Meditations on my return to planetside

Doppler · 2003-09-04, 09:14 AM

Having taken a brief unwilling hiatus from planetside I return to the following observations.

The tube door bug is back, I experienced the joy earlier today of gearing up, matrixing to a base to fend off attackers and being stuck in the tube until the vanu took it at their leisure to shoot all the fish in the barrell. Fun fun.

The more I look at the expansion the more it seems like I'm paying for tribes. In theory I dont have a problem with this except for when I bought tribes way back in the day I got a fully functioning game out of the box complete with features that thhis game insists on making me pay an expansion for. Great.

I think my fundamental problem is not so much paying for an expansion, but all the promises the Dev's made but have failed to carry though on. Planetside has been up and running for how long and we've recieved a grand total of how much free content, hmmm 2 vehicles.

No platoons, no base benefits Just the bomber the liberator and a bunch of dinking with the wapons balance.

THe problem with a expansion pack based model in this type of enviroment is it has never been explored in a game so heavily PVP reliant before. I cant speak for asherons or DAOC but the last pvp MMORPG i played heavily was UO. When they added expansion packs there wernt any real game imbalancers you could bring back from the new world areas. EQ had vastly improved gear in the expansion packs however it was not nearly as PVP reliant so it wasnt as much of an issue.

Conclusion:I will not be getting core combat untill all the promised free material talked about since beta has been implemented. If core combat rolls out and I am unable to compete because of my lack of weaponry I shall simply stop subscribing.

Anyone elses thoughts on the matter.

Deadlock · 2003-09-04, 01:14 PM

amen

Nimbus · 2003-09-04, 01:59 PM

Sounds good to me. My opinion already was that this expansion was coming too soon. They should be working on the things they promised to, rather than coughing up expansions to try and squeeze out more money.

Happy lil Elf · 2003-09-04, 02:17 PM

Having taken a brief unwilling hiatus from planetside I return to the following observations.

Welcome back

The tube door bug is back, I experienced the joy earlier today of gearing up, matrixing to a base to fend off attackers and being stuck in the tube until the vanu took it at their leisure to shoot all the fish in the barrell. Fun fun.

One of my outfit members had an issue with this last night. I spawned next to him and the door opened for me but apparently stil didn't for him. Was odd but personally I haven't been stuck since the fix and it seems to be kinda different in the way the bug behaves /shrug.

The more I look at the expansion the more it seems like I'm paying for tribes. In theory I dont have a problem with this except for when I bought tribes way back in the day I got a fully functioning game out of the box complete with features that thhis game insists on making me pay an expansion for. Great.

It seems you're paying for tribes? I guess I don't get what you're trying to say. This game isn't like tribes at all. The continents are huge as is the max number of players per continent. The gameplay is radically different. Looking ahead to the expansion it's even harder to see. Tribes didn't have any urban combat and while there were a few underground maps, they were usually custom made and very poor. There were no incentives to capture. I just don't see how Tribes and Planetside or the expansion fit together.

I think my fundamental problem is not so much paying for an expansion, but all the promises the Dev's made but have failed to carry though on. Planetside has been up and running for how long and we've recieved a grand total of how much free content, hmmm 2 vehicles.

No platoons, no base benefits Just the bomber the liberator and a bunch of dinking with the wapons balance.

Ok, Planetside went live on what, May 20th or so, right? So it's been a whopping three and a half months. And in that time they've released two vehicles, balanced heavy assault, balanced the AA MAXs, released the Skyguard anf the Liberator, fixed numerous bugs and even a couple of hacks, make the lightning more usefull, buff the Pulsar, redo the physics engine and probably some others that I'm forgetting.

Point is the game hasn't been around all that long yet, and there have been many changes alreay. They're working on it and I think they have their priorities right. Make sure the stuff already in the game is working and balanced before throwing more and more content out that could potentially upset the game even more.

THe problem with a expansion pack based model in this type of enviroment is it has never been explored in a game so heavily PVP reliant before. I cant speak for asherons or DAOC but the last pvp MMORPG i played heavily was UO. When they added expansion packs there wernt any real game imbalancers you could bring back from the new world areas. EQ had vastly improved gear in the expansion packs however it was not nearly as PVP reliant so it wasnt as much of an issue.

Yes it has, DAoC. DAoC is all about PvP. There isn't a whole lot else for people of mid level or higher to do and those are the people your market yourself to because they stay.

Your second point, about not being able to bring potentially unbalancing items back doesn't have a whole lot of basis I don't think. There is no god weapon in CC. No god vehicle. Everything being released can be taken down with the weapons we have now. Someone managed to drag a Flail (the new artillery piece) up from the caverns? Grab a reaver or a lib and blow it the hell up. Someone brought back a switchblade? Who cares, it's an ATV

The new weapons don't sound all that overpowered, in fact I'll take a good old sweeper over the ones they've listed so far.

Conclusion:I will not be getting core combat untill all the promised free material talked about since beta has been implemented. If core combat rolls out and I am unable to compete because of my lack of weaponry I shall simply stop subscribing.

Ok, good for you. I'll never understand this reasoning but yay for you I guess. You show those mean lying devs....or....something. As far as not competing goes, there's nothing that looks unbalanced about anything that's been released so far, so I have no idea why you would feel it would keep you from competing.

Anyone elses thoughts on the matter.

Umm yeah, see above

Cease · 2003-09-04, 02:27 PM

I'm just getting sick of the bugs. Bugs that make or break base caps.

Its getting really friggin old to try to defend a base, spawn, run to the terminal and hit G for 20 seconds. I'm getting sick of seeing my teammates having to do the same thing.

I'm sick of doors that decide to take 10 seconds before they open. I've died so many times trying to get thru a door that didn't want to open. I've killed SO many enemy that couldn't get out the door.

Madcow · 2003-09-04, 02:29 PM

Originally posted by Happy lil' Elf
Ok, good for you. I'll never understand this reasoning but yay for you I guess. You show those mean lying devs....or....something.

This is such a funny attitude to me. It's pretty well admitted that the population has been dropping to levels that concern even the die-hard player base. Then people post about the idea that this may cause them to cancel their subscriptions, and many of the die-hards blow it off as a useless exercise. Cancelled subscriptions mean two things. The obvious one is less money to the PS team. The less obvious one is more difficulty finding good battles, which in turn can cause more cancellations, which in turn...you get the idea.
Voting with your consumer dollar is extremely effective, and if PS handles this incorrectly they may find it out in a big way. In the meantime, all the company line rhetoric is nothing more than Nero fiddling while Rome burns.

Doppler · 2003-09-04, 03:00 PM

Elf, your a fanboy,

I dont mean that in a bad way but it's the truth you show the atypical behavior of disparaging anyone who fails to tout the games praises. I like the game too, i just happen to be a cynic.

SImilarities to tribes, the addition of CTF style gameplay, the addition of mortar style weapons, the addition of teleporters. The types of maps are irrelevant to the argument. With a smoking machine you could get a lot of people in a tribes 1 game. With the continued drop off in server populations it gets harder and harder to find those big beautiful battles that sucked me into this game.

You are right I neglected to mention the upgrade to the lightning, which was a welcome addition of more free content. I however refuse to see bug fixes and hack fixes as some kind of gift that totaly justifies them not having in platoons. Heres a comparison, blizzard is still fixing the odd bug or hack in it's products months after their released, and here's a thought, they dont charge a dime for it. Now i realize the majority of what i'm paying for is server upkeep but I whould still like them to deliver on their promises before they start talkign expansion.

Likewise i refuse to acknowledge weapons balancing as some warm fuzzy gift, that's something that the devs must do if they dont want the game to become imbalanced and loose customers due to frustration.

The simple ability of my enemies to get something that I cannot imbalances game play for me personaly. I dont care if i can hop in a reaver and take it out, that doesnt help me so much if the enemy is shelling my vehicle term does it, or has a teleporter set up enar my spawn room.

Be sure and get back a retort to those cheatin' lyin' heathen subscription players, who question the dev's devine glory.

Happy lil Elf · 2003-09-04, 03:07 PM

Yay taking my quote out of context. That quote is not realting to him canceling his subscription. If you look at the quote in my post and what I said it's relating to the refual to buy the expansion until the free content has been released. I gave a separate answer regarding his concerns over the ability to compete which was what brought up his statment that he would cancel his subscription.

The reasoning I don't understand, and perhaps I wasn't clear enough about this, is the "Until I get the free things I'm not buying the expansion" reasoning. So until you get the free things you will refuse to buy the expansion. That's what makes no sense to me. I'll be enjoying the new areas and equipment while you limit yourself to older things because you think not buying the expansion until the free content is released will make some sort of statment. You're saying you'll buy the expansion so cancellation or the redirection of your consumer dollars doesn't factor in since you've stated you'll be buying the expansion anyways.

Doppler · 2003-09-04, 03:16 PM

And I apologize for not making it clearer, if the expansion rolls out and the free content hasnt had any progess made on it I will most likely not reup my subscription, I really doubt that the expansion is going to bring the hoped for windfall of players by the marketing department, so without those big battles theres really no draw for me.

GeistX · 2003-09-04, 04:22 PM

Originally posted by Cease
...Its getting really friggin old to try to defend a base, spawn, run to the terminal and hit G for 20 seconds. I'm getting sick of seeing my teammates having to do the same thing.

I'm sick of doors that decide to take 10 seconds before they open. I've died so many times trying to get thru a door that didn't want to open...

I hate that, died a few times while waiting for the equipment terminal to let me purchase stuff.

Happy lil Elf · 2003-09-04, 04:37 PM

Elf, your a fanboy

Yay, a catch phrase!

I dont mean that in a bad way but it's the truth you show the atypical behavior of disparaging anyone who fails to tout the games praises. I like the game too, i just happen to be a cynic.

No, I countered your arguments. I couldn't care less if you don't praise the game. But if you're going ot be critical I prefer to see arguments that aren't old and easily countered.

SImilarities to tribes, the addition of CTF style gameplay, the addition of mortar style weapons, the addition of teleporters. The types of maps are irrelevant to the argument. With a smoking machine you could get a lot of people in a tribes 1 game. With the continued drop off in server populations it gets harder and harder to find those big beautiful battles that sucked me into this game.

The style of CTF in Planetside is not compareable to the style in Tribes. The pace and even the way it works is very different. As far as I'm aware there is the addition of a mortar style vehicle. I don't recall seeing a mortar for infantry, but then it has been a week or two since I even looked at the new stuff. Teleporters were not in Tribes. Sure they were in some of the mods, but if you want to include mods in this any semi-futuristic game could be said to be a tribes clone (except for one thing which I'll get to) because there were a ton of mods. Yes, with a good machine and someone with a godlike connection they could host a large game of Tribes, but not 300+ people. You play on Johari I noticed. I play on Emerald and I have no problem finding large fights at all, which may account for our difference of opinion in that respect.

The point is PS is not Tribes and only in remote ways does it even resemble Tribes. Here's that "one thing" I said I'd get to, Tribes focused on one thing: Manuverability. That's the defining aspect of the game. As a single little guy you could fly everywhere and anywhere. That's what separates it from all the other FPSs out there. Why not compare PS to UT? It has teleporters and CTF as well, oh and a chaingun, and a camera flown missile too.

You are right I neglected to mention the upgrade to the lightning, which was a welcome addition of more free content. I however refuse to see bug fixes and hack fixes as some kind of gift that totaly justifies them not having in platoons. Heres a comparison, blizzard is still fixing the odd bug or hack in it's products months after their released, and here's a thought, they dont charge a dime for it. Now i realize the majority of what i'm paying for is server upkeep but I whould still like them to deliver on their promises before they start talkign expansion.

Likewise i refuse to acknowledge weapons balancing as some warm fuzzy gift, that's something that the devs must do if they dont want the game to become imbalanced and loose customers due to frustration.

I didn't call them a gift. I gave them as reasons that the free content (platoons, the Lodestar and base incentives, etc) have been delayed. My point is that fixing things like that, which should imo should definately be taken care of before adding anything new are mostly likely why these things have been delayed. Yes it would have been nice if they would have taken the people working on expansion content and put them on those projects but I seriously doubt those decisions were up to the Devs.

The simple ability of my enemies to get something that I cannot imbalances game play for me personaly. I dont care if i can hop in a reaver and take it out, that doesnt help me so much if the enemy is shelling my vehicle term does it, or has a teleporter set up enar my spawn room.

First of all those aren't very good examples. This is just an educated guess but from what I've seen you'll be able to go through teleporters, just not set them up yourself. So here's the thing, in both of those cases you having the expansion will have no effect on your ability to retaliate or defend yourself or yourself at all. I understand that it's annoying that the enemy can get vehicles and weapons you can't but then that would be due to a choice that you made. So while I understand what your saying, it makes little logical sense to me.

Be sure and get back a retort to those cheatin' lyin' heathen subscription players, who question the dev's devine glory. [/B]

I'm countering your arguments because I think some of them are flawed. Is that ok?

Madcow · 2003-09-04, 04:56 PM

Originally posted by Happy lil' Elf
Yay taking my quote out of context. That quote is not realting to him canceling his subscription. If you look at the quote in my post and what I said it's relating to the refual to buy the expansion until the free content has been released. I gave a separate answer regarding his concerns over the ability to compete which was what brought up his statment that he would cancel his subscription.

Out of context? Maybe you should read Doppler's next post and realize that while I thought his statement about possibly cancelling was quite clear, you might have missed it. Therefore I'm taking your statement in context, as in the actual context of what you were responding to. He states that if he hasn't received what he perceives as promised free additions by expansion time that he'll most likely cancel. You give the rolleyes response and basically say that won't do anything. Then you accuse me of taking something out of context. Interesting.

The reasoning I don't understand, and perhaps I wasn't clear enough about this, is the "Until I get the free things I'm not buying the expansion" reasoning. So until you get the free things you will refuse to buy the expansion. That's what makes no sense to me. I'll be enjoying the new areas and equipment while you limit yourself to older things because you think not buying the expansion until the free content is released will make some sort of statment. You're saying you'll buy the expansion so cancellation or the redirection of your consumer dollars doesn't factor in since you've stated you'll be buying the expansion anyways.

Again, Doppler didn't say that.

Madcow · 2003-09-04, 05:01 PM

Originally posted by Happy lil' Elf
I didn't call them a gift. I gave them as reasons that the free content (platoons, the Lodestar and base incentives, etc) have been delayed. My point is that fixing things like that, which should imo should definately be taken care of before adding anything new are mostly likely why these things have been delayed. Yes it would have been nice if they would have taken the people working on expansion content and put them on those projects but I seriously doubt those decisions were up to the Devs.

Who the ultimate decision belongs to isn't relevant at all. Some players (myself included) view the expansion pack being rushed while the promised free content is shoved on a back shelf as a very bad sign. Cancelling your account isn't 'getting back' at the devs or Sony, it's voicing your displeasure at the way they've handled the launch and the expansion. If enough people cancel, Sony gets the idea and if it isn't too late they take drastic steps to win people back and to gather new people. If enough people buy into whatever Sony says and the population goes up, Sony has no reason to change the way they are handling things and it's business as usual. Let's hear it for a free market society!

Doppler · 2003-09-04, 05:31 PM

First off lets pigeon hole the tribes analagy for a moment it was an analagy nothing more and once again i should have identified it as such very implicitly.

Elf
If it is as you put forth and our "free" content was delayed due to bug fixes and weapons balancing doesnt that show negligence on the part of the design team. THey knew that weapons balancing was needed from back in beta, they work for SOE they knew that they whould need to set aside man hours for bug fixes. So where was the crime, in making promises they knew they couldnt keep when people pointed out that while the game was good it was certainly lacking some "meat" and in response they said 'Well heres what were working on" or were they negligent for not thinking "Hey we might have to fix CTD bugs."

Thirdly lets admit to ourselves that maybe catch phrases usualy have some basis of fact, maybe you feel it was an unfair label in your case and I will concede that and apologize if i offended you, however all I'm saying is that's what it looks like to me.

Old and easily counterable arguments how about old and party lines retorts.

Heres an old line of logic for you.

I buy a game, at the same price as a stand alone game, however this one I'm required to pay a monthly fee or it's more or less worthless to me. I agree to do that because I like the game, I understand that I am paying for server upkeep necissary to keep the big battles which no other game offers going, and that more free content is promised.

Fast foreward four months, less then half of the content promised since beta is delivered up and their talking about making me pay again the same price (i'm guestimating) as i whould of an expansion for a stand alone game, plus my monthly fee, when they havnt kept witht he promises in the original package.

Lets try another analagy, lets say your a company and lets say you purchase a coffee refining plant from another company, and they promise to provide you with A) Beans B) Upgrades to your existing plant over time. Four months down the road they've delivered beans yes, but not in the quantities you've hoped, and they've only delivered about half their promised upgrades to your existing plant. Now they want to sell you another plant.

Do you A) Continue to toss money at them even though they've proven borderline unethical B) Cut your losses.

Thats the situation as I see it facing the PS community.

Happy lil Elf · 2003-09-04, 05:46 PM

Once again Madcow, you missed it. So here, let me go through it for you one more time. What we're arguing now is pointless since Doppler went back and changed/clarified his statment but you're arguing my original statment which was made prior to that.

Here is what he said:

Conclusion:I will not be getting core combat untill all the promised free material talked about since beta has been implemented. If core combat rolls out and I am unable to compete because of my lack of weaponry I shall simply stop subscribing.

Now then, here is what I said:

Ok, good for you. I'll never understand this reasoning but yay for you I guess. You show those mean lying devs....or....something. As far as not competing goes, there's nothing that looks unbalanced about anything that's been released so far, so I have no idea why you would feel it would keep you from competing.

Now let me explain this a little further because I guess it wasn't clear enough.

Doppler:

Conclusion:I will not be getting core combat untill all the promised free material talked about since beta has been implemented.

My response:

Ok, good for you. I'll never understand this reasoning but yay for you I guess. You show those mean lying devs....or....something.

Then Doppler stated:

If core combat rolls out and I am unable to compete because of my lack of weaponry I shall simply stop subscribing.

And I responded with:

As far as not competing goes, there's nothing that looks unbalanced about anything that's been released so far, so I have no idea why you would feel it would keep you from competing.

He does not state he will cancel if CC comes out before the free content. He states that he will cancel if he feels he can not compete. Do you understand now? Two separte statments by him and two separate responses from me. That about as much as I can walk you through it. I hope you grasp what I was saying now.