Pilot Archive
Thread: JTL Ship Balance Discussion
At the end of the day (barring the bellabub) you can only do these quests once and after enough blowing up in space all these ships will be down to 10/10 condition and be practically useless eventually anyway and people will go back to the standard ships.
It's the age old arguement, if can't beat them, join them, if you get annoyed at eta-actis / Arc / RGI / Vaksia / Adv X / bellabub pilots, go get one yourself and beat them at thier own game, nerfs don't help anyone in the long run they just alienate people.
Odd topic. Hard to call them unbalanced, since they're spread across the board.
The RotW figthers are completely unbalanced in context of the old fighters. The bottom line is that their mass ormanueverability (least likely to change IMO) needs to be reduced to bring them in line with their ship type role. Right now they nearlyhavethe mass of a standard X-Wing (a medium/heavy fighter) yet they handle like light fighters... which you'd think they are. Or in the case of the Heavy X-Wing, you have an assault fighter than handles like a medium fighter (it should be closer to Y-Wing handling IMO).
The only thing to compare these ships to are the older ships - but as I've said before, with a new expansion there has to be some expectation of new, better equipment.
I would have to completely disagree on this point. New expansions do not mandate new and better stuff. An expansion mandates new stuff. Simply adding more of better things leads to mudlfation on the ground, and that's bad enough as is. In the context of a space flightsim that's action-based, this line of reasoning flat out doesn't work. New and different ships/equipment might be necessary, but that does not mean they have to be better in every way. The new content can be unique in the new offering of balance between existing stats, rather than having to completely improve over the previous generation (unless you want to throw all the hard balancing work that was done in beta for chassis types out the window and make JTL into Everquest: The shooter).
LeaphChausew wrote:
My main gripe..in fact my only gripe about ROTW from a completely personal based oppinion is that space looks silly with everyone flying just a handful of ships and new pilots are getting an easy pve ride and not actually learning much/if anything at all.I don't like the fact that the original JTLS ships seem to be only reserved for the intiial grind of a pilot profession with most people..and even then, a lot of people just buy the heavy mass variants and grind their entire profession in one ship, then when they can use a JSF/GSF etc..they'll then stick to that and never experience any other ship ever again which to be honest is probably sensible these days, but its so boring.Half the fun for me was and still is [in fact especially now] messing around with the original ships and seeing how well I can make them compete with these new 'uber ships'. With my A-wing, I'm still doing rather well for myself, however if I flew a GSF I'd probably be more or less [excuse the bad language] 'Untouchable' apart from to a few pilots. With my Awing...I feel vulnerable/paranoid/more on the ball -all- the time which is great..It takes proper piloting and genuine consideration as to whether to opt for fast/manouverable engine and a weaker weapon/shield or vise versa etc. Now with the JSF..to anyone with an ounce of adeptness in this game..its just boring in most cases. Its 'wow, I can squeeze on a good everything and my decision making perogative has more or less been removed now'. Yeh these pilots in JSF might still get killed a fair few times but then you get the situation where because they're spoiled for mass/speed/manouverability etc already..it is then harder to work out how to improve and I doubt many of them will consider the possibility that if they used a more demanding ship, they may actually learn FASTER and more effectively.<
I still take out my Y-Wing "Longprobe" from time to time. It works wonders when needing large amounts of missiles. If I fill it with two tubes of Concussion missiles and two Ion Cannons, I lead the charge on attacking Gunboats. I fly in, smack the shields really hard and burst away. My team mates roll in behind me, hitting the shields some more and burst away.
We rinse and repeat, then start hammering the hull.
This team work is a wonderful tactic that works well.
OK.....
I'm a master pilot and I like to fly a lot. I don't see any problems with the new ships at all. I think they are great fun and I wouldn't change a thing. If you feel that you need to fly a specific ship at any given time just because a pilot beat you in pvp then I think you have issues that go far beyond the game. Now im not saying that to be mean or to demean anyone, but its flying. Uber equipment is nice, but you can only have so much of it on a ship.....ANY SHIP, unless its a YKL or YT. Every ship is defferent and people set them up diffirently. I fly all of my ships and sometimes I get killed, IT HAPPENS. Now just because some people like to fly one type of ship doesn't mean i have to and i don't. Personaly I love my B-wing, LOVE IT. I dont fly it all the time because I like flying my other ships to. What I don't understand is why the people in this forum thinks that there needs to be a change in equipment? Each ship is different and has its good and bad points and they fill different roles. Now i get that your upset that there is something with decent damage that can manuever well and flys fast and people use it........so what. I just think this is all very silly and I'll be upset if my ship gets nerfed because you don't like it.
CuchulainnDarklight wrote:
LeaphChausew wrote:
Actually, nerf is a word. We're part of an ever evolving language here. Well, no it isnt to be pedantic but, I know what you mean. And therein lies the problem. It is better to qualify what you mean instead of using a word that is open to interpretation.
But basically..you raise a good point. Thing is..we can sit here forever arguing the pros an cons of the rotw ships but I don't think much will be done to actually fix the problem (yet)and yeh there is a problem. We wouldn't have so many huge threads related to the rotw ships if there wasn't a problem. Everyone is making good/fair'ish points I think. Its just down to your ownperspective. Hm. Yup, though tbh the fact that one of them has JEDI symbolism may cause a lot of the trouble, you know how anything jedi gets in this game
Thinking about it, I'm really kind of sitting half on/half off the fence with the rotw ships. I acknowledge there are valid issues with them, but at the same time....are they 'really' causing that much hassle? From my point of view, I don't think they are on the whole. Me, personally, Its not that much of a big deal on a day to day basis. But, on a bigger picture the new ships are game-breaking. Dont believe me, look at the compo armour on the ground and the CU that wrought!
Just how many pilots who choose to fly the JSF etc actually max them out to their full potential? Not all that many I don't think...not on Bria anyway. True there are hundreds of the things buzzing around, but...most of them are flying third rate crafted gear so in that respect, the pilot's own lack of experience kind of balances them out and makes them easier to kill with my outdated vintage A-wing. /shrug..just food for thought. I have one maxed out, its part Awing comps, Xwing comps, and new stuff, i have 4 mass left over. I took the best stuff from my other ships and put it in the JSF, Ive died twice. In 2 months, it makes PvP so boring now. But one of those crapola loaded JSFs you talk about is worth maxed out Awings. Or in my case one day, my JSF was worth a mixed bag of maxed out Opps, ADV, and Ints flown be VERY good pilots.
As I mentioned earlier...most if not all of these new pilots who go from heavy starter ship to JSF/RG TIE/GSF etc are missing out on a whole learning curve here, so yeh there are loads of rotw ships flying around..but are they really that uber? Maybe these rotw ships are on the whole, just letting those who otherwise wouldn't show much interest in space actually get into space and enjoy it a bit more. So a novice is harder to kill now? So what...if you claim yourself to be a good pilot or even an 'ace' this really shouldn't make too much of a difference. Yup ive gone back o my stock Xwing at the mo to re-up my pilot skills.
The only time balancing issues come into the game are with pilots as good as or better than you who max out the JSF etc and in times like those, you either go get the same ship and do the same as them so you're ona dead par with them..or if you're like me, you accept that that pilot will probably win due to their enhanced ship and equal/better skills but...if you choose to engage them, well if you lose hey..who cares, you're in a worse ship so wave that off as an excuse [if you really need an excuse]
or...if you do actually beat them, well be glad that you managed to beat somthing bigger than you in somthing lesser than them. Cant agree here, the balance problem is that the new ships ARENT balanced while the old ones are, that means that in a fully tricked out Awing, for example, a JSF with nowhere near as good components will out-turn, out-shoot, survive more damage, and all with a worse pilot in it. This isnt much of a problem for PvE, but in PvP these ships lack of balanceis extremely obvious. Space PvP becomes like the preCU ground game, and we REALLY dont want a space CU do we.
I also play with the naive belief/hope that any pilot worth their weight in bantha fodder will choose not to fly one of these new ships and opt to fly what they used to fly with, prior to rotw to make a point that they don't need stabilisers on their bike to fly. However saying that, I won't openly mock any pilot who chooses to make use of one of these new fangled ships.
/shrug
-Leaph
To summarise,
1. Me very good pilot.
2. Me fly Awing against JTL ships me win 90% of time.
3. Me fly Awing against ROTW ships me win 10% of time.
4. Me fly JSF against anything JTL or ROTW me win 99% of time.
Conclusion, imbalance exists.
Message Edited by CuchulainnDarklight on 07-18-2005 08:58 AM
Fair enough...but actually, nerf isa word. Newly coinedverb from the semantic field of online gaming. [quoted from the dictionary of Leaph
]
Message Edited by quadpers0n on 07-18-2005 05:20 PM
PaceNebulon wrote:
CuchulainnDarklight wrote:
Did you read the second part of my post? yes, did you read mine?
To reiterate, they are using these new ships to bring in money. So don't care what we think as long as people buy ROTW. They are not going to "fix" the new ships, so just accept it and move on. They might one day bring the JTL ships up to speed but I will believe it when it happens. They would still bring in money if the ships were balanced, i bought ROTW for the new ships and i thought they would be balanced. Once again the ground loot is balanced with in game stuff, why not the space loot?
Yes, I read it. I also read my own post, so I know that I didn't say that it wouldn't be BETTER to change the ROTW ships. I remained completely neutral in the "nerf the JSF" vs. "Leave it alone" debate. I was stating that it is pointless to argue about it. I also didn't address any problems with the ground game, as it isn't even close to being a factor here, I was just using the pointless protests during the CU as an example of SOE completely ignoring whatthe players have to say about content already implemented into the game.
The bottom line is whether you think the ROTW ships throw off this rediculous imaginary balance between JTL ships and ROTW ships (the balace between factions is the ONLY balance that matters), SOE doesn't care and they aren't going to change it. If they were even marginally considering it, all this information would have been covered several times in the first month of release. So there is no need to post these threads once or twice a week. Just suck it up and live with it or quit playing the game.
Well might as well close the forums down then eh?
quadpers0n wrote:
the problem with all this ship balance discussion is that it isn't really the ship's fault. it's really the lack of real content's fault, just like the ground game.
hear me out:
so they come out with JTL and immediately players start hammering the AI, after a few modifications we have what we have now.
problem is PVP is too fast for many inexperienced players. it takes an extra amount of dedication to steel yourself to having 50+ encounters where you finally begin to realize quick PVP's potential. many pilots, who didn't buy JTL exclusively for PVP however, quit before they reach that peak, and come here to complain.
well one of their principal arguements is "why is PVE so slow and PVP so fast? it'd be more fun if PVP was slower, like PVE."
of course, we all know the problems with that arguement, it doesn't scale with variable skill levels and equipment. to create parity we need speed, reflexes and aim to be important.
so the devs circumventour vehement cries against damage reductionby introducing smaller hitbox ships that get hit less in PVE do more damage in PVE and can last longer in PVP.
"oh no!" you say. the game is destroyed!
well the problem with that is, PVE at a master level is more fun with these new ships. how can you nerf something that literally is more fun and brings more people to space?older lighter ships suck for PVE againts tier 5 mobs. in fact, i'd go so far as to say anything but twin lvl 10 guns sucks for PVP against tier 5 mobs. so what really is the root of the problem here? schooling inexperienced pilots to believe that mind numbing assaults on PVE mobs should be par for the course in PVP too? or is the root of the problem absurd AI and lack of content that forces you to grind an absurd amount to aquire weapons to get to the point where the PVE experience is enjoyable? imagine if the opposite of what the inexperienced PVP'er requests was true. "Why isn't PVE as fast as PVP?" we all know the answer to this: even mediocre pilots would annihilate the NPC AI.
the problems we are experiencing with these new ships aren't a symptom of the ships at all, they are fun to fly and relativey efficient against "master level" content. the problem though is that master level content is boring. the AI sucks, to compensate the devs make their shields stronger. thus the initial lighter fighters we progressed through the tiers with are absurdly inefficient. thus a disparity between player expectations is created, thus the devs overcompensate, thus we have 10 page arguements asking for the ships to be nerfed.
sadly, thesesymptoms are endemic to SWG.
we've all seen this before.
Message Edited by quadpers0n on 07-18-2005 05:20 PM
Umm, I find that the original fighters are more fun against the master content, than the new ships. My stock Xwing cuts through waves of Tier5s in DS with no problem at all. I fly my Awing around corvettes, bungoats and the ISD for the sheer joy of it. And nothing compares to a nooby screaming "OHH F*CK WERE GOING TO DIE" from your Ywing longprobes turret as you barrelroll into 3 bungoats and a full squad of tier5 fighters with a massive grin on your face.
quadpers0n wrote:
. i can stay alive just as long in PVE with a 40k mass interceptor as i can with a 170k mass oppressor, it's just that blowing ships up takes more shots.
Eh.. T/I is 50K mass
Although this begs a question, Should all ships excell at all things? Call me old fashioned but ive always beleived a ship is made to fill a specific role. Be it fast interdiction, space supriority, bomber, or even multirole (jack of all trades master of none).
Unfortunatly, this is something JTL has never implemented very well.
quadpers0n wrote:
i don't believe the pre-ROTW heavy fighters are obsolete, and i never have. i think people who say that they are obsolte are pilots who either don't understand component selection, throttle speeds, missle use, or they are pilots who are sore losers and want to win all the time.
If anything, perhaps the heavy fighters are the best thing to counter them. Especially the oppressor with it's 3 missile hardpoints. 3 IR-IIs down a JSF's gullet would spoil most pilot's day. And, a large amount of newer pilots (ie. the mentioned grab a jsf and make ace quick pilots) tend not to bother with CMs.