(This is posted in the bugs section, but reposted here because most of it is just ideas not bugs and I would like feedback from people. Thanks!)
I spent a great deal of time this weekend rolling tanks. It was a total blast, but there were some very annoying problemsI will try to summarize everything I saw that I hope to eventually see improved. Great games can always get better!!!
#1 - Cannot Land Successfully at VH.
Since there is no runway at a VH, it's not letting us land our VH hangar sorties successfully. Also, when you are attacking a VH, you cannot land your tank/m3/m16 there either. This is disturbing to those of us who care about our stats.
#2 - Sometimes unable to hit VH
I have heard that this is simply a sprite bug, but that was not my experience this weekend. Many times, I was unable to hit a VH with my tank HE shots. The shots would sail right through. Most often, this occurred at 800-1200 distance. One of those times, I still managed to destroy the VH with normal dirt hits, but most of the other times, it wasn't doing any damage that I could tell.
#3 - The Tank Machine Gun (#3) sites are off
The tank gun sites are screwed up. It shoots to the left of the mark, or to the upper left sometimes. Its very very frustrating.
#4 - Main turret/75mm gun not staying targeted.
Sometimes, when you switch from the #2 main gun to the #3 machine gun, then back again, the #2 gun is no longer where you had it aimed. I found it usually jumped to the right about 20-40 degrees.
#5 - Machine gun frustrating to use.
The machine gun is limited to pointing in the general direction that the main gun is pointing, and its only capable of going up to a certain angle. Maybe this is how it really was, but its very very frustrating because a Panzer is basically helpless against a plane that is attacking from behind at a steep angle.
#6 - Panzer WAY too susceptible to plane gun fire
This weekend, I ran a dozen or so sorties in my panzer to a rook VH. Cobra was out there in a F4U. About 11 of the 12 times, he would attack from behind, at a steep angle, and kill me on almost every pass with just a few pings.
I understand tanks did not have as much armor in back as in front. I understand that a plane CAN kill a tank. BUT, even Cobra said, it sure seems a bit too easy to kill them.
Even using smoke, even turing directions, etc, I was unable to avoid being killed by him. His angle of attack was such that I could never get a shot on him with the machine gun. Very frustrating, and seems to be a bit unrealistic.
#7 - Scoring on VH captures
It seems to me that anyone within a certain distance of a VH map room should get credit for field capture/map-room destroyed. I would run a panzer to a VH, my buddy Mathman would run a M3, and after we do our damage and take it over, I would get no credit for the capture. It would be nice that any ground unit within a certain distance from a map room gets credit for the capture, or maybe a capture assist?
#8 - Bomber rankings...what about ground unit rankings?
Running ground units, and running b17's or b26's are very very different skills. Of all the skills in the game, I find myself enjoying ground skills the most.
Its very dissapointing to find that much of what I do in tanks, m16's and m3's comes out as Bomber rankings, or not at all. I have racked up nearly 150 kills in ground units in tour 6, and those kills mean nothing for the ranks from what I can tell. If you look up kills in the Bomber ranks, it does not associate any type of rank with them.
Considering that you cannot do anything but ditch at a VH, that you do not get ranking credits for your bomber/ground-unit kills, etc, there is a lot of skilled ground unit effort that is going unrewarded.
I would love to see a 3rd category of rankings. Fighters, Bombers, Ground-Units.
I've heard rumours of a navy coming, and if thats true, it could end up just being Airplanes, Ground-Units, Naval Vessels, etc. But, unless ground-units are separated from bombers, then they should at least give you ranking credits for your ground-unit/bomber kills.
#9 - Main gun needs a center command
Given that there is a bug that makes it so your main gun does not always stay where you left it when you switch to machine gun, etc...and given that we are not sitting inside the tank, its too easy to become disoriented in the main turret. It would be very very helpful, and more fair I wager, to have a command that automatically centers the main turret.
#10 - M16's, M3's..never damaged, always destroyed with a ping.
Im not sure how many m16/m3 sorties I've run, I would wager well over 30 or maybe 40, and the one consistent factor I notice - they never are damaged, they just get blown up. I dont think I can remember a second pass in one of these bad boys. When planes that are only shooting .50 cal, or smaller can kill you with a ping or two, from any direction, it makes me wonder if the damage analysis portion is getting over looked. Of all the times i've died in these units, only once did I lose a track and just sit there til getting killed. Maybe its not a problem, but seems they die a tad bit fast.
#11 - VH Respawning Bugs/Issues
I have film of this happening - the same guy would respawn over and over at the VH, 61 i think, and would take shot after shot after shot. I would pop him 8 times at his spawn point, he would not die, then he would kill me with 1 hit. This happened at least 3 times in a row.
Later, he complained that he was not being allowed to ditch.
Under any analysis, no tank could ever take 8 AP hits to the main body. Its not only unrealistic, it destroys game play. It takes so long to get tanks somewhere compared to fighters. When you have to waste all your ammo because of game bugs, it makes you not want to take tanks at all.
It also seems very unfair that people can respawn so fast, and so close to the VH. If you and a friend are attacking a VH, and you took 20 or 30min just to get there, its not balanced gameplay, or realistic to let some defender pop over and over and over again. A persistent respawner can single-handedly defeat an entire ground assault. Sure there are ways to deal with this, but I had a couple thoughts.
Seems to me that you should be forced to wait 1 minute to respawn at the same base you just died in. Also seems that you should not respawn right in the same point every time, but that you should respawn outside the base, say 8k-5k away or so.
#12 - Takes too long to get places
Depending on which run you're making, it takes a LONG LONG time to get attacking ground units to other bases.
Its basically unfair - the defenders can repop over and over and over right at the fight, the attackers, no matter how skilled, no matter how well they attack, must start all over again if they are killed.
I guess it would be nice to see some more balance in this regard.
#13 - Cannot hit HQ from closest VH
We worked for HOURS and HOURS to get the VH near one teams Headquarters. Come to find out, even those its right next door, you cant roll ground units from there to their HQ. Why is this?
#14 - Vehicles need an accelerator lock
Why cant these vehicles use the throttle like the planes do? I cannot keep my stick pushed forward for 30minutes at a time.
IF you run it up to full speed, then switch to another gun, etc, it will stay locked forward on even ground. But the second you go uphill it disengages, etc.
Maybe we could put these things on the same throttle system as planes. Or, maybe we could just have a key that locks it at full throttle. Either way, this should be fixed because it makes driving more work than fun heh.
[This message has been edited by BotaBing (edited 07-17-2000).]
