastachief]

I voted no. Whingeing pilots need to learn to fly and accept they cannot hover spam any more. Armour needs to learn better approaches and learn that they can no longer just steam in and click the iwin button.

In PS1 near every TR carried a lock on striker and the moment you neared any infantry you got lock on.

What happened?
1. Pilots in ps1 could fly and would hug the ground and evade the lock using the terrain to break line of sight
2. The Mini map showed the incoming missile
3. Pilots learned the different avenues of approach to get a run in on infantry and would nose gun them with 12mm pretty effectively, that's right kids they had to aim to get their kills. (of course i'm ignoring the reaver right now as most people had mossy only)

In this description i've only used the striker as an example. Take a look at the starfire or skyguard or base aa turrets or wasp all of them were massively powerful AA much more so than anything in ps2.

[NewSith]

If in fact the results haven't been tampered with, it is quite a bit obvious people are not looking for a challenging game with some form of complexity in it, a weapon like the annihilator is really bad for diversity in the game, people seem more focused on effortless gain than seeing balance, it is not as if we were asking for lock on removals, just adding a bit more complexity and situational armament.

I don't want to do any complex actions to kill a player that can kill me without any complexity. Remove the Annihilator and there are two options against MBTs and hoverspam - go get an MBT/ESF or be farmed.


So I vote "no" unless in return MBTs are made driver+gunner and Rocketpods get their splash removed completely.




PS Poll results only prove that vehicle to infantry ratio is 1:1, which is wrong on so many levels...

[bpostal]

Just wait till the striker to gets added.

[Rothnang]

I'm saying your stance of 'infantry should just die, that's what they are there for' is fallacious when it will bend the statistics in your favor. You may not care about those numbers, but they do matter and saying yours must be improved while infantry's must be worsened simply because you are in a helicopter and they are on two feet? That's ridiculous. Should an infantry grunt win 1v1 against an ESF? No, but then I don't think the ESF should even be engaging the grunt.


I'm not saying in any way that I need more kills and infantry needs to die more to give them to me, I'm saying that I'm annoyed that vehicles are increasingly becoming irrelevant to the overall game.

Base capture is the primary objective in the game, and that can only be done by Infantry. It's impossible for vehicles to dislodge infantry inside a base, so any kind of defense also has to boil down to infantry.
The one place where vehicles rule is in the open spaces between bases, but those are pretty much irrelevant, because people can just grab an AMS clowncar and drive it right up to the enemy base so they spawn inside the base. Vehicles are also not the best way to kill a deployed Sunderer, a few blocks of C4 or some mines work wonders, and can't be repaired through.

Sure, you can still pull vehicles and you can get kills with them and participate in the fight to some extent, but there is absolutely nothing you're really needed for.

Outfits that run nothing but Infantry, Galaxies and Sunderers are very successful in this game right now, but I dare you to find me a single outfit that does well by running nothing but Tanks or Aircraft. We have a "combined arms" game where vehicles simply aren't important in any way. As unpopular as that may be, if vehicles wreck infantry and you need more vehicles to stop them then they have a place in the game that really matters, and aren't just a curiosity on the battlefield.

[Hawgg]

I believe you guys misunderstand the usefullness of the Annihilator.

I play heavy assault more than anything else and have ALL the launchers, and will tell you right now, flat out, the Annihilator is one of the worst weapons in the game. When I saw this thread I actually thought you meant it should be refunded because it is so useless.

See, the damage on it is just SO LOW. It takes 4+ of these to take down a single ESF, and when are you EVER going to be able to get 4+ locks in on an ESF before it flies away?

Killing MBT's and Lightnings is impossible without other people assisting you, and even then you only get assists.

And you can't kill ANY infantry with it...so...



The only scenario I can see that you guys would think it is overpowered is if there is a group of 5+ coordinated heavies all using it at the same time to "one-off" vehicles. This argument is invalid for 2 reasons.

1) Other launchers can do this too.

2) It is not the Annihilator doing this, it is the teamwork and coordination. Why don't you just prevent players from coordinating? :P

[Rothnang]

How good an Annihilator is on its own is unfortunately completely irrelevant to what players in a vehicle get to deal with whenever they go anywhere near a battle that's large enough to have a whole bunch of Annihilators shooting at you.

The Annihilator makes mass infantry spam overpowered, not the individual soldier. (All infantry based lockon weapons do that really, the annihilator didn't bring anything new to the game, it just made the the bullshit more accessible)

[Baneblade]

Lock on weapons can be removed once ESFs can't rocket spam infantry. It's a fair trade off, you want to be left alone and so do they.

[zulu]

Lock on weapons can be removed once ESFs can't rocket spam infantry. It's a fair trade off, you want to be left alone and so do they.
Quite the opposite. As someone who likes to play as infantry, armor, and air, I can say that the main thing is that I'd like vehicles to be able to play a bigger role in large battles. Right now, once a zerg hits a certain level and there are enough rockets (lock-on or no) zooming around, vehicles (especially armor) often can't do much, and because of the timer (and to a much lesser extent the resource cost), pilots and tankers would rather sit back and play long-range artillery than get up front and support the infantry.

It's a complicated problem, since there are a lot of aspects to it and there are multiple conflicting goals.

This attitude of "oh well I just play A2A so I shouldn't be affected by desired buffs/nerfs to affect air-to-ground or AA stuff" seems to be kind of common, and I think it wildly misses the point of flying A2A in the first place. The various aspects of the game should be interconnected -- ultimately everything you do should have some larger consequence when it comes to taking and holding territory.


The only scenario I can see that you guys would think it is overpowered is if there is a group of 5+ coordinated heavies all using it at the same time to "one-off" vehicles. This argument is invalid for 2 reasons.

1) Other launchers can do this too.

2) It is not the Annihilator doing this, it is the teamwork and coordination. Why don't you just prevent players from coordinating? :P

Well, I think the problem is that it's fairly easy to reach a sort of critical mass where any zerg of sufficient size is likely to have enough Annihilators to deny enemy air from coming in, as well as to harass enemy armor from pretty far away.

And the Annihilator, by its nature, is significantly easier to "coordinate" (here used pretty loosely, since it would include two heavies on opposite ends of the battlefield just happening to point their Annihilators in the same direction... but to be fair that should count here as much as anywhere else) than it is to coordinate an attack using more difficult-to-use weapons. Attacking a tank with infantry in the open field (rather than, say, just popping in and out of a spawn room) requires exposing your squad, not bunching up, and hopefully attacking the tank's rear. Locking on from a few hills away and pushing the right button isn't quite as difficult.

And there's nothing wrong with that, but it creates a certain environment, and right now I think that environment just sorta sucks.

Infantry-on-infantry battles are fun, yes, but especially in larger battles I'd hope tanks and fighters and gunships would play a large role, perhaps a deciding factor.

[Rothnang]

Lock on weapons can be removed once ESFs can't rocket spam infantry. It's a fair trade off, you want to be left alone and so do they.

What ever happened to "rock paper scissors" huh? When people complain about Papers scissor repelling rocket launcher suddenly it's no longer "Well, get a rock to help out" but "It's scissors own fault for wanting to cut paper"... :lol:


In all seriousness, any "X is too good at killing infantry" argument is going to fall on deaf ears with me as long as infantry has a thousand ways of getting infinite free respawns. Don't get me wrong, I'd much rather see a game where vehicles are important to infantry because they rely on their own vehicles in some way, than because the enemy vehicles can sweep them off the field easily, but what you're advocating there is a game where vehicles and infantry don't really interact at all anymore.

[Baneblade]

ESFs are not anti infantry units. At least they weren't really intended to be, that is just a side effect of the way rockets work.

[zulu]

ESFs are not anti infantry units. At least they weren't really intended to be, that is just a side effect of the way rockets work.

I think that's an extraordinarily weak argument, given the availability of anti-infantry guns (they might be terrible, but they're there) for all of the ESFs and the fact that a "side effect" here (fragmentary damage) could easily be removed (just make the rockets have no splash radius and thus only good for anti-armor work) if the devs wanted to.

Moreover, why shouldn't ESFs threaten infantry? Every other vehicle in the game (with the possible exception of Galaxies) can threaten infantry, there's certainly historical precedence for single-seat Close Air Support fighters (from the IL-2 Sturmovik to modern strike fighters and attack helicopters), and their role is still limited when attacking infantry (they're very good at taking out one or two guys or a very-tightly-packed group, but they don't have much longevity because of light armor and the weapons' relative weakness), and other units (namely Libs) do the job better (or would, if ground attack right now didn't require a great deal of speed just to survive, which is purely a product of an overreaction against ESFs being too strong early in the game's development).

[Loban]

I believe you guys misunderstand the usefullness of the Annihilator.

I play heavy assault more than anything else and have ALL the launchers, and will tell you right now, flat out, the Annihilator is one of the worst weapons in the game. When I saw this thread I actually thought you meant it should be refunded because it is so useless.

See, the damage on it is just SO LOW. It takes 4+ of these to take down a single ESF, and when are you EVER going to be able to get 4+ locks in on an ESF before it flies away?

Killing MBT's and Lightnings is impossible without other people assisting you, and even then you only get assists.

And you can't kill ANY infantry with it...so...

This is exactly why I haven't bought it yet. I just stick with the NC Crow and Hawk and change my loadout during battle as necessary.

[Peacemaker]

Did they nerf the lock on times or something? I know they nerfed it by 1 second but It seems to be taking even longer now. It really made it more fair to be on the receiving end as you now have enough time to get from cover to cover. Getting caught in the open is still almost a death sentence.

The new lock on time defiantly brought some balance to the weapon, and it was needed. The problem now is it feels individually weak. I don't really see a problem with this, it's the same as spawning an MBT, Gal, or lib and not getting gunners. The other two launchers have 400m range and 1 second lock on. Seems good. The only thing I would like to see is the AA launchers velocity, it seems a little low for intercepting aircraft.

[NewSith]

Well, there's also one change everyone refuses to mention - missiles finally predict the movement of their target instead of just blindly following it.