The Air game is 20 times better post GU11

[Whiteagle]

Originally Posted by maradine

I love this argument. Specifically, I love how it's uttered mono-directionally without any hint of irony.

I KNOW right?
This from the same guy who thinks Air-to-air Missiles are OVERPOWERED just because an enemy Air Team understands the concept of having a Wingman...

[Rahabib]

lol. it sounds like "Hey if you cant beat me just get 3-4 of your friends then." How is that fair?

As Whiteagle pointed out, if the skyguard was a worthy option, it wouldn't be a problem. If you dont like having a buff skyguard, why dont you get some of your team mates on the ground to help take them out :P

[maradine]

Originally Posted by Rahabib

lol. it sounds like "Hey if you cant beat me just get 3-4 of your friends then." How is that fair?

It's not - it's the giant elephant in the room that no one wants to talk about. On the ground, people measure fairness in terms of which MAX has a better AI weapon, or how OP this or that rifle is. Such fractional problems! The pilot arguments seem to be centered around how much of a solo killstreak is the appropriate tithe to their resource cost, or how many dedicated hard counters must be present for them to consider farming elsewhere.

The two parties are playing different games - indeed, the two parties want different games in the first place.

It doesn't matter. The game will evolve how it will evolve. The people who like it will stay and play with the people who like it. The people who don't will leave. If the thought of an air monoculture is appealing to you, however, I ask a simple question - why in Crom's name would you choose to play this?

[Whiteagle]

Originally Posted by maradine

If the thought of an air monoculture is appealing to you, however, I ask a simple question - why in Crom's name would you choose to play this?

No, the issue is that Air is suppose to be but ONE facet of a Combined Arms Stratagem, but it's role as a highly mobility burst damage platform requires it sacrifice endurance...

Thing is, Air shouldn't have a lot of endurance, but they don't (yet) have the lateral space to strategically make use of their mobility to avoid damage.
Thus the Devs nerf their primary ground threats to hell just to give them an arena, but end up shitting over the rest of the game because now we have a HIGHLY durable, highly MOBILE burst damage rape machine.

[phungus]

Bursters are not as weak as you guys are saying. I shot down 3 reavers yesterday in the limited time I burster MAXed. You just have to control your fire, and yes, you can't solo ESFs at range anymore (and that's a good thing).

AA MAXes instantly denying airspace to all air vehicles is not balanced, it never was, and the people wanting that to be how things work isn't going to cut it for now. Sorry but infantry troops shouldn't, and now thankfully don't, have an auto win instantly pullable and relivable ultimate counter to all air units at extreme ranges. Now organized outfits will start using air again and not rightfully disregard it as useless. Maybe player numbers will drop and revenue will fall since alot more people are unwilling to play air then are willing to pull it. If keeping a sizable % of the playerbase satisfied requires killing the air game again for money reasons, well I can see the devs crushing air again, but for now you can assume the devs want a balanced game where players who choose to pull air can actually have an impact at decent sized battles.

That said I do think it would be a good idea to look into reimplenting direct impacts. I do think Bursters are too week within 200m, and giving them a skill based damage bonus for direct impacts is a way to improve that. With effective burster range being what it is now, and given their role is to support and protect infantry from enemy air, it seems reasonable within say 100m bursters should be a bit more lethal and have lower TTK against ESFs.

[Whiteagle]

Originally Posted by phungus

Bursters are not as weak as you guys are saying. I shot down 3 reavers yesterday in the limited time I burster MAXed. You just have to control your fire, and yes, you can't solo ESFs at range anymore (and that's a good thing).

AA MAXes instantly denying airspace to all air vehicles is not balanced, it never was, and the people wanting that to be how things work isn't going to cut it for now (unless player numbers drop and the development team thinks it's worth it for $$$ to kill the airgame again as an actual credible threat to ground assets). Sorry but infantry troops shouldn't, and now thankfully don't, have an auto win instantly pullable and relivable ultimate counter to all air units at extreme ranges. Now organized outfits will start using air again and not rightfully disregard it as useless.

That said I do think it would be a good idea to look into reimplenting direct impacts. I do think Bursters are too week within 200m, and giving them a skill based damage bonus for direct impacts is a way to improve that. With effective burster range being what it is now, for close combat support of infantry troops, within say 100m bursters should be a little bit more lethal and have slightly lower TTK against ESFs.

Look, we agreed that pulling back the Range on Bursters was alright...

Thing is, the Skyguard is STILL shit, so we have no long range Mobile Flak!
AA Base Turrets are hopefully decent, but more often then not they're already blown by the time the fight gets to one...

[phungus]

Originally Posted by Whiteagle

Look, we agreed that pulling back the Range on Bursters was alright...

Thing is, the Skyguard is STILL shit, so we have no long range Mobile Flak!
AA Base Turrets are hopefully decent, but more often then not they're already blown by the time the fight gets to one...

I think my noted lack of skyguards pulling up the slack of anti air ground assets has less to do with the lethality of the skyguard and more to do with the fact playes haven't adapted to the current gameplay. People still pull a single burster in an outpost spawn room and expect it to outright kill or force to flee three ESFs at a time (I know I spent a little time last night farming small groups at outposts doing exactly that with spadar). That just wol't cut it, if you see two or more highly skilled ESFs attacking a position you can't just go - derp burster MAX and force them away, you can slow them down and deter them (and yes MAXes are still highly effective at dettering air, twice last night a burster showing up dropped my Kph and Sph significantly, while simultaneous -- and arguably more importantly kept me from turning the battle -- until that point we had flipped the flag and were winning, thanks in no small part to my rotary and that impact was significantly reduced by that burster flak - that was enough to keep us from taking the base), but you and you alone (or even with a single buddy) is simply no longer the hard counter to any and all air units. Players will realize this and adapt, but it may take up to a weak. If in a week if there are massive air zergs like right after post launch, and ground feels helpless, then we can talk about how things are working, but right now we just don't know.

[SolLeks]

Originally Posted by Whiteagle

Look, we agreed that pulling back the Range on Bursters was alright...

Thing is, the Skyguard is STILL shit, so we have no long range Mobile Flak!
AA Base Turrets are hopefully decent, but more often then not they're already blown by the time the fight gets to one...

I have not dusted off my skyguard yet so let me ask this. Is the range of the skyguard around the same as tank render? If it is I feel that is fair as air can not hurt you when you can not hurt them. If it is not, then it needs to be buffed so it is.

Also, The air game is not that much diffrent from the ground game other then the fact we have 3 dementions and the only way we are up there is with resource / timed thingies. We are still glass cannons when we try to hurt the ground, we just asked that we are not hurt by things we have no way of hurting ourselves (kinda like tanks fighting the engi AV turret, its no fun to be hit by that thing from a klick away and have no way to retaliate).

[Whiteagle]

Originally Posted by phungus

I think my noted lack of skyguards pulling up the slack of anti air ground assets has less to do with the lethality of the skyguard and more to do with the fact playes haven't adapted to the current gameplay.

No... The Skyguard is SHIT, it has a Cone of Fire so wide you are better off getting out of the Lightning and shooting them with your Rifle.

The VIPER is now a better choice of Anti-Air turret, because you CANNOT sufficiently harm a single ESF enough to cause him to flee and you may also have to deal with Enemy Armor!

In fact the only thing making the game playable is the fact that Air HAS NOT CAUGHT ON to the fact that they no longer have a Ground Counter.

Originally Posted by SolLeks

I have not dusted off my skyguard yet so let me ask this. Is the range of the skyguard around the same as tank render? If it is I feel that is fair as air can not hurt you when you can not hurt them. If it is not, then it needs to be buffed so it is.

Uh, not really...

Like I just said, you are probably better off using a CARBINE instead because at least you can reliably hit with it.

[maradine]

It's not that bad. But it is considerably worse than what the Burster used to be, and arguably worse than it is now.

[Whiteagle]

Originally Posted by maradine

It's not that bad. But it is considerably worse than what the Burster used to be, and arguably worse than it is now.

No, it's that bad...
It's basically where the Burster probably should have been, but as a Long Range AA platform it's still shit...
Let me put it this way, Falcon thinks the Skyguard is a beast because his squad pulls FIVE of them at a time!

[maradine]

I was referring to your assertion that pulling out a carbine is better.

[Zadexin]

Originally Posted by Shogun

yeah, change the lock visual so the pilot gets no warning until a missile is fired at him!

but also increase missile lock on range by 50%.

because it is totally back to airside as it is now!

bursters nerfed to total uselessness AND rescost increased, skyguard not accurate enough and not enough range, missiles not enough range and every pilot uses flares now, even aa turrets suck. so there is absolutely NO weapon against air, that is as effective as the weapons air turns against ground.
and the sky is full of aircrafts now all the time.

thanks for screwing the game again for all nonpilots.

by the way, is joystick support fixed already, so i could finally try to pilot something as well? i want to use the overpower flavour of the month as well...

I don't know about all that. Last night during our Esamir alert I don't remember taking a single death from an ESF. And I clearly remember blasting some dopey pilots sitting in a hacked AA turret. (I love doing that).

I have honestly never had a problem with shooting ESFs down with skyguards OR AA turrets. People just really have to learn how to lead their shots. Its not like hitscan ground fighting. You have to shoot well in ADVANCE of the planes. I have lost count how many terri-bad players I have had on my Walker. How in the world can't you hit an ESF with a WALKER!

Whats more, with any G2Am pretty much the instant you start locking the ESFs pop flare and head for the hills. I don't even bother shooting at them anymore with my striker. Just ping em and they run.

Galaxies are still flying death trap bullet magnets. Liberators, yeah I guess they could be a problem. If anyone learned to use one in a meaningful way. At max altitude people will have to learn to lead their targets again and we all see how good people are at that

[Whiteagle]

Originally Posted by maradine

I was referring to your assertion that pulling out a carbine is better.

Eh, debatable...
...It certainly FEELS more effective.

[CrankyTRex]

If it makes it possible to play a meaningful role as an A2A pilot again, I look forward to trying it this weekend.