Removing progress bars, introducing player skill for engy/medic/hacker.

[DviddLeff]

I have wondered in the past about removing the progress bars from the support roles, and replacing them with a system in which the players skill is tested, essentially mini-games (although I dislike the term) for the process.

Vancha posted recently in response to another topic about hackers fighting through the network against each other to have into a base, which reminded me of this.

We see similar systems in place in other games, particularly hybrid RPG/FPS games such as Bioshock, Thief, Fallout or Oblivion. From these we can get ideas of what kind of systems we could replace them with. I think its Dystopia which has a hacking war going on parallel to the FPS fight, but I have never played it so I cannot comment on how they do it.

The Advanced and Expert certification would give the player a leg up on those without it, making the process significantly easier.

Thoughts?

[Barbapapa123]

hmm...

hacking could be a typing mini game? getting adv. hacking lessens the amount of lines required.

[DviddLeff]

Yeah something like that. The key is making it decent and fun, yet challenging. When I saw that trauma centre game for the DS I wondered if the gameplay could be transferred into PS for medics healing and reviving.

[CutterJohn]

Mini games get obnoxiously tedious in a short amount of time. I loathe hacking/lockpicking minigames.

Something extremely simple like the reload mechanism in gears of war isn't too bad, a simple one step reflex action.

[DviddLeff]

That's my worry CJ, it needs to be something that's either simply timing based or actually require you to really learn some kind of skill, I keep thinking about working out math problems of some kind to be a hacker, which seems ridiculous is some ways, but oh so right in others!

[CutterJohn]

Playing with a calculator handy is EVEs territory, not Planetsides. :)

[Baneblade]

the hacking game should be DOS 6.0

[Furret]

I liked the hacking system in Face of Mankind, if anyone ever played that game.

It's probably a bit more complicated than will fit in the pace of gameplay that PS has. FoM moved very slowly as far as coordination and attacks went (It was an MMOFPS as well). But they had three levels of hacking tools, and depending on how much you paid for the tool, it would be easier to hack the door.

As for medic and engie, you're not really working against anything, so the minigames should be very simple. For gluing a vehicle, they could give you a puzzle of the vehicle, and depending on how damaged and how certified you were, it would take a certain amount of time to fix it back up. Also, players without a glue gun could repair, although a simple repair would fragment it into 50+ pieces easily.

Don't really have too many other ideas for body engie or medic, perhaps reviving could be clicking on the different parts of the body in the correct order (as listed randomly in the corner of your screen) to revive your buddy.

Self healing/repairing could also be made more difficult to slow down the One Man Army types, although I don't know how much of an issue that will be in the next PS.

[Peacemaker]

If done right I'd agree. Would be nice for a hacker to fail at opening a door.

[Sirisian]

These ideas sound painfully boring in an FPS game. I'd probably just let someone else repair the generator or hack a base. Then again I never did that stuff in the game since I found it boring.

I guess I prefer a progress bar to heal my liberator (which is frequently damaged). I'd actually almost prefer getting rid of the glue gun and just placing a deployable healing unit so I didn't have to watch my back, but as a fellow cloaker I feel that risk is required to make healing a vehicle dangerous.

Do you really think it's a broken system and would these changes that are proposed enhance the gameplay and make the game more enjoyable? I wouldn't be against minigames in the game though, but no in the core game.

[Bags]

Something like this was in alienswarm. It was really boring for a shooter.

[CutterJohn]

Something like this was in alienswarm. It was really boring for a shooter.

Yes. Yes it was.

I recall in Mass Effect 1 I just used console commands to give myself a ton of whatever it was you could use to bypass the hacking/lockpicking frogger game, so I didn't have to do that any more. Omnigel i think it was.

In oblivion I did the same thing, maxing my lockpicking skill and giving myself that infinite lockpick relic.

Minigames suck.

[Wrath]

the problem as I see it with this idea is all the examples of it working in a game are in single player games you imagine how annoying it would be having to do a mini game in the middle of a fire fight every time you needed to get inside a tower.

other issue is in all the games listed as well as mass effect which somebody else mentioned after the first couple of levels and beating the mini game 7-8-9 times it becomes so boring a repetative that people always look for short cuts to skip it. and thats 2-3 hours into maybe a 40 hour game. how bad would that be after 300-400 hours of planetside?

[DviddLeff]

So perhaps rather than minigames, the timing test suggested like the gears of war reload system to add some thought to the process and reward the more able by completing it faster.

As it is it's just mindless waiting, adding a simple skill test to it makes it more interesting.

[CutterJohn]

Yes, the gow reload mechanism was an example of a decent skill based check. It didn't get annoying, could be learned with practice, and didn't give a gigantic benefit over waiting, and didn't overly penalize you if you failed.


Of course, the other half of figuring unborifying the progress bars is eliminating or reducing them. For instance, does advanced medic need to have the progress bar?

You could make the rez instant, then have a 10 second cooldown after use. Soldiers rezzed would be mobile, but unable to shoot for those ten seconds as well. This gets you much the same functionality, but without the progress bar.

The glue gun could put a heal over time effect that lasts for ten seconds, with a ten second reload. Same repair rate, less staring at a bar. Granted, this does make people repairing less susceptible to cloaker ambush, but that never happened much anyway.

healing/repairing grunts imo was never that horrible, but they too could have a heal over time effect with a longish reload, and I hope that those people will be able to place healing/repairing beacons that soldiers can fall back to in order to get repairs anyway, to reduce the reliance of med/engy certs.

Not sure about hacking. It does have to take a bit of time to do. Some could be made faster though, like doors, or maybe vehicles if it uncloaked you.

[DviddLeff]

I dont want instant revives or similar: it was an issue in BF that people would rush out and revive you in a crossfire just to get their stats up, and get you killed within seconds of getting back on your feet. Making them take time to work on getting you back up stops them from doing this, and makes it more of a challenge.

Also getting whacked by cloakers while repairing didn't happen too often as vehicle crews would retreat further back from the front lines once they had been killed by cloakers to avoid them; an experienced crew wouldn't repair in an area where there's a high likelihood of them lurking.

[CutterJohn]

Treat problems, not symptoms.

Issue: Medics with insta rezz can rezz you in a firefight, leading to your swift redemise.

Solution: Let the rezzed person decide if they want to pop back to life or not. We can pretend they are still dead, but the rezz goop gave them just enough coherence to decide if they want to stand up now, wait a bit, or go to the spawn room. Give them 30s to decide before the effect fades, so you don't have bodies popping up after five minutes.

Of course stupid ones can still rush out. And may. You do not have to suffer for their idiocy though.

[BlazingSun]

I bet we would see hackers who would hack the hack system ... Instant base resecures, the second he touches the console, etc. :eek:

[Hamma]

imo an intant rez system is just a bad idea all around.

The hacking ideas are interesting - what is gears of war reload system you describe? Never played it.

[Wrath]

yeah but being ressed in a cross fire wasnt the only issue with BF it was the constant rushing of medic squads they'd just rush forward ress the guy at the front who had fallen and push on like a never ending train of ressed corpes, it was worse then fighting a horde of zombies least they'd stay dead when you kill em

[CutterJohn]

In bf a rez puts you instantly back at 100%. In PS you have little or no armor, and no stamina. And if you follow my suggestion, no gun. So.. Pretty gimp target. Medic rushes would do little other than pad the enemy kill counts.

[DviddLeff]

Yeah true, stamina would fix it.

The gears reload system basically rewards you wig a quicker reload if you tap the reload button again at a certain point in he reload cycle. First time I saw it it reminded me of golf games where you have to tap the button at certain points of the swing.

[Bruttal]

I like the idea sorta but at the same time i think it would just slow game play down to much or for others make it to dumb to ever do those rolls

[brinkdadrink]

Healing:
I think the current system for revive is fine but just cut it in half. Like i said in another thread what if after you get a certain amount of revives lets say 500 then you can cert expert medic and then you can get insta or near insta revive. Even now when you are revived you die instantly if you get shot. And to help make them revive with only 50% health and the armor they had when they died (currently used)

[CutterJohn]

Healing:
I think the current system for revive is fine but just cut it in half. Like i said in another thread what if after you get a certain amount of revives lets say 500 then you can cert expert medic and then you can get insta or near insta revive. Even now when you are revived you die instantly if you get shot. And to help make them revive with only 50% health and the armor they had when they died (currently used)

Why do vets need rewarding with better equipment again? Thanks, but no thanks. In PS, a gun is a gun is a gun. All equipment should have the same ability. Now if there exist mods/implants/special armors whatever to improve an items performance, fine, so long as everyone has access to that too.

[Wrath]

In bf a rez puts you instantly back at 100%. In PS you have little or no armor, and no stamina. And if you follow my suggestion, no gun. So.. Pretty gimp target. Medic rushes would do little other than pad the enemy kill counts.

issue with your suggestion is it totally gimps the person being revived so why would they want to chose to be revived?

[FastAndFree]

Because walking back from the nearest spawn point would take more than the x seconds it takes to regain your senses or whatever.
If respawning elswhere is even feasible (for example, during a gen hold)

And I don't see how minigames would slow things down, what with the current progress bars alredy doing that

[DviddLeff]

Yeah the key is making the minigames give the player the chance to shave seconds off the process, or if they really fuck it up add seconds on.

[Wrath]

Because walking back from the nearest spawn point would take more than the x seconds it takes to regain your senses or whatever.
If respawning elswhere is even feasible (for example, during a gen hold)

And I don't see how minigames would slow things down, what with the current progress bars alredy doing that

where as being revived with no weapon is gonna mean you can help people how?

and the progress bars mean you can pay attention to whats going on around you and react quicker when coming under fire where as a mini game would become boring tedious and leave you more exposed to fire.

[DviddLeff]

That's the point; you should be focused on the support action.

[Wrath]

your missing the point after the 100-200 time doing it all you'll be thinking is god this is so crap thats all they do in the games you used as examples. mini games are only fun when there challanging and no repetive. they wouldnt be able to be challenging in game and they'd damn sure become repetive real quick.

while you've got a lot of ideas for planetside a lot of them seem to be just a case of pumping out ideas whuile brain stormings great. to me with this one its a none starter your adding a pretive boring element which even in games you've used as examples of it working well nobody likes after 2-3 hours. and tried to mesh it into a working format.

[brinkdadrink]

Why do vets need rewarding with better equipment again? Thanks, but no thanks. In PS, a gun is a gun is a gun. All equipment should have the same ability. Now if there exist mods/implants/special armors whatever to improve an items performance, fine, so long as everyone has access to that too.

I say this because if you do something a thousand times your going to be better at it than someone doing it for the first time. Its something to strive for other than just BR. I love planetside and my charicter is still only BR23 because i just started up again but what turned me off was the lack of progress. I am not asking for an uber gun to blow heads off with single shots. Support roles all deal with time, not accuracy.

I said before insta revive because of the previous post which is a little much but if it takes off 20% of the time then great. I dont just get it but its even more certs to add to gain the time.

Everyone says planetside is great because at its core a new guy can kill a vet. This doesnt change that. Besides if a new comer can only cert MA and a vehicle then he is still at a clear disadvantage as someone with HA AV Rexo. What i am saying is I want something to strive for to give a little seperation from the pack. eventually everyone will have it but that is how it is.

There are only a few things that people fight for
- bases (It gets old because there is no purpose except for the battle itself)
- BR (eventually you hit a cap)
- CR (For most people its just for the OS)

I like some type of progression. I am not asking to become a crazy killing machine because I am vet but for something in the support role why cant you make it faster. With the guns the more you play the better you get but with support roles its not the case.

Support progression would fix this. It would also change the game because people could cert it for the day but you have to play it to get good at it.

I am sorry to get into a rant I just have high hopes for PS:N and hope the specialized roles we used to have come back.

[Bags]

Planetside is built on having as horizontal as possible leveling while still having leveling. Giving vets so many perks really starts to add up and move away from the initial design philosophy.

[brinkdadrink]

But its not giving vets that big of a perk. Support classes dont kill. I am not saying i should heal someone faster. Just reviving. Engineers the glue gun would go faster. Hacking the T-Rek would be faster. None of these kill players. It doesnt deny them from new players either. It just adds another thing to get for those who play support roles. This might help with the game anyway. faster revives has less people going back to spawns. faster glue helps the tank wars. faster t-rek lets the clockers distract the other team more. All of these dont hurt anyone and still leave you open to be killed.

[Bags]

Support classes being better allow their friends who do kill to kill more / faster / sooner.

[brinkdadrink]

Support classes being better allow their friends who do kill to kill more / faster / sooner.

This only fuels team work. This helps both new and vet players because it all matters who is revived. The time is only a tiny bit shorter which will help in only a handful of situations.

[Bags]

I'm all for slightly faster rezzes but I think everyone who is certed for them should get them. As it is now, I rarely if ever rez lowbies in a high action combat environment, as it takes way too long and they generally just die again.

[Wrath]

yeah I dont see the need for faster ressing either I can understand your point brinkdadrink but I just think going down that route of giving people quicker actions like that is a sticky point.

and personally from my exerpince in games its not really needed as a reward. i'd imagine achivements would be incorperated into PS:N since it seems to be some what a requirement in any game nowadays. and games are just as happy collecting meaningless achivements as they are to get unlocks

[CutterJohn]

your missing the point after the 100-200 time doing it all you'll be thinking is god this is so crap thats all they do in the games you used as examples. mini games are only fun when there challanging and no repetive. they wouldnt be able to be challenging in game and they'd damn sure become repetive real quick.


Then there should be advanced certs, implants, armors, etc, for people who enjoy a role to enhance their performance at it.

Ask for elite medic certs, medic implants, support armor, not making the game 1 tiny step away from a conventional RPG.

[Bags]

and games are just as happy collecting meaningless achivements as they are to get unlocks

The worst part is people go for achievements in wow that don't even give you anything but 10 achievement points, which do nothing.

[DviddLeff]

Wrath, we've already come to the realisation that minigames such as those found in the games I mentioned initially are not the best for PS, instead a quick player reaction time game to knock 2 seconds or so off or add 2 seconds onto the process would be desirable, remove the boredom and make it more interesting.

No to achievements unlocking faster revives and whatnot.

[Wrath]

The worst part is people go for achievements in wow that don't even give you anything but 10 achievement points, which do nothing.

yeah but thats the point people still collect em just because its something to do.

Wrath, we've already come to the realisation that minigames such as those found in the games I mentioned initially are not the best for PS, instead a quick player reaction time game to knock 2 seconds or so off or add 2 seconds onto the process would be desirable, remove the boredom and make it more interesting.

yeah but thats what I mean about you trying to mash something else together. it'll make things intersting for the first 2-3 hours because its something new and different after that it just comes boring just like the current system. but it comes more annoying because its involved.

[Robert089]

yeah but thats what I mean about you trying to mash something else together. it'll make things intersting for the first 2-3 hours because its something new and different after that it just comes boring just like the current system. but it comes more annoying because its involved.

I don't think you understand what he is getting at Wrath, it's not a mini game per se, more of an opportunity. Imagine the current hacking progress bar but as you are hacking a few glowing white bars come in the opposite direction. Now you can just ignore this completely and have the normal hack time, but if you hit all of these white bars it could lower your hack time by something like 25%. If you attempt to hit them and miss however it could increase hack time by 25%.

At least I think that is the sort of thing Dviddleff is getting at, not a mini game that can become boring such as those in bioshock where you connect the pipes, it is something you can ignore or if you feel like it attempt to do in order to do it better.

[Timantium]

Would this be like the Mass Effect unlock minigame for chests and doors where you have to wiggle the little line frogger style to the center through the polar clock of rotating curls?

Or would this be like the other mini games where you have to solve a riddle or a logic puzzle?

I just want to blast the door lock off with HA and run through the opening... why do I have to think to open a door and get boomered?

[DviddLeff]

Thats it exactly Shadow.

Oh and Timantium, "boomering" doors apart was one of the first suggestions i added to the upgrade project :)

[Lartnev]

To my mind using support equipment shouldn't involve skill at all. I can understand the reasons for adding it: a) watching progress bars is boring, and b) I want to be able to move that progress bar quicker if I'm better than the player stood next to me. But I think that there are plenty of other arenas in PlanetSide for skill to play a factor.

Support should be a level playing field with terms of skill. That way someone who isn't good at twitch gaming, or is new to the game, can be as useful as the deathmatching god(dess) standing next to them. It was an effective mantra of Tribes 2 and has been noted on several of the blogs about PlanetSide.

Now it isn't all about equipment; There is also play-style, certifications, game knowledge, etc to improve your medic, engineering, and hacking ability. Veterans will have an edge over newbies and this is desirable because it gives players something to aim at. But the last thing PlanetSide needs is well-meaning players feeling like they've failed because they didn't hit the sweet spot of a circle while trying to heal someone in the heat of battle.

[Lonehunter]

I feel bad I'm the only one that just wants to hold down a button to hack shit lol

[Azellon]

I feel bad I'm the only one that just wants to hold down a button to hack shit lol


Not the only one.

Just the only one to say so up until the point you posted.

[Bags]

I like to point click and hack.

[FastAndFree]

Talking about progress bars, I would love it if the glue gun could "lock on" to repairs like the REK so you could let go go the button while you repair

[Vicini]

i always figured that the bar represented pre programed codes for door or pre loaded viruses or for med and repair pre learned skills through your cert program that simplifys it for you the user as a progress bar.

Though a mini game of operation for med would be hella fun....

[Robert089]

Though a mini game of operation for med would be hella fun....

Almost... got... it........ *BZZT* player you were healing dies.

[basti]

Something like this was in alienswarm. It was really boring for a shooter.

Aye, the Alienswarm thingy.

At the beginning, it was neat, interresting. But after a few times, you figured the patterns out, and then its just boring. Later, it becomes annoying.
Its the same with all those Mini games. Oblivions Lockpicking got annoying as well.

Because of that, no to minigames. Even if they manage to create something that isnt going to be boring after a few hours, it will still become something that annoys the feck out of ya. :)

[Bags]

I just save in Oblivion and auto-pick and reload my game until I get things open in 1 - 2 lock picks.

Mini games just aren't fun.

[Sirisian]

I just save in Oblivion and auto-pick and reload my game until I get things open in 1 - 2 lock picks.

Mini games just aren't fun.
Didn't everyone do that? Bioshock was the same way.

[Bags]

Didn't everyone do that? Bioshock was the same way.

My brother doesn't.

[Baneblade]

I'm going to add my ante to the pile.

I don't want a straight timer for hacking. Yet, I also understand the need to leave complexity at the sanc.

So this is what I propose:

You can hack the way you are used to now and just let the device brute force its way through on its own.

OR

You can participate in the minigame to speed it up.

So people who don't want to bother with it just have to wait a little longer for the hack. While other players can get very good at it and become known as Expert Hackers.

The hacking certs should remain, but they shouldn't be as fast as they are now by default. The minigame should be required for the current elite speeds.

A player who gets really good at the minigame might not even need higher hacking certs to outhack someone who relies on the brute force hack, yet has 'expert hacking'.