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voltaicbore

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  1. Thanks for swinging by, Drak. I'd quote your post but we're already getting into walls of text, so I'll mix general and specific remarks. Most of the meta shifts made themselves obvious within the first 2 matches upon my return, especially your point about shifting from our old "almost always offensive" style to a much better mix of defensive and escape flying. The first ship I master on any character is always a GS, so I already flew with an eye on line of sight, and I definitely see that it's become vastly more important as a dynamic source of missile (and strike fighter blaster) break. I've also begun to notice a wider variety in strike fighter packages being run successfully, which probably reflects the new roles that you mention being opened up for strikes. But while I agree with your description of the current state of meta shifts in GSF, I'm more interested in knowing specifically what you (and anyone else who has an opinion on it) thinks of the cost/benefit balance of running the various T2 strike builds that make sense. Sure, it's great that strikes are doing well (despite the tone of my initial post I was one of the many pilots yearning for a strike rework back in the day), but is the current mix of killing power and survivability on strikes where you think it should be? With the passage of just a little time (and several more matches where I flew/flew against strikes of all kinds), my opinion remains that strikes are slightly too forgiving. I'm particularly impressed with the Clarion/Imperium's ability to soak GS hits, survive the barrage, and kill its way back to safety, and I've done the same on Starguard/Rycer setups but with what I feel is a generally slimmer margin of safety. My flight time on the Pike/Quell variants are too low to say much, but suffice it to say that I flew two zero-death deathmatches on my very first two outings on those things.
  2. This is perhaps the most egregious thing about GSF. While it's impossible to replicate the wide range of situations new pilots will be exposed to in any pvp game mode with just a tutorial, the GSF tutorial is notably bad. It gives you some sense of how basic maneuvers work, but some things like doing a full stop behind a safe wall by pressing X is just totally absent. This is perhaps the most easily fixable aspect of GSF, in my opinion. And yes, warzone pvp also lacks a similar access to empty arenas for practice, but at least combat resembles what players do in pve all the time. GSF is so different from the rest of the game that I believe it merits a better tutorial system. While I completely agree that nothing will turn off newer/less experienced pilots than hours of curbstomps, I feel there's very little the devs can do regarding this matter. Not allowing teams to form in a team-based game mode is just... silly, and asking people to voluntarily split themselves up is literally telling people how to have their fun. The only long term solution is to get better, and I mean that in all sincerity, no snark. The real problem is a lack of place to practice targets and maneuvers outside of matches. Currently new players have literally no place to learn the maps. Just knowing where to attack from and where to escape to is a great advantage. If a new pilot just flies around away from combat trying to learn the map during the match, they'll get hit with the non-contribution debuff and eventually die. Just having each map available in a self-study mode, with the option of a few AI ships to shoot at/get shot by would be a huge boon to new pilots.
  3. Thanks for the feedback, guys. Verain, good to see you still fly & post. Protorp was just the first projectile that came to mind when I wanted to fire up some complaints - I personally lean towards EMP and concussions for my own use. It's just that, as you said, protorp really can't be temporarily outrun like we used to, and has that obscene range that good pilots (or bad ones en masse) can use to perform GS-like area denial - just on more mobile and mid-range-deadly platforms. I used the word "oppressive" to indicate that perhaps-too-defensive style mid-range pilots are locked into, not raw damage output. I did notice that strikes struggle to notch kills quickly on node, perhaps I didn't give that drawback enough credit. My warcarrier does passably well against strikes on point, since I can poop out seekers, circle pursuers strategically around railgun drones, incessantly break lock with bolder satellite-hugging maneuvers, and unload a magazine full of armpen HLC on them if they decide to peel off. I'm the worst T2 scout pilot I know, and on point I feel like BLCs give me a good chance of killing or at least chasing off a strike. I'll have to pay more attention to that the next few domination matches I get into. I also agree that strikes *should* be as damaging as they are, at the ranges they are. I just don't see them paying high enough a price in terms of risk. The GS vs strike engagement does run, in broad strokes, like you mentioned - I've done hull damage to the strike and have abandoned my perch before taking anymore more than nominal damage myself. However, the hull damage I caused is pretty minimal relative to the hits I put on. I can land two full T5 ion rails on a strike, and watch it saunter away with shields and engine power to spare, apparently. Again, I'm not saying that it should go back to the days of strikes being suicide runs against a T5 ion + rail combo, but I also don't think it's balanced for a quarrel/mangler to land two fully charged hits on a strike and watch it leisurely peel off with 80% health and some engine boost (and yes, I'm aware that pdive can cost 0 engine power, but I know the pdive movement and what I'm seeing is not that). It's quite possible I'm just shooting into particular builds that are exceptional at dealing with ion rails and other lockdowns, I'll have to pay more attention to which flavor of T3 strike gives me the most trouble. I guess what it really comes down to is what I perceive as a "reset time" advantage strikes have. I just feel like a strike is much more capable of coming back for another bite a bit too much more quickly than the other classes. I *do* think that strikes should indeed be the best at that particular aspect of combat - a deroosted GS rightly pays a high engine cost for picking an assailable spot, scouts should always be paranoid about losing what little hull they have, and bombers should fear persistent attack swoops from strikes. I'm just not sure that the price other classes have to pay to keep up with the strike is commensurate for how much killing power the strike brings each and every time. Perhaps the hydrospanner buff that Thutmose mentioned is why I'm seeing strikes coming back faster and healthier for round 2. Maybe I'll feel differently after more matches and more observation, and more tweaks to components/crews/etc. I'm prepared to admit, if I discover it's true, that it was all merely an L2P issue on my part. However, I doubt I'll fully change my position on strikes being overtuned; even on a stock T1 strike, I'm finding that I'm notching more kills and safely resetting more fights. I don't even have a proper escape engine component, just base retro thrusters to help me finish a kill or reposition in a dogfight. Even if I don't change my mind on strikes, I might be willing to accept it if I feel like more new and unknown pilots can perform acceptably in them. Anecdotally my experience thus far lines up with what Thutmose said about less frequent blowouts, and if strikes have to be this way to contribute to that, I'll grudgingly accept it.
  4. Disclaimer: I am extremely and unabashedly salty. That doesn't mean I'm necessarily wrong about everything I say, but now that the bias is out there I don't have the burden of attempting to hide it behind the veneer of civility. I also put "new" in quotes for the thread title as I realize most of these changes have been around for a while, but I'm returning from a years-long break and they're still pretty new to me. To all you strike fighter devotees, who suffered through the long period of strikes being the laughable niche choice you flew just for a challenge: your patience has been rewarded handsomely, and I deeply, deeply resent you for it. With total sincerity, I hope something horrible happens to you IRL to compensate for the strike fighter renaissance you currently enjoy. Although I have no cosmic powers to actually make anything happen to any of you, when the next tragedy befalls you or the ones you love the most, know that I am out there somewhere feeling an inexplicable sense of satisfaction. Now that I've spewed forth that bit of toxicity, a question for discussion. What do veteran strike pilots think of the current balance between strike fighter killing power, survivability, and disengage ability? Admittedly the last two things I listed are closely related, but "survivability" as used here refers primarily to the simple ability to take some solid hits yet not blow up. I find it hard to criticize any one of those 3 aspects individually, but put together I feel they make strikes nearly impossible to deal with, outside of running equally skilled and equipped strikes against it. It's much the same way that I feel the protorp improvements would make more sense if they didn't take away the disto break. Both at the same time just makes protorp oppressively effective. Some of you might say "hey, that actually describes balance, and what the workhorse strike fighter role should be." You might even be right! However, I feel like strikes currently enjoy too many advantages for the precious few weaknesses to make up for it. It seems too easy for a competent strike to close gaps on every class of ships (especially slug rail GSes) and just run off if things go south with scout-esque impunity. Sure, the scout might better evade retaliatory shots, but the strike can now just eat a few clean hits and run off to reset the whole affair in short order.
  5. As a returning (and rusty) GSF veteran, I hate to admit it - but yes, there is an incredibly steep learning curve now. It was always there to some extent, but it's far worse now than it's ever been. I think (the much-needed and long-awaited) rebalancing of certain ship classes is to blame... which sucks, because I think these very same changes that amplify veteran pilots' ability to curbstomp new players were also desperately needed. I won't go into further detail unless someone loudly demands it, but I think the changes allow for a more aggressive style of play across the board - which IMO benefits established pilots far more than new ones. GSF has always been a very skill-based form of pvp - every veteran has stories of taking stock (totally unupgraded) ships into combat on new characters, and having great matches nonetheless. It just goes to show that a strong grasp of GSF fundamentals and knowledge of the maps means a lot. This, of course, is a double-edged sword for newcomers. On the one hand the emphasis on skill means that you don't have to grind out tens of thousands of requisition to stand a chance. Meta upgrades certainly help, but you can still manage to contribute without having everything maxed out. But on the other hand, that same emphasis on skill means that the veteran pilots who just do everything better can really eat you alive. I just got out of a deathmatch where I made 0 kills. Plenty of assists, and decent enough total damage, but... 0 kills. I'm not sure I had a match like that except for the very first match I flew, ever. It's rough out there, even for someone who knows a lot of tricks but is faded on the muscle memory when it comes to certain things. I can easily imagine that a newcomer would be totally disgusted by such an experience, and it would only intensify as it happens match after match. Until more veterans start quitting for good (many already have), this problem will only get worse. As far as I can tell, the only hope for GSF remains the obscenely good pve rewards associated with it. Easy XP, and at 75 a warzone crate every match. I believe propping up a pvp mode via pve rewards is a bad idea and indicates severe problems with maintaining population, but at least it will give demoralized newcomers a reason to come back every once in a while.
  6. Yeah getting spawn camped really takes the fun out of the camp-ees. It's possible to regroup at a farther point, but I've never seen any team make a meaningful push back. I'm just glad that thanks to cap ship turrets (and probably more even skill/experience all around at the time) I was never a victim of spawn camping when I first learned GSF. I can easily imagine completely writing off GSF if that happened to me early on. As for talk of veteran pilot replenishment, I agree that such replenishment is vital. Some of us have been around since GSF's launch, but that of course is a player pool that will only shrink over time. I, too, have noticed several new names flying bombers, but doing so in the most miserable and ineffective way. The hope would be that having more matches with a higher chance of experience diversity would eventually produce more new pilots that make it past that "inert aoe ion bait" stage.
  7. Heh I'm glad the otherwordly powers of repeated name drops drew you out. No need to preach to the choir, I'd definitely count myself within the low end of the veteran pool. I'm no stranger to the top of the end-of-match scorecard, but will readily admit I am easily overshadowed by some of the bigger names. My primary issue is probably how spread out and sporadic my GSF activity has been. I uninstalled swtor for nearly a year, and will happily uninstall again when my 2-month sub runs out in July and I get my new computer (enabling me to slither back to my game of choice). My aggregate matches flown, KDR, win rate, etc will not stack up well against many of the people I can fly competitively with on a per-match basis. I would honestly not be surprised if my win rate and KDR were both abysmal by veteran standards, as I learned to fly from repeated fiery death, and have not subsequently flown enough matches to normalize those stats. We're talking from the days of when the original Xiao was an absolute terror to new pilots on SL. Aside from just being a bit rusty at the moment, my other current challenge is playing on a computer I'm not used to. I got used to an even 25-30 fps on my previous machine, and once I lost that (I range from 3 fps on lost shipyards to about 15-20 on kuat for this computer) I found out my fundamentals need some work. I've had a good time coping, falling back on a few low-fps countermeasures that help me at least feel like more of a threat (e.g. plasma rail with evasion debuff). Your 50-match experiment is something I'll have to watch in a bit, so apologies if you addressed this next question in that vid: I assume you were in GSF chat or the Discord (if it existed at the time) and at least had some awareness of whether or not groups were queuing? I think knowing that you tended to *not* draw veteran opponents when you knew several groups were out there would help make your 50 match sample that much more robust. But if the pattern generally holds, I feel like that makes the case for cross-faction even stronger. Agreed. I just think that we'd be able to retain a higher proportion of the new pilots that peek into GSF if there was something we could do about poor matchmaking before solving the population issue. A big enough pool of pilots would essentially solve much of the problem, just via probability. The dev team's abandonment of GSF is something I've long been aware of, and I feel it's a mixed bag. On the one hand, I'm sad that things like the strike fighter overhaul never really had a chance. On the other hand, I have no problems flying the same old maps over and over. Furthermore, aside from strikes, I think GSF represents one of the purest and most balanced forms of pvp out there, period. As I mentioned earlier I've flown some great matches in a totally unupgraded ship. Sure it's nice to have armpen, wingman, and a missile break disto, but the fundamentals of power management, situational awareness, and reading buff bars on your target never lose their value regardless of your upgrade situation. Any form of pvp where an "ungeared" player can more than hold his/her own just through mastery of the game mode is a great one in my book, and I think this aspect of GSF was really saved by abandonment. It's kind of like the awesome nature reserve that has sprung up in the DMZ separating North and South Korea. The root cause for people not going in there is stupid, but one of the nice consequences is that nobody's had the chance to go in there to mess things up further. I'm lazy so I don't go too far out of my way to help new folks, but will take low-hanging fruit opportunities. So if someone asks in fleet chat "wut iz dis GSF" I'll usually reach out and encourage them to /cjoin gsf, watch some guides, get some advice, and keep flying. I also used to throw out basics (f1-f3 for power modulation, space for boost, x for full stop) in ops chat if I saw a bunch of new names in the roster. I've never really coordinated with a wider effort to balance queues, but I'll never relog to the other faction because we're getting roflstomped and frequently leave for the other side if we're doing the roflstomping. Sadly I think that's the extent of what we can do, other than fragmenting into pairs more often than full groups of 4. Welcome to the fold! Some of us with thousands of matches still love it just as much. Also in terms of CXP, my toons that are nearing/just cracked into tier 2 are still reliably getting 1 command rank per match. Still the best way to do cxp for me, aside from the HM EV I spam for 242 gear during the week lol.
  8. EDIT, AGAIN: I just googled the topic instead of using the forum search box, and found several results covering this exact thing. One example: http://www.swtor.com/community/showthread.php?t=885700. Whoever has the power to do so, feel free to trash this thread. Also, if there's a way I can do it myself, someone tell me how lol. Apologies if this is retreading old territory; I ran a search for this topic and was shocked to get 0 results. I think cross-faction queueing might help alleviate two issues: (1) increasing queue pops, and (2) starting to address (just a START, in no way a substantial solution for) the frequent match imbalance. I think point (1) merits almost no further discussion; if the queue were not hampered by the requirement to either field 1 full team from each faction or 2 full teams from just one faction, it would be easier to get a match going. Point (2) is frankly what I am more interested in. I realize that group queueing can still be a significant imbalancing factor - just one group of 4 aces can really make a huge difference if the other side does not collectively have the skill to answer those 4. Furthermore, there is no matchmaking algorithm for GSF, and frankly I think it should stay that way. My experience with glicko/elo elsewhere has been largely unhappy, and I cannot imagine a scenario where the swtor dev team could actually get it right. But if at least solo aces and groups from both factions could be flexibly mixed, I think that would do something meaningful to replace what we as players are already only occasionally doing now (coordinating group queues across servers/factions as well as occasionally voluntarily relogging to the other faction for balance). If nothing else, some imp newcomers that got rolled by a premade group last round may have the chance to get carried the next pop, and that might be enough to salvage the new pilot experience. I used to say that I prefer to fly terrible losses over not flying at all, but it still stings to fly 7 losses to the weekly on more than one toon. I imagine that new pilots with far less attachment to the game mode would reasonably give up on GSF. GSF is the sole aspect of this game that I still like, and if I'm feeling this salty about it I'm sure we've already lost scores and scores of potential pilots. Yeah yeah, I can already see Despon typing "git gud, I can do 60K in a t1 scout." To an extent I can't deny that idea - I, too, have flown some of my best matches in totally stock T1s, as have several other regulars I've spoken to. That being said, I think it's also fair to say those experiences are outliers. I just think rather than hoping someone gets good enough to carry, it would make more sense to restructure the queue. EDIT: On reading this, it seems like I'm taking a shot at Despon near the end. I most certainly am, but it's only because I remember him answering another salty pleb with a more literate version of what I quoted. To be fair to him, few have demonstrated as much dedication to educating new pilots as Despon has. It's just that I think all the video instruction in the world means so little compared to not getting melted out of the gate on a lopsided match.
  9. I think I missed some pages while catching up on this thread, so apologies if this has been addressed already. I've recently come back to swtor because my main computer has a fried gfx card and I'm borrowing one that can't run the other game that made me abandon swtor. That other game has entirely normalized pvp gear - the bolster simply puts everyone at max. Players can make stat choices for different builds by simply picking from any of the 6pc set bonuses in the game, as well as picking different earpieces/implants (which are also at max stat level). A system like this, if the Hero Engine could even support it, would pretty much turn pvp into a skill-only thing. Of course, it wouldn't solve any of the bellyaching that we'll inevitably see from ppl so far who've farmed 6pc sets. But overall, I think it would save the dev team from continuing to miss the mark on pvp balance.
  10. I've uniformly found crit to be a better choice for me on Quarrels/Manglers. It's not that often that a target gets away from me with just a sliver of hull left, meaning that the extra 160 would have made the kill. It's probably a function of how I hold and fire - most of the time I charge enough to very solidly make the kill, and only when I'm about to die or lose the target do I release a partial charge. Then again, your question was really related to our DO discussion. I wish I had numbers, but I'm thinking Drakk is right - I have never seen anyone survive a fully charged crit DO rail. However, I rarely get the DO out of the gate, so I'm not sure if a fresh target with full shield/hull could manage it.
  11. Several others have mentioned it already, so I want to add it with just a bit more force: CLASS STORYLINES. I get the feeling that an announcement that we're getting honest-to-goodness class storylines expanded would generate enormous (positive) buzz. Even today, with your allegedly "acclaimed" new content, I still prefer any of the 8 class storylines I've already played to any new story content we've seen from Makeb onwards. KotFE is the worst offender. The moment I completed Chapter I, I knew right then that I could not stomach doing the KotFE storyline than once on any given server. If the game is actually doing as well as you're making it sound, I hope it teaches the team this lesson: there may be a way for you to bring said honest-to-goodness class storylines back. Consider the following: (1) We are willing to WAIT for story content: Indeed, if KotFE is really performing that well, then you've proven that the playerbase is willing to wait for (even inferior) story content to be released in bursts, instead of waiting for huge releases. (2) We are (possibly) willing to PAY for story content: Again, *if* KotFE is doing as well as you say it is, then you've also proven that you can get us to pay for access to story. Sure, you gave away level 1-50 class storylines. But now you've just shown you can put story behind a paywall, and we're ok with not getting story until we pay for it. Admittedly, it's possible that nobody actually likes KotFE, and what's happening is that people are just subbing for all the myriad other gameplay benefits and play KotFE just because it's part of the package deal with the sub. But again, *if* KotFE is as well-recieved as you allege, then I think you can look at that as evidence of our willingness to pay for story, even when you already gave so much of it to us for free. I guess the saddest part about all this is that we get this open letter, a bunch of us post on the forums, and then... nothing. As the letter seems to promise, the dev team is just going to do what it does, and I'm not sure it really cares about anything the community says that doesn't somehow fit neatly into what they were already planning. Just... class missions. Bring them back. I think we've shown that we'd pay for that. That's all your bosses care about in the end, right?
  12. Hear, hear (on the civility points just made). That's a real shame - there's been a sharp spike in bad attitudes, from new and veteran players alike. That's an issue that reaches far beyond just strikes. I'm getting tired of the endless cries of "cheater! premade!" I'm seeing more of these days.. Should there be open animosity towards/ad-hominem attacks against strike pilots? Never. Calculated disdain? Perhaps. It's not wrong to point out that for almost any pilot in almost any situation (with some notable exceptions already mentioned in the thread), you're likely not helping the team as much in your strike as you could in a different class of ship. That being said, this is a game. I fly what I like, others fly what they like. I just happen to like the Quarrel and Novadive, neither of which raises eyebrows. LOL that was also my first thought after hitting submit. I'm sure someone could make a charity game out of it.
  13. Sad to see you go, 'dox. I, for one, will miss your presence on JC, should you decide to really make good on your threat to leave us. That being said, not sure you should be proud of more Clarions on JC bars. You yourself made passing reference to it earlier - on JC a lot of us *do* notice "Eudoxia knock-offs." Why knock-offs? Because they're absolutely awful at it, and generally cannot come close to matching your consistent performance on that ship. I'm completely with Verain on this. The fact that some of the best pilots in GSF can perform well in strikes doesn't come anywhere near proving strikes are a responsible choice for the team. Just because any NBA player could grind me to dust in a one-on-one basketball match while wearing flip-flops does NOT mean flip-flops should be acceptable for competitive play, anywhere, ever.
  14. Why are people confused as to how cross-faction queueing favors the ONE cross-faction map we have? Makes tons of sense that this one is the one we see all the time, as it is the ONE pvp instance that has the luxury of slapping together teams without respect to faction. I'm thinking it's just raw statistical reality that's driving the prevalence of the Odessen pops, not anything else. I think cross-faction has worked beautifully for the Odessen map, and I'd hope to see some sort of similar effort applied to GSF.
  15. Couldn't find any information about who voices our favorite logistics Mirialan (she does one of the new KotFE Havoc troopers as well). I initially assumed it could be the same actor who does the female smuggler, but was never quite convinced of that. Anyone know?
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