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the last battlefield i played was 2142 and before that was 1942 with the Desert Combat mod.

it was pretty easy to fly compared to Desert Combat days.

my first attempt did result in a crash because i forgot how to fly and did not remember to use spacebar for lift. i did try pitching it around front and back and side to side and it was easy to hovor and regain control from any direction.

I'd say the controls are more akin to BFBC2/BF3 chopper control, though quite a bite more sensitive on default. I do not like how They have set W/S to faster/slower and then a CTRL/Space for ascend/descend. Also they stupidly have the mouse controls opposite what they should be for the flyers, and need to default them for the input to be inverted when entering a vehicle. Looking forward to tomorrow though!

Glad to hear, I shall remain unworried for the time being, then!

Spacebar for lift seems a little weird, but that's just because I am used the WASD+mouse combo. There is a button for decreasing height as well, right? Or do you have to manage it by pressing and releasing spacebar - meaning that the craft will sink when you take your hands off the keyboard?

And ugh, Desert Combat - such a fun mod, but I absolutely could not fly there at all.

[edit] nvm, question answered ... hmm, so no speed control via pitching the nose? A little too simplified, but I guess I can work with that. Probably makes sense from a tech PoV, too, considering that the aircraft in PS aren't true helos but probably closer to VTOLs.

Sensitivity and mouse control inversion (separate for vehicle / aircraft) can be configured in the options, right?

Also, thanks for the explanation! o/

Usually if spacebar is lift, then ctrl is lower. Same buttons that are standard for jump and crouch, respectively.

VermGho5t wrote:I'd say the controls are more akin to BFBC2/BF3 chopper control, though quite a bite more sensitive on default. I do not like how They have set W/S to faster/slower and then a CTRL/Space for ascend/descend. Also they stupidly have the mouse controls opposite what they should be for the flyers, and need to default them for the input to be inverted when entering a vehicle. Looking forward to tomorrow though!

You can invert the aircraft controls for the mouse, but unfortunately they also invert ALL aircraft viewing or gunning. In other words, your flight will be inverted (as god intended) but if you're manning a gun in a Galaxy or Liberator, it will ALSO be inverted, which is awful. It's one of those things that will hopefully be ironed out by launch, even if I'm not terribly partial to flying.

Guess I am not going to be a pilot then First Heli I took in BF3 I managed to take it straight out of bounds and also my first jet crashed before it left the ground

Thats why they call me a foot soldier.

It's got a learning curve, but I like that! It's good not to have the air choked with easy to fly aircraft. Also, as an infantryman, I've almost never been killed by a fighter craft in Planetside 2. That makes complete sense to most of you I'm sure, but in Planetside 1 the aircraft were basically hovering turrets of death and I'd regularly get killed by Mosquitos and Reavers that were meant to be either hunting tanks or scouting. They're more for taking out other aircraft like Liberators and Galaxies, or hitting armored columns in Planetside 2. It's a welcome change!

Yeah i agree with that. I really hope they iron out the default control/view inversion in later updates. I think it is something rather intuitive that should be default to all games, but I think it is something that development generally overlooks. I am really hoping they have mouse look while piloting aircraft as well, as the fov is really limited. On another note has anyone else who has beta access and played noticed the shaking/vibrating of your gun when in iron sights? I find it really annoying.

I don't think I really agree with that. There's other, better ways to prevent the air from being "choked" with fliers than using an idiotic control scheme.

Melissia wrote:I don't think I really agree with that. There's other, better ways to prevent the air from being "choked" with fliers than using an idiotic control scheme.

It's not "idiotic" by any stretch. It just has a learning curve.

Brother SRM wrote:It's got a learning curve, but I like that! It's good not to have the air choked with easy to fly aircraft.

I was mostly disagreeing with the sentiment here:

Which is utterly nonsensical. Making a crappy game control scheme to try to make people NOT want to play fliers is stupid.

Melissia wrote:

Brother SRM wrote:It's got a learning curve, but I like that! It's good not to have the air choked with easy to fly aircraft.

I was mostly disagreeing with the sentiment here:

Which is utterly nonsensical. Making a crappy game control scheme to try to make people NOT want to play fliers is stupid.

That's clearly not what they're trying to do Mel...
What they want to do is get loads of videos of people crashing planes into things because it's ing hilarious

purplefood wrote:

Melissia wrote:

Brother SRM wrote:It's got a learning curve, but I like that! It's good not to have the air choked with easy to fly aircraft.

I was mostly disagreeing with the sentiment here:

Which is utterly nonsensical. Making a crappy game control scheme to try to make people NOT want to play fliers is stupid.

That's clearly not what they're trying to do Mel...
What they want to do is get loads of videos of people crashing planes into things because it's ing hilarious

They clearly want this kind of situation:

Lol, that about sums up battlefield bad company 2's choppers .

Its even worse if you know what you are doing, tearing around at max speed feet above the treeline and no one will spawn and your gunners will complain you aren't hovering so their girl arms cant steady the chainguns.

:(

Ahahahahaha damn that is 100% accurate

Just played for about an hour tonight, took part in a massive armored column with well over 30 tanks, buses, and light tanks with air support. The game was running REALLY smooth tonight; maybe not buttery smooth as I'd like it to be, but leaps and bounds better than it has before. They've done a lot with performance lately, and it shows.

 Melissia wrote:

Brother SRM wrote:It's got a learning curve, but I like that! It's good not to have the air choked with easy to fly aircraft.

I was mostly disagreeing with the sentiment here:

Which is utterly nonsensical. Making a crappy game control scheme to try to make people NOT want to play fliers is stupid.

The thing is Planetside is all about 'specialization' of your character.

In PS1 I was in a large 'air cavalry' clan, and was one of about 5-6 pilots in it, piloting the big galaxy transports for large troop movements. You invest your 'skill points' in character levelling (so the game actually allows you to fly the thing in the first place), but then its another matter to actually learn how to fly it. My clan boss used to have us doing practice drops and pick-ups, coming down at maximum speed and then throttling off just before you hit the ground, or a 'holding pattern' of 3-4 of us flying really high up when the rest of the clan had dropped in to take a base.

I can kind of understand where you are coming from in that the game should be as accessible as possible, but at the same time I think it was great that you could benefit as a team from specialization. And really that is what Planetside is all about - working as a team, with the different units benefiting each other, rather than lone-gun ramboes who can do everything well themselves. You can make a character a good medic, a good sniper, a good pilot, even a good grunt - but the point is that there is another depth to the process to benefit those who persist with a character class.

It's not about it being accessible. It's about not doing idiotic game design when you can have intelligent game design instead. I hate idiotic game design for its own sake. There's far better ways to prevent the "everyone has a chopper/fighter/hovercraft/whatever" problem than being a total crapwad and making them obnoxious to use.

I suppose the point I was trying to make was that it is perhaps a deliberate design decision. I'm sure they could make the vehicles very easy to pilot, so that anyone can jump in and be doing barrel rolls straight away, or as in the example I gave of coming in and landing on a dime. They must have thought that's it more fun to occasionally have someone mess up, fly into the side of a mountain.. Or, on the other hand, appreciate a great bit of piloting.

 Melissia wrote:
It's not about it being accessible. It's about not doing idiotic game design when you can have intelligent game design instead. I hate idiotic game design for its own sake. There's far better ways to prevent the "everyone has a chopper/fighter/hovercraft/whatever" problem than being a total crapwad and making them obnoxious to use.

How about you quit bitching and try flying one?

 Brother SRM wrote:
\How about you quit bitching and try flying one?

How about you shut up and actually read what I am posting before you respond to it? You haven't read it yet, or you would have realized that I wasn't actually even talking about Planetside, but your statement of:

Brother SRM wrote:It's got a learning curve, but I like that! It's good not to have the air choked with easy to fly aircraft.

There's far, FAR better ways of preventing people from spamming aircraft than using a controller design made by a mental midget.

And you know what, I would play it if they'd send me a beta code, but nope, none yet.

So you're saying that they shouldn't have a learning curve as a barrier whatsoever? Planetside 1 had that, and it was miserable. Aircraft were floating turrets that were better at sniping infantry than anything else. Also "controller design made by a mental midget" is a hell of a way to reinterpret "has a learning curve" like it's a bad thing. Airplanes aren't super easy to fly, and that puts some players off them. I understand how to fly them, but I'm not terribly interested in learning the ins and outs of flying one in Planetside 2. I know I'm not skilled enough to take on a better fighter pilot because there's a learning curve; it might take a few takeoffs before you understand how to fly aircraft, but you'll get the basics down. It's hardly unintuitive or one of the more kneejerk-ready words you would use, but it's not easy to master right out of the gate.

I hardly see how something reliant on player skill and practice is a bad thing. There's already a ton of air power in the game right now anyway, and much of it is skilled pilots who've been in the flightseat since they got into the beta or tech test.

 Brother SRM wrote:
So you're saying that they shouldn't have a learning curve as a barrier whatsoever?

Don't be stupid. I'm saying competently designed game balance doesn't require awkward, confusing control schemes. The game needs to be enjoyable first and foremost, and having stupid and awkward controls limits enjoyability.

A lot of games have sucked ass simply because their control scheme is convoluted, making playing the game more hassle than it's worth.

But the controls aren't stupid or awkward, there's just a learning curve to figuring out how to move a high speed aircraft, as there should be.

You haven't actually read a singrle post I've made have you.

Neither have you. Learning curve does not equal bad controls. It's also not a balance issue you're running off on, it's a one-off statement I said that "bad pilots means less airplanes in the air" which is a given.

 Brother SRM wrote:
Neither have you. Learning curve does not equal bad controls. It's also not a balance issue you're running off on, it's a one-off statement I said that "bad pilots means less airplanes in the air" which is a given.

Actually bad pilots mean more airplanes on the ground in burning piles...

 purplefood wrote:

 Brother SRM wrote:
Neither have you. Learning curve does not equal bad controls. It's also not a balance issue you're running off on, it's a one-off statement I said that "bad pilots means less airplanes in the air" which is a given.

Actually bad pilots mean more airplanes on the ground in burning piles...

Exactly! Working as intended

Yes, I have read your posts. But you're responding to something I never said.

I am not talking about planetside 2. I was responding specifically to this:

Brother SRM wrote:It's got a learning curve, but I like that! It's good not to have the air choked with easy to fly aircraft.

I am not talking about planetside 2. I am objecting to the notion that convoluted control design should be used to make the game harder. That's artificial difficulty, and really bad game design. There are far, FAR better ways to limit the number of craft in the air. Hell, even Call of Duty's killstreak system is better, and that's a horrible system. The system used by games like Homefront and Blacklight Retribution are another example-- you EARN your vehicles, you don't just spawn camp until you get one.