Then you play those ships you like and you level them, and you do not get to level other ships. There is an obvious problems with trees in low tiers requiring you to get two different types of ships in some cases, but otherwise it’s fairly obvious system - if you want a healer, you level healers. If you want a tank, you level tanks. You don’t get to move your extra experience from your max level warrior to your druid just because you have a max level warrior.
They basically went for traditional MMO leveling model.
I like Tier 1 Gunships. I like the Deimos 2, I hate the Phobos. Your logic is horrendously flawed.
I cannot name a game off the top of my head that uses a leveling system this bad. There are ships all across the tree that are, either due to perception or cold-hard-fact, worse than the ship that came before. Deimos 2 feels a tad slow, but otherwise is a kick-xxxx Gunship. Phobos is a brick with a bullseye painted on it. Fox-M is… meh, okay I guess. Fox is arguably a stronger ship because of its superior passive bonus.
One of the issues is that the Dev team still don’t use accurate terminology. They say “Star Conflict is an MMO”, and then give us a game that is an arcade shooter. Immediately, player perception is set incorrectly from the outset. The game is a Beta, but if you join via Steam you aren’t told this - hence, I suspect, why the backlash on Steam is even higher than on the official forums.
In this kind of game, people want to be able to compete, but you never can. Unless the matchmaking system accidentally creates a fair game, the default is to put you in a group where you are in the middle of the power curve. In theory, that means sometimes I should be put into matches where I curb-stomp everyone, but that never happens… I’m always at the bottom or middle of the power group.
This is bad, and here’s a fine example of why:
Space Marine! Your default weapon in multiplayer is the Bolter. It is sometimes dismissed as a bad weapon, for “n00bs only”, but in the hands of a player who understands its strengths and weaknesses you can do well with it. All weapons in Space Marine have perks you unlock by performing certain actions. In the Bolter’s case you need 250 kills to unlock Kraken Rounds (slower rate of fire, but much more powerful), and about 50 Killstreaks to unlock the Targeter (reduced shot spread).
Those two abilities combined can be used together. You need to be about level 18-20 to use two perks in that game. Assuming you hit those criteria, you could turn your Bolter into the Kraken-Targeter Bolter; one of the deadliest weapons in the game. It is powerful, accurate and versatile enough that a player with that gun can do anything. You can run-and-run, you can headshot, you can fight up close, you can fight from a distance… you are the ultimate jack-of-all-trades warrior.
More importantly, with that weapon you are more than capable of competing with players of any level. The game goes up to Level 41, and a level 20-ish player with Kraken-Targeter can dominate the score board.
This is what we want in Star Conflict. The hypothetical player in my above example is very strong in one area - a specific weapon (or ship, in Star Conflict’s case), and that is because they invest time and effort into their desired weapon (ship). By contrast, higher players get the advantage of having unlocked more stuff - they can change roles by swapping to a loadout that better suits what needs be done.
I want to fly a ship and know that ship is fit for purpose. I don’t want to have to grind crap ships because “the devs thought people weren’t playing them enough”. That attitude shows total ignorance of their own game; they didn’t ask why players skipped over those ships. They didn’t ask why people were so dismissive of Rank 4, or Rank 7. They didn’t ask why players lingered in Tier 2/3 long after they should have theoretically moved up to the next Tier.
You know what really stands out in my mind as proof the Devs have stopped caring about their player base? They don’t ask us questions in their in-game polls anymore…
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