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.

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

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.

clearly they need to fire twice as many rockets maple 2x the dmg will fix everything (god i hope ccp takes me seriously roflmao)

This is a grand idea. Maintaining sight lock makes good sense, even if you boost missile velocity (Slightly, 10% at the extreme most) to make lolswarms have to work for their kills. Yeah, vehicles could move in and out to dodge, but you know what? Your job is to make sure that tank isn't killing your team, and he can't kill your team if he's busy avoiding your swarms.

This is war. It's about who wins, not your personal kd ratio or padding your wp. AV's job is to deny the enemy vehicular assistance, whether my forcing him to hide, or blowing him to hell.

Also, I agree that dropships should be able to dodge swarms. Missiles turning 180 with no change in acceleration is ridiculous.

I want a dumbfire rocket launcher (Like an RPG). I pretty much want the plasma cannon but make it anti armor and more like how BF3's RPGs are. I hate lock on weaponry and always will. If you want an argument then tell me reasons why we shouldn't have this.

I like the op original idea of making the plasma cannon stronger and swarms weaker, simply due to the degree of difficulty of the weapon, and its effective range.

Oh so your saying the weapon should force you out of cover? lol the weapon was designed so that you could engage the enemy armor without exposing yourself. You want to kill me? well then get up that mountain and come get me because im not budging. This is a war game. I will do whatever it takes not to die while making you die as many times as possible. Welcome to the true battlefield where patience and playing on the defense is rewarded and being a run and gun sport tard is punished.

Make em anti air only.

wtf does skill have to do with anything?

difficulty of proper use is a valid point, skill at circumventing said difficulties is an individual player trait and has no place in any balancing conversation.

I don't use swarms, be it AV nade or tank I never have a problem with armor tanks. But than again that takes risking suits to get close enough to throw a nade or risking my own tank to take out theirs. Swarms are the I win button of AV, no skill no risk and devastating to even the best fit tanks. Every other form of AV has some risk, swarms power has to come in line with the risk that's not involved.