Originally Posted by Figment
That was one of the first and only times I ever saw Galaxies being used for tower camping for instance. But when Reavers were removed, all the flyboys took up Liberators to solo.
They are not really suited to the task due to being rather sluggish, but given the opportunity (typically lack of opposition of certain kind), players immediately will exploit such armour/firepower benefits. :/
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This may be a reason why soloable MBT's will actually be balanced. If they balance them right, it could be that lightning > solo MBT in a fight.
Lightning was certainly not useless in PS1, but I always felt that it was slightly underpowered. Certainly you could have a swarm of them come in and dominate, but that's true for most things. Superior numbers and tactics can make even a suboptimal vehicle be effective.
Reavers certainly had more than their share of being overpowered, but I think that their dynamic against Liberators are an interesting one. A multi-man Liberator could decimate things in ways that a Reaver could only dream about. A solo Liberator was pretty dangerous as well, except for the fact that it was so vulnerable to enemy aircraft.
If they manage to make Lightnings be the superior solo tank, with solo MBT's being an option, but often a bad one, balance may still be achieved. Of course, balancing aircraft is a lot different than balancing tanks, but tweaking things like vehicle turn speed and main gun turn speed could be viable options.
Maybe Lightnings will be one of the major new tank hunters. Using superior speed, turn rate and turret rotation speed, they may be able to lay waste to a solo MBT's vulnerable rear end.
Of course that only addresses making solo MBT's less appealing. Obviously you also want to make 2 man MBT's be worth their while and avoid turning the game into Lightningside, but still, I think that the Liberator offers some interesting insight into ways that the new MBT's could remain balanced.
Originally Posted by Figment
Question is what content would have to be added that isn't covered already by something else?
The more variation you add, the less you can vary in vehicles because all niches are filled...
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Yet an MBT or a Sunderer will never be able to travel very fast, no matter how much you upgrade their speed. A Lightning will never be able to carry passengers.
Adding something like an ES buggy that maybe has a few extra passenger slots to make it like a cross between a buggy and a Deliverer could still add a healthy new dynamic to the battlefield.
It's not just about being able to fill a niche, it's also about how many niches you can fill at once or in what combination.
Things like different combinations of turn rates, acceleration, top speed, armor, locational armor, firepower, abilities, passenger slots, targets (AA, AI, AV), resistances (AA, AI, AV), etc., all make for varied uses.
You could have every role that absolutely must be filled be already filled when the game launches, but still have room for valuable new additions. Look at PS1. The game didn't launch with a dedicated bomber, but it got the Liberator shortly after launch. The game wasn't hurt by it's absence, but it was certainly a valuable contribution to the game.
The just have to make sure that there are no glaring gaps when the game launches, and make sure that any new additions are valuable new parts of the game.
I hope they spend what time they need to make sure that buggies are more useful than they were in the first game. They were a lot of fun in PS1 and had their uses (especially the Skyguard), but I want to see them a lot more on par with the usefulness of ES fighters, or ES MBT's, or anything else in the game.
I don't want to see a lot of underpowered crap in the game. Maybe a token weapon or two, so that we can laugh when we kill someone with it, but for the most part I'd like everything to get a lot of use.
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