Kurtz Posted April 9, 2006 Share Posted April 9, 2006 On the Tactical Display (press space bar) you can see AA coverage of your (and the enemy's) turrets. Sometimes the coverage is not shown (especially when placing new turrets). This makes it harder to place turrets for maximum coverage. As I said, it doesn't happen every time and I haven't been able to reproduce this issue consistently. Also, the Sensor Jammer range takes priority over the AA turret's range when AA turret is placed within Sensor Jammer's range. Only SJ's range is shown. This behaves the same all the time. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
yurch Posted April 9, 2006 Share Posted April 9, 2006 I would also like to add that enemy air coverage should take a sort of 'precedence' in display over friendly AA. Like on that ice map, having a friendly AA turret overlapping the coverage of the large enemy tower coverage is somewhat unintuitive for new players - the green circle makes it look 'safe' to drop in range of the ATGM. The jammed turret circle behavior is supposed to represent what coverage the enemy can see, which isn't terribly intuitive either. I've had a few players tell me not to put friendly jammers over my friendly AA turrets as it would stop them from firing(it doesn't - the hermes would never fire if this was true). Perhaps a lighter circle for 'jammed' AA coverage is in order? Getting killed/dropship killed by a deployed turret also has no message. New players often think they can't deploy in an open area, when in reality they're getting shot by a jammed turret. I also think there are a little too many AA turrets availible for the initial setup. The number is about right for the map size, to replace losses, but the intial number availble is the problem. It's possible for defenders to completely bottle the map up (hermes can also be used in the AA setup), and the poor dropping bunch just gets EMP/fire missions/hurricane rounds/mortars tossed on top of them from onset. This is a pretty sour start for a game. Sometime bots have to spawn virtually off-map and clear a route for the players. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kurtz Posted April 9, 2006 Author Share Posted April 9, 2006 Good points. Maybe there should be a limit on where unit can be dropped in the deployment phase, just as in CTF scenarios (but with a larger circle). No message when killed by jammed AA has a point - it's jammed and you never knew what hit you. On the other hand, this is the only kill that doesn't give a message, which may lead to some conclusions. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
yurch Posted April 9, 2006 Share Posted April 9, 2006 Well, there's no kill message for unjammed turrets (or mines) either, and there IS a message for the hermes autogun... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ClaytoniousRex Posted April 10, 2006 Share Posted April 10, 2006 Kurtz, the coverage that is displayed changes based on whether you're currently picking a drop location or not. When you're not picking a drop location, all friendly AA assets show their effective radii on the map. When you are picking a drop location, then only those friendly AA assets which provide defensive cover for your dropship are shown (such as ion beam towers). This is so that, while you are picking a point to drop, you can see where it is "safe" to drop - where you will get some friendly defensive fire on your way down. The stupid thing about this, as it works right now, is that it does this even during the deployment phase when no dropships are needed. That just makes it harder to see where you have coverage without any benefit, so we can stop doing this during deployment. Yurch, you're right about the lack of a message for kills by turrets. We'll get that in pretty soon. As for handling a map that is saturated in enemy AA turrets, it's not very hard for a coordinated team to make a foothold and clear out a wider DZ. But you *have* to do it together. If you all drop together with the right mix of units then, yes, you will lose some dropships on the way down, but the survivors can very quickly clear out turrets in the area, making the 2nd and subsequent drops of your teammates easy. And yes, of course the enemy is going to be laying indirect fire into you, which is why you included a good number of Hermes in your drop, and he will be laying EMP into you, which is why you included a Cutter, and he will be putting direct fire on you, which is why you brought a Thor or two for the Hermes and Cutter to hide behind, etc. etc.... [ April 09, 2006, 09:03 PM: Message edited by: ClaytoniousRex ] Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
yurch Posted April 10, 2006 Share Posted April 10, 2006 I didn't say it wasn't possible, I said it was miserable being hurricane target practice. The first unjammed dropship drops tend to attract ctrl-m fire. Screw the cutter, (what can that do in an EMP storm, besides being the only one shooting? Does it have another special function to help the team vs EMP?) I recommend tempests and getting the hell out of the area post-haste. There's no reason to force the attackers to drop inside AA every competitive game - it doesn't make sense from a immersion point of view - we would drop further away if we could, but the boxy confines of the world limit that. We do have super-long range engines in the fluff and I'd hope for the soldier's sake that command wasn't always so pressed for time. The way to fix that is either less turrets or bigger maps, and I'm betting less turrets is the saner choice. (or, as kurtz says, the circle thing) Placing so many turrets every game gets a little tedious anyway. Anyway, kurtz's other point... Turrets that are jammed don't show the AA range at any time. Why is this? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Drusus Posted April 10, 2006 Share Posted April 10, 2006 If the defender decides to jam all of his AA turrets and add in Hurricanes shooting ctrl-m fire at drop zones and emp & artillery too, then it is going to be fun... Hermes can't shoot while it is inside the dropship¸ and anyways I have bad experiences from shooting down plasma mortar shots. If you put manual drop orders for the bots, then you are really screwed. They will continue to drop to that location until your inventory gets empty. And you have no idea where the turrets are before the game starts, so your only sane choice is to let the bots drop where ever they want. Luckily bots know where the jammed turrets are, at least it seems so to me. Or maybe this is just because of no kill messages for AA. Anyways it is propably possible to break a team playing defenders AA cover, but is it fun? And really, we would drop further away, but we can't... BTW is it possible to restrict the drop zones via modding? I think one fun game type could be 3 drop zones for both teams and then just try to capture the base, nobody being the defender. The drop zones would be limited thorough the game, not only in deployment. The goal is just to have as much time when you are having atleast one unit in the objective area. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kurtz Posted April 10, 2006 Author Share Posted April 10, 2006 Originally posted by Drusus: Hermes can't shoot while it is inside the dropship¸ and anyways I have bad experiences from shooting down plasma mortar shots. But it generally survives. It will be crippled, maybe static, but most of the time it can continue to fire the AA gun. IIRC the AA still works during EMP attack. Or does the 20 mm work as well? I think some vehicle can fire while under EMP attack but can't remember which..? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
yurch Posted April 10, 2006 Share Posted April 10, 2006 I think only the cutter can fire it's 20mm. The autogun on the back of the hermes stays active, but I'm not sure if the jammer does. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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