There are around a dozen dropship vs. swarm launcher threads active as I write this, so why one more? -áWell, because it encompasses those and more.

Basically I'm wondering how you balance a free weapon with an expensive asset. -áDUST is supposed to be all about making decisions about the relative risk of skilling into a certain role vs. another, and fielding a certain asset or another.

So how does that work when one asset (swarm launchers) is free of both SP and ISK requirements and the other is very expensive for both?

Right now the free swarm launchers are a OHK to the free LAV's, so they seem to be in balance. -áThe free launchers will also keep tanks back and force dropships to fly at top speed where they are less effective. -áThat seems to be fairly well balanced as well.

I believe a good part of the problem is that the free launchers discourage folks from skilling into effective AV because they are free. -áWhy spend SP or ISK on something better when CCP provides those for nothing? -á

The problem comes in when those same people expect the free weapon to be just as effective against top tier vehicles as it is against the free LAVs.

How would YOU balance any free weapon against a more expensive asset, no matter what the two were?

You balance free by making the asset require skill to use effectively regardless of price, and the expensive (SP and/or ISK) just do it more efficiently, but by putting yourself at financial risk if you fail.

Swarm launchers are a fail weapon all around. They require no skill to use, there is little skill can do to improve your effectiveness with one, they wrap around wall yet hit 6" rocks, and they can't catch dropships at full speed but will flip them over for an instant kill at over 600m if they don't render on approach. It's broken for the user, it's broken for the target, and it needs completely reworked as a weapon class before we can even think about balancing the costs.

I think you post on these threads just to get my likes

Nobody is asking for path prediction, merely a working version of the take-the shortest-route-to-target stuff that swarms are supposed to do, limited by a minimum turning radius built into the missiles and a maximum flight time.

Math and physics say no. Hitting a non-ballistic vehicle with a slower missile would require some major ass-pulls on the code side that would result in swarms being an auto hit. At which point they should just account for the hit and not even bother drawing the missile in flight

I don't think the problem is the swarm missiles.

1) The militia swarms do pretty nasty damage considering how easy they are to get. Highest tier dropships right now have around 4500-5000 eHP, enough for 4-5 volleys from a militia swarm launched by someone with no skills or mods improving its damage.

2) A dropship has only one maneuver that can be considered "evasive": fly as fast as it can. Thus, calling for swarms to predict their path or outrun a dropship at full speed is calling for a dropship to always get hit, regardless of the pilot's skill. As you can see from point 1, this will quickly lead to every dropship getting taken out, because it only takes 4-5 hits from even the weakest swarm to end them.

3) I'm not a huge fan of being forced to rely solely on ECM as a way to defeat swarms. How do you implement that?

3a) Cooldown: Module is activated and all or most of the swarm damage is prevented. After some cooldown this module can be activated again. Is this a long cooldown? Because if it is, there's plenty of time for 4-5 more volleys to land. If its not, we're right back where we started with swarms not working.

3b) Random: X percent chance to shoot down/cause to miss an incoming missile. I'm not a huge fan of randomness in these kinds of games, because it de-emphasizes skill.

3c) Mitigation: Basically a resist mod that only works against swarms. Not helpful.

3d) By using a mod slot for the chaff (or whatever) the dropship has even less eHP to survive the primary threat to it right now: the forge gun. I know it's popular right now to say that dropships never die, but every time I take one into the air I get one-shotted by a forge gun. Granted, I've only played about five hours all build so I'm still flying a Viper with bad mods, but it's still a problem and will remain one even when I can survive two or three shots as many of the Myron pilots can.

Now, let's talk about the things we know are eventually going to change:

We know capacitor for vehicles is coming, and we know turrets are going to use it. Dropships will probably be pretty cap-hungry anyway (I'm kind of hoping that just being airborne consumes cap) so we're going to end up in a place where a dropship can't be shooting forever like it does now. It's going to shoot and then have to wait a while to recharge its cap.

We know that eWar is coming. There's a video that specifically talks about webbing a dropship so that it's easier to kill.

As a result of this, and possibly some other changes (I can't imagine missiles not seeing a nerf since they're the only small turret anyone uses) dropships are going to lose a lot of their offensive power, relegating them to a role of troop transport and support. Which, frankly, is exactly where I want to be.

Now ask yourself, how does a dropship support troops on the ground? Troop transport is an obvious answer. If it stays to act as a mobile spawn point then its vulnerable, of course. Especially having sacrificed tank for some support mods. What happens when someone notices a volley of swarms coming at their drophsip? It starts flying, of course. But since swarms are faster than dropships thanks to everyone complaining, they hit and the dropship dies.

Okay, so dropships don't stay stationary. It picks up people in one place, flies at full speed and....hopes they jump out over the objective? I guess a team with a lot of practice could get that right. Then, while they're taking the objective, the dropship flies around for a while doing nothing until it can come back and pick them up, hoping no one hits it with super-fast swarm missiles. That's...unhelpful.

I guess I should have expected this thread to greet into the specifics of dropships and swarm lunchers, but I really am interested in the generic free vs. cost balance question.

I read one suggestion that the cost should be a high player skill requirement. That's an interesting answer I wasn't expecting.

That expands the conversation to three categories of cost:

SP
ISK
Player Skill

That greatly expands the possible combinations and may provide an answer.