Outfit Specialization

[SealDude]

I read about the thing the devs want to add where Cr 4 and 5 commanders have a list of commanders on a certain continent that they can give orders to do. I came up with and idea that would make the commanders job of coordinating efforts easier and also make organizing outfits easier.


Outfit Specialization: When an outfit is created the creator is asked what kind of operations his/her outfit specializes in.

Infantry- Made up of mostly grunts they enjoy ground battles and taking facilities.

Armor- Made up of mostly tanks and their gunners they support infantry but do not go into the facilities

Air- Made up of mostly reaver/skeeter/liberator pilots they stay in the air and blow things up

Supprt- Made up of galaxies, lodestars, routers, ANTs, engineers, medics, and other support staff. They ride around the battle field giving people rides and patching them up

Special Operations- Infiltratiors, Snipers, and other personel who excute behind enemy lines operations and ambushes.

Multi- See Below


Multi Spec. Outfits.- Outfits that have certain parts of them doing different things can break up their outfits into divisions. If an outfit wants to have an air and a tank division than the leader breaks it up and assigns a sub leader for each division. There is a special division channel and a button to "Division Up" where a member can hit it and join the largest platoon that is not full in that division. This saves people from having to say "LFS!" every time they log on if their mates are busy in a battle.


Interfacing with the Commander: When the commander calls up his/her list they have special tabs for Air, Armor, etc... When they click on that they get a list of outfits specializing in that with the highest ranked first. The divisions of a multi outfit are included in the respected list


What this means for Commanders- Instead of having to /tell the leader of every squad asking "Do you have tanks/can you do this?/etc..." They can just click the armor tab and send a /tell to the highest ranking person online saying "Ok get your tanks and get over here"

[dscytherulez]

The majority of people would say multi, because there are so few outfits that just specialize in one thing (granted there are a pretty good amount of tank outfits and such, just not enough for it to really make a difference.). It would be an ok implement, but I think it would be seriously underused.

[SilverLord]

I like this idea. Definatly(sp) useful.

[Mognoc]

No; nobody would listen to just one guy when they themselves are CR5.

[SilverLord]

I think that if this was implemented, that the big outfits would convert to one of the above outfit types mentioned and this making this possible.

[SealDude]

No; nobody would listen to just one guy when they themselves are CR5.

I think they would respect the fact that someone knows whats going on and his helping to direct them. Besides if someone said to you "Some VS are sneaking in the rear please go kill them" I think that squad would because its a chance to kill someone that not everyone else is after.

edit: One way you could make it so that not every squad goes multi is that a squad that has that spec gets a little bonus xp/ outfit points when using that skill. Might be exploitable though :doh:

[HawkEye]

What this means for Commanders- Instead of having to /tell the leader of every squad asking "Do you have tanks/can you do this?/etc..."

i dont know about u guys but i have never done this or heard of anyone doing this. its a good idea overall but i think the majortiy of peeps wuoldnt listen to one person giving out orders,

[SealDude]

The reason you dont see commanders doing this yet is because the base system is not in yet. If you read the dev ideas on the planetside board was of them was that they wanted a menu where CR 4 and up commanders could see a list of squad leaders on that cont. I am 100% sure that if that is implamented Comms will want this because they will have to /tell that squad and ask them if they have tanks so that they can do x y and z. And for those who say that you wont listen to one person then having command ranks is pointless. Besides the reveal enemy and orbital strike all commanders do is tell which conts are hot and where to do stuff such as "Bring ANT to itan!" What do you need 10 different commanders to due something? Also if a commander sees that you are a tank outfit and are on a cont would it be that much of a stretch for you to take your tanks to a different area and kill things? Cmon.

[BigFreak]

It'd lead to the problem I know I've experienced on Werner too many times: CR5s not knowing their place. The Squad Leader leads his squad. The CR5 can relay information to the empire, fair enough. The CR5s can suggest a game plan, fair enough. The CR5s should NOT expect to be running everyone's squad for them. It's just so damned annoying. < /bitchaboutbigheadedcr5s >

[Fencer]

One problem with this is that you'd need to allow the specilazation field to be changed. I don't know about you, but my outfit's composed of different people from the time the game launched.

[Warborn]

Probably around a year ago I came up with an idea regarding Outfits earning credits as they accrue whatever your numerical scoring is (Outfit Points I think it's still called). Anyway, the idea was that, among other things, Outfits could purchase bonuses from a wide list of stuff through expending credits earned by people getting more Outfit points. Stuff like all infantry in your Outfit having a 10% increased footspeed, 50 more armor, aircraft or land vehicles that have a 2.5 minute timer, longer afterburn times, automatic shields that recharge inside any friendly SoI, and so on and so forth. As you buy more upgrades, though the upgrades get more expensive to get, making them into long-term goals over time, giving people something to work towards as a group, too. Cost of the abilities would also scale in relation to unique accounts which have characters in the Outfit, so you wouldn't be penalized for having alts in the Outfit, because they'd be on the same account. Most large Outfits would probably spread their points out, but smaller groups would definitely be closer-knit and more open to the idea of focusing on a couple areas to specialize in and give themselves an edge in doing.

Point is though, this sort of a system would allow for what you're describing, but I think it would be better in that it'd give people flexibility (infantry and aircraft specialized, let's say, or just infantry, or aircraft, or whatever), diversity (those who focus on infantry upgrades won't have the same upgrades), and would give long-term goals. Naturally people outside an Outfit would suffer from it, but a system like this could be emulated through tracking of Battle Experience, translating it into points that can be used to buy enhancements that apply when you're not in an Outfit.

Either way though, I love the idea of people being able to specialize their Outfits, and have been for this since I heard about Planetside, whatever its incarnation would be.

[SealDude]

Good idea man! I never said CR5s would be telling squads how to be run, its just a simpler way to suggest things. If you are CR5 and you see that heavy armor is coming through your back lines are you going to say "Enemy at back lines" no you are going to say "Heavy armor bring tanks/av" because if a squad of snipers go they will get fucked. This just makes it easier. Say you really need tanks in one area. Rather than broadcast in the hopes that one or two people will go with their tanks, you send a message to an outfit squad that you know has spec in tanks on that Cont. If you have any doubt that they will go send a tell to another squad. If you know a certain outfit has a reputation for being a good squad and one to take orders then send them a tell. Its not too hard.

[BIGTROJANMAN]

I like the idea. but i would have to agree with dscytherulez most people would pick multi, and it would be hard to find an outfit with pacific things they do like transport, support,ect. good idea though

[UncleDynamite]

Dscyth has a point: lots of people will choose multi. So what about making an incentive for an outfit to specialize?

How about giving "discounts" for certs depending on what your outfit specialization is? For example, if you choose to make your outfit specialize in "Air," all the people in your outfit would be able to get the Air Cav cert for, say, 2 certs instead of 4? If you're a multi outfit, then you get no such discounts.

This would encourage players to not only make specialized outfits, but it would also give a reason for players to join outfits in the first place. There might be a problem of outfits declaring themselves an "Armor" outfit for the heck of it just to get a tank discount (and then not really use tanks that much), but I'm sure we can tweak it so that exploiting could be minimized.

[SealDude]

Yes in my second post in this thread I had a similar idea except for the fact that they would get some bonus xp when using that spec but a disocunt works too.

[Vis Armata]

Multi Spec. Outfits.- Outfits that have certain parts of them doing different things can break up their outfits into divisions. If an outfit wants to have an air and a tank division than the leader breaks it up and assigns a sub leader for each division.

Big outfits already do this, but within their own structures.

[Gigabein]

Probably around a year ago I came up with an idea regarding Outfits earning credits as they accrue whatever your numerical scoring is (Outfit Points I think it's still called). Anyway, the idea was that, among other things, Outfits could purchase bonuses from a wide list of stuff through expending credits earned by people getting more Outfit points. Stuff like all infantry in your Outfit having a 10% increased footspeed, 50 more armor, aircraft or land vehicles that have a 2.5 minute timer, longer afterburn times, automatic shields that recharge inside any friendly SoI, and so on and so forth. As you buy more upgrades, though the upgrades get more expensive to get, making them into long-term goals over time, giving people something to work towards as a group, too. Cost of the abilities would also scale in relation to unique accounts which have characters in the Outfit, so you wouldn't be penalized for having alts in the Outfit, because they'd be on the same account. Most large Outfits would probably spread their points out, but smaller groups would definitely be closer-knit and more open to the idea of focusing on a couple areas to specialize in and give themselves an edge in doing.

Point is though, this sort of a system would allow for what you're describing, but I think it would be better in that it'd give people flexibility (infantry and aircraft specialized, let's say, or just infantry, or aircraft, or whatever), diversity (those who focus on infantry upgrades won't have the same upgrades), and would give long-term goals. Naturally people outside an Outfit would suffer from it, but a system like this could be emulated through tracking of Battle Experience, translating it into points that can be used to buy enhancements that apply when you're not in an Outfit.

Either way though, I love the idea of people being able to specialize their Outfits, and have been for this since I heard about Planetside, whatever its incarnation would be.

I'm not sure I like this. Sounds a bit too far on the side of RPG for what PS is meant to be.

[BIGTROJANMAN]

Dscyth has a point: lots of people will choose multi. So what about making an incentive for an outfit to specialize?

How about giving "discounts" for certs depending on what your outfit specialization is? For example, if you choose to make your outfit specialize in "Air," all the people in your outfit would be able to get the Air Cav cert for, say, 2 certs instead of 4? If you're a multi outfit, then you get no such discounts.

This would encourage players to not only make specialized outfits, but it would also give a reason for players to join outfits in the first place. There might be a problem of outfits declaring themselves an "Armor" outfit for the heck of it just to get a tank discount (and then not really use tanks that much), but I'm sure we can tweak it so that exploiting could be minimized.


now this idea is even better

[Wraithlord]

The outfit Im in is mostly black ops and the jobs nobody else CAN do, such as filing 4 infils into main enemy strongpoint to blow the gen, or getting 20-30 maxs organized for a Max Crash. We all have infiltration suit...I guess that says something about our playstyle :D

The tells we get when our squad of infils attacks an AMS in unison with grenades and blow it to hell in 2 seconds are REALLY funny. Try it sometime !

[SealDude]

Big outfits already do this, but within their own structures. Uhhh thats the point so that multi outfits can have a structured system within the game so that it is easier too coordinate with commanders and to keep it organized.

About the idea for using outfit points for upgrades. This is a practical RPG element like the rest of PS. Whereas in other RPGs you have to do stupid things like clicking "go" for half an hour to build weapons so that you can be good at it, why not put the outfit points you get any way to work. That way if you outfit specalizes in armored warfare they can acctually reflect that in game. It dosent make sense that somone uses tanks everyday of their life yet dosent get any better at it.