A Wee Balance Scenario: AA vs Aircraft - Page 7

dm Akolyte · 2012-05-14, 10:42 AM

The issue with aircraft in Planetside 1 (and in BF3) is that aircraft are incredibly difficult to use to their full potential. And so aircraft are given a very high potential power, but since most players can not tap fully into this potential, an average player ends up with an average amount of power.

AA usually has the opposite problem. AA is super easy to use (Locks on to a target, Fire and forget missiles, etc.) and so the weapons themselves must be relatively low power.

And so, the power dynamic that occurs is that an AA user can handily wipe the floor with a relatively unskilled pilot, but the truly skilled pilots are virtually untouchable. Someone with a sparrow easily reaches their maximum potential--there is little effective difference between an experienced and unexperienced sparrow user--and this potential is simply not good enough to deal with good pilots.

And so, the problem with AA vs. Aircraft in these games is that as someone with AA, your effectiveness is largely not determined by YOUR skill, but by the skill of the pilots. This is an incredibly frustrating dynamic, and one of the main reasons I quit playing PS1.

Kipper · 2012-05-14, 10:48 AM

Originally Posted by elfailo

You don't attack a tank with a knife, you bring your own tank.

Exactly, if you're being farmed by a particular type of unit in a particular situation, find out what counters that unit in that situation - and bring that to the party.

If you're running 30 infantry across a field and you get farmed by enemy air cav, don't blame them - blame your own air cav for not covering you.

Xyntech · 2012-05-14, 11:03 AM

I think the thing people don't like about fighting against aircraft is that it's often so much of an all or nothing type of situation.

You get spammed by a reaver, but then you don't see the 10 minutes he keeps flying around unable to attack much of anything due to constant lock-ons scaring him off. The aircraft runs and heals whenever it survives some damage, but it runs and hides a lot of the rest of the time as well.

From the sounds of it, aircraft are more fragile now than ever, so I don't think it's time to worry about them just yet. It sounds to me like they will only be farming extremely stray, stupid, unprotected stragglers, with the rest of the time spent trying to stay alive long enough to do something useful.

Originally Posted by Mechzz

Also, the issue being discussed is not that aircav had a long TTK, it's more that infantry in general (and VS in particular) had no effective hand-held AA. So the long TTK didn't matter - you were dead because you had nothing to fight back with.

Well, actually the NC had no effective hand held AA. The Striker was the best deterrent, but the Lancer was the best hand held AV gun for actually (potentially) killing an aircraft.

The Pheonix was just shit. The NC were severely gimped on AA, at least early on before the Skyguard.

Originally Posted by Kipper

If you're running 30 infantry across a field and you get farmed by enemy air cav, don't blame them - blame your own air cav for not covering you.

One unit should not be the only effective counter to itself.

Although, that being said, I am strongly in favor of aircraft being one of the best AA units in the game, along with tanks being one of the best anti tank units in the game and snipers being one of the best anti sniper units in the game, etc etc.

I also agree that aircav should be able to take out AA, but it should be difficult, and also risky, even with superior numbers. Your first choice to take out enemy AA should be tanks and other AV platforms that are harder for AA to take out. Taking out enemy AA with your aircraft should be a last resort, only used when there are fewer AA units, with far too many other units supporting them preventing your tanks from getting in close.

The game needs hard counters, but those hard counters shouldn't ever be guaranteed wins. Skill, tactics, surprise, and superior numbers should always be able to turn the tables in an otherwise bad situation.

kaffis · 2012-05-14, 11:16 AM

Originally Posted by Stardouser

I think the answer is indeed as you say: I would rather aircraft were expensive enough to justify being that hard to kill - at least you know, if you get 3-4 guys together to kill some aircraft, that you will be hurting them in the resources department. I would rather they be expensive enough to justify this, than they be cheap or free but weaker.

Unfortunately I think we can pretty much be assured they will go for cheap and weaker, because they don't want anyone to be unable to pull a vehicle and be forced to go infantry. I am not saying this because it's complimentary, either, I think you ought to be able to deny vehicles to the enemy.

Powerful but expensive enough to be denied to you, that's the key, but it probably won't be that way.

Exactly. Because I doubt they'll want to present you with a game where, "Here, you can specialize to be an awesome, focused pilot!!! Oh, you got shot down. Better pound ground for a while to be able to do what you've focused your resources and specializations on... Sucks to be you for the next two hours!"

Thus, the majority of the time, it has to be assumed that, on average, a skilled pilot will earn enough resources in his aircraft to afford a new one later, or at least, very nearly so.

Given that, you have to look at the infantry vs. aircraft without resources being a major consideration. It will come down to one guy vs. one guy. And neither's *chosen* playstyle (remember, infantry is a choice, not a "gee, I'm too broke to afford to play the *real* way" matter) should trump the other's.

Instead, what they choose to bring to the table, counter-wise, should be the heavy contributing factor to tip the scales.

Bottom line: it shouldn't require an entire squad of AA-equipped heavy assault infantrymen to take down a lone pilot. So I'm really alarmed at how many people are nodding at each other about statements like "no, an AA infantry guy shouldn't be anywhere near a 50/50 chance against a pilot." That's a bunch of pilots looking for god-mode. Either that, or people assuming that said pilot, once he *does* run the misfortune to happen across half a dozen guys with AA to take him out (killing 5 of them in the process!), has to run around doing grunt-work to earn a plane again.

Neither are good design decisions, IMO.

If you want vehicles to be powerful and meaningful against infantry, they need to be multi-crewed, so you're talking 2-3 guys in a vehicle against multiple infantrymen working together.

Mechzz · 2012-05-14, 11:22 AM

Originally Posted by Xyntech

Well, actually the NC had no effective hand held AA. The Striker was the best deterrent, but the Lancer was the best hand held AV gun for actually (potentially) killing an aircraft.

The Pheonix was just shit. The NC were severely gimped on AA, at least early on before the Skyguard.

I always assumed the Phoenix was decent, but I didn't play TR or NC enough to find out for sure. Sounds like we were all in the same boat in that case, since the Striker drew the comment that its worst effect was that is caused migraine in enemy pilots due to constant lock on warnings.

Originally Posted by Xyntech

One unit should not be the only effective counter to itself.

Although, that being said, I am strongly in favor of aircraft being one of the best AA units in the game, along with tanks being one of the best anti tank units in the game and snipers being one of the best anti sniper units in the game, etc etc.

I also agree that aircav should be able to take out AA, but it should be difficult, and also risky, even with superior numbers. Your first choice to take out enemy AA should be tanks and other AV platforms that are harder for AA to take out. Taking out enemy AA with your aircraft should be a last resort, only used when there are fewer AA units, with far too many other units supporting them preventing your tanks from getting in close.

The game needs hard counters, but those hard counters shouldn't ever be guaranteed wins. Skill, tactics, surprise, and superior numbers should always be able to turn the tables in an otherwise bad situation.

This.

And of course, at the end of the day we'll test it to heck in beta. But I do carry a torch for the idea that if they give AA to infantry it should actually be capable of the "anti-" part

Kipper · 2012-05-14, 12:14 PM

Originally Posted by Xyntech

One unit should not be the only effective counter to itself.

Of course, and that's not what I meant - having your own fighter screen is just one effective counter to enemy aircraft. Packing shoulder mounted AA, engineer built turrets, Lightning Skyguards are all options too.

What I'm trying to say is - if you fail to provide ANY counter, however you prefer to do it, you should expect to die. Not just to aircraft, but to whatever it was that arrived that you failed to anticipate. That's what combined arms is all about.... its about bringing the rock, paper AND scissors to a fight so you can answer whatever it is you come up against.

From what we've heard, PS2 is going to provide effective counters to everything with everything else - tanks will be able to fit AA,AG,AI, aircraft will be able to fit AA,AG,AI, infantry will be able to spec AA,AG,AI... so there's loads of choices for diverse play.

Also - what was said about aircraft spending most of their time running, hiding, or not shooting is also true. Bummer as it is when they find you, most of the time they're flying around looking for something that's worth attacking that has no defence. Organised teams will probably keep air-cav at bases and towers and call them in to specific situations/map markers as opposed to just randomly patrolling, which will be the domain of solo players more likely.

Originally Posted by Mechzz

And of course, at the end of the day we'll test it to heck in beta. But I do carry a torch for the idea that if they give AA to infantry it should actually be capable of the "anti-" part

I hope that infantry AA won't be super deadly to aircraft being used properly, as there's likely to be quite a lot of them and quite difficult to spot and hit individually. The purpose of infantry AA should be to destroy idiot pilots who try to hover-farm, and either scare off others, or force them to have to attack at high speed where they'll be far less accurate and far less deadly.

Xyntech · 2012-05-14, 12:27 PM

Originally Posted by kaffis

Bottom line: it shouldn't require an entire squad of AA-equipped heavy assault infantrymen to take down a lone pilot. So I'm really alarmed at how many people are nodding at each other about statements like "no, an AA infantry guy shouldn't be anywhere near a 50/50 chance against a pilot." That's a bunch of pilots looking for god-mode. Either that, or people assuming that said pilot, once he *does* run the misfortune to happen across half a dozen guys with AA to take him out (killing 5 of them in the process!), has to run around doing grunt-work to earn a plane again.

Is a guy with a Decimator guaranteed to kill a AI MAX? No. The AI MAX still may come out on top.

But with a little skill and tactics, the infantry can devastate the MAX.

The same should be true for an AI aircraft facing down an AA infantry. Both are designed to fight each other, so it should be closer to 50/50, but the more powerful unit types will always have an edge.

In general, I think it should go something like: infantry < MAXes < aircraft < tanks

Infantry vs infantry with AI weapons = 50/50

Infantry vs MAXes with AV and AI weapons respectively = 45/55

Infantry vs aircraft, with AA and AI weapons respectively = 40/60

Infantry vs tanks, with AV and AI weapons respectively = 30/70

or something like that.

The reason for this is due to how hard they are to obtain, and how hard they are to get around to important locations. By obtaining I mean spawning btw, I'm not referring to resources.

Infantry can spawn anywhere, so they are very easy to obtain. getting around isn't too hard either, since they can spawn anywhere and ride in vehicles as well.

MAXes can spawn anywhere, and can sprint, but are otherwise slower and are unable to drive vehicles.

Aircraft are extremely easy to get around due to their speed, but lockon AA and paper armor can make it very hard for them to go where they are needed.

Tanks are slow as shit and can only spawn in certain areas.

So basically, something like a tank deserve a lot more effectiveness than aircraft or infantry, due to how hard it is to get them to places that matter.

I'm not saying aircraft should just be farm mobiles, but it's a complex formula.

Hopefully PS2 has more cover for infantry, so that it is that much harder for aircraft to pick them off and that much easier for infantry to make ambushes. There should always been room made for skill to overcome slight statistical disadvantages.

This is only intended to show how I think balance should be when both targets spot each other at the same time in a one on one fight. There are always other factors, like how quickly that infantryman will be back in the fight versus that aircraft/tank/etc, which is why balance isn't so straight forward.

Stardouser · 2012-05-14, 12:32 PM

Originally Posted by kaffis

Bottom line: it shouldn't require an entire squad of AA-equipped heavy assault infantrymen to take down a lone pilot. So I'm really alarmed at how many people are nodding at each other about statements like "no, an AA infantry guy shouldn't be anywhere near a 50/50 chance against a pilot." That's a bunch of pilots looking for god-mode. Either that, or people assuming that said pilot, once he *does* run the misfortune to happen across half a dozen guys with AA to take him out (killing 5 of them in the process!), has to run around doing grunt-work to earn a plane again.

I think that in a toe to toe scenario, it should take 2 AA infantry to reach a 50/50 chance against whatever the weakest air unit is. Of course, many situations will not be "toe to toe", if the infantry are able to take cover behind trees/rocks etc, they will be able to get additional shots off and reload before the aircraft finds them, in which case a single infantry has a good chance. On the other hand, if aircraft catch you out in the open, that most certainly should not be a 1 to 1 situation.

And I'm not a pilot in any game I play, either. I just think that if they are paper tigers, it's bad for the game.

Kipper · 2012-05-14, 12:41 PM

I think a good trade-off here is that infantry AA can lock on to an aircraft but the missiles are restricted by speed or range (probably range).

If an aircraft spots two AA soldiers out in a field and decides he's going to slow down to a hover and pick them off, they should be able to own him for being dumb.

If on the other hand, the aircraft has to approach at high speed to allow it to get away from the inevitable missile, it will probably miss anyway so stalemate, nobody wins.

If the infantry are good, they'll know to get and hold a lock, and fire at the most optimal time to have the best chance of a hit (likely just as the aircraft passes overhead).

If the pilot is good, he'll be able to aim and fire whilst travelling at full speed, or at least know what angles/terrain he can use to outsmart a missile.

I think a good AI infantry vs a good solo air-cav should more likely result in nobody killing anyone rather than one side always killing the other. If one side isn't good, they lose.

Stardouser · 2012-05-14, 12:46 PM

Originally Posted by Kipper

If an aircraft spots two AA soldiers out in a field and decides he's going to slow down to a hover and pick them off, they should be able to own him for being dumb.

I really hate to bring this up, but it's relevant here: If we have 3D spotting, ESPECIALLY if you can 3D spot for yourself(jets in BF3 can just hit Q and anything within a couple of inches of their nose, evne if 300m away, will get spotted), then aircraft won't have to slow to a hover, 3D spots will allow aircraft to strafe things they can't actually see, so they won't have to slow down. And the reason that matters is, if AA is too limited in range, aircraft will fly in and out of that range before you can fire.

Xyntech · 2012-05-14, 12:47 PM

Originally Posted by Kipper

I think a good AI infantry vs a good solo air-cav should more likely result in nobody killing anyone rather than one side always killing the other. If one side isn't good, they lose.

This would be good.

Anyone who thinks an AI specced aircraft shouldn't be able to farm some unprotected non AA infantry is out of their mind (Traak).

But I would like to see AA units given more of a chance to use skill to even the odds, as well as seeing two units who are specced against each other but who are both very vulnerable (like infantry and aircraft are vulnerable) end a lot of their fights in draws more often than kills.

Kipper · 2012-05-14, 12:54 PM

Originally Posted by Stardouser

I really hate to bring this up, but it's relevant here: If we have 3D spotting, ESPECIALLY if you can 3D spot for yourself(jets in BF3 can just hit Q and anything within a couple of inches of their nose, evne if 300m away, will get spotted), then aircraft won't have to slow to a hover, 3D spots will allow aircraft to strafe things they can't actually see, so they won't have to slow down. And the reason that matters is, if AA is too limited in range, aircraft will fly in and out of that range before you can fire.

Well, range is a balance thing that can be tweaked, as would be the speed of the projectile.

Also, if you're moving fast - even if you see something, it's going to be harder to hit.

Your HUD on an aircraft (or your infantry's visor as we're in the future) is probably going to be able to put a target marker around things that need to be shot at, so seeing stuff is not likely to be the indicator of whether you can hit it or not... more like how straight you can shoot.

....As long as you can't see things through other solid objects, I've hard that happens on BF3 and it sounds dumb.

Stardouser · 2012-05-14, 01:00 PM

Originally Posted by Kipper

Well, range is a balance thing that can be tweaked, as would be the speed of the projectile.

Also, if you're moving fast - even if you see something, it's going to be harder to hit.

Your HUD on an aircraft (or your infantry's visor as we're in the future) is probably going to be able to put a target marker around things that need to be shot at, so seeing stuff is not likely to be the indicator of whether you can hit it or not... more like how straight you can shoot.

....As long as you can't see things through other solid objects, I've hard that happens on BF3 and it sounds dumb.

No, actually, being able to see through opaque cover was a BC2 problem. BF3 made it so that the spot won't show through solid objects. Note however, that it does show through one or two odd things that it shouldn't such as smoke.

kaffis · 2012-05-14, 01:08 PM

Originally Posted by Stardouser

I think that in a toe to toe scenario, it should take 2 AA infantry to reach a 50/50 chance against whatever the weakest air unit is. Of course, many situations will not be "toe to toe", if the infantry are able to take cover behind trees/rocks etc, they will be able to get additional shots off and reload before the aircraft finds them, in which case a single infantry has a good chance. On the other hand, if aircraft catch you out in the open, that most certainly should not be a 1 to 1 situation.

And I'm not a pilot in any game I play, either. I just think that if they are paper tigers, it's bad for the game.

This is what I'm against. One guy shouldn't be able to effectively fight odds that *outnumber him* when his enemy is specifically equipped to fight him.

If the guy in the aircraft feels vulnerable, he should bring friends.

It's not that I want to see aircav end up weak, or scared of their own shadow. I just want to see them working together in teams, just like every sane infantryman will have to.

All of these suggestions that a lone aircav should have an even chance against MULTIPLE AA-equipped infantrymen is essentially saying that "aircav should flat-out win against anything less than a full squad of diverse infantry." And that's a load of BS. Because now, you've got squads of 10 infantry running around, with 2-guys dedicated to AA, and they've got an *even* chance to not just be slaughtered by a lone plane. And they're still royally screwed if a plane and his wingman come sniffing around.

I'm all for stalemates or no-kill outcomes when discussing 1v1, for the record, so long as when kills do happen, they don't heavily favor one side of the equation.

Kipper · 2012-05-14, 01:15 PM

Originally Posted by kaffis

All of these suggestions that a lone aircav should have an even chance against MULTIPLE AA-equipped infantrymen is essentially saying that "aircav should flat-out win against anything less than a full squad of diverse infantry." And that's a load of BS. Because now, you've got squads of 10 infantry running around, with 2-guys dedicated to AA, and they've got an *even* chance to not just be slaughtered by a lone plane. And they're still royally screwed if a plane and his wingman come sniffing around.

The way I see this is that if the aircraft gets the drop on the squad of 10 infantry, he wouldn't know what it was composed of - so he takes one run, probably doesn't hit anything, gets two missiles up his tailpipe which he evades, and is then too scared to come back because next time, he's expected.

Again, the smart pilot stays away from that situation knowing that they were packing AA, the dumb/brave pilot goes in for a second run and maybe hits something, maybe doesn't - maybe gets shot down, maybe doesn't.