Nerf everything except the ship I'm flying, it's ridiculous.

lolno

Mad aside, ion railguns are kind of really dumb.

They're an excellent counter to a bomber cluster on a node.

Fight cheese with cheese, right?

They're an excellent counter to a bomber cluster on a node.

 

Fight cheese with cheese, right?

Truthfully, AOE Ion rails are a great defensive weapon for the gunship, especially, when you frag one guy and 4 of his buddies comer after you like a pack of piranha. Pick out the biggest and slowest of the bunch, zap, and **** while they are hit their Booster recharge.

The great irony is that if every Gunship only had access to one railgun, I don't know that as many people would complain about Ion Railgun.

Sure, Ion Railgun by itself excellent CC ... but if chosen, it would mean the Gunship doesn't have any long-range killing power. To kill anyone at long range you'd need two Gunships--one with Ion and one with Slug (or Plasma ... but lol no).

That would make the Ion Gunship purely a team role. It might still be overpowered ... but at least not as ridiculously as Mangler/Quarrel is now.

But yes... while I do think the OP posts begging for nerfs rather prodigiously, I cannot argue with the key point. Ion Railgun is indeed the most ridiculous weapon in the game.

Here are all of the ways it makes every other weapon in the game look pitiful:

* Ion Railgun can reduce any ship's shields to zero in one shot, except for a Bomber with overcharged shields

* Ion Railgun can reduce any ship's weapon and engine energy to zero in one shot

* Ion Railgun is an AOE with a huge radius (because reasons)

* Ion Railgun has a range of 15000m, meaning you can fire from safety against 3 out of 4 ship classes

* Ion Railgun's target has no warning they are about to be hit by Ion Railgun unless they are looking at the Gunship charging it

* Ion Railgun comes with its own second railgun which deals excellent damage against hull!

The ONLY "weakness" Ion Railgun has is that it does very little damage to hull. But that weakness is not a weakness at all, since every Mangler/Quarrel MUST have a second hull-damaging railgun. You might as well just count it as a "bonus" part of the Ion Railgun.

Compare the Ion Railgun with any other secondary weapon or system ability in the game. Or any primary weapon for that matter. If you had Ion Railgun as a Secondary Weapon choice on every ship, would you ever NOT take it? If you could take it instead of Rocket Pods or Proton Torpedoes or even Cluster Missiles on Scouts and Stings, wouldn't you? Heck I'd even take it instead of Seismic or Seeker Mines.

Okay, so surely BioWare must have crippled the Mangler/Quarrel in order to make up for it having this ridiculously overpowered weapon, right? Not really...

Manglers/Quarrels have strong shields (that bite back!), moderate hulls, some base DR, plenty of mobility from Barrel Roll ... and Burst Laser Cannons ... because why not give them the most powerful short-range weapon in addition to the most powerful long range weapon?

In my opinion, Ion Railgun needs to have its energy-draining effect completely removed, or else do far less shield damage. It can't zero out BOTH shields and engines. Its AOE component should never have made it into the game--or if that must remain, put it on the Plasma Railgun.

And as for Manglers/Quarrels, the fact that they have access to all three railguns means they are the true "sniper" build of Gunship (unlike the Dustmaker/Cometbreaker). To me, this implies that their primary short range weapons should be comparatively weak--for emergency use only. They should have access to Lights and Rapids. They should not have Barrel Roll (what the heck do they have Interdiction Drive for if they also get Barrel Roll?).

But we've been singing this song since December.

Mad aside, ion railguns are kind of really dumb.

The first step in fixing them is to split the tier 4 upgrade better. AOE should not give massive energy drain as well!

Also, only the primary target should get the debuff from tier 5, if AOE is chosen.

The first step in fixing them is to split the tier 4 upgrade better. AOE should not give massive energy drain as well!

 

Also, only the primary target should get the debuff from tier 5, if AOE is chosen.

AoE shouldn't exist at all. It doesn't make logical sense. Why does my railgun suddenly ionize things within a radius of my target? If the ionization effect of the shot can jump through open space like that, why isn't it a beam? (No, BW, don't make it a beam. That's not a good idea.)

You know what I would have given AoE if my boss had told me that AoE absolutely had to exist in GSF? Protorps. The hardest weapon in the game to hit with, not the easiest.

Nerf everything except the ship I'm flying, it's ridiculous.

Bombers are OP and gunships are for cowards.

(plays a sting with bypass/burst lasers combo)

Bombers are OP and gunships are for cowards.

 

(plays a sting with bypass/burst lasers combo)

bypass/burst is so pre-2.6

bypass/burst is so pre-2.6

Your current support nova isn't very scary without a burst dps to help you out though. Not that there's anything wrong with that- it's a team game, and locking someone down is invaluable if there's a gunship, strike, or type 2 scout anywhere close at all- but I think that the nonsense solo sting is still best at the role of Totally invincible Elite Unkillable Awesome Ninja. They just cry because they aren't the top pick for everything at all times forever.

It's mostly sting pilots who shed tears over bombers, for instance, and make threads crying about how a gunship got away instead of dying instantly like they expect everything to.

*snip* ... it seems odd that the drain effect is so very effective, and doesn't scale with charge. I think some mild tweaks is all it really needs.

Yeah.

Edit: cut it down to the part I agree with.

Ion railgun is good for the game. It does remain rather effective as a clumped damage effect, and it seems odd that the drain effect is so very effective, and doesn't scale with charge. I think some mild tweaks is all it really needs.

why

please see shayd's post

please also explain to me why ion aoe makes any logistical sense at all

I can't say I'd shed a tear if they took away ion railgun AoE, but they'd better combine it with some other effective method of clearing out massed drones and mines. EMP just isn't cutting it.

You picked them off one at a time with that 15km railgun your have. Not like drones are going to sprout engines and come after a gunship.

please also explain to me why ion aoe makes any logistical sense at all

Cause the development team that did GSF might have played alot Command & Conquer.

I know when I see the word ion in a video game I always think of C&C.

You picked them off one at a time with that 15km railgun your have. Not like drones are going to sprout engines and come after a gunship.

If it was that simple, bombers wouldn't be anywhere near as good at satelite defence as they are right now.

If it was that simple, bombers wouldn't be anywhere near as good at satelite defence as they are right now.

They really aren't, there's just many bad people that play pac-man with mines.

Cause the development team that did GSF might have played alot Command & Conquer.

I know when I see the word ion in a video game I always think of C&C.

That's funny, I always think of The Empire Strikes Back...

AoE shouldn't exist at all. It doesn't make logical sense. Why does my railgun suddenly ionize things within a radius of my target? If the ionization effect of the shot can jump through open space like that, why isn't it a beam? (No, BW, don't make it a beam. That's not a good idea.)

 

You know what I would have given AoE if my boss had told me that AoE absolutely had to exist in GSF? Protorps. The hardest weapon in the game to hit with, not the easiest.

Not only that but what exactly is an Ion Railgun?

Railguns, Gauss guns, Coilguns all have one thing in common and that is that they are NOT energy weapons, they fire projectiles. They use more advanced means than propellants to accelerate a projectile at hypersonic speeds to cause kinetic damage.

Not only that but what exactly is an Ion Railgun?

 

Railguns, Gauss guns, Coilguns all have one thing in common and that is that they are NOT energy weapons, they fire projectiles. They use more advanced means than propellants to accelerate a projectile at hypersonic speeds to cause kinetic damage.

Maybe it's an ionized projectile? Like a bean bag with mojo in it.

The first step in fixing them is to split the tier 4 upgrade better. AOE should not give massive energy drain as well!

 

Also, only the primary target should get the debuff from tier 5, if AOE is chosen.

I'd say more that the energy drain should only hit the primary target. If and until bombers are reduced a bit, that aoe damage is helpful on the stupid stacking of bombers and gunships in an area which I see almost every match now. If that were adjusted, maybe it'd make more sense to removed the aoe damage component...

Still, I think it's the energy drain part that's the issue. It's too much of a drain on one target, let alone multiples, and even if they changed the effect to be improved by a higher charge on the shot, a fully charged shot takes all of a couple seconds and should not affect a ship's power usage so dramatically for much, much longer.

I've seen it posted elsewhere and I kind of agree... if the other railguns didn't do so well against shields, Ion wouldn't need all of these other crazy bonuses. Somewhere in all these ideas is a good, balanced approach to the rails.