Ze Post From Ze Muzzerland

[dm_cowsfromhell]

I vish to make some new emp specific reavers, no? So zat ah may feel zlike ze ved baron, no?. Ze first draft:

TR: big ol gunship.
Optimally crewed by two people, large and fairly slow, but can strafe at 80% of forward speed. Forward weaponry is a pair of heavy chainguns which accelerate during continuous fire with a rear turret (enormous turreting range) that spews faster, longer ranged rocklets like a fire hose. Heavy armor but lousy cof on both weapons for maximum area of effect.

NC: fighter bomber.
Same speed and almost the same armor as a standard reaver but operates on completely different principles; this thing is not designed to rocket spam, it carries a 20mm gun and a resonable number of plasma bombs (large splash and good damage versus nearly everything) has extremely bad brakes so as to make hovering in combat nearly impossible.

VS: air superiority fighter.
This thing, unlike the rest of vanu weaponry, is made to dominate at what it does, it has the speed of a mosquito, the armor of a reaver and faster AB recharge than either weaponry will be some sort of energy weapon with similar speed and half the ROF of a 20mm so that youll still have to lead your target. Can cloak over a period of 3-5 sec. This thing will be able to chew up air, maxes and light vehicles from long range, but it will do almost nothing to infantry. An inability to Kill infantry will stop this thing from actually killing someone once they eject from a plane, meaning that this thing will not neccessarily yield too many kills. It will be bait to all av weapons and im thinking that you could kill it with a chaingun before it got you. (note that this thing cant fire or afterburn while cloaked.)

Rather than stupid reaver upgrades or useless libs, i think that some varied, but not TOO good aircraft would really help the game funwise these would be available with a seperate add on to air cav. PS. how the hell do i turn off overtype?

[Warborn]

It would be nice if all Reavers were similar to your fighter-bomber suggestion.

But the air superiority fighter is where it would be at. We've got more than enough air vehicles to make air cover one of the most important things in the game. That's why the ability for one Empire to prey upon aircraft with such a fighter would be so beneficial. Thus I would hope ALL Empires get a Reaver variant which is meant to be an aircraft killer.

However, I would suggest it have homing missiles instead which operate under an identicial principle to strikers. Keep the reticule on the target, they home in. If the target can evade your lock, the missiles dumbfire and will likely miss if you can't get the lock back on almost immidiately. Reason I'm in favor of this over guns is because of how fast and durable this thing is. MAXs and vehicles would have quite a lot to fear from an aircraft which can move as fast as a Mosquitoe while still having the armor of a Reaver. Preventing its weapons from being able to lock onto anything but aircraft would make it nearly useless against ground targets, and thus, prevent itself from simply replacing the standard Reaver. Reaver to kill ground targets, Reaver variant to kill air targets.

how the hell do i turn off overtype?

Insert key. Above Delete.

[ORANGE]

Originally Posted by dm_cowsfromhell

has extremely bad brakes so as to make hovering in combat nearly impossible.

that would be cool especially if you've ever tried to get a vehicle while Hobbie and his gang are around

[Keebler]

I would like them to buff the lib's bombs if they did this, libs take enough pounding from reavers to begin with.

[Cryptica]

I like the NC variant and the VS variant, but the TR seems a little boring. Basically its a reaver that can rocketspam/machinegun at the same time. No good.

[EarlyDawn]

I'd prefer some kind of laser-guidance for the lib bombs. Maybe only allow one in the air at a time, and have to precision guide it down on the target? If the pilot can keep it in the air long enough, he should be able to actually get some effective munitions to the target.

[Duffman]

NO GUIDED AIR TO AIR MISSLES EVER

sry that would just completly ruin what little dog fighting we have

[EarlyDawn]

Probably going in man, Devs have said that the Mosquito will probably get that as a Beyond Battle Rank 20 Elite Ability.

[Warborn]

Originally Posted by Duffman

NO GUIDED AIR TO AIR MISSLES EVER

sry that would just completly ruin what little dog fighting we have

Well if the developers would allow skill back into the game I'd suggest that all homing weapons work like Battlefield: Vietnam's, or UT2k4's (for the aircraft thing) and not be something you can just point at, fire, and ALWAYS hit with, but rather something that will shift itself toward the target, but can be dodged, and needs to be fired at an appropriate time in order to make it hard for the enemy to dodge. Aircraft which sit and hover would be dead meat, but being on the move and such, as BF:V chopper pilots need to be, can stay aloft a long time. That'd be two birds with one stone. They could also increase the speed on aircraft with that too, because their survival wouldn't depend on their judgement and afterburn bar anymore, but rather their ability to engage targets intelligently. That'd make for some fun dogfights, if Desert Combat/BF:V/UT2k4 is anything to go by.

But if they want to keep the game on the same track then hey, more homing crap and never miss, whatever.

[Lartnev]

Originally Posted by EarlyDawn

Probably going in man, Devs have said that the Mosquito will probably get that as a Beyond Battle Rank 20 Elite Ability.

I wish you'd stop calling them that EarlyDawn as I don't think merit commendations apply to only BR20s. I know you're only trying to link them with the ideas that have been thrown around before, but it's kinda misleading.

If they add air to air missiles, I'm sure they will also add air countermeasures at the same time as their counterbalance.

[dm_cowsfromhell]

Hmm, ill post the second draft in a bit.

[ChewyLSB]

I was actually thinking about Empire specific Reaver's the other day, and this is what I came up with.

Common Pool Reaver: This would be almost the same thing as the normal reaver, except that it is manned by two people. The second person operates the rockets, and can aim them from straight forward to at a 45 degree angle down. The pilot operates the 20mm's, which are obviously fixed.

NC Hawk (since Falcon was already taken): Basically, a Dive Bomber. The pilot operates either a forward fixed 20mm gun, or his secondary, a single high ordinance bomb. This bombs work in the same way that liberator bombs work, except that they can be dropped at any angle. In fact, it's better to drop them at a steeper angle, so they won't go off target as much. (Think about the World War II German Dive Bombers) Also, the bombs are about 5 x more powerful than a single Liberator AV bomb. You can only use AV mode with the Hawk. The second seat in the Hawk is the rear gunner, which operates a 30mm. He is situated just behind the pilot, and his gun only goes above the plane, just in front of the tail. So he can fire to the left or right above the tail. (The inspiration for this came from World War II dive bombers)

VS Ionis: Vanu versatility is hard to translate to aircraft, as hovering aircraft isn't exactly special, and AP/AI ammo doens't work either, so this is what I came up with. The Ionis is special in one way, and that's underwater fighting. The Ionis is capable of going underwater without losing the vehicle. When you go underwater, there is no vehicle status bar. The oxygen bar lasts three times as long as a normal person could go underwater, due to on board oxygen tanks. Even without this ability, the Ionis is very special. The Ionis has a guided missile launcher operated by the gunner, the SideWinder. The SideWinder is very much like the Pheonix. It can be fired from underwater. In primary mode, the SideWinder is mounted underneath the Ionis, at a 45 degree downward angle. In secondary mode, the Sidewinder will rotate through the Ionis, and after 10 seconds, it will be mounted on top of the Ionis at a 45 degree angle. And vice versa for secondary to primary. Obviously, during the 10 second transition phase, you cannot fire the SideWinder.

TR Preyer: The Preyer goes through the TR motive, more is better. The vehicle holds a pilot and two gunners. The pilot has a fixed forward firing 15mm. The first gunner has missiles that work very similarily to the way the missiles in UT2K4 work. When you fire, it will home in on the closest enemy aircraft. However, it will only home in for a couple of seconds, so to actually hit the target, you need to plan ahead and lead your shots. The enemy will also get a missile lock warning. If there are no air targets, the missiles will go dumb fire, and the secondary mode will automatically make them go dumb fire. This is useful for ground targets. The second gunner operates dual 20mm machine guns, one on each side of the craft. These can be pointed from straight forward to a 45 degree angle up and down.

These aircraft all fill several roles. In an air to air fight, a Preyer will beat an Ionis, and an Ionis will beat a Hawk (assuming the pilots and gunners are equally skilled). However, for ground targets, a Hawk is the best, Ionis second best, and Preyer the worst.

[Onizuka-GTO]

Tails you have a good idea. i like it.

erm.. i mean Chewy.....

[ChewyLSB]

Bah. I have a good avatar, but I don't know anything about resizing gif's...

[Onizuka-GTO]