Liberators should lose lift when flying inverted or at high (>60deg) bank angles.

This will weaken their ability to threaten ESFs without resorting to using the tail gun.
Currently novice ESFs stand no chance against liberators even in groups of 3 or more.
Source: Me. I gun Daltons.
This means:

• No more belly-up Dalton/Shredder threat to ESFs pursuing, only tailgun.
• Fresh/novice pilots will actually threaten experienced liberator crews instead of being tankbuster/shredder/dalton fodder (I've sent so many apologetic /tell s explaining what happened and why it happened since I started gunning long ago)
• Liberators will require fighter escort, much more than now, in order to have staying power.
• Liberator crews will have a more A2G centric mentality, so improvements can be made to their A2G capabilities with this "unit independence nerf" as the trade-off
• Balancing(buffing) them will give them an actual influence on the battlefield, since they'll be dedicated A2G units and their improved A2G ability is easily countered by any ESF presence (even a single good pilot)
• No reduction in manoeuvrability means A2G role will not be affected, only that it will lose altitude quickly at high bank angles only used in A2A combat with ESFs, from 60 degrees to completely inverted.

Other possible changes: Climb rate reduction? Altitude will become valuable to both fighter escorts and enemy air groups.

I am an utterly terrible pilot, my deaths come from geometry 10x more often than the enemy.

I have NO issues avoiding the belly of a Lib.

If a pilot is too dumb to turn and boost AWAY from the gun when a Lib does this, then attack from the rear/high rear...then they deserve to die.

Nuf sed.

disable the heavy belly guns when belly not at certain degrees?

How about a buff so it can last longer than 10 seconds at its optimal bombing altitude in a large fight?

Maybe then people will be encouraged to actually bomb things rather than play some twisted (and entertaining to watch) AA game.

If liberators were actually viable A2G units in fights where AA is present you might have had a point. As it stands thou, they need all the help they can get.

You might be able to destroy new ESF pilots while gunning a lib, but on the flipside I completely destroy new lib pilots while flying a esf. It's just a result of the high learning curve for pilots.

Come find me in a liberator, I'll always have either the:
Belly facing you,
Tankbuster facing you,
Walker facing you

P.S. I have nano repairs, so if you have to bugger off for repairs, you're back to square one.
Meanwhile I'll pass the time by killing sunderers.

Attention to detail is an important life skill. Please learn it.

In order to hit a ESF with a Lib gun, or a Tank gun for that matter. The ESF pilot either has to be not paying attention or is simply ignorant. Hit a ESF with either a Tank gun or Lib gun once and he will not fall for it again. That is part of the learning process. Take that away and you actually make it harder for newer pilots to get better.

If you come at a Lib from the side and it rolls to show its gun at you. Your best bet is to roll in the direction the lib is going and hit spacebar, you are now moving out of the gunner's firing arc. You then want to roll back upright and keep hitting spacebar so you don't roll in front of the lib and get hit by the nose gun or even rammed. This way you sail over the top of the thing and can rotary it and rocket it to your hearts content.

Thats a skill that new pilots simply need to learn through trial and error. And let me tell you something. If I can do it, anyone who flies for a day can figure it out.

Most pilots know how to deal with libs turning like that. It makes them easy targets. I tell my lib pilot to simply point at the home warpgate and beeline to it. Let me chase off the ESF with the tail gun instead since we're more likely to survive that way, then trying a desperate one shot with a Dalton.

Libs don't need a nerf to their banking or anything like that. ESF players simply need to adapt. I did, and therefor anyone can (I'm not a great ESF pilot).

Not this **** again puhleeeezzze....



Also... What liberators?

Bahahhaa

Except..

Stay 300m away keep your distance and just main ESF gun the guy to oblivion...

You're a bad troll

The lib has been trashed so hard with the AA changes in the game...

Yet OP wants it nerfed because he's a baddie and got dalton'ed.

Stay classy forumside.

No need for a nerf. 6 second TTK on a 3 man vehicle is already hilariously easy-mode. The last time a Liberator killed me in an ESF was when I had 0 ammo left in my Rotary and he was on fire so I thought it would be fun to ram him into a cliff. It worked, too. The time before that? Probably January, playing at 3am against Justicia's 3 man crew...

Do remember that Liberators die to other Liberators in 1 second (the fastest TTK of any one vehicle versus its counterpart), and that 3 ESFs vs 1 Liberator is actually the 'balanced' way to approach the conflict (especially when 3 ESFs have far more A2G power than 1 Liberator, too).

Absolutely no need to do anything to Liberators except VASTLY buff their armour versus ground weapons, and slightly buff direct hit damage.




Also, being a fighter escort is boring. Think less like this is a strategy game and more like an FPS; no need for escorts with no fear of death, just a need for fear of the enemy to make it necessary to address any+all threats. Same effect on gameplay without boring duty roles for players.

You miss the point. As a Dalton gunner, few pilots will dare to risk the chance of getting hit by staying within their original trajectory when my pilot flips the belly at them. It's very difficult to hit them at those ranges (they're still smaller than the circle in my crosshair) but all but the most inexperienced ESF pilots won't take that chance, because it's an instagib.
This is what forces ESFs in that situation to disengage and change heading, removing my craft from their sights.
This achieves two things: It allows the liberator to get out of its originally inferior position in the dogfight, into a pursuit curve
It also allows nano-regen a chance to activate and heal up some of the damage taken. Because nano-regen works by %, the liberator readily heals up a significant fraction of ESF hits. This can cause pilots who stay very far away to run out of ammunition quickly, allowing the liberator to heal back everything that it has lost when they go for ammo/repairs.

Incorrect. Rolling in that direction and pressing spacebar barely changes your trajectory. Ever flown an ESF? I'll assume you're an OK pilot who cannot dream of challenging the better ESF pilots on your server yet.
Holding down v.thrust at cruise speeds or otherwise deflects your trajectory by about 15 degrees according to the elevation markings on the HUD. This still results in a very fast rate of closure, and the liberator can very, very easily out-turn that small change in trajectory to maintain the gun on target; i.e. he turns his belly towards you and pitches up.

Theorycrafting on your part has been poor; best option in this case is to actually AB over or under the liberator (you're fast enough, dalton will probably miss) and bank in the direction of the liberator's nose while doing so. Emerge on the other side and if you have done it right, you'll be perpendicular to the liberator's flightpath (not for long). Flip and do the air reverse while unloading. Staying in reverse, you'll be battling the liberator's skills and will be your best option. I suggest you spend more time in your ESF to learn to fly.

You stand no chance against my liberator pilot/gunner team with your theorycrafting example. Hitting spacebar doesn't do enough, only an air reverse can change your position with sufficient angular velocity to out-turn the liberator while maintaining nose on target.

You again fail to understand the potency of a good gunner/pilot team. The tankbuster is the killing blow, the dalton only forces ESFs to stay away from the places the Liberator otherwise cannot hit.
I would not like to further converse with you, for a simple, arrogant reason: "Get on my level".

You know that very well. And you should know that you've never faced a good dalton liberator team. You've only faced the average bunch who think pointing the belly and waiting for a miracle is all there is to it. No, the liberator uses that opportunity to close in and the Tankbuster becomes the real threat. Tailgun is rarely used because it is very, very ineffective against experienced pilots.

Stop trying to dumb down this game more than it already has been.

Most of the better ESF pilots rarely die to liberators. I can't remember my last death either.
But I'm speaking for the entry-level pilots. If it takes a large amount of experience to actually face off with a good liberator team, one should realise that the A2G vehicle is performing a role in which it wasn't designed for.
Two things:
Above average Liberator teams threaten even experienced ESF pilots.
Liberators aren't very good at their actual role, A2G.

So, why not shift their capabilities?

Citing another problem that exists does not in any way mitigate the current "problem" of liberators being poor at their main role (A2G) while being surprisingly effective at A2A self-defense.

I also don't see what the issue is with liberators dying to each other in a second. How does this affect anything about reducing their ability to go belly-up?

Not really possible; currently, liberators are found in very, very small numbers over large fights because in the sky, every HA, AA turret, Burster MAX, MBT, and their moms are all shooting at them. There's no cover. In order to let them survive, their armour would have to go through the roof. This sounds all good and dandy until it scales down to the quieter outposts. Liberators will be able to farm those with little concern for any resistance. Hence a good compromise that I can think of is a perhaps 50% increase in resistance to AA, a severe nerf in terms of nano-regen for liberators, a speed increase (from 180 to maybe 210 kph), afterburner duration increase to allow them to survive a bombing run, and finally a manoeuvrability decrease to stop them from using all the previous improvements to be even better at A2A.

Being a fighter escort is boring IF and ONLY IF the enemy does not see a liberator as a high value target. If 4 liberators are in the sky and the enemy is sending quite a steady trickle of ESFs (because perhaps only ESFs actually pose serious threats to liberators after this change) to tickle them and hopefully take them down, being an escort fighter with would actually be entertaining, instead of the current situation today where maybe 1 or 2 ESFs will approach a liberator.

Increasing the liberator's A2G capability while reducing it's A2A capability doesn't seem like dumbing down the game.
Using trendy catchphrases doesn't really work well when you need to put things together with logic and reason.

If liberators are difficult to take down via ground-based AA, and no longer pose a threat to ESFs, it is possible that ESFs will be used for sky-clearing purposes. Increasing the diversity of tactical options seems like the opposite of dumbing down the game.

...Is this post serious? lol, if it is you truly haven't tried to fly a lib around in the real world of planetside. Especially if you are crying cus you get pwnt by libs in general.. You are calling for nerfs because you fly bad.. Spend a week flying a lib with upgrades or not to see how absurd your post is.. We'll leave the lights on for ya. lol really... lol!

Even if you're too stupid to engage libs without getting daltoned, they're big enough targets you can just shoot them down from quite a ways away, farther than a dalton can shoot. Or even A2A missiles, just keep spamming the lib with them

So because there are like 5% of lib crews that can be considered experts the lib needs a nerf so new ESF pilots don't feel bad because they got blasted by superior skills?

Most lib crews absolutely suck at A2A fights,I consider myself above average lib pilot but I still can't take out really skilled ESF pilots and often the rookies get away(smoking) from me.

In my opinion there is no need to nerf the lib...if you do then this flying killer whale will become mostly extinct.

We're already at a point where you have very very few new people trying to fly.
Continue those nerfdemands, and soon, there won't be much left to shoot at.