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Sleepy Zan
Internal Error. Negative-Feedback
2048
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Posted - 2012.10.16 23:45:00 -
[1] - Quote
I've been here since E3 and since then it seems that either swarms are too slow making them useless against dropships who just do circles around he map, or too fast making dropships worthless anytime someone decides to pull out the free starter fit.
I'm suggesting to increase swarm speed but nerf their maneuverability.
Right now swarms can turn on a dime giving dropships no chance if the swarms were fast enough to catch up to them. Lowering the maneuverability gives an experienced drop ship pilot more of a chance of surviving. If the dropship tries to fly in a straight line or a circle swarms will catch up and the dropship can dodge a volley or two of swarms after the pilot learns the limits of their maneuverability. However, if there are too many swarms the dropship will have no chance (which is how it should be). Currently there are no swarm counter measures and the dropship isn't going to be the most maneuverable thing in the air so without any counter measures it should be more vulnerable to AA then what it is now. |
Baal Roo
Subdreddit Test Alliance Please Ignore
811
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Posted - 2012.10.16 23:48:00 -
[2] - Quote
The best fix, IMO, would be to bring back the slow homing from Plateau but decrease the maneuverability. |
mikegunnz
Pink Fluffy Bounty Hunterz RISE of LEGION
425
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Posted - 2012.10.16 23:53:00 -
[3] - Quote
Just increase swarm speed, and introduce a chaff or equivalent anti-swarm dropship tool. "Chaff" should have one use, and a marginal "recharge" time. This would make it effective against a lone swarm user, but would mean dropship is vulnerable to multiple AV/swarm users trying to take it down.
As it stands now, a competent dropship pilot is invincible. Unless of course there is at least one good Forge gun user.
edit: Maybe a chaff or flare module. Standard module giving you one use before recharging. Enhanced and Complex mods would either give more uses between recharges, or one use between recharges, but with less time to recharge. |
Governor Odius
Doomheim
177
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Posted - 2012.10.16 23:56:00 -
[4] - Quote
Pretty much any buff to swarms would mark a swift end to dropships everywhere. Leaving things as they are leaves dropships invulnerable.
Governor Odius wrote:I think we're going about this the wrong way. Instead of asking "How can we make it possible to kill a dropship while it's doing the only thing that could be considered 'evasive actions' allowed by its flight physics?" we should be asking "How can we make it so 'swarm dodging flight' and 'warfighting flight' aren't the same thing?" In other words, let's make it so that flying around at top speed isn't the way for dropships to earn warpoints.
1) Range penalties on the turrets. The turrets need to be there, because that's how a dropship provides support and cover to troops it drops off, but it should lose effectiveness past 15m or so. Reduced damage, reduced accuracy, something.
2) Transport assist points. CCP has mentioned before that they're planning this, or something similar. For those of you not familiar with the idea, they'll have pilots get a portion of warpoints earned by anyone they recently dropped off.
3) Remove the swarm starter suit. As it is now every time a dropship or HAV appears on the field every d-bag grabs his swarm starter suit and goes to town. This is why you rarely see HAVs anymore and dropships are forced to behave the way they do.
What does this change? You still won't be able to kill a dropship that is moving at max speed around the map. Not with swarms, anyway. But that pilot won't be able to make any money that way anymore. Instead, he or she will be taking position over cap points and supporting troops with rapid transport and acting as a mobile spawn point that shoots missiles. Maybe even fitting a remote rep, who knows? The point is that its role is being changed from "doofy looking AC-130" to "ground support aircraft" like it's supposed to be. And while it's doing that ground support it's not flying at max speed, and a vigilant AV troop has an opportunity to do damage. Thus avoiding swarms becomes about situational awareness and reflexes, not holding the joystick forward and slightly to the left.
I believe that these three things (one of which CCP has all but stated is coming) are the best way to get the gameplay to where we want. |
Tbone322
D3ath D3alers RISE of LEGION
124
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Posted - 2012.10.16 23:56:00 -
[5] - Quote
mikegunnz wrote:Just increase swarm speed, and introduce a chaff or equivalent anti-swarm dropship tool. "Chaff" should have one use, and a marginal "recharge" time. This would make it effective against a lone swarm user, but would mean dropship is vulnerable to multiple AV/swarm users trying to take it down.
As it stands now, a competent dropship pilot is invincible. Unless of course there is at least one good Forge gun user.
Having just played the same game against a good dropship pilot, I agree with this.
Faster direct line swarms so the pilot can dodge around buildings to destroy the swarms, and chaff as a module that needs recharging to distract the swarms that aren't avoidable. |
mikegunnz
Pink Fluffy Bounty Hunterz RISE of LEGION
425
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Posted - 2012.10.17 00:06:00 -
[6] - Quote
Tbone322 wrote:mikegunnz wrote:Just increase swarm speed, and introduce a chaff or equivalent anti-swarm dropship tool. "Chaff" should have one use, and a marginal "recharge" time. This would make it effective against a lone swarm user, but would mean dropship is vulnerable to multiple AV/swarm users trying to take it down.
As it stands now, a competent dropship pilot is invincible. Unless of course there is at least one good Forge gun user. Having just played the same game against a good dropship pilot, I agree with this. Faster direct line swarms so the pilot can dodge around buildings to destroy the swarms, and as a module that needs recharging to distract the swarms that aren't avoidable.
Yeah it was a rough one. Prime example of something that needs rebalancing.
Two players (one pilot, one gunner) completely changing the course of a match.
Despite there being a forge gunner (a bad one, who was never in a good position to take down dropship) and 3 swarm users trying to take down said dropship (which almost never hit ship) |
Dover inthe Sky
11
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Posted - 2012.10.17 00:08:00 -
[7] - Quote
I just want to ask has anyone who is commenting on this ever flown a drop ship. It is nowhere near easy to do and it takes a lot of practice to be good enough to dodge swarms. Right now we are probably dealing with good pilots which makes them almost invincible. But if you compare this to real life in a sense. Not to try and start something Because yes I know this is a video game. If you take in to consideration that a militia swarm is like the equivalent of a basic RPG or a Gustav. With this understanding it is understandable why capable pilots are able to get away from them. I think that a good balance to this problem would be to increase the speed as well as the damage of the swarms as you either level the skill or make it into the upper tier swarms.
Basically making it that if you want to take down a good pilot or at least one of good measure then you are going to need something a little bit more reliable just like the pilots are a little bit more reliable at keeping himself and his ship alive.
I am not hating on the ships or the swarms but, I think this would be a good balance. |
Scheneighnay McBob
Bojo's School of the Trades
1062
|
Posted - 2012.10.17 00:09:00 -
[8] - Quote
Watch your swarm buffs- dropships may be a problem, but LAVs need to stand a chance. |
Tbone322
D3ath D3alers RISE of LEGION
124
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Posted - 2012.10.17 00:15:00 -
[9] - Quote
Scheneighnay McBob wrote:Watch your swarm buffs- dropships may be a problem, but LAVs need to stand a chance.
That's why I think a slight speed buff, but direct flight path of the missiles won't hurt the LAVs. They will still be able to run and hide and have the missiles hit rocks or something. |
Dover inthe Sky
11
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Posted - 2012.10.17 00:17:00 -
[10] - Quote
Scheneighnay McBob wrote:Watch your swarm buffs- dropships may be a problem, but LAVs need to stand a chance.
I didnt take this into consideration with the speed comment. to balance that i cant see any adds to the LAVs that would not cause a problem with speed balancing and handling of LAVs. |
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mikegunnz
Pink Fluffy Bounty Hunterz RISE of LEGION
425
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Posted - 2012.10.17 00:22:00 -
[11] - Quote
Dover inthe Sky wrote:I just want to ask has anyone who is commenting on this ever flown a drop ship. It is nowhere near easy to do and it takes a lot of practice to be good enough to dodge swarms. Right now we are probably dealing with good pilots which makes them almost invincible. But if you compare this to real life in a sense. Not to try and start something Because yes I know this is a video game. If you take in to consideration that a militia swarm is like the equivalent of a basic RPG or a Gustav. With this understanding it is understandable why capable pilots are able to get away from them. I think that a good balance to this problem would be to increase the speed as well as the damage of the swarms as you either level the skill or make it into the upper tier swarms.
Basically making it that if you want to take down a good pilot or at least one of good measure then you are going to need something a little bit more reliable just like the pilots are a little bit more reliable at keeping himself and his ship alive.
I am not hating on the ships or the swarms but, I think this would be a good balance.
Honestly, you don't need to be THAT good of a pilot. Not like you need to do barrel rolls, or any crazy maneuvers to dodge swarms. You just have to continuously fly in a straight or semi-large circular pattern. The dropship controls are a little funky, but it's not that tough to learn to fly it well enough to stay alive.
Not saying piloting takes no skill, it does. But you only need basic skill to keep it alive from swarms.
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mikegunnz
Pink Fluffy Bounty Hunterz RISE of LEGION
425
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Posted - 2012.10.17 00:24:00 -
[12] - Quote
Scheneighnay McBob wrote:Watch your swarm buffs- dropships may be a problem, but LAVs need to stand a chance.
I'd say, give the LAV the same access to a chaff/flare module. |
Reimus Klinsman
BetaMax.
320
|
Posted - 2012.10.17 00:35:00 -
[13] - Quote
Remove the scope feature and add the ability to switch the missiles to an air to air mode or something. |
Lead Squall
Planetary Response Organisation Test Friends Please Ignore
54
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Posted - 2012.10.17 00:37:00 -
[14] - Quote
Another option to address the drop ship domination, is to have the turrets give some kick. If shooting makes piloting the ship more difficult and making shot from the turrets more difficult it will at least separate the good pilots from the bad. |
Scheneighnay McBob
Bojo's School of the Trades
1062
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Posted - 2012.10.17 01:40:00 -
[15] - Quote
I can't belive I forgot to mention this- I came up with this when I was thinking of why people only seem to use dropships on certain maps-
Very simple: add more installations! From my past experience as a dropship pilot, AA turrets can be a handful- both because of the power and because they're difficult to destroy. Sure, swarms don't do much unless you hit the dropship with a pincer attack (when a dropship is evading one group of swarms, get someone to fire another group in front of it- if it's going fast enough to avoid swarm A, it will fly straight into swarm B) but good old-fashion heavy railguns make short work of them.
Another easy solution would just be increasing the speed of higher-tier swarms.
Yet another thing I noticed- swarms seem to want to hit the ship from behind- instead of going straight into it, they like to turn so they can chase it. |
Skihids
Tritan-Industries Legacy Rising
969
|
Posted - 2012.10.17 01:52:00 -
[16] - Quote
The fancier flying will come into play only when we can slow down to perform our primary mission. That's when you need accurate ground reference manuvers to fly fast to an objective and stop directly overhead for a drop without a lot of time consuming corrections that allow the enemy to prepare for an assault.
That's when a pilot might sneak in at low level, weaving in between cover to pop up with his troops as a complete surprise.
That will only happen when we have a defense other than breakneck speed. |
Scheneighnay McBob
Bojo's School of the Trades
1062
|
Posted - 2012.10.17 01:59:00 -
[17] - Quote
Btw: a question to any current dropship pilots-
Are you using the new modules that increase the flight speed? |
Leither Yiltron
KILL-EM-QUICK RISE of LEGION
417
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Posted - 2012.10.17 03:38:00 -
[18] - Quote
The problem isn't just the swarms, it's the entire design of the dropship.
We're trying to have our cake and eat it too with the current design of the dropship. There are four primary factors which contribute to the dropship's balance current balance:
(1) How survivable is it (decreases risk) (2) How much damage can it do? (increases reward) (3) How much does it cost (increases risk) (4) How much other utility does it have (increases reward)
There is no way to balance the dropship so that it is both survivable and it has good damage capabilities. Why is that?
In order to keep risk/reward within acceptable parameters, if you make the Dropship more tanky, you must make it cost more ISK. No matter what, a Dropship will always have the utility of troop transport. If it is tanky, and passably maneuverable, then it must cost more. Otherwise, everyone would always have a dropship: there would be no reason not to have one. It's the same kind of logic that goes into the LAV "spam" produced by free LAV BPO's. The less it costs, the more "why not" mentality.
Meanwhile, the more weapons capacity you give a dropship, the more potential reward. Some risk or another must offset this, so either you have to decrease health or increase price in order to achieve some sort of balance.
Right now, we have a bit of a problem. Swarm Launchers being unable to hit dropships effectively boosts the HP of dropships for the time being. Yes, they are forced to fly in a circular pattern, but it seems that the weapons are still effective while flying in this pattern, at least on smaller maps. This situation is actually great, because it shows exactly what's wrong with the current dropship design.
Dropships have good weapons, good tank, and are at a price which is profitable granted those two factors.
The problem with dropships is that their current balance insists on them doing all the air things at once. http://cdn.memegenerator.net/instances/400x/28487752.jpg
Dropships right now are troop transports and weapons platforms at the same time. Meanwhile they're priced like they're troop transports without weapons capabilities.
If the swarm launcher is fixed in any way, the dropship becomes obsolete. Why? Because suddenly it just costs too damn much for how risky it is to fly one of the things onto the map. The weapons on a dropship aren't good enough to justify a 100k+ ISK cost that you're almost guaranteed to lose to any idiot and his swarm launcher.
If the EHP is left as is on the dropshiop, the dropship is overpowered. Why? Because it has the potential to do a lot of weapons damage for very small risk, since killing the things is so damn hard.
The core of the issue is that CCP hasn't made a decision. Is the dropship a troop transport, or is it a weapons platform?
If it is a weapons platform, it needs to be cheap, be relatively easy to kill (though not TOO easy, mind), and it needs to be able to do quite a bit of damage during the time that it's alive. Being cheap and fragile is essential. This way the risk isn't much, the reward is potentially high, but it requires a skilled pilot in order to maximize the reward you can get out of the dropship since it can be killed easily.
If it is an actual troop transport, it needs to be tanky, about the same price point that it is now, and it needs to have limited weapons capability.
CCP keeps on trying to combine weapons and tank in the same place. You'll never be able to balance that, especially IN THE AIR, which is worse than on the ground. The weapons make the reward too high compared to the risk, which is relatively low. This was the previous problem with tanks- they had great weapons and were really quite hard to kill. It didn't matter what the price point was, because they simply never died.
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Skihids
Tritan-Industries Legacy Rising
969
|
Posted - 2012.10.17 03:53:00 -
[19] - Quote
Scheneighnay McBob wrote:Btw: a question to any current dropship pilots-
Are you using the new modules that increase the flight speed?
Do you mean the one that has a 630 PG requirement when a Myron as a max PG of 400 and the Grimseness 545? |
Piercing Serenity
Pink Fluffy Bounty Hunterz RISE of LEGION
181
|
Posted - 2012.10.17 04:38:00 -
[20] - Quote
Leither Yiltron wrote:The problem isn't just the swarms, it's the entire design of the dropship. We're trying to have our cake and eat it too with the current design of the dropship. There are four primary factors which contribute to the dropship's balance current balance: (1) How survivable is it (decreases risk) (2) How much damage can it do? (increases reward) (3) How much does it cost (increases risk) (4) How much other utility does it have (increases reward) There is no way to balance the dropship so that it is both survivable and it has good damage capabilities. Why is that? In order to keep risk/reward within acceptable parameters, if you make the Dropship more tanky, you must make it cost more ISK. No matter what, a Dropship will always have the utility of troop transport. If it is tanky, and passably maneuverable, then it must cost more. Otherwise, everyone would always have a dropship: there would be no reason not to have one. It's the same kind of logic that goes into the LAV "spam" produced by free LAV BPO's. The less it costs, the more "why not" mentality. Meanwhile, the more weapons capacity you give a dropship, the more potential reward. Some risk or another must offset this, so either you have to decrease health or increase price in order to achieve some sort of balance. Right now, we have a bit of a problem. Swarm Launchers being unable to hit dropships effectively boosts the HP of dropships for the time being. Yes, they are forced to fly in a circular pattern, but it seems that the weapons are still effective while flying in this pattern, at least on smaller maps. This situation is actually great, because it shows exactly what's wrong with the current dropship design. Dropships have good weapons, good tank, and are at a price which is profitable granted those two factors. The problem with dropships is that their current balance insists on them doing all the air things at once. http://cdn.memegenerator.net/instances/400x/28487752.jpgDropships right now are troop transports and weapons platforms at the same time. Meanwhile they're priced like they're troop transports without weapons capabilities. If the swarm launcher is fixed in any way, the dropship becomes obsolete. Why? Because suddenly it just costs too damn much for how risky it is to fly one of the things onto the map. The weapons on a dropship aren't good enough to justify a 100k+ ISK cost that you're almost guaranteed to lose to any idiot and his swarm launcher. If the EHP is left as is on the dropshiop, the dropship is overpowered. Why? Because it has the potential to do a lot of weapons damage for very small risk, since killing the things is so damn hard. The core of the issue is that CCP hasn't made a decision. Is the dropship a troop transport, or is it a weapons platform? If it is a weapons platform, it needs to be cheap, be relatively easy to kill (though not TOO easy, mind), and it needs to be able to do quite a bit of damage during the time that it's alive. Being cheap and fragile is essential. This way the risk isn't much, the reward is potentially high, but it requires a skilled pilot in order to maximize the reward you can get out of the dropship since it can be killed easily. If it is an actual troop transport, it needs to be tanky, about the same price point that it is now, and it needs to have limited weapons capability. CCP keeps on trying to combine weapons and tank in the same place. You'll never be able to balance that, especially IN THE AIR, which is worse than on the ground. The weapons make the reward too high compared to the risk, which is relatively low. This was the previous problem with tanks- they had great weapons and were really quite hard to kill. It didn't matter what the price point was, because they simply never died.
I agree with the idea behind this post. I think too many people are trying to turn dropships into a dropship/fighter jet hybrid. Give somebody something that can fly and they'll want it to do everything. Give people more options, and they start asking for an option that is even more specific. The problem we have now is that there is only one option. My understanding is that dropships should be used to transport soldiers efficiently while giving them the protection they need.
Viewing dropships as I do, I think that dropships should be a little healthier, and possibly a little slower. There will be other forms of aerial transportation (hopefully) that will fill the roles that people are expecting dropships to fill. If jets (or something to that effect) are put into the game, I expect them to be able to outmaneuver dropships 9 times out of 10. I expect them to have chaff to deter swarms and high mobility. If we have more options, we won't expect any one vehicle to do everything
For now, I'd propose a hot-fix that reworked the flight path of swarms. As of now it is impossible to 'lead' targets. This is particular annoying when you are trying to fire over a small ridge by aiming your SL in the air and the missiles somehow leave the rocket launcher perpendicularly. I know that these are guided missiles, but even if someone wanted to anticipate where a circling dropship would be and aim appropriately, they couldn't. The swarms would all follow the same path. Making a tweak to the way swarm launchers track their targets will keep the Dust community from nerfing the game into oblivion. The method - not the numbers - would be changed. Dropships wouldn't take anymore damage than they did before the hotfix so long as they are flexible. Swarm Launcher users won't hit their targets any more often unless they pay more attention to their weapon. And we will save a problem with having CCP risking another imbalance in the game.
PSN: PiercingSerenity Country: US Class: Assault Corp: Shattered Ascension |
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