No place for ESF?

Its getting harder and harder to fly.
All turrets get better angle.
Lock-on is buffed.
Now VS and TR Max will get 50% faster Burster MAX fire increase.
The wurst buff i think was the lock-on missile in GU8.
Take the Striker cost 700 cert or 1000 sc certs.
Takes down 72% of your ESF lock-on 2 sec lock range black circle, fire range around red circle.

Its almost impossible to dodge missiles.
They follow your trail now so no matter how good you are they will hit you.
So now A noob can kill the best pilots bravo SOE!

Like there wasnt anough AA already.

It takes skill to fly.
It more skill to fly and get any certs.
But now it is almost impossible to really join bigger fights.
It takes a bit of practice to lead a target whit a MAX and no skill for the lock-on missiles.
Some one that some certs or cash for MAX or lock-on weapon can ground a fully upgraded ESF whit so much more ease.
I think the MAX AA and the lock on is to strong.
At a close range the max should be really good but not the distance that it does damage now.
I understand the hate VS ESF and to be honest i think the rocket pods should only be good VS vehicles.
Make them stronger VS sunderer some to tanks and other vehicles.
No damage to infantry.
And i think night vision is OP as well.
Now infantry lights up like xmas lights.
If they would make the night vision and the rocked pods a bit less OP they night tune down the MAX and lock-ona bit to.
Skyguard and turrets must keep up a Good AA defense.
Let me know what you think.

No. I may decided to elaborate later.

The should increase the flight ceiling to 1500m, it would solve a lot of this....

Or clouds

Just because you can go there doesn't mean you should go there, or be effective when you do. You're a light strike fighter, your whole spiel is mobility. No, you will not survive in the middle of platoon on platoon combat, you will likely die. Welcome to the club. Pick your fights carefully, stick to the fringes and be opportunistic. See a liberator blundering into the zone soaking up fire? There's your chance. Another ESF derping in? Follow him in. Come in from behind cover, then get the hell away.

The expectation of pilots in these sorts of games is that they should be able to take out any target they want provided they personally put in enough skill. Anything that interrupts them (things that people on the ground take for granted) are deemed unacceptable and "skillless" counters to what they want to do. The truth of the matter is that much like a tank cannot roll up in the middle of the battle and expect to survive if he over commits, neither can you.

NS weapons which include Bursters will receive minimal if any additional effect from the proposed MAX abilities as stated by the devs.

The rest has been covered by countless threads.

The ESF is the only air unit that is not horrendously underpowered at the moment. The only reason it is viable though is because of rocket pods.

OP bursters > OP rocketpods > everything else = balance

ATM lock-on is OP. it was good after GU7
Exapt that the flairs dont work sometimes.

Wel why is it in the test server than??
Very fast AA

Dude you really dont have to tell me how to fly.
Max you can hide from but the improved lock-on is just overkill.

Bursters being efficient past 200m is a myth though.

Your accuracy against moving ESFs drops down to 10% at longer ranges.
People drawing rings of "impenetrable burster fire" are off by a mile.


Anyway, you brought it on yourself.
Rocket pods have been continuously nerfed from beta and rightly so albeit it took 6 months to admit it.

Where did you get this statistic?

So esf should not be in any fights? Platoon vs platoon is planetsides selling point. If you dont want combind arms of air, infintry and tanks, go find a new game.
AA has been fine since the game came out, it just took it being overpowered for people to use it...

Playing, feeling.

10% or not, don't expect killing an ESF at 300m unless he's particularly stupid

Just a wild guess but perhaps because it's called a test server?

Combined arms is something that's thrown about without too much thought into what it actually means. Throwing ESFs into an A2G role in a large battle isn't the essence of combined arms. Utilising Liberators as A2G pounders while the ESFs fly as escort that's supporting either a defense or offense on the ground is a correctly balanced combined arms force. If you've got half a dozen Liberators hitting AA, trust me, they're not going to focus on ESFs. If enemy ESFs attempt to pick off the Liberators, friendly ESFs engage them.

Seen how quickly a Liberator equipped with a Shreader can take out an AA MAX?

Liberators clear the AA, ESFs clear other ESFs and if you're successful, it's farming time for both Liberators and ESF. ESF as an A2G in a large battle is not a balanced combined arms force, the fact that it's difficult to do should be by design of actual combined arms.

Those are the worse max AA players I've seen, under normal circumstances with even 2 AA maxes that lib would be gone in no time with the gunner having no chance to get a shot on. It's nice shooting from the gunner yes but that lib would never be floating around like that with any half decent AA max players.

If you really want a good role, pop A2A missiles and max out lock on time, and go to town on liberators and galaxies. My role is to take out the big boys, if there are a bunch of liberators, you're going down. It's been successful and gives me the role of air supeirorty. This goes against other ESF's, in dogfights, stick with your nosegun, or use A2A if you saw them ditch flares and you're at a good distance where it'll be viable to use them, otherwise use nosegun.

Ignore the haters that say "NOOB A2AM" use them right, and air superiority is yours, and THATS your role.

Why? I like that it's getting harder to fly. Less rookie pilots means more resource batteries.

Be that as it may, Liberators should be the air units engaging ground in large battles, not ESF.