Pilot Archive
Thread: A few more thoughts on Pilot 'stuff'
Now as someone who flies a 66k mass starfighter, I'd usually be the first to correct someone who is complaining about their JSF at 90k mass being inadequate but you know... just feel that extra bit fluffy and teddy bear like today.
My advice to any Freelance pilot who is having mass issues is this.
Do an Imperial pilot profession.
It is also another way I learned how to set my A-wing up. You see, it isn't a matter of saying "righty...66k mass I know what to do!"...at least, it wasn't for me. Imperial pilots, like everyone else (Heavy Ships aren't considered here) start out with a 12k mass ship. The point is, as stated in the manual that you move onto a better ship pretty soon. The no droid commands allowed, slow almost painful initial grind of your first go at tier 1 in that starter ship is there to show you, assuming you're a pilot who wishes to learn that equipment management is going to be important.
So that is the 'Leaph empathising, being understanding and opening his heart to the masses' part. In fact, I still am kind of but time for some facts. I hope this does help new pilots as this is the general oppinion mixed with my own oppinion along with a few suggestions on what to do if your dilemma is 'not having enough mass'.
- A-wing - 66k mass approx. In my personal oppinion, the most beautiful, in both aesthetics and performance balancestarship in the game.
- TIE Interceptor - possibly the most hardcore whilst still retaining an ounce of it's former competitive nature at 50k mass.
- TIE Advanced - 66k mass approx. I view this as the Imperial's A-wing equivelant, only you'd be wrong to assume you handle the two ship in the same way. (Well I would be anyway since I find to obtain success with either ship I have to adopt different flying styles).
Possible contraversy: I don't consider this ship as a realistic contenderbut I do know some people who love them so...
- Dunelizard - 85k'ish mass. Very argueable I know, but considering this ships size, the fact it has this mass with two weapon slots and it's handling mods I do honestly believe this ship is of a low mass when you consider other ships similar to it. (Mainly due to it's size and though I've never flown one, I've heard plenty about them and have fought enough of them in the past to appreciate them).
All of these ships have noticeable limits if you actually take the time to fly them and grasp an understanding of how the game works, how parts work, how pvp works etc.
Now to a pilot such as myself, a JSF, Belb, RGI (as an A-wing pilot -especially- the RGI for me) which have all been claimed to have low mass are in actual fact so massive compared with how large they are and how they handle that it is rather funny. Now that isn't a complaint. I've had noone show me a good reason or kill me enough to get me out of my A-wing (yet), but to new pilots, absorb what I've said above and if you really want to erm 'get somewhere' (used very loosely as this is a game after all) I 100% promote it as it helped me a lot.
In my pondering over this subject, I also realise this. Those who started from day 1 of JTLS or mastered before ROTW, have somewhat of an advantage. Not just the additional experience, but the fact that the game was limited all that time ago. Back then, we knew where we stood and the game felt somewhat more balanced and I had that oppinion even as a player who missed out on the nerfed gear back then too. With ROTW, we have a lot more diversity even if that doesn't seem apparent on the surface. Sure...most people are in JSFs, Belbs and Advanced x-wings these days, but the loot, crafted gear and overall -choice- is much more ranged.
Before ROTW, I would have never have believed, let alone considered that a lvl 8 engine, blaster and lvl 7 shield would fit in an A-wing. (I know 'some' very lucky people did have uber ships and I'm not going into the 0 mass exploit territory people here) but the point is, A-wings (as always my main example), on the whole had lvl 6 engines, lvl 8 blasters etc. I thought that ship had reached it's limit. Hell, the guy who was popularly considered Bria's top pilot back in the day, even said that himself BUT, now it isn't just myself who has proven that wasn't the case.
The advantage with playing pre-ROTW was the very fact that lmitation on choice, doing things the 'hard' way, -having- to fly that 12k mass starter ship with no droid commands gave you, the experienced pre-ROTW 'veteran' the tools you needed for the rest of your ingame piloting career. At least, the building blocks.
What I'm trying to say is, the pilot community has evolved in some ways and devolved in others. Those who didn't like the change have since left the game more or less and those who could adapt...have. We have a new influx of fresh pilots (look at the pilot forum as it is now and compare it with four months ago and you'll be rather surprised) and I think this is positive.
We need to encourage these people. I'm aiming this part mainly at pilots who fly often now, but didn't before rotw. Kind of like...the, hell actually, This is aimed at everyone, including myself as a future reminder (since I am less than perfect). Flaming is pointless. I learned the hardway that arguing a point...even if technically you are the one who is 'morally' correct isn't always a good thing. Flamewars are easy to start and bad oppinions of people are easy to acquire when you're conversing through the use of a public forum where body language etc doesn't come into play. (basically, is a lot easier here to 'hate' someone and let them know about it here than irl).
I've written far too much as per usual with my Tri-annual essays on my thoughts, feelings and general points of view on JTLS but I'll end with these last few points....
- I think the game is heading in a positive direction. In fact, I kind of picture this as the JTLS 'Adolesence' era where we have more bugs than you could shake a stick at, however the game is still very much loveable and worthwhile.
- Some Jedi are actually taking interest in flying these days. Now as much as I dislike the concept of Jedi, times do change so I think they should be more widely accepted and racially offencive terms such as 'glowstick wielders' should be checked a bit.
- As mentioned previously, new pilots, amateur pilots, the generally inexperienced...have a go at Imperial as a pilot prof if you wish to learn and gain somthing from it. If not, look out for those who actually do fly low mass ships and ask for advice. I'd post some tips on setting up an A-wing here but it'd take too much writing of text and right now I'm tired.
- I still don't like epulse. But that isn't to say, after all this arguing/debate etc...I'm mor eopen and understanding on why some people do it. Other people...like those arrogant enough to do it with the intention of griefing are those I have the problem with.
- Let us not flog the launchmissile thing to death now.
- I read earlier Tomo, you saying you'll enquire about the ISD and the lag issues it creates for people. That...I would be especially grateful for if you could do that for us.
Thats enough for now. I hope you debate it and make talk of it.
Respectfully,
Learning curve:
yup, Imperial pilot always was the best for this. I think all the old timers know it. If someone were to ask me how to be a better pilot, i would have, and still would say, Do imperial pilot and don't use a heavy tie. You wont learn anything if you use one.
Personnaly, looking back ive gauged my own progression in different phases.
1. Newbie, just learning the basics of the game, and die alot.
2. Rookie, you know what parts do, you discover a couple droid commands and still die alot, but not as much as before.
3. Novice, your looking at your parts more closely now, and often find yourself scouring shipwright vendors for optimal crafted parts. your ship does ok, but theres still alot of room for improvement. Some tier 3 missions your soloing, some your not, you still die, but alot less then before.
4. Accomplished, You know what to look for in crafted, and what not to. You find your s till not satisfied with your ship, and are looking really hard for ways to improve it. You start exploring looted parts and Re engineering more, and crafted a whole lot less. You very seldomely die now.
5. Master. In your quest to ever improve your ship, youve come to a point where your no longer working within a 2000 or 1000 mass tolerance, but a 500 or less mass tolerance in working your ships. You've learned as much, if not more about looted parts then crafted. Where as back in novice you were looking for the optimal crafted parts, your now looking for very specific looted ones. You can't remember when the last time you died in PvE was.
Eh.. i had more points to reply to, but i just ran outta gas so ill just hit the submit button now.
Good thread title and excellent work, Leaph.
I have to agree that, especially for the current hitbox size, the RGI is definately a high mass ship.
That being said, I fly a Krayt mostly 
An old friend called that sucker Moby, but hey, I like it.
A point I would like to make, mainly to the PvE crowd, is to go fly PvP once or twice in DS once you think you have your ship to where you like it.
I say this in no way to flame, especially since I am primarily a PvE kinda person.
My point is this: While all of your skills/equipment/ship/god-given talents,may be more than adequate in PvE, the computer simply cannot give you the kind of challenge you need to see just how sharp you areup tothis point. A veteran, someone like Leaph,Nesanya, Rapax,Kahl(I can never rememberthe damn spelling)breiner, or Tomowould be a perfect choice.
No matter how quick or how long an encounter would be with any veteran pilot (success or not), normally tells can be exchanged quite cordially afterwards. Unless, of course, you get an idiot like me whom doesn't have the instant messages turned on for some dumba** reason 
More to the point, PvP teaches more to any pilot than any PvE content (sorry Kashyyk, even you ) can ever do.
Julak wrote:
Leaph I could hug you. I fly a standard TIE Interceptor as a proud member of Storm Squadron, I understand how you talk about mass issues, I can't fathom a ship like the B-wing with 220k mass. I fly my measly 50k mass ship, but it has taught me. I learned to RE, use droid programs so you don't get loaded down by heavy engines, I beleive that people must use light ships in order to know how to fly heavy ships. Excellent post, and although you fly for the Alliance, good flying to you.
I'm an avid B-Wing flyer and let me assure you that I'm running into the exact same issues as you do with your 50k interceptor. 242k mass sounds like a lot but the need for a L10 engine and 4 guns means it's gone very quick. It is the most fun ship to setup though, due to thelarge amount of variants possible.
A realtest of skill/way of learningis to use only pre-RotW ships and only youre factions droid commands, if any. All this swapping of droid commands has made the pilot grind a joke (in difficulty).I can honestly say i made it through my original rebel mastery withoutusing asingle droid command, heck back then emergency shields was my favourite move. I only needed help on one or two of the t4 missions and the vette, and this was all back at launch using only un-RE'd looted parts.
Unless new people dont read the forums and dont have friends who have already come to grips with space they will never see the 'real' JTL. well thats just my oppinion anyway 
I'd post my own thoughts but I tend to ramble and the reply would be about 10 pages long so I'll leave that for another thread, maybe give myself something to do over lunch at work.
In terms of where space is heading, I like that it continues to have a wider range of pilots with fresh experiences and voices, and that we're seeing improvements to POBs and the addition of new ships. A lot of these new ships either revolutionized or, depending on your viewpoint, broke space, and with those massive changes came a lack of changes for certain types of ships--notably heavy fighters in PVP and bombers in anything. These ships were marginal at best in those roles pre-RotW, but with the addition of medium-massed ultra-agile fighters, many of the slim advantages the underpowered JTL ships possessed were cut even further or reduced entirely.
As for space's adolescence, then, I can see that, but we've still got some growing pains to work through before it reaches anything that could be called maturity. Addressing the underpowered classes of ships, ensuring POBs are viable in PVE and PVP, adding player-controlled capital ships, and finally, introducing more post-master content, both smuggler/BH/ranger/master pilot etc. missions and, most importantly of all, a meaningful and engaging GCW--those are the things we need to look toward to keep space balanced and consistently fun.
I do see some progress made in those areas, but I also see a lot of stagnation. It's hard as hell to know where the dev team is headed until they post the results in the In Concept or In Testing forums, but I certainly hope and will continue to push for the changes that will complete the space game.
Great post Leaph, I started as a Tie Pilot however I found Freelancer more fitting of my toon from an RP stand-point (yes I'm a role player and damn proud of it). However as of late I have been thinking about trading my old Krayt and Dune Lizard and YT-1300 in for a X-Wing or Tie-Fighter... I will say first off that yes I do own a JSF and that's my 'main' ship. It isn't about speed or anything like that, I like the way it looks and well everytime I fly it I want to jump into the chair of an A-Wing more and more...
I can't help it I got hooked on Space Sims like Wing Commander and X-Wing back in the day. I'm really enjoying the space battles in Battlefront 2. And the A-Wing was alwas a great looking ship (imho). But anyway, I have seen 'slowly' new pilots coming into the game, I think all of us do have to remember that Star Wars had more in it then Lightsabers and the Force. I don't mind Jedi's jumping into space, however I don't think Jedi's should have Jedi skills or the like in Space.
I think in the end what I'd love to see is more balance. I mean if we could balance things in the ground game out, I think there should be something for us Pilots as well...
Good post... I just have one thing to add in there.
When someone posts in effect to nerf a certain ship, or this or that... Who really gets hurt? The noobs.
Hypothetically speaking here, say the devs listened to the cries that came out after rotw concerning the jsf, and actually lowered the mass... The new guys who dont have the equipment get put farther behind.
Same thing with W03. You can scream at the devs to fix it, but what will the older experienced masters do? Refit theyre ships to handle it. As for the new guys comin up the ladder? You might just break theyre backs, as in some cases you're really almost telling them to start over. So next time a new ship is added that may seem a little out of balance, or makes certain things a bit too easy, remeber that it is another shot at getting more people into space, and not so much a free pass.
I for one noticed on Gorath a huge jump in the number of people in deep space after rotw. Myself and a couple of others on the server may be responsible for sharing ammo with them, and educating them in the ways of space pvp, but thats the game. Eventually you're going to have a few of these people stick with it, and see that other side where most of us now sit, and embrace it. I'm sure I speak for many players who are on servers with little to no JTL population.
dogmeat1337 wrote:
Hypothetically speaking here, say the devs listened to the cries that came out after rotw concerning the jsf, and actually lowered the mass... The new guys who dont have the equipment get put farther behind.