Style vs. Reason - wear & tear on equipment textures, or "Why spawn broken stuff?"

[FIREk]

INTRODUCTION
I'm a bit of a "fluff n*zi" about most of the things I like and PlanetSide is one of those things. I assumed that, since we will be using resources to get stuff, then perhaps that stuff won't be magically constructed by nanites anymore. Then comes "Nanite Systems" and T-Ray's recent tweet "nanites baby nanites".
The latter even suggests (massive conjecture) that vehicles won't come out of the ground (from an assumed manufacturing station) but will likely spawn on the pad, formed by nanites.


THE QUESTION
Since respawning is rationalized, and soldiers are expected to die often and be reborn with new equipment, auto-magically rematerialized with nanites, why should the TR equipment show some wear, and the NC's equipment be "chipped, dented but never compromised"?


ADDITIONAL COMMENTS
When I first saw the TR and the NC in the trailer, the NC looked like a proper military, with their Land Warrior/Future Soldier-style weapons and equipment. Even in PS1, I never thought of them as a rag-tag band of hippies with guns - if they were, they wouldn't be using guided weapons and fancy-looking tanks, let alone linear accelerator-enhanced weapons, or MAX units equipped with personal energy shields.
It's great that they're using older designs - they may not have access to the vast resources and R&D assets of the TR, or the crazy Vanu-inspired tech of the VS.
It's awesome that their tech is more bulky, robust and rough-looking. It sets them apart perfectly (T-Ray I love you for making this work!).
But when I added wear & tear to magical nanite-based production to the mix, and then saw the torn sleeve on Higby's character (on the Indar sunset screen), something in me snapped.
And, when you look at this render of the Magrider, you can see that even VS tech will be manufactured somewhat chipped and dented.


BUT WHAT ABOUT THE STORY?
No one says that the NC need to be some poor-ass, malnourished guerrillas with rocks, AKs and RPGs - they're using too much sophisticated equipment for that image to work.
To me they were always well-organized freedom fighters, with strong political and financial backing.
Even without the latter, PlanetSide's world has nanites which make the question of resources all but irrelevant. Plus, the TR, VS and NC will all fight for the same resources, so no faction is truly more resourceful than the other.
I think this would work and none of the factions needs to make their first steps into battle with second-hand gear.


ALTERNATIVES
Perfect solution: I'm assuming that, as far as development assets are concerned, the chips, dents and tears on the textures are on separate layers in the files, and extracting them wouldn't require the art team to rework them, or make them from scratch.
Ideally, all equipment should be in mint condition when created, but deteriorate afterwards. Over time (or, even better, over distance moved or damage taken), the wear&tear texture (extracted from the current textures) would be superimposed on the min condition texture.
This is done for vehicles in APB, for instance - they get dirty over time.
It would also make players that survive longer stand out among n00b fodder. Especially if the deterioration was based on distance traveled.

Decent solution: Just drop the wear&tear and just stick to the awesomely unique design principles to make the factions stand out. Maybe add deterioration at some point after release.
The overall feel of the game would be less gritty, but with nanites and rationalized rebirthing, there's little room for "gritty" in PlanetSide 2.


DISCUSS
So, what is your take on the subject?

[LZachariah]

Remember, the NC are described as scavengers/commandos/masters of asymmetrical warfare. Of course, no one would ever construct a new, BROKEN object via nanites ("let's make it with a scuffed paint job!"), but one could consider that nanites are also used to disassemble and TRANSPORT objects that had previously been scavenged. I imagine giant weapon vaults wherein objects are teleported, via nanites, to the NC (in this case). So their devices aren't being made from scratch (with worn bolts and a chip on the shoulder-stock), but they are being rifted to the soldiers via nanites.

~Zachariah

[Crator]

I totally agree. Your suggestion adds a dimension of realism to the game. But, what makes you think they haven't done this already? Perhaps the screen shots showing deterioration you mentioned were taken after some time that caused it to, well, deteriorate.

[kaffis]

None of the above. I would love to see damage displayed as it occurs. However, I have no problem with NC spawning "broken" stuff in the manner we've seen. I like to think that it's not a matter of the NC nanites constructing things from scratch that are pre-battle-scarred, but rather, that the NC doesn't have sufficient resources (being a guerrilla insurgent force at heart) to construct things from scratch with nanites. Perhaps they're salvaging and repairing critical damage instead for redeployment?

[Traak]

Chest-length red beards on the NC

GMC pickups. Not TR. NC.

Rebel flag vests

Banjos

Bases that look like Kentucky split-pitch roofs, with the lower-pitch part being the cover for the porch

Coon dogs. Whatcha think the roof on the porch is fer, boy?

Female soldiers have halters made of tablecloth, Daisy Dukes.

Rebel slouch caps

NC have half-tracks. They HAVE to have half-tracks.

Campfires

Yeah. Let's not do the "roughed up" look halfway, yeeeeeeehaaaaaw!

[Baron]

I will max out the skill tree for the banjo, Day 1

[Vash02]

I would guess that there has to be a blueprint that the nanites use to build vehicles. It could be that the original vehicle they scanned in was all beaten up and worn and hence the nanites create vehicles to the same exact specifications as the original everytime.

Thats what I think would explain it story-wise.

[CutterJohn]

I don't mind the wear and tear so much.. Pristine vehicles would look a bit out of place, and a system of making them dirty would just be a lot of work with little real payoff.. its not that important.

I do think they take the weathering a bit too far though, and the wear patterns look somewhat odd, since much of the wear is not in a spot that would actually see wear..

[Raymac]

Originally Posted by Traak

Female soldiers have halters made of tablecloth, Daisy Dukes.

OH hell to the yes!

It's going to come down to preference in the end. I think this really is one of those style vs realism things, and personally I like style first. I always tell my friends when we are watching a movie and they say "psshh thats so not realistic", I say, you want realism then go stand on the corner. I watch movies and play games for the fantasy of it. I can suspend disbelief for a bit.

Also, it can be explained to make it realistic, like the nanites are based off a "saved" copy and since it was banged up and cobbled together to begin with, then that's the mold that's being used. (edit: like Vash02 said)

[Traak]

Originally Posted by CutterJohn

I don't mind the wear and tear so much.. Pristine vehicles would look a bit out of place, and a system of making them dirty would just be a lot of work with little real payoff.. its not that important.

I do think they take the weathering a bit too far though, and the wear patterns look somewhat odd, since much of the wear is not in a spot that would actually see wear..

You mean, the scrape marks from running over other vehicles that should be on the underside of the front of the tank, not on the back of the turret?

I would love to see shiny bare metal on the parts of the sides of the tank road wheels that face the sprocket teeth. I used to painstakingly paint that shiny bright silver on my tank road wheels when I built plastic scale models. Of course, the German tanks had teeth on both sides of a single center set of wheels. I don't think modern tanks make that visibility-multiplying mistake.

Oh, and I want plastic scale models or already-built models of my favorite PS machinery. Moichendizing!

[Dreamcast]

I made a thread about this once.

I think wear and tear after battles.

It will be cool if the armor got destroyed where u got shot at, and then got exposed till ur skin showed so if you got shot on ur skin, u die quicker since you will get inflicted with extra damage.

But I don't think Planetside is efficient enough to do that.

[Graywolves]

I like wear and tear over time although I doubt it would be implemented.

My reasons being that I always felt badass when I was riding around in a vehicle filled with bulletholes or accomplishing so much in a single life.

[Raymac]

Originally Posted by Graywolves

I like wear and tear over time although I doubt it would be implemented.

My reasons being that I always felt badass when I was riding around in a vehicle filled with bulletholes or accomplishing so much in a single life.

I totally agree with you. Every time I landed my reaver for repairs and saw it covered in bullet holes, I would get a big smile on my face.

[Talek Krell]

Originally Posted by Raymac

I totally agree with you. Every time I landed my reaver for repairs and saw it covered in bullet holes, I would get a big smile on my face.

+1 to this and the OP.

[Accuser]

Originally Posted by Vash02

I would guess that there has to be a blueprint that the nanites use to build vehicles. It could be that the original vehicle they scanned in was all beaten up and worn and hence the nanites create vehicles to the same exact specifications as the original everytime.

Thats what I think would explain it story-wise.

^ This
There's nothing saying that there's a Vanu-tech "computer aided design" interface where the factions get to design whatever they want. They brought over a small civilization worth of gear to Auraxis, found the nanite construction tech and scanned in what they had. NC had to bolt a tank together as best they could, then scan it, then start pumping them out using the resources on Auraxis.

This makes perfect sense if the founders of the VS were TR scientists who discovered a cache of Vanu tech and figured they could scan it all and use it to secede.