anti air

[Warborn]

Originally Posted by WritheNC

Just cuz he is lead designer doesn't mean they will change their minds. Sure, he might have a fresh point of view, but he won't be there long if he plans on hammering in his own vision without consent of the rest of the team.

Lead Designer gets the final say in what happens and what doesn't. Everyone else gets input where appropriate, but he's the Lead Designer because people trust him to know what is best for the game.

But you're right about the second part, half of the vehicles in the game don't do jack or are too specialized.

There are a lot of ways to combat AA, but it's not the devs' fault if nobody uses them(Although part of the problem is sitting in an AA max on air guard is boring, and flying in Air Cav is fun, which is a big reason for the disproportion).

Not the devs fault that nobody uses them? Yes, it is, actually. If the various forms of AA aren't appealing enough -- meaning if it's not effective enough, or its negatives overshadow the benefits of using them -- then people won't use them, and the developers have failed to properly impliment adequate counters. It is never our fault in situations like this. This is a game, and if it's not fun for us, we won't do it. It's their job to make sure their plans get carried out, to make sure that using AA is fun enough for the player to get used enough as expected, and that involves them predicting what the players will do. If we aren't using something enough and thus something else becomes too common and therefore unbalanced, it's their job to make use want to use the first something more, so that things are balanced.

Although, to point out (this isn't directed at anyone in particular), I do not believe that the reason reavers and mosquitoes are the most successful vehicles in the game is because people don't use enough AA. The problem is that, unlike other scenarios on the game (seeing a tank, being attacked by a sniper at long range, being close to an AI MAX), if you see a reaver or a mosquito, and it's coming for you, you are almost certinly dead. If it's a reaver, unless there is a ton of AA on it, you cannot win. You will die, and that's that. You won't necessarily die against a tank, nor will you die against a sniper at long range. It takes skill on both parts to overcome the other, and although you are at a disadvantage, you can prevail. Against a reaver or mosquito, you can't. You lose, and it's a virtual guarentee, and that makes it extremely unfun. Nobody likes to go into these games and lose automatically.

And "well you shouldn't have gone outdoors" is a bullshit copout answer in response to the fact that infantry have no chance in hell against reavers or, usually, mosquitoes when outside. A sniper's territory is outdoors, isn't it? So why don't they one-shot kill? Why can't we make a grunt's death against snipers guarenteed too? Or how about AI MAXs killing infantry 10x as fast as they do now, so that you die basically before you have a chance to pull out an AV weapon when you see them (you know, kind of like bumping into a reaver or skeeter outdoors). After all, that's what AI MAXs are for, isn't it? Killing infantry? So why not? Or how about tanks killing vehicles in two shots, and infantry instantly if they're anywhere near the blast? Isn't that fair? I mean, it's a tank, just like how a reaver is a gunship! Tanks are suppose to be unstoppable on their turf, just like you're suppose to die if you run into a gunship, aren't they?

And while we're at making the rest of the game fit the reaver/skeeter paradigm, why not have AA weapons kill aircraft in a couple seconds too? I mean, they're AA weapons. You're firing missiles, or lasers! If infantry shouldn't go outdoors when reavers are around, reavers and mosquitoes shouldn't fly when AA is around. Right? That's fair too, isn't it? It's the same logic people use to justify the reaver's power against infantry, after all, so it must be correct if the reaver's current implimentation is good as well. Wouldn't Planetside be a great game if everything were balanced like a reaver? You wouldn't need any skill at all! You'd just walk out the door, and everything you're "suppose" to kill would die, and when something that's suppose to kill you came along, you'd die. That sure would be a lot of fun, huh?

If anyone else still disagrees, fine, keep thinking air cav vehicles are just peachy. But don't try to argue with what I've written, because there is no way you can honestly tell me that these vehicles that hardly any top 10 players on any empire, of any server, don't have at least one of, are balanced. Maybe they'd be balanced if Planetside were suppose to be an online game of paper-rock-scissors, where you either win outright or lose without a chance, but that's not what Planetside is, and these vehicles need to be brought back to reality and out of whatever acid trip funk created their current implimentation in the first place.