So there it is, the new update. I played around yesterday a bit, and server ping was quite high, jet i have gathered some impressions. It is too early to judge every aspect of the patch, but as the DEVs wanted feedback, here we go: General: 1) Underpop: Logged in as VS on Miller, 24% world pop. I can not see triggering and winning an alert with that pop... 2) Crosshair change for Viper feels strange, it is much more usefull to estimate the drop than the spread. Everyone knows that it blooms, but tap fire is harder now. 3) Composite armor description for MBT and Lightning are missing. Does this only reduce C4 damage or grant health bonus? Balance: 4) Tank vs Infanty: Engagament time went up. It is quite funny too be chased by 2 LAs with flak armor and need to put multiple tank shells into them (even more to splash them), because of shield/health-regeneration. (/s) 5) Archer gameplay was nice, even solo. 6) Repairing a tank takes forever, maybe longer... Technical: 7) Performance: Ping was ok, fps went up a little, but the server's Hamster was dieing, logged out at that point. Impression, need further testing: 8) Magrider got indirectly nerfed by the removal of directonal armor and handling buffs to other tanks. The RoF buff does not make it out dps a Prowler or Vanguard, requires to have more time out of cover. Flanking sides is completly negated, thus tank warfare is reduced to more peek-and-shoot 9) Infanty-Infantry gameplay did not change. Got hit a few times by the new sniper, effetivness ranging from "uh, that tickles" to "could also have been a bolt action". 10) Airgame not tested. If you respond to this thread, pls keep it constructive and dont cry. Write what objectivly.
I think the Flanker Armor (not composite, as that died I do believe, as I couldn't find it) Apparently only reduces damage from C-4. Unless they forgot to mention any of details - As for everything else, the composite armor that still exists adds health. Just to note; Sadly, I haven't been able to re-cert into my Archer again. So how's it feel against maxes? Is it still that glorious? I did notice, in AV against vehicles, the new velocity made hits easier; Mind you the damage loss, means more rockets. But due to the longer repair times from the larger health pools, this might not be an issue; Did you find it take more time to repair from rocket strikes? I mostly was in live-fire, without time to repair, so that's an actual question. For aircraft, You should notice the increased durability against ground fire in Liberators; That 50% armor from below. ESFs seemed to be a lot more active in all manner of warzones, but could've been just due to the Alerts.
Here are my air game observations so far: 1. ANTI-VEHICLE ESF: With AA nose gun (TR: Rotary) and AV (Hornets). Hornets can now kill vehicles again as opposed to scavenging kills or needing 6 passes to get a possible kill (assuming no target repairs). Hornets are deadly again. My AA gun (Rotary for TR) "seemed" much more powerful, not sure if it is...but seemed so against tanks Heavy Assaults with rockets are more dangerous now--faster lock on time means less time to evade via terrain. This caused me to move from fire suppression to flares. I LIKE that threat being real (I also enjoy playing an HA AA guy, even as a minor nuisance to enemy air) 2. ANTI-AIR ESF: With AA nose gun (TR: Rotary) and Tomcats. Borderline OP against Valks and Libs Reducing Lib belly gun damage to ESFs was loooong needed, but coupling that with Tomcat changes may have been a bridge too far--may have been... Need more time to judge effectiveness of ESFs versus more fully occupied libs (hyenas, belly and pilot) The A2A changes might encourage fighter escorts which I hope it does. Whenever I see a friendly lib on the field, I'll often fly escort if I am equipped as such 3. FARMER JOE ESF: With AI Nosegun (TR: Banshee) and Hellfire missiles. I didnt play this load out much yet. But since 2012 release, these are my highest kill weapons. Say Cheese! With faster HA rocket lock-on's my ability to farm...err fight infantry was impaired. THIS. IS. GOOD.
1) Thank you 2) Biggest advantge of archer is still that it takes away a good amout of health almost unnoticable. Yet, damage is decreased and one needs more hits, i think 5 bodyshots or 3 headshots (2 Hs +1 BS). This makes Archer less viable in 1v1, but still a good thing as you can carry mines and turret on said class. 3) From single strikes i can not tell, i backed up and repaired at 30% life, and i had the feeling i could lay a book on my button and go for a walk.
I have only tried the some of the VS side so far. Ambusher jets are really fun, but kind of unfair against vehicles. I'm tearing them up. The alerts are better than the last system of play. The only problem I see, is that there is a lot of ignorance about the alerts still. The players aren't fighting the faction that has triggered the alert. However, if it worked as designed, do you really want 2 factions only fighting one. Sure, it would be a challenge, but no one would ever win until they were overpopped. Rocket Launchers are a joke. They are terrible. I couldn't even kill a spitfire turret using the s1 with one hit. I hit it 6 times in a row but one engineer was repairing it so I could not kill it. Killing vehicles: you have to shoot them forever. The Typhoon rocklets are nerfed a little too much. It took 2 1/2 magazines to kill a vehicle terminal, where it was only 1 magazine before. I could see 2 magazines but not more. Still checking out the other stuff, we'll see.
Typhoons are fine. It takes less than 4 mags to kill a Sunderer. Yes, their damage numbers were reduced, and so did the vehicle health and resistance rebalanced, but not for terminals, they still have the old numbers.
Agree, it was funny. Aiming dead center at 10m and 1/6 hits.Tap-fire helps. But then TTK is like a wall... Viper is now a short range-medium burst weapon versus tanks, meh against infantry.
Not sure why they changed so radically what was an under rated starter weapon. Bloody loved the thing! Feeling very sorry for the newer players, they've missed out.
So it has been a while and i want to go on with the feedback: Alert system: -The good: In total, i like the new alerts. The are meaningfull, action packed, tensed. Oh, and (finally) predictable. On equal pop good fights are happening, to either prevent an empire from getting 41% terretory or pushing them below 36%. Sometimes this leads to a counter alert, more action! Time feels good adjusted, 30 minutes are on point. Rewards (Iso-4 and shop items) are cool and motivating, however i got "sunderer spare tire" and it didnt unlock... -The bad: At the moment the system is not flawless. Population imbalance favours a empire far too much. I can see it could be fair to some point due to the supposed double teaming, jet fighting e.g. 60% on a secondary continent is pointless. Playerbase needs some time to adopt to the new alert system. I sometimes can see "farmfights" going on between "allied" empires. Another point is terretory grab. This discribes getting far more % of a continent without setting up hives. When later on the hives are set, the alert is autowin. The principle is ok! If you let them have so much terretory, its your bad. Delay the cortium and recap. But the alert should be automatically end if the defending empire has 50% terretory. Often this can only happen with population imbalance, so i would start fixing this first. Construction: Building is less important. Often you build your 2-3 Hives and let them run. After getting 25k you dont care anymore. I think this is ok. However, this makes OS useless. With its high charging and setup time there realy is no need for it anymore. I would like to see it used as a defensive weapon striking at bases. So When you are going to tigger an alert, you can whipe a base once (because of the massive charge time) Since bases to be capped are on the frontline, construction has to be there as well (Other than hive). Since OS is showing on map, taking it out strategically is possible. LA Ambusher Jump Pack Fun! It is cool. The handling is inuitive, i clearly has downsides, but hopping around gives more attack routes and even more suprise. Used wrong it turns you into free certs XD. CAI: -Ground vehicles: Overall changes are feeling good (after getting used to some repurposed stuff). Tank to tank combat lasts longer, outrepairing is not a thing anymore. AP is still king, but other ammo types have more all around purpose. Fighting Infantry seems to be off. Often you need more shots, and Infantry seems to hurt as before. I will keep an eye on this... XP for damaging vehicles is also nice. Flak is heavy nerfed, syguard has double the ttk of a walker... -Air: Valk is stronger. The with the possibility of rumbleseat abuse nerfed, but also increased repair rate and sometimes better guns, the valk is now in a good spot as a dropship/supporter. The Lib was nerfed. The nerf vs. ESF feels ok, a Lib shouldnt be a very effective A2A gunship. Self defense wise it would be somewhat nice if the backweapon could have the "old" damge back, but this is open to discussion. Freelock needs the cockpit removed... ESF on the other hand simply got buffed. Their time to kill vs Airtargets is greatly reduced, pushing them better into the role of air superiority fighters. This is what it should be. However, the pack much more endurance vs. groundtargets and with rockets still a good ttk. The own the sky, they farm the ground, and the only hardcounter is another ESF, what is strange balance wise. I would like to see them vurnable to flak. G2A lockons are a minor threat to ESFs due to the short attack window. Often you can only fire one, even with quicklock and improved relaod. Ranger and skyguard dont do much damge as it stands now. In order to make those weapons work, i would give them a burst fire mode with 10 bullets each and a bigger refire time. Damage is bigger, so if you manage to hit all shots, it will take like 45% HP. The weapon has a high bloom and high velocity, making it deadly in close but harmless for far vehicles.
Your assessment sounds pretty balanced and objective. It covers a few things I have no experience of myself so I couldn't say more than that. Just a note about under pop and alerts though, I think it might depend on time of day or something as I have now fought in four alerts on Miller, two triggered by VS, which they won (the others were one each by TR and NC). The faction pops in all four cases were pretty even. I find VS population tends to be lower than the other factions on cobalt, though not by as much as when it was at its lowest a few weeks ago. Personally I like the changes that make infantry more dangerous to tanks at close range but with tanks having more long range influence due to shorter anti tank weapon range. It kind of reflects reality a bit more in my experience, albeit by making ttk longer rather than making visibility from inside a tank poorer and manoeuvrability worse. And yeah, longer repair times mean more exposure for my engies, but hey ho. I understand why it has happened and more xp to gain if you survive long enough AFAIK. The biggest plus marks for me are: the new alert system, which seems to have prompted bigger and more aggresive fights; the free Tanto (why did I ignore it when it first came out!) - rediscovered the jazz of playing LA as well; vehicle damage bonuses for hitting ground vehicles (I run ESRLs for poops and giggles, so no lock-ons for me). Whilst I have run nanoweave armour on all classes since forever, I do like the changes that will give new players 20% protection for some things from rank 1 as opposed to having to cert up to rank 5 to get that level Ike in my early days.
Well not much of the feedback is what i'd call 'quick' - so i'll give you my version: (1) If you like ground vehicles: Pull a Harasser (2) If you like air: Pull an ESF (3) If you like transporting people: pull a Sunderer, Valkyrie or Galaxy - but watch out for (1) and (2) as they are now utterly dominant and EVERYWHERE I like the new alerts (got to finish on a positive, after all )
After yesterday's session a little more stuff: Ground: Flanking The removal of tanks directional armor makes flanking much harder, and not worth the effort. First, you have to cycle far longer unnoticed to get to the back istead of a side, and often you get just one free shot, then the tank turns allready. Especially flanking heavier targets like Lightning vs MBT or vs multiple opponents disfavours such behavior. Ground: Harrassers Harrassers are strong. The benefit from the same change like ESFs do: The increased health gives them much more durability during a short attack window. It was allready hard to take a Harrasser down with 3-4 Hits pre update, but now ground has hard times to score 4-5 hits. Reload speed does not help here either, since one only get one chance at most to fire at a decent crew. Air: Hornets Hornets are quite powerfull and good against ground armor, but also borderline OP vs other Air. Hitting a Valk with one salvlo leaves it burning, A Lib and Gals are taking not many more and ESF may be 1HK. However, using them against an aware enemy is hard. One will have to watch this issue carefully. Air: Flak Flak is a joke. My squad was flying (better hovering) in a valk at decent height and could outrep the damage easy. Ok, not every vehicle has repair from engies, still I also saw ESF directly attacking ranger Harrassers and Skygurads, just to pull firesupression and afterburner after destroying or dealing heavy damage to their "Hardcounters"... The lancer: All ES rocketlaunchers but lancer benefit from increased reload speed to put out more damage. The lancer on the other hand has recived a bigger magazine. Notice here, that the dps parameter of a lancer was never the reload, but the charge speed. Therefore i suggest to bring the lancer in line with other launchers and improve the charge speed and go back to 6 shells. Damage and range were allready nerfed in a good direction.
Next turn: Alerts: We need more information about alerts. I logged in at the 20 minute mark of an alert. Ok, i am late, still, lets rock! Who has triggerd it? Lets check... both NC and VS had 25k cortium and 41% continent. So what now? I had to ask, since it was not clear who to fight against or for. (Can this be checked in session stats (TAB screen)?) Action: Regardless if you like or dislike the patch, i defenetly brought more action to the planetside. With player triggered alert one can see much more effort on the warfront, climax in alerts. Rewards: I think the iso-rewards should be rebalanced. The alert type is We-against-Them, and so the reward should be. Having a thrid place is non intuitive and promotes fighting on the "wrong" frontline. Triggering fraction win: 300 iso + item (no changes)+lock Triggering fraction dont lock: 100 iso Allied fraction win 150 iso each (300 by two) Allied fraction lost: 50 iso each (100 by two)
My overall impression is that the new alerts were great at first, I enjoyed fighting in them and got some decent rewards. The last few days, not so much. Every one I've played in has been so one-sided that it's just not fun. I've noticed that Pounders have been heavily nerfed against infantry, as have base AV turrets. ESF are stronger than ever and the handling on Lightnings sucks. They swerve all over the place.
