What determines who wins more often? Player skill, Population, or Faction imbalance?

[Assist]

So after spending my coffee time this morning reading through posts on Planetside2.com forums, I've come to realize that I disagree with a lot of what is posted.

It seems like people on the official forums blame a lot of the games issues on faction specific weapon imbalance, which blows my mind. The game is fairly well balanced for a three sided game, the few disparity's are obvious though. But reading on the forums about which factions weapons are stronger just drives me nuts. For the amount of guns in the game and the incredibly small differences in RoF, TTK, Reload, etc I find it amazing that people think FactionA wins more often because of their weapons. It really bothers me the most when I see people saying Vanu have it the best with the bullet drop, because 90% of fights happen in a range so small that bullet drop doesn't even have to be considered and when they're outside of that range the VS have damage drop off that everyone conveniently ignores when debating the minimal differences in weapons. Does anyone really feel that the weapons are that imbalanced? Do you guys get pushed out of defending a base and blame it on the faction balance/weapons? It feels like it's the most talked about subject on the forums and it blows my mind because it's one of the few things that are extremely well done compared to other tri-faction or even two faction games.

One of the least talked about subjects in PS2 seems to be player skill. Probably one of the more interesting subjects to me because this game wants to delve into the MLG market. I'd venture to guess that most of time someone pulls some amazing shot the first word that comes to mind is hacker. I personally don't do that much, I usually just take another drink, but I know from the /yells, the posts on forums, and the hilarious videos of legit players that people believe any sort of obscene player skill must be a hacker. If PlayerA from FactionA wipes out a room on his own someone yells bullshit as soon as they revive. Truth is it doesn't happen that often because usually someone reacts quick enough once something like that happens and with the short TTK that guy is taken care of by the pray and spray method. When is the last time you lost a base due to the skill of your opponent? Skill seems to be well balanced in this game IMO, for good or bad. The great players still can dominate in their own way but they don't make enough of a difference in a large fight that they really change the tide of the battle themselves. This type of game play is great for the lifetime of the game but the attraction of the game should be based on something like meta-game/strategy which is really lacking right now. I think one of the few places where player skill shines is in the aircraft, I have no chance against some of the good pilots on Waterson, where as I can still get a lucky shot or two in against the great infantry players. While I don't think player skill has an immense impact, I prefer it how it is because it means that teamwork and/or strategy is still required to dominate.

Which brings me to the third deciding factor in the game, population. I think population plays far too big of a part in the game right now. Population overwhelms any potential weapon imbalance as well as any potential player skill difference. Zergs destroy any tactics involved in defense. Doesn't matter if you have the best strategy and the best players, you're going to get overrun by the zombie horde if you attempt to fight it. Unless of course you have a zerg to counter it. While I'm fine with this style of game play, the problem is that there's not always a zerg to counter the opposing zerg. The zerg vs zerg mentality works until one zerg disappears. Then you have a handful of people getting crushed attempting to defend and a zerg of bored people taking empty territory. You can almost always login and find a zerg vs zerg fight, but lately it seems that one side has multiple zergs while another faction only has one. Eventually the side with one zerg gets flanked by two zergs and people just split and head to another continent. The problem is there's no good reason to fight outnumbered. There's nothing that gives you a chance to fight outnumbered. I enjoy being on the underdog side in most games because you always have something to work towards, but in Planetside 2 it feels like you're just being punished for being on the underdog faction. How they can fix/change this, I have no idea. It may be perception that has lead to one side being underpopulated, maybe it's this fourth faction so many talk about, or maybe it's just that there's no appeal to being on a certain faction. Either way, the fact is it's not fun to get run over day after day because you simply don't stand a chance against the overwhelming number of players running at you. I think one thing that could really help the issue is giving more incentives to defend territory you control, as well as make it easier to defend that territory. I think the closer a base is to your warpgate the more value it should have. Small changes can go a long way in this game, as some recent balance adjustments have shown, I wish they'd do some small tweaks to try and even out the populations on servers. Worst that happens is the faction imbalance shifts to the underdog and then they can tweak from there.


Time for more coffee.

tl;dr - Weapon balance is as good as it gets, get over the minuscule differences; Player Skill vs. Player Teamwork is really well balanced; Population needs to be close to even across factions for this game to work.

[psijaka]

Originally Posted by Assist

-snip-
tl;dr - Weapon balance is as good as it gets, get over the minuscule differences; Player Skill vs. Player Teamwork is really well balanced; Population needs to be close to even across factions for this game to work.

Agree wholeheartedly.

Faction imbalance issues are minor. Skill is important, but if 30 tanks turn up outside Broken arch, then you've lost anyway.

[Assist]

Originally Posted by psijaka

Agree wholeheartedly.

Faction imbalance issues are minor. Skill is important, but if 30 tanks turn up outside Broken arch, then you've lost anyway.

And I'm ok with getting zerged down at a base, that's part of the game. As long as there's a friendly zerg somewhere that can counter it. When there's not a friendly zerg that can counter, then there's a problem.

[CraazyCanuck]

Add in a more lucrative reason for defense other then a small bonus on killing a guy while defending and keep improving base defensibility. I'm a defense whore and love making a capture as much of a pain in the ass as I can manage, but even wih my sick appetite for abuse I'm getting tired of the futility of it. The warp tunnels were a nice touch but we need more. Put all vital areas of a base underground.

[Kerrec]

I agree with you.

However, I do firmly believe in the 4th faction. And it's obvious they believe in weapons being imbalanced since they switched teams in the first place.

After GU2, most of my deaths were to NC BR10's or below using 1000 Cert weapons. To me, it's obvious. And I'm sure the NC and VS were seeing TR BR10's or below kill screens too.

The 4th faction is a serious issue. Being able to switch factions while staying on the same server wasn't a good idea.

[CraazyCanuck]

Originally Posted by Kerrec

The 4th faction is a serious issue. Being able to switch factions while staying on the same server wasn't a good idea.

Bingo! Agreed Kerrec. Bonehead idea that was.

[EVILPIG]

Current balance:

Best infantry weapons - TR,VS,NC
Best MAX - NC,VS,TR
Best ESF - VS,TR,NC
Best Tank - TR,VS,NC

[Graywolves]

The massive amount of people who can't properly test or analyze anything in the game has lead me to simply not bother saying anything half the time. People generally just want to lobby for their team or play style.

While there is a lot of factors in gun play to be competitive it is undermined by the surrounding environment and balancing. Overall the minor errors in gun play balancing don't effect much other than subjective game play.

It is possible to get a small group of coordinated players and be a pest to larger forces, sometimes even defeating certain forces. But the game's flow is definitely governed by momentum.

So if I had to choose one of the three I would say population, as much as I don't want that to be it's just one of those basic fundamentals of war. Not much can be done against a 3:1 ratio or higher unless certain factors are met or the forces are funneled/manipulated in a way to make them work in 1:1 encounters.

But if you break a Zerg's momentum then you get more of your own forces show up and an actual battle occurs. Then whoever wins gains momentum and pushes while the loser disperses.

[Assist]

Originally Posted by EVILPIG

Current balance:

Best infantry weapons - TR,VS,NC
Best MAX - NC,VS,TR
Best ESF - VS,TR,NC
Best Tank - TR,VS,NC

You're speaking about weapon imbalance, and I disagree with all your opinions on the ranking of 'best'. As I said, weapon imbalance is hardly there at all, to the point that it's one of the last things that should be debated because of the amount the imbalance effects game play.

Originally Posted by Graywolves

The massive amount of people who can't properly test or analyze anything in the game has lead me to simply not bother saying anything half the time. People generally just want to lobby for their team or play style.

While there is a lot of factors in gun play to be competitive it is undermined by the surrounding environment and balancing. Overall the minor errors in gun play balancing don't effect much other than subjective game play.

Completely agree. Some of the whining about faction imbalance is hysterical. I personally love the ones who always come out in droves against the VS for having no recoil.

[EVILPIG]

Originally Posted by Assist

You're speaking about weapon imbalance, and I disagree with all your opinions on the ranking of 'best'. As I said, weapon imbalance is hardly there at all, to the point that it's one of the last things that should be debated because of the amount the imbalance effects game play.

You brought up weapon imbalances. I didn't say that it was the "problem". I'm illustrating that the game is fairly balanced as far as strengths and weaknesses of each empire, which supports your view. But since you disagree with it so much, rate the empires in the same format I have. I would love to see your view on it.

[Assist]

Originally Posted by EVILPIG

I would love to see your view on it.
Best infantry weapons - TR,VS,NC
Best MAX - NC,VS,TR
Best ESF - VS,TR,NC
Best Tank - TR,VS,NC

Well it's going to differ player to player is my guess, even by a small margin. Which is just a testament to the balance done originally by SoE.

Best infantry weapons - NC,VS,TR
Best MAX - NC,TR,VS
Best ESF - TR,VS,NC
Best Tank - TR,VS,NC

Really should start another thread about this, like I said above I think most people will have different opinions on it in one way or another.

[BIGGByran]

Originally Posted by Assist

Well it's going to differ player to player is my guess, even by a small margin. Which is just a testament to the balance done originally by SoE.

Best infantry weapons - NC,VS,TR
Best MAX - NC,TR,VS
Best ESF - TR,VS,NC
Best Tank - TR,VS,NC

Really should start another thread about this, like I said above I think most people will have different opinions on it in one way or another.

Best infantry weapons - VS,TR,NC
Best MAX - NC=TR,VS
Best ESF - TR,VS,NC
Best Tank - TR,VS,NC

Population imbalance generally determines who wins more.
Player Skill would generally determine who wins but since we have unlimited spawns, Player's skill gets down graded.

[Mordelicius]

Originally Posted by EVILPIG

Current balance:

Best infantry weapons - TR,VS,NC
Best MAX - NC,VS,TR
Best ESF - VS,TR,NC
Best Tank - TR,VS,NC

All things equal, meaning: equal population, equal skill and equal organization,

Vanu wins infantry fights in their sleep.
TR wins with their Prowlers with tank battles.
Scythe has slight edge over the Mosquito since they are harder to hit.
NC Max wins cqc, TR wins on sustained medium fire and Vanu has the long-range sniper Max. In usefulness NC has slight edge because of the CQC nature of specialized Biolab fights.

My take on current balance:
Infantry Weapons: VS>TR>>NC
Best Max: NC>TR>Vanu
Best ESF: VS>TR>NC
Best Tank: TR>VS>NC

Much like the Magrider nerf, I can't wait until GU4 when they have finished the major weapon balance pass. I'd say Vanu rules like hell on K/D. They have a much higher effective DPS with stupidly OP combination of accuracy, high ROF and no recoil

Logically, it should have been:
NC: High Damage, low ROF, low accuracy, medium recoil
TR: High ROF, low damage, low accuracy, medium recoil
VS: High Accuracy, low damage, low ROF, medium recoil

As it is, NC has High Damage ( like 10-20% bonus) with low ROF, low accuracy and maddening recoil. Not to mention the flinch screen given to us by high rof TR and Vanu.

[Assist]

Originally Posted by Mordelicius

All things equal, meaning: equal population, equal skill and equal organization,

Vanu wins infantry fights in their sleep.
TR wins with their Prowlers with tank battles.
Scythe has slight edge over the Mosquito since they are harder to hit.
NC Max wins cqc, TR wins on sustained medium fire and Vanu has the long-range sniper Max. In usefulness NC has slight edge because of the CQC nature of specialized Biolab fights.

My take on current balance:
Infantry Weapons: VS>TR>>NC
Best Max: NC>TR>Vanu
Best ESF: VS>TR>NC
Best Tank: TR>VS>NC

Much like the Magrider nerf, I can't wait until GU4 when they have finished the major weapon balance pass. I'd say Vanu rules like hell on K/D. They have a much higher effective DPS with stupidly OP combination of accuracy, high ROF and no recoil

Logically, it should have been:
NC: High Damage, low ROF, low accuracy, medium recoil
TR: High ROF, low damage, low accuracy, medium recoil
VS: High Accuracy, low damage, low ROF, medium recoil

As it is, NC has High Damage ( like 10-20% bonus) with low ROF, low accuracy and maddening recoil. Not to mention the flinch screen given to us by high rof TR and Vanu.

I'd love to know where these myths come from.

VS have nearly the same recoil as NC, in fact in some weapons most would consider it worse for VS because the first shot recoil is worse. Take a look at the weapons charts sometime before saying stuff like that :\ Overall NC weapons are a bit worse in recoil, but not by very much.
Same with the ESF's, the Mosquito has the smallest hitbox not the Scythe. The Mosquito also has more maneuverability due to the speed having a direct effect on turn speed in the air.
Also the VS MAX being a long range sniper? O.o Have you tried to use one ever, there's nothing sniper about it. It's nice to have range, but the CoF accuracy is on par with your scattermax.
Effective DPS is completely dependent on player skill. But since you brought it up, TR have the highest theoretical DPS as they also have the highest average RoF.

I'm fairly sure most of the balancing issues people have with the game are those individuals listening to their buddies spread rumors about the other factions. Myths - always debunked by doing a little research on your own.

[Ghoest9]

Originally Posted by Assist

I'd love to know where these myths come from.

Ummm they probably come from people who actually try to play with the starter weapons.