139 replies to this topic

[AsianJoyKiller]

Roundlay, on November 24 2012 - 10:58 PM, said:

AsianJoyKiller, on November 24 2012 - 12:56 PM, said:

Arriving at the AA missing 1/3-1/2 your health is negligible_
Dying because the battleship landed a the last shot as you escaped and having to spend time respawing and traveling back is nebligible_
Being unable to repair because the battleship decided to shoot you while you repaired leaving your team one man down is negligible_

Those are not negligible effects, no. But they're also counter to my experiences whilst playing Siege mode; I've found the battleship's impact on moment to moment gameplay pretty minor.

Of course, your assertion may be totally spot on, but without some hard numbers I don't really see any reason to think this is a huge issue.

It's not an issue that one team gets an arbitrary damage boost over the other team when they should be fighting on equal terms_

[PlagueDoctor]

Basically it boils down to this. If you ignore the AA to fight the battleship, you lose. If you ignore the Battleship to get the AA, you also lose. It requires an artificially high amount of skill to do both effectively (not everyone is AJK)

[NBShoot_me]

PlagueDoctor, on November 24 2012 - 11:54 PM, said:

Basically it boils down to this. If you ignore the AA to fight the battleship, you lose. If you ignore the Battleship to get the AA, you also lose. It requires an artificially high amount of skill to do both effectively (not everyone is AJK)

Meh, AA is all that matters, if you are able to hold it long enough, the other team will just rage quit after having their n'th battleship blown out of the sky before it gets 5 feet from their tower.

I really like the idea of having the battleship actually deal damage to an enemy tower while it's in the air (posted earlier in this thread), even if alive for a very short amount of time.

Heck, you could even give meaning to having the two tower health bars, the first one signaling that, I don't know, having the battleship at first fire long range at the tower not doing a heck of a lot of damage each volley but from a safer distance.  Once you've damaged the other teams defenses (emptied out the first "life-bar" for the tower) have said team’s battleship stop, return to base and dock, and require even more energy than before to launch it for a close range final assault on the enemy tower: able to actually do a lot of damage per volley, but more open to enemy fire.  Of course, that’d all depend on how long the devs would want a siege game to last.

EDIT:
I’d rather have the center AA emplacement function as a capture-able point of defense against long range attacks (though highly effective against the 2^nd close range attack wave) and have some form of AA closer to base that’s harder to attack though maybe less effective (damaged_) once the other team’s battleship actually goes in for the kill.  You’d at least force the attacking team to push farther than the halfway point of the map to actually take their opponents base and win.

I don't know, maybe even require engery to power the middle AA so it's not just some capture the flag equivalent.

Edited by NBShoot_me, November 25 2012 - 12:33 AM.

[Roundlay]

AsianJoyKiller, on November 24 2012 - 11:52 PM, said:

It's not an issue that one team gets an arbitrary damage boost over the other team when they should be fighting on equal terms_

I said huge issue, not issue. Never a good idea to balance game mechanics in a vacuum. I've not played any games in which it was obvious that my opponents were winning because battleships can fire upon mechs.

[DarkPulse]

AsianJoyKiller, on November 24 2012 - 10:45 AM, said:

Then why don't deathmatchers need an incentive to kill each other_
Why don't people in MA need an incentive to capture silos_

Oh right.
Because WINNING THE GAME is the incentive to get their butt to the objective.

So obviously there doesn't need to be any extra incentive.
Which brings us back to, "Why should playing the objective give you an advantage_"

If you want to go that way, then the obvious answer to that is "punishment for failure." You failed to get your ship up first, so now you're going to get hit by a few extra missiles and rockets.

Why shouldn't a battleship be able to shoot at you_

AsianJoyKiller, on November 24 2012 - 10:45 AM, said:

Both you and defekt seem to be hung up on theatrics.
This is a very poor argument, because GOOD GAMEPLAY should always trump aesthetics.
And if the battleship never shot at players in the first place, can you honestly tell me that you'd have questioned why it didn't shoot_

I would absolutely expect that if an enemy launches a huge-ass battleship, that yes, it is going to try to shoot at me. Again, why wouldn't it_ Some sort of gentlemen's agreement about fairness and ships only fighting ships_ Get real.

The enemy launched a huge, flying, ship of war. If it's not shooting at me, I'd think frankly that they are neuron-deficient.

Now, can you explain why you're so opposed to battleships shooting at you without making it sound like "It's automatic and it can kill me, so it's unfair"_ Because to be honest, this is almost like the turret argument you made which I also found ridiculous.

AsianJoyKiller, on November 24 2012 - 12:13 PM, said:

Okay, first things first.
When talking about the theory of balanced gameplay, assume that the opponents are of equal skill. So please, no more talk of "if the other team is better they'll hold the AA anyway" because that has no place in a discussion of balance.

Immediate flawed assumption; there is no such thing as purely even skill. There's an echelon of elites, a handful of goods, quite a few averages, and plenty of not-so-goods and newbies. The game will be dictated by this far more than by any silly battleship.

AsianJoyKiller, on November 24 2012 - 12:13 PM, said:

So why should the launching team get an automatic advantage to keeping their ship in the air_
Why shouldn't they have to defend the AA with the same resources that the team trying to take the ship down has_
Why, in a fight between two equally skilled teams, should one get an advantage just for doing what they are supposed to do_

Because your team failed to do it quicker than they did. It's that simple. You either had a team who didn't know how to play Siege, or your team was chased away from collecting EU in some fashion.

Once again, assuming "equally skilled teams" is also a mistake. There's no such thing; there never will be. Stop using this to strawman the argument. If the other team got it up faster, they are better than yours in some fashion. Because, to use your argument and take it to its logical conclusion, two "evenly skilled teams" would always launch ships at the exact same time (because they're evenly skilled!) which renders your whole argument 100% moot because then both sides would be having ships firing at the enemy, thus negating your arguments of "advantage."

AsianJoyKiller, on November 24 2012 - 12:13 PM, said:

Let's flip this around and think about it a different way.
If the team that launches a battleship gets an advantage, why doesn't the team trying to take the battleship down get one_
If the attackers (launched battleship) get an advantage to holding the AA, shouldn't the defenders (kill battleship) get one to try and hold the AA too_

Like you said, flip it around. Why should the team who's executing better play at the EU collection points be penalized and have absolutely nothing change except for a huge warship that'll slam into the enemy base 2 1/2 minutes later, which can (at least for the first few times) be shot down by the enemies without them even going to the AA if they really want to_ Who in their right mind would build a warship that can't fight back_ Granted, the fact it kamikazes the enemy base is another weird question, but I digress.

The enemy battleship going up is a "reward" for failure on your side. You didn't execute for some reason, so it places more pressure on you, and furthermore, the AA is one of the few places in the map where the ship isn't able to smack you if you're on its lower level. Do you think this is a coincidence_

AsianJoyKiller, on November 24 2012 - 12:13 PM, said:

What if, instead of only the attackers getting an advantage from an attacking battleship, only the defenders gained an advantage by having their base fire artillery strikes at the attackers_

The defenders are playing the objective too, by trying to take/hold the AA, so why aren't they rewarded with an advantage_

Because that then is punishing a team for doing good, which is not how it's supposed to be.

The battleship provides a slight material advantage, but not a huge one. It's mostly only a threat if you're not moving and out in the open, so it mostly targets the people who are hanging back and sniping or rocketing it. The few times I've been killed by the battleship, I was either sniping and shooting it, or at the AA. I certainly didn't rage over the fact that it killed me, because I was weak enough that really anything would've killed me.

There's also the fact that the AA is a very stationary point and the Battleship is not. Artillery that can hit the AA will pretty much just force everyone to camp inside and make defending it much more difficult (in an annoying sense) because then there will be no external play (artillery will get them), lining them up for very easy sniper shots and grenade spam from a couple grenadiers. This means that matches will draw out longer (which I wouldn't particularly mind - more XP - but some people seem to be opposed to a Siege match taking more than 15 minutes for some reason), and really all that the artillery would do is turn the AA defense phase into the TDM phase, since the attackers won't bother going there and will just separate and pick off the defense.

It's easy to propose solutions; it's hard to propose ones that work. Artillery, simply put, will not work.

AsianJoyKiller, on November 24 2012 - 12:56 PM, said:

Arriving at the AA missing 1/3-1/2 your health is negligible_
Dying because the battleship landed a the last shot as you escaped and having to spend time respawing and traveling back is nebligible_
Being unable to repair because the battleship decided to shoot you while you repaired leaving your team one man down is negligible_

I'm sorry... what_

Stop playing A-Class all the time, that's half the answer. You sacrifice speed for armor and you know that.

That said, I can't ever remember really being shot by the thing to 1/2-1/3rd health. And yes, that includes playing as an A-Class, so really, how the heck are you moving so that it instant-targets you_

[Aelieth]

Personally, I wish there were more environmental things to kill people on all maps. That would help with your point against why only Siege is shooting at you. Still, since there are different game modes I expect each game mode to act differently. Having defining things about each mode is important, and I believe there should be more than just a death match.

The battleship has always done damage, but for this beta the damage has been greatly increased. That's my problem with it. If it can keep me from repairing and kill me, then it becomes a problem. I agree with previous posters about making the damage scale based on the amount of players on the map.

The battleship does not feel like a reward or a punishment, to me at least. It feels like it is part of the game and part of the environment. Learning to cope with additional outside variables is part of learning to play the game. I've been really good at running into walls lately, need to get my spacial awareness down a little more, but I don't complain about the walls being there, blocking my retreat or hindering me from getting away. Nor do I complain about falling down when I have my energy left, only to hit the ground with a *thud* and I'm dead.

So I could use the same argument about the battleship. It's the largest indicator on your radar. It's making noise. It's telling you that "I AM HERE, RUN PUNY MECHS!" So, don't stand underneath it, just like you wouldn't dodge into a wall right next to you (unless you are me, then you would).

I still do feel like there should be more dynamics to the game, and hope more are added. Removing the battleship's ability to attack feels like it removes a dynamic from the game which is already sorely lacking.

[AsianJoyKiller]

DarkPulse, on November 25 2012 - 02:03 AM, said:

If you want to go that way, then the obvious answer to that is "punishment for failure." You failed to get your ship up first, so now you're going to get hit by a few extra missiles and rockets.

Again, I have to ask, would it be fair for the top person in Deathmatch to get a damage bonus just because they killed more people_ Would it be fair in TDM if the team in the lead got a reduction in heat generation_ Would it be fair if in MA the losing team got hit by the missiles_

All those examples are the exact same concept. Rewarding the winning team with an advantage while punishing the losing team for what_ Being less skilled_ Less organized_
Why should they be punished when they're already at a disadvantage_

Quote

Why shouldn't a battleship be able to shoot at you_

I would absolutely expect that if an enemy launches a huge-ass battleship, that yes, it is going to try to shoot at me. Again, why wouldn't it_ Some sort of gentlemen's agreement about fairness and ships only fighting ships_ Get real.

The enemy launched a huge, flying, ship of war. If it's not shooting at me, I'd think frankly that they are neuron-deficient.

So here, you completely ignored the part about "GOOD GAMEPLAY should trump aesthetics" and want to argue on the theatrics of the thing. You know what_ I can do that. I can show you why battleships shooting at players is stupid even from a thematic standpoint.

The objective of Siege is to destroy the enemy base by launching a gigantic battleship that will kamikaze itself on the enemy base. Wait... what_
In a world with limited resources, we're building giant ships just to have them blow up a few minutes later_
What the hell kind of sense does that make_ Why are we wasting time putting weapons on a ship that's going to blow itself up_
And if we are going to put weapons on it, why aren't they shooting the enemy base_ I mean, that's the point of Siege, right_ So why isn't the battleship trying to chew off every single bit of health on that base that it can before it blows up, and wasting it's time pestering the ground forces_
Or why not fit the damn thing with anti-missile systems so it doesn't even have to worry about the AA in the first place_

Stop trying to argue that removing weapons from the battleships doesn't make sense, because you know what_ The whole damn theme of Siege mode doesn't make sense.
Removing weapons from them makes no difference in how logical it is, because the whole damn thing is a logical mess.
So I want you to either address the fact that all of it is bat!@#% insane or start arguing good game mechanics.

Quote

Now, can you explain why you're so opposed to battleships shooting at you without making it sound like "It's automatic and it can kill me, so it's unfair"_ Because to be honest, this is almost like the turret argument you made which I also found ridiculous.

A I believe I have done a good enough job in this thread explaining my position.
B You can take your wild exaggeration of what I said and shove it.
C Didn't MG Turrets get a nerf_ Oh yes, they did. Obviously someone in studios didn't think my position was ridiculous.

Quote

Immediate flawed assumption; there is no such thing as purely even skill. There's an echelon of elites, a handful of goods, quite a few averages, and plenty of not-so-goods and newbies. The game will be dictated by this far more than by any silly battleship.

Except you could program a bunch of AI and they would be purely equal on skill.

Quote

Once again, assuming "equally skilled teams" is also a mistake. There's no such thing; there never will be. Stop using this to strawman the argument. If the other team got it up faster, they are better than yours in some fashion. Because, to use your argument and take it to its logical conclusion, two "evenly skilled teams" would always launch ships at the exact same time (because they're evenly skilled!) which renders your whole argument 100% moot because then both sides would be having ships firing at the enemy, thus negating your arguments of "advantage."

Are you telling me it would be impossible to find 12 people who relatively equally skilled and put them on two teams in a manner that gives neither team any real advantage_
You also conveniently ignore there is an ebb and flow of battle, the dynamics of strategy and luck. The battle game be on even terms without being symmetrical.

Also, launching at the same time doesn't render my whole argument "100% moot". That doesn't address the foolishness of being rewarded for completing objectives you should need no incentive for, the fact that it takes no real effort to launch, the fact that battleship weapons have no basis in skill or the whole conceptual mess that is Siege mode.

Quote

Because your team failed to do it quicker than they did. It's that simple. You either had a team who didn't know how to play Siege, or your team was chased away from collecting EU in some fashion.

Like you said, flip it around. Why should the team who's executing better play at the EU collection points be penalized and have absolutely nothing change except for a huge warship that'll slam into the enemy base 2 1/2 minutes later, which can (at least for the first few times) be shot down by the enemies without them even going to the AA if they really want to_ Who in their right mind would build a warship that can't fight back_ Granted, the fact it kamikazes the enemy base is another weird question, but I digress.

The enemy battleship going up is a "reward" for failure on your side. You didn't execute for some reason, so it places more pressure on you, and furthermore, the AA is one of the few places in the map where the ship isn't able to smack you if you're on its lower level. Do you think this is a coincidence_

Because that then is punishing a team for doing good, which is not how it's supposed to be.

This is what I don't get. You're okay with a team that already has the advantage, gaining even more of an advantage. But you're not okay with a team that's at a disadvantage being able to level the playing field some_
Again, why do you need an extra advantage if you already have the advantage.
And why should it be okay to punish the disadvantaged team_

Quote

The battleship provides a slight material advantage, but not a huge one. It's mostly only a threat if you're not moving and out in the open, so it mostly targets the people who are hanging back and sniping or rocketing it. The few times I've been killed by the battleship, I was either sniping and shooting it, or at the AA. I certainly didn't rage over the fact that it killed me, because I was weak enough that really anything would've killed me.

Those turrets are primary weapon strong, and if you get into a fight with someone of equal skill while being shot, you will lose.
The only places to hid from the battleship, especially on Bazaar, are deathtraps or removed from the combat zone.

Quote

There's also the fact that the AA is a very stationary point and the Battleship is not. Artillery that can hit the AA will pretty much just force everyone to camp inside and make defending it much more difficult (in an annoying sense) because then there will be no external play (artillery will get them), lining them up for very easy sniper shots and grenade spam from a couple grenadiers. This means that matches will draw out longer (which I wouldn't particularly mind - more XP - but some people seem to be opposed to a Siege match taking more than 15 minutes for some reason), and really all that the artillery would do is turn the AA defense phase into the TDM phase, since the attackers won't bother going there and will just separate and pick off the defense.

It's easy to propose solutions; it's hard to propose ones that work. Artillery, simply put, will not work.

So even if the artillery was located outside the enemy spawn, what_ You can't go over there and shoot it_
And hasn't part of your argument been "ignore the battleship weapons"_
Why can't you just ignore the artillery_

Do you realize that the artillery and battleship weapons are the same concept, just implemented in a slightly different manner_
By refuting one, you refute the other.

Quote

Stop playing A-Class all the time, that's half the answer. You sacrifice speed for armor and you know that.

That said, I can't ever remember really being shot by the thing to 1/2-1/3rd health. And yes, that includes playing as an A-Class, so really, how the heck are you moving so that it instant-targets you_

Unfounded assumption complete with argumentum ad hominem. Nice job there.
I also like the part where you ignore the other two points.

[AsianJoyKiller]

Aelieth, on November 25 2012 - 07:48 AM, said:

Personally, I wish there were more environmental things to kill people on all maps. That would help with your point against why only Siege is shooting at you. Still, since there are different game modes I expect each game mode to act differently. Having defining things about each mode is important, and I believe there should be more than just a death match.

But should these hazards only be a detriment to one team_ Especially if they are active hazards, meaning they are actively targeting you_

If battleships just launched strikes at the AA which affected friend and foe alike, I'd be much more okay with it as an active hazard. But right now, I only affects one team, giving a clear advantage.

Quote

The battleship does not feel like a reward or a punishment, to me at least. It feels like it is part of the game and part of the environment. Learning to cope with additional outside variables is part of learning to play the game. I've been really good at running into walls lately, need to get my spacial awareness down a little more, but I don't complain about the walls being there, blocking my retreat or hindering me from getting away. Nor do I complain about falling down when I have my energy left, only to hit the ground with a *thud* and I'm dead.

When was the last time a lava trap came after you_ Or the last time a bottomless pit followed you around to swallow you up_
Take these walls and falling for instance. You are good at running into walls. The walls are not good at running into you. You failed to manage your fuel properly and fell to your death. Your fuel didn't drain itself and the ground didn't jump up and slam itself into you.

Are you seeing what I'm getting at_
PASSIVE hazards are only a threat because of a failure on the part of the player.
ACTIVE hazards force themselves upon the player.

Quote

So I could use the same argument about the battleship. It's the largest indicator on your radar. It's making noise. It's telling you that "I AM HERE, RUN PUNY MECHS!" So, don't stand underneath it, just like you wouldn't dodge into a wall right next to you (unless you are me, then you would).

To not stand underneath it on Titan (or whatever they call it now), means either removing yourself from combat entirely, or taking cover in a battlezone.
To not stand underneath it on Bazaar, means sitting in a battlezone, several chokepoints that are deathtraps or traveling halfway across the map.
All options put you or your team at a significant disadvantage.

Quote

I still do feel like there should be more dynamics to the game, and hope more are added. Removing the battleship's ability to attack feels like it removes a dynamic from the game which is already sorely lacking.

Dynamics are fine.
But they need to make sense, and they need to be fair.

[Sylhiri]

DarkPulse, on November 25 2012 - 02:03 AM, said:

Stop playing A-Class all the time, that's half the answer. You sacrifice speed for armor and you know that.

That said, I can't ever remember really being shot by the thing to 1/2-1/3rd health. And yes, that includes playing as an A-Class, so really, how the heck are you moving so that it instant-targets you_

I think it just is more noticeable when you have fewer players on your team. If your going 2 v 3 then the turrets always target you, half the time you are trying to dodge and heal with the other time spent trying to get to the AA to fight the other 3 people. I've had one game in that situation where it always targeted me, it was like they had an extra player on their side. This is all Sahara, I never had a problem with Titan since it has so much cover.

[WAVER]

I ve played only a few Siege battles, but being shoot by this ship make me nervous. And also, playing Siege on multiple layer stages is quite fuzzy bunny.

[PlagueDoctor]

What if the Battleship Had its weapons disabled below a certain threshold of players on a map_ In 3v3s or 4v4s, Battleship weapons can give one side a very clear advantage, however, once you have any meaningful amount of players on your team the ship weapons get destroyed quickly once they become a problem.

BOOM, problem solved.

[DarkPulse]

AsianJoyKiller, on November 25 2012 - 11:27 AM, said:

Again, I have to ask, would it be fair for the top person in Deathmatch to get a damage bonus just because they killed more people_ Would it be fair in TDM if the team in the lead got a reduction in heat generation_ Would it be fair if in MA the losing team got hit by the missiles_

All those examples are the exact same concept. Rewarding the winning team with an advantage while punishing the losing team for what_ Being less skilled_ Less organized_
Why should they be punished when they're already at a disadvantage_

Again, you're arguing this for the sake of arguing it. The other modes don't have a huge frickin' ship.

The "reward" is not as big as you make it out to be. Again, I simply don't die that often to the things, though I did notice it got beefed up sharply. It should be toned back down, but removing it is just plain silly.

AsianJoyKiller, on November 25 2012 - 11:27 AM, said:

So here, you completely ignored the part about "GOOD GAMEPLAY should trump aesthetics" and want to argue on the theatrics of the thing. You know what_ I can do that. I can show you why battleships shooting at players is stupid even from a thematic standpoint.

The objective of Siege is to destroy the enemy base by launching a gigantic battleship that will kamikaze itself on the enemy base. Wait... what_
In a world with limited resources, we're building giant ships just to have them blow up a few minutes later_
What the hell kind of sense does that make_ Why are we wasting time putting weapons on a ship that's going to blow itself up_
And if we are going to put weapons on it, why aren't they shooting the enemy base_ I mean, that's the point of Siege, right_ So why isn't the battleship trying to chew off every single bit of health on that base that it can before it blows up, and wasting it's time pestering the ground forces_
Or why not fit the damn thing with anti-missile systems so it doesn't even have to worry about the AA in the first place_

Stop trying to argue that removing weapons from the battleships doesn't make sense, because you know what_ The whole damn theme of Siege mode doesn't make sense.
Removing weapons from them makes no difference in how logical it is, because the whole damn thing is a logical mess.
So I want you to either address the fact that all of it is bat!@#% insane or start arguing good game mechanics.

It wouldn't be that hard to change the ship so that when the timer runs out, it launches some sort of "bomb" at the base and then flies off, or disappears in some kind of warpgate, or something. And let's face it, if you did that, you'd still be arguing this point, I'm sure, so let's not use "It kamikazes!" as an excuse.

It shoots the enemy forces because the EU doesn't move itself, and probably because the enemy base tower has anti-bullet and rocket defenses. And, naturally, it doesn't have AA defenses because such complex technology was lost in the Big Oops.

AsianJoyKiller, on November 25 2012 - 11:27 AM, said:

A I believe I have done a good enough job in this thread explaining my position.
B You can take your wild exaggeration of what I said and shove it.
C Didn't MG Turrets get a nerf_ Oh yes, they did. Obviously someone in studios didn't think my position was ridiculous.

A: And I've done good enough arguing mine. You don't like them, I'm fine with them.
B: I've already played enough Sokoban, thanks.
C: They did, and now the things are utterly worthless in terms of both damage and durability. Know how much one does to me if I know it's there_ SIXTY, while I one-shotted it with a TOW or a grenade. This is literally negligible on even an A-Class, as even without boosters you can heal it back in about four seconds. If it somehow gets me off-guard, usually it's more like 100 or so, which is still exceedingly minor unless you're horrible at getting away to heal. If they weren't re-placeable, I think considerably more people would be raising Cain over it.

AsianJoyKiller, on November 25 2012 - 11:27 AM, said:

Except you could program a bunch of AI and they would be purely equal on skill.

Again, see strawmanning. Purely equal AIs will launch battleships at the exact same instant, take exactly as much damage, and effectively nullify each other perfectly. The match would thus never end except by external factors, like the map positions.

AsianJoyKiller, on November 25 2012 - 11:27 AM, said:

Are you telling me it would be impossible to find 12 people who relatively equally skilled and put them on two teams in a manner that gives neither team any real advantage_
You also conveniently ignore there is an ebb and flow of battle, the dynamics of strategy and luck. The battle game be on even terms without being symmetrical.

Also, launching at the same time doesn't render my whole argument "100% moot". That doesn't address the foolishness of being rewarded for completing objectives you should need no incentive for, the fact that it takes no real effort to launch, the fact that battleship weapons have no basis in skill or the whole conceptual mess that is Siege mode.

Impossible_ No. Improbable_ Sure. And the simple fact of the matter is two teams that close in skill would launch nearly simultaneously... which, yes, does render your argument moot since then both teams are being shot at by the other side's ship.

The simple fact of the matter is that the only time a ship seems extremely powerful is if you're in a small Siege game, like a 2v2 or a 3v3. I played a 2v3 earlier (sadly, I was on the 2 side) and the ship seemingly tore my C-Class a new one, bringing it down about 50% of its health.

However, that's not OP. It's the simple fact that I was literally the only one being shot at.

The ship does seem to pick its targets on either range or randomness, but the more people playing, the less it does to any individual person. We can assume that if it did ~450 damage to my C-Class with me being the solo target, if we divide that by 6 we get 75 damage to each individual player. That's nothing.

A better solution, rather than your "Remove them, it's OP!" call, would be for the battleship damage to scale proportionally to the player count. Reduce it by 2/3 if there's 4 players or less in the server, reduce it by 1/3 if there's 5-8, keep it full strength for 9-12.

AsianJoyKiller, on November 25 2012 - 11:27 AM, said:

This is what I don't get. You're okay with a team that already has the advantage, gaining even more of an advantage. But you're not okay with a team that's at a disadvantage being able to level the playing field some_
Again, why do you need an extra advantage if you already have the advantage.
And why should it be okay to punish the disadvantaged team_

No, I simply don't believe it's the game-breaking advantage that you think it is, just like I didn't think turrets were OP. Good players rarely suffer hugely at the hands of a battleship; weaker players learn fast to respect it and improve. When there's more people playing, the ship has more targets, and so any individual player is hit less by it. Now, in a 2v2 match right now, it is very nasty, because the ship will indeed focus on 1-2 players and tear them up, but this is not a problem in a 8+ man game.

This means that it perhaps needs some scaling for lower playercounts, but the concept isn't exactly busted.

And again, the main thing I'm for is equality. The ship can shoot players, so players can shoot the ship. If the ship is to no longer shoot players, I'd expect for the ship to not be shootable anymore either, rather than some half-baked "Artillery" defense or something.

AsianJoyKiller, on November 25 2012 - 11:27 AM, said:

Those turrets are primary weapon strong, and if you get into a fight with someone of equal skill while being shot, you will lose.
The only places to hid from the battleship, especially on Bazaar, are deathtraps or removed from the combat zone.

Well, if you're that frustrated by them, you can always shoot and blow up the turrets, too.

That said, again, the more people playing, the less focused the ship's fire. In a 4v4 or higher, the thing will do minimal damage to you.

AsianJoyKiller, on November 25 2012 - 11:27 AM, said:

So even if the artillery was located outside the enemy spawn, what_ You can't go over there and shoot it_
And hasn't part of your argument been "ignore the battleship weapons"_
Why can't you just ignore the artillery_

Do you realize that the artillery and battleship weapons are the same concept, just implemented in a slightly different manner_
By refuting one, you refute the other.

No, because the artillery will shell a fixed point - the AA - and the ship won't.

And that's exactly what I said if it were implemented - people would barely bother with the AA since nobody wants to be forced inside by shells, and then they would become easy prey for snipers and grenadiers. The ship isn't going to focus on just one point, nor will it focus on any one player too much if the teams are of sufficient size.

AsianJoyKiller, on November 25 2012 - 11:27 AM, said:

Unfounded assumption complete with argumentum ad hominem. Nice job there.
I also like the part where you ignore the other two points.

Well, I do take it back, because today I did play a low-man Siege game as I said above, and in that sense, I was torn up by it because I became the ship's sole target.

However, all that makes me feel is that it should have its damage scaled relative to the number of players - not a full removal. The only way I'm fine with a removal of battleship weapons is if players can no longer shoot it down with small arms either.

Sylhiri, on November 25 2012 - 11:45 AM, said:

I think it just is more noticeable when you have fewer players on your team. If your going 2 v 3 then the turrets always target you, half the time you are trying to dodge and heal with the other time spent trying to get to the AA to fight the other 3 people. I've had one game in that situation where it always targeted me, it was like they had an extra player on their side. This is all Sahara, I never had a problem with Titan since it has so much cover.

Having likewise played (and indeed it was Sahara/Bazaar where this happened), I can concur with this sentiment. However, I feel a better solution to this, as I said above, would be to simply scale down the damage at lower playercounts, as opposed to removing it altogether. This way, the ship is a potent force without being an overbearing force.

Edited by DarkPulse, November 25 2012 - 02:01 PM.

[defekt]

AsianJoyKiller, on November 25 2012 - 11:42 AM, said:

Quote

B You can take your wild exaggeration of what I said and shove it.

Quote

argumentum ad hominem

Quote

argumentum ad hominem

Physician, heal thyself.

The sheer volume of hypocrisy in this thread makes my skull itch.

[Beemann]

Arguing for realism and feasibility when we've got kamikaze ships that we build in bases that are easily artillery-able and fuel with energy collected from conveniently placed fountains of pure energy seems silly to me

Oh and if it just shot a bomb, why wouldn't it keep shooting bombs_ Why would it run away_
That's even LESS sensible

Edited by Beemann, November 25 2012 - 04:02 PM.

[virella]

why not just change it from a battleship to an explosives ladden transport ship, it would then make sense why it kamikazis into the enemy base, only way it could hurt it, make it a single nose mounted turret, that as they get shot down gets more turrets and better ones, but from what ive seen once it starts shooting someone unless they get out of its line of sight or somone else gets closer they will keep shooting that same person, was in a 5v5 shooting the engines with a rockteer and not keeping a real close eye on my health and in 3-4 shots from one of its missle turrets was destroyed, with no damage from enemy mechs.

if not going to drop number of turrets and make them low damage with more turrets as they get shot down, possibly cut the damge it deals to 1/3  give it a 30% to 40% damage buff to go along with the hp buff per ship death.

[AsianJoyKiller]

DarkPulse, I'm trying to be reasonable here, but you have repeatedly ignored points I've made, made wild exaggerations of my position, made ridiculous assumptions and regularly resort to strawman and ad hominem arguments.

I really don't want to try and debate with someone who does that habitually.

[Necro]

This thread got pretty heated >.>

[Ace4225]

uhh.. don't know if this point got brought up yet, but there are alternatives to fighting for the AA.

Yes, the turrets have been buffed to where they now do a noticeable amount of damage, but the battleship's engines have also become easy enough to destroy with your mech's weapons.

I was playing Siege with some friends earlier and we decided for the heck of it to play one game with both teams as all Rocketeers. [boy, was that fun xD]

My team repeatedly launched ships and was able to hold the AA, so the opposing team started immediately shooting at the battleship from their base (a little before it reached the halfway point). Before the battleship had reached 3/4 of the way across the map, it was shot down. The enemy team managed this twice before we finally beat them a third time and scored.

Alternative objectives to holding the AA_ check.
Are the battleship's turrets in range of hurting you when they're more than halfway across the map from you_ Nope.

Just a thought.

Edited by Ace4225, November 26 2012 - 03:06 AM.

[Beemann]

Shooting the battleship itself should be nerfed or removed. As it stands it's much too viable a strategy and it breaks the gamemode at high-end play, particularly from a spectator standpoint
So basically the only alternative to fighting for the AA involves making the match boring as fuzzy bunny for everyone involved

[DarkPulse]

AsianJoyKiller, on November 25 2012 - 10:21 PM, said:

DarkPulse, I'm trying to be reasonable here, but you have repeatedly ignored points I've made, made wild exaggerations of my position, made ridiculous assumptions and regularly resort to strawman and ad hominem arguments.

I really don't want to try and debate with someone who does that habitually.

You're making similar wild ones of mine. I made my position clear: I don't think they're too strong, I don't think they need to be removed, in a "real" game they're not going to be much more than a minor nuisance and if the ability for them to shoot is removed, removing the ability to shoot it down without even having to bother with the AA is a reasonable balance. The only tweaking I feel it needs is a strength nerf proportional to the number of players on the server: Full strength for 9+, 2/3 as strong for 5-8, 1/3 as strong for 4 or less. How is this strawmanning and arguing ad nominem_ I made my positions clear and succinct; you're the one who is insisting "But you can't shoot missiles at enemies in Missile Assault and no other game mode gives you an advantage!"

First, let's define strawmanning: "To create the illusion of having refuted a proposition by replacing it with a superficially similar yet unequivalent proposition (the "straw man"), and to refute it, without ever having actually refuted the original position."

You proposed getting rid of the weapons, I said it was fine as long as players can't blow the ship up without the AA either. You countered with ships doing kamikaze collisions making no sense; I proposed changing it from ships to something like a computer hack. And I'd be arguing against anyone who suggested similar ideas without some kind of reasonable balance against it, because as I said above, I don't feel it's as game-breaking as you do, and I explained why, as well as how to balance out the removal of weapons - which is something that you did not mention, implying that you would still be fine with players being able to shoot down a ship that can no longer shoot them back. (If, on the other hand, you also supported removing that, I'd be considerably more in support of your argument.) Therefore, I feel that my argument cannot be strawmanning, because I'm considering alternatives and other solutions which would, indeed, get you what you want, as well as remove the potential imbalance of players being able to hang back in their spawn rooms and snipe the ship for at least its first few spawns.

As for argumentum ad hominem_ You're the one making the argument for the case, and I'm arguing reasons against it; arguing ad hominem would be if I disagreed with your position solely because it's you. Nobody else is leaping to defend your position like you are, so really, who else do I have to argue against_ You can't call essentially a two-person argument an "argumentum ad hominem" unless I disagreed with you based on some superficial reason, like "you don't play enough Siege to know it" or something like that. I'm arguing your points here and why I think they're bad - therefore, the accusation of argumentum ad hominem is also false.

Before you make such ridiculous accusations, think a little more clearly. I'm against the changes because I think the changes you're proposing would stink, not because you're arguing in favor of change, and I even offered alternatives, balancing suggestions if it is removed, and even balance suggestions if it remains in.

In short, I feel that you don't know what arguing ad hominem means, and your interpretation of strawmanning is very, very, very loose. Tu quoque.