I'm a fairly new player here, but in the short amount of time I've been playing the game, I've noticed a couple of rather annoying aspects about both the missiles that I believe warrant posting about. The missile AI needs to be tweaked a bit. When a target is coming straight at me and I fire a missile (or even when they're moving/running away, sometimes), the missile won't just run into the target, it'll actually avoid it and loop around to try and hit it straight on from behind. Needless to say, this is pretty annoying, especially since half the time, the missile won't catch up to the target by the time it's looped around because it's used up too much fuel. Every other space-combat sim style game I've played will let the missiles hit from more than one direction, rather than forcing it to try and hit from behind. I think a slight revision to the missile's AI could fix this.

One other suggestion: if the missiles aren't targetable, destroyable objects, perhaps they should be. It would make for an interesting game mechanic, since pilots could target incoming missiles and potentially shoot them down. I've seen this mechanic work very well in other games and it would be neat to see here.

Missles are targetable... but I think you need to be an alpha (or perhaps even a beta?) tester to have the command already bound to your keyboard if at all.

LocalRadarPrev and LocalRadarNext

should do the trick. Keep hitting whatever key you bind them to till you get a rocket## or missile##.

They aren't destroyable though so it doesn't really matter that you can sometimes target them.

Are you using the heatseekers? If so, makes sence for them to loop around; the heatsource is behind the ship, not in front of it. These missiles aren't dumbfires ya know.

if the heat source is behind the ship, how do you thrust laterally or in reverse? "Heat seeking" missiles are actually much more commonly radar or laser guided in modern weapons technology, one may think that when we have 1 man fighters travelling between star systems at FTL speeds then missiles may be a bit more advanced :)

So what I'm basically saying is, don't try to mix reality and a video game. Balance for combat should be more important than a percieved "reality."

Missile's seriously need to be more effective. Simply put, it is difficult to hit barrel-rolling players with direct fire weapons and something needs to offset this tactic. Missile AI barely even qualifies as effective against stupid bots and needs to be improved dramatically to be worth the Large weapon slot I'm wasting on it right now.

IIRC, there is known problem with homer's AI in that it doesn't lead the target correctly. When it gets close to the target it finds that it can't turn quickly enough to hit the target, resulting in it looping around behind.

AFAIK, The facing of the target has nothing to do with it.

It was never a big issue for us oldbies because we had all sorts of other weapons to play with and we were used to homers not being all that effective, so we never really pressured the devs on it.

I figure that they will get around to it, when they get around to it. Uneffective homers are better than too effective homers. Fire-and-forget weapons tend to be no fun.

Of course, missiles shouldn't be so effective that you cannot dodge them. This removes the dogfight element from the game and gives the advantage to swarmers.

However, when three ApuTech Guardians jump me I need a little extra oomph that I can rely on as I frantically barrel roll away. If missiles are going to suck then we should have an alternative heavy weapon at the early licenses.

I like the idea of being able to shoot incoming missles, that would add rather than take away from the dog fight element.

Having been playing for a while i find the missles to be fine. There are a few other threads about missles and how they work.

Like most weapons, missles have a 'sweet spot' where they are effective, and drop out areas where all they are is a waste. Since most combat takes place at close range ( 150m to 300m) missles work just fine. Most homers are not ment to be a close range weapon, but rather intermediate or 'first fire' weapons.

Not to long ago hommers were a little better then they are now, thank god they were nerfed.

I also agree with Akoman about wanting a little oomph when jumped by mulitple opponents. But I don't think 'upping' homers is the answer.

One final note: New players and low lvl characters should not be able to compete with high lvl bots or high lvl characters. When you get a high enough licience lvl there are some good missle systems out there. In the mean time don't fire at people who are higher lvl then you. Of course there is always a chance you may win, but it is slim......