Flak does too much damage to ESFs

Not only do G2A lockons bring an ESF to burning with just 2 rockets fired, we can't escape Flak. Flak is supposed to deter aircraft, not butcher them. If one Skyguard or AA turret is up in the area, if he has 2 brain cells in his head all ESFs in the area will be rendered useless. The range of Flak was supposedly nerfed, and yet it still kills you outside render, and hits you well outside of the range of anything, even other ESFs. There was a post containing the cause of all ESF and Liberator deaths as of post PU02, and the number 1 cause was G2A lockons with over 33000 deaths (about 75% of all deaths) of Libs and ESFs, Flak being number 2, and the lowest of the low was other ESFs killing other ESFs.

I thought you wanted to make it easier for newby pilots to fly, SOE? How does making it so one Skyguard or Burster shuts down an entire area of the air 'easier' for new pilots to learn in?

AA doing its job, nerf please.

Also any pilot with 2 brain cells in their can avoid flak. There is a reason is the second most common death and not the first. Flak is fine.

There are not enough facepalm MEMEs to reply to this thread. Pls buff facepalming.

I say this as a pilot: I think flak is fine

It deters and if you are trained enough you can evade, skyguard is pretty much the only thing that can kill. Sorry OP, i think you need more time in the air

Well i have plenty of time in the air and i agree with him. Flak is currently ridiculous. And yes, as a matter of fact i do own a skyguard and i use it. It is the most overpowered weapon in the game save the uber AV mana turret which i also own and use.

Now one skyguard can completely clear the skies. Two skyguards can kill all but the best pilots with ease, and 3 or more skyguard will kill ESF so fast they cant even react. Not to mention the complete blindness caused by flak detonations.

So i can get in a skyguard with 2 friends and completely dominate an air wing of 10 or even more ESF and LIBS, and that is balanced?

AA is doing its job lol. So by that logic a libs job is to kill ground targets so it should be immune to flak. Rocket pods are intended to kill infantry, so they were working as intended and never needed a nerf. ZOE max was intended to make the VS max better, it was doing its job. No nerf required?

That argument that AA is just doing its job is silly. It is clearly overpowered and anyone who has been on both sides of AA knows how overpowered it is.

The only people who say otherwise are either those who prefer flak in its current state because they benefit from its opness, or they want to act like they are so uber it doesnt affect them.

I fly on occasion, and i am friends with most of the best pilots on Connery, and i don't know any of them who think flak is fine in its current state.

Skyguard needs to be a lot better at killing infantry and have its range reduced by about 50% and then it would be balanced.

No way should a nearly invisible (from the air), extremely easy to use tank, be owning ESF that are much much harder to operate and also far more visible.

I would be in favor of either changing the lightning to be like an ESF and allow it to equip multiple weapons but only use one at a time, or just make the skyguard better at other stuff than killing air and make it so that its ACTUALLY doing its INTENDED JOB which is to DEFEND an armor collumn, not clear the skies for 3 hexes.

Tower turrets are even worse than skyguard. They are at every single major base in the game. They cover almost every inch of the map, and by that i mean a guy at the Crown can hit planes from as far north as J908 and as far south as xenotech so that at any point on the map there will be a turret somewhere that is shooting at you. They can never truly be taken out of a fight. They cost no resources. They require no certs.

Turrets need a massive range nerf. Down to 300 meters. They should be for defensive purposes only. And by that i mean you have 3 esf hovering 100 meters above the base, then flak turret will own them. ESF flying by at 500 meters cant be hit.

Burster maxxes got nerfed for the exact same reasons that the rest of flak needs a nerf.

People yelled and screamed for a skyguard buff. I told you that was dumb and skyguard was fine. Which it was at least vs air. Now we have a huge problem again.

I'd be perfectly fine if lock-ons were hit with the nerf bat.

AA should be the definitive defense against air; they should be strong against it.

I have maxed afterburner and dogfighter 3 on my Reaver. Best advice I can give to any pilot is either fly low or really flippin' high.

I have been shot down only once by a skyguard after ~40 some encounters.

Easiest way to get away from them? Hit the deck. Fly under trees. I can generally get away with about 70% of my health remaining. In Esamir, fly behind mountains and crystals. Canyon sections of Indar, dive in or out, keeping the ground or bases in-between you and the flak.

If you're mid-height, fire off the afterburners and start holding space, a directional key based on where you want to roll, and start pushing your mouse diagonally vertically and the direction you want to go. Most skyguard gunners will look where you are and will judge based on your direction and movement where they need to shoot. I can dodge a good amount of shots simply by taking Peppy's advice (dear God, please tell me at least one person gets that reference) and doing a wide barrel roll. People generally find it difficult to lead those kinds of maneuvers.

tl;dr Flak is fine. I use my skyguard a bit as well, more as support than active ESF hunting, and I will say that the Skyguard eats up pilots who fly AI the stereotypical fashion: rockets, AI turret (SHOTGUN POWA!) and whatever else; when a skyguard is in the area, it's still fully possible to play AI. You just can't hang around. Determine your target. Come in at low alt. Find the target, nose down, shoot, and get out of there.

Skyguards are fine.

That flak is from busters, skyguard still broken. And it is ridiculous and I love it =P

Flak IS a little too strong against ESFs, but it's more or less fine against Liberators/Galaxies, although still greatly capable of causing their deaths. Only the explosion damage aspect of Flak should be cut down a little bit. Direct hits from Flak should still hurt to reward accuracy, but the prox explosion damage doesn't penalize inaccurate firing at all. That's the only thing really wrong with Flak currently. Well the damage range could be cut and I wouldn't lose sleep over it.

A dedicated AA vehicle is good against Aircraft?!
A multipurpose fighter can't hardcounter dedicated AA vehicles?!

Good balance SOE

So you can lord over the battlefield like the Skygod And never be punished for poor positioning in the easiest to position vehicle in the game? Your precious ESF, Like harrassors you have no business in Direct conflict with heavy ground defenses. And if you are flying close to air defense towers you need to change how you play. Your vehicle costing points is ZERO reason to have an advantage or be given any slack for mistakes, This point system is meant to give you a disadvantage and not give you license to complain your machine, that give you a unprecedented advantaged in mobility. Is countered when you get too close to your counter That Also have NO chance to ever chance you down. ESFs ability to kill any target that isn't specifically tooled to counter them is second to none. This would be the same of a harrassors driver lamenting he cannot Solo crewed Double AV weapon equipped tanks anymore
Also you seem to not have as much experience with AA weapons as you are letting on, You MASSIVELY overstate the range these weapons have. I can hit with a carbine at Aircraft render distance too but that does not mean I could EVER make a kill with it. All AA useless past 300 meters for delivering usefull amounts of damage.
Poor Skygods.

AA is ridiculous against air. But i feel thats necessary

i can reach out and kill predictable pilots to about 400-450 with a skygaurd, and that's the way it should be.

I think the current AOE but low accuracy scheme is to keep it from being too much of a infantry killer. In most games the AA tank is a pretty hardcore infantry erasing aimbot of death.. I could agree to an extent if they didn't make the skyguard a OP ground attack tank

Yeah if they dont evade you can kill them. But its takes many seconds at that range and I have yet to see a single ESF at that range ever NOT try to turn the other way that was not distracted with a dogfight or caught attacking ground targets
Sub 300 meter range is when you can REALLY hurt a aircraft before they can react

I mean it is a 4 barrel 40mm chain gun, it should shred infantry, but I understand why they dont want it to.

Biggest issue is still poor base design. New Amerish looks much better for combined arms fight--seriously, the center mountain is one giant fortress and there is lots of cover with open areas between. I don't think air or vehicles or infantry are happy with the current combined arms balance, but if Amerish is the new standard, then I think some rebalancing can definitely be done. Flak should be scaled back, as should lock-on and AV range in general with the new base design.

Why? Because the new bases are defensible. Infantry and AV can hole up and defend themselves there, and if we reduce their effectiveness that won't change, but it allows vehicles to fight in open fields and forces infantry to rely more on transport to move around (which Amerish does). Better maps mean we can get better balance for everyone.

yeah it is a 300m hate machine for ESFs that costs more resources then an ESF and sacrifices most of its anti armor and infantry ability to deal with just aircraft, at the moment I think its pretty well balanced. you are pretty much a sitting duck for anything with a real AV weapon when you are in a skygaurd.

Pilot calling for another nerf? Few hour ago it was... Prowler if I remember correctly. Now its flak. What is next?

Better enjoy the fact that in few centuries people lost mystical ability to manufacture fire-and-forget missiles. That would be fun
Its raining man!

There are fire and forget missiles in the game, in fact every lockon rocketlauncher except the striker wich hopefully no one uses anymore since it is the worst in dps and survive-abillty of all.

I run maxed Flak armor.

I know I'm about the only one... Most find nanite repair too valuable. But if you're running an A2G set-up flak armor can really save your *** and help you survive enough burst to get out and repair.