'Tactical' Troop Tracking System

[Dart]

It was introduced in the latter stages of PS1 and would allow you, with one glance at the map, to approximate the number of enemy atty any particular location. Personally i always felt it was removing part of the essence Planetside and tilting an already biased system further in favour of the defenders. But the question NOW is do we want to see it's return in PS2?

Would you like tip seder some kind of GUI informing you roughly how many 'bad guys' were in each hex. Personally i hope it doesn't return. I think the battle lines will be easily distinguishable this time and it feels as if this game will be even harder to do damage behind enemy lines than they last one. If the spec ops groups like ours are showing up on the global map before we hack anything it'll become prohibitive....

[Mechzz]

Sorry to be the one to bring you the news, but it's already in the game. Numerous times in the E3 vids we saw people looking at the hex map waiting to spawn and it pops up an "influence indicator" for each hex you hover on.

Not sure how good/bad it is, but it does seem to be another tool to help ensure we spread out on the map.

[Dart]

Sorry to be the one to bring you the news, but it's already in the game. Numerous times in the E3 vids we saw people looking at the hex map waiting to spawn and it pops up an "influence indicator" for each hex you hover on.

Not sure how good/bad it is, but it does seem to be another tool to help ensure we spread out on the map.

Huh, well that'll teach me for not paying attention. Unfortunately it's not to help us spread out on the map, it's the precise opposite in fact. It's the inform the lazy majority what the sneaky minority are up to so they don't have the element of surprise any more. And it will make the fights more stale and less dynamic as everyone is forced to zerg around and stay in large numbers.

Hopefully it is something that'll be removed in beta. Defending already sounds 'painting by numbers' easy, this could really harm the effectiveness of every small Outfit.

[ringring]

oooh double post

[ringring]

I completely agree with the point.

Perhaps the indicator doesn't work quite like that and the indicator only activates in certain circumstances equvalent to creating a hotspot or been identified on radar or something.

The ideal would be to get no indication until the 'sneeky people' do someting active such as hack a CC, the indication then given should be 'CC hacked' and from there it would be upto the defenders to identify the size of the problem and whether they want to do something about it.

[Dart]

I completely agree with the point.

Perhaps the indicator doesn't work quite like that and the indicator only activates in certain circumstances equvalent to creating a hotspot or been identified on radar or something.

The ideal would be to get no indication until the 'sneeky people' do someting active such as hack a CC, the indication then given should be 'CC hacked' and from there it would be upto the defenders to identify the size of the problem and whether they want to do something about it.

Precisely. That would be my preferred scenario.

Hot spots do appear to be back, which I'm fine with - i remember the original game before them and they were definitely an improvement. However if a team is working quickly and quietly and NOT killing anything, I'd rather they were rewarded for their stealth. It'd be a small concession by the devs to show everyone they weren't trying to dumb the game down to a point of banality.

[ringring]

owww triple post.

[GuyFawkes]

It was introduced in the latter stages of PS1 and would allow you, with one glance at the map, to approximate the number of enemy atty any particular location. Personally i always felt it was removing part of the essence Planetside and tilting an already biased system further in favour of the defenders. But the question NOW is do we want to see it's return in PS2?

Would you like tip seder some kind of GUI informing you roughly how many 'bad guys' were in each hex. Personally i hope it doesn't return. I think the battle lines will be easily distinguishable this time and it feels as if this game will be even harder to do damage behind enemy lines than they last one. If the spec ops groups like ours are showing up on the global map before we hack anything it'll become prohibitive....

A really, really, good point. For me, the best element of the original were the small groups that took down point A , and the resecure teams that countered them ,which generally were black and white negatives of each other from each faction.

[Seagoon]

A very simple solution to this problem is to make the player only show up on the hex map if A) they kill somthing, or B ) they are spotted by an opposing player (as in the Q button spot function).

For normal fights this wont make much of a difference, everyone will be killing everyone and spotting everyone all the time. But in any kind of black ops mission this means that if a team is good and stealthy then they can get a lot done before being spotted.

EDIT: Seems like the hex map influence chart shows how far the hack has progressed not how many players are there ?

[Dart]

A very simple solution to this problem is to make the player only show up on the hex map if A) they kill somthing, or B ) they are spotted by an opposing player (as in the Q button spot function).

For normal fights this wont make much of a difference, everyone will be killing everyone and spotting everyone all the time. But in any kind of black ops mission this means that if a team is good and stealthy then they can get a lot done before being spotted.

EDIT: Seems like the hex map influence chart shows how far the hack has progressed not how many players are there ?

So you mean, almost like hotspots?