Pilot Archive
Thread: A Petition on Escorts....
JanuHull wrote:
Nah, make'em longer. Tier 3 missions are where true pilots are made or broken. If you can take the heat, unload, redeed, and delete your ships,then take the bus with the rest of the sheep.
I hate to bust anyone's bubble, but perseverance andenduranceare as important to piloting as ADHD driven adrenaline junkie-ism. Whaddaya gonna do, land after someone pops you in your uber little 4333 JSF poonfighter because you got owned by a guy in an A-Wing or TIE Advanced who outlasted you in a long dogfight?
I do agree that escorts could do with a little more action, and a touch more speed out of the ships we're covering. Maybe some of these escorts could be redone as multisector runs in the future to shake things up a bit.
i agree and disagree. the tier3 missions are alot of fun, but not because of ultra long escorts. its mission after mission of tier 3 ships targeting YOU. it takes a long time to complete all teh objectives, and you are on your toes for most of it. we need more missions like this.
the tier4 SS mission he speaks of is hideously boring. you sit there and escort your target, blowing awaya couple pissant fighters as they spawn. as this point (44xx) your pretty much in your end-game fighter, and not even a spawn of tier5 fighters should bea threat to you. make it hard to do, and even keep the sortie just as long, but give more objectives instead of making someone escort a freighter for an hour.
Ragnaat wrote:
may i suggest avoiding the dath station mission set
F***
Escort
Missions.
Anyone else remember the old days like me?
Back when seeing a master pilot was a rarity, and getting one to help your tier 3 mission was next to impossible?
Back whenthe best parts on your ship were often crafted with notso good first gen resources, and RE was not understood that well so having a lot of these parts was not the norm
Back when no one really understood or used DI's a lot
yeah, back when Kessel was PvP
Because, if you remember this, then you remember how TOUGH these missions were back then, even with great pilots, and pretty decent loadouts for the time. As an Imp, no one had figured out how to wedge that massive Cert 8 shield into anything, hell most of us had not seen one.
This was what these missions were designed for, and they did that very well.
With parts the way they are now, and with the ROTW ships, I agree, these do need a revamp. Doesn't mean I would not be sad to see them go, I have fond memories of Tier 3 in that first week...the gnashing of teeth, and the cries of anguish as that last gunboat , with one weapon left at 30% would blow up the mission taker 
Good times...really good times. You found out who your friends were when someone would do one of those with you, 3 times in a row 
My entire post was not solely directed towards you, sorry, I was unclear.
Croll wrote:
Where in my thread did I once insinuate that these missions are hard? That is the point. They are not hard in anyway, lack imagination, and are purely a timesink. Re-read Psiko's suggestions above, and tell me that those would not make for more interesting escort missions. I could care less if the escorts were 5 hours long, but if I had some real content within that mission it would be worth my while. As it is these are the only missions I dread doing when I find them. They are the only things that make Storm Squadron seem "difficult".The tier 3 missions arenot difficultthey are just one long timesink with a challenging battle at the end. Some people are up for that challenge, and some are not. I personally think it is sad that when youstart working on the station missions that no one is saying, "Hey, hit up that escort mission in Yavin 4. It's a long one, but man you get the loot, and only 4 people have been able to finish it."
I mean when you take a duty missiondoes anyone knowingly take the escort missions over the destroy? I can say that I have only done so by accident since IWOULD rather be "bathed in hot oil" than purposely accept an escort mission. My point is that that is wrong, and I should be interested in taking either type of mission due to the interesting levels of challenge they offer me.
Croll wrote:
Flying to me equals combat, not staring at the rear end of a ship while nodding off.
My you ahve no concept of real flight do you... ok some history here.
WW II:
Bomber raids. P-51s escorting B-17s and B-24s in to bomb targets. LONG ESCORTS... ow does a spending a few hours in flight BEFORE you even get the first enemy fighters sound? Same thing with bomber flights in the pacfic.
Korean War:
F-86 and F-88 Sabers had at elast 1 hour flight before they got to the combat zone. In fact it took so long and so much fuel they could only spend about 10 minutes in combat once they arrived untill they had to fly home.
Present:
Fighters and bombers use inflight refueling to allow them to fly for up to 12 hours to and from a target area or patrol for about 4 hours over a target area. Fighters MIGHT get to drop ordance ( bombs and Air to ground missles ) and most likely will land with some weapons ont eh wings and rounds in the gun magizine(sp).
Flying combat aircraft rarely involves combat. Most of the time is training flights certification flights, fling time to keep you're certifications, etc...
You're idea of flying doesn't exist in war. Only in WW II for the interceptors, yes the INTERCEPTORS did taking off mean combat in a few minutes.
Pskyo and Thunderbyte I agree with you're comments. The Escorts need to be changed but never go away.
Escorts are also there to help control the number of pilots. I would also bet there are going to be some LONG escorts to get Capital ships to try and make them rare. To be honest I want to see the title ACE removed from being earned from completing the missions and getting the largest ships. very few of the "aces" are real aces. Ace should be resserved for people with about 500 million prestige. They have earned it and they have spent more time in space and can out fly you no matter what fighter they fly. I'm not to 500 million my self yet.. not to much farther to go.
Sorry, but why would you possibly bring up "real world" wars in this discussion about a game? It makes no sense as we are talking about a game. It has no relevance to the discussion at hand. You want an idea of the sorts of escort missions that make for a fun game look at pretty much any space sim out there. Especially the Star Wars one's. Of course I have no concept of "real flight" because I am talking from the perspective of a video game, and never once insinuated that I had any more experience than that. There are plenty of "real world" flight sims out there that you can enjoy, butin the Star Wars movies and gamesthe battles are typically dogfights. I feel the same way about "real world" flight sims as I do the current escort missions. Flaming bamboo shoots under the fingernails for me. Been that way since I wasted too much time playing Dam Busters when I was a kid.
PS: I guess I need to clarify this too. I believe the escort missions AS THEY ARE should go away, but escort missions in general need to be revamped. If you feel that hours of little content in a mission is fun then I guess that is where we can agree to disagree, but if I am flying I want something to do other than loop de loops around the engine struts of whatever freighter I am escorting at that moment. Ipostedin this thread just to throw my two cents in, and am not going "Baaa-aaa /sign". Not only that, but I am an Ace Pilot. Why in the world am I escorting all these freighter's anyways? Shouldn't I be escorting capital ships into battle?
Message Edited by Croll on 08-02-2005 11:58 PM
I /sign! I have had it with the extremely long escorts. Especially the SS squadron 3-3-2-2 one where you have to kill 4 waves before the others spawn? It doesnt clearly state that you need to kill the 4 waves BEFORE others spawn.
Needless to say, the waves keep popping forever, and if you get to the end and the game doesnt like it, you fail the mission. Then redo the freakin thing that takes 1.5 hrs+ to do. CMON, waste of time!