Rocket Launcher incoming

Soo we will get a new rocket launcher: THE NSSwarm who is taking the same place like the old striker as it seems

So how is the front on the ESRL side:

we all know that the Lancer beats them all of course and followed by the Phoenix.

So is the striker coming to its old glory or do we need to put it to the other broken TR gear once and for all like the:

Fracture and TrapM1

Annihilator with less damage and some-kind improved lock-on system

There is more incentive for players to purchase an NS weapon than faction-specific rocket launchers. Done.

learn to play

I was worried by the Swarm but honestly I tried and it doesn't feel as op as the old Striker was. Fast rockets are not so precise, slow rockets should dodgeable, and like the old Striker is counterable by flares and stealth, and it's useless against max and infantry.
Even if you land all rockets the damage is basically the same as other rl.

Yep the Trap works perfectly as intended.

This is what i think the TR are

Yeah this.

It's not as OP as the Phaseshift (in very narrow circumstances), but it's still a solid weapon.

No it doesn't. The Lancer is firmly in the middle at the moment, and recent buffs have boosted the Striker to the point where's it's now only barely below the Lancer. The Striker still needs help, but at least it's moving in the right direction.

That's kills. Which is problematic because 1) it doesn't take into hours of usage and 2) it mostly is used to determine anti-infantry effectiveness.

If you look at Vehicle Kills Per Hour (VKPH), you see this:



Which handily shows that the Lancer is definitely killing more vehicles per hour of use than the other options. It pretty much has always been that way, according to the available data.

Yep, this is true - in terms of kill numbers overall, however, it isn't doing all that well compared to the Phoenix. The lancer gives up the vast majority of it's effectiveness versus anything but ground based vehicles, the Phoenix can be fired at absolutely anything, thus, it is. The Lancer is fired almost exclusively at vehicles, as it's useless against infantry, driving up it's VKPH significantly due to universal non-use versus other target types.

The Lancer is an extremely specialized weapon, similar in usage style to the Archer. It's good against vehicles, and vehicles only. The Phoenix can be fired around hills, and over complete cover at a not insignificant range.

If the goal is exclusively anti ground vehicle, then yes, Lancer is generally the best overall option at 75+ meters. If the goal is general overall effectiveness, the Phoenix is best. The Striker... really needs help, it's not really all that great at anything right now.

Really, I think the mechanics for the Swarm should be applied to the Striker as a secondary fire mode, then come up with something new if they really want to release another NS rocket launcher.

lancer has the easiest time of all launchers when hitting galaxies or liberators at any range, you surely can't reliably hit fast moving ESF with that, but the same can be said about the phoenix, same when dealing with infantry. it is extremely good at killing MAX units camping on a tower or at medium/long distance too.
can't see why vanu players think it's such a high specialized weapon, a charged laser does to a sunderer more damage than a rocket from a common pool lock-on RL, with no drop, 800 m/s speed, outer-space range and 8 "rockets" instead of 5. no wonder if it outperforms other launchers in vkph.

Would love to know how many of those phoenix kills are against Engie turrets

I think the Striker should just go back to what it was with a faster firing rate, and more damage done if all the rockets hit, with an instant lock on ground vehicles, and normal timed lock for aircraft.

Before, the biggest ***** was trying to get more than 2 or 3 rockets to hit ground vehicles and aircraft before.

So the idiots at SOE responded with the current one, now, you can't hit a castle from 10 feet away.

Make the swarm what the current striker is, but buffed, because this is just inhumane to have such an appalling piece of garbage in the game.

Lock ons are best at hitting Galaxies and Liberators, and Liberators are agile enough to make hitting unreliable at ranges where Lock ons cease to function. Galaxies are indeed rather easy to hit, I agree with you there. Skilled players can hit both with a high degree of reliability, most players cannot, from what i've seen.

It's fairly good at killing max units, yes, but with 3 second charge time required to do any appreciable damage, it experiences the same issue as with the Archer: After the first shot, your target leaves, and the tracers make it simple to see where the shots are originating. It's fine scoring hits, but not typically kills (Hence, the low average kills stat.)

In reference to your comment on damage, I decided to do the actual calculations myself, as I wasn't sure whether this was correct.
As it turns out, you are!

Against a Sunderer, with 4000 health and 45% armor at all (non underside) angles...
The Default Rocket Launcher does 702.28 damage, 6 shots are required to down one from full health.
The Lancer does 825 damage (As does the Phoenix, interestingly enough) per 3 charge shot. This requires 6 fully charged shots.

Assuming instant fire on reload and perfect aim, this means the Lancer will need 3 seconds of charge time and 5.2 seconds of reload time per 2 shots.

To make a long story short:
The default dumbfire launcher requires 26 seconds to remove a Sunderer,
The Lancer requires 33 seconds to remove a Sunderer.

The dumbfire still wins in terms of damage output, but yes - this assumes ideal range, it is indeed much simpler to hit a Sunderer at high range with a Lancer. In exchange for a nearly complete inability to remove Infantry, ESFs, and to a degree, Liberators... the Lancer grants high range against ground vehicles. At maximum damage dropoff at (~450-500 meters), the damage is a bit less then halved, which is just under a full 60 seconds to remove a MBT, assuming shots at high armor.

This is the reason I refer to the Lancer as a "Special purpose" launcher - you must plan to be within a certain range of an intended target - ideal range is ~225-450 meters (Up to 300 meters, the high exposure time and high visibility tracers make you a prime target for Snipers.) - Carrying a Lancer into CQB combat, or base fights, means that you are sacrificing all potential uses for a Dumbfire rocket launcher vs Infantry, Maxes, nearby Sunderers, etc. It's best used at exclusively high range.

This is not to say it's a bad item, it's a special-purpose Rocket Launcher that's both amazing in groups, and performing area denial at high range when solo (Indar / Amerish especially) ... You won't be scoring many kills on your own, but you are annoying enemy armor out of otherwise excellent cover. (Which, consequently, is the reason I think that TR / NC hate facing it. It's obnoxious being blasted from high range, regardless of damage done.)

The Phoenix manages to be similarly special purpose - high alpha damage, but not amazing DPS, but it can shoot around corners, and over cover, not to mention (nearly) OHK hovering ESFs from unanticipated angles, not to mention that it's second to none at taking out sundies over low cover, which is frequently all that's available when on offense / defense.

I like the idea of a secondary firing mode for the Striker - Duplicate the functionality of the NS-Swarm and simply add it to the Striker as a secondary firing mode, but reduce the number of shots to 4 for that mode (With an increased fire rate, and perhaps +50 meter range above standard lockons). Keep the current version of the striker as is as a firing mode option, but with less CoF and slightly faster projectile velocity.

Just my 2 cents on the matter, the striker at the moment feels like a gimmick - the mechanic is kinda eh, as is the damage.

That's 5 shots, do you even math?
It's 5 shots in VR as well against stock/repair/ammo/stealth sundies up to 450m. This is the same as Lock-ons vs sunderers.
I manged to get a 27sec TTK against a stock sundie in the VR with just releasing as soon as it gets to 3, although I timed with a stopwatch so some decimal seconds might be a bit off.

Thanks for the catch, the total for TTK slightly below there is correct, I just hit 6 instead of 5 in the section you quoted.

Bah, and it's too late to edit the original. Ah well.

Yeah but the game is semi-realistic. So going from 6 shots to 4, doesn't make sense. it'd make sense if it was a Lancer or something, because that's all energy. But the Striker uses physical rocket ammunition.

The problem is, the Phoenix is controlled, the Lancer's projectile is so fast, it's practically point and click, with nearly unlimited range.

So, make the Striker fire 500 dmg, laser guided, high velocity rockets. Or, make it insta lock on ground vehicles, and delay lock on Aircraft, and buff its damage.

Because the Striker is just dwarfed by the power of the Phoenix and Lancer. Or, make the other two as weak as the Striker. That might actually be better, because the AV in this game, is just too much. Just like there's way too much AA.

Any of the above are fun concepts for it, I personally like the laser guided idea. The concept I had in mind was that the extra two rockets' worth of fuel are re-allocated to the remaining rockets, perhaps splitting the warheads between them as well for an extra damage boost. Or perhaps drop it to 3 rockets, double the damage per rocket, and slow the fire rate slightly (also, increase the physical rocket size a good bit, to account for the extra projectile mass for realism purposes.)

You still run into the problem that your Kills chart doesn't take into account the amount of time each weapon is used. When you look at KPH...



The Lancer isn't that far behind the Phoenix at an anti-infantry role. In the last few months, there are even periods of overlap.

The Striker on the other hand...