No sanctuaries - this is a disgrace

[Faarooq]

The thing I loved about PlanetSide was the fact each faction always had a "home". Somewhere we could regroup, plan and initiate group activities such as raids. Being part of a raid was always special in this game and they were the moments I remember most.

Why are they not in PS2? I can't help but feel this new PlanetSide experience is going to be a downgraded version (bar graphics) of something released nearly 10 years ago. It's things like this that lead me to believe SOE are rushing this game.

[AThreatToYou]

MAN THE HARPOONS!

PREPARE THE NAPALM! LOAD THE FLAMETHROWERS!
AND LET IT NOT BE US WHO DINE IN HELL TODAY!

(a)

[Dairian]

There are footholds which are the exact same thing as a sanc. Other than there is one for each continent.

[Landtank]

If they were rushing the game they probably wouldn't have delayed it four years to develop a brand new engine for it.

Footholds are whats in the game now, not much we can do about it. They have discussed bringing back sanctuaries after they release a few more continents.

Footholds are the easiest way to allow all 6000 players to play at once on a server, as the three continents will always have all three factions on them.

[Turdicus]

I don't share a single one of your concerns

[Sabrak]

That topic again, but with a little bit of "SOE is rushing the game" trolling.



Meh. Really.

[ringring]

We've talked about this ... and ultimately we don't know why there are no sanctuaries.

[Graywolves]

We've talked about this ... and ultimately we don't know why there are no sanctuaries.

They want people to get in the fight quicker and view sanctuaries as an in-between or middle man.

The 1 thing that I think about with this currently is when the continents are all full, making the server full. Wait in queue to get on your server and then end up waiting on a different continent then your outfit/friends are and wait there anyways.


It might appear post-launch.

[Stardouser]

If they were rushing the game they probably wouldn't have delayed it four years to develop a brand new engine for it.

Footholds are whats in the game now, not much we can do about it. They have discussed bringing back sanctuaries after they release a few more continents.

Footholds are the easiest way to allow all 6000 players to play at once on a server, as the three continents will always have all three factions on them.

Isn't releasing with 3 continents technically rushing the game? I mean, in this case we understand exactly why it's necessary to do so, because handcrafting continents takes forever, and we don't want to wait for 6 more continents to be made, now, do we?

What if they just implemented a temporary solution like...use the 3 continent models they do have to put 9 continents per server, but simply, there would be 3 copies of each continent per server. A sort of...placeholder solution, if you will. And then as new continent designs are finished, replace them. And thus, by using this placeholder design to start off with 9 continents, they'd be able to start off with a sanctuary.

Who would notice if some of the continents looked alike, anyway :)

[Mirror]

Although we can only imagine how footholds are going to work, I think they will be better than the sanctuaries as it will get you into the fight a lot faster. It's the way that the dev team have chosen and until we experience it for ourselves we should accept it.

If it sucks or doesnt work then we can suggest a different system that might work better.

[BarrelRoll]

I'm concerned about the fact that now you can't really control a whole continent anymore, that was one of my favorite and most rewarding parts of Planetside 1!

[Mastachief]

The footholds are fine for now.

With only 3 conts it makes perfect sense to not have sancs. You will launch the game and spawn on the cont with space either into the battle or at your foothold.

It will be fine.

The foothold warpgates protect you and the warpgate shields are "2.5x" larger than planetside one so it is very difficult to pin the enemy into them.


This thread is pointless as nothing will change, if you feel strongly for sancs then please write a wall of text giving good argument for them and pop it into the ideas forums.

[The Kush]

I'm still hoping they appear post launch

[disky]

I just hope that if they do add sanctuaries, they're in orbit.

Dust can do it, so can we.

http://gamefanmag.com/wp-content/uploads/DUST514_WB_CommandPit.jpg

[RoninAfro]

Isn't releasing with 3 continents technically rushing the game? I mean, in this case we understand exactly why it's necessary to do so, because handcrafting continents takes forever, and we don't want to wait for 6 more continents to be made, now, do we?

What if they just implemented a temporary solution like...use the 3 continent models they do have to put 9 continents per server, but simply, there would be 3 copies of each continent per server. A sort of...placeholder solution, if you will. And then as new continent designs are finished, replace them. And thus, by using this placeholder design to start off with 9 continents, they'd be able to start off with a sanctuary.

Who would notice if some of the continents looked alike, anyway :)

It's not rushing. Think of the other continents like content patches or expansions. 3 will be ready at launch, with more being added when they're ready. They're not stopping at 6 continents either. And how does copy/pasting each continent 3 times not feel like rushing it? That would also spread out the population 3 times, severely taking away from the massiveness of the battles. Not worth it, just to add a sanctuary that isn't really needed yet.

[TheRagingGerbil]

Footholds are really no different then broadcast warpgates. It just cuts down on the damn travel time getting from sanc. I'm perfectly fine with removing the sometimes 30 minutes of empty continent traversing in order to link gates.

[Stew]

Santuary simply reduce the pace of the game !

Foothold will be almost as the same as sanctuarry whiout slowing thing down and created confusion for new commers !

I will never say this enough We need most people as we can in the game the Cod players the Bf3 players the MAG players the Ps1 players the (( others games )) players and also brand new pc gamers etc.. We need them all to achieve whats this game is all about !

people who want this game to be fill only by Ps1 hard core player must understand the game will not last few months of suport if their is no player based and the player based have to Be huge in order to suceed VERY huge

Have you ever seen a game where the minimal requirement per map is at least 1300 players ? and where its design for 2000 players 6000 per servers

This is huge the only player based thats we can pick from is mostly COD , Bf3 , steam , and in order to have a fun and straigth foward experience

Why remmoving the sanctuary? Because it was a bad designed choice at the first place ! i think having an awesome base where their is training station can be achive inside the foot hold few shooting range and simulation room etc..

ask for constructive idea instead of asking for a copy and past of planetside 1

SOE had a sufficient data to show how the sanctuary was not any good to the game pace ! And how confusing and not fun it was for the new comers

Mission systhem and foothold are a great way to remedy the deficiency of the first game

SOE are brillant devs and i agree with them on thats design choice !

[Stardouser]

It's not rushing. Think of the other continents like content patches or expansions. 3 will be ready at launch, with more being added when they're ready. They're not stopping at 6 continents either. And how does copy/pasting each continent 3 times not feel like rushing it? That would also spread out the population 3 times, severely taking away from the massiveness of the battles. Not worth it, just to add a sanctuary that isn't really needed yet.

Not true. I think you're rejecting it before thinking it through. Using 9 copied and pasted continents does not necessarily spread out the population 3 times, because then, instead of 6000 per server, you can have 18000. The reason you are not thinking it through is because, OK, so what happens when they add more continents? There is not going to magically be lots of new players coming instantly in to add population to existing servers, so server merges will be necessary. By starting off with more continents, less servers are needed to start.

Also, as others have pointed out in other threads, people will go where the battles are, so even spread out a bit, that's not a concern. I think Beta will show that actually having 2000 per continent is too much, and really, it should be more like 4500 per server max. That's a personal guess, obviously. And it translates to something like 15000 across 9 continents, not 18000. AGAIN - PERSONAL GUESS that 2000 per continent will be too crowded. But if I'm right, all these fears of "spreading people out too much" are false. See this thread :http://www.planetside-universe.com/showthread.php?t=43474

And I'm not saying this just for the sanctuary.


1. Santuary simply reduce the pace of the game !


2. SOE are brillant devs and i agree with them on thats design choice !

1. What? No. When I played PS1 sanctuaries were only a place to go when you first logged on or after you got completely repulsed from a continent. The effect is minimal.
2. Please don't blindly accept dev decisions because they are the devs...

[Stew]

We've talked about this ... and ultimately we don't know why there are no sanctuaries.

higby smedley issaac and others explains it Millions of time you should lisen to the webcast and interview dude !

Sanctuary are unnecessary slow thing down create confusion to new commers and also are simply a ball and chain atached to the game !

Simple as thats they have sufficient data to proove it was a bad designed choice at the first place

Thats why they go with the mission systhem and continents foothold it save you many loose time !

this is suposed to be a welcome change especially for those who have very little time to play !

[SixShooter]

No sanctuary = disgrace???:huh:

Sanctuaries were huge in proportion to what they were used for and most of the space was largley unused (I'm sure there are some who liked to have a picnic in the middle areas). 3 hart stations was overkill when 1 would have been enough even in the high pop era. Raids will still be able to form up in and around the footholds or any other uncontested piece of ground.

While having them return would be nice, there is really no need for it. To say that it's a disgrace for them not to return is a huge over reaction.

[Stew]

Not true.

And I'm not saying this just for the sanctuary.



1. What? No. When I played PS1 sanctuaries were only a place to go when you first logged on or after you got completely repulsed from a continent. The effect is minimal.
2. Please don't blindly accept dev decisions because they are the devs...

i tough the same back in the day i found sanctuary useless and it was a lost of precious time

Foothold are the equivalents because anyway you have to take warp gates and the foothold are a warp gate it make you save time and the pace of the game do not suffer from it !

WE NEEDS NUMBERS YOU GOT THATS ?

This isnt a 300 player match

this is 64 square kilometres and need to be populated whith ongoing actions
and war this is a shooters game first !

So anybody who just want to jump and rak up kills are welcome because they will help no matter if they dont comunicate or anything as long as they figth and help its good for us its good for bigger outfits and the major outfit will run the strategies and the (( rak up killers )) will serve as meat shield and mercenary ;)

Simple as thats

Santuary slow down the pace if you dont have anymore territory (( wich could be the worst senarios ))

The total domination is pure bullshit it make contestable and figthable area unuse and its simply dumb !

Why having a like 30 maps in a game like battlefield if you can only play 3 of them ? if you have figth one base or maps like 1 time in a compleat years ?

Why designing a awesome maps like planetside 2 to have all these space in one color and no ones figthing on 90 % of it ?

this ISNT planetside 1 their is much more diversity outpost etc.. the designed of those are 10 time better than planetside so i want to see all those space changing color all the time ;)

I dont want nc to dominate the entire continents because it will be boring and BAD

I want NC to take some regions based on the ressource available and defend them as long as those are usefull to use and also changing out plan and our map domination based on ressource we need and resource we want to denied our ennemys ;)

[Obiyer]

Can we pull armor in the staging areas? And, how big are they? Can they fit like 300 people from different outfits trying to get organized?

My worry from looking at the game is that it will turn into World War 1 type combat, with deeply entrenched lines along the three continents, each faction controlling the territories nearest to their staging area.

Guess we have to wait until beta, but what worries me is by the time beta comes along SOE may not be willing to make the large changes their playerbase would suggest. I've never seen a beta where the company was willing to do drastic changes based on the feed back.

[Satch]

I will miss sanctuary, however I see why they have taken them out. One cool thing about Footholds is that you could send a scout over to enemy faction footholds to check if any raids ARE forming up and report it to your faction. I will miss being able to control whole continents though, was a really good feeling :)

[etheral]

Just chiming in to let you know that I agree in principle, Im not happy about the removal of sanctuaries. It was great to have a place to chill out and just dick around with outfit mates after a series of intense battles.

The problem is that with only 3 continents at launch, and with no means of locking down a continent, footholds really are the best approach.

Hopefully this will change as more continents are added though.

Also, to the people claiming that sanctuaries "confused" new players: Is dumping a new player into the middle of a pitched battle with no context whatsoever, or even a chance to get a feel for how the game handles supposed to be LESS confusing?

[SixShooter]

I will miss sanctuary, however I see why they have taken them out. One cool thing about Footholds is that you could send a scout over to enemy faction footholds to check if any raids ARE forming up and report it to your faction. I will miss being able to control whole continents though, was a really good feeling :)

The scout thing is a really good point and could really change up tactics.

[Stew]

I will miss sanctuary, however I see why they have taken them out. One cool thing about Footholds is that you could send a scout over to enemy faction footholds to check if any raids ARE forming up and report it to your faction. I will miss being able to control whole continents though, was a really good feeling :)

Basically you talk about exploiting the F2p aspect of the game to basically cheat !

And also you said that having a empty useless continents where all the great figthable area are Unuse is awesome

Enough said !

[Coreldan]

All I have to say is..

DAMN!

On topic: Not really concerned.

[Stardouser]

Basically you talk about exploiting the F2p aspect of the game to basically cheat !

And also you said that having a empty useless continents where all the great figthable area are Unuse is awesome

Enough said !

Scouting the footholds is cheating? Really? I think it's a consequence of the design decision the devs have made. The devs you just said were brilliant and made the right decision.

Edit: I think he means sending a jet to scout the foothold- NOT a spy account on the other empire.

[Stew]

The problem is that with only 3 continents at launch, and with no means of locking down a continent, footholds really are the best approach.

?

3 continents of 64 square killometres each whith (( indoor combat like biolab )) and tons of figtable area !

this isnt planetside 1 continents if you compare those to planetside 1 a ps2 continents worth 3 ps1 continents so basically their will be 9 ps1 continents in planetside 2 (( content wise ))

[ThermalReaper]

Also, to the people claiming that sanctuaries "confused" new players: Is dumping a new player into the middle of a pitched battle with no context whatsoever, or even a chance to get a feel for how the game handles supposed to be LESS confusing?

Of course it is! Studies show that 99.99% of FPS players are the equvilent of limbless monkeys who have amnesia when it comes to new mechanics.
The other 0.01% consists of 0.009% of retards and the remaining 0.001% are the genius people who have exceeded Tesla, Edison, Da Vinchi and other great inventors and scientists 5 seconds after the formation of the zygot.

Note to people who say sanctuaries confuse people: This is a joke. I don't mean any offence. Please don't kill me.

[Stew]

Scouting the footholds is cheating? Really? I think it's a consequence of the design decision the devs have made. The devs you just said were brilliant and made the right decision.

Edit: I think he means sending a jet to scout the foothold- NOT a spy account on the other empire.

»»»»»you could send a scout over to enemy faction ««««««

If i understand whats he said basically he did not talk about sending a recon infiltrator to the ennemy territory but he seams to talk about using a vanu accont ( for a exemple ) to spy in the vanu foot hold ! Since the F2P model is in place !

But the same thing will happen with sanctuary as well (( log in as vanu )) look if their is any massive atack planned in VS sanctuary

So yeah

I have no problem with Real Recon operations thoese are fun and rewarding and fair so if a real infiltrator can make is way to the ennemy foot hold and come back with some valuable info its fair and iam ok with it

If this guy talk about exploiting the F2P model i think for me this is silly and basically cheating !

[etheral]

Basically you talk about exploiting the F2p aspect of the game to basically cheat !

And also you said that having a empty useless continents where all the great figthable area are Unuse is awesome

Enough said !

Are you really that stupid? Scouting is legitimate gameplay in pretty much every game that allows it. *Edit: Never mind, just seems to be a misunderstanding of what scouting means*

Also, the fact that the continents are unusable for a little while after being taken IS THE WHOLE POINT.

We PS1 vets all know that anything that we do in the fight for auraxis is ultimately futile, because it will be recaptured by someone sooner or later. But being able to lock down the continent gives us some small token of victory, if only for a little while.

PS2 seems to be denying us even that. I could be wrong, of course, since we wont know how the game works until we actually play it

[Stew]

We PS1 vets all know that anything that we do in the fight for auraxis is ultimately futile, because it will be recaptured by someone sooner or later. But being able to lock down the continent gives us some small token of victory, if only for a little while.

it

Dude if for you having a rewarding price is Having unuse awesome maps then iam NOT LIKE YOU !

TOTAL DOMINATION IS 100 % BULLSHIT !

It just make the maps unuse and useless i want to figth over area i want to take the ressources i need and take our empire to the top in term of ressource colection

Having the entire maps in Blue will be for whats ? whats kind of game do you want ?

Ok you dont want the regions to be take back and foward rigth ?

So ok ill put you alone in a server ill paint the maps in the color you want a leave you alone on your TOTAL DOMINATION MAPS ;)

Do you like the picture ? sound fun rigth ?

[Saifoda]

I don't share a single one of your concerns

^ That.


Bam.

[etheral]

Dude if for you having a rewarding price is Having unuse awesome maps then iam NOT LIKE YOU !

TOTAL DOMINATION IS 100 % BULLSHIT !

It just make the maps unuse and useless i want to figth over area i want to take the ressources i need and take our empire to the top in term of ressource colection

Having the entire maps in Blue will be for whats ? whats kind of game do you want ?

Ok you dont want the regions to be take back and foward rigth ?

So ok ill put you alone in a server ill paint the maps in the color you want a leave you alone on your TOTAL DOMINATION MAPS ;)

Do you like the picture ? sound fun rigth ?

I like turning the entire map blue because then I can say that, for a little while, I won ;). That is what you're failing to grasp

[Kalbuth]

Dude if for you having a rewarding price is Having unuse awesome maps then iam NOT LIKE YOU !

TOTAL DOMINATION IS 100 % BULLSHIT !

It just make the maps unuse and useless i want to figth over area i want to take the ressources i need and take our empire to the top in term of ressource colection

Having the entire maps in Blue will be for whats ? whats kind of game do you want ?

Ok you dont want the regions to be take back and foward rigth ?

So ok ill put you alone in a server ill paint the maps in the color you want a leave you alone on your TOTAL DOMINATION MAPS ;)

Do you like the picture ? sound fun rigth ?

wtf does that mean?

total domination gives a goal and a sense of achievement.
It's not supposed to stay in that state more than 15 minutes usually....

[Stew]

I like turning the entire map blue because then I can say that, for a little while, I won ;). That is what you're failing to grasp

dude each time you achive a goal YOU WON look at this

PlanetSide 2 -- Ground Assault on Tech Plant HVAR - YouTube

Facility capture You won you achive your goal No need to dominate the entire map for this

its compleatly a silly way of thinking !

And also you cant say you won when their is a total domination whats you did personally to make this happen ? did you figth over every single piece of regions to say in a total domination senario thats you personally won ?

NO you can be the worst players in the entire empire and say i won ? just because the map is painted in one color ? I call bullshit on thats

The way to be reward in this game is about achiving micro goal each region capture is a win each battle were you capture or defend a base is a win every ambush and goal you ahve fix and achive you win

BECAUSE YOU HAVE COMPLEATED YOUR MISSION

SIMPLE AS THATS

making 95 % of the continents unuse is not fun is not rewarding its a pile of crap and hope should never happen !

[Kalbuth]

How much PS1 did you play, Stew?
Cause zero-basing and/or total domination has pleased a lot of PS1 players throughout the years. It's a broader scope than just "winning a base", which is like just winning a BF3 map, something you do routinely.
When you achieve something once a year, you tend to appreciate at least a little bit that moment.

[etheral]

dude each time you achive a goal YOU WON look at this

*snip*
Facility capture You won you achive your goal No need to dominate the entire map for this

its compleatly a silly way of thinking !

And also you cant say you won when their is a total domination whats you did personally to make this happen ? did you figth over every single piece of regions to say in a total domination senario thats you personally won ?

NO you can be the worst players in the entire empire and say i won ? just because the map is painted in one color ? I call bullshit on thats

The way to be reward in this game is about achiving micro goal each region capture is a win each battle were you capture or defend a base is a win every ambush and goal you ahve fix and achive you win

BECAUSE YOU HAVE COMPLEATED YOUR MISSION

SIMPLE AS THATS

making 95 % of the continents unuse is not fun is not rewarding its a pile of crap and hope should never happen !

Dude, you have no sense of scale. Taking a single facility is a small thing, and can be undone in about 15/30 mins. An empire that wants to retake a continent has to put HOURS, or possibly days into it. To me, thats a real fight. Capping a facility is just one small battle.

Also, i dont need the game to tell me what my mission is, tyvm

[Stew]

How much PS1 did you play, Stew?
Cause zero-basing and/or total domination has pleased a lot of PS1 players throughout the years. It's a broader scope than just "winning a base", which is like just winning a BF3 map, something you do routinely.
When you achieve something once a year, you tend to appreciate at least a little bit that moment.

3 years dude so i know whats iam talking about ;) IAM GLAD SOE AS made all those change it will be better for the game only the looting part is miss from me all the others feature are better ...

I jsut think they must reimplement destroying generator etc.. and also empand on this to have many side objective !

Dude, you have no sense of scale. Taking a single facility is a small thing, and can be undone in about 15/30 mins. An empire that wants to retake a continent has to put HOURS, or possibly days into it. To me, thats a real fight. Capping a facility is just one small battle.

Also, i dont need the game to tell me what my mission is, tyvm

you will be able to create your own mission just proove you worth the trust of your troops and youll have followers and soldiers at your command ;)

[Wings]

Enemys could spy at the home warp gates and see what they are planning/loading up. This wouldn't be the case if there was a sanc

[etheral]

3 years dude so i know whats iam talking about ;) IAM GLAD SOE AS made all those change it will be better for the game only the looting part is miss from me all the others feature are better ...

I jsut think they must reimplement destroying generator etc.. and also empand on this to have many side objective !

I hate to break it to you mate, but 3 years is NOT a long time. You know nothing of how planetside 1 was in its heyday

you will be able to create your own mission just proove you worth the trust of your troops and youll have followers and soldiers at your command

Also, way to miss the whole point of my post

[etheral]

Enemys could spy at the home warp gates and see what they are planning/loading up. This wouldn't be the case if there was a sanc

Gotta say, I actually consider this a good thing. If your planning a big offensive, you'll need to put patrols out to intercept scouts

[Hipshot]

They should make a planetside 1 continent :p
Why? just beacuse they can.

[Mastachief]

Enemys could spy at the home warp gates and see what they are planning/loading up. This wouldn't be the case if there was a sanc

Nonsense, it's a f2p game there will be lots of spys regardless.

[Faarooq]

Enemys could spy at the home warp gates and see what they are planning/loading up. This wouldn't be the case if there was a sanc

Much prefer the element of surprise.

The days of being in a base on your own and seeing 20+ air cavalry move in on your position are gone.

[MasterChief096]

I am by far a sanctuary advocate.

Lets address the arguments.

1. Takes too much time to go from sanctuary to the battlefield:

- With their log in system, it sounds like you can choose whether you spawn at a foothold, base, tower, outpost, or just drop pod in wherever the hell you want right at the beginning of your play session. If you feel like sanctuaries "take too much time" then just don't ever log in there, jump straight into the action.

- How exactly does it take too long? I log in currently in PS1, pull a vehicle, check the map, pick where I want to fight, and get there really damn fast. If there is no more lattice, it will be even faster, you can basically go from sanctuary to broadcast warpgate to taking random territory without having to worry about driving a long ass ways to a base because its the only lattice link.

2. Sanctuary is too big

- Shrink it then, takes less development time and resources. One HART with a HART shuttle facility, several vehicle pads, and several respawn locations would do the trick. Put the warpgate right next to the HART area and put a big ass staging area behind the HART for the big raids and stuff, problem solved.

3. Locking continents and sending an empire back to sanctuary is for whatever reason a bad thing

- I don't understand this argument at all. Locking continents gives an entire empire (especially disorganized zerglings) a huge sense of achievement. They feel like they won a real battle. The other team feels like they got their ass kicked (rightfully so), or if they held out for a long time, they feel like epic Alamo last-standers.

- The lack of a lattice system means that if an empire gets kicked off a continent, they could stage a raid (IN SECRECY AT SANCTUARY) and basically hit a continent from ANY of the broadcast warpgates, since there is no longer a lattice system. This would keep the flow of battles fresher and keep things dynamic, instead of what the current foothold system is going to do. Continents are going to get divided into three parts, and the front lines won't change a whole lot except for certain pushes that make ground until things stabilize again. If they rotate the footholds, big deal. TR would now have the front lines that the NC had and so on and so forth. Having an off-continent staging area that isn't tied down by lattice is the only way to keep the fighting dynamic and allow us to fight on every square inch of a continent.

[Sledgecrushr]

I hope before the add anymore continents that they make auraxis more like a real world where you can hop in your reaver and fly around the world without any artificial boundaries.

[Obiyer]

I hope before the add anymore continents that they make auraxis more like a real world where you can hop in your reaver and fly around the world without any artificial boundaries.

After reading this I thought of a mossie traversing the ocean to another continent, which led me to think naval battles, and battleships, and bases in the middle of the ocean, and submarines, and mossies launching from aircraft carriers. Maybe for Planetside 3.

[The Degenatron]

- I don't understand this argument at all. Locking continents gives an entire empire (especially disorganized zerglings) a huge sense of achievement. They feel like they won a real battle. The other team feels like they got their ass kicked (rightfully so), or if they held out for a long time, they feel like epic Alamo last-standers.

Locked Continents = Wasted Content

It's really just that simple. Try to think like a game developer for a minute. Do you want to:

A) Spend thousands of dollars and hundreds of man hours designing something that will be withheld from your users for 80% of the time?

B) Spend thousands of dollars and hundreds on man hours designing something that will be used all of the time, every day?

It's a pretty simple choice, isn't it?

When your empire has a continent locked, do you go there? No.
Why not? Because there's nothing to do. There are no enemies.
So, what's the answer? Ummmm...Make is so continents are never locked?
Now you're getting it!

As a player, I want to be able to go to any of the continents at any time.

If you are playing Planetside, and you enjoyment isn't "The Fight Itself", then you're doing it wrong. If all you're after is some little digital medal, then you're missing the point.

"Hey, if you want me to take a dump in a box and mark it guaranteed, I will. I got spare time." - Tommy Boy

[etheral]

Locked Continents = Wasted Content

It's really just that simple. Try to think like a game developer for a minute. Do you want to:

A) Spend thousands of dollars and hundreds of man hours designing something that will be withheld from your user for 80% of the time?

B) Spend thousands of dollars and hundreds on man hours designing something that will be used all of the time, every day?

It's a pretty simple choice, isn't it?

When your empire has a continent locked, do you go there? No.
Why not? Because there's nothing to do. There are no enemies.
So, what's the answer? Ummmm...Make is so continents are never locked?
Now you're getting it!

As a player, I want to be able to go to any of the continents at any time.

If you are playing Planetside, and you enjoyment isn't "The Fight Itself", then you're doing it wrong. If all you're after is some little digital medal, then you're missing the point.

"Hey, if you want me to take a dump in a box and mark it guaranteed, I will. I got spare time." - Tommy Boy

Think like a game developer? Is this game made for them?

Those advocating continent locking enjoy the "fight itself" just as much as you. We just want something that says, to them as well as us, "yeah, we kicked their asses". You guys are acting like the conts will be locked off permanently :rolleyes:

[Sephirex]

Sanctuaries will be back after they get more some more continents in. Hell, they only have one of the three continents finished as things stand right now.

Also, I expect they will want to put a little more time into making sanctuaries unique, and not the small boring islands with a few buildings they were in PS1. Also, hopefully each sanctuary will be more like a capital city, and can even be seiged as a huge meta-game event if the empire has been pushed back far enough.

[Wings]

Locked Continents = Wasted Content

It's really just that simple. Try to think like a game developer for a minute. Do you want to:

A) Spend thousands of dollars and hundreds of man hours designing something that will be withheld from your users for 80% of the time?

B) Spend thousands of dollars and hundreds on man hours designing something that will be used all of the time, every day?

It's a pretty simple choice, isn't it?

When your empire has a continent locked, do you go there? No.
Why not? Because there's nothing to do. There are no enemies.
So, what's the answer? Ummmm...Make is so continents are never locked?
Now you're getting it!

As a player, I want to be able to go to any of the continents at any time.

If you are playing Planetside, and you enjoyment isn't "The Fight Itself", then you're doing it wrong. If all you're after is some little digital medal, then you're missing the point.

"Hey, if you want me to take a dump in a box and mark it guaranteed, I will. I got spare time." - Tommy Boy


Missing the point of a locked continent abit, its not the same as PS1. PS2 has no lattice system as he said wich means you can attack and take whatever base you want. The battle will just move to a different area.

[Kalbuth]

Locked Continents = Wasted Content

It's really just that simple. Try to think like a game developer for a minute. Do you want to:

A) Spend thousands of dollars and hundreds of man hours designing something that will be withheld from your users for 80% of the time?

B) Spend thousands of dollars and hundreds on man hours designing something that will be used all of the time, every day?

It's a pretty simple choice, isn't it?

When your empire has a continent locked, do you go there? No.
Why not? Because there's nothing to do. There are no enemies.
So, what's the answer? Ummmm...Make is so continents are never locked?
Now you're getting it!

As a player, I want to be able to go to any of the continents at any time.

If you are playing Planetside, and you enjoyment isn't "The Fight Itself", then you're doing it wrong. If all you're after is some little digital medal, then you're missing the point.

"Hey, if you want me to take a dump in a box and mark it guaranteed, I will. I got spare time." - Tommy Boy

Would make somewhat sense if continental lock would last long. Would make somewhat sense if population was enough anyway to have large pop on every conts at the same time.
If once they unlock more content, there is not enough people to get a fair amount of players on each continent, your precious content is lost anyway, because there is nobody playing on some opened cont.
If the pop is enough, the continental lock will never last more than a few dozens of minutes anyway because of the hordes of ennemies coming to take it back.
=> "lost content" is independant of possibility of continental lock

[The Degenatron]

Think like a game developer? Is this game made for them?

It's not a goddamned ham sandwich. No game developer has EVER said "I'm making this game for ME ONLY. Don't touch it! I'm going to put it in the fridge with my name on it! It better be there at game time!"

You've just shown that you are, in fact, completely incapable of thinking like a game developer.

But, on a side-note, Higby and Smedley have both said "We're making the game we want to play, the game we've been dreaming of."

Those advocating continent locking enjoy the "fight itself" just as much as you.

Apparently not, because you know what DOESN'T happen on locked continents? That's right, FIGHTING.

No action = waste of space. It's a pretty simple concept.

We just want something that says, to them as well as us, "yeah, we kicked their asses".

Well, why didn't you SAY so? That was easy! Problem solved:

http://i1068.photobucket.com/albums/u455/TheDegenatron/EtheralsCertificate.jpg


You guys are acting like the conts will be locked off permanently :rolleyes:

I take it that you haven't been playing Planetside 1 recently. Continents stay in a permanent state of lock for weeks on end.


Missing the point of a locked continent abit, its not the same as PS1. PS2 has no lattice system as he said wich means you can attack and take whatever base you want. The battle will just move to a different area.

So wait...you're saying that the continent should be "locked" but that the other empires should be able to "attack and take whatever base you want". Do you understand what a "locked continent" means?

Would make somewhat sense if continental lock would last long. Would make somewhat sense if population was enough anyway to have large pop on every conts at the same time.

Like I said, continents stay locked for weeks in PS1.

With only 3 continents with only 2000 players per planet - yea, I think the devs are going to have a hard enough time finding a place to everyone who is going to want to play without having whole continents locked out for the sole purpose of stoking your ego.

If once they unlock more content, there is not enough people to get a fair amount of players on each continent, your precious content is lost anyway, because there is nobody playing on some opened cont.

First, that's a mighty big IF you just threw out there.
Second, there's a huge difference between "Nobody in my empire WANTS to fight there" vs "Nobody in my empire CAN fight there."

If the pop is enough, the continental lock will never last more than a few dozens of minutes anyway because of the hordes of ennemies coming to take it back.
=> "lost content" is independant of possibility of continental lock

Again, I don't think you know what a "Locked Continent" is.

For those who are arguing out of ignorance: a "Locked Continent" specificly means that you prevent another Empire from being able to capture bases on the continent. The attacking empire must take bases on another continent that allows attacks on the target locked continent.

If you are thinking that a "Locked Continent" is "always open to attack" then you've got it wrong.

And if you think a continent should always be open to attack, then why shouldn't each empire have a permenent foothold?

[ODonnell]

The Sancs will be missed. I hope they return at some point. The firing range and vehicle training area were great. There was nothing like the hart coming in for a landing and the massive doors opening. Its all that small stuff that i'll miss.

[Stardouser]

For those who are arguing out of ignorance: a "Locked Continent" specificly means that you prevent another Empire from being able to capture bases on the continent. The attacking empire must take bases on another continent that allows attacks on the target locked continent.

If you are thinking that a "Locked Continent" is "always open to attack" then you've got it wrong.

And if you think a continent should always be open to attack, then why shouldn't each empire have a permenent foothold?

1. So we don't call it a "locked" continent. We just call it continent removed of enemies.
2. So the question becomes, why should bases be located inside the warpgates? When bases are located in warpgates the travel time to the initial fights is cut to nothing, and there are no surprises as to what will be waiting for you on other other side of the warpgate, since your forces will be able to see if the enemy is planning to contest the warpgate. And not only that, it gives the advantage to the people massing in the warpgate since they can see what vehicles and infantry types are massing outside against them, and it lets them pull the right vehicles to counter.

Edit: To be clear, there should be no locks, any continent should be subject to attack through a broadcast warpgate at all times.

[Raymac]

One of the GREAT things about the foothold over the sanctuary, is that you can form up a raid safely WITHOUT LEAVING THE CONTINENT. Which is extremely helpful when there is a poplock.

That reason alone makes it worth it in my opinion because I don't know about you guys, but there have been multiple occasions where I've gone back to form a raid and in the meantime the continent got poplocked. So we had to wait twiddling our thumbs to get back in and in that time our objective for the raid was already obsolete.

EDIT: I find it amusing that Stardouser is making theses bold assumptions about Planetside 2 mechanics (like the time it takes to get back into the fight from the warpgate) and he has NEVER even played Planetside 1.

[Dougnifico]

I still support home continents that can be invaded. 1 safe zone. Footholds can be taken if certain conditions are met and they lead back to the home continent. No unused game area. Everyone has a home. Win-Win.

Orbital sanctuaries are also pretty sweet. Would be awesome once there are 10 continents again. Then it would have more purpose to launch orbital invasions and turn warp gates into footholds.

[feuerdog]

I never really saw much need for sanctuary,....aside from being a virtual loading screen area, they really served little if any purpose.

My outfit was pretty active so I just joined them and stayed in the group.

I practically use sanc for only loggin in or off.

With the new spawns, drops, warpgates, it really is just an elimination of the middle man. Works for me.

Continent locks, while cool, were technically just lost play space.

Any loss of stealth/surprise from sanc based assaults can be easily adapted to with superior tactics and strats,....a welcome direction in my book.

[etheral]

It's not a goddamned ham sandwich. No game developer has EVER said "I'm making this game for ME ONLY. Don't touch it! I'm going to put it in the fridge with my name on it! It better be there at game time!"

You've just shown that you are, in fact, completely incapable of thinking like a game developer.

Excuse me? Why should I be thinking like a game developer? I am a customer. You know, one of the people that pays their wages?


Apparently not, because you know what DOESN'T happen on locked continents? That's right, FIGHTING.

No action = waste of space. It's a pretty simple concept.

You know whats even worse than a continent thats temporarily locked? A permanent stalemate where nothing changes. Glorified trench warfare is not fun. One of the major complaints about planetside one from back in the day was the futility of it all. From the looks of things, PS2 is going to be even worse on that front


I take it that you haven't been playing Planetside 1 recently. Continents stay in a permanent state of lock for weeks on end.

I take it that you never played planetside back in 03, when the servers were full and action was happening on pretty much every continent?

Like I said, continents stay locked for weeks in PS1.

NO THEY DONT. the problem is that there simply arent enough people left to assault more than one continent at a time

[xRidick]

If they were rushing the game they probably wouldn't have delayed it four years to develop a brand new engine for it.

Footholds are whats in the game now, not much we can do about it. They have discussed bringing back sanctuaries after they release a few more continents.

Footholds are the easiest way to allow all 6000 players to play at once on a server, as the three continents will always have all three factions on them.

The building of the new engine gives the dev's all the more reason to want to rush the game. Time is money!

[Stardouser]

One of the GREAT things about the foothold over the sanctuary, is that you can form up a raid safely WITHOUT LEAVING THE CONTINENT. Which is extremely helpful when there is a poplock.

That reason alone makes it worth it in my opinion because I don't know about you guys, but there have been multiple occasions where I've gone back to form a raid and in the meantime the continent got poplocked. So we had to wait twiddling our thumbs to get back in and in that time our objective for the raid was already obsolete.

EDIT: I find it amusing that Stardouser is making theses bold assumptions about Planetside 2 mechanics (like the time it takes to get back into the fight from the warpgate) and he has NEVER even played Planetside 1.

I find it amusing that you think I haven't played PS1. It's too late to go back and be a vet, but I've flown around the world and tested things out, fought in a few battles, such as is possible for me to do.

And even if I hadn't, common sense would tell you that starting in the sanctuary(or anywhere else that's not on the continent in question) and then traveling through the warpgate adds travel time. And what is your point, anyway? That there should, or should not be travel time added by traveling through the warpgate?

Debate the issue, don't rely on discrediting people for not having played PS1 to avoid having to actually discuss the issue itself. This isn't PS1. And I'm not making assumptions about what PS2 IS, but I'm instead talking about what it could or should be.

[xRidick]

Think like a game developer? Is this game made for them?

Those advocating continent locking enjoy the "fight itself" just as much as you. We just want something that says, to them as well as us, "yeah, we kicked their asses". You guys are acting like the conts will be locked off permanently :rolleyes:

No, it's not made for them. That is the point. They want to make it fun for the CoD kids.

[Sephirex]

No, it's not made for them. That is the point. They want to make it fun for the CoD kids.

I thought it was because they only have continent done, are rushing to get the other 2 done, and it was the only mechanic that will really work until they get more content?

It is fun to blame everything on BF3 and CoD though.

[Landtank]

The building of the new engine gives the dev's all the more reason to want to rush the game. Time is money!

Perhaps, but they were already developing Planetside Next, and they scrapped that because they weren't happy with how it was coming out!

[Dougnifico]

I thought it was because they only have continent done, are rushing to get the other 2 done, and it was the only mechanic they will really work until they get more content?

It is fun to blame everything on BF3 and CoD though.

I'll bet that Ameresh and Esimir are done. They have to save something. The suspense keeps our attention. If we had all of it at one we would get bored. lol

[Sephirex]

I'll bet that Ameresh and Esimir are done. They have to save something. The suspense keeps our attention. If we had all of it at one we would get bored. lol

They're not....

The map of Ameresh was found in the Alpha Game files. Very rough around the edges. Bases and basic terrain are in and that's about it.
Esimir really hasn't even been started and may even end up being post-launch.

This also fits what we heard from different videos, that all attention has been focused towards completing the first continent for testing.

There's a reason there's been NO footage.

[Dougnifico]

Well that is quite disturbing to hear. I pray you are wrong...

[Sephirex]

Well that is quite disturbing to hear. I pray you are wrong...

Oh, it'll all work out. Just be prepared for the initial wave of complaints when Beta starts with one continent.

[Turdicus]

They're not....

The map of Ameresh was found in the Alpha Game files. Very rough around the edges. Bases and basic terrain are in and that's about it.
Esimir really hasn't even been started and may even end up being post-launch.

This also fits what we heard from different videos, that all attention has been focused towards completing the first continent for testing.

There's a reason there's been NO footage.

Ah thats incredible! Guys Sephirex has been inside of SOE studios and knows EXACTLY what the state of game development is! How come we didn't know about this sooner? You don't have to be so modest Sephirex we are all jealous of you. Also it is truly incredible to hear that the reason there isn't footage of other continents is because they arent done, and not because a good marketing team never releases information about EVERYTHING in a game before release.

Usually its good to keep things hidden to generate conjecture and excitement, but man I never would have guessed the SOE team would do the opposite of whats sensible. :rolleyes:

[Sephirex]

Ah thats incredible! Guys Sephirex has been inside of SOE studios and knows EXACTLY what the state of game development is! How come we didn't know about this sooner? You don't have to be so modest Sephirex we are all jealous of you. Also it is truly incredible to hear that the reason there isn't footage of other continents is because they arent done, and not because a good marketing team never releases information about EVERYTHING in a game before release.

Usually its good to keep things hidden to generate conjecture and excitement, but man I never would have guessed the SOE team would do the opposite of whats sensible. :rolleyes:

It's incredible. I watched the videos from SOE and "LISTENED" when they spoke. It's an amazing thing.

[super pretendo]

Ah thats incredible! Guys Sephirex has been inside of SOE studios and knows EXACTLY what the state of game development is! How come we didn't know about this sooner? You don't have to be so modest Sephirex we are all jealous of you. Also it is truly incredible to hear that the reason there isn't footage of other continents is because they arent done, and not because a good marketing team never releases information about EVERYTHING in a game before release.

Usually its good to keep things hidden to generate conjecture and excitement, but man I never would have guessed the SOE team would do the opposite of whats sensible. :rolleyes:

occam's razor

[Turdicus]

occam's razor

Eh, yeah I'll submit to that but then by that logic neither of us has any more or less claim to our point. I've watched every video and read almost every interview and at no point did I see anyone explicitly stating the condition of the other two continents or the reasons for holding them back from the public eye. I could be wrong, if anyone would care to post a link proving me wrong.

I certainly haven't found anything that sways me to Sephirex's theory.

[Sephirex]

Eh, yeah I'll submit to that but then by that logic neither of us has any more or less claim to our point. I've watched every video and read almost every interview and at no point did I see anyone explicitly stating the condition of the other two continents or the reasons for holding them back from the public eye. I could be wrong, if anyone would care to post a link proving me wrong.

I certainly haven't found anything that sways me to Sephirex's theory.

True. It's never explicitly said.

There's a few times where they are asked straight out about the 3 continents being at launch and the most they'll do is pause for a second and then respond that "well, that's the goal.

Higby did release this earlier this month, http://yfrog.com/z/h7v2xcofj, which fits perfectly with the half finished map found in the E3 build alpha files for the second continent. http://i.imgur.com/pgK58.jpg. There was no files for the third continent.

In videos from less than a few months ago, Higby says he isn't even sure which continent #3 is going to be based on yet.

Honestly I don't know their turn around time on maps. I just wouldn't expect all three to be there at the start of beta.

[Turdicus]

True. It's never explicitly said.

There's a few times where they are asked straight out about the 3 continents being at launch and the most they'll do is pause for a second and then respond that "well, that's the goal.

Higby did release this earlier this month, http://yfrog.com/z/h7v2xcofj, which fits perfectly with the half finished map found in the alpha files for the second continent. http://i.imgur.com/pgK58.jpg. There was no files for the third continent.

In videos from less than a few months ago, Higby says he isn't even sure which continent #3 is going to be based on yet.

Ah I see where you're coming from, however I would argue that just because Higby says he doesn't know doesn't mean thats the truth.

[Sephirex]

Ah I see where you're coming from, however I would argue that just because Higby says he doesn't know doesn't mean thats the truth.

If they entered Beta with all 3 maps, having been secretly working toiling away without releasing a scrap of info, I will shit my pants in happiness.

[feuerdog]

As stated, beta will be a ramped up progression.

I would guess that at some point during the beta process we will stage from one continent, to two, or possibly more, as it progresses.

Since beta is alot more of a numerical stress than the core mechanics of the alpha it seems to me that testing multi-continent loadings will be important before release.

All assumptions of course, but it's my icecream and you can't have none.:groovy:

[The Degenatron]

1. So we don't call it a "locked" continent. We just call it continent removed of enemies.


2. So the question becomes, why should bases be located inside the warpgates? When bases are located in warpgates the travel time to the initial fights is cut to nothing, and there are no surprises as to what will be waiting for you on other other side of the warpgate, since your forces will be able to see if the enemy is planning to contest the warpgate. And not only that, it gives the advantage to the people massing in the warpgate since they can see what vehicles and infantry types are massing outside against them, and it lets them pull the right vehicles to counter.

Edit: To be clear, there should be no locks, any continent should be subject to attack through a broadcast warpgate at all times.

You bring up some good points about having people be able to pull vehicles in the warpgate.

And by "Good", I mean that it is good that it is that way. Game Level design 101: always balance for Offense. If you balance for defense, that leads to stalemate and no action. Not fun.

Excuse me? Why should I be thinking like a game developer? I am a customer. You know, one of the people that pays their wages?

Because then you would understand why certain design elements are the way they are, and not the way you want them to be.

Pays their wages? How freakin' egotistical is that? You should try that on a cop the next time you get pulled over: "I pay your salary! I'm gonna let YOU off with a warning this time!"

Let me know how that goes.

You know whats even worse than a continent thats temporarily locked? A permanent stalemate where nothing changes. Glorified trench warfare is not fun. One of the major complaints about planetside one from back in the day was the futility of it all. From the looks of things, PS2 is going to be even worse on that front

http://i1068.photobucket.com/albums/u455/TheDegenatron/EverybodyFacepalm.jpg

You're joking, right? Pleeeeeease tell me you're joke.

I take it that you never played planetside back in 03, when the servers were full and action was happening on pretty much every continent?

I did. From Beta to BFRs. The second worst thing to BFRs? Continent locks.

NO THEY DONT. the problem is that there simply arent enough people left to assault more than one continent at a time

Wait, first you deny what I said, and then you give a reason as to why what I said was true.

The population that's left are forced into fighting on Hossin or Forseral because every other continent is locked.

Did you know that ever since I resubbed I have not been able to play on Oshur? Even back in 2004 after the breakup of Auraxis, I only got to play there a handful of times. It was always locked.

[Zekeen]

If the population feel a staging area is required, they will add in sanctuaries of some sort. I'm sure if we feel it doesn't hurt gameplay, we will get it just like we used to.

[Stardouser]

You bring up some good points about having people be able to pull vehicles in the warpgate.

And by "Good", I mean that it is good that it is that way. Game Level design 101: always balance for Offense. If you balance for defense, that leads to stalemate and no action. Not fun.



You know, that is an interesting point. If offense is DESIGNED and balanced to keep the battle moving and defenders will be generally pushed back it could make things interesting.

But then we have to ask, how do you balance against defenders? Will empires be able to set up defenses along a front line in the frontier(out among the minor towers in the middle of continents) or will defenses tend to gravitate towards major bases only? We talked in another thread about keeping the right number of players per continent, but before we can balance offense vs defense, how many people are actually going to be doing one or the other at any time, and when? I've often wondered if main base sieges will typically be, at least at the beginning, something like 200 of Empire A against 50 Empire B at one base, and vice versa at another base (and adjust that formula for 3 empires).

[Dougnifico]

If sancs are introduced, you shouldn't be forced to load your game into it every time you log in. Just wanted to throw that out there.

Also, I don't think they should ever lock a continent. It should always be vulnerable.

[The Degenatron]

I thought it was because they only have continent done, are rushing to get the other 2 done, and it was the only mechanic that will really work until they get more content?

It is fun to blame everything on BF3 and CoD though.

"...and players will have many continents to go to. This is a desert themed continent, but there will be a ice continent, there will be a lava contient, and there will be a grasslands continent..." - Matt Hignby

Here's the video:

IGN Live: Planetside 2 Demo - E3 2012 - IGN Live - IGN Video

[Bags]

If one ends up being needed, I can't imagine it will take long to make one. They wouldn't have to hand craft a sanctuary so they could just make it via automated software.

[Sephirex]

"...and players will have many continents to go to. This is a desert themed continent, but there will be a ice continent, there will be a lava contient, and there will be a grasslands continent..." - Matt Hignby

Here's the video:

IGN Live: Planetside 2 Demo - E3 2012 - IGN Live - IGN Video (http://www.ign.com/videos/2012/06/07/ign-live-planetside-2-demo-e3-2012)

Yeah I remember.
Desert Continent - "is"
Other Continents - "will be"

Doesn't sound like they are done, does it?

[Malorn]

The lack of sanctuaries was an intentional design decision, not the result of a rushed product cycle.

It has merits and has been discussed many times before. I have no energy for this one anymore.

[The Degenatron]

You know, that is an interesting point. If offense is DESIGNED and balanced to keep the battle moving and defenders will be generally pushed back it could make things interesting.

But then we have to ask, how do you balance against defenders? Will empires be able to set up defenses along a front line in the frontier(out among the minor towers in the middle of continents) or will defenses tend to gravitate towards major bases only? We talked in another thread about keeping the right number of players per continent, but before we can balance offense vs defense, how many people are actually going to be doing one or the other at any time, and when? I've often wondered if main base sieges will typically be, at least at the beginning, something like 200 of Empire A against 50 Empire B at one base, and vice versa at another base (and adjust that formula for 3 empires).

In this case, the best defense is a good offense. If the enemy is driving into your territory, then flank them with a force of your own and drive into their territory. They will have no choice but to divert some of their players back onto defense and that will lighten the load for your defenders.

This is something that was discussed in the developer blogs that were included with Team Fortress 2. They talked about how they always wanted the offense to be able to punch through the defense and capture the flag. The reasoning is that defending should always be "a losing battle" so that the battle is always in flux and scoring is always happening. And by losing battle, they meant that all other things being equal (number of players, class types, etc).

I think PS2 has this built right into the ground because the frontlines are going to be so long. There simply will be no way for an empire to defend its entire border. But on the same token, there will be no way for an empire to sustain a concentrated attack in one area because that would divert so many resources and leave the backside vulnerable.

I think we're going to see a lot of shifting in the areas of control.

[The Degenatron]

Yeah I remember.
Desert Continent - "is"
Other Continents - "will be"

Doesn't sound like they are done, does it?

If they were done, we'd be playing it.

[Sephirex]

If they were done, we'd be playing it.

Exactly. Expect to see the Desert continent only for the very start of Beta, unless Beta ends up starting past July.

[Stardouser]

In this case, the best defense is a good offense. If the enemy is driving into your territory, then flank them with a force of your own and drive into their territory. They will have no choice but to divert some of their players back onto defense and that will lighten the load for your defenders.

This is something that was discussed in the developer blogs that were included with Team Fortress 2. They talked about how they always wanted the offense to be able to punch through the defense and capture the flag. The reasoning is that defending should always be "a losing battle" so that the battle is always in flux and scoring is always happening. And by losing battle, they meant that all other things being equal (number of players, class types, etc).

I think PS2 has this built right into the ground because the frontlines are going to be so long. There simply will be no way for an empire to defend its entire border. But on the same token, there will be no way for an empire to sustain a concentrated attack in one area because that would divert so many resources and leave the backside vulnerable.

I think we're going to see a lot of shifting in the areas of control.

Hm. So the best case scenario is, for example, 50 defensive guys hold off 200 while 200 more of your guys set up for offense come by, spank them off your base from behind, and then immediately counterattack?

[The Degenatron]

Actually, no you probably won't even see your offensive guys.

Like this:

http://i1068.photobucket.com/albums/u455/TheDegenatron/Frontlinetactics.jpg

An NC thrust is being cut off by a VS flanking move. The NC would have no choice but to fall back and attempt to reestablish the connection. The attack would stall and the lines would equalize.

The VS defenders along the west coast would never even see their saviors.

Edit: Rereading your post - Yea, kinda. That's not to say that if the VS didn't just push right back with supperior numbers they wouldn't also win the day. But the same effect could be accomplished with far fewer players by using a strategic flanking move.

Keep in ind, there's a LOT of border to cover and all three empires are going to be continuously probing for weaknesses.

[Stardouser]

Actually, no you probably won't even see your offensive guys.

Like this:



An NC thrust is being cut off by a VS flanking move. The NC would have no choice but to fall back and attempt to reestablish the connection. The attack would stall and the lines would equalize.

The VS defenders along the west coast would never even see their saviors.

Edit: Rereading your post - Yea, kinda. That's not to say that if the VS didn't just push right back with supperior numbers they wouldn't also win the day. But the same effect could be accomplished with far fewer players by using a strategic flanking move.

Keep in ind, there's a LOT of border to cover and all three empires are going to be continuously probing for weaknesses.


Well, the thing I wonder is, except for infantry and maybe tank movements which are slower, 8 km across the continent, that's a bit short, wouldn't attacking armies reach their objective before a sizable army could intercept, usually?

[Kalbuth]

Again, I don't think you know what a "Locked Continent" is.

For those who are arguing out of ignorance: a "Locked Continent" specificly means that you prevent another Empire from being able to capture bases on the continent. The attacking empire must take bases on another continent that allows attacks on the target locked continent.

If you are thinking that a "Locked Continent" is "always open to attack" then you've got it wrong.

And if you think a continent should always be open to attack, then why shouldn't each empire have a permenent foothold?
Coming back late after long evening here.
Just to clarify : I'm not advocating for articial "lock".
I'm advocating for the possibility to simply "win a continent", ie push all opposition out of it and own the whole continent. Nothing more. No artificial lock after that, nothing. Just the ability, and game mecanisms made for that, to oust your ennemies out of one cont, meaning you "won this cont".

I'm just saying that having this as a potential goal is far better than only contemplating "win base X" as the epitom of objectives achievable, like some have stated above.

That means that certain gameplay mecanisms should be pushed to make it viable and avoid constant stalemate. Efficient resource system is part of these mecanisms.


As for foothold, I'd wait for beta before saying if they are the end-of-all hope of continental-wide win

I didn't mean "continent lock" as per PS1 post patch XXXXX. Sorry for using a term full of old signification :)

[Zolan]

I agree that replacing sanctuaries with footholds for the sake of catering to the players who cannot figure out how to launch a drop pod onto a continent from a HART or orbital space station is ridiculous.

However, because they will only have three continents at launch, sanctuaries are probably not that important right now. Perhaps once a couple of other continents get introduced they will move away from the current foothold system and replace the footholds with a series of world-wide interconnecting warp gates for travel (primarily vehicular) between continents.

If an orbital space station were introduced for each faction as a sanctuary, this would further solve the problem of the common foothold fan response that "I won't be able to get to the continent because the others will be locked and I would be really sad because I can't play." Simply add some launch pods to the station sanctuary and allow players to launch themselves onto the surface every 5 minutes. These launches would only launch you into the open areas of the map, not on top of bases or towers. Similar to the way HART pods worked in the original Planetside.

You could even add some spiffy empire propaganda and audio to the inside of the drop pods as you were waiting to launch. "Technology is Might" speech or something like a "Loyalty, Honor, Bullets are cool" speech, etc. etc.

[RawketLawnchair]

So, yeah.

In my opinion, entering/exiting vehicle animations not being there and the fact that you drive and fire the main gun of a tank instead of there being a main gunner, in many ways, is much more disgraceful than not having a sanctuary.

[Gonefshn]

Honestly having the warp gates to stage and gather is the same thing. You want space? you have a space.

Wait until you get to try it out before slamming the idea so much. I bet if this was done in PS1 people would have been fine with it and never would have asked for their own specific empire instance. Look past nostalgia and think about it. We still have everything the sanctuary offered us it's just not in it's own continent. This will save time and keep you in the game. Good things.

[Dougnifico]

So, yeah.

In my opinion, entering/exiting vehicle animations not being there and the fact that you drive and fire the main gun of a tank instead of there being a main gunner, in many ways, is much more disgraceful than not having a sanctuary.

Gotta make some concessions for the sake of success. Video games are still a business after all. Also, in BF3, tanks weren't super op. Teamwork wasn't amazing. But still, being the driver and having nothing to do but steer makes a lot of people bored. The general FPS crowd would be turned off.

I personally welcome changes that bring planetside into the modern age. Some things are just more fun than others and modern games are finding out what is and isn't. Everyone will bitch because they changed so many things but in the end the game will find greater success.

[Immigrant]

I just hope that if they do add sanctuaries, they're in orbit.

Dust can do it, so can we.

http://gamefanmag.com/wp-content/uploads/DUST514_WB_CommandPit.jpg

I concur.

[Sephirex]

So your fine with the game being dumbed down for COD/BF kiddies to have fun while us veterans are screwed over and forgotten?

I'm mad that we're not all still playing quake!

[Sephirex]

If it wasn't for CoD/BF3, this game would have Sanctuaries, tanks that require 12 men to drive, 10+ continents, free server transfers, full sized mech warriors, and a public library.

My outrage is endless.

[Dougnifico]

So your fine with the game being dumbed down for COD/BF kiddies to have fun while us veterans are screwed over and forgotten?

Yes. I want to play a game with thousands of people and not 12. But I have a question for you...

WhyMad? :D

[Turdicus]

If it wasn't for CoD/BF3, this game would have Sanctuaries, tanks that require 12 men to drive, 10+ continents, free server transfers, full sized mech warriors, and a public library.

My outrage is endless.

Haha the lack of public facilities in Auraxis is truly outrageous and the lack of a public voice on the matter has demolished my faith in this community. No statues, no baths, no COLOSSEUM :mad:

[Dougnifico]

Where are the horse races? The sacrifice altars? The mural of myself and my old PS1 character for me to stare at for hours while I find other stuff to bitch about?!?! lol

[Raymac]

I find it amusing that you think I haven't played PS1. It's too late to go back and be a vet, but I've flown around the world and tested things out, fought in a few battles, such as is possible for me to do.

And even if I hadn't, common sense would tell you that starting in the sanctuary(or anywhere else that's not on the continent in question) and then traveling through the warpgate adds travel time. And what is your point, anyway? That there should, or should not be travel time added by traveling through the warpgate?

Debate the issue, don't rely on discrediting people for not having played PS1 to avoid having to actually discuss the issue itself. This isn't PS1. And I'm not making assumptions about what PS2 IS, but I'm instead talking about what it could or should be.

I guess I based that comment on old data. When you first joined up with this forum a couple months ago, you stated that you haven't played the game and you were coming from a (disappointed) BF3 player perspective.

I'm all for new people to offer their opinions on the game. It would be stale around here if it was ONLY PS1 vets and there were no new voices. I just think there is a fine line between offering an opinion, and stating a quantitative conclusion. i.e.
When bases are located in warpgates the travel time to the initial fights is cut to nothing

That quote just is not accurate. The only exception is on the extremely rare occasion of being camped at a warpgate. Now this has happened in PS1, and it clearly can happen in PS2, but it's the exception not the rule. And frankly, being camped at a warpgate can happen if there are sanctuaries or not.

All of that was just a side point though. My main point was the royal pain in the ass it was having to leave a continent just to form a raid safely. That's why I love the foothold idea. I did take a cheap shot at you, and that was probably a bit offsides, so I'm sorry for that.

[Stardouser]

That quote just is not accurate. The only exception is on the extremely rare occasion of being camped at a warpgate. Now this has happened in PS1, and it clearly can happen in PS2, but it's the exception not the rule. And frankly, being camped at a warpgate can happen if there are sanctuaries or not.

All of that was just a side point though. My main point was the royal pain in the ass it was having to leave a continent just to form a raid safely. That's why I love the foothold idea. I did take a cheap shot at you, and that was probably a bit offsides, so I'm sorry for that.

Er, I was thinking about that - whether the transit time is cut to nothing depends on what you were planning to attack. I'm guessing that PS2 will have towers and minor capture points within half a kilometer of the warpgate, so if those were the target then I was more accurate. If a main base is the target then sure, it's not accurate to say that fighting is very close.

Here's what I wonder. What other options are there? I think the heart of the matter is this : The continent approach. Footholds make it 3 different wars per server, not one. But ignore that for a moment: The continent approach. 8 X 8 km isn't that big, and Planetside isn't going to be the only viable MMOFPS forever. I suspect that one or more competitors, whenever they come, will not adopt the small continent approach but will instead have single landmasses capable of holding an entire server's worth of players - ie, 10,000, 15,000. I understand the concern here is that with that approach, 15,000 people will converge on one point but there's got to be a way to prevent that.

Now, this is sort of off topic, but the reason I bring it up is, with the continent approach, there's pretty much only three ways to do it that I can see:
1. Footholds
2. Sanctuaries
3. Physical travel(flight) between continents(which, technically, is the same as the single landmass idea, except..well..continents are separated by oceans).

The reason I am hitting this angle is because we're looking at it as either footholds or sanctuaries. What else could we do that is missing? At this point, discussion is theoretical, the game's going to release with footholds and we can't stop it, but maybe, just maybe, we could come up with something for the 5 year plan or Planetside 3 that's worthy.

[drennam]

there is no sanc because conquest is no longer chained from base to base,
and they expect full on action from each continent.

its not a ''disgrace'' you weirdo =s its to accommodate the new changes and spread the player base

[RageMasterUK]

We had 3 separate areas in the sanc anyway in Planetside 1 so we we're split into three parts even then. Good old HART A, HART B and HART C. Served us all well enough back in the day. Shame the only difference was the letter...

...however...

Now in PS2 each sanct base gets a separate continent focus. Each will be set in seperate environments, so you also get 3 distinct types of scenery with your safezone experience.

Back in the day 30 players had to face 2 loading screens to re-enter battle every time a platoon leader called "Recall". All players can now 'Recall' and re-deploy without having to face any loading screens. Total Win for everyone.

Unlike PS1, instead of having to imagine battles raging on while in your safezone, it will be possible at times to see it right outside your front window. You get a direct connection to your battlefield instead of a remote one.

And, as a bonus, when I get into someones random Gal at a sanct, I can assume with some level of ceirtainty which cont he's going to head out to :D

-RageMasterUK

[Sephirex]

you weirdo

He just took things to the next level.

[Papscal]

Rush it already, give me beta or give me cheese cake.

:wantbeta:

[Sephirex]

Rush it already, give me beta or give me cheese cake.

:wantbeta:

Smedley just tweeted that there will be news on Beta date next week.

[Turdicus]

Smedley just tweeted that there will be news on Beta date next week.

Doh, the child in me hoped that "a few weeks" meant 2 =P Time to put my waiting boots back on :(

[Sephirex]

Doh, the child in me hoped that "a few weeks" meant 2 =P Time to put my waiting boots back on :(

If we're lucky he'll announce it for that following weekend.

[RageMasterUK]

Doh, the child in me hoped that "a few weeks" meant 2 =P Time to put my waiting boots back on :(
This^

[BraavikStal]

Scouting the footholds is cheating? Really? I think it's a consequence of the design decision the devs have made. The devs you just said were brilliant and made the right decision.

Edit: I think he means sending a jet to scout the foothold- NOT a spy account on the other empire.

Sending a jet to scout the enemy is a viable and logical tactic. I like the idea.

[JointReef]

I hope they one day bring back the sanc. I understand the reasoning behind footholds. I also hope they add "owning" a cont it has benefits for the empire that owned them, It gave atleast some feeling that u won a huge battle and little closer to winning the war even though you knew u couldnt but its what added to the immersion of planetside. No Lattice links though? i understand what they trying to achieve with this. Look at planetside 1 when bases where lattice linked is it directed the main zerg to the next base and put the battle most of the time in 1 area above and around bases n towers. Giving the effect of a BIG war.

Now when i saw MAG i thought nice closest thing to planetside i can play.. played it the entire team was stretched to diff parts of the map very rarely saw the other squads.. felt big but not Planetside big, PS2 maps seem big as do the bases, but having no lattice links? this wont feel like a massive war like planetside, we will al be split up in to different areas sometimes the forces on planetside where split but, you always had alot of single base fights too, these seem less likely in ps2 as any base can be taken so platoons will try split off from main 2 or 3 groups trying to capture behind enemy lines in turn enemy tries to do it to you aswell results in smaller proxy wars all over map.. I dont want a planetside copy and paste, game was buggy n inbalanced but planetside was fun!

most of my memories are massive battles over centre base on cyssor capturing the LLU that spawned in the events before LLU base capture. Getting pounded with mags and prowlers in my thundy with my outfit, jumping in to lake and driving over water being helped by 40-50 friendly reavers in the sky and actually survive the onsslaught from TR and VS during the LLU event on cyssor. 3 ways wernt always amazing but to me these massive battles in a large-ish focused area is what made planetside the game i always loved!

I would of thought thats 1 of the reason that made planetside amazing to many vets? or is that just me lol. This is just what i gather from info i know may be something in place to make these massive battles happen, if you can capture any base then it could turn in to MAG n MAG got boring fast was just BF2/3 on a much bigger map so they could fit more people on one server, Controlling the zerg on ps1 was hard enough with the good community we had compared to most games imagine now with alot more zerglings. Many more lonewolfs and rogue squads will be in ps2 than ps1 lets hope we have good people to lead them and lets hope they dont mind being led.

Wall of text V, V, S (so u can hear it in your ps1 soilder's voice from memory)

NC Forever!

*Edit changed wording from "will" to "could"

[FuzzyandBlue]

So your fine with the game being dumbed down for COD/BF kiddies to have fun while us veterans are screwed over and forgotten?

So what you're saying is even though exact same thing that was in PS1 exists in PS2, except its faster and easier to use, you veterans are getting screwed over? And its all for the COD/BF "kiddies". Because only 8 year old kids play those games.

If any veteran feels screwed over by the changes that are being made, it because they have a childish sense of entitlement. "I played PS1 so all my opinions are right."

And yes I will forget you 8 seconds after I finish this post. Just so I cover all you're bullet points.

[Toppopia]

So what you're saying is even though exact same thing that was in PS1 exists in PS2, except its faster and easier to use, you veterans are getting screwed over? And its all for the COD/BF "kiddies". Because only 8 year old kids play those games.

If any veteran feels screwed over by the changes that are being made, it because they have a childish sense of entitlement. "I played PS1 so all my opinions are right."

And yes I will forget you 8 seconds after I finish this post. Just so I cover all you're bullet points.

You mean 12 year olds. 12 year old american kids that swear at you for being good and such.

My brother got sent a message by a team mate saying "Stop winning the game, you're stealing all the kills blah blah blah".

Thats when i lost all respect for those type of people. You don't get angry at a team mate winning the game for you. Thats just the most stupid thing ever.

[SKYeXile]

You mean 12 year olds. 12 year old american kids that swear at you for being good and such.

My brother got sent a message by a team mate saying "Stop winning the game, you're stealing all the kills blah blah blah".

Thats when i lost all respect for those type of people. You don't get angry at a team mate winning the game for you. Thats just the most stupid thing ever.

iv got team killed before in WOT by a platoon because i was killing everything, le sigh, kids these days.

[JointReef]

You mean 12 year olds. 12 year old american kids that swear at you for being good and such.

My brother got sent a message by a team mate saying "Stop winning the game, you're stealing all the kills blah blah blah".

Thats when i lost all respect for those type of people. You don't get angry at a team mate winning the game for you. Thats just the most stupid thing ever.

iv got team killed before in WOT by a platoon because i was killing everything, le sigh, kids these days.

Talking of kids my mate got banned from BF2 cos some kid make fake screen shots of him cheating to PB and they banned him from every server. I know 100% he never cheated

*Edit* What kids n photoshop can do these days lol

[Karmic Revenge]

I'll miss sanc, honestly, but I don't think it's the end of the world to not have it.

You'll see people just falling back to bases instead of all the way back to sanc. (Which keeps them closer to the fight, really.)

[Ratstomper]

Outfit orbiting motherships.... :D

[Sabot]

The only probelm I have with the footholds is the fact that it's going to be hard to get any kind of surprise attacks going. With the sancs, at least enemies didn't know know you were coming until you were actually there... kind of boring tbh.

I think it'd be cool if instead of the warpgates, we did have a sort of sanc.. well more of a staging area... a small island where you gather up. Esentially it is a sanc, just a lot smaller without the HART or the many buildings or warpgates. And to attack a cont, you could choose a hex on the grid that had beaches on them, and sort of... land there by sea, creating a beach head. I tihnk it'd be a more dynamic mechanism for this... as a attacking faction can spread out a little more and secure at least one area, instead of getting camped at the warpgate. But if they spread out too much, they'll be easily pushed back again since the hack times on hexes you have no adjacent hexes to are much longer.

And it'd be a lot more fun for the defending factions as well, as outfits that like to run fast response ops will have a lot more to do and get to defend hexes instead of camping a warpgate. They will have to think a little more tacticly regarding which hexes to defend if the force landing is too great and they spread out over many hexes. But if the entire faction lands on the same hex, the defending faction will have to abandon the current battle for a while to defend, if they deem it more important, and so on...

The warpgates that already are in place on the conts could lead to other coninents instead... and to "cap" a warpgate and be able to use it you have to own all sourrounding hexes or something like that.

I don't know... it might be a hard to do now as the edges of the maps might need some redesigning... I guess one way to solve it would be so that you can't see inside a bubble from the outside. Wouldn't be as much fun though..

[Toppopia]

I like the beach idea. And also add ships that spawn vehicles that sit on the beach to spawn our vehicles and such.

[Canaris]

The only probelm I have with the footholds is the fact that it's going to be hard to get any kind of surprise attacks going. With the sancs, at least enemies didn't know know you were coming until you were actually there... kind of boring tbh.

they could always make the warpgate shields opaque to those outside of it if it's needed, you still can have your suprise attack

[Sabot]

they could always make the warpgate shields opaque to those outside of it if it's needed, you still can have your suprise attack

It wouldn't be the same thing though, as it would esentially still mean camping of warpgates. But if you read the last paragraph I wrote you can see that that's exactly what I propsed :)

[Stew]

Locked Continents = Wasted Content

It's really just that simple. Try to think like a game developer for a minute. Do you want to:

A) Spend thousands of dollars and hundreds of man hours designing something that will be withheld from your users for 80% of the time?

B) Spend thousands of dollars and hundreds on man hours designing something that will be used all of the time, every day?

It's a pretty simple choice, isn't it?

When your empire has a continent locked, do you go there? No.
Why not? Because there's nothing to do. There are no enemies.
So, what's the answer? Ummmm...Make is so continents are never locked?
Now you're getting it!

As a player, I want to be able to go to any of the continents at any time.

If you are playing Planetside, and you enjoyment isn't "The Fight Itself", then you're doing it wrong. If all you're after is some little digital medal, then you're missing the point.

"Hey, if you want me to take a dump in a box and mark it guaranteed, I will. I got spare time." - Tommy Boy
AGREE 100 %
Think like a game developer? Is this game made for them?

Those advocating continent locking enjoy the "fight itself" just as much as you. We just want something that says, to them as well as us, "yeah, we kicked their asses". You guys are acting like the conts will be locked off permanently :rolleyes:
Disagree 100 %
The figth itself is the only reason why we play this game to enjoy massive figth tons of aproch and tactical possibility , Galaxie drop , tank colums , galaxie with reaver escort and liberator bombers , massive infantry figth

This game is all about it , if you want to play on empty continent just load a Far cry map editor and Sit their and enjoy your Free realm lock just for you

You seams to not enjoy the game the (( figth )) so man i cant understand how crazy all this thing is !

CONTINENTS LOCK = LAME and stupid lost of space lost of gameplay potential !

Thats why they have created the ressource ssythem as it is ressources will moove across the maps encouraging people to actually change the figth from a region to another !

And this is all about thats

Why making 64 square kilometre maps to have them lock and unplayable 99 % of the time ?

This is so silly and stupid !

[GuyFawkes]

My only concern with the footholds (which are like a large warpgate) is their positioning on the maps.

They aren't like a beachhead position , the devs appear to have them within the continent . I can see why, its so a faction always has a 360 degree way of fighting out from them. On the flip side it means you can never 'sanctuary' lock a team.

It also means the vs/tr/nc will always attack from the same position , the stalemate will happen in same central hex and so on. The only real variety is do you go to x,y, or z continent today. Its like cyssorside on crack.

They need to add some tactical warpgates or something. You cap point alpha which unlocks a warpgate to a point within the opposing factions area. Something to mix it up.

[Stew]

they could always make the warpgate shields opaque to those outside of it if it's needed, you still can have your suprise attack

Yeah i think the warp gates shield should be opacfor those who dont OWN it like if your TR and your at NC gates you see the shield BLACK and if your Nc and your at the Nc warpgate shield you see it like it is at the momments !

[MooK]

I do like the idea of orbital platforms as sanctuaries.

[ODonnell]

I do like the idea of orbital platforms as sanctuaries.

I think a lot of us have had this idea in some form or another. It makes great sense, and would be a very unique and great fit in the PS universe. I feel pretty strongly that omitting sanctuaries is a bad decision and is/should be separate discussion from land locks.

[MooK]

I think a lot of us have had this idea in some form or another. It makes great sense, and would be a very unique and great fit in the PS universe. I feel pretty strongly that omitting sanctuaries is a bad decision and is/should be separate discussion from land locks.

Unfortunately,

The more I think about it, the less it makes sense. How can we pull of trigganator raids from space? Hotdrop Vanguards? Eh...

[Goku]

Unfortunately,

The more I think about it, the less it makes sense. How can we pull of trigganator raids from space? Hotdrop Vanguards? Eh...

WG portal to your foothold at least?

I like the idea of a space station TBH.

[MasterChief096]

Locked Continents = Wasted Content

It's really just that simple. Try to think like a game developer for a minute. Do you want to:

A) Spend thousands of dollars and hundreds of man hours designing something that will be withheld from your users for 80% of the time?

B) Spend thousands of dollars and hundreds on man hours designing something that will be used all of the time, every day?

It's a pretty simple choice, isn't it?

When your empire has a continent locked, do you go there? No.
Why not? Because there's nothing to do. There are no enemies.
So, what's the answer? Ummmm...Make is so continents are never locked?
Now you're getting it!

As a player, I want to be able to go to any of the continents at any time.

If you are playing Planetside, and you enjoyment isn't "The Fight Itself", then you're doing it wrong. If all you're after is some little digital medal, then you're missing the point.

"Hey, if you want me to take a dump in a box and mark it guaranteed, I will. I got spare time." - Tommy Boy

Hey guess what? Having the same three-way stalemate on a continent in which the only fighting happens along the basic, same front lines ad infinitum (which probably constitutes only 10% of the total continent anyways) is an awful waste of continental space. Only by having battles fluid and dynamic can you experience the fight on every square inch of the continent, and being able to kick an empire off a continent would only add to the fluidity.

But, judging by your asshole-ish response, you probably joined PlanetSide after the huge battles were over when killwhores really started to make a name for themselves, and so you quickly say that anyone with an idea differing than yours is "doing it wrong". Guess what, I started day one on beta, and the game has always been about "the fight itself," guess what again, "the fight itself" used to be really dynamic because we would capture entire continents, move on, and then have to fall back on the defensive to defend those captured continents.

It's not a goddamned ham sandwich. No game developer has EVER said "I'm making this game for ME ONLY. Don't touch it! I'm going to put it in the fridge with my name on it! It better be there at game time!"

You've just shown that you are, in fact, completely incapable of thinking like a game developer.

But, on a side-note, Higby and Smedley have both said "We're making the game we want to play, the game we've been dreaming of."



Apparently not, because you know what DOESN'T happen on locked continents? That's right, FIGHTING.

Umm, when an empire captures a continent, two things can happen. Both empires go after NEW (AKA FRESH) targets, or the empire that just got kicked off comes back and uses a different strategy to take the continent, its not like the continent is gone from the game for good...

No action = waste of space. It's a pretty simple concept.
Then prepare for 90% of the continents to be wasted with the foothold system once the front lines are drawn and nothing ever changes. Yeah have real fun with that.

I take it that you haven't been playing Planetside 1 recently. Continents stay in a permanent state of lock for weeks on end.

If you are judging locked continents off of RECENT PlanetSide 1, then you have proven to everyone here that you are in fact, a complete noob to PlanetSide.

So wait...you're saying that the continent should be "locked" but that the other empires should be able to "attack and take whatever base you want". Do you understand what a "locked continent" means?

Once again, you prove that you are a PlanetSide noob. Back in the day, when we would steamroll continents, we would say when we kicked the other empires off that we "locked" the continents for our faction. This did not tangibly LOCK the continent and stop enemies from going there. The term came up from when the continent would become a full shade of blue, red, or purple when an empire owned all the bases, and later when the continental benefit would become locked from your empire until someone else took it. Maybe you should go watch some old PlanetSide youtube videos or something, and actually learn a bit about the game.


Like I said, continents stay locked for weeks in PS1.Once again judging off of what? Current PS? Current PS is a GHOST of its former self.

With only 3 continents with only 2000 players per planet - yea, I think the devs are going to have a hard enough time finding a place to everyone who is going to want to play without having whole continents locked out for the sole purpose of stoking your ego.

Not really. Sanctuary can even be instanced, which wouldn't matter a damn bit in the slightest, since no other empire would be able to go there.

First, that's a mighty big IF you just threw out there.
Second, there's a huge difference between "Nobody in my empire WANTS to fight there" vs "Nobody in my empire CAN fight there."

Once again, you incorrectly assume that locking a continent in some way shape or form stops all enemies from ever going there again.

Again, I don't think you know what a "Locked Continent" is.

For those who are arguing out of ignorance: a "Locked Continent" specificly means that you prevent another Empire from being able to capture bases on the continent. The attacking empire must take bases on another continent that allows attacks on the target locked continent.

No, this is completely incorrect. Locking a continent means kicking the other empires off and taking full control of the continent. It does not prohibit the very same enemies from coming back and attempting to retake it. Where are you getting this definition? This isn't even true in PS1 most of the time.

If you are thinking that a "Locked Continent" is "always open to attack" then you've got it wrong.

Actually you do.

And if you think a continent should always be open to attack, then why shouldn't each empire have a permenent foothold?

For the first three continents on release, rotating footholds is a better idea than sanctuary. For the future with 5+ continents, sanctuaries are a better idea and footholds should be removed. Once again, for the same reasons.

1. Sense of achievement
2. Keeps battles dynamic by allowing enemies to get kicked off then come back at a completely different location, rather than stalemate along the same three front lines. Even rotating footholds would place empires along the same three front lines, just at ones that the other empires had. You know that "for the fight of it" argument you made? Well guess what, fights would be a lot better if enemies could be pushed off continents. There you go, I didn't say locked, I'll be politically correct and say "enemies being pushed off continent." Does that help you understand?
3. Sanctuaries give people a staging area away from enemy eyes that can be used to launch attacks on different continents at will.

[MasterChief096]

It's not a goddamned ham sandwich. No game developer has EVER said "I'm making this game for ME ONLY. Don't touch it! I'm going to put it in the fridge with my name on it! It better be there at game time!"

You've just shown that you are, in fact, completely incapable of thinking like a game developer.

But, on a side-note, Higby and Smedley have both said "We're making the game we want to play, the game we've been dreaming of."



Apparently not, because you know what DOESN'T happen on locked continents? That's right, FIGHTING.

No action = waste of space. It's a pretty simple concept.



Well, why didn't you SAY so? That was easy! Problem solved:

http://i1068.photobucket.com/albums/u455/TheDegenatron/EtheralsCertificate.jpg




I take it that you haven't been playing Planetside 1 recently. Continents stay in a permanent state of lock for weeks on end.




So wait...you're saying that the continent should be "locked" but that the other empires should be able to "attack and take whatever base you want". Do you understand what a "locked continent" means?



Like I said, continents stay locked for weeks in PS1.

With only 3 continents with only 2000 players per planet - yea, I think the devs are going to have a hard enough time finding a place to everyone who is going to want to play without having whole continents locked out for the sole purpose of stoking your ego.



First, that's a mighty big IF you just threw out there.
Second, there's a huge difference between "Nobody in my empire WANTS to fight there" vs "Nobody in my empire CAN fight there."



Again, I don't think you know what a "Locked Continent" is.

For those who are arguing out of ignorance: a "Locked Continent" specificly means that you prevent another Empire from being able to capture bases on the continent. The attacking empire must take bases on another continent that allows attacks on the target locked continent.

If you are thinking that a "Locked Continent" is "always open to attack" then you've got it wrong.

And if you think a continent should always be open to attack, then why shouldn't each empire have a permenent foothold?

AGREE 100 %

Disagree 100 %
The figth itself is the only reason why we play this game to enjoy massive figth tons of aproch and tactical possibility , Galaxie drop , tank colums , galaxie with reaver escort and liberator bombers , massive infantry figth

This game is all about it , if you want to play on empty continent just load a Far cry map editor and Sit their and enjoy your Free realm lock just for you

You seams to not enjoy the game the (( figth )) so man i cant understand how crazy all this thing is !

CONTINENTS LOCK = LAME and stupid lost of space lost of gameplay potential !

Thats why they have created the ressource ssythem as it is ressources will moove across the maps encouraging people to actually change the figth from a region to another !

And this is all about thats

Why making 64 square kilometre maps to have them lock and unplayable 99 % of the time ?

This is so silly and stupid !

Yes the game is about the fight itself, but yes, it is also about the META-GAME, the actual STRATEGY involved, being able to OUTMANEUVER AND DEFEAT the other empires. You can't do that with the current system of footholds.

You and that other guy seem to think that locking a continent will forever stop all fighting from happening on that continent. This is wrong. In fact, it will allow the empire that got kicked off to come back on to the continent from a completely different side if they want, if the footholds were just made into universal broadcasts or something.

If you think the resource system is going to be enough to keep a fight dynamic, you are wrong. No empire is going to want to move on resources that will put it between the foothold of another empire (that it can't even attack) and the other empire's front lines.

Also, making foothold warpgates opaque would solve the problem of WHAT is coming in a surprise attack, but not WHERE. You basically would know exactly where that raid is hitting, since they have to be in the foothold.

Current system: Three empires fight, maybe one empire gains an edge over the other, pushes it back to foothold, good empire gets raped by the other empire that didn't get pushed back to foothold and the empire that did at the same time, front lines reset, new empire gains edge, rinse and repeat.

Why making 64 square kilometre maps to have them lock and unplayable 99 % of the time ?

Please find me some sort of evidence that being able to kick other empires off the continent would make them "unplayable 99 % of the time ?"

[Goku]

Can you guys please stop this back and forth on the locking of conts. In PS1 you never EVER could lock conts if you captured the entire cont. The only time in PS a cont was locked was the conclusion of the rabbit event. I forgot the specific number of hours, but the winning empire gained that cont for that amount of time and other empires were unable to gain access to that cont. The event rarely happened anyway after its introduction due to people hating it so much.

[Kalbuth]

Yes the game is about the fight itself, but yes, it is also about the META-GAME, the actual STRATEGY involved, being able to OUTMANEUVER AND DEFEAT the other empires. You can't do that with the current system of footholds.

You and that other guy seem to think that locking a continent will forever stop all fighting from happening on that continent. This is wrong. In fact, it will allow the empire that got kicked off to come back on to the continent from a completely different side if they want, if the footholds were just made into universal broadcasts or something.

If you think the resource system is going to be enough to keep a fight dynamic, you are wrong. No empire is going to want to move on resources that will put it between the foothold of another empire (that it can't even attack) and the other empire's front lines.

Also, making foothold warpgates opaque would solve the problem of WHAT is coming in a surprise attack, but not WHERE. You basically would know exactly where that raid is hitting, since they have to be in the foothold.

Current system: Three empires fight, maybe one empire gains an edge over the other, pushes it back to foothold, good empire gets raped by the other empire that didn't get pushed back to foothold and the empire that did at the same time, front lines reset, new empire gains edge, rinse and repeat.



Please find me some sort of evidence that being able to kick other empires off the continent would make them "unplayable 99 % of the time ?"

apparently they take "continent lock" as per definition of Planetside 1 post patch #Idontknowwhatnumber where actual domination on a continent is actually really locking it out for ennemy empire (ie, the ennemy cannot enter there for some reason)
I don't remember clearly, it may have been the case at some point in PS history. Taking this as a PS1 fact, though, is rather strange.

EDIT : Thanks Goku for clarification.

Let's use "continental domination" for better understanding, then?

[ArbitraryDemise]

Yes the game is about the fight itself, but yes, it is also about the META-GAME, the actual STRATEGY involved, being able to OUTMANEUVER AND DEFEAT the other empires. You can't do that with the current system of footholds.

You and that other guy seem to think that locking a continent will forever stop all fighting from happening on that continent. This is wrong. In fact, it will allow the empire that got kicked off to come back on to the continent from a completely different side if they want, if the footholds were just made into universal broadcasts or something.

If you think the resource system is going to be enough to keep a fight dynamic, you are wrong. No empire is going to want to move on resources that will put it between the foothold of another empire (that it can't even attack) and the other empire's front lines.

Also, making foothold warpgates opaque would solve the problem of WHAT is coming in a surprise attack, but not WHERE. You basically would know exactly where that raid is hitting, since they have to be in the foothold.

Current system: Three empires fight, maybe one empire gains an edge over the other, pushes it back to foothold, good empire gets raped by the other empire that didn't get pushed back to foothold and the empire that did at the same time, front lines reset, new empire gains edge, rinse and repeat.



Please find me some sort of evidence that being able to kick other empires off the continent would make them "unplayable 99 % of the time ?"

I for one, am thankful that our omniscient overlord has shown the benevolence to correct our erroneous ways.

Look man, you're a class A fool.

There is no tactical depth gained from shoving an enemy back into their home base versus shoving them completely off the continent and waiting for them to try getting back onto the continent via one or two sets of entry points.

Also, as for your evidence: if a continent is dominated then the other empires CANNOT get back into the continent until they retake a set of points on the continent... right?

So then, the continent is unplayable until that one(or more) point on the continent is retaken. That is agreed upon.

The disagreement here, is how long it would take for an empire to rally enough people to actually retake those one or two points to end the lock. The evidence is that you've got people WHO HAVE SEEN this shit happen. Where a continent is locked down for extended periods of time because the other empires cannot get enough people to end the lock.

So then, as my final question: if there is a game and no one can play the game, is there actually a game?

With a continent under the domination of one empire, there may as well be no game until enough people log on to end that domination.

Edit:


Current system: Three empires fight, maybe one empire gains an edge over the other, pushes it back to foothold, good empire gets raped by the other empire that didn't get pushed back to foothold and the empire that did at the same time, front lines reset, new empire gains edge, rinse and repeat.


Dude, you're making it sound like this isn't what happens in PS anyway! One empire gets an advantage, kicks the other empires off a continent, or just outright pushes them back to one small part of a continent. Then that empire doing the pushing slips up and the process repeats with a different empire kicking ass.

That is PS, that is the game. The fun comes from the changes that occur to the fight as the whole process repeats.

[RageMasterUK]

If you think the resource system is going to be enough to keep a fight dynamic, you are wrong. No empire is going to want to move on resources that will put it between the foothold of another empire (that it can't even attack) and the other empire's front lines.

There will most likely be active and passive resource aquisition.
You will actively gain stockpiles of resources in a nice chunk if you're involved in a successful capture. Passive is the trickle in effect based upon ownership.

Players will mostly be hunting ACTIVELY for the STOCKPILES when they are logged on. It is this element which will keep things dynamic.

If an enemy base has an enormous on-capture stockpile reward (because it hasnt changed hands in a week), empires will become motivated to attack the base just to get at the stockpile. EVEN IF ITS RIGHT NEXT TO A FOOTHOLD. Capping the hex to HOLD IT will not be their primary motivator. The stockpile-on-cap reward will be the reason people bother. After capping they would probably then strike at other adjacent stockpile-heavy hexs with their new capture-time bonus. Its not all about the trickle-in effect of owning bases, if you're playing actively you will want to cap bases to get these stockpiles much more than the trickle-in effect.

Also, making foothold warpgates opaque would solve the problem of WHAT is coming in a surprise attack, but not WHERE. You basically would know exactly where that raid is hitting, since they have to be in the foothold.
Explain please how you will know exactly where on a 64 square kilometer map a raid will attack. Theres no way you can know exactly where the raid is heading when looking at it assemble in a foothold. The raid may even decide to fly through to another continent after assembly, ever think of that?

Even if you have spies at every enemy foothold, you only get the same heads up and intelligence that you would in Planetside 1 if you had spies at every warpgate. You only really know that the raid is attacking the cont you're on when they leave the foothold and start moving.

-RageMasterUK

[Malstrum]

It'd be fantastic to see sanctuaries in Planetside 2, especially with the new graphics. Although, I think footholds are a better solution to keep the action flowing from launch, and then as more continents, perhaps sanc's could be added as a staging hub for operations globally, rather than a staging hub for just 3 continents, which personally I don't think is needed.

[Sabot]

And here I was, thinking I'd come up with one of the best solutions to this problem ever, and all you do is argue about something else.... I hate the internet.

[Tamas]

Oh hi, you must be new.

[Goldeh]

So your fine with the game being dumbed down for COD/BF kiddies to have fun while us veterans are screwed over and forgotten?

whymad. Whyumad?

[Zolan]

Hey... hey guys... listen... hey listen.. listen I got... guys... listen...

Current argument by posters...

"No foothold = No content"

FALSE

Solution?

Orbital Space Station Sanctuary with launch tubes (for drop pods).

Note: Drop pods can launch infantry (onto any cont.) every 5 min and pods can only land outside of bases on the open area of the map (similar to PS1 HART).

http://static.tumblr.com/jt87k5b/XRAloppc5/fresh_prince_i.jpg

Example Scenario:

"OH MAH GAWD I CAN'T SPAWN ON DA CONTINENT BECAUSE IT ARE LOCKED BY BARNIES!"

Solution?

1. Spawn at said OSS Sanctuary
2. Walk over to the launch pods
3. Enter a launch pod (buckle seat belt)
4. Select drop location on locked continent
5. Launch
6. ??????????
7. Fight

[Littleman]

The argument here isn't so much what constitutes as lost or wasted content so much as it is between those that find satisfaction in the fight itself and victories (hex taking) versus those that play for major, "game winning" victories (continent captures.)

As if by definition, MMO's don't really cater to the "game winning" crowd. If one played PS1 and asked themselves "what's the point? We'll just lose it tomorrow." they're not just missing the point of Planetside, they're playing the wrong game.

If a game ending victory is what one seeks, BF3, CoD, UT, Quake, and many other shooters end once the time is up, the kill quota is fulfilled, or the flag is captured X number of times, etc.

Sanctuaries aren't important. Removing them simply removes an unnecessary loading screen. If you're setting up a raid, chances are you know ahead of time where you're going, and footholds allow one to set up on the continent proper. But gosh darn, if people really want their sanctuarys back because they're still stuck on expecting PS2 being exactly like PS1 sans the graphics, then I won't mind if SOE obliges. They're just not allowed to take away my footholds.

I don't care if that one little area is always red on your map. You'll get over it. I rather like my place on the pop locked continent, even if the foothold is all my side has left. The rest of you can sit in queue from your precious sanctuary.

[ODonnell]

WG portal to your foothold at least?

I like the idea of a space station TBH.

Pretty much. You can take your infantry and hot drop into the foothold. Yeah, you wouldn't be able to do vehicles at the stations, but once on planet in the foothold you can acquire them and roll out. The stations would be a staging area and perfect for grouping up. Once groups/voip and everything is setup, hot drop to foot hold, spawn gal/tanks/reavers and GO. If it takes more than two minutes for the outfit/platoon/group to mobilize once on planet, than your doing it wrong. IMHO stations are a much more elegant and immersive way/place to get everything set up. Foot holds seem like an unfinished and unpolished way of doing it. There have to be better and more balanced options even if you don't like the idea of stations.

P.S. As others have stated, this thread isn't about cont locks, its about sancs. A real PS vet would also know what cont locks really were, and its infuriating that there have been so many factually wrong posts in this thread.

[Malstrum]

An idea on the sanctuaries. Seeing as the TR constructed the space stations in order to stop information and personnel going through the wormhole, it would make sense for them to have an orbital station as a sanc. However, personally I think considering TR would have military dominance in space (I think), meaning that the VS and NC should have sanctuaries elsewhere.

With the NC's guerilla type nature, I was thinking they could have a sanc somewhere hidden, as to hide their primary staging area from the TR, like a dense forest, jungle, mountains ect.

With the VS, their sanc would most likely be near where the highest concentration of alien structures would be, for easy access for scientists and what not, or perhaps even in a cave such as the caves from PS1.

I enjoyed being in sanc with my outfit back in PS1, but I always disliked the fact that despite each of the faction's differences, the sanctuaries were exactly the same, and so I feel that the factions should be in an environment suited to them.

If there was some added lore to suggest the NC and VS capturing some orbital stations from the TR, then I would certainly go with the orbital sanctuaries, but at the moment I think it would be better suited to each of the factions lore to have sancs in different environments.

[ODonnell]

An idea on the sanctuaries. Seeing as the TR constructed the space stations in order to stop information and personnel going through the wormhole, it would make sense for them to have an orbital station as a sanc. However, personally I think considering TR would have military dominance in space (I think), meaning that the VS and NC should have sanctuaries elsewhere.

With the NC's guerilla type nature, I was thinking they could have a sanc somewhere hidden, as to hide their primary staging area from the TR, like a dense forest, jungle, mountains ect.

With the VS, their sanc would most likely be near where the highest concentration of alien structures would be, for easy access for scientists and what not, or perhaps even in a cave such as the caves from PS1.

I enjoyed being in sanc with my outfit back in PS1, but I always disliked the fact that despite each of the faction's differences, the sanctuaries were exactly the same, and so I feel that the factions should be in an environment suited to them.

If there was some added lore to suggest the NC and VS capturing some orbital stations from the TR, then I would certainly go with the orbital sanctuaries, but at the moment I think it would be better suited to each of the factions lore to have sancs in different environments.

See I like this idea as well. There are so many other ways to do the foot holds. In its current state it just feels unfinished, boring, and lacking. It doesn't have to be one or the other. You can do both.

[SnipeGrzywa]

So much flame . . . Here's my 2 cents

The 2 major problems with no sanctuaries are:

1 - With a foothold your staging area is within enemy view. Yes, there is a lot of area you MIGHT be going to, but if the majority of the time you will be hitting the next base, or hitting the base that is about to be captured. I don't care what outfit you are. When you get a call that you are doing a gal drop, it takes time to recall and load up and move, giving the enemy plenty enough time to get air wings or AA set up near your foothold. Also, with the continental link system, your raid could attack from multiple directions. Now the enemy knows exactly where its coming from, and that is your foothold.

2 - I'm afraid to use the term "cont lock", but this was a MAJOR factor in the strategy of the game. I couldn't tell you recently how it is, but in the first 4 years of PS1 there was a huge "meta-game". All the CR5's (before there were a million of them) working together and directing outfits to acquire as much land as possible. It gave the game the depth that no FPS has ever reproduced. By having footholds, this meta-game will be gone. It won't be global war, it will be 1 map (yes huge) with a time limit set to infinite. Especially with only 3 continents (all Population locked) at launch, your entire log session will consist of only 1 of them, never moving on to the next continent. In PS1 I attacked and defended each base on each continent 100 times over. You were eager to log in not to see how the battle is going (though sometimes it ended up being the same battle) but how the WAR is going.

Also, on a side note, some of the most epic battles took place while FIGHTING for our foothold, your first base. You wanted to fight and win over a continent? Then you have to go out there and get it. The amount of teamwork needed to be able to get large enough tank columns, air wings, and fully loaded Gals to take that first base on a heavily defended continent, along with ghost elements harassing the rear, was unbelievable. I felt better after securing a heavily defended foothold then I did when the last base on a continent was secured.

To me some of their decisions are aimed at the CoD and BF fans, trying to draw them in. Are the footholds taking the game to far from the original? In my opinion yes. Is it a deal breaker? No. Just like in PS1, changes are made to the game. You adapt. You overcome. And you either still play the game, or you quit. Me? I'll see you on Auraxis.

[Rumblepit]

there are sanctuaries silly, they were moved into warpgates on conts we will be fighting on.


ok who brought the new kid?

[Sephirex]

I still think they have MUCH bigger plans for the meta-game once they have the base game up and running.

[ODonnell]

I still think they have MUCH bigger plans for the meta-game once they have the base game up and running.

I would agree. I think that is why the foot holds/warpgates/sancs are in their present form. I think the Forgelight engine would be fantastic for putting a NC base in the side of a mountain. That would be one hell of sanc.

With the foot holds it will be a little disappointing not being able to sit around the table, drinking beer, and talking about epic events when you pushed a certain faction off. That feeling of accomplishment was great.

[Reborn]

lets play the game first then make this thread

[Sephirex]

lets play the game first then make this thread

Thank you! YES!!!

[Haro]

I think the beauty of the current system is that it will be built up as we move along. PS1, for all it's awesome factors, was a fairly inefficient game. Some vehicles received very little use compared to others, same for several weapons. The vast majority of map space on continents was really not used, especially for sanctuaries.

With the current development model, we have a style that emphasizes on making the most out of all resources: maps have bases more evenly distributed out of land, all three continents are designed to be fully populated and contested at the same time, and quick access is given to all three continents. I think this is a great way to start the game: in the first months of the live play, PS2's gameplay will revolve around the novelty of large-scale combat (or rather, larger, even compared to the original.) But the devs can add on features as they go, designing them in a way to specifically address the needs of the population. If we need sancs, and we may very well, I'm confident that Devs can get them to us. On that note, I do like Malstrums ideas. Personally, I never really liked sancs that much. I certainly didn't hate them, and I will admit that we may need sancs depending on where the game goes after these first three continents. But for me, most of my trips in the sanc were like an interective menu. Intriguing, nice to look at, maybe, but usually I just wanted to get out as quickly as possible, because Sancs aren't really necessary for a lot of reasons: for individual or small group play, such a large, dedicated area isn't really necessary for equipping or choosing your battlefield. It was largely used for large outfit preps, something that honestly could be done in any dropship center except you wanted everyone to get there quickly and not risk an ambush. Warpgates, in theory, do all the same things, so the OP's response seems over-exaggerated, at the very least.

Remember also that during PS1, nearly everyone wanted sancs to change. There were tons of threads asking for sanctuaries to somehow interact with the world and be part of gameplay, rather than these utterly isolated realms. Warpgates can offer that.

[MasterChief096]

I for one, am thankful that our omniscient overlord has shown the benevolence to correct our erroneous ways.

Look man, you're a class A fool.

There is no tactical depth gained from shoving an enemy back into their home base versus shoving them completely off the continent and waiting for them to try getting back onto the continent via one or two sets of entry points.

Also, as for your evidence: if a continent is dominated then the other empires CANNOT get back into the continent until they retake a set of points on the continent... right?

So then, the continent is unplayable until that one(or more) point on the continent is retaken. That is agreed upon.

The disagreement here, is how long it would take for an empire to rally enough people to actually retake those one or two points to end the lock. The evidence is that you've got people WHO HAVE SEEN this shit happen. Where a continent is locked down for extended periods of time because the other empires cannot get enough people to end the lock.

So then, as my final question: if there is a game and no one can play the game, is there actually a game?

With a continent under the domination of one empire, there may as well be no game until enough people log on to end that domination.

Edit:

Dude, you're making it sound like this isn't what happens in PS anyway! One empire gets an advantage, kicks the other empires off a continent, or just outright pushes them back to one small part of a continent. Then that empire doing the pushing slips up and the process repeats with a different empire kicking ass.

That is PS, that is the game. The fun comes from the changes that occur to the fight as the whole process repeats.

Actually, there is more tactical depth. It gives an empire that just got kicked off OPTIONS for attack, rather than attacking through the same warpgate over and over again which is highly obvious. Please explain to me where the tactics are found in attacking from the same foothold over and over again? You have the same 180 degree angle of attack from the same foothold over and over. If you get booted and the footholds are all broadcasts, you have three different 180 degree angles of attack to choose from, or you can even coordinate pincer movements if you're good enough. A LOT more tactical than footholds.

And where the hell are you getting the idea that if an empire is kicked off it has to attack through the same set points? If an empire is kicked off it can simply form a raid and hit several different areas if it wants. It'd be a lot harder for the dominating empire to defend three broadcast warpgates while worrying about another empire...

There are three empires for a reason. If NC takes all of Indar from TR, VS can launch a raid onto Indar or another NC continent. This will take NC population away from Indar and allow TR to try and establish a new front line somewhere. You act as if the NC would take Indar and have it locked until enough TR log on to actually end it. You expect thousands of NC to just camp every warpgate on the continent and not respond to the VS threat at all? It doesn't happen in PS, it sure as hell won't happen in PS2.

Also, your whole argument that PS is fun in the changes that occur from the repeating of processes is once again, based off of current, terrible PS gameplay. The meta game of PS involved picking which continent you were going to next wisely in order to best corner the other empires and maintain the best domination, the epic fights always resulted in the other empires trying to stop you from doing this or doing this to you.

Once again, you make it sound like the continent will be dominated by an empire, "with the continent under domination of one empire" as in... the whole empire just sits there and guards it, this is not the case.

There will most likely be active and passive resource aquisition.
You will actively gain stockpiles of resources in a nice chunk if you're involved in a successful capture. Passive is the trickle in effect based upon ownership.

Players will mostly be hunting ACTIVELY for the STOCKPILES when they are logged on. It is this element which will keep things dynamic.

If an enemy base has an enormous on-capture stockpile reward (because it hasnt changed hands in a week), empires will become motivated to attack the base just to get at the stockpile. EVEN IF ITS RIGHT NEXT TO A FOOTHOLD. Capping the hex to HOLD IT will not be their primary motivator. The stockpile-on-cap reward will be the reason people bother. After capping they would probably then strike at other adjacent stockpile-heavy hexs with their new capture-time bonus. Its not all about the trickle-in effect of owning bases, if you're playing actively you will want to cap bases to get these stockpiles much more than the trickle-in effect.


Explain please how you will know exactly where on a 64 square kilometer map a raid will attack. Theres no way you can know exactly where the raid is heading when looking at it assemble in a foothold. The raid may even decide to fly through to another continent after assembly, ever think of that?

Even if you have spies at every enemy foothold, you only get the same heads up and intelligence that you would in Planetside 1 if you had spies at every warpgate. You only really know that the raid is attacking the cont you're on when they leave the foothold and start moving.

-RageMasterUK

You will never get to that base next to the enemy foothold exactly because the foothold system won't allow you to. The other empire will start to plow right through your backyard if you even attempted to go towards an enemy foothold. Its going to be a three-way stalemate with front lines that form a triangle in the center of the continents.

Oh, how do I know where on a 64 square kilometer map? Maybe because the enemy foothold is on one square kilometer of that whole thing, and that's the only location they can regroup, so naturally, by some mysterious intelligence, its kind of obvious that they will be attacking that general direction after you push them back into that foothold.

[MasterChief096]

So much flame . . . Here's my 2 cents

The 2 major problems with no sanctuaries are:

1 - With a foothold your staging area is within enemy view. Yes, there is a lot of area you MIGHT be going to, but if the majority of the time you will be hitting the next base, or hitting the base that is about to be captured. I don't care what outfit you are. When you get a call that you are doing a gal drop, it takes time to recall and load up and move, giving the enemy plenty enough time to get air wings or AA set up near your foothold. Also, with the continental link system, your raid could attack from multiple directions. Now the enemy knows exactly where its coming from, and that is your foothold.

2 - I'm afraid to use the term "cont lock", but this was a MAJOR factor in the strategy of the game. I couldn't tell you recently how it is, but in the first 4 years of PS1 there was a huge "meta-game". All the CR5's (before there were a million of them) working together and directing outfits to acquire as much land as possible. It gave the game the depth that no FPS has ever reproduced. By having footholds, this meta-game will be gone. It won't be global war, it will be 1 map (yes huge) with a time limit set to infinite. Especially with only 3 continents (all Population locked) at launch, your entire log session will consist of only 1 of them, never moving on to the next continent. In PS1 I attacked and defended each base on each continent 100 times over. You were eager to log in not to see how the battle is going (though sometimes it ended up being the same battle) but how the WAR is going.

Also, on a side note, some of the most epic battles took place while FIGHTING for our foothold, your first base. You wanted to fight and win over a continent? Then you have to go out there and get it. The amount of teamwork needed to be able to get large enough tank columns, air wings, and fully loaded Gals to take that first base on a heavily defended continent, along with ghost elements harassing the rear, was unbelievable. I felt better after securing a heavily defended foothold then I did when the last base on a continent was secured.

To me some of their decisions are aimed at the CoD and BF fans, trying to draw them in. Are the footholds taking the game to far from the original? In my opinion yes. Is it a deal breaker? No. Just like in PS1, changes are made to the game. You adapt. You overcome. And you either still play the game, or you quit. Me? I'll see you on Auraxis.

Yes. I've already said that I think the footholds are necessary for the three-continent system at launch, and it will essentially be one map with an infinite timer that you don't leave your entire session, but after three bases, moving upwards from five, they are going to need a sanctuary system and footholds will become a hindrance.

[Sephirex]

Some? All of the decisions they chosen for Battlefield Auraxis is dumbing it down for the COD/BF kiddies not us they just want the new casual players for a quick buck,and then sell them 15 dollar DLC or maybe 30 bucks for a super powerful new weapon.They don't care about us veterans! Removal of sanctuaries proves my point!

I believe it's already been stated they don't want to split the community by charging new areas as DLC.
Or releasing super powerful weapons for "30 bucks".
Also they're keeping Planetside 1 up and letting Veterans into the beta first.

I don't know why I'm telling you this. You're obviously quite comfortable in that little ball of rage you've made for yourself.

[Littleman]

There's no convincing the people that want their sanctuaries back that the footholds essentially are sanctuaries, only without the required loading screen between the safe zone and the combat zone.

I'm expecting SOE to turn a deaf ear on this one, as it goes against one of their plans for Planetside 2: get into the fight ASAP.

I can't see SOE someday later removing the bases under the bubbles and linking the gates together like in the old days. I believe the foothold concept is here to stay. Our transport between continents will likely involve visiting a tube and picking a foothold to spawn at.

TL;DR

Sancs are gone. Footholds are here. PS1 was then. PS2 is now.

EDIT: Regarding adding continents. If pops across servers don't pick up to fill the continents, I fully expect they're planning to merge servers until we're all playing on a single super server. Not sure how things will pan out of we can make one toon on each server, and they can all be a different faction though...

Really would like to hear how they'll handle new continents and populations.

[Littleman]

That's probably a lie you know SOE they'll just their mines and make the game PAY2WIN mark my words!

This is dumbing down that your letting SOE get away with it's unacceptable!

I can't even tell if you're being crudely sarcastic (aka, trolling) or not. Too simple. Too much thoughtless rage.

Your name isn't helping either.

On the idea you might be serious however: sanctuaries never gave depth to PS1. The staging area has moved to the warpgates the sanctuaries in PS1 were linked to. Nothing more.

[Stew]

Hey guess what? Having the same three-way stalemate on a continent in which the only fighting happens along the basic, same front lines ad infinitum (which probably constitutes only 10% of the total continent anyways) is an awful waste of continental space. Only by having battles fluid and dynamic can you experience the fight on every square inch of the continent, and being able to kick an empire off a continent would only add to the fluidity.


this is a very wrong statements i can qualified this as Dead wrong !

Why ?

Because the game will be based on ressources and mission systhem the ressources will moove across demultiple HEX regions and force players to get in the piece of continents they did not own and will fracture every piece of regions If the ressource systhem is well done and if people figth for them ALL THE MAP WILL BE USED

Because the dev team will not make the (( middle of the maps )) where equally blue purple red empire meet ;) FULL OF INFINITE RESSOURCES those place will be really fastly depleted

so they will force via the ressources systhem and mission systhem to make players moove across the regions and figth on every piece of territory because ressources will emerge and deplet

The entire trafics over the regions on a continents will be mostly based on the ressources available in each HEX when those are deplet those have no purpose exept if they ahve a very strategic poisition to get another HEx thats worth something !

[InternetZombie]

Some? All of the decisions they chosen for Battlefield Auraxis is dumbing it down for the COD/BF kiddies not us they just want the new casual players for a quick buck,and then sell them 15 dollar DLC or maybe 30 bucks for a super powerful new weapon.

Wow bittervet much. We haven't played the game, we don't know how these things will work out. Have they made decisions that make the game accesible to a larger audience? Yes. Planetside is all about massive combat, without people there is no point in playing Planetside.

They don't care about us veterans! Removal of sanctuaries proves my point!

There giving Vets beta access and have been listening and take suggestions from Vets since day 1. Clearly they don't care what we think /sarcasim

They got rid of sancs because they are barely used, they serve nothing more than a glorified menu. I can see where outfits might be upset that they lost there super secret stagging area and I understand that now we wont be able to completely lock down a continent, but I'm thinking that with the number of people playing Planetside 2 that even if we could lock down a continent it wont happen. This however is all speculation and we will have to wait for beta to see.

TLDR Calm your shit and wait for beta bittervets

[Sifer2]

Personally I will miss Sanctuaries as well. I see this as a step backwards really in game design. My hope is eventually they give us Orbital Sanctuaries. On board space stations or big ships or something. The Hart could be back with a timer now based on different continents as the ship/station orbits over them.

I also hope we get the VR training programs maybe with actual AI for the stuff to fight this time.

[Drakkonan]

Sanctuaries made the game more immersive, and I'm not entirely sure why. I guess I'd just like a place to spawn vehicles for free to practice, and somewhere to hangout and regroup. It doesn't have to slow down the time it takes to get to combat if it's implemented correctly.

[proxy]

Did you know, they wanted sanctuary raids back in PS1 beta?

I feel robbed that they short sold their projected gameplay in this timeline. They don't listen to the alternate timeline vets like me.

[MasterChief096]

I can't even tell if you're being crudely sarcastic (aka, trolling) or not. Too simple. Too much thoughtless rage.

Your name isn't helping either.

On the idea you might be serious however: sanctuaries never gave depth to PS1. The staging area has moved to the warpgates the sanctuaries in PS1 were linked to. Nothing more.

You do realize, footholds won't be effective staging areas.

1. You will probably be able to see what the enemy is massing up, they can make the barrier not visible for enemy empires, but big deal. Instead of seeing the exact details like 22 vanguards, 30 reavers, 10 galaxies, you'll probably be assuming that there is something similar to that waiting to leave the warpgate. The empire will sit there and camp the raid. The raid will push out the same exact way, every single time. Boring. No diversity in how you can raid a continent anymore.

2. People probably won't form raids, instead they'll play the famous planetside warpgate games jumping in and out of the barrier and exchanging useless shots in useless firefights that get nothing done.

With sanctuaries, you push the enemy off continent, the dominating empire disperses because they know that there aren't hundreds of enemies waiting inside the warpgate, and this gives an opportunity for the defeated empire to enter the continent in a different way.

Now I realize, and have already admitted, that with only three continents (bad idea imo, with as much hype as this game is getting they could have easily released with 8 or 10) footholds will be necessary in the beginning, because there aren't enough continents to actually have a flowing fight. Each of the three continents is going to be a 3000 player instance that never changes. Boring again.

The old feeling of taking that last zone on a continent and saying, "This is finished, where are we going next" is gone. Its been replaced with, "We've pushed them into the foothold, fall back and defend against the other empire backhacking us (because we had to devote the manpower to pushing these guys back to the foothold) and we'll lose all the territory we gained anyways because the dudes in the warpgate will just step outside when we go defend the backhacks. Boring again.

Once again, footholds will carry us by for only three continents, but with five or more, there will need to be a system in which enemies (provided they are failing enough) can get booted from the continent to allow the attacking empire to stage another assault somewhere else.

Footholds remove a lot from the game.

1. Resecure outfits - gone and/or highly useless
2. Flowing, continental battles - replaced with three huge instances
3. Sense of achievement in dominating a continent and then moving on to another one - replaced with "which continent do I feel like fighting on today? Its not like anythings changed since I last logged on."

And I'm sorry, if it took you longer than three minutes to get from sanctuary to a fight in PS1, you're an idiot.

You have a HART shuttle, instant action (which btw, is instant, and will be in PS2), and were about 15 seconds from a vehicle pad as soon as you load in. The longest part was probably the loading screen.

[The Degenatron]

Hey guess what? Having the same three-way stalemate on a continent in which the only fighting happens along the basic, same front lines ad infinitum (which probably constitutes only 10% of the total continent anyways) is an awful waste of continental space. Only by having battles fluid and dynamic can you experience the fight on every square inch of the continent, and being able to kick an empire off a continent would only add to the fluidity.

You want to have it both ways. On one hand you say your emipre is going to be able to drive the other two empires right back to their warpgates, and then you turn around and say you CAN'T drive them back to their warp gates. Which is it?

From what I've seen, you CAN drive both of the other Emipres back to their warpgates. You wanna keep the continent "locked"? Then you're gonna have to post armies at the edge of the warp domes to hold in the enemy.

And that's exactly what you DON'T want. You want to be able to drive those armies OUT, so you can turn the lights out, lock the door behind you, and leave the continent UNDEFENDED.

Sorry, that sucks and that's LAME.

But, judging by your asshole-ish response, you probably joined PlanetSide after the huge battles were over when killwhores really started to make a name for themselves, and so you quickly say that anyone with an idea differing than yours is "doing it wrong". Guess what, I started day one on beta, and the game has always been about "the fight itself," guess what again, "the fight itself" used to be really dynamic because we would capture entire continents, move on, and then have to fall back on the defensive to defend those captured continents.

I played every day from Beta to BFRs, and off and on for the last 11 months.

"We use to fall back on the defensive..." What a joke. The zerg only moves forward. I know it and you know it. The closest thing to defending a continent in PS is a global saying that "continent X is being ghost-hacked, send a RRT to base Y". And sure enough about 20 guys would fly to the other continent and kill the five to ten guys trying to neutral a base so they could get a foothold, and then they chase then back to a tower, locking the continent back down, and return to the zerg.

"...move on...", as in leave the continent with a skeleton crew of defenders (at best) and go somewhere else. Well, here's the good news: now if you want to move to a different continent, you don't have to drive the other empires off first. Now you can just go there and fight. Everybody wins.


Umm, when an empire captures a continent, two things can happen. Both empires go after NEW (AKA FRESH) targets, or the empire that just got kicked off comes back and uses a different strategy to take the continent, its not like the continent is gone from the game for good...

That is...IF Empire B has a lattice link onto that continent. Because, once it's locked, you can't pod onto it anymore. If there are no lattice links, well then Empire B doesn't have much choice about going there, do they. They'll have to cap across Continents X and Y from the other direction to get back to continent Z. Meanwhile, the zerg from Empire A is now pushing across continent W with little resistance, beause Empire B has all gone to do that end around, or joined a battle against Empire C. However you play it out, Continent Z get LOCKED and become unplayable for all of the empires because there's NOBODY THERE TO FIGHT.


Then prepare for 90% of the continents to be wasted with the foothold system once the front lines are drawn and nothing ever changes. Yeah have real fun with that.

Again, you want to have it both ways. Either you're going to be able to drive the enemy back to their gate or you're not. Pick one:

If you CAN, well then you'll get to play on every squre inch of every continent all of the time.

If you CAN'T, then it doesn't matter it the gates are foothold or not, because you're never going to drive the enemy to there.

Pick one.

If you are judging locked continents off of RECENT PlanetSide 1, then you have proven to everyone here that you are in fact, a complete noob to PlanetSide.

I'm judging it by the mechanic itself. By it's very definition it means that a continent is not being used.

Once again, you prove that you are a PlanetSide noob. Back in the day, when we would steamroll continents, we would say when we kicked the other empires off that we "locked" the continents for our faction. This did not tangibly LOCK the continent and stop enemies from going there. The term came up from when the continent would become a full shade of blue, red, or purple when an empire owned all the bases, and later when the continental benefit would become locked from your empire until someone else took it. Maybe you should go watch some old PlanetSide youtube videos or something, and actually learn a bit about the game.


"This did not tangibly LOCK the continent and stop enemies from going there."

Oh really?
Can you HART onto a locked continent?
Can you warp to a Broadcast Warpgate from sanctuary to a locked continent?
No, you can't. That sounds pretty "locked" to me.

If you have a lattice link then you can broadcast to an adjacent continent and come through the connecting WG.

And if you DON'T...well, then your only option it is to try and neutral the base and cap it before you get your ass kicked by the RRT.

And if your empire isn't already DOING those things, well then I guess you're just shit outta luck aren't you, because going there alone isn't going to do shit, now is it?

Once again judging off of what? Current PS? Current PS is a GHOST of its former self.

Which is exactly what PS2 will be if you get your way. Logging into a game and finding out that your empire can't even get out of it's sanctuary isn't going to keep people coming back, that's for sure.

And that is EXACTLY what you're arguing for. You want to "own the board" and "win the game". Well, you can't have winners without having losers and no one is going to play if they are locked out.


Not really. Sanctuary can even be instanced, which wouldn't matter a damn bit in the slightest, since no other empire would be able to go there.

Oh brilliant! I can see it now:

"We're forming up a raid, meet at the warp gate. Where is everybody?"
"They're on Sanctuaries 04 and 08, they can't get into this sanctuary because it's pop-locked."
"Ok, we'll meet up on Amerish."
"We can't, it's locked by the TR."
"Ok, we'll meet up on Indar"
"We can't, it's locked by the VS."
"Seriously? STILL?! We've been fighting on Ceryshen for a WEEK now. When the hell are the TR and VS gonna fight each other for a change?"
"They are sir."
"Oh good! Where?"
"Right outside our warpgate, sir."
"F*** THIS I QUIT!!"

Once again, you incorrectly assume that locking a continent in some way shape or form stops all enemies from ever going there again.

It doesn't have to be "ever again". Players should have a choice of where they want to play. Period. Making it so that they can't, for any reason, it bad design.

No, this is completely incorrect. Locking a continent means kicking the other empires off and taking full control of the continent. It does not prohibit the very same enemies from coming back and attempting to retake it. Where are you getting this definition? This isn't even true in PS1 most of the time.

I already explained that above. In practice, continent locks funnels everyone to just a few places. It happens often that a continent has no viable link to it, and the ONLY viable option to get onto that continent is to take a long round about trip, and then trying to neutral a base and cap it before the owners show up and kick you off the continent.

Actually you do.

No, I don't.

I don't get it: what are you wanting?

If you want the continent to be "always open" then that is EXACTLY what you get when you have footholds on each continent. What's the difference between driving them off the continent and having that warpgate be able to produce the enemy at anytime, and just driving them into that dome?

For the first three continents on release, rotating footholds is a better idea than sanctuary.

Rotating footholds? Are you f***ing JOKING? So, I'm fighting across the continent and oops, suddenly the warpgate behind me switch to TR and now MY warpgate is on the other side of the continent, or worst on another continent completely? Your cunning plan, I don't think you've thought it through.

For the future with 5+ continents, sanctuaries are a better idea and footholds should be removed. Once again, for the same reasons.

1. Sense of achievement
2. Keeps battles dynamic by allowing enemies to get kicked off then come back at a completely different location, rather than stalemate along the same three front lines. Even rotating footholds would place empires along the same three front lines, just at ones that the other empires had. You know that "for the fight of it" argument you made? Well guess what, fights would be a lot better if enemies could be pushed off continents. There you go, I didn't say locked, I'll be politically correct and say "enemies being pushed off continent." Does that help you understand?
3. Sanctuaries give people a staging area away from enemy eyes that can be used to launch attacks on different continents at will.

1. Why can't you get a sense of achievement from driving an empire all the way back to their warpgate? Or for taking a base? Or for capturing a tower?

2. You're making a lot of assumptions about the stalemate. Multiple pronged attacks and flanking manuevers could do all sorts of cool things to the front lines. There's no difference from "pushing off the continent" and "pushing into their warpgate". If you can do one, you can do the other.

3. Footholds gives players a choice on which continent to play. Perhaps I don't like Indar. Maybe I never want to play there. With footholds, I have that choice. With no footholds, then I have to go where I'm allowed.

[Littleman]

You do realize, footholds won't be effective staging areas.

1. You will probably be able to see what the enemy is massing up, they can make the barrier not visible for enemy empires, but big deal. Instead of seeing the exact details like 22 vanguards, 30 reavers, 10 galaxies, you'll probably be assuming that there is something similar to that waiting to leave the warpgate. The empire will sit there and camp the raid. The raid will push out the same exact way, every single time. Boring. No diversity in how you can raid a continent anymore.

2. People probably won't form raids, instead they'll play the famous planetside warpgate games jumping in and out of the barrier and exchanging useless shots in useless firefights that get nothing done.

With sanctuaries, you push the enemy off continent, the dominating empire disperses because they know that there aren't hundreds of enemies waiting inside the warpgate, and this gives an opportunity for the defeated empire to enter the continent in a different way.

Now I realize, and have already admitted, that with only three continents (bad idea imo, with as much hype as this game is getting they could have easily released with 8 or 10) footholds will be necessary in the beginning, because there aren't enough continents to actually have a flowing fight. Each of the three continents is going to be a 3000 player instance that never changes. Boring again.

The old feeling of taking that last zone on a continent and saying, "This is finished, where are we going next" is gone. Its been replaced with, "We've pushed them into the foothold, fall back and defend against the other empire backhacking us (because we had to devote the manpower to pushing these guys back to the foothold) and we'll lose all the territory we gained anyways because the dudes in the warpgate will just step outside when we go defend the backhacks. Boring again.

Once again, footholds will carry us by for only three continents, but with five or more, there will need to be a system in which enemies (provided they are failing enough) can get booted from the continent to allow the attacking empire to stage another assault somewhere else.

Footholds remove a lot from the game.

1. Resecure outfits - gone and/or highly useless
2. Flowing, continental battles - replaced with three huge instances
3. Sense of achievement in dominating a continent and then moving on to another one - replaced with "which continent do I feel like fighting on today? Its not like anythings changed since I last logged on."

And I'm sorry, if it took you longer than three minutes to get from sanctuary to a fight in PS1, you're an idiot.

You have a HART shuttle, instant action (which btw, is instant, and will be in PS2), and were about 15 seconds from a vehicle pad as soon as you load in. The longest part was probably the loading screen.

You do realize, you're stuck in the past?

A lot of bold, untested claims forged solely on your imagination and dare I say from sheer lack of thought put into anything in this post, and many of your prior posts too. As I said: the sanctuary staging areas have been moved to the warpgates they were connected to. Nothing more. Sanctuaries won't change anything, they're just glorified server select menus.

By the way, stop talking like SOE couldn't make everyone inside the bubble invisible to everyone outside it. Warpgates in PS2 =/= warpgates from PS1. Get used to it.

[MasterChief096]

You want to have it both ways. On one hand you say your emipre is going to be able to drive the other two empires right back to their warpgates, and then you turn around and say you CAN'T drive them back to their warp gates. Which is it?

From what I've seen, you CAN drive both of the other Emipres back to their warpgates. You wanna keep the continent "locked"? Then you're gonna have to post armies at the edge of the warp domes to hold in the enemy.

So you'll be willing to sit there and camp a warpgate dome for as long as you can hold off both empires until you eventually get pushed back, rather than just kicking the empire off and moving on to another fight?

And that's exactly what you DON'T want. You want to be able to drive those armies OUT, so you can turn the lights out, lock the door behind you, and leave the continent UNDEFENDED.

Sorry, that sucks and that's LAME.

You must have sucked at the whole PS meta-game thing, because you may leave a continent undefended, but you never leave it "unwatched." You always kept eyes on a continent that you took, looking for evidence it was being probed or attacked again. This is where fast response "resecure" outfits came in extreme use.

Why is it lame? You are saying its lame to move on to a new target after fighting for a continent for potentially hours at a time? You want continents to never change indefinitely, and if they do change, you want the FACT in the back of your head that the changes are meaningless because things will just reset back to the normal front lines shortly? Lame.



I played every day from Beta to BFRs, and off and on for the last 11 months.

"We use to fall back on the defensive..." What a joke. The zerg only moves forward. I know it and you know it. The closest thing to defending a continent in PS is a global saying that "continent X is being ghost-hacked, send a RRT to base Y". And sure enough about 20 guys would fly to the other continent and kill the five to ten guys trying to neutral a base so they could get a foothold, and then they chase then back to a tower, locking the continent back down, and return to the zerg.

"...move on...", as in leave the continent with a skeleton crew of defenders (at best) and go somewhere else. Well, here's the good news: now if you want to move to a different continent, you don't have to drive the other empires off first. Now you can just go there and fight. Everybody wins.

The zerg only moves forward if it can. 40% NC versus 60% TR will not move forward. The TR zerg will be moving forward, the NC zerg will be defending. They may move out, pull vehicles, and attack the TR, that does not mean it is actively trying to move forward. Plus there were tons of very large organized outfits that would hold continents on the defensive until the population advantages would switch.

Your example of backhacking and 20 guys resecuring from 10 is literally based on modern day PlanetSide combat, yet you claim you've played through beta and BFRs. If you had played back then, you'd realize that sometimes a damned huge outfit like Sturmgrenadier or The Enclave would invade a continent with 100+ people, requiring another like-minded outfit to go on the defensive until the situation could change.

"Now if you want to move to a different continent, you don't have to drive the other empires off first. Now you can just go there and fight. Everybody wins."

Once again, you are in basically saying you are in favor of three static maps that you choose to go to every day. This is like saying that you're logging on to BF3 and setting your server filter to Metro, and playing metro all day. Depending on how our team does in Metro, the fight changes, we go from outside, to in the metro, to outside again, that doesn't make it persistent. The map will eventually reset and it will all happen the same way.

Now instead of a game mechanic resetting the map, footholds and the three-continent system will reset the "maps" because of how they are naturally set up. This (as I have said) will have to do for the beginning of the game when there are only three continents, but if this system remains the same when they are approaching 10 continents, it will utterly fail. Sure the persistence is in that something is yours until its taken back, but the problem is that everything will naturally be taken and taken back based on the system, so the persistent feel will only go so far.

Oh and guess what, back when PlanetSide's populations were rather large, there were usually two-three poplocks plus some smaller fights to participate in. You STILL got to pick between 3+ continents to fight on, even with continental domination mechanics in place. If I was fighting on poplock Ishundar, there might be a poplock on Searhus and Cyssor that I could choose to leave to before we won on Ishundar, or a smaller fight on Oshur. The ability to kick an empire off the continent was still there, but since there was so many people and so many continents, there was always a fight. The difference was that there was ALWAYS a fight, the fight could CHANGE dramatically based on who won what continents, AND you could get the "Yeah! We took this continent" sense of achievement.


That is...IF Empire B has a lattice link onto that continent. Because, once it's locked, you can't pod onto it anymore. If there are no lattice links, well then Empire B doesn't have much choice about going there, do they. They'll have to cap across Continents X and Y from the other direction to get back to continent Z. Meanwhile, the zerg from Empire A is now pushing across continent W with little resistance, beause Empire B has all gone to do that end around, or joined a battle against Empire C. However you play it out, Continent Z get LOCKED and become unplayable for all of the empires because there's NOBODY THERE TO FIGHT.

Lattice is gone in PS2. HART dropping is changed in PS2. This nullifies pretty much all of this paragraph. Empire A can get kicked off Indar, form a raid in sanctuary, and hit Indar through the opposite warpgate on a different side of the continent. The hex system allows for this to happen. Hell, Empire A could enter Indar from ALL of the warpgates and attempt to take the center of the continent because there is no lattice.


Again, you want to have it both ways. Either you're going to be able to drive the enemy back to their gate or you're not. Pick one:

If you CAN, well then you'll get to play on every squre inch of every continent all of the time.

If you CAN'T, then it doesn't matter it the gates are foothold or not, because you're never going to drive the enemy to there.

Pick one.

Where are you getting the idea that I want both? My platform is that we need a sanctuary system in the future (for 5+ continents IMO) so that empires can be physically booted from a continent allowing the fight to move elsewhere and allowing the booted empire to conceive different attack strategies on continents.

The problem I am addressing with footholds is that its not possible. EACH of the THREE empires has a foothold. Nothing GRAND will ever happen. You may secure 1/3 of the continent and give yourself enough resources to keep playing, but nothing epic will happen to give a sense of achievement. There will be a pie-like triangular division of the continents and that will be all there ever is. One empire may gain a slight edge when its doing well one day but due to the effects of overextending themselves they will never be able to actually hold that territory for a long time or capture the continent (which by the way, is fun, and if you think it wasn't fun in PS1 to capture a continent and stage a raid for the next one, you're a minority).

Sanctuaries add a new level of depth to the meta-game. Kicked off Empire B might not want to go back to Indar, maybe they'll take the kicked off forces and hit Esamir instead, forcing a response from the Empire A forces that won Indar and didn't already leave for other fights. Maybe Empire B's smaller, elite outfits, will go wreak havoc on Indar and force a response from Empire A's smaller, elite outfits.

"This did not tangibly LOCK the continent and stop enemies from going there."

Oh really?
Can you HART onto a locked continent?
Can you warp to a Broadcast Warpgate from sanctuary to a locked continent?
No, you can't. That sounds pretty "locked" to me.

If you have a lattice link then you can broadcast to an adjacent continent and come through the connecting WG.

And if you DON'T...well, then your only option it is to try and neutral the base and cap it before you get your ass kicked by the RRT.

And if your empire isn't already DOING those things, well then I guess you're just shit outta luck aren't you, because going there alone isn't going to do shit, now is it?

I stand corrected on the HART dropping issue, but since PS2 is going to allow you to log directly into a drop pod anyways, I doubt this would be an issue.

On the other hand, yes you could go from sanctuary to a broadcast on the very same continent, if you attacked or owned the continent in the first place, that means that you already had a link to one of the bases, meaning it would probably still be there if you got kicked off, unless you're losing so bad you are on the verge of sanct-lock, which didn't happen often with large populations (happens a lot now, by-product of lower populations).

Which is exactly what PS2 will be if you get your way. Logging into a game and finding out that your empire can't even get out of it's sanctuary isn't going to keep people coming back, that's for sure.

And that is EXACTLY what you're arguing for. You want to "own the board" and "win the game". Well, you can't have winners without having losers and no one is going to play if they are locked out.

I never said I want to "win the game." I'm advocating for a sanctuary system that allows you to win individual continents for a time being and move on. Sanctuary locking an empire back in the day was rare, but when it did happen it was epic. Usually the sanctuary locked empire regained its ground really fast because the dominating empire would start to get its ass kicked by Empire C. Global domination was EXTREMELY rare and didn't last for a very long time at all. I don't care if I see global domination or sanctuary locking, I care if our Empire can take continents, move on, then fall back to defend those continents later depending on the meta-game development.



Oh brilliant! I can see it now:

"We're forming up a raid, meet at the warp gate. Where is everybody?"
"They're on Sanctuaries 04 and 08, they can't get into this sanctuary because it's pop-locked."
"Ok, we'll meet up on Amerish."
"We can't, it's locked by the TR."
"Ok, we'll meet up on Indar"
"We can't, it's locked by the VS."
"Seriously? STILL?! We've been fighting on Ceryshen for a WEEK now. When the hell are the TR and VS gonna fight each other for a change?"
"They are sir."
"Oh good! Where?"
"Right outside our warpgate, sir."
"F*** THIS I QUIT!!"

First of all, the instanced sanctuaries was just an idea. Oh, and that whole situation you outlined above would never happen. Even if sanctuary were a ridiculous amount of instances, say 1000, and there was one player per instance, when they warped to Indar, all one thousand would warp to the SAME Indar.

Second, even if TR and VS were fighting each other right outside of THREE separate warpgates, all of the former footholds (that would count nine warpgates in total) would now be broadcasts, meaning the sanct-locked NC could hit each continent through a combination of three warpgates or focus all their forces in one. Do you seriously think that TR/VS forces tied up with each other outside a warpgate can stop a poplock invasion force on the other side of the continent?

You also assume that empires will be easily sanct-locked. That wasn't the case in PS1, and I extremely doubt it would be the case in PS2.

It doesn't have to be "ever again". Players should have a choice of where they want to play. Period. Making it so that they can't, for any reason, it bad design.

Ok so you want to sacrifice real persistence and a world that can be actually influenced for three-ten 64km maps that always have a fight on it and always have the same front lines. Sounds fun. Just because you can set your server filter in BF3 to any map you want doesn't make it a good persistent world MMOFPS mechanic. Like stated before, with sanctuaries and 5+ continents, there will more than likely be 3+ fights going on anyways. The way you would have it is that 10 continents all have footholds and each continent is poplocked? That would require a lot of people, first of all, to not drain pops and stop big battles from happening, and second of all it would be extremely lame. Persistence would be there, it would just never be used, save hoarding 1/3 of every continents resources for yourselves.

I already explained that above. In practice, continent locks funnels everyone to just a few places. It happens often that a continent has no viable link to it, and the ONLY viable option to get onto that continent is to take a long round about trip, and then trying to neutral a base and cap it before the owners show up and kick you off the continent.

Once again, you're arguing a removed PS1 mechanic - the lattice system. Its been stated that there is no lattice, save you will capture hexes closer to your own hexes faster than ones that are deep inside enemy territory. With footholds being turned into BG warpgates and sanctuaries being added, an empire could attack pretty much any continent it wanted in force.


No, I don't.

I don't get it: what are you wanting?

If you want the continent to be "always open" then that is EXACTLY what you get when you have footholds on each continent. What's the difference between driving them off the continent and having that warpgate be able to produce the enemy at anytime, and just driving them into that dome?

Read above.

Rotating footholds? Are you f***ing JOKING? So, I'm fighting across the continent and oops, suddenly the warpgate behind me switch to TR and now MY warpgate is on the other side of the continent, or worst on another continent completely? Your cunning plan, I don't think you've thought it through.

The footholds wouldn't be rotated during playtime idiot. They would probably be rotated during server maintenance and downtime. It would be scheduled not spontaneous.

1. Why can't you get a sense of achievement from driving an empire all the way back to their warpgate? Or for taking a base? Or for capturing a tower?

2. You're making a lot of assumptions about the stalemate. Multiple pronged attacks and flanking manuevers could do all sorts of cool things to the front lines. There's no difference from "pushing off the continent" and "pushing into their warpgate". If you can do one, you can do the other.

3. Footholds gives players a choice on which continent to play. Perhaps I don't like Indar. Maybe I never want to play there. With footholds, I have that choice. With no footholds, then I have to go where I'm allowed.

1. You do get a sense of achievement for small goals like towers and bases, but the empire's sense of achievement, that you are fighting a persistent war and are in fact playing an MMOFPS, something different from BF3 or COD, would be ENHANCED, not reduced, buy being able to conquer continents.

2. I noted that one empire may be able to gain an edge over another, but it that doesn't mean the edge would last for any substantial amount of time. They would overextend themselves, start getting backhacked by the third empire, and have to send more pop to deal with it, allowing the empire that got owned to go retake the territories it lost.

3. Not true. I already stated that PlanetSide usually had two-three poplocks going and a smaller fight, plus continental domination mechanics in place. Since lattice is gone and replaced with hexes, empires can attack whatever continent they want. You will log in, maybe one fight IS on Indar, but the two-three others will be on other continents. The other six-seven continents will be currently divided up by the other three empires. You can argue, "What if I want to fight on continents six-seven because I don't like the three being fought on?" This would be an extremely erroneous argument. If this is the case, you better damn sure hope you like the three continents that are released at launch, otherwise your shit out of luck man.

Simply put, footholds are necessary for the three continent system at launch. Anything above five continents leading up to ten requires a sanctuary-like system.

Footholds RESTRICT (yes restrict) the fight to a perpetual three-way stalemate that can never be broken or substantially changed for a substantial amount of time.

If you look at one of the biggest complaints in PlanetSide during its days of waning populations, it was stalemated three way battles. There was a couple weeks where I logged on, to see the same damn three way happening on Hossin with a defending empire in Voltan and the two other empires beating their heads together around that base or over Bitol. Footholds make it so that instead of that three way happening by chance, it will be secured by the game's mechanics. People got tired of fighting on Hossin for 2+ days. People will get tired of the same fights on three continents going on ad infinitum for as long as the game lives too. There needs to be a mechanic that gives players the hope and the ability to CHANGE the composition of the world, to meaningfully TAKE over territory, not just push an empire into an indestructible foothold on the very same continent you were fighting for.

Again, footholds will get the game by for its three continent days, but for over five continents you need sanctuaries. Only with more continents and a sanctuary-like system can we return to the good ol' two-way battles that were actually winnable, with the occasional three-way stomp-fest that was occasionally fun.

Well, I guess you wouldn't NEED sanctuaries, but you would need a DIFFERENT system than what footholds have to offer for 5+ continents, something that allows a continent to be won over and then re-invaded without hampering mechanics like the lattice system, etc.

[MasterChief096]

You do realize, you're stuck in the past?

A lot of bold, untested claims forged solely on your imagination and dare I say from sheer lack of thought put into anything in this post, and many of your prior posts too. As I said: the sanctuary staging areas have been moved to the warpgates they were connected to. Nothing more. Sanctuaries won't change anything, they're just glorified server select menus.

By the way, stop talking like SOE couldn't make everyone inside the bubble invisible to everyone outside it. Warpgates in PS2 =/= warpgates from PS1. Get used to it.

Yes I'm stuck in the past by advocating a mechanic in a game that was AHEAD of its time.

Yes my nine years of PlanetSide gameplay (never let my sub drop once, never bought a yearly subscription, I've spent thousands on this game total, including multiple vent and teamspeak servers, multiple websites for outfits, etc) is bold and untested claims I guess, eh? What's that make yours?

If you want to know how sanctuaries would change the game, read my last post.

SOE could make everyone in the bubble invisible, but it would be useless. That bubble would be located in the same corner of the continent forever. Thus, an empire would OBVIOUSLY know where the bubble empire is going to attack from. An empire would OBVIOUSLY know what types of units would be coming out (considering the other two continents would be close to population locks too).

[Blackwolf]

They want people to get in the fight quicker and view sanctuaries as an in-between or middle man.

The 1 thing that I think about with this currently is when the continents are all full, making the server full. Wait in queue to get on your server and then end up waiting on a different continent then your outfit/friends are and wait there anyways.


It might appear post-launch.

Other problem is some people might just log in for some downtime, but their count still applies directly towards the continental capacity. People screwed around in the sanct all the time, ANT demo derbys? Organizing raids was another thing that occured in sanct.

Now all of this activity will apply directly to continental pop caps. I don't see it working out so well especially at launch, and I think the DEVs are drastically under estimating just how big this game will be right at launch.

[Radaeron]

I can see why they dropped sancs. I don't mind so much.

As far as derbies and the like go. I'm sure similar events will be held ;) will be looking to do some myself.

[Littleman]

Yes I'm stuck in the past by advocating a mechanic in a game that was AHEAD of its time.

Yes my nine years of PlanetSide gameplay (never let my sub drop once, never bought a yearly subscription, I've spent thousands on this game total, including multiple vent and teamspeak servers, multiple websites for outfits, etc) is bold and untested claims I guess, eh? What's that make yours?

No less than yours, but these expenses don't prove the necessity of sanctuaries...[/color]

If you want to know how sanctuaries would change the game, read my last post.

SOE could make everyone in the bubble invisible, but it would be useless. That bubble would be located in the same corner of the continent forever. Thus, an empire would OBVIOUSLY know where the bubble empire is going to attack from. An empire would OBVIOUSLY know what types of units would be coming out (considering the other two continents would be close to population locks too).

You're imaginings are worthless to me. They're not based on anything but what you want to believe. I can see footholds for what they are.

Sanctuaries. Are. Obsolete.

You're trying too hard to argue against what was a clear design decision, with a helluva lot more thought put into it then you could even hope to match and don't you doubt that.

[noxious]

Without continent locks there is no difference between footholds and sanctuaries. In PlanetSide you would travel to the continents via the HART, or via warpgates. In PlanetSide 2 you will travel to the continents via missions (dropping you where the fight is, so basically the HART replacement) or via warpgates (which happen to be footholds).

In both PlanetSide and PlanetSide 2 there are two methods for getting to the fights; drop right on top of them, or enter via the warpgate. The fact that there are no more sanctuaries doesn't make a difference. It's the lack of continent locks that should be lamented, if anything.

[GrayWave]

"Disgrace" is waaaayyy too strong a word to use before any of us have even played it. Geez.

This game is Planetside 2, not Planetside 1: 2012 Edition.

[Littleman]

Without continent locks there is no difference between footholds and sanctuaries. In PlanetSide you would travel to the continents via the HART, or via warpgates. In PlanetSide 2 you will travel to the continents via missions (dropping you where the fight is, so basically the HART replacement) or via warpgates (which happen to be footholds).

In both PlanetSide and PlanetSide 2 there are two methods for getting to the fights; drop right on top of them, or enter via the warpgate. The fact that there are no more sanctuaries doesn't make a difference. It's the lack of continent locks that should be lamented, if anything.

The issue here is what determines breaking the lock? A certain continent needs to be completely controlled by the invading empire? A count down timer?

Locks worked well in PS1 because of the lattice system. Once one took a base connected to one on another continent, that continent was unlocked.

In PS2, we have hexes. Sure, we could say warpgates should be linked, but what determines when a faction can't move through said warpgate to the locked continent? Owning the entire continent? Adjacent hexes? Is the continent unlocked until the winning empire takes hexes in the next continent BEYOND the warpgate?

I think footholds are the simpler method. The obvious sacrifice is essentially losing the sense of victory in completely booting the enemy off the continent. It's still not impossible for SOE to introduce continent locks even with footholds however, as logically it would just deny spawning at said footholds!

Yet, I imagine everything will work itself out in the end. Either the servers keep rising to fill new landmasses, or servers are merged as they're introduced until we're all on one super server fighting for Auraxis, or just as naturally, certain continents will see a majority of players while small tactical units harass an undisputed continent and the ever coveted fast response outfits can throw their 100 men at those 7 ghost hacking a tower somewhere.

People will naturally gravitate towards where the battles are raging. There doesn't need to be continental lock outs to facilitate that. If we have so many people playing all continents are being fought over all the time, then we'll likely never need worry about anyone achieving a victory scenario anyway.

[Sifer2]

Other problem is some people might just log in for some downtime, but their count still applies directly towards the continental capacity. People screwed around in the sanct all the time, ANT demo derbys? Organizing raids was another thing that occured in sanct.

Now all of this activity will apply directly to continental pop caps. I don't see it working out so well especially at launch, and I think the DEVs are drastically under estimating just how big this game will be right at launch.



That is a really excellent point actually. Something the developers probably have not considered. Lots of people blindly defending the foothold decision that will be flip flopping, and supporting the return of Sanctuary mechanic come beta I think.

The only way I can really see it working is for them to fundamentally change how the servers work, and just instance the hell out of the continents. Because there are only 3 of them with a cap of 666 players of your faction at once. Either there will be huge que's to get into a continent or it will need to be instanced like crazy.

Which will ultimately feel like a huge step backwards metagame wise. Which is bad as that was the primary flaw of PS1 to begin with. Before even BFR's that was everyone's big complaint was you took a base before bed then woke up to have it back in enemy hands. The new system seems to be designed to amplify this, and probably make it even more meaningless if i'm right about the necessary instancing.

[Wayside]

The thing I loved about PlanetSide was the fact each faction always had a "home". Somewhere we could regroup, plan and initiate group activities such as raids. Being part of a raid was always special in this game and they were the moments I remember most.

Why are they not in PS2? I can't help but feel this new PlanetSide experience is going to be a downgraded version (bar graphics) of something released nearly 10 years ago. It's things like this that lead me to believe SOE are rushing this game.

I don't know that I'll miss sanctuaries as an idea, but I'll miss some of the stuff they contained. Like the VR Training rooms. Especially with the introduction of so many modifications for each weapon and vehicle. Would be great to have a place to "test drive" a potential mod. Especially if you're thinking of dropping real-world money for it.

But they could put that anywhere. Drop a VR Training building in each of the empire strongholds on each continent. Doesn't have to be in one specific place.

[Dougnifico]

I still think all of these concerns would be solved with an expansion to have home continents. Basically, sactuaries that can be invaded with a capitol, citadel, or home base that is the only true safe area. You have a home and all game space is combat viable. These continents may be smaller as they might not as often be used. They should also give more advantage to the defender the closer the fight gets to the capitol.

With this, we could then use warpgates as footholds that can change hands. If you hold all territory adjacent to either end of the gate, it becomes a foothold safe zone. You can also do this and bring back a world lattice system just between continents, or all footholds can be general warp centers to any other gates held as a foothold, but still have a partner that is synced to it. If one of the pair is unlocked, the connection becomes open to all; everything a free fire zone.

[The Degenatron]

So you'll be willing to sit there and camp a warpgate dome for as long as you can hold off both empires...

"Son, we live in a world that has walls, and those walls have to be guarded by men with guns. Who's gonna do it? You?" - Jack Nicolson (A Few Good Men)

...because you may leave a continent undefended, but you never leave it "unwatched." You always kept eyes on a continent that you took, looking for evidence it was being probed or attacked again.

Having a CR5 glance at an empty continent on a map ever 10 minutes is not a good use of of game content, server space, or rented (and very expensive) bandwidth.

Why is it lame?....

It's lame because it allows you the luxury of not defending a continent. It leaves servers empty and unused.

The zerg only moves forward if it can. 40% NC versus 60% TR will not move forward...

How is that in any way a contradiction to what I said? The point I was making was that once that zerg is done "zerging-out" on a continent - the action is over. No one stays behind to defend.

If anything, it's an advocation of the new system: One side get routed and barely hangs on UNTIL POPULATIONS ARE EQUAL, and then it becomes a really good fight. Poplutations will eb and flow in PS2 just as in PS1.

...sometimes a damned huge outfit like Sturmgrenadier or The Enclave would invade a continent with 100+ people, requiring another like-minded outfit to go on the defensive until the situation could change.

Or, that outfit would sweep through an uncontested continent in two hours, because the owning empire was poplocking two or three other continents and no one wanted to pull off of the good fights to go to a losing fight.

Once again, you are in basically saying you are in favor of three static maps that you choose to go to every day. This is like saying that you're logging on to BF3 and setting your server filter to Metro...

And what you are saying is like BF3 telling you "You don't get to play Metro today because you suck. You have to play Seine until you earn the right to play on Metro again. We don't care if Metro is your favorite map." (Really? Metro? That map sucks. It's just just funnel that turns into a turkey shoot every time.)

Now instead of a game mechanic resetting the map, footholds and the three-continent system will reset the "maps"...

Again, you're wanting to have it both ways by saying that the mere presence of a foothold automatically means that the continents will reach equalibrium in a 10 continent server. You assume that a warpgate foothold (WGFH) equals poplock. It doesn't. Only if there are enough people to poplock every single continent would your fears be realized. And here's the thing, that exact same scenario would happen in PS1 TODAY if there were enough people to poplock every continent. If PS1 had the sustained population, then the exact same thing would occur: all of the continents would reach an equalibrium and a constant state of conflict. If any continent became locked in that situation, then by todays PS1 rules that would mean that you'd end up with 333 of the owning empires soldiers sitting on that locked contient with no place to go but to sit in a warpgate hoping someone would drop from one of the poplocked continents and meanwhile the other two empires have 333 soldiers each in their sanctuaries sitting in the warpgates waiting to get out. The ONE thing they COULDN'T do: go back to the continent they just got kicked off of because IT'S LOCKED: You can't droppod on it, you can't broadcast to it, you can't warp to the adjacent continents because those are all POPLOCKED. You're stuck in sanctuary. Time to log off. That's bad design.

So now you say that having footholds makes every continent stalemated. Wrong, not without the global population to poplock every continent. And if that's the case, then it's GOOD that a player can go to the one continent that's NOT poplocked because it has a foothold on it and that he can go directly to it.

If on the other hand, there's not a large enough population to poplock every continent then you will see ebs and flows of ownership on the different continents. They won't be stalemated. You'll be able to look at a map and see that it's all blue, or all red, or all purple. The WGFHs aren't going to change that.

The ONLY reason to NOT have WGFHs to to prevent the other empires from coming back.

...back when PlanetSide's populations were rather large...You STILL got to pick between 3+ continents to fight on, even with continental domination mechanics in place. If I was fighting on poplock Ishundar, there might be a poplock on Searhus and Cyssor that I could choose to leave to before we won on Ishundar

See, this makes me think that you don't know what you're talking about. Poplock means no one else can come in because the continent is POPulation LOCKed You couldn't leave for one of the others, or yea I guess you COULD, but that would mean sitting in line at a warpgate waiting to get in - so why the hell would you do that?

What I don't understand is why you couldn't get that same "Yeah! We took this continent" sense of achievement with WGFHs present?

Lattice is gone in PS2. HART dropping is changed in PS2...hit Indar through the opposite warpgate on a different side of the continent...Hell, Empire A could enter Indar from ALL of the warpgates and attempt to take the center of the continent because there is no lattice.

The only way to make what you're talking about work is to reinstitute a form of the lattice system between the warpgates. A warpgate could only be linked to one other warpgate and then each empire would have it's WGFH on one single continent. THAT is why I keep talking about the lattice system. And the droppod system is even more restrictive now, so I don't see your point there.

Ok, here is where your cunning plan totally breaks down. I'm fighting across Indar when all of the sudden I'm getting shot in the back because the TR came through the warpgate BEHIND me? Oh wait, those warpgate guards you hate so much, I guess they'll have to be stationed at your own warpgate just to watch your back while trying to take a continent. How rediculous is THAT? Bad idea all the way around.

Where are you getting the idea that I want both? My platform is that we need a sanctuary system in the future (for 5+ continents IMO) so that empires can be physically booted from a continent allowing the fight to move elsewhere and allowing the booted empire to conceive different attack strategies on continents.

Let me explain that phrase since it's meaning totally escaped you the first time. When I say "you want it both ways", I mean that you want to argue the point from both directions. You are assuming the worst from both systems and saying that those BOTH will happen. That is fundimentally wrong. You say "We CAN drive people right back to their dome and therefore we need the domes to be neutral so we can drive them OUT of the continent" and then you say "we can't break the stalemate at the frontlines so we'll never get to see those other 2/3 of the map". That's wanting to "have it both ways", aka "having your cake and eating it too". Either you ARE going to be able to drive people back to their warpgates, which means by default that you have broken the frontline stalemate OR you can't break the fronline stalemate and therefore will NEVER drive the enemy back to their warpgate and therefore it doesn't matter if the gates are neutral or not. Pick one.

For example, you think that not having WGFHs means you can go somewhere else when the battle is over. But at the same time you say that either of the other two empires can come pouring through any of the three warpgates at any time. What makes you think you'll even get halfway across a continent before the other empires come flooding out of the other gates? There will be no pushing anyone off anything with that system.

The problem I am addressing with footholds is that its not possible...

Populations being equal. Which is exactly what happens in PS1 now. Continents can be contested for days when the populations stay balanced and stable on them. When the populations are uneven, then the lines move.

Sanctuaries add a new level of depth to the meta-game...

Sanctuaries don't promote that and WGFHs don't preclude it.

I stand corrected on the HART dropping issue, but since PS2 is going to allow you to log directly into a drop pod anyways, I doubt this would be an issue.

Nope, you'll only be able to drop on your squad.

On the other hand, yes you could go from sanctuary to a broadcast on the very same continent, if you attacked or owned the continent in the first place, that means that you already had a link to one of the bases

Empires don't get kicked off of continents and continents don't get locked unless all bases are lost. Why do I have to explain that to a "9 year vet"?

It sounds to me like you are getting "Locked Continent", "Poplocked Continent", and "Sanc-Locked" all mixed up in your head.

I never said I want to "win the game." I'm advocating for a sanctuary system that allows you to win individual continents for a time being and move on....

"win individual continents for a time being" - How long? How long are you goign to keep players from playing on cerain continents? 1 Second? 1 Minute? 1 Hour? 1 Day? It sounds to me like you're saying "indefinately as long as it can be held." Thats bad design. How many possible paying customers should SOE write off to stoke your empires ego?

"Sanctuary locking an empire back in the day was rare, but when it did happen it was epic." - Epicly bad if you're on the losing team.

WGFHs don't stop you from taking an entire continent.

First of all, the instanced sanctuaries was just an idea....would warp to the SAME Indar.

Yea, a bad idea.
And I never even implied the continents would be instanced.

Second, even if TR and VS were fighting each other right outside of THREE separate warpgates...

Having all three WG on every continent open all of the time is an awful idea. You complain about not having any way to win and hold ground but you are totally fine with empires being able to attack you from which ever direction? The reason why I assume a lattice link style connection between warpgates when talking about this is because it's the ONLY way to make it work.

You also assume that empires will be easily sanct-locked. That wasn't the case in PS1, and I extremely doubt it would be the case in PS2.

When continents can be locked, then empires can get sanc-locked. It may not be easy, but possible is bad enough. It should NEVER be possible. Ever.

Ok so you want to sacrifice real persistence...

Again, it has nothing to do with the function of the warpgates and has EVERYTHING to do with the Global Population. Noting is stopping an empire from capping all hexes on a continent except the other empires. And here's the wierd thing, you then turn around and say that all three warpgates on each continent should be broadcast warpgates so that just makes your "problem" three times worse. Every continent should have a foothold, absolutely. I don't see how that's any worse than a sanc with a connection to all of the warpgates on all of the continents. Seems to me that would REALLY hurt your meta-game. I don't undstand what you mean about the poplocks.

Once again, you're arguing a removed PS1 mechanic - the lattice system. Its been stated that there is no lattice, save you will capture hexes closer to your own hexes faster than ones that are deep inside enemy territory. With footholds being turned into BG warpgates and sanctuaries being added, an empire could attack pretty much any continent it wanted in force.

They can do that without sanctuaries or broadcast warpgates. And instead of "Lattice system", from now on I'll say "paired Gate System", since that most closely describes what I mean.

The footholds wouldn't be rotated during playtime idiot. They would probably be rotated during server maintenance and downtime. It would be scheduled not spontaneous.

Wow, a bad idea just got worse. Now you're talking about world resets. No thanks.


1. You do get a sense of achievement for small goals like towers and bases, but the empire's sense of achievement, that you are fighting a persistent war and are in fact playing an MMOFPS, something different from BF3 or COD, would be ENHANCED, not reduced, buy being able to conquer continents.

I think the 2000 players trying to kill me all at once are going to be a sufficient reminder that I'm not playing Bf3. Also, the fact that I can travel over miles and miles of territory; I think that's going to be a pretty good reminder too.

I fully expect continents to be conquered - flipped all to one color. WGFHs aren't gonna change that.

2. I noted that one empire may be able to gain an edge over another, but it that doesn't mean the edge would last for any substantial amount of time. They would overextend themselves, start getting backhacked by the third empire, and have to send more pop to deal with it, allowing the empire that got owned to go retake the territories it lost.

Sooooo...just like what happens in the PS1 meta-game. No difference at all. So tell me again what so important about kicking Empires off of continents?

3. Not true. I already stated that PlanetSide usually had two-three poplocks going and a smaller fight, plus continental domination mechanics in place...

I find it rather telling that you describe the idea of giving players ALL the options of where they want to fight as "erroneous". I don't think giving player an opportunity to play on whichever continent they want is wrong or outside the norm at all.

And again I think you're confused: Poplocks are where you'd see the three empires evenly matched. Absence of poplocks means you'd seen one empire dominating.

Simply put, footholds are necessary for the three continent system at launch. Anything above five continents leading up to ten requires a sanctuary-like system.

Footholds RESTRICT (yes restrict) the fight to a perpetual three-way stalemate that can never be broken or substantially changed for a substantial amount of time.

No, they won't. The best system is the one that scales without major changes. Just because Empire C has a foothold warpgate on a continent does automatically mean they will be sending their full forces.



...There needs to be a mechanic that gives players the hope and the ability to CHANGE the composition of the world, to meaningfully TAKE over territory, not just push an empire into an indestructible foothold on the very same continent you were fighting for.

WHY? If the enemy can come pouring right back out of the thing one way or another, what the hell does it matter? What you are wanting is three times WORSE. You're wanting to have Empire C get pushed back to their warpgate, only to have them pouring out of the other two warpgates before you can even finish.

Again, footholds will get the game by for its three continent days, but for over five continents you need sanctuaries. Only with more continents and a sanctuary-like system can we return to the good ol' two-way battles that were actually winnable, with the occasional three-way stomp-fest that was occasionally fun.

OH! So THAT'S what this all about?! You hate 3-way battles? Boy, did YOU sign up for the wrong game.

Well, I guess you wouldn't NEED sanctuaries, but you would need a DIFFERENT system than what footholds have to offer for 5+ continents, something that allows a continent to be won over and then re-invaded without hampering mechanics like the lattice system, etc.

The closest thing to that would be the "Paired Wapgates" I was talking about, with a single "Home Dome" for each empire, each located on a different continent. But, again, that would lead to whole continents being sectioned off from the other two empires, and that ends up being wasted space.

[ODonnell]

Degenatron, can we expect more walls of text on the 666th forums? :lol:

[PredatorFour]

Degenatron ...."See, this makes me think that you don't know what you're talking about. Poplock means no one else can come in because the continent is POPulation LOCKed You couldn't leave for one of the others, or yea I guess you COULD, but that would mean sitting in line at a warpgate waiting to get in - so why the hell would you do that?


Well he would maybe do what i used to do and go make a coffee/tea or roll a smoke or something. Also we have a little special ability called patience. Go look it up ;)

[MrBloodworth]

There are footholds which are the exact same thing as a sanc.

This is incorrect.

[MasterChief096]

"Son, we live in a world that has walls, and those walls have to be guarded by men with guns. Who's gonna do it? You?" - Jack Nicolson (A Few Good Men)



1. Having a CR5 glance at an empty continent on a map ever 10 minutes is not a good use of of game content, server space, or rented (and very expensive) bandwidth.



2. It's lame because it allows you the luxury of not defending a continent. It leaves servers empty and unused.



3. How is that in any way a contradiction to what I said? The point I was making was that once that zerg is done "zerging-out" on a continent - the action is over. No one stays behind to defend.

4. If anything, it's an advocation of the new system: One side get routed and barely hangs on UNTIL POPULATIONS ARE EQUAL, and then it becomes a really good fight. Poplutations will eb and flow in PS2 just as in PS1.


5. Or, that outfit would sweep through an uncontested continent in two hours, because the owning empire was poplocking two or three other continents and no one wanted to pull off of the good fights to go to a losing fight.



6. And what you are saying is like BF3 telling you "You don't get to play Metro today because you suck. You have to play Seine until you earn the right to play on Metro again. We don't care if Metro is your favorite map." (Really? Metro? That map sucks. It's just just funnel that turns into a turkey shoot every time.)



7. Again, you're wanting to have it both ways by saying that the mere presence of a foothold automatically means that the continents will reach equalibrium in a 10 continent server. You assume that a warpgate foothold (WGFH) equals poplock. It doesn't. Only if there are enough people to poplock every single continent would your fears be realized. And here's the thing, that exact same scenario would happen in PS1 TODAY if there were enough people to poplock every continent. If PS1 had the sustained population, then the exact same thing would occur: all of the continents would reach an equalibrium and a constant state of conflict. If any continent became locked in that situation, then by todays PS1 rules that would mean that you'd end up with 333 of the owning empires soldiers sitting on that locked contient with no place to go but to sit in a warpgate hoping someone would drop from one of the poplocked continents and meanwhile the other two empires have 333 soldiers each in their sanctuaries sitting in the warpgates waiting to get out. The ONE thing they COULDN'T do: go back to the continent they just got kicked off of because IT'S LOCKED: You can't droppod on it, you can't broadcast to it, you can't warp to the adjacent continents because those are all POPLOCKED. You're stuck in sanctuary. Time to log off. That's bad design.

8. So now you say that having footholds makes every continent stalemated. Wrong, not without the global population to poplock every continent. And if that's the case, then it's GOOD that a player can go to the one continent that's NOT poplocked because it has a foothold on it and that he can go directly to it.

9. If on the other hand, there's not a large enough population to poplock every continent then you will see ebs and flows of ownership on the different continents. They won't be stalemated. You'll be able to look at a map and see that it's all blue, or all red, or all purple. The WGFHs aren't going to change that.

10. The ONLY reason to NOT have WGFHs to to prevent the other empires from coming back.



11. See, this makes me think that you don't know what you're talking about. Poplock means no one else can come in because the continent is POPulation LOCKed You couldn't leave for one of the others, or yea I guess you COULD, but that would mean sitting in line at a warpgate waiting to get in - so why the hell would you do that?

12. What I don't understand is why you couldn't get that same "Yeah! We took this continent" sense of achievement with WGFHs present?



13. The only way to make what you're talking about work is to reinstitute a form of the lattice system between the warpgates. A warpgate could only be linked to one other warpgate and then each empire would have it's WGFH on one single continent. THAT is why I keep talking about the lattice system. And the droppod system is even more restrictive now, so I don't see your point there.

14. Ok, here is where your cunning plan totally breaks down. I'm fighting across Indar when all of the sudden I'm getting shot in the back because the TR came through the warpgate BEHIND me? Oh wait, those warpgate guards you hate so much, I guess they'll have to be stationed at your own warpgate just to watch your back while trying to take a continent. How rediculous is THAT? Bad idea all the way around.



15. Let me explain that phrase since it's meaning totally escaped you the first time. When I say "you want it both ways", I mean that you want to argue the point from both directions. You are assuming the worst from both systems and saying that those BOTH will happen. That is fundimentally wrong. You say "We CAN drive people right back to their dome and therefore we need the domes to be neutral so we can drive them OUT of the continent" and then you say "we can't break the stalemate at the frontlines so we'll never get to see those other 2/3 of the map". That's wanting to "have it both ways", aka "having your cake and eating it too". Either you ARE going to be able to drive people back to their warpgates, which means by default that you have broken the frontline stalemate OR you can't break the fronline stalemate and therefore will NEVER drive the enemy back to their warpgate and therefore it doesn't matter if the gates are neutral or not. Pick one.

16. For example, you think that not having WGFHs means you can go somewhere else when the battle is over. But at the same time you say that either of the other two empires can come pouring through any of the three warpgates at any time. What makes you think you'll even get halfway across a continent before the other empires come flooding out of the other gates? There will be no pushing anyone off anything with that system.



17. Populations being equal. Which is exactly what happens in PS1 now. Continents can be contested for days when the populations stay balanced and stable on them. When the populations are uneven, then the lines move.



18. Sanctuaries don't promote that and WGFHs don't preclude it.



19. Nope, you'll only be able to drop on your squad.



20. Empires don't get kicked off of continents and continents don't get locked unless all bases are lost. Why do I have to explain that to a "9 year vet"?

It sounds to me like you are getting "Locked Continent", "Poplocked Continent", and "Sanc-Locked" all mixed up in your head.



21. "win individual continents for a time being" - How long? How long are you goign to keep players from playing on cerain continents? 1 Second? 1 Minute? 1 Hour? 1 Day? It sounds to me like you're saying "indefinately as long as it can be held." Thats bad design. How many possible paying customers should SOE write off to stoke your empires ego?

"Sanctuary locking an empire back in the day was rare, but when it did happen it was epic." - Epicly bad if you're on the losing team.

WGFHs don't stop you from taking an entire continent.



22. Yea, a bad idea.
And I never even implied the continents would be instanced.



23. Having all three WG on every continent open all of the time is an awful idea. You complain about not having any way to win and hold ground but you are totally fine with empires being able to attack you from which ever direction? The reason why I assume a lattice link style connection between warpgates when talking about this is because it's the ONLY way to make it work.



24. When continents can be locked, then empires can get sanc-locked. It may not be easy, but possible is bad enough. It should NEVER be possible. Ever.



25. Again, it has nothing to do with the function of the warpgates and has EVERYTHING to do with the Global Population. Noting is stopping an empire from capping all hexes on a continent except the other empires. And here's the wierd thing, you then turn around and say that all three warpgates on each continent should be broadcast warpgates so that just makes your "problem" three times worse. Every continent should have a foothold, absolutely. I don't see how that's any worse than a sanc with a connection to all of the warpgates on all of the continents. Seems to me that would REALLY hurt your meta-game. I don't undstand what you mean about the poplocks.



26. They can do that without sanctuaries or broadcast warpgates. And instead of "Lattice system", from now on I'll say "paired Gate System", since that most closely describes what I mean.



27. Wow, a bad idea just got worse. Now you're talking about world resets. No thanks.




28. I think the 2000 players trying to kill me all at once are going to be a sufficient reminder that I'm not playing Bf3. Also, the fact that I can travel over miles and miles of territory; I think that's going to be a pretty good reminder too.

I fully expect continents to be conquered - flipped all to one color. WGFHs aren't gonna change that.



29. Sooooo...just like what happens in the PS1 meta-game. No difference at all. So tell me again what so important about kicking Empires off of continents?



30. I find it rather telling that you describe the idea of giving players ALL the options of where they want to fight as "erroneous". I don't think giving player an opportunity to play on whichever continent they want is wrong or outside the norm at all.

And again I think you're confused: Poplocks are where you'd see the three empires evenly matched. Absence of poplocks means you'd seen one empire dominating.



31. No, they won't. The best system is the one that scales without major changes. Just because Empire C has a foothold warpgate on a continent does automatically mean they will be sending their full forces.





32. WHY? If the enemy can come pouring right back out of the thing one way or another, what the hell does it matter? What you are wanting is three times WORSE. You're wanting to have Empire C get pushed back to their warpgate, only to have them pouring out of the other two warpgates before you can even finish.



33. OH! So THAT'S what this all about?! You hate 3-way battles? Boy, did YOU sign up for the wrong game.



34. The closest thing to that would be the "Paired Wapgates" I was talking about, with a single "Home Dome" for each empire, each located on a different continent. But, again, that would lead to whole continents being sectioned off from the other two empires, and that ends up being wasted space.

I numbered your points in order to avoid having to splice the quote and get all technical.

1. Well, a lot of people did enjoy the "watch and resecure" game of keeping conquered continents in check and responding to hacks on them in force. Its a highly opinionated claim to say that its wasted content when its a perfectly fun and interesting mechanic of the game that gave it a unique feel that you had territory, and the enemy tried to take that territory in a number of ways.

2. It doesn't leave the luxury of not defending a continent. You have to go to defend it if the enemy shows up. Where are you getting that you take the continent, leave, and never go back? I haven't advocated for a mechanic that gives you control of the continent on like a timer or something.

3. I have never once seen 40% of Empire A leave a continent against 60% of Empire B simply because the zerg was done "zerging out" and couldn't be on the offensive anymore. In fact, that was one of the largest command problems, immovable amounts of zerglings that we needed elsewhere to help out but simply wouldn't get off the continent that was lost.

4. Not with only three-continents. This is why I'm advocating a re-introduction of sanctuaries at 5+ continents. With only three continents in the game and with as much hype as this game has, we can safely assume that all three continents will be near a population lock most of the time.

5. Yes this would occasionally happen, but usually there was a defense force mustered from the leadership of outfits. The New Conglomerate Alliance on Emerald was a notable example.

6. Except with sanctuaries and broadcasts, you could still choose whatever continent you want to fight on.

7. I am fully aware that on a 10 continent server, there wouldn't be enough population to poplock all 10 continents, that's not the point. The point is why on a 10 continent server would we give every empire an unconquerable foothold that they can use to play stupid "hack and run" games with without actually having to fight for that foothold? If players are going to be able to go to any continent they want, at least make them fight for a foothold so that when the 40 guys who want to run ops on a continent don't have a perma-base with everything you need in it without having to do anything to get it. You are completely right about PS1. If all 10 continents were poplocked, the whole game would be a constant state of equilibrium. This is exactly what PS2 will be like while having only three continents. Since there is nothing I can do to change how many continents the game will release with, I've already stated I think footholds are the necessary mechanic for launch and only three continents, since all three will most likely be poplocked all the time anyways or close to it.

8. Yes, the three continents will most likely always be nearing or at a poplock at launch. No, its not good if a player can go straight from a poplock to another continent that has no one on it via his foothold there, he should have to attack the damn continent and the owner of it, secure his foothold, and then push.

9. I agree. But at launch with only three continents this won't happen.

10. Not necessarily. I don't want it so that the enemy empires can't come back. I just want it so that they aren't protected by some care bear mechanic that allows them to never have a worry of losing. And I use the word losing in a broad way. I am not in favor of being able to perma-beat an empire in any sort of way.

11. Maybe because that's what you have to do? If three continents are poplocked and you want to get on, you have to wait. This is how its been done in MMOs for a very long time.

12. Because you don't take the continent.

13. I suppose that would work, but I would prefer if WGFH's could be captured like any other piece of territory in the game, and then have a warpgate lattice system AND a sanctuary. Perhaps certain rules for being able to assault a foothold could be in place? Like 85% of the territory on continent must be held by your empire or something to that effect? I misinterpreted what you were meaning by lattice, I thought you were referring to the old PS system in which every base was lattice linked, but I just now realized you are talking about a warpgate only lattice system.

14. This happens in PS1 anyways, and besides, if every empire can use the warpgates, then it wouldn't really be that big of a deal. And if Empire A went through a warpgate behind your territory, it'd be extremely slow for them to cap territory since none of their empire's hexes are close to them.

15. Ok I see what you mean by the phrase, and you are partially right. I agree that we will be able to drive people back to their dome, but not with three continents. I've already blabbed on long enough about how only three continents and the hype this game has will mean that all three continents are locked in a perpetual 3-way stalemate. So I guess you are right in the sense that I want both, to be able to drive enemies back to the WGFH's and take the continent, but I've made the distinction that for only three continents WGFH's will be necessary.

16. Well I don't see it as being as chaotic as you envision. Just because empires have access to all warpgates doesn't mean they'll pull together the miraculous organization to launch a raid through all of them simultaneously. You'll get your pesky fast-action outfits that go behind lines but you'll have counter-outfits to those types of guys too. If there weren't foothold installations, then the WG's would just be WG's and the empires wouldn't be able to use them as an uber base that has all needs supplied.

17. I agree here.

18. Well, there's the key difference. Sanctuaries will promote it after 5+ continents are in the game, and WGFH's are basically useless to do anything about promoting it with the current three continents since three continents is not nearly enough for the scale this game will become in the future.

19. I thought I remember Higby in an interview stating that when you first log in you can opt to drop pod in anywhere, and its a one-shot deal, as you can't die after you drop pod and do it again unless the squad leader has the ability for you to. He said it was just another way to log in and enter combat quickly, but you can only do it once. I might be wrong but I'm fairly certain I heard this.

20. You misunderstood what I said. I meant that an empire could go back to a continent that they just lost. Lets use an example. NC has a link to Oshur from Amerish. NC takes Oshur. VS attacks, pushes NC off of Oshur. NC can go back to Oshur through the same WG link that comes from Amerish. Yes if the continent is locked then you can't drop pod there, but nothing stops NC from going back at all, unless VS/TR take the base on Amerish that provides the Oshur link.

Continued in next post (character count, LOL, never done that in a forum before).

[MasterChief096]

21. How is it bad design to incorporate continental domination mechanics in a persistent world MMOFPS? If anyting, if one empire is doing REALLY bad and only owns say, two continents (out of 10), then it will be a really epic and motivating moment to go back on the offensive and regain some territory. People didn't complain about not being able to fight on every continent in PS1. Instead everyone knew that eventually the fight would probably move there, and they just enjoyed the movement of battles instead. That hasn't happened recently, because, go figure, populations are all really low so the only really good way to have a fight is to be in a three-way.

22. I don't really see how this is relevant. I stated that just to show how easy it would be to ensure that sanctuary doesn't become poplocked. There are TONS of different mechanics that can be instituted to ensure sanctuary can house enough people at any one time.

23. I wouldn't mind lattice linked warpgates as far as meta-game goes and then the hex territory control system for the continents, I just didn't want to use the word lattice, because low and behold if you mention a PS1 mechanic being good you are apparently "stuck in the past and unable to adopt modern FPS mechanics." In fact, I agree here. with 5+ continents, remove footholds (or make them conquerable), institute warpgate lattice links and sanctuaries, and enjoy an expanded meta-game.

24. You're that against sanc-locking in a territory control MMOFPS? I mean, I'm not advocating that that be the GOAL of the game by any means, but if an empire is coordinated enough to effectively push an empire back to its sanctuary WHILE dealing with the other empire, then I think the mechanics deserve to be in place. Like previously noted, sanc locks NEVER last a long time and usually result in the sanc-locked empire regaining all of their territory quickly. It'd be a lot harder to sanc-lock an empire with PS2s mechanics, considering there's no lattice and all.

25. We agree here. The problem is that in the beginning of the game with three-continents you'll never be able to break the stalemate. With more continents footholds become a very care bear and cheesy feature, to just give access of a continent to an empire that has done nothing to be able to strategically plan its invasion. Its basically, "flood these hexes out of the WGFH with no real direction or planning behind it." PS2's strategy meta-game has been severely hurt by the foothold system. Micro-tactics are still there, like outfit strategies and stuff, but there is no more real overall "global" atmosphere to the game. Just three perpetual three ways that always revert to the same triangular three way front line set up.

26. Understood.

27. A lot of prominent players have argued for rotating footholds to change up the fight at least a little bit. Most players agree that the beginning of PS2 will be the perpetual three-way. Rotating the footholds at each downtime would provide players with a slightly freshened change in perspective. They did the same thing in PS1 by rotating the home continents to give each empire different lattice links so that the players could experience opening fights from regions they previously never fought on a lot. It worked extremely well, except they only did it once before they stopped caring about the game.

28. Well its going to be pretty hard to travel over miles of territory that is contested when the perpetual three-way stops you from ever really advancing all the way to an enemy foothold (unless the population of one empire is EXTREMELY low, in which case we have bigger problems).

29. Yes, but the difference is that territory can be held for a substantial amount of time in the PS1 meta-game. Things will eventually reset (thats why there's three empires, to make sure one doesn't get outdone and then can never recover). The problem with PS1 is the territory was useless (until benefits), so holding territory didn't really mean anything other than the achievement out of it. With PS2's resources, it would be meaningful to capture entire continents.

30. Because this isn't a match based FPS? Its persistent world, things should be allowed to happen that can't happen in other games. No one EVER complained in PS1 about all ten continents NOT being open. I never once heard, "Geez, I wish every continent had a fight on it." If there was a fight on a continent they hated they went to one of the other 2-3 fights instead.
A poplock is anytime an empire reaches its population limit for that continent. There could be a three-way poplock, two-way poplock, or even a single poplock. You can also refer to a three-way poplock as just a general poplock, yes. Just because all three empires don't have poplocks doesn't automatically mean one empire would be dominating, it just means that only two empires might have poplocks, in which case things could still be a stalemate.

31. Did you mean "does not mean they will start sending their full forces?" If so, then yes you are right, but why give an already captured, permanent, uber-base to an empire on a continent that has done nothing to capture it and make it THAT much easier to take the continent? That goes for all three empires. One of the most exciting parts of PS1 was raiding a continent and trying desperately to capture that first base so that you could establish your FOOTHOLD on the continent. The same should be true for PS2 once there are more continents.

32. Not what I want. This is exactly what would happen if sanctuaries were in the game at launch with only three continents and every WG being a broadcast, which is exactly why I don't want sanctuaries (or equivalent system) in the game until later on.

33. Not really. Just because a game has three empires doesn't mean that every battle has to be a three-way. That is completely and blatantly wrong actually. The best moments of PlanetSide (and I speak on behalf of a lot of accounts) were not three-way clusterf**** that went nowhere for hours at a time, they were two-way battles that moved a lot, one empire winning bases, the other losing but having a good time defending against the onslaught. The purpose of three empires is to stop one empire from gaining a pop advantage and completely eradicating the other empire with no hope of ever recovering. Its a checks and balances system, not a system that promotes EVERY battle to be a three-way stalemate.

34. That is actually a good idea for the game when there are only 5-8 continents in the game. In essence it would be creating the old system of home continents (which has its flaws no doubt). It wouldn't section the continent off from attack as you say though, the other empires would still be able to fight there but it would be a lot harder of a fight.

Truthfully, I'm starting to think that the best system would be one that has a sanctuary, conquerable footholds, and a warpgate lattice system. Except I think it would be really cool if the lattice could be influenced by the conquering of continents unlike PS1 where lattice always stayed the same. Perhaps a fluid system of footholds in which when a FH gets captured, it re-prioritizes a base on another continent owned by that empire to become the new FH or something.

As you can see I've tried to change my tone up in this discussion so that we are flaming each other less and less, since some pretty good discussion is starting to happen anyways. I apologize for the rude irrelevancies such as calling you an idiot. I just get frustrated because the instant counter-argument is that you're a "bitter vet." Makes you sound old, like you like old mechanics, when in fact I think a lot of PS1's mechanics were and still are ahead of "modern" FPSes. But by all means, continue to strongly push your ideas!

[Kalbuth]

Having a CR5 glance at an empty continent on a map ever 10 minutes is not a good use of of game content, server space, or rented (and very expensive) bandwidth.

Just to nitpick a lot, and break a freaking huge Wall of Text War, and get us a breath, and also because it's my job :) :
No, in 2012, bandwidth is not expensive anymore

[CuddleMeLoki]

TL:DR
A lot of vets crying about nothing.

[Otleaz]

There needs to be a warning on this thread... I came in without hiking equipment and now I am screwed.

[Littleman]

This is incorrect.

Incorrect in being exactly alike, but correct in that they essentially perform the same basic function: giving the empire a safe zone to deploy from. Footholds just skip the queues and loading screens.

[MasterChief096]

Incorrect in being exactly alike, but correct in that they essentially perform the same basic function: giving the empire a safe zone to deploy from. Footholds just skip the queues and loading screens.

1. Queues will still be there. If a continent is poplocked its poplocked.

2. It does skip a singular loading screen, but big deal, its one loading screen! And the way they have PS2 set up it sounds like you'll be able to log in to the continent directly anyways, so even if there was a sanctuary, you wouldn't ever have to go to it.

[Landtank]

There needs to be a warning on this thread... I came in without hiking equipment and now I am screwed.

My hand cramped up scrolling half way down the page, sweet jesus.

[wasdie]

I don't think it matters at all. I don't want them to waste time making 3 sanctuaries that don't do anything a foothold can't.

If the sanctuaries actually played a vital role that couldn't be replicated any way else, I would say they should be there. However they provide nothing unique at all.

The removal of warpgates as well is not a loss either. It was just a method of getting from point A to point B. It was a little confusing for new players and it doesn't play into the new gameplay at all. It's not dumbing down something if you want to change the fundamentals of how something works so that it's a whole new experience.

[Kalbuth]

Incorrect in being exactly alike, but correct in that they essentially perform the same basic function: giving the empire a safe zone to deploy from. Footholds just skip the queues and loading screens.

Sanctuary + lattice gives several options to enter a continent depending on what other conts you own (you potentially can enter through each warpgate, not just one and always the same on cont X)

Footholds are static, each empire on each cont is always going to "enter" through the same gate from the same side and has no tactical option possible

That's the biggest difference between both, to me

[wasdie]

Sanctuary + lattice gives several options to enter a continent depending on what other conts you own (you potentially can enter through each warpgate, not just one and always the same on cont X)

Footholds are static, each empire on each cont is always going to "enter" through the same gate from the same side and has no tactical option possible

That's the biggest difference between both, to me

But Higby's reasoning is that a locked continent is wasted content. They've hand crafted these continents and made sure that nearly every square inch of terrain can be fought over. This is the reason for the hex grid. They want to the fights from only happening in and around the bases to fighting over a much larger scale area.

This will balance out the reduction of continents at launch as well as make the maps feel much larger. Locking down a continent denies people the ability to play on that map.

It makes sense. They are going through a lot more work to make each continent. Why would they only want 1-2 to be active at any time when all 3 can have 2000 people rocking on them at the same time.

[Littleman]

1. Queues will still be there. If a continent is poplocked its poplocked.

2. It does skip a singular loading screen, but big deal, its one loading screen! And the way they have PS2 set up it sounds like you'll be able to log in to the continent directly anyways, so even if there was a sanctuary, you wouldn't ever have to go to it.

This is why I get to call you out on not thinking things through. Or thinking at all.

Yes, poplocks will still be there. What you failed to consider from your PS1-trapped mind is that in PS2 we can form raids ON the continent in the same way we formed them on PS1 at the sanc. If I hear my CO call for a regrouping to set up a raid, I won't have to give them the big ol' ..I.. knowing it will get locked by new members to the fight the moment we recall.

If your concern is that the enemy can see you coming, they're likely sitting right outside your foothold, in which case your empire should be looking for a new continent to sack.

And while the loading screen isn't a big deal, refer to point 1, which makes sanctuaries obsolete. If I can get setup ON the continent I'm fighting on, why the hell would I want to take the separate instance of a continent over it? One word: nostalgia.

I'm pretty sure SOE won't introduce sancs simply to humor you.

Let go of the past. Footholds are the streamlined versions of the sanctuaries. Stop blinding yourself to that fact.

[Otleaz]

But Higby's reasoning is that a locked continent is wasted content. They've hand crafted these continents and made sure that nearly every square inch of terrain can be fought over. This is the reason for the hex grid. They want to the fights from only happening in and around the bases to fighting over a much larger scale area.

This will balance out the reduction of continents at launch as well as make the maps feel much larger. Locking down a continent denies people the ability to play on that map.

It makes sense. They are going through a lot more work to make each continent. Why would they only want 1-2 to be active at any time when all 3 can have 2000 people rocking on them at the same time.

With that logic, any territory behind the front lines is wasted content...

[berzerkerking]

I just hope that if they do add sanctuaries, they're in orbit.

Dust can do it, so can we.

http://gamefanmag.com/wp-content/uploads/DUST514_WB_CommandPit.jpg

Forget about footholds this must be done!
Now marry me you sexy beast:love:

[Littleman]

Sanctuary + lattice gives several options to enter a continent depending on what other conts you own (you potentially can enter through each warpgate, not just one and always the same on cont X)

Footholds are static, each empire on each cont is always going to "enter" through the same gate from the same side and has no tactical option possible

That's the biggest difference between both, to me

This is entirely true, I admit. The lattice system doesn't exist. For that matter, I'm not entirely sure the warp gate bubbles have teleportation capabilities to begin with. After all, we're meant to select a continent to spawn on. I imagine moving from continent to continent involves despawning at our footholds and picking another foothold to spawn at.

Without these features, it does reduce the options regarding from which direction an empire assaults a continent, but do remember the terrain around an empire's foothold is supposed to benefit that empire the most, or so I've heard. Also, since they're footholds, how do we determine whom owns what between the two connected footholds? Or are we to assume VS and TR can chill in the same foothold because TR own the Esamir foothold connected to the VS owned Indar foothold?

Also, consider the worse case scenario (which will never happen,) what happens if a faction is reduced to a single foothold? Only then would a sanc make sense, but again: it'll never happen. If it does, PS2 is screwed population wise.

The game's primary focus is to facilitate constant warfare, constant back and forth, constant fighting. "Victory" isn't a part of the big plan with Planetside 2, it just gives our fighting meaning and direction. The carrot on a stick we're not meant to catch.

[Greenthy]

I'm all for the old sanctuaries back , but I can understand some of the reasoning for the strongholds:

The fight is literaly staring you in the face the minute you look at your map, and it's within travel distance:
No need to hop through a couple of warpgates, instant action to hope you end up where u want to, ...

But I'll miss the sanc almost as much as the rest here.