Rix Heavy Scout Discussion

[Adept]

QUOTE (HSharp @ Jul 6 2010, 02:59 PM) I was thinking of that myself actually, a new dawn of heavy scout rushes, a lone scout in a sector soon becomes a swarm, dunno if that will actually be more cheesy though then current heavy scouts.

I'll take a swarm of regular gat armed scouts any day. Even if they carry gunners, that still halves the amount of rix mini-ACs out there.

[zombywoof]

QUOTE (Adaven @ Jul 5 2010, 05:58 PM) While I think that this is the most varied and interesting of the threads on this topic, no one has mentioned the idea I've always been in favor of:

Get rid of the rix mini-AC scout, and make hvy SR scouts free.

That would decrease the level of overall cheese while returning the faction a little closer to it's MS roots.

I... I really like this idea. I would say do this and then perk the energy regen a tad.

QUOTE (HSharp @ Jul 6 2010, 04:59 AM) I was thinking of that myself actually, a new dawn of heavy scout rushes, a lone scout in a sector soon becomes a swarm, dunno if that will actually be more cheesy though then current heavy scouts.

Well 20 pilots would only be able to bring 10 miniAC to the party.

[Xeretov]

If I interpret Adaven's idea correctly, he just wants the current Rix Hvys reduced to a gat or two (and I'd return the ammo to 800 if that happened) and make the current Hvy SRs free rather than $500. There would still be two separate ships in the loadout screen, the noticable differences being the SR version would have twice the sig and half the energy regen unless we made changes there too. Though I don't see a need for said changes.

Note that SR hvys still have a mini-ac turret. Further amusing is that they also have the standard 800 ammo for it.

Overall an interesting idea. The free heavy SRs would be a nice compensation in lieu of losing the front mini-AC on their normal heavies which would force them to get turret gunners like most other factions. I've got some nagging doubts about making them free though. Imagine one SR finding the enemy miner and ripping in the entire rest of the team in turret-equipped SR and normal heavies. Sure they can do that right now, but it costs a good $3000 or so to rip in that much of the team under ideal circumstances. More if they use all or mostly SRs rather than a mix.

I think if anything I'd rather reduce the cost by half than remove it entirely. A $500 price tag on an SR just feels like a good price for its capabilities, and they get some decent perks from the research upgrades already.

Which means that this idea basically goes back to removing the mini-AC and replacing it with gatts or something else.

[HSharp]

QUOTE (Xeretov @ Jul 6 2010, 08:34 PM) If I interpret Adaven's idea correctly, he just wants the current Rix Hvys reduced to a gat or two (and I'd return the ammo to 800 if that happened) and make the current Hvy SRs free rather than $500. There would still be two separate ships in the loadout screen, the noticable differences being the SR version would have twice the sig and half the energy regen unless we made changes there too. Though I don't see a need for said changes.

Note that SR hvys still have a mini-ac turret. Further amusing is that they also have the standard 800 ammo for it.

I don't think Adaven meant having two scout types for Rix.

Also all Heavy Scouts have 800+ ammo and mini-ac turret except Rix and TF which have less ammo.

And Adept doesnt seem to realise the power of being able to rip in your whole team to a sector in less than 12 seconds even if they are just firing gats and the odd mini-ac.

[l1ngus]

I just don't see, why the heavy scout should get any perk in trade for the overdue nerf.

[Jimen]

QUOTE (Xeretov @ Jul 6 2010, 03:34 PM) Overall an interesting idea. The free heavy SRs would be a nice compensation in lieu of losing the front mini-AC on their normal heavies which would force them to get turret gunners like most other factions. I've got some nagging doubts about making them free though. Imagine one SR finding the enemy miner and ripping in the entire rest of the team in turret-equipped SR and normal heavies. Sure they can do that right now, but it costs a good $3000 or so to rip in that much of the team under ideal circumstances. More if they use all or mostly SRs rather than a mix.

I don't really see any problem with this, actually. Forcing them to carry turrets (by removing the front mini-AC) is MORE THAN ENOUGH of a nerf for that tactic. In a 15vs15, the Rix team can only field a max of 7 turreted hvyscouts for miner O - I'd say 6-8 ints and 2-3 scouts launching to d (as long as a probe caught the SR so they knew reinforcements were coming) are enough (probably way too much actually) to give the other team a better-than-even chance of saving the miner, while still leaving them 5+ pilots free to hit Rix's undefended @#(!. As long as you take away their ability to almost be on par with adv ships in one-on-one dogfights (I consider a turret to be essentially two-on-one), it's pretty hard to break them.

[Xeretov]

QUOTE (HSharp @ Jul 6 2010, 04:40 PM) I don't think Adaven meant having two scout types for Rix.

Well then I have issues with his idea.

The SR scout has reduced energy regen to limit how fast ships can rip into it. It also has a high signature to make it easier to track down. If we don't make two separate ships then we have to decide which nerfs to keep.

If we give it a high signature (which is even higher than the basic scout mind you) then its going to have a hard time sneaking anywhere for whatever purpose. TP2 comes to mind in particular, and Rix Sup is so rarely seen I don't think that techpath needs any more nerfs. Give it normal signature though and you have an SR that is not only free, but is hard to find.

If we give it a reduced energy regen (which again is half that of the basic scout) then you severely limit its ability to nan. But if you give it normal energy regen then you can rip that many more ships in.

The best solution is to keep them as separate ships, and imo not go mucking around with something (SRs) that feels balanced as-is.

[Koln]

IMO If hvy SRs are free and a full team of people in SRs started ripping to just 1 SR, each time someone rips in you get another one with a full energy set for rips, so energy regen doesn't really matter a lot.

What it's really an issue is the sig stuff, you sure can't sneak a hvy scout for a tp2 drop with an sr (as easy as it would be with a reg scout).

[Xeretov]

QUOTE (Koln @ Jul 6 2010, 06:24 PM) IMO If hvy SRs are free and a full team of people in SRs started ripping to just 1 SR, each time someone rips in you get another one with a full energy set for rips, so energy regen doesn't really matter a lot.

True, but if you wanted to rip something else in (like adv. figs) then you'd have half the interval time once you were empty. Meaning 10s for adv figs as opposed to the current 20 or so. Unless you reduced the energy, in which case we go back to the nanning problem.

[Adaven]

Yeah I was talking about just 1 hvy scout type available at loadout. I figured there'd be some kinks with the sig, didn't realize there was a regen nerf in there as well.

I agree with Koln, I'm not convinced that the regen factor isn't that big a deal really overall. Lower regen does hurt bomber/htt runs, but on the other hand, you'll be able to rip more scouts in at will.

Same thing for Adv figs. Yes in theory each scout will be able to rip less figs in, but you'll have many more potential rip scouts on the map. Right now you are lucky to see 1-2 people still in SR's when hvy's are up. That's not going to change much as long as there is a 2nd scout type available with more powerful pilot weaponry, regardless of the price of SR's.

Sig is likely going to be more tricky. TP2 would be much harder at current SR sig. Maybe a reduction in sig would be in order. How much? I have no idea.

I'm thinking you're probably best off by just making the current hvy SR the only hvy available and seeing how that shakes things up before trying to second guess how to fix it completely. This is a change in gameplay that few people are really familiar with anymore, and could swing either way balance wise, depending on what new tactics people come up with.