More Vehicles?

[Ludio]

I was reading Sporkfire's first post (http://planetside-universe.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&threadid=2270) and I noticed this:

We have to keep in mind that the screenshots we have released and the vehicle information on the web site are only a sample of what will be released. There is a pretty wide array of vehicles...

So does this mean that there are more vehicles? Or just more info on the existing ones. Post your thoughts on what they haven't revealed.

They are very wise in the ways of misdirection, so we scrutinize their every post with a microscope! :D

[Sputty]

Could be. They could also be planning patch vehicles

[Ludio]

I don't mean to get technical (well yes I do), but he did say:

There is a pretty wide array of vehicles

That implies that it is already in the game.

Of course:

are only a sample of what will be released.

is pretty ambiguous, it could mean in patches, or when the game is released.

[Bighoss]

they could just be designing new vehicles if there is a demand

[Hamma]

There are some vehicles that are not available or posted on the official site - thats probably what he means.

[doggzj]

On the gamespot videos there is a NC - buggy type vehicle that had a cannon on the back. It engages some Terrain tank that is rapid firing missiles.

I'd say there is more varity then we know of :)

[Bighoss]

YAY:D

[Sputty]

Those are the NC enforcer fighting with the TR Marauder

[afex]

Originally posted by Sputty
Those are the NC enforcer fighting with the TR Marauder

actually, its an enforcer fighting a lightning.

doggzj: read up on the vehicles some more. we already know about all those.

and we also know that they mentioned a new cert-free vehicle awhile ago. now whether this is the ANT is still left to be seen.

[Tobias]

It is the ANT i believe, or a unarmed/unarmored basklisk i think.

[Kyonye]

i think it would be pretty cool if you could personalize a buggy or a quad by putting on your own weapons. say maybe instead of a flux cannon on the Vanu buggy, you can put a heavier version of the Vanu lasher.

[Tobias]

Aye, it would be cool, but then people would find the most killer combo's possiable and everyone but the newbies would use that. I personaly want a Skeeter with a laser cannon.

[Kyonye]

well the dev's would set limitations. the harasser has a weapon in front of the passenger seat so they can only put a weapon there but it would have to be a weapon of some sort that resembles what they have on it already.

[Sigurd]

The only type of vehicle i think they need to add more of is air units, i think their should be a larger version of the mosquito for a more powerful fighter. But other than that i think they have a good variety of ground vehicles like heavy and light tanks, and jeeps and transports and 4x4's its pretty much everything your heart could desire lol

[LesserShade]

^I think the reaver is what you're looking for

[Saint]

A bomber would be welcomed by me, as long as the pilot gets to drop bombs and it isn't as powerful as the one in tribes 2 was.

[Sputty]

I think a pure fighter would destract from aot of the war making the Reaver require too mcuh escort too be useful., May as well jsut use fighters and more tanks. Also, bomber MAY come in but it'd need alot of tweaking and it could be annoying like artillery is in BF1942

[Fire_Monkey]

Theres screenshots for all vehicles except the stealth quad and the big troop transport...I'm too lazy to look at the real name right now;) :ncrocks:

[doggzj]

How exactly is artilary annoying?

Also, I didn't know the NC enforcer had a cannon on it. Must have miss read it. And I KNOW the other vehicle had been already talked about, but I never said that it was a new vehicle, did I? Lay off...

[Camping Carl]

:confused:

[Sputty]

Have you ever played BF1942? The spam deaths and massive deaths from arty areannoying. You;ll be spawned, killed, spwan killd, etc. Also, peoplem will jsut firte randomly and just get lucky.

[Toimu]

I think navel ships would be better than more ground or air vehicles.

[Duritz]

Well, we know that the devs didn't add any artillery because of easy death spamming, and I also think that it would be quite difficult to balace many more aircraft without making a lot of people annoyed.

You can't add bombers if you are going to add artillery, so thats out, and what else would you want?

Reavers already have air-surface covered, and Mosquitos have the recon role down as well. And bombing was just discussed.

An air superiority jet would be the only nearly feasible idea not already covered by another vehicle; however, to make an effective AS jet, you need a fast plane with pretty good weapons. Basically, a Mosquito with more firepower. Either you reduce the armor to the point that AA MAXes could own it in a few shots, but somehow prevented it from getting owned by other air vehicles (including itself because its air SUPERIORITY and stupid not to be a good fight) except for maybe the Galaxy's guns, or you just make it too good.

If this happened, it would simply devolve into air battles and land battles, with little mixing, because reavers and mosquitos would not be able to compete with it, and would be destroyed on sight. Land vehicles would not care about it, because it's not very good against them, and Galaxies would need even LARGER escorts. The only thing that could beat it would be another one with a better pilot, or an AA MAX. This would lead to problems with the way battles stop revolving around land, and therefore stop revovling around actually controlling a base. This also would make all other air vehicles even LESS of supporting vehicles, and could only be used once the skies were clear. This COULD add strategy, but it would also tick off people who want to be air-surface pilots, reconaissance pilots, and Galaxy pilots.

I just don't think that many vehicles could be added that didn't already cover what is already being done without unnecessary difficulty and unwanted nerfing.

Next time, Naval battle problems.

[edit] Great idea, you could have this be all fine and dandy if you incorporate one simple thing. Aerial bases. Think of it, bases floating in midair, or maybe on huge pillars kept taut by the rotaion of the planet. This way, you would be required to be proficient in every aspect of the game to be able to achieve continental locks. The only problem is that only elite people and people with a galaxy ride can get there.

Maybe it could be connected to sets of teleporters on the ground in special towers that connect to all sorts of parts of the base. This way you CAN attack from the ground and noobs would be able to at least get there.

Next, you could add more air vehicles more easily by only allowing them to be produced far above the planet, therefore it would keep the attention of the AS jets away from reavers and would add more use to having new, smaller dropships. If they were small enough, they could be quite fast. Maybe that idea would spark some interesting discussion.

I'm gonna start a new thread about this.

[Duritz]

Naval vehicles, contrary to most opinions, need not be restricted to artillery warfare to be interesting. I think that naval battles could, with considerable difficulty, be integrated into this game without death spamming.

The simplest way to do this is simply to use ships that do not REQUIRE artillery to be useful. But, truly before any of this there is no point in having naval units without artillery capabilities and not have naval bases. Not only the harbor ideas, but islands, floating bases, submarine bases, and underwater domes.

Also, if you are going to add lots of water around noobs, you have to let people swim, so to balance this you could simply have a line of swimming armor. Stealth, Agile, Reinforced, and MAX water suits. Then simply do not allow any weapons to be fire underwater. This would not be hard to code, but the art would be EXTREMELY difficult. Once you have the basics, just like on land, armor, bases, and weapons, you can move towards creating vehicles for this environment.

If you divert your concept of naval battle away from artillery, then of course you can see the possibilty for quite a few designs. The only real problem with most of these is that, with the size being considered, how are they to be operated? Anyway.....

Aircraft Carriers, of course, are the obvious first choice. However, it would simply be too powerful to have these spawn planes, so just have it be one HUGE landing pad. Complete with advanced radar capabilites they could be quite nice.

Submarines are easily the next wanted addition. I believe that these could only be either a 1-person or a pilot/gunner setup. There could easily be one of both.

Destroyers also have a role. Simply let them use their AA capabilities and depth charges to basically deter other vehicles from coming too close.

All of these are quite possible, however they would require so much work that I would never even ASK the devs to try an include it until at least an expansion. However, if they have discussed naval battles they have already thought of this so........

[Derfud]

I think when he says vehichles, that we have not seen, such as; The deliverer, or the Sunderer.

[Sputty]

Carriers and transports would be the most useful and some defense ships that have little in the ay of true "artillery" but lots of AA firepweor. Empir-specific too...heh...That'd be nice..Also transports that can hold 50 or more people or light transports thatn hold likwe 16 at max

[Fire_Monkey]

We have seen the deliverer here:
http://www.planetside-universe.com/media/viewer.php?cat_id=39&img_id=2

[Ludio]

Duritz, I don't think that bombers would be classified under the spam category of artillery. With artillery you can bombard areas far away from where the artillery is set up with little fear of retaliation until they find out where you are and are able to take out your defenses. It is an offensive weapon that doesn't have to be exposed. The bomber on the other hand has to fly over the enemy to kill them. This means that they will be able to respond in kind with AA fire. It is not able to hide behind other defenses and attack you from long distance. It is also like a galaxy in terms of its vulnerability to air superiority. In fact it could be made completely defenseless against other aircraft. At least a Galaxy has turrets, but a bomber could be completely focused on air to surface combat.

The air superiority fighter could be put it, but it would be tough to balance as you pointed out without taking the focus away from ground combat.

I like the idea of a smaller transport plane though. They have the sunderer and the deliverer for ground transport so why not a lightweight air transport. Perhaps they could even make them empire specific.

[Duritz]

The reason that the United States uses bombers so readily today is because they ARE death spammers. They are extremely effiecient because they allow for minimal resistance.

Reavers are not completely able to avoid ground fire while attacking simply because its rockets don't do enough damage to REALLY spam and it is vunerable to non-specific-AA fire when near the ground. This is a disadvantage because it is an air-surface attack craft. Also, Reavers attack head on because the rockets seem to be forward firing, so someone at least has to be aiming at you directly to hit you.

A bomber NEVER needs to be near the ground except for takeoff and landing. Now this type of situation would be ok, if the bomber was only attacking units that can fight back. At those types of altitudes, the only resistance to them would be other aircraft and AA MAXes. Also, even MAXes would have trouble taking them down. Look here (http://www.planetside-universe.com/content.php?p=sdArmorInfo) the TR MAX would have a SERIOUS disadvantage beside the others. And since that's the only truly efficient surface-air defense, it debilitates their entire empire.

Artillery works in all of the same ways, I mean, sure you CAN snipe or fire rockets at artillery platforms, but it doesn't mean that that will prevent death spamming because of that. It's not like you can't figure out where artillery is coming from after 2 shots. Then in a couple shots later you can have a Mosquito fly up and spot it, at the slowest: 30 seconds.

Another thing, doesn't matter if the explosion came from above or miles away, it wouls still suck to some, and noobs get turned away by that kinda thing. Don't get me wrong, I would LOVE to have bombers, artillery, and naval units with artillery capabilities, but I understand why the devs aren't including them in the game and I agree with them. They would make too many people unhappy.

[Jaged]

I think we need more air vehicles!! I want a air to air fighter!

[Duritz]

Originally posted by me yesterday, but nobody reads posts.....EVER......or this part of a quote......EVER.......unless.....you're....reading ...this....*sigh*.....I never win.....
An air superiority jet would be the only nearly feasible idea not already covered by another vehicle; however, to make an effective AS jet, you need a fast plane with pretty good weapons. Basically, a Mosquito with more firepower. Either you reduce the armor to the point that AA MAXes could own it in a few shots, but somehow prevented it from getting owned by other air vehicles (including itself because its air SUPERIORITY and stupid not to be a good fight) except for maybe the Galaxy's guns, or you just make it too good.

If this happened, it would simply devolve into air battles and land battles, with little mixing, because reavers and mosquitos would not be able to compete with it, and would be destroyed on sight. Land vehicles would not care about it, because it's not very good against them, and Galaxies would need even LARGER escorts. The only thing that could beat it would be another one with a better pilot, or an AA MAX. This would lead to problems with the way battles stop revolving around land, and therefore stop revovling around actually controlling a base. This also would make all other air vehicles even LESS of supporting vehicles, and could only be used once the skies were clear. This COULD add strategy, but it would also tick off people who want to be air-surface pilots, reconaissance pilots, and Galaxy pilots.

I just don't think that many vehicles could be added that didn't already cover what is already being done without unnecessary difficulty and unwanted nerfing.

Unless you give them an environment that will keep them away from owning everything else, i.e. aerial bases and/or new vehicles, they will be too effective against current vehicles in the current fighting situations. So, either come up with a new SERIES of vehicles that balance out and/or make air bases or nerf it to the point of player apathy.

[MrVulcan]

im all for a real bomber!
If you give it:

none/minimal anit-air (needs fighter escort)

slow compared to the other air (cant outrun enemies, cant rush bases w/o cover)

Either:
A: A Heavy Bomb that had to be Reloaded by
I: Landing on an airstrip (builds bombers/aircraft)
-or-
II: Long reload time
B: A Light med bomb that had lots of splash dmg, but wouldnt kill much............

C: Somewhere in the middle....

But I am up for more race specific stuff most of all.... here is an idea for race specific bombers:

NC: Slow, 1 Heavy Bomb, armor between reaver and Galaxy
TR: Slow, Cluster Bombs, armor between reaver and Galaxy
Vanu: Fast! in bursts, but slow norm, Lazer Cannon (very small radius of fire, but very powerful!), low armor


what do you guys think?

P.S.
Duritz, thats funny :D

[Ludio]

The reason that the United States uses bombers so readily today is because they ARE death spammers. They are extremely effiecient because they allow for minimal resistance.

The reason the US uses bombers is because they have extremely large payloads and operate at high altitudes. And of course stealth bombers can't be picked up by radar.

That doesn't mean that the devs have to make bombers in Planetside the same. And what do you mean that they are hard to take out by AA? If the bomber can see them, they can see the bomber.

Look here the TR MAX would have a SERIOUS disadvantage beside the others. And since that's the only truly efficient surface-air defense, it debilitates their entire empire.

What is wrong with the TR MAX? And they also have the only non-MAX homing missile.

The bomber is actually one of the vehicles on the top of the list for development as soon as the game is finished.


MrVulcan, some good ideas, here is what I was thinking for empire variations:

NC: Most powerfull bombs, but small payload.

TR: Cluster Bombs that do small damage over large area, large payload.

VS: Stealth (can't be picked up by radar, but still visible), and a bit more manueverable, but weaker armor and bombs.

[Duritz]

Originally posted by LudioThe reason the US uses bombers is because they have extremely large payloads and operate at high altitudes. And of course stealth bombers can't be picked up by radar.

That doesn't mean that the devs have to make bombers in Planetside the same. And what do you mean that they are hard to take out by AA? If the bomber can see them, they can see the bomber.

They don't NEED to make them the same. If they don't then they can be added, and BELIEVE me I'm all for fair bombing, but what the average joe wants when he says he wants a bomber IS what we have today. Extremely efficient machines in an extremely efficient role. And that's just not newbie friendly.

Yes, they are hard to take out, they will be flown at very high altitudes, and will be quite hard to spot unless the game ceiling is very low. Unless you make it a HUGE plane (think sever times Galaxy) and gave it reasonably weak armor it would be too easy to get by, you could have it go very slow, that's a good idea Vulcan, or you could use less powerful bombs, and if they're not too weak that would be a prime possiblity. I would probably use a bomber like that, and I think it would be fair. But, the real problem with adding a weaponm like that is that people have the same problem with that as they do artillery. You just die if it hits you. It's fair, but noobs won't like it, and I'm sorry to say but noobs are what make MMO games' worlds go 'round.

I'm not saying that the TR MAX sucks; what I'm saying is that the TR MAX's AA weapon would not be able to TOUCH bombers. It takes quite a bit of practice to learn to shoot a flak cannon at high altitudes. The other MAXes have homing missles, but the TR has to lead its tagets correctly to hit them.

True, the striker is homing, and hopefully that makes up for the MAX's AA shortcomings, but I was referring to the MAXes, I had aready considered the striker at the time, when I said: "truly efficient surface-air defense."

Actually, Ludio I like your ideas for the different bombers a lot. They fit very well with each empire's traditional fighting style.

I do what I can MrVulcan......I do what I can.......

[MrVulcan]

First off, I do enjoy reading the arguments and counter arguments made in these forms on general, they are not just rants and im better than you posts that make going to forms so bothersome, so thanks everyone! :rofl:
--------------------------------------------------------------

Anyways, back on topic! :rofl:

You do have a very valid point, noobs are what make the world go around, since without them, we have no one =)

Now why i think that if they will make the bombers, they will be race specific is due to the fact that in every area but air, there is a low tech general pool, and a high tech unique pool. This is true for every area but air, so this would give the devs the ability to sorta fill out the game in the unique techs area =)

Now, I do like the stealth idea, but I think that stealth bombers could be problematic, I can see a squad or 12 of stealth bombers ruling during night, and storms .... Though this is true in rl, I think that that 1 aspect should be looked at with great care.

Also, about the altitude of the bombers... Perhaps the bombers could fly high (not so high as to be anywhere close to immune to AA, etc, but high enough to avoid a good deal of dmg) and yet if they fly high, the bomb will almost drop at random. This was a problem for the bombers in early WW2, thus they had to come in low to be able to hit anything.... So you could fly the bomber high, but you wouldn�t hit your target unless you came in for a "bombing run" =) :thumbsup:

But i do very much agree that the NC needs a high dmg, small radius, low # bomb pre run, and the TR needs a low dmg, high area (cluster, etc), high # bomb per run) so they can sorta coat the area with light dmg before the main battle, or the nc culd take out a the point in the line....

The Navu i think, leave the most problematic of groups.... I dont know if my idea of a 3+ sec high burn would work? So it could make a run at high speed to avoid fire, but be very vulnerable to fire after it dropped its payload....

But i do agree that based on their capabilities, the armor and speed must be enough to get in, but not enough to rule anything...


P.S.
Everyone you do know that I was referring to Duritz's funny quote "Originally posted by me yesterday, but nobody reads posts.....EVER......or this part of quote...... EVER....... unless..... you're.... reading... this....*sigh*.....I never win....." Just want to make sure, since when i went back and read it, many may not have gotten it =P so just to make sure =P

[Ludio]

Yes, they are hard to take out, they will be flown at very high altitudes, and will be quite hard to spot unless the game ceiling is very low.

The devs have never said how high the ceiling will be, but I don't think it will be so high that you will be unable to see what is attacking you. There is weather that will affect visibility, but that will make it hard for both the aircraft and the people on the ground. If it is that high of a ceiling then it would be unfair to have a bomber.

So assuming that they don't have a really high ceiling, and that there isn't any problem seeing vehicles at high altitudes then I think that a bomber could be balanced. It would be especially balanced if you needed to escort it just like a galaxy (but more so) and if it is relatively weak in terms of armor (between skeeter and reaver).

An average joe gamer might think of a bomber and think of a B52, but most people will look to tribes, or BF1942 for what they think a bomber should be like.

It's true that the TR max has to lead the target, but thats what the high rate of fire is for. I like the sound of saturating an air corridor with flak. :D

[Duritz]

I think that the most effective thing to do besides balancing damage would be to make it a larger target just for visual contact and to give AA better hit possiblities.

Ludio, I guess it really does depend on the flight ceiling, but from stuff I read pretty recently from Hamma or someone (it was someone who had played, maybe it was on the OF) that the you can fly quite high, it was so high that he said that it was difficult to tell what is going on on the ground. That's pretty high, especially at night. Hopefully planes will have signal lights, but thats just not realistic in a war zone. I'll look for the source on the flight ceiling.

I think that if you made the bombs mostly AV only, then you would have far fewer complaints about death spamming. Also, the cone of fire could apply to bombers. It could give you a big circle, especially for TR ;), and give the ground units a nice loud whistle. That would send them for cover and not give vets enough accuracy to own with the bombs.

I think that you armor assesment, actually to my surprsie may be alittle low depending on how effective the bombs will be. If the bombs are quite inaccurate and lower damage then the armor could be reaonably closer to the Galaxy's. However, since I guess we really don't know how much armor any of these have compared to each other, I don't know. It CAN be balanced, and I sure hope that they can pull that off right. They probly will, and I won't be able to wait for the day.

[Zatrais]

I don't think the TR AA MAX would have to much trouble firering at bombers flying high up.... it can just spam the general area whit it's 4 flak barrels, reading where the aircraft is going and taking the traveltime of the flakshells into consideration won't be to hard after a while..

Remember, the flakshells arn't supposed to hit the plane but a scatter metal fragments in the area around it, so a clamped down AA max will proabably be able to fill the path of the bomber whit a crapload of flak pretty fast..

course knowing the travel speed of the shells would be nice, but that is my tought on it.

[Sputty]

Adnt eh shell's max altitude. Same with the missiles and such. If the bombers can safely fly above the AA weapons then they'd need to make an interceptor as well.

[Venom]

If they were to add bombers i would perfer too see a type of AA vehicle. I have come up with a few ideas, for empire specific AA vehicles and here they are...

TR: a two man, possibly 3 man half-track(wheels in front and treads in back) type vehicle. the gun is a big minigun like they have on the US naval ships to destory incoming missles. could have two miniguns side by side for added coolness. if there is one gunner then he would have full 360 degrees motion, but im thinking if its possible, a second gunner could climb on the tank, the gun position would shift over to allow another one to pop out on the other side. the range of motion would be limited, but could combat double the targets.

range of motion with 2 gunners would be like this:
| gunner position
\ / range of motion in degrees to the left and right, not the turret moving forwards and backwards and whatnot
-> the way the gunner is facing
/ \
<-| |->
\ /


not the best picture. the gunners both fire at targets infront and behind, but not to the sides. the turrets could be limited in their pitch to allow them to fire on planes in the horizon but not target ground targets (infantry and tanks).

VS to come next.

[Venom]

VS:

I see the VS as using a hover tank, with a single manned turret on the top. the turret is a sphere, like the belly turrets on WW2 bombers. http://www.455th.ukpc.net/tomfeise/8thusaaf/100thbg/100053.jpg and http://community.webshots.com/storage/1/v3/7/87/53/16278753SgRLOvNyPs_th.jpg for examples.

the turret would take full advantage of the VS hover technology by using it to suspend the ball and to get the full range of motion. the weapon could be a single or dual pulse lasers, which fire sort bursts of laser fire. if you have ever played mechwarrior 4 then think of the clan ERpulse lasers. again the turret would be limited in its pitch so as to not beable to combat ground targets but to still beable to attack planes on the horizon.

NC to come next, im having a bit of trouble coming up with a design.

and im not expecting the PS team to read these and go oh wow, we have to add that, im just letting my imagination run wild because i have teh day of school and im bored.

comments are welcome! :)

[SpartonX]

hmmm, i like things the way they are when it comes to air battles cus adding anythingelse would upset the ballence, the only thing i could see working is some sort of helicopter, thats if the handling of a misquito isn't like the handling of a helicopter

[LesserShade]

^well we'll have to see, being that most of us here haven't played the game yet, it's hard to say what kind of balance there is to upset

[MrVulcan]

As fas as an intercepter, i think that the mosquito would server thar role well =) And the rever would be the std fighter, gunship

oh, i think that if they make AA tanks, that the bombers could be quite strong!

I think that if htey did make aa tanks/trucks, whatever that in general they would have to be very bad vs other troops, so as not to have a bunch of them, but thats normal...

I like the TR idea, for nc, i was thinking more along the lines of

A buggy with a rocket launcher pack on the back (like the little buggy in C&C generals for the terriorists) ya know, fast, very low armor, and a nice missle payload =P

For vanu, how about a lazer guided rocket system (hand held), so they could fire a rocket, but guide it to the bomber! Med dmg, but would hit! =) ((like nuke in UT, but low/med dmg vs air, very low dmg vs troops...))