VTOLs vs AA Balancing 0.4.3

[(TLL) Heretic]

Did some-one have VTOLs changed from Light to Heavy armour with the 0.4 release and not state so in the release notes?

They are now almost impossible to shoot down with the early game AA (feel like they are 2-3 times as armoured as a Shiva and much better at dodging also), so they must be packing Heavy Armour.  The games AA, all but the Huit Prime,  is massively ineffectual against VTOLs (if piloted by anything other than a noob) they are thus immune from harm during the early-mid game ( ie. until the ERLarge Laser carrying 'mechs appear in the later game).

And; on armour levels of VTOLs vs weapons without modifiers for armour type;  if you hit a Sulla with 2Gauss slugs it's Body component is brought down to ~40%, so 4 Gauss slugs on the Body = 1 dead Sulla.....seems balanced and reasonable.  VTOL takes 2 Gauss to Body component and armour drops to ~65%.  Also VTOLs are arguably harder to hit than a Sulla (VTOLs bob around making them harder to hit accurately, whereas with ASF you only have to calculate lead, not lead & bob).

I know that the Hawk Moth is meant to represent a flight of 4 of these vehicles....so it gets 4tons of armour if the CBT Hawkmoth has 1ton,  or ~12 tons of weapons podspace if the CBT version had of 3tons (or whatever), but the armour levels vs AA weapons (class 2&5 ACs/UACs/RACs and Mguns) is ridiculous, so I assume that VTOLs are now Heavy Armour instead of Light.

The MWLL Hawkmoth is more like 12 CBT VTOLs than a flight of 4.

Anecdotal evidence; yesterday on Frostbite I reloaded my RAC Partisan 3 times from a friendly APC while engaging, and failing to destroy 3 VTOLs, who lazily hovered between 100-800m from me with absolutely no fear at all of the most expensive early game AA,  they received constant damage from my RACs in 9 second bursts with almost 3 second cooldowns before waddling off home for repairs at~20% Body component remaining. 

Despite 14400 RAC2 shells (3 complete reloads for the 4 guns at ~80% accuracy, so ~11500 hits) no VTOL was downed (damage received was so low that they could lazily wander off at liesure) they came back in tanks once Large Laser boats appeared.  ERGO early AA is wholly inadequate at dealing with an early VTOL zerg rush....in 0.3.2 the VTOLs at least feared the AA platforms, in 0.4 they can engage and even destroy them with impunity:(

TBH being almost immune from it's natural counter & being able to capture bases (WTF is that about!?! Air Units Dominate while Ground Units Capture = Combined Arms game) and with VTOLs being as cheap as chips means that we should all learn to fly VTOLS, have 10 people start in them, donating their money to get a couple of more folks some endgame Clan Heavies and just Roflstomp game after game to prove how broken the VTOLs Pros v Cons, Cost v Reward actually is.

[darktimes]

I noticed too that the hawkmoth can take ridiculous amount of damage. both piloting it and trying to shoot it down.

AA should be feared and effective in its role, Pilots should dread it and it should effectively protect and immunize its position from air attacks.
currently, it does not. I place my hope in the possible rebalance and fixing of the LBX, which do 5x damage against air. especially the LBX2, which should have a range of 1500-1600m.

[Come and See]

VTOLs don't appear to have the bonus multipliers from damage (LBX, AC's, etc) that Aerospace has. I can blast a V-tol with the 2 LBX-20 and 2 LBX-10 Shiva and it won't even take them down in one shot.

VTOLs vs Aerospace is unbalanced if the pilot is good. VTOLs can out turn any Aerospace chasing them and can actually fire on them as they fly around them and then they can even keep up with them if the pilot tries to flee. The VTOL with the RAC-5 is the best AA unit in the game right now and I've been owned by it on my Shiva because they can simply out turn me. Its rather infuriating because I can't even get behind them and they can sit there blasting me with their cannons the entire time.

VTOLs need some serious rebalance right now. They're the best AA units on top of being able to out-turn, out fly, out armor, and out damage any Aerospace plane.

I have to actually run from RAC VTOLs in a plane because there's absolutely nothing I can do against them.

[=KoS= Saber15]

When piloting a VTOL you also have to deal with the absolutely terrible aiming, drift, and the fact that tapping anything instantly makes you explode or have the part fall off. VTOLs were useless in prior versions, I think they're fine now. AA still hurts me when I fly in a RAC Hawkmoth, but it's not the "seen by AA - instant death" that it was in previous versions.

[KingLeerUK]

Hawkmoth also travels at 1/3 the speed of the other aerospace assets and by its very nature needs the ability to stay on station and duke it out.
 
Also, comparing to the RAC5+2xMG version you should keep in mind that it also has +2 tons of additional armour to let it perform its role to the fullest.
 
Honestly guys, and especially Heretic, the aero balance feels REALLY good now from air-to-ground, ground-to-air and air-to-air standpoints.  I flew for several hours this week and did not notice that I was particularly overpowered (unless the opposing team took no steps to address me) or that I was taking undue amounts of damage when playing close air support and aero-hunter.
 
The ATM Sulla variant in particular is incredibly effective at hunting everything else in the sky.

[HAARP]

I had big problems taking a single fricking VTOL out with Aerospace. Hitting them with LBX/ACs is very very hard and the LBX does pitiful damage against them compared to ASF. VTOLs can deal a lot of damage to you with that RAC5 and Shivas are only slightly faster than them. Once you are in range of them, all you can do is run, because Shivas simply don't have enough maneuverability to "dogfight" VTOLs. Sullas are not off better either, lacking any decent air-to-air weaponry. Maybe I just suck at dogfighting, but I can't remember having had such problems before 0.4. All I can do is ram them, which works beautifully, but I wouldn't do that on purpose.

[Zathrus-SPARTA-]

Although the Vtols are a little harder to shoot down I think they should be as King Lear pointed out.
Think of a Vtol as an A-10 warthog tank killer and you get the idea. It has to be heavily armored because it is going to take damage due to the speed and altitude of it's mission design.
You can still shoot down Vtols early in the game as I have done so several times, it just takes missles to do it instead of guns.

[darktimes]

if the Vtol would behave and be controlled like the crysis Wars vtols (yes I played some vanilla), then they would have truly excellent speed and manouverability, and thus could get a decrease in armor to balance it out.

[-AAA-]

Sulla E.
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[HAARP]

Sulla E.
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Believe me, I tried. Getting lock on Vtols is hard.

[Come and See]

Sulla E.
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Fly around the VTOL, don't even get close behind them, and watch as the VTOL spins around in circles firing RAC and M-guns at you as you adjust your speed to keep up?

[Kadreal]

The ATM Puma is a beast that can take out a VTOL in two good barrages. One good barrage will put them in the orange and send them limping home at the least.

[(TLL) Heretic]

Hawkmoth also travels at 1/3 the speed of the other aerospace assets and by its very nature needs the ability to stay on station and duke it out.
 
Also, comparing to the RAC5+2xMG version you should keep in mind that it also has +2 tons of additional armour to let it perform its role to the fullest.
 
Honestly guys, and especially Heretic, the aero balance feels REALLY good now from air-to-ground, ground-to-air and air-to-air standpoints.  I flew for several hours this week and did not notice that I was particularly overpowered (unless the opposing team took no steps to address me) or that I was taking undue amounts of damage when playing close air support and aero-hunter.
 
The ATM Sulla variant in particular is incredibly effective at hunting everything else in the sky.

+1 Karma to ComeandSee for the dedicated ASF pilots perspective.

@Leer, I agree the AA vs Anything-that-flys is about 99% there, and all work done do far deserves to be applauded for sheer awesomeness ('especially the genius that came up with the 2Gauss, 2Mgun, 2ArwIV Huit.....a MeanMachine by all definitions...my favourite AA...well, apart from the "SiegeEngine" MkII).

This is purely about the VTOLs vs ASF balance, and right now we have cheap VTOLs available from start that largely outclass their AA counterparts.  And VTOLs handling/aiming problems should not be an argument here....as this is stuff that we will surely iron out by 1.0 anyways.

[Frostiken]

ASF aren't going to be balanced for as long as FBombs exist in their current iteration. Anything that's based around "destroy it before he can use his weapon" is not balanced.

TBolts would be fine if NARC range would be reduced to 200m or so, like it should be. Instead with the 900m range, the TBolts are basically designed as a completely unnecessary aerospace counter to anti-air units. Dumbfire NARC. Tap radar on, fire TBolts, tap radar off. Turn around and leave. Nobody even saw you, TBolts travel fast enough that no tank or mech heavier than a medium is going to be able to move *if* they even see them.

Seriously, why can't mechs get weapons that are this retarded and lame? Might as well put in the Mektek railgun.

[Evgen]

ERGO early AA is wholly inadequate at dealing with an early VTOL zerg rush....in 0.3.2 the VTOLs at least feared the AA platforms, in 0.4 they can engage and even destroy them with impunity:(

With impunity? Can you show me how any variant of VTOL can destroy AC or LBX partisan on their own? I do not pretend to be the best Partisan pilot but I am sure I can easily deal with VTOL 1 vs 1. 

From my experience the most DPS VTOL variant now is RAC. On its own it can destroy Hover tanks, BA. Ah and  Shiva and Sulla which are full enough to dogfight with RAC VTOL well, then, yes. The same I can say about light mechs which piloted by newbies who stand still or run in one direction. So basically Hover tanks, BA and Shiva are the only ones who should really fear RAC VTOL. As to other units RAC VTOL needs: close range, 4 or more runs and a lot of piloting efforts to finish heavily damaged! target. Otherwise it will just not have enough ammo/time to kill anything on its own. 

The main difference of 0.4.0 version is not VTOL armor but that partisan AC5 is much less effective beyond 800 range, so you can’t kill everything from other side of the map like before. 

Also next time when you compare VTOL survavibility vs Shiva or any other unit pls. take into account other units firepower output and speed. You know LBX Shiva can shred apart heavy mechs in several runs.