Higby Clarification on Upgrades

[sylphaen]

Originally Posted by Xyntech

But sidegrades are not inherently less deep or less rewarding. In fact, in a FPS, I'd argue that it's more rewarding to have a ton of customization options, but still feel like you killed that newer player based on your skill, not your gear.

To me, Xyn pretty much summed it up there.

BR40 in PS1 was OP because you had access to all playstyles available and it made your character more versatile, not because it made your character stronger.

[Xyntech]

Originally Posted by Sirisian

Why can't it be both? It's no different than someone buying a grenade or a medkit with resources to gain an upperhand in a situation. The skill could easily be knowing what gear to buy for situations. If both players are smart they'll choose similar gear (or opposite gear) and spend their resources to help themselves equaling the combat out depending on how the player's want to do things.

A grenade must be purchased every time. A cert unlock only requires a one time purchase.

A day one player can earn a few resources and get a grenade, but they can't earn 10,000 cert points to level their damage up +%300.

The devs range of %20 doesn't seem too unreasonable to me, but you're off your rocker if you think something like %50 or more would be acceptable. It's just plain and simple shitty gameplay.

Imagine for example if in the first Planetside, new players only started off with the beamer, and then had to level up to BR20 to get a Pulsar, and then up to BR40 to get a Lasher. Can you imagine how shitty that would be for new players coming into the game? Come the fuck on. We want PS2 to continue to be welcoming to new players years down the line. That means the game needs to be a relatively even playing field, where vets have more options, not more power.

Would you even have fun outclassing new players through gear alone? Fuck that. I am so glad that Higby isn't thinking along those lines on this issue. At least he has some restraint, capping the idea at %20ish.

[Aractain]

Originally Posted by Dreamcast

Theirs one thing I don't understand.


I remember seeing a crap load of perk boxes for weapon damage.


So will it be benificil for me to only have 5 perk boxes for weapon damage instead of 10 because I gat a little bit more damage with 5 perk boxes but don't sacrafice a lot of my accuracy...unlike if I had all 10 perk boxes which should sacrifice more accuracy?



What Im trying to say is will 10 perk boxes be better than 5 perk boxes...automatically or will their be a trade off their.


Hopefully u understand.

This is what I was wondering too.

[Sirisian]

Originally Posted by Xyntech

A grenade must be purchased every time. A cert unlock only requires a one time purchase.

I guess I wasn't clear. I was suggesting it should cost resources every spawn to use certs. Some might be small amounts with others being larger. It's an easy way to create a resource drain in the individual resources. The developers don't seem to like that direction. Not sure why.

Originally Posted by Xyntech

The devs range of %20 doesn't seem too unreasonable to me, but you're off your rocker if you think something like %50 or more would be acceptable. It's just plain and simple shitty gameplay.

I haven't said any numbers. I think you're reading into what I'm saying and assuming.

On that note though exact percentages would really depend on the TTK and balancing of the game. Allowing an unlock for a tank to increase the armor or increase the speed have interesting complications for balancing especially when resources come into play. You mention 20% is reasonable as the devs stated. That could very well be the average change with and without resources. (Though there would be a general understanding that most people would have resources and would be upgrading in their own way give or take).

As an example that I'd prefer would be if you're an infantry and there's some air outside that are annoying. If you didn't want to use a max you could grab your AV lock-on weapon and then use resource to upgrade it with faster lock-on, faster rockets, and longer range for a boatload of resources. (A fighter pilot could do the same thing). Now if all these go beyond the 20% threshold is a balancing issue and one players would need to think about. Personally for me the exact percentage doesn't matter much as long as the gameplay works and is fun.

[SKYeXile]

Hmr that makessense, i was under the impression each cert would be a very slight passive upgrade though.

[Xyntech]

I apologize for my misunderstanding. That would be possible, but it could create some pretty difficult spawn load outs. You would have to plan ahead for all sorts of contingencies if you didn't want to use as many resources here or there.

I doubt anybody is going to want to sit there for several minutes tweaking their load out each time they spawn.

Good idea in principle of cost vs reward, but with the amount of customization options that are going to be available, I don't see how it will be practical. With the current method, there will already be a significant variety to choose from, but at least players will only have to save custom load outs for as many combinations of certs as they want to use, not additional loudouts that use less certs to save on resources.

[Rbstr]

Originally Posted by kaffis

Wait, this isn't how people were reading that screen before?

/boggle

Yeah, I don't get why people thought otherwise.

A few upgrade slots, some stuff the goes in each one of them. Only one at a time.

[Blackwolf]

Originally Posted by Stardouser

What does increase range mean? Effective range? Literal maximum(ie, bullets wink out of existence at 300m for example)? Less bullet drop? Less spread?

Probably less bullet drop. The only thing affecting the range of weapons that fire bullets is their drop rate, so more range would likely be an accuracy boost in itself simply because you have to compensate less for bullet drop.

[Graywolves]

I'd prefer horizontal customization.


BUT!

Perhaps a stock(un-modded weapon) will be weaker than an upgraded weapon. Then it's basically a decision of which upgrades you are using. As long as the upgrades are small/minimal I wouldn't mind so much. Newer players might mind, I won't.

Character progression isn't something I enjoy much.

[Gonefshn]

Originally Posted by Graywolves

Character progression isn't something I enjoy much.

See I agree. It has been so long that we have really had nothing but MMORPGs and I feel like because of that people have associated the words MMO with RPG so much they believe it has to have RPG elements. This is an MMOFPS it doesn't need heavy RPG elements. What is important in RPGs is gear, progression, looting, exploring. What is important in an FPS is competitive fair gameplay.

[Sirisian]

Originally Posted by Gonefshn

See I agree. It has been so long that we have really had nothing but MMORPGs and I feel like because of that people have associated the words MMO with RPG so much they believe it has to have RPG elements. This is an MMOFPS it doesn't need heavy RPG elements. What is important in RPGs is gear, progression, looting, exploring. What is important in an FPS is competitive fair gameplay.

To be fair if it was up to me all the certs would be unlocked and players would be able to customize their weapons, vehicles, and loadouts with resources. Talking about upgrades in respect to the cert system greatly complicates the discussion since it brings the whole idea of player progression into the mix. So instead of what I'd prefer with just "I killed some guys and repaired a tank that killed a guy and earned 200 resources that I can now spend on upgrades for a loadout" it's more along the lines of "I killed some guys and repaired a tank that killed a guy and earned some 200 resources, but I can only spend it on stuff I have unlocked so in most people's minds I'm automatically weaker than someone who has unlocked everything". I think that part is really making the conversation awkward. It's making it difficult for me to get across my idea at least since the whole unlocking system creates that beginner vs veteran difference that people hate and want to get rid of. I don't think the developers want to remove that?