tastzlike chicken
ROGUE SPADES
112
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Posted - 2014.01.07 00:02:00 -
[1] - Quote
GÇ£AdaptGÇ¥ , GÇ£You have to change your tacticsGÇ¥, GÇ£You have to time your attackGÇ¥, GÇ£Know the vehicleGÇÖs weaknessesGÇ¥, GÇ£YouGÇÖre just used to the OP god gun swarm launchers used to beGÇ¥, GÇ£Get goodGÇ¥, GÇ£Use a smoke grenadeGÇ¥ ( Oh, sorry, that last disingenuous unhelpfully helpful auto-answer was from a different gameGǪ)
I agree most of the tactical advice tankers are flogging would be AVGÇÖers with. Speaking as a part time proto swarm user I would like to think that most of us rapidly adopted the tactics that tankers and others have outlined and still find our AV weapon of choice lacking. The swarm launcher is nowhere near as pathetic as the plasma cannon but at least they can shoot infantry with it when they need to. (Please, do not reinstitute dumb fire Swarms).
I use it as an area denial weapon, to give infantry some breathing room or a brief opportunity to traverse an open killzone. It is currently the most effective use of the Swarm Launcher GÇôbut if you look at my score at the end of a match where I was doing this as a dedicated function, you would wonder if I had done anything at all the whole match. Crap-ton of damage dealt but little reward for it.
Current hardeners +current tank speed = extremely low risk engagement of infantry for all but the most inept tankers. Swarm launchers needed to be nerfed but the HAV changes plus the changes to the SL was a little bit much from the SL users point of view. I do think they are closer to being balanced than they were before.
A good first step would be to restore the swarm launcher damage. Leave the lock on range as is; it was broken before. LetGÇÖs see how that goes for a while.
Something that CCP could do that would augment the swarm launcher and complicate combat (in a good way) would be to create a tackler role. Give me a means to slow your escape -- Webifier technology (as has been suggested by others) to slow your roll. (Stasis webifiers reduce the speed of a target by a certain percentage and the effects stack (subject to penalty)).
I would engineer them to have high fitting costs and be short range, line of sight infantry modules so that HAV gunners (and enemy infantry) can un-ass the tank by dealing with the tacklers. GÇôand/or create a vehicle module that can perform this duty. This provides a new role for the battlefield and should promote GÇ£teamworkGÇ¥ both to kill a tank and to keep it up and running.
It doesnGÇÖt inherently buff the swarm launcher but does tie up more infantry to increase the effectiveness of the existing AV systems.
I shy away from the idea of a webifier grenade (spam abuse and too low risk for infantry compared to its effect. I also donGÇÖt think webs should be AOE) however, I could support a deployable equipment item.
The lock on range of SL's was a problem. It was too easy for SL infantry to destroy vehicles from relative safety. |