The balance issue with multi-gunned vehicles

[Arkanakaz]

I think that the problem in PlanetSide 1, was that because some of the ground vehicles were so similar to each only the weapon and the armour statistics that separated them – making balancing them impossible. So using the Deliverer and the tank I’ll try to show what I mean (the statistics are made up):

Option 1 (PlanetSide Now):

Deliverer
Armour: 25
Damage Per Second for each gun 25

Tank
Armour 50
Damage Per Second for each gun 50

This is how it is at the moment in PlanetSide 1, with the tank getting far more armour although it has less people in it as well as more firepower, for a gunner looking for a gunning spot there is no point in getting in the deliverer. This follows the pattern in the current game that the more gunning positions there are on a vehicle the less fire power each one provides – making the tanks the best option for a soldier looking for a vehicle to gun if they want the best possible weapon.

Option 2:

Deliverer
Armour: 75
Damage Per Second for each gun 50

Tank
Armour 50
Damage Per Second for each gun 50

Good thing about this is that the armour equally reflects the number of people in the vehicle (two man tank 25x2=50 and three man Deliverer 25x3=75) and each gunner is giving the same damage output regardless of which vehicle he picks. Problem is why not just pick the deliverer and go around with just one gunner, while making the most of the extra armour?

Option 3:

Deliverer
Armour: 75
Damage Per Second for each gun 50

Tank
Armour 75
Damage Per Second for each gun 50

This solves the problem with option 2, but means that although the deliverer has equal armour, with three people in rather than two; it has less per person than the tank making it pointless to have three in the Deliverer, as it would be better to find another tank for the 3ed soldier – seeing as in this situation any vehicle with two people would provide more armour per person than one with three within.

**********

What happened in PlanetSide 1 was that there seemed to be an effort during the balancing stage to make it so that all vehicles had the same armour and damage output when they were fully manned. I don’t think this made any sense as; to look it from the perspective of the empire, four tanks each manned by two people are far superior to one vehicle with eight people in, because four tanks are providing much more armour and firepower to the battlefield than one larger vehicle such as a Sunderer variant.

So the solution I think, is to make vehicles with different numbers of people dramatically different from each other in ways that are more subjective than fire power and armour. Or, perhaps more realistically, to make it so the larger vehicles have different guns, meaning that each person who gets in the vehicle adds something new, for example one direct fire gun, one than can arc over walls, another that does anti-air and so on. This way larger vehicles could become more versatile with the more people who get into them, without having the issue of a large vehicle being used like a tank - with just one gunner.

Thoughts..?

[Raymac]

I don't mean to be trite because you obviously have put thought into this, and it is a legitimate point you bring up. For me, though, it's still early to worry about balance.

[Headrattle]

What happened in PlanetSide 1 was that there seemed to be an effort during the balancing stage to make it so that all vehicles had the same armour and damage output when they were fully manned. I don’t think this made any sense as; to look it from the perspective of the empire, four tanks each manned by two people are far superior to one vehicle with eight people in, because four tanks are providing much more armour and firepower to the battlefield than one larger vehicle such as a Sunderer variant.

That isn't how it works at all. Tanks kick out the most damage and have, by far, the most armor. The Sunderer has less armor then the tank with the least about of armor. Why? Because they are transports. The Deliverer and Sunderer are not tank killers. The Sunderer specifically it an assault vehicle designed to drive to a base, let lots of people out, and lay down covering fire. Or just kill lots of infantry. Deliverer does much the same thing.

You are comparing apples to carrots. The transport vehicles are made for transport.

[Valdae]

Yeah I see the effort you put in but this is mad.

[Chaff]

....hmmmm....how 'bout a Sundy with nothing different, but 4 x 75mm cannons on it ?
It'd be like a drunk hippo with 4 Lightnings attached to it....

[Infektion]

I see no point in this, i'm sorry... it's a TANK! It should be OP, I'd like to see you take a 55mm round to face and tell me if you need some balancing. We could add some body armor here and there.

[FIREk]

A Deli carries 4 people (maybe more in PS2 if it becomes a proper transport, replacing the lame van and lamer truck?) and can swim. Its armament was also quite effective against aircraft. Its guns also didn't require a particularly skilled gunner.

That was advantage enough, I guess.

Now that the "it's 1 cert cheaper" advantage doesn't count, maybe it needs a slight armor boost, but it shouldn't be balanced with a tank DPS-wise. It's not what it's for.

[Headrattle]

Tanks used to me much more expensive. THO. But the problem I have, is that the class system will allow there to me lots more tanks on the battlefield because everyone can get one. This is not a good thing in my opinion. Diversity is better. Every vehicle having its role.

[BorisBlade]

Well before the last tank buff the deli was perfectly balanced. A tank should bring the most armor, and most firepower. However at the disadvantage of being the slowest vehicle and having to use lobbed tank shells taht are harder to land on targets the farther they are and faster they are moving. But get near em and you are toast. Its job is to put on the hurt on things in range and be able to hold ground with its armor which also allows it to push battle lines forward.

Before the tank buff, the deli still had decent armor, while less than a tank, it wasnt half that of a tank like it currently is (it was closer to that of a magrider which has the least armor of all tanks). It moved considerably faster than tanks allowing it to use its speed and maneuverabilty as its advantage. Its weapon's dps wasn't even close to that of a tank, but it was able to land these shots from range many times easier than most tanks except the mag. This allowed it to operate from range, staying back and wearing the tanks out with speed/skilled driving. It did require more gunners, but could cross water which unless you were vs you couldnt do in anything else. It also did very well versus aircraft, harder to land shots than flak but still tears em up if you hit em. (the reaver rockets have since been buffed versus armor)

The tank buff buffed tank's armor and buffed their speed to where a magrider moving with the strafe "cheat" goes pretty much the same speed as a deli, has alot more firepower, much more armor, can cross water and needs less people to operate. The deli is junk as VS.

That role needs to come back. Let the deli be a light tank. Much faster than other tanks, still have decent armor, although not as high as the heavy tanks. And with the same type of weapons that are considerably less dps but can be much more consistant in actually hitting the target helpin to balance them out and allowing them to work at range to make use of their faster speeds/less armor. Leave the passenger slots, it would fill a dual role since no one would use a pure transport vehicle despite what we may think or hope.

You dont need to get to crazy with gunners needed. Yeah its gotta be handled well, or you wont waste people on high gunner vehicles when you can get a bunch of low gunner ones instead which is most always better. (aka prowler versus vanguard issue). Empire variants need to be teh same, more overall power should need more gunners. But only as a general rule. Many other factors come into play when balancing.

Take the raider. Each gun is 80% of a deli gun versus ground armor targets. So 2 gunners would do 80% of a deli, 3 =120%, 4=150% . But thats 5 people in one vehicle, thats 2vans/mags and one more for a reaver or whatever. Sounds bad but if you need the transport and have teh manpower but not the pilots available, then its nice to give em all guns. And would of course be better if it had better speed than the MBT's instead of being slower than a magrider which still trounces teh fully manned raider in DPS/armor as well as speed and only needs 1 gunner.

Gotta look at the bigger picture, there are a ton of aspects to look at and hopefully this time they do a better job so we see much more variety on teh battle field instead of "just roll tanks or lose" when it comes to ground vehicles.

[Lunarchild]

Are the transports not faster and more manouverable than your standard tank? I thought that was what set them apart mainly (other than being able to hold more people)

[Arkanakaz]

In case I gave the wrong impression I like all the ground vehicles and this wasn’t meant to be about nerfing anything. I just think that all vehicles should get used equally ideally; it just makes for a more varied and interesting game play. If you watch the vehicle pad in a base in PlanetSide it really isn’t like that.

I guess the larger vehicles are for transport but I hope they are more attack orientated in PlanetSide 2; unless they can find a way that to make the transport vehicles better than the assault vehicles at transporting troops to make up for their lack of armour and firepower.

Regardless if they do chose to add an larger assault vehicle then I think they should consider this. :)

[Headrattle]

Yes. The transports are much faster and more maneuverable then tanks.

The Deliverer is not a light tank. It is a transport. Confusing the two means that you don't get it.

The Deliverer hasn't had close to the same armor as the tanks since launch. I used to have it all written down, but over the expanse of time, I have lost it.

I agree that people don't use the transports as much as they should. Gamer psyche I guess. Many would rather Hart or run the jump in a vehicle. Always seemed strange since the Deliverer was a great light vehicle. However with the Deliverer varients, you have, essentially, a light tank that can dish out a lot of damage. But usually to infantry.

In truth I question the viability of the deliverer other then a small squad transport. The Sunderer fits the bill better in most ways, other then the Deliverer being much faster.

[Valdae]

I wouldnt mind seeing more armor and less speed on a sunderer, but thats about it..

[Talek Krell]

I would like to see the ground transports more, but trying to balance them with the tanks is completely missing the point.

I'm hoping that the customization options will provide more incentive to use ground transport this time. The devs have mentioned stuff like mortars and AA turrets, which suggests that deli's and sundys might be more useful in an infantry support role.

[Bruttal]

yeah am have to agree with everyone else, its a transport vehicle, though it doesn't get used like it should because everyone has a vehicle now days and they just fly or drive over there themselfs. also not alot of Infentry just walking around to get caught by one of these things either and if there is theres a shit load of mines in there CY ready to blow your ass up lol.

[Redshift]

They're not suppose to fight each other, the deli and the sunderer were supposed to be troop transports, but they were never used because it was easier to pull mossies, or grab a gal if you really wanted to move rexo's around.

They'll suffer the same problem in PS2 unless they do something to make them more useful than a gal drop, i.e make the sunderer much faster and give it a shield it can deploy like the AMS bubble, then you can ram a BD and shield yourself while you push in, which would be different to a gal drop where things would be faster but more likely to get splattered by vehicles on the way in

[Aractain]

Sunderer types needs a infantry launching cannon.

[Azren]

Option 1 (PlanetSide Now):

Deliverer
Armour: 25
Damage Per Second for each gun 25

Tank
Armour 50
Damage Per Second for each gun 50


If only it was that simple, but you forget the different attributes of the weapons they carry.
Lets make it simple and bring Mr Reaver into the field.
Mr Tank will try to fight him, but if Mr Reaver has a good pilot, it will be a very one sided match (even with the supposedly aircraft killer magriders).
Mr Deliverer on the other hand can shoot at a very heigh angle, at a heigh rate and attack the Mr Reaver even if it is right above him, giving a good driver a very good chance to take him down.

In comparison even for killing ground troops deliverer can be better than tanks due to it's much more precise weapons.

Don't forget to include that the delis can float on the water, making them a very small target.

I personally killed more reavers in my deliverer than my skyguard, just sayin'.

[exLupo]

Red's pretty much nailed it. The problem isn't about armor, it's about role and lack thereof. The ground transport vehicles never needed a proper balancing because they were, more or less, irrelevant. I may be getting my hopes up but I think the new skilling system will put that right.

While it may be possible to get just enough skill to drive a tank or mossie and use that for transport but if you don't put any skill time into it, you'll be easy xp for those who do. The new system sounds like it will incentivize specialization where your boots will need to get into a transport if they want to go anywhere in any kind of speed or safety. Hopefully, this time around, ground transports will be given some kind of unique standing so both they and galaxies will be useful in their own purview.

[cashfoyogash]

Much like in RL IFVs (infantry fighting vehicles) have provided problems in design. The M2 Bradley is severly under armored compared to a M1 Abrams which at the front is like 3 feet thick i believe. The bradley is only around 20 mph faster than an Abrams and is severly out gunned by an Abrams. So SOE kinda hit the nail on the head their ground transports are fast, under armored compared to tanks, and out gunned by tanks...

Now some countries have tried using TPCs (tank personal carriers) which would be like taking a Abrams gutting it of its cannon and making room for a squad of grunts. If SOE wanted to make ground transports more viable they would make them better armored but not over a tank, make them able to keep pace with a tank, and make the armament so it is useful. Since you can specialize your vehicle maybe they could have anti tank versions, anti personal versions, and anti air versions.

The purpose of IFVs were mainly to take pace behind the tanks and would dismount grunts as needed in support of the tanks, meaning flushing anti tank soldiers out of hard terrain like caves or urban areas. The bradley was created in fear of russian tanks crossing over. What you would mainly find in a IFV for the longest time was anti armor infantry. Armored troop transports were made to be able to fight in a tank battle and still function. Other than that troops would travel in things such as humvees or duece and a halfs depending on what military era you looked at.

I think the only way to truly keep people from using mossies or tanks as transports is to limit the equipment players can have when in them. In a RL abrams tank, the crew qualifies with a 9mm pistol (they do qualify with an M16 as its basic and everyone is a rifleman but they dont use them and not sure if any are kept in a M1 Abrams) and they dont wear IBAs (bullet proof vests) they have a slimmer version of it that isnt as equiped to stop a 7.62mm round, they dont wear ACHs (army kevlar combat helmet) they wear a different type of helmet which supports communication i believe. They wear a fire retardant suit (they actually call it a flight suit) not the usual ACUs (army combat uniform with the digital camo which blends with nothing). So I propose that any operators of any vehicle have to fit a similar loadout. If you wanna drive a tank or gun a tank then thats your role, your not going to jump out and clear buildings. Now the driver for a IFV should fill the same role but the grunts in back can be fully armored and equipped ready to dismount and put foot to ass.

[Redshift]

While it may be possible to get just enough skill to drive a tank or mossie and use that for transport but if you don't put any skill time into it, you'll be easy xp for those who do.

This is the bit that worries me tbh, powergain in a FPS, i can really see this going tits up

[CutterJohn]

AMSs, free and infinite vehicles, gunner slots, and Galaxies make ground transports largely worthless. To get to the next fight you hitch a ride as a gunner or roll your own vehicle. At the fight you just respawn at the conveniently located AMS someone is bound to bring. And if someone really wants to focus on transporting troops, they'll cert galaxy, which is far superior. Faster, can bypass enemy land fortifications, and put you on the roof, and do it for more people. Delis and Sunderers could never compete with that.



I don't have an issue with there being ground transports, but they should be viable combat vehicles in their own right, and reflected by cert cost, with no penalties for the ability to carry people. If its not a viable combat vehicle, it won't be used, just like the delis rarely are, because people can for the most part take care of their own transport.

[exLupo]

This is the bit that worries me tbh, powergain in a FPS, i can really see this going tits up

Don't let it bother you too much. If it's like EVE, the power ramp isn't that high in a per-unit sense. Beyond that you're looking at either line escalation (MA to HA) or lateral specialization (MA to Sniper). It's been speculated that the raw MA vs MA will be less of a +20% damage and more an aggregate of rof, accuracy, clip, damage and whatnot.

I think I stated it oddly. I imagine the basic MA user will have a player skill gap that could cover them vs another MA user but come up against a user with both MA and HA on his back and the HA one is potentially at a substantial advantage.

Comparing it directly to EVE break down as that's a more extreme beast as you've got not only your ship skill but weapons (with accuracy, rof, damage, energy cost skills), drones (with a ton of skills), speed, acceleration, energy regen, and armor/shield/hull strength skills, not to mention fitting skills that give you more "stats" to use gear with. PS2 will probably have vastly more accessible but an ultimately smaller aggregate pool buff.

[Headrattle]

It shouldn't have any pool buff. It is an FPS, and making higher level players more powerful then lower level players is bad, in my opinion. More options, fine. More powerful, I have a problem with that.

[CutterJohn]

It shouldn't have any pool buff. It is an FPS, and making higher level players more powerful then lower level players is bad, in my opinion. More options, fine. More powerful, I have a problem with that.

Many do, but it seems we're stuck with it. I hate more options just as much. I long for the classic days of FPSs where you just played for the fun of it and didn't have any of this rpg nonsense to deal with.

[Malorn]

Deli is a transport. A tank is supposed to be more appealing if firepower and pushing a line is your goal.

[Logit]

It shouldn't have any pool buff. It is an FPS, and making higher level players more powerful then lower level players is bad, in my opinion. More options, fine. More powerful, I have a problem with that.

This.

Balance is going to be more of an issue if Veterans players become too powerful.

[kaffis]

That isn't how it works at all. Tanks kick out the most damage and have, by far, the most armor. The Sunderer has less armor then the tank with the least about of armor. Why? Because they are transports. The Deliverer and Sunderer are not tank killers. The Sunderer specifically it an assault vehicle designed to drive to a base, let lots of people out, and lay down covering fire. Or just kill lots of infantry. Deliverer does much the same thing.

You are comparing apples to carrots. The transport vehicles are made for transport.
The problem, though, was that at least half the population had tank driving certs. Why roll your squad in 1 Sunderer with crappy armor and weapons, when you could instead roll in 5 tanks, with 5x awesome armor and weapons?

Transports and tanks were not balanced in their availability well, leading to a pathetic presence of transports. Tanks should cost a lot of resources, while transports should be cheap. IIRC, this was more or less the case with NTU in PS1, but that ran into a problem: NTU were a renewable resource.

See, NTU could never be a seriously limiting factor, because to make it so, you also had to upset the stability of the territory control mechanic, as bases would lose power and become up for grabs.

With PS2, hopefully the varied resources can be not only scarce (unlike NTUs, which, ultimately, were only ever an ANT run away), but individually balanced to achieve a more diversified vehicular presence that encourages more efficient means of transport on a macro-scale (1 Sunderer being slightly more efficient per head than 2 deliverers, which would be vastly more efficient than 10 mossies, which would be somewhat more efficient than 5 tanks, which would be on par with 10 lightnings, which would be a bit more efficient than 10 reavers, etc.). In addition, hopefully resources will have checks at a squad and/or outfit level as well as an empire one, so that a few wasteful individuals don't screw over the war effort for another outfit or their empire as a whole -- which was the other reason NTU dependence wasn't balanced more aggressively.

[CutterJohn]

Deli is a transport. A tank is supposed to be more appealing if firepower and pushing a line is your goal.

Which it is. Few people want to gimp themselves by training for a transport vehicle that nobody will want to get inside of.

It has to be a viable combat vehicle worthy of pulling on its own merits, or offer some other bonus aside from people moving, or it will just rarely get used.

[Aractain]

Not every vehicle has to be a combat vehicle though.

I REALLY hope the Galalxy has a radar dish upgrade, I hope the Deliverer (or equiv) has a command upgrade with cool antenas that gives some kind of bonus to something...

The deliverer could have a range of kewl stuff to make it a real small transport such as an EMP cannon, Anti-air weapons, smoke dispensors, ammo/heal terminal. Not to mention it should be very very quick compared to tanks like double the speed (not realistic you say? - gameplay, I say!).

Add to that the very nessesary reward for actual transportation (in the form of XP or something else - not kills while in a transport vehicle thats stupid).

What would be nice is a instant port into a transport vehicle from range to help people loading up.

[CutterJohn]

Not every vehicle has to be a combat vehicle though.

Obviously. I'm just saying a ground transport either has to be a combat vehicle, or bring something extra to the table besides merely hauling grunts(AMS functionality, BF2142 style pods, etc), to be worthwhile.

Getting your carcass to the next fight is not difficult, and the delis in PS offer little incentive to use them over gunning, getting your own vehicle, or going in a galaxy, which has a number of advantages over the deli.

[kaffis]

I wonder if weather could play a part in this? Violent storms that make flying inherently more dangerous and difficult to control/navigate, while also disrupting things like spawning to Galaxies and spawning on squad members...

[NapalmEnima]

Getting your carcass to the next fight is not difficult, and the delis in PS offer little incentive to use them over gunning, getting your own vehicle, or going in a galaxy, which has a number of advantages over the deli.

The Deliverer's one advantage over a Galaxy is availability. You don't even need a tech plant, much less a dropship center, to get one. It's not a first choice, it's a less-awful fallback position.

But for PS2: gun ports would be nice for all those passengers. And someone also mentioned "sockets" for MAX suits that would leave them partially exposed and let them fire.

[Brusi]

I think i would like to see some sort of Overdrive gear on ground transports and perhaps some of the more lightly armored multi-person vehicles.

Kinda like the MAX running mode, disabling the weapons when your speed goes over the overdrive limit perhaps.

Also agree with varied gunner seat positions, perhaps even have some soley utility gunner positions. Need someone present in the EMP seat to active the EMP, or need someone in the radar seat, to activate radar functionality.

[Headrattle]

Gun ports is an excellent idea. Not as much firepower as a 12mm cannon, but you still get to fire a weapon at stuff. Should you exclude certain weapons?

[Sovereign]

Open gun ports for infantry that is, if you do it for maxes as well then you'll needlessly complicate it balance wise..

[CutterJohn]

If you insist on adding popguns to the side of the vehicle, then just have a pre installed firing port weapon (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M231_Firing_Port_Weapon).

[Headrattle]

That is fine. A punisher for each passenger. Limited field of fire, but the guy gets to shoot at stuff. Not that over powered because it is just as if the guy were walking anyway.

FPS players like to shoot stuff. Allowing passengers the ability to shoot stuff (even if mostly ineffective) will increase the usage of a transport. Using a type of weapon that would be on par with something they would have anyway if they were running from point A to point B would make a lot of sense.

[CutterJohn]

FPS players like to shoot stuff. Allowing passengers the ability to shoot stuff (even if mostly ineffective) will increase the usage of a transport. Using a type of weapon that would be on par with something they would have anyway if they were running from point A to point B would make a lot of sense.

A fair point. :)

Though I still don't understand why you think they'd be running...

[exLupo]

Though I still don't understand why you think they'd be running...

Coming from any other wide-field FPS, the assumption is pretty natural. Limited transport that's more ground focused. New players are gonna be in for a shock if PS2 is like PS1.

[NYRampage]

This type of conversation is going to be good to have but probably not until we have more details. Already they are hinting at hundreds of perks/certs etc that are going to affect the balancing. Frankly, I'm worried they will be able to balance it all because there will be so many combinations to be had. (I can't wait to see a cert tree published)

[NapalmEnima]

Frankly, I'm worried they will be able to balance it all because there will be so many combinations to be had. (I can't wait to see a cert tree published)

This is cited as one of the reasons to do away with the free-form inventory. A given class will have access to X, Y, and Z, but those things are designed with balanced interactions in mind. A, B, and C, will NOT be available in that class, and some Game Breaking Interactions between them simply aren't issues.