Gameplay: Annihilator Heavy Airship

[Ohanka]

"Annihilator Heavy Airship"

Crew:

Commander
Navigation Officer
Engineering Officer (controls power: explained below)
Fire Direction Officer Ground (Designates Targets: explained below)
Fire Direction Officer Air (see above)
Gun Crewmen x 16

Armament:

2x Faction Specific Fighters
Air Defence Turrets x8 (2 front mounted, 2 on the left, 2 on the right, 2 at the back)
Pounder Artillery Cannons x2 (dual Liberator Cannons, one at left, one at right)
Ground Attack Mortars x4 (left, right, front, back)
SAM Turret Control x1 (top-mounted launcher)
AT Missile Turret Control x1 (bottom mounted launcher)

The Annihilator is a “flying battleship”. About 60-80 meters in length. Only one can be called in on a map. In order to for an empire to call one in it must control a “Heavy Landing Pad” which is a facility in of itself, where this massive vehicle can collect crew and launch. It would ofcourse have to cost resources numbering in the thousands. Once an Annihilator Is destroyed there is an hour long cooldown for that faction to call it in again. The idea behind these massive behemoths is to provide extreme fire support to a faction which rewards teamwork. After all, it'd need a heavily organised group of players to man this ship. Let me explain the mechanics of it.

Essentially it has a full interior. (Corridors! I love corridors ) 3 floors. The bottom floor is for loading of troops and vehicles (you can fit a tank in this things cargo hold) and accessing ground attack weaponry. The middle floor holds the Bridge and some AA turrets, as well as the engineering core, rear launch bay and Escape pod access (see later). The top floor contains the open galaxy landing pad (to give a sense of how HUGE this thing is) and Anti-aircraft weapon access. This vehicle would need a sizeable chunk of a team to properly Man. 21 for the actual ship control. As well as two for the fighters on the back. Not to mention Marine Compliment for the ship and an engineering crew to repair it, all in all it'd need about 50 men to man it.

Crew Positions:

Commander: The Commander directs the ship. Basically like a squad or platoon commander. Requires a certain command rank to use it. Only the Commander can receive messages from Ground Forces to request assistance from the Heavy Airship

Navigation Officer: The Navigation Officer flies the airship. Nothing really spectacular.

Engineering Officer: here is where things get interesting. The ship will essentially have some engineering powers which can be operated by the Engineering Officer, assuming he has certed it. These include “Shields up” this raises a shield around the Airship. Making it extremely difficult to kill and impossible to land on, but it cannot fire. “All power to the weapons” which increases the rate of fire of all guns on the ship.

Fire Direction Officers: these guys direct the fire of the ship. To co-ordinate ground attack and anti-air operations. Basically just a team-work thing. They have a 360 camera either at the top of the ship or the bottom depending if they occupy the ground fire control position or air fire control position and designate targets for the Fire crews.

Gunners: shoot the guns. Obviously.

What purpose does it serve?

A number of purposes. Mainly Ultra-heavy fire support. The armament on this thing can level an entire city, especially when directed by the Fire Officers. However it can also be used as a staging post for ground operations. Thanks to the 2 fighters on the back and the Galaxy landing pad up top, this thing can be used to staging point. One of the engineering options is “activate respawners” which completely immobilises the ship, but makes it a spawn location for troops. Which enables troops to use the galaxy to land on the ground below, while receiving fire support from the ship itself.

Now. Lets explain the rest of it. One of your questions probably is, how do resupply it? Surely it must have fixed ammunition. That is true. Like everything else in Planetside its ammunition is numbered. It cannot easily land. A couple of light assaults with ammo packs won't fill up 4 liberator cannons!. No, for the rearming and fueling (this thing has a fuel meter, explain later) I propose a customisation option for the Galaxy, A refueling aircraft, with a refueling pipe. Attaching one of these pipes to the Airship would fill it up until the Galaxy is out of “supplies” at which point it must land and fill up. There are four ports for these Galaxy refuelers to rearm the Airship.

Last Question: “But Ohanka, how do you destroy this monstrosity?” There are several ways. Despite how it may seem, the Annihilator is not invincible. It can be destroyed through sustained air attack or AA fire. However this Is a time consuming process and most likely the Airship will have destroyed you before you it. Therefore there are quicker ways to do it. Firstly, if it runs out of fuel it will plummit to the ground and explode, killing everyone onbaord. This will encourage the defending team using this Airship to setup good logistics with properly escorted refueling craft so it doesn't randomly fall out the sky. The other way is direct assault. A galaxy can drop troops onto the galaxy pad or the airpad of this ship, wherein the attacking team can land on the ship and eliminate the crew. The bridge and gun crew can be killed, but the ship cannot be manned by the attacking team, only the defending empire can control it. Instead it is often better to destroy the Core. The Core is what keeps the ship from exploding. If the core sustains heavy small arms fire it will explode. When the core explodes it gives everyone on the ship 30 seconds to evacuate. This is where the escape pods come in. There will be escape pods for 30 men on this ship (so some crewmen will never make it off alive > ) which you can use in order to escape the explosion. When the ship explodes everyone onboard will be killed, and they will count towards the kills of the attacking team who destroyed the core.

So. What do you think? A welcomed addition to planetside? Suggestions on improving this idea?

[Zekeen]

Well, good work getting so many details in, but this is actually one of the most highly talked about things around. The concept of a large flying warship is everyone where. The biggest want in an outfit air cruiser, so, it's definitely already being talked about.

[Ohanka]

Originally Posted by Zekeen

Well, good work getting so many details in, but this is actually one of the most highly talked about things around. The concept of a large flying warship is everyone where. The biggest want in an outfit air cruiser, so, it's definitely already being talked about.

Yeah Its what i based my idea on. This is just my take on the idea. I feel Planetside 2 is just the game where this sort of thing will fit in. with 600 + players per faction on each continent i see the most organised teams being willing to invest about 70 or 80 troops to keep this kind of asset on the field.

[Synapse]

This could be just the thing to move the front lines around.

One of them could push the advantage way one way or another but then you lose it...its gone for a while.

[Figment]

And then it hovers over an area with 10 people defending and they log off for the day.


Seriously, no. No. NO.

Will you people learn from BFRs already? FFS.


The equivalent armour for 21 people on ONE unit?

You honestly think... No wait, that's enough said. Or should be, if you think.

[Ohanka]

Originally Posted by Figment

And then it hovers over an area with 10 people defending and they log off for the day.


Seriously, no. No. NO.

Will you people learn from BFRs already? FFS.


The equivalent armour for 21 people on ONE unit?

You honestly think... No wait, that's enough said. Or should be, if you think.

I think you have either misunderstood the concept or completely ignored 90% of the post. This is not just "one unit". In essence it is an extremely costly, slow moving. flying firebase with the speed of a severely handicapped tortoise that only the most organised of outfits will be able to operate correctly. There is not armour for 21 people in this unit. It has 16 weapon systems. 8 of which are anti-air defence. Yes, you can fly it with 21 people. But then you won't have crew for the fighters on the back, or the galaxy dropship, no marine compliment to defend it from boarders, no repair crews in case of damaged parts and no logistics (did you forget where i mentioned if its not refueled regularly it will fall out the sky?). I estimate it will take the combined efforts of about 70-80 people to keep this running. It is not designed for defence. It is an offensive unit. Really a base of itself for use on the frontline. Not camping random towers. That would be a waste of resources. No one would use the manpower of 70 people to defend a random tower. If it is used to defend a random tower thats 70 men wasted who could be on the frontline.

If anything it is here to encourage teamwork, it will require supply lines to keep running. Those Galaxies that resupply it need escorts. If the resupply galaxies are shot down, it dies. If it hasn't got a defensive crew to fight off boarders, it dies. It would encourage numerous people with different play styles to co-operate together heavily in order to get this level of firepower. Its not a light investment either. It will cost thousands, if not tens of thousands (depending on the rate at which resources are earned and balancing) to call in. Its not indestructable by any means. The loss of this massive airship will cause a significant reduction in the power of the owning Empire. It would be in everyones best interest to keep it up and running.

If you don't like it the idea, fine by me. But so far people have said that similar concepts to the Airship are frequently discussed, which implies that people are keen on the idea. Im simply offering a teamwork-heavy varient of the outfit air cruiser idea floating around.

[kunzadar]

I smell BF 2142

I have a few suggestions and questions.

How fast does it move?
If this thing moves at anything more than a walking pace then it will be difficult to handle having players walk around in it, not to mention it might be over powered if it is to fast.

Where does it spawn, and where is the heavy landing platform?
I like the idea of this being a reward for capturing a base, but for this to be fair that base should be in a highly contested area of the map so all the empires get a shot at it. However if the air ship spawns in the center of the map it is already posed to do massive damage. That being said I think the ship should spawn at the defending empires home base so the other empires have a long warning of when this thing is coming in in order to mount a coordinated defense.

The refueling:
Supply lines are cool, but i think the refueling should be simplified. Just allow a regular gall to have a utility slot for titan supplies or whatever, and when the gall lands on the vehicles landing pad they are automatically transferred.

The guns:
The outer guns need to have their own health and be able to be destroyed. This gives the on board engineers something to do by allowing them to repair destroyed stations, and enables attacking forces to do something meaningful short of blowing up the whole thing. Also if the intent is to board the ship you can blow up the AA guns to make it easier. Repairing guns could also cause the titan to run out of fuel/energy faster.

Navigating:
This thing is going to need to be so slow that their is no point in a pilot or navigator. Allow the ship commander itself to set way points on the map, and the ship follows them automatically.

The kill:
Just as controlling this ship is going to be a massive team effort with a large cost, destroying the ship should also be a massive team effort with a large reward. Special "Titan attack points" should be awarded for all significant steps in bringing the titan down. For destroying outer guns, for killing infantry on board, and for damaging the core. Also their should be a large boon given to whichever empire destroys the titan, like a bonus on resources or something.

[Figment]

I read it and it's a horrible idea for very obvious reasons. Even if it takes 70-80 people to run, you're not doing anyone a favour.

Could go into detail but it's not worth my time and it doesn't seem like you're interested in discovering downsides or looking at it from alternatives, or opposing perspectives at all. You're too focused on forcing in a huge unit that doesn't fit in a competitive game by pretending it's a teamwork/endboss style unit and therefore supposedly "fun" and a "challenge".

This type of MMO game needs competition on reasonably level playing grounds on a player to player basis to succeed, not pwnage-mobiles with super-imposed handicaps. Small groups should not be dealt short by having to not just compete with larger numbers, but also ultra-heavy units they can't try to divide and conquer. Your logistical demands do not suffice, because if you have this small group and defend somewhere, you can't go away from your defense to disrupt the larger unit without the larger unit in the meantime dominating whatever you were trying to defend. It doesn't work!

It's going to be boring and choirs for the users and frustrating for the opposition. End off. If you can't see why, that says enough.

[Ohanka]

Originally Posted by kunzadar

I smell BF 2142

I have a few suggestions and questions.

How fast does it move?
If this thing moves at anything more than a walking pace then it will be difficult to handle having players walk around in it, not to mention it might be over powered if it is to fast.

Where does it spawn, and where is the heavy landing platform?
I like the idea of this being a reward for capturing a base, but for this to be fair that base should be in a highly contested area of the map so all the empires get a shot at it. However if the air ship spawns in the center of the map it is already posed to do massive damage. That being said I think the ship should spawn at the defending empires home base so the other empires have a long warning of when this thing is coming in in order to mount a coordinated defense.

The refueling:
Supply lines are cool, but i think the refueling should be simplified. Just allow a regular gall to have a utility slot for titan supplies or whatever, and when the gall lands on the vehicles landing pad they are automatically transferred.

The guns:
The outer guns need to have their own health and be able to be destroyed. This gives the on board engineers something to do by allowing them to repair destroyed stations, and enables attacking forces to do something meaningful short of blowing up the whole thing. Also if the intent is to board the ship you can blow up the AA guns to make it easier. Repairing guns could also cause the titan to run out of fuel/energy faster.

Navigating:
This thing is going to need to be so slow that their is no point in a pilot or navigator. Allow the ship commander itself to set way points on the map, and the ship follows them automatically.

The kill:
Just as controlling this ship is going to be a massive team effort with a large cost, destroying the ship should also be a massive team effort with a large reward. Special "Titan attack points" should be awarded for all significant steps in bringing the titan down. For destroying outer guns, for killing infantry on board, and for damaging the core. Also their should be a large boon given to whichever empire destroys the titan, like a bonus on resources or something.

1) How Fast does it move: This ship only moves at the average soldiers (none sprinting) running speed. It needs to be this slow so that stuff can land on it and soldiers can walk around on it. As i recall the Titan didn't have issues when moving, but thats a different game.

2) Well its spawned through a special terminal. Only the Leader of an outfit or a platoon can call it in. As for your suggestion of having it at a starting base. Like you said i don't want it wrecking havoc instantly. Nor do i want each faction to call one in from the start. Perhaps the Heavy Landing Bay can be at an Empire's home base, but a special "call in" facility in the centre of the map must be controlled before the console is accessable.

Refueling: The Galaxy Landing pad ontop starts with a Galaxy already there, which is outfitted entirely as a transport. So a seperate Refueling Pad would be useful. Maybe the utility slot for refueling removes all transport capacity, and maintains only a few guns. Making it a pure resupplier.

Another idea would be the fighter launch bay. When the fighters return they can be re-armed and repaired. But at the further expense of titan fuel, decreasing the time between when it needs resupplied again.

3) The guns: This is how i imagined it. The guns would have their own health and would be able to be destroyed. Disarming it should be a viable tactic to totally destroying it, but the turrets should be repairable. Like you said, but take up resources.

4) Navigating. It probably is better to have the Commander act as the navigator too through a waypoint system. Being the helmsman of this thing would be rather pointless.

5) Agree completely on the killing of it should give special rewards, like boosted resources and bonus points for killing the troops. When the guns explode on the ship, i imagine the crewman using it is also killed.

As a final closing addition to my original idea Facilities should be equipped with Anti-airship Torpedos, which cause heavy damage to the Airship. This would encourage ground forces to assault the base first and destroy the Torpedo launchers.

[MightyMan]

YES.
This will make a great new in-game objective and will give players more things to do other then "attack this base" or "defend this base" on both the friendly and the enemy factions.

Now here's what: this ship should spawn each 6-10 hours for all factions in the same time on 3 continents, making this a big special event. After the spawn it will take another 30 minutes for it to be able to be controlled (build phase) giving the friendly faction time to organize the ship crew, and the enemy factions to sabotage it and destroy it before it launches, which will also make the friendly faction to have to defend the ship.

The ship can be launched only after it has all the officers on board.
The ship will spawn in the continent connection points (I don't know how those are called) because those are the only points that cannot be captured by the enemy.

Officers should all be in commander rank so that griefing or AFKing (Navigator can just crash the ship in the first 2 seconds) will not be possible (or in case it is, the officer responsible will be perma kicked from commander rank and banned for a week).

The commander should be able to be each of the other officers, because he will not really have anything to do, other then pointing the ship to a different point every 10 minutes.
The commander can give his place to any of the officers on board in case he needs to go AFK for some time, or just wants to leave the game.

Engineer should be able to trigger the following modes: shield which will give 30% more defense but 30 less weapon power, weapon power which will give 30% less shields and 30 more weapon power, speed which will give 30% less weapon but 30 more speed and natural which will be regular stats.

When the ship is on land the commander can trigger the spawn mode, which make the ship work as a base, but will need 5 minutes to change from base mode to mobile mode.
When the ship is crashing, it will automatically go into crash mode allowing 30 of the members to eject them selves without receiving fall damage similar to the ejection perk for the galaxy.

Fire direction officers should be able to mark targets, which will make the targets show on the mini map for a minute and will highlight them making them more visible for other gunners.

Galaxy fueling and repairing will be triggered through galaxies who have the fueling perk and only when the galaxy lands on the galaxy terminal.

Love the idea and I will be more then happy if it will ever be implemented into the game.
:g roovy:
@Figment: Shut up and go to your dark corner, it is an idea. Only the devs are the one to decide whether or not the idea will be in the game and how will it work, not some kind of a random douche like you. This forums are designed to suggest new ideas and improving those that exist. If you cannot be nice enough to any of those, then either do not post on the thread at all, or just state why do you think the idea will not feat into the game without that all "being an asshole" thing of yours. "not worthy of my time." stick this sentence up your ass and go away.

[Baneblade]

I am diametrically opposed to any airship idea that can put the entire ground side of the game on farm status.

If your idea made it in, War Machine and many other outfits would focus on getting one of these and use it nearly exclusively.

Fix the farming problem and you have a solid foundation to work with, possibly even collaborate with others of us that have airship ideas.

[MightyMan]

^

this ship should spawn each 6-10 hours for all factions in the same time on 3 continents, making this a big special event.

Basically just make it so that the ship will spawn automatically, after long periods of time, and don't have an option for personal spawning. Problem solved.

[Ohanka]

Originally Posted by Sobekeus

I am diametrically opposed to any airship idea that can put the entire ground side of the game on farm status.

If your idea made it in, War Machine and many other outfits would focus on getting one of these and use it nearly exclusively.

Fix the farming problem and you have a solid foundation to work with, possibly even collaborate with others of us that have airship ideas.

Yeah i realise this would be a problem. Although it could be circumvated by giving it insane respawn timers till one can be called in again. My vision of it is to support the Ground Forces, not for Ground Forces to exist to call thsi in.

[berzerkerking]

Originally Posted by Ohanka

"Annihilator Heavy Airship"

Crew:

Commander
Navigation Officer
Engineering Officer (controls power: explained below)
Fire Direction Officer Ground (Designates Targets: explained below)
Fire Direction Officer Air (see above)
Gun Crewmen x 16

Armament:

2x Faction Specific Fighters
Air Defence Turrets x8 (2 front mounted, 2 on the left, 2 on the right, 2 at the back)
Pounder Artillery Cannons x2 (dual Liberator Cannons, one at left, one at right)
Ground Attack Mortars x4 (left, right, front, back)
SAM Turret Control x1 (top-mounted launcher)
AT Missile Turret Control x1 (bottom mounted launcher)

The Annihilator is a “flying battleship”. About 60-80 meters in length. Only one can be called in on a map. In order to for an empire to call one in it must control a “Heavy Landing Pad” which is a facility in of itself, where this massive vehicle can collect crew and launch. It would ofcourse have to cost resources numbering in the thousands. Once an Annihilator Is destroyed there is an hour long cooldown for that faction to call it in again. The idea behind these massive behemoths is to provide extreme fire support to a faction which rewards teamwork. After all, it'd need a heavily organised group of players to man this ship. Let me explain the mechanics of it.

Essentially it has a full interior. (Corridors! I love corridors ) 3 floors. The bottom floor is for loading of troops and vehicles (you can fit a tank in this things cargo hold) and accessing ground attack weaponry. The middle floor holds the Bridge and some AA turrets, as well as the engineering core, rear launch bay and Escape pod access (see later). The top floor contains the open galaxy landing pad (to give a sense of how HUGE this thing is) and Anti-aircraft weapon access. This vehicle would need a sizeable chunk of a team to properly Man. 21 for the actual ship control. As well as two for the fighters on the back. Not to mention Marine Compliment for the ship and an engineering crew to repair it, all in all it'd need about 50 men to man it.

Crew Positions:

Commander: The Commander directs the ship. Basically like a squad or platoon commander. Requires a certain command rank to use it. Only the Commander can receive messages from Ground Forces to request assistance from the Heavy Airship

Navigation Officer: The Navigation Officer flies the airship. Nothing really spectacular.

Engineering Officer: here is where things get interesting. The ship will essentially have some engineering powers which can be operated by the Engineering Officer, assuming he has certed it. These include “Shields up” this raises a shield around the Airship. Making it extremely difficult to kill and impossible to land on, but it cannot fire. “All power to the weapons” which increases the rate of fire of all guns on the ship.

Fire Direction Officers: these guys direct the fire of the ship. To co-ordinate ground attack and anti-air operations. Basically just a team-work thing. They have a 360 camera either at the top of the ship or the bottom depending if they occupy the ground fire control position or air fire control position and designate targets for the Fire crews.

Gunners: shoot the guns. Obviously.

What purpose does it serve?

A number of purposes. Mainly Ultra-heavy fire support. The armament on this thing can level an entire city, especially when directed by the Fire Officers. However it can also be used as a staging post for ground operations. Thanks to the 2 fighters on the back and the Galaxy landing pad up top, this thing can be used to staging point. One of the engineering options is “activate respawners” which completely immobilises the ship, but makes it a spawn location for troops. Which enables troops to use the galaxy to land on the ground below, while receiving fire support from the ship itself.

Now. Lets explain the rest of it. One of your questions probably is, how do resupply it? Surely it must have fixed ammunition. That is true. Like everything else in Planetside its ammunition is numbered. It cannot easily land. A couple of light assaults with ammo packs won't fill up 4 liberator cannons!. No, for the rearming and fueling (this thing has a fuel meter, explain later) I propose a customisation option for the Galaxy, A refueling aircraft, with a refueling pipe. Attaching one of these pipes to the Airship would fill it up until the Galaxy is out of “supplies” at which point it must land and fill up. There are four ports for these Galaxy refuelers to rearm the Airship.

Last Question: “But Ohanka, how do you destroy this monstrosity?” There are several ways. Despite how it may seem, the Annihilator is not invincible. It can be destroyed through sustained air attack or AA fire. However this Is a time consuming process and most likely the Airship will have destroyed you before you it. Therefore there are quicker ways to do it. Firstly, if it runs out of fuel it will plummit to the ground and explode, killing everyone onbaord. This will encourage the defending team using this Airship to setup good logistics with properly escorted refueling craft so it doesn't randomly fall out the sky. The other way is direct assault. A galaxy can drop troops onto the galaxy pad or the airpad of this ship, wherein the attacking team can land on the ship and eliminate the crew. The bridge and gun crew can be killed, but the ship cannot be manned by the attacking team, only the defending empire can control it. Instead it is often better to destroy the Core. The Core is what keeps the ship from exploding. If the core sustains heavy small arms fire it will explode. When the core explodes it gives everyone on the ship 30 seconds to evacuate. This is where the escape pods come in. There will be escape pods for 30 men on this ship (so some crewmen will never make it off alive > ) which you can use in order to escape the explosion. When the ship explodes everyone onboard will be killed, and they will count towards the kills of the attacking team who destroyed the core.

So. What do you think? A welcomed addition to planetside? Suggestions on improving this idea?

This has been suggested in greater detail before. See here:http://www.planetside-universe.com/s...ad.php?t=41198
I would think that to prevent these form ever landing would better balance the gameplay. Only having one in the sky would overpower the winning faction. Instead These would be outfit bought and cost incredible amounts of resources and money only ten would realistically exist on a continent at a time at max faction productivity. Cool Idea though. Just remember to check the related topic before posting. Maybe you can bump a pre-existing topic

[Ohanka]

Originally Posted by berzerkerking

This has been suggested in greater detail before. See here:http://www.planetside-universe.com/s...ad.php?t=41198
I would think that to prevent these form ever landing would better balance the gameplay. Only having one in the sky would overpower the winning faction. Instead These would be outfit bought and cost incredible amounts of resources and money only ten would realistically exist on a continent at a time at max faction productivity. Cool Idea though. Just remember to check the related topic before posting. Maybe you can bump a pre-existing topic

I love the idea in that topic you linked

anyway. This thing is designed to be in the air, and thats it. It can never land. The only time it'll be on the ground is when it is initally launched and the only way it'll go to the ground will be in a fireball. The only way on or off is through Galaxy transport or Escape Pods (a one way thing). I have the idea for this thing to be one per faction on each continent. Once it is destroyed it has an insane respawn timer before it can be called in again.