So the new Sunderer update, love it or hate it, I think Toadman deserves credit for at least trying to move the game and giving us something actually new in terms of content after a year long drought. And to be honest Helion wasn’t that big of an addition anyways. Ability UX. The Nanite Armor Activation is under ability 2, while other vehicle’s fire suppression is ability 1, thus being a headache to use in the heat of the moment. If not possible to rewire, just swap deploy and armor categories. Survivability. One of the main goals for this update was making Sunderer Spawns more stable and prevent their destruction through lone tankers and the like. For the most part I believe that they succeeded. While Dome is right now unusable due to clipping issues, Nanite armor is perfectly capable of outpacing enemy attacks long enough to get rid of them. It has come at a cost though. Battle Sunderer. Especially with Point Defense and Nanite armor, a Sunderer can easily challenge other vehicles and come out on top. Now since we still want to maintain their newfound staying power, the most sensible solution would be to cut down Nanite Armor repair values while undeployed and maybe even the repair station repairs recieved while undeployed. Similiar to how deploy dome takes a bit to come online, so should there a delay before nanite armor gets back to full strength after deployment. This still means a Sunderer can hold a position, but not advance due to the redeploy penalty. Chipping Battles. Earlier I had the unfortunate experience of being stuck in a “vehicle battle” that boiled down to three groups of sunderers each from a different empire to have gathered on the hills around Waterson’s redemption on Esamir and shell each other across the base. It was an absolute stalemate, because neither side could get close enough to use havoc or break formations with armor / flail darts, AA positions kept Liberators at bay, so overall it was a miserable experience, yet due to how important vehicle supremacy around that base is, no faction could give up on this pointless exercise. This comes both down to aforementioned undeployed Nanite armor, but more importantly I believe, to the fragility of everything else. With the Sunderer setting a new baseline for Armor, defensive side for other Armor and maybe the Liberator (Dalton being very effective, needing 2 people to fly properly and being hard to replace thus deserving their role as Spawn Killers over ESF and Valkery) need to be reexamined. Be that extra HP, Belly G2A armor for Libs and or seat repairs making a return. Shelling Nightmare. While I only had the misfortune of running into a crowd of Point Holding Sunderers once, it wasn’t nice. If I had it my way, I would force Sunderer with Point Defense to use ANT-No-Deploy-Zone and should the reduced Nanite Armor change turn out to not be enough outright take away AI/Hesh weapons from Sunderer. Nanite Armor All Around. With Dome Shield being defective and thus not being used both enhanced plating and reactive armor just seem useless. Aside from people using tank mines, there is little a single enemy can do against Nanite Armor, as it should be in my opinion. On the other hand while moving around there are no repairs and thus the “benefits” of enhanced plating and reactive armor are negated. As a consequence everyone is currently running around with nanite armor as the all-rounder for both deploying and going on the offensive. Again a strong indication why Nanite Armor needs to be toned down. Should that not suffice, two ideas for the other armors to make them more viable alternatives: Reactive Armor. While not deployed, plates regeneration of plates is faster. After undeploying there is a delay, before gaining this benefit. The idea is to make this the defacto movable battle sunderer over the nanite armor. Still being able to tank out a vehicle if playing their cards right (unlike current nanite armor, where there is no counterplay), but also quickly overwhelmed under superior firepower from multiple enemies. Enhanced Plating. In addition to damage resistance, should also grant havoc immunity. Given how I expect an uptick in havoc use, being able to counter it, makes EP that more valuable when expecting heavy fire and friendly support around the Sunderer. Mobility. Gonna be honest, best change to sunderer. Sure the audio could be adjusted to reflect the higher engine power, but that’s a cosmetic issue. Simply put the increased speed means it becomes less of a chore to bring Sunderer to a new fight and it also means reaching advantageous but steep locations is a breeze. What is more annoying now is using Rocket Launchers on moving busses, which is why I wouldn’t want similar buffs to other armor. But should that somehow be remedied, say by increasing projectile speed, improving Ground Lock on navigation and acquisition time, I wouldn’t mind if at least top speed (not acceleration) for all armor got increased, as a means of reducing travel and thus downtimes for armor players. Cargo. Man I’ve heard many people complain about the new armors, but gotta be real, I am more split on the Cargo system instead. In principle I love the idea of the sunderer being able to do more than just drive somewhere and deploy, yet I have issues. Let me explain. Repair Station Supremacy. Out of all available cargo, the repair station is simply the best. Ammo Printer and the short lifespan of many average tanks means I rarely run into ammo issue. Point defense being the only thing truly capable of draining ammo reserves. Scout is interesting to farm XP, but Infiltrator darts are much more capable. And unless I specifically need to break into a place, Gate Diffuser isn’t worth it. Right now we lack meaningful choices for the Cargo Slot, just as we did before the update, when you really only ever Fire Suppression on Utility. On the other hand adding more interesting stuff would bloat the Sunderer a logistical monster. Undying Columns. Not only that, but while it makes repair bus columns slightly more annoying to use, with enough busses just organizing a rotation for the damn things, basically circumvents any issues. Repair Stations also contribute to the Chipping Battle issue. UX. Please replace the “realistic” icon for stations with something abstract that clarifies the type of Station. How about a simple circle with the already existing wrench and ammo symbol, etc. Use the current symbol for spotted enemy stations instead. Not knowing where what station type might be needed/is available is annoying. Collision. Please remove friendly collisions with cargo. I don’t care if you have to give them the same collision model as Caltrops, but in crowded spaces, they become a bumpy nightmare. Fixing Cargo. Here is what I would do with the new cargo system: Now I said it before the update and I say it again. Logistical support such as cargo should be part of the ANT.Not only does it lack a function outside of Cortium harvesting, it being separate from the Sunderer, means Cargo power doesn’t need to be taken into consideration with the Sunderers overall power and other functions. Move Cargo to ANT. Until a suitable replacement is found, give Sunderer back its Performance Slots. After seeing what the staying power of an armor column with repair stations, or rather the stalemates it can cause, if Cargo becomes part of the ANT, rather than a cool down, they should cost Cortium, like 1k-2k per item. And in general Cargo should have a limited lifetime. With Cooldowns something like 30 seconds, with cortium cost one minute. We need more meaningful alternatives to Repair Station. The possibilities are endless, especially if you go with the Cargo costs Cortium route. Let me just spitball some of my more out there ideas. Pull one Free Max terminal. Lock-On-Block to protect friendly Air from Rocket Launchers. Mini-Two-Way-Shield Bubble. A temporary Spawn Tube. Dome Shield. Needs its clipping with Sunderer weapons issues solved ASAP. But even with that issue, the Shield already proves troublesome for areas, where either due to terrain (inside Scarfield i.e.) or in the case of shielded garages mines, prevent friendly armor to support a push against them, domes are oppressive for infantry alone. While some might say just make it two way and be done with it, I think that would overdo it. Instead how about we just make it so that Havoc has some impact on Dome. That could be something like reduced regeneration or lowering the resistance against infantry weapons, so that a crowd could break it. Missing Diving Ability. Right now Sunderer have no way to dive. I already saw there is a yet new unused third ability keybind, why not use that one? Refunds on old abilities. Not sure if the data is already lost, but if the Sunderer Rework will stay, I think everyone would appreciate to get a refund on their now removed Sunderer Certifications. Cloak. Okay last but not least the cloak. I am just gonna leave my notes from another post here: Cloak busses can be easily found by following the trail of infantry, even more so with radar darts. So, how about you just give people spawning from a bus a temporary invisibility buff that also protects them from recon. Only is applied for spawning and time depends on cloak rank and is anything from 20-40 seconds. If you rather have something else make a Corsair like ejection cannon module that only works while parked. Allowing for buses to keep a distance from bases and be positioned in much better defendable positions, while still allowing infantry somewhat decent access to a fight. Has the bonus of cutting the time it takes to run from a cloak bus into a facility. Some personal advice for future development There is a lot of good here, as I already stated. Much of the frustrations I experience or hear from other player, comes down to Sunderer having received an overall huge increase in power. This hurts the Nanite economy and strategic value of other vehicles. But I would lie if I didn’t enjoy the new flexibility in loadout and mobility afforded by the update. So while there are some problematic areas, I believe in general this update has taken the right direction. As I see it, now with Sunderers having a new higher base line of power, other vehicles previously gutted because of their problematic interactions with weak Sunderers, can similar be made to shine again, which in turn would make using them more appealing again. I think the players can all agree that there are some styles of play which got removed from the game, which we miss. And I believe through updates like these, that strenghten weak links of the game economy, we can make the entire game more robust to handle wacky nonsense which we would otherwise deem to powerful. Or to summarize: Fun is when the arms race isn’t a slope into the graveyard of nerfs (RIP Rumble Seat Harrasser, Battle Valkeries, etc.), but a continuous cycle of one upping everything. Oh and that second round of PTS could have been useful, sad there had been scheduling issues. Keep up the good work Toadman interactive and good luck with your other upcoming projects.