Topic title.

I was under the impression that once a missile was locked and fired, that was it. You had to break the lock beforehand using either evasion skills or breaking LOS.

In a match earlier, everytime I locked on to a certain Scout and fired, he used his boosters for a second or two and outran the missile. What's even more odd is he managed this about two or three times in a row, and I've never seen it before.

Is it just that? That I've never seen it before/never been lucky enough to manage it?

Dev post on the topic

http://www.swtor.com/community/showthread.php?p=7017500#edit7017500

Once a missile is in-flight, the only way to avoid being hit is to activate a defensive maneuver type engine ability (the same list as above). This will 'evade' the missile. Visually, the missile will still complete its journey towards your ship, but it will not explode and no damage will be done to you.

Chances are that he didn't boost away from the missile, but instead activated Barrel Roll to avoid it

Once a missile is fired the target has until the missile reaches him to use an evasive maneuver (any evasive maneuver) or an upgraded distortion field to break the missile lock.

In most cases it's best to wait until the missile has been fired, since it takes a little extra coordination and time to concentrate on keeping you in their sights and they often cannot also shoot you at the same time due to the difference between the target lead and missile tracking, plus it makes them waste a missile.

Use the time to build up a little extra engine power and burn away, or weapon/shields to turn back and let em have it.

In most cases it's best to wait until the missile has been fired[...]

It should be noted that cluster missiles travel very quickly and are usually fired at short range, so if you get a very fast lock warning, better not wait for it to evade. Or you can just boost your shields and tank them, if htat's an option. But I've been hit by those many times while trying to wait for the lock. It just doesn't seem to work.

Dev post on the topic

http://www.swtor.com/community/showthread.php?p=7017500#edit7017500

 

 

 

Chances are that he didn't boost away from the missile, but instead activated Barrel Roll to avoid it

That's what I thought... at least I'm not going senile!

There was definitely no Barrel Roll going on, as he was just boosting away each time. I'll have to figure out what this Distortion Field looks like and keep an eye out from now on.

Distortion field doesn't affect it... Only the defensive rolls, turns and the likes do. Not other abilities.

Look at the final upgrade for Distortion Field - one of the options makes it break missile locks upon activation.

Look at the final upgrade for Distortion Field - one of the options makes it break missile locks upon activation.

Ah, but I was talking about the baseline distortion field

I'm not so sure, but iirc, before the GS launch, they were introducing the classes, and mentioned that scount can even outrun the missiles.

Don't know for sure, but I think that it is doable, I might have done it couple of times. Thing is, there is a "range" parameter on each missile, so I assume that if the fighter locks his 10k range missile on me from 6k meters and I manage to outrun the missile for another 4k, the missile will just die there at 10k and not explode.

Or, the "range" parameter could be the lock-on range and I might be wrong. Don't want to lie to you, just thinking aloud.