Yep, I fully understand that and don't expect it to happen, I'm just saying that their designs make more sense with the opposite factions, based on nothing other than their mechanics.
Welp, the Striker could be amazing or terrible. If its just laser guided or something than assuming its RoF and damage are decent, it could be a winner. If its an actual lock-on that gets cancelled by flares, then it is significantly less good to downright terrible depending on rocket velocity and whether or not it can just dumbfire. Either way, so long as it can dumbfire, and I can kill an MBT with one magazine or less to the rear, and it has decent RoF, I will be happy.
One mag dumbfire kills to the back of a MBT would almost definitely be game breaking...unless the RoF was absolutely awful... Oh well we can always hope. "Victory through strength...etc, etc."
The problem is that if one mag doesn't kill an MBT to the rear, then that would mean that the damage per shot on the striker is less than a bolt action sniper rifle. And that's just silly. No matter what, 5 rockets from the Striker had better do more damage than 1 from the ML-7, or it needs to have a much higher velocity or something. Otherwise, I don't see the point of using it.
Eh, not really. If you're failed so immensely at situational awareness that you have infantry firing into your rear, you deserve to die. It's not conceptually any different from C4. It's kinda silly that a Drifter LA is generally far better at killing terrible tank drivers than any HA can be. Not any of these new weapons, since they're all basically standoff-range weapons, but a short-ranged dumbfire like the Decimator absolutely should one-shot on a rear hit.
I still think I will stick with my Dumbfires......the idea of standing exposed while locking and tracking...doesnt sit well with me lol.
Ultimately that's the problem I see with the TR launcher. While the NC and VS launchers open up new tactical possibilities with their unique roles, the Striker is just another lock-on rocket launcher... If it is balanced --> Why use it when we already have a slew of lock-on and dumbfire launchers? If it is underpowered --> Why use it? If it is overpowered --> It will get nerfed making it balanced or underpowered... Honestly I would say there is a big difference: C4 requires that you get much closer to your target. Also expensive to cert into and has steep resource costs. Rockets can be fired from range (a huge advantage especially if there is cover) and can be spammed if there is a nearby ammo pack. I would agree that the Decimator has no real role in the game atm. Why use a launcher with slower reload and projectile speed if it still takes 2 hits in the rear to kill a tank? Imo, SOE should further reduce the projectile speed and reload time on the Decimator but give it enough damage to 1hko tanks from behind (i.e. Make it the Vulcan of Heavy Assualt AV loadouts).That would give the Decimator a clear niche in the game.
Well, I can see several potential uses for the Striker, assuming that it doesn't blow. So long as it does at least 800 damage total on a direct hit per rocket, and can empty a clip in 2-3 seconds, it will be pretty boss. It will have enough burst DPS that you can paste any tank you can get rear shots on fairly quickly. Additionally, the pseudo lock-on means that it is still functional against air targets, particularly slower targets like Galaxies and Liberators. Having to stay in the open to guide the rockets will suck, but that seems like a pretty even trade-off for a combination of flexibility and damage, so I am ok with that. Overall, my hopes are that it will do 800+ damage per rocket, be able to fire all 5 shots in no more than 4 seconds, and have a velocity of at least 120m/s, if not 150. That might be OP, but considering the shenanigans that people will be able to get up to with the Pheonix and the Lancer, I'm not sure it is.
Have you been to PS1 where the TR's Lockdown mode for their MAX made their AA-specific MAX (Dual Bursters) an absolute nightmare for aircraft? The Dual Cyclers were straight up evil to infantry. The Pounder however, had much large clip sizes, like 32 per clip I think, so the double fire rate actually meant something. Well, the TR always had the highest ammo for their specific stuff. I think even their AI MAX had something like 200 shots per clip.
Lock down would be good for AA, but I find AA to be extremely boring. Having my head in the sky pewing away at incoming aircraft.
Dual Mercy TR MAX in Lock-down would be more or less straight up area of denial since the rate of fire on those things would be so high that a heavy poking to fire a rocket would get torn up in less than a quarter of a second. Ask any TR Dual Mercy user what their typical TTK is against infantry and ask them to cut it in half, that's what lock-down will allow.
If the pheonix gives the devs headaches they have only themselves to blame for importing a PS1 weapon without the PS1 tactics and limitations. Shields instead of Doors leaves places one can potentially fire from unmolested, allowing missles to one shot infantry instead of it taking many missles (Pheonix in PS1 was an annoyance to infantry but it reloaded very slow and it took like 6 or so to drop most infantry, which was pretty common across the AV weaponry from that game, even the most powerful weapon the decimator took multiple rounds.)
That's why the best spots for Lock-down are often in enclosed areas where they're denied the use of C4. Given how slow a MAX is by default, it wouldn't stop the LA from just sorta moving forward while above to drop their little ****bricks. I once called C4 blocks as such when describing them in posts where I die to them, but see the LA doing it and knowing I can do nothing about it, so I shall once more refer to LA's using C4 as 'tossing the ****bricks'.
They're just ESF pilots and tank drivers who are whining early before they get hit with no lock-on warnings as they rocket-pod and HEAT round infantry. I look forward to the Phoenix, I used to use it as a recon item. Unfortunately with so few rockets in PS2 i'll have to use it sparingly for that purpose.
You ever try to one-shot kill an infantry with a Phoenix before. Not as easy as it sounds unless they're standing idle and letting you hit them in the face.
Did you read my post before replying? I said it took 6 or so pheonix shots to drop most infantry, the 1 shot referred to current rocket launchers in PS2 which aren't too difficult to peg infantry with unless they move a lot.
Sorry it read that in PS1 it took 5-6 rounds but in PS2 it'd only take one to one-shot someone. Which it might, but that'd have to be one good headshot and most likely with them being injured. I'm so looking forward to pegging off snipers and AA maxes with them.
Just wait till there are 3 lock down AA maxes covering air or 10 lock down AI maxes defending a biolab. The point of lock down is to provide incredible support, if it's anything like PS1 the 4th faction hackmax might migrate to LD Mercy Max's.
