I and about 6 of my friends tried out VO about a year ago, we really really liked it at first, but ran into some issues... As a preface, 5 of us played for about 3 months iirc.

Money was useless. This is nice to some degree, but once you have more than 100k it's pretty much ridiculous. That has been rectified and makes me want to come back to some degree. Ever since I played this game I thought it had kickass potential, and I come back about once a month or so to check on the updates.

PVP, this is where my main beef is:
The freedom of movement is neat, and is a first for an MMO since Allegiance, however, it suffers from it's own flexability.

First off, it's hard to tell by sight if a ship is in range or not, even when you're used to the way it works.

Second, backwards movement. Backwards movement is a good thing to have... Not so good in the way it is implemented. As it is, you can pretty much dead stop and backup at the same speed as your front speed, with the same acceleration rate. This is bad. I'm sure that many people will come into this topic screaming at the top of their lungs "OMG N00b, IT"S JAWSOME THE WAY IT IS!oneeleven!!112"

The reason that it is bad is because closing with your opponent is made twice as hard, and this is especially bad for newbies as they will have an extremely tough time landing a single shot. Even as it is, fighters will circle and backstrafe/roll for some time before a conclusion to the battle.

The only weapons suitable for these long ranges are neutrons and a few others, and in many cases renders the more neato guns that people like myself prefer, useless. These are the slow projectile, heavy damage guns, even popcorn. Yes, you can land hits with the guns occasionally if you happen to pull the right maneuver and your opponent doesn't react fast enough, but the point is that landing hits is what makes things fun, even if you lose.

I'm not suggesting that you make maneuvering obsolete... Quite the opposite in fact. I am suggesting that you make maneuvering more important by allowing opponents to close on one another. Backwards flying is neat, but it allows for a players minor adjustment to become a major with fairly little effort.

Here is the meat of what I suggest:
Reduce the acceleration of backwards flying (doesn't have to be a whole heck of a lot)
Reduce the max speed that can be attained by backwards acceleration (This just makes sense... Considering that the large engines are pointed towards the rear of the spacecraft for a reason...)

After you do that, players will be landing more hits, so the combat extremely fast deaths I suggest that:

Fighter hull strengthened (hell... Double it. Considering that fights would take place at much closer range, fighters are going to be in need of taking a lot more punishment)

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These are the sorts of things that make fighting in VO a lot of fun. I've wanted to suggest this for a long time, but I know I'm gonna get creamed, bitched at, flamed and toasted for even opening my mouth. TBH, the stuff mentioned above is the main reason that me and my friends left. It's not very fun to fight if you can't hit anything 90% of the time... Even when you have quite a good bit of experience with things... But meh, what do I know?

I love you!

Are you serious? I was expecting to get flamed...

Nah, you present the problem very soberly.

And it would eliminate some of the players screaming BACKROLLER time and again because that particular tactics would not be as efficient (and boring..) anymore.

As to more armour on the fighters, why should it increase? So you die more when fighting close, tough! It goes for everyone really and teaches the values of dodging. Remember the five D's

Is what I would say if I ever were to fight;).

I think he was sarcastic...

Anywho i all for tuning down the backwards movement speed, but giving all ships double hp is just plain silly.

Well I agree that making the hp more would be silly, but it was a preemptive suggestion for people saying that they would die 50 billion times faster.

Atm I am just rather displeased with the type of skill needed for dogfighting. I always that it was a better test of mettle when you had to dodge, duck, dip, dive and dodge at a range where it actually mattered.

Fact is, I think that the dogfights in VO would be much more intense if backwards movement wasn't such a factor, because the way that you maneuver has serious consequences and skill with rolling and strafing becomes even more important.

Point-by-point:

PVP, knowing if you are in range: This is what the little distance value is for in the targetinfo box. If you use the TCS set of plugins, one of them (CentralInfo) puts this information on the center of your HUD where it is easier to see. Give it enough practice, and you will be able to tell just by sight (without the gauge) how far away your target is.

PVP, backwards acceleration: Actually, backing up at the same speed as you move forward makes perfect sense.

The ships use gravitic propulsion (it's in the backstory, go see for yourself) -- effectively, creating a small gravity well in the direction that the pilot wants to go, pulling the ship in that direction. There's no restriction to which direction you can go with that sort of propulsion.

What's the only thing that we can do that is restricted to the direction the 'engines' are pointing? Turbo.

VO isn't your standard "flight simulator", and while some of the ships might look like they can fly in an atmosphere, that isn't a reason for them to fly that way in space. Being able to move backwards at the same speed as you can move forwards opens up a wealth of new tactics that one wouldn't be able to use otherwise.

PVP, range of weapons: If your weapons can't hit at a certain range, move in closer until they can. Turn on the "flight assist" mode; that will remove your ability to fly backwards and will be constantly forcing you forwards into the fray, where your weapons will have a better chance of hitting. Just be careful that you dodge more, because you will be a bigger target at those ranges.

Overall: If you want fight up close, turn on flight assist or jam your hand/foot/finger/whatever on the forward acceleration button. Anyone who has put in sufficient amounts of time and effort to learn how to fight in VO manages to do just fine with the "low" armor, the ability to move backwards at full (non-turbo) speed, and the other things you are saying need to be changed. This isn't Freespace or Ace Combat or (god forbid) MS Flight Simulator. Ships in VO move differently. Either you're good at it or you're not -- and if you're not, it's up to you whether you want to practice and learn to adapt to a new type of skill.

I am intrigued by the idea of slowing down backwards motion, but there is one aspect that makes it more dubious for me. When I'm fighting three or more opponents at once, I tend to back up a lot (not backroll, I don't use my roll keys) to keep them in my field of view and keep them from all overwhelming me at once. With the backwards speed lowered, it would be far easier for a couple pilots to completely overwhelm a single opponent (and it's already extremely difficult for that single pilot if the two know what they're doing), making ganking even easier and probably encouraging more people to run in the face of being outnumbered. I'm not sure if there's a way to reconcile the speed nerf with this problem, but I thought I'd bring it up.

I am suspicious of the idea of reduced backwards acceleration. I'm not sure that it addresses a problem that needs to be solved or can't be solved by buffing various weapon classes instead.

Capping backwards motion sounds repulsive to me. Should you slow down just because you make a 180?

@ Kanaka: In regards to backstory fluff... I Have read the backstory many times and nowhere is it mentioned that the serco use gravatic pulse engines. Those Inventions were Itani, and picked up to some lesser extent by The Propeller Group.

Knowing if you are in range: I addressed this in my post. I would appreciate it if you reread it so that I don't have to repeat myself.

The "wealth" of new tactics provided by backwards flying are not always positive. For example you have backwards rolling. Just because you like to play a certain way doesn't mean that other will agree with you. A "Gentlemans Agreement" should not have to be reached in pvp. PVP should be what it is, as it is.

Players like to survive. It's kinda like people frowning on missle users in combat. Then what the hell are they there for in the first place? If I'm losing a battle and I have missles equipped, you can bet your ass I'm gonna cram a few up there either to A: Win the battle, or B: Buy some time to retreat.

@diqrtvpe: Why are you taking on 3 opponents at once? Unless you are a supreme pilot or unless your opponents are not nearly as skilled as you in the cockpit, you should be running your ass off.

I don't really see how this is a "problem", because if you are outnumbered 3 to 1, you should be running.

Back @ Kanaka: Turning on flight assist is a great way to get beat up fast in combat and you know it.

I never called the armor "Low", Where did you get that idea?

Move in closer until they can: Happens to be a wonderful way to get your ass shot off, especially if you are using the weapons with slow projectiles, or extremely short range ones (like popcorn).

The ability to fly backwards at max speed with the same acceleration is a detriment, not an augmentation to pvp, and drives many people like myself away from the game. That's the main reason that me and my friends stopped playing. We didn't like the low ship costs either, but that was minor in relation to the backwards flying.

@pointsman: Ideally, there would be a button push that while held down, keeps your current acceleration in a certain direction while allowing you to pitch/yaw your fighter. The caveat is that you can't maneuver as well while doing this.

Capping backwards speeds will invite a massive amount of rocket-ramming, which isn't good.
 

Also, http://www.vendetta-online.com/x/msgboard/3/16710

I like this quote:
"Lowering the reverse speed and/or thrust would create an artificial and unneccesary advantage for advancing pilots. In short, you're asking for a gameplay modification to compensate for your own lack of skill."

This is dumb. As unrealistic a space sim as VO is, it should pay some homage to inertia and lack of friction.

And you avoided my suggestion to buff those weapons which you describe as being ill served by distance control cabal. This would be a much cleaner way to achieve your goals.

As it is, I can win with rockets, flechette, gauss, etc. Rockets are actually quite popular so I'm surprised you declared them useless.

If you are comfortable saying that 3v1 should result in running or death then perhaps you will agree that 1v1 should loom with the same determinism if one person's setup trumps the other.

All in all I think weapons are fairly balanced though it could be better. This is the central issue and the one you should address.

Backrolling isn't a viable tactic. If you die by it you need some training.

You aren't trolling are you?

"Lowering the reverse speed and/or thrust would create an artificial and unneccesary advantage for advancing pilots. In short, you're asking for a gameplay modification to compensate for your own lack of skill."

If that is the final answer, then my "underskilled" Credit Card will not be paying for this "overskilled" game. I've already mentioned that this is the main reason that me and my friends were originally driven off from the game.

I've been coming back to the site every so often hoping that stuff would come around, but sadly, it has not. Has it ever occured to you that newbies will get turned off at this nearly instantly? PVP Combat in VO is interesting, but atm it's not particularly fun.

"Oh great he's going backwards again, woofrickinhoo, lets hit the afterburner so that we can close with him... oop not we're getting hit because we want to close. Ok lets back off and see if we can get lucky here. Oh hey there we go... hit him a few times" ... *5 minutes later...* Screw this stuff, this is lame *Afterburns to close with target because at this point, Who cares?* *Dies* *tries it again* *Dies* *logs off VO and cancels account* "Jeez, what a neat game, foiled by that crap.

Lol @ gentleman's rules for a pvp oriented mmo, now that's rich.

Concerning rocket spamming, that is a legitimate point, however, couldn't the rockets be adjusted to account for it?

@pointsman, explain to me where I said rockets or popcorn was useless? Popcorn is useless unless you can close enough to use them, but meh.

"If you are comfortable saying that 3v1 should result in running or death then perhaps you will agree that 1v1 should loom with the same determinism if one person's setup trumps the other."

What? That would be very much paper/rock/scissors don't you think?

Sigh... I haven't ever died by backrolling. I'm simple laughing at the "Gentleman's rules" that dictate you shouldn't do it.

You need to spend more time reading my posts instead of skimming while trying to think up what you want to say next.

No I am not trolling. At the moment I don't really have a vested interest considering that I am not currently subscribing. I tried coming back for a total of 2 days several months ago, and within hours I was so turned off by the pvp that I immediately canceled again.

I think VO has some serious potential, and it's a really neat game, but most people, like me, are going to be turned off fairly quickly by the pvp is the game.

Back @ Kanaka: Turning on flight assist is a great way to get beat up fast in combat and you know it.

I beg to differ. It takes more skill on your side and makes combat more intensive but you can win if you do it consistently.

You are so full of crap. PVP is nothing like you describe it. Maybe you are just inept.

azumi: I use flight assist quite often...

Well, this thread is turning out pretty much like I figured it would. As it has, I bid you good day, and take care.

bye!

Can we disagree with people without being insulting, or at the very least hide it better from me?

No. :P

Doing as Forboding_Angel suggests will most likely drive off more people than those who come because of it.

No.

He's trolling.