Oh lord, playing PS2 is fucking depressing now

[Babyfark McGeez]

Seriously, what happened here?

I stopped playing again for a while, and after i did log in again this week on miller-tr i noticed how utterly horrible the gameplay has become.

First, the population imbalance is atrocious.
I don't care that planetside is "a game about numbers", infact i even like being outnumbered, more challenging and more to shoot at (not to mention a small, free xp boost).
However there is a point where it just becomes a joke. There is barely ever any remotely even fight to be found. Usually two continents have overwhelming numbers on one side (50+%) and if you're lucky one continent has a somewhat acceptable population.
But as tr it was allways the same anyways: Ok numbers up to 8 pm, then all of a sudden numbers drop like a stone and the faction becomes more or less nonexistent (atleast on indar).
Vs is the opposite, which is why a vs player and me determined that tr is the faction of kids and vs is the faction of unemployed people.

Second, farming mentality.
I use to point out where enemy sunderers are located via regionchat. Now two things can happen: Either nothing, or i get told that "we know that, but it's a good farm". Then when you proceed to down the sundy, best outcome is your own team is pissed off silently. Worst outcome is you get fucking teamkilled. Great stuff.

Third, my faction consists of fucking morons now.
You can bet that if there is a remote facility, disconnected from the mainland, everyone will go there, losing all the other territories in the process. Getting back your own tech plant? Naaaah. Defending a base for an alert? No way man.
It doesn't even make any sense, i somewhat understood it during that joke of "WDS", but now? people flock to the most retarded bases aslong as they are disconnected from the mainland. The only "order" i saw during my playtime was someone ordering support for such a disconnected base, while the tech plant right next to it was being under assault and an amp station needed defense for an alert.
Nobody knows what they are doing, it is as if all the coordinated outfits have left the game and all that is left are either newbies or lonewolf farmers.

Am i just unlucky in my server/faction/continent/time of the day combination or is that really how PS2 is being played these days? Because, fuck me, that is depressing to witness.

[AThreatToYou]

IIRC that's Miller for you. Every server but Waterson.

But let me be entirely fair: that's just the game. Tactics? Winning? Lol, fuk that! Winning is having the highest k/d and/or score per minute!

[HereticusXZ]

Yeah, pop imbalance is pretty fraking frustrating, correcting it with XP "incentives" is just making the problem even worse!

I also agree it's extremely frustrating when no one wants to nock out the enemy spawn because "It's a good farm!" but we lost the base!!!



IMO if you you lose the facility while in it, You should lose half of the XP you gained in the fight, punish people for being greedy, Don't reward them! Give them a incentive to pick and choose to participate in reasonable fights and to fight harder!

The game really needs to get away from XP incentives and give us tactically important incentives similar to Tech-Plants controlling the production of MBT's. a Bio-Lab should control production of MAX and Amp-Stations should control the production of Liberators!


ABOVE ALL, Solve the god damn pop ballance! I don't care about Alerts, OMFG, WDS, Nexus, Hossin, or any of the Community Clash bullshit if the live-game that we play every single day is royally fucked with one-sided populations!

[Babyfark McGeez]

Well last time i could atleast pretend it was actually about territory control and didn't feel like the only one playing that way.
But this time it's like people aren't even trying anymore. The whole "k/d ratio, spm and certs" gameplay was so "in your face" that my eyes nearly fell out of the socket from rolling so much.

Maybe i should try waterson. :J

[DviddLeff]

Get yourself a positive outfit and start having fun again.

[CraazyCanuck]

I play Mattherson and Connery depending upon which of my buddies are on 8pm+ eastern and can almost always find a good fight. Might want to give either a try. Amerish last night was a blast. I've also played early in the morning on occasion and that's when I find similar issues to some of those you've mentioned.

[Dougnifico]

Ah.... so happy to be on Connery. lol

[ringring]

@Babyfark this is the game, the devs made it this way, we've been pushing the intercontinental lattice stuff since beta but I don't think anything will change until it comes in.

[HereticusXZ]

See I've been Connery TR from Launch and it's no exception to the population problem...



Connery' History was for the first 3 months absolute TR domination, holding control of Indar uncontested for 2 and a half straight months + the Prowler & Striker problems, to NC total domination for a few months during the Hacksaw OP drama, then the Helios Merger + ZOE Fiasco and the VS are suddenly dominating.

Connery has this illusion of being a "balanced" server because you have Outfit Alliances and competitive Outfits carrying the whole faction against a 42% or higher world-pop enemy faction. I presume other Servers have a similar situation if not far worse one to deal with!

Say what you will about target rich environments, that argument caters to the XP Farm crowd. I'm here to capture territory to get resources so I can enjoy the game. If I just want to farm I'll go play some BS Arena Shooter game, or maybe cookie-clicker!


TL/DR: Being Out-Poped is NEVER a good thing, no matter how you try to twist it!

[Stardouser]

As far as population imbalances, I don't think that can ever be stopped. But SOE could end the days of zerg support. Zerg support, to me, is when a game provides exponential advantages to a higher population that go beyond the advantages that simply having a higher population would normally bring.

For example, if you have 20 guys taking a base and the enemy has 5-6 defenders, you might expect the defenders to at least inflict losses and delay the enemy. But because of endless revives, revive grenades, and just plain revives being so fast that you can bunny hop or a-d step while doing it to stay alive even under fire, if you have more players in a fight, just have a few medics(more for spectacular effect) and you won't take much losses (where loss is defined as being forced to respawn).

Get 15 enemies holed up in a flag building and 5 guys can't even permanently kill one of them due to revives and you see the point.

And then, where vehicles are involved, repairs are too fast/easy and overpowered as well and cause a very similar effect. Even solo tanks, when they take damage, can back out and repair with ease; but if you have just one engineer repairing (making you a two man tank basically even if you're a Lightning) then you can hold multiple AV without moving much.

So, zerg support is a real thing. Among the possible solutions:
1. Institute responsible limits on revives (ie, after 2nd/3rd death, must respawn)
2. Add nanite ammo to revives that has to be replenished at a sunderer or terminal
3. Require medics to stand still while reviving or it is interruped
4. Add 2-3 seconds to the time it takes to revive (especially MAXes)

1. Add a 2-3 second delay to the start of repairs if you jump out as a driver (to combat solo repairing)
2. Cut repair speed by 50% across all tool cert levels
3. Make the overheat occur faster
4. Limit the number of repair tools that can affect a vehicle at once

[Edfishy]

I have a lot of fun when I roll with an outfit that works hard to win. Just gotta pretend like gating the other team will lead to an assault on another continent, PS1-style. =P

In regards to "fixing the population balance", how can this be done? Only a alternatives I can see are:
- Eliminate free accounts (... ain't gonna happen)
- Respawning in a 24-48+ territory respawns in 'waves' and has a queue similar to joining a full continent. The higher the pop, the longer you wait in queue (maybe paying players get the queue priority here?)

Your turn. Alternatives go!

[camycamera]

i have really gotten back into the game again, but i have really seen lots of idiots as well.

people lacking knowledge of using their classes properly (i have constantly yelled in front and followed a medic/engineer for help), and general incompetence.

yesterday actually while in a MAX i witnessed a teammate teamkill someone else for no reason, in which i slapped him once when he nearly killed him, and when he did kill him, i v-0'd him "cease fire! you're hitting TR!" then i bitchslappped him to death.

later on, when i was heavily damaged, i called out for engees to repair me. 3 did, and all huddled around me. but then, all of us was killed by C4. and it was that same FUCKING idiot that was TKing earlier on.

god, the attitude of some players these days are appalling. that was the worse TKing experience i had lol.

[Calista]

Imagine what it will be like on PS4 with the running and gunning CoD 4chan yoloswag 420noscoping trollololers.

[ShadoViper]

Imagine what it will be like on PS4 with the running and gunning CoD 4chan yoloswag 420noscoping trollololers.

Pretty sure the bulk of those kids are on the pc more than a console.

I know the matherson vanu empire was absolutely filled with an overabundance of brony-reddit-9gag subhumans.

[bites]

Ah.... so happy to be on Connery. lol

Must be nice from your point of view ... but being that this is a persistent world ... I can tell you its not _THAT_ nice ... what used to be "NC IS OVERPOPED WAAH" is slowly waltzing into "VANU ALL THE THYME!!!"
ZOE Started it down this path of nasty and its been progressively getting worse ... WDS highlighted this especially ... "Even pops during prime" (which in reality means TR is below both VANU and NC, NC who sometimes BARELY outpop Vanu ... in most cases) any time outside of that however (eg theres more than 5 hours in a day people...) Vanu zergfit around with up to 50% pop, they cruised round ghost capping EVERYTHING and took WDS via attrition rather than any form of skill or strategy.

Honestly I don't know how .. or why they still do it ... it boggles my mind that after this many months they are still zergging the shit out of the server to the point that during a late night Alert .. all NC does is try slow down the massive zerg (the plat leaders just outside peak used to actually state this as the goal, fact is most are gone and your lucky to find 2 open squads now).. and TR (rightly so) just don't bother ... which you can't blame them for at all!

The result ... it sucks, and slowly but surely while the "pop" remains relatively the same .. the server itself is hard pulling to one direction and taking itself out of the race for fun.

TLDR Still love the game (read as "TAKE MY MONEY!!!"), but outside of peak times (or during them for our TR overlords) its quickly becoming an uphill skiing event that isn't that much fun (you can still play in the snow .. but you won't be climbing mountains anytime soon...)

Sauce: http://borderlinetactical.net/rsnc/world-population/?world_id=1&zoom=3

[Gatekeeper]

Population balance is a real problem, definitely. Anything that can be done to either balance out pops, balance them out in an area, or negate the advantage of the zerg will help the game a lot.

Although it pains me as a Medic to say it, I think Stardouser has the right of it - nerfing revives/repairs would help make zergs less totally overwhelming. I think his suggestion of adding 'nanite ammo' for revives that can only be regained at sundies/terminals would make sense. The same logic could be applied to repair tools (though to ease the pain for vehicle crews you could also allow repair nanites to regen automatically at ammo towers/landing platforms).

Slowing spawn speed when one side has higher population (or speeding it up when you have less) could also work. I'd even be interested to see if giving direct combat buffs (extra health? stronger shields?) to the outnumbered side might work. A handful of super-soldiers defending an outpost against an overwhelming horde could actually be pretty fun for both sides.

Also, did I see somewhere that a faction's resources are going to be shared out amongst their players? If so, that would also help to weaken zergs as they end up with a smaller share each.

[ringring]

Population balance is a real problem, definitely. Anything that can be done to either balance out pops, balance them out in an area, or negate the advantage of the zerg will help the game a lot.

Although it pains me as a Medic to say it, I think Stardouser has the right of it - nerfing revives/repairs would help make zergs less totally overwhelming. I think his suggestion of adding 'nanite ammo' for revives that can only be regained at sundies/terminals would make sense. The same logic could be applied to repair tools (though to ease the pain for vehicle crews you could also allow repair nanites to regen automatically at ammo towers/landing platforms).

Slowing spawn speed when one side has higher population (or speeding it up when you have less) could also work. I'd even be interested to see if giving direct combat buffs (extra health? stronger shields?) to the outnumbered side might work. A handful of super-soldiers defending an outpost against an overwhelming horde could actually be pretty fun for both sides.

Also, did I see somewhere that a faction's resources are going to be shared out amongst their players? If so, that would also help to weaken zergs as they end up with a smaller share each.
Never happen, it's far too PS1. :groovy:

I don't know what the devs are thinkning of tbh. They seem to concentrate on developing stuff and redeveloping it. e.g. cloaker redo, lib redo and I hear they will look at the tech plant again.

All of these things are good in themselves but all they can do is to scratch a minor irritation, they won't do anything to retain players over the longer term.

Perhaps they don't see the need to retain players over the long term? Perhaps they see that there will be a natural life-span to the game and are only trying to provide short-term experiences?

There have been criticisms from the start (nothing but a TDM and dumbing down etc etc) which have been pretty much spot on and the devs don't really show any inclination to address them; therefore we can assume, I suppose, that everything is going to plan. - How depressing is that!

[Edfishy]

I don't know what the devs are thinkning of tbh. They seem to concentrate on developing stuff and redeveloping it. e.g. cloaker redo, lib redo and I hear they will look at the tech plant again.

I think it's a matter of their being on a skeleton crew and not having the engineers necessary for massive changes to their engine. Instead they have to work within their means, which means toying around with existing stats.

Sounds like May or so is when they'll be scheduled to have some crew back (from EQ:N or the new zombie game) and can accomplish the lattice changes.

[bpostal]

Babyfark, if you're talking about yesterday's biolab alert I gotta warn ya that there's a lot of people who either log off for a couple hours when those pop or just ignore the whole damn thing entirely.

[Chowley]

Ya Miller pop is pretty awful at the moment. I generally play from 8pm on so my playtime is usually completely dominated by the giant VS air zergs, its seriously getting old.

Although the sundy farming while common, I usually only see when the server is very quiet, late at night or early in the day. When the server is bloody quiet and motivation is low I do not object to ignoring enemy sundies.

The worst thing for me now though is Indarside has made a pretty big return in the last week :( Indar is pushing me away from the game, along with other issues.

[almalino]

Ya Miller pop is pretty awful at the moment. I generally play from 8pm on so my playtime is usually completely dominated by the giant VS air zergs, its seriously getting old.

Get NC Phoenix and OHK small planes from the air. They usually think they can escape when hit but Phoenix gives no indication and it is OHK.

I often look for such zergs and hunt planes with Phoenix. So much fun. Phoenix is very powerful Anti Air rocket + granted it is very slow.

[Babyfark McGeez]

Well, i logged in shortly tonight to see the new deathscreen (seriously, what's the fuzz about there?) and the pop was completely fucked up again lol (something like 60% vs on indar, 50% tr on esamir and 50% nc on amerish).

I didn't even bother playing, but at this point i have no doubts that if SOE isn't taking this issue seriously and does something about it it will ultimately do the game in. Besides making an absolute horrible impression on new players, i can't imagine even toughened up regulars putting up with this all the time.

And since it isn't consistently imbalanced towards one faction it's affecting nearly every player at one point or another.

I really have to check out other servers sometime to see if it's just miller that's so skewed, but thankfully i don't have any time to play much games (let alone this one) currently. :p

Man, april can't come fast enough. Personally more time for games then, and generally: PS1!

[BlaxicanX]

Imagine what it will be like on PS4 with the running and gunning CoD 4chan yoloswag 420noscoping trollololers.



It'll probably be better. PC Gamers are like 4Chan members; they don't really seem to know how to enjoy games- they just bitch.

The same ADHD sheeple mentality that allows console gamers to swallow shit like annual CoD games is what also makes the atmosphere much more fun and enjoyable.

[Babyfark McGeez]

Countering a generalized assumption with...a generalized assumption. Nice!

Bitchy whiners vs. consumer zombies, we really need a PS4 vs. PC server now. :p

[War Barney]

Population balance is a real problem, definitely. Anything that can be done to either balance out pops, balance them out in an area, or negate the advantage of the zerg will help the game a lot.

Although it pains me as a Medic to say it, I think Stardouser has the right of it - nerfing revives/repairs would help make zergs less totally overwhelming. I think his suggestion of adding 'nanite ammo' for revives that can only be regained at sundies/terminals would make sense. The same logic could be applied to repair tools (though to ease the pain for vehicle crews you could also allow repair nanites to regen automatically at ammo towers/landing platforms).

Slowing spawn speed when one side has higher population (or speeding it up when you have less) could also work. I'd even be interested to see if giving direct combat buffs (extra health? stronger shields?) to the outnumbered side might work. A handful of super-soldiers defending an outpost against an overwhelming horde could actually be pretty fun for both sides.

Also, did I see somewhere that a faction's resources are going to be shared out amongst their players? If so, that would also help to weaken zergs as they end up with a smaller share each.


I've been suggesting some balance changes to revives for a while now, as much as people might enjoy a never ending supply of revives right now reviving is just insane, each medic can carry 4 revive nades to revives almost a full platoon in cramped spaces, its insane. My suggestion was that there should be a execution you can do to enemies so they can't be revived and it would be nice if MAXs couldn't get revived.
z
Right now mass repairing and reviving really does favour a zerg, people keep trying to say reviving helps smaller groups but small groups often get wiped zergs don't so having a ton of medics to revive everybody on the point makes them very hard to deal with, limitations on revive would make it easier to pick at zergs. And of course nothing makes you feel more worthless than sneaking onto the point killing 5 guys only to die to a medic who revives all of them so in essence you did nothing but farm exp but did nothing to help the fight...

Numbers is the main thing that needs fixing though... the main thing that makes me stop playing is logging in and seeing every fight is a 80-20 fight, even if my side is the 80 I just log off as its just not fun.

[HereticusXZ]

I'm of the opinion that zergs and pop-imballance can be solved by turning the incentive to attack/defend away from XP gain and make it a more practical dependence like....

"Oh no, if I lose this base then I can't spawn X item/vehicle! I better defend it! Or if I take away THIS facility from the enemy at THIS location then they can't spawn any of X Item/Vehicle in other territory's until they res-establish a connecting lattice!"

[BlaxicanX]

^ That won't work because playstyles within the game are too different, and it depends on player empathy for their fellow players.

If I was playing the game and I noticed that we just lost the tech-lab that allows my faction to build ESF's, I wouldn't give a single fuck. Because I don't fly ESF's and I could care less if my factions' pilots have to ground-pound like the rest of us. Similarly, will a pilot care about tankers losing access to their MBT's? Probably not.

There isn't really a way to stop a "zerg" because the entire core concept of the game encourages people to mass up together and roll around the map getting into big fights. Safety and victory both lie in numbers, and even if the game gave you zero exp for taking a base because you did it as part of a zerg, human instinct to follow the herd will set in for most people anyway.

But as far as incentives, an incentive is something that personally benefits you. Thus, something distant like "if you don't keep that base, your factions' pilots can't fly" isn't enough. It has to be something that punishes or rewards everyone on an individual level.

[Mordelicius]

@ OP:

On the population imbalance, it's the WDS Preseason 2. It touched off not just intra-server faction switching or just flat out logging out, but cross server migration.

The "MLG themed" NC competition in Waterson such as NUC and ZAPS has largely evaporated already before WDS even started. In addition, due to the ZOE nerf many hight VS migrated to other servers.

As a result, the VS 'barely' lost the WDS preseason 2 to NC. Had it gone another day, the NC would have lost our razor thin lead. The VS were essentially ignoring alerts and capping continents just to get the lead, resulting to less and less fighting with each faction concentrated on one continent.

On farming. It happens since the alert rewards aren't enough. It rarely happens in NC Waterson, but it can be frustrating when a rogue group would be farming somewhere unimportant during an alert.

I've suggested a different alert reward system a while ago to make it more interesting: http://www.planetside-universe.com/showthread.php?t=55841 (supply crate drops that physically is parachuted! Something concrete that can be fought over after the alert).


On the TR being least populated. In general, the chief reason is the buildup and collapse of insta-win vehicles/fracture max complex, coupled with the OP Strikers. When your whole 'gameplay' was based on strikers decimating vehicles and letting your Anti-infantry Harassers/Max Fracture finish off the remaining infantry for months, losing it almost overnight can be devastating.

In addition, in Waterson, NUC (TR) is not as active/effective as they used to be (which sucks; fighting NUC is one of the best reason to be in Waterson). Waterson TR has been making a comeback lately though.

@ the topic of last couple of patches:

Liberators are currently overpowered. My fully armored Sunderer was destroyed in 3-4 second. They have to fix this crap. Wasn't the Sunderer survivability was just fixed recently allowing attackers to consistently allowed to respawn and not get mass wiped by Sundies blowing left and right?

These Libs are obliterating the spawn Sundies to great effect. Raise Sunderer resistance to the Liberators. Take a pick SOE, make Liberators air glass cannon or weakly destructive tank. They can't be both! They are strong against everything again.

Sniping is overpowered. They say they want to protect the newbies from being farmed (that's what we've been saying on and on and on last year: nerf all the OP stuff pronto) that's why they added the new kill screen yet they ignored warnings that Snipers do not need any buff :doh:. Their instakill long range headshots is low risk/high reward. Been saying it all along they didn't need buff. It's like Dev left hand doesn't know the right hand, doing things to nullify each other's functions.

[EVILoHOMER]

Most people have quit because the developers didn't listen, every one I know who played, quit by Dec 2012 and I personally noticed the population halved by Jan 2013.

The game became depressing to play, not only because there was no meta game but because the base designs sucked, the weapons were boring and it just wasn't anywhere near as good as Planetside.

The main issue however was population, it was amazing at launch, giant battles everywhere, all the servers were packed and there were giant battles all day long. Now however the only time you'll get good sized battles is during peak time and even then it is nothing like it used to be.

Game is dead, move on, should know not to have faith in SOE, they've fucked up every game they've ever made.



Just cannot believe it is already coming up to 2 years old :\

[ringring]

Most people have quit because the developers didn't listen, every one I know who played, quit by Dec 2012 and I personally noticed the population halved by Jan 2013.

The game became depressing to play, not only because there was no meta game but because the base designs sucked, the weapons were boring and it just wasn't anywhere near as good as Planetside.

The main issue however was population, it was amazing at launch, giant battles everywhere, all the servers were packed and there were giant battles all day long. Now however the only time you'll get good sized battles is during peak time and even then it is nothing like it used to be.

Game is dead, move on, should know not to have faith in SOE, they've fucked up every game they've ever made.



Just cannot believe it is already coming up to 2 years old :\

While I agree with your first two sentences your last is more than a wild generalisation it is wrong. There are still pop locks on continents at times.

Your general point though is correct, as I think we're all saying.

[Taramafor]

Most people have quit because the developers didn't listen, every one I know who played, quit by Dec 2012 and I personally noticed the population halved by Jan 2013.

The game became depressing to play, not only because there was no meta game but because the base designs sucked, the weapons were boring and it just wasn't anywhere near as good as Planetside.

Just cannot believe it is already coming up to 2 years old :\

Agreed. Lack of a proper world(/universe?) end goal gives people nothing to strive for either.

The biggest problem is that for anything SOE DID do right, they'd add a whole new shit load of just plain wrong.

[Babyfark McGeez]

Logged in for my daily certs and decided to play the last 10 mins of the alert that was going on.

And...the game is fucking broken right now lol. I was able to capture points from a few hexes away and we had some invincible guys standing outside our spawn. There was probably more but i preferred to log off. Do they ever test their shit? :p

[Vashyo]

Farming is winning, you win new guns and other items doing it. ^^

Wish we had scores based on how well you do an area instead of just killing as much people as possible as fast as possible as it is now. Bit something like PS1 where u could get some serious XP for taking over a tough base.

[Boildown]

Patch after patch for eight months straight SoE has done nothing but reinforce zerg-friendly gameplay, while nerfing small squad gameplay. There must be some metric that says they make more money this way. I for one can't wait for Star Citizen Dogfighting Module. I'm glad I let my year-long sub lapse in December, I wouldn't want to be paying for the game in its state right now. This game still has its moments, but they are fewer and farther between than they used to be.

[BlaxicanX]

If you want small-squad gameplay, play Gears of War.

idk. When I hear people complain about big battles in PS2, I think of someone complaining about not being able to use their hands in soccer.

[HereticusXZ]

^ That won't work because playstyles within the game are too different, and it depends on player empathy for their fellow players.

If I was playing the game and I noticed that we just lost the tech-lab that allows my faction to build ESF's, I wouldn't give a single fuck. Because I don't fly ESF's and I could care less if my factions' pilots have to ground-pound like the rest of us. Similarly, will a pilot care about tankers losing access to their MBT's? Probably not.

There isn't really a way to stop a "zerg" because the entire core concept of the game encourages people to mass up together and roll around the map getting into big fights. Safety and victory both lie in numbers, and even if the game gave you zero exp for taking a base because you did it as part of a zerg, human instinct to follow the herd will set in for most people anyway.

But as far as incentives, an incentive is something that personally benefits you. Thus, something distant like "if you don't keep that base, your factions' pilots can't fly" isn't enough. It has to be something that punishes or rewards everyone on an individual level.



As opposed to right now where everyone sits at a tower or Bio-lab and just farms XP all day?

Make the 3 main facilities control and restrict a feature of the game and you will see incentive to defend. That's nice a pure and true Softie won't care about Vehicles or MAX' but catering to other playstyles who do care, they will ideally want to defend these other facilities over the XP farm.

Plain softies can do everything but things like Air, Armor, or MAX Units give you options to make the breakthrough crash now rather then in 15-20 minutes with a long slug-fest.

Breaks up the Zerg that's only zerging for XP to chase after important objectives relevant to the war effort over "Which fight has the best XP farm?!"

[BlaxicanX]

Let's say that Amp Stations now control ESF spawns, if you lose all your amp stations, your faction can no longer spawn their ESF.

Your faction loses all its last Amp Stations.

Do you think that your faction is going to mount a concentrated effort to get an amp station back? I would argue that it probably wouldn't. The infantryman isn't going to particularly care, the guy driving a tank isn't going to particularly care, and the pilots who can't fly their ESF's aren't going to unite all the other pilots and groundpound to grab an amp station. So what'll happen is that your faction will lose access to ESF's, and life will go on as normal until it's eventually recaptured. In the meantime, pilots will either groundpound or they'll log in to a different character and fly their ESF's.

Take a look at history; you need a Tech-Plant to spawn MBT's. Esamir has only a single tech-plant on it, meaning that at any one time, only one out of three factions on Esamir can spawn MBT's.

When was the last time you saw the lone Tech-Plant on Esamir be hotly contested by all three factions? When was the last time you saw Eisa constantly changing faction hands? It doesn't really, because unless it's a Tech-Plant alert, Eisa Tech isn't considered a strategically important objective on Esamir, despite the fact that you need it to spawn MBT's. Being able to spawn MBT's just isn't that important to anyone in a faction besides the people who drive them. It's the same situation for ESF's and... pretty much any other vehicle in the game.

I think you're underestimating the inherent greed in players. The reason why we have farms is because exp personally benefits a player, always. I don't care if some poor guy in my faction can't spawn his esf, but I always need a new gun, or a weapon attachment, or a new ability, etc etc. So if I have to choose between farming players for exp, or taking Eisa tech-plant so that my faction could spawn MBT's, , why would I choose Eisa tech-plant over moar exp, aside from just having a big heart?

[HereticusXZ]

More or less my point Blaxican is exactly the point you just made, there's to much incentive in the XP farm, individual greed. We need options, reasons, incentive, SOMETHING to get away from the XP farm/zerg and back into the realm of tactics and strategy.



Also to counter....

Eisa specifically doesn't hold much significance for a combination of Lattice and the cost to push and take the Tech-Plant isn't worth the territory you'll lose by committing so much manpower to such a heavily fortified position.

You don't see any care for most of the Tech-Plants right now, because the MBT is largely under-powered, or ground armor in general is largely useless and I'm going to point at Community Clash as my evidence.

As with any game the balance of power revolves around the competitive scene simply because it's the competitive players who points out the strength and weakness of weapons and vehicles, there using it the fastest and the loudest.

With that said Air is first and foremost the deciding factor in every single CC Match, then comes the Infantry to actually grab the points. Armor is no real factor, yeah you can argue exceptions to the rule but I'm talking in-general use.



Expanding on the role of TP's and armor relevance, Applying similar restrictions to other Main Facility: Bio-Labs control the MAX, Amp-Stations control the Liberator.... This is just one option to try and get focus away from XP Zergs and back into the realm of Strategy and Tactics.

I'd love to see other options proposed, discussed and explored if the Main Facility restrictions aren't to your taste.

[KesTro]

I honestly think community clash isn't very good evidence when talking about PLanetside 2 as a whole. In small skirmishes? Yes I can see air being needed but in the open world everyone has their part to play there are fights I come across regularly where air can't do a damn thing because the AA has reached critical mass. At that point it's time to pull armor.

[Assist]

IIRC that's Miller for you. Every server but Waterson.

But let me be entirely fair: that's just the game. Tactics? Winning? Lol, fuk that! Winning is having the highest k/d and/or score per minute!

Unfortunately that's true, as there is still no substantial reason to play for your faction as opposed to your own personal gain.

[Binkley]

My concern isn't that not enough players will care to get their amp stations back (to be able to spawn ESFs), but that they won't be able to. If your factions loses it's ESFs, MBTs, etc how is it going to be able to fight back against opponents that have these things? When the skies are filled with enemy ESFs, Libs, and Galaxies and you have no air power to counter them, you are royally screwed. Good luck taking back you major installations.

[Xaine]

Why do you think the game dropped like 80% of its population in 6 months after launch?

Because its bad, and doesn't come NEAR the original Planetside.

What everyone seems to ignore is how hard SOE dropped the ball on this game. It looks great, plays great - but has no substance at all.

An FPS on this scale is an amazing technical achievement. If they'd made it like Planetside 1 (taking territory means something, death has meaning, tactics actually matter) then the game wouldn't be in the god awful spot it is now.

It's like they looked at everything that made Planetside 1 good, scratched their head and said 'Nah, fuck that - lets make it less interesting'.

SoE make good games, apparently by mistake - then they release they have something good, try to make it better/make a sequel and cut the heart out of it, leaving it a limp, lifeless shell.

GG SoE. Never have I seen someone throw so much money and effort at such a good idea, and have it fail SO hard.

[bpostal]

Unfortunately that's true, as there is still no substantial reason to play for your faction as opposed to your own personal gain.

You can play for your faction because you enjoy seeing your faction do well. Unfortunately that only carries you for so long.
During my week off for spring break I played for maybe two hours...and beat Mass Effect, Mass Effect 2 and Mass Effect 3 in a row again because that sounded more satisfying and enjoyable.

[BlaxicanX]

More or less my point Blaxican is exactly the point you just made, there's to much incentive in the XP farm, individual greed. We need options, reasons, incentive, SOMETHING to get away from the XP farm/zerg and back into the realm of tactics and strategy.



Also to counter....

Eisa specifically doesn't hold much significance for a combination of Lattice and the cost to push and take the Tech-Plant isn't worth the territory you'll lose by committing so much manpower to such a heavily fortified position.

You don't see any care for most of the Tech-Plants right now, because the MBT is largely under-powered, or ground armor in general is largely useless and I'm going to point at Community Clash as my evidence.

As with any game the balance of power revolves around the competitive scene simply because it's the competitive players who points out the strength and weakness of weapons and vehicles, there using it the fastest and the loudest.

With that said Air is first and foremost the deciding factor in every single CC Match, then comes the Infantry to actually grab the points. Armor is no real factor, yeah you can argue exceptions to the rule but I'm talking in-general use.



Expanding on the role of TP's and armor relevance, Applying similar restrictions to other Main Facility: Bio-Labs control the MAX, Amp-Stations control the Liberator.... This is just one option to try and get focus away from XP Zergs and back into the realm of Strategy and Tactics.

I'd love to see other options proposed, discussed and explored if the Main Facility restrictions aren't to your taste.

I think you make good points here. A lot of the problems with the game are tied to the balance issues. Maybe people would care about their factions having access to tanks and planes if they were a strategic necessity to win fights- as it currently stands, they aren't. Air exists to farm infantry until it gets run off by AA, tanks bombard buildings until they get blown by by AV; the only time either have any staying power are if their faction has a big pop advantage at a base, but if that's the case that factions going to win the base with just infantry anyway. Beyond that, air and armor has no relevance in a fight- thus, they aren't a strategic goal to keep.

Game balance is a massive can of worms though, so I'm not going to get too deep into that, but you get the gist. In order for something to be a faction-wide incentive, it has to be something that every member in a faction cares about. *Right now*, the only thing in the game that has value to everyone is exp. So I guess the real question is, what else in the game can we make valuable enough that the entire faction can recognize the value of making sure they always have access to it?

[OpolE]

I love it, this guy gets to write 'fucking' in his title. You can't penalise me

[libbmaster]

If you want small-squad gameplay, play Gears of War.

idk. When I hear people complain about big battles in PS2, I think of someone complaining about not being able to use their hands in soccer.

I totally agree. Population imbalance is frustrating at times, but if you are not prepared for that, you are not prepared for the "planetside experience".

I'll admit I would like it if they could look into some XP systems or whatever to counter act it, but that's probably a never ending battle. In the end, the best thing they can do to attack the pop issue is to keep new players rolling in.


SoE has done things I don't like. They could have definitely communicated with the community better in regards to the release of the "kill map". I personally would like to see them forgo the "weekly updates" system to ensure more bug free patches. And there is considerable weight to the argument that much of this content should have been put together pre-release.


But with that said... I feel like criticism of this caliber is unwarranted.

[Edfishy]

I'm liking the whole "extra Overshield" to help aid population unbalance, especially if it applied towards vehicles as well. Would be fun IMO.

[Timithos]

As far as population imbalances, I don't think that can ever be stopped. But SOE could end the days of zerg support. Zerg support, to me, is when a game provides exponential advantages to a higher population that go beyond the advantages that simply having a higher population would normally bring.

For example, if you have 20 guys taking a base and the enemy has 5-6 defenders, you might expect the defenders to at least inflict losses and delay the enemy. But because of endless revives, revive grenades, and just plain revives being so fast that you can bunny hop or a-d step while doing it to stay alive even under fire, if you have more players in a fight, just have a few medics(more for spectacular effect) and you won't take much losses (where loss is defined as being forced to respawn).

Get 15 enemies holed up in a flag building and 5 guys can't even permanently kill one of them due to revives and you see the point.

And then, where vehicles are involved, repairs are too fast/easy and overpowered as well and cause a very similar effect. Even solo tanks, when they take damage, can back out and repair with ease; but if you have just one engineer repairing (making you a two man tank basically even if you're a Lightning) then you can hold multiple AV without moving much.

So, zerg support is a real thing. Among the possible solutions:
1. Institute responsible limits on revives (ie, after 2nd/3rd death, must respawn)
2. Add nanite ammo to revives that has to be replenished at a sunderer or terminal
3. Require medics to stand still while reviving or it is interruped
4. Add 2-3 seconds to the time it takes to revive (especially MAXes)

1. Add a 2-3 second delay to the start of repairs if you jump out as a driver (to combat solo repairing)
2. Cut repair speed by 50% across all tool cert levels
3. Make the overheat occur faster
4. Limit the number of repair tools that can affect a vehicle at once

The problem isn't the class mechanics of medic and engineer. It is the non-defensiveness of the base. 5-6 defenders who own a base should cause havoc with 20 attackers, but they don't because the base isn't defensible enough until what we've recently seen on just a handful of bases on Amerish. Both sides have medics so that argument is null. Defenders can't pull vehicles to combat enemy vehicles, so it is a vehicle pulling problem, not an engineer problem.

Your suggested changes to medics and engineers are not minor tweaks that would preserve game balance, but are major nerfs that would upset the balance of the entire game. I'm not saying either of those classes need slight tweaking, but definitely not a whole bulleted list of radical changes.

[Timithos]

I don't understand why SOE doesn't institute one-way server transfer tokens from over-populated factions to servers with underdog factions, and to monetize it even. I don't understand.

And I don't understand why they can't make same server character freeze-outs of 3 to 5 hours, like PS1 with it's 24-hr freeze outs. People want to play other factions - I get it - so they'll learn to play on different servers. I know people can create multiple accounts, but most won't, and it will alleviate the problem of 4th factioning. It won't eliminate it, but it will certainly alleviate it to a good degree. And I have 4 characters from different factions on both Connory and Waterson. I'd be willing to "suffer" the 3-5 hour freeze-out to pick up my passive certs. I won't like it, but I'll see it as necessary. Heck. Since when does SOE not do things we don't like that are not necessary - like ADS prevention while jetting.

I understand continent over-population from organized factions through the various server/outfit alliances that get to a continent first and lock the others out. That is a Planetside tradition. But I don't agree with server over-populations.

[BlaxicanX]

5-6 defenders who own a base should cause havoc with 20 attackers

Why?

[Taramafor]

Why?

First of all, it was probably a figure of speech.

Second, the side that defends should have the advantage, otherwise what is the point in defending anything at all? That's not to say it should be impossible for attackers to, well, attack with the same numbers, just that it should be more difficult.

[Baneblade]

I'm looking forward to finally getting BR 31 in PS1.

[Timithos]

First of all, it was probably a figure of speech.

Second, the side that defends should have the advantage, otherwise what is the point in defending anything at all? That's not to say it should be impossible for attackers to, well, attack with the same numbers, just that it should be more difficult.

And so far what we've had before Amerish is 55% attacking numbers /faceroll /roflstomp their way through bases pressing the I-Win-Button. 55 attackers winning against 45 defenders who supposedly "own" a base is absolutely pathetic. This is supposed to be Planetside, not some arena FPS where a base is nothing but an airsoft/paintball arena with obstacles equal to both sides. We need to see a minimum 60-66% attacking numbers on the map before bases show themselves to be adequately defensible. Even Bio Labs with their unimaginative choke points are an automatic 62% faceroll for the attackers.

And forget about adding siege mechanics such as base power drain, armor territory dominance, and air zone dominance. None of that metagame stuff can be added or enjoyed with the current non-defensibility of bases. It'd be impossible or the biggest joke we've ever seen in this game so far.

[almalino]

I follow BF4 discussions and people complain there all the time the same way people complain in PS2 forums. Game is being dumbed down for COD crowd.

I do not play BF4 myself so cannot say is it true or not.

[BlaxicanX]

First of all, it was probably a figure of speech.

Second, the side that defends should have the advantage, otherwise what is the point in defending anything at all? That's not to say it should be impossible for attackers to, well, attack with the same numbers, just that it should be more difficult.

This doesn't answer my question.

And so far what we've had before Amerish is 55% attacking numbers /faceroll /roflstomp their way through bases pressing the I-Win-Button. 55 attackers winning against 45 defenders who supposedly "own" a base is absolutely pathetic. This is supposed to be Planetside, not some arena FPS where a base is nothing but an airsoft/paintball arena with obstacles equal to both sides. We need to see a minimum 60-66% attacking numbers on the map before bases show themselves to be adequately defensible. Even Bio Labs with their unimaginative choke points are an automatic 62% faceroll for the attackers.

And forget about adding siege mechanics such as base power drain, armor territory dominance, and air zone dominance. None of that metagame stuff can be added or enjoyed with the current non-defensibility of bases. It'd be impossible or the biggest joke we've ever seen in this game so far.

You use a lot of hyperbole.

What methods would you use to make bases more defensible?

[Stardouser]

Both sides have medics so that argument is null.

Your suggested changes to medics and engineers are not minor tweaks that would preserve game balance, but are major nerfs that would upset the balance of the entire game. I'm not saying either of those classes need slight tweaking, but definitely not a whole bulleted list of radical changes.

5 guys having 5 medics can't use their revives against 20. They'd have no one to do any shooting. The 20 can have 5 medics and completely erase every death (not from stats of course). So the argument that both sides have medics certainly doesn't hold any water when we're talking about a 20 on 5 situation and whether or not the 5 should hurt the 20. And the rest of the time, it's just cheesy gameplay.

Also, it would not upset the balance of the game, the balance of the game is upset right now. Of course, those who like to zip off behind a rock and erase substantial damage in a few seconds will not agree; bearing in mind that in this game if someone is 50 meters away and their tank goes behind a rock, they can be repaired in 5 seconds and yet it takes you well more than that to get in position to fire again.

Also, the bullet list was not a list that I meant ALL things should be done, but merely a list of things to choose one or two from. Nanite ammo, for example, might be enough to bring revives to balance.

[Timithos]

This doesn't answer my question.



You use a lot of hyperbole.

What methods would you use to make bases more defensible?


I use hyperbole, because constantly spewing out specific ideas about base defense is exhausting and obvious to me. I'm so tired, I'm not even going to put much mental effort into this. No proper grammar for you.

Ok, this is not rocket science. SOE apparently discovered 3 tools only on base defense: Choke Points (Bio Labs), Walls (Wallsamir), and Elevation (Amerish).

Spawn room fracturing: I can solve the spawn camping problem on 70% of the outposts on all of Auraxus. Place Spawn Room C of Freyr Amp Station into every small outpost on Auraxus. It is sunken into the ground with roof egress and 5 teleporter/tunnel exits. Spread the exits out 50-100 meters apart from eachother around the base. Make them come up into buildings with no line of sight to the doors. Each building has 2-5 exits. Armor and air would have to literally camp 20+ exits points which is virtually impossible. Only an organized outfit or extremely overwhelming zerg could cover the 6 infantry exits. It is NOT armor and air's job to camp the spawn room. It is their job to suppress the attacker's avenues on their way to capture points, vehicle terminals, and generators. DONE. #1 biggest base problem solved. (Because one above ground spawn room and one above-ground teleporter DIDN'T WORK on Esamir SOE!)

More turrets, more variety. Better range of motion. Better placement.

ADS camera firing at head level so we can actually take advantage of cover. You stand on top of a wall, and you can't see the attacker below you, but he can pop you in the head, because your "chest camera" is obstructed by the wall or some crate.

Modules that you can install into your facility that enhance it's usefulness and power (like more bonuses, tougher turrets, etc.) This is a PS1 concept.

Put cat-walks and stairs on the defender side of walls only. And since we don't have the chest camera problem anymore, we can actually use them.

Design sloped terrain where defenders can EASILY get out of a base, but attackers can't easily get in. One-way drop off catwalks are a good idea too... the ones in Esamir in that ONE base, you know?

HUD and Mini map information for facility owners ONLY! Don't show attackers that a generator is overloaded or destroyed. Make them check! Make them communicate. It's the defender's facility. We have the data - not the attackers.

Trenches that are insidiously sized to trap, wedge, and disable lightnings, vanguards and prowlers. Ever been driving along and suddenly fall into a trench and you can't drive out? Facility defenders should have dug these defenses to size. Don't want to get trapped? Stay away, or drive at higher speeds at an angle.

5 attacking classes can overload a generator, but only one defending class can repair it when blown. It take 3-4 seconds for 5 attacking classes to initiate blowing a generator, but 15-20 seconds for a defending engineer to repair it. How is this remotely fair for defenders?! Either flip flop that crap, or equalize the situation.

Change the size of the capture point radius. The defenders get a larger circle to spread out and DEFEND. The attackers get a smaller circle.

Tweak the capture flip timer too. Defenders is shorter, attackers is longer.

A.I. facility turrets that fire at 50% effectiveness, limited range, and no target leading. (Again, another PS1 concept that worked.)

Since I solved the spawn camping problem in 70% of the small outposts everywhere. Attackers might not want to venture out to "suppress the spawn". Better defend the capture point, because they'll have a steady stream of defenders coming at them so it WON'T be boring. Oh and since that is the most viable attacking strategy, you can bring back 0/6-6/6 capture mechanics that speed the capture.

***********************

Gosh, and once bases are actually defensible, we can add all kinds of attacking components:

Armor siege capture mechanics for holding a dominating a swath of land.

Air siege capture mechanics for dominating the air in the zone.

Power drain/ANT tactics.

Linear generator/control console shut down pathway mechanics like... I don't know... 10 freaking generators/consoles that finally lead all the way to destroying the spawn tubes.

Another linear destructible debris path that leads to the spawn tubes. Yup, destructible bases.

But since bases or so pathetically designed, we CAN'T HAVE ANY OF THIS!

I'm exhausted. I broke my promise.

[Taramafor]

See, it's not just me yelling for better base defense and proper cover. >_>

[HereticusXZ]

Better base design IMO is just band aid solutions, we've been given better base design every major update, every continent revamp, all ever sense the first Indar revamp....

It still hasn't changed the core problems...


Build walls, move the spawn-room, add underground complexes and it still doesn't change the fact that this base has no relevance beyond a glorified paintball arena.

Bases need real mechanical relevance beyond XP or Resources gain.

Ask yourself "What relevance does X facility bring to my Empire that impacts me in a very real way?"

Answer: Only the Tech-Plants control over Main-Battle-Tank production.... and that's arguable over how relevant MBT's are for impacting the war effort.

One of the largest problems to PS2 is the lack or absence of incentive "Why do we fight?" beyond the generic fact that it's a video game, dakka for the sake of dakka. XP Is quite literally the only reason anyone goes to any fight.

Tactics and Strategy, Choosing the right base to attack/defend should be more important then Zerg to X base because it has the most XP.

[War Barney]

Better base design IMO is just band aid solutions, we've been given better base design every major update, every continent revamp, all ever sense the first Indar revamp....

It still hasn't changed the core problems...


Build walls, move the spawn-room, add underground complexes and it still doesn't change the fact that this base has no relevance beyond a glorified paintball arena.

Bases need real mechanical relevance beyond XP or Resources gain.

Ask yourself "What relevance does X facility bring to my Empire that impacts me in a very real way?"

Answer: Only the Tech-Plants control over Main-Battle-Tank production.... and that's arguable over how relevant MBT's are for impacting the war effort.

One of the largest problems to PS2 is the lack or absence of incentive "Why do we fight?" beyond the generic fact that it's a video game, dakka for the sake of dakka. XP Is quite literally the only reason anyone goes to any fight.

Tactics and Strategy, Choosing the right base to attack/defend should be more important then Zerg to X base because it has the most XP.

Aye the *why* is one thing this game really lacks, theres no story to speak of, just some lore you can never know if you don't look for it and bases how no meaning except to gain exp unless its an alert.

If anything alerts highlight what you're saying, that bases need relevance, alerts are fun because they give you a purpose, its fun getting a platoon together and planning out a strategy to reach a base you need to capture to win (though its boring how it more or less forces you to 1 place you might not enjoy or fight over certain bases you don't enjoy). It would be nice if this idea of purpose was more constant.

The problem really is how though, making more vehicles tied to it wouldn't help as I don't enjoy vehicles so wouldn't give a crap still, same as a lot of people, tying it to guns would be very complex, make no sense and just annoy people.

One simple idea which I think you've already suggested in other threads would be to make every base have a purpose, perhaps defence bases that make it take longer to cap other bases, towers with radar on top (which can be disabled by a gen) that give minimap vision to the bases next to it on the lattice, bases that are covered in AA and AV turrets giving control of routes to other bases.

The sad thing is I don't even think this would help.. it would make you focus certain bases first but there'd still be no grand reason for it. Whats needed is things like this AND some kind of intro for players to get them hyped up for fighting for their faction, and perhaps some kind of reward if you lock all the continents something BIG like 2k certs for everybody or chose a free gun (perhaps not that big..) that way people would know what they are fighting for! a faction with goals they now understand and a reward which is hard to get but worth it when you do. Is there even a bonus for locking a cont other than it flashing up obnoxiously? I've never noticed so if there is its obviously really pretty negligible.

[HereticusXZ]

I'm not talking about the lore >.>

I'm talking about strategic military relevance, When you fight a war you fight it over tactical positions or important resources, NOT in the middle of butt-fuck egypt, just cause. IE a farm provides food, a city provides shelter, a factory produces weapons...

Take away the Farm and you starve a army, take away the city and the army suffers in the elements, take away a factory and the army has to scavenge for weapons...

All facilities in PS2 should have a relevance and a noticeable impact that is felt by the whole Empire.

Right now we have a Bio-Lab heal, Amp Stations Turret CD, and Tech-Plants control MBT's? If you lose any of these do you care at all to leave the tower-fight your in? Or will you stay at the tower and continue to farm XP?

[Sledgecrushr]

I'm not talking about the lore >.>

I'm talking about strategic military relevance, When you fight a war you fight it over tactical positions or important resources, NOT in the middle of butt-fuck egypt, just cause. IE a farm provides food, a city provides shelter, a factory produces weapons...

Take away the Farm and you starve a army, take away the city and the army suffers in the elements, take away a factory and the army has to scavenge for weapons...

All facilities in PS2 should have a relevance and a noticeable impact that is felt by the whole Empire.

Right now we have a Bio-Lab heal, Amp Stations Turret CD, and Tech-Plants control MBT's? If you lose any of these do you care at all to leave the tower-fight your in? Or will you stay at the tower and continue to farm XP?

I woulnt want to punish an empire even more that is losing already. If anything you should make it to where the winning side becomes more vulnerable to a loss of resources becuase its supply line is too long. IMHO an empire should become slightly stronger the closer it gets to being warpgated.

[mrmrmrj]

We fight because it is fun to shoot people in the face or the back or with a tank cannon.

I don't need anything more.

[Crator]

I don't need anything more.

"I" being the operative word. Some people want more....

[HereticusXZ]

We fight because it is fun to shoot people in the face or the back or with a tank cannon.

I don't need anything more.




Stagnation is death.

Without progress we'd have what we had on day 1 of PS2 launch and never touched again, no weapon updates, no nothing. and that would of been a terrible thing.

PS2 has no meta-game, It needs Meta-Game.

[ringring]

We fight because it is fun to shoot people in the face or the back or with a tank cannon.

I don't need anything more.
But that can only take you so far.

If all you want to do is shoot then you don't need a lot of what we already have, all you need is a gun and targets.

And to be frank other than a gun and targets all we have are an outfit structure and squads and platoons. And, that's pretty much it where if we are talking about an empire vs empire there should be a war and there isn't, there are only skirmishes.

I like pew-pew from time to time too!

[Timithos]

Better base design IMO is just band aid solutions, we've been given better base design every major update, every continent revamp, all ever sense the first Indar revamp....

It still hasn't changed the core problems...


Build walls, move the spawn-room, add underground complexes and it still doesn't change the fact that this base has no relevance beyond a glorified paintball arena.

Bases need real mechanical relevance beyond XP or Resources gain.

Ask yourself "What relevance does X facility bring to my Empire that impacts me in a very real way?"

Answer: Only the Tech-Plants control over Main-Battle-Tank production.... and that's arguable over how relevant MBT's are for impacting the war effort.

One of the largest problems to PS2 is the lack or absence of incentive "Why do we fight?" beyond the generic fact that it's a video game, dakka for the sake of dakka. XP Is quite literally the only reason anyone goes to any fight.

Tactics and Strategy, Choosing the right base to attack/defend should be more important then Zerg to X base because it has the most XP.

What we've been given is tiny, incremental base design changes from update to update. None of us have ever seen significant base design except maybe only twice: Wallsamir and Amerish revamp. That's it.

Putting up ONE extra above-ground teleporter is not significant base design. You're right. It's a bandaid solution. But putting in 5 buried teleporter rooms spread 50-100 meters apart from eachother IS significant and certainly not a bandaid.

Putting together all the ideas above off the top of my head the other night is not a bandaid. It's a major base design update the likes of which we have NEVER seen before.

And added defensiveness has added relevance on Amerish, and some people are having a blast in longer lasting battles. There are hard-fought battles that give much more satisfaction and meaning of finally winning - or even finally losing - the battles.

And I agree: This games' XP is too high for killing enemies and not enough for strategic activities like capturing and defending bases. We should get more xp for base captures, base defends, capture point flips, generator overloads, terminal and turret hacking, destroying and repairing turrets, sunderer deployment, squad leading, etc. and a little less across the board for everything else in the game.