bomb bay balanceing...

[ouch]

it seems there splash damage ring is too small and thier over all damage done is pretty small compared to the heavy wieght your unit has to deal with. even basic vtol defenses chews up vengance body equiped vtols when the vtol has a bomb bay because it has to move so slow to get anywhere.

the plasmite bombers seem to have good fire coverage, but the damage done isn't very high for the slowness of the unit.

lancer, or light cannon equiped vtols seem to not only do more over all damage per load, but also reload a LOT faster.

I also think bombs need some damage upgrade research to go along with the accuracy ones.

[Arcalane]

They know, I can assure you. There are some balance fixes to VTOLs coming up soon so don't panic.

[armigus]

I never use bomb bays for VTOLS. My VAS (VTOL Assault) Bombers use the Bunker Buster to wipe out structures. The VAT (VTOL Anti-Tank) units use Rockets (Lancer->Tank Killer->Scourge). I can hit from further away, minimizing AA damage. The Panther body is ideal until you get NEXUS bodies.

[NucNut]

Bug HV Cannon Vtols, SWARMS of them... and a few mantis Hydra (2xScourge) VTOLs thrown in for good measure...

I've been playing AiVolution, and since they don't use VTOLs or AA sites, i've been holding them at bay with these two beauties.

That said, i look foward to the day when a mantis hydra cluster bomb bay VTOL is used to pin down a column of advancing viper bodied tanks

[Tiger]

GFG, the AiVolution AI doesn't use VTOLs? (I haven't played, see my report on the beta).

Now, that just makes the game TOO easy, imo- their VTOLs were the thing that kept me from feeling completely safe whenever I bunkered in my base with a half-dozen hellstorm batteries and about as many Wasps (my name for bug VTOL HPVs).

Take this as a concern at the second hand, guys (programmers)- allow the AI to use VTOLs, for the sake of keeping things somewhat of a challenge in SP Skirms.

[Per]

VTOLs are definitely underpowered right now. Not just because the weapons are bad (they are!), but also because the targetting and landing micro-AI routines are quite bad. A swarm of patrolling VTOLs will typically all attack the same target, and fly across the entire map to land on the same, over-utilized landing pads where they were built, instead of the always available landing pads right next door to where fighting goes on. I want to look into this when we have killed the last bugs for 2.1.

[ouch]

on the other hand they are the only thing that functions on slow computers...