Anyone else feel the squad spawn option has broken the front line mechanic of the game? Before this change there was a push and pull effect when attacking a base just what SOE have been trying to achieve for a long time and what the lattice was introduced for. Now especially when a platoon is attacking, the tactic is to grab 4 or more Galaxies and hover above the objective at the flight ceiling allowing the whole platoon to constantly spawn in behind the front line. I think if Galaxy spawning is going to stay then it needs to be how it was in the beta where the Gal has to land and deploy. Add this tactic to the WDS style game play where all players just want the easy cap it makes the game very boring.
1. galaxys need to be a lot lower than flight ceiling in order to safely drop troops as the safe fall doesn't work from a certain hight or if the galaxy is moving too fast. 2. Galaxy's are huge juicy targets for any and all aircraft, no feature previous to this has really encouraged aircraft to go after other aircraft. 3. This one is more me but whenever they have a galaxy hovering over a small base i redeploy to the base thats next along and shoot it down with my AV turret.
It gives pilots something to do other than farming infantry who have no hope of counter attack. I like it.
Along these lines. My personal game experience hasn´t changed much since the Galaxy update. And like Nin says, it´s really not that hard to scare those Galaxies of or kill them outright. Had 3 Outfit Gals doing coordinated drops over the Octagon on Esamir a couple of days ago, all it took to get rid of them was me and another burster MAX. They even had Engis ontop repairing and it still wasn´t enough to keep them in place.
Enemy has Galaxies? Step 1: pull a Liberator step 2: there is no step 2 You don't even need a Gunner. Equip Zephyr and Tankbuster Fly in, empty a tank buster mag pull up kill with Zephyr. I would never recommend G2A in low numbers against Galaxies, as even i in my Sologalaxy will rather die due to laughing than by your fire. but you will die. be it a Whalehug, one of my Gunners or me switching midair to the bulldog. other than that the Squadspawn is nothing more than a QOL improvement. you don't have to fly back to pick up someone, be it because he is late or because he jumped out to C4 something. but thats about it. Without the squadspawn the Galaxy would just be a taxi flying from one spawn to the base, making it harder to kill.
They probably don't know that you can hover on flight ceiling and drop troops safely. Good luck bursting down something that is barely visible and hovering on flight ceiling.
The Octagon is on even terrain, and the Gals were pretty high up. It´s not a real problem hitting them if they can´t move. Also, this is Esamir with flat terrain. On Indar this tactic isn´t applicable at all on 70% of the continent because the ceiling isn´t remotely high enough. There might be situations where you can´t do much about this tactic but I have yet to encounter one where this was gamebreaking in any way. Aside from that, if organized squads or platoon use this tactic then it wouldn´t be a problem if only a organized squad or platoon could counter it -- as in coordinated attack with aircraft on the Gal´s.
The only time i seen ppl having a small problem in scaring a gal away was when it was high enough for ppl not to be able to aim that high. All it took was moving 100m from the base and shooting from there. Before the change galaxies were 1 off spawn beacons. Now there are actually battlegals and there is an incentive to actually hunt the gal down instead of just shooting it once to get the xp when the pilot suicides it. They are still slow, they are still big targets, they are still a cert pinata, you still have the 15 sec redeploy timer + quite a lot of time to get on the ground and if on the move even the chance for the ppl to spread out. I really don´t see a problem in being able to spawn in it(especially as it is squad only, you would needs a sky full of gals to deploy ppl in a big battle which would be a nightmare.
We experimented and there is a maximum distance that you can fall before the safe fall effect wears off. Flight ceiling generally too high for a safe drop as the effect times out before you get to the ground.
it's missing some sort of no deploy radius but that gets insanely tricky if your not being locked as stationary. then again just having to stop to allow spawns wouldnt really be that bad, and would allow you to retreat deploy and get your squad all reloaded this could get a bit of that push pull mechanic going again. then again, after a few weeks we might see a lot more ESF pilots going out to hunt galaxy's specifically. also i would really like to see at least a partial roll back on the burster nerf. giving them back the old COF would go a long way toward keeping those galaxies mobile and not just hovering
True that. All its really done is increase the frequency of Gal drops, which by nature have a huge shock value against defenders. Competent player are quick to respond, and the defending force maintains the advantage of stable reinforcement lines. However, the major goal of a Gal drop is to disrupt an enemy line and soften the front enough for allies to push forward. The only time I've seen it be absolutely crippling was the first day when Gals would drop whole squads of HAs on top of deployed Sunderers. A couple days later this became a lot less frequent as AA density and HMG fire practically tripled. With the WDS encouraging blobs of air moving from base to base, air fights in general have gotten a lot more overwhelming, distracting them from ground fights.
I guess it depends on where you are dropping and the actual relation between the ground and the air ceiling. It is still a lot higher than it was before the update.
The Timer for Squad Galaxies and Sunderers need to be a LOT longer than normal spawn timers. Galaxies and Sunderer Squad spawning should be an alternative, not the "go to".
I did used to be much lower but a long while back they increased the duration of the safe fall from a gal. So yes you can be quite high up and over high terrain that might even be flight ceiling but generally you need to be much lower. Anyway if the galaxy wants to provide fire support with it's bulldog's it generally will be flying much lower.
Drifter jump jets solve this issue. Activating the jetpack instantly shuts down the visual effect, so the player is not as obvious when falling. Drifters also allow to stay 20-30 meters above the battlefield and drop C4 while airborne. Then the operator has to drift away, press redeploy and he's back in the Gal with fresh C4. This is a very, very powerful tactic, especially against zergs of random people who don't communicate. 2 Walkers and 2 M20's scare away uncoordinated airplanes. A full squad can bring 12 Galaxies, so by the time the last one gets shot down, the first player can bring a new one anyways. This doesn't always work as a flight ceiling Galaxy simply might not even render.
I have experience from this in both directions, I fly battle gals and find my self unable to stick around if any aircraft start attacking me and that's regular occurrence. They don't always kill me but they do force me to retreat after losing or killing them. Then I personally shoot down galaxy's and liberator's from the side of bases with my AV turret but that's more a weird skill I have.
I think it's overpowered. Not game-breakingly so, but air power has gone from being near-irrelevant to the only thing that matters (no point clearing up on the ground if you'll just get dropped again immediately), and that's more than should have been done. A good gal drop required coordination and logistics before, now it just requires one guy to get a galaxy to the target.
Nope. Pro-Tip: Tank Buster (A cheap 250 cert beastly weapon... or is it 100 certs? I think 250. Still cheap.) can shred galaxies with impunity.
Also, for the first time... well, ever... in PS2 Air is often more concerned with Air than Ground. Frankly, I think it's awesome.
I think that's the main adjustment that is still needed - tack on another 15-30 seconds to the spawn timer to spawn to a squad-owned galaxy/sunderer. From fastest to slowest, respawn should be: instant - Warp gate 10-20 seconds - Nearby deployed sunderer or spawn tube 30-60 seconds - Drop Beacon 45-90 seconds - Squad-owned sunderer/galaxy
