[Suggestion] Automated AA turrets - always on stand by

True, when I made that post I believe I had just got back from the game where I shot down more planes with my AP cannon than my Skyguard :|

It can be fun, but I guess it all depends on what happens and what you run into while skyguarding.

yes they were they could lock onto maxes, air and all other vehicles but the mosquito had sensor cloak what made teh turrets not lock onto it.

Whos Joey?

Now that Spitfires are here, this idea seems more real than ever. Problem is still real and solution is still valid.

Triple the Skyguard's velocity and double its accuracy. RIght now, it wouldnt matter if it could half clip a Gal, its so inaccurate and the shells have such bad velocity one cannot even hit an aircraft with it....I was aiming like 3 planes in front of an ESF flying above my head and after like 350 rounds, and even at times when he sat still, I couldnt even hit the guy......and this is like maybe 100-200m...above me in an Amp station....I was like really? THen the spread was instant and twice the size of any liberator....

AA In general needs to be buffed......Air is kinda over running this game and has really made it boring unless your a pilot. Step outside in anything but a tricked out plane as a triple ace pilot and you die.....Tank warfare? gone. Trying to walk from point to point in a base that isnt 100% covered from air? gone....step out on a balcony to fire down on some guys? plane will surely blow you away....

Grab a DUal Burster max to think your going to shoot down teh planes? ok....you just gave him a free kill..

You necromancer..... Though yes, I understand why it's more real than ever.

I don't think making phalanx AA turret automatic (even if bad) is a good idea. It might seem nice on paper, maybe at a tower, 2 of them ain't so bad if the miss a lot and have way reduced range. But what happens when you fly over an AMP station..... What about a tech plant? Imagine having those AV turrets automaticaly take pot-shots at tanks below; same concept for air.

If those are placed, I think they should be easy-to-kill with a zepher/duster. Otherwise it would be too easy to have engies just deploy 5-6 turrets and forget about air entirely.

I noticed how much you were more sensible back then too :/

They had deployable AA Spitfires in PS1, they were called Cerberus Turrets and needed the Fortification Engineering certline.

They targeted air in a smallish radius and shot flak very accurately but at a slow rate of fire. An engineer could place up to 5 of these.

Also: Phalanx Turrets all auto-targeted any vehicles that entered their range, shooting 100% accurate shots at a MUCH slower Rate of Fire than if itwere manned by a player. They also targeted Infantry that fired upon them, but did not auto-target them.

They also did not target Harassers and Mosquitos, which were Shielded from their sensors. Though if they shot at them, the turret shot back accordingly.

Auto Turrets, including the AA variety, already belong in Planetside and i would welcome their return.

What if the AI turrets only shot at spotted ESF's, and were about as accurate as a player would be with 5mins experience using an an AA turret, able to hit occasionally if an ESF moves in the same direction for 5 seconds, and even then only a small % of the shots would hit.

The same for AV turrets (only being able to hit easy targets), and would only fire at enemy tanks while they were spotted with Q. If not spotted, an enemy tank could drive up to point blank range and not be fired upon.

Being able to Q a tank/ESF and have the nearby unmanned AV/AA turret respond would feel great.
Infiltrators would have more reason to hack the turrets, engineers more reason to repair them.

The AI controlled turrets would be pathetic in comparison to a decent player, not posing a real threat at long range (1 in 20 AV shots hitting a non stationary tank at greater than 200m range, and taking about 5 missed shots before every shot after that hits on a stationary target further away than 200m).

It'd be a similar thing for AA turrets. They'd be effective vs ESF's hovering stationary and farming infantry with rocketpods, but not so much vs a pilot moving unpredictably.

Would make infantry feel less powerless, while not posing a threat to non- hover farm podding pilots.
If you're hovering in place 100m from an unmanned AA turret, it's going to be hitting you accurately.
If you're moving in a straight line it'll hit you occasionally, once every 5 sec or so.
If you do anything fancier than fly in a straight line, it'll hit you so infrequently that you can ignore it.
The same for AV turrets, hit you eventually if you stay still, occasionally if in straight line, almost never if you move in a serpentine driving pattern.


What do you say pilots & drivers, could you deal with that?

What about Infantry players, would this be a welcome change?, the power to Q a tank/ESF and have the nearby unmanned turrets respond to your request for help?

Seems like a reasonable compromise to me.

I had the same thought about Infiltrators hacking these turrets, and the benefits that brings.

• I would also suggest Stealth have an effect like it does against lock-ons.

• Might consider giving the Valkyrie a short Wraith ability as an olive branch to pilots? Would allow a forward contingent to sneak in and take care of the Turrets. Might even allow the turrets to be slightly more effective if there's a fun counter?

• Should the link between spotting and turret response be a class specific ability? Infiltrator might seem natural since it is spotting, though seems like infils do have a lot already. Engineers would be tied to turrets, but they also have a lot. How about Light Assaults? They can gain a height advantage for clear view of the skies. Spotter binocular in their utility slot relays the tracking info to the base's turret(s)? This way, it would take more than just one infiltrator to sneak behind the lines and cause all havoc.

I've been saying this for Ages.

I'd pull out a skyguard or even just top AA guns SO MUCH MORE OFTEN if I knew I could swap em out 1-2 minutes later without cost.

If you want infantry with no vehicles, play a different game.

Don't play combined arms shooters.

Simple.

This game doesn't even do infantry combat well enough to beat out pure infantry shooting games.

As an aside, were you around for the Liberator Wraith glitch?

HOLY HELL THAT WAS GLORIOUSLY FUN (and OP as all frack.. BUT FUN!!! )

Maybe spotting an aircraft/vehicle only activates the nearest appropriate automated turret?
A lone infiltrator could Q you, and the closest unmanned AA turret would start firing, limiting the damage a single infiltrator could do (less effective than manning a turret themselves).
If multiple players spot you, then it activates up to 1 turret for each of those players.

I like the idea about stealth, would probably increase the time before the turret started firing after you're spotted & decrease turret accuracy. A valkyrie that's not moving in a straight line wouldn't get hit much even at closer than 100m range, so it shouldn't affect skilled valk pilots.

The further away from a turret the spotter is, the longer it takes to start firing at the target. 1 extra second for every 50m between the spotter and the nearest turret. So if if an infantry's in the middle of nowhere between bases, they can still call in AA support but the message takes a while and there's signal loss etc


A squad would be able to activate all the turrets in a tower by using Q, a lone player would only be able to get one turret firing at a time.

Actually thats not really all. The problem is that AA is not viable unless it is in unrealistic numbers. Do you know how hard it is to get people to sacrifice their ground offence capabilities for the *CHANCE* to blow an ESF or two, Maybe even deter a galaxy or a liberator to leave at its earliest convenience? This would also stop the sky units from farming deep enemy territory and killing unmanned defensive units without a challenge.

People refuse to use them because most of the AA options we have are a complete joke. Its not about getting better.

+1 for this, if only to piss off the ESF/Liberator community.

Another issue in PS2 is that as long as turrets are not manned, they may as well be destroyed. They serve no function while unmanned than to feed your foes certs from destroying them when they first arrive in a sector. If you leave the destroyed, they can't feed your foes, but if so it takes a long while for a defenseless Engineer to repair them then man them and by then the air may easily be so thick with enemy aircraft that it don't matter anymore.

And when you do man them you have a pair or more of stationary, inaccurate turrets with neglectable damage-output. Any organized airforce can and will take these out before they become a big danger. In smaller fights the air is dominant because the AA is insufficient to kill anything but ESF's and Libs that over-extend themselves. IN bigger fights the air vanish from the site unless they have massive ground-force support simply because of the sheer volume of AA being pulled, but this is the universal issue of zerging and not unique to air vs ground balance. Also, a superior number of aircraft will win against an inferior number of AA, by design.

In short, the air vs ground balance has many holes and many issues, and personally I don't expect them to be solved anytime soon, perhaps ever.

The only time I ever had fun doing AA when when SC4NNER tankbusted my prowler while I was repairing it.

I pulled a skyguard and spent 20 minutes hunting him down. When I finally found him I scared him so bad he ran into a tree.

But yea, anything to make pilots unhappy at this point. I hate them.

Umm so if you don't like airplanes, and you don't want to bother yourself with learning to fly?

Why don't you just play another game?

Who is so so so so terribad that they die to ESf when they play infantry?

If you hate airplanes because they kill you, it is because you are a terribad.

We shouldnt balance the game based on the opinions of bad players.

If we do that we will just have a bad game.

Its already heading in that direction with returded spitfire turrets.

Who thinks its fun fighting spitfire turrets raise your hand.

Stupid idea this is.

L2P. That means learn to play. From what you described you are not good. You just admitted you couldnt hit an ESF that was 100-200 meters away with a skyguard.

Seriously.