This game being about combat and all, it makes sense that players should be encouraged to fight each other, be it air, ground, or sea.
The trouble with that statement as it relates to the recent changes is that it assumes player response will be what you (or more importantly, hitech) hope it will be. But that isn't the path of last resistance, and the path of least resistance is what you're most likely to see.
In this case the path of least resistance is to send bomb-and-bailers to pork every radar within three sectors and then bring in buffs at 25k+ to drop all the hangers at the target base before bringing in fighters, town killers, and troops. It's also to fly in even
bigger hordes than before.
And that's exactly what I've been seeing for the past three nights.
None of these changes is for the better. None of them encourages more fighting; in fact, they encourage
less fighting and bigger hordes at the fights that do occur. With all the dar down people who want to up alone or in a pair and go hunting will have a much, much tougher time finding a fight. The only reliable way to find a fight will be to go to where there are 20-30 friendlies and an equally big enemy dar bar.
You'll also see more GVs and fewer fighters in base takes. Instead of scrambling fighters to intercept an incoming raid, you'll be scrambling them to dive-bomb incoming tanks. I don't think there are many players who find that more exciting.
Believe me, I'm not saying this because I think that's how things should go, I'm saying it because I
regret that that's how things will go. And I'm not complaining because it will make taking bases harder - if it's harder for me, it's harder for the enemy too, so that's all good. I'm complaining because it will encourage
worse gameplay, not better.
Much of the criticism of NOE raids has always been misplaced. You don't fly NOE to avoid combat. You fly NOE to gain the advantage of surprise so as to
win the ensuing combat. You can't possibly avoid combat flying so low that it takes all of ten seconds for the enemy to take off and engage you. If you want to avoid combat you fly at 30k where no one can possibly catch you. Or you fly in enormous hordes so the enemy is intimidated out of even trying to resist. But flying in that huge horde is no less a problem if you come in at 10k than it is at 100 feet.
I enjoy defending against base takes at least as much as taking bases, and there's little in AH that excites me more than seeing 10-12 enemies pop up in an NOE raid. I know that if I up there I'll be in for a vicious knife fight and a challenging defense, and if a few other friendlies up we have a fighting chance to foil the attack. It's when the bad guys come in at 20k+ or in hordes of 30 or more that I know there's no point in taking off. And that's exactly what this change is already encouraging.
However, I really hope hitec will leave the settings the way they are for a bit rather than giving in to the temptation to keep tinkering in realtime. If he keeps tinkering, the source of the trouble will never be clear, but if we stick with the new settings for a few weeks, it will give everyone a better view of the resulting changes in behavior and what does and doesn't work in encouraging the sort of gameplay they'd like to see.
