Global Wide Command Chat?

[DviddLeff]

I hope we see the mission system as a fundamental part of command (I am sure it will be) to allow commanders to direct the troops.

Squad leaders will either make the missions themselves or their platoon leaders will make them and either ask specific squad leaders to complete them (ie I ask my outfits paratrooper squad to capture a comm outpost) or make them available to the empires independent squads.

I really hope we see companies, collections of 3-4 platoons of troops all led by an overall commander who brings the platoons together. This player would give out platoon missions, general orders to take/defend a region rather than individual territories.

[basti]

Originally Posted by DviddLeff

I hope we see the mission system as a fundamental part of command (I am sure it will be) to allow commanders to direct the troops.

Squad leaders will either make the missions themselves or their platoon leaders will make them and either ask specific squad leaders to complete them (ie I ask my outfits paratrooper squad to capture a comm outpost) or make them available to the empires independent squads.

I really hope we see companies, collections of 3-4 platoons of troops all led by an overall commander who brings the platoons together. This player would give out platoon missions, general orders to take/defend a region rather than individual territories.

It has been mentioned already that the system is allowing you to issue missions for your squad, platoon and empire. And apperently also Multiple, selected platoons.

But it needs to be able to issue missions from the very basic level (defend this, attack that) to a very very detailed level (grab tanks there, form up there, follow this guy there, there and there).

Just got an idea while writing this post: What about allowing the guy who issued the mission to talk to everyone that accepted it? Would just be like /comxy, but only for those who want to have it at that time. In addition, give those who are leaders and deep enough into the skill tree the ability to talk with each other, means just like /c is these days for the different command ranks. Means Squad leaders would have a chat, Platoon leaders would have one, and continental leaders would have one. This allows coordinations between those groups, and allows people to issue missions that work together with everyone else. For example, Basti issues a mission to form up a Tank raid at some base, allowing Basti to lead everyone who accepts this mission, giving the tank raid the ability to be useful. At the same time, Basti and leff are talking to each other how they could use the tank raid for the empires benefit, and Leff starts a Mission to attack a certain Territory. Now Basti is being the distraction with his tank raid, binding alot of of enemys away from Leffs target. Leff now has the possibility to take his target. While Leff is just holding the target, situation changes, the enemy retreats to attack Leffs troops, Leff informs basti that he is under heavy attack, and Basti can easily lead his Tank raid to support leff.


Holy crap. If im not mistaken, that would actually solve the global Spam completly (only one leader for a mission, and only those part of the mission see the leader talking) and adding alot of abilitys to the leaders while adding reasons (ressource rewards or whatever) to follow orders for those who acccept the mission.
The only issue that is left would be some tart training up his leader skill tree just to annoy everyone else in there, means /c spam. But i guess that could be dealt with /ignore easily, such a guy would propably need a month to be able to talk in /c again.



Comments?

[Raymac]

Originally Posted by basti

Just got an idea while writing this post: What about allowing the guy who issued the mission to talk to everyone that accepted it?

I didn't even need to read another word in your post. Thats a kick ass idea that I really hope the devs are already working on, and if not, then they should work on it so it's in the game. Very very cool.

[Bags]

I like that idea. If you select the mission chances are you will care about what they have to say.

[Tigersmith]

Originally Posted by Raymac

I didn't even need to read another word in your post. Thats a kick ass idea that I really hope the devs are already working on, and if not, then they should work on it so it's in the game. Very very cool.

Fantastic Idea. I would love doing this.

[MgFalcon]

basti, your idea is amazing! I would love to see this implementing into PS2 as the new command system(chat).

What I myself would like to see (modifying your rank chat a bit) is that the higher ranks (Overall Commander?) would be able to observe all the lower chats (/s, /p, PL chat, SL chat, etc.)

This will lead to better cohesion; if the Commander of Mission: Whatever sees there's a problem in a certain squad/platoon, he will instantly know about it and [hopefully] fix it. Rather than needing a sitrep.

Then again knowing how the new Command system will work would be nice before all this awesome speculation.

[basti]

Originally Posted by MgFalcon

basti, your idea is amazing! I would love to see this implementing into PS2 as the new command system(chat).

What I myself would like to see (modifying your rank chat a bit) is that the higher ranks (Overall Commander?) would be able to observe all the lower chats (/s, /p, PL chat, SL chat, etc.)

This will lead to better cohesion; if the Commander of Mission: Whatever sees there's a problem in a certain squad/platoon, he will instantly know about it and [hopefully] fix it. Rather than needing a sitrep.

Then again knowing how the new Command system will work would be nice before all this awesome speculation.

Great idea. A overall command guy would propably help alot coordinate the missions. After all, leading a bunch of tanks really needs focus, and its hard to do the continental leading as well at the same time, as you sometimes just miss important information, especialy if the game is going to be faster than PS1. Having a guy taking care that you know where you are needed with your guys is really helping there.

[Malorn]

Originally Posted by basti

You just never lead, right?

/c was never broken, it worked at every single point during Planetsides life. Because it was JUST a chat channel, nothing else. What players do with that is up to them, and they screwed it up, badly.

The broken part is the mechanic to gain access to write in /c. Being a CR5 wasnt sacrificing something else, it was just be number 1 in squad and wait. Thats why at some point tarts got in, and trolled everything to pieces.

There should be, no, ther HAS TO BE a /c chat like cannel. If commanders can not communicate with each other, it will just be a spam of random missions that dont work well together, quickly making players realize the uselessness of the mission system, causing the entire game to become one giant zerk without any sense of global strategy.

I agree with this entirely. There needs to be an easy means by which commanders can coordinate. There's a few ways they can do this. I think the outfit-level is important. In the early days the first people to CR5 were actually squad leaders. That means they commanded something, and many were outfit leaders or officers. That led to /c being used for outfits, squads, and platoons to coordiante. Later as it became diluted with asshats /c became a toilet.

Two things guarantee that someone 'commanding' gets access to a command chat. Either they make it so all squadleaders (period - anying leading a squad at any moment in time) can communicate freely across the world/continent, and/or they allow outfits to form their own command chat, complete with a permission system. Having all squad leaders talking to each other I think should be continent-wide, while the outfit-formed chats are global. The difference is just one of spam. Most squads aren't going ot care about what happens on another continent, but outfits could very well be doing multi-continent coordination, or request help from a besieged territory. I think they need both to functionally replace and far exceed the effectiveness of /c chat.

the ability to write to everyone, means /comxy, should also stay in, but have some limitations. Counter globalling needs to stop, there should be a chosen one to write to everybody. /comxy can go away without much tears if the mission system is capable of giving players easy and fast directions, while allowing to go very deep into detail to plan complex strategys, including nessesary micro managment.

This I disagree with. If you have the squad-leader level communication at the continent-level, and you have missions to tell everyone what you think they should do then you have achieved everything that a /comall or /comxy will achieve and much more.

[Hamma]

Awesome Idea basti!

Also, I don't think /c was ever broken just /comxy and /comall

[Malorn]

Originally Posted by basti

Just got an idea while writing this post: What about allowing the guy who issued the mission to talk to everyone that accepted it?

This is a great idea. But it does depend on how they do the whole "accept" thing and how missions are rewarded. Players in proximity to a mission objective might also be included. I would expand the idea to "Anyone who accepted the mission explicitly or those who are in proximity to the objective and would be rewarded by it." For example, if I made a mission to capture a base, and a bunch of people went there but didn't 'accept' the mission, I'd be able to talk to those people too since they are implicitly on the mission and would benefit from its completion.

In addition, give those who are leaders and deep enough into the skill tree the ability to talk with each other

I disagree with this, becuase that creates the same 'command creep' that we had in PS1 where more and more people join the chat because more and more people train the certs.

Instead as I stated in a previous post I believe the best solution is to allow all squad leaders to chat with each other at any time (regardless of how much cert training they have in command). In that way you don't get creep and anyone you are talking to is at least somewhat in charge of people and can be of value.

I would also propose that only squad leaders of a certain size get included, namely something like size 3. 2-man squads aren't much different from 1-man squads. But 3 is when you start to have meaningful teamwork and coordination (that's a subjective statement, so I don't feel too strongly about it, just an thought).

You could however differentiate between a squad leader and a platoon leader in the chat so those reading it know the difference between a guy with maybe 2 other people following him vs a guy that could have up to 30 and probably has about ~15 on average.

[Vancha]

I seem to remember Matt saying every cert in the game is conceivably trainable with enough time, which is very disappointing in regards to the leadship (because as time goes on, you inevitably end up with too many commanders).

Basti's idea sounds great, but I have the same problem with it as I have with removing global/continental chat: explanation.

It's not something I often saw CR5s doing, but often I think you could get the zerg to cooperate by actually explaining why you wanted them to do what you were asking them to do. It's all very well telling them to attack a base other than the one closest to them, but if they don't understand that taking that closest base would put them in the middle of a three-way, they probably won't follow the order.

Global/continent chat allows you to explain your orders, and similarly only being able to talk to people who've accepted your mission means those people have to have understood the purpose of that mission in the first place. People aren't likely to accept a mission to go and attack some Auraxian deposit miles away if they don't understand the impact it would have in the current battle. So long as you could attach a "description" or "details" section to the mission that people could read before they accepted it, I think I like Basti's idea a lot.

[Malorn]

Originally Posted by Vancha

I seem to remember Matt saying every cert in the game is conceivably trainable with enough time, which is very disappointing in regards to the leadship (because as time goes on, you inevitably end up with too many commanders).

Just because you learn a cert and qualify to command doesn't mean that you do. It might be tied to a specific role, or have other qualifications - such as actually leading a squad. Some abilities might be bound to how many members are in the squad. Or all of the above. There are many ways to limit commanders and the framework they have thus far mentioned does not exclude any of these.

[Grimster]

I hope and believe that in Planetside 2 there won't be a way for commanders to send chat messages to everyone on their faction. A command chat is something I do hope we see so that commanders can communicate with eachother but from what the developers talked about so far the mission system seems like a far more appropiate way for the commanders to communicate with the troops, by providing direction and targets in battle.

[Vancha]

Originally Posted by Malorn

Just because you learn a cert and qualify to command doesn't mean that you do. It might be tied to a specific role, or have other qualifications - such as actually leading a squad. Some abilities might be bound to how many members are in the squad. Or all of the above. There are many ways to limit commanders and the framework they have thus far mentioned does not exclude any of these.

Hopefully.

[Bruttal]

the spam is an easy thing to fix, you could have a UI box and when someone is in CR5 CHAT spaming you type there name into the box click mute. at this point if 4 or more cr5's do the same thing the guy will be muted from global chat for 2hours. Nice little msg to popup on there screen. "Command has revoked your Global chat coms"