Are solo players gonna be screwed?

[Dreamcast]

I was just wondering, with the squad spawns, even mentions of squad buffs....Seems like being solo could hurt you in this game.


I know this game is meant for teamwork but I loved playing solo, sniping and doing whatever I want behind enemy lines.


So are solo players screwed in this game?.....Or did I miss some news that says otherwise or even worst news....thanks

[Vancha]

Obviously there's going to be benefits to being in a squad, but hopefully they won't make solo-play too detrimental. Certain styles of sniper and cloaker certainly work better by themselves.

[Sirisian]

Yeah they're killing of solo players for better or for worse. The outfit skill tree system seems to enforce that idea. Though I doubt it's going to stop you from sitting and sniping by yourself unless you can't heal yourself. Still reading information myself so I'm looking for clarification. [source (http://massively.joystiq.com/2011/07/08/soe-fan-faire-2011-planetside-panel-and-interview-with-creative/)]

[DviddLeff]

Its war; Rambo has his place but even he needs the rebels or Troutman to save his ass every time.

[CutterJohn]

Seems to me they are certainly adding some hardcoded benefits to squads and outfits. Who knows how much of an effect it will have. Hopefully solo play is still viable. Some days I do not want to deal with people, and just want to camp a hill with a starfire.

[Bags]

I think it's a bit too early to worry about this.

[Raymac]

Its war; Rambo has his place but even he needs the rebels or Troutman to save his ass every time.

^ THIS!!! Perfect metaphor.

[Aractain]

I hope not, solo players = large casual player base. I want it to be fun for even crap players. The bigger the game gets the more we win in the long run.

[Sifer2]

Honestly I always get a little annoyed when the solo crowd are quick to chime in an complain whenever something doesn't go their way. The whole point of MMO's really is to interact with other players. If you ask me the solo whine crowd has ruined a lot of MMO's in recent years.

That said I doubt anything is stopping you from running solo in Planetside 2. Even though it would make far more sense to squad up. They even said there will be an auto-join feature. Will you miss out on Outfit bonus's? Maybe we will see how it goes. Though honestly I don't think anyone is entitled to it. If you want it join an Outfit. I think what they are doing is interesting an cool having Outfits that specialize in different combat roles. We don't need whiners tearing it down cause they feel they deserve everything.

[CutterJohn]

Honestly I always get a little annoyed when the solo crowd are quick to chime in an complain whenever something doesn't go their way. The whole point of MMO's really is to interact with other players. If you ask me the solo whine crowd has ruined a lot of MMO's in recent years.

That said I doubt anything is stopping you from running solo in Planetside 2. Even though it would make far more sense to squad up. They even said there will be an auto-join feature. Will you miss out on Outfit bonus's? Maybe we will see how it goes. Though honestly I don't think anyone is entitled to it. If you want it join an Outfit. I think what they are doing is interesting an cool having Outfits that specialize in different combat roles. We don't need whiners tearing it down cause they feel they deserve everything.

In most games, teams already have the advantage merely by virtue of having more bodies. It is somewhat annoying that they get advantages above and beyond this. Teamwork rewards itself quite enough already.

[Dreamcast]

Honestly I always get a little annoyed when the solo crowd are quick to chime in an complain whenever something doesn't go their way. The whole point of MMO's really is to interact with other players. If you ask me the solo whine crowd has ruined a lot of MMO's in recent years.

That said I doubt anything is stopping you from running solo in Planetside 2. Even though it would make far more sense to squad up. They even said there will be an auto-join feature. Will you miss out on Outfit bonus's? Maybe we will see how it goes. Though honestly I don't think anyone is entitled to it. If you want it join an Outfit. I think what they are doing is interesting an cool having Outfits that specialize in different combat roles. We don't need whiners tearing it down cause they feel they deserve everything.


Thats another think I didn't really like......Outfits/squads giving you missions?



It sounds cool but sometimes you just want to be solo and do what you want...I guess is going to depend on how strict your outfit is.

[Sifer2]

So don't join an outfit an ignore the missions. But don't complain if you don't get the rewards. That's the mentality that ruins things for everyone else in MMO's these days.

Granted if it does become a big balance issue with Outfits having too much advantage I could see toning it down or removing it then. But definitely not just because you don't want to join an Outfit.

[DviddLeff]

All these teamwork incentives are there to encourage people to play together, get to know each other and form outfits... which play the game for longer than most solo players and keep a large portion of the player base engaged in the game.

[Dreamcast]

I said it was cool, just that I hope there is an ignore/accept feature like you said.

[basti]

IF you dont join up with a squad once in a while, you propably lack some benefits, but it most likley wont be that drastic.

But if you dont want to ever join a outfit and dont want to ever join a squad, then MMOs in general are the wrong game for you.

[Aractain]

But if you dont want to ever join a outfit and dont want to ever join a squad, then MMOs in general are the wrong game for you.

Screw that, I've seen LOADS of people who like playing 'alongside' people but not 'with' them. Those people are providing a chunk of cash to the industry right.

Good game design allows you to include these players into the overall push and thats sorta kinda teamwork. Especially if they are medics and engineers.

[Sifer2]

Screw that, I've seen LOADS of people who like playing 'alongside' people but not 'with' them. Those people are providing a chunk of cash to the industry right.

Good game design allows you to include these players into the overall push and thats sorta kinda teamwork. Especially if they are medics and engineers.

Which sounds like the point of missions to me. To steer these hard heads in the right direction an make them useful.

[BlazingSun]

But if you dont want to ever join a outfit and dont want to ever join a squad, then MMOs in general are the wrong game for you.

Why? There's a massively amount of enemies to shoot at. That's a good incentive to play an MMO.

[Storn]

This evening we had three full squads doing galaxy drops on positions. As a group we were largely successful. I tell you that because it made the evening and fight that much more interesting. Now was there room in those fights for solo play? Absolutely! We hit the target and those sticking with the squads attacked as a team those that wanted their own experience did that too. Most were infiltrators but a few were other classes but they did stay around the general target area. I think in general people will find exactly what they are looking for in the framework PS2 pushing. See you all out there! :)

[Crator]

In my mind, solo play in Planetside is typically most successful when you provide support to the rest of the empire. As long as everyone can see where the other players are fighting and keep up with them then it shouldn't be an issue to play alongside the other players who are teamed up.

[yozzer]

Tried running with a bunch of guys from a community I'm in, but I found that I could not concentrate on my game and have to listen to the constant chatter and overtalking that was going on which affected my gameplay.

I play Engy and I just ammo up and repair everybody and anybody that is in my area of operations, now since yesterday's patch I find it very difficult to survive long enough to get any kills, it's like instant death with nano weave 2. So today I get back into the action and upgrade to nano weave 3 and still the same experience, but it won't put me off going solo.

[Timealude]

The only time I really go solo is went im practicing my sniping, that way once i get good enough...I can support the rest of my team and keep our tanks safe from those dirty lock on HAs :D

[Helwyr]

I was just wondering, with the squad spawns, even mentions of squad buffs....Seems like being solo could hurt you in this game.[...]

Playing solo will be viable, just so long as you know that it will be the large organized Outfits that are the driving force behind what happens in game. As a soloer you can still find a place in your Faction's fight whether it be fighting alongside the masses or doing your own thing on the sidelines. Every Faction has big organized Outfits, so it's not as though it's soloers and casuals vs them.


But if you dont want to ever join a outfit and dont want to ever join a squad, then MMOs in general are the wrong game for you.

Strongly disagree with this basti. The correct line IMO would be if you don't want to ever interact with other players then MMOs are the wrong game for you. MMOs are about massive scale player interaction, not limited or defined by squad/group play or being in a player organization. It isn't soloers that are out of place in an MMO, it's mechanics like Instancing that really doesn't make sense, which fortunately we don't have to worry about in PS2.

[DirtyBird]

I think solo players will be happy so long as they can track where the battles are and have the ability to get there to be part of them.

Sometimes even when you are in an outfit you might have days where you just want to run around on your own because you cant commit 100% of your play time to the outfit objectives.

Most solo players understand that there will be extra benefits to the outfits, they just dont want to be left out or more to the point they dont want to feel pushed out.

The world is full of solo players successfully taking part in MMO's, its wrong to suggest MMO's are not for them.

[EisenKreutzer]

I think solo play has it's place in PS2. I've been doing it a lot lately, and it's fun. Sometimes joining random squads feels a lot like solo play, since most of them don't communicate over VOIP, and those who do are usually germans, ukranians or something similiar (on EU servers atleast). Running alongside a gang of people can be just as rewarding as being in a squad like that anyway.

Of course, what really kicks ass is being in an organised squad with a team leadert who takes control and guides the squad to victory.

Since joining squads is so easy in the game, I thinkl lots of people will do it and be lured into cooperative play that way. It definately is the superior way to play, and I think most people are going to discover that through the random squad feature.

[Babyfark McGeez]

I go solo all the time with no problems at all.
Just grab an ams/sundy, place it strategally well and voila, you have your own army providing you security for whatever killing purpose you were on.
Or go with light infantry and sneak up onto their base sam fisher style, flying from cover to cover and pick your targets.
Or grab an AA max and clear the sky from those nasty flying things.

Or, or, or. Where is the problem here? I don't think i have joined a squad in the last few days yet allways took part in big battles and even managed to contribute quite a bit to the conquering due to ams placing, point capturing and alike.

[Voltar]

can you get your own squad leader bonuses while solo or does a 2nd person in a group trigger those certs?

[SpottyGekko]

My experience with "squad play" has been underwhelming these last few days, playing as NC on Indar (EU).

Every squad I join is silent, whereas I massively prefer to use voice comms. It almost feels like players are joining squads because there is a button to click, but they just keep on soloing in whichever area they happen to be in.

Then you have the squads where VOIP is treated like a chat channel, with all kinds of general conversations going on.

I need to find an outfit...

[Rolfski]

Lone wolves will eventually not be cut short in PS2 as most people like to be lone wolving from time to time.