Top man, thanks.
How does one deal with packhounds?
- Thread starter bladebss
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Top man, thanks.
TheMegaTurnip
Banned
One spams the living F out of TLB's and runs when they do get off a shot.
(Cowardice keeps you alive sometimes)
Also, Thermal Vent Beam Lasers. With careful thruster management you can run a ship at 0% heat meaning no missile lock and the second you cease firing, you drop off the radar and target lock is broken.
(Cowardice keeps you alive sometimes)
Also, Thermal Vent Beam Lasers. With careful thruster management you can run a ship at 0% heat meaning no missile lock and the second you cease firing, you drop off the radar and target lock is broken.
Like he says that's what I do
Biggest prob with pack hounds is the module damage not structural usually after a volley of packhounds I can't shoot back because I have no guns left
ECM's are rubbish because you actually get the impression charging one upto 3km cuts through all missiles upto that point during the charge, but the reality is you have to release it. So timing becomes crucial, which is difficult if your foe fires at you from 1km and you try to do a quick charge and release to stop it precisely.
TheMegaTurnip
Banned
Heh funny guy xD
Mate I'd advocate them being automatic, as long as the ship has ECM, missiles can't maintain lock. The anti-missile defences are so unbelievbly weak. They and PDT's could use buffs. The PDT's getting something like mutiple streams of fire would be good and all.
Definitely needing buffed. Hounds cut through them all.
The Replicated Man
T
Using FA off and vector control you can in most cases, "Kite" them. I usually go into a orbit around the enemy equipped with them (Providing I am in a faster ship) and watch as the hounds explode behind me
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This whole thing confuses me. It does not match my experience.
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To understand where I am coming from: normal seekers have six times the health of a pack-hound. Seekers go for the target as fast as possible, so they minimize exposure time to PD. Pack-hounds have a somewhat slower base speed and their tumbling adds to the distance they have to travel. Thus they are exposed to PD longer. Also note that all testing indicates that their tumbling is not enough to noticeably reduce the PDs effectivity. The only thing actually speaking for pack-hounds here is that PD tends to slightly overkill. If some shots are already on way to a missile but it is not destroyed yet, the PD will still fire at it, even if the next projectile to impact will destroy it.
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So on the average, pack-hounds take more damage on the way to the target than regular seekers. The noticeable difference is the binary nature of single seekers. Either it impacts, or it is destroyed. So if PD has a 50% chance of destroying a single seeker at a certain range and position, it also destroys about 50% of all pack-hounds of one launcher. The damage reduction is about the same.
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The difference comes from different aspects. First, engineered effects. While seekers either hit or are destroyed and don't deliver a special effect at all, a single pack-hound making it to the target it enough to apply the special effect.
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The other thing is that pack-hounds indeed have a damage advantage over seekers. But that's not in their swarm nature, but in their reload/fire cycle. When firing a seeker and pack-hound in parallel, the seeker for the first six shots is on par with damage. Seekers just spit out one missile after another, while seekers go through their 1.5 seconds of firing and 3 seconds of reload cycle. Thus seekers actually even start out with a small advantage, then falls behind a tiny bit, but it's not a big deal. But after six shots, seekers have a much too long reload time, while pack-hounds just keep firing. That's where they develop their actual massive damage advantage.
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So yes, in many aspects pack-hounds are better. They don't have to wait to reload at the worst time. They have a higher chance to bring special effects of engineers on the target. But even in the best possible environment for them, that both ships are stationary, the percentage of damage delivered is not in their favor. And when shooting at a moving target, where projectile speed matters even more than in a stationary test setup, seekers fare better than pack-hounds, due to their better flight path and higher speed. Last not least, note that seekers have a bigger explosion radius. So when pack-hounds make it to your unshielded hull, their smaller explosion radius results in less systems taking damage. When a seeker actually makes it to your unshielded hull, it tends to apply more total damage to your ships systems, utilities and hardpoints.
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So all in all, I consider this a bit of a psychological thing. When fired at with pack-hounds, you are very likely to have part of them explode on your hull, even when your PD is working. When fired at with seekers, the chance to have an explosion on your hull is lower. Your PD might destroy it. And even if it happens, it is only one explosion. The higher number of explosions and the fact that it's very likely to have at least one or two missiles to reach you gives the impression of them being more powerful. But missile per missile (vs. sixpack of pack-hounds after sixpack of packhounds) seekers actually on the average bring you more damage. That is, until they have to reload and thus don't deal any damage for a much too long time.
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So really, pack-hounds have several advantages. As long as the target is not using PD, pack-hounds outperform seekers by far. Thus it's reasonable to pick them over normal seekers. But pack-hounds being more effective against PD is a myth. They actually do fare worse against PD than regular seekers.
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Just as an addendum to all of that: You can also damage munitions with other weapons. But you need to hit them several times to do that. What screening shell seems to do is to massively increase the damage against munitions, so even one fragment of the frag cannon hitting it is enough to destroy it.
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And no, I also haven't tested that against torpedoes. So I can't tell if one hit is enough. Also, on the missile test I had to tell my partner to please shoot at me from the front. I am not good enough a shot to randomly shoot down missiles. But I am rather sure that we have people around, who can do that.
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Hehe. You explain practically what I tried to just describe. Pack-hounds are slow, you can use that to give PD the necessary time to dispose of them.
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I dueled a chieftain hull tank yesterday in my "melee" FDL in which I had just swapped out PAs for packhounds. I was on my way to the CG haz res for testing when he asked for a duel. I said, why not and thanks for asking.
1) My FDL: prismo shields 2900mj/2600 hull, 2 packhound racks (drag munitions/overload), 2 pulse lasers (scramble/emissive), 1 Huge MC (overcharged)
2) His Chieftain: low shields (bi-weaves), tons of hull, MRP I assume, PAs with TLB, not sure what other weps he had
3) We agreed not to the death, "gg" over comms would end it.
Summary:
The few rams I was able to land convinced me to avoid ramming in this duel since I was getting the worst of it. His TLB was killing me because he broke at least half of the missile locks I managed to acquire. Even when I did manage to target one of his weps and land a volley of missiles, they seemed to do little damage. MRP? My opponent was a superior pilot that much was clear to me. This was a battle of attrition that I barely eeked out a win with 6% hull remaining. The packhounds were a factor, but he mitigated them well with TLB.
The real effect that put me over the edge:
1) My FDL: prismo shields 2900mj/2600 hull, 2 packhound racks (drag munitions/overload), 2 pulse lasers (scramble/emissive), 1 Huge MC (overcharged)
2) His Chieftain: low shields (bi-weaves), tons of hull, MRP I assume, PAs with TLB, not sure what other weps he had
3) We agreed not to the death, "gg" over comms would end it.
Summary:
The few rams I was able to land convinced me to avoid ramming in this duel since I was getting the worst of it. His TLB was killing me because he broke at least half of the missile locks I managed to acquire. Even when I did manage to target one of his weps and land a volley of missiles, they seemed to do little damage. MRP? My opponent was a superior pilot that much was clear to me. This was a battle of attrition that I barely eeked out a win with 6% hull remaining. The packhounds were a factor, but he mitigated them well with TLB.
The real effect that put me over the edge:
turreted Pulse lasers on "fire at will" - scramble spectrum kept him off balance long enough for me to land some good shots. Yes I know I'm a scrub and will use tech to my advantage all day long
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Hmm, yea. They do have higher volume of fire, mostly due to not taking ages long reloading breaks. Which indeed means that the total damage to get through is higher.
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On the range statement, though: at short range seekers usually make it to the target. They have the necessary health for that. While pack-hounds still loose one or another. Due to them just spitting out more missiles till out of ammo, you don't feel the loss. You still have plenty of explosions on target. But in terms of damage prevented, PD is more effective against pack-hounds than against seekers.
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At the initial convergence/arming range of packhounds, a single PDT usually isn't enough to stop them all, but it is usually enough to stop a single seeker. The extra health of seekers isn't an enormous advantage if the travel time is low because a PDT is still going to fire a full burst at each packhound, while one or two bursts is generally enough to take out a seeker at close range. At ~1km range, if my PDT is pointed in the right direction, not a single seeker from a high-cap rack will make it through. Replace that with a packhound and about half will.
If you are trying to knock out the thrusters of a runner, seekers are probably better, but in a face to face match I do tend to suffer weapon malfunctions from packhounds earlier and more often, both because my PDT usually can't clear them all and because the way I need to move to minimize damage from those munitions that will impact is less clear, even if I have a split second longer to decide.
If you are trying to knock out the thrusters of a runner, seekers are probably better, but in a face to face match I do tend to suffer weapon malfunctions from packhounds earlier and more often, both because my PDT usually can't clear them all and because the way I need to move to minimize damage from those munitions that will impact is less clear, even if I have a split second longer to decide.
TheMegaTurnip
Banned
The issue I find most irritating regarding packhounds is that whilst the level of splash damage per rocket is less than a seeker, because of thier swarm like nature, you usually suffer from AOE damage from more than one angle meaning it's very difficult to asses which angle of your ship to present to the targeting missiles.
Because of that more widespread splash, the odds of more modules being caked is consierably higher. (Even when PDT's/ECM are involved)
Though the majority of players seem to share the general concensus that aimbot is lazy piloting they have become less and less common recently, however speed and TLB will always be the most viable options to dealing with them IMO. 830mps combat courier, focused pulses and a mine launcher.
Because of that more widespread splash, the odds of more modules being caked is consierably higher. (Even when PDT's/ECM are involved)
Though the majority of players seem to share the general concensus that aimbot is lazy piloting they have become less and less common recently, however speed and TLB will always be the most viable options to dealing with them IMO. 830mps combat courier, focused pulses and a mine launcher.