Air Gunships are missing

Yea, this is exactly what i meant. Numbers like DPS is only a certain aspect of the game.

I am not sure what's so abuseable. What i mean is that the gunship is moved to the T2 tier, as a T1 unit, if that makes sense.

I don't mean literally stopping. A bomber can move at full speed and fire. If a gunship can just move and fire like that, it's a better bomber. The brawler had to get, for all intents and purposes, into "move sideways" mode and then it fired. What sets the Brawler apart from most Supcom gunships is that it's essentially a fighter with regular guns, in stead of some of sumcom's missile(-esque) solutions. It also does not have perfect accuracy (an inherent spread).
As to filling in the numbers: IMHO, when we look at a gunship as a possible alternative, we should make sure it plays proper, not just assign some numbers or talk in numbers. the behavior of a gunship as a unit is far more important than what it outputs.

Pretty much by its definition, any death blob of sufficient size can get anywhere.

There are MANY levels of implementation between copy/pasting and reinventing the wheel. For one, i would look at why the Brawler worked and how. Then, i would see how those variables apply to PA and then i would come up with a custom solution.

What i meant is that we look at how such a gunship fits for PA. Not that we just copy the brawler and say "this works".


Sorry but this post got a bit biger than i anticipated.

If you did simply move gunships to T2 as T1 units, they would (hopefully) be pretty useless. The entire basis of a balanced 'glass cannon' gunship is that it melts under even T1 AA. By the time you're able to churn out these T2 gunships the enemy should have comprehensive air defence coverage.

While I don't want to recreate supcom's problem of unit redundancy, having a unit that fills an early game niche that doesn't exist late game is not the same as having units that are simply replaced by bigger, better versions.

Ah that explains it. Thanks.

I still get the feeling plenty of people's hate for gunships stems from Supcom.

That might be true, but it's not necessarily a bad thing. I love gunships and almost always played Cybran, in part to take advantage of their T1 gunships, but the fact remains that they were incredibly imbalanced in Supcom and PA is a similar enough game to make people wary about implementing the ol' flying tank again.
As I've said, I definitely think gunships have a niche to fill, but I'd rather they were something you used occasionally, situationally and in small numbers rather than in huge blobs as a real combat force

I like the glasscannon idea. This way it would not have to be to expensive. That way it could be used to harrass enemy expansion. Sending it on a suicide mission or some sort.

I think a gunship would be usefull if 1 or 2 could slip behind enemy lines and maybe take out 4 or 5 enemy mexes before being discovered and destroyed. Just to keep an enemy from expanding too fast.

So it doesnt have to be a tank. Just fast and with a decent dps.

Wow. Lots of discussion since I was last here.

I for one think Gunships should be in the game.

They're an excellent and easily counterable unit since they can't shoot at air. They'll also be even more easily counterable when advanced air defense towers are in the game – assuming they end up being flak with AOE like has been hinted at.

When paired with the PA Ammo System, I think they'll be very balanced. They won't be this giant death ball that endlessly hovers above and destroys whatever is below them. When in use they're a drain on the economy and they must recharge/reload once they run out of ammo.

The larger the flight of gunships, the bigger the drain on the economy, the more of a liability they are.

This makes them excellent for hit and run, raiding, and defending. Send them in, they empty their payload and then they must be pulled back to recharge.

Make them glass cannons and they'll be even more balanced.

Gunships are very different compared to planes. They can hover and you can control them much more easily than planes. I would like them being used to raid or attack areas with poor aa coverage since they can cover lots of ground and are easily controlable like tanks and dont have to fly all over the place like planes.

Also since they cover alot of ground you can choose when you fight and where or reinforce certain areas quickly

Currently bomber dont have ammo i hope they change this in the future so they reload after 1 bombing run (and really hope bombing run will drop several bombs instead of 1). This would mean that compared to planes gunships have more staying power.

Lets hope they are fans off something,im see that they are not fans off many things

The gunship as implemented in SupCom was not terribly exciting. It's basically just a plane with lots of HP that shoots ground units.

However that doesn't mean that gunships, period, must be boring. Helicopter gunship style units that are actually very fragile but have powerful weapons can definitely work. Very fast compared to land units, and slow compared to fast movers like air superiority fighters.

Over one month later and Gunships are still missing from the game.

The quicker they can be playtested the faster than can be balanced.

Lets get them in so we can start testing them out.

Um... The unit cannon isn't in the game, and it's been over a year.

Honestly, I never thought I would say this, but Beta is Beta. Learn patience.

I say no to gunships, NO GUNSHIPS

I think they're a necessary addition to combat massive ground armies with something other than massive ground armies.

Once bombers work properly, I think that might change.

Have you tried advanced bombers now? Slow them down (by lots of move orders) and a single one can wipe out a death ball with ease. If you know how to micro them they are stupidly overpowered.

Agreed!

Advanced bombers only - there's nothing else at tier one.

You kind of need something fast as well, to escape the fighters. I like massing scouts. 5 of them do attrition damage to tanks (because tanks can't shoot back), 20 of them are pretty lethal, you need 40 of them to make a "Cossack wall", and once your at 100 it's probably time to start wondering if the enemy is ever going to build anti-air.

Now that t1 bombers work (kinda) its much better to just get bombers and fighters.

Bombers really only work against slower targets. Gunships would be the fast response.

Not with carpet bombing, there is little you can do to escape that.

Kinda hard to carpet bomb what you can't catch.