The ugly truth: Fighting Air is Boring.

Yes I did.

And now here are some statistic for you:
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/ccc?key=0AshlLUNJ_SE8dERMcHJlWkJXYy13WVROc2s2TTNjOWc&usp=sharing

Top 10 reason that ESF die are:
1: Suicide
2. Collisions
3. Saron laser Cannon
4. M18 Needler
5. Vortek Rotary
6. M16 Rotary
7. Hailstorm Turbo Laser
8. Mustang
9. Annihilator
10. Skyguard.

So sorry but no. The best counter to ESF is other ESF.

Lol, oh rly nao? Dogfighting is the funnest part of the ESF. It's also the only vehicle that can keep up with the ESF. The ESF can escape from an encounter with ANY vehicle besides another ESF. That's how it is supposed to work.

It's funny for you, and other sky-gods. ESF are not funny for me and MANY other players. Stop thinking just about you.

I tried to explain to you, in detail, how there would be no air game if AA was significantly more effective against air. I spend far more time playing infantry than I spend in the air, so I also have some experience of what the ground pound is like https://www.planetside2.com/players/#!/5428010618040909441/vehicles. I don't see it air as a problem then, either.

Libs are the problem, ESF's are fine. You can't boost AA because that'd screw ESF's, so just nerf the Liberator already.

And give the Skyguard something to do besides shooting air, because Air isn't going to stick around near a Skyguard and sitting there hoping they come back is something few people are willing to do.

It isn't that I refuse to fly, it's that SOE doesn't want to give my Vanguard wings for some reason. Don't blame me for their decisions...

Agreed.. all tanks need 80% more wings.

Give up...the Sky Gods want to keep their EZ mode SoE-provided farming machines just as they are...

As I said, you are NOT going to convince them to give them up or be seriously threatened by G2A...therefore, the only thing that makes any sense is to follow a very simple basic rule:

Three bites at the apple...then the apple leaves.

Let the Air Farce zoom over empty bases with nothing to farm.

Its YOUR decision to stay or leave...as for me, /redeploy solves the whole dilemma. Try it!

I can confirm that I've stopped playing for a while until they fix the air game. It's just sad.

Leave. Leave. Leave. Is this seriously a solution? MAX crash? Leave. Spawn camped? Leave. OK. *Eventually Leaves PS2* See where that leads us? I understand you're trying to help the OP avoid angst but curing the symptoms is temporary, we need to eliminate the cause. I also understand the Air Farce guys trying to find solutions that THEY view as reasonable. It's not going to work, it's like telling me that SkyGuard is OP and me telling you THEN PULL A SKYGUARD AND L2SG.

Air is frustrating. It's causing ripples of irritation that are now reaching far, distorting what fun there is to be had. On the other hand... PS2- Massive scale- All that means is bad performance, randomness, getting slaughtered like lambs because there's more of us and only 2-3 Libs(Or X,Y,Z kind of unit)... And a lot of REDEPLOYING(Matches, Rounds, not really an MMO). With massive scale comes massive frustration, Peter... Because a single person can't be allowed to influence much(Like 1 V 1 a Lib). And 3/3 Libs brutally trample any 3 ground units focused on taking them out. The joke's on the Air Farce though, as Libs MELT other Libs, even 1/3 V 3/3 the 1/3 can likely wreck the other ship in 1"... And, as ESFs are bickering among them because LOCK ON A2A or, well, Lib. And Libs bicker with ESF because... ESF! Surprise.

PS2 is falling apart when you not only try to isolate units that are the only counters to each other, but fail at it by giving them enough power to break that isolation and wreak havoc all over.

I ADORE MY LIB, I LOVE ITS WEAPONS(Not the Duster, no...). I think NERFING IS NOT the solution. But I recognize the problem. Until more do, no creative solution such as more clearly defined roles(Bomber, hence not so maneuverable nor hovering) and weapons that are far more specialized and not so Jack Of All Trades, can be implemented. Not without having said Air Farce rage until we end up with either a TTK of 1' or separate Servers or areas for Air, Ground and Infantry.

PS2 never launched. PS2 just escaped and now there's no reigning it in without breaking some eggs. Best we all realize that and push for it, instead of being entitled because we can 360YOLOPODREVERSESTUFF in an F2P flop. We might end up with an actual GAME we can feel comfortable paying for, instead of say, a Beta.

I'm not saying it doesn't, I'm claiming that the people who complain about air only being counterable by air haven't played either infantry or air enough to realize air is, in fact, counterable by non-air.

In an Infantry fight there are 6 different classes with 13(?) different weapon variations, from shotguns to Bolt action rifles, and about a million different ways to use the terrain to your advantage. Aiming skill and Positioning skill go hand in hand.
In a tank fight there are 5 vehicles (that pose any threat to each other) which all have their own way to use and defeat. Traversing terrain and flanking is alot more important than aim.
Airfights consist of 2 and in rare cases of 3 different units. There are Noseguns, tankbuster and Dalton, in some cases Cojotes and even some A2A rockets. sometimes the third unit, the galaxy, has some fun and creatrs lots and lots of rage from the skygods who can't stand being rammed.
The AV fights consist of C4 and rocketlaunchers and lots and lots of positioning. these weapons require a good amount of skill and offer a high risk high reward gameplay.
The AA fights consist of Lock ons and Flak (Burster and Skyguard play pretty much the same) you point at the Aircraft and watch it trying to evade and disappear 2 seconds later. there is no skill nor fun in fighting air.

and don't you dare say "shot at aircrafts with Dumbfire rockets"
That is not AA, thats getting hits on stupid pilots. due to the low velocities of dumbfires they are ineffective. the only 2 weapons in the game that make Antiair fun are the Vanguard and the Lancer, due to the high skill ceiling. but the Lancer sucks at Antiair, it does the same damage as lockons but requires alot more skill.

I have no problem with that. I'm a sunderer driver and gal pilot but I still looks to be rewarded in the game. Anti airplay isn't rewarding in any way, and that's why only a few people use anti air. It's not that I think we need better weapons against air, but the ones we have limit you in any other way. Try to get back the 250 cert from the aa rocket launcher just with killing aircraft or try to get the 2nd max gun by shooting aircraft ...

Actually according to the stats the best counter to an ESF is the ESF itself, which is sad.
Trees are OP

How much time do you have spent in vehicles? I get your points if this was real life, but tanks really can't soak up damage (except the Vanguard, to an extent), especially in big fights where a tank can easily be destroyed rapidly by any form of concentrated fire. A single MBT dies to focus-fire from two other MBTs in ~3½-4 seconds (assuming they are taking damage to the front), without the use of any ES abilities. I wouldn't determine that as being able to soak up a lot of damage. Also, in offensive pushes, you aren't only there to keep the enemy occupied, you are also there to take out valuable targets via pincer and/or flanking maneuvers. You are there to punish the enemy faction for lacking situational awareness, and taking them out from the flank. You aren't accomplishing anything in the middle of the zerg, that you wouldn't be able to accomplish using most other platforms as well, and you certainly aren't contributing to be a deciding factor for your faction to win the battle.

One issue is then the incentive given to drivers of tanks to stay with the zerg, which have gotten more an more apparent, like they don't want us to actually accomplish anything. This is seen by the power of aircraft against ground targets just 50-100m away from the main zerg, as they are easily dispatched of by the roaming aircraft.

The ONLY reason tanks are better served in the zerg right now, is because of aircraft being all over them at all times if you aren't in the middle of the friendly zerg, especially with the latest lib buffs (which is caused more-so by the increased popularity than the actual combat prowess of the Lib in my opinion). I actually don't have a problem with Libs taking me out while flanking, but some ESF coming along while I'm ~75m away from a huge friendly zerg, with a non-specialized load-out, where I cannot do anything to combat it aside from gimping my tank severely is annoying. When the pilots then come on the forums and claim they cannot fight within 500m of large battles, that is even more annoying, as it is clearly BS, while they have a 1-man craft equipped to take on anything pretty effectively. It's like the Lightning had both a Skyguard (maybe with 10% less DPS), and a Viper/Python to change between while driving, as both are 1-man vehicles (heck, it could even be a Walker, just let the Lightning driver be able to move whilst shooting the Walker). I actually think that alone would help quite a bit with some peoples aircraft issues, and it would give pilots a taste of their own non-specialized medicine.

When people won't even redeploy when they are being spawn camped by 20 tanks, I doubt they will be able to redeploy when aircraft are around. I get your point though

But we're not.

We're thinking about -everyone- playing. Because NO ONE in this game is a pilot, or a tanker, or infantry. We are all of the above, constantly. UNLESS you're choosing to arbitrarily restrict yourself, at which point, it's not for SOE to provide you extra tools so that your nonsensical decision can be rationalised by otherwise-game-breaking weaponry.

You need to stop thinking about 'me', or even 'infantry', and start thinking about 'my platoon'. If you don't want to be in the air, that's fine. Someone in your platoon will want to get in the air. If you want to give them a hand from the ground, you can roll AA and enjoy working as a part of a team, whilst perhaps not scoring too many kills.

It's absolutely paramount to the existence of the air game at all that ground is not the most effective counter to air, otherwise any force that chooses NOT to use aircraft will beat a force that's using aircraft. When I put 12 of my 48 guys in the air to counter their 12 of 48 guys who are in the air, they get a battle, and we get a battle on the ground. If my 12 beat theirs, unless they get some logistical superiority and continue addressing my guys in the sky, my 12 guys are now going to help us secure victory on the ground. IF however 12 guys in the sky were more easily countered by ground units than air units - so lets say, only 8 AA units necessary to counter 12 air units - then all of a sudden if I put 12 guys in the sky and go for a 'combined arms' approach, they only have to switch 8 guys to AA to deny any involvement in the fight, meanwhile what was previously a balanced conflict has become unbalanced as they have 40 G2G troops, whilst I only have 36.

Unless there's something more relevant to fight over in the sky than the eventual ability to win a battle by raining hellfire from above, air is either made irrelevant by ground troops (in the case you're arguing for, where ground is more effective as AA than air is), or the bane of existence of ground troops when left uncountered by friendly aircraft.

We've tried a ridiculous level of the latter (at launch of the game), and a ridiculous level of the former (after the air cull, and especially with 'Anniside' and 'Anniside 2.0: TR get to win all da fights') - what we have now is a reasonable amount of balance between the need for air to be relevant, and the need for ground to have fun from time to time.



A final parting thought: the real problem is that the above dichotomy has completely different effects on small and large scale conflict. A majority of complaints do not come from people participating in an organised manner in large scale conflict, where the balance is effect and my 12+36vs12+36 example can ring true - they come from smaller fights where the 'raining hellfire' effect is overly pronounced and there are not enough players able to commit air to the fight to stop air being the single deciding factor of the battle.

There's no real solution here that isn't completely arbitrary or game-breaking for one size fight or the other. Hence, I'd much rather things stay as they are, such that combined arms exists in the large battles the game is intended for, and that small battles fall by the wayside as the issue remains unsolvable. Sorry groundpounders.

You need to stop thinking about 'me', or even 'Air', and start thinking about 'my platoon'. If you don't want to be on the ground, that's fine. Someone in your platoon will want to get on the ground. If you want to give them a hand from the Air, you can roll a Banshee and strap on some flares and enjoy working as a part of a team, whilst perhaps not scoring too many kills.

It's absolutely paramount to the existence of the ground game at all that air is not the most effective counter to ground, otherwise any force that chooses NOT to use ground will beat a force that's using ground.

Unless there's something more relevant to fight over on the ground than the eventual ability to win a battle by capping the point, ground is either made irrelevant by air troops (in the case you're arguing for, where Air is more effective than the ground), or the bane of existence of air when left uncountered by friendly ground troops.



Oh wait this argument is both equally valid and equally ridiculous either way isn't it?

This is somehow a problem? Do you think it's sad that the biggest killer of infantry is other infantry?

He says that it's paramount that ground forces not be as effective as air forces as counteringnair, and to an extent, he's right. Air is so much harder to use than AA, so if AA was as good at killing air as a nosegun/ab ESF, the only purpose of ESFs would be ground pounding. If AA wants to be anywhere near as effective at killing air as air, it needs to sacrafice survivability, resource cost, or versatility.

If Air wants to be anywhere near as effective at killing Ground as Ground, it needs to sacrafice survivability, resource cost, or versatility.


Hrmm... nope, still silly and founded on nothing at all either way.