VTOL vs STOL

[CraazyCanuck]

Yeah hard to dogfight with such a low celing. I've been trying to improve at the low flying acrobatics and using the terrain more. Usually go to Amerish to "practice" maintaining the "Freddy Flintstone" style now, but can get a little over confident. Wish my joystick worked properly with PS2.

[Riekopo]

I don't think it's a gravity problem. I think it's a problem of unrealistic inertia and physics. It also seems like there is a continuous thrust being generated from all sides of the aircraft. If more realistic physics were implemented into the flight model then that would fix this I think. However, the aircraft would then need to be redesigned. The ESFs could be made into dedicated air superiority fighters and the Liberators into dedicated gunships. Maybe a new fighter-bomber and bomber could then be introduced and a resupply galaxy.

[maradine]

There wasn't much appetite for a more complicated and realistic flight model early on, but I'd be pleased to learn that's changed.

[Rothnang]

I think the easiest fix to the whole hovering thing would be to make fighters roll and pitch much slower if they aren't at speed. That way if you're slowing down for a landing or to drop missiles on someone it won't severely impede you, but if you try to turn your fighter into a floating turret that simply wouldn't work.

More dogfights, more bombing runs, less hover-turret.

[Obstruction]

everyone wants to change everything in the main forum. i thought there was an "ideas" forum for that? this is the area to discuss current gameplay. i come here to see if anyone has done testing on different cert lines or weapons, check out cool videos and read discussions about patch notes, hotfixes, weird bugs, etc.

i avoid the SOE forums and the ideas section because of the butthurt whining and nonsense changes that people want. you honestly have no idea what the smallest changes are going to do in a game this complex, so you have to change one small thing at a time or else the whole thing could start to suck so fast you wouldn't believe it.

[Sirisian]

Originally Posted by Obstruction

everyone wants to change everything in the main forum. i thought there was an "ideas" forum for that? this is the area to discuss current gameplay. i come here to see if anyone has done testing on different cert lines or weapons, check out cool videos and read discussions about patch notes, hotfixes, weird bugs, etc.

I think you're in the wrong thread. This is obviously a discussion of the gameplay of flight in this game and some of the implementation issues after trying different cert lines and their gameplay in regards to ground combat.

Originally Posted by Obstruction

you honestly have no idea what the smallest changes are going to do in a game this complex, so you have to change one small thing at a time or else the whole thing could start to suck so fast you wouldn't believe it.

Indeed. That's why I suggested not making a large change from VTOL to STOL. There are minor changes which would just repurpose the existing cert lines. For instance hover would allow a person to hover more efficiently using less afterburner where as a dog fighting frame would give high efficiency in forward flight. Very minor changes without requiring runways or removing airpads from the game.

[Baneblade]

Aircraft shouldn't be able to fly below 50% speed unless they are landing, and to land or take off requires VTOL mode, which has a capacitor. Capacitor should be strong enough to handle even the worst take offs and landings, but once it is depleted, you better be moving or your ass is ground bound.

[Rothnang]

More hover restrictions make sense for fighters, but for the bigger aircraft that's hardly feasible. They can't engage in dogfights anyways, so they don't ruin air battles by turning them into hover dances.