Pilot Archive

I am noticing a rather disturbing trend with space content recently. It seems that the more and more we move away from the release of JTL, the more they are mixing ground and space. Don't get me wrong, I like that they are doing this, but I fear that soon hybrid and non-combat characters may have their advancement cut off. In RotW, we saw ground requirements to get some of the new ships. However most of those requirements were easy, so having limited combat skills (sometimes having no combat skills at all) wasn't that much of a problem. The starmap quest for Nym was a bit of a different story. I'm still stuck at the Nightspider part. My partner and I just don't have the survivability to get through there. But that's OK, too, since I don't expect to be able to do everything.

However, now we're hearing about being able to board and take over capital ships. Which sounds to me like a combining of the two versions of the Vette, ground and space. Is this the trend we're likely to see in the future? Are we going to be expected to either have combat skills or pray that our friends who have them let us tag along in order to enjoy the new space content? One of the things I really liked about space was that it didn't matter what you were on the ground. You were a pilot in space, and as a Dancer I had just as much ability to fight off enemies as a Jedi.

I know that the details aren't even close to finalized yet, but this is worrying me. I enjoy my non-combat skills, but space is the main part of my game. I don't want to miss out on most of the new expansion because I am not much of a fighter on the ground. Is this a concern for anyone else?

They're not removing star-fighter combat, so. No, you're not.

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D8alus wrote:
They're not removing star-fighter combat, so. No, you're not.

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Well, that's really helpful. Thank you for sharing that with us.

HOWEVER, if you need to do ground based combat missions to get all the new toys, then yes, they are forcing us out of space. If you're doing a quest for a spaceship, you should be in space, not crawling into a cave and squashing bugs.

What does "forcing us out of space" mean? Yes you have to land occasionally. Yes, you should meet new folks and try other parts of the game too. If your crafter can't get up enough skills to burst run through the spider cave, get some friends to help. The whole intent of the CU was to make people interdependant again. I don't have a problem with "hybrid" quests. They actually make the game more interesting.

I agree. I like the fact that, even though I'm half-crafter, the big bad Jedi need to call on us pilots for help occasionally.

I think their philosophy was more of forcing groundpounders INTO space than forcing pilots out. I think they're thinking of the new RotW content as ground combat with a space component than space combat with a ground component. The same applies for the upcoming capital content; its intention is probably to bring the new group philosophy to space; you'll need ground combatants as well as qualified pilots, especially if there are fighter escorts around the new ship.

I really suspect there will be an initial space combat period, probably disabling the corvette and neutralizing its escort, before you can begin to board it; the video at fanfest was likely just a demonstration of the engine and idea, not how it will be implemented exactly in game. If there is, you'll need fighters as well as POB transports for the mission.

I think the intent is to encourage more grouping. I don't think the concept vid from fan fest is absolute. I would speculate that, yes, there is going to be a lot more content geared towards doing both space and ground missions to complete quests. And if that is the case then, if you are someone who is good at pilot then you will want to find a player who is good at ground fighting and vice versa. Imagine being a pilot attacking a vette then once its disabled your group members who are good fighters board it and take it over.

I know most of us want to be good at everything, but this is an MMO and grouping is going to be the norm. I would not worry about being forced out of space. I think if the DEVsgo in the direction with adding capital ships, etc. then it is going to get a lot better for us Pilots. Think of it like this: we form a symbiant relationship with players who focus on their ground abilities. They will depend on us to get them into space for capturing capital ships and/or space staions, etc. And we will depend on them to help us when we are running around on the ground.

Yeah, far be it from me to defend the devs, but I think things are okay here. They've made the new ships tradable. So if you're a crafter, you don't have much physical muscle, but you do have financial muscle.

As for cap ships, if we ever do get to the point where we can board and capture big ships like that, it's understandable that you'd have to bring along a gang of marine-like friends anyway. So just make sure you can hire the right people to do that job for you, and don't stand in front of them while they're doing it!

I think its being debated whether the capital ships are going to be ownable (ie you can land and deed the ship and call it back later) or if it will just be "borrowed" - ie you only get to keep it as long as you're using it, you cant land planetside with it etc. If its the former, expect the fight to be on par with the instanced vette missions. If its the latter, it will probably be an easy enough fight for 1-2 masters.

Also, dont hold your breath for usefulness. It might turn out the caps arent worth the effort to capture and man. Just look at the current POB ships.

You did actually watch the movies didn't you?

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Treena_Daal wrote:
However, now we're hearing about being able to board and take over capital ships. Which sounds to me like a combining of the two versions of the Vette, ground and space. Is this the trend we're likely to see in the future? Are we going to be expected to either have combat skills or pray that our friends who have them let us tag along in order to enjoy the new space content? One of the things I really liked about space was that it didn't matter what you were on the ground. You were a pilot in space, and as a Dancer I had just as much ability to fight off enemies as a Jedi.

I know that the details aren't even close to finalized yet, but this is worrying me. I enjoy my non-combat skills, but space is the main part of my game. I don't want to miss out on most of the new expansion because I am not much of a fighter on the ground. Is this a concern for anyone else?

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I can understand your point. But, if you look at rotw, the heavy fighter quest, you cannot do these unless your are either good in space, or have friends. Most of the other stuff is obtainable by non combat classes. I helped a lvl 5 DE get a JSF the other day. I think they've done a good job with rotw. I hope for all the the people who just play for jtl, this continues.

Kirsha - Kettemoor

The Y-8 quest seemed crafter friendly enough. I don't feel it's out of line for combat ships to have combat quests to get them.