Queue for Scouts & Strike Fighters Only

[Whizzer_]

Wouldn't that be a Queue for Scouts? Why would you fly a Strike when there is really no benefit to do so?

[FridgeLM]

Wouldn't that be a Queue for Scouts? Why would you fly a Strike when there is really no benefit to do so?

 

Literally every battle scout pilot thinks they can also speak for strike fighters.

 

Spoiler: in 2.5 battle scouts and gunships were the only ships having fun.

[Fractalsponge]

On a side note, you do not need specialized builds to kill strikes, scouts and even bombers. Cuz yaknow gunships are entitled.

 

Wait, BLC/overcharge/retro/dfield/maxturning type 2 scouts aren't entitled to be able to run down anything they want and still be the best at a dogfight?

 

You do need specialized builds to reliably run down and kill some scout builds, and engaging a bomber in a minefield is hard for any scout without an EMP build. The only gunship build that can't be 100% run down and killed by basic scouts is the one that everyone takes, because otherwise you might as well suicide repeatedly and get the match over with quicker. The presence of hard counter builds is not supposed to mean you'll always lose to them, otherwise it'd be annoying as **** to fly something when your hard counter build is out there.

 

Similarly, the presence of a build that can do everything the best means you'll only get that build. Remember 2.5 and Galactic Flashstingifre?

Edited March 14, 2014 by Fractalsponge

[Itkovian]

I find a Pike works well with a long range missile loadout and a fast ship build. It competes with scouts on speed and range and with a standoff weapons loadout it doesn't really need more than mediocre maneuverability.

 

I'd like to try that as well, if I could have 2 pikes I'd try that.

 

As it stands, however, I have mine built for engine power and maneuverability, with clusters and protorps. The end result is something of a balanced build: good maneuverability and dogfighting punch (cluster missiles/quads), and good mobility (lots of engine power w/ barrel roll) and stand off firepower with Protorps (I even use range capacitors to help with minefields and getting the first hits in in a head on - though I suspect I am mostly gimping myself on that one).

 

Even with limiting my barrel rolls to every 20 or so seconds (something I've done most of the time since hearing about the 2.7 nerf), I've got plenty of mobility at my disposal, and when I get close to something I can hurt them very effectively.

 

I'd love to try out a pure long range build focused on speed, but I tend to draw people's attention and so I've found that having decent dogfighting abilities helps a lot (also, trying to fight gunships at range is a bad idea, I prefer running in and dogfighting them).

 

But you know, if I could I'd have 5 different pike builds lined up.... maybe 3 plus a Clarion and a Star Guard... one can always dream.

Edited March 14, 2014 by Itkovian

[Morgrid]

Literally every battle scout pilot thinks they can also speak for strike fighters.

 

Spoiler: in 2.5 battle scouts and gunships were the only ships having fun.

 

It all changed when the Bomber Nation attacked...

[Zoom_VI]

Wait, BLC/overcharge/retro/dfield/maxturning type 2 scouts aren't entitled to be able to run down anything they want and still be the best at a dogfight?

 

You do need specialized builds to reliably run down and kill some scout builds, and engaging a bomber in a minefield is hard for any scout without an EMP build. The only gunship build that can't be 100% run down and killed by basic scouts is the one that everyone takes, because otherwise you might as well suicide repeatedly and get the match over with quicker. The presence of hard counter builds is not supposed to mean you'll always lose to them, otherwise it'd be annoying as **** to fly something when your hard counter build is out there.

 

Similarly, the presence of a build that can do everything the best means you'll only get that build. Remember 2.5 and Galactic Flashstingifre?

 

Ok firstly I want to know what ignoramus decided that because back the old days Dfield Flashfires where FOTM that now post nerf there opinions are invalid? I agreed with that nerf because it was justified. But I fail to see how my opinions are invalid because I choose to play a class I enjoy and will always play even if it gets nerfed below the Comet Breaker.

 

No you not need specialized builds to kill scout builds trust me I would know, I have used every single primary, secondary, engine, and shield component available on both scouts. You don't need special builds to counter any of them. All you need is a frigging braincell and not be those baddies who try to beat scouts at their own strengths.

 

Lets look at scouts shall we.

 

I take Burst lasers, it means I'm great for dogfighting, one of the best lasers for it. It also means I will always be attempting to get closer and will have nightmares dealing with minelayers because of the close range. Great against scouts and strike, total crap against bombers.

I could take quads, gives me a nice chunk of range that makes me much more effective at dealing with things like bombers, it also comes at the cost of leaving me much less effective in scout to scout dogfighting. Great against bombers, not so good for dogfighting

 

I could take clusters, great multipurpose weapon, it also means I'm going to suck at ambushing things since missile locks will give away any surprise I might have had. Great for dealing with scouts, sucks against gunships

I could take rocket pods, superb weapon for ambushing, also sucks balls in dogfights due to its horribly small firing arc and terrible tracking penalty. Great for ambushing gunships, sucks against scouts.

 

I could take Dfield, great thing these days with all the seekers and missile drones lying about. But it comes at the cost of leaving my life at the mercy of RNG. Great for dogfighting and against gunships, not so good against minelayers.

I could take directional, completely take RNG out of the equation, also gives largest shield arcs available to FF. Also leaves me with one less missile break and no good defensive cooldown. Great against bombers not so good against fighters and gunships.

 

I could take blaster overcharge, superb burst potential. It also means my FF wont have a single engine regen component, which considering scout's live as long as the engine pool can backfire easily. Great for bursting down gunships but it sucks if they manage to escape since it leaves me without the endurance for chasing.

I could take Booster recharge, a great option in this age of ion rail, also comes at the opportunity cost of some offensive cooldowns. Great for chasing not so good if you find yourself having to ambush something.

 

I could take retro thrusters, great for dogfighting gives a solid offensive advantage. Also leaves me without a good gap closer particularly since I can't also take +10% as a teir 3. Great for dogfighting terrible against gunships.

I could take barrel roll, great from chasing and gap closing, also a great escape tool. It also has no offensive advantage in a dogfighting and often takes away any advantage you might have had in position. Great against gunships, terrible against scouts and strikes.

 

 

Now lets look at gunship.

Now if I'm gunship that is going to fight I scout lets see what components I would take.

Well firstly I want dfield for dealing with their primaries and a extra missile break.

I want ion rail since its great for leaving scouts dead in the water.

I want slug rail for a finisher.

I want BLC since it might come in handy if they manage to close with me.

I want barrel roll so I can bug out if they get close.

 

Now if I'm going to fight a strike.

I want ion to shut them down.

I want slug to finish them with.

I want BLC in the off chance they actually manage to close with me.

I want dfield for the missile break that is always handy against strikes.

I want barrel roll so I can kite them forever.

 

If my gunship is going to fight a bomber

I want ion to clear all their drones and to zero their massive shield arcs.

I want slug to kill them off.

I want dfield incase they get a missile drone or seeker close to me.

I want barrel roll to quickly reposition if they LoS me.

 

Or if I'm fighting another gunship

I want Dfield as evasion is the best to deal with railguns.

I want ion to drain them so they can't roll out or fire back.

I want slug to finish them.

I want barrel roll so I can instantly exit their sights

 

I don't know about you but I am seeing some discrepancies between gunships and the rest of us mere dogfighters.

Perhaps because gunships are the only ship in game that has no opportunity cost, and has a single build that is optimal for every situation that gunship will ever be in. Type one gunships are like the perfect ship, literally zero flaws zero disadvantages.

Edited March 14, 2014 by Zoom_VI

[Itkovian]

Perhaps because gunships are the only ship in game that has no opportunity cost, and has a single build that is optimal for every situation that gunship will ever be in. Type one gunships are like the perfect ship, literally zero flaws zero disadvantages.

 

I'd have to agree with this... personally I think the idea of giving them BLCs is completely daft. You don't give the best short range dogfighting weapon something with the best long range sniping weapon, that's just bloody silly.

 

Beyond that, well, it's true type 1 gunships suffer from Single Build Syndrome. There's a build that's clearly head and shoulders above all others (including anything Type 2 can do), and that's an issue, especially when you compare it to all the different builds we see out there for other ships.

[Armonddd]

Literally every battle scout pilot thinks they can also speak for strike fighters.

 

Uh, since when? I've certainly never counted myself among them.

 

Spoiler: in 2.5 battle scouts and gunships were the only ships having fun.

 

Oh, did you never fly with good strike pilots in 2.5? For a long time, the best pilot in my guild flew a Rycer.

[Zoom_VI]

Spoiler: in 2.5 battle scouts and gunships were the only ships having fun.

Tell me when a concealment operative voices concerns about not being viable for ranked do you tell them shut up, because they where the most overpowered class back in 1.0? No you don't because this is 2.6 not 1.0 not 2.5. The only balance that matters is the balance of the here and now.

 

It doesn't matter what was overpowered last month, all that matters what is overpowered now, and it isn't stings. There is no original sin or rather original FOTM in balancing. You deal only with the current. No grudges.

Edited March 14, 2014 by Zoom_VI

[FridgeLM]

Ok firstly I want to know what ignoramus decided that because back the old days Dfield Flashfires where FOTM that now post nerf there opinions are invalid? I agreed with that nerf because it was justified. But I fail to see how my opinions are invalid because I choose to play a class I enjoy and will always play even if it gets nerfed below the Comet Breaker.

 

I'm going to address this directly because I think it's the most important difference between our perspectives.

 

You seem to think that just because your laser evasion got nerfed that it brought you back in line with strike fighters and speed scouts.

 

It didn't.

 

You still have by far the greatest offensive potential of any scout or strike fighter. None of those ships can match a battle scout with BLC and overcharge. On top of that, you have access to all the most viable and easiest to use secondary weapons other than railguns. On top of that, your survivability, taking your engines and maneuverability into account, is arguably superior to all other scouts and strike fighters.

 

The only "drawback" you have in a dogfighting scenario is inferior range to most strike fighters, which is irrelevant because you can close the gap with minimal engine power. When that happens it's a game of turning, and it's one you'll always win.

 

Just because bombers and gunships can kill you, even if they can kill you regularly, doesn't mean you're still not broken. You're still overpowered, but you're getting hard countered. The only thing keeping you from still being FOTM are bombers and specifically minelayers.

 

To clarify your analogy, it'd be as if this were 1.0 and operatives had all their offensive potential they had back then (maybe with a minor defensive nerf), but the devs introduced a new class who were decent against other classes but specifically countered operatives. Operatives would still be OP but wouldn't, by virtue of being countered, be FOTM. However, we'd still get posters like you screaming to the high heavens about the new anti-operative class.

 

Is 2.6 ideal balance? I'd argue no, I don't think hard counters are very compelling design-wise, but it is far preferable to having stupid little battle scouts run roughshod over the entire battlefield like they did for months before 2.6.

 

Oh, did you never fly with good strike pilots in 2.5? For a long time, the best pilot in my guild flew a Rycer

 

I am a good strike pilot. The only viable/best strategy to win against good teams pre-2.6 was to hug a satellite like a proto-bomber and spam the hell out of shield power converter because you literally could not compete against battle scouts.

 

I have 109 battles flown on my Quell (put it in mothballs after 2.6). My win/loss on that ship is 88.99%.

Edited March 14, 2014 by FridgeLM

[Zoom_VI]

Just because bombers and gunships can kill you, even if they can kill you regularly, doesn't mean you're still not broken. You're still overpowered, but you're getting hard countered. The only thing keeping you from still being FOTM are bombers and specifically minelayers.

 

In case you missed my last post I don't give two frigging craps about last patch's balance.

And why does scout's advantage over strikes mean gunships are entitled to roll over every other class. If we are going to use rock/paper/scissors balancing why do gunships lack any counter? hmmm? Just because your disadvantaged to me and I'm disadvantaged to the next guy does not mean the last guy gets to faceroll all of us.

Edited March 14, 2014 by Zoom_VI

[FridgeLM]

In case you missed my last post I don't give two frigging craps about last patch's balance.

 

I'm talking about currently, and how you're still OP. Any measures to address nerfing ships that counter yours should also be taken with steps toward nerfing yours too.

[Armonddd]

I'm talking about currently, and how you're still OP. Any measures to address nerfing ships that counter yours should also be taken with steps toward nerfing yours too.

 

your entire argument about scouts being OP relies on there being zero 1v1 engagements whatsoever and is therefore laughably inapplicable

[FridgeLM]

your entire argument about scouts being OP relies on there being zero 1v1 engagements whatsoever and is therefore laughably inapplicable

 

I don't understand this statement, clarify.

Edited March 14, 2014 by FridgeLM

[Zoom_VI]

I'm talking about currently, and how you're still OP. Any measures to address nerfing ships that counter yours should also be taken with steps toward nerfing yours too.

 

Strikes are what falls under the jack of all trades master of none clause. They cannot be able to match a specialized ship in that ship's own category because if a multirole did that they would completely and utterly invalidate the specialized ship.

 

Now that said the big problem with strikes is that their versatility is not useful in the current meta. Now if we saw matches where teams where using blackbolts, rycers, stings, dustmakers, both bomber types, and manglers all at once the strike would be a very good spot, because versatility ships excel in environments where the strengths of your opponents are varied. However the problem in the real game is that people like to stack a whole bunch of one class. This has been a plague of pvp since pvp was invented. Stacking takes out usefulness of versatile ships like strikes.

 

In short strikes are not underpowered per se, but they where designed for a meta-game that does not exist.

[FridgeLM]

In short strikes are not underpowered per se, but they where designed for a meta-game that does not exist.

 

No game designer, no matter their ability, sets out to make something under or overpowered.

 

These imbalances occur when the meta settles and people figure out what is best in practice. This means, yes, strike fighters are underpowered.

 

They're less so than they used to be, however, because they're quite good against bombers and battle scouts are finally dying to ships that are not gunships and other battle scouts. So they, and balance in general, are in a better place than they used to be.

Edited March 14, 2014 by FridgeLM

[Armonddd]

No game designer, no matter their ability, sets out to make something under or overpowered.

 

Not true. A number of designers intentionally nerf skills into the ground to make them essentially unusable, or buff new classes to make them more appealing. It's stupid, but it's far from unheard of.

[Fractalsponge]

In case you missed my last post I don't give two frigging craps about last patch's balance.

And why does scout's advantage over strikes mean gunships are entitled to roll over every other class. If we are going to use rock/paper/scissors balancing why do gunships lack any counter? hmmm? Just because your disadvantaged to me and I'm disadvantaged to the next guy does not mean the last guy gets to faceroll all of us.

 

You getting facerolled on your server in your battle scout?

 

First of all, let's remember that any balancing must happen at the mean, or it'll either make a class stupidly OP in the hands of the top pilots, or completely pointless for everyone.

 

I'm pretty sure we'll just talk around each other, but here goes. I'll preface the rest of the post by saying ion railgun IS stupidly powerful. I don't think anyone that has played GSF would argue otherwise. I'd happily take a nerf to it, but only if gunships still tools to escape from or mitigate a type 2 scout. I'm pretty sure no one wants to play a damn turret that gets a few shots off and then dies in a completely futile way. Then again, Shadowlands LOVES bomber NPC spam, so what do I know about what kind of gameplay appeals to people?

 

My point earlier about the one build thing for gunships is that people take it because it's the only one that's at all viable against opposition, especially type 2 scouts. If you nerf that build into the ground, there had better be some reason to take the other options, because otherwise you'd completely hand the battlefield over to...type 2 scouts. BLC Flashfires pretty much ruled the game before bombers came along to disrupt them at mesas B and shipyards C. Now they're just disproportionately good in...all the space between the other nodes, and all of TDM.

 

And where's the hard counter to stings and flashfires? There isn't a hard counter to them. Maybe the 0.5% of gunship pilots that can land enough shots to cripple and then kill a decent charging flashfire before they have to run, but see above for balancing for the mean. A "Hard counter" for something to me isn't "can kill something quickly if they ambush a target" - it means it can easily kill someone of equivalent skill that's out to get them, while both are fresh, simply by virtue of the class mechanics. Minelayers are a hard counter to SOME scouts, but only at the node, and even then it's not really a sure thing - plus half the game is TDM, where a scout has to be really dumb or really unlucky to get gibbed by a mine (and once drones respect LOS and evasion, there's pretty much no reason for a scout to die to bomber in TDM)

 

You would be right that by the measure I laid out above, type1 gunships don't have a hard counter either. They are also disproportionately good in a wide engagement envelope - but they share this with flashfires, albeit in different places. Gunships also have just as much of a counter as a battle scout - get someone to sit on them until they're not dangerous, with a railgun or something that can chase and fight them (no points for guessing what kind of ship can catch and dogfight a type 2 scout on equal terms). An alert flashfire with full evasion, dfield missile break, regen thrusters and barrel roll (these are pretty common choices) is harder to kill than a gunship when piloted at the same level. The type 2 scouts trade the ability to hit someone that disengages ineptly (or good ambush ability) for the ability to immediately turn and dogfight any pursuers with an advantage, and a dominant 1v1 advantage in most other circumstances.

 

Comet breaker/dustmaker is so dumb I don't even know how to fix it. It would probably take a complete revamp to make it viable.

 

Stacking is a separate issue and I have no idea how to fix it in a way that doesn't make the game stupid to play. It is also one that affects type 2 scouts as much as gunships and bombers. A flashfire/sting swarm running around has no good counter, while you can most definitely break a gunship wall.

 

TL;DR If you nerf gunships, better also nerf type 2 scouts.

[Armonddd]

You getting facerolled on your server in your battle scout?

 

If you want people to take you seriously, you probably shouldn't start out with ad hominem above your wall of text that I now have no motivation to read.

[FridgeLM]

If you want people to take you seriously, you probably shouldn't start out with ad hominem above your wall of text that I now have no motivation to read.

 

Too bad, because he really disassembled the battle scout whine brigade's position re: their complete myopic lack of perspective.

 

TBH you don't have to read it as an insult, he might actually be asking a real question.

Edited March 14, 2014 by FridgeLM

[Zoom_VI]

Too bad, because he really disassembled the battle scout whine brigade's position re: their complete myopic lack of perspective.

 

Trust me it goes well with the strike brigade's myopic lack of perspective.

 

I thought about responding to that wall of text but I don't think it would do any good since there are too many people with their heads stuck in 2.5

Edited March 14, 2014 by Zoom_VI

[FridgeLM]

Lol, you two even use the same demeaning term for his fairly reasoned post.

[zaskar]

I used to respect a couple people in this thread, they fly well. However they seem to be morons, either this thread is all troll or several people have faked intelligence but are really below 70iq knuckle draggers.

 

Stop with the whining, as long as there has been roles in multiplayer games people have whining something is op or "ohh they nurfed x class into the ground, bastards". TF2 is a great example, people used hate the spy, raged over snipers and for a while could not kill engineers.sound familiar? You cannot predict with certainty how classes will balance on paper you have to see how the actual userbase plays the classes. This multiplayer video gaming 101.

 

Stop wasting time being enraged about nothing and go download the pts client and help play test 2.7. Make something better.

Edited March 15, 2014 by zaskar
Damn autocorrect

[Zoom_VI]

Lol, you two even use the same demeaning term for his fairly reasoned post.

 

I was quoting your demeaning term Einstein.

 

this thread was actually having a very reason discussion particularly about the vid showing the ion rail effects, but then you jumped in on your nerf scouts campaign because they touched you in 2.5.

Edited March 15, 2014 by Zoom_VI

[FridgeLM]

I was quoting your demeaning term Einstein.

 

wall of text

 

wall of text

 

A non-zero amount of attention would've spared you this embarrassment, "Einstein."