Welp.. Skyguards are useless now...

Libs got nerfed at every single update, either directly or indirectly, since launch. ONE TIME +4% buff against flak on the composite loadout that no serious Lib crews fly and you throw a fit.

#nosympathy

If you want to kill air, let it get close before opening up (and obviously have sufficient AA to begin with). Alot of the time i start taking AA as soon (or close to) as i enter render range. That obviously won't kill any competent pilot, what's more it will likely piss them off getting plinked at constantly. I make it a priority to ambush any AA source that just blindly fire away at everything if i'm in a lib.

Those rare time when the target has coordinated AA tough.. well those extra few% CA got now is not going to help. at all.

BTW Skyguards also do considerable damage to ground vehicles, turrets and infantry.

Again, the lib is a a2g counter. When 2 counters engage each other, all things being equal the person who outplays the other will come out on top. BUT all things are not equal, the lib has 3 people in it. Two of those people have weapons ideal for erasing you, with a third capable of doing some damage. In order to come out on top you have to outplay your opponents by a wide margin. Furthermore, there's a good chance that pilot has a lot more certs in his/her aircraft than you do in your skyguard. 3 people working together, better prepaired and sporting 3 times the firepower.

Try again with some teamwork or at the very least read teks posts and work on improving your play. He gave you some good advice. Imagine if you had 3 people working together in that same situation, even if it is just 2 heavies with lock-ons(that don't stand in the open to get bulldogged).

why wont this thread die?
the skyguard was buffed several times without air being compensated. upgrade your lightnings and take skyguarding seriously. noone wants a skillless weapon you point up and win.

actually under ideal circumstance (within 100 meters and all direct hits [not flak]) it takes the skyguard a little under a clip and a half. if you are firing at targets that are maneuvering and/or at extreme range taking 2 to 3 clips seems reasonable to me. of course i vomit fire everywhere in my skyguard, 700,000+ shots fired in just a little under 160 hours of play, but i have 1,040 vehicle kills to my skyguard. wow 700 shots per kill doesn't sound very impressive, although i do get lots of assists too.

ng com

I have that same feeling! But with the Vanguard Shield Nerfs / Vanguard Buffs / Vanguard Shield change threads.

i just a few minutes ago put a C4 charge and 2x decimator rockets into a vanguard and dropped it down to half health, do you know what one C4 charge and one rocket does to a prowler? the answer is the prowler gets blown the F--- up. i regularly blow apart prowlers this way, but even without the shield the vanguard just didn't give a crap that i walked up to him and planted explosive ordinance directly on his rear and then hit him in that same rear with 2 heavy anti vehicle rockets. he was never even aware when i attacked him no shield he never even moved, he never even had to. AFTER i dumped those explosives into his rear armor, he noticed he had been damaged turned his turret and ended me.

so until we can kill vanguards with somewhat reasonable means you can just deal with it.

i will say screw the shield threads from now on, because after tonight i understand how thoroughly heavy assaults get screwed by the almost indestructible nature of this tank. the shield is the tip of the damned iceberg.

Ive said this in another thread, but ill say it again here. AA gameplay just isnt fun or rewarding enough. You are correct, a team of 4-6 skyguards working together is actually quite potent... but good luck finding anyone who actually wants to do that. With the lack of XP and kill rewards involved in playing dedicated AA, most people would rather simply stay indoors or redeploy to another location (those who actually sit in a spawn and/or repeatedly die to the lib need stop doing that, though...). I still tend to pull my skyguard, bursters or AA rocket launcher sometimes, but only because the situation absolutely demands it.

I bet if being an AA gunner was actually fun and rewarding the libs would not seem so powerful because we would see more AA weapons in use. I personally would love to roll with a dedicated AA squad more often if this were the case.

First off, this thread was about Skyguards, not Vanguards, notice SKY versus VAN of the vehicle title. I'd direct you to the other Vanguard change threads but I've lost track of them because they're going nowhere fast; just talking about stat changes normally.

HA's have different types of rockets now, in regards to AI or AV? You're absolutely, positively certain that there was no hitch / server lag, pc hiccup when you assaulted the Vanguard, not Skyguard right? Skyguards don't have shields...

skyguards die with a rocket and a C4. the only other vehicle that DOESN'T die to C4 and a rocket is sunderers. if i did have a lag spike tonight it was the only one and the only effect it had was making a vanguard extremely tough, because all of the hits registered damage. this would be the only lag spike of this variety i have ever seen OR vanguards are unbalanced BS.

i don't know if you are on a test server or something, but there are no unique rockets for connery heavy assaults. the decimator is just the decimator. i just checked.

you brought up the vanguard, i merely responded.

I initially brought up the topic of multiple Vanguard change threads; not the effect of the shield or the issues you've had fighting the Vanguard (those were made AFTER your post mentioning Vanguards ). It's inaccuracies similar to these; that gain notoriety which might have an effect to how the devs implement questionable changes, be it Vanguard, Magrider or Prowler.

lawn gnome, thank you for skimming, in this thread at least, my posts, imo.

You seem to be really reactive to mentions of Vanguard, which just by the thread topics I'm inclined to think that you haven't kept up to date with the recent Vanguard threads and come to the conclusion that on your own, you shouldn't fight against a Vanguard.

By the way, Sunderers won't die with even 2 C4. Bring friendlies .

Replace reloads with heat managment & make it 500 cert weapon.
It will feel more real, be more skill based & more available!

I made one of those. I was like "aww, now I'm the jerk" but that was more to figure out if they actually were going to change the shields (maybe?).
Those threads boil down to "Jealousy is not becoming my friend"

that doesn't change the fact he doesn't have any experience, and his aim is probably terrible, and for the millionth time, pull a couple skyguards

^ I agree - check this out....

Who knows really? Their vague description earlier doesn't really give an idea as to what of any specific EST balance they'll be making. I'm sure as far as the VG goes, it's a high probability that the shield will get tweaked or nerfed to some extent.

Galaxies and Sunderers are designed for transport. There's a reason why half the passengers can't gun. In regards to A2A missiles killing Libs, A2A missiles aren't balanced at the slightest. With nosegun/rockets, there is existing competition between Liberators and ESFs.

If you buff the damage of the Skyguard, perhaps Liberators wouldn't fare as well, but ESFs are the ones which suffer as a side effect.

Actually the problem with Lib's and Skyguards is when you have one flying towards you at height and the pilot switches to the belly gun which is AP and blasts the heck out of you and this has been the problem since the AA nerf when all the flyboys cried because they couldn't farm ground pounders. Now this was done on all sides. IMO remove seat switching in all vehicles for the pilot or driver and that should at least resolve some of the problems all round and reduce the NERF on the AA stuff.

As for two skygaurds I have seen a single pilot lib kill two skygaurds using that tactic.

I was driving through a narrow valley and got divebomb TB'd and finished off with a dalton. I died in seconds. I could have made a rage filled forum post about how this is unfair and game mechanics need to be changed, but I just equated it to poor positioning on my part and not having assistance from other AA units, then logged off and did some housework instead.

as a dedicated skyguard, i can say it's all about positioning. sure, libs can destroy you and it happened plenty of times, but that was the fault of me not moving around and being a sitting duck.
fought against a TR air zerg once, after a couple of planes went down they all flew off to one of my blind spots and rushed to my old position.
unfortunatly, i saw it coming and picked another position, fish-in-a-barrel'ing them and recieving hate tells.
it's not that the gun is weak, it's very powerfull IF you know how to use it. you just have to move, change your position every so often.

that, or just get another guy to skyguard with you.
one skyguard is a deterrent
2 skyguards is locked down airspace