Kintosi Posted October 19, 2014 Share Posted October 19, 2014 (edited) We arn't lying about the Cookies. (Also, we need more pilots Impside on the Ebon Hawk.) Edited October 19, 2014 by Kintosi Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TrinityLyre Posted October 19, 2014 Share Posted October 19, 2014 (edited) Verain and I came by earlier today and blasted apart some pub group on TEH. We'll try and swing around more often when time permits. Edited October 19, 2014 by TrinityLyre Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Verain Posted October 19, 2014 Share Posted October 19, 2014 I mean, we were flying boy bombers, so strictly speaking they mostly blew themselves apart. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
nyghtrunner Posted October 20, 2014 Share Posted October 20, 2014 I mean, we were flying boy bombers, so strictly speaking they mostly blew themselves apart. To this day, I still don't understand how you came up with the boy/girl descriptors for the bombers... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
FridgeLM Posted October 22, 2014 Share Posted October 22, 2014 To this day, I still don't understand how you came up with the boy/girl descriptors for the bombers... It's just like any other stupid jargon on this subforum that serves to make the community as inscrutable to new entrants as possible. Real talk? "Ace" is the same thing - means nothing. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
QuinMantha Posted October 22, 2014 Share Posted October 22, 2014 Drako, Verain, while I do appreciate you migrating on over to help us keep Repside humble, I don't know if sticking your head in, blowing some of us away and wandering off is the best thing to help Impside right now. Believe me, the Repside GSF channel has been sitting down and having a long conversation about this for at least the last hour. The problem isn't that Repside's getting too big for its britches. Okay, let's use an exercise to agree on terminology before we proceed here. GSF has pretty much always had a stratification of pilots, usually according to ability (more than ship mastery, though that does contribute). On the top, you've got, let's call them, 'Rogue-grade' pilots. These are server aces, or ronin GSFers who hop from server to server, the cream of the crop, the really deadly pilots. On the bottom, we've got noobs. Two-shippers, maybe F2P accounts just sticking their heads in for the first time who don't know a missile break from their own butts. And then in the middle, you've got, again, let's be nerdy and call them 'Wraith-grade' pilots. Pilots who aren't the best, but can still churn out a decent performance. In terms of numbers, maybe a guy who comes out of a match with 3-5-and-3. Ebon Hawk Impside can muster Rogue-grade pilots. They've got great flyers. Some of the deadliest people to fly, in my experience, are exclusively Imperial pilots. The problem is not that Impside can't muster good pilots; it's that when those pilots aren't on, there's nothing to fill the void. That core group of Wraith-grade pilots is missing from Ebon Hawk Impside right now, and everything else is just getting bulldozed by the Republic Rogue-grade pilots, who queue over and over and over again, because for them--for us--it's fun. This is something we've really been scratching our heads about recently. It's a problem with many facets: in one part, it's a problem with Republic Rogue-grade pilots getting too entrenched in their characters and bulldozing any up-and-coming competition. It's also a problem with Impside Rogue-grade pilots either not being online, or not contributing to helping their newer pilots. And it's also a population problem. We're in a slump right now because the kiddies are all in school, other games are showing off new and interesting things, and nobody wants to stick their heads up just to have some jerk in a Gunship who also acts on stage and posts long, convoluted posts about faction balance (...that sounds so familiar! It's like I know that guy!) blast it off. It's been suggested that we might get some people back in the period between 3.0 and when the kiddies get out for the holidays, but having a planned groundwork in place before that happens will help to retain some of those folks. What we need right now isn't a one-off shoot-'em-up to tamp a perceived 'faction imbalance' back down. What we need is a concerted effort towards building the Impside GSF community. Leveling new characters, all the while, taking new pilots under our wings and teaching them the basics of flying, communication, dogfighting tactics, game strategy, and bringing up a new crop of Wraith-grade pilots. This isn't a problem that can be solved by blasting folks into not queuing. This is going to require a bit of community-building. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Caernos Posted October 22, 2014 Share Posted October 22, 2014 (edited) Drako, Verain, while I do appreciate you migrating on over to help us keep Repside humble, I don't know if sticking your head in, blowing some of us away and wandering off is the best thing to help Impside right now. Believe me, the Repside GSF channel has been sitting down and having a long conversation about this for at least the last hour. The problem isn't that Repside's getting too big for its britches. Okay, let's use an exercise to agree on terminology before we proceed here. GSF has pretty much always had a stratification of pilots, usually according to ability (more than ship mastery, though that does contribute). On the top, you've got, let's call them, 'Rogue-grade' pilots. These are server aces, or ronin GSFers who hop from server to server, the cream of the crop, the really deadly pilots. On the bottom, we've got noobs. Two-shippers, maybe F2P accounts just sticking their heads in for the first time who don't know a missile break from their own butts. And then in the middle, you've got, again, let's be nerdy and call them 'Wraith-grade' pilots. Pilots who aren't the best, but can still churn out a decent performance. In terms of numbers, maybe a guy who comes out of a match with 3-5-and-3. Ebon Hawk Impside can muster Rogue-grade pilots. They've got great flyers. Some of the deadliest people to fly, in my experience, are exclusively Imperial pilots. The problem is not that Impside can't muster good pilots; it's that when those pilots aren't on, there's nothing to fill the void. That core group of Wraith-grade pilots is missing from Ebon Hawk Impside right now, and everything else is just getting bulldozed by the Republic Rogue-grade pilots, who queue over and over and over again, because for them--for us--it's fun. This is something we've really been scratching our heads about recently. It's a problem with many facets: in one part, it's a problem with Republic Rogue-grade pilots getting too entrenched in their characters and bulldozing any up-and-coming competition. It's also a problem with Impside Rogue-grade pilots either not being online, or not contributing to helping their newer pilots. And it's also a population problem. We're in a slump right now because the kiddies are all in school, other games are showing off new and interesting things, and nobody wants to stick their heads up just to have some jerk in a Gunship who also acts on stage and posts long, convoluted posts about faction balance (...that sounds so familiar! It's like I know that guy!) blast it off. It's been suggested that we might get some people back in the period between 3.0 and when the kiddies get out for the holidays, but having a planned groundwork in place before that happens will help to retain some of those folks. What we need right now isn't a one-off shoot-'em-up to tamp a perceived 'faction imbalance' back down. What we need is a concerted effort towards building the Impside GSF community. Leveling new characters, all the while, taking new pilots under our wings and teaching them the basics of flying, communication, dogfighting tactics, game strategy, and bringing up a new crop of Wraith-grade pilots. This isn't a problem that can be solved by blasting folks into not queuing. This is going to require a bit of community-building. In defense of my absence, I am taking the GRE test on Friday. As such, currently Life is full of nothing but study guides and practice tests with a deep longing to fly, that i can't even dampen by reading the forums during my commute. Hopefully this "wraith grade" pilot will be back behind the stick soon (Apologies for typos and bad grammar, typing on my phone on a train) Edited October 22, 2014 by Caernos Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
QuinMantha Posted October 22, 2014 Share Posted October 22, 2014 Believe me, I'm not blaming anybody for anything. I think Ebon Hawk may reaching a point, though, where a very serious effort needs to be made to help build things up in order to make things more fun and competitive for everyone, as opposed to doing what we've been doing, fielding our best pilots and then telling them to pull punches. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RickDagles Posted October 23, 2014 Share Posted October 23, 2014 I like the idea of having pros from other servers coming to TEH. I think this is only just the start of a trend in which all of the best pilots converge onto the same server. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Verain Posted October 23, 2014 Share Posted October 23, 2014 I like the idea of having pros from other servers coming to TEH. I think this is only just the start of a trend in which all of the best pilots converge onto the same server. Much of TEH doesn't like this, however. I've not seen such angst on any other server. I don't actually think you'll see aces "converge". What will eventually happen (and really happened months ago) is that several standout servers have a bunch of active and very skilled pilots with characters on them. Once everyone has everything everywhere, that will be a pretty big deal... but Bioware will make changes (who knows what) before then, so not worth much to speculate. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
QuinMantha Posted October 23, 2014 Share Posted October 23, 2014 Much of TEH doesn't like this, however. I've not seen such angst on any other server. I actually share the sentiment, I recognize that it's not fair to you, and I'm at a loss to explain it myself. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MiaowZedong Posted October 24, 2014 Share Posted October 24, 2014 Well...personnally, I generally do welcome "visiting" aces, regardless of which side they're on. However, I must admit, that if there ends up being 3-4 top notch players on one team, premade with voice, and the other team doesn't have a premade on it, it does tend to make for games that are seldom fun or interesting. It doesn't really matter if the voice premade is local or visiting; and I've even flown with voice and stomped on newbs a couple of times, and done it more than a couple of times without voice. The problem, though, isn't so much "omg premades" as a lack of competition and stakes to motivate more serious premade on premade action. GSF is IMO too small and casual, at the moment at least, to be a very good PvP environment. It needs more dedicated pilots and dedicated guilds. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Verain Posted October 24, 2014 Share Posted October 24, 2014 (edited) It's just like any other stupid jargon on this subforum that serves to make the community as inscrutable to new entrants as possible. Nicknames aren't jargon. We have guides for new players, like the Stasiepedia ( http://www.swtor.com/community/showthread.php?t=729222 ). Real talk? "Ace" is the same thing - means nothing. Real talk? If you don't know who the aces are on your server, you don't even understand what the game is. Edited October 26, 2014 by Verain Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kintosi Posted October 24, 2014 Author Share Posted October 24, 2014 (edited) So much derail! This thread is about cookies! (in all seriousness: ) What we need right now isn't a one-off shoot-'em-up to tamp a perceived 'faction imbalance' back down. What we need is a concerted effort towards building the Impside GSF community. Leveling new characters, all the while, taking new pilots under our wings and teaching them the basics of flying, communication, dogfighting tactics, game strategy, and bringing up a new crop of Wraith-grade pilots. This isn't a problem that can be solved by blasting folks into not queuing. This is going to require a bit of community-building. This is the primary reason i have switched to playing Imperial side most of the time. I would classify myself a a high-end 'Wraith-level' pilot as you term it, or on a good day, even Rogue-level. More often than not, i'm in the top 25% of the scoreboard, and often the best or second best on my team. Pilots like me usually end up in Eclipse Squadron under Nemarus on Impside. He (and the rest of E-Squad) are really trying to hype GSF and breathe life back into the dark sided community. Even among the E-Squad 'Angst' does creep up. I'll admit, I cause some myself on off days. This is understandable, however, after a few matches against a team of pubs (premade or no) with almost entire 5-shippers, flying GS (T1, T3), battle scout (t2), or drone bomber (t2). These 3 ships seem to make up the 'meta' pub side, with 5/8 or so of the pilots queued fly exclusively those ships. Yea, they are ridiculously good. However, they are also ridiculously rage inducing. New or newish pilots have a hard time countering them, and even 'wraith and rogue' vets cant always deal with 2 or 3 of them at once. My encouragement to the exclusively pub pilots, would be to only play the above ships when the opposing team merits it. (I.E, they are using them in equal numbers too.) Otherwise, fly something else. Your skill will undoubtedly win the match anyway. Just that slightly longer, less rage inducing time to kill on other ships gives new pilots a chance to LEARN. Not to mention have fun, god forbid. Also, consider rolling an imp alt. Cant hurt can it? Anyway, good discussion folks! - Kintosi/Eclipse-nine Edited October 24, 2014 by Kintosi Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
QuinMantha Posted October 24, 2014 Share Posted October 24, 2014 My encouragement to the exclusively pub pilots, would be to only play the above ships when the opposing team merits it. (I.E, they are using them in equal numbers too.) Otherwise, fly something else. Your skill will undoubtedly win the match anyway. Just that slightly longer, less rage inducing time to kill on other ships gives new pilots a chance to LEARN. Not to mention have fun, god forbid. Also, consider rolling an imp alt. Cant hurt can it? - Kintosi/Eclipse-nine Kin, I don't know if the end-all answer, either, is for Repside to start pulling punches. A lot do, although, to be fair, I don't know if me rolling out my T3 Gunship as opposed to my T1 is making it any easier for anyone flying against me. What I'm trying to do is see if I can't get folks from the Repside GSF channel to put their mains down for a month or two, fly exclusively Imperial, queue with new players and be social with them, and help Eclipse talk up GSF and get people interested. I've already gotten some soft commitments from a few players. We'll see how it goes. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kintosi Posted October 24, 2014 Author Share Posted October 24, 2014 Kin, I don't know if the end-all answer, either, is for Repside to start pulling punches. I'm not asking for anyone to fly at anything but their best. Still competition also helps learning. But throwing stock 2 shippers against the ships i mentioned (piloted by experienced players, anyway) Is kind of like throwing level 10s into the 55 ranked pvp queue. Its just a massacre. The new guys dont learn anything because they barely get out of the spawn zone before getting vaped. Will flying a different ship than your mastered T1/T3 GS do them any good in the long run? Nope. You're still going to win. Will they live a little longer? Maybe. But the important thing is that they have a chance to learn the game before their ship is dust for the 10th time that match. And when the opposing team has people who are actually a threat, pull out dat mastered GS and go to town on them. I'm not saying 'Don't play your favorite ship' or 'Don't fly your best.' I'm just trying to encourage the best pilots to think a little before they stomp another 2-shipper out of the queue permanently. If the game is over before it has even begun, why make it worse? Fly something different for a change. Maybe you'll enjoy it! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bafucin Posted October 24, 2014 Share Posted October 24, 2014 Sometimes (most of the) it feels like I end up alone with lvl 1 VS lvl 55 people... we never win.... I try my best but it's a bit boring and I can understand that people hate it sometimes.... The gameplay and all that it's great... but the teams? I'm not sure. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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