ESF(fighters) are unbalanced, not the GALAXIES NOR THE LIBERATOR.

OK next take a ESF get a trial on rocket pods and spend some time flying and come back and let us know how your experience is.

No need for that. If it's in any way similar to my experience flying a vanilla scythe scratching the paint of vehicles with the default gun, tree-related deaths will outnumber AA related ones by 700%. That's counting base turrets.

The problem is right now AA is a relatively thankless task for the vast majority engaging in it. Single pilots or gunners of all type reap large gains in certs by unloading their rockets and cannons on infantry/vehicles easily killing many. Anti-Aircraft has to coordinate with 2 or 3 different allied Anti-Aircraft type to have a hope to reliable bring down a target splitting any cert gain and reducing the benefit. One task is being greatly rewarded with certs while the other is not. There is no cert award for damaging or deterring aircraft and that is irritating to those who try and engage in the task. Why should a single pilot/gunner be able to cause massive damage while a single Anti-Aircraft has to rely on stupidity and luck to have any hope of gaining a kill that will benefit them.

ESF are flying tanks, Liberators are flying bunkers, and the AA is reduced to small damage against both. Yes, eventually an aircraft can be brought down, but usually only after it has done substantial damage and made a mistake. Anti-Aircraft needs a slight increase if only to allow them to kill targets and be rewarded like pilots for engaging in their tasks.

I think AA should cut through ESF fairly quickly. There should be more incentive for ground troops to try and take out AA.

The MAX is half the price of an ESF or Lightning, it's also an infantry unit, so there's a few reasons to back up the logic behind it getting support points.
Try focusing fire with a buddy who has even a single Burster. The careless pilots will probably go home on foot pretty often once you get some good aiming skills.

The Lightning+Skyguard on the other hand, being a 200 resource, 1000 cert point tank should do alone what 2 MAXs with 3 Bursters do together.

The main problem with ESF's are their rocket pods. They are incredibly good at taking out infantry and vehicles. Just about everything explosive in this game has a specific purpose, to either be good at killing infantry or be good at killing vehicles, not both at the same time. A single salvo can take out a Magrider or kill a group of infantry. That is not balanced when other things like grenades only kill infantry in droves not tanks, or rocket launchers which are effective AV and not as effective against AI. Also, the fact that I can "hide" in a building while they are flying around yet the explosions from rocket pods massively go through building walls to being able to kill me is ridiculous. Either need to fix their aoe radius or Sony needs to learn how to prevent explosions from going through solid building walls.

I can't wait to get my nemesis AA rocket launcher.

that's your problem,not a soe problem,my answer for you is no.

make them really small explosions so that it is really hard to kill small targets with them. DONE YOUR WELCOME INTERNET!!

Leave the rocket pods alone.
Planes are there to deliver loads of firepower quickly.
Gunships are in the game to offer continuous airborne fire support.

They just shouldn't go unpunished if they want to bombard with AA present in the area (and I'm OK if the planes are able to shoot up the AA units themselves, no need to artificially overdo Rock-Paper-Scissors).

As a reaver pilot, this is what I'd prefer. Needing to dodge around AA heavy areas to reach objectives would honestly make it more fun for me, and if I'm stupid enough to fly over AA, it's no ones fault but mine.

agree with alot of the posts , esf's are very vulnarable regardless of what its certed into , its all down to the individual who knows when to retreat or hang about , the later will get you killed very fast , to be honest flying is probably the most dangerous thing to do in game

The amount of troll and nay-sayer is pretty impressive I must admit.

ESF as right now are unbalanced, fill multiple roles and are exeptionnally annoying effectively scaring new alike older player away from the game.

Its not fun AT ALL on the receiving end, its called counter play and its badly designed; http://extra-credits.net/episodes/counter-play/

I think ESF health and damage is fine. They need to restore the range of AA turrets and the skyguards, they're only effective at rookie pilots that fly really low and close. ESF aren't really overpowered, there just isn't a way to counter a massive air force except with another air force. Yes bursters maxes are effective, but several ESFs and libs with AI/AV pods will always obliterate anything on the ground. Increasing the health to turrets is pointless IMO. Ace pilots are smart enough to wait for tanks to destroy turrets before any heavy attacks.

IMO they need to increase the range on the fixed AA, skyguard, and walker but not damage. Fix the ability for rockets to track aircraft and maybe increase the speed slightly. Force the ESF's to run/dodge/flare. Lastly, tank heat rounds should always one shot them, they're hard as hell to hit with those rounds anyway. The composite armor doesn't say anything about reducing damage from tanks but a heat lightning can't one shot an upgraded ESF. The only people that would complain about that are rookie pilots that are stupid enough to strafe low and head on.

It's true. The lib and gal are fine, but fighters are out of hand.

Don't buff AA - nerf rocket pods!

Just the same way as you have flak that doesn't damage Infanttry beyond scratching them? Even if you shoot an Infiltrator repeatedly in the head with high velocity flak at point blank range, they still don't die.

I'd be a lot happier if ESF were removed from the game, and the flight ceiling for gals and libs were brought down to within burster range.

I shoot down baddies all the time. Anyone with half a brain will just fly away. Feels pretty good to get 0 xp for that.

I'm basically a dedicated ESF pilot atm. I have lots of upgrades for mine. Here are a few things I've learned:

I get destroyed if there's more than 1 dual burstar max shooting at me, in about 5 seconds (before I can burn away)

I get destroyed by skyguards if they let me get WELL within their firing range before they start shooting (they kill me while I burn away)

I get severely damaged by infantry small arms fire, if they are shooting at me while I line up for a shot, and often times finished off by some other means later.

I destroy other enemy ESF's REALLY EASY with my A2A missiles and the Turbo Laser. Best counter to ESF's are those A2A missiles.

I only manage to chase away ESF's with my heavy assault's Nemesis (surface to air missile), not destroy.

I kill liberators and galaxies easy by using the rocket pods with turbo laser follow ups while the rockets reload.

I kill ground infantry super easy with the rocket pods.

It takes about 3 passes to kill tanks or sunderers typically, and it takes 5 seconds or more to reload between salvos. If they don't shoot me, it's an easy kill. if they are by themselves it's an easy kill. If they are with other people, I typically can't get a kill and get chased off or destroyed.

So there you go. Work with your team, and you'll be pretty safe. They aren't hard to chase away or destroy when you're not by yourself.

It still takes 8 seconds to down an ESF if you can make every single round hit. That's an insanely high TTK in a game like this. Especially when you consider that most ESF's actually move and that the AA MAX has a massive cone of fire coupled with savage damage degredation.

I actually enjoy my AA stints, but let's be honest about what an AA user is going to get out of the activity in terms of tangible material reward. There are far more lucrative pastimes in the game than AA duty.

AA is clearly for those that don't care about kills, XP, and cert gains. The Elitist **icks in the game also say it takes no skill, so only the thick skinned amongst us will do it