[Suggestion] this game would be objectively more fun for a majority players if A2G ESF's were toned down.

Yes, I can actually:



ESF's have yet to stop my squad from getting on point with the skywhale.

Login, spawn somewhere and watch the zerg. They are not on point. They are everywhere else. The ones on point are organized outfits. Not zerglings. Zerglings, lone wolves, solo players, and zergfits without direction are useless to their factions. Sorry if you're one of those players, but I am telling the truth. I could make the same request of you and say show me the zerglings that are getting on point in an equal fight (not a ghost cap) and you wouldn't be able to show it.

But yeah, as soon as my new computer is built, I'll get you the video.

Feel free to do so, and please make a video of you trying to demonstrate how easy mode ESFs are.

Perhaps it's you that should read up on this modern warfare..
70% of all air loses in "recent" history, have been to G2A weapons.
70%. That leaves 30% to A2A, less than half.
The unbeatable F15, 100? 200? A2A victories, with no loss.
-> Has been shot down by "stupid" G2A weapons.

The game shouldn't take situations like Afghanistan or Iraq as examples; with all due respect for pilots "in the field",
those areas don't really feature AA on a similar technology level, or with a remotely considerable "dense-ness" of what a modern, effective AA setup would look like. Such a setup would have a diverse mix of radars and missiles, probably including short-ranged missiles designed to intercept incoming missiles/bombs.

Aircraft are manoevreable, but:
Historically speaking, ground has far, far more powerfull radars. Not so in game; ESF is only thing in game to get actual AA radar; 600m max range. Ground can also have more powerfull computations behind the radar.
AA is cheaper than aircraft. (to buy, and to maintain).
AA is easier to upgrade: new radar on the truck, great. New missile on the truck: great. Jet fighter: uhm sir? This radar doesn't fit inside the nose? Oh, and we lack the power to operate it.
AA is easier to use; you need skilled operators, you need tactics, sure. But compared to training jet fighter pilots?
AA has less harsh malfunctions; over the course of lifetime, of certain aircraft 30% was lost in crashes without combat being the cause. (of that %, several can be repaired but still.. ) Most known example: bird flies into the jet engine. Bad enough if you're a 747, really bad for something like an F16. Other risks: stalling during training, ..

Oh, and btw: some of the most succesfull aircraft, were NOT "designed" for destroying ground targets.
The F15? Originally designed for A2A. High altitude fighter does not a good "CAS" aircraft make for example.
F14? Long range interceptor.
F16? A2A on the cheap.
F22? Designed for A2A. Now can do some A2G.
Typhoon? Originally primarly A2A; A2G added.
The primary task of an airforce, is air supremacy.
Not A2G.
A2G in the sense of "plane able to drop a guided bomb/missile" doesn't really require all that much "design" work.
An F4 Phantom can play bomb truck.
Note also the USA first had the F117 (fighter-bomber); the B1 "semi-stealth"; the B2 true stealth, and only then the Raptor.
Because the requirements for A2A are by far higher.


Do you want to know how ground can really screw air?
Put a couple of mbt's on the runway. (see also: Balkan campaign)
in-game, aircraft are not limited by take-off and landing-ways. There are no airports to destroy.
Do you envision an F35"B" landing in the desert, and the pilot getting out with a repair tool?
To an extent, you can repair mbt's "in the field" (mostly put on a new track.. anything else still requires a "workshop")


BUFF G2A.
GIVE MOUSEYAW AND AIRGAME WILL OCCUR.

I have stated repeatedly that it is almost impossible to balance air game vs ground especially when it comes to overextended vehicles. It doesn't matter what you nerf or how much TTK is adjusted because when you are found you will be destroyed only at the slower rate. This changes exponentially with AA stacking or A2G stacking and when you factor in newbies on both sides it does not look good. For example a group of vehicles flanking with plenty AA becomes extremely efficient flank. A2G zerg also becomes extremely efficient. For example 10-15 Mosquito's using nothing but a Needler default nose gun would melt AA Sundy's nest.

Only a handful of A2G pilots who are persistent and determined stick around large battles and try to contribute to the outcome of their empire advance. All of these pilots are really good at aiming, awareness, and can fly extremely low and fast with total control of the ESF. This contribution is minimal at best. All of the best aces in this game don't bother with it. Why? Because it is not worth their time and effort. They know that even if they do succeed and escape with low health they can be chased down by lurking A2A pilots below their skill level and almost always lose because of it.

It could possibly be balanced by reducing A2G TTK in conjunction with AA TTK. This would require to many changes and honestly given how SOE nerf/buffs things I don't think this is even possible. Best way to go around this problem is to add more cover for infantry, vehicles and air. Bigger and more trees, clouds and better base design.

How I always felt about this matter was pretty simple.

Make it so each rocket launcher has a unique function, we have dumbfire, Ground lockons which should launch the rocket where it flies upward for a bit before homing in on the ground vehicles, ground to air rockets where the rockets fly forward briefly before flying towards the target (clearing any obstacles instead of shooting sideways out of the thing and killing the user), etc.

We should also have it so lockons aren't so pin point accurate in chasing, i want to see pilots perform some real intense maneuvers to shake off rockets, like if they perform a barrel roll at the right time the rocket may just miss them, or if they perform a sharp enough turn the rocket is too close and can't keep up and just loses them.

In return, I'd be happy if that meant people carried by default 1 or 2 more rockets to make up for the fact that, they may need more in order to down an aircraft or vehicle. That since ground to ground lock on rockets come from an angle harder to escape for vehicles, that they can no longer be dumb fired, but may do more damage or something in compensation, making our existing selection of rocket launchers unique in purpose and function.

Currently, there is only your ES, and Ground to Air, they all are the same gun with a different scope but one serves as a better all around purpose than the rest. (I mainly just use a decimator and call it a day)

I also propose the NS ones to have very unique functions:

Decimator only has 3 shots in which you must discard the rocket launcher and thus go to a terminal to restock it since it can't be reloaded. (Increase damage, make it the strongest dumbfire rocket)

Annihilator should perform lockons where all rockets launch and fly vertically briefly before going to lock on target, for ground and air.
(this could render it useless if you don't got some head room)


Now we can have some fun.

You already can do a few particular maneuvers to evade an air lock-on rocket, actually. The most effective, and dangerous, (Besides outright outrunning one.) is to flip straight upside-down, hold up-thruster and afterburner, forcing you down towards the ground at high speed, and flip back over close to the ground, shooting forwards and regaining altitude. The rocket hits the ground. Understandably, this is not viable in several areas of each map, and is best if only attempted in the desert regions of Indar, and on Esamir.

Yeah I could try like shooting 4 rockets at a tank and then disengaging before coming back at another pass... Only to have that MBT repaired. And in anticipation of me. Shooting infantry is nice, provided you can distinguish them from your team mates and can survive AA when going close. Currently, I use up 6 rockets just to kill a random HA or infiltrator. Group kills are uncommon now, since everyone knows to spread out when moving on foot. The only time I got a group kill was when I saw a mess of infantry crowding their sunderer, so I swooped in killing 3 BR 10-12 players, one of them happened to be locking on to me so I got away relatively unscathed.

Liberators are just big fat targets once you have your own ESFs surrounding it. Don't talk to me about how people take down ESFs with the belly cannon because that is pure skill.

Maybe we can consider buffing G2A instead of calling for nerve to air? Like giving Skyguards a purchasable radar that tracks air targets, or perhaps a utility vehicle that is equipped with a powerful radar that informs allied vehicles and air about enemy air within a certain area (we could use the sunderer for this one).

Enough of lazy players calling for nerfs. Give them a buff and let them figure out how to work with them.

OK WHO HORNETED FLEECH's magrider come on fess up.
Fleech you are back! Still shaking the same maraca I see.
Oh well thats just the nature of combined arms Fleech. You have super fast walkers you can use. Have you tried running your magrider as a heavy assault with some A2G rockets? I hear that the skyguard is meant for AA and is very versatile, even in tank fights.

Im sure you'll figure out something!

Nevermind, this post will get me banned. I can feel it.

I think these types of debates are worthwhile and helpful.
In actuality, tanks are in a good place. The A2G power of ESFs needs some tweaking to make their AV power actually competent. I think 90 percent of the player base feels this way.

No you see if he put an AA gun on his magrider, he wouldn't be able to farm infantry as much. Everyone knows ground farming infantry should get precedence over air farming ground, because the point and click adventure of PPA farming is much more skill-based than flying an aircraft.

i also agree that these debates are worthwhile and helpful :^)

ESF's are in such a dire situation willterry san sama senpai chan, will you help bump my tiny thread that no one seems to care about?

i mean clearly this is such a non issue that 20 pages of discussion aren't valid.

your opinions are always so deep and valued by so many


:^)

:^))

:^)))

And that means that we can't strive for a better system? In fact, there's dozens of games out there that do sport some good air gameplay with ground. How come that can't be done in Planetside 2? Because the current systems aren't working properly?

Look, here's how balancing can go: If aircraft are OP right now, you take 1 damage off. Still OP? take another damage off... until at some point it's balanced.
But damage isn't the only thing that can be balanced, if you have aircraft weapons that deal far too low damage, it becomes not fun to use and players will complain about that. So you can play around with stuff. Reload time, magazine size, ROF, AOE, fire mechanics (we have an aircraft mounted explosive shotgun, there's tons of other mechanics that can be used) etc.
On the other hand we have AA, and currently it's just a low-skilled mess that doesn't work very well. The only high-skill AA weapon is the Walker, and looking at it's performance it's not exactly good. That doesn't mean that we can use different mechanics and different stats to come up with a balanced weapon. And we haven't even begun to touch on different flight mechanics for instance that allow you to better avoid AA.
Stating something doesn't make it true. And even if it were true, we can still go for a better system than we have now.

And you point is...? Infantry and tanks deal with the same "problem", you are basically saying "it's unbalanced because Zergs can use it". Well, that's one of the problems that any MMO FPS will have to face and try to fix, the fact that having more weapons pointed at the enemy means you win much easier. This causes quick imbalances when players want cheesy kills and band together to always outpop the other team.
Things like limiting resource gain when you are outpopping is a way to handle this, by taking away the option for more force multipliers you give the defenders a fighting chance, but that has nothing to do with normal balancing. This is a mute point, and has been brought up before in this thread.

exactly, which is why the airgame needs to be changed! AA needs to be different, instead of an automatic hit whenever you get close, it needs to be the skill and capabilities of both parties that determine the outcome! Harassers are one of the closest vehicles to ESF, and they can use their speed and maneuverability to avoid lots of fire, while a good tanker can hit them repeatedly and kill them, but bad tankers have it tough because there's not flak that can hit Harassers. The same should count for aircraft. They should be able to work inside big battles, and AA should be easier to use and pick in smaller battles as well. AA and aircraft should be picked almost in equal portions as vehicles and AV weapons are picked, or if less aircraft is picked than an equivalent of the same amount of AA needs to be present in every battle.

I see more possibilities and I don't think I need to repeat them here.

i'm sorry that we want to enjoy the game as well. zergs are just ever so engaging.

what year was this post made in?

if your going to call me a farmer at least accuse me of using the up to date weapons that aren't garbage.

It is an option, yes.
However, I think most pilots would rather not see G2A lockons deal more damage for example.
Myself and others have proposed mini-walkers for heavies, as a G2A option.
This gives infantry an option for bases where due to terrain it is extremely difficult to get a lockon to hit.

And yes, skyguard should have a good AA radar. "good": see how the ESF radar works: it's not just the minimap; it also gives an indication of where the aircraft is with the arrow system; meaning a lightning would have an idea approximately of the altitude.
Ideally such radar would have very limited view past terrain; so a lightning skyguard in a canyon can't see the ground-hugging ESF closing in on the canyon from the side untill very late, vs 600m range at max rank.
Personally, I think the sunderer has more than enough utility and power for 200 nanites.

Another option is to put it on the harasser; as a radar-scout vehicle.
After all, a harasser can bring a ranger or walker too.
Then some coding would be needed that the harassers' radar gives info to the skyguard nearby. This is probably more work than simply putting it on the skyguard.

"Big" aircraft, like the liberator and galaxy could be detected earlier than ESF and valk. (IRL a 747 is quite easier to detect & track than a F16).

The ground radar could do slow rotations, say 4-5s for 360°; indicating enemy aircraft as it turns like for the ESF for 1s, then dissapear.

Stealth would however, become even more important; after all, stealth should provide some benefit vs radar no?
So, reduced detection range (halved at max rank?), and only "light up" 0.5s?

So many possibilities..

Plainly buffing AA, as in moar dps! MOAAAR!
I rather like the idea for the skyguard; a liberator shouldn't be able to out-tank it.
One option is that flak is buffed, but so is composite armor, to compensate.
a composite armored aircraft would have the same survivability as a composite armored now,
but without armor the aircraft becomes more fragile.
This should encourage more people to invest in composite over NAR or stealth.
composite armor could also provide protection from ESF noseguns; again "nerfing" current aircraft vs noseguns, unless having composite.
You can argue that this leads to tougher aircraft in-game, as more people bring armored aircraft. OTOH, these aircraft are no longer stealth or self-repairing.

So the whole game should revolve around Galaxies and getting on the point then? Great game, great game... Which is exactly why it needs changing. Seriously, there's little goals in the game, but if this really was all the goal in the game it wouldn't have lasted 2 months, let alone 2 years.

Did I say they were on point? I said they were spawncamping, which is inside the base, and there's enough buildings nearby spawnrooms to camp from, and this also means that the Skywhale technique you proposed would be the only way to play, since spawnbunkers mean that you need to walk through open space first to get to the point. Why are those spawnbunkers even there then? As the only real way to get anywhere according to you is skywhaling it from the warpgate to the point and then sticking there, ignoring the entire gameplay of tanks and aircraft because "that's just cert farming in the midfield" even when those tanks and aircraft fight in and around a base. I would ask you, why even bother with aircraft, tanks and the whole MMO experience? looking at your idea of the game it should be just "spawn inside building, fight for point, hold it while enemies spawn inside building and try to take it back". Great game! Oh and you said this was balanced right?

I didn't say they were on point, you made that up. And oh I would like to see that video of yours.

I do believe that 90 percent of the player base feels that the AV abilities of ESFs are under powered. It is only right that hornets and other AV weapons of the ESFs be polished to actually be effective.

Doesn't matter what the goal was, is, or will be. Its how it is now. Right now your hardcore outfits and squads do the following:

1. Meet up at warpgate.
2. Pull Gal's.
3. Drop on a base to attack or defend.
4. Sit on point until goal is reached*
5. Redeploy to Warpage and repeat 2-5.

*Number 4 entails medics sitting behind cover rezzing, Engies dropping packs and turrets to cover doorways. Heavies and MAXes 'tank' the incoming zerg if it bothers to come in. If Light Assaults are used, they get on top of things to avoid fire, and infils use recon darts or motion sensors.

Nowhere did I say this was ideal. But it is the best way to play the game to take/hold bases, and ultimately win alerts. As the game Currently is.

Now if you click my link I supplied earlier, you would see my suggestions on how to improve vehicle play so that the above isn't the only effective way to play outside cert farming. And I even say that once that is done (and ONLY once that is done) they could be REBALANCED. I never said we don't need balance. I said we don't need balance that only affect the casual zerg play.

Now even though I say the above isn't the ideal way to play the game, doesn't mean that sort of coordinated play isn't fun. I just don't like the idea that its the only way outside outright zerging. But it is unique compared to bringing more numbers to a base to take it. As you can actually beat forces twice or three times larger than your own. And in bases four times.

But yeah, go check out the link. Its got good ideas in there. Allows for vehicles to be relevant in base play. If that were to happen, I'd be the first one to call for rebalance of vehicles including ESFs. But with how the game currently is, and how easy it is to totally obsolete everything that isn't a Gal or Sundy, I can't support any rebalancing that might nerf vehicles. To me that'd be like taking the patriot flare gun and cutting its damage by half. Doesn't make sense to me.