Starfighter battles need balance

[Apoll]

While the concept is ace, and preferring it to normal PvP it needs some work on balance.

 

How to win domination battle with low tier scouts and stikes only, when the enemy had 5-6 bombers and by the time it hits 2 minutes into the battle the whole field is crammed with mines, turret missiles, and railguns? Impossible to even score a single kill with everyone hiding behind a wall of auto-targeting bots.

 

http://i1165.photobucket.com/albums/q599/Fediuld/Screenshot_2014-11-25_17_41_39_403287_zpscb39a50a.jpg

Edited November 25, 2014 by Apoll

[Ryuku-sama]

While the concept is ace, and preferring it to normal PvP it needs some work on balance.

 

How to win domination battle with low tier scouts and stikes only, when the enemy had 5-6 bombers and by the time it hits 2 minutes into the battle the whole field is crammed with mines, turret missiles, and railguns? Impossible to even score a single kill with everyone hiding behind a wall of auto-targeting bots.

 

http://i1165.photobucket.com/albums/q599/Fediuld/Screenshot_2014-11-25_17_41_39_403287_zpscb39a50a.jpg

 

Low tiers is inherently false. The Novadive/Blackbolt is a very good ship. The StarGuard/Rycer is harder to fly but stll very good. Its problems are common to every strikes.

 

Now? How to kill bombers??

 

It's impossible for a new player in a stock ship. From the fact you're using InYour Sights instead of Wingman (which is easy to get on an Imp), took the time to get TT instead of getting Distortion Field or StE, use BR without DF T3 Breaker.. I can say you're one.

 

New players can barely hit a Strike fying at them rather slowly, locking a protorp and firing HLC.

 

Now if you ask how to kill bombers with a Rycer... HLC. Conc. Directionnal. You are out of their mine range and can kill a bomber rather quickly. Problem is you have to know what you're doing.

[Apoll]

Low tiers is inherently false. The Novadive/Blackbolt is a very good ship. The StarGuard/Rycer is harder to fly but stll very good. Its problems are common to every strikes.

 

Now? How to kill bombers??

 

It's impossible for a new player in a stock ship. From the fact you're using InYour Sights instead of Wingman (which is easy to get on an Imp), took the time to get TT instead of getting Distortion Field or StE, use BR without DF T3 Breaker.. I can say you're one.

 

New players can barely hit a Strike fying at them rather slowly, locking a protorp and firing HLC.

 

Now if you ask how to kill bombers with a Rycer... HLC. Conc. Directionnal. You are out of their mine range and can kill a bomber rather quickly. Problem is you have to know what you're doing.

 

The issue is not the bombers nor the other players. but the gazillion of turrets and mines that do not miss you.

[Verain]

Do not fly into those. Like asteroids, walls, and spiked pits, they can't miss you, but neither can they move at all. It is a stationary hazard, not a bot.

[Gavin_Kelvar]

The issue is not the bombers nor the other players. but the gazillion of turrets and mines that do not miss you.

 

Turrets are a bit of a problem since completely stock ships lack any armor penetrating weapons. Your best bet on the scout is to get the upgrade on pods. Ironically even though strikers are, in theory, packing more heavy ordinance than scouts it takes them longer to have armor piercing weapons (unless you switch to proton torpedoes, but you'd kill a turret faster using non-armor piercing HLCs than making torpedo runs).

 

As for mines your HLC on the strike should give you the range to kill them before they're a threat to you. Scouts are a bit more difficult since most of their primaries put them dangerously close to the activation radius of mines. Strike or scout though the best counter to mines is situational awareness and not getting too close to an active mine. I'd give strikers a slight advantage over scouts in this department since they can still threaten a bomber while remaining outside of the minefield activation radius.

[StrixHiraeth]

The issue is not the bombers nor the other players. but the gazillion of turrets and mines that do not miss you.

 

Defense turrets or drones with lasers will miss you if you have evasion. Solution: Approach the turret, activate Distortion Field or Running Interference just before you're in range, and kill the turret or get out of there before the effect falls off. If you don't have evasion, hopefully you have something long-range to shoot them with.

 

Mines: be careful about where you're flying, avoid following bombers from straight behind them (use strafing and flybys on them, ideally your attack approach on a bomber should be at a 90 degree angle to their trajectory). If you decide you need to go through mines, try to shoot them before they blow you up. This is difficult to do to concussion or seismic mines. If there's a gunship on your team, they can clear minefields relatively easily. In matches where the enemy is fielding 4+ bombers.... your team's best option, unfortunately, is to do the same--and I agree that those types of matches are less fun.

 

Gunships: either people on your team need to get up close and personal with them, you need to just be mindful of where they are and stay out of range, or you need to return fire with your own team's gunships.

 

While the concept is ace, and preferring it to normal PvP it needs some work on balance.

 

How to win domination battle with low tier scouts and stikes only, when the enemy had 5-6 bombers and by the time it hits 2 minutes into the battle the whole field is crammed with mines, turret missiles, and railguns? Impossible to even score a single kill with everyone hiding behind a wall of auto-targeting bots.

 

http://i1165.photobucket.com/albums/q599/Fediuld/Screenshot_2014-11-25_17_41_39_403287_zpscb39a50a.jpg

 

The "imbalance" you're talking about is just a matter of ship upgrades. Unfortunately, there *will* be matches where your team (or the other team) is simply so out-gunned that you can't do much. We've all been there. It's been a LONG time since it was so bad I couldn't get any kills, but it can happen... but in this case balance is only brought when the teams are roughly equal in terms of upgrades and experience. Looking forward to the accelerated requisition in the coming expansion! As long as a few new/new-ish pilots stick with it for a while, within a couple of months of the expansion's release, we should see fewer matches that are one-sided because of gear.

 

TL;DR There are options available to any ship to deal with the specific problems you mentioned. Seems you're just having bad luck with the matchmaker more than anything else.

Edited November 25, 2014 by Ymris

[RickDagles]

The best thing to do to beat bombers is to not let them set up a nest. Kill them before they can get to the satellite. Use Spearpoint/Bloodmark tensorfield at the beginning and hunt em down with thermite torpedos. Plus with the speedboost your team's bombers will get to the satellites first.

 

Another effective tip that works against most bombers is to go far under the satellite and kill him and his mines from a distance with thermites (10000m), protons (10000+m), railguns (15000m), heavy lasers set to range capacitors (6900m), concussion missiles(7000+m), etc. Anything in the 6900+ range will be really effective. Use the "X" key to slow down and get in the maximum effective range. The only thing you have to worry about is being targetted by enemy gunships and scouts. Otherwise it's simple. Note that this will not work on kuat mesas B or lost shipyards C.

Edited November 26, 2014 by RickDagles

[zaskar]

I want to kill tune right about now