Agreed, no more swarm ADS discussion in this thread. It will be deleted. Neither are a topic of Hotfix Echo.

Before you do that, can I please have a dumb-fire swarm..? I don't even much care that it does low damage to infantry, I just want a dumb-fire swarm...

I want one that's a PLC mirror.

If we are at it to discuss stupid mechanics on ADS (not swarm vs ADS) could we please get rid of the auto re-center of the camera? That way a ADS actually could aim preciely and not do the "camera slingshot" where you tilt your thumbstick down and need to guess when to fire your turret.

Exactly. Some pilots just keep hammering this topic in an effort to win some forum points. Nobody is listening to this particular rhetoric at CCP.

How can we get swamers to be more involved in shooting down thier ariel foes without over-exposing them to infantry any longer than necessary?

Wow! That is some mighty fine isk QQ.
At most a proto ADS is what 2 mil isk, at most!

The best fit Python is over half a million ISK. I would imagine the Incubus is right around the same number. With vehicles, I usually restock the individual parts; suits is wholesale restock.

You blow up 2 proto logis and you just destroyed your worth in proto gear. This is not a conversation about isk, because then we get into killing potential.

Two logis equates to 2mil ISK? What are you talking about?

My cheapest full proto fitting costs me 250k.

Entirely your decision to use cheap stuff or PRO stuff. If you can't afford to lose PRO gear, don't complain about it.

The prices of everything in isk has come down.

I remember when the IAFG cost 117k ISK. I only had 5 of those fits; I had 20 fits with an ADV forge. Yeah, infantry gear is dirt cheap compared to a vehicle. A PRO turret alone costs more than a PRO suit.

Lets not make that a factor in what should rock paper scissor what, because the ADS will lose that conversation. It is like the HMG, kills a lot in several situations so the swarms are the nerf the ADS received.

Seems the only answer has been to buff AV and infantry weapons, while simultaneously nerfing vehicles.

Swarms are fine where they are and the good ADS pilots have accepted them as they stand.

Swarms are not fine. Do you have any SP in vehicles? Do you use vehicles at all?


ADS should be more worried about the new tank hulls, IMO.

There's no bonus to railguns, which is the ideal vehicle counter to an ADS.

BTW - In PC, we are seeing very few swarms shooting down ADS. If you have infantry support an ADS is insanely powerful. Pubs have the swarms taking down ADS and they are only effective if there is no infantry support and proto swarms.

They chase them off pretty well. There's forge guns on the rings, and swarms somewhere on the other side of the compound. Essentially that's the only socket I've played in PC, and I have a lot of PC experience in a tank.

To respond to the "I don't want Swarms to surprise kill me due to rendering." Welcome to the world of surprise ADS missiles killing infantry or scouts with REs.

You hear a dropship coming. The only time you don't is when you're not paying any attention at all.

In this game, you will die sometimes, you have been warned. Please stop stunting the growth of this game.

It sure isn't helping with retainment, and outright not encouraging anybody to decide to be a pilot.

If we are at it to discuss stupid mechanics on ADS (not swarm vs ADS) could we please get rid of the auto re-center of the camera? That way a ADS actually could aim preciely and not do the "camera slingshot" where you tilt your thumbstick down and need to guess when to fire your turret.

If that's the case, would be good to have a button that re-centers the camera.

Holy ****... that is a ****ing first. Constructive feedback.

What the everloving ****.

CCP rattati don't you dare rip a hole in lore just to give us Anti-shield swarms >:(

There is no hole in lore. Every race in eve makes their own missiles. Caldari make kinetic warheads, Minmatar explosive, Gallente Thermal and Amarr EM. Caldari are the most missile oriented, minmatar come second, amarr third (and they have some truly nasty missile ships) and gallente have almost none.

CCP rattati don't you dare rip a hole in lore just to give us Anti-shield swarms >:(

You're so cute.
We all know your opinion. Yes, I do use vehicles (Mostly LAVs and HAVs) and I use derp ships mostly to get up high, so no ADS for me because the firing mechanics.

The ADS is hard to use. I have it.

My friend does do ADS and in all but wide open maps the swarms are blocked as long as you aren't hovering right over them raining death. Stay moving and you can outrun the swarm death of a single commando.

No, 3 volleys cannot be outrun until you're right at the edge of lock on range.

Combined fire will win over you though as it should.

That requires teamwork, and the people here don't want to use teamwork.

People not want to be pilots? You must smoke some good stuff! The controls are tough and there really isn't a cheap or easy way to practice which is the main barrier.

Would you want to waste SP into vehicle upgrades when you only have a few million? Better off throwing it all into infantry. We get BPOs from boxes now, little reason to get ISK weapons and suits when you get AUR gear for free.

BTW - You don't logi, just shhhh. Proto min logi, 8 proto slots filled, 4 pieces of proto equip, a proto gun, and wish I could fit a poto nade but no pg or cpu for one at all, even when maxed in those upgrades (CPU&PG).

And how would you know I'm not a logi? Have you ever played with me? Have you ever played against me? I've had PRO Min and Gal logi, obviously with PRO gear. I now have PRO Amarr logi, and the only equipment I haven't skilled into is the scanner, because of only 3 slots at ADV and PRO. You don't know me, so how the hell do you assume I don't have any logi suits at all?

You must only know vehicles. No wonder you don't understand AV which has 2 sides. It all makes sense now!
(Wanted to say more, but trying to not play your game.)

You're a flying idiot. I have PRO swarms and plasma cannon, with PRO Min and Gal commandos. I used to have PRO forge, but dropped it. I had it paired up with the Min sentinel, which was and is pathetically weak. I know vehicles very well, I started using them in Chrome. I also know AV pretty well, having multiple forms of PRO AV, as well as having to escape and evade it in a vehicle.

Again, you're assuming a hell of a lot without knowing anything about me.

I agree. the only sensible way to do anti-shield swarmies is to make the launcher just that- a launcher.
by adding rockets to the marketplace, you not only give a reason for the calmato to use swarms (scourge rockets) you also would add shield based AV (Infermo rockets and Mjolnir rockets) all without disenfranchising minnowmandos that have leveled into swarms because you said so (Nova rockets). this requires some actual work, but the profound impact that buying ammo for our weapons would have on gameplay (not to mention the increased ease of balancing on account of improving the options for combat) is well worth it. of course, with ammo types, varying advantages and drawbacks are necessary, but theres a game that gives a great source of reference for this. its called EVE Online.

What is the point of increasing the LAV scan radius to 30m when their scan precision is 50 dB and when vehicle active scanner range is independent of base range?

Also why not make basic medium frames have 2 equipment slots so they'll finally be the generalists that assaults and logistics branch out from?

Righto, I haven't actually run the numbers yet and that was off the top of my head, so let's go.
Will disregard proficiency for all weapons because it only applies to certain damage types. Let's look at raw damage.

Summary at the bottom.



Galmando with Allotek does 1870 damage per shot (glorious).
Reload time with Galmando is 3.5*.75 = 2.25. Charge time with maxed skill is 0.45s. Therefore max fire rate without lag and with perfect timing is one shot per 2.7 seconds.

1870/2.7 = 692 DPS

Minmando with Wiyrkomis does 1373 damage per volley. Lock on time is 1.05s with max skills.

I'm not entirely sure how to calculate swarm DPS, honestly. I know there's a forced delay between lock ons and the SDE suggests that's 1 second, but I might be reading the wrong thing. Let's go with the 1 second number for now.

1373 damage per 2.05 seconds means 669 DPS.

Top AHMG sentinel:

The best case scenario for an AHMG is on the Galsent because it can fit 2x damage mods. 2x HDMs gives about a 9% damage increase.

The proto AHMG does 616 DPS under the current proposal. 616*1.09 = 671 DPS

Let's add the forge gun to this list.

Your normal proto forge gun hits for 1440 damage every 3 seconds. With the same circumstances as the AHMG, this leads to 523 DPS. An IAFG will do substantially more at 726 DPS.




Summary:

So under optimal circumstances:
PLCs do 692 DPS.
Swarms do 669 DPS (?)
AHMGs do 671 DPS
FGs do 523 DPS
IAFGs do 726 DPS


Hm. They're all very close, really. AHMG does very similar damage to swarms and marginally less than the Galmando PLC. Bearing in mind that the Galmando does wonderful, wonderful things to the placon I will point out that a double damage modded non-commando allotek placon without the bonus does 481 DPS. The placon is comparatively only viable on the Galmando, then.


Anyhow, looks like I was wrong about it outDPSing -all- other AV weapons. However, it's very similar in terms of DPS to all the others! IAFGs are the only ones that noticeably outDPS it, at 50 DPS more, and that's a difference of less than 10%.


My concern is that it can very viably compete with all other AV options on raw DPS (and indeed, if those other AV options aren't in optimal circumstances it will noticeably outDPS a good few of them) while being much easier to use than the other options and also being by far the most effective against infantry.

No other AV weapon offers anywhere near as much anti-infantry capability as the AHMG, but the AHMG is right up there with the best of the AV options at the same time. It offers, quite literally, the best of both worlds.


EDIT: I am also concerned that the Galmando is practically required to have viable placon DPS. I know the bonuses fit the commando type, but they just do so much good for the placon that you pretty much need to have them to use the placon viably.

@ CCP Rattati and Swarm Rhetoric

The mechinics of how swarms work is the issue. With a certain range Swarms are mathermatically garunteed a hit, and beyond a certain range Dropships mathematically are garunteed escape.

Before the hotifx Delta changes, the mathematics were heavily stacked in the dropships favor. Hit Afterburner, and you escape beyond a point where swarms in flight would never catch up. Toggleing a switch required very little pilot skill then. No matter what a swarmer did, the math was stacked against him/her.

Currently the situation is inverse. Hitting afterburner will not let you escape from swarms in flight, just from swarm lock on range. Now the math is heavily stacked against the pilot. Swarms in flight will always catch up with a Dropship. Hitting a switch doesnt work anymore (which is fine) but niether does any combat manuevers a pilot may pull off.


tldr: before it took little skill to dodge swarms no matter how good the swarmer, or how much work the swarmer put into his/her tactics, today it takes little skill to land a hit with swarms no matter how good the pilot.

The question is how do we bring skills of both parties into play? This is much more important than nerfing.

How can we get swamers to be more involved in shooting down thier ariel foes without over-exposing them to infantry any longer than necessary?

Who is more likely to die, the swarmer or the ADS?

Depends on the hull and how much of a scrub the pilot is.

What if the pilot is a super scrub 3?

So us supporting our preferred role without bending is unreasonable?