End Game: Pros and Cons

[Death2All]

Originally Posted by NEWSKIS

Personally I'd rather see occasional events that take place on specialized continents for that purpose. In PS1 they ran some special events

I think I agree with this bit from your quote, not sure about the rest


I'm in favor of events or something that occasionally changes the game. I'm not in favor of anything that resets the entirety of the game every few days, weeks, months, or even years. It undermines the purpose of making a persistent game when it ends.

[TotoDestroy]

You guys have to understand where the Devs are coming from, while anyone who's played PS1 get that this isn't like every other FPS, generally it will be compared apples to apples to either a MMO or FPS. Clearly the Devs are passionate and they want to infuse the same spirit in this new game, but without something that appeals to more than just we PS vets this game doesn't stand a great chance of success.

No, nobody wants anything that pulls the playerbase from the main game, but this game must appeal to the masses, it must be pick up and play. It took me months to understand the facets and nuances other original, but I toughed it out, the modern gamers attention span is far shorter they want instant gratification.

[Bags]

Originally Posted by TotoDestroy

You guys have to understand where the Devs are coming from, while anyone who's played PS1 get that this isn't like every other FPS, generally it will be compared apples to apples to either a MMO or FPS. Clearly the Devs are passionate and they want to infuse the same spirit in this new game, but without something that appeals to more than just we PS vets this game doesn't stand a great chance of success.

No, nobody wants anything that pulls the playerbase from the main game, but this game must appeal to the masses, it must be pick up and play. It took me months to understand the facets and nuances other original, but I toughed it out, the modern gamers attention span is far shorter they want instant gratification.

I don't understand how anything higby is suggesting provides instant gratification.

[General M]

I see the way forward being unique, fun and well thought out events, with special victory conditions as the way forward. I can't say how the practicalities of that would be or how people would be rewarded, but I know from playing previous "events" that it creates excitement, talking points and memories.

IMO there are two main problems with the whole "Empire X wins, now reset" that are:

1. One of the main points of an endgame is to end monotony and stop the game going stale, having a reset isn't going to change that much at all in PS2, at least not as it would in WW2OL (from what I've seen so far).

2. The fact is, with 3 teams, you either have to nerf the other teams, or take away uncappable areas (not viable IMO) for one team to truly assert dominance, at least on a server-wide scale. If you do make it so one team is beat and can't simply respawn in uncappable areas, then as soon as the first team gets knocked out, you're probably going to see a lot of those players switch server or have a break from playing. This is okay if it's a quick win but 1v1 campaigns could take as long, if not longer to finish than when it was 1v1v1 and the first losing team were knocked out, meaning players on the first losing side have a long wait.

TL;DR events, not reset.

[SgtMAD]

Originally Posted by NEWSKIS

I can see where people might want something to work towards and win, but as others have said it does kind of get away from the persistance of the game. Personally I'd rather see occasional events that take place on specialized continents for that purpose. In PS1 they ran some special events, but they did it on the regular continents which led to balance issues during the event. The specialized continents would be made so that all 3 empires are on an even footing to begin with. Make the event winner determined by the fighting and strategy, not who happens to be on the right continent at the right time.

winning those events had nothing to do with being on the right continent,it was all about being in the hart before the drained cont was revealed and then globalling the drop targets,which was only two bases(tech plant and closest base to it) needed to grab the capitol link and once you had that hacked you didn't even need to defend that hack because no one else could get the needed two links in time.
once the cap was hacked you could send out the mossies to find the mono and have armor there to transport it, game over,32 minutes to win the round,next continent flips at the top of hour so we would all recall,get in hart and wait for drop,Markov NC never did worse than 27-1 over the three day events.

then we formed MARKOV(TR) for the '05 E3 mono event held on Emmy,we felt snubbed so we invited ourselves to the party,our platoon ended up on the big screen at the SOE booth with a SOE guy playing with us,we swept that shit too,they said we were cheating

[PrISM]

Originally Posted by Xaine

It had to roll with the times.

I loved vanilla wow and Everquest 2, but they had to evolve to stay alive. Same with PS2. It needs to be updated for today's market.

Updating and changing something for the better is one thing. Changing things just because modern games have them doesn't necessarily make it a good thing.

[SwiftRanger]

Getting e-sports options in would be the same as making a new game. This isn't StarCraft II, LoL or Tribes: Ascend. This is an MMOFPS, you shouldn't have to look at more limited genres to provide a good end-/metagame (ranking as nr.1 on a ladder isn't the motivation I am looking for in a multiplayer game btw, it's nice to know you're the best player or you're in the best outfit but it's not what keeps me playing).

The failings of PS1 involved the lack of a meaningful metagame. Replacing it with tournaments isn't gonna do much for most of the playerbase, clans will still remain with the games that do e-sports better. If it isn't much effort for SOE to implement then I could appreciate it as a side-feature but there's the danger that it takes grunts and good soldiers away from the real frontlines.

As others have said, do something with the story. Provide lore-themed goals and when an empire hits them they get a persistent visual or map-based reward for it:

- do something with research about opening the wormhole again
- find out why the aliens left Auraxis, their origins, whether they'll be a threat or a welcome ally in the future
- successfully bring in defecting scientists from another empire
- look at other planets if they offer anything of value (by collecting resources to launch a space expedition or something like that, make it like a race for the moon), have the space launch platform be one facility in Auraxis so empire will have to fight over it.
- new space travellers from Earth which made it to Auraxis after all and which have news to tell from home, capture them and escort them to your base so only your empire can obtain their intel.
- try to decode messages from outer space with potential valuable information in them
- ufo's which land in the middle of Auraxis, meteorites with rare materials that crash somewhere...
- ... the possibilities are endless, this is sci-fi space.

All I am saying: those lore diaries are very nice but you could implement them in the actual game. As long as there is something that could just lift the impression you're fighting a meaningless war without end. Don't get me wrong, constant war is good, that's the core of PlanetSide but just adding a few details here and there which make the world a bit more interactive could do a lot. I can't count the folks which have given up on the first game because the maps and bases in PS1 remained the same and changed of empire ownership every hour or so. There wasn't anything that really lasted. A good endgame needs several long-term goals for each empire which could have an impact (visual, mapbased or gameplay-wise) on the war.

Of course, the devs have already recognised what made PS1 such a slug at times so maybe we'll just get non-stop massive warfare action (and short-term goals through the mission system) where we don't have the time to wonder about long-term goals. Maybe...

[MockZero2]

So many ideas on tourneys and outfit vs outfit event which I would be happy with but this isn't really what the issue is is it? I mean we are looking for that one thing to ultimately fight for in the main game that would happen with extreme rarity but not take people away from the main game or reset the game in any way.

So PS1 had a little something like this though didn't it? What about when you locked a factions home continents, you received access to their vehicles.

I thought this was perfect personally. Now I know there is no home continents in PS2 but maybe if there was some condition that was so hard to achieve you would only see it happen once every few months. I can't think of what it would take because I don't feel like I know enough about PS2 . Still I think a reward of having access to the other empires tech and killing them with their own vehicles and weapons would be HUGE! Nothing like killing some one with their own stuff. Maybe you would get this reward for a week instead of 24 hours though.

This may not even be a possibility because I remember them saying something about not being able to devote the time to making all the different faction skins for all of the vehicles to allow for vehicle hacking but I still think this would be perfect.

Maybe a place in the bases for a banner to appear showing off the accomplishment for the next month. What ever that monumental accomplishment is.

What ever I think it should take an extreme amount of fighting, teamwork, and some luck to pull off. Locking the enemies home continents was a good example but I can't think of anything that would comparable in PS2.

[Malorn]

The best idea in this thread was taking a page from Dark Age of Camelot and adding in "relic" like objects that can be stolen to give your entire empire a bonus. This gives incentives to not only control resources but also to drive deep into an empire's territory and take very specific objectives.

A good way to do it is to simply have ONE relic on each continent that on a reset spawns in the center of the continent. The empire that holds that relic in one of its facilities gets the benefit of the artifact. Call it some ancient Vanu artifact. Each continent has a different Vanu artifact bonus (infantry damage, air damage, ground vehicle damage, speed, armor, etc). Only one faction can control the artifact at any given time on the continent.

Make them like LLUs or mods or what not that have to be physically transported from the capture site back to a facility. It stays in the facility until another empire captures it, at which time it can be transported to another facility. Then we get some of that old LLU-style gameplay where vehicles swarm the LLU, and other empires could swoop in for the steal.

That gives people different motivations to fight on specific continents. The Indar continent might be a 10% infantry damage bonus. The Esamir continent might give a 10% ground vehicle damage bonus. The Amerish continent could give 10% air vehicle damage. As new continents get created they could have other bonuses, like armor, speed, etc.

Whatever empire holds the artifact on a continent will likely be the target of the other two empires.

That's a great way to make conquest meaningful, create continental differentiation, and give the players of each empire tangible goals.


Example: On indar, perhaps TR went and captured the Indar Ancient Vanu artifact, giving them 10% infantry damage. They carried this artifact a la LLU-style to the Bio Lab by their Foothold. The NC or VS need to capture that bio lab to unlock the artifact and transport it somewhere else. So the NC make a push on the TR, while the VS sweep around behind and snag the bio Lab. While the VS are moving the artifact north a crack NC crew steals it and brings it back to their Tech plant. And the cycle begins anew.

To keep things from getting too stale the artifact could de-spawn if it sits too long at any one base (like 72 hours or something like that) and go back to its neutral point.

If 1 artifact creates too much double-teaming behavior there could be more than 1 artifact on each continent. The important thing is that the bonus is reasonably significant and unique to each continent so you don't have stacking issues. If one empire gets too powerful with artifacts then the other two empires will keep it in check by going after them. Seems like a good gameplay mechanic to me.

[Skitrel]

Originally Posted by Malorn

The best idea in this thread was taking a page from Dark Age of Camelot and adding in "relic" like objects that can be stolen to give your entire empire a bonus. This gives incentives to not only control resources but also to drive deep into an empire's territory and take very specific objectives.

A good way to do it is to simply have ONE relic on each continent that on a reset spawns in the center of the continent. The empire that holds that relic in one of its facilities gets the benefit of the artifact. Call it some ancient Vanu artifact. Each continent has a different Vanu artifact bonus (infantry damage, air damage, ground vehicle damage, speed, armor, etc). Only one faction can control the artifact at any given time on the continent.

Make them like LLUs or mods or what not that have to be physically transported from the capture site back to a facility. It stays in the facility until another empire captures it, at which time it can be transported to another facility. Then we get some of that old LLU-style gameplay where vehicles swarm the LLU, and other empires could swoop in for the steal.

That gives people different motivations to fight on specific continents. The Indar continent might be a 10% infantry damage bonus. The Esamir continent might give a 10% ground vehicle damage bonus. The Amerish continent could give 10% air vehicle damage. As new continents get created they could have other bonuses, like armor, speed, etc.

Whatever empire holds the artifact on a continent will likely be the target of the other two empires.

That's a great way to make conquest meaningful, create continental differentiation, and give the players of each empire tangible goals.


Example: On indar, perhaps TR went and captured the Indar Ancient Vanu artifact, giving them 10% infantry damage. They carried this artifact a la LLU-style to the Bio Lab by their Foothold. The NC or VS need to capture that bio lab to unlock the artifact and transport it somewhere else. So the NC make a push on the TR, while the VS sweep around behind and snag the bio Lab. While the VS are moving the artifact north a crack NC crew steals it and brings it back to their Tech plant. And the cycle begins anew.

To keep things from getting too stale the artifact could de-spawn if it sits too long at any one base (like 72 hours or something like that) and go back to its neutral point.

If 1 artifact creates too much double-teaming behavior there could be more than 1 artifact on each continent. The important thing is that the bonus is reasonably significant and unique to each continent so you don't have stacking issues. If one empire gets too powerful with artifacts then the other two empires will keep it in check by going after them. Seems like a good gameplay mechanic to me.

Could go further and say that an empire that collects all artifacts and holds them for say, 72 hours, gains some sort of technology that ends the war.

That's going to be an extreme rarity, you're going to see the other factions heavily ganging in order to stop 1 faction that's clearly ahead, it'll auto balance the game through the very fact that people will fight to stop each other from winning as well as winning themselves.

I can't remember now, there was a free strategy game I played years ago that had this principle, seeking out artifacts, collecting and defending them for a set period in order to win.

You could make the artifact locations a secret until say one faction has managed to acquire 3 at once, something then happens, the idea being that due to being collected they connect with one another, emitting some sort of energy that is then traceable, warning the other factions of the location and bringing hell down on the base they're being held at. Through this you could continent locking the artifacts and allow players to transport them all together. High risk high reward in doing so though. Makes them easier to defend but failing to defend them means they all get taken.

I like it, there's interesting possibilities and it fits with the lore.

[Malorn]

Right, instead of locking a continent and closing off battle, you could define the Artifacts as win conditions.

Essentially holding the artifacts replace continent-lock. So you have a way of declaring victory and dominance but you dont' close off the continent or stop the battle there. The battle rages on, but the empire that controls the artifact effectively 'owns' the continent.

[Sardus]

Correct me if I'm wrong but... wasn't the whole point of planetside was that there was NO end game? Wasn't that the reason why it was so successful? in that it was persistent and never ending (and always had something to do)?

[Malorn]

Originally Posted by Sardus

Correct me if I'm wrong but... wasn't the whole point of planetside was that there was NO end game? Wasn't that the reason why it was so successful? in that it was persistent and never ending (and always had something to do)?

Yes, but I believe the issue being raised is about the lack of tangible accomplishments. For example, locking a continent was a tangible accomplishment in PS1 and it carried with it a benefit (a cont lock benefit). The lock marked the end of the campaign and a milestone of achievement.

Those appear to be lacking in PS2 with uncaps.

Though I agree that something tangible is needed, the cont lock mechanic is not one I will miss. I like the idea of replacing the cont lock benefit with an artifact that the empires could fight over on the continent and move around to different facilities.

[sylphaen]

If there is a victory based condition on relics, the combat will gravitate around one object somewhere. Imagine a rabbit gameplay x10 where 1000 people all rush towards a spot on the map...

Territory control would become a hindrance towards capturing victory items. The empire with those items would move them deep, deep, deep inside their territory like PS1 mods.

There could be all sorts of lame un-fun things happening.

Devs created great maps with cool spots to fight in. I could care less about end-game conditions. What counts is that we are provided with a system that is conducive to creation of great battles in awesome spots.

[SwiftRanger]

Well, everyone says no to unfun things and the war definitely shouldn't end but it could be spiced up. Even with the resource war we can't be sure PS2 will have enough staying power and we might see players dropping off like in PS1. There should be something else to spend resources on (besides your own character or outfit), either an empire-wide project where anyone can benefit from (that mothership on the art sketches for example) or something else that breaks through the perception(/reality) of an endless grind of capturing/losing bases/outposts.

SOE wants PS2 to be more like EVE Online but without the boring parts. No-one is saying we should ditch the overall war from time to time, that's something you can't sacrifice but each empire can divert their troops to different or more nuanced goals just like on an average day on the battlefield.