Walker Needs A Buff

I agree to an extent, with both yourself and SoljVS.

I feel that ESFs should have to fear the ground less than they already do. It's so hard to fly them without being annihilated, because lock-on rockets are tricky to evade, (when you are being targeted by other enemies), flak shreds ESFs easily, with little skill, and with great results for the AA gunner, standard arms damage ESFs, (handheld infantry guns, when concentrated fire is used, will often force an ESF to flee), and vehicle guns also damage them. ESFs are, as I see it, disadvantaged at the moment because they are so easy to kill by other aircraft such as the Galaxy and the Liberator, and the ground can hammer them to a pulp to quite an equal level.

While the flight ceiling may prove a suitable defence for the ESF, most dogfights, as you say, often involve spiralling to the ground, or a steady subconscious descent on both the adversaries parts, where they enter the firing grounds. Moreover, ESFs above the flight ceiling are ultimately useless because what good can an ESF do while sitting at 800m above ground, other than have a chat with the clouds and contemplate the meaning of life? I'd really like it if ESFs were not so vulnerable to AA weapons, and if Galaxies and Liberators were. AA is borderline useless against Galaxies and Liberators whereas it decimates ESFs and Valkyries.

Fundamentally, I feel that AA capabilities against the ESF need a nerf in general. ESFs can very rarely pull a successful rocket dump without losing most of their health. ESFs often can't evade the onslaught of lock-on rockets once the flares have been used. ESFs can't defend themselves against flak, which has a high operational distance. ESFs can't see where fire is coming from, though appear for other units at a distance far beyond that of the ESF's render range, (as with all aircraft). The same applies for the Valkyrie. Though Galaxies and Liberators can hold their own; they can take the punishment that ESFs cannot. Liberators have better guns than ESFs, can similarly use an afterburner, and have far more hit points.

Ideally yes, de facto, no. I've been killed so many times by friendly AA guns trying to help me out when I'm fighting an enemy pilot - a good intention of course - because AA has such dispersion, and there is fundamentally no precision to it. You literally just hold down that left click button and you're away with very little consideration. Lock-on rockets are more of an exception, though if I see two ESFs at it while I'm on the ground, I very rarely decide to help out, unless the opportunity for that perfect shot presents itself.

Of course, when aerial targets appear anyway, a consensus I have noticed is that all attention of the enemies of the aircraft turns towards it, which often ends disastrously for the pilot, (if the thing is an ESF or Valkyrie). It's not even that people want to help allies in the air. They just see something appear and want to shoot it.

Well the difference about that is tanks and LAs are both on the ground within the same realm. I don't see either of those in the air. Now an A2A battle with in range of ground forces I don't have an issue with. But an A2A battle at 800m relative altitude and still getting pegged by some scrub 1km out I have an issue with.

Tanks can always be more vigilant to approaching LAs, have more aware secondary gunners, even equip that motion sensor thing they have (not sure what it's called I don't tank).

What can an ESF do about some guy (usually guys) 1km out while already engaged? Or is it that everyone just has such hate for flight since they themselves can't manage to learn it? Cause let's be honest if people took the time to learn to fly and be effective at it these dumbed down OP weapons wouldn't even need to be introduced in the first place. Players would see an air problem and use air to remove said problem, but I guess not everyone has the mental aptitude to do this, so everything should be designed to give their lack of skill instant gratification while having virtually no risk.

Even the LA approaching the tank has risk involved. The guys sat in the walkers, bursters, and AA turrets not so much.

I run a Kobalt + Walker Sunderer for a similar effect, but I stick with armor columns as I run proximity repair, so the near-total loss of AV capability isn't a big deal to me. It's obviously less protected than yours but at least C4s still don't insta-kill unless I don't keep my Sundy repaired.

And at that cost, I get a weapon that can both snipe infantry and act as point-defense up-close. I know you can make the Walker work better by using slopes, but since I already have the Kobalt I tend not to bother and reserve it for air deterrence (and the occasional fairy that pops up while I'm shooting at the sky).

And as a plus, I can scratch infantry off allied tanks' back without damaging them or triggering the teamkill alert with the Kobalt.

Not gonna give it a try since it doesn't suit my playstyle, but I'm going to take your word for it since you're obviously way more experienced in using the Walker in unintended roles.

Well, as long as the ground variants aren't nerfed.

Walker? That's a funny way to spell ranger.

Are you sure? I'm quite certain it's 800 m/s (600-700-800 depending on charge).

Based on the Wiki / primordial patch notes from a few years ago, it appears you are correct - thanks for the check on that. Still, I thought I remembered it being 900 at max... I'll confirm in game later tonight.

Yep! I run the loadout you describe as well - I swap between the loadouts I listed, for the most part.

My most common Proxy repair loadouts are: Basalisk / Walker for the front lines, Kobalt / Walker for rear lines, and Fury / Walker when I plan on circling a sieged base, supporting offense where needed.

For Deploy Shield, pretty much the same, only I'll skip the Walker in favor of another Kobalt or Fury when I have a garage to park in, or other sources of full coverage from the air.

For Cloaking sunderer forays, I'll typically go Bulldog / Ranger. If i'm found by an armor unit, I'll bulldog, then hop out and run between shots - the long delay for reloading is enough that I can escape when they think i'm reloading, whether that's to C4 them or stalker cloak away depends on how close they are. If it's air that finds me, the huge pile of flack explosions can sometimes scare less experienced pilots away, and either way, the blinding flack is enough for me to hop and swap to stalker infiltrator / dash away as they get their bearings. Either way, I've started locking my cloaking sunderers upon pulling them, although I always unlock as soon as they start getting hit, or I know they've been spotted.

Never go out of the way to do it. Usually we pull a walker when we see two or three ESF's in the area that don't seem to be deterred by any AA we already have out there. So we will drive out mid range wait for em to take a little flak or lock on then finish em when they try to run to safety, or help out any friendly ESF's in a fight.

After that we just find targets of opportunity. Because of it's accuracy it's like a sniper rifle against larger targets. You can even harass tanks with it if you get behind them. You can stay a good distance back on flat ground. Basically, we never go looking for Sundies or Tanks...but when our intended ESF targets are rare we will throw our weight around on other targets or try to weaken tanks who are in fights with other armor and help out friendly lightings against MBTs.

The large clip size and high rate of fire is what makes it good. If ya get get bored one day head into VR and try it out. I'm not saying you will win a 1v1 fight against MBT or Sundy. But if that Sundy is deployed or has no gunners it won't take you long. Dual Walker Sundies are a different story, you really need to find nose down situation to do anything against ground targets. Or hope they have the high ground above you. I generally wouldn't recommend this, dual walker sundies however are murder against anything in the air. Even libs generally run away when they see their health dropping.

Obviously you have not played much AA. Guys with Walkers, Bursters, and Skyguards are sitting ducks for other ground forces and Liberators. They even make nice easy to spot tracers in the sky that scream out "easy kill right over here!". We can nerf the Walker when fire suppression on ESFs gets scaled back to 12% repair instead of 24% repair.

Aircraft have the ultimate ability to pick their fights and use speed and surprise to their advantage. If you can't learn to use those things then expect to get murdered by AA. If people would just learn to fly and be effective at it these weapons wouldn't seem so dumbed down and OP. Killing a good ESF with AA is almost impossible unless there is lots of it. The best you can do 95% of the time is just drive it off for a bit.

I think a (not so) small damage increase against libs/gals would do well for the g30 walker.
I also think that they are (somewhat) fine against esf (not so sure about valks) but they should have some visible tracers (like esf noseguns) because it is annoying to see damage but not know where it came from even when facing the general direction of the source.

I really don't see walkers as needing a buff. Excellent sustained damage, relatively average skill floor for ease of use. Having 400m to play with before damage drop off even begins is huge -- especially as air renders FAR sooner than armor does. You have much more time to damage an aircraft before they can even see you on their screen. The fact that they go on everything (do we want Gals and Libs with even BETTER tail guns?) I really don't see how you can justify a buff to walkers that would not completely marginalize air and make piloting a non-existent profession.

Have played some AA and I can tell you knowing how to lead a target works wonders in your damage applied. Most grounders don't seem to grasp that concept. But I play AA to deter should I ever do some ground combat and I feel like helping out the squad.

If I want to kill aircraft I will get in my own ESF. I don't think we'll ever agree. I fly and you don't apparently. As someone who wants the kill when he shoots at the aircraft you want your weapons buffed, as someone who gets targetted by everything out there and knowing how much things actually hurt I say stop being a baby you already have it good.

Watch the vid in my sig. Notice how when I'm dogfighting pretty high up most of the time I'm getting shot at constantly from morons on the ground usually 500+m away just hoping they can get that last hit and score a kill.

I think before anyone says any kind of AA should be buffed they should be required to learn to pilot and stay up for longer than 10 min at a time. Then come back and say it.

Anyone can do simpleton ground combat. Not everyone can pilot.

You obviously don't fly much if at all.

I have at least 40 hours using flak and its ******** easy and the only people who die while doing it are not good players.

Of course as SoljVs already pointed out only bad players want to use flak or locks in the first place.

They are angry because they are too lazy to learn to fly and so they expect to sit on the ground and just dominate air because they pulled someting the devs called AA.

Skyguards arent sitting ducks for anything unless they are bad.

Back skyguard up to a tree or a building behind friendly tanks and never die.

Drive skyguard in 3rd person at all times when not actually firing the gun.

Look around for libs trying to sneak up on you.

If you are aware of whats goin on around you, you will never die in a skyguard.

If you can't flak well or use a walker well you are just terrible at the game and should probably play a tab target game instead.

Go get 500 kills in an ESF and then come back and talk about how the walker needs a buff.

L2P. Seriously.

Buff? Get dafuq! lol

I find the Walker really good with accuracy and rate of fire and it is useful against some ground targets as well. I jumped into a Sundy the other day with dual Rangers and I know they have proximity fusing against aircraft but man! are those things inaccurate!.......and slow firing for an AA platform. At least it seems that way after firing the Walker.

Actually I don't feel that AA needs to be buffed at all. Walkers are reasonable long range AA while the Skyguard is superior to the Walker at close range. Lock on launchers provide good support for both or themselves and can be countered with flares or good piloting. I play AA to drive off aircraft. The occasional kill is just nice bonus as AA in general is a suppression weapon system, not a killing weapon system, unless the pilot is just bad.

Spend more time in a Skyguard. Every other vehicle murders them. Even fury flashes can be a threat. Backing up against a tree or building will get you C4'd or flanked. You have to keep moving and hope you don't get flanked or surprised by something with vehicle stealth. AV Harassers don't even need stealth to do this as they are so fast. Prowlers with racer chassis can do it without stealth as well. Magriders just come from odd places where you wouldn't expect to see an MBT.

Very few areas favor a Skyguard in a lib vs Skyguard fight and even then the lib will win if the pilot is good. Libs move too fast to be able to spot them in time most of the time if the pilot is good.

That said, the Skyguard and Walker are both fine and do not need any real buffs or nerfs in my opinion.

reply is not edit....

The Skyguard is a bit of a joke as it stands. It could use some buff, not necessarily with its G2A capability.

Hell, it's part of the reason that I switched to a Sunderer in the first place. Similar if not superior AA performance (Walker), considerably better anti-infantry (Kobalt) and a very profitable support system (Nanite Proximity Repair) makes me wonder why I waited until the proximity radar nerf* to switch over.

* As far as the Lightning is concerned, having proximity radar moved from utility to defense is a nerf.

Go play G2A flak, then tell us of those "easily, great results"

I have news for you: everybody has to disengage and repair their vehicles.

You can't keep yourself under enemy sight for long? Get shot from enemies that don't even render? Welcome to every vehicle routine! Also, "high operational distance". Yeah, if you don't move at all.

We must be playing 2 completely different games, because I play in 3 servers and is always the same: is ANYONE going to pull any AA? I can't kill them just by myself, you know!