Higby on Territory System

[Hamma]

via Reddit:

well the way the territory system is designed, if you own territory adjacent to territory you're capturing you'll get a bonus to capture time. The base (i mean base like "default", not "facility" in this case) capture time is pretty long, lets say 10 minutes, but for each hex of adjacent territory you own you'll get lets say a 1 minute bonus (these aren't the actual times, and it's a bit more complicated than this, but this is the general gist). So, if you're going back into "enemy territory" and capturing something surrounded by their territory, you'll not only have a long capture time that they can easily react to, but, they'll be able to recapture it extremely quickly as they have it surrounded with their territory. In this way, natural front lines form where people are fighting over borders in order to progress to key resource capture points.
http://www.reddit.com/r/Planetside/comments/il5og/hey_rplanetside_im_matt_higby_the_creative/c3413i4

[Traak]

So "front lines" will be more important than they were in PS.

[Raymac]

This is one of the biggest changes that I'm most excited about. I always loved the field battles, but they weren't very frequent in PS1. This new system should be a big improvement over the base hopping that was so common before. At the same time, you'll still be able to "back hack" and capture valuable territory behind enemy lines, but it will feel much more like Bastogne in WW2. Sounds really awesome!

[Death2All]

Is that thread on reddit still going? I had all but forgotten about it. Was that bit posted today?

I'm very interested to see what kind of gameplay this will boil down to. Are people going to be discouraged to attack an enemy territory because of the time to capture penalty and the capture bonus the enemy possesses?

[SKYeXile]

Yea it seems like its a really well thought out system, i cant see any faults with it yet. Provided you dont get any personal points or XP for taking a base against no resistance(like PS1) that is. I'm aware of the incentive of resources ticking for holding a base, but i dont think any of us want to see a merygo round of taking bases because you get a burst of initial points for taking an objective, like warhammer.

[SgtMAD]

see, I read that and the first thing that comes to mind is the term "FARM"

you hack a base behind enemy lines and the fast movers will be there first,so you have to defend that,which can be done,once the hack goes through you then have even more ppl showing up to take it back-"come on,it will be easy with that short timer" and it will become this magnet.

if no one bothers to try the resecure and the hack goes through you just keep hacking hexs until the enemy freaks out.

[Xyntech]

see, I read that and the first thing that comes to mind is the term "FARM"

you hack a base behind enemy lines and the fast movers will be there first,so you have to defend that,which can be done,once the hack goes through you then have even more ppl showing up to take it back-"come on,it will be easy with that short timer" and it will become this magnet.

if no one bothers to try the resecure and the hack goes through you just keep hacking hexs until the enemy freaks out.

That sounds pretty epic to me

[SgtMAD]

That sounds pretty epic to me

welcome to Hostile takeover

[cellinaire]

The details of Territory Control System as it is now sounds dang awesome. =)

And I have to agree with Xyntech on this one
(because it at least lets there be a slightest chance of one or few soldiers causing a ripple on other enemy factions or platoons deep within enemy territories. Not one man army thing, But with very very well thought-out plan, reflex, skill, and luck coupled with ingenious wits).


Oh, so much possibilities.

[Xyntech]

Meanwhile, those defenders of that one little area are having to defend against overwhelming odds, while their enemies, who are busy attacking the front lines, the more logical targets, will be capturing territory relatively fast, because all of their opposition are busy trying to hold a little patch of land.

I foresee this making for epic, behind the lines tactical assaults to grab key resources or territory and/or disrupt the enemy. I doubt it will usually be the best option for pushing your front forward.

Giving tactically oriented outfits and teams more to do than just dropping gens and shit will be really cool.

[Traak]

I'm thinking it would be even better with generators and spawns that you can't wreck. Then battles don't turn into "rush the gen, kill it, wait 15 minutes." If you want to take a base, for a change, you will actually have to fight, to the end, for it.

And I know that spawn camping can be an issue with that, so they could put in things to mitigate spawn camping, such as spawns being impossible to enter, many passages out of the spawn room, so soldiers could mass up and rush down one exit, leaving the enemies guarding the other exits at a momentary disadvantage.

Of course, not having Audio Amp would make this, and the whole game, work better also. Imagine having to actually see an enemy to know where he was!

[cellinaire]

Many great ideas here already, which is enough to make me smile.

And don't you worry, Traak. I'm sure I've heard a line from the devs that says

"There will be multiple goals to take down and dominate enemy bases" ;)

[SKYeXile]

see, I read that and the first thing that comes to mind is the term "FARM"

you hack a base behind enemy lines and the fast movers will be there first,so you have to defend that,which can be done,once the hack goes through you then have even more ppl showing up to take it back-"come on,it will be easy with that short timer" and it will become this magnet.

if no one bothers to try the resecure and the hack goes through you just keep hacking hexs until the enemy freaks out.

I am naming this the Dagda theory.

[ShockNC]

as much as i like the new territory system, i find my self always a bit bored as i find myself wanting to go on acts of sabotage or other fun stuff but other than blowing the gen, there isn't really much to do other than blow the gen/mine the area/head to the front line after a bit of boredom saying "FOR THE SWARM!"

hopefully the new mission system will allow for more fun stuff.

[SKYeXile]

well you would hope that blowing a gen to deny the enemy a specific resource or base bonus is still a vital tactic. hopfully lattice or link lines still exist, not for base control but simply how the bases and their bonuses are linked to one another, so cutting off power to one base could strip the enemy off all there bonuses on the other side of that base.

[Raka Maru]

This all sounds very cool. *visions of sabotage*

[Rivenshield]

So this is the replacement to the old lattice system. How elegant and organic and *natural* it sounds. I'm excited.

[Coreldan]

It sounds good. I just hope there will really be not enough incentive for those ghost hackers to go about all the time. Well, I guess it can be a strategy that too, forcing a re-secure group to leave the frontline, but meh.. :D

[Raka Maru]

It sounds good. I just hope there will really be not enough incentive for those ghost hackers to go about all the time. Well, I guess it can be a strategy that too, forcing a re-secure group to leave the frontline, but meh.. :D

Stop dis'n my job. ;)

[SKYeXile]

It sounds good. I just hope there will really be not enough incentive for those ghost hackers to go about all the time. Well, I guess it can be a strategy that too, forcing a re-secure group to leave the frontline, but meh.. :D

well thats the thing, it would take somebody like 30min to hack into a content and like 2 minties for the hack to take the back base, you gain nothing from switching ownership of the base only for holding it, which solo i doubt you will for long with any reasonable resecurer squad coming at you....though there are afew squads i would dare to take on solo...especially with a lower TTK.

[Hamma]

From what Higby explains I can't wait to see how this works in the game. I think it's going to add much more to the battles, just think of fighting over random stretches of land as you push the enemy back to their bases. It's going to be a blast. :D

[Shogun]

sounds like sabotage squads will have kind of a challange now!
sometimes it was just stupid in ps1 when a whole cont was ninjahacked by only a few cloakers.

this time you need a squad to actually hold what you try to hack, and a single cloaking boomer expert is not enough to keep the enemy away.

just give us as many tactical opportunitys as you can, devs!
just shooting other players is a thing every fps can deliver, but planetside 2 can generate a real war feeling with all the tactical stuff involved

[Mirror]

sounds exactly like how I thought it would work. farmtastic!!!!

[SgtMAD]

LOL squads, you ppl aren't ready for what's coming,I have over 100 ppl ready to go.

yes this will be happening all the time,the idea of holding and defending a hack behind the lines is so much more fun than running with the zerg on the front lines.

if you think you are going to pull this type of mission off with a squad then you are fooling yourself

[Shogun]

yes i used the wrong term... platoon not squad ;-)

but it´s hard to remember how it was with really hundrets of players online. it´s sooooo long ago .

[Coreldan]

Well, the last times a cont was poplocked isn't that long ago. When they gave those 45 days to people, it was quite common even.

Makes me wish they let previous subscribers be allowed to play for free.

[Shogun]

i started my free 45 days when most of the other freetimers had already spent theirs. so i missed the poplock fun :-(

we all know that the ps1 pop will go to zero, the day ps2 beta starts.

and if you want to know if ps2 delivers what it has promised, just check on ps1 on the second ps2 day ;-)

it ps1 is still empty, ps2 works.

if ps2 delivers, there is no need for ps1 anymore i suppose. but i still have the fear that i might miss something from ps1 that didnt make it to the new installment so bad, that i might want to stick with the old game. hope that doesn´t happen.
if this happens we need a free to play planetside classic ;-)

[Graywolves]

I just hope there will still be room for special behind the lines operations to hinder the enemy supply lines....or drop every generator on the continent before they look at the map again.

[Coreldan]

I don't see why would they even keep PS1 up, just a waste of server costs :D

I think they mentioned they learned a lesson with EQ and EQ2 at the same time or something

[Wahooo]

I just hope this description is reality when the game becomes playable. Global Agenda's AvA maps were described very, very similar to this once as well.

[dm Akolyte]

This sounds like a cool system.... as long as all territories aren't created equal.
With any hex along a battle line being equal, I foresee that the battles will just get spread out across that line, instead of having actual focused pushes. I guess facilities will be natural focal points, but just a possible issue. Have to see how it works in practice, I guess.

[DviddLeff]

You are going to see strong points like facilities, outposts and bunkers as the focal points for combat, but it will be really interesting to see strategies develop as commanders get their forces to capture surrounding territory to speed up the capture of the strong point.

I imagine we will also see territories at the edge of the map being captured first quite often (with no adjoining territory on one side it may mean that capture times are shorter).

Real strategy is what this territory control system may offer us, on top of what we had in the original.

[Raymac]

So instead of having only TOD fights, we'll have Hex Of Doom fights now too.

[Death2All]

So instead of having only TOD fights, we'll have Hex Of Doom fights now too.

At least there will be wide open fields, for the most part (at least that's the way the made it sound).

Towers were one of the biggest flaws in PS1. You had these huge fields and vast landscapes to fight over, yet, all the action took place in these small towers. Having such a huge scope and concealing it within a tower was extremely lame. On top of all that towers are prevalent all over any map. Next to everybase, nearly every choke point, they really held the game back.

I know there's a lot of people who specifically played PS just for the ToD aspect of it, which I think is a shame. More wide open fights over big fields would be a godsend. Condensing the whole game into a tiny structure just becomes a spam fast.

[Raymac]

^ Agree 110%

[NewSith]

I know there's a lot of people who specifically played PS just for the ToD aspect of it, which I think is a shame. More wide open fights over big fields would be a godsend. Condensing the whole game into a tiny structure just becomes a spam fast.

IMO that's what made PS unique. Freedom of choice. CQB or Open Areas, nothing is restricted. So there's no shame in it. But that's just my opinion.

[Crator]

So instead of having only TOD fights, we'll have Hex Of Doom fights now too.

At least there will be wide open fields, for the most part (at least that's the way the made it sound).

Towers were one of the biggest flaws in PS1. You had these huge fields and vast landscapes to fight over, yet, all the action took place in these small towers. Having such a huge scope and concealing it within a tower was extremely lame. On top of all that towers are prevalent all over any map. Next to everybase, nearly every choke point, they really held the game back.

I know there's a lot of people who specifically played PS just for the ToD aspect of it, which I think is a shame. More wide open fights over big fields would be a godsend. Condensing the whole game into a tiny structure just becomes a spam fast.

Don't forget, Combat Engineers will have deployables that must be manned... I'm certain these deployables will include barricade structures as well as manned gun turrets and such... Should be interesting...
Oh, and mine fields (not confirmed yet but why wouldn't they have them).... :)

[NewSith]

Don't forget, Combat Engineers will have deployables that must be manned... I'm certain these deployables will include barricade structures as well as manned gun turrets and such... Should be interesting...
Oh, and mine fields (not confirmed yet but why wouldn't they have them).... :)

Manned minefields?

[sylphaen]

Manned minefields?

A good decoy never hurt a minefield.
;)

[Traak]

Reminds me of the time, when I had a good computer, running up a tower, surging, cloaked, with SS on, and JPMonr0e, underage boyfriend of some Sony exec (my theory on his longevity in PS as a supreme cheater), was running down, also surging, in Rexo, I believe. In 1/5th of a second he stopped, turned around drew the Jackhammer and one-shotted me.

Yeah, PS2 can do with more open-field battles and far less of it being in towers and courtyards. Open field battles allow the support workers to do more than just be singled out by the Reavers/Tanks/HA's/BFR's to be decimated while the same players are running away shrieking and wetting themselves if any player or vehicle within even two classes of being as heavily armed or armored comes along.

I do hope the spawn points are extremely heavily armed and armored. Again, this will make them less of a focal point of people who get wood from attacking defenseless targets, but run away from any real opposition.

Perhaps in PS2, Tanks will fight tanks, and Reavers and HA's will find some Reavers and HA's to fight, instead of just searching diligently for the wounded cloakers, medics, and unarmed-support-vehicle drivers to pick on.

That would be like a whole different world! A new Auraxis, where cowardice is not exalted!

[cellinaire]

And for those people who are saying "Why PS1 is still up?"


Well let SOE keep the PS1 servers up as long as it's profitable. No need to shut the PS1 down intentionally, even after PS2 launches. ('Cause I think there are still some people that don't like the PS2's style and details. Yeah maybe some of them are just there in the hopes of getting PS2 early beta access, but there also are this playerbase who still want to play PS1.) ;)

[Traak]

And some have very slow computers that would turn PS2 into a slow walk through hell.

[Sifer2]

I know 10 minutes probably isn't the final time an he was just throwing it out there. But IMO it doesn't sound long enough to really discourage back hacking. Not that it should be impossible to do but it shouldn't be easy. Otherwise it will be like Planetside 1 back in Beta where it was just Chaos an you could hold nothing. 10 minutes sounds like a while but its not that long to respond in proper fashion of getting some people with you, pulling vehicles, an then traveling out there. Where as a small team of back hackers could have moved on to back hack 6 other locations in that time.

So yeah I like where they are going with this system but I don't think it will work as smoothly as they expect just do to player behavior. People in FPS tend to be more aggressive than defensive. Since aggressive has more glory and action. They will sooner go back hack everything than sit around defending in the off chance someone will come try to take this backwater outpost.

[Xyntech]

Maybe the different hacking times could be more on a curve than being linear.

No friendly hexes touching = 30 minutes
1 hex = 20m
2 hexes = 15m
3 hexes = 10m
4 hexes = 6m
5 hexes = 3m
6 hexes = 1m

[Traak]

People in FPS tend to be more cowardly than aggressive. Since cowardly has more K/D ratio. They will sooner go back hack everything, especially if it means easy kills against cloakers

There, fixed that quote for you. I have found that "resecure teams" are mighty brave, if facing a few cloakers. But when they are faced with HA opposition, they give up and run away, soiling their diapers.

[SKYeXile]

I know 10 minutes probably isn't the final time an he was just throwing it out there. But IMO it doesn't sound long enough to really discourage back hacking. Not that it should be impossible to do but it shouldn't be easy. Otherwise it will be like Planetside 1 back in Beta where it was just Chaos an you could hold nothing. 10 minutes sounds like a while but its not that long to respond in proper fashion of getting some people with you, pulling vehicles, an then traveling out there. Where as a small team of back hackers could have moved on to back hack 6 other locations in that time.

So yeah I like where they are going with this system but I don't think it will work as smoothly as they expect just do to player behavior. People in FPS tend to be more aggressive than defensive. Since aggressive has more glory and action. They will sooner go back hack everything than sit around defending in the off chance someone will come try to take this backwater outpost.
it will really depend on the rewards, while some people will gravitate to the "FOR THE GLORY OF THE EMPIRE" playstyle, most will go the path of least resistance to whatever earns them the best rewards.

I'm interested to see there system and checkout probable flaws. But by having the resource system constantly ticking you think that would be an incentive to hold land, unlike PS1, i guess it will depend on what the individual gets out of holding onto a base or at least defending a base.

But you're right, most people will play aggressive because more kills = more points and your upfront so more points for capturing whatever.

[ShockNC]

well you would hope that blowing a gen to deny the enemy a specific resource or base bonus is still a vital tactic. hopfully lattice or link lines still exist, not for base control but simply how the bases and their bonuses are linked to one another, so cutting off power to one base could strip the enemy off all there bonuses on the other side of that base.

Me thinks that there needs to be support structures to support some of the more advance stuff.

make it a Tier system
first tier- you get your basic weaponry and vehs: common pool lighting, buggy, MA. not dependent on any structure

second tier- get your tanks, reavers, etc, depenant on tech plant

third tier- GGs, BFR equivalent, Motherships (seen in concept art) need tech plant along with something else.

or make it so that the main facility is dependent on tower silos to work. instead of that one NTU silo, there are several that can be blow up and when they do, the people get limited access to ammo/vehicles/guns etc for a limited time until the system reroutes to a new silo.

[CutterJohn]

No tech. The tech concept sucked. You basically couldn't fight an equivalent army if you didn't have it.

I could see tech reducing the cooldown for vehicles. Normally something like a 10 minute respawn, but with tech its 5.. That would be pretty cool.

[SKYeXile]

No tech. The tech concept sucked. You basically couldn't fight an equivalent army if you didn't have it.

I could see tech reducing the cooldown for vehicles. Normally something like a 10 minute respawn, but with tech its 5.. That would be pretty cool.

I think it is removed yea?

[Mirror]

I think it is removed yea?

It's a certain amount of resource now afaik

[Coreldan]

I think they recently mentioned (in AGN I think?) that pulling vehicles won't cost resources, but I guess it could've referred to some more basic stuff (as in stuff you could pull without tech plant, etc).

[Traak]

How about, instead of blowing gens and tubes, we just actually shoot enemy soldiers and win that way?

I know, revolutionary as it may seem, a first person shooter where you are actually shooting enemies, but I think there may be a few such games on the market where you do more to win than just run in and kill an enemy's generator or spawn tubes, and they actually do make money. I think the new, awesome paradigm of killing enemies in battles that take longer than the five minutes it takes to warp down to a gen room and kill it would actually work.

Another thing that could be tried is to make spawn points in general inviolate. So instead of all the HA's and pilots and tanks hunting down spawn points to rape, as they are undefended and result in great K/D ratios, how about we make the Galaxy have a dome it can deploy that NOTHING can get into? Then tanks would have to concentrate on something else, but what?

OMG! I HAVE AN AWESOME IDEA! TANKS COULD FIGHT OTHER TANKS!!!

Wait... that means, hey, planes could actually attack other planes! OMG! What an AWESOME new game mechanic! Protected spawns, and people actually attacking others who are at or near their level of armor and weapons!

I know it might be hard for armor and air players to adjust, but I bet with some training, they could start fighting something other than Lodestars, AMS's, ANT's and softies! Imagine! A Planetside where vehicles and planes, instead of having an unspoken agreement to avoid each other and only rape each other's softies, would actually attack other vehicles and planes.

Weird. It's hard to even imagine.

Maybe they can give minus points for killing something weaker than you, and positive points for killing something at your level of armor and weapons or above. Something to motivate the vehicle and plane guys to do something other than run shrieking away from each other, while pouncing on any cloakers, almost-dead AMS's, and whatever else is their preferred target.

And make capture of objectives FAR more rewarding than just mindlessly killwhoring. So, say 1 XP point for making a kill on a cloaker, 2 XP points for a kill on a softie, and 250,000 for capturing a base.

The present points system is so ludicrously worthless. 849 xp for capturing a base, 2,500 for shooting down a bomber. Balanced? Hardly.

Making actually attaining goals on the map more, as in WAY more rewarding, XP-wise, than brainlessly killwhoring would change the game for the better. Something has to motivate people to not buy the latest killwhore cheats and actually work as a team.

The start could be making kills almost worthless, and making team-captured objectives astronomically more rewarding. Making kills by planes or armored vehicles on cloakers and softies worth ZERO on your kill stats would be cool, also. If you want to be credited for kills, kill something that isn't fifteen orders of magnitude lower than your "spam then cower" vehicle of choice. I know the weapon vehicles would still target cloakers and wounded medics, since old ladies and children aren't available, but at least it wouldn't pad their kill stats, and might make them more eager to do something more balanced and more useful for the empire.

Inviolate gens and spawns
No stats for killing way beneath your vehicle level
Micropoints for killing soldiers, especially HAs killing medics, etc.
Megapoints for capturing objectives
MINUS kill stats for friendly kills.
MINUS points for friendly fire damage

[Coreldan]

I liked gens and tubes. Most of the time, tubes werent really taken down until they had practically lost the base already. For me it was just a natural succession of what happens when you take a base, it was sorta sealed when you dropped their tubes.

As for gens, as long as there are big enough downsides for the attacking team to drop the gen, I don't mind. I don't want every fight, or even majority, to be won by dropping gens, but I somehow like the option as a mean of "we need to deny this base from them, even if it means we deny it from ourselves".

I didn't really play in the early days though, but 2009-2010 when I mostly played, gen dropping wasn't really that common.

[Traak]

I don't want every fight, or even majority, to be won by dropping gens, but I somehow like the option as a mean of "we need to deny this base from them, even if it means we deny it from ourselves".

You know that you can't kill your own gen and tubes, or even damage them.

[Coreldan]

You know that you can't kill your own gen and tubes, or even damage them.

I was thinking that through the attacker, sort of like "ok we better drop the gen cos we need to end this fast, even if it means we can't get the base ourselves either (or can, but it'll require probably 30 mins worth of fetching for ants and all that crap :D)".

What an interesting concept that would be by the way.. being able to drop your own gen to deny the immediate control of the base from the other team when it looks bad for you... :D

Then again, we would have people who will either grief people by dropping own gens or then multi-faction people coming around to ease the fight by just walking into the gen room as friendly :D

[SgtMAD]

we used to be able to kill our own tubes and gens,we used it to herd the zerg but it got nerfed

[sylphaen]

And make capture of objectives FAR more rewarding than just mindlessly killwhoring.

This would mean that your experience rewards depend on the performance of other people a.k.a. forcing people to work in teams.

The latest trend is that forced teamplay is a terrible design and people do not want it (ref. tank threads).

In what you propose, if you want to solo, you are stuck with the zerg whose collective IQ is in direct relation to the average laziness of its individuals.

Maybe what you propose would increase the "give-a-fuck-about-objectives" factor but it directly penalizes the best players who should be rewarded for being such good killwhores.

There should be a balance within soloing and grouping. Only the good solo players should find that soloing is a good alternative to level up. While the worst players who can't aim should at least be able to find a group to leach experience from.

A balanced system would not penalize groups of incredibly good players who know how to frag and take objectives at the same time.

[Khellendros]

Then again, we would have people who will either grief people by dropping own gens or then multi-faction people coming around to ease the fight by just walking into the gen room as friendly :D

Pretty much why they removed it in PS1.

[Coreldan]

Pretty much why they removed it in PS1.

Ah, so it was possible. Wasn't around back then.

[SgtMAD]

The latest trend is that forced teamplay is a terrible design and people do not want it (ref. tank threads).

like in this thread where less than 20% of the voters want the "new" gunner system?
if we go with the votes, we get a version of the old PS gunner set-up

http://www.planetside-universe.com/forums/showthread.php?t=37352

talk about putting some "spin" on an issue LOL, you have a future working at Faux News

19 votes out of 98 cast turns into a trend?

[sylphaen]

like in this thread where less than 20% of the voters want the "new" gunner system?
if we go with the votes, we get a version of the old PS gunner set-up

http://www.planetside-universe.com/forums/showthread.php?t=37352

talk about putting some "spin" on an issue LOL, you have a future working at Faux News

19 votes out of 98 cast turns into a trend?

I'm glad that you spotted my intended ironic tone through an exagerated example. In fact, the exagerated example of a someone playing the arms and the other the legs of a soldier to extrapolate what a forced driver/gunner vehicle play meant was a sad day for me (even though the description was quite valid).

To make it clearer what I meant in a more serious way with my post above:

- rewarding captures excessively vs. combat experience is a bad idea.
>> my opinion: I believe it will not happen since it's easy to spot that not rewarding players at a personal (i.e. solo) levels is a bad recipe to keep players.

- knowing what level of teamplay the devs are aiming for would be interesting information.
>> my opinion: as of today, we got a lot of "how it's implemented" information vs. "how it's meant to be played" information. The whole debate about tanks essentially revolves around that issue i.e. how much power solo tanks actually give vs. how much power solo tanks should actually give. To be honest (and disclaimer: I liked PS1 style tanking), I am not blindly against PS2 style tanks. Some people have even mentioned good ideas in how things would be balanced (Xyntech, 3rd page in the "Drivers Main Weapon" thread).

The issue at stake is not about driver-with-gunner or driver-with-guns but rather: what is the intended role of tanks in PS2 ?


Since irony does not always convey the correct message, you are right that maybe I should have been clearer in my previous post that my issue is more about "design philosophy" rather than how mechanics are implemented in the game.

As far as I know, we haven't been told much about design intentions. However, we do see some things from which it is possible to reach wild conclusions about intended designs. The potential of some of those scenarios happening is what scares some people.

At my personal level, as I keep saying, it's wait and see. In the meantime, it's still possible to play forumside and discuss ideas, defend what you like, etc...

______

Concerning your post, I'm still kind of glad that I sounded like FOX News on crack for at least one moment in my life.
:lol:

(This is not meant as a personal attack btw... I liked your post and it was correct to state that I was blowing things out of proportion since it was intended sarcasm. Your reply was funny (in a good way) and it made me smile (again, in a good way). No harm or disrespect intended.)

[dm Akolyte]

Maybe the different hacking times could be more on a curve than being linear.

No friendly hexes touching = 30 minutes
1 hex = 20m
2 hexes = 15m
3 hexes = 10m
4 hexes = 6m
5 hexes = 3m
6 hexes = 1m


Add in some distance modification. So a surrounded hex that is still pretty close to your other territories would not take as long to hack as one out in the middle of nowhere.

[sylphaen]

Any news on how taking control of an hex would work ? Would there be different capture "mini-games" depending on the hex ?
e.g.: control 5 area points at the same time, hack into a command building, destroy enemy item and build your own over it, take control of a base, etc...

[dm Akolyte]

Any news on how taking control of an hex would work ? Would there be different capture "mini-games" depending on the hex ?
e.g.: control 5 area points at the same time, hack into a command building, destroy enemy item and build your own over it, take control of a base, etc...

Depending on how small the hexes are, that could be tiring. I assume for most of them it will just be "have a set number of people in the hex for a set number of time"

[Xyntech]

Depending on how small the hexes are, that could be tiring. I assume for most of them it will just be "have a set number of people in the hex for a set number of time"

That would be kind of interesting if they lifted some classic gametypes from other FPS's to broaden the capture types.

King of the Hill, Capture the Flag, Plant the Bomb (hacking and holding), etc, but with the Planetside 2 twist.

Team Deathmatch wouldn't really work, since that's the ordinary state of PS2 in general.

What are some other gametypes you could modify?

Maybe Payload from TF2? Spawn a capture device at a friendly location and have to slowly move it into the enemy hex or something.

[Raka Maru]

That would be kind of interesting if they lifted some classic gametypes from other FPS's to broaden the capture types.

King of the Hill, Capture the Flag, Plant the Bomb (hacking and holding), etc, but with the Planetside 2 twist.

Team Deathmatch wouldn't really work, since that's the ordinary state of PS2 in general.

What are some other gametypes you could modify?

Maybe Payload from TF2? Spawn a capture device at a friendly location and have to slowly move it into the enemy hex or something.

Kind like the LLU?

I remember the first time I picked up that thing. I thought my own empire was gonna shoot me and run with it, I kept getting lost in the base. :D

[Xyntech]

Kind like the LLU?

I remember the first time I picked up that thing. I thought my own empire was gonna shoot me and run with it, I kept getting lost in the base. :D

Well the capture the flag thing was in reference to the LLU.

For King of the Hill to work as a capture system, it would have to be a specific area within the hex that you needed to defend, not the entire hex. You could still make the capture zone be rather large though.

[Traak]

I would like to see the only way to end the hack on an LLU base is by the team whose base it is that gets hacked has to carry it back and put it in the socket.

[Raka Maru]

I would like to see the only way to end the hack on an LLU base is by the team whose base it is that gets hacked has to carry it back and put it in the socket.

But then, the aggressors would not even have to bring it to their base.

[Xyntech]

But then, the aggressors would not even have to bring it to their base.

I think his idea is that there is no timer of any kind. If the attackers want to cap the base, they have to bring the LLU to a friendly facility. If the defenders want to stop the hack, they have to bring the LLU back to the base it spawned at.

There are a lot of reasons why this would be a bad idea, but some of them could be overcome. For example, a group of players grabbing the LLU and running off to the far reaches of the map to grief the other two empires. This could be solved by giving the LLU a limited range that it can be from the base that spawned it, although it would have to just drop to the ground instead of being destroyed or spawning back at the base if you wanted there to only be one way to resecure it.

Additionally there is the problem of having the LLU get stuck in some glitched area where you can't get it out of.

I do kind of like the notion of both sides being able to carry the LLU though. Even better would be if all three empires were able to grab an active LLU, potentially allowing for the third empire to make a steal in a contested 3 way situation.

[Raka Maru]

I think his idea is that there is no timer of any kind. If the attackers want to cap the base, they have to bring the LLU to a friendly facility. If the defenders want to stop the hack, they have to bring the LLU back to the base it spawned at.

There are a lot of reasons why this would be a bad idea, but some of them could be overcome. For example, a group of players grabbing the LLU and running off to the far reaches of the map to grief the other two empires. This could be solved by giving the LLU a limited range that it can be from the base that spawned it, although it would have to just drop to the ground instead of being destroyed or spawning back at the base if you wanted there to only be one way to resecure it.

Additionally there is the problem of having the LLU get stuck in some glitched area where you can't get it out of.

I do kind of like the notion of both sides being able to carry the LLU though. Even better would be if all three empires were able to grab an active LLU, potentially allowing for the third empire to make a steal in a contested 3 way situation.

I like the 3 empire LLU fight idea.