The State Of The Sovereignty

Having had a bit of time, I wanted to come back to this point. iRheul is absolutely right:

THE SARON FEELS LIKE THE MAG's MAIN GUN.

This brings up several issues. Firstly, unlike the other two MBTs, a Magrider must have two crew members in order to be even remotely comparable to the other tanks.

Secondly - why does the Saron feel like the Mag's main gun? To me at least, the Magrider's driver weapons feel very floaty and have no weight to them, either on firing or shell impact. The Saron is the only Mag weapon that feels like a real tank turret.

This is very problematic - it indicates a multitude of problems with the Magriders driver weapons, as well as an over-reliance on a secondary weapon that the other two MBTs do not have, allowing them to be far more effective with only a single crewman. I'm open to suggestions as to how this could be solved - do we improve the Mag's driver-weapons so it's not so reliant on the Saron, or the other way around?

One further issue was raised in a thread I made specifically regarding the Saron: with the new vehicle armour buffs, all non armour-piercing weapons are going to have higher TTK against tanks. This makes the Magrider even worse - BECAUSE THE SARON IS NOT CONSIDERED TO BE AP DAMAGE TYPE.

This is a HUGE problem that has yet to be addressed or even mentioned by the developers. As the Mag is so reliant on the Saron to be good at, well - being a tank - after the armour buff, Magriders will effectively be floating coffins. If the armour buff goes through (and it should), then the Saron damage type should be changed to AP to at least give the Mag a fighting chance.

First of all: What Vanu is good at and what they do.
http://forums.station.sony.com/ps2/index.php?threads/current-weapon-trends-magnified.121766/
This might help demonstrate what I mean if you understand it sufficiently.

Vanu is good at:
Reloading.
Moving and shooting.
Mid-range combat traits.

Vanu is bad at:
Idealized TTK.
Killing multiple enemies in a row.(Worst magazine damage)

Vanu's traits are not:
Slow projectiles (they are highly competitive, projectile speed is actually generally associated with Damage).
Accuracy: NC gains sniper-like first shot accuracy. TR gains the best sustained accuracy (even per damage). Vanu's accuracy is only best while moving (which most people admittedly do), but you should realize that the factional trait is best at mitigating a disadvantage(moving), rather than becoming a proper advantage, like NC has.


Factional traits are currently minimized and blurred. The differentiation of weapons in their current form means that these traits are often stepped on and rarely come up on a distinct level. All the same they are these and reflect subtle trends

Vanu seem to be kicking everyone's arse on mattherson.

I guess organization and teamwork trump supposedly broken useless weapons.

well i just wrote a 2 page rage rant, after reading this about how badly VS been screwed. then hit delete, no one is listening anyway no one has been since launch

its time to give up and switch or say **** you to soe and move on
by switching im basically throwing away close to $300 bucks worth of ES gear and cosmetics by leaving im throwing away closer to $500

all because i wanted to play the sci-fi faction in a sci-fi game, **** me right?

Pretty much. It sure as hell isn't our vehicles! Many of us have been VS since beta or PS1, and stick with the faction regardless. We do the best with what we've got, but that doesn't mean that what we've got doesn't deserve another, closer look.

Post it. Seriously - though avoid the rant bit if at all possible. The only way this will get resolved is through people like you and me airing their issues here in a sensible, coherent manner - so the more of them the better.

I find myself playing my TE character (TR) and my NC alt alot more often now then my original, BR81 VS main.

Vanguard shield is so broken.. Oh this medic planted 2 C4 on me.. *delay to where I think he'll hit the button*, 'Sheilds up' .. Lolol.. 1shot the medic, go back to what I was doing.

Prowler Lockdown .. contrary to most peoples beliefs.. locking into a stationary mode is NOT a weakness.. Not when it grants you.. what is it.. 60% projectile speed and reload? (I have it maxed).. I destroy any tank 1v1.. Magrider mobility means jack all when they can't hit half their shots, on ME, a STATIONARY TARGET, because they have to move to dodge mine.. and die anyway.

The mossie.. omg.. stupid fast... Took my 12k cert refund across my 3 chars on 3 factions and now have a pretty beastly ESF for all 3. By Far, Mossie, the best. The speed and rocket pod *type* is the best. I find the scythe and reaver to be very close together in terms of ability -- The scythe having in essence, 7 hard hitting rocket shots (2x7 = 14 per reload), and the reaver having only 12 slow firing, slow speed, but single rocket per click.

TLDR: In complete agreement with the OP on his points.. and wish to stress that our *racial* ability on our magrider, is a load of CRAP.
Give ZOE to magriders, that'd make up for not having anchored mode... screw 1 second magburner on 60sec CD ********.

I hear you... Though I don't think we have it that bad it's more that I chose the purple pajama suited faction because I thought lasers and plasma and floating tanks. I thought we'd have experimental weapons that are very situational and maybe even up at most times but are just so silly they're fun.

I honestly thought this was going to be the update I was waiting for. I saved up all these certs and I was finally going to be able to have something cool on my walking protoss armoured crab suit but ended up with nilly and a an AV weapon that looks like they slapped together a pistol and a lancer with basically the same output.

Our ppa has been worthless since beta and saron (While good!) is basically the main gun. Now TR and NC have their own things to complain about and I respect em for it. That jackhammer is still... ugh...

But it's more that I've noticed a trend and that trend seems to be less and less uniqueness to the 'alien' faction and starting to make me wonder why I didn't join one of the other two. As silly as it is, I could always get a prowler with racer chassis and a vulcan and drive like crazy into a battalion. Sure I wont win but I can still do it, there are options to play silly or varying styles on the more 'traditional' factions and this is really what makes my jaw drop.

As for the magrider main gun, I would up the velocity but also up the gravity. Arching on this gun actually suits it well but it should bombard a place accurately. I also would have researched DOTs into the game's code because I think a weak plasma blast with a dot attached to it and maybe temporarly make the hit location burst into blue flames for 2 seconds would have made this tank feel VERY unique and yet still just as balanced as the others.

Also funny enough the ZOE would actually work on the Magrider very well due to increased speed and damage at the cost of armour since tanks tend to engage at range. Add a power up and power down toggle to balance it a bit and this would fit way better than the 'charge' magburn ability.

If the mag burner provided a flat acceleration and top speed buff to all movement for the duration of the burn, it would actually work to enhance mobility usefully and complement the ability to strafe.

The mag's maingun should be back on the top of the tank (PS1). But to be honest its artist time that isn't going into something new to sell. And all the tanks need reworking into 2-3 man, dedicated role vehicles, with significant increases to tank health. A fixed position secondary / tertiary weapon for the driver isn't a problem then and is something that should be installed on all tanks.

the coordination between vanu outfits was what made me choose it as my faction, being the underdog is great for a short period but when your getting more and more nerfs just because your faction has some skilled outfits. you get pretty frustrated when your constantly fighting against better equipped factions with population advantages, then you come here and people are still crying for you to be nerfed even more the game is just not fun, and its not getting any better

i log in maybe 4 hr a week now, usually only on test to see how much worse its going to be when the next patch hits, and honestly the only thing keeping me on the forums is the $500+ i stupidly spent in the store hoping that ill login and see a redemption patch where they open up cross faction unlock equivalents so i can switch factions with out pissing away the $300 ish i wasted on empire specifics prior to the VR

I've wanted this for a very long time.

Don't you find it weird that every faction thinks they're underpowered?

VS is fine, stop crying.

I like the VS as an UP faction, I like to overcome that extra bias. However, it is decimating our population, which come the Lattice, is going to end up with us getting some stupid knee jerk buffs.

The best thing we have as a faction is our nice, dark default camo.

They need to remove the Saron fire delay tbh, it's just completely unintuitive and unnecessary.

The Magriders main cannons need more velocity, and more AoE, to match their damage. As it is right now, I think the AoE is disproportionally small compared to TR and NC versions. If that was done, I can't think the Magrider would need much done to it. And when I say improve these stats I do mean small increments not 50% or w/e some QQers will be imagining.

The acceleration buff to the mag was very good, and it shouldn't need much more in that regard, possibly a tiny buff to rival chassis levelling which seems to have not gained from the increase in the base by the same amount.

As for ZOE, lets see it on live first; same for the new AV weapon, which I'll admit on paper looks pretty weak, should be tested in combat for a week or so before calling it rubbish.

I'll admit though that no bullet drop is totally useless.

But its funny how the numbers back up our claim isn't it?
population and stats.

Right before the last update where magrider got a small buff i made a thread about how weak the MAg is 1v1 and how slow it is and that it should be buffed because it cant dodge piss all with all the other tanks having bullets that are incredibly fast now.

My thread was not well received and a lot of people said no......
the next day the patch came out and mag strafe was buffed a little bit.

Mag was OP once BECAUSE at the time there werent so many crazy AV weapons like we have now. Everyone is scared of going back into magrider OP territory but it doesnt have to be that way. Our main guns need a considerable projectile speed buff and we need more strafe speed plain and simple

After reading, I can tell what kind of player the OP is.

L2P and stop QQing about your Magrider. You just got a hell of a ton of buffs to your strafe and MAX weapons. Now you want one particular weapon buffed? You're probably one of those jack-offs that go around spamming HE vs infantry.

Also, the ZOE hasn't even come out yet, so stop QQing about what will obviously be an OP ability compared to lock-down and a riot shield. Just by what is on the test server, I can picture numerous ways it will be a superior ability.

As an NC I agree the NS needs a buff.

They need new toys to play with that match up to the Phoenix and the Raven. More so that they are more attractive to people to want to play. The VS need thing to attract players to even out the populations. Simply put when you have one faction getting camera guided rockets and the other getting charge weapons, what sounds more fun.......?

I as an NC want to see the VS over the next few updates buffed and given some cool stuff in order to keep players happy because at the end of the day I as an NC player want and NEED the other factions to be happy playing otherwise I won't have anyone to play with because everyone will leave.

Higby do you understand this^?

Give VS MAX jet packs or short range teleports (20 meters for example) etc to make them technologically more impressive like they are supposed to be in lore

Troll post.
main anti infantry max weapon: nerfed into utter uselessness
Mag strafe: brought back to an older value
ZOE: underwhelming and uninspired
mag main cannon: the worst projectile speed and drop

No, the only problem with NC is lack of range AI weapons for MAX and the Reaver cross hair is a little liar.

Those 2 small problems are insignificant to the VS. They need a buff in a few areas. The devs it seemed tried doing this when they removed degradation over distance, but they need to go a bit further though maybe they are doing it slowly as to not make the to powerful.

I'm genuinely pleased to see other faction players being so reasonable about this post - thank you.

I realise they won't all be like that (oh what a world that would be), but the tone so far has been excellent bar a few outliers. Keep it up guys!