Large existing clans to 1 server (reserved spots)

[Monsta]

Hello, can planetside2 deal with large existing communities/clans who like to play together? Maybe not all on the same empire, but lets just say, how to make sure a group of 300 players can all join the Europe #2 server as TR. And are there reserved slots available for platoon leaders? To make sure the new recruits can join that same platoon after 2 years the game has been released?

And is it possible to login with your same account on a different server without loosing your upgrades and stuff?

[Dubious]

Have they announced how many servers they will have already?

Usual thats what the Open Beta is for, to see how many ppl are willing to play the game at release

[Bags]

Reserved slots dont work in an mmo...

[Bobby Shaftoe]

300 players

The only potential problem you might have is getting all 300 of them on the same continent at once, as that would be, as we've been led to believe, almost half the population limit of an Empire per continent (666 or so).

[yonman]

OP is thinking in the wrong terms about this
Your character is *bound* to a server, you can log onto another server but it'll be a separate character...
Also, you choose a faction - you don't get slotted into a team to keep the numbers even in the fight.
Your 300 friends, assuming you do not push the population limit for your side, will always play together. You will not be auto-balanced to the other team, you will not have to choose which friends to play with... you will always be in the right team (VS, of course) with your buddies alongside you.

This is the reason you see such faction loyalty in PS - you always play for the same team and your hated nemesi always play for the other teams. It's like an episode of G.I.Joe :D

[Accuser]

Each server can host around 6,000 players at a time. That's divided up into about 2,000 players per continent (instance). So I'm sure they'll allow AT LEAST 6,000 players to register per server, especially considering the way F2P will bring in lots of come-and-go players. That's >2,000 per faction.

Unfortunately that's all of the official word I'm aware of. Though I'm sure that anything you buy in the cash shop will be available to you on any server you play on. Character server transfers haven't been discussed, but I'd imagine that would be available if you need to move your Outfit after 2 years.

Hopefully there will be some kind of quick turnover mechanism so that the F2P (that is, the non-freemium) players will have their spots on servers deleted after a period of inactivity to make room for active players.

[Nemeses]

OP is thinking in the wrong terms about this
Your character is *bound* to a server, you can log onto another server but it'll be a separate character...
Also, you choose a faction - you don't get slotted into a team to keep the numbers even in the fight.
Your 300 friends, assuming you do not push the population limit for your side, will always play together. You will not be auto-balanced to the other team, you will not have to choose which friends to play with... you will always be in the right team (VS, of course) with your buddies alongside you.

This is the reason you see such faction loyalty in PS - you always play for the same team and your hated nemesi always play for the other teams. It's like an episode of G.I.Joe :D

This, cant reserve slots in a MMO as it does not work.

[NoDachi]

Sometimes we forget how this will be many's first sample of 'MMO'.

[Monsta]

Thanks for replies guys. I guess picking the less or medium populated server after its being released is a wise thing to do if you like to play with a huge amount of friends. Organizing all players in one specific area will be interesting indeed. Should not be a huge communication issue since we already provide Teamspeak3 to 1300+ members.

[Sledgecrushr]

OP is thinking in the wrong terms about this
Your character is *bound* to a server, you can log onto another server but it'll be a separate character...


Where did you hear that we were going to be "bound" to a server?

[Flaropri]

Hopefully there will be some kind of quick turnover mechanism so that the F2P (that is, the non-freemium) players will have their spots on servers deleted after a period of inactivity to make room for active players.

I don't see why that would be necessary, particularly since it is one character per account per server, that would require a LOT of characters to "fill" the servers database. In any event, I would hope that they don't do it to encourage people to come back and try it again and then maybe even actually finally pay some money if they like the [insert whatever brought them back to try again here].

Generally speaking, for games of this type the capacity for created characters is much, much larger than for active players.


Where did you hear that we were going to be "bound" to a server?

It had been stated by the Devs I believe during E3 or the duo stream prior, I forget exactly. You get one character per server. (I'm sure they'll allow for limited Transfers/sell them though.)

Could have been better with a little more editing, and a little less self consciousness, but it was enjoyable regardless.

[Stardouser]

Star Wars the Old Republic had a program where guilds applied to be placed on server together at release.

It depends on whether the open beta is a rolling launch, or whether at the very end of open beta they wipe and everyone has to rush to re-create characters. If release is a complete do-over, then what could easily happen is, let's say your outfit is 100 guys. 50 of your guys could get a character created on the right server, and then the server gets too full and gets shut down for new character creations for a few days to shift new character creations to other servers. The other 50 guys, without a clan placement program, are stuck playing on another server until that is all settled.

[Sledgecrushr]

It had been stated by the Devs I believe during E3 or the duo stream prior, I forget exactly. You get one character per server. (I'm sure they'll allow for limited Transfers/sell them though.

What I got from the dual commentary was that you wouldnt be allowed to create more than one character per account.

[BiocYte]

What I got from the dual commentary was that you wouldnt be allowed to create more than one character per server on the same account.

Everyone hears something different lol. I heard that you couldnt have toons in different factions on the same server. I believe it will be similiar to PS in which you can have several if they are all TR for example. I doubt they will limit you to one toon.

[james]

Unless they allow private servers i highly doubt there will be any type of reserved slots.

[yonman]

Unless they allow private servers i highly doubt there will be any type of reserved slots.

No I think you don't understand.
This game doesn't have private servers. There are no instances, no private rooms, no lobby, no match-making service, no battle-grounds for pvp, no separate mechanism of any kind to separate you from your friends and from your enemies. There are no servers with custom configs. No custom community maps to install.

The map is one huge frikkin consistent world that plays out whichever way you like.
Rush 10 guys defending a base with 300 buddies? guess what! Those 10 guys are going to have a hell of a time screaming for reinforcements and fighting you and your overwhelming odds. Those guys will lose not because "teams are not fair" but because their empire did not respond in time to assist with sufficient manpower and resources. Tragic? maybe, but that's war for you.

There is no separation, no slots, no limitations. There's just endless, seamless terrain, dotted by bases, towers and other features. These can be fought on without "Declaring" about it. You don't enter and exit zones. You don't connect to regions or a RvR area. The map never resets and your enemies aren't pushed back to their starting point when their assault is done and the timer restarts. It's one big war-zone with no boundaries.

Any other way to describe it for what it is?

[Sieldan]

No I think you don't understand.
This game doesn't have private servers. There are no instances, no private rooms, no lobby, no match-making service, no battle-grounds for pvp, no separate mechanism of any kind to separate you from your friends and from your enemies. There are no servers with custom configs. No custom community maps to install.

The map is one huge frikkin consistent world that plays out whichever way you like.
Rush 10 guys defending a base with 300 buddies? guess what! Those 10 guys are going to have a hell of a time screaming for reinforcements and fighting you and your overwhelming odds. Those guys will lose not because "teams are not fair" but because their empire did not respond in time to assist with sufficient manpower and resources. Tragic? maybe, but that's war for you.

There is no separation, no slots, no limitations. There's just endless, seamless terrain, dotted by bases, towers and other features. These can be fought on without "Declaring" about it. You don't enter and exit zones. You don't connect to regions or a RvR area. The map never resets and your enemies aren't pushed back to their starting point when their assault is done and the timer restarts. It's one big war-zone with no boundaries.

Any other way to describe it for what it is?

Excellent description, dont think it could be described any better.

[Gimpylung]

The mainstream shooter market has been stagnant for sooooo long, 4-64 player matches on rotating map cycles ad infinitum since 1993 from Doom to BF3.

I'm kinda jealous of those guys who've played plenty of shooters but never played PS. They have one hell of an OMFG moment to look forward to when it finally dawns on them what Empire allegiance, persistance and massively multiplayer truly means.

Good luck to those guys :)

[Deadeye]

The mainstream shooter market has been stagnant for sooooo long, 4-64 player matches on rotating map cycles ad infinitum since 1993 from Doom to BF3.

I'm kinda jealous of those guys who've played plenty of shooters but never played PS. They have one hell of an OMFG moment to look forward to when it finally dawns on them what Empire allegiance, persistance and massively multiplayer truly means.

Good luck to those guys :)

Don't worry, us vets of PS1 will them quite the education when they arrive ingame.;)

[Rivenshield]

This is the reason you see such faction loyalty in PS - you always play for the same team and your hated nemesi always play for the other teams. It's like an episode of G.I.Joe :D
Nicely and completely put.

There can't be more than a thousand hard-core PS1 vets. I'd like to see us nominate a veterans' server before we go live, so we can continue to fight alongside old friends and gun down old enemies. If we can manage that, then the outfit issue will take care of itself.

Don't worry, us vets of PS1 will them quite the education when they arrive ingame.;)
Yes we will. They too will learn, as we once all did, that Planetside is not a game. It is an actual goddam *war* -- on a virtual battlefield.

[Arovien]

Wouldn't be surprised if SOE develops a pre-registration system for outfits months before the game launches. Kinda like what Bioware did with SWTOR. Incentives will be in place to promote signing up. SOE would assign outfits (and outfit alliances) to an appropriate server (based on outfit size and type of server desired), but outfits that sign up WILL NOT be able to pick the exact server.

Just a thought.

[Mordelicius]

Hello, can planetside2 deal with large existing communities/clans who like to play together? Maybe not all on the same empire, but lets just say, how to make sure a group of 300 players can all join the Europe #2 server as TR. And are there reserved slots available for platoon leaders? To make sure the new recruits can join that same platoon after 2 years the game has been released?

And is it possible to login with your same account on a different server without loosing your upgrades and stuff?

What stops large groups from pre-registering a ton of ALT enemy accounts, denying the other faction of population and the same time friendly-fire killing on purpose?

I can already see the cheap tactics prevalent in any RvR game. You know there's gonna be many 'dummy' alt guilds for the sole purpose of getting cheesy advantage like griefing, spying, misinformation or kill-farming.

[MediocrityGoggs]

What stops large groups from pre-registering a ton of ALT enemy accounts, denying the other faction of population and the same time friendly-fire killing on purpose?

I can already see the cheap tactics prevalent in any RvR game. You know there's gonna be many 'dummy' alt guilds for the sole purpose of getting cheesy advantage like griefing, spying, misinformation or kill-farming.

Nothing, as registering a bunch of dummy characters also does nothing, because the continent/server population is for active and online players at any given time, not how many characters there are registered, so dummies or offline players are a non factor.

Also, it was just said that you can only have a character of ONE faction per server, so they'll have to do that kind of stuff on a different account if they even bother. As for griefing, there is an anti-griefing measure in place in the original game where causing damage to your team would accumulate "grief points" and getting too many would eventually prevent you from firing your weapons or driving a vehicle, so any kind of grief rampage will be rather short lived.

[Mordelicius]

Nothing, as registering a bunch of dummy characters also does nothing, because the continent/server population is for active and online players at any given time, not how many characters there are registered, so dummies or offline players are a non factor.

Also, it was just said that you can only have a character of ONE faction per server, so they'll have to do that kind of stuff on a different account if they even bother. As for griefing, there is an anti-griefing measure in place in the original game where causing damage to your team would accumulate "grief points" and getting too many would eventually prevent you from firing your weapons or driving a vehicle, so any kind of grief rampage will be rather short lived.
Dual Box-ing. Two computers with at least two accounts (one for main and the other for the enemy) and logged at the same time denying the other faction population and manpower. Or flatout just logging to spy, troll, spread misinformation or coordinate friendly fire kills.

Kill farming. Part of a guild logging to an enemy 'dummy' guild so they can be farmed by the same guild. The same dual-boxed alt accounts will be loaded to vehicles for easy kill farming.

As for the griefing, what's the cooldown before these "grief points" are reset? What's the threshold? It will be circumvented by cycling many alt accounts.

All these will be exploited unless they close loopholes.

[Monsta]

so dummies or offline players are a non factor.

Can you proof that it works this way? What I am afraid of is that a server is full at some point (at daily basis), which would force my friend to play on a different server and we cannot play together. (no way i am starting with a new character)

For large clans this means their possibile recruits can now only come from 1 server. For clans (supporting tons of games) it means its requires to setup a fully new division (chain of command) based on another EU server+empire, instead of joining the awesome big division. I hope you understand my concerns..

[vVRedOctoberVv]

I don't see why there's so much concern about all this. The servers are not based off characters that exist on them, they are based off characters that are actively logged in. People will generally gravitate towards low-ping (i.e. local) servers, except for outfits. Outfits should have no problem getting onto a server together unless they're trying to take 1500 people all to the same place if they are all apt to be active at the same time. Even so, the bigger restriction would be population cap, they can all be on the same server, they just may not all be able to log in at the same time.

I also oppose the idea of "all the old PS1 clans going to the same server". I see why it appeals to some people, but it would be better for the community as a whole for new and old to mingle more freely across all the servers. Besides, with the influx of old players coming back, I doubt you could fit everyone on one server like that, anyway.

[The Kush]

Reserved spots don't work and it's not called a platoon it's an outfit. You clearly have never played ps1 so I don't understand why you care.

[kidwithstick]

Usual thats what the Open Beta is for, to see how many ppl are willing to play the game at release

Actually... its to test the game on a big scale from multiple rigs from multiple locations to try and stamp out as many bugs as possible BEFORE release....

:rolleyes:

[Monsta]

they are based off characters that are actively logged in.
I understand that. Just a little concerned here that Planetside 2 becomes so addictive no one leaves till the 5 year plan is over, and the maximum amount of players is reached in no time. Players wont wait 10/20/30/etc minuts in line. Recruiting players as a long term mission for an outfit will slow down and stop at some point. That situation could happend after a month the game launched the servers. Is it SEO's goal to get the servers running on max till its no longer fun to wait in line asp?


It would be better for the community as a whole for new and old to mingle more freely across all the servers.
Fully agree.

[Infektion]

Unless they allow private servers i highly doubt there will be any type of reserved slots.

He's trolling! I know it!

[Novice bot]

You clearly have never played ps1 so I don't understand why you care.

Loving this bullshit you throw around. Let's say newest unreal tournament announces, can I go around throwing people off the forums because they haven't played the series for 13 years? Get a grip mate, its not a game for Planetside 1 players only.