We'll be taking a look at the plasma cannon along with all AV weapons as part of the vehicle work we are doing in 1.5.

Tbh, I think the clip size is fine. I like the idea of a shoulder mounted "rocket" weapon in the game. It does, however suffer from a lack of a benefit, so here's what I'd do:

Swap swarm launcher damage with plasma cannon damage. The swarm launcher is in every way superior to the cannon - clip size, damage, range, and accuracy. I think that the plasma cannon should reward proper placement by being a burst damage close range rocket, while the benefit of swarms should remain the lock-on feature, at the cost of a lower damage.

I don't know about the rest of you, but I want them to apply kick to the user when you fire them. I want dumb-fire back.

I want to be able to aim straight down and launch myself into the air, landing behind and enemy and then knifing them in the back of the face.



But, if I can be serious for a moment -

Ideally, I'd want swarms (assuming time was found to be put in to this) to be shifted to something like an 'assisted lock' TOW launcher.

Fly-by-wire missiles are nothing new in shooter games. However, they're usually pretty difficult to use. While I'd love to see a proper TOW system... I just don't see it happening. So... What I'd like to see, is essentially what we've got now but removing the 'fire and forget' aspect of the weapon, requiring someone to maintain the lock by keeping the 'locked on' target box inside their reticule until the missiles make contact. Losing track/LOS of the target would make the missiles miss, but could be corrected and put pack on course if the lock is re-established quickly enough.

Now, with a change like this you could fire repeated volleys off the same lock, but you'd need to maintain tracking throughout the entire thing. This requires a lot more dedication from swarmers. Alongside this, I'd like to see a missile velocity buff, but keep the damage the way they are. As-is missiles are pretty slow and can be evaded entirely by certain vehicles going at top speed. Faster missiles would prevent this in most cases, and would reduce the amount of time a swamer would have to maintain direct sight & lock.

As primarily an AV player, and secondarily a tanker with my alt, the only problem I see with swarms is the fact that you're invisible to most of the targets you're attacking. If they would fix the rendering issue that makes tanks unable to see swarms unless they're launched from like 40m of them, this would fix most of the problem. If you call in a militia tank, you should damned well lose it to my proto swarms with dmg mods, the same way I can take out militia suits with a proto suit/weapon.
The damage is fine, there are already PLENTY of actually capable tankers out there who know how to fit their tanks and can withstand 8-9 volleys straight before finding cover for the 1 minute it takes to come back in at full health. The same goes for militia and assault dropships. Some of the assault pilots have figured out that it's quite possible to take almost no damage from swarms while still engaging us by just strafing in a circle above us. Swarms never catch them and they never stop shooting us.
Also, I would like to see some uniformity on the swarm missile tracking. Either make it curve (seek) after the target all the time, or make it fly to the place the target was and then abruptly turn, right now it's about 50/50 on what the logic will be. Make it predictable so both the av and vehicle drivers will know how to react.


Edit: In reply to Nova Knife: That's a terrible solution. The second you fire a vehicle would simply have to move in and out of cover, similar to strafing as a dropsuit when somebody is shooting you, except for with a vehicle it would literally make them unhittable.

As primarily an AV player, and secondarily a tanker with my alt, the only problem I see with swarms is the fact that you're invisible to most of the targets you're attacking. If they would fix the rendering issue that makes tanks unable to see swarms unless they're launched from like 40m of them, this would fix most of the problem. If you call in a militia tank, you should damned well lose it to my proto swarms with dmg mods, the same way I can take out militia suits with a proto suit/weapon.
The damage is fine, there are already PLENTY of actually capable tankers out there who know how to fit their tanks and can withstand 8-9 volleys straight before finding cover for the 1 minute it takes to come back in at full health. The same goes for militia and assault dropships. Some of the assault pilots have figured out that it's quite possible to take almost no damage from swarms while still engaging us by just strafing in a circle above us. Swarms never catch them and they never stop shooting us.
Also, I would like to see some uniformity on the swarm missile tracking. Either make it curve (seek) after the target all the time, or make it fly to the place the target was and then abruptly turn, right now it's about 50/50 on what the logic will be. Make it predictable so both the av and vehicle drivers will know how to react.


Edit: In reply to Nova Knife: That's a terrible solution. The second you fire a vehicle would simply have to move in and out of cover, similar to strafing as a dropsuit when somebody is shooting you, except for with a vehicle it would literally make them unhittable.

right onn you think their mostly ballanced. Armor tankers claim that proto swarms do a rediculas amount of damage. Do you agree of disagree? When i ask them about it they all say they do about 3000 damage per volly

Two proto modded volleys will instapop well fitted tanks.

right onn you think their mostly ballanced. Armor tankers claim that proto swarms do a rediculas amount of damage. Do you agree of disagree? When i ask them about it they all say they do about 3000 damage per volly. I am a shield tanker and with totall 60% resist (counting the natural resist) 4 to 5 proto swarm vollys strips me of my shields. thats a lot of damage

No, they won't. Unless you're running more than the 3 complex dmg mods I am, you're not fighting "well fitted" tanks at all. Falchion yesterday, slightly over 9k shields. Armor can't hit those high of numbers, at least that I've ever seen, but they can certainly fit to negate damage or just rep through it.

Exmaple Core: Yes, they are definitely biased towards being used against armor targets. I'm not so sure about 3k, but then again these are some of the same people that kept saying Lai Dais were doing anywhere between 4k and 7k damage. Numbers always inflate. Generally I think they could use a buff though, as I have a slightly higher success rate against armor than shields.

yeah, Exp. does way too much bonus damage against armor

perhaps lowering it's dmg bonus against armor (and equally raising the dmg against shields) they would not be so over powered.

PRO lvl swarms w/ dmg mods OHK STD LAVs that aren't runing like 2 active resists and even then they barely survive.

either that, or introduce ADV and PRO vehciles that have more slots/built-in resist/PG/CPU/etc. to contend with PRO level AV

No, they won't. Unless you're running more than the 3 complex dmg mods I am, you're not fighting "well fitted" tanks at all. Falchion yesterday, slightly over 9k shields. Armor can't hit those high of numbers, at least that I've ever seen, but they can certainly fit to negate damage or just rep through it.

Exmaple Core: Yes, they are definitely biased towards being used against armor targets. I'm not so sure about 3k, but then again these are some of the same people that kept saying Lai Dais were doing anywhere between 4k and 7k damage. Numbers always inflate. Generally I think they could use a buff though, as I have a slightly higher success rate against armor than shields.

Dust 514 : The Importance Of AV Grenades

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=laoXHCsk3hw




4 LAV'S in less than one minute...if you reduce the amount of AV or what not.....REDUCE the amount of LAV'S that can be present.

Dust 514 : The Importance Of AV Grenades

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=laoXHCsk3hw




4 LAV'S in less than one minute...if you reduce the amount of AV or what not.....REDUCE the amount of LAV'S that can be present.

I don't know about the rest of you, but I want them to apply kick to the user when you fire them. I want dumb-fire back.

I want to be able to aim straight down and launch myself into the air, landing behind and enemy and then knifing them in the back of the face.



But, if I can be serious for a moment -

Ideally, I'd want swarms (assuming time was found to be put in to this) to be shifted to something like an 'assisted lock' TOW launcher.

Fly-by-wire missiles are nothing new in shooter games. However, they're usually pretty difficult to use. While I'd love to see a proper TOW system... I just don't see it happening. So... What I'd like to see, is essentially what we've got now but removing the 'fire and forget' aspect of the weapon, requiring someone to maintain the lock by keeping the 'locked on' target box inside their reticule until the missiles make contact. Losing track/LOS of the target would make the missiles miss, but could be corrected and put pack on course if the lock is re-established quickly enough.

Now, with a change like this you could fire repeated volleys off the same lock, but you'd need to maintain tracking throughout the entire thing. This requires a lot more dedication from swarmers. Alongside this, I'd like to see a missile velocity buff, but keep the damage the way they are. As-is missiles are pretty slow and can be evaded entirely by certain vehicles going at top speed. Faster missiles would prevent this in most cases, and would reduce the amount of time a swamer would have to maintain direct sight & lock.

As we should all know by now, AV and vehicals are going to be changed in 1.5 and most likely 1.6 and will be changed completly. as evident in this post:




So, im going to go through the whole list of AV weapons in different threads and try to collect a non biased collection of feedback the Devs can use to change vehicals and AV. So remember, what we post here is what they may listen to. Ive started a discussion on Plasma Cannons in this thread: https://forums.dust514.com/default.aspx?g=posts&m=1145262#post1145262
Also, this link is the AV nade discussion: https://forums.dust514.com/default.aspx?g=posts&find=unread&t=99452 Feel free to throw in your thoughtful and reasonable ideas in ethire.

What are your ideas for the swarm launcher rebalance?
Remember to ALWAYS give reasons on your ideas, we dont want to give the DEVs crap to read. Put up a convincing argument!!

Personally, I believe the swarm launcher should be the weakest form of AV due to the simplicity of the weapon, that a no skill required weapon should not be an insainly effective weapon on the battlefield, like it currently is. However, it should still be able to keep a tank at bay, its AV. I feel it should do the least amount of damage compared to the other AV and a post in the plasma cannon discussion sums it up here:


This way, the shield tanks will be largely unbothered by explosive AV because of the explosive resist shield tanks boast and the real counter to shield tanks will be the eventual lasers and the current forge guns. Armor tanks will still be hurt by the explosive type of swarms, as it is their weakness and will scare them away.
The swarms tracking is absurdly exact but very awsume to watch and needed, swarms would be too easy to avoid without such extreem tracking measures. If the damage is reduced it may be entitled for a +1 clip size as well, if not then the current clip is sufficent. The missle speed, range and lock time are also very sufficent as is. The promblem with the weapon is its damage.
My opinion

Let me tell you a little secret. Many people will tell you im the best tanker in the game. Im not saying I am, I just do my best and let others decide. But there is a reason people say these things. I know how to fit a tank better or as well as anyone in this game. I have a 7kdr and it would be like 15 if I didn't screw around from time to time. Perhaps if I activate every module on my tanks ill take 2 to 4 proto volleys.

Im talking about armor tanks which take more damage to swarms. Sheild tanks are different they wont have such a big deal but there reps are so sh!tty that taking any damage in a shield tank makes you very vulnerable.

just lol

im not an armor tanker so i cant comment on the real damage to armor tanks, id imagine they do do alot of damage because they are made to destroy armor tanks, their explosive. 4 to 7k damage per lai dai is... and exageration lolol i dont talk to idiots who claim those numbers i assure you my armor tank freinds are more reasonable than that. But at the same time you use the swarms and i belive you both, though your opinions clash. Its weird. You say swarms should be buffed because you do better vs armor than you do shields. Armor tanks take more damage from swarms and shields take less, wouldent those kind of results make sence and be expected? how would you buff the swarm and why?

you should be able to cancel a swarm lock without having to turn around 360 , thats whats missing from swarms

As we should all know by now, AV and vehicals are going to be changed in 1.5 and most likely 1.6 and will be changed completly. as evident in this post:




So, im going to go through the whole list of AV weapons in different threads and try to collect a non biased collection of feedback the Devs can use to change vehicals and AV. So remember, what we post here is what they may listen to. Ive started a discussion on Plasma Cannons in this thread: https://forums.dust514.com/default.aspx?g=posts&m=1145262#post1145262
Also, this link is the AV nade discussion: https://forums.dust514.com/default.aspx?g=posts&find=unread&t=99452 Feel free to throw in your thoughtful and reasonable ideas in ethire.

What are your ideas for the swarm launcher rebalance?
Remember to ALWAYS give reasons on your ideas, we dont want to give the DEVs crap to read. Put up a convincing argument!!

Personally, I believe the swarm launcher should be the weakest form of AV due to the simplicity of the weapon, that a no skill required weapon should not be an insainly effective weapon on the battlefield, like it currently is. However, it should still be able to keep a tank at bay, its AV. I feel it should do the least amount of damage compared to the other AV and a post in the plasma cannon discussion sums it up here:


This way, the shield tanks will be largely unbothered by explosive AV because of the explosive resist shield tanks boast and the real counter to shield tanks will be the eventual lasers and the current forge guns. Armor tanks will still be hurt by the explosive type of swarms, as it is their weakness and will scare them away.
The swarms tracking is absurdly exact but very awsume to watch and needed, swarms would be too easy to avoid without such extreem tracking measures. If the damage is reduced it may be entitled for a +1 clip size as well, if not then the current clip is sufficent. The missle speed, range and lock time are also very sufficent as is. The promblem with the weapon is its damage.
My opinion

Firstly, I apologize because I haven't read any of this thread except the OP (I'm at work and wanted to respond with my idea before I forget).

I was gunning in a friends tank a couple days ago and we were discussing how cool it would be if the gunners in the tanks could shoot the swarm missiles and blow them up before they hit the tank. Now this would apply to all gunners and swarms. I like to run AV and use proto swarms and used to use FG back in chrome. I think nerfing swarms is a bad idea because they are strictly AV, FG and plasma cannons can be used on infantry. Nerfing the swarms would make them completely useless. Instead of nerfing, they can be balanced by letting gunners shoot them out of the sky! How cool would that be?

Ps:
Sorry for any typos or grammatical errors. I'm at work typin this on my phone trying not to get caught.