The balance issue with multi-gunned vehicles

[Arkanakaz]

I think that the problem in PlanetSide 1, was that because some of the ground vehicles were so similar to each only the weapon and the armour statistics that separated them – making balancing them impossible. So using the Deliverer and the tank I’ll try to show what I mean (the statistics are made up):

Option 1 (PlanetSide Now):

Deliverer
Armour: 25
Damage Per Second for each gun 25

Tank
Armour 50
Damage Per Second for each gun 50

This is how it is at the moment in PlanetSide 1, with the tank getting far more armour although it has less people in it as well as more firepower, for a gunner looking for a gunning spot there is no point in getting in the deliverer. This follows the pattern in the current game that the more gunning positions there are on a vehicle the less fire power each one provides – making the tanks the best option for a soldier looking for a vehicle to gun if they want the best possible weapon.

Option 2:

Deliverer
Armour: 75
Damage Per Second for each gun 50

Tank
Armour 50
Damage Per Second for each gun 50

Good thing about this is that the armour equally reflects the number of people in the vehicle (two man tank 25x2=50 and three man Deliverer 25x3=75) and each gunner is giving the same damage output regardless of which vehicle he picks. Problem is why not just pick the deliverer and go around with just one gunner, while making the most of the extra armour?

Option 3:

Deliverer
Armour: 75
Damage Per Second for each gun 50

Tank
Armour 75
Damage Per Second for each gun 50

This solves the problem with option 2, but means that although the deliverer has equal armour, with three people in rather than two; it has less per person than the tank making it pointless to have three in the Deliverer, as it would be better to find another tank for the 3ed soldier – seeing as in this situation any vehicle with two people would provide more armour per person than one with three within.

**********

What happened in PlanetSide 1 was that there seemed to be an effort during the balancing stage to make it so that all vehicles had the same armour and damage output when they were fully manned. I don’t think this made any sense as; to look it from the perspective of the empire, four tanks each manned by two people are far superior to one vehicle with eight people in, because four tanks are providing much more armour and firepower to the battlefield than one larger vehicle such as a Sunderer variant.

So the solution I think, is to make vehicles with different numbers of people dramatically different from each other in ways that are more subjective than fire power and armour. Or, perhaps more realistically, to make it so the larger vehicles have different guns, meaning that each person who gets in the vehicle adds something new, for example one direct fire gun, one than can arc over walls, another that does anti-air and so on. This way larger vehicles could become more versatile with the more people who get into them, without having the issue of a large vehicle being used like a tank - with just one gunner.

Thoughts..?

[Raymac]

I don't mean to be trite because you obviously have put thought into this, and it is a legitimate point you bring up. For me, though, it's still early to worry about balance.

[Headrattle]

Originally Posted by Arkanakaz

What happened in PlanetSide 1 was that there seemed to be an effort during the balancing stage to make it so that all vehicles had the same armour and damage output when they were fully manned. I don’t think this made any sense as; to look it from the perspective of the empire, four tanks each manned by two people are far superior to one vehicle with eight people in, because four tanks are providing much more armour and firepower to the battlefield than one larger vehicle such as a Sunderer variant.

That isn't how it works at all. Tanks kick out the most damage and have, by far, the most armor. The Sunderer has less armor then the tank with the least about of armor. Why? Because they are transports. The Deliverer and Sunderer are not tank killers. The Sunderer specifically it an assault vehicle designed to drive to a base, let lots of people out, and lay down covering fire. Or just kill lots of infantry. Deliverer does much the same thing.

You are comparing apples to carrots. The transport vehicles are made for transport.

[kaffis]

Originally Posted by Headrattle

That isn't how it works at all. Tanks kick out the most damage and have, by far, the most armor. The Sunderer has less armor then the tank with the least about of armor. Why? Because they are transports. The Deliverer and Sunderer are not tank killers. The Sunderer specifically it an assault vehicle designed to drive to a base, let lots of people out, and lay down covering fire. Or just kill lots of infantry. Deliverer does much the same thing.

You are comparing apples to carrots. The transport vehicles are made for transport.

The problem, though, was that at least half the population had tank driving certs. Why roll your squad in 1 Sunderer with crappy armor and weapons, when you could instead roll in 5 tanks, with 5x awesome armor and weapons?

Transports and tanks were not balanced in their availability well, leading to a pathetic presence of transports. Tanks should cost a lot of resources, while transports should be cheap. IIRC, this was more or less the case with NTU in PS1, but that ran into a problem: NTU were a renewable resource.

See, NTU could never be a seriously limiting factor, because to make it so, you also had to upset the stability of the territory control mechanic, as bases would lose power and become up for grabs.

With PS2, hopefully the varied resources can be not only scarce (unlike NTUs, which, ultimately, were only ever an ANT run away), but individually balanced to achieve a more diversified vehicular presence that encourages more efficient means of transport on a macro-scale (1 Sunderer being slightly more efficient per head than 2 deliverers, which would be vastly more efficient than 10 mossies, which would be somewhat more efficient than 5 tanks, which would be on par with 10 lightnings, which would be a bit more efficient than 10 reavers, etc.). In addition, hopefully resources will have checks at a squad and/or outfit level as well as an empire one, so that a few wasteful individuals don't screw over the war effort for another outfit or their empire as a whole -- which was the other reason NTU dependence wasn't balanced more aggressively.

[Valdae]

Yeah I see the effort you put in but this is mad.

[Chaff]

....hmmmm....how 'bout a Sundy with nothing different, but 4 x 75mm cannons on it ?
It'd be like a drunk hippo with 4 Lightnings attached to it....

[Infektion]

I see no point in this, i'm sorry... it's a TANK! It should be OP, I'd like to see you take a 55mm round to face and tell me if you need some balancing. We could add some body armor here and there.

[FIREk]

A Deli carries 4 people (maybe more in PS2 if it becomes a proper transport, replacing the lame van and lamer truck?) and can swim. Its armament was also quite effective against aircraft. Its guns also didn't require a particularly skilled gunner.

That was advantage enough, I guess.

Now that the "it's 1 cert cheaper" advantage doesn't count, maybe it needs a slight armor boost, but it shouldn't be balanced with a tank DPS-wise. It's not what it's for.

[Headrattle]

Tanks used to me much more expensive. THO. But the problem I have, is that the class system will allow there to me lots more tanks on the battlefield because everyone can get one. This is not a good thing in my opinion. Diversity is better. Every vehicle having its role.

[BorisBlade]

Well before the last tank buff the deli was perfectly balanced. A tank should bring the most armor, and most firepower. However at the disadvantage of being the slowest vehicle and having to use lobbed tank shells taht are harder to land on targets the farther they are and faster they are moving. But get near em and you are toast. Its job is to put on the hurt on things in range and be able to hold ground with its armor which also allows it to push battle lines forward.

Before the tank buff, the deli still had decent armor, while less than a tank, it wasnt half that of a tank like it currently is (it was closer to that of a magrider which has the least armor of all tanks). It moved considerably faster than tanks allowing it to use its speed and maneuverabilty as its advantage. Its weapon's dps wasn't even close to that of a tank, but it was able to land these shots from range many times easier than most tanks except the mag. This allowed it to operate from range, staying back and wearing the tanks out with speed/skilled driving. It did require more gunners, but could cross water which unless you were vs you couldnt do in anything else. It also did very well versus aircraft, harder to land shots than flak but still tears em up if you hit em. (the reaver rockets have since been buffed versus armor)

The tank buff buffed tank's armor and buffed their speed to where a magrider moving with the strafe "cheat" goes pretty much the same speed as a deli, has alot more firepower, much more armor, can cross water and needs less people to operate. The deli is junk as VS.

That role needs to come back. Let the deli be a light tank. Much faster than other tanks, still have decent armor, although not as high as the heavy tanks. And with the same type of weapons that are considerably less dps but can be much more consistant in actually hitting the target helpin to balance them out and allowing them to work at range to make use of their faster speeds/less armor. Leave the passenger slots, it would fill a dual role since no one would use a pure transport vehicle despite what we may think or hope.

You dont need to get to crazy with gunners needed. Yeah its gotta be handled well, or you wont waste people on high gunner vehicles when you can get a bunch of low gunner ones instead which is most always better. (aka prowler versus vanguard issue). Empire variants need to be teh same, more overall power should need more gunners. But only as a general rule. Many other factors come into play when balancing.

Take the raider. Each gun is 80% of a deli gun versus ground armor targets. So 2 gunners would do 80% of a deli, 3 =120%, 4=150% . But thats 5 people in one vehicle, thats 2vans/mags and one more for a reaver or whatever. Sounds bad but if you need the transport and have teh manpower but not the pilots available, then its nice to give em all guns. And would of course be better if it had better speed than the MBT's instead of being slower than a magrider which still trounces teh fully manned raider in DPS/armor as well as speed and only needs 1 gunner.

Gotta look at the bigger picture, there are a ton of aspects to look at and hopefully this time they do a better job so we see much more variety on teh battle field instead of "just roll tanks or lose" when it comes to ground vehicles.

[Lunarchild]

Are the transports not faster and more manouverable than your standard tank? I thought that was what set them apart mainly (other than being able to hold more people)

[Arkanakaz]

In case I gave the wrong impression I like all the ground vehicles and this wasn’t meant to be about nerfing anything. I just think that all vehicles should get used equally ideally; it just makes for a more varied and interesting game play. If you watch the vehicle pad in a base in PlanetSide it really isn’t like that.

I guess the larger vehicles are for transport but I hope they are more attack orientated in PlanetSide 2; unless they can find a way that to make the transport vehicles better than the assault vehicles at transporting troops to make up for their lack of armour and firepower.

Regardless if they do chose to add an larger assault vehicle then I think they should consider this.

[Headrattle]

Yes. The transports are much faster and more maneuverable then tanks.

The Deliverer is not a light tank. It is a transport. Confusing the two means that you don't get it.

The Deliverer hasn't had close to the same armor as the tanks since launch. I used to have it all written down, but over the expanse of time, I have lost it.

I agree that people don't use the transports as much as they should. Gamer psyche I guess. Many would rather Hart or run the jump in a vehicle. Always seemed strange since the Deliverer was a great light vehicle. However with the Deliverer varients, you have, essentially, a light tank that can dish out a lot of damage. But usually to infantry.

In truth I question the viability of the deliverer other then a small squad transport. The Sunderer fits the bill better in most ways, other then the Deliverer being much faster.

[Valdae]

I wouldnt mind seeing more armor and less speed on a sunderer, but thats about it..

[Talek Krell]

I would like to see the ground transports more, but trying to balance them with the tanks is completely missing the point.

I'm hoping that the customization options will provide more incentive to use ground transport this time. The devs have mentioned stuff like mortars and AA turrets, which suggests that deli's and sundys might be more useful in an infantry support role.