The problem with air at this point is that by design air sticks around and spams, instead of launching precision or periodic strikes. Imagine if air units had to make high-speed passes or risk falling out of the sky. Then they had to wait about a minute before their rockets/bombs/whatnot were rearmed. On top of that, instead of instantly turning around or hovering, they had to keep flying in loops and all that. In that scenario air units would still be capable of inflicting great damage (rocketpod burst damage is one of the highest DPSing things in the game), but the attacks would have a significant waiting time in between bursts. So infantry wouldn't be subject to constant attack, just air strikes at relatively predictable intervals. SOE has kind of gone this route with reducing Liberator ammunition capacity, in hopes that it would create punctuations in Liberator bombardment. It more or less worked, or at least significantly reduced how often Liberators will spam their shots. Doing it for ESFs as well would be a solution. I prefer this fix to walls/ceilings because at least air can still participate in the fight... just not with a constant unending stream of explosives. Air strikes are great, air spam is not.
The problem is that Aircraft can get anywhere inside a bases walls, Vehicles are kept outside fighting each other/pinning the infantry in until the shield are down. Air on the other hand, just swoop in and annihilate the tanks AND the infantry and zip off/hover farm. There is no cover from them unless you are inside a building away from all windows, and even less cover for vehicles. The ONLY places you can drive a tank to escape them is inside the center of an AMP Station, Tech Plant, or Biolab. The game needs areas that actually restrict air from participating so the ground forces(tanks and infantry) can actually fight each other more. And AA only matters once the fight blows out to 48+vs48+ zergfests on either side. Anything sub-24ish and they dominate totally since individual AA is weak, and if you try to mass pull it in smaller fights that leaves you woefully inept at fighting off the enemy ground forces.
Air do ruin infantry fun, which is why whenever air shows up I pop into a MAX with Bursters and ruin their fun... or at least bug them enough to make them go some place else. If there's one thing your average PS2 pilot doesn't have it's patience.
Dome shields were not the solution. The good pilots would've still been able to shoot through the small gap and only made it harder to counter air for the infantry dudes. Domes would be fine if, and only if, they sealed off a base entirely (kind of like a bio dome). I think a more realistic solution is to introduce much more under ground bases like we've seen on amerish. Also, these under ground bases would need more importance attributed to them (make them alert objectives) to make sure people fight there more often. On the flip side, since I used to love flying myself but just don't see the point anymore, it'd be awesome to have some control points floating 800m+ out of g2a lock on range and could only be capped by someone inside an aircraft. These capture points would not be connected to the ground lattice but once capped it could offer your faction on that continent a nice buff like let's say 50% off infantry resources. Make it have enough value to make people want to own that point and be willing to spend air resources on.
Air sure does ruin fun - when you're farming the infantry peons from the air, a sky god showing up definitely ruins the fun!
Sure, you can have your domeshields. I can still nuke enemy sundies, and burster maxes/tower defenses can no longer annoy me from safety. Galaxies would also be basically invulnerable spawnpoints. In fact, an all new meta would defelop- sundies can no longer be bombed by enterprising light assaults, leaving only tanks and aircraft to take them down. Infantry peasants would be completely incapable of operating outside bases without burster maxes defending them from spawnrooms, and a faction with air control could attack a base as long as it wanted, giving actual value to air combaf.
Actually, Prowlers are generally easier to tankbust. Nice wide butts, and most of the time they are to busy shooting at infantry peasants to actually retaliate. Magriders on the other hand, can be a pain in the dalton because they can strafe out of the way of fire, and on an attack run the most difficult direction to change is horizontal. Not only that, but they also have the fastest reverse speed(Unless SOE already nerfed that), and the most dangerous direction to look on an attack run is down, as you risk plowing your pretty 30mm autocannon into the ground if you try and keep on the attack run, and if you choose to abort your likely to give your target a clear shot on your belly. While the most dangerous tank in that situation is debatable, as each one has it's merits. Vanguards and Prowlers tend to hit with their main guns more often, but Prowlers tend to have less gunners, and many times will be using HE, so the damage is significantly reduced. Magriders tend to be unable to turn in time to get a main gun shot(And are less qualified in the first place with slower velocity and worse turret elevation), but more often then not they are running a Saron and that can deal quite a bit of damage. Finally, while I did say that Prowlers tend to be pretty safe, an AP Vulcan Prowler will pretty much tear you a new *******. Is this related to the OP at all? Not really. Deal with it.
Depends on how the population of players work. If the majority of players were armour and air, this would be a horrible idea to gain profit. If the majority was infantry then this would be a fantastic idea to intrigue the majority. However if SOE hasn't done so already then I think the majority of players still play armour and air which means your idea would be a disaster. Theres also another thing that proves my statement which is that your dome was featured on PTS and if they just deleted the idea then that means it changed from infantryside to vehicleside which means this idea would benefit the minority.
So basically to sum up the OP "Hi I'm a casual player playing a more or less team oriented game with combined arms in it. But I can't be bothered to do anything outside what I want to do. So therefore what interferes with it needs to be nerfed until it doesn't bother me anymore." If it's ruining your fun, maybe this isn't the game for you? These kinds of things have already destroyed many aspects of this game that could make it amazing, rather than just another arena shooter with annoying vehicles. If this game wasn't the only of its kind out there (that I am aware of at least), I probably wouldn't be playing it, unless of course other companies did an even worse job at doing a proper combined arms game.
I think this issue only comes up in certain bases. Where you're basically in a hole and AA doesn't have much free space to pin pilots down. If you can't get a height advantage on your environment, then AA can sometimes be a pain. However, that's the nature of the game. You're not always going to be in ideal situations.
read this: Depends on how the population of players work. If the majority of players were armour and air, this would be a horrible idea to gain profit. If the majority was infantry then this would be a fantastic idea to intrigue the majority. However if SOE hasn't done so already then I think the majority of players still play armour and air which means your idea would be a disaster. Theres also another thing that proves my statement which is that your dome was featured on PTS and if they just deleted the idea then that means it changed from infantryside to vehicleside which means this idea would benefit the minority.
G2A lockons aren't fun too Same goes for Bursters and skyguards. Don't have 'em ? 250c for a G2A lockon. 1 free Burster, Trial a skyguard if you want. I trial G2G and G2A often, bought G2A today though with certs.
imo, air is in a weird position at the moment, they're either too close or too far and really not implemented in a "combined arms" fashion.
If its linked to a gen, I've got no problem with it. As long as it is INTELLIGENTLY placed into the game, and not band-aided in.
