Well, it has been some time since I had played GSF, largely due to some of the glaring issues I had with the game mode for some time that only got worse and worse as the weeks, then months, and now years have progressed. Ranging from problems with matchmaking taking up to 30 minutes or more at a time, to the use and over population of Tick Bombers and the like... and a waning interest in the game as a whole but that's hardly BW's fault.

But upon returning and hearing some things had been patched, I wanted to dive in blind to see what it was all about, and my reaction? The rage and wrath of a thousand stars.

I've not posted here before but before the most recent patches when BW never bothered to poke GSF with a stick for well over a year it seemed, but I've a rather distinct and white hot anger toward the "Tick Meta" that bombers employed, camping in hard to reach spots where either you'd be exposed to get at them with a GS, or forced into a kamikaze run with a Scout to even have a chance to dent their defense, whist I assume they were playing sit-n-spin on their thumbs, raking in points and doing little else than playing the game on Easy Mode.

And I was a rather adamant scout player, I loved my Tier 2 (Flashfire/Sting) like nothing else. It was fun, fast, engaging, and I had to manage a fair few resources to be one of the harder nuisances to kill. But with the latest patch, any semblances of a Scout being viable in a GSF match outside of being burst, run, or be blown up. The key to mine (and other scout player's) core strategy was the maxed out utility of the Distortion Field ability, allowing you to negate missile locks and incoming missiles. I can't tell you how often that ability saved me in a game when I had to run down Bombers and combat three other players, ball and tie them up, whilst my team worked on objectives elsewhere.

Now with one of the latest patches, that ability has been nerfed to non-existence.

However, a still past issue remains in the form of ticking, and it's bastardized brother, of Tick Stacking, where after one tick is dug in and defenses set up, another bomber swoops in and further creates a hell nest for the other team to clear. Often times on multiple points with two, sometimes THREE, bombers in place there when even a skilled team has no chance possible to dig them out.

I've voiced my opinion to multiple sources of "F*ck you!" and "Get Gud Scrub" by the team performing this, and by others who feel less passionately about the issue.

There is no sway I can pull, no believed chance a developer will even give a crap about a 6 year subscriber to the game, but if they are I hope you guys could hear me out on two proposed rule changes for the game I loved dearly at it's start, and grew to resent as they added what I feel was the worst addition to the game mode.

1: De-nerf Distortion Field back to it's prior state, or make certain missiles unable to de-lock (proton torpedoes and sabotage probes for example)

2: Put a team wide cap on the number of bombers able to be fielded in Domination. A ratio of 1 Bomber / 4 Players, limiting the capacity of a 4 Bomber strat to just farm points and make the game nearly unwinnable for the other team.

I know I'm going to be ripped a new one on here over these suggestions, but screw it if a Dev actually sees this post and plays the game they've made substantially less enjoyable than it once was in it's start.

any semblances of a Scout being viable in a GSF match

Your scout is still viable.

The key to mine (and other scout player's) core strategy was the maxed out utility of the Distortion Field ability, allowing you to negate missile locks and incoming missiles.

That's a button, not a strategy. I'm not even sure it qualifies as a tactic. The existence of disto breaking missiles meant that everyone ran disto to ignore missiles, and anyone running missiles was an idiot, because they couldn't lock on to any player who bothered to hook up a keyboard.

I can't tell you how often that ability saved me in a game when I had to run down Bombers and combat three other players

Yea, that's the problem. Those three players shouldn't have all their missile locks trivialized because you have a button to ignore them.

Now with one of the latest patches, that ability has been nerfed to non-existence.

It still breaks missile locks before the missile is in flight. If it sounds like a missile you don't want to tank, press the button before the lock completes. You usually want to wait a second or even two (depending on tones) before pressing the lock, while you evade the next lock (that will begin immediately) once you cancel the first.

Tick Stacking, where after one tick is dug in and defenses set up, another bomber swoops in and further creates a hell nest for the other team to clear. Often times on multiple points with two, sometimes THREE, bombers in place there when even a skilled team has no chance possible to dig them out.

A skilled team can trivially wipe out three ticks, or a nest of any size, depending. You can EMP the nest (not on your dps ship, but on a utility ship, which you or a team mate can run), you can ion the nest, etc. You probably won't be able to clear that nest solo on a berserk melee like the type 2 scout, but there are ships that can.

1: De-nerf Distortion Field back to it's prior state, or make certain missiles unable to de-lock (proton torpedoes and sabotage probes for example)

I hope distortion doesn't go back. Missiles were crap as a result of that. There was no way to buff missiles appropriately in a world where everyone could just become immune to them on that ship.

Did you know that EMP field gives you 3 seconds of missile immunity, every 30 seconds... and even shares that immunity with your allies? You can still break missiles in flight, not just locks, that way. It's not on the type 2 scout, of course, so you'll be giving up some damage and shields if you go that path.

As to "make certain missiles unable to de-lock", I'm not sure what you mean. Proton torpedoes are breakable just like any other missile. The tooltip saying otherwise was fake news. Sabotage probe can be broken in flight as well, and that has always been the case- the missile does have a really fast flight time, however, but it is absolutely breakable.

2: Put a team wide cap on the number of bombers able to be fielded in Domination.

Have an anti-bomber ship on your bar if you are really frustrated by bombers. Group with other players and make sure at least someone is able to run an anti-bomber ship if you see this kind of thing happening a lot. It's almost always solo players losing to multiple bombers who make this complaint, and the answer to team work, or the existence of multiple players, is not to buff a carry ship to the point where it doesn't matter if your team is terrible.

I know I'm going to be ripped a new one on here over these suggestions, but screw it if a Dev actually sees this post and plays the game they've made substantially less enjoyable than it once was in it's start.

You're not alone in your opinion. But I'm pretty sure you are damned wrong about it. I'm very glad that distortion no longer allows type 2 scouts and type 1 gunships to enjoy a special position of being able to cooldown-tank in space for extended kill cycles. It trivialized many of the other ship choices, component choices, and crewmen choices.

Let's reply quote by quote, shall we?

That's a button, not a strategy. I'm not even sure it qualifies as a tactic. The existence of disto breaking missiles meant that everyone ran disto to ignore missiles, and anyone running missiles was an idiot, because they couldn't lock on to any player who bothered to hook up a keyboard.

Yea, that's the problem. Those three players shouldn't have all their missile locks trivialized because you have a button to ignore them.

Wrapping these both into one for the time being as the reply applies to both. The core strategy comes in the way of playing the "Glass Tank". Drawing fire and forcing hostiles to lock missiles on myself, and once launched using distortion field to render the attack useless. Costing opponents the shot and time focused on me rather than my team mates. I stated it was a utility, the strategy came from not just knowing how to use it (i.e. clicking a button), but when.

It still breaks missile locks before the missile is in flight. If it sounds like a missile you don't want to tank, press the button before the lock completes. You usually want to wait a second or even two (depending on tones) before pressing the lock, while you evade the next lock (that will begin immediately) once you cancel the first.

Ties in with the first but I was speaking more of the specialization of the ability, being able to render missiles in flight null rather than just the lock on feature. And I've played GSF from the beta days, I understand the difference in tones.

A skilled team can trivially wipe out three ticks, or a nest of any size, depending. You can EMP the nest (not on your dps ship, but on a utility ship, which you or a team mate can run), you can ion the nest, etc. You probably won't be able to clear that nest solo on a berserk melee like the type 2 scout, but there are ships that can.

Those are all strategies I and other team mates have employed to mixed results, usually to a hard counter by enemy interferance fighters and the often (again) the hard to reach areas the ticks have lodged themselves into, especially on maps like Mesa and the Asteroid Field's C point. To build off of there, when this is spread across not one but TWO capture points, that's where I draw the issue (highlight coming up shortly).

As to "make certain missiles unable to de-lock", I'm not sure what you mean. Proton torpedoes are breakable just like any other missile. The tooltip saying otherwise was fake news. Sabotage probe can be broken in flight as well, and that has always been the case- the missile does have a really fast flight time, however, but it is absolutely breakable.

What I mean by this goes on the lines of once the missile is locked and FIRED, it cannot be negated or outrun by any means other than an engine ability. Distortion field would have no effect on their trajectory or have the ability to be rendered null after the lock has been established and projectile fired.

Your other points are valid and I do agree on many of them. Team play is vital in a game mode like this, but that doesn't fully negate my personal feelings toward some of the changes that the mode has made from it's launch... Bombers being the addition I noted at the end that I feel the game was made all the worse for including. I understand their role and sadly now, it's too late to outright remove them, but that does not remove the fact that they have eaten away at what the game was at it's inception: Dogfighting in Star Wars. Not playing bot manager and playing in what I still consider 'easy mode'.

And yes, it did trivialize the use of certain fighters and fighter types (Strike Fighters got a massive buff from this, one that was admittedly needed). However, I still have no love for bomber mains, regardless for the various reasons given (Not focused on the game, 'medical' issues, exct.) and I am still of the opinion that the game is worse off with them included. It is arguable that it takes less skill and effort to play bomber, yet they are often rewarded more for this than some of the better Scout/Gunship players.

Wrapping these both into one for the time being as the reply applies to both. The core strategy comes in the way of playing the "Glass Tank".

It wasn't glass, that's the problem. Also it was also a cannon: the battlescout remains the highest damage in the entire game under cooldowns.

Drawing fire and forcing hostiles to lock missiles on myself, and once launched using distortion field to render the attack useless.

Which, because entire ship classes had no way around that, meant that anyone that was doing that was absolutely and completely wrong. They were bad for playing those ships. Now, they aren't. If you're on a strike and you see a battle scout dive in pre-5.5, you lock on your missile and then you start shooting at them. You can either get close enough and hope that you release point blank with enough latency to get the lock to fire, or you hope they blow disto so you can lock for real by shooting at them. Either way, the distortion negates both of your things, and you can't peel. The scout gets to do his job unmolested. This was absolutely an issue. You couldn't know it was coming and build your strike differently: your only options were deployables that ignore the evasion or lock cheese, gunships fishing for 15% hit chances, or playing a battle scout yourself. It's not some master trickster enforcing his will, it's just a mechanic that trivializes entire ship classes.

the strategy came from not just knowing how to use it (i.e. clicking a button), but when.

"When the missile is fired" is about 95% of the way there. That's why it's just a button.

Ties in with the first but I was speaking more of the specialization of the ability, being able to render missiles in flight null rather than just the lock on feature.

Right, so by "non-existence" you meant "now the talent only breaks locks and is still really good, instead of breaking locks and missiles in flight".

Those are all strategies I and other team mates have employed to mixed results, usually to a hard counter by enemy interferance fighters

So now you and your team are running into a balanced resistance of enemy players, with some intercepting the anti-nest ships and others building a nest to defend against the dps ships. How is this a problem?

What I mean by this goes on the lines of once the missile is locked and FIRED, it cannot be negated or outrun by any means other than an engine ability.

Or EMP field, or an ally doing EMP field. So what you mean is, it can't be broken by distortion field. That's literally the entire intent. Whatever missiles can be broken in flight by distortion field, no one will use, because they will be bad.

Distortion field would have no effect on their trajectory or have the ability to be rendered null after the lock has been established and projectile fired.

I do think that distortion field could have been nerfed differently. If it had a reduced duration or damage to represent a partial hit or near detonation, I think that could have worked too. That would be instead of any form of lock cancelling, of course, and if multiple targets were locking you, you'd still get hosed. But we got a different nerf, and it still accomplishes the goal of disallowing the trivialization of weapon and ship classes.

Bombers being the addition I noted at the end that I feel the game was made all the worse for including.

Many really like bombers, but you are definitely not alone in your thoughts here. Given that they are here, and barring a redesign, they need to be viable.

Not playing bot manager and playing in what I still consider 'easy mode'.

I can't get behind your disdain for an entire class of players.

However, I still have no love for bomber mains, regardless for the various reasons given (Not focused on the game, 'medical' issues, exct.)

What on earth lol.

The change to distortion field is a very good change. The only downfall is that it's kinda lame that a scout can't break seeker mines with DF.

Flashfire/Sting is still a very strong ship. It's still the best overall domination ship IMO.

And I was a rather adamant scout player, I loved my Tier 2 (Flashfire/Sting) like nothing else. It was fun, fast, engaging, and I had to manage a fair few resources to be one of the harder nuisances to kill. But with the latest patch, any semblances of a Scout being viable in a GSF match outside of being burst, run, or be blown up. The key to mine (and other scout player's) core strategy was the maxed out utility of the Distortion Field ability, allowing you to negate missile locks and incoming missiles. I can't tell you how often that ability saved me in a game when I had to run down Bombers and combat three other players, ball and tie them up, whilst my team worked on objectives elsewhere.

 

Now with one of the latest patches, that ability has been nerfed to non-existence.

So, you miss being a great pilot when you have a ship that has a gear advantage that allows it to hit other ships very hard and also pretty much prevents them from having any reasonable chance of hitting back. You also hate the ship class that has passive weapons that can reliably hit a scout, though only if you're fool enough to fly into them.

Oh, and you can't handle tick bombers.

See, 5.5 for GSF was a patch about gameplay balance. So while scouts still have a long list of gameplay advantages, the scale of those advantages when added up is no longer of a much greater size than the total set of advantages that other ships bring to the game.

If your strategy is to pick a ship with a massive mechanical advantages to carry you through fights you wouldn't be able to win on the basis of skill, you're going to have problems because while ships are still different, the large differentials in total raw power have been toned down to be very small differences in total raw power.

Welcome to the level playing field.

Welcome to a fair fight.

Deal with it.

I think original poster is from the past. Now a days you see whole wars where neither side even has a bomber on their bar, much less chosen it. EMP fighter has always been a good counter to bombers, people just didn't like to use it because the juicy OP blc-scouts were impossible not to choose. But now that fighter is the only viable class to use, 6 people on your team might be rolling EMP build fighters, and the other team may have 0 to 1 bombers (instead of 3 - 4+ before), so not sure what your issue is there.

I think you just need to make the adjustment everyone else has and try a fighter. If you were used to scout, the transition to fighter is probably pretty seemless. Now you'll have the armor to chase down a GS with little effort, and bombers (if any exist still) are a breeze to handle. Imagine how hard it is for people who were not expert dog-fighters now to have to learn fighter, or new players trying to learn the game. Your adjustment shouldn't be bad.

Long story short, blc/pods scouts are no longer the BS OP class, its fighter now. Join the club and give it a fair try. I think you'll like it.

EMP fighter has always been a good counter to bombers, people just didn't like to use it because

...literally every other option was better. EMPm was terrible, and bugged on top of that, in the past. Its lock time was too long, its damage was trivial (and bugged), and it prevented you from fielding a better weapon. Then it got much better in 5.5, un-better in 5.6, and in 5.6.1 will be better than bad but badder than best.

But now that fighter is the only viable class to use

No, it's not. That is ridiculous and unsubstantiated by any kind of evidence. Strikes are good... situationally very good. The other classes are all still quite viable, better on some maps, worse on others, better vs. some comps, worse vs. others. This is how it should be.

and the other team may have 0 to 1 bombers (instead of 3 - 4+ before), so not sure what your issue is there.

Matches with 4+ Bombers on a team were a farce and bad for the game. They continue to be. People still do it because inexperienced or indifferent players can't win against them. Skillfully played bombers are an asset to any team. Ticks playing hide-and-don't-move aren't, and shouldn't be part of the game.

Imagine how hard it is for people who were not expert dog-fighters now to have to learn fighter, or new players trying to learn

Holding down RMB to lock a missile isn't some daunting twitch-based reflex check. Neither is playing a support variant like the T3F with Repair Probes, which is extremely durable, mobile, and has reasonable offensive capacity to boot.

Long story short, blc/pods scouts are no longer the BS OP class, its fighter now. Join the club and give it a fair try. I think you'll like it.

Strikes are not OP. No class currently is. That is how it is supposed to be.

- Despon

Hating on Bombers seems a bit silly... EMP is much better than it ever was, and that makes Scouts a great ship to kill bombers. I mean... don't EMP my bombs, and then try to go nose to nose with my bomber because I got Shields and Armour for days, and my Heavy Lasers will go through your scout faster than your Rapid Fires will go through me.

...and in Rock, Paper, Scissor mode, there are lots of scenarios where Bombers are Paper, and any ship you want to run can be Scissors. Strike Fighters have more speed, maneuverability and better range than bombers. Every laser has a longer range than the lock of a Mine; and lasers have no cooldowns. Gunships have absolutely the best range, Ion Railguns will clear out mines something fierce, and even a bomber's heavy defenses aren't going to stand up to the kind of pounding a gunship can dish out.

I had some definite rust on my fighters before the server merges... we just weren't getting pops on my slow, half dead server. When I first started flying again, I had some definite problems in the cockpit that were 99% me forgetting how to do stuff. Server merges reset my custom UI for flying... and also, I didn't realize that my components reset as well. You absolutely need to open up all your ships, check to see what your components do now... and make sure the ones you want haven't had their upgrades reset.

...but, once I got some fights in, again, and reset my ships to fly the way that made the most sense, I came to realize that GSF is in a much better place than it has been in ages.