Why G2A locks, destroy PS" Gameplay

Just look, it sucks for all A2A pilots

The start is just, that u guys can see, it was an good fight, and not A2A stoped it, no G2A locks without skill without anything ****** this **** up....

U Talk, that the Job of an ESF should do, kill Libs...... now for all wo dont know to Fly, isn`t so easy to get a Lib, because u dont fight alone vs the Lib....

Psssttt... If you haven't heard, PS2 is a team game, with all sorts of different forces from ground vehicles, to air vehicles, to infantry. If you want a A2A exclusive game, there are several on the market, but PS2 is not one of them.

I have never had any probs with g2a lockons. Also they are necessary.

I'm sorry, but I'm going to have to disagree vehemently about lockon rockets ruining air to air gameplay.

If you pull a tank and I'm an infantry, I can at least use C4. If I don't have C4, I can pull a heavy assault and rocket you with a dumbfire rocket, or an anti-vehicle grenade, or so on and so forth. No matter what I am, i'm not completely helpless and can still kill the tank if I outplay it to a significant degree.

If you're in a scythe and I'm on the ground, rocket pods completely eliminate direct fire from all but heavy assaults as a viable option, as if I can see you, you can drive a rocket into my skull. If I'm a dedicated Anti-Air, such as a skyguard or flakmax, I gave up the ability to threaten anyone else to hurt you (skyguards can still crush people and damage light infantry, but actually getting infantry kills with one is rare if the infantry have half a brain). If I use a lockon rocket, you can still escape combat and heal up before I can put enough of them into you to kill you. If I try a dumbfire rocket, well, it works when it hits, but reverse maneuver and your ability to turn and roll out of the path of the rocket means 9/10, it just forces you to break off, and doesn't actually hit.

There's no room to outplay air. I can't make a fancy long range decimator shot. I can't use an invisible C4 ATV to catapult over a hill and ram you. I can't sneak up on you and C4 you. I can't bullfight you in an AV max. I can't skip an AV grenade over a hill into you. Air to Ground relies on lockons and generous damage radius weapons like flak to make up for the fact that we can't use the majority of our arsenal to hurt you and cannot force an engagement.

G2A???

lmao, hardly a bother.

Only specific AA (including A2A) weapon worse is the Ranger.

Awww, does fire surpression not save from this? How unfortunate.

I think that the problem that people like him feel the most is that this happens too often and prevents them from killing A2G pounders - the lockons are being used against them (A2A guys trying to take down A2G units) instead of on their intended targets (those farmers). If you're farming the ground and an enemy ESF jumps you, simply fly down near a friendly Sunderer and some friendly infantry unit will pull a G2A launcher and take out the aggressor for you. I tried it multiple times and it actually works.

It's kind of weird really. G2A locks are necessary to prevent ESFs from farming small fights but at the same time they also prevent A2A pilots from killing those A2G ESFs which ground AA doesn't manage to kill. In a way, you can obtain air dominance simply by pulling enough G2A locks. Eventually, the enemy will stop hunting your ground pounders because your AA will create a no-fly zone on the battle and your ESFs will have free farm.

Basically, instead of preventing it, mass ground AA (and especially G2A locks which are easy, abundant, and hard to dodge) simply moves ESF ground farming to your side, so that your enemy is getting farmed instead of you.

Now of course, if we had a proper A2A-only interceptor, things could be more interesting, but I guess that a weird multirole that is both OP and and UP at the same time is enough for SOE.

Uhm, that's kinda the whole point of COMBINED ARMS.

If the enemy REALLY wants ground farmers to stop killing them, pull AA.

It doesn't take much to reach critical mass and prevent all but the most restricted and fastest air to ground strikes (and even those at extreme risk... I should know since that's usually where I operate and my KDR for piloting kinda blows)

You got too close to enemy ground units, end of story. You were too focused on your target and neglected that there were other players in an MMO game, 99% of them who hate you. It was a good idea of that enemy air unit to retreat to friendly territory when attacked by enemy air, it was a bad idea for you to pursue them that far into their AA envelope. I realize that lock ons can be frustrating, but you have many ways to counter them and are in fact completely immune to them if you keep your distance. If you have any better ideas for G2A weapons please enlighten us. Flak? Sucks balls. Moves so slowly with a spread like a goddamn shotgun. Dumbfire rockets? People drive faster than those pieces of crap. Tank shells? Awesome, but logically, killing air isn't really what it should be doing and they are pretty bad at it. Lancers/Vorteks are my personal favorite, but that's because I like doing weird *** crap in games. Striker is only good for super close range encounters because of the slow *** projectile speed(like when air is actively lolpodding ground). And Phoenix is only good if they are pretty close, stationary, and not paying any attention to their radar. I know you want to be completely immune to ground troops, but if you are threatening their air units, they should be able to help out, especially if you get that close to them. That's how team based multiplayer games are, we help our teammates when we can.

There only things that are remotely close to being qualified as unintended targets for the G2A launcher are ground vehicles and infantry in dumbfire mode.

Nobody gives a flying bacon about whether an ESF is a groundpounder or an A2A. We have neither time or a 8x scope on any AA weapon to confirm that kind of crap. You're also missing the fine detail where there's no ESF nosegun that is actually bad against ground.

I think the solution to this would be to grant extreme-range A2A missiles to A2A aircraft.

In that way aircraft can knock out other aircraft from render distance. This means that A2A aircraft could engage other aircraft while remaining outside the infantry SAM bubble.

Of course even A2A aircraft should be shot down by larger SAM systems (ones that cost nanites and aren't infantry-carried), but at least you wouldn't have to worry about infantry SAMs anymore.

Quite frankly the point of combined arms should not be to lock out a role because of "critical mass", nor to constantly "bounce" the "free farm" status between the two fighting factions depending on who pullls the most G2A launchers.

I mean, really, if it's combined arms, all roles and vehicles should have a place in a fight, there should never come a point when ESF pilots will just say "kay, too much AA here, time to find another fight".

Why can't everyone have a place? Why do some roles have to get "disabled" after "critical mass"? This is plain bad game design that goes well beyond the simple aspect of "balance", IMO.

This post is funny.

Same logic applies to A2G but that creates a **** storm

Not really.

In a case where the enemy has a complete and effective AA systems, aircraft shouldn't have a role... at that point in time. Instead the pilots ought to be coordinating with ground elements to locate and destroy AA so the aircraft could return.

Aircraft should be the ultimate glass cannons... they can deliver an unparalleled amount of firepower in a short time, but the flipside is that aircraft should be extremely fragile and expensive.

This means that the side which has cleared out the enemy AA will have a terrific tactical advantage; they can safely bring down a ton of firepower on the enemy.

Knowing this, commanders should be incentivized to clear enemy AA so that friendly A2G aircraft can participate. This could easily happen if the pilots are flying as part of a platoon (a dedicated aircraft and rearming squad for example) and communicate their needs to the platoon leader.

because there's no limits on vehicle count or even player counts.

There's critical mass of MAXes, Tanks, Aircraft, and AA. HA's even or infantry in general.

Everything in this game is a contest of critical mass.

SIZE ALWAYS MATTERS

and all that.

Air/AA balance in particular is tricky.

The TTK for AA to Air is pretty quick on a per player basis, it's just that air has the evasiveness and speed to **** of dodge before being killed.

This in turn frustrates AA who feel like they're underpowered, despite it taking less AA players to chase off Air numbers.

overall, it balances out in the greater scheme, but there are frustrating extremes for either side of the coin.

I'm sorry, but since I can't see your armaments from 250m away, I'm going to have to assume that you're only looking to shoot down my ESF teammate so that you can destroy ground targets unimpeded. Thus I'm going to execute some pre-emptive dissuasion.

So sorry if your epic fighter duel gets interrupted.

Well regardless if I think he's a lolpodder or not I'm going to try to help my team mate if I can. Lock on launchers also have a minimal chance of accidental friendly fire unlike Flak.

I don't really understand the "just use teamwork" argument. Teamwork is not mandatory to enjoy the game for ground vehicles and infantry, why should it be for air? Isn't PS2 supposed to be a much more "casual" game than PS1 (according to DGC's official direction)? You either create a game with good teamwork tools (which we don't have) to promote a well-crafted coordination system (which we don't have) for all types of units (which is currently not the case), or you make a casual game for everyone (but right now air are excluded from this, according to the "just use teamwork" logic)

Also, as I said, I think that it's not really matter of balance, of being a glass cannon, of having this or that perk, it's a matter of designing a fun game that works. Way too often, air-to-ground and ground-to-air are not fun and they don't work. I'd much rather see my ESF nerfed and completely redesigned into a shell of its former self than keep it as it is now, if that meant having ground-air interactions that are fun and actually work.

I don't want "an unparalleled amount of firepower" with a "flipside" and "teamwork", I just want a casual (not because I necessarily like casual, but because DGC has decided that way) game that works.

I'm below all you aircraft in my Flash with a bucket, collecting the salt to dust the french fries that feed my many illegitimate children.

I've seen some amazing pilots. Pilots that utilize tree cover and topology and literally pop up out of no where to pwn you in your face then jet off only to do the same thing from a different angle.(I still hate them though, the magnificent bastards) Just like every unit in the game, you just need to be aware of your surroundings. Know where the threats are, know where you can take cover to break LOS, know when to pursue and when to break off. If you don't want to be the Glass Cannon, there's always being a Liberator or Galaxy pilot. As long as you play it safe you can get in and get out before the AA can take you down.Though you do need to worry about the aforementioned Glass Cannons pursuing and finishing you off.

And if you want a completely casual, no teamwork weapon with no flipsides(weaknesses I translate this to), maybe being a pilot is not for you. The only way I can see making a "casual" game for air is if you make an observer drone that doesn't interact with the game world. As soon as you strap a weapon on though, you are fair game for people who want to kill you, which is only fair.