For the past week I’ve been trying to get into this game as much as I can. I come from a history of playing World of Tanks, World of Warplanes, and War Thunder. All these games I’ve enjoyed but this, this is absolutely horrifying most the time. I’ve really taken my time to come up with this list of just general things this games needs to fix, or at least re-think about before ever coming out of beta.
Now in most mmo’s that I listed above, there is the general 3 classes that player chooses from. Light, medium, heavy. Now they usually follow these guide lines.
- Light - Fast, Low Damage, Low to Average armour.
- Medium - Average Speed, Average Damage, Average Armour. [Average Overall]
- Heavy - High to Extremely slow speed, High Damage, High Armour.
Now the reasoning behind this is that Lights beat Heavies, Heavies beat Mediums, and Mediums beat Lights. Now I’m not saying that this game in anyway needs to follow these rules to the letter but this system does not even exist in the game. What actually occurs is that the heavies/frigates are top dog and share 0 disadvantages. Yes, they are slower at max speed but this doesn’t even matter. Because about 75% of the time the remain almost stationary or just pull forward for a better view at spawn. Yes it is possible to circle strafe a frigate but it’s rotational speed is not slowed, which literally allows to get it’s sights on you in a few seconds. Which brings us to the second reason frigates will dominate, their range of their high powered laser is vastly too far. Lets say a fighter/or interceptor has a maximum range of 2500m, well most frigates can triple that range and reach you at 7500m. These lasers (just from one frigate) can drop shields and armour in about 5-10 seconds, even with buffs activated. Now most would say well frigates are not meant to be taken on as a 1v1 game, and more of 3-5v1 engagement. Well this would be great and if the entire game was a 5v1 match but simply it’s not, there are other pilots and over half will also be in frigates. Which leads the attacking squad being completely demolished without even destroying 1 frigate. With this system so broken that a single frigate can sit 7500m+ out from a enemy and not recieve any negatives is absolutely bizarre in my mind, and what I see more often than not is that around 80% of each team will have multiple frigates in their armament and then as a game progresses around the halfway mark the games dwindle down to only about 3-5 pilots using interceptors or fighters, while frigates sit back, by their spawn, in wolf packs of 5-7 and just go on a killing spree on the pilots who play objectives. Which brings me to the second system that is very much in need of reconsideration.
Damage and experience, I’ve found this the most annoying part and almost silliest. When combating a enemy in this game their is two stages, the fight to lower each other shields and then the to do permanent damage to the hull for the kill. What I’ve seen alot is ships will engage in fights and as soon as their shields drop to around 10%(the same time the ship warns you) they will flee and the pursuer has to chase them, which usually ends up bringing the fight back to the spawn where the pursuer is instantly killed. Now this situation is not broken but what happens is that a actively engaging pilot has now received no points for lowering shields and has suffered death for chasing a coward. This happens most commonly with interceptors who have speed advantage and are exploiting the above problem but isn’t the only time where the active pilot gets no points. This also has occured to me multiple times where I have lowered an enemies shields completely and just at the moment where I get about 5-10% hull damage on him, a friendly missile will come in and obliterate the enemy. That’s great, enemy is dead, but where is my points for taking down the shields which are usually stronger than the hull itself? I get the idea that yes it’s regenerative and if exp was given out for lowering it there might be some players who would misuse it (wouldn’t really expect it now though in lower player pop.) But what would be greatly appreciated would have to be if say I lowered a shield from 100 to 75 I got 25 points (Even though shields aren’t 100 but could just be averaged at a %). I just seems absolutely ludicrous that I don’t get anything for attacking someone but if a friendly ship has taken down a enemies shields and his hull is exposed and I get 1 shot on him before he explodes I get 60 points. It’s an assist but if anyone who engages this target gets the same exp, it’s not really an assist as in 2 players worked cooperatively but instead everyone got a light punch on him and have done minimal damage while one player has done the main damage.
This is my next and last point, and is centered around ships. Ships are basically shells, in sense they bring only protection, an ability and, speed differences. The crew/pilot is basically transferred from ship to ship and is the center of what the player is centered around improving. Which leaves ships basically as toys for the pilot. They are non-upgradable (besides the weapon, modules, rockets,etc etc which are all dependent on the pilots exp) and there is zero reward of sticking with one, besides for the limitations of the pilot and the income rate you have. You never spend time with a ship, there is probably not very large deviations between yours and others, and it’s just an object that you just don’t dedicate yourself to. It reason for it is basically meaningless.
Also who decided the ability to not sell a ship was a good idea, why would this mechanic ever be disabled?
Now from this point on I’m not going to address in game mechanic problems but instead visuals and controls which should be short just because I understand it’s in beta and hopefully will be changed shortly in the future.
Now I’m going to address the visuals first, because in a game where bright lasers, ship tails, and missile trails dot the sky (er space) a light faded reticle system is easily lost. I don’t know how many times I’ve been so completely blinded by the things on screen that I’ve had to stop my ship or follow the arrows from the center reticle just to find my my targeting reticle. This can easily be changed just by adding in a transparency adjuster in the settings. Which also brings me to the oddest point of how this game is lacking the simplest settings of binding controls or adjusting visuals. A little spit and polish where I could readjust where my dimensional map is or better targeting system would give the game the extra boost that the game could use. But like I said these are changes that I’m sure no doubt will come out in a future update.
Also I would hope there is or will be a module that would lock the targeting reticle or ships nose on a enemy player for a couple of seconds. Because when an enemy zips past me and I lose total idea (even with my map) of where he is and I have to slam on the brakes and spin around I lose my mind, mostly because by the time I turn around he has as well and is already engaging me and the system repeats of him blasting past me as I try to track him.
Now I hope my view/opinions are very centralized around me and some players are actually getting to play the game and enjoy themselves, but it just pains me to get into a game, and see players switch to frigates and sit at spawn. (Especially in objective games).
Sincerally, Freedomf63
Raging xxxx Extraordinaire