Sup / garrison tech poll

[Correct]

QUOTE (sambasti @ Oct 21 2008, 09:30 PM) it is easier to say everyone in ints by the aleph and go, than everyone set up 3k from the miner.

STOP TALKING CRAP.

[takingarms1]

QUOTE (sambasti @ Oct 22 2008, 12:30 AM) Well, the point made by the people who say ints are better is that 5 ints can shred a 2 fig, 2 nan miner d, and subsequently kill anything coming from the base. Sfs are harder to set up, usually less coordinated, and killed by the 2 figs on miner d. If the sfs are well coordinated the miner is dead, but it is easier to say everyone in ints by the aleph and go, than everyone set up 3k from the miner. The setting up takes to long, since the miner is a moving target.

Have you ever seen 5 sfs rush a miner? Probably not. I guarantee you they will shred the miner even though the 2 nans are nanning constantly. The ints have to kill the nans first.

It's not an issue of which is better, it's an issue of which is easier to use. Using sfs takes some skill and most people just don't have it. Like IB says above, organization in this game is hard and ints dont really have to be that organized to be effective. However given equal levels of competence, sfs are better at miner killing than ints, no question.

[Abomination]

Of course the speed factor is not mentioned at all. It takes much less time to actually start killing stuff in a nearby sector with ints.

And that is why exp > tac for killing miners, on real maps.

[takingarms1]

Except that the miners have to be in an adjacent sector.

For tac they don't.

That's why in most games with competent pilots and commanders sfs > ints for killing miners.

I think the problem is that you base your opinion on the perception created when you've seen 5 ints rush an adjacent sector and tear up some miners. That does happen on occaision, but in the context of most real games it is fairly rare. However in most tac games where both sides are competent, the tac team usually takes out all but 1 heavily defended miner. The same cannot be said of most exp teams even when that exp team faces only sup or tac on the other side.

[Abomination]

Actually on any regularly played core throughout all of Allegiance history, except maybe some A+ versions, ints have enough fuel to travel within their own sector, to another sector, and another. 2 sectors away. Kill a miner. Get podded or pod self. Get picked up by the scout that's eyeing the miner or probing, or a late int full of fuel. Rinse, repeat. Unfortunately.

Not to mention that a good exp team can quickly take the map, possibly even expanding into one of your sectors, and essentially having access to all your safe sectors with a single op push.

[takingarms1]

I swear you don't play the same game that I do.

First off, yeah ints can boost across a sector to get to the miners. But then they are 2 sectors from home and unable to get back in time if they get bombed or their own miners get rushed. But ok maybe they can do the pod-self thing and do pod-pickups, but then they're not attacking your miners anymore.

On top of that, while they are boosting, the enemy team has lots of time to move the miners and set up a defense/nans, so it is a lot less effective than boosting to an adjacent sector.

If an exp team can take the map such that they have adjacent access to all your sectors than your team is filled with idiots and the exp team deserves to win anyway. And I can't think of a single decent-sized map (except maybe star?) where a single op push would give an exp team access to all your mining sectors. That's just nonsense man.

[Abomination]

So ints don't know how to get picked up now?

Yes, while all those ints are rushing the miners, you can bomb or rush miners. Expansion however has the briefest exploitable window when making a miner rush, since that's the whole point. Fast ships?

Well, actually, you can't "rush" miners if you're tac. Because sfs will have just left their own sector while the enemy ints are already in the mining sector.

Oh, and, expansion can do the same thing. Maybe only a couple of ints are rushing miners. While a couple of ints are defending vs this supposed well-timed bomber run. Or the few sfs running about. Oh, and expansion can defend vs this bomber run better. In fact, ints can even pod themselves during the rush and get picked up and get home, if they need more manpower to defend. Oh and, the expansion team can bomb too.

Also, like I said, you must have not read the part of getting picked up, something which doesn't really take that much time. Less time than ripping home, or podding self and getting picked up in either a fig or a sf. Especially if you take beacons, rescue probes, and sanctuaries into account. Which we won't, for the sake of making sup/tac not feel embarassed.

As for your map demand, I say HiHigher. Push op high or low. You can now travel 2 sectors away via enemy home to normally safe mining sectors of their short-low, midlow-short, midhigh-short. Or you can force them to push miners forward to midhigh-center or midlow-center (both of these sectors are 2 sectors away from your home anyway, and 1 is also 2 sectors away from the pushed op, so they're ripe for rushing again, just via a different route... the only safe mining sector would be the center of the map, and by the time those miners get there, hell, a new enemy op con is out and about again)

Edit: Hypothetical situations can go on all day. But you should look into the facts. Like, properly played int teams get home faster than either figs/sfs. Ints can travel up to about 2 sectors away much much faster. Here's a point you were arguing: Ints are better at dogfighting. Here's a point in favor of tac: A ton of coordinated sfs can kill a miner no matter what, while the same cannot be said about a ton of ints/figs, since they have to deal with the nans/escort first.

[Kltplzyxm]

TA is correct.

Put it this way... given a 2 nan 2 int D on a miner, 5 attacking ints have a lower chance of success than 5 SFs. Many of us have seen it on the wrong end of the stick and it ain't pretty. Usually the 2 ints go off chasing an SF or two while the remainder out dmg the nans or kill them outright before support can respond.

The other key here is which Crono already mentioned. If a team is careless then miners will die with ease in little time. Not just that but it also takes less human resources to kill that miner. A single nan on a miner is virtually worthless vs. a single SF (assuming the SF pilot is smart and shoots the nan first). Even a 1 int 1 nan D doesn't guarantee anything vs. 1 SF. To D that miner properly you need to give almost 5 players to defend the miner. That is probably 3 more than whats neccessary for backup to arrive if it was against ints.

TAC ties up people in different ways. You can't just measure it solely in killing efficiency.

EDIT: Don't forget too that an SF basically has little ammo contraints being an energy weapon. Cons are much more under threat with SFs in a single sortie. I do agree that in some ways ints do a better job at stealth, but they are rightfully handicapped where SFs aren't. Also, differences between reg ints vs. hvy ints is significant too. You have more time to respond to an undefended miner vs. reg ints. Hvy ints you have some time to respond. Vs. SFs, you have none.

Not to bring up an old can of worms but again, it all depends on pilot skill and pilot patience. It really doesn't take that long to set up 3 SFs to kill a miner given proper coordination. Often times, just two is enough while you need a sizeable team to achieve the same rate of success using ints.

EDIT #2: I'm willing to bet that when 4 miners die in a span of 4 minutes it happens because the attackers went TAC and not EXP. Too bad I can't come up with numbers to prove it.

EDIT #3: I edited my post alot so my apologies if its a little all ove the place (don't tell me I didn't warn you. It's on my patch).

[Abomination]

Yes, your secure miner kill with sfs is more reliable if properly coordinated. However, by the time your sfs have killed 1 miner, ints can have killed 2-3.

An echo from another thread!

Why is speed so undervalued?

I guess I really am playing another game from TA. In my game, I'm rarely podded, I'm trigger happy with my mouse, ready to launch out of base, I barely have time to chat and type, because damn it, there's just that much to be done! Miner kills aplenty! In TA's game, he's silently... stalking a miner, slowly wearing down its nans... A game of cat and mouse. His backup arrives, and eventually... eventually... eventually... BOOM! The one miner explodes.

edit: I will admit though that tac can kill multiple (and especially undefended, poorly managed) miners faster... most of the time. End of the day though, it usually ends up with exp having 1 miner, and tac having 0. And that's all you need.

[Kltplzyxm]

One thing I've noticed is that when you're in an int, your perception of time does change - everything seems to be fast. SFs are slower and takes a little patience but really it doesn't take that long to traverse a sector without booster in a non int small ship. Remember that when you go 2 sectors to kill a miner, you are boosting part way and not the entire way. Things seem very fast in and int but considering the amount of time spent walking with ints, camping, and finding your quarry I think the differences are marginal. Yes there is a time advantage to ints but I don't think it's as big as ppl make it out to be. This "deploy" advantage obviously displays itself the most when responding for Base D.

EDIT: I know this is like apples and oranges but when I was in grad school doing a User Interface class there was a study done to compare coder efficiency in terms of editing using either a text editor (Vi, emacs, etc) to move the cursor or to click-highlight-edit using the mouse. I forget the exact numbers because it's been so long but the study revealed that each coder thought that text editors did the job of editing faster. But actually, the time to complete simple editing tasks was done faster with the mouse, even tho each coder didn't think so. The assumed conclusion: Busy work (in this case keystrokes) made ppl think that certain things were faster than they really were. Food for thought.