DRONE STRIKES from your PHONE !@#$%!

[Bazilx]

As Thor would say, I like it.

[DoctorBrain]

Originally Posted by infinite loop

I am extremely worried about this drone strike thing. If I die to shit that someone launched from their goddamn phone this game is fucked.

Originally Posted by Mango

If this comes to pass I would fear playing PS2 in the 9 to 5 time frame. I wouldn't even want to go outside for fear of instantly getting my head blown off by a cavalcade of bored office workers.

Originally Posted by Ajaks

My concern is an abundance of drones over the long term. In the early days of PS1 when the amount of CR5s was small Orbital Strikes were a strategic asset. Once everybody became a CR5 The OS became another form of spam.

I agree completely with the above posts. The concept of calling in supporting drones using mobile devices seems like one of those ideas that sounds great on paper but would be horrible if actually implemented. There is way too much potential for abuse and spam, especially considering that PS2 will be free-to-play. Players might end up running dual accounts - one for drone spam, the other for actual, consistent play. What would it be like if you ran up against one opponent who had a recon drone or drone strike available whenever he needed it? A guy sitting at his computer, playing PS2 and calling in drone strikes with his iPad, will have a significant advantage over players with only a computer. And what about larger outfits - theoretically they could have legions of "AFK" members who could provide drone support to them at any time. The game won't be quite as fun anymore when fleets of drones flown from simplified UI's on iOS or Android devices are backing up all the major outfits or groups.

This problem becomes even more apparent when one considers the long-term; as Ajaks pointed out, what is it going to be like six months down the line, when everybody has the required resources or certs to call in drones? A cooldown can be avoided with secondary accounts. A level cap or resource requirement would have to be fairly high to avoid abuse with alt accounts, to the point where the drone concept might not be practical.

I really like the concept of having PS2 apps for mobile devices, but I think we should leave the gameplay in the actual game.

[Crator]

Hmmm, good point DocBrain....

[Machine]

Originally Posted by Littleman

So Bill is in an important executive meeting, gets a call, "I need to take this call..." Walks out of the room, and picks up the phone.

"Hello?"

"Dude, I need you to soften up some guys for me in hex A7, northwest corner, by the tower."

Bill hangs up, loads up the app, drops a drone, takes a dump, then goes back to his ever so important meeting.

He later comes home to find that taking that call and blowing to smithereens that annoying floating tin can called a Mag-Rider and it's crew of pop-corn fairies allowed his TR squad mates to then take the tower, providing the Terran Republic a vital spawn point and turning the tide of the battle with the Vanu in full retreat!

epic win.

[Arovien]

Finally!

Unlike the C.I.A. I won't be respecting political borders... o wait...

[Malorn]

Cooldown & resource cost and it might not be a completely retarded idea.

[Toppopia]

Originally Posted by Malorn

Cooldown & resource cost and it might not be a completely retarded idea.

Or a queue you have to sit in so that only dedicated people will use it. And if you go afk then you get moved back down the queue,

[Kran De Loy]

Accumulating cooldown based on how often the ability is used and how much in game activity the account has combined with a high training cost to get to the drone strikes?

You have to spend a large chunk of time to make each account viable for drone strikes and unless the account is actually be used the cooldown on the drone strikes increases steadily.

Also have the back end systems track accounts that are used too exclusively for drone strikes?

[Nasher]

Originally Posted by Fylix

My one concern is that the 2000 player pop will be getting filled up with people piloting drones on their phone. If this is in addition to the 2000 pop, cool, if not, then I'd really rather have full players taking those spots.

This. They should give priority to people actually logging in to the game on their PC, even if it means kicking out people flying drones around on their phone.

[MrKWalmsley]

Couldn't have said it better Doc, pointing out the main problems with it besides its empowerment to richer people, essentially making the game P2W but the money you are giving away is to other companies.

[Asp]

Originally Posted by MrKWalmsley

Couldn't have said it better Doc, pointing out the main problems with it besides its empowerment to richer people, essentially making the game P2W but the money you are giving away is to other companies.

Where does the idea that this is going to give money to other companies come from? When it's an SOE app to begin with (so worst case, you're giving money to SOE from buying it), and best case the app will most likely be free, especially if they want the social parts of the app to have widespread use..

This will likely be an ability you cert for in the game anyway, so being there vs android remote would be largely semantic; particularly if, as previously suggested: It has a cooldown, costs resources (maybe a great deal of them), and takes a good deal of your cert points in some command tree to gain in the first place.. Certs you'd normally use to upgrade your weapons and vehicles..

It's no more spam worthy than a guy making 12 orbital strike sleeper alts (no ipad required!), and it's hardly likely to cause the blue blooded, money fueled, power grab takeover of PS2 by a bunch of talentless rich guys with a room full of gold plated ipads..

I get the discussion on the pros and cons of it, but some of this stuff is somewhat needlessly alarmist..

[MrKWalmsley]

Originally Posted by Asp

Where does the idea that this is going to give money to other companies come from? When it's an SOE app to begin with (so worst case, you're giving money to SOE from buying it), and best case the app will most likely be free, especially if they want the social parts of the app to have widespread use..

Well if SOE does charge, which is unlikely, then it would be P2W. BUT only as I have said before, if drone strikes are IPad/Android exclusives and are unavailable in-game. And when I say pay to win, I do not always mean that the person is directly paying the game company for an exclusive ability, I mean that it is possible for someone to shell out cash to get a game-mechanic exclusive to what you buy. The actual money transfer may not be P2W, but the end result would be the same; poorer people not being able to access a specific gameplay element despite having the game.

So to sum it up, I have absolutely no problem with this mechanic, but only if it is not exclusive to IPad or Android users, and is actually accessible in-game with the same mechanics. As likely as it is or is not, having a system for calling in drones seems more like something that would have been announced as a gameplay feature first, before it was announced as also available on other devices, which leads me to believe that at this current time, it is an exclusive to those devices, although that is only speculation, and I would be relieved to be proved wrong.

[Raka Maru]

Originally Posted by MrKWalmsley

Well if SOE does charge, which is unlikely, then it would be P2W. BUT only as I have said before, if drone strikes are IPad/Android exclusives and are unavailable in-game. And when I say pay to win, I do not always mean that the person is directly paying the game company for an exclusive ability, I mean that it is possible for someone to shell out cash to get a game-mechanic exclusive to what you buy. The actual money transfer may not be P2W, but the end result would be the same; poorer people not being able to access a specific gameplay element despite having the game.

So to sum it up, I have absolutely no problem with this mechanic, but only if it is not exclusive to IPad or Android users, and is actually accessible in-game with the same mechanics. As likely as it is or is not, having a system for calling in drones seems more like something that would have been announced as a gameplay feature first, before it was announced as also available on other devices, which leads me to believe that at this current time, it is an exclusive to those devices, although that is only speculation, and I would be relieved to be proved wrong.

Why would you need to fly a drone when you are already on your computer in your real ES aircraft? I'm thinking the gameplay will be significantly different than really being on the PC. What they are trying to do IMO is be inclusive to the mobile users rather than excluding those without iPads/iPhones/Android devices.

I see where you're coming from, because the people with these devices can continue playing when they leave their PC's at home. But think about this, I can still play when on the road because my laptop will have PS2 installed on it. This is also hardware that everyone does not have. Some have shelled out mega bucks for graphic cards. I cannot use these on my laptop, so does this give them the advantage?

I still think SOE is trying to be inclusive with these mobile apps and this is a good thing.

[The Kush]

This drone thing is stupid. I would rather not have it in game.

[Mango]

Agreed. I do not want to be killed in PC game by someone playing a game on a cell phone.