NPC's in planetside?

[Sirisian]

Originally Posted by IDukeNukeml

I want someone to convice me we need NPC's in this game.

"need" is a strong word. We don't really "need" too many things other than the basics of an FPS. The game is going to grow as a F2P title with more content. Ideally I can see your point where they should focus strictly on content that will make them money, but at the same time I'd prefer if the continents themselves didn't get stale. So adding things to them would be nice (not necessarily creatures).

I want them to make the game world more immersive and alive even if no one is around in an area as I fly or drive my vehicle to the front. Or if I'm cloaking or sniping away from people finding my perfect area I want to know there are other dangers of going solo. To me adding creatures are like adding different types of trees or rocks to the continents. Another reason is to add memories to the game and cause a small level of chaos on certain regions of the maps. I have a full post though that's a little more in depth into what I'd specifically want to see.

Originally Posted by IDukeNukeml

The entire concept behind Planetside WAS PVP only worlds.

I know you registered late, but if you followed the development of Planetside 1 you'd know that isn't true. They had a lot of things they wanted Planetside 1 to be. You sound really ignorant when you say that. I linked this earlier, but most people have read it years ago and understand that the developers wanted Planetside to be bigger than it was.

They have the chance to do it now. Maybe not at release, but as the game grows they could definitely turn Auraxis into a living world with a persistence beyond just the players.

Originally Posted by Aurmanite

Here you linked me screenshots of them thinking about adding creatures and them dropping them. Can you guess why?

Why would I guess? You and I both have no idea why they did that and making assumptions about it is a poor form of debate, and one I won't partake in.

[Hamma]

Let's all try and pretend we like each other

[CidHighwind]

Holograms.

If NPC's DO make it (and believe me, I am personally against it like 99.99%) then make them holograms. It explains away the need to kill them. It explains away how they're loyal [they just get reprogrammed at the time of facility hack... hell, that's WHY you hack if you'd like] and it provides an interesting element of "s*** guys, I hear footsteps...someone in the base with us?"

[Sirisian]

Originally Posted by CidHighwind

Holograms.

I can't force people to read all the threads so I will say robots were mentioned a few times for base defenses in other threads. They were compared to moving spitfire turrets that are deployed by the base in hallways when no one is around to slow down pesky solo players.

[CidHighwind]

I was imagining them more as walking ghosts within the facility. They go about their business as we go about ours... If anything it would provide more immersion as people realize that they are fighting for an operating facility. These holograms aren't things that individuals walk up to a console and say "hey give me a beer" they carry clipboards and move from station to station like ghosts of Esamir's past.

It's aesthetic for sure, but not 'non-immersive'

[Livefire]

Originally Posted by WaryWizard

I think he would want it in the thread so everyone can see it.


The only thing I can think of is immersion. Looking at this great forest/meadow and not any form of life at all is kinda meh.

Sorry for the length but he asked for it.

First off forge light could do all this with no lag or fps problems for up to date computers so we don't need to talk about performance issues. The only thing that matters is dev's times and so I would be fine with it after more important game mechanics is done.

Ok I see 3 different kinds of npc's being useful for planetside2 and 2 of them could be combined in most cases.

First is a living world that is always changing with animals filling the landscape so it is not a starielle environment, this includes the already added weather, day, night cycle effects which they have said will be in the game. The alien animals could be run over, shot, or just stared at. They would run from you when you get near or if bullets are fired by them. So they would avoid battles by default.

Second you have human npc's that work at the bases and do things like help you with your training, mod your weapons, buy your weapons, repair your avatar, and repair your vehicles for you as well as rearming them. In place of just standing computer consoles now. They would populate the otherwise sterielle auto functions of the bases.

First 2 are just eye candy and for immersion and realism.

This one introduces a mission system I would call a side mission like in arma.
The third and more complicated way, and this would be combined with the second would gets involved with the xp system. So the civs run all the base systems for each empire, each empire has a certain number of civs maintaining all there bases. The more bases you have the more civs that arrive to man it. Presumable from the base each empire has that can't be captured. The more civs you have manning your bases as an empire the more xp bonus you get like the pop xp bonuses. So you want as many bases as you can get however you can get them and there for populate them with your civs for more xp bonus per kill and base cap. The civ's are empire specific engineers, scientist, researchers, and worker bees.

Now it gets real interesting, Like real world there should be penelties for killing non combatants so killing your civs would get you grief as well as killing the enemy's. So if the enemy can, they would want to capture them alive for important intelligence and by doing so they get even more xp bonus. So you would want to hold the base as long as you can or if you can't evacuate the civs from the base so they don't get killed or caputed, lowering your xp bonus and empowering the enemy's. If the enemy can capture some of your civs they will take them back to one of there base brigs for interrogation. So then you can go and put together a special forces team and go on a (side mission) bust them out and rescue them getting some of your xp bonus back if they don't defend off your attack, because they would lose some of there xp bonus for losing those prisoners. Another (side mission) could be your civs are transporting a new weapon system from one base to the other and you need to defend it because other wise if an enemy gets it they get some xp and if the transport is successful your empire gets the xp. Another (Side mission) during a base cap could be there is a VIP general in the base, cap the base and take the general dead or alive before he is evacuated. The base cap would be the primary xp of course but the side mission during the cap would be a bonus xp to the cap if you completed it. Another (Side mission) would give you weapons free and have you kill as many of there civs in that base for extra xp from the cap. Most of the time though you would not be able to hit one with out getting grief, you would want to capture them by default just as in RL.

So we would be playing are part as solders for are faction, ie protecting are bases attacking others and trying to keep are npc's safe from the enemy so we maximise are xp bonus. And the npc's would be doing there part running everything behind the scenes.

This is just some of the ways you can use human npc's in passive forms that would make the objective game play far more interesting and realistic, with precision and command having more stuff to do then just telling the army what base to attack and firing OSes. It would also bring the world of planetside alive everywhere rather then just where the biggest battle is taking place.

[Sirisian]

Originally Posted by Livefire

So the civs run all the base systems for each empire, each empire has a certain number of civs maintaining all there bases. The more bases you have the more civs that arrive to man it. Presumable from the base each empire has that can't be captured. The more civs you have manning your bases as an empire the more xp bonus you get like the pop xp bonuses. So you want as many bases as you can get however you can get them and there for populate them with your civs for more xp bonus per kill and base cap. The civ's are empire specific engineers, scientist, researchers, and worker bees.

What you said here offers no gameplay to the game.

Originally Posted by Livefire

Like real world there should be penelties for killing non combatants so killing your civs would get you grief as well as killing the enemy's. So if the enemy can, they would want to capture them alive for important intelligence and by doing so they get even more xp bonus. So you would want to hold the base as long as you can or if you can't evacuate the civs from the base so they don't get killed or caputed, lowering your xp bonus and empowering the enemy's. If the enemy can capture some of your civs they will take them back to one of there base brigs for interrogation. So then you can go and put together a special forces team and go on a (side mission) bust them out and rescue them getting some of your xp bonus back if they don't defend off your attack, because they would lose some of there xp bonus for losing those prisoners. Another (side mission) could be your civs are transporting a new weapon system from one base to the other and you need to defend it because other wise if an enemy gets it they get some xp and if the transport is successful your empire gets the xp. Another (Side mission) during a base cap could be there is a VIP general in the base, cap the base and take the general dead or alive before he is evacuated. The base cap would be the primary xp of course but the side mission during the cap would be a bonus xp to the cap if you completed it. Another (Side mission) would give you weapons free and have you kill as many of there civs in that base for extra xp from the cap. Most of the time though you would not be able to hit one with out getting grief, you would want to capture them by default just as in RL.

I'm not gonna lie. That just sounds painfully boring. I thought I hated the idea of humanoid NPCs before. It sounds like you haven't thought any of this through. You want to add basically LLU captures with living people. Why not just use disks taken from a base? Also this is a F2P game. People are going to kill these random civilians for fun and not even care about the XP. Look at the Planetside 1 generator issue when you gave people 2 choices. It's very difficult to get people to work together and not destroy something for fun.

[Livefire]

Originally Posted by Sirisian

What you said here offers no gameplay to the game.


I'm not gonna lie. That just sounds painfully boring. I thought I hated the idea of humanoid NPCs before. It sounds like you haven't thought any of this through. You want to add basically LLU captures with living people. Why not just use disks taken from a base? Also this is a F2P game. People are going to kill these random civilians for fun and not even care about the XP. Look at the Planetside 1 generator issue when you gave people 2 choices. It's very difficult to get people to work together and not destroy something for fun.

That is there choice, as the gen was. It would be up to them to decide if they want more xp or not. But the reason to not just have a disk is because that is boring and this is immersive and realistic. Really not fun compared to what recapping the same bases over and over the exact same way with no other objective? That is why they added the llu because people wanted different types of objectives.

[Garem]

+1 to the "calm down folks" posters, although I understand the strong objections to the idea.

BTW, I'm not strongly swayed either way, but here's some food for thought.

The "animals" and passive NPCs issue has been discussed, so... what about NPC caravans?

Nobody really liked driving ANTs, but they had a very important purpose.
Resources in the game are changing; we're not exactly sure how, but we know that "territory is survival".
So we know they're going to be very important.

I can foresee it being interesting to have, say, an NPC caravan sending resources from the front line to a more secure location, or vise versa, for an outfit or just automatically by a faction itself. This creates an objective for the team to protect that isn't just a base.

Sure, I suppose it COULD be a player-driven convoy. But they got rid of ANTs for a reason- driving them really isn't as much fun as driving a tank. Player-directed NPCs could actually increase the game's PvP soul, not necessarily diminish it.

Addendum:

NPCs should never get computer space over players. I'm sure this can be scripted, of course, so that animals and any other NPCs disappear when poplocks happen. This makes sense, too- if that many people are around with guns, tanks, and aircraft and I were a helpless (insert NPC) I'd get the hell out of Dodge, too.

[Livefire]

Originally Posted by Garem

+1 to the "calm down folks" posters, although I understand the strong objections to the idea.

BTW, I'm not strongly swayed either way, but here's some food for thought.

The "animals" and passive NPCs issue has been discussed, so... what about NPC caravans?

Nobody really liked driving ANTs, but they had a very important purpose.
Resources in the game are changing; we're not exactly sure how, but we know that "territory is survival".
So we know they're going to be very important.

I can foresee it being interesting to have, say, an NPC caravan sending resources from the front line to a more secure location, or vise versa, for an outfit or just automatically by a faction itself. This creates an objective for the team to protect that isn't just a base.

Sure, I suppose it COULD be a player-driven convoy. But they got rid of ANTs for a reason- driving them really isn't as much fun as driving a tank. Player-directed NPCs could actually increase the game's PvP soul, not necessarily diminish it.

I actual was going to mention the ant being driven by a npc, lol forgot that one. Possible another thing command rank could do, give you the ability to tell a npc what to do as in evac the base and head to gal or sundere, move/stop that type of thing.

[Canaris]

Originally Posted by Marth Koopa

NPCs take CPU

NPCs don't add anything

waste

^ this most of all

[MGP]

I've imagined the chat like this:
"LFG to kill that <random-dragon-alien-thing-in-the woods>, good exp and drop epic weapon mods!"
And then i've started to cry...

[IronMole]

Originally Posted by Livefire

I actual was going to mention the ant being driven by a npc, lol forgot that one. Possible another thing command rank could do, give you the ability to tell a npc what to do as in evac the base and head to gal or sundere, move/stop that type of thing.

Oh so now were replacing players for NPC's?

All the ideas that you lot have come up with can just be done mission based with players.

What next? I will be able to hire an NPC to be my companion in fights?

[Warborn]

The knee-jerk reactions in this thread are sort of funny and sad. Are they sure they want PS1 vets to get priority access to the beta?

[IronMole]

Originally Posted by Warborn

The knee-jerk reactions in this thread are sort of funny and sad. Are they sure they want PS1 vets to get priority access to the beta?

Only if they don't want a care-bear game.