BF3 Customization Designs and Planetside 2

[Malorn]

I was playing BF3 the past few weeks (I'm sure some of our PS devs were too!) and I think there are some great things to take away from their designs.

All bugs, hit detection, etc issues aside, I thought the game has a very good design. Particularly I want to touch on things which I believe have been expressed to some extent by the PS2 team.

The big theme I see form BF3 is tradeoffs and customization.

BF3 has a pretty sweet customization system with different slots on weapons that unlock over time. In PS2 terms these unlocks would be certs. There are clear tradeoffs.

Weapon Customization

Take optics, for example. There are tradeoffs to them. Reflex sight has no zoom but its very fast aiming. As the magnification of the sights increase, the time to acquire aim increases on the optics. They have a wide range of optics so you can pick the magnification, reticule, and aim speed that most suits you. The higher power optics also had a glare as a balancing mechanic t give away a sniper position (which teaches you to displace frequently). I also found myself switching optics depending on the map. For example the Caspain Border conquest map had longer typical engagement ranges than the Operation Metro rush map. So the ability to customize my weapon to my preference was good.

Other good weapon customizations were the tradeoffs between using a laser pointer, which tightened the CoF in un-aimed fire, a tactical light which could blind the target, a suppressor, a flash suppressor, or a heavy barrel. Choose one! Great balancing mechanic both between the devices.

Each device also had its own tradeoffs. The laser pointer had the red beam that could give you away both when looking direct. The suppressor lowered damage as its downside. The heavy barrel added aimed accuracy at the expense of recoil (so you get single-shot accuracy but worse multi-shot accuracy).

There is great design here with tradeoffs between which option you choose, and each option had benefits and hinderances.

The weapons themselves were a lot of side-grades as you might say with different characteristics. Some had differing ammo capacity. Some had more damage, or different recoil. Some were designed for full automatic spraying, others for more precise shots. This reminds me a lot of what Higby mentioned about the Cycler having 4 variants that were all side grades for different characteristics. When I think about how many weapon variants I saw, 4 seems about the right number when you think about how you want it to handle and the role for the weapon. So 4 different cyclers, maybe 4 different sniper rifles or heavy assault variants, etc.

Again the theme is tradeoffs. Take the SCAR-H. It only had a 20 round magazine compared to the 30 rounds of the M4. But it fires a 7.62 not 5.56 so it had a lot more power to each shot. As a consequence it has higher recoil on automated fire but more damage per-shot and a smaller magazine. Great balancing there and both weapons are good in their own respects for slightly different purposes.


But it goes beyond just the guns - the secondary weapons and gadgets also had tradeoffs. Engineers had two that were interesting to me, the "Launcher" spot and the "Gadget" slot.

For the launcher you had to choose between the RPG, the Stinger, or the Javelin. The RPG was general-purpose, good for a variety of things and close-range vehicles, but not good against far-away vehicles or aircraft. The stinger was good against aircraft but left you vulnerable to ground vehicles. And the Javelin was not in beta but I suspect it filled the gap of hitting distant vehicles and used an IR locking mechanism (based on what it is used for in the real world). So as an engineer I had to make a choice on Caspian on which one I wanted to use. Choosing the stinger meant I had to avoid tanks like any other infantry.

For the gadget you had to choose between a repair tool, AT mines, or a robot that could repair, arm, or disarm remotely. For a rush map with vehicles I can imagine the choice might be difficult as all could be useful.


Infantry also had a bonus they could give themselves and also their squad, such as faster sprint, more ammo, explosion resistance, etc. The thing I noticed about this bonus is that the damage/suppression bonuses had corresponding resistances. Flak countered Explosion, and Cover countered suppression. This is a cool way to do the perk.

Two things they did not have:
1) body armor giving more damage absorbing
2) more damage on bullets

Both of these are must-haves if they exist and so DICE left them out so there's a real tradeoff decision among the other options. A great design decision and one that PS2 should take note of. Damage bonuses that affect the main weapon are generally not good, but other perks like ammo, explosing istane, runspeed, etc can be good tactical bonuses to your team.




Vehicle Customization

I dont' know how many of you got to try out Caspian border when they opened it up last Friday but they had some great vehicle customization options which were again tradeoffs.

Take a tank for example. It had 1 gadget slot and 1 weapon slot.

Jets were the same way. You had to choose between having an air-to-ground bomb on the jet or heat-seeking air-to-air missiles. You had to choose whether you wanted one of you gadgets to be stealth, which increased lock times.

Just browse the different vehicle unlocks and you'll see some really cool stuff, from motion sensors, IR vision, larger radar, smart bombs, stronger armor, auto-repair, stealth, IR camoflauge, faster reloading, etc.

All are tradeoffs! We can't have all of them at once, but we can tailor our vehicles to the situation and use those cusotmizations to react to what the enemy is doing. If for example the enemy was using bombers I'd put some IR camo on my tank or some IR smoke.

If PS vehicle customization is anything like this then I'll be quite happy.


The design paradigm that BF3 uses predominantly has two key points that I want to drill home.

1) X number of upgrade slots, where certain upgrades go in certain slots.

This creates a tradeoff between upgrades and allows you to avoid upgrades that might be OP if used together. It also creates a meaningful customization decision. From making the choice between a flashlight and a suppressor, or the choice between using a stinger and an RPG, I have meaningful choices as a player that will directly impact my game.


2) upgrades have upsides and downsides

This creates side-grades for just about everything. For example I love suppressors, but I also hate that in some cases it increases the number of shots to kill someone. It matters! Seeing someone at 4% life in the kill-cam after losing the engagement meant that I lost that engagement because I was using the suppressor. Had I not used it the increase in damage would have killed the opponent. However, the fact that I was using a suppressor possibly made fewer hostiles notice me, allowing me to even get that kill opportunity in the first place. I've also seen laser-pointers and flashlight beams poking out from around corners which gave away my opponents before I saw them.


If PS2 follows these good design paradigms it will be in great shape!

[Bags]

I thought they already stated that there will be trade offs?

[ThGlump]

They cant take good game mechanic from bf3, since they already took the bad ones

[DviddLeff]

Totally agree with the way BF3 does its unlocks; would work perfectly in PS. "Unfortunately" I has a busy weekend so didn't get to play the larger vehicle map, but from what little I saw of the beta I really enjoyed it once the bugs I was having trouble with got ironed out.

Side grades and specific weapon/upgrade slots are the way forward I think.

[Geist]

Originally Posted by Bags

I thought they already stated that there will be trade offs?

Ya, one of the things they always say in every interview is that no one will be overpowered, and each new weapon/upgrade will be for variety, not power, which is always nice to hear. But they could definitely take some things for BF3 to make their own weapons even more perfect in terms of customization and balance.

[CrystalViolet]

Agreed. I also really like the slick UI system they use to deliver all of the customization options. I hope this is something that the PS2 devs put a lot of work into getting right.

[Bags]

Originally Posted by CViolet

Agreed. I also really like the slick UI system they use to deliver all of the customization options. I hope this is something that the PS2 devs put a lot of work into getting right.

Slick is the last word I would use to describe the interface of BF3. You have to be in game to do anything interface wise!

[CrystalViolet]

Originally Posted by Bags

Slick is the last word I would use to describe the interface of BF3. You have to be in game to do anything interface wise!

The browser thing is questionable, but I was talking about the actual customization menus. They're very intuitive and well designed.

[Talek Krell]

Originally Posted by Bags

Slick is the last word I would use to describe the interface of BF3. You have to be in game to do anything interface wise!

That's likely to be less of an issue in Planetside though. You won't be on such a strict timer there.

[Malorn]

Please stay on topic. This isn't about how great or terrible the BF3 UI is. It's about how they did a great job with customization and have some fundamental ideas that jive well with what we've seen so far in the PS2 information.

Its sort of a proof-of-concept of the same customization options PS2 is considering and gives us a glimpse of what it might look like. I'm re-affirming that I like this direction and hope PS expands upon it.

Also careful to note "power" is in options, not in flat bonuses applied to players in the BF3 model. The one exception to this is the explosive damage bonus, but that too is a tradeoff and has a countering flak armor bonus.

In fact, everything is a tradeoff in BF3. Tradeoffs tradeoffs tradeoffs...

[Talek Krell]

It sounds like a pretty solid system to me. Although I'm hoping that PS2 is a bit more radical in it's options. I'd like to see things such as:

The ability to reconfigure an air vehicle (either Lib or ES fighter) as a 2 person gunship.
The ability to replace the Gal's troop carry/spawn capacity with an expanded vehicle bay and repair facilities (to replace the Lody).
The ability to replace the Lib bomb bay with a light troop carrying compartment.

And so on.

[kidriot]

the more I see of how customizable PS2 will be the less thrilled I am at its release. not to say customization is bad (options are good), but the sheer balancing act the devs would have to put up with with 1 x x x x x options is daunting.

the magic of PS1 was really, a simple game with basic options, but what you did with those options made the game a one-of-a-kind. think of skiing in Tribes. all you did was jump down a hill and before you knew it you were flying at Mach 1. too many customizable options will drown a game in unnecessary fluff.

simple mechanics and options don't mean a simple game, but too many options and you have a fucking mess.

[Aractain]

Its easier to balance trade offs than it is to balance having everything (which means having 1 setup and everything else has to be overpowered to compete).

Excellent post Malorn! Totaly agree, hope PS is like this (they have the opportunity to get creative since its sci-fi, so I hope they take advantage of that).

[Eolin]

Hop they will take a look at the sounds in BF3. They are completly amazing, especially far explosions. Sound is a very important thing in war, and I think PS2 devs should be considering it more important than just "pew-pew" or " tzee tzee " for laser guns

[CutterJohn]

Originally Posted by Malorn

Two things they did not have:
1) body armor giving more damage absorbing
2) more damage on bullets

BC2 had these, and while nice, they definitely weren't 'must haves'. Depended entirely on what you were doing, as there were plenty of other quality unlocks to choose from. I concede they were probably the 'best' all purpose selection if you weren't sure what you were going to do.


Direct upgrades with no downside are fine, so long as it has the downside of not being able to fit something else that would also be useful.



Stuff I'd like to see:


All- Adding attachments will, due to their mass, stabilize the weapon while firing and strengthen(but slow down) melee attacks(if such exist). However, they will make you move a bit slower, turn a bit slower, reload slower, and have a larger cof while moving, along with costing resources of course.

Barrel upgrades

Cooling jacket - allows for long term sustained fire(obviously best used with the box mag)
Suppressor - keeps you from pinging the minimap when shooting.
Rail assist - Increases damage and range, but limits the rof
Underbarrel launcher - adds a GL/shotgun
Muzzle brake - Reduces recoil and cof effects due to firing, but makes the gun louder and the flash larger.

Sights

Reflex scope - Standard. Fuck iron sights. This is the future.
4x-12x scope -
Spotting scope(4x) - Allows one to laze targets or call them out for strikes.
Targeting computer(4x) - Allows you to range targets for airburst grenades if you have the GL.
Composite scope(4x) - Built in vision enhancement to see through smoke/walls/etc.

Magazines

Small - Lightest weight, fastest reload
Medium -
Large -
Drum - Super heavy, very long reload.

Stocks

Standard -
Storage - Increases ammo capacity by X, and holds your smokes.
Pistol grip(no butt) - Ultimate in weight reduction, but recoil effects are quite severe.
Recoil absorbing - reduces recoil.