News: Server Hotfix 10/16/13

[EVILPIG]

All servers will come down for maintenance at 6:00 AM PDT (3:00 PM CEST) for a hotfix.
Downtime Start: 6 am
Downtime ETA: 90 minutes



Spawn changes

Reinforcement spawn locations are now more likely to show up for front line battles.
Instant Action now has a higher chance of choosing a location on the player's current continent.
Increased standard spawn options to include:
Nearest Small outpost by lattice links
Nearest Large outpost by lattice links

This should alleviate situations where pilots and others are downed more than one region away from a friendly territory and are stuck with no good spawn options. This change will offer the nearest small outpost and nearest large outpost in addition to the nearest major facility that is already available. This should allow those players to either join the nearest front or fall back to spawn another vehicle at a larger facility.

Please note that the distance is by lattice-links, not as the crow flies.



World Domination Series UI Update

We have added the following UI elements to improve the awareness of the WDS to players, and to better inform players on where they can make a meaningful impact to their empire’s scoring.

The TAB Scoreboard now lists the Daily, Weekly, and Season scores for each empire. The scores shown are only for your server. Empires are sorted top-to-bottom so it's quick to see where your empire stands for the day/week/season.

The Map Region information panel now shows current WDS scoring value for the region. The capture value is the amount of WDS points your empire will receive if it were to capture the facility. The hold value is the amount of WDS points the owner will receive at the next point deposit. Next to the hold value is the time remaining for the next deposit.

The values listed in the UI are up-to-date values and take all modifiers to the scoring into account, including top dog and difficulty. Due to difficulty modifier changing with population, these point values will change over time.





World Domination Series Scoring Update

We have updated the World Domination Series scoring rules. New scoring rules are as follows:

Base Scoring Value Changes - The base values for capturing and holding territories is being adjusted for greater scaling potential. Here are the new values:

Small Outpost: 10 for capture, 20 per hour held
Large Outpost: 30 for capture, 50 per hour held
Major Facility: 50 for capture, 100 per hour held

These values are much higher than current, but they will be typically much lower than they seem due to the difficulty modifier (described below) reducing overall scoring value. Players will still see a significant increase in overall scoring potential compared to the previous scoring rules. The expected point scoring increase is approximately three times higher than previous weeks. These values take into account typical capture rates and hold times such that large outposts will roughly be worth twice that of a small outpost, and a major facility will be worth roughly twice that of a large outpost.

Difficulty Modifier - The value of a territory for both hold and capture will now scale in value depending on the level of enemy presence on the continent. The difficulty modifier will be between .1 and 1, depending on the most populated enemy faction on the continent. The difficulty modifier is defined as: MAX( .1 , EnemyEmpire1Population/PopulationCap, EnemyEmpire2Population/PopulationCap)

This means that empty continents will be worth much less than populated continents, and that empires that outnumber their opponents on a continent will be getting less capture and hold scoring there than those opponents. The most valuable territories will be on continents with a strong enemy presence. There is a minimum value of .1 so dominating empty continents still has some meaningful value, but fighting on a more populated continent has a significantly greater impact potential.

Top Dog Bounty - Territories belonging to the empire with the highest seasonal score for the server will have 50% increased capture point value to the other empires. This will make being the scoring leader more challenging. It is intended to prevent a runaway empire and to give underdogs a reasonable chance at a comeback.

These are the only scoring updates going in at this time. We want to see how these changes affect the preseason before making further adjustments.

Depot
Coming soon: Keep an eye out for Halloween sales on some new arrivals and old favorites.




Misc

Rotated the Warp Gate owners again for the World Domination Series event
Lowered "Alert Incoming" time to 2 minutes from 15



Bug fixes

Hooked up impact audio for MAX AV weapons, rocket launchers, and Liberator Dalton
Depot: Fixed a bug with purchasing boosts while in the VR training zone
Several helmets will now properly display character heads
Spectre Helmet now has appropriate camo pattern
Improved faction color visibility on stealth suits for the NC, TR and VS. As a result camouflage no longer covers the entire surface area of the suits.
Fix for rocket lock-on intermittently getting stuck on

[EVILPIG]

Top Dog Bounty - Territories belonging to the empire with the highest seasonal score for the server will have 50% increased capture point value to the other empires. This will make being the scoring leader more challenging. It is intended to prevent a runaway empire and to give underdogs a reasonable chance at a comeback.

If this was +50% XP, players who pursue it.

[ringring]

I wonder if this indicates no performance patch this week? I would have thought they would roll both up into one weekly patch.

[ChipMHazard]

We won't be seeing any performance patch on the live servers before the 30th.

[ringring]

Originally Posted by ChipMHazard

We won't be seeing any performance patch on the live servers before the 30th.

Gah!

Of course. I knew that, really, cross my heart.

[Ruffdog]

Originally Posted by EVILPIG

Improved faction color visibility on stealth suits for the NC, TR and VS. As a result camouflage no longer covers the entire surface area of the suits.

Incoming refund demands and general shit-storm?

[EVILPIG]

Originally Posted by Ruffdog

Incoming refund demands and general shit-storm?

This is highly disappointing.

[Maidere]

Camouflages are p2w. They nerfed them a bit, what's good.

[camycamera]

hopefully this will help stop the whiners on forumside, but heh, who am i kidding. nothing pleases them.

[Ruffdog]

Originally Posted by EVILPIG

This is highly disappointing.

If I was NC I'd be a bit pissed off. That baby blue that's magically appeared!
Camo is exclusively acquired with money (or referrals yeah yeah) which people have parted with, based upon a look which is now different. Not smart if you like repeat business.

[Babyfark McGeez]

Funny sidenote; The latest patch (which i assume is this one) sets off my anti virus software. Or maybe the guys n' gals at "avast" added planetside 2 to the malware list.

[Phaden]

Originally Posted by Babyfark McGeez

Funny sidenote; The latest patch (which i assume is this one) sets off my anti virus software. Or maybe the guys n' gals at "avast" added planetside 2 to the malware list.

Same here, frustrating. Added to exceptions list until it was fixed, but didn't allow me to update properly until i rebooted.

[Babyfark McGeez]

Yeah it was quite the pita to get it running.
But on a positive note defensive respawn options are now working fine again.

[Belhade]

What's this patch, anyways? Do I not understand what "server hotfix" means?

[synkrotron]

It does it automatically when you start the game front end... Once it is loaded the Play button lights up.