Flying Overseers are terribly badly designed

[Captain Doombeard]

Generally speaking, when you design an enemy unit, you pick from a list of advantages to give it.

Is it a swarmer? Make them fast and spawn a billion of them. A tank? Make its armor hard to penetrate.

Flying Overseers have the following advantages:
- They spawn in groups of two to five
- They can tank direct hits from anti-tank weaponry
- They fly
- They are nimble, hard to hit, able to dodge fire
- They hit hard
- They have a high fire rate
- They can flush you out of cover with grenades

There are no weaknesses on this list.

Every aspect of their design is strength on strength on strength.

I can clear them. I can win missions and make progress. I got over four hundred kills on my last drop, slogging through wave after wave of Illuminate.

But I wasn't having fun. I was gritting my teeth the whole time, wishing I was doing something else.

The fun is gone. I want to go back to fighting bots. The Illuminate are just not fun to fight at all, and half of the problem is these damned flying overseers.

I don't care what is done to balance them, but SOMETHING must be taken away from them, because you can't just design an enemy with a long list of advantages and no clear weaknesses.

Certainly not if you want me to keep playing them.

Back to bots for me.

EDIT::

Let's make something clear: I DO successfully fight the Squids. I can take down flying overseers.

I know that there are different options to take them down. I know that the meta for Squids is different than for Bots or Bugs.

What I'm saying is that I'm not having as much fun fighting the Illuminate as I have fighting Bugs or Bots.

I think that there are design flaws in the Illuminate that make them more annoying and less fun. This is a very subjective analysis, your mileage may vary, but several people in my friend group have the same opinion:

The Illuminate are an ugly slog to fight, and don't feel as fun. And part of the problem seems to be that the flying guys are too tanky for how fast they are.

Y'know, it just don't feel good. Something feels off.

End of the day, it's all about whether the players are having fun. Right?

We have a lot more fun against Bots. That's all.

I feel like this could be useful feedback for the devs.

[ThotsBContagious]

Originally posted by Captain Doombeard:

There are no weaknesses on this list.

Yes there is, their jetpack.

[{sBc} Bane5]

Just bring an MG, crouch, and burst them down. A guard dog handles them quite well too.

[Captain Doombeard]

Originally posted by ThotsBContagious:

Originally posted by Captain Doombeard:

There are no weaknesses on this list.

Yes there is, their jetpack.

Giving them a weak point to hit doesn't make them less of an annoyingly strong unit.

When they're spinning over my head or pressing me down a street behind a swarm of zombies, I don't have time to line up a shot on their damn jetpack.

EVERY unit has at least one weak point or weak-ish point to hit, but THIS unit can still tank a direct hit to the jetpack with armor penetrating weapons. It takes at least two hits with a Senator to pop that jetpack.

So no. If that's the weakness, it ain't weak enough to make up for their laundry list of strengths.

[ThotsBContagious]

Originally posted by Captain Doombeard:

Originally posted by ThotsBContagious:

Yes there is, their jetpack.

Giving them a weak point to hit doesn't make them less of an annoyingly strong unit.

Except you said no weaknesses. It is, just because you can't maneuver around them.

Diving exists as do impact grenades.
I've gotten a fair bit just diving out of their way and firing.

Originally posted by {sBc} Bane5:

Just bring an MG, crouch, and burst them down.

This basically.. its easy with any auto based weapon. Just think like the dodgeball movie.

Dodge/dip/dive & dodge

[Captain Doombeard]

Originally posted by ThotsBContagious:

Except you said no weaknesses. It is, just because you can't maneuver around them.

So we're playing word games now? Or are we talking about actual practical gameplay?

They have one weak-ish spot that still takes multiple hits to crack, and it's on their back. You know, the part of them you CAN'T see when they're shooting at you.

They're still a flying unit that is nimble AND fast AND tanky AND hits hard.

I call ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥. This is not good design work.

[dyra55]

Originally posted by {sBc} Bane5:

Just bring an MG, crouch, and burst them down. A guard dog handles them quite well too.

Alternatively one headshot from AMR kills them too

[Polar Test 53]

heavy machine gun takes them out pretty quickly too

[Polar Test 53]

Originally posted by Captain Doombeard:

Originally posted by ThotsBContagious:

Except you said no weaknesses. It is, just because you can't maneuver around them.

So we're playing word games now? Or are we talking about actual practical gameplay?

They have one weak-ish spot that still takes multiple hits to crack, and it's on their back. You know, the part of them you CAN'T see when they're shooting at you.

They're still a flying unit that is nimble AND fast AND tanky AND hits hard.

I call ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥. This is not good design work.

when they are facing you you can hit the right side of thier backpack with 1-2 hits depending on the gun.
they shrug off anti tank rounds cause the have ablative armor making them tank 80% less from the first hit

[Prowler™]

If you are using light weapons you will find the entire game hard due to how enemies and weapons were "balanced" hahaha

All mid pen weapons decimate every regular enemy in the game due to how armour works...exception being the liberator penetrator, which sucks so bad...low ammo, low damage, takes most of the mag to kill any mid enemy...but its free.

Adjudicator, counter sniper, xbow all obliterate overseers. Senator 1 shots them to the head/jetpack. MG43/HMG currently dominate. WASP can hit them if you want but it also sucks in general, you are better off taking the HMG and resolving your skill issue.

[Xzystance:TTV]

they aren't that bad honestly. Annoying? very much so. hard to kill? not at all, shoot the backpack with an AMR or most any other weapon for that matter. you can even hit it from the front too, it sticks out over their left shoulder (the right side if they are facing you). They however are one of the more obnoxious mobs to fight though.

[Devilish Bear]

Originally posted by Captain Doombeard:

Originally posted by ThotsBContagious:

Except you said no weaknesses. It is, just because you can't maneuver around them.

So we're playing word games now? Or are we talking about actual practical gameplay?

They have one weak-ish spot that still takes multiple hits to crack, and it's on their back. You know, the part of them you CAN'T see when they're shooting at you.

They're still a flying unit that is nimble AND fast AND tanky AND hits hard.

I call ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥. This is not good design work.

Tell us a little bit about what youre using? If youre using a shotgun primary weapon that might be the problem. What are you using in terms of grenades? Incendiary Impact does a great job of keeping the voteless at bay. Also unless you ahve to youre not supposed to face tank hordes... Run from them. You are faster than literally everything on the bot and illuminate front.

[normalplaye]

machine sentry gonna melt down these guy, new support weapont WASP gonna oneshot these guy. Also, practice your aim, if your aim is good then Anti-Material rifle going to be your best friend to fight against these overseer including the Harvester. It can one shot the overseer if headshot or if hitting their jetpack and 4 shot the Harvester on the same leg of it. in case, all of that don't fit you well? Try purifier, 2 shot the overseer on fullcharge.

when fighting against the fyling oine, just move left and right, it will mess up with their aim. The only time when their aim can instantly kill you is when you stand till and shoot them at dangerous range. And overall, don't be panic and stay calm, That also the most effective way on dealing with them.

[SHOKK♥]

Just generally the pathfinding of the hovering units need work, they intersect destructible geometry constantly clipping inside and suddenly rise and fall on the slightest mesh collision changes if it isn't a flat surface. They are way too strict on being a specific space above the ground that they suddenly surge up and down on the slightest things.

It needs tweaking, they're already annoying as is hiding behind things to call in ships or nade spamming. I don't think they need this very janky movement on terrain lol.

[The Dess 2023 GOTY Edition]

Op out here asking for easy mode when you can gat these flying targets with a liberator. Op you really need to get better at the game, it's already way too easy don't ask for it to be dumbed down even more.

[Fuzzyballs01 ꦙ]

the weakness is their jetpack
doesn't take much to blow it up

man I just use a medium armour piercing assault rifle and spend half a mag taking one down, which doesn't matter because city maps have tons of ammo pickups

git gud