Well there's been changes to hardeners, so obviously that's an AV buff!!!.... Oh and PLC's got stronger too!

I also don't understand the thesis statement. I have had a lot of my fits invalidated though by the changes to resource costs and prior to this patch it was practically impossible to use dropships anyways due to how powerful swarms were.

A Python camped our spawn last night, 4 people pulled out swarms. A few Plasma Cannons, not to mention a missle turret and blaster. We all lit the thing up, it turned flew around a building and popped back out, full shields and armor and continued to destroy us. I think the guy went 20 odd/ and 4.

Im not saying dropships are in a good place or they shouldnt be looked at, but give it some time.

The way I see it any buff for assault dropships would make them op to infantry, technically you're not supposed to be able to kill a proto tank with an ASSAULT(lightwieght low health/ hit and run tactic) dropship. If a tank killer is what you want, wait for CCP to release heavy dropships.

I think the real issue is none of us really know how to balance Dropships.

Numbers, yeah, we could probably establish that. But with the issues every pilot has with Swarms, I highly doubt it would work. I think we need to modify Swarms so that they make us pilots rage less but are still effective. Then, potential balance changes.

Considering how often that the PLC is effective against dropships it's hard to remember they exist in the context of the topic.

I actually had a moment earlier, where several PLC's were shot at me like RPG's in some military flick.

I love the assumption of "ignored". Where is the consolidated ADS thread with numbers so I can feast my eyes on it?

You really want to bring that up as "ads pilots being the victims" . The result is actually not terribly OP dropships that still have a place in PC, and good pilots can easily go 20 KDR in pubs.

GǪGǪGǪ..
GǪGǪGǪ.
GǪGǪGǪ.. How many pages was the dev-thread for HAV Progression? 100+ pages? I didn't read through much of it, but I can imagine the discussion was as heated as Rattati hinted it was.

I still think, right now is a little too early for individual players (ANY of us) to stand up and post "facts" about the Dropship's quality and things it deserves. It's always a bad idea to (and too easy to) fall into the impression that you're representing the views of your fellow vehicle-players. Especially when it comes to the DS.

I get a feeling that, if we trace Dust 514 back far enough, we'll find that DS players (yep, I will count myself as guilty too) were the first players to get nipple-fixation over their Dust toy, and, wellGǪum, we are guilty of letting our cocky idea of flying get in the way of:

--Agreeing on some fundamentals that we like about the fitting-slots and module-stacking, which can help the devs toward creating a Progression the way they've established for HAVs.

--Getting CCP a consensus set of "jobs" or functions for the DS, which had begun being debated back in 2013, but repeatedly gets derailed in a gasoline fire.
Hey
--Earning much healthy social-cooperation or gameplay respect from the players who drive OTHER vehicles or who happen to do OTHER jobs in this infantry-game besides "Dropship Piloting".

I personally don't think these player-authored threads will survive any better than the 2013 threadsGǪ not until Rattati starts his own official Dropship-Progression thread. And even then, pleaseGǪ. we're gonna have to swallow a LOT of humble pie amongst ourselves in order to help the devs keep the thread viable.

Let the Devs handle the cpu/pg reworking, and perhaps let them handle the modules and Skilling rework too.
Take a breather and lay off the AVers a bit (they aren't as big an enemy to us as we have been to ourselves).
I know we've often felt ignored before,GǪ but this time finally the devs DO want to start discussing the DS; maybe let's let Rattati choose which parts they want to discuss and how.
(ugh, I'm sounding like Gandhi, or something)

It's just that, if HAV-Progression took 100 pages to debate, I just don't want our chance at restoring DS to end up 500+ pages and a Dev-failure due to too much of our own,GǪ.well, "pilot righteousness".

GalComs can put up a worrisome flak field, but PLCs are just bad at AA duty. Projectile speed plus drop makes it hard to nail such a mobile target.

I always wonder how devs tell about Vehicles and AV weapons balancing meaning only tanks and leaving behind Dropships and LAVs.
And every time they pass one part of the equation they seem to ignore other parts.

As a reminder:
1. HAV vs HAV can not be balanced without HAV vs DS and HAV vs LAV as well.
2. Vehicle vs AV means HAV + DS + LAV. Not HAV vs AV. Not DS vs AV. Not LAV vs AV.
3. Vehicle vs Vehicle can not be balanced without Vehicle vs Infantry (this means turrets balance mostly).
4. Mixed AV weapons (Plasma Cannon, Forgeguns) must be balanced against Infantry + Vehicles = Infantry + HAV + LAV + DS.
Not Infantry + HAV. Not HAV + LAV. All 4 types of targets.

Obvious, but

1: It was still badass

2: Flak fields are scary.

But buffs can include things like intuitive controls and better shooting mechanics. If you can actually reliably land shots on a forge sent, you can kill him faster than he can kill you.

But the problems with dropships are vastly more involved than simple EHP. Most of the problems result from poor fitting, which has been acknowledged in multiple places and clunky controls which are the opposite of intuitive.

I got a alt that has assault dropships.

I noticed that every time I tried to aim down with the Assault Drop ship, the camera cursor/aim reticle would automatically push itself up again. This made it very hard to aim and defend myself with my front missile turret against other vehicles and infantry.

I find the feature of the camera auto centering constantly to the horizontal plane very irritating. Please remove/disable that camera feature to help ADS pilots use there vehicles to there highest potential.

In summary, I would like my Assault dropships 3rd person camera to stay still without user input (after I have adjusted the cursor position downward by a certain amount) and not 'autonomously move' up until it is parallel to the horizontal axis with reference to the map.

I can't find the thread, but the best ADS fix I saw was removing the pilot's ability to fire at all and make a gunner seat that fires the nose turret. Then the ADS is not a cobra helicopter but instead a black hawk which needs a second gunner to really leverage the flying platforms. Then all the additions and buffs can be added because it is in the spirit of a cooperative vehicle.

I think the thread got down to creating the only ADS weapon as wing mounted swarms for AV. Everything else was up to the crew.

This could be applied to tanks as well. The driver does not fire the main cannon in that situation, it is the main gunner and you can even make the skills of the gunner add to the vehicle performance (In the Tanks Dev Thread).

Then being a pilot is being a pilot. You are here to fly or drive. Don't expect to be a one man killing machine inside your vehicle. Even an LAV can't drive and shoot without help, so why not apply the same mechanic to tanks and ADS?

I have issue with this solution for the same reason I object to it for tanks.

The entire financial burden for the vehicle rests upon the pilot.

Yet he must be dependent upon someone else to operate his equipment and not be a dumbass. Or to at least have the courtesy of having skilled appropriately.

This is asking a lot, to the point of being unreasonable.

Agreed. That said, I would love to see a variant that worked that way for both HAVs and DSs!

Ratt, i wish it was that easy.
We aren't at the bottom with you but with everyone else?

It's just "IT FLIES? KILL IT WITH FIRE!"
Imagine the uproar that comes with someone asking for a buff to ADS of any kind. Whether it be fair or not, people just don't like us.

That's what I mean by our rights being trashed by the majority. If you know what i mean.

So, i just think it's simply human nature to not try something (with good intentions) that's just going to attract negative attention. Some nerf swarm threads are reasonable, have good explanations, and other things of the ilk; but, there's a reason why it gets out of hand. One person comes with some pitch forks, and starts handing them out to their friends. Then, the same on the other side and BOOM. No more reason. It happens so often we just don't do it anymore, we don't want to travel down that path again to see more forks Yknow?

Now that doesn't justify anything, but i hope you understand how we feel. Maybe you do, maybe you don't. I don't know, but I'll just call it how I see it.

This ^ ^

A vehicle designed to require 2 people to operate, would surely be allowed the survivability to require 2 people to take it out with AV.

A lot of people wanted that & currently if you are screwing around with a co-gunner, your fit is totally gimped.

Let's be blunt. AV is going to need to be adjusted to deal with HAVs (excluding swarm launchers). This is a simple fact.

This means in turn that dropships will need to be adjusted so they do not become relegated to the scrap heap. This is another simple fact.

If the discussion can remain civil (something woefully lacking in the past, on all sides) we might actually get some progress.

Generally the argument sticking point is that certain pilots want to have the EHP of an HAV and civility usually takes a sharp turn for the worse.

But buffs can include things like intuitive controls and better shooting mechanics. If you can actually reliably land shots on a forge sent, you can kill him faster than he can kill you.

But the problems with dropships are vastly more involved than simple EHP. Most of the problems result from poor fitting, which has been acknowledged in multiple places and clunky controls which are the opposite of intuitive.

Yes I realize some pilots can be amazing maneuvering. But there needs to be simpler control options for beginners. A "novice" mode as it were.

There needs to be more reliable shooting mechanics. It's too easy to have someone in a sentinel suit avoid fire when you are RIGHT ON TOP OF HIM.

I'm also of the opinion that collision damage should be set to zero while shields are online. Armor on armor impact only For collisions. Not because I think crashes are unfair. But because shield dropships explode when a five year old flings a ffistful of gravel at them even when they take a damn railgun shot to the face and keeps going.

There's a lot of options for fixing dropships and keeping them viable even with buffed AV in play. I am More than happy to offer suggestions and do math to assist. The more constructive you guys are the more I'm interested in helping.

The more righteous outrage I have to deal with the more interested I am in outright antagonism.

I can't find the thread, but the best ADS fix I saw was removing the pilot's ability to fire at all and make a gunner seat that fires the nose turret. Then the ADS is not a cobra helicopter but instead a black hawk which needs a second gunner to really leverage the flying platforms. Then all the additions and buffs can be added because it is in the spirit of a cooperative vehicle.

I think the thread got down to creating the only ADS weapon as wing mounted swarms for AV. Everything else was up to the crew.

This could be applied to tanks as well. The driver does not fire the main cannon in that situation, it is the main gunner and you can even make the skills of the gunner add to the vehicle performance (In the Tanks Dev Thread).

Then being a pilot is being a pilot. You are here to fly or drive. Don't expect to be a one man killing machine inside your vehicle. Even an LAV can't drive and shoot without help, so why not apply the same mechanic to tanks and ADS?

Minmando av here ..Both style dropships got incredibly weak with the patch any drop ship that comes close to my minmando swarms dies. ..it's a problem someone propose changes for them to Rattati that brings them back as atm they are swatted out of the skies like a fly
I don't fly so I could say what's wrong but from an av perspective durp ships are weak