Let's talk about Strike Fighters

[Gavin_Kelvar]

there's also a cd/reload time on rail guns.... imagine if it was the same as the one on torps

 

I thought there was but I didn't see anything when I checked Dulfy earlier today. But yeah that kinda was my thinking: railguns would be in the same position as torps if they had an 11 second reload. GS just flat out wouldn't be viable and they'd be horribly unable to kill a bomber efficiently. Like I said being able to ion rail spam to keep a bomber's pets in check got me thinking how missiles like EMP will always lag far behind ion rail in that duty unless they have a massive reload time reduction. Likewise I was able to efficiently kill bombers with slug rail that match because of the super short reload whereas it would've taken me much longer to do so with torps.

 

If torps are supposed to be the big long range burst alternative to railguns they honestly need to have a reload/lock-on competitive with railguns or else the meta will stay much the same where slug rail is the only efficient long range killer of bombers.

[tunewalker]

Honestly like I said before if we just removed reloads and didnt touch lock times we have a whole new plethora of stuff to look at.

 

First Torpedoes really wouldnt be all that much more reliable.. they would be more reliable of course, but it wouldnt all of a sudden make torpedo wielding ships top dogs at anything really. Though I guess that's what makes them balanced, good but not "Op".

 

Second you would have to realize how many ships this would affect other then strikes. Bombers all have P. Torp as an available Secondary, sure they have to give up a mine to do so, but you could potentially change some of how a bomber plays depending on build, maybe 1 type of bomber build is good against scouts, but another is better against Strikes and Gunships using P. Torp, heck 2 out of the 3 have access to Concussion missiles.

 

Third Honestly Concussion missiles would honestly see the biggest advantage from this, they are much more reliable to lock on then the Torpedo Counter parts, and with reduced reload times they get to Cluster level spam capabilities, but again the question ends up being, Does this really help strikes? remember that strikes are just slightly faster then Gunships (we did run calculations and run distance difference is only around 2,000 Meters) and unlike gunships they only have 1 missile break, and unlike SCOUTS they only have 1 missile break. If you just buff missiles with out touching anything about a strike's defenses or mobility or anything else you may find that while you have given Strikes teeth, you also turned their defenses into the litteral wet paper blankets by comparison to the rest of their counter parts.

 

This is why this is such a huge thing, there is no 1 fix, the problems of the strike are numerous.

 

Once again I want to bring up Quick Charge shields, they are one of the few shields that makes a strike feel like it has some mobility thanks to its increased regen time, but it gives up SO MUCH for that mobility. I want to compare it to a component on ANOTHER ship that its on's OTHER shield that provides mobility.... The T1 Scouts Shield to Engine power converter. If you put these 2 shields side by side you can see 1 is ABSURDLY deficient, and that would be the Quick Charge, not only does the Shield to Engine give oyu better legs and running speed then Quick Charge, it also gives better defenses, -30% capacity vs normal capacity.... its absurd that 1 shield can be this bad, not to mention that its the STARTING shield on 2 out of the 3 strikes, the 2 that are in the worst position, further Strikes have the "best base shields" which only works AGAINST IT when one of the shield options it gets is the shield that provides the LARGEST subtraction of shields, and since this is all % based, the larger the %, be it - or + the larger the effect. If the T1 scout is to even think about quick charge over Shield to Engine, then quick charge needs to provide better defenses, and the only way that it will do that is if you remove the -30% capacity from the shield, people have already done the math and shown that a properly managed directionals can come close to quick charge in regen rate, so that's not an exuse, furhter directionals have a +10% capacity AND can be double to a set location, while quick charge provides just a small shield heal for its use, if any ship is to take it, it needs to be balanced to the same level as disto or Shield to engine, I dont think it should be giving more engine the shield to engine, but it should give better defenses.

[Gavin_Kelvar]

Honestly like I said before if we just removed reloads and didnt touch lock times we have a whole new plethora of stuff to look at.

 

First Torpedoes really wouldnt be all that much more reliable.. they would be more reliable of course, but it wouldnt all of a sudden make torpedo wielding ships top dogs at anything really. Though I guess that's what makes them balanced, good but not "Op".

 

Second you would have to realize how many ships this would affect other then strikes. Bombers all have P. Torp as an available Secondary, sure they have to give up a mine to do so, but you could potentially change some of how a bomber plays depending on build, maybe 1 type of bomber build is good against scouts, but another is better against Strikes and Gunships using P. Torp, heck 2 out of the 3 have access to Concussion missiles.

 

Third Honestly Concussion missiles would honestly see the biggest advantage from this, they are much more reliable to lock on then the Torpedo Counter parts, and with reduced reload times they get to Cluster level spam capabilities, but again the question ends up being, Does this really help strikes? remember that strikes are just slightly faster then Gunships (we did run calculations and run distance difference is only around 2,000 Meters) and unlike gunships they only have 1 missile break, and unlike SCOUTS they only have 1 missile break. If you just buff missiles with out touching anything about a strike's defenses or mobility or anything else you may find that while you have given Strikes teeth, you also turned their defenses into the litteral wet paper blankets by comparison to the rest of their counter parts.

 

I pretty much agree with everything here. And to be clear I advocate reducing the lock-on time as well. Reloading in 1 second won't help torps if you can LOS them so you never launch one. My point though is that if you reduce the lock-on to conc or cluster times it'd still be distinctly inferior to slug rails for killing efficiently simply due to the long reload. It shouldn't necessarily be able to be fired as fast as a slug but it should be at least in close competition to it.

 

As for missile breaks I think the devs should do a heavy balance pass and remove the double missile break system so everyone only has 1 missile break at most. That requires some fine tuning of things like clusters but I really don't think it's good for the evasion shield to also have a counter to missiles which are the counter to evasion. It'd be like CP countering all non-AP weapons and then having a T3 mechanic that makes all AP weapons except ptorps ineffective against it. You just can't build a defense mechanic, create a counter to that mechanic, and then give the component that provides the biggest buff to that defensive mechanic a counter to the defensive mechanic's counter.

Edited September 11, 2015 by Gavin_Kelvar

[JasonSzeremi]

I pretty much agree with everything here. And to be clear I advocate reducing the lock-on time as well. Reloading in 1 second won't help torps if you can LOS them so you never launch one. My point though is that if you reduce the lock-on to conc or cluster times it'd still be distinctly inferior to slug rails for killing efficiently simply due to the long reload. It shouldn't necessarily be able to be fired as fast as a slug but it should be at least in close competition to it.

 

As for missile breaks I think the devs should do a heavy balance pass and remove the double missile break system so everyone only has 1 missile break at most. That requires some fine tuning of things like clusters but I really don't think it's good for the evasion shield to also have a counter to missiles which are the counter to evasion. It'd be like CP countering all non-AP weapons and then having a T3 mechanic that makes all AP weapons except ptorps ineffective against it. You just can't build a defense mechanic, create a counter to that mechanic, and then give the component that provides the biggest buff to that defensive mechanic a counter to the defensive mechanic's counter.

 

So basically remove the missile break from DF

drop the reload times to match the reload on the slug railgun

cut most lock on times in half

give quick charge shields no penalty

?

Also emp field has a missile break, but I think it's CD is so long it lessens it's sting... it's also on craft that aren't overpowered (T1 scout? any other craft with the field?) in their other options.

if better missile options makes bombers come out of hiding to fire torps, it also makes them targets for torps, gs, and missiles.... which might make things more interesting in the dogfight game.

Edited September 11, 2015 by JasonSzeremi

[Danalon]

So basically remove the missile break from DF

drop the reload times to match the reload on the slug railgun

cut most lock on times in half

give quick charge shields no penalty

?

Also emp field has a missile break, but I think it's CD is so long it lessens it's sting... it's also on craft that aren't overpowered (T1 scout? any other craft with the field?) in their other options.

if better missile options makes bombers come out of hiding to fire torps, it also makes them targets for torps, gs, and missiles.... which might make things more interesting in the dogfight game.

 

If you drop the reload times and reduce the lockon times, there's no need to remove DF break - this would simultaneously lower the skill ceiling for Scouts/Gunships and lower the skill floor for using missiles even further. One of the reasons Gunships and Scouts are so popular with good players is their extreme power when played correctly. It would be a good thing to lift Strikes up to the level of the other two and not to lower the good ones so Strikes can shine with lockon spam that does neither require good aim nor good flying.

 

 

The game only has 4 major buttons (+2 mouse) and knowing when to push what button makes the difference between a good player and a bad player. Most classes have strong enough abilities to make most of their buttons worth hitting and a failure in timing can make the difference between making a lot of kills or dying. I don't think nerfing a good cooldown on two classes to improve the performance of low-skill weaponry on one class doesn't seem like a good trade. It would be better to give Strikes something that's worth hitting a button.

Things I can imagine helping Strikes with their cooldowns:

• Improving quick charge shields. for example: on use they regenerate 750 shield hp per second for 6 seconds and when the shields are full, the additional energy is rerouted to fill engine and weapon capacitors.
  
• Maneuvers could have 2 charges (separate cooldowns) for Strikes.
  
• New copilot abilities suiting Strikes. One ability could reduce the next lockon to 0.5s or make it instant. Another could reduce the reload time of missiles by half as long as the copilot ability runs. Another one could make missiles unbreakable as soon as they're launched during its duration.
  
• General buffs to blasters and missiles will help making T1 & T2 Strike system abilities more useful.
  

 

 

Some of those will affect other ships, but I think they fit Strikes best. Especially copilot abilities can be very powerful when used at the right time. Passive buffs to Strikes still should include more engine power, to make it easier for them to run away or charge - they should have enough energy to be still be able to run away after being hit from an ion rail if they didn't waste their engine pool before.

Edited September 11, 2015 by Danalon

[JasonSzeremi]

then how about rocket pods for strikers? more skill, more reliable, their max range of 6k is pretty close to the target range for strikers of having a good dps at 4-8k

[Gavin_Kelvar]

If you drop the reload times and reduce the lockon times, there's no need to remove DF break - this would simultaneously lower the skill ceiling for Scouts/Gunships and lower the skill floor for using missiles even further. One of the reasons Gunships and Scouts are so popular with good players is their extreme power when played correctly. It would be a good thing to lift Strikes up to the level of the other two and not to lower the good ones so Strikes can shine with lockon spam that does neither require good aim nor good flying.

 

The main reason I see for removing the break is because DField basically has a counter to all sources of damage (except for static mines that require the pilot to fly into them). It's passive and active evasion counter all accuracy based weapons and missile break counters the counter to evasion (namely lock on weapons). As I said that's like giving CP a mechanic that allows it to counter non-AP weapons and counter to the AP weapons that are supposed to counter it. That's bad design plain and simple (I seriously doubt anyone would claim CP was balanced if the T3 upgrade had an option that basically ignored all AP weapons except say HLC. Yet that's what DField's break does and people claim that's good design). That's overall crippling to strikers since it means a DField enemy can basically ignore all sources of damage a striker can do to it. Removing the break seems the better option when the only other thing is to basically buff strikers offensively to the point where their damage is effectively ignoring those defenses (since that level of buff runs the risk that against targets without those defenses they'd be vaporized faster than what a scout can currently pull off with CDs).

 

And honestly lowering the heavy missiles to cluster spam levels is probably a bad idea since it would just make DField that much more essential and non-DField craft that much weaker. I think the only reason torps might be balanced with a lock-on/reload at the level of clusters is because the firing arc (even if it's base became 16 to counter the ninja lock loss) would leave it difficult to use in a close range dogfight where spamability seems most problematic. Personally I'd be fine if torps had conc's lock-on and reload. Concs would probably be a good place with their current stats if the double break system were removed. My main point with the lock-on/reload with torps is based on experience that against targets without a missile break it's unreliable because it's too easy to LOS and it's TTK is far too high when compared to other options like slug rail (to be clear it shouldn't have a TTK at the same level as slug but it should be at least competitive enough to be a viable alternative). EDIT: personally I think the devs should aim for a 2:1 ratio of slug shots:torps fired (excluding travel time). currently it's something crazy like 4:1 or higher.

Edited September 11, 2015 by Gavin_Kelvar

[Danalon]

I seriously doubt anyone would claim CP was balanced if the T3 upgrade had an option that basically ignored all AP weapons.

 

If its duration would be the same as DF (6 seconds with 20s cooldown) it wouldn't be much of a problem. I'm guessing it would be even weaker in its current main role of soaking up mine damage in satellite combat.

 

Imagine DF had no lock break but lasted 19 out of 30 seconds like CP does. Would that be better to fight off than its current version?

 

I don't think it's that easy to compare those two abilities with one another.

CP makes its user more durable in situations with enough things to cover behind, which makes railguns and HLC harder to use and BLC, the only AP weapon working well in CQC, is somewhat dangerous to use because of mines. This is referring to the current meta, where CP ships are usually bombers.

DF is completely different. It enables scouts to survive a hit & run attack in which they'd otherwise die. It lets them either get in safely to unload damage or get out safely after they killed their target. It helps Gunships to survive against other gunships and it helps gunships to run away from scouts.

[ALaggyGrunt]

We could get away with un-nerfing evasion if we made some weapons hard counter it.

[btbarrett]

What if you just changed something as minor as the inherent Dampening on strike fighters such that they were undetectable to most gunships until they reached 11km or (whatever the max range of protorps is)? Heck, if you made it so they were undetectable until they were even closer (8k?) it may just give a use for Sensor Beacons or scouts playing scout roles. I don't think ghost missile tones from an enemy beyond targeting range would be that imbalanced either. It would make ProTorps and Thermites stronger, but those are slow-locking, long-reloading missiles in the first place so you can't just spam them.

 

Edit: I think it has the added bonus of making the Sensor component and the Tactical crew-member somewhat relevant since your best defense against getting surprised is greater sensor range (something we have never cared about).

Edited September 11, 2015 by btbarrett

[Gavin_Kelvar]

If its duration would be the same as DF (6 seconds with 20s cooldown) it wouldn't be much of a problem. I'm guessing it would be even weaker in its current main role of soaking up mine damage in satellite combat.

 

 

 

Well they're both employed with entirely different tactics. At any rate though with proper CD management an evasion scout can ensure that it is never threatened by the majority of missile weapons that are the one counter to evasion.

 

So the comparison is valid since DField's break is doing what my comparison to CP suggests: ie giving the build a counter to all of it's counters save for one of those weapons. Just because the components have different duration doesn't change the fact that DField's break literally grants its user immunity to almost all the weapons (missiles) that counter evasion builds to the point where those weapons effectively don't exist in game. That's no different than deciding that CP should have a T3 upgrade that effectively erases all AP weapons save one as viable counters to the build.

 

If DField's break didn't effectively remove those weapons as counters then they'd be as much of a threat to a DField build as clusters. The fact is that the only missile weapon counter to evasion that actually works is clusters which means that DField's break is effectively a counter to the majority of its counters. So you either have to 1) make all missiles as spammable as clusters (which IMO is not a good design choice) or 2) remove DField's break. Either way missiles need to be close to the same level (or the same level) of threatening to a DField user as clusters or you're effectively keeping the status quo where only one of the build's counters actually works and the rest might as well not exist.

 

EDIT:

Once DField breaks a missile you're looking at anywhere from 8.6 to 15.4 seconds of that missile reloading and relocking (longer if the missile is unupgraded or you factor in the target not just sitting in your firing arc waiting for you to reload and relock or if you factor in missile travel time). But for the sake of argument let's say the target doesn't do anything that forces the enemy to take longer than 15.4 seconds to fire their next missile. That means for DField has a vulnerability to missiles between a mere 4.6 seconds (torps) and 11.4 seconds (concs).

 

CP unupgraded is vulnerable to non-AP weapons for 15 seconds. Now DField grants a hefty evasion buff for 6 seconds, leaving it with 14 seconds where it's vulnerable again to accuracy based weapons. So that's about the same time of vulnerability unupgraded CP has to non-AP weapons (yes I know we're comparing upgraded vs. unupgraded, I just needed to state these numbers for what follows). For the sake of argument let's say you changed CP so your two T3 options were as follows: upgrade it's overall duration so it's vulnerable to non-AP weapons for 11 seconds and remains vulnerable to AP weapons (CP functions exactly as it does now) or an upgrade called something like "hardened armor" that provides an additional 160% DR against AP specific sources of damage for 18 seconds. Now let's say in that world the only weapon with more than 100% AP was HLC, this means the damage of all the other AP weapons is completely nullified. Taking this CP upgrade means it's now vulnerable to non-AP weapons for 15 seconds and AP weapons for 12 seconds.

 

Congratulations we have now created a CP that counters it's counters exactly the way DField does with nearly the exact same time periods of vulnerability. Note the CP user is now faced with the exact same choice DField users currently face: longer immunity to damage affected by DR/Evasion (the respective T3 duration upgrades which incidentally leave both components vulnerable to non-AP/accuracy sources of damage for 11 seconds; remember DField users still have engine missile breaks so choosing this option doesn't mean they trade any ability to counter missiles which automatically puts them ahead of CP users who did have to trade ANY counter to AP for this longer duration) or keep the base immunity the component gives to damage affected by DR/Evasion so you can GAIN immunity to the counters of that build (AP and missiles respectively; incidentally both are .6 seconds apart in vulnerability to their counters). Based on the consensus of which DField upgrade you should use I'm guessing it'd be the same for CP. I didn't have to give DField 20 seconds duration or anything to make it be within a second of having the same vulnerability duration of my hypothetical CP, I just had to create a new CP T3 upgrade and leave DField functioning exactly as it is now.

 

Would that CP be at all balanced? Not likely. Is that exactly how DField functions with the T3 break? Yup. This is what I'm getting at in my comparison between DField and CP.

 

Imagine DF had no lock break but lasted 19 out of 30 seconds like CP does. Would that be better to fight off than its current version?

 

Just to highlight this part but if you look at my above edit you'll see it's actually entirely possible for DField to get the equivalent immunity CP has IF DField takes the duration rather than missile break option. Selecting that means that DField's evasion lasts 9 seconds out of 20 which gives it's user 11 seconds of vulnerability to accuracy based weapons. That's exactly the same number of seconds a CP user is vulnerable to non-AP weapons. So it's not a matter of imagining your scenario, DField can totally be set up to only be vulnerable to accuracy for 11 seconds the way CP is vulnerable to non-AP weapons, it's just that the missile break option that allows DField users to ignore all but one lock-on weapon that counters their build is a far better choice than having a shorter duration of vulnerability to accuracy based weapons at the price of being vulnerable to evasion's counter.

 

 

I don't think it's that easy to compare those two abilities with one another.

CP makes its user more durable in situations with enough things to cover behind, which makes railguns and HLC harder to use and BLC, the only AP weapon working well in CQC, is somewhat dangerous to use because of mines. This is referring to the current meta, where CP ships are usually bombers.

DF is completely different. It enables scouts to survive a hit & run attack in which they'd otherwise die. It lets them either get in safely to unload damage or get out safely after they killed their target. It helps Gunships to survive against other gunships and it helps gunships to run away from scouts.

 

But the AP weapons are all still effective against a CP user. And therein lies the difference. All AP weapons can still damage a CP user (some being more easy to use than others but still they are all still counter it) whereas only clusters can damage a DField user barring pilot error. A CP user can't press a button to simply ignore the majority of AP weapons that counter it; DField users can and do just press a button to ignore all counters to it save for clusters. DField doesn't just allow it's user to survive when they'd otherwise die, it allows it to ignore being pressured by the majority of the counters to it's build while it completes it's attack run whereas a CP user MUST respond to the pressure of AP weapons by breaking LOS (which may mean breaking off from an attack run). DField's break allows a scout to get in safely when the counters to it would otherwise have forced it to withdraw or die. That's not balance, that's allowing pilots to press a button to ignore the counters to their build. There's a reason CP doesn't have that option: it'd be horribly broken if CP users could just press a button to that effectively made almost all AP weapons non-existent in the game.

Edited September 12, 2015 by Gavin_Kelvar

[Grue_Hunter]

Just to add to the discussion....as a late comer to GSF, I've found that the strike fighters are "ok" but only that. The secondary weapon choices for the strike fighers are disappointing and not too useful unless you manage to actually sneak up on an opponent. Until they get a secondary weapon which is a bit more responsive, then I'll be leaving them as the ones I'll only play after I've exhausted the bonuses on the other ships.

[Danalon]

DF does not "literally grant its user immunity to all counters to high evasion builds". It doesn't counter seismic, concussion or interdiction mines. It doesn't counter railgun drones. It doesn't counter interdiction effects. It doesn't counter ion rail cleave. And it only counters seekers, missle drone's missiles and other missiles once and is not giving an immunity like maneuvers do.

 

The difference in duration of CP and DF also indicates their main uses.

CP is made to give someone the chance to hold his ground. That's why CP works best at satellites where mines and interdiction effects lessen the threat to be killed by scouts (the mines and interdiction effects are also the reason why CP is more useful on bombers than on strikes) and LoS can be used to avoid railgun damage as well as defensive flying allows to avoid most HLC fire and missile locks. Using LoS (with the help of interdiction effects) is what makes the difference between a good and a bad bomber pilot.

DF is made to give its user the chance to be superior for a single attack. If the attack situation happens in open space in a 1v1 situation, DF or no-DF makes the difference. It also allows a scout to finish its current attack, even if a gunship should spot him in time. It allows a gunship to stay on target for their current charge while under pressure before they have to retreat. Think of it as similar to cloaked classes in ground PvP. They're allowed to have the first hit and burst damage, but they usually need to retreat if they fail. Using DF (combined with maneuvers) wisely is what makes the difference between a good and a bad scout/gunship pilot.

 

CP with an option to make AP weapons useless would not be OP if the effect was short enough. If the current T3 options of CP were combined and replaced T2 and the new T3 would be either "+4 seconds duration" (making it to what it is now) or "-10 seconds cooldown, -11 seconds duration, effect works now against AP" (making it comparable to what DF is now) then it would be the choice between a defensive and an offensive option. The offensive option with 20 seconds cooldown and only 6 seconds duration would be extremely helpful when you had to defend yourself against a scout or a gunship for a short period of time but also would lose potential in fights against bombers at satellites.

The other way around, if DF's right T3 would stay the same but its left T3 would change to "+13 seconds duration, +10 seconds cooldown" (making it comparable to what CP is now). With the new option Scouts would have a disadvantage against other scouts with the break option (assuming BLC+clusters on both), and a general disadvantage against lockons, but they will become almost impossible to kill with blasters or railguns.

 

From my point of view, the problem isn't DF itself. The problem is that missiles and torpedos aren't good enough, which makes the T2 Strike the probably worst ship. They either need direct buffs, for example revamped talents to allow a choice between a significant reduction of lockon or reload time, or indirect buffs via copilot abilities as I mentioned above, for example unbreakable after launch (1min cooldown, every missile fired during the next 20 (15?) seconds can't be stopped from hitting once it's launched). For the T2 Strike it might be an improvement to be able to equip the same missile twice. Most "utility" missiles need a general revamp to be viable at all.

On topic of AP weapons I think the main problem is that they either don't have AP at all or they have 100%. It might be a good thing to reduce some weapons to 60-80% while other weapons that currently don't have AP could be raised to 20-40%. Having BLC with 60% AP would make CP a more useful option for Strikes as well as having RFL with 40% would make them a nice option against bombers for ships without acces to BLC and somewhat useful for starter ships.

[ALaggyGrunt]

Well they're both employed with entirely different tactics. At any rate though with proper CD management an evasion scout can ensure that it is never threatened by the majority of missile weapons that are the one counter to evasion.

 

So the comparison is valid since DField's break is doing what my comparison to CP suggests: ie giving the build a counter to all of it's counters save for one of those weapons. Just because the components have different duration doesn't change the fact that DField's break literally grants its user immunity to almost all the weapons (missiles) that counter evasion builds to the point where those weapons effectively don't exist in game. That's no different than deciding that CP should have a T3 upgrade that effectively erases all AP weapons save one as viable counters to the build.

 

If DField's break didn't effectively remove those weapons as counters then they'd be as much of a threat to a DField build as clusters. The fact is that the only missile weapon counter to evasion that actually works is clusters which means that DField's break is effectively a counter to the majority of its counters. So you either have to 1) make all missiles as spammable as clusters (which IMO is not a good design choice) or 2) remove DField's break. Either way missiles need to be close to the same level (or the same level) of threatening to a DField user as clusters or you're effectively keeping the status quo where only one of the build's counters actually works and the rest might as well not exist.

 

EDIT:

Once DField breaks a missile you're looking at anywhere from 8.6 to 15.4 seconds of that missile reloading and relocking (longer if the missile is unupgraded or you factor in the target not just sitting in your firing arc waiting for you to reload and relock or if you factor in missile travel time). But for the sake of argument let's say the target doesn't do anything that forces the enemy to take longer than 15.4 seconds to fire their next missile. That means for DField has a vulnerability to missiles between a mere 4.6 seconds (torps) and 11.4 seconds (concs).

That's missing fly time. The protorp's fly time is so bad I forced a sledge to pdive, was on it almost immediately with a protorp lock, and it boosted ahead of the ptorp and pdived again because the cooldown was back up.

CP unupgraded is vulnerable to non-AP weapons for 15 seconds. Now DField grants a hefty evasion buff for 6 seconds, leaving it with 14 seconds where it's vulnerable again to accuracy based weapons. So that's about the same time of vulnerability unupgraded CP has to non-AP weapons (yes I know we're comparing upgraded vs. unupgraded, I just needed to state these numbers for what follows). For the sake of argument let's say you changed CP so your two T3 options were as follows: upgrade it's overall duration so it's vulnerable to non-AP weapons for 11 seconds and remains vulnerable to AP weapons (CP functions exactly as it does now) or an upgrade called something like "hardened armor" that provides an additional 160% DR against AP specific sources of damage for 18 seconds. Now let's say in that world the only weapon with more than 100% AP was HLC, this means the damage of all the other AP weapons is completely nullified. Taking this CP upgrade means it's now vulnerable to non-AP weapons for 15 seconds and AP weapons for 12 seconds.

 

Congratulations we have now created a CP that counters it's counters exactly the way DField does with nearly the exact same time periods of vulnerability. Note the CP user is now faced with the exact same choice DField users currently face: longer immunity to damage affected by DR/Evasion (the respective T3 duration upgrades which incidentally leave both components vulnerable to non-AP/accuracy sources of damage for 11 seconds; remember DField users still have engine missile breaks so choosing this option doesn't mean they trade any ability to counter missiles which automatically puts them ahead of CP users who did have to trade ANY counter to AP for this longer duration) or keep the base immunity the component gives to damage affected by DR/Evasion so you can GAIN immunity to the counters of that build (AP and missiles respectively; incidentally both are .6 seconds apart in vulnerability to their counters). Based on the consensus of which DField upgrade you should use I'm guessing it'd be the same for CP. I didn't have to give DField 20 seconds duration or anything to make it be within a second of having the same vulnerability duration of my hypothetical CP, I just had to create a new CP T3 upgrade and leave DField functioning exactly as it is now.

 

Would that CP be at all balanced? Not likely. Is that exactly how DField functions with the T3 break? Yup. This is what I'm getting at in my comparison between DField and CP.

 

That hypothetical charged plating could still be whacked with energy leech or snare very easily-ion missile, interdiction missile, ion rail, ion mine, interdiction mine, interdiction drone, sab probe. Oh, and it couldn't be put on a platform with serious mobility. Mines and drones can be flown around, missiles can be broken by engine-so we're back to ion rail. Dfield, less so, unless there's something nearby which can be hit with ion rail so it can splash, or it gets dragged through a mine+dronefield. So, it wouldn't even be as broken as dfield if you did that.

 

Just to highlight this part but if you look at my above edit you'll see it's actually entirely possible for DField to get the equivalent immunity CP has IF DField takes the duration rather than missile break option. Selecting that means that DField's evasion lasts 9 seconds out of 20 which gives it's user 11 seconds of vulnerability to accuracy based weapons. That's exactly the same number of seconds a CP user is vulnerable to non-AP weapons. So it's not a matter of imagining your scenario, DField can totally be set up to only be vulnerable to accuracy for 11 seconds the way CP is vulnerable to non-AP weapons, it's just that the missile break option that allows DField users to ignore all but one lock-on weapon that counters their build is a far better choice than having a shorter duration of vulnerability to accuracy based weapons at the price of being vulnerable to evasion's counter.

Almost. CP is 19s on/11s off. Dfield is 6/24 (stock), 6/14 (t2, t3 right), or 9/11 (t3 left). This would give anything with charged plating a lot more time on target if we ignore snares and drains. The time on target would mean almost nothing because the game would get a lot more snare/drain-heavy, and without any weapon power available, the charged plating ship is stuck with missiles.

 

But the AP weapons are all still effective against a CP user. And therein lies the difference. All AP weapons can still damage a CP user (some being more easy to use than others but still they are all still counter it) whereas only clusters can damage a DField user barring pilot error. A CP user can't press a button to simply ignore the majority of AP weapons that counter it; DField users can and do just press a button to ignore all counters to it save for clusters. DField doesn't just allow it's user to survive when they'd otherwise die, it allows it to ignore being pressured by the majority of the counters to it's build while it completes it's attack run whereas a CP user MUST respond to the pressure of AP weapons by breaking LOS (which may mean breaking off from an attack run). DField's break allows a scout to get in safely when the counters to it would otherwise have forced it to withdraw or die. That's not balance, that's allowing pilots to press a button to ignore the counters to their build. There's a reason CP doesn't have that option: it'd be horribly broken if CP users could just press a button to that effectively made almost all AP weapons non-existent in the game.

 

Mines and drones are the big counters, not clusters. Nothing will kill a scout faster than dragging it through a minefield-which is why the Candy Mountain games and all the threads about bombers and gunships: GS counter not-scouts, bombers counter pretty much anything which gets in range.

 

I know that was a troll idea, but as a way to shake up the META, it would work. I'm just not sure it would be much fun, because of how snares would go everywhere.

[Ramalina]

 

The difference in duration of CP and DF also indicates their main uses.

CP is made to give someone the chance to hold his ground. That's why CP works best at satellites where mines and interdiction effects lessen the threat to be killed by scouts (the mines and interdiction effects are also the reason why CP is more useful on bombers than on strikes) and LoS can be used to avoid railgun damage as well as defensive flying allows to avoid most HLC fire and missile locks. Using LoS (with the help of interdiction effects) is what makes the difference between a good and a bad bomber pilot.

DF is made to give its user the chance to be superior for a single attack. If the attack situation happens in open space in a 1v1 situation, DF or no-DF makes the difference. It also allows a scout to finish its current attack, even if a gunship should spot him in time. It allows a gunship to stay on target for their current charge while under pressure before they have to retreat. Think of it as similar to cloaked classes in ground PvP. They're allowed to have the first hit and burst damage, but they usually need to retreat if they fail. Using DF (combined with maneuvers) wisely is what makes the difference between a good and a bad scout/gunship pilot.

 

Well if DF had a 3 min CD like Force Cloak, we probably wouldn't be complaining about it. Stealth if you'll recall, can't be entered while in combat without use of a very long timer CD.

 

A big part of the issue is that the defensive CD cycle on double break ships is shorter than the burst cycle on other ships, it protects against sustained DPS at the same time, and it's available on the ship classes that are best at kiting. If you did that in the ground game the first ten pages of the PvP forum would be filled exclusively with rant threads about that ability. Not that the ten pages of rant threads is unusual, but they rarely manage to unify around a single rant topic.

 

I think that DF may actually be fairly balanced on a BLC-Cluster-Interdiction T3 gunship build. It has range and mobility constraints that are fairly strict, and they moderate the power of what's otherwise basically a battlescout clone. Other ships can escape if they want to, and the gunship has difficulty escaping to the extent that the weaknesses of DF when it's on cooldown actually have a chance to matter.

 

 

Of course, one could just shorten the burst cycle so that every ship can slip burst in through the DF CD cycle, the problem then is that since less than half the ships get DF, suddenly all the non-DF ships are getting hit by about twice as much burst, leaving us with the same DF based disparities in balance that we have now.

 

To not touch DF, in addition to getting it so that all classes of ship had primary/secondary weapon combos that could reliably slip burst damage through the DF CD cycle you'd also have to find a way to equalize for DF's average ability to prevent incoming damage with other shield options' ability to absorb and regenerate that damage. Right now the other shields lag by quite a bit, which would need to be addressed on the ships that don't get DF. Buffing QCS would be a good start.

[tunewalker]

And what Ramalina just said is basically the begginning and the end. Yes offensive buffs are needed for missiles to be viable (to me its just lock times and range to a degree) but that's not it, if we upped the damage and range of strikes and efficiency of strikes so that they can hit these Disto monsters with any kind of reliability, they all of a sudden become victims of their own tactics, thus the only way to fix these issues is not only a buff to secondaries but a serious buff to shields that ARENT disto. Quick charge is one, but honestly so is Directionals. there is a reason Disto is more popular on a scout then Directionals or Quick charge (ya they have that to...) this is ALSO why this is so hard... oh look all those bad components that a strike has, buff them to make them Op... oh look the scouts are playing them now and they are still better then Strikes because their mobility actually allows them to get into range of their effective weapons... who would have guessed.

Edited September 12, 2015 by tunewalker

[Svarthrafn]

Really there should have never been space superiority scouts. The basic scout isn't that bad balance-wise. A good T1 scout can be very good, which is great. The T2 though is the one that flat out obsoletes strikes. When GSF first launched, I started on scouts. Got really good with the T1 before I upgraded to the T2 and it felt like god mode.

 

Make scouts skirmish/EWAR and leave the heavy hitting to the strikes, and I think things would be pretty solid.

 

I love my strikes. I enjoy the flying style and the weaponry a lot more (I'm american, and our pilots love our missiles!). However it sucks knowing that I do my job better in a sting or flashfire. Any buffs to strike components and weaponry need to be strikes only, or else the scouts will do it better.

Edited September 12, 2015 by Svarthrafn

[JasonSzeremi]

We could get away with un-nerfing evasion if we made some weapons hard counter it.

 

When did evasion get nerfed?

2. most of us seem to be against nerfing evasion directly, because it plays an importent role in gunship warfare, where there are very very few other good defenses.

[JasonSzeremi]

What if you just changed something as minor as the inherent Dampening on strike fighters such that they were undetectable to most gunships until they reached 11km or (whatever the max range of protorps is)? Heck, if you made it so they were undetectable until they were even closer (8k?) it may just give a use for Sensor Beacons or scouts playing scout roles. I don't think ghost missile tones from an enemy beyond targeting range would be that imbalanced either. It would make ProTorps and Thermites stronger, but those are slow-locking, long-reloading missiles in the first place so you can't just spam them.

 

Edit: I think it has the added bonus of making the Sensor component and the Tactical crew-member somewhat relevant since your best defense against getting surprised is greater sensor range (something we have never cared about).

 

So stealth strike fighters?

[Svarthrafn]

So stealth strike fighters?

 

I mentioned this in a thread just yesterday. If you were to introduce some sort of stealth ship, the crying about gunships would plummet.

[JasonSzeremi]

Really there should have never been space superiority scouts. The basic scout isn't that bad balance-wise. A good T1 scout can be very good, which is great. The T2 though is the one that flat out obsoletes strikes. When GSF first launched, I started on scouts. Got really good with the T1 before I upgraded to the T2 and it felt like god mode.

 

Make scouts skirmish/EWAR and leave the heavy hitting to the strikes, and I think things would be pretty solid.

 

I love my strikes. I enjoy the flying style and the weaponry a lot more (I'm american, and our pilots love our missiles!). However it sucks knowing that I do my job better in a sting or flashfire. Any buffs to strike components and weaponry need to be strikes only, or else the scouts will do it better.

 

Well this is the genie that escaped from the bottle.

 

Now that so much time and investment has gone into flying these 'space superiority' scouts we have a large and mostly happy community of T2 pilots who justifiably will push back if you try to nerf their birds.

 

So how do you make the strike fighter better at being a strike fighter, then the T2 scout? Without taking away someone else's fun.... hopefully fun of facing a challenge and not just fun of slaughtering noobs in strikes who don't know they are crap.

 

I am in favor of buffing missiles/cutting lock on times, perhaps even killing reload time altogether.... or dropping ammo completely..... (Rail guns don't have ammo counters and those are projectiles. Bombers don't have ammo counters and mines and drones are solid objects not energy bars. Ground game doesn't use ammo that isn't automatically replenished like energy. )

Currently it takes at least as much skill to fly a strike fighter well as it does to fly a scout, but the scout can do more, survive longer, fly further. But everything I can throw at one of these with a strike doesn't even leave a dent sometimes, while they leave me launching from my spawn points.

It is with some relief and some dismay that I realized these fighters simply out class the strike fighters I fly well. They should be on the same playing field but everything that goes into a good engagement, even from surprise, favors T2 scouts over strikes. Part of it, is that the strike simply does not have a good set of surprise weapons. Cluster missiles are good in the tight ranges where scouts excell, but every scout I've seen can survive one spread of these and a burst of any laser the strike mounts plus get away quicker then the strike can persue.

 

All I want is the ability to shoot down my target just as well as my target can shoot me down. Give me the tools to do the job the strike fighter was designed for, let it be one where the one who fires first flys away, and I'll never complain about being shot down.

But if I fire first, do everything right, and still get shot down by another craft in my ideal range, head to head, then something is wrong with my bird.

[JasonSzeremi]

I mentioned this in a thread just yesterday. If you were to introduce some sort of stealth ship, the crying about gunships would plummet.

 

from the rumors I have heard, stealth fighters were on the drawing boards, but they were considering them as counters to scouts, which... already have counters.

[caederon]

I mentioned this in a thread just yesterday. If you were to introduce some sort of stealth ship, the crying about gunships would plummet.

... and the crying about stealth ships would immediately rise to fever pitch.

 

Given that one of the chief complaints levied against gunships is "I didn't even see what killed me!" do you think people would appreciate and accept a ship class whose defining characteristic is sneaking up on things unseen and killing them?

 

There are interesting mechanics possible with the concept of stealth, and there are sensor abilities that exist now which would finally have a reason for existing, but one thing the introduction of stealth fighters would NOT do is reduce forum whining. It might re-target it slightly, but the cries would be loud and anguished.

 

Despon

[Ramalina]

When did evasion get nerfed?

 

Long ago in a GSF meta full of battlescout swarms. They used to be able to get to something like 110% evasion if they blew all their cooldowns.

 

 

Re: stealth/damping

 

Dampening sensors used to work as advertised in the description without a 15 km limit. This is why when arguing GSF design with Verain I generally have to pull out the reminder that as designed the T1 GS was capable of having a fully optimized build. They may have altered the numbers for various sources of dampening in one of the balance passes, but a GS used to be able to get within firing range of a strike without showing up on the strike's sensors at all. Stealth gunships were such a balancing disaster that they just broke damping within 15 km, and didn't bother giving anything to compensate for it. All those useless sensor related talents and components on the T1 scout were supposed to be the counter to dampening and the planned stealth class, but in addition to the components not working nearly well enough there weren't enough players willing to fly ECM scout builds to support their team. It turned out to be easier and faster to just have a giant swarm of battlescouts roaming around and destroying all of the other team's strikes, gunships, and any battlescouts that hadn't upgraded and learned to use both Barrel Roll (when it had a 10 s cooldown) and DF.

 

I think the take home lesson there for the developers was that stealth, even when very limited is really hard to balance well in GSF, and that as cool as the idea may have initially seemed they didn't, and probably still don't, have the time needed to do a decent job of balancing a stealth ship class.

[Gavin_Kelvar]

DF does not "literally grant its user immunity to all counters to high evasion builds". It doesn't counter seismic, concussion or interdiction mines. It doesn't counter railgun drones. It doesn't counter interdiction effects. It doesn't counter ion rail cleave. And it only counters seekers, missle drone's missiles and other missiles once and is not giving an immunity like maneuvers do.

 

Okay I concede that it doesn't counter the various static mines out there. But I don't consider those to be true counters since it requires a scout to commit some type of pilot error to be hit by them (either flying into them due to poor situational awareness or staying latched on a bomber's tail long enough for the bomber to drag it into the mines, in which case the scout is no longer utilizing the hit and run method best suited to it's strengths).

 

Also I don't consider snares to be counters per se since you'd still largely need to kill it with some other weapon that does a higher amount of damage. And Ion AOE is absolutely not a counter since it requires you to hit a different ship than the evasion scout; a counter is something that works directly on the ship itself without requiring an additional target to be present for the counter to work (and since Ion Rail is accuracy based evasion is the counter to the railgun, not the other way around).

 

As for the rest of you're post I'll just quote Ramilina and Tune who basically cover all the reasons why a buff that ignores doing anything to DField won't actually work or ultimately benefit strikers as much as it should

 

Of course, one could just shorten the burst cycle so that every ship can slip burst in through the DF CD cycle, the problem then is that since less than half the ships get DF, suddenly all the non-DF ships are getting hit by about twice as much burst, leaving us with the same DF based disparities in balance that we have now.

 

To not touch DF, in addition to getting it so that all classes of ship had primary/secondary weapon combos that could reliably slip burst damage through the DF CD cycle you'd also have to find a way to equalize for DF's average ability to prevent incoming damage with other shield options' ability to absorb and regenerate that damage. Right now the other shields lag by quite a bit, which would need to be addressed on the ships that don't get DF. Buffing QCS would be a good start.

 

if we upped the damage and range of strikes and efficiency of strikes so that they can hit these Disto monsters with any kind of reliability, they all of a sudden become victims of their own tactics, thus the only way to fix these issues is not only a buff to secondaries but a serious buff to shields that ARENT disto. Quick charge is one, but honestly so is Directionals. there is a reason Disto is more popular on a scout then Directionals or Quick charge (ya they have that to...) this is ALSO why this is so hard... oh look all those bad components that a strike has, buff them to make them Op... oh look the scouts are playing them now and they are still better then Strikes because their mobility actually allows them to get into range of their effective weapons

 

And just to address this:

 

Mines and drones are the big counters, not clusters. Nothing will kill a scout faster than dragging it through a minefield

 

The reason I considered missiles the primary counter to evasion and not mines is this: bombers came out after the official release (and several months after early access) whereas missiles were there from day one. I'm assuming here that the devs wouldn't have introduced a defensive stat that completely countered accuracy based weapons (remember evasion originally could basically reduce a weapon's accuracy to 0% before tracking penalties) and not also have a weapon that countered that defensive stat. So if mines, not missiles were meant to be the primary counters it means they basically did the equivalent of launching the game with DR/CP and only released AP weapons several months later. I for one don't believe the devs would make that big of a balancing mistake.

 

Ergo my conclusion is that all missiles were meant to be the primary counters to evasion but due to DField's missile break it effectively means only one of those counters works. As I recall DField during early access only had a 3 second duration so a lot of people picked the duration boost and during the heated debates over evasion many of it's defenders argued you should just use missiles if you couldn't hit with blasters (and without everyone using the break concs were somewhat reliable). This was changed in 2.6 to 6 second duration along with the evasion nerf.

 

This does bring up a balance idea that wouldn't require removing DField's break: return DField's duration to 3 seconds. To further make that choice even more compelling remove all of DField's base passive evasion and shift it to that T3 upgrade. That way a DField user who chooses the missile break for added defense against missiles must pay the price of distinctly less evasion defense (meaning even if they break the missile accuracy based damage will stand a better chance of getting through).

Edited September 12, 2015 by Gavin_Kelvar