[Suggestion] Nerf Mosquito and Scythe Air to air and buff Reaver

Good, you've defined your terms. I'll go one farther and say that, in conditions of 100% accuracy, the reaver comes out on top (I think? Not positive on this one, as I don't know the actual TTK for the noseguns, or whether different magazine sizes would affect things). I'll go even farther than that by saying that the reaver is the best at the reverse maneuver, so far as distance covered and duration in rm is concerned.

However, a higher skill floor would indicate that, between equally experienced aces, the reaver should come on top. The skill floor is higher, so the benefits of becoming highly skilled would then be higher, no? Statistically, this has never been the case. Don't get me wrong, the reaver IS great still, and a fair amount of pilots have a preference for it. That said, the Q4 stats of reaver pilots don't really fare all that well against the other ESF's. The only valid explanation is that it doesn't actually have a higher skill floor (except potentially at the very, very highest levels of accuracy) because it is hampered by being a larger, easier to hit target than the other ESF's. If we were to go by best stats (and anecdotally) the highest skill floor ESF is also the highest skill ceiling one. Why? The slim profile of the scythe is a boon when you are new, because you are naturally more difficult to hit when fighting head to head. Once you've learned how to use your craft, the slim profile of the scythe is a big advantage, because you are a very difficult target to hit while reversing, without sacrificing accuracy relative to the other ESF's when they're doing the reverse maneuver.

So please, what EXACTLY do you mean by high skill floor/ceiling. Those words get thrown around a lot, but I have not seen them substantiated.

Duels aren't a fair representation of an ESF's effectiveness on live. The Reaver has high dps, high alpha damage weapons, and has powerful afterburners. This makes it great for ambushing. The mosquito is hard to hit from most angles, and is faster than the other two, giving it the least downsides for not having tanks. Sure, the scythe easily has the smallest frontal hit box, but it is the most vulnerable when ambushed of the 3.

I've flown the reaver a bit, it's not as smooth as the scythe but it's quick and the guns hit hard. It doesn't matter what you fly, if you sit still and let your opponent hit you you're gonna die.

Forumside staph

Threads like this are against the rules.

Killing a Scythe or Mosquito from front with this gun is not very possible. They have very thin hitbox and good hover movement abilities. While Reaver sucks like this, a Scythe or Mosquito can melt a Reaver quickly without even unlocking another nosegun. Their default Noseguns are very OP, and Reaver is really easy to hit with its giant hitbox. That causes Reaver to lose air fights.
And yes, I'm talking about encounters with equally skilled pilots. After I created a lvl 20 VS character with medium level Scythe unlocks, I realized that I can win a lot of airfights like an ace pilot. Scythe is a kill machine which makes air kills a lot easier. Reaver is the reason NC has no air superiority.
Try all ESFs and you will realize that Reaver really sucks at air to air fights.

http://ps2oraclestats.com/?stat=vKPU&weapon1=4302&weapon2=4600&weapon3=4900
No great discrepancy here. The defaults all perform on-par with eachother. This is the default nosegun, which all pilots automatically have access to.

Come on Daybreak, either buff Reaver and NC or offer NC players to transfer TR or VS. I spent a lot of time playing, and I don't wanna play on a dying faction.

LoL, biggest problem for Reaver is that it's NC.

Im fine with the reaver. When i was new to piloting, i would die almost off the bat due to the fact that other pilots could out manouver me. I practiced near the warpgate so that i had free reign. With the reaver, you just gotta practice hard. Maby a bit harder than other pilots, but youll get good

I completely agree, VS and TR fighters are overpowered. this is why twitch streamers use Mosquito+Needler combination 7/24.

The other guy got it wrong.

But no, skills > teamwork up to a certain extent.

Also, you can have 2 non-communicative random pilots that would wreck 4 lower skilled players that communicate on teamspeak.


You'd also be surprised at how many times I've been in front of an enemy warpgate (usually J908 crater on indar) and literally wrecked people back to back to back, regardless of their teamwork effort. Wrecking sometime a gal AND their lib/esf escort altogether.

In the air, skills is the biggest factor by far. I'd prefer to have 1 insanely skilled player than 20 bad ones. Because that one insanely (by insanely i mean zelp-level) skilled guy on a dalton will be way more dangerous and versatile.

i for one have not seen any sign of the reaver struggling in any special way compared to the others , change this and the reaver will get maggie treatment and be cried all the way to the firey armpits of development oblivion.

My general answer is no , but something to bring up is the damage alterations with the A2A rotaries to normalise dps somewhat , intrigueing but good or bad...

Nose to nose the Reaver is at a very large disadvantage. I DO fight but the harder to hit Mossie and Scythe hit boxes make fighting them on their terms stupid. With Racer/AB tanks you can SOMETIMES make a run at them quick and do some damage and when they flip to "duel" you blow by and outdistance their guns to try and make a run at them again later. The new default radar though is going to kill that fighting style as well... yippee.

it's not a "style". You just happen to come across an oblivious player. There's a difference.

And no, the reaver's just fine. Scythe's a bit on the stronger side, but unless you got extremely good pilots, the difference is not that huge. Reaver's just fine in hover fights.

It is not just a "bit". Faster bullet speed and smaller hit box are HUGE advantages in the way air to air combat is played in this game. Only with a numbers advantage to make the Scythe "pancake" to a shooter can the DPS of the Vortek be used as an advantage.

Either the Reaver should have it's skill floor lowered (hitbox) or skill ceiling raised (bullet speed).

you don't seem to understand what skill floor and skill ceiling are.

That aside, I know the air-game quite well. It's pretty balanced, scythe's on the stronger side but just a bit. That's it.
Otherwise feel free to link me your profile from where you get all that experience and knowledge.

I wonder what would happen, sometimes, if the dev team chose a random day, such as April 1st, and replaced all ESF Noseguns with t-shirt cannons that did 1 damage, and the after burners caused a flame-out sound with a jaunty little music box tune that caused the ESF to go to a dead stop? Just for that one day.

How long would it take ESF pilots to figure out they were being pranked, and not getting hit with the Nerf bat that they continually assert that they live in epic, apocalyptic fear of. How many of them would, without thinking, rampage across forumside, proclaiming things like how they are "LEAVING FOREVA BECUZ MY ESF PAINT WAS CHANGED, +%2 INCREASE IN VISIBILITY AGAINST SKYBOX, HERESY BRUH!"

Would it take an hour, two hours, 6 hours, before they figured out it was all a joke?

The world wonders.

The ESF game is definitely not equal. Jawarisin might want to keeps his advantage but truth be told, with rotary nose guns being normalized the Reaver will have to get a boost for losing one of its strong points, which was higher damage.

But even there if both pilots are aware of each other it comes down to turret nose fights cause the design is stupid as hell and Reaver will always lose in equal pilot skills.

People said above that it isn't about duels but fact is its all duels. The air game needs to be dumbed down if you want more people to participate or else the current situation where an elite pilot just roams the whole map and kills other ESF too easily to the point they give up, will continue to be.

I feel no urge to link my alts but feel free to check my profile on this character of course. And I am quite aware of what a skill floor and skill ceiling are.

By making the Reaver's hit box smaller you would make the floor lower as with the same skill as you have now you would have more of a chance to fight the other ESFs and by increasing bullet speed you would increase the skill ceiling by allowing those with time to learn aim more potential DPS.

But what do know, only been playing games for 34 some odd years right?

Damn, 34 years and you still haven't caught on?

Here's a hint: Increasing bullet speed would actually lower the skill ceiling. Less leading required.

And yeah... looking at your stats... I'm giving you a little trophy for having actual flight time - though the stats are quite low and it's on connery. But hey, you've at least flown; which is more than most people can say in this thread.

https://www.planetside2.com/players/#!/5428147970871342881

Are you stupid? I now think you are.