ESF Air to Air Feedback for Devs

[maradine]

Originally Posted by SolLeks

Higher Flight ceiling will make no difference, speed is fine and why are so many people agenced the fact that these are VTOL aircraft? Stop thinking that they are 'jets' because they are not. Think Space helicopter / jet things (aka VTOL).

It would make a huge difference. One of the primary A2A complaints is that dogfights are ruined by flak intervention. Another 800 meters of space above the flak umbrella leads to some very interesting consequences, not least of which is pure air engagements.

[VGCS]

Originally Posted by SolLeks

Balancing around hackers sounds like a very bad idea. Currently there is no 'perfect' loadout as a ESF with AB pods will do better facing a ESF with rockets, a ESF with rockets will kill ground /libs better and a ESF with A2AM will be able to snipe enemy ESF and kill libs / gals more effectively.

Now, if the differences are enough is up for debate.

They're really not... and the legit players who just happen to be hacker-tier are even more unstoppable b/c A2AM's just don't work on them either. They spin around and kill you instantly before you can even get a Lock. I've been PODDED by some of them in a Dogfight even while twisting and turning AND using the Extended Afterburner tanks barrel-rol Reaver Climb. I dunno, maybe those guys were cheating too and I just couldn't tell but if they're able to do that legitly too, then there obviously IS a best loadout when it comes to Air-VS-Air, and the actual one the Devs added for A2A is not it... Partly b/c Pods also have large collision hulls which matter a lot more than Lockons when you're talking about Skill Vs. Skill. I'd personally rather have new A2A's that are Wire-guided or something. Or maybe act like like Flak... B/c right now all the A2A's do is make you waste time watching a red box turn Green when you could have just as easily gunned the BAD pilots down in half the time... And that gun?? The podders get the same Gun. That's not fair. I don't care what excuse you could possibly try to justify it with. Rotary + Pods is too versatile and gives them too much self-defense potential tacked on to all their AV power

[Whiteagle]

Originally Posted by maradine

It would make a huge difference. One of the primary A2A complaints is that dogfights are ruined by flak intervention. Another 800 meters of space above the flak umbrella leads to some very interesting consequences, not least of which is pure air engagements.

Except creating a space for air to be completely unreachable by ground, making ground defenses and terrain flow crafting completely worthless..

[VaderShake]

Originally Posted by SolLeks

Higher Flight ceiling will make no difference, speed is fine and why are so many people agenced the fact that these are VTOL aircraft? Stop thinking that they are 'jets' because they are not. Think Space helicopter / jet things (aka VTOL).

A 2 A combat would be better if they were more like jets and you added a helo varient. maybe that's what they need to do add a jet fighter to each faction, fast fixed wing, air attack craft.

Let the current Reaver, Mossy, and flying tiara act as the "Space Helicopters"

[Ice]

On the topic of xp distribution.
One thing I really hate is the constant kill-stealing that occurs with a2a combat. I'll find an enemy pilot, engage in the "constant circling" dogfight with him and put in like 95% damage. Then right as a I reload and circle around for a shot, another esf, or some g2a will finish him off, granting me partial xp. While this isn't that big of a deal, it happens quite frequently and gets annoying, especially with big xp rewards such as libs that have been farming or gals.

[Whiteagle]

Originally Posted by Ice

On the topic of xp distribution.
One thing I really hate is the constant kill-stealing that occurs with a2a combat. I'll find an enemy pilot, engage in the "constant circling" dogfight with him and put in like 95% damage. Then right as a I reload and circle around for a shot, another esf, or some g2a will finish him off, granting me partial xp. While this isn't that big of a deal, it happens quite frequently and gets annoying, especially with big xp rewards such as libs that have been farming or gals.

Fair enough, far more understandable then the people that whine about bail outs or decking on purpose to avoid giving the kill...

...Seriously guys, what makes you any better then us ground pounders who solo a tank only for the driver to bail and get away?

[CrankyTRex]

Most of what I'd say has been covered, so I'll just hit the things I'd like to reinforce.

I don't think raising the flight ceiling is a terribly effective choice. Anything that wants to hit the ground is going to be down at ~200-300m anyway, and those are the things the A2A craft should be there to stop.

It's kind of a catch-22. A2A can't really have a strong role so long as the AA does the job better (and puts the A2A at a disadvantage in combat), which it does. 2-3 Burster Maxes can lock down the sky pretty effectively, but the AA is so powerful because otherwise the ESFs can eat the ground's lunch.

As for actual combat:

1. Flight Physics
-spinning in place is boring and gives a lot of weight to who's certed out more. Aircraft at near-hover should be bricks. Inverted libs trying to pick people off with the tail gun should fall out of the sky. Using your altitude to gain speed and momentum should matter more. All of the AA seems to designed to force the ESF to act like a jet and then to kill a jet. Might as well turn the ESF into something more like the F-35 in BF2 and solve all those problems

2. Navigation
- it's hard to tell where you are, where other aircraft are, etc. I wish this game had a couple of more views, like a first-person view without the cockpit blocking everything. Just give me the HUD with a speed and an altitude indicator. As nice as the art is, it's just in my way. A head-on view, and a fly-by view would be nice too.

3. Bombs
-If rocket pods had been bombs that varied in type (AP, Napalm, EMP, etc.) we'd probably never have had the farming issue to begin with. Let's add some.
-Rocket pods need to only be useful at low speed or low altitude

4. Standard equipment
-flares should be standard equipment and everybody should get a secondary weapon to start with so that new pilots aren't at a disadvantage. We don't force infantry to start with just a pistol and no shield and ask them to cert for their rifle and overshield.
-with everyone having flares and flight physics coming into play, A2A missiles can have longer range and be less lock=hit/flare=block. It's silly to see a missile loop around an enemy aircraft and hit it in the cockpit. If you actually had to break after popping a flare, that would help too. If I'm aiming at something from above and to the side, the flare popping out the back is not going to break my lock or affect my missile.
-potentially add chaff and thus a radar A2A missile option.

Not particularly in favor of oddball weapons or sort of wire-guided missiles, but I wouldn't mind seeing how they work first.

Edit:
Almost forgot. Varied lock-on warnings. I'd like to know what is locked on to me. Is it on the ground or is it another aircraft?

[Ice]

Originally Posted by Whiteagle

...Seriously guys, what makes you any better then us ground pounders who solo a tank only for the driver to bail and get away

Not to spark this debate again , but once the pilot jumps out, he falls to apparent death, unless they are running light assault which only goes for like 1% of pilots. Thus any potential kill/xp is lost. Whereas the situation you've stated still leaves the chance of a kill, unless the driver suicides after leaving the vehicle, which I have never seen.

[Whiteagle]

Originally Posted by Ice

Not to spark this debate again , but once the pilot jumps out, he falls to apparent death, unless they are running light assault which only goes for like 1% of pilots. Thus any potential kill/xp is lost. Whereas the situation you've stated still leaves the chance of a kill, unless the driver suicides after leaving the vehicle, which I have never seen.

Except he's going to be worth more then 100 extra XP if it was a menace or a revenge kill...
...If he's been that much of a problem you might as well just be thankful for getting him out of the sky.

[ChipMHazard]

I would personally prefer some more drastic changes be made to the ESFs, instead of just trying to add on new weapons and tweak the old ones. Kinda think that you guys shot yourselves in the foot when you made the ESF this versatile, going to be hard introducing other aircraft now.

http://www.planetside-universe.com/s...ad.php?t=54887

But... Make a choice with the current rocket pods. Have the rockets deal splash damage only or deal very little splash damage/have a smaller splash radius. Make them AI or AT, not both. Alternatively you could,as has already been suggested, make rocket variants. Could even have one rocket type that's meant to be used against other ESFs: Fast, direct hit damage only, a new damage type that doesn't work well against tank armour.
I like the idea of making the current A2A missiles into slow heavy hitting Jachhammers, the idea of having reticule lock-on long/medium range A2A missiles and EMP missiles(They won't make the ESF drop like a rock, just disable its other systems leaving only flight controls and nose gun).

I also agree with increasing the flight ceiling. Think everyone else has already covered any other thoughts I might have on the subject.

[maradine]

Originally Posted by Whiteagle

Except creating a space for air to be completely unreachable by ground, making ground defenses and terrain flow crafting completely worthless..

Who cares if they're unreachable? They have to fly into the umbrella to have any effect below. Weapon ranges still apply, and terrain flow has always been something air can engage with or avoid at will. Plus, your fighter cover is presumably up there.

[Whiteagle]

Originally Posted by maradine

Who cares if they're unreachable? They have to fly into the umbrella to have any effect below.

And they can fly back up to auto repair and then dip back down.

You guys complain about Burster MAXes doing the same thing with tiny Spawn Rooms and shields, imagine a shield 14 square kilometers that Roflpods and Libs can duck behind...

This would also kibosh any plans for Aerial repair and resupply, since an Air Fortress or Support Galaxy will just sit up there nigh unassailable.

Originally Posted by maradine

Plus, your fighter cover is presumably up there.

If you even HAVE fighter cover to begin with!

Remember Burster were buffed to the point they're at now because the Developers originally wanted AIR to be the primary source of Anti-air...
Since good dedicated Air Superiority are a rare breed, this left most forces shit-out-of-luck when the much more common Air-Cav came around to blow all their crap up.

I'm not saying their shouldn't be a place for Air to fight Air, you guys should get a theater of your own, but if you put that area right ABOVE Ground Combat there are going to be issues.

Personally, I'd wait for intercontinental Oceans, a place where their isn't going to be much Infantry Combat period.

[maradine]

Intercontinental oceans as a traversable combat area is the longest of long odds - hoping for that as a fix is akin to waiting for the sequel.

Let me also set something straight - I think the current air/ground balance is great. I enjoy flakpacking the shit out of things, I enjoy pure dogfighting, and I enjoy the unfortunate and ridiculous monoculture that ESF fits have become. I'd be perfectly happy if nothing changed. But clearly a lot of people are not.

In that context, we change something.

So what if fighters can burn two minutes above the umbrella waiting for nano to regen? They're shot up, not carrying composite, and they're vulnerable to fighters - fighters which a whole bunch of people in this thread want to be. You exclaim "If you even HAVE fighter cover to begin with!" with the forum equivalent of a foaming mouth - this thread is full of people asking for that to be viable. This is a path for that to be viable.

Originally Posted by Whiteagle

Remember Burster were buffed to the point they're at now because the Developers originally wanted AIR to be the primary source of Anti-air...

This sentence defies logic. I'm going to assume you misspoke. Are you saying that that's what they wanted, but they failed? Or changed their minds? Or that they were wrong in their original intent? Or are wrong now? How do you get form A -> B?

[SolLeks]

Originally Posted by maradine

It would make a huge difference. One of the primary A2A complaints is that dogfights are ruined by flak intervention. Another 800 meters of space above the flak umbrella leads to some very interesting consequences, not least of which is pure air engagements.

Just about everything that makes a difference in battle will be close to the ground. Libs, A2G ESF and thus A2A ESF will be close to the ground. Even on parts of the map that the 800m will mean you are high enough to not be hit by AA, you do not see much if any fights that high. With how A2AM are currently, you need some forum of cover to fly around if your flairs are down. Also using the mountains is very helpful if your using just your nosegun to ambush enemys that are following you and covering the reverse maneuver to not get killed mid turn. Having more air space will only effect people using air as a transport, It will do nothing for A2A fighting. The only way to make this effective is to then increase the range of ground attack aircraft, but then they will also be above the flack range and we will have much QQ from you ground forces.

Originally Posted by VGCS

They're really not... and the legit players who just happen to be hacker-tier are even more unstoppable b/c A2AM's just don't work on them either. They spin around and kill you instantly before you can even get a Lock. I've been PODDED by some of them in a Dogfight even while twisting and turning AND using the Extended Afterburner tanks barrel-rol Reaver Climb. I dunno, maybe those guys were cheating too and I just couldn't tell but if they're able to do that legitly too, then there obviously IS a best loadout when it comes to Air-VS-Air, and the actual one the Devs added for A2A is not it... Partly b/c Pods also have large collision hulls which matter a lot more than Lockons when you're talking about Skill Vs. Skill. I'd personally rather have new A2A's that are Wire-guided or something. Or maybe act like like Flak... B/c right now all the A2A's do is make you waste time watching a red box turn Green when you could have just as easily gunned the BAD pilots down in half the time... And that gun?? The podders get the same Gun. That's not fair. I don't care what excuse you could possibly try to justify it with. Rotary + Pods is too versatile and gives them too much self-defense potential tacked on to all their AV power

A lot of good pilots use pods, but they reconize that they will be outclassed by someone using AB tanks as the AB tanks let pilots do more thruster manuvers. I have not gotten hit by rocketpods in a long time since I started using ABpods and I am able to dodge a lot of the so called 'god tear' nosegun fighters (snafu, babacua, nox. Wile I am not better than them, I do put up a hell of a fight)

Originally Posted by VaderShake

A 2 A combat would be better if they were more like jets and you added a helo varient. maybe that's what they need to do add a jet fighter to each faction, fast fixed wing, air attack craft.

Let the current Reaver, Mossy, and flying tiara act as the "Space Helicopters"

1. That assumes we have more realistic flight models.
2. the 'fights' would turn into 'high G turn fights' where people with joysticks or keys bound to nose up will win as long as they keep their speed at the correct speeds. It would turn air in basically what BF3 has and to be honest, its not that fun imo (I flew a lot in BF3). Sure fixed wing aircraft can be made to work, but why bother when the current VTOL aircraft are both part of lore and work fine once you master a few good maneuvers. I dare say, don't turn flying in this game into flying like 90% of the other games out there, this type of flying is more fun. I have many times been able to flip my aircraft around and continue to fly backwards wile shooting back at the enemy that is chasing me and I find doing stuff like that much more fun than anything you can do with BF3's Air.

[Whiteagle]

I'm saying that they wanted Air to counter Air, but Air to Ground was so prevalent that they HAD to buff Ground to Air so that Ground Combat would actually exist.

Really, how many people are going to run pure Anti-Air ESFs?
...The same number who pull Skyguard Lightnings?
When given a choice people are going to want to take the option that allows them the greatest effectiveness on the battlefield.

You may run with a Dedicated Anti-Air group, but some servers don't have Outfits that focus on Air Superiority.
Hell, one of the largest Terran Outfits on Waterson calls itself an Air Force, but I rarely see them Air borne in Force.

Simply put increasing the Flight ceiling isn't going to fix these problems.
Yes you'll create a theater AA ESFs can hunt in, but they will be the ONLY predator capable of taking down Ground Attack and Aerial Transport units that will abuse the hell out of this umbrella.
Basically, you will break the Ground Game trying to please the Air Game this way, as there will NOT be enough Anti-Air ESFs to keep this envelop clear.