with no clear way to judge who is the best or what the best means all we have is opinion. I have been heavy AV since chrome. Dropships are fodder. The few pilots I have interacted have outperformed their crappy equipment. The dudes I listed are my personal favorites and have time and time again proved their piloting skills. Nobody else has been noteworthy. Just like tankers, AV guys keep a list. Sadly my tanker list is useless now because tanking is a joke

Dual hardeners. FG can barely scratch a drop ship now. Good "pilots" are a dime a dozen. You got the same complex the tankers got. When CCP unties AVs hands we will see who's good. Until then I will endure everyone's bragging and hiding behind mommas skirt.

...I wouldn't be trying to say that I'm just talking out of my ass when I say that around 50% of the pilots in Condor Squad and 1st are amazing, because they are. Before this update even came out I was killing forge gunners who thought they could 1 shot me, but were proven wrong with my fitting. I'm not trying to change the tone here, but when you say that we're just "bragging" and aren't really that good, you're extremely mistaken. Have you even seen me, judge, or the other pilots I listed in the OP fly?

And i don't even fit hardeners! And neither do most of the other pro pilots I fly with, I can take shots and recover from them by using speed and maneuverability to get myself out of sticky situations, not a hardener. 2 Complex Shield Extenders sure, but no active modules of any kind except for my complex afterburner in my speedy and transport fit, and my hard hitter fit which has a complex missile dmg amplifier.

thing is the pilots I mentioned have always been bad ass.

I never noticed the rest of you. I am nerfed you are buffed. Now you pick a fight.

Serimos vs. Snugglz vs. Judge vs. gbghg vs. NG vs. Card vs. taxirides vs. Numnutz

Let's make this happen

I'm pretty sure most of us would crash into each other before anyone killed anything
Do I get gunners? Serimos can easily out gun me, but i fit side guns for gunners and try to give them the best angles so I would probably loose in a 1v1 against him. Same with snugglz.

Serimos I couldn't agree more with this post. There are bad pilots good pilots and ace pilots, each being better than the last. I'm sure we could argue all day about who is better, however I think each ace pilot has their own unique way of flying and can say with pride they are the best at their style. I am Pvt Numnutz and I am the grandmaster of the Numnutz style!

For me, the measure of a good dropship pilot is how much you squad mates will trust you in getting them from point A to point B in one piece. Or getting what needs to be done, done. If I ask Judge to clear out a roof top, he'll do it. If i need Evo to pick us up in a hot zone, he'll do it. Foxbat can trusted to absolutely destroy infantry.

I 'm proud of the trust I've earned, and i'm not good at all yet at assault flying. I like the fact that if my squad finds themselves in a empty match they won't hesitate to leap into my ship because i won't let them down. Carrying 6 proto suits in pc match full burners on, when crashing might cost you the match, that's trust. I'm one of the only pilots my CEO will fly with all proto'd out.

Its all about dependability.

thing is the pilots I mentioned have always been bad ass.

I never noticed the rest of you. I am nerfed you are buffed. Now you pick a fight.

Lmfao that would be one sight to see.

It would be fun... but i can some it up for you... whoever gets hit hit first will eventually hit afterburners and it will become a chase game throughout the entire match until hp returns to full, attempt to fire first, if hit then roles switch, if not continue with previous chase.

On a side note, most of us use the ADS, so its really hard to compare simply on kills. ADS is an aerial support vehicle. I normally follow a squad of dustbunnies and when they attemp to capture stuff I hover in a circle around the objective pointing out enemy spawns or I can kill them myself let them know they are still clear.

To me, I will you the best derpship pilot if you find a squad behind enemy lines being fired by rail tanks, forges, and swarms, and you can come in, pick them up and drop them off somewhere safe without losing your derpship. Now thats some real skill.

That's why I love the derpship community. There really isnt a competitiveness with each other because of what we all went through since the game went public. We endured together.

So instead of thinking who would win in a battle... here's the scarier scenario... what happens if me, judge, gbghg, NG, numnutz, snd Serimos (or any other pro pilot) end up in the same squad????

I like dropships. But only if they're blue.

My dropship is white...How do I get a blue one?!?!

I've never heard of the pilots you mentioned. Difference between you and the pilots in here is that just because we never heard of them we don't assume they are 'fodder'. In the 1st Airborne, we treat all pilots with respect regardless of skill level or notoriety.

The thing you need to get into your av head is, nobody ever cared about individual forge gunners. No pilot i know of a has said pre 1.7' 'wow, that guy firing 2.5 k worth of damage at my 3k hp 1.5 million isk dropship from 400 meters must be really skilled at standing on buildings.' You're just not that special.

The pilots you list however, i look forward to meeting in chat or in battle. Hopefully they're not at all like you.

The dropship role is like the Logi role but with fewer opportunities for war points.

We can be slayers, sure, everyone likes that. We are transporters, obviously, though we're rarely used for that, surprisingly. But we also have a lot of odd jobs that go unnoticed and unrewarded, but are tremendous game changers. ADSs are the best link cleaners and placers in the game. In a tank squad, spotting tanks and early warnings can benefit your tankers beyond measure, and in close tank fights your added firepower can sweep fleeing tanks easily. And many more.

Dropships are, in my mind, the most versatile and useful, though tragically underused, vehicle in the game.