If you had complete control over balance in GSF, what would you change?

[Delta_V]

This thread started off as a "wishlist" of changes people would like to see in GSF, but most of the posts just ended up focusing on balance, so I thought I'd make a new thread just for that. Warning: walls of text inbound.

 

If I had control of balance in GSF, here's some of the things I'd change:

 

Gunships

I'm going to talk about Gunships and Scouts first, because changes to these ships would have to occur at the same time. Right now, T1 Gunships and T2 Scouts are pretty much the only things keeping each other in check - change one, and the other might end up running rampant. Individually, Gunships, at least the T1 Gunship, might be slightly overtuned right now, but not badly so; in fact, their offensive potential might be a little too high, but their survivability might be too low. The only issue is with how easily they stack. While stacking gunships might not be the optimal strategy, it requires far less coordination to set up than it does to counter. While a group of pugs might be able to set up a gunship ball, setting up the proper mix of ships and timing required to counter it is outside the coordination of the typical pug. Unfortunately, I don't know how to fix this issue without rendering individual gunships underpowered.

 

General changes:

Slightly buff Gunship base mobility (but not maneuverability), either through increasing speed or decreasing afterburner activation/consumption costs (I'd buff Strike fighter mobility as well, so this wouldn't step on Strikes' toes). Leave them behind Scouts and Strikes in this department, just decrease the delta a little bit. Gunships lost quite a bit of survivability when Barrel Roll was nerfed way back when, and it was a good thing, since they were far too difficult to kill. I think that nerf went a little too far, and it is now easy to shut down all but the best gunships, but I'd rather add survivability back in way that requires skill to utilize, rather than of the "press this button to not die" variety.

 

Changes to railguns

Right now, Slug and Ion are simply the best railguns, and there is no reason to ever choose Plasma. That means the T1 always takes Slug/Ion and the T2 and T3 always take Slug. This is largely because Slug gets all of the nice things compared to Plasma - better accuracy, burst damage, armor ignore, shield piercing. I'd change that so there is a reason to take all 3. One thing I would do to all three is reduce the Crit Magnitude to 25% base, but increase the Critical Chance talents to compensate; this would result in the same average damage, but reduce the potential for one-shots, which are just annoying.

 

- Slug: Remove armor piercing but keep shield piercing, give it the highest base accuracy, lowest tracking penalties, and largest firing arc. Potentially give it the shortest charge time and slightly reduce it's damage. The goal here is to make it the best at killing scouts, where you don't need as much damage and armor piercing is irrelevant, but more accuracy is important for punching through evasion. Burst damage and a shorter charge time relative to the other railguns is also useful because the engagement window against scouts is so small. But trying to kill a bomber with this thing would be difficult due to lower sustained damage and lack of armor piercing.

 

- Plasma: Give it armor piercing, make the DOT stack (maybe up to 3 times or something), and potentially increase its damage. Give it the lowest accuracy, highest tracking penalties, and smallest firing arc. Possibly include a debuff like Thermite Torpedo's where it reduces the target's armor, although not as much as Thermite to account for the ease of landing railgun shots compared to torpedoes. The goal here is to make it the best at killing bombers, where you need armor piercing and sustained damage. Accuracy and firing arc are less important because your target is slow and evasion is not a factor. W/ this, if you get a couple stacks of the DOT rolling, even if the bomber manages to LOS behind a satellite, they will keep taking damage. However, hitting scouts, and to a lesser degree strikes, w/ Plasma would be more difficult due to lower accuracy and the smaller firing arc.

 

- Ion: Leave it middle of the road in terms of accuracy, tracking penalty, and firing arc. Increase the relative effectiveness against shields, especially compared to Slug, either by increasing Ion's damage or reducing the damage of the other railguns against shields. If Ion becomes a viable choice solely because of it's shield damage, you could maybe afford to reduce the CC options at T5. Even if the T5 choices are left alone, if some gunships are tempted into rolling Slug+Plasma to deal with both Scouts and Bombers, that would reduce the amount of CC in the game, which is a good thing IMO. But if Strikes get some sort of Shield Hardness (I'll address that later) that reduces shield piercing, they might be able to face tank a Slug shot, while hitting them with Plasma would be difficult, so Ion would be the best bet for countering them.

 

The goal here is to make each railgun good for a different purpose. Slug would be the best at swatting Scouts out of the sky, while Plasma would be best for burning down bombers, and Ion would be best for punching through a Strike's shields. Taking Plasma+Slug would let you deal with Scouts and Bombers, but a Strike could face tank the Slug and not get hit by the Plasma. Taking Ion+Slug would let you counter Scouts and Strikes, but you would struggle to burn down Bombers. Ion+Plasma would leave you struggling to hit Scouts. The numbers would be tuned so that the overall offensive potential would decrease slightly, since they have to choose which targets to be effective against, but this would be offset by improved survivability. This would result in a slight buff in some circumstances (when the railgun is matched to the target), but a nerf in others (when using the wrong railgun for the target).

 

T1 Gunship

Biggest changes here (besides what was already mentioned) would be buffs to all of the Engine and Shield Components outside of Barrel Roll and D-Field.

-No idea what to do with Weapon Power Converter or Feedback shield, since the basic design of these components is just bad.

-Rotational Thrusters could gain a lock break, making them a "break lock and face enemy" instead of the standard "break lock and ****" of the more normal components; this would be similar to how Retro Thrusters break a lock while having an offensive purpose as well.

-Interdiction Drive could use some sort of buff to make up for a lack of a lock break. It shares a role w/ Barrel Roll in that it's meant to be a "****" option, but the CC effect just doesn't make up for the lack of a lock break, at least on a gunship.

- Fortress Shield needs... something. Even +130% shield just isn't enough to justify remaining a stationary target, and won't let you tank enemy fire for very long. This really needs some sort of other bonus to be practical.

- D-Field could use a nerf of some sort, especially the Lock Break option, but if the other shields are buffed enough for some gunships to actually use them, it might not be as big of an issue.

 

T2 Gunship

Everything from the T1 Gunship applies here, except the talk about D-Field. Those buffs would not result in a direct increase in power for the T1 Gunship, since they would only be buffing weak components up to the level of the components that everyone chooses right now; this would merely increase the T1 Gunship's build variety. However, the primary issue with the T2 Gunship is that it doesn't have some of the best components of the T1; this means that buffing the weak components would result in a considerable buff to the T2. However, the T2 could probably use further buffs, since the Primary and Secondary weapons it gains in return for losing BLCs and Ion Railgun, along with its Secondary Components selection, are generally inferior. I'm just not sure what those buffs would be.

 

T3 Gunship

This one is in a pretty good place right now. As long as the weaker shield components it shares with the other Gunships are buffed, it should be fine. However, with the increased specialization of the railguns proposed above, it might be a good idea to give the T3 access to Plasma Railgun.

 

 

Scouts

Again, any changes here would need to be made at the same time as the Gunship changes, to prevent one or the other from completely ruling the meta.

 

System Components

The burst damage cooldowns, namely Targetting Telemetry and Blaster Overcharge, really need to be nerfed. Targetting Telemetry could use a longer cooldown and the Crit buffs should not affect secondary weapons - this would reduce the absurd burst potential of the Quads'n'Pods build. Meanwhile, Blaster Overcharge could either use a reduction in its rate of fire buff, or it could use some drawbacks to activation. For instance, remove its buff to weapon regen or give a debuff to weapon regen after it expires - basically make it a "sure, you can increase your damage now, but you'll gimp your damage a few seconds later". Or make it a high-risk, high-reward option where it decreases your shield and engine pools while in use.

 

T1 Scout

Mostly in a good place. Has a unique playstyle if Engine Power Converter is used, and has a few unique components, although Sensor Beacon could really use a buff. Oh, and fix Sabo Probe already

- Rocket Pods could lose the shield piercing. It's not necessary, and contributes to the only arguably OP build of this ship (TT+Laser Cannons+Rockets), although the T2 variant of that build is the bigger issue.

 

T2 Scout

Arguably the most overpowered ship in the game right now, although nerfing TT and BO, and removing the shield piercing of Rocket Pods as described above would go a ways towards fixing that.

- Burst Lasers need to lose their armor piercing. I didn't mention this in the Gunship section because it's not an issue on Gunships. T1 Gunships mostly use BLCs as a defensive option, meaning against harassing Scouts and Strikes, where armor isn't generally a big deal. But on Scouts, it makes them too effective at killing Bombers and Turrets.

- D-Field is simply the most powerful shield option, and needs to be nerfed. However, many pages have been spent on these forums discussing how to change it, and no consensus has been reached. The missile lock break makes it too powerful against missiles, but I'm just not sure how to change it.

 

T3 Scout

Slightly underpowered. Tensor Field is invaluable at the beginning of Domination matches, but beyond that, this ship just doesn't have much synergy in its components. Could use more suggestions on what to do with this ship.

- Add Rocket Pods as a secondary option. The current choices are just too niche, and the only one that's not underpowered is Thermite, although I'll talk about the other choices in the Strike section.

- Again, now that the Infiltrator class has been put on hold, the Sensor Beacon needs a reason to exist. Maybe increasing the accuracy or decreasing the lock-on time of nearby allies.

Edited September 23, 2014 by Delta_V

[Delta_V]

Strikes

Right now, Strikes, especially the T1 and T2, are generally considered underpowered. The entire class could use some buffs, as well as some buffs to individual components.

 

General changes

-Buff the mobility and maneuverability of all strikes. Let Scouts remain king in these categories, but decrease the delta. Right now, Strikes are just hopelessly outclassed in a turning fight, not even accounting for the superior close range weapons of Scouts.

- Implement a Shield Hardness stat (I believe Verain was one of the first to mention this idea) that counters shield piercing. So if you have 10% Shield Hardness, it would reduce the shield piercing of any weapon by 10%. The only exception I would recommend would be ProTorps and Thermites, which could be programmed w/ like 200% piercing, owing to the difficulty in using these weapons. If Strikes got some base Shield Hardness, and could get more on something like Directional Shield, that would increase their appeal compared to Scouts, since it would make Strikes noticeably more survivable in certain situations, such as being able to face tank a Slug Railgun w/out flinching.

 

T1 Strike

Underpowered due to lack of effective blasters. HLCs and Quads are good, but lack synergy. Looking at the weapons, two builds seem obvious - one focused on mid-range using Quads and Ions, and another focusing on covering all ranges w/ Rapids and HLCs. However, each build suffers from issues with one of its blasters.

- Buff the base range of Ion Cannons to 5k. This would increase its synergy with Quad Lasers, and when combined with Cluster Missiles, create a very potent mid-range build. Right now, the short range of Ion Cannons, combined w/ the Strike's lower mobility, limit this weapons effectiveness.

- Buff Rapid Fire Lasers. This one is huge, considering how many ships it affects. However, I waited until now to bring it up because all the other ships that have it have either LLC or BLC for short range. So while greater build variety is a good thing, all the other ships have something to fill the gap. But on the T1 Strike, RFLs are the only short-range option you get. That makes it far more important for this ship that they get buffed. Personally, I would increase their dps, make their tracking penalty equal to BLC, and give them a less punishing damage+accuracy drop-off at range. Perhaps give them shield piercing as well. So while BLC would be better at very short range, RFLs would at least have superior accuracy and dps at 2k+ meters. On the T1 Strike, these could then be paired w/ Heavy Lasers to create a build that is effective over a huge range.

- Could use another Blaster option. The T2 Strike at least feels like a missile specialist, owing to its 5 missile options, including some highly specialized choices. However, the T1 Strike doesn't feel like a blaster specialist, as it only has 4 blasters (only one of which is a niche option), and several other ships have just as many choices.

 

This would give the T1 Strike two very effect builds. Ions+Quads+Cluster Missile would create a lethal mid-range combination. Meanwhile, Heavies+Rapids could be combined with either Clusters or Concussion Missiles to threaten enemies at a wide variety of ranges. Throw in a range capacitor, and you could engage with blasters all the way from <1000 meters all the way out to 6900 meters. It might not be as lethal as the mid-range build, but the shear versatility would be nice.

 

 

T2 Strike

This Strike is underpowered due to the general issues w/ missiles in this game. With some of the most dominant ships (T1 Gunship, T2 Scout) having multiple lock breaks, a ship that relies on missiles is bound to have issues.

- Add Retro Thrusters. While P-Dive is nice, Retros would synergize perfectly with this ship by buying precious seconds for a missile lock.

- Buff Ion Missile by increasing its shield damage and reducing it's reload time to that of Concussion Missiles. Right now there is virtually no reason to take this weapon, as its shield damage and CC ability aren't anything special, and it's reload time is horrendous.

- Buff EMP Missile by reducing reload time. Again, far too long of a reload time for what this weapon does. Since mines have been nerfed, I'm not sure if the radius of this needs to be buffed anymore.

 

T3 Strike

This strike is generally in a good place. Its offensive potential isn't anything to brag about, but its group utility is substantial. If strike mobility is buffed across the board, I'm not sure anything else needs to be changed here.

 

 

Bombers

Bombers are in a strange place - incredibly useful in Domination, remarkably underpowered in TDM. They're also similar to Gunships in that, even in Domination, one Bomber isn't especially overpowered, but they stack extremely well. It's easy to just zerg 4 bombers to a single satellite, and once there, all they have to do is fly around and drop their ordinance on cooldown. Again, this is not an optimal strategy, as it can be defeated by the proper mix of Gunships, Strikes, Scouts, and Bombers of your own, but this counter strategy requires much more coordination and timing than the bomber swarm does. So any balance changes have to be made in a way that they don't make individual bombers underpowered, while not making groups of bombers too powerful.

 

General Changes

- The interplay between Damage Reduction, Charged Plating, and Armor Ignore needs to be reevaluated. This could have been addressed in the Strike section, but it affects bombers even more, so I waited until now to bring it up. Currently, Armor Ignore and Damage Reduction are completely binary - if the enemy doesn't have Armor Ignore, stacking DR is incredibly effective (i.e. a Charged Plating build is an ideal counter to a Minelayer) and Charged Plating can make you virtually invincible while it's up, but if the enemy does have Armor Ignore, DR becomes useless and Charged Plating is suicidal (i.e. the second you run into pretty much any Gunship). The end result is that you are better off ignoring DR most of the time, and only using it in niche builds. Here, I would change it so the only weapons that get 100% Armor Ignore are ProTorps and Thermites, owing to the niche nature of these weapons, while other weapons that currently have it would get 25-50% Armor Ignore. That would make DR less binary and more broadly useful. In this case, Charged Plating would also likely need to be reevaluated.

 

T1 Bomber

- Needs desperate help to not be useless in TDM, but I've got nothing. Any ideas here would be appreciated.

- Need a method of manually detonating mines beyond simply deploying the next one. This is especially true of Concussion Mines, where the default number of 2 deployable makes manual detonation difficult. And manual detonation is one of the most fun aspects of playing a bomber, so I'd like to see this expanded.

- Ion Mine needs its radius and shield damage buffed; right now there's no reason to use it. It's radius needs to be big enough that it reliably hits the enemy *before* your other mines, so that it strips the shields and lets the other mine(s) hit hull. Considering it will be paired w/ either Seismic (3000m base) or Seeker Mines (4000m base), I'd say it should be at least 3000m, or double what it is now.

- Concussion Mines could also use a buff to their radius now that mines respect LoS. That change effectively reduced the volume of space affected by each mine, so bumping up its radius to 2000m or so seems fair.

 

I really don't know how to make this one more useful in TDM, but I think these changes would leave it in a decent place in Domination.

 

T2 Bomber

This one is generally less powerful than the T1 in Domination, but it actually has a use in TDM. It's not exactly powerful in TDM, but its mines and drones can set up a decent area of denial, giving your team a place to retreat to when under pressure, so it does have a role.

- It could really use another engine choice. AFAIK, it is the only ship in the game w/ only 2 engine choices. This is because they removed the Hyperspace Beacon (and made it exclusive to the T1) before bombers went Live, but still.

- I'm sorry, but I really don't like the Railgun Drone; it just feels too much like an aimbot. I wish it would respect player skill more, but I don't know how hard it would be to implement maximum turning rates or tracking penalties on it. And it *does* play an important part in the T2 Bomber's area denial role in TDM, so I don't know how much you can change it.

 

T3 Bomber

I have very little experience with this ship, so I should probably defer to others on it's state of balance, but there's only one thing (apart from the mine changes mentioned previously) that really sticks out.

- Swap the Reactor for Armor. This is needed to make Charged Plating not a complete trap on this bomber. The Armor component plays to the strengths of the bomber; the Reactor simply does not.

Edited September 24, 2014 by Delta_V

[zaskar]

No.

 

/thread

[Gavin_Kelvar]

I'd focus on strikers:

 

5-10% buff to maneuverability (or whatever % is allowable without giving it the same base stat as a scout).

1-2% improvement in engine efficiency (again whatever is allowable without being the same as a scout)

 

T1 Striker:

add LLC

 

T2 Striker:

replace armor with reactor (better synergy with 2/3 of shields, avoids DR build trap)

Maybe add thermites

 

T3 Striker:

Replace sensor with thruster component; it makes no sense why they have sensors

Add HLC (for heavy fighter builds) - I truly dislike that it lacks some weapons like this that would allow it to truly be more than "support/healer ship" and have a more offensive build.

 

Overall I think strikers are overall in a good place and need more tweaking to allow them to meet their potential rather than needing massive buffs/nerfs to bring them in line.

 

RFLs:

Increase their power draw

Buff their damage

Slight decrease in tracking penalty (not to BLC levels)

 

- D-Field is simply the most powerful shield option, and needs to be nerfed. However, many pages have been spent on these forums discussing how to change it, and no consensus has been reached. The missile lock break makes it too powerful against missiles, but I'm just not sure how to change it.

 

I thought it might be fixed in two ways:

1) return it's duration to it's beta days of 3 seconds (so the left tier is distinctly valuable again)

2) make the missile break replace BOTH the passive and active evasion

 

This gives a player two choices: 1) have increased protection against blaster/accuracy based weaponry or 2) have defense against missiles at the cost of less defense against blasters/accuracy based weaponry. I don't think the missile break would be as big a problem if disto didn't grant passive and active protection against blasters at the same time (and visa versa).

Edited September 23, 2014 by Gavin_Kelvar

[Delta_V]

I'd focus on strikers:

 

5-10% buff to maneuverability (or whatever % is allowable without giving it the same base stat as a scout).

1-2% improvement in engine efficiency (again whatever is allowable without being the same as a scout)

 

T1 Striker:

add LLC

 

T2 Striker:

replace armor with reactor (better synergy with 2/3 of shields, avoids DR build trap)

Maybe add thermites

 

T3 Striker:

Replace sensor with thruster component; it makes no sense why they have sensors

Add HLC (for heavy fighter builds) - I truly dislike that it lacks some weapons like this that would allow it to truly be more than "support/healer ship" and have a more offensive build.

 

Overall I think strikers are overall in a good place and need more tweaking to allow them to meet their potential rather than needing massive buffs/nerfs to bring them in line.

 

RFLs:

Increase their power draw

Buff their damage

Slight decrease in tracking penalty (not to BLC levels)

 

Just added the Striker stuff, and agree w/ most of your points, especially the base mobility/maneuverability.

 

I didn't mention adding LLCs for T1 Strikes because I'd rather see RFLs buffed to be a viable choice. That would have the benefit of affecting other ships as well, and improve the experience of new pilots by not starting them off with a trap component.

 

For the T2, Thermites could be a good idea.

 

For the T3, I actually forgot to mention HLCs. That would be really nice to have.

 

edit: bomber stuff will be coming after I grab dinner

Edited September 23, 2014 by Delta_V

[SammyGStatus]

I tried to quote you but the train ride is short and t1 gunship nonsense of your opener lost your credibility. For high level play, t1 GS is unable to keep up with t2 scout. There have been AN UNREASONABLE amount of nerfs regarding the t1. You want to fix the game? Make it so scouts can't be infinitely evasive for 15 seconds and upwards (still wont get Tom n scrab on my dps, but it would def help GS dps).RNG is the only reason I have an avg of ~70. Have you seen Rumina's excel sheet? Top two are t2 scout pilots (scrab an Rumina), then a GS or two (me n tsukuyomi) then EVERYONE else in the top 10 is t2 scout....that may not be exact, but top5 definitely is that way, and the scales tip heavily for scouts.

 

This is by their nature - 3 second charge for me to do any substantial damage vs a scout or strike that has insta dps. Make it so GS can match scouts in dps. That's what they should fix - nerf the only two people that can consistently post better numbers than me

Edited September 23, 2014 by SammyGStatus

[Ryuku-sama]

Thermite on the T2 Strike wouldn,t be a good idea simply because it would destroy the use of a double torpedoes T2 GS.

BLC should lose its armor pen. They make scouts far too effective against armored targets.

Rocket pods are fine as they are.

Blaster Overcharge doesn't make any sense. You overcharge your blasters, you should have a drawback somewhere. I would buff BO's crit chances in T2 to 15% but make it comes with a baseline -20% shield and a -50% regen on engine and shield when its up. It would need to be on a toggle like Fortrees to be effective tho.

Targeting Telemetry shouldn't take a nerf to its uptime, but a nerf to its burst potential. And the best way to do that would be by changing Precision Targeting in T5 by a 15%-20% accuracy buff.

T1 Strike could use LLC.

I like the OP railgun changes.

Fortress is fine as it is. Maybe giving it a baseline turning buff (10%) could make it viable.

[_Syntinen]

High quality .wav file saying "I am a bad person" that plays every time railgun is loaded or mine field dropped.

[Gavin_Kelvar]

I didn't mention adding LLCs for T1 Strikes because I'd rather see RFLs buffed to be a viable choice. That would have the benefit of affecting other ships as well, and improve the experience of new pilots by not starting them off with a trap component.

 

I'd love RFLs to be useful too so I fully support your proposed buffs. I guess the real problem is not making them a poor man's LLC. I think we can at least assume that they aren't meant to be balanced the way MLC is to Quads since many ships that have LLC also have RFLs whereas most ships that have MLC don't have Quads (and visa versa).

 

The main thing I would wonder is whether you'd end up with RFLs filling one role with LLCs in a different one (which would be the ideal). In which case I don't think there'd be any harm in adding LLCs since they'd be for different playstyles rather than the equivalent of giving MLC and Quads to a ship where there'd be little/no reason to choose MLC over Quads.

[Delta_V]

I tried to quote you but the train ride is short and t1 gunship nonsense of your opener lost your credibility. For high level play, t1 GS is unable to keep up with t2 scout. There have been AN UNREASONABLE amount of nerfs regarding the t1. You want to fix the game? Make it so scouts can't be infinitely evasive for 15 seconds and upwards (still wont get Tom n scrab on my dps, but it would def help GS dps).RNG is the only reason I have an avg of ~70. Have you seen Rumina's excel sheet? Top two are t2 scout pilots (scrab an Rumina), then a GS or two (me n tsukuyomi) then EVERYONE else in the top 10 is t2 scout....that may not be exact, but top5 definitely is that way, and the scales tip heavily for scouts.

 

This is by their nature - 3 second charge for me to do any substantial damage vs a scout or strike that has insta dps. Make it so GS can match scouts in dps. That's what they should fix - nerf the only two people that can consistently post better numbers than me

 

That's why:

A) The first thing I suggested was to buff Gunship mobility because individual gunships are too easily shut down.

B) I suggested making Slug Railgun better at hitting scouts by virtue of better accuracy, lower tracking penalty, larger firing arc, and possibly a shorter charge time.

A) I went on to suggest nerfs to T2 Scouts. Just because T2 Scouts are more overpowered than Gunships doesn't mean there aren't issues with gunships.

[Icebergy]

Really the only things I would do are make Strikes slightly more maneuverable and maybe a little faster and nerf bomber health slightly.

[Nemarus]

I agree with most of your suggestions.

 

As for how to buff the T3 Scout ... fixing Ion Missile would help a lot. As would giving it Interdiction Missile (isn't it a bit strange to have a missile type that is available only on a hybrid fighter Gunship?)

 

T2 Strike could also get Interdiction Missile to buff its power considerably. Interdiction Missile + Cluster Missile is a very powerful combo, especially if combined with LLC's. I actually set aside one of my alts to use a T3 Gunship with Interdiction Missile + Cluster Missile + BLC's and it was pretty fearsome. Alas, it wasn't quite worth sacrificing a railgun.

 

But on a Strike (especially one with buffed maneuverability and/or shield hardness) it would be very powerful.

[Delta_V]

I agree with most of your suggestions.

 

As for how to buff the T3 Scout ... fixing Ion Missile would help a lot. As would giving it Interdiction Missile (isn't it a bit strange to have a missile type that is available only on a hybrid fighter Gunship?)

 

T2 Strike could also get Interdiction Missile to buff its power considerably. Interdiction Missile + Cluster Missile is a very powerful combo, especially if combined with LLC's. I actually set aside one of my alts to use a T3 Gunship with Interdiction Missile + Cluster Missile + BLC's and it was pretty fearsome. Alas, it wasn't quite worth sacrificing a railgun.

 

But on a Strike (especially one with buffed maneuverability and/or shield hardness) it would be very powerful.

 

I forgot about that thing, and yes, it is rather bizarre

 

Yeah, adding that to the T3 Scout and T2 Strike would help both ships quite a bit.

[Fractalsponge]

Assuming no dramatic changes to the existing playstyles, here are my suggestions:

 

Strikes need a general buff to mobility - maybe higher max engine pool, keeping high regen as the domain of scouts? I agree with giving type 1 strikes LLC, but a major buff to RFL would largely remove the need for this. A major buff to RFL would also be lovely for new players, since it's a default weapon. Armor -> reactor for T2 strike also seems like a good idea. HLC should be +armor pierce natively, and the existing talent can give a damage boost (or split armor ignore to 50% base with the talent giving the full 100%). That way new players always have access to a ship that can deal with satellite turrets and CP builds. Of course, a general rework of DR in gsf would be welcome, but I'm trying to keep changes minimal.

 

Interdiction missile on any scout is OP. I'd rather give T3 clusters if you HAD to buff its offensive use. IM on T2 strike would be fine and a welcome addition.

 

CF needs a nerf. Increase duration and dramatically decrease crit boost? Or switch it to a flat % increase to primary weapon damage?

 

BO I feel is about right at the moment, since the duration is quite short. Maybe increase the blaster weapon draw for the duration, and impose a short debuff to weapon use after BO wears off?

 

TT is just too damn good right now. The "surge" boost is out of control, especially when stacked with crit from CF. I'd make it a smaller flat damage increase, like BO, and reduce the crit. A global cap on +crit may deal with the unholy CF synergy, but I imagine this is a bit more complicated to code.

 

Gunships need no nerfs, unless there is a corresponding buff to gunship escapes or general mobility. Plasma should probably be buffed, since it really needs to do more damage over time to justify the lack of accuracy boost and the non-bursty nature of dot weapons. I think slug and ion are about right. Maybe up damage of ion, and reduce either the duration or the strength of the T5 snare (but not both).

 

Here's going to be an unpopular suggestion:

Remove LOS restriction on AOE mines. By all means tweak seismic or interdiction damage to compensate if you must.

 

Also, make ion mine and ion missile worth taking. Ion mine needs to drain a lot more, or do a lot more damage, or both. Ion missile needs a cluster-type cooldown and needs to drain/snare/damage more.

Edited September 24, 2014 by Fractalsponge

[MagikFingerz]

How about restrictions on team composition? I played a match today in Denon Exosphere where the opposing team had 1 bomber on each of their 2 satellites and 5 gunships. If GS are going to stay the way they are there should be a limit to how many can be one on each team IMO.

[Delta_V]

That's actually a good way to approach Armor Ignore. I'd reduce HLCs, Plasma Railgun (remember, I'd give the Armor Ignore to Plasma instead of Slug), and Rocket Pods to 50% Armor Ignore instead of 100%, but make it baseline. That way all 3 starter ships have access to Armor Ignoore right off the bat. Then I'd reduce their damage by a certain percent and put a damage increase where Armor Ignore was in the talent tree.

 

Pretty much agree with your other points, except the AOE mines. I just think having them ignore AOE makes it too easy for bombers to ban all other ships from the nodes in Domination. Making them respect AOE makes the bomber have to think about placement more; they have to compromise between making the mines harder to shoot down (meaning you want them hidden) while still letting them hit enemies (wanting them more in the open). That makes a bigger difference between the performance of a good bomber and a bad bomber.

 

Edit: I just realized Plasma Railgun has a T4 talent that reduces armor by 20% while the DOT is ticking. I'm not sure if it applies to the initial shot or not, but it's strange in that it is currently the only armor ignore in the game that is not 100%. I'd still rather give it a baseline "reduces armor by 50% while active" though.

 

Double Edit: Posted my thoughts on bombers, not sure if I feel like addressing secondary components and crew.

Edited September 24, 2014 by Delta_V

[KE_Maverick]

With all due respect to all suggestions in this threat thus far, it is still a mere fakt that every single strategic oriented game was based on the stone, scissors, paper principle.

I send my cavalry after swordsman, because they just run over them, but when pike men show up, i retreat my cavalry, because the pikes kill my horses easily, as well as the swords man easily kill the pike men.

When I bring a balance into the spread of each and focus on each strength and weakness, then there is not really a need for altering individual types.

 

BUT, unfortunately the group setups in GSF These days go in the direction of having in an 8 vs. 8 match about 4 GS, 2-3 Bombers and 1 or at best 2 fighter ships.

In my personal opinion this is due to lack of piloting skills of individuals, as well as the mere over power of those gunships, due to their range advantage and no warning whatsoever that they load up their weapon against a poor Scout or Strike Fighter, who will then die as more or less one shot, without any skill in piloting involved in that kill whatsoever.

 

Take on the other hand a match of FTP Players, were there are just Scouts and Strike Fighters in, they are so much mor fun to play. Dog fights as one would expect when hearing the word "Galactic Star Fighter", and those fights are pretty balanced. The Strike Fighters pack a havier load of firepower and to make up for that the Scouts move and turn a bit faster. Peachy!

 

The whole trouble starts when the GS and Bombers are brought in. Whether it is T1, T2, or whatever Tier. Because then there is no more dog fighting, then you have to watch as priority where those pesky GS are hiding and that you are not in sight and range of them, or you are dead meat.

Hence there Needs to be something that can co against them to take the edge of them away, at least a little bit.

Well, this can pretty much only be done by Scouts, due to their fast movement and the punch of firepower they pack. But if the Scout targeted by a GS while approaching it and doesn't avoid their shot with a barrel roll or flying waves, then they die in most cases with one hit.

So noone can really say the GS have nothing to defend themselves against the Scouts. A Condor and equivalent on Imp side (whatever it is called), can even switch to Burst Lasers and Cluster Missiles when a Scout approaches. That evens out the fire power, but the shield and armor advantage is still with the GS.

 

Looking at Bombers in Domination matches is a chapter by itself in this Story. How can it be, that a single concussion mine blows up a completely healthy Scout with one hit, when the Bombers were only meant to be support ships? Three of them at a satalite and it is a suicidal Mission for any Scout if trying to attack that satelite. Even with the EMP Explosion of the Nova Dive is just a 5 sec break of all those mine explosions and in that time no satelite can be conquered. The EMP Missiles of the FT-6 Pike are more or less useless, since they only have about 6000 meter range.

Here would be a moment to utilize GS well, if they would take out all those nasty mine fields, that the fighters can move in and conquer the satelite and deal with the ships defending it.

Again a wonderful stone, scissors, paper scenario, which unfortunately never gets utilized as that and people rather wine about imbalancing, because all they really care about is how to catapult themselves to the top of the kill list, instead of looking at the picture as a whole. (reference: all those suggesting to give the Strike Fighter a better turn rate, that they turn like Scouts, but don't touch the fire power, nor the shields, nor Def abilities, nerf the Scouts but make the GS even stronger, basically all only seeing the direct advantage of their own personally prefered class, without thinking about the impact of those changes in the entire picture.)

....For example: When the CD of Barrel Roll and Distortion Field was increased, my personal kill / death ratio with my Flashfire went from 7.8 down to 3. That's how severe even a slight change, like increasing a CD of 2 Def abilities, can become.

 

So let's cut through the chase and call the child by its name.

The Setups of the ships are as they are now what is required to be at least somewhat able to stand against those GS floods and any change on just one class would terribly mess up the whole.

 

Therefore if anything needs changing, than that we need a spread limitation, that there can only be a certain number of each class per match. Just like it is when signing up in the Group Finder for Flashpoints and OPS, where i select my role up front; in this case by the available ships i put in my selection and that the class which is full gets grayed out, or something like that. For example for every 4 Players in the match 1 GS and 1 Bomber, ...etc. max, that in a full house (12 vs. 12) there could only be a max of 3 GS and 3 Bombers, etc.

 

- Or reduce the fire power of ALL,

- Or increase the Shields / Defense abilities,

so that this dieing in seconds comes to an end, that the survival rate, or so to say life span of pilots gets a bit increased,

and that there will be some sort of warning when being targeted by a GS.

Edited September 24, 2014 by KE_Maverick

[Fractalsponge]

Type limitation is a dumb idea. People should get over it. If you even think it might be a good idea, think about it this way - 4 idiots take the only slots for your favorite ship type - you don't get to play it for the whole game and have to watch them fail at it for the whole match. Your entire GSF career is based on RNG getting you the chance to fly the ship you want. You still think it's a good idea? Edited September 24, 2014 by Fractalsponge

[Delta_V]

Type limitation is a dumb idea. People should get over it. If you even think it might be a good idea, think about it this way - 4 idiots take the only slots for your favorite ship type - you don't get to play it for the whole game and have to watch them fail at it for the whole match. Your entire GSF career is based on RNG getting you the chance to fly the ship you want. You still think it's a good idea?

 

Pretty much this. As much as I hate stacks of gunships or bombers, there will never be a fair way to assign who gets to fly which type.

[Devrius]

Type limitation is a dumb idea. People should get over it. If you even think it might be a good idea, think about it this way - 4 idiots take the only slots for your favorite ship type - you don't get to play it for the whole game and have to watch them fail at it for the whole match. Your entire GSF career is based on RNG getting you the chance to fly the ship you want. You still think it's a good idea?

 

I agree, but then there's the flip side to this.

 

As the game stands right now I have to change ships to adapt to the enemy's strategy, so I end up having to fly ships I don't like anyway. If it where up to me I would fly my type 1 strike all match long and dog fight, but I have to switch to scout to hunt GSs and to bombers to hold satellites.

 

This game is rock (bombers), paper (GS), scissors (scouts) with strikes being Jacks of all Trades masters of none.

 

But new players start with only "scissors", the type 1 scout armed with RFLs (a trap component meant for new players if I've ever seeing one) and the type 1 strike which is under powered (but fun as Hell!).

 

I would say that if rock/paper/scissors is the name of the game and we have to chose ships to adapt to the enemy strategy that all type 1 ships be given to new pilots after doing the introduction to GSF 1st time quest.

 

 

I've seen many matches where 2 ship teams are doing fine versus 5 shippers, then they break out classes they are not equipped to handle...

 

 

The best way to balance GSF? Make components less expensive to upgarde and flat out give out the type one ships... Okay nerf TT too and remove the armor pen on BLCs

[Fractalsponge]

I won't argue against giving everyone the base ships and components to experiment with. But limiting choice is a bad idea, and people need to stop proposing that.

[KE_Maverick]

I would say that if rock/paper/scissors is the name of the game and we have to chose ships to adapt to the enemy strategy that all type 1 ships be given to new pilots after doing the introduction to GSF 1st time quest.

 

Oh i totally agree. In fact, since GSF is for the most part brought over from Star Wars Galaxies, they should even implement that level circle we had in SWG. That you had to fly a certain amount of missions and complete xxx to gain another Level of piloting and with that unlocking the right to use certain ship classes, technology level and abilities.

 

This would also make the match making a lot easier, plus there wouldn't be any piloting skill lacking people flying around in GS and be on top of kill lists, when they would have to earn the right to fly a GS first.

Edited September 24, 2014 by KE_Maverick

[KE_Maverick]

Pretty much this. As much as I hate stacks of gunships or bombers, there will never be a fair way to assign who gets to fly which type.

 

Sorry, but I for my part have whatever 1000 matches in Scouts, about 100 in strike fighter but only 8 in GS and 2 in a Bomber. Even tho i do have them all mastered, but i just can't stand flying GS or Bombers.

So just like me prefering Scouts, there are other people who prefer the Strike Fighter, others the GS, etc. But many are more or less forced to fly a GS or a Scout to be able to stand against those nasty floods of GS, since that's the only way to go against them successfully.

Are they happy with being forced to fly a GS hunting Scout, when they love their Strike Fighter?

I seriously doubt it!

But if there would only be 2 of those pests...ehmmm...GS allowed in an 8 vs. 8 match, they can be dealt with in a Strike Fighter.

[Delta_V]

I won't argue against giving everyone the base ships and components to experiment with. But limiting choice is a bad idea, and people need to stop proposing that.

 

Yeah, I'd be all for giving everyone the T1 ships and removing the unlock cost for all components. That would let new people experiment with different builds and let them invest Req into whichever components they want, rather than get tempted into investing in a trap component like RFLs. Right now, you almost have to invest 150k Req into a ship to get it Mastered before you can start experimenting w/ different stuff, which is silly IMO.

[KE_Maverick]

Type limitation is a dumb idea. People should get over it. If you even think it might be a good idea, think about it this way - 4 idiots take the only slots for your favorite ship type - you don't get to play it for the whole game and have to watch them fail at it for the whole match. Your entire GSF career is based on RNG getting you the chance to fly the ship you want. You still think it's a good idea?

 

Yes I do, because the community of players who actually do play GSF is very small and is decreasing drastically with the increase of those GS overloaded matches. I created characters on most servers to see how long the waiting time is that a GSF match actually opens. On most servers the waiting time is sometimes up to half an hr. and only on The Red Eclipse do we still have decent waiting times that matches open. But a lot of my friends are not playing GSF anymore only because of those ridiculous 4+ GS and 2 Bomber Setups in a 8 man match, and they will only start playing GSF again, when those BS setups are not happening anymore.