Aircraft in RACE maps

[iZumo]

From another point of view a single Venom has to put up with a dozen of Hellbenders, each of them with triple and half the amount of HP (1600 + 3*300) plus shields. And it is not only twinbeams but also skymine secondary fire that are used to shoot Venoms down (and it is effective to prevent it from regenerating HP). If you're up against a decent HB team it is damn hard to survive in the air.

It's not hard at all to take a pair of benders one-by-one, and that's the usual scenario. Two problems that occur in Venom as far as I remember:
- lasers deal massive strike to the benders (lasers should be that good only versus other Venoms / Havocs in my taste)
- regeneration (i.e go further en route to obj, wait for hp regen, march against the bender)

[iRobot]

I prefer a weaker craft:instant respawn design to powerful craft:3 min respawn, just my op.

[Azarael]

An intended change was to have factories spawn a different vehicle in depending on player count. HBRace Darknight has long runs, but also has Havocs to mitigate air power.

[Jate]

The greater the distance, the harder it is to hit the target for both opponents. Considering that Venoms do not have hitscan weapons it is generally harder for Venoms to hit their target - this is balanced by their speed and agility.

A dozen of Hellbenders does not have to be packed into a single area of the map to be a threat. Race maps are not separated in distinct chambers, so it is possible for benders from half of the entire map to shoot a single Venom (and it does happen). It also doesn't help going after one HB out of a group of two or more for that same reason. And it doesn't have to be a dozen - all it takes to shoot down a Venom is a group of two or more benders with good gunners (solo is a no-go, obviously).

It doesn't really make sense picking a weapon and calling it OP just by its base DPS, just as it apparently didn't make sense when comparing base HP. A general observation is that both sides suffer about the same.

[iRobot]

A venom shouldn't be able to kill multiple hellbenders. The point of the map is to have the objectives achievable. It's fine as-is.

[iZumo]

The greater the distance, the harder it is to hit the target for both opponents. Considering that Venoms do not have hitscan weapons it is generally harder for Venoms to hit their target - this is balanced by their speed and agility.

A dozen of Hellbenders does not have to be packed into a single area of the map to be a threat. Race maps are not separated in distinct chambers, so it is possible for benders from half of the entire map to shoot a single Venom (and it does happen). It also doesn't help going after one HB out of a group of two or more for that same reason. And it doesn't have to be a dozen - all it takes to shoot down a Venom is a group of two or more benders with good gunners (solo is a no-go, obviously).

It doesn't really make sense picking a weapon and calling it OP just by its base DPS, just as it apparently didn't make sense when comparing base HP. A general observation is that both sides suffer about the same.

It's exactly the agility that makes it easy to go on 1vs1 combat with hellbenders, especially in Darknight. Perhaps, not as much as in Hotrace. And it's fairly easy to fly in closer distance and then it's trivial to hit a bender (it's actually not that hard on larger distance). Benders move linearly.

[Azarael]

Consider diving a moot point if scaling aircraft were implemented. Under general conditions you'd have a Havoc without plasma, under conditions where there are enough people to deal with them Venoms would spawn (i.e. any complaints could easily be dismissed as terrible play) and Craptors with gunship maneouverability would spawn at very low playercounts where Havocs would ruin the map.

I offered to do this before but for some reason it wasn't considered worthwhile.

Btw, Craptors shouldn't be in the poll. It's well-known they're not direct-combat vehicles, in ONS they're actually countered by twin beams and they have no agility at all.

[iRobot]

Give Raptors the weapons of Venom and you have a nice package.

[Donnie]

Dragonfly - It's the best!

[Jate]

Consider diving a moot point if scaling aircraft were implemented. Under general conditions you'd have a Havoc without plasma, under conditions where there are enough people to deal with them Venoms would spawn (i.e. any complaints could easily be dismissed as terrible play) and Craptors with gunship maneouverability would spawn at very low playercounts where Havocs would ruin the map.

I'd say that's the way to go. It might require some tweaking with the weaponry and maneouverability of Raptors, though.