Poor AA Mechanics, and why they make me rage.

Before I start, I'm not your typical PS2 pilot. I have over 200 hours in the air since beta, and I primarily focus on flying. My stance of ESF and Lib balance is that your success should be skill-based. This thread is NOT directed at A2A, G2A, or A2G balance. They are all subjects closely related, but my intent is not to buff aircraft or nerf aircraft in this thread. If you want to know my stances on how to fix air balance, you'll have to wait a few days! I will say, there needs to be some changes in the outlook on what constitutes good and fun gameplay mechanics for the touchy air aspect of Planteside, particularly if this game is truly going to be an "esport."

Here are a few basic concepts I'll be hitting on.

1. No cert in Planetside 2 should be mandatory for proper balance. This extends to all gameplay aspects. Infantry, Armor, Aircraft.
2. Success should be determined more by SKILL and less by rock/paper/scissors. It is ok to give an advantage, but it's not ok for hard-counters that require minimal skill. This is not aimed towards flak-based AA, but rather A2A Missiles and many other aspects of planetside (ex. 1 shot grenades, mines/claymores etc)
3. Deaths should not be out of your control when possible.

No cert in Planetside 2 should be mandatory for proper balance:
Hopefully the first thing that came to your mind was flares. Another thing an infantry-men would probably relate to would be flak armor. If flak armor needed to be buffed to 50% damage reduction, why is it a cert to begin with? Flak Armor is a borderline mandatory cert in order to achieve proper game balance and play as the game is intended. "Infantry are dying to fast to explosions? Ok, let's buff flak armor, and they'll have to cert it." Yes, you can be successful without it, but running around instantly dying to random explosions gets frustrating very fast. That's just an example of non-air gameplay mechanic that I would classify as being "poor."

So flares... why are they mandatory? Ever since Planetside 2 release and arguably late beta, they have been required in order to be successful in an ESF. With the amount of lock-ons at your enemies disposal, you can't function without them in the current state of planetside. Flying at high altitidues is often death sentence against A2AM users even with flares. So is flying out in the open (ex. the whole norther half of Indar). Without flares, you are a free kill from long range to G2A launcher users and A2AM users. They can't even be dodged. The only way to break locks now is to cut off their travel path with large objects while the missile is at a range far enough to be cut off. With the recent G2A/A2AM buffs, the necessity to have flares certed multiple echelons deep has skyrocketed even more.

Success should be determined more by SKILL and less by rock/paper/scissors.
When I read the latest patch notes with regard to the lock-on times of A2AMs I was admittedly quite furious (and I still am). Many outstanding PS2 aviators have made fantastic suggestions on how to make our A2AM system more skillful to use and less downy, but they were ignored. It's evident to me SOE believes A2AM mechanics and acceptable and even encouraged with the latest buffs. I'm here to say SOE is dead wrong. Let's be honest, the lock on radius is too big for these high damage, long range acrobatic, physics rewriting missiles. They are far too easy to use. No aim required. It is not fun whatsoever dying to terrible players with 1/5 your skill because they brought missiles to a fight. Substandard pilots can grab an ESF, equip missiles, and be extremely effective against players that could 1v4 them in a nosegun battle. Not to mention they have a nasty habit of ruining actual dogfights which have become more and more rare since the glory days of beta dogfighting. Currently if 1 single A2AM users shows up, you are forced to flee, no matter what. No matter how good you are, or how bad the A2AM user is, You leave, or you die. That is a terrible design flaw. If a player is good enough to 1v2 players that are slightly better equipped for the job, let them.

I'm not sure how to put this, but it's definitely good for A2A users to have an advantage and to allow them to be effective, but it should not be an advantage simply because they showed up to a fight with 'X' equipped. It should be an advantage because 'X' excels over 'Y' in A2A. What I am saying is put some skill in to A2AMs and for crying out loud quit buffing the things. If anything they should be reworked entirely. Require some aim or ability. Catering the game to the lowest common denominator players may be good for a short period of time, but it won't last.

Deaths should not be out of your control when possible.
How does this apply to AA? Well first we had the MAX render distance issue which has greatly improved. The irony in the whole situation is the new big threat is from Gounders. Grounders lock on extremely quickly, fire at extreme velocities, and can not be dodged, Also their range is absolutely 100% absurd, particularly in comparison to Infantry render time/distance. Aircraft are getting blasted out of the sky again by invisible opponents. Unfortunately grounds have very fast lock-on times and velocity preventing adequate time to properly react. The majority of the time "reacting" consists of pressing your flare button and running away. That's not reacting, and that's not skill-based whatsoever. That doesn't separate good pilots form bad. The same applies to A2AMs, however I think they were adequately covered in the previous paragraph.



TL;DR
There is a lot of namecalling and assumptions being made with respect to air balance. Please don't confuse the desire to be OP with the desire for good gameplay mechanics. I'm not suggesting aircraft need buffs or nerfs. I'm not suggesting AA needs buffs or nerfs. The lock-on AA aspect of Planetside 2 is frustrating and poorly implemented and should be changed. Bring more skill in to AA use and allow AA success to be determined by a players abilities, not lock-on characteristics.

Spot on.

But beware the players that will come in droves to defend Lockonside 2. Fire and forget (which requires no skill) is now rewarding. God forbid people actually learned how to play and be good at something.

I'm pretty sure this is one the things that was requested countless times, even before the tech test started.

You might be surprised to hear this, but SOE didn't give a ****.

Completely agreed, OP.

PS2 needs a rocket launcher that requires skill to use against aircraft, like the "guide-by-crosshair" launchers from Bad Company 2 or BF2.

The BC2 guided launcher was an antitank weapon that only the most skilled could use against air.
It would never be viable as the main G2A weapon in PS2.

AA is the way it is because Air is overpowered, if Air was toned down to be more balanced against ground then ground forces wouldnt need cheap things like invisible lock on launchers and AA spam, in the current meta you either spam rockets and flak at the sky or you die to lib farmers, blame the devs for poor air balance, not the AA

I don't understand why we don't shift to the way it was done in ps1. You had to keep that crosshair on your target, if you did you got a hit. It's almost as though they designed a mechanic, realize the problem would be huge when you gather hundreds of players, then mitigated it. SOE really needs to stop reinventing the ******* wheel and look to their own successes and failures.(old voice macro menu...)

i see many ways to exploit guide-by-crosshair unless they fly very high after launch

True if you're talking specifically about those ridiculous across-the-map shots. At closer ranges with choppers circling your base, it was fairly easy to hit the average heli pilot with the AT4.

How would you exploit it?

Total BS, I take out enough ESF's and Libs with my AA MAX. If we're playing with 2 MAXes the sky is ours.

They should simply get rid of G2A and G2G lock on rocket launchers and introduce wire-guided ones.

Invest in flares, it helps me out when Im flying.

Laughs.

Another pilot thread for those whom have deludied themselves into thinking being able to get kills in a game that is taylor made for getting the most kills from the air means they are "skillful".

You want a real skill ? Learn carpentry, accounting, or plumbing.

Don't bother wasting your time Nox, they know what they are doing and why they are doing it.

The easier they make this game for easy stuff, the more they will see money, it is simple call of duty design, embrace the future of this game.

I think G2A is a bit OP too.

Where were you when the players were getting shouted down by the special interests in these forums? Like we are right now?

SOE is clearly following the forums. Don't be lazy, and speak up for the players, or this game will go Carebear faster than you can say "I don't get it, so I'll lobby for an easier game".

I've suggested this before: make lock-ons produce a dot or direction on your minimap as well as a warning. Even though you can't get the G2A launcher user to render at that distance, it gives an indicator of where to avoid or hunt.

You are completely missing the point of what I posted. Additionally there are better ways of making AA effective without using the current lock-on system. I did not make this thread to discuss balance, but many really really good suggestions have been made in the past.

If I am so average and typical, do you think you could stand a chance against me in the air? Because right now there are only 3 players on Connery that can even put up a fight against me. I would like to see it. It's obvious you didn't read or comprehend that point I'm getting across. Skill vs. Balance vs. good Gameplay Mechanics.

Also don't preach to me about professional skills or at least investigate who you're preaching to.

The missile lock by user-guided reticle sounds fine to me.
I really liked using that kind of weapon when it was used back in the original Half Life.

certs shouldn't be needed for balance -agree

AA is fine ... its tjust it's no revarding enough , but that will chance when xp gain system is revamped (30th day this month ) trust me .

I don't know, I think it'd be pretty easy to hit Libs and Galaxies with them, as well as hovering, rocketpodding ESFs that you catch unawares.