People dominating in GSF, what does it mean?

[Osoygatitalove]

Does it mean some have natural skill?

 

Does it mean some folks have much more situational awareness?

 

Does it mean some folks lack spatial intelligence and some others have it well developped?

 

Does it mean some people are smarter?

 

since its a whole new gameplay, id like to know

 

what do you think?

Edited December 4, 2013 by Osoygatitalove

[Pwnboy]

Some people were involved in the beta, so they'll be a step ahead of everyone else, just as subs will be before the preferreds get it and the perferreds will have it before the F2Pers.

 

Or maybe they just have a natural inclination to it.

[Rafaman]

I'm going with natural skill... some savvy and a little bit of luck.

 

Natural skill is a given, but what I've noticed is some players zoom in and track enemies that are already damaged or taking damage. Then, they swoop in and take the kill without having done much of the work. Lol. That is savvy. And of course, it pays to be lucky sometimes.

[PLynkes]

And some people are just hopeless.

 

 

That is not meant as an elite put-down. I am by no means necessarily excluding myself from the above category.

Edited December 4, 2013 by PLynkes

[ArcturusSaDiablo]

3rd person shooting in 3-dimensional space. Yeah, there is a significant amount of skill involved. Having a chance to play during the Beta test, I got a feel for it. But I know I'm still not going to be a top PvP dog in this fight. (See what I did there?) But it's still fun for me. I suspect I'll be playing at it from time to time, just to mix up the game some.

[Vandicus]

At the moment, 70% practice, 25% natural talent/reflexes, 5% superior gearing knowledge.

 

Right now the difference in practice for players is so massive that I believe its the primary contributor. As time passes, I think there'll be a much smaller gap in experience, which will make the primary determinant talent/reflexes.

[Osoygatitalove]

I'm going with natural skill... some savvy and a little bit of luck.

 

Natural skill is a given, but what I've noticed is some players zoom in and track enemies that are already damaged or taking damage. Then, they swoop in and take the kill without having done much of the work. Lol. That is savvy. And of course, it pays to be lucky sometimes.

 

you cant zoom in unless you are gunship, what you can do is press and hold F, and look around

[Rafaman]

you cant zoom in unless you are gunship, what you can do is press and hold F, and look around

 

When I say zoom, I mean thrust max and speed boost. But you are right, it depends on the ship you are in.

[Fantazm]

Practice I'd say. Just anecdotal though obviously.

 

First game with gunship I was rubbish, 2nd game with it I did a lot better.

First game with strike fighter I was beyond awful and got 0 medals, 2nd game I did a lot better and got 4 or 5 kills.

[TheDavy]

Definitely a combination of practice and skill. When you just start out it takes some getting used too, but after that skill has a large impact, as well as dexterity and a steady hand. Locking on missiles is hellishly hard for me still XD

[Infernixx]

Flight sims are hardly a new thing and for many people, it's a first-love. So, of course, there's going to be some people that are better at it from the start as they've had massive previous experience in other sims. Likewise, there's a solid core of early PTS players who spent every weekend testing GS and honing their skills.

 

So, between the two, you're going to have people who know how to dogfight like a champ two days into GS subbed access. A guildie of mine is a frickin 'monster' at GS and filled up guild chat with a stream of achievement spam on Tuesday.

[chuixupu]

All of it.

 

Right now there are a lot of people jumping into the GS for the first time. If you just happened to have one team that has a ton of noobs and the other team has a lot of well-practiced people, it will feel very one-sided. Depending on some RNG involved, the veterans cueing up together are going to get better faster and gear up faster as well.

[Nempo]

I've only played 15 games or so and the difference between my first foray (not even one medal) to now is huge. However, like all flight based fighting a lot of it is luck and how often you find yourself being targeted.

 

For every game I found myself always being a target, I also had games where I was rarely shot at and was blasting away ships left and right with impunity.

 

Customizing ships for how you prefer helps as well. I altered my basic scout for a DoT missile and longer ranged blasters for better hit and run tactics (always funny to watch my DoT destroy someone that has full shields ), yet my advanced scout has heavy hitting blasters and faster lock on missiles for dogfighting purposes. Why do I use a scout base ship for dogfighting and not the fighter? I enjoy the speed advantage even if it means I have less armor/shielding.

 

I'll be unlocking the advanced fighter next to see about the dual missiles, the shield ignoring plasma missiles will be worthwhile to have whenever I am not being targeted and have time to sit and track a target, using concussion missiles for when I have to be in the thick of the hornet's nest.

 

I've seen others use the basic fighter's ion blasters and heavy blasters, swapping back and forth as needed to run someone down. It is all about customizing your ship to suit you, and keeping special awareness of what is going on around you. Zero in on one target too much and you end up dead.

 

What needs to happen, however, is people who suicide to not give others a kill need to receive penalties to how much ship/fleet requisition they get. 10% reduction per suicide if you are actively engaged (the game knows if you are engaged due to someone having you targeted). It rather ruins the fun of the game if people just act that way.

[Kamatsu]

I'd say it's a combination of practice, player skill and natural ability. Some people will naturally be better at this kind of gameplay than others, so will do better at it. Practice will help improve a person's gameplay quite a lot - it's at that point that natural ability and skill starts to decide who does well and who doesn't (assuming approx the same level's of component's & upgrades).

 

I know for my first few games I was absolutely terrible at it - never damaged anything, constantly dying. After a few match's I've gotten better, to the point where I can usually actually hit other ships and the stationary targets. Still have to actually kill anything - but practice has made me better. Doubt I'll get much better though as I have a documented hand-to-eye co-ordination problem, which makes things like GSF hard for me to do very well.

 

What made me the saddest to see was there are already people starting to call people who do well "cheaters" and claiming that they must be hacking to do well. It didn't take long for this nonsense to start up... why can't people just accept that there will always be ppl better than them at something? Why fall back to idiotic claims of cheating & hacking when they get beaten... esp on the very 1st day that something got released to the masses (well, subscriber's at least).

[Alec_Fortescue]

Means I' am an ace!

[Sarfux]

GSF reminds me of my Black Prophecy days when I tested it and then played it until it got shutdown. Awesome dogfighting game. Anybody else play that?

 

Yes, people have natural skill to it.

[kirorx]

What needs to happen, however, is people who suicide to not give others a kill need to receive penalties to how much ship/fleet requisition they get. 10% reduction per suicide if you are actively engaged (the game knows if you are engaged due to someone having you targeted). It rather ruins the fun of the game if people just act that way.

 

I dont think that's what they are doing, I crash a lot when trying to evade someone because I take a lot more risks to avoid being blown to bits, that and the barrel roll can be dangerously unforgiving

[Apophis_]

Skill.

 

I play osu! and Dota 2 so it is easy for me to move my mouse on my targets, I'm almost always top damage and I got 75%+ achievement in my third game.

[Thorkir]

It's very much practice-based.

 

And learning what ships you can work with. I tried the Star Guard, didn't get a single medal or kill in a match. Switched to the NovaDive, and I typically end near the top of the chart on damage.

[Hassat-Hunter]

10% reduction per suicide if you are actively engaged (the game knows if you are engaged due to someone having you targeted).

That would be horrible. I crash most of the times evading or trying to line my target... and so does the opposition usually. Thus in combat.

Never intentional, but it happens very very often.

 

So yeah, that would be the most horrible punishment for just already dying stupidly and having to refly into combat.

 

@ OP; Yeah, skill and training has a lot to do with it. Though I have to say gear has a big part too. Couldn't hit the broad side of a barn earlier, but with my weapon upgrades tracking and actually killing has become a lot easier. So it's not just experience, but also the gear one works with. Those upgrades make a major difference, even if you would think 8% or 2% wouldn't matter that much. It does...

[Delta_V]

A lot of the domination early on was from closed beta and PTS vets, who already had significant play time invested in GS and knew the controls and strategies right off the bat. It took me about 20 matches on the PTS to really start to feel comfortable in GS, but then when it went Live, I was able to light up the scoreboard from the get-go since I got the learning curve out of the way already..

 

You can already start to see that skill/experience gap eroding, though. At first, every match seemed to have 2-3 people at the top of the scoreboard with a bunch of kills, followed by a whole lot of 1s and 0s. Now, there are more and more people getting multiple kills each match.

[Thorkir]

A lot of the domination early on was from closed beta and PTS vets, who already had significant play time invested in GS and knew the controls and strategies right off the bat. It took me about 20 matches on the PTS to really start to feel comfortable in GS, but then when it went Live, I was able to light up the scoreboard from the get-go since I got the learning curve out of the way already..

 

You can already start to see that skill/experience gap eroding, though. At first, every match seemed to have 2-3 people at the top of the scoreboard with a bunch of kills, followed by a whole lot of 1s and 0s. Now, there are more and more people getting multiple kills each match.

Should be quite a challenge once more of the playerbase gets used to it.

[DarthSabreth]

I would say some have experience and skill.

 

1, experience, some have played and enjoyed flight sims in the past. for me I played the tie fighter / xwing fighter when it cam out and enjoyed the hang out of it, also the regular fighter sims too. so leading the target and using obsticles to my advantage plays a part in wining a dog fight.

 

2. skill, getting lost and losing awareness of whats going on around you will bring disastrous results to your experience in a match. skill plays a vital role in winning a dog fight.

 

those that don't put the time in to learn the mechanic's of the game will have a very difficult time in it.

[Helig]

Mainly practice - and a bit of natural sense of 3-d space (when flying in tight spaces) - which would also come with practice. Played a lot of stuff like Freelancer in my day, so GSF fealt right at home. Edited December 5, 2013 by Helig

[niceguyy]

I think one of the best ways to get better at GSF (other than practice yourself) is to watch others and see how they play.

 

If you would like to watch a PTS vet in action you can see my past streams of GSF at http://www.twitch.tv/swtorplayer95

Click on my Profile and then Past Broadcasts near middle of the page. I played Imperial on PTS but I have defected to the Republic. I use various ships (mostly Strike Fighters) and I'm pretty good but still need more practice. I try to include Tips, Tricks, Tactics & a Q/A into my GSF streams.