Road Map: Sky Lance / Air Carrier

[Staticelf]

Everytime I see the Sky Lance collecting cob webs in the techplants I wish it had a use.
http://i35.tinypic.com/2lj6hiq.jpg

I know its probably three years down the road but an air carrier would be the perfect combo to go with the Sky Lance add on.
http://i37.tinypic.com/2km3de.jpg

In my mind it would take 4 people to spawn each paying full sky reaources (750?).
And be about the size of 4 galaxies in a square

It would have:
Spawn Room
ESF (only) spawn console (sticking with Aircraft carrier theme)
Drop Pod spawn console (for assaults or just to get off the thing safely!?)
2 cannon turrets on bottom
4 anti-air turrets (2 below / 2 above)
Ammo reload runway for ESF/Gals/Libs
And some sort of engineer station to repair damage? (Like a reactor core to use tool on?)

Then the Sky Lance would have a valid target!
And would be devastating to the air carrier
(Oh I would also add a sky lance terminal deep in the tech plant so infils could hack it to take to offline. That way you could safely move the air carrier over the plant.

Other Suggestions? If we could get this near the top on the forums/Reddit and on AGN maybe we could bump it closer down the "road" to reality?

[Canaris]

who'd want one of those when the TR has already produced

http://media.pcgamer.com/files/2012/11/PlanetSide-2-Bastion-Fleet-Carrier.jpg


heh I always thought they should put the skylance on auto-defense of close prox to warp gates, you get to close and zap, back to spawn room for you! ;)

[Sledgecrushr]

I dont think the air carrier should have any guns on the bottom. What i eould like to see is the pilot able to tilt the ship over and give the ground (another flying carrier?) a nice broadside. I see the air carrier being almost worthless against ground targets but fairly strong against other air units.

[Staticelf]

Hey that would work for the TR one...

(The NC one would have "Danger Zone" playing in a loop of course.)

I dont think they need to be Inter-Continental semi-space craft.

Trying to add that would open up a whole new nightmare of programming to get them moving between continents.

Lets just get them in the sky first! "Space-Side" can come later.

[Staticelf]

I dont think the air carrier should have any guns on the bottom. What i eould like to see is the pilot able to tilt the ship over and give the ground (another flying carrier?) a nice broadside. I see the air carrier being almost worthless against ground targets but fairly strong against other air units.

I see your point Sledge and I think a broadside cannon set would be a better match than ground cannons.
I think the carrier should always remain level though. (Just move up down, right left, forward backward)

You would have to keep all the troops piloting/shooting/repairing inside the carrier since they probably wouldnt be able to run around on the deck....(ever try to stand on a moving lightning/sunderer?)
But like being in a Sunderer/Galaxy I'm sure you could do all the jobs I'm proposing from "seats" (F1-F12)

Something like this?:
F1: Driver
F2: Engineer (Repair)
F3-F6: AA Turrets
F7/F8: Port/Starboard Broadsides
F9: Holding seat for spawning into
F10: Holding seat for spawning into (does nothing like being in seat 4-12 of sundy)
F11: Immediatly drops you to surface in a drop pod
F12: Opens a menu for launching ESFs

[Sledgecrushr]

I see your point Sledge and I think a broadside cannon set would be a better match than ground cannons.
I think the carrier should always remain level though. (Just move up down, right left, forward backward)

You would have to keep all the troops piloting/shooting/repairing inside the carrier since they probably wouldnt be able to run around on the deck....(ever try to stand on a moving lightning/sunderer?)

I would love for the air carrier to be able to list. Say you take out one the giant engines on the starboard side the vessel should list that direction. Being able to tilt would give some nice gameplay to the air carriers pilot as well. I see epic duels between two or more fully manned air carriers. Like old frigates working to gain an advantageous position before the big guns start to roar.

This vehicle by itself will bring people to the game if its done correctly.

[Sledgecrushr]

I see the jobs being doone from stations, much like capture points in a base. If the crew is able to move about the ship while in flight then i think this would give rise to boarding actions between air carriers. Also these stations woukd be capturable/hackable/sabotaged to either capture the great ship or to send it crashing into the ground.

[Staticelf]

Uncontrolled list would be cool. Kind of how it gets hard to fly your scythe/lib when its on fire and almost dead!

The broadsides shouldnt have much movement so that gunners have to coordinate with driver so he can line them up to get a shot.

(I expanded my post above to cover how people would board the carrier.)

[Staticelf]

I see the jobs being doone from stations, much like capture points in a base. If the crew is able to move about the ship while in flight then i think this would give rise to boarding actions between air carriers. Also these stations woukd be capturable/hackable/sabotaged to either capture the great ship or to send it crashing into the ground.

I agree the stations would make for cool combat on the carrier (enemy dropping in from galaxies, drop pods from space/enemy carriers it starts getting really exciting!)

I just dont know how much programing it would take to get troops to "stick" to the carrier? (Like my example of standing on a Sundy...doenst currently work no matter how much I want to relive my Teen Wolf days.)

I think it would probably have to be vehicle like in how people ride in/on? it.

[Staticelf]

IF it were possible to get troops to stick to the thing...

Then another way to implement it could be as an indestructible "air-base" that could be taken by any empire and moved around by whoever was in control of it currently. (One per continent) You couldn't take it into warpgate areas and had to keep it at least 100ft above the ground (cant park it somewhere completely out of reach of others)

Sky Lance could still be used to disable its systems and/or stop its movement for a period of time?

[Phantomdestiny]

the main problem is not really the programming of the "sticking" but the programming of having that structure hold together while being a "moving/dynamic mesh" . But the biggest problem will be on the design side , our resource system just wouldn't work it with it right now. for me the only way to make it work would be to have an industry system in the game .

E.g : let's say you need 1 million outfit/empire points to make it ; which are either taken out of donation made by players or outfits then the money goes to a factory (in the sanctuary , which will be in-game no doubts if it wasn't gone be SOE wouldn't of mentioned it on the roadmap with continent locking )
where it is combined with resources which are harvested on a series of different continents (we'll see after the resource revamp) .

That leads to a start in production which takes let's say 1 week (real time) that allows other empires to prepare a counter measure against it .

Now the Carrier could be a mobile foothold for the empire to assault a continent however it can be destroyed .

method 1 : infantry would overload 2 gens (hack/hold) on the ship for 5 minutes. the gens would be bellow deck which means that the spec ops squad would need to infiltrate the interior of the carrier like a base and there is potential to defend it .

method 2: sky lances on the continent are captured and fire at the carrier . the sky lances need a preparation time to fire . This drains HP from the carrier but the carrier can be repaired by a repair vehicle "repair gal/lodestar" or equivalent but only to a small extent eg: can only repair if bellow 1/4 health not bring it higher than 1/4 HP. To fully repair it , the carrier needs to go back to sanctuary (in a repair dock this would take 1 hour to repair )

method 3 : ESF's and other planes with special weapons (missiles which do little damage to "normal vehicles") can attack weak point of the structure of the carrier for example engines , observation deck , drop pods launchers , weapons, ESF catapult/run way ). Which would make for each part of the vessel useless for example if the launchers are destroyed you can no longer drop. This would be the longest taking method .

TLDR: design

[Falcon_br]

Ok guys, lets go play BF 2142!
I really fail to see the difference from it to the Titan on BF 2142, and we are asking for Titan on the game since day 1 of beta!
Where is the road map link to it?

[Staticelf]

Ok then lets go back to the path that 4 players can create these by combining resources 750x4 =3000....I dont think this thing should be massive...more like an upgunned larger galaxy (but carrier shaped) that can spawn troops, spawn drop pods, spawn ESF's, and repair itself in air.

[Staticelf]

I loved BF 2142 and found it very odd when I started playing planetside 2 that there weren't mechs striding across the surface of Auraxis. Seems a perfect fit!?

[Phantomdestiny]

Ok then lets go back to the path that 4 players can create these by combining resources 750x4 =3000....I dont think this thing should be massive...more like an upgunned larger galaxy (but carrier shaped) that can spawn troops, spawn ESF's, and repair itself in air.

but we don't want a bigger gal WE want a freaking FLYING FORTRESS . and smedley clearly said that he wanted ps2 to become a sandbox much like his beloved EVE (but to an smaller and less overwhelming extent which still allows new players) .

And another thing the mechanics for using resources are about to change and i can bet that the just spent 300 resource to spawn vehicle x will not exist any more.

We want vehicles which fills new roles not bigger galaxies. the point of this would be a goal to go towards aka a vehicle which would be unique and would take time to achieve meaning it is strategically vital not a player but to the empire

[Shogun]

I loved BF 2142 and found it very odd when I started playing planetside 2 that there weren't mechs striding across the surface of Auraxis. Seems a perfect fit!?

you are trolling right?
if not... there IS a reason why there are no "mechs" in ps2. the reason is, because mechs are called BFRs on auraxis. now do a search on the forums ;-)

[Phantomdestiny]

you are trolling right?
if not... there IS a reason why there are no "mechs" in ps2. the reason is, because mechs are called BFRs on auraxis. now do a search on the forums ;-)

NOOOOOOOOOOO the nightmares not again , why did you mention that acronym Shogun not again

[Staticelf]

I agree Phantom that a massive spacecarrier would be amazing but asking too big means we would probably get nothing...(asking small usually gets us about the same most of the time I'll admit)

But having these ideas be as simple as possible has to give them a little better chance of becoming reality.

[ThatGoatGuy]

I like the idea, but I think that the overall size (I can't believe I'm saying this) is too small for something like this. I can see just a hundred of those floating around in the sky, totally crowding up all air space. I think that we should just stick to the "galaxy that can carry a tank" idea.

[Staticelf]

I see your point and I agree that a bunch of them would get cumbersome and pointless...but I could say the same about an outfit spamming 30/40 galaxies...they become a cert farm for the enemy and have no tactical value after about the fourth galaxy (which is why it doesnt and wouldnt happen to often)...this is also why I say it should take 4 people to spawn and use up all their air resources. (Then they cant just go spawn a second, third, fourth)

And they can't really man them all so they are just useless floating certs for the enemy if you start to spawn too many of them (as with anything that you spawn too many of..their usefulness quickly degrades and you end up with a pile of exploding sunderers. Yay C4!)

[ThatGoatGuy]

I see your point and I agree that a bunch of them would get cumbersome and pointless...but I could say the same about an outfit spamming 30/40 galaxies...they become a cert farm for the enemy and have no tactical value after about the fourth galaxy (which is why it doesnt and wouldnt happen to often)...this is also why I say it should take 4 people to spawn and use up all their air resources. (Then they cant just go spawn a second, third, fourth)

And they can't really man them all so they are just useless floating certs for the enemy if you start to spawn too many of them (as with anything that you spawn too many of..their usefulness quickly degrades and you end up with a pile of exploding sunderers. Yay C4!)

With there being no tactical value well then why would they implement it in the first place? Any vehicle in this game has tactical purposes, whether you understand them or not. Adding a four man "Aircraft carrier" wouldn't serve any thing in the game, therefore it would be unnecessary to add.

[Staticelf]

Im saying spamming 30 of them would result in no tactical value...please read...then post. (in that order)

Of course it would have tactical value...its an air asset that can spawn troops that can drop pod into bases. That alone would make it the most valuable air vehicle.

[Sledgecrushr]

At some point soe is going to have some outfit specific stuff introduced to the game. This air carrier might very well be something an outfit could work towards. Something that would take a outfit resource point to acquire. Because something like this shouldnt be about small group tactics.

[Baneblade]

I suppose I need to take up the gauntlet again.

[Whiteagle]

the main problem is not really the programming of the "sticking" but the programming of having that structure hold together while being a "moving/dynamic mesh".
Indeed, it'd pretty much need to be one solid mesh with details rendered as accessories, like how you some times spot player models with no head or weapons.

But the biggest problem will be on the design side , our resource system just wouldn't work it with it right now. for me the only way to make it work would be to have an industry system in the game .

E.g : let's say you need 1 million outfit/empire points to make it ; which are either taken out of donation made by players or outfits then the money goes to a factory (in the sanctuary , which will be in-game no doubts if it wasn't gone be SOE wouldn't of mentioned it on the roadmap with continent locking )
where it is combined with resources which are harvested on a series of different continents (we'll see after the resource revamp) .

That leads to a start in production which takes let's say 1 week (real time) that allows other empires to prepare a counter measure against it .
Ok then lets go back to the path that 4 players can create these by combining resources 750x4 =3000....
Actually Star Trek Online did something similar to this with their Fleet Bases and Embassies, where Fleet (Their Guild System) members could contribute various Items and Resources towards a "Fleet Project."

Then, like their Duty Officer Missions, once the requirement quotas are met it takes a certain amount of real time to "process" and when completed gives the Fleet a reward, or in this case a giant-ass Air Carrier.


Now the Carrier could be a mobile foothold for the empire to assault a continent however it can be destroyed .
Yeah, this is exactly why I'm waiting for true Intercontinental Transfers and Oceans before asking about this; This is a perfect platform for assaulting a Continent.

It's basically a Mobile Air Facility, so who wouldn't want one floating around each Continent?

method 1 : infantry would overload 2 gens (hack/hold) on the ship for 5 minutes. the gens would be bellow deck which means that the spec ops squad would need to infiltrate the interior of the carrier like a base and there is potential to defend it .
Again it's a Mobile Facility, so they could maybe make it so that you can not only scuttle it with a Hack, but outright HI-JACK it!

This could be a great balancing AND game play factor; Outfits have to make sure they have people guarding their Flying Fortresses lease they be

method 2: sky lances on the continent are captured and fire at the carrier . the sky lances need a preparation time to fire . This drains HP from the carrier but the carrier can be repaired by a repair vehicle "repair gal/lodestar" or equivalent but only to a small extent eg: can only repair if bellow 1/4 health not bring it higher than 1/4 HP. To fully repair it , the carrier needs to go back to sanctuary (in a repair dock this would take 1 hour to repair )
Eh, I'd much rather see the Sky Lance as a Continental Defensive Deployable; a hot-dropped or specially erected Mega Turret that takes forever to cool down but can two-shot large Air and Sea ships.

I mean, it's an ORBITAL DEFENSE GUN, so you are either going to be building an installation around it or plunking it down somewhere you need some SERIOUS artillery.

As for the Air Carriers, I don't think they'd have to shuttle all the way back to the Sanctuary to lick their wounds, their literal boatload of Hit Points will take forever to Repair even with a Full Squad of Engineers and that's IF they don't also have to deal with multiple Sky Lances/Orbital Strikes and Galaxy-loads of Boarders.

method 3 : ESF's and other planes with special weapons (missiles which do little damage to "normal vehicles") can attack weak point of the structure of the carrier for example engines , observation deck , drop pods launchers , weapons, ESF catapult/run way ). Which would make for each part of the vessel useless for example if the launchers are destroyed you can no longer drop. This would be the longest taking method .
Component Damage would be nice, but I'd settle for the Directional Model and hack/destroyable Terminals if it's too much trouble...

I don't think Aircraft will need "Special" weapons just to deal with one, they'll have plenty of AA Turrets to worry about anyways, let alone whatever Interceptors Launch to meet them.

[Sledgecrushr]

I think we will see air carriers in about a year. There is a lot of game infrastructure that would have to be implemented before something like this would be released.

[moosepoop]

id love to see it in the game, like a floating fortress slowly lumbering across the map.

even it just stays still in the sky it would still be pretty cool.

[leifnielsen]

I noticed some of the buildings in Planetside 2 look like they have movable parts. Pistons, stabilizer struts, blast doors that are folded down etc...

Speaking of the Sky Lance...it's currently enclosed in the tech plants, so I wonder if in the future, they're going to add some animation to all these moving parts, maybe have the wall or ceiling slide away in front of the Sky Lance so it can actually see the sky. If not, then are they just going to redesign the entire tech plant?

With the blast doors in front of the vehicle bays, I was thinking it would be pretty cool if a faction could lock down the base so it couldn't be attacked by opposing factions for a designated period of time.

OR...Use the lock down, but make it so the carrier is the only thing that can attack the tech plant while it's in this state. perhaps by dropping troops from above. (All other drop pod activity would restricted to prevent people from just using squad beacons to get in the base.) The Sky Lance would be the primary defense against enemy carriers.

[AThreatToYou]

Just make it a new type of base that moves. Or something like that.

TITAN MODE

Idea:

- Ownership of a continent grants ownership of Titan/carrier.
- Titan/carrier can be disabled but not captured until the continent is captured.
- Titan/carrier can be destroyed by enemy ownership of tech plants. The Skylance Turrets in the tech plants at every base will open up and fire at the Titan/carrier if the base is connected to an amp station (to power the skylance).
- Titan/carrier will respawn once continent is recaptured or captured.
- Control of titan carrier? I have no idea where it should move or be.

[NewSith]

Just make it a new type of base that moves. Or something like that.

TITAN MODE

Idea:

- Ownership of a continent grants ownership of Titan/carrier.
- Titan/carrier can be disabled but not captured until the continent is captured.
- Titan/carrier can be destroyed by enemy ownership of tech plants. The Skylance Turrets in the tech plants at every base will open up and fire at the Titan/carrier if the base is connected to an amp station (to power the skylance).
- Titan/carrier will respawn once continent is recaptured or captured.
- Control of titan carrier? I have no idea where it should move or be.

I think that with the Rush lanes, they can pretty much put Titans on rails. In addition, if Titans get an "ownership" thing, like the bases are about to, then outfits can decide what hex it should fly over next. This will somewhat make sure that Titans don't ruin the frontlines, by just shortcutting around half the hexes.

[Whiteagle]

I noticed some of the buildings in Planetside 2 look like they have movable parts. Pistons, stabilizer struts, blast doors that are folded down etc...
Well that's more to play up the idea that all these Facilities were dropped from Orbit...

Notice that there is a crashed Bio Lab on Esamir for instance.

[leifnielsen]

Well that's more to play up the idea that all these Facilities were dropped from Orbit...

Notice that there is a crashed Bio Lab on Esamir for instance.

I don't think I've seen that one. I never considered that they were dropped from orbit. That changes my perspective on things.

[Whiteagle]

I don't think I've seen that one. I never considered that they were dropped from orbit. That changes my perspective on things.
Dude, what did you think the Giant Thrusters were for?

[Sledgecrushr]

I would like to see these air ships to be outfit owned and an outfit should be limited to just one at a time. There should be no limitations on where you can take one of these airships.

I would hate to see this thing basically on rails moving frome one predeterminated place to the next. This is a sandbox game and the devs should give us the tools to determine our own path.

The airship really shouldnt be overly large. But should be set up so a platoon can move about its decks.

I woud like it a lot if you could land the airship and drive a couple of vehicles into its lower hull. This would add gameplay where this large vehicle that is very susceptible to ground attacks would be encouraged to interact with the ground in a meaningful way.