Why so few Lightnings w/Skyguard ?

Quoting this to stress that it will not even be a close fight going up against a lib alone unless it's a crew that literally know nothing about the lib. They can easily tank the damage if you land all your shots and they miss some of theirs.

Because every time I see loads of air and run off to pull my Skyguard, all the air mysteriously disappears the moment I drive up. Instead they are replaced with a platoon of AP Vanguards. It never fails. So I often prefer to pull my burster MAX because I can then easily switch to fractures when all air magically vanishes.

Its boring, the end.

Once the air threat is gone, all you can do is sit there waiting for some more air.

Let them damage heavy armor (again?).

It's fun for sundy hunting and picking fights that you won't probably win.

Er, it actually does reasonable damage against infantry and armor, provided you're not being focused (but hey, if you pulled a Skyguard it's unlikely you did it alone; either you pulled it to clear a ton of enemy air alone and ditched it or you're part of a large army where your ability to spray damage onto things is still valuable after the air is gone.)

Lightning with skyguard is simply sitting ducks, free xp for any opposing team players.

Not to mention anti air is just not too fun to play. I've tired it with skyguard, tried it with AA MAX. I feel totally vulnerable the whole time playing anti air duty. Anti air would be more fun if you don't run out of bullets.

Pull Skyguard all the time, my favorite vehicle to use to be honest. Sometimes being a "support" vehicle isn't always 24/7 fights and fun but it does help the team out. Whether it be scaring the air away or dealing heavy damage to them, either way it helps clear the skies. Hell, even if you just annoy the piss out of them enough to distract them from ****** your teammates I consider it a win in my books.

Easily said, if I'm in a tank...ATLEAST 90% of the time it's a Skyguard. Yes, I do play as TR but I still fear the Harassers and Magriders...nothing will calm that fear.

Slightly inaccurate? Its horribly inaccurate.

It destroys sunderer faster than heat and ap gun. You have to be close though to hit with all those shells.

The range at which a Skyguard becomes effective against infantry is also the range where you become an easy target for tanks and anyone with a rocket launcher. Sitting back, wishing for air, maybe killing a lone infantryman every half hour or a 90% damaged harasser is not appealing to me. If you can do better with the thing, more power to you.

I

I did testing an walker is just a little below skyguard. Rangers 2x the time to kill esf. Also walker can damage heavy armor which walker can not.

What if skyguard came with 2 sorts of ammo. One AA shells and the other be kobalt bullets but the 4 barrels makes it shoot like 4 kobalts. select fire mode and wait for the reload.

Theres a good few reasons.

reason 1. Most lightnings pulled are by new players looking for some quick power. Lots of default guns, and HEAT. They make the lightning appear more popular, and less capable then they really are, and make up the bulk of lightnings on the field at any one point.

Reason 2. Skyguard is expensive.

Reason 3. Skyguard is still recovering from a bad rep. Many players still don't know it was buffed three ways. 40% more ammo, higher velocity, and more damage. Thats a big difference between the skyguard of today and the skyguard of the past.

Reason 4. Lack of interest in specialization. Which is a problem for anyone interested in ever using the lightning. All of its good choices leave you quite vulnerable to targets it is not specialized against. The idea is that the lightning is fast enough to avoid confrontations with what it is weak against, and fast enough to hunt down what its strong against.

Reason 5. Poor understanding of its proper use. The general misconception is that you take the lightning straight into the problem area, and point at the sky, and things are supposed to die. Truth is there is a bit of skill to it. The skyguard's damage is far greater when within a certain range, and wounding a bunch of ESFs without support is a good way to make enemies and die. Its very important to know how to engage, when to engage, and what tools you'll need to improve your chances of success.

As an example, I've recently been getting into stealth skyguard again. I get to a really high location to decrease my distance to the target, and only engage at those which I feel I can kill. It nets me decent success if I pick a good location, and causes enemy air to wet themselves.

In large battles I find nanorepair to be my favorite since getting out of my tank is not really an option.

Because all those ESFS are turned to dust by a random squad of Reavers by the time you get there

even if you're fighting vanu on the other side of the map, reavers

If your not interested in speccing up the lightning itself, the gun alone will be underwhelming.

A more appropriate AA option over the lancer (which is terrible against air) would be the nemesis. The nemises launcher wrecks air, and performs well when dumbfired at infantry and armor.

Perhaps make the detonation trigger for direct hits on all targets. Marauder on steroids. Would be quite fun against infantry.

Anyway its almost more fun trying to hit esf with ap or heat. The former will set them on fire. Theres a lot more satisfaction in killing esf that way than with skyguard.

Yea I learned that after a while. I can't outmaneuver a harasser and I can't outgun something like the halberd and Vulcan harasser even with perfect accuracy.

I remember a 1v1 with a vulcan harassar where I was landing all of my shots keeping my front facing and I still lost. I mean I know I'm a light tank and using a flak cannon, sure, but flak cannons shred light vehicles, like a damn buggy.

Because they are garbage, vulnerable as heck and extremely situational, regardless of what people claim.

A lone skyguard isn't gonna do jack against any air threats, any smart pilot will just fly away and try again over and over, and if you want to scare them away, a lone HA with a lock on launcher will do just the same.