An ORIGINAL Planetside 2

[Furret]

trying to take the best of both worlds here.

What if the vote feature would only be used to remove someone from office.

The EXP whore gets into CR 10, but if he does a shitty job, he's able to be voted out (to CR 5 honors)

[Kumoblade]

I do believe there should be only so many Commanders barking orders on the field. At Maximum 5. I like the idea of fighting to maintain your position, and adding voting to get jerks out of office and promoting next in line to his spot is a pretty damn good idea.

Only problem I could see is if you have assholes down-voting officers they don't like. However, that happens everywhere you go even in the real world. People will kick a lot of people to try to get above them.

However, you can only restrict assholes so much before they decide to take their business elsewhere.

[Gortha]

I really would love to play THIS Planetside the OP is talking about.

Very good thoughts.

Regards
Gortha

[Sifer2]

It's true the command structure should be better in the sequel so that some especially good leaders can rise to the top through a combination of ingame accomplishment an politics. So that the people in charge know what they are doing an can lead the faction much better.

Something like successfully completely missions an taking structures as a squad leader puts you in the running an then other players can vote you up if they think your good. You would have to keep actively playing too to stay eligible.

[DviddLeff]

The key thing that was wrong about PS command structure was that the most experienced commanders (CR5s) had no reason to carry on commanding, it was even a waste of points for them to carry on doing so.

Sure not all CR5s were decent commanders, but at the very least they had put in the time leading squads.

[Furret]

and all they would do was flame each other on global chat and draw penises on our maps =D
but that was always fun

[Sifer2]

Yeah that's cause they just made it a grind for points. An grinders are the last people you want leading you lol.

I would like to see maybe no more than 20 CR5's per faction. With each one of them having got there because everyone respects them an knows they are good at leading people to win. An of course they have to keep playing regularly to keep the rank so its not something you just earn for the hell of it but more you get there cause you want the job.

[DviddLeff]

http://sites.google.com/site/planets...mmand-overhaul

Reduce the number of CR5s by putting them in an actual command structure, only allow them to use their command tools if they are leading a squad/platoon/company and have invested certification points into commanding.

[Vancha]

^
Few things come to mind...

- The people who are most proficient at commanding their empire are restricted to 2 hours a day?

- How are planet commanders decided? Merging 3 companies?

- There's a difference between people who are best at leading and people who want to lead. Won't making command abilities cost cert points cause those who are best at leading on a worldwide/galactic scale but prefer other roles cause them to stop leading entirely?

[DviddLeff]

I suggested the restriction of two hours so that Galaxy Commanders cant hog the role, but as there is a voting system to get rid of them then the restriction would not need to be in place so I have removed it

Good question regarding deciding planet commanders (same goes for deciding base and galaxy commanders for that matter). Perhaps allow the relevant commander to put themselves forward for the position but then any other eligible commanders in the base SOI/continent/world the chance to put themselves up as well, then its voted on?

Regarding command taking cert points; I do think this is the best way as commanders have a lot of very useful tools which they get for free anyway; and many more with my proposals. As it stands you get even more people leading that don't want to, as otherwise its simply a waste of CEP and everyone wants to unlock the OS anyway.

[Vancha]

Who would vote, and what would be their motivation? I can't help but think you'd end up with zergfits abusing the system by sheer force of numbers.

Regarding certs, I agree as far as PS, and have no idea with PSN. Hopefully they'll keep both certs *and* the command system in the sequel, but being a new game means they could take them in an entirely different direction.

[DviddLeff]

Id probably have all the squad leaders voting, but the major flaw in the system seems to be that you could get even a small outfit making lots of 2 man squads and skewing the system; but I don't see how to counter this apart from weighting the votes depending on how big the squad/platoon/company is.

In my eyes the cert system is one thing they must keep the same in PSN. The command system works fine as is... for the first 6 months at which point the experienced commanders retire and just pad their kill count with OS strikes and bicker in global chat.

[Vancha]

I certainly hope certs stay practically the same as in PS. Changing to a class system would be unforgivable. Though assuming certs for the sequel, they could still be changed slightly...either in their value or what the choices consist of.

The command system works fine as is... for the first 6 months at which point the experienced commanders retire and just pad their kill count with OS strikes and bicker in global chat.

So we have two problems. Encouraging people to keep commanding and discouraging people from gaining CEP for the wrong reasons.

The second one's easy...change orbital strikes.

- You could remove all personal gain. Give credit to an "Orbital station" and stop them adding to kill count, merit requirements and BEP.

- You could have a CR5 start a vote on using it on a certain base, and if 50% of the CR5s online agree it kills all friendly and enemy troops at a selected base and turns the base neutral (I'm thinking 12-24 hour cooldown for the entire empire).

- Or you could remove them entirely.


The main problem is encouraging people to lead after they reach CR5. I'm thinking there needs to be some kind of CEP decay, so the only way to stay CR5 is to keep commanding. How quickly it would decay, whether it decayed when you were offline, how fast it decayed while you were offline and whether certain actions could accelerate or decelerate the decay would all need to be figured out, of course.

If you consider planetary and galactic commanders to be "macro commanders" and squad/platoon/company leaders to be "micro commanders", this raises a new problem...How does a macro commander continue gaining CEP without resorting to micro command? A macro commander doesn't necessarily want to be leading squads, platoons and companies when they're busy leading the entire empire.

Something similar to your missions system would probably solve this, though there are countless ideas that could be dreamt up I think. I always found the best commanders could tell what would happen before it happened, though I'm not sure how you could implement a system to reward that. You could also reward micro commanders CEP for providing recon to the macro commanders, and reward macro commanders CEP for contributing recon via camera drones and scout video feeds (though I have no idea how CEP-worthy recon would be decided - votes would be too abusable). Presumably the drivers of said scout vehicles would receive BEP/merits for their service.
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Having said ALL That, I never felt that micro commanding and macro commanding had much in common. Perhaps it would be an idea to provide separate ranks and rewards for micro commanding and macro commanding, as well as a way to become a macro commander without micro commanding (a way to get CR5 without leading squads/platoons/companies). Though obviously going down this route of thought throws up a fresh new batch of problems and possibilities.

[DviddLeff]

CEP decay is an idea I've toyed with in the past but overall I dislike it as however yo do it it will have more of a negative affect on casual players than those with more time on their hands (who play more and have less downtime for CEP to decay during).

By getting a commander to invest both time leading squads and cert points towards commanding makes them really decide which role they wish to play as.

Regarding the OS I wish the thing was never implemented, or at least increase the timer so that only a certain number can be deployed in a combat zone every so often. As it is its only really used to target AMS's, and driving them to the front line is one of the most frustrating tasks in the game.

Macro commanders would gain CEP as a percentage of their company or platoons successes, it filtering through to them.

You mention that the best commanders could predict what would happen in the field, and this is totally true. However it is very hard to reward such forethought as typically these commanders would finish fights quickly and with minimal risk; thereby reducing the XP available to the troops and themselves.

Keeping commanders commanding is a big issue, and one way to do this could be to reward success with medals (essentially just the merit system) but rewarding commanders for x amount of base captures or defences or so long commanding a company, platoon or squad. You could even give out medals for earning more and more CEP past CR5 (a bit like martial artists getting different degrees of their black belts).

[Vancha]

Originally Posted by DviddLeff

have less downtime for CEP to decay during).

During...what?

It sounds like you're assuming the decay happens while they're offline. If it only decayed while they were online, I don't see why it'd be any worse for casual players.

Cert cost - while your ideas are good for discouraging people who want CEP for the wrong reasons, it also pushes away those who may be good at leading but prefer to spend certs on non-command roles. I'm not against your idea if it's the only possibility available, but I think if we can find an alternative way to stop people gaining CEP for OS/chat channels, that'd be preferable.

The OS problem gets solves by removing it or drastically altering it like we've said.

Whether or not global/continent chat should stay and how it would work is something else entirely...and depends on how macro commanding will work in the sequel. Any thoughts on this?

Originally Posted by DviddLeff

Macro commanders would gain CEP as a percentage of their company or platoons successes, it filtering through to them.

You mean any platoons or companies that take a base on a continent would give CEP to macro commanders (CR5s) on that cont as well? You dismissed CEP decay earlier, so what purpose would this serve?


Rewarding forethought - I agree entirely this would be hard to reward, but you say commanders would try to end fights quickly and cleanly like it's a bad thing. Granted, in Planetside it was, but that was due to fault with the game. Hopefully the flow of battle and the design of bases in the sequel will mean that a decent resistance by the enemy makes a good fight inevitable. Though once again, our inability to know what bases will be like, how they'll be captured, how they'll be built and how we'll be rewarded for capturing them makes this a pointless avenue of conversation I suppose.


Merits - This would definitely hook some people into commanding; good idea!


The more I think and talk about this, the more I think commanding squads/platoons and commanding
globally (galactically?)/continentally should be two separate avenues with their own rewards. That way you could encourage people to lead squads and platoons for the sake of leading squads and platoons, rather than simply being a stepping stone to CR5.