Thinking RFL is trash? Think again!

[Kintosi]

I know this is a heated topic and I also know that as soon as i post my 2 cents, certain members of the forum will immediately quote me and explain how they think i am wrong. But i'm going to throw in my two cents anyway.

 

Personally, I really like RFLs for a number of reasons:

 

1. When combined with a t3 frequency capacitor they do significant damage.

 

With over 900 sustained DPS and over 1000 either shields or armor with upgrades (pick shields), the sustained dps on these things I formidable. Combine that with rocket pods and maybe an offensive cool-down system or crew and all of a sudden RFLs have a TTK that is respectable, while not over-powered. Yes, that requires you to have good aim and get a sustained lock on them, but that leads to point number 2.

 

2. They teach you to aim.

 

RFLs have one of the (if not the single) widest angle of attack in the primary weapons category. They can practically shoot sideways in a turning fight, especially with upgrades and a crew with +2 degrees. combined with the "Rapid" nature of RFLs, this allows new players and vets alike to practice their aim. shots put in the hit-box have immediate and clear responses, tagging the **** usually at least once even when against high evasion builds. Also, with their fairly high accuracy penalty for firing at the edge of their arc, RFLs train you to get behind your target, and aim linearly with the center line of your ship. This is good practice for any laser, not just RFLs, so getting into a habit of that style of dog fighting is not a bad idea.

 

3. low energy cost

 

RFLs can shoot just about continuously. they use such low energy that you can chase an enemy around a sat with your trigger help down for extended periods of time. This both lets the pilot have one less thing to try to coordinate (click at the exact right time in conjunction with lining up aim) and the sheer number of red hit indicators on the other pilot's HUD can cause panic. Its common for a less-experienced pilot to have a minor heart attack when their screen fills with red, whether or not they are significantly damaged. this causes them for make mistakes, such as crashing into the satellite or other obstacles, and pre-maturely punching engine maneuvers allowing for missile locks and/or freeing up the capture zone. Physiologically, full frequency RFLs is intimidating. They sound and look mean.

 

4. RNG crits

 

With the high rate of fire on RFLs critical hits become more reliable. more shots = more RNG rolls = more crits. so when combined with TT or other such abilities, you can expect a lot of red numbers.

 

5. They are simply fun to use.

 

It's a matter of preference, but on a t1 or t3 scout specifically, i really like the feel of RFLs. High turning, high angle of attack, rapid fire, and low cost makes it hard for me to miss in any dog fight. i can often kills less experienced pilots without anything getting through my shields (even with S2E shields). I can even hold my own with quads and pods scouts with certain builds and upgrade levels depending on my character. Also, i feel that this sustained DPS setup is less rage inducing, and gives my opponents the opportunity to learn. I prefer not to fly the OP/FOTM builds when the opposing team isnt forcing me to do so in order to be an effective pilot.

 

6. Admittedly i haven't worked with LLCs as much

 

I will admit that i have not worked with LLCs nearly as much as RFLs, so i can see merit in a lot of the arguments here. however, it all comes down to a matter of preference. I like the feel of RFLs better. It seems to me im a more effective pilot with RFLs v.s. LLCs. And for me, i use what i like in games, even at the cost of slightly less effectiveness. After all, games are supposed to be fun right? (yes, i know im a filthy casual, but i can still shoot you down. )

 

7. Bring on the opinions!

 

I'm now bracing for the incoming Troll/Flame/You'reWrongI'mRight responses. I will rate them on a scale of 1 to 10 GO!

Edited August 23, 2014 by Kintosi

[Fractalsponge]

I strongly agree with everything you wrote Verain, except these two:

 

UI doesn't help you understand what's going on, especially as regards enemy gunships and mines. Mines could use an explosion graphic that is accurate and visible- why does an exploding turret make a smoke cloud that kills tons of pilots, but an exploding mine is just a tiny little pwoof?

 

Anything that points to gunships is a nerf to them, of course, and could need compensation, but maybe that would be worth it.

 

Explosion graphics from mines would have to be extremely carefully implemented. A smoke cloud implementation like turret deaths would make domination games almost unplayable.

 

A pointer for gunships charging on a target would pretty much eliminate the effectiveness of the vast majority of gunship pilots. A signal for a target to immediately tap spacebar would eliminate the main advantage of the class: ambush kills. And I don't for a moment think 95% of people are good enough to charge up without pointing on and releasing accurately with a snap shot at the target. Any change would need to be accompanied by a buff to damage to reward a successful shot (and probably a buff to weapon regen so it's easier to hold charge at max while taking their time pointing on), and that's not really in the spirit of reducing burst. It would almost completely remove the (limited) effectiveness of gunships in domination, since the satellite ticks of 2.5 are already back in force, and cede even more of the TDM meta to battlescouts.

[Ardaneb]

I agree that rapid-fire lasers are not friendly to new players. I think the easiest way to change that is to increase the accuracy at 3000 and 4000 by 10%. Throw in a better tracking penalty, say 0.5%. New players will have the satisfaction of hitting more often and can focus on flying.

[Kuciwalker]

1. When combined with a t3 frequency capacitor they do significant damage.

 

False, and LLC does more, and sustained damage is the weakest damage anyway.

 

2. They teach you to aim.

 

RFLs have one of the (if not the single) widest angle of attack in the primary weapons category.

 

False, in practice LLC and BLC have wider.

 

3. low energy cost

 

This is a **** niche.

 

4. RNG crits

 

Low variance is a disadvantage in PvP, not an advantage.

 

5. They are simply fun to use.

 

Only if you like not killing things.

 

6. Admittedly i haven't worked with LLCs as much

 

i.e. you have no idea what you're talking about, as LLC is superior along every dimension except power drain.

 

7. Bring on the opinions!

 

You're bad at thinking.

Edited August 23, 2014 by Kuciwalker

[Kintosi]

False, and LLC does more, and sustained damage is the weakest damage anyway.

sustained damage is almsot a requirement for killing shield stacking bombers and strikes. throw in bypass, and this point is completely moot.

 

False, in practice LLC and BLC have wider.

not in my experience, but okay.

 

This is a **** niche.

power management isnt niche. its how you get kills in GSF. out of power? youre dead.

 

Low variance is a disadvantage in PvP, not an advantage.

more crits is NEVER bad.

 

Only if you like not killing things.

the sheer number of kills on my blackbolt-only character disagrees

 

i.e. you have no idea what you're talking about, as LLC is superior along every dimension except power drain.

Opinion.

 

You're bad at thinking.

I rate this at 5/10. not bad rage, but needs better zings. Also, where are the personal attacks upon my mother's honor?

 

I rate this at 5/10. not bad rage, but needs better zings. Also, where are the personal attacks uppon my mother's honor?

[Llama-Eight]

Furthermore experimental evidence will vary on a person by person basis. By no means did I ever say that everybody should use it. Simply not to discount it. I maintain my previous position.

 

While different players will get different results due to different play styles & skills, maths doesn't lie. The tooltip values may be wrong (& it'll be harder to tell without a combat log) but unless you have any objective evidence to support that claim you will have a hard time convincing people.

[Verain]

I strongly agree with everything you wrote Verain, except these two:

 

Explosion graphics from mines would have to be extremely carefully implemented. A smoke cloud implementation like turret deaths would make domination games almost unplayable.

 

I wouldn't want a smoke cloud, or ANYTHING that would obscure sight. But the fact of the matter is, we need a thing that shows a mine exploding. EMP field, for instance, does this correct- the graphic represents the extend of the blast. If you are like "why am I locked out", you can look at the debuff and remember the massive field that appeared. A new player seeing an ally go to a node and a mine explosion, representing graphically and accurately the extend of the explosion, will show him exactly what is going on. He'll quickly learn the difference between the pathetic radius of an ion, concussion, or interdiction mine, and the massive ball that is a seismic mine.

 

Again: don't read into me advocating something really stupid. Why would I be in favor of more smoke bombs? My point is that an exploding ship or turret makes a visible and gameplay important graphic set, a mine, which actually explodes should be MORE visible. The mine explosion graphic is mostly unimplemented.

 

A pointer for gunships charging on a target would pretty much eliminate the effectiveness of the vast majority of gunship pilots.

 

So you went from "the UI should help you out more" to Spartan laser, which I certainly don't advocate.

 

The simple fact is, your UI cries like a baby when an opponent is right clicking you, but doesn't see fit to notify you at all when a gunship within 14km is charging like the sun. As I've advocated before, pretend that the graphic indicator of enemies (small red triangle) became different- changes to a bit of yellow, becomes thicker- if it is both a gunship and charging a laser. Or just pretend that instead of all enemies being a little triangle, that there was a different shape or color for each ship type.

 

These things don't "reveal" the gunships any more than the current UI does for a good player, who mostly knows when gunships are around and aiming.

 

Yes, you are correct that even these could be nerfs to gunships. But these are not ludicrous or wild nerfs, and could be compensated for if deemed needed. Again, don't immediately assume I'm advocating for some worst case scenario. The fact of the matter is, the ship's computer seems really tuned to avoid a missile lock, but its like the designers forgot to put in a scanner for an enemy changing to super saiyan unless you remember to map your directional glance buttons.

 

@Kintosi

When combined with a t3 frequency capacitor they do significant damage.

All the other guns are better, and they can have this capacitor as well.

They teach you to aim.

So do the other guns, and they deal damage.

RFLs have one of the (if not the single) widest angle of attack in the primary weapons category.

RFLs do insignificant damage at max deflection, unlike BLCs. In fact, you are much more likely to be useful in those high deflection scenarios with quads, because you only have time for one shot, and a quad that hits is way more damage than a single RFL.

Also, with their fairly high accuracy penalty for firing at the edge of their arc, RFLs train you to get behind your target, and aim linearly with the center line of your ship.

Everything but BLC trains you for this. So to wit: it's great that they have a large range you can click in, because you can shoot once at max deflection, but also great that they are so awful that you eventually have to steer like you are flying with quads anyway. Why not just use a good gun to start with, instead of this?

low energy cost

Yes. This is their only thing, and it doesn't matter.

RNG crits

Meaningless red numbers. The whole point of crits is that your enemy actions, taken when assuming a normal amount of damage, can make him incorrect. RFLs get the same out of crit as every other gun over a long enough time, and over a short enough time, they gain no burst benefit.

They are simply fun to use.

Agreed. It is satisfying to fulfill the requirements this gun has and get a kill. For something that is so awful for a new player, so hard to master, and so cool to watch and listen to, it needs to be buffed to not suck. I totally agree that this should be a good gun, they just failed hard on the tuning. If your gun makes you jump through all kinds of hoops, you should get a reward. You don't.

Admittedly i haven't worked with LLCs as much

By reading the rest of it, I knew this ahead of time. Everyone who defends RFL is generally speaking from ignorance, and I don't mean that in an insulting way.

 

I think the easiest way to change that is to increase the accuracy at 3000 and 4000 by 10%. Throw in a better tracking penalty, say 0.5%. New players will have the satisfaction of hitting more often and can focus on flying.

 

I made a bunch of suggestions in the linked thread, and honestly, anything will work. Your idea would work great- it would fall under a category of being a consistent weapon that lacks burst but is able to hit anything within range. That would be a great niche for this gun. Others could work too. The issue isn't the devs not having the time to make RFL great, it's that I guess they don't think it should be? Or maybe it is the time. The last patch broke the XML in several ways and nerfed ION MISSILE, probably on purpose, and EMP field, probably by accident. So maybe they don't have the time.

[Fractalsponge]

The mine implementation sounds fine. Just pointing out what you absolutely don't want to have happen.

 

The spartan laser marker for railgun targeting has been proposed before, and any time the discussion remotely comes close to implying this, it deserves to be corrected as soon as possible. That said, the enemy marker UI change has potential. You've hinted at the potential already - the people that need the help already probably won't be able to make use of it. If they could make use of it, then they would already have figured out the other cues that scream "charging gunship!!!"

 

I think it has the potential to mostly influence ace v ace matchups, where the ability to land the first shot in surprise is critical to survival and effectiveness. Such an UI change may contribute nothing to newbies, but complicate gunship play at the high end.

 

All of it is sort of moot, since the tutorial system wouldn't be able to explain any of it. There's a lot of basic UI functionality that is not at all well explained to new pilots, except by direct instruction or forum reading.

[Ramalina]

Some people have made the rather odd assertion that RFLs are somehow not quite as bad on a Starguard as they are on a scout.

 

This is not true.

 

In addition to having every deficiency that they have on a scout, they are further crippled by the base ship platform's lesser turn rate and boost endurance.

 

If you want a good short range cannon on a Starguard your options are Ion, Quad, and Heavies* (* requires extremely good aim).

 

If you want a new player friendly, short range cannon, that can produce kills with reasonable effectiveness; the option is to choose a starship other than the Starguard because the Starguard does not have such a cannon available.

 

Personally I'm running Heavies and Ions on almost all of my Type 1s these days. It is NOT a newb friendly setup at close ranges (say less than 2500 meters), but it is a lot more effective than RFLs if you can hit with the Heavies at point blank range.

 

 

Really the RFLs are only best if:

a: They are the ONLY wide angle cannon your ship can equip

b: Your aim is so bad that you consider a single 200 point hit out a long spray of fire to be a really great 'golden bb'.

 

That's also pretty much the only time RFLs are a decent choice, and only just barely at that.

 

Or to put another way, the only cannon in GSF that RFLs are better than. . . .

is no cannon at all.

 

Unless you adhere to Zen starfighting, in which case you may consider, "the cannon that is no cannon," to be substantially better than RFLs.

[Armonddd]

The best message this thread can give is that RFLs are underestimated by the community -- that is to say, they're not as bad as they're made out to be. You can absolutely argue that the downsides of RFLs are less notable in practice than they are in theory, especially with a skilled pilot, and I think you could get pretty far with that argument.

 

Unfortunately, that doesn't change the fact that RFLs are practically inferior to LLCs; all the math shows that there are no practical situations where the one will outperform the other. Even if they could beat LLCs in their niche, RFLs certainly would not pull ahead by enough to overcome the inherent disadvantages of a high fire rate -- especially in a game mode that revolves around satellites.

[ALaggyGrunt]

I've found RFL to be decent against bombers on sats. They're usually kind of surprised when they die to RFL.

 

These weapons can use frequency capacitor and still not go through your energy too fast. So can heavies, which makes HLC/RFL/freq on a type 1 striker a pretty good combo.

 

Unfortunately, they have big weaknesses in that fight:

1: Gunships. While you are 1km from that slow bomber's tail, that bomber's gunship buddy will do its best to kill you. If you're in a scout, you'll get blown away by mines and go through distortion field really fast.

2: Charged plating, because 2 damage/shot. To a lesser degree, deflection armor. If you or a friend thermited the bomber first, that's not a problem any more. This is why burst lasers are always not just better, but overpowered: they're nasty enough before tier 4, and brutal once charged plating becomes useless against them.

3: Interdiction mines and drones. If you're snared, you're not going to keep pace with a good bomber pilot.

[Armonddd]

I've found RFL to be decent against bombers on sats.

 

Nothing without armor penetration is even halfway decent against a bomber on a sat, who is the #1 priority in every match (unless an ace is around).

[zaskar]

What I find more funny is that there are still people that think that anything besides math matters in a mmo. If you learn the math on how things work, you are winning. if you are a snowflake and think you can beat the game cause you're like, a gaming legend then. well. you're lolz.

 

With that said, skill does play a pretty important part with this minigame. However if you pit too like-skilled pilots at each other in T1 scouts, one with LLC and one with RFC the LLC pilot is going to destroy the RFC pilot, period. If you argue this, you must have flunked out of high school because I T I S B A S I C M A T H

[Nemarus]

What I find more funny is that there are still people that think that anything besides math matters in a mmo. If you learn the math on how things work, you are winning. if you are a snowflake and think you can beat the game cause you're like, a gaming legend then. well. you're lolz.

 

With that said, skill does play a pretty important part with this minigame. However if you pit too like-skilled pilots at each other in T1 scouts, one with LLC and one with RFC the LLC pilot is going to destroy the RFC pilot, period. If you argue this, you must have flunked out of high school because I T I S B A S I C M A T H

 

That's the interesting thing about this thread--the person who posted is probably the best Battlescout pilot across all servers, in terms of raw talent, instincts, and reflexes. That he could be so offbase regarding theory, yet still perform so well, is further proof of his raw ability (or suggests he actually is hacking, as the newbs accuse).

 

I think his conclusions come from a flawed perspective though. He was farming bads on their spawn, hunting for DPS records, and he found himself actually scoring high DPS benchmarks with RFLs--because he could pretty much keep shooting forever, without running out of power . And the bads he was spawn-farming were so bad that he was never off-target for more than a.second or two.

 

In that situation, it is true that LLCs and BLCs would have run out of power, thus limiting his DPS. But the bads were so bad, it was like he was shooting at an unmoving wall. And in that case, across the time it took to score 50 kills, RFLs would produce the most sustained DPS.

 

But as we all know, GSF between experienced pilots is all about burst DPS, and energy cost is the least significant bit when it comes to cannon choice.

 

Just to be clear, I am not saying the OP is only good against newbs. He is amazing against all levels of competition. But I think he just had a few farming matches where RFLs performed better than he expected, and he didn't think enough about how the circumstances had been very contrived to allow that to happen.

[Verain]

That's the interesting thing about this thread--the person who posted is probably the best Battlescout pilot across all servers, in terms of raw talent, instincts, and reflexes.

 

Nemarus, you don't play on enough servers to make anything resembling that claim. More importantly, OP is simply not comparable to Stasie and Drako, and is also not really comparable to Scrab.

 

 

 

I think his conclusions come from a flawed perspective though. He was farming bads on their spawn, hunting for DPS records, and he found himself actually scoring high DPS benchmarks with RFLs--because he could pretty much keep shooting forever, without running out of power . And the bads he was spawn-farming were so bad that he was never off-target for more than a.second or two.

 

And even THEN he should have been using LLCs. Quads consume at 25 or so, RFLs at 16 or so, and LLCs at 20.

[FridgeLM]

That's the interesting thing about this thread--the person who posted is probably the best Battlescout pilot across all servers, in terms of raw talent, instincts, and reflexes.

 

This is a pretty outrageous claim and probably nonsense. I'd have gone with, "he seems really good to me."

[Kuciwalker]

This is a stupid argument.

[Verain]

This is a stupid argument.

 

Dude when you clicked on some guy talking about how great RFL is, you kinda knew you were in for a wild'n'wet ride.

[Nemarus]

Nemarus, you don't play on enough servers to make anything resembling that claim. More importantly, OP is simply not comparable to Stasie and Drako, and is also not really comparable to Scrab.

 

Yeah, but those I think of as "the best" have come to The Ebon Hawk, haven't they? Or are there that many Super Ace pilots who haven't?

 

Scrab, for example, was part of Eclipse Squadron, and flew regularly with us for a time. While his ability to farm records against bads is quite impressive, in a competitive TDM his offensive potential was about the same as me in my Blackbolt, except he also died all over the place because he has no interest / skill in flying defensively.

 

As for Stasie and Drako, of course they are also amazing--but it's hard to judge them individually since you guys so often fly together and support each other. And even then, on a good day I can manage to eek out a small handful of kills against them despite that team support. That being said, they have a much broader skill across all ships.

 

But in a Battlescout, Yuuko/Friendlygurl is another animal. Regardless of whether he is farming bads or being focused by moderate aces, he cleans up, and he does it with few or no deaths--consistently. Killing him seems nearly impossible--Jamie Lannister-esque. Doesn't matter if he's alone or has support from Aimbot or Pylan.

 

I haven't seen any other pilot who can maintain such high offensive and defensive quality while flying solo. Gunships don't stop him. Mines don't stop him. He wins every duel.

 

Maybe you guys have him on farm status--if so, good for you. But from my experience, he is the best individual Battlescout pilot I've encountered.

 

Which is why it's a bit ridiculous that he could post so ignorantly about theory

[Kuciwalker]

stahp

[Nisdain]

This suddenly turned into a hilariously amusing thread.

[Ryuku-sama]

This suddenly turned into a hilariously amusing thread.

 

I brought my popcorn a while back

[Nemarus]

stahp

 

Well, if you--who flew with him--aren't defending his ability, then I guess I shouldn't either. Perhaps I've just seen a few of his better matches then, and haven't seen how bad he can be.

[Kuciwalker]

Well, if you--who flew with him--aren't defending his ability, then I guess I shouldn't either. Perhaps I've just seen a few of his better matches then, and haven't seen how bad he can be.

 

I am not taking any position on his ability. Not because I don't have an opinion, but because this back and forth of "is he the bestest ever or not" is impossible to actually resolve with these interlocutors on this medium. And because it doesn't even matter.

[Ryuku-sama]

Well, if you--who flew with him--aren't defending his ability, then I guess I shouldn't either. Perhaps I've just seen a few of his better matches then, and haven't seen how bad he can be.

 

*Munches popcorn.* This is gold!!!