How I would change Annihilators.

The problem is that flares/smoke have almost no use outside of countering lock-ons. It isn't economical to cert into a tool that has only one specific use.

You haven't actually used an Annihilator have you?

I mean, a well organized Anni Squad can be pretty deadly, but they are actually really vulnerable to good ESF pilots who know how to use flares in combination with cover.

30 ESF's would easily disperse a 30 strong Anni Squad/Platoon IF they attacked en mass. Similarly, depending on how many people are in the Anni unit, a reasonable number of tanks can easily overrun them (assuming that the Anni Squad is in an accessible location, which, to be fair, is often not the case) Say around 1/2 to 1/3 as many tanks as the Anni unit has Annihilators?

That's not to say that I don't (tentatively) agree that the Annihilator is a problem, but seriously, lets not blow this out of proportion. Rabid hyperbole like that is what makes useful debate impossible.

Do you really think you could get 30 ESF pilots (in a group) good enough to combine flares and cover while taking out 30 people with annihilators that are respawning constantly and being revived constantly... Not to mention 30 esf's in the air trying to use cover near eachother will mean imminent crashing. 30 people with annihilators aren't like ESF's because they don't require resources to spawn and they can be revived.
I love infantry battle and I hate being farmed by vehicles, so for me to want to get rid of annihilators is weird but I think it's best for balance.

So it isn't economical to cert into a tool that prevents you from dying when faced with masses of lock on? Okay. I'll just go ask SOE to remove all the defensive and offensive certs in this game. After all it isn't economical to cert into them. It is much more economical to just die and whine on the forums until the one aspect you die to is nerfed to ****.

A thing to add to our madness over wether 30 annihilator equiped HA's will beat 30 flare equiped ESF's

The annihilator only requires for you to move your cursor over the plane and click the left mouse button.

The ESF's... ya. An entirely un-skilled group of players pointing there guns at colorful, flying objects would very likely win out over multiple highly skilled pilots intelligently manuevering to eliminate there targets. If the pilots arent doing that, they probaly crashed into a cliff on the way over.

My point - the annihilator dosent even require much skill for its power.

As much skill as flares.

Also the whole debate around skill is jumpers for goal posts, its all neuro-motor reactions at the end of the day.

As I said earlier, if there is an issue with balance and Infantry v. air or Infantry v. Vehicles.

Then I suggest looking to the corners, to wit Flares and IR. Specifically changing the time they take to recharge by small increments and going from there.

When if using the terrain, situational awareness and IR/Smoke flares a Pilot of a vehicle can survive several runs against a annie nest. Then things will be 'balanced'.

Every now and then though, still just going to get instagibbed by 30 rockets, welcome to space war. Its not supposed to be afir.

When Lock ons become pointless as you can spam F and ingore them, gone too far the other way.


I really don't think its that much of an issue though, I think a lot of people have been spoilt by situations (e.g. back when Libs were stupidly imbalanced) where you could regularly expect to survive in a vehicle for 15-20 minutes at a time, and are regular getting killed and thinking its imbalanced because of this.

If this were the case, we would see it being done in game, and often. I can't think of an instance where our Annihilator nests have been taken out by an overwhelming amount of coordinated ESFs - in my own experience(my fellow TE feel free to correct me if I'm wrong here).

Perhaps it has something to do with the fact Annihilators lock on at 500m, pinging the ESF's lock on warning - with no real indication to the pilot where from or how close the threat is. I HIGHLY doubt your ESF wing would have time to accurately blow it's payload and do any significant damage to the Annihilator infantry from that distance (or even closer). It would take a level of coordination that simply isn't present in your typical PUGs and most outfits, and isn't facilitated by the game UI or mechanics.

Great post Buzz, surprised because on Mattherson its the enclave who really use these to the most effect, i quit flying and just infantry zerg because of the problem you stated.
How is it that the devs were told it was a bad idea in tech test and removed the launcher that locked onto both air and ground and then just threw it back in?
Bad memory?

Agreed. If a tactic exists that can wipe out another tactic, but no ones using it, that suggests theres something wrong with the plan.

Put simply, wether its the fact that this game has the bare minimum of features to facilitate teamwork (or even make it possible), or any of the countless other flaws we've brought up, there is obviously something wrong with this ESF spam idea. How can i tell? Because it's never been used, period.

If what it comes down to is that its easier for a noob to spam an annihilator then pilot an ESF, that that still means annihilators are unbalanced.

Why the hell AV and AA launchers should not be able to dumbfire?! I hope this will never be implemented.

By the way, callofdutymouse skills are not the only skills. It takes skill to get behind enemy lines and destroy his tanks. It takes no skill to spam infantry with HE rounds and rocketpods.

Why not just make it a guided projectile like the new Engineer turret?

Waiting for EW attachments for aircraft and anti-radar missiles. Hrm...

Actually it has been used. It happened to an Anni squad that I was in. Multiple Reavers were popping over the edge of a hill, popping their flares, blasting us with rockets, and then jetting over the horizon before we could establish locks. Another time a few talented Scythe pilots were regularly roadkilling us by skimming over the hill we were on. Ive also seen Anni squads get overrun by just a few tanks and infantry. To be fair, these are usually in situations with only a single squad. I don't know if anyone besides the Enclave can regularly (or even ever) run 30+ Annihilators.

Really though, that's all besides the point. In general, ESF's don't coordinate very well, and I don't expect to see a horde of them using team tactics (or even zerg tactics) to take out an Annihilator nest. I was simply responding to the assertion that 30 Annihilator's would almost immediately win when placed in direct competition with 30 ESF's, which is not true.

30 Annihilators would definitely kill 30 ESF's that happened to be flying around in the same airspace without actually paying attention to the Anni squad, which is more often the situation.

Once again, I agree that the Annihilator is in a bit of an odd spot and the easiest way to deal with it is to remove it. I just don't think its nearly as unstoppably OP as many people make it out to be.

I really don't think it would have that effect. A minimum lock-on range along with a lack of dumb fire certainly would, but not a lack of dumb fire mode alone.

He's 2-for-3 since release, in my opinion. Remember, he also tried to argue that Nanoweave Armor was ridiculously overpowered. He claimed it gave a 25% increase in survivability when it was really only 12.5% (a single bullet, maybe two at long range).

You shouldn't be surprised. The Enclave openly admits to abusing flawed game mechanics to their advantage. Only after his outfit's abused something for a month or more does BCP "remind" everybody that he's actually against it.

BCP is the One-Percenter/banker/corporate CEO of the PlanetSide universe.

We, in the Enclave, have been advocating for items like the Annihilator to have been removed since tech test. We had the same weapon in tech test and made the same concern. We were listened to due to what it can do in mass numbers and here we are again, the same issue. You would swear SOE only cares about $$$..

Abusing a flawed game mechanic? You mean having people purchase an item and use it? Okay....

Unbelievable

I don't think you're thinking this through.

Let's assume we're operating on a platoon level which is four squads. As it stands right now each squad has a mandatory requirement of all HA units carrying Annihilators. That translates into four squads doing AA/AT work.

If the Annihilator didn't exist I would have one out of the four squads doing AA work while three do AT work. Or have two doing AA work and the other two doing AT work. Either way it forces me to split my AV weapons up and reduces the amount of spam I am contributing to a fight.

See how it helps?

Most would be blown apart 500m away before they rendered. The survivors would make feeble attempts to rocket spam whatever infantry rendered. Unfortunately for them with Flak 5/Resist which all of our infantry wear most of the HA would survive. Those who did die would be instantly revived by a Medic and would resume killing all other remaining ESF.

I'm sorry but I don't think you actually play the same game that the rest of us do.

See... there's a disconnect between what you and BCP say about your "pre-historic" opposition to Annihilator-like weapons and the sheer joy on display in BCP's "GET ANNIHILATED!" video.

There's absolutely no hint of "I've experienced this before, and it's going to be bad for the game," in that video. It's all, "This is ******* awesome!"

I am against the weapon in question simply due to it rendering the dedicated launchers pointless.

I will say though that I fly a scythe about 75% of my playtime, and I have never died to an Annihilator. Maybe my server doesn't use them? Maybe I fly smart? I don't know.
Generally when I get locked I get the hell out of dodge.