"Sky Camper and the World of Tomorrow"

[Virt]

I spent most games last night trying to shoot down VTOLs on Inferno with a Mech sporting a gauss rifle and PPC.

Even at a ping of 60, the rubber banding and simplest manoevering on their part, after the first shot, made them almost impossible to hit.

So the VTOLs would fly away for a bit, wait until I was engaged in a battle with another Mech, and then swarm back and take me out.

[Cujo]

Mech...gauss rifle...PPC

Well there's your problem :/

[Django]

The new harasser c is sex for shooting down aircraft.  It is always my first choice on clearcut and sandblasted.  I just got out of a match where I started with the C and 10-15 minutes later I was 7/0 and buying myself a MadCat Prime.  The majority of kills being aircraft and BA.

[(TLL)Highlander]

Mech...gauss rifle...PPC

Well there's your problem :/

Agreed. PPCs are just bad against air. Gausses are great against Aero with their mostly predictable flight patterns but I for some reason find them ill suited agaisnt VTOLs. 

[Virt]

I agree PPCs aren't good for fly-swatting.

Gauss rifles should be, but currently aren't.

[(TLL)Highlander]

Well they may be hard to hit stuff with but one of those slugs will take off a wing one hit. Or anything else on the plane for that matter, especially since the update.

[Spyro]

I agree PPCs aren't good for fly-swatting.

Gauss rifles should be, but currently aren't.

what are you talking about?  you need to work on your aim...I hardly miss with gauss rifles even shooting Aerospace to Aerospace...take your time, line up your shot, lead your target, and don't hesitate when you think you got the shot...honestly if I can shoot a sulla out of the sky with Tbolts or go BA hunting with the nose of my Sulla on Extremity (and I don't mean accidental run-ins) then you can hit a VTOL with a Gauss rifle.

[(TLL)Highlander]

It gets hard when they get jumpy.

[Virt]

what are you talking about?  you need to work on your aim...

Aim has nothing to do with it when the VTOLs are warping and rubber banding around.

[Dalmp]

Gauss rifles are the shiznit for hunting aero.  And even more so in laggy servers, since a consistent firing AC will miss a ton of shots due to needing to lead the target the entire time, while the chances of the Gauss firing at that moment during the rubber band is much less.  Though you can always go find a more stable server if it's too bothersome (the 32/32 servers are the usual culprit).  Personally I think it's amazing how you can take a 13k hovercraft and have 9/0 kill ratio in the first 10 minutes of a match, enemy pilots permitting, while mech jocks struggle for a few kills and continually go home to pay for repairs.

IMO the ACs (and debatably the RACs) need to be tightened up further, since they really aren't all that useful for AA vs targets further than 400m.  The LBX is fine as it's not really meant for AA to begin with, but the partisan A should not have an AA designation.  Anything specifically meant for anti-air should not behave like a shotgun, it just violates common sense.  UACs and gauss are perfect though (I love the Huit A too).  They hit so easily it really drives home that the problem isn't so much lag or player accuracy, but that the other 'AA guns' are built all wrong. 

[nordwars]

Similarly, I find PPCs useful as AA weapons. Like gauss, but you dont run out of ammo. I think I've probably shot down as many aeros with PPCs as LRMS. You've just gotta get the hang of how much to lead the target since they are a bit slower than gauss.

[Crash_411]

Mech...gauss rifle...PPC

Well there's your problem :/

and yet.... it shouldn't be.

[Virt]

and yet.... it shouldn't be.

Precisely!

[Redvan]

a big problem i noticed is that people using the sulla with tbolts (forget which variant it is, as I never use it) simply fly out, drop, fly back.  Myself, I use sulla prime all the time, I'm primarily air to air, and when there is no air to kill, then I'll strafe ground troops with the highly ineffective SRMs (just for something to do while I wait for the next aero).

A problem with this I found is that I cant chase them into their base to shoot them down for obvious reasons.  Their AA turrets will have me dead before I can get the aero dead.

This is something that should be changed to help prevent "camping".  How?  Dunno.  An idea I thought up was give them a couple pairs of Tbolts rather than just a pair.  That'd encourage them to stay away from their base long enough for sulla prime's and mechs to shoot them down.

or just make it easier for the sulla prime to shoot down other aeros.  I'd not complain about that one bit.

[(TLL)Siilk]

and yet.... it shouldn't be.

Precisely!

 And why, pray tell, it shouldn't? You never saw a tank firing it's main gun at the helicopter IRL, aren't you? That's what AA systems for. Here we have the same situation. MWLL is a combined arms game, set in BT universe. There are all kinds of military equipment to use, all have their strength and weakness balanced quite nicely.  
 
Have you read any BT books? It stated there quite unambiguously, that mechs, while being powerful weapon platforms, never should be deployed in combat alone, without anti-BA and anti-air support. Mechs are not a wunderwaffe even by in-universe terms. But, alas, having too much mech-centred games in our past (don't get me wrong, I can't overstate how much I love MW series) and too much clan honour in our souls we are used to think of mechs as the one and only possible combat unit. But it's absolutely not so. I'm sure, devs'll introduce a mech-only arenas in the final release for trueborn to conclude their duels with all the honour and respect to each other without any dishonorable interference. You just have to wait a little bit longer. But it's not the only way of fighting a war. The only one honorable way, may be, but not the only one at all.  

 By the way, none of games I played on public MWLL servers has the problem of some specific unit dominating all others. With too much aerospace of VTOLs there always someone on your side, who decide to became a dedicated AA and keep them at bay. If an enemy team is all-mech there's always a shiva coming in for an attack run. And so on.

 So, Virt, if the only problem you have is with flyboys, don't mind it. Just concentrate on what you're good at -- piloting a big mean mech. I'm sure your team'll make an effort to support it's Atlas with some AA cover.  But if you're not really good at mech either... Well, that's another problem.