Hot spots

[Figment]

EDIT: Tactical Map redesign (WIP)

http://img9.imageshack.us/img9/9002/tacticalmapoverlay.jpg

http://forums.station.sony.com/ps2/index.php?threads/hot-spots.71142/
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Hot spots need to more accurately represent where fighting takes place and the intensity of it.

If a fight is going on in the south of an Esamir region, the hot spot is always over the base itself. You hence don't know direction of the fight (where is it moving/are they heading, who is winning?), when heading to the region, you have to search for its exact location, can't predict where you could cut them off, bassically making proper decision making much harder than needed.


I would suggest using two hot spots, one for ground and air fighting. Second, I would suggest density, size, transparancy and colour to be related as such:


Density: linked to spread of fighting and movement speed based on locations
Size: amount of players engaging each other
Colour: lethality (amount of deaths per minute) and empire(s) involved (edge of hot spot star, shape of star?)
Transparancy: age of conflict


In ps1 you sometimes saw a conflict between two aircraft create a trail of hotspots, but only based on speed of fading and speed of hot spot moving and intermediate distance, position and direction of hot spots could you derive it was an aircav engagement rather than a frontline. This could thus be done more intuitively.

Note that I feel fog of war is important, only fights observed by your empire should be seen. That is enough info already, increases the need for scouting and doesn't create an information overload.

[Electrofreak]

Agreed, it could be much clearer than it is now.

I really hate to keep saying "do it like PS1 did" but there's a lot in PS2 that could be improved by using what worked well in the original.

[Ruffdog]

Agreed. The "Not" spots need looking at

[sylphaen]

Agreed, it could be much clearer than it is now.

I really hate to keep saying "do it like PS1 did" but there's a lot in PS2 that could be improved by using what worked well in the original.

Indeed. I stopped playing, keep reading but I do not bother posting structured posts about ideas anymore. It costs too much time.

However, if you take a look at many problems, they can be summarized to 2 keywords: diversity & scalability.

IMO, for a massive game to be successfully massive, solutions need to be scalable and address/offer diversity. Massiveness is an achieved-state, not a constant. The good news is it can be designed, the difficulty lies in designing it efficiently which requires genius or experience.

[bpostal]

There is no 'like' button but I approve of a hot spot revamp to make them viable for telling where the action is.

[Crator]

There was also the, what was it called?; The thing that you could fade in-and-out as you like and it would show exactly what the OP is talking about (concentrations of activity based on spotting). Hotspots should help you locate more concentrated/constant battles whereas the other system works alongside it and is more of an enhancement to hotspots.

[Rivenshield]

Agreed, it could be much clearer than it is now.

I really hate to keep saying "do it like PS1 did" but there's a lot in PS2 that could be improved by using what worked well in the original.

So we continually say -- not because we're trying to reinvent Planetside 1 like a bunch of bitter clingers, but because there's no reason to reinvent the fracking wheel.

A lot of new things work fine.

1) The microtransaction model is seductive (though I think they would sell more SC by an order of magnitude if you let people experiment with different certs on a VR range. You'd go into battle, and get a serious jones for that perfect weapon you were messing with just fifteen minutes ago, and buy it.)

2) The class system works fine. (I miss the custom inventories too, but hey.)

3) The limitations of resources and cooldown timers makes it possible for stubborn defenders to attrit the attackers over time, even if they have to fall back a couple of times. This is as it should be. (I still don't understand how you get resources or from where; I just accept it. I suspect most other players do the same).

4) Making everything available to everybody has worked out fine, IMHO. It's awe-inspiring to ride along with an armored column of twenty or thirty. (It's just annoying they don't meet the other armored columns that often; and too often suffice to all but cap a base by themselves. Once the gen is blown, the armor zerg comes pouring in, shoots up the veh bay, boxes in the spawn building with vehicle spam, and Bob's your uncle.)

But the things that were right about the original, and the *reasons* they worked right, haven't changed. I still don't understand the institutionalized dig-the-heels-in resistance to lifting and adapting them to the new Auraxis.

We finally got the AMS back. We clearly have a long slow slog ahead of us to get the rest.

[Figment]

There was also the, what was it called?; The thing that you could fade in-and-out as you like and it would show exactly what the OP is talking about (concentrations of activity based on spotting). Hotspots should help you locate more concentrated/constant battles whereas the other system works alongside it and is more of an enhancement to hotspots.

You mean the tactical map overlay that showed activity based on scout radar of (watch) towers, Mosquitos, buggies and ATVs?

[Fear The Amish]

i agree i also think that to help foster large battles they could add some sort of map icon to show where the zergs are. Like if it goes over a platoon in one hex its like a big pulsing red/purple/blue dot and it updates real time when more then a platoon is in a single hex (so you could track the zerg and either engage it or avoid it)

[Crator]

You mean the tactical map overlay that showed activity based on scout radar of (watch) towers, Mosquitos, buggies and ATVs?

Yeah, that's it...

[Furber]

One flaw I see with the current hot-spot system is that there seems to be a limited amount of them based on how many deploy locations there can be (6 maybe?). I can only see this getting worse as they add more conts, unless they plan on increasing the number of deploy locations.

All that being said, PS1 hot-spots were a better communication of where an actual fight was. 80% of the time I deploy on a hot-spot there are no enemies (unless it's the crown or somewhere there's ALWAYS a fight), and some times even few friendlies.

Seems like this hot-spot system is going to tie into the mission system some how, but I'm not sure how that'll turn out if the hot spot system itself is pretty flawed.

[Ghoest9]

The whole hotspot sytem is broken.

It tends to form zergs in places where even the zergers would rather not be and should not be but they have no other choice because the options are limited.

[Figment]

Added a WIP image. :)

[Vashyo]

the hot spot-system is completely random, sometimes you drop somewhere and see nobody. even though it states there's intense battle going on. :mad:

It's like people do short 5 minute intense battle then they just scatter elsewhere...sigh

[RykerStruvian]

As others stated, no reason to reinvent something if the previous system worked great. Awesome post.