blacknet: we've already fixed that for the next release.

Tried all the skirmish types now, the small skirmishes definitely feel slow. and tend to take around 40 minutes. The scenario seems fine but compared to the other skirmishes this one definitely feels the slowest. The casualty count before retreat seems like it may be a bit high in relation to the value trident and its respawn time. The fighter skirmish also feels slow, like the bots aren't quote aggressive enough. I want to say the fighter skirmishes should play out more like a border patrol than a small scale skirmish. The NPCs all have ninja dodging powers and tend to pair up endlessly shooting at each other but never killing because they're so effective at dodging. About 90% of the mission kills accumulated in the fighter skirmish come from players or from NPCs, the NPCs are highly ineffective at killing another NPC in a one on one fight.

Anything beyond the fighter skirmish feels like a spamrag fest to me. When there are capships around, destroying fighters really doesn't make a difference. Hence, everyone and their mother brings a spamrag. This doubly hurts the Serco more than the Itani for the following reasons:

-If Itani lose their capship, it's only a short hop away to reload. If Serco lose their capship, they have to take the time to travel all the way to Geira and back. The time this costs them is invaluable.

-Serco lack a good pursuit fighter to run down rags. It's been suggested numerous times before, but I think this makes it all the more apparent. I think the drain on the SVG should be lowered back to what it used to be. With the current situation, you have the Itani with rags to bomb and valks/IBGs to run down Serco bombers. And you have the Serco with only rags to bomb and nothing equivalent to defeat enemy bombers. Proms are useless in this area. Unless you plan on giving the serco something more effective than a rag to bomb with, they need something else in order to compete.

The NPCs all have ninja dodging powers and tend to pair up endlessly shooting at each other but never killing because they're so effective at dodging. About 90% of the mission kills accumulated in the fighter skirmish come from players or from NPCs, the NPCs are highly ineffective at killing another NPC in a one on one fight.

+1 This has always been the case, and it has always been very annoying.

I agree with lecter. The comps should be stupider at dodging, and more effective at aiming.

Also, capships just sitting there is boring as hell.
Or when one capship attacks every other ship by itself.

That's not the problem, if you lure them and fire and bursts then they usually get hit... however, a lot of the npcs (aside from ones with ammo that they need to conserve like flares) tend to fire even when their energy hits 0. This means that the npc they're aiming at is constantly dodging and incredibly hard to hit... I propose that you give all the nation specific npc fighters the ai that npcs with flares have (if you look at the flare valk npcs then you will notice that they also fire their neuts in bursts). This would also help the npc proms in a way because right now they have two neuts and a gatling turret, but since they fire it all at once the energy drains so quickly that they might as well be firing one neut.

I have also found some cap ship AI bugs that may need some fixing. When Teradons fight TPG Constellations sometimes they'll be stuck out of range of the yellow snowballs meaning a giant stare-down. But I found out that I can easily turn the tide in a situation like this by bumping the Teradon forward ever so slightly, killing the Constellation. This bug also shows up with HACs even though it appears that the Teradon is in range of firing in this situation. I bumped the Teradon forward and voila! The HAC's shields were down. I think this started when the cap ship AI was changed for "better navigation" so for a quick fix maybe you could change it back. Seriously, though... cap ships really need to engage other cap ships sideways (except for Teradons).

P.S.: In the Trident, you can fire a ****load of swarms in the swarm turrets by firing, exiting, entering, firing, exiting, entering, and firing again. Might wanna fix that x_x lol.

if you lure them and fire and bursts then they usually get hit

Yes, genius, we know that. However, the NPC bots do not ( it's unclear if your suggestion is to make it so that the NPC bots do know this).

In the Trident, you can fire a ****load of swarms in the swarm turrets by firing, exiting, entering, firing, exiting, entering, and firing again. Might wanna fix that x_x lol.

This was supposed to have been fixed months ago.

Something I will make a note of: The system for this, in its current form, is horribly unbalanced. As Ghost stated earlier, the itani have a short in system jump to get back ot the fight. Serco have to fly from GR to Deneb to the battle over and over and over again. When doing a Large Skirmish...this ruins the fun of the event. If I wanted to fly the equivalent of the entire Dominion in one mission I'd do Escorts.

The Serco need a station in Deneb. A copy paste of the GR O4 station would be perfect. No turrets or anything...just a station to make things fair. Otherwise, I see no point in the Serco bothering because the time it takes for the Serco pilots to return makes the task annoying rather than fun. It also(I think) partially explains why the Serco hold around 10? sectors compared ot the Itani's 20+.

Another note...you might want to lower the amount needed to win a Large Skirmish...2000 takes FOREVER.

It takes about 45 minutes to end a Large skirmish with a 5 man group when there is no player opposition, as for the serco lack of controlled sectors, thats mostly due to their relatively low participation in border skirmish compared to the itani. A large skirmish is supposed to be Large, hence longer than the other skirmishes.

I noticed in the small and medium BS that often a NPC gets "sticky" at the cap ship. it just sits there waiting for me to kill it..

You can shoot them with the turrets and they stay on their place. Easy shooting..

Also in one of those cap ship (think its the trident) you can shoot multiple flares with one turret.. If you exit that turret and then get back you can shoot again. Over and over again.

Also.. Flying from GR to Deneb is getting kinda "bored". would be great if this could be shorter.

besides that.. I think its great fun to fly and get shot there. Meeting some nice people on my way to smithereens.

thats mostly due to their relatively low participation in border skirmish compared to the itani.

Which might have something to do with what Ghost and djmorg pointed out.

I have to agree with the others and would suggest Deneb be reworked. Perhaps with one station for each side located at the wormholes

The reason why the "enemy" looks as if they are sticky when I am in a turret, seems to be the fact that they chase me.

When I exit the craft in my own vessel, they follow me and are not static anymore.

Ohh yeah... Wat really drives me insane is having to fly trough an Ion storm before getting to the battlefield..

:-)

Yes, genius, we know that. However, the NPC bots do not ( it's unclear if your suggestion is to make it so that the NPC bots do know this).

It was a counter argument, read the rest of the paragraph. I'm saying that if one npc is shooting at the npc that you're trying to aim at then that npc gets a lot harder to hit because it's constantly dodging drained neut shots that don't do anything anyways and therefore can never get "lured" in the first place. I suggest a change in the rate of fire of the npcs, not the dodging capabilities. And I can still fire a ****load of swarms from Trident swarm turrets xD.

If anyone doesn't believe the part about turning the tide by bumping the Teradons forward, then try it again if you see your team's Teradon engaged, but not firing at an enemy Constellation or firing at the enemy HAC. Just keep bumping the stern of the Teradon and keep an eye on the enemy cap ship's shields. Maybe I'll make a PCC test mission to make sure.

And I second the motion to rework Deneb: take out the Itani stations, take out the hive, and put Serco and Itani stations at their designated wormholes. Then allow asteroid sectors to be taken as well. And maybe a few guards can be planted in the taken sectors... like hardcore npcs, the ones with actual sunflares or something lol (Territorial Hogs might fit the roll?).

I have had a lot of fun testing this out so far.

Some thoughts:
+ NPCs should probably shoot at and refuse docking to anyone not taking the mission.
+ Anyone who teamkills should be booted from the mission.
+ NPCs should preferentially target lmines.
+ FF Restrictions should be dropped in Deneb.

NPCs should probably shoot at and refuse docking to anyone not taking the mission.
Shoot at? Nah. Refuse docking to sounds more legit though.

Anyone who teamkills should be booted from the mission
Is FF off in Deneb? If so, awesome. Good thinking.

Serco are the invaders, right? So it doesn't make sense for the Serco to have ANY stations in Deneb whatsoever.

Although it WOULD be a neat idea if the Serco captured enough systems (like over 50%) in Deneb, that a Serco station appeared on the Deneb side of the Deneb-Geria WH. This station would only offer wartime stuff, not much trade stuff. One entrance and 2 exits, a small station.

And if the Itani can reclaim more than 50% of the sectors, then the station on the Deneb side would "be destroyed" I.E. go away.

Although it would be much more interesting to actually DESTROY the Serco station once it became vulnerable.

Interesting Leebs but will the Itani station disappear if Serco wins?

The Serco building a station inside the Deneb wormhole would be a normal activity of an invasion as it would establish a beach-head.

The fighter-only missions need to spawn faster....

Heh, just did a medium skirmish and much to my surprise that unlike in a hive skirmish i could not waste the shields of a capship on my own so I actually needed to partake in team work!

Anyways to make a long story short, Interstellar and I dropped the shields of an entire Serco fleet consisting of 3 ships and our teradon finished them all, w00t.

I think players should not be allowed to dock with capships of the opposing factions, regardless of their standing with that faction. I saw an Itani dock with a Serco Trident during Small Skirmish and get repaired/refilled - that's just not right.