Patch 5.4 patch notes
Virtual Realms feature revealed
The Proving Grounds are coming
The latest patch 5.4 newsBreakfast Topic: How is vehicle combat treating you?
by Lesley Smith 
May 18th 2009 at 8:00AM
I've done my time in Wintergrasp and I love it, especially when you can hitch a ride and let someone else do all the shooting (/joke). However I've always found the targeting system a little awkward. The vehicle interface in general feels clunky -- particularly when you're doing certain quests. Wintergrasp is bearable, but boss combat means you have to be more on your toes, especially when it's a team effort between the people driving and those who are unleashing hell upon Flame Leviathan and its minions.
So I'm quite curious to know what you guys think of the use of vehicles in WoW. Do you like the interface? Is there enough variety? How do you find using them in PvE combat in Ulduar? What about Wintergrasp? Do you wish we could have those flying vehicles mentioned way back at the WWI? Drop your comments in the box and cast your vote in our poll below.
| I love it! It really adds a new dimension to the game | |
|---|---|
| I like it but prefer hand-to-hand combat | |
| It's okay for Wintergrasp but not in Ulduar, there's too much going on | |
| It would be better if the interface weren't so clunky | |
| I hate it. I want to play my class. | |
| I've not tried any of the vehicle based combat yet | |
| There's vehicle combat in the game?? |
Filed under: Patches, Breakfast Topics, Expansions
Reader Comments (Page 2 of 3)
Frag May 18th 2009 8:32AM
Our guild enjoys FL so much we avidly look forward to going in every week. The most drama we have at the moment is who gets to drive the hogs around (Aw man, not the siege engine again!?). I will admit on our first run we did take our time and goofed around during the gauntlet to get used to the controls (and stopping to wait for those that were still figuring it out). Amazingly we did end up one-shotting FL the first time in, but I would almost chalk that up to everyone being so damn excited about it.
I do feel the whole vehicle aspect of things isn't for everyone. We try to place people in the vehicles they feel the most confident for their first run. I find myself constantly being a driver and so I have adapted to mouse-turning and hotkeys for shooting. It really makes the thing a blast, you can just sit back and start raining fiery death on everything!
That being said, I am probably in the rarity for it, but I wouldn't say no to more events like this in game. At least within my guild, we absolutely love driving around.
Also: Highway to the Dangerzone lifts guild moral. Really.
Euripides May 18th 2009 8:36AM
You wiped on loot leviathan? Did your guild try it without reading a strat or watching a vid first?
Fedya May 18th 2009 8:37AM
I didn't vote because there's no right option there.
When I look at vehicle combat we had pre-Ulduar it sucked badly (don't know about winter grasp, I'm talking about Malygos and Oculus).
It sucked badly, not fun at all and vehicles didn't scale with gear.
But, Ulduar is opposite! Starting gauntlet is fun, the first boss is hell of a fun.
Speaking of that, how you guys managed to wipe at FL?
Toasterface May 19th 2009 2:16PM
Vehicle interface...? Please don't tell me you are actually using those stupid arrows to move your aim around, that is just plain errors honestly. I am not even sure why blizzard put the option there since it makes driving and shooting impossible.
As others have said, use the mouse to aim and keybindings to shoot. It will be a whole new world to everyone who is not doing it now.
Dah May 18th 2009 8:45AM
I didn't really see an option for this, but the answer which would have been more fitting for me would have been:
"I don't like vehicle combat, but it was done well enough in Ulduar to be enjoyable."
duskhawk May 18th 2009 8:41AM
If only Malygos had Ulduar style vehicles, my guild might have gone to him more than twice. >.
Hal May 18th 2009 8:53AM
I haven't been to Ulduar yet, so all of my vehicle experience is WG/SotA based. My only real gripe is how difficult it is for melee characters to attack a (moving) vehicle. The targeting is awkward, as you have to be in just the right spot to pull off a hit.
Boize May 18th 2009 8:57AM
To be honest, when it was first announced that there would be vehicle combat in Ulduar, I have to say, I was... less than enthused.
However, with the way it was implemented for Flame Leviathan, I think it works really well.
It's true that this is an easy boss, yet I think it adds a nice bit of variety into the usual fights (although that said, the bosses and their fights are very varied in Ulduar - a definite plus!).
In Malygos (and Oculus), with three-dimensional vehicles, it didn't seem very nice. However, on a nice flat surface, vehicle combat seems to work a lot better.
Overall, I'm just glad that they were able to implement a viable vehicle system in Ulduar. It is enjoyable indeed.
sumnub May 18th 2009 9:08AM
I like vehicles, I agree that they add a nice dynamic to the game and add variety to battlegrounds, boss fights etc. I also agree that they are fairly simple to control and the targetting system isnt too difficult to master. However, I do feel it could be improved slightly to enhance the game play a little.
I think the reason the combat feels a little clunky, is because aiming the weapon also aims ur driving direction. If say, for example, you could use the wasd keys to control the movement of the vehicle, ie, move forwards, move back, rotate left, rotate right.... and use the mouse cursor for targetting, then it would feel much smoother.
This would allow you to navigate your vehicle around rocks/terrain etc yet still focus fire in one direction. Anyone who has played and of the Halo serious on xbox probably knows what I am talking about if they have ever driven a scorpion tank...
PS Sorry this comment is so long..... lol
Groth May 18th 2009 11:46AM
its a fixed forward firing catapult. to aim it, you need to move to point it left and right, unlike a turret which can swivel. it may have been a little annoying at first, but creating something which is easy to aim would make for a lot of QQ from the melee
crsh May 18th 2009 9:04AM
The UI is down right awful; I spend most of my time swearing at it.
Rai May 18th 2009 9:21AM
I love the Flame Leviathan fight/run, especially on the chopper. It's such an awesome vehicle.
Personally, I think that there should have been more than one boss utilizing vehicles in Ulduar, but of course, people would have complained about it.
soatari May 18th 2009 9:29AM
When you have any kind of latency (satellite, dial-up, etc) the vehicle system adds like a double layer of latency. Goes kind of like this:
1. Click button to fire cannon.
2. Wait 500ms to 1200ms (depending on connection)
3. Cannon fires, global cooldown triggers.
4. ANOTHER cooldown triggers right after global cooldown finishes.
5. Repeat.
This is why the Argent Tournament event is so painful to play for me. I seriously doubt Blizz tested how it would work with medium to high latency. I know I've seen a few threads about it on the official forums, but Blizz hasn't responded to any of those.
Sinthar May 18th 2009 10:37AM
LOL the results so far - love it, like it or loath it seem to be the ones ppl go for.
The only thing i have a problem with is the aiming, when the driver goes over a incline, it sort of makes your range wig out. As the driver, my biggest problem is the urge to pull FL as our RL tells the newbies the tactics.
I personally think blizz did right this time. Put the gimmick (ie vehicle) fight at the start, then let us progress normally, rather than EoE which although its nice, i find a bit clunky, and the wrong way round imho. As the passanger however i found the rockets a bit prone to overshoot and pull things easy. It wasnt a problem - you can then kill the pulled things quite easily, unless you were at the boss.
In our guild too the major problem is who is going on what vehicle. I look forward to a turn on the hog myself :)
Cyrus May 18th 2009 9:40AM
The big only problem with vehicle combat in Malygos phase three and in the Oculus, but it's a big problem, is visibility. It's pretty damn hard to figure out three-dimensional combat on the back of a dragon with big flapping wings. The Oculus is bad enough, where you have to run from those orbs but not get too far from each other. Malygos phase three is ridiculous, with no ground to base yourself on and 24 other people on identical mounts. After a few initial seconds to get lined up correctly, you might as well do that fight blindfolded, navigating only by the aggro warning and guildies yelling "MOVE LEFT!"
Vehicle combat in WG (same for SotA, I guess, but I've only done that a couple times) is fun but can be annoying. Vehicles aren't good at anti-player combat, it seems. It gets really frustrating to drive a big-ass siege engine that gets taken apart by one dps with just a couple stacks of Tenacity before I've had a chance to hit a southern tower more than once or twice. Maybe they should make give vehicles something like siege armor? It *looks* like it should be tougher.
Dan May 18th 2009 9:49AM
So far, I have only really liked the vehicle combat in Ulduar. I have been using the chopper and it's real fun... although, I have made a promise that I will not use the turrets in any of the other vehicles until they fix it so it doesn't screw up your aiming whenever the driver of the vehicle turns. And I still hate using the drakes in EoE and The Oculus... since you are up in the air flying, it's real hard to tell where you are since the area is so big. Vehicle combat in Wintergrasp is so-so, and with there being only one vehicle to use in SotA, it's kinda boring there.
Kemikalkadet May 18th 2009 9:54AM
I think they've learnt a lot since the first attempts at vehicle fights. The oculus was downright awful, malygos phase 3 wasn't much better either and a lot of the vehicle quests seem kinda tacked on. Strand of the Ancients just feels like a scripted fight rather than a dynamic battleground, though i've liked the way vehicles work in Wintergrasp since the zone first opened.
I really think they've got it down in Ulduar though, i can't put my finger on why, but it's just so much more fun running the gauntlet and FL fight than earlier vehicle fights. While pressing 1 over and over gets a little boring, the controls are fairly intuitive and the way you fight through the gauntlet really works well.
Lise May 18th 2009 10:02AM
I was very skeptical of vehicles when WotLK came out, the quests with them (that one in Howling Fjord: helicopters, quarry, gargoyles, remember?) tended to be bugged and the controls tended to be clunky.
But I think they're really shining in Ulduar, Strand and Wintergrasp. I hope that the devs can work out some balance issues with the vehicles in PvP so that they can add some more speed-boost options, because my only complaint about them is how long it takes to get anywhere in those zones. Like I said, this really isn't a complaint about the vehicles themselves, moreso the battleground/zone balance issues.
Wildcat0695 May 18th 2009 10:06AM
I don't like the vehicle combat interfaces. There should have been a standard way to aim and move, and better scaling in size. Everyone does not have a 26" widescreen to play on (ex. the riding the giant quest in Zul Drak... the giant took up just about all of my 19" widescreen, targeting and moving sucked).
I also don't play zoomed all the way out (it's my preference). With most of the vehicles that I have encountered you have to adjust your zoom out to 100% to be able to use the vehicle effectively. That's a bummer to me.
Demi May 18th 2009 10:12AM
My guild is now doing FL with 3 towers up, so I spend my time in that fight being the flying boomkin taking out the defense systems. That being said, before being the designated feathered cannonball, I really enjoyed the vehicle combat and found it relatively easy to use the control scheme.